Whilst the noble Don Esclevador and
his little band of venturesome followers explored
the neighboring fastnesses in quest for gold, the
Father Miguel tarried at the shrine which in sweet
piety they had hewn out of the stubborn rock in that
strangely desolate spot. Here, upon that serene
August morning, the holy Father held communion with
the saints, beseeching them, in all humility, to intercede
with our beloved Mother for the safe guidance of the
fugitive Cortes to his native shores, and for the
divine protection of the little host, which, separated
from the Spanish army, had wandered leagues to the
northward, and had sought refuge in the noble mountains
of an unknown land. The Father’s devotions
were, upon a sudden, interrupted by the approach of
an aged man who toiled along the mountain-side path,-a
man so aged and so bowed and so feeble that he seemed
to have been brought down into that place, by means
of some necromantic art, out of distant centuries.
His face was yellow and wrinkled like ancient parchment,
and a beard whiter than Samite streamed upon his breast,
whilst about his withered body and shrunken legs hung
faded raiment which the elements had corroded and
the thorns had grievously rent. And as he toiled
along, the aged man continually groaned, and continually
wrung his palsied hands, as if a sorrow, no lighter
than his years, afflicted him.
“In whose name comest thou?”
demanded the Father Miguel, advancing a space toward
the stranger, but not in threatening wise; whereat
the aged man stopped in his course and lifted his
eyebrows, and regarded the Father a goodly time, but
he spake no word.
“In whose name comest thou?”
repeated the priestly man. “Upon these
mountains have we lifted up the cross of our blessed
Lord in the name of our sovereign liege, and here
have we set down a tabernacle to the glory of the
Virgin and of her ever-blessed son, our Redeemer and
thine,-whoso thou mayest be!”
“Who is thy king I know not,”
quoth the aged man, feebly; “but the shrine
in yonder wall of rock I know; and by that symbol which
I see therein, and by thy faith for which it stands,
I conjure thee, as thou lovest both, give me somewhat
to eat and to drink, that betimes I may go upon my
way again, for the journey before me is a long one.”
These words spake the old man in tones
of such exceeding sadness that the Father Miguel,
touched by compassion, hastened to meet the wayfarer,
and, with his arms about him, and with whisperings
of sweet comfort, to conduct him to a resting-place.
Coarse food in goodly plenty was at hand; and it
happily fortuned, too, that there was a homely wine,
made by Pietro del y Saguache himself, of
the wild grapes in which a neighboring valley abounded.
Of these things anon the old man partook, greedily
but silently, and all that while he rolled his eyes
upon the shrine; and then at last, struggling to his
feet, he made as if to go upon his way.
“Nay,” interposed the
Father Miguel, kindly; “abide with us a season.
Thou art an old man and sorely spent. Such as
we have thou shalt have, and if thy soul be distressed,
we shall pour upon it the healing balm of our blessed
faith.”
“Little knowest thou whereof
thou speakest,” quoth the old man, sadly.
“There is no balm can avail me. I prithee
let me go hence, ere, knowing what manner of man I
am, thou hatest me and doest evil unto me.”
But as he said these words he fell back again even
then into the seat where he had sat, and, as through
fatigue, his hoary head dropped upon his bosom.
“Thou art ill!” cried
the Father Miguel, hastening to his side. “Thou
shalt go no farther this day! Give me thy staff,”-and
he plucked it from him.
Then said the old man: “As
I am now, so have I been these many hundred years.
Thou hast heard tell of me,-canst thou
not guess my name; canst thou not read my sorrow in
my face and in my bosom? As thou art good and
holy through thy faith in that symbol in yonder shrine,
hearken to me, for I will tell thee of the wretch whom
thou hast succored. Then, if it be thy will,
give me thy curse and send me on my way.”
Much marvelled the Father Miguel at
these words, and he deemed the old man to be mad;
but he made no answer. And presently the old
man, bowing his head upon his hands, had to say in
this wise:-
“Upon a time,” he quoth,
“I abided in the city of the Great King,-there
was I born and there I abided. I was of good
stature, and I asked favor of none. I was an
artisan, and many came to my shop, and my cunning
was sought of many,-for I was exceeding
crafty in my trade; and so, therefore, speedily my
pride begot an insolence that had respect to none
at all. And once I heard a tumult in the street,
as of the cries of men and boys commingled, and the
clashing of arms and staves. Seeking to know
the cause thereof, I saw that one was being driven
to execution,-one that had said he was the
Son of God and the King of the Jews, for which blasphemy
and crime against our people he was to die upon the
cross. Overcome by the weight of this cross,
which he bore upon his shoulders, the victim tottered
in the street and swayed this way and that, as though
each moment he were like to fall, and he groaned in
sore agony. Meanwhile about him pressed a multitude
that with vast clamor railed at him and scoffed him
and smote him, to whom he paid no heed; but in his
agony his eyes were alway uplifted to heaven, and
his lips moved in prayer for them that so shamefully
entreated him. And as he went his way to Calvary,
it fortuned that he fell and lay beneath the cross
right at my very door, whereupon, turning his eyes
upon me as I stood over against him, he begged me that
for a little moment I should bear up the weight of
the cross whilst that he wiped the sweat from off
his brow. But I was filled with hatred, and
I spurned him with my foot, and I said to him:
’Move on, thou wretched criminal, move on.
Pollute not my doorway with thy touch,-move
on to death, I command thee!’ This was the answer
I gave to him, but no succor at all. Then he
spake to me once again, and he said: ’Thou,
too, shalt move on, O Jew! Thou shalt move on
forever, but not to death!’ And with these
words he bore up the cross again and went upon his
way to Calvary.
“Then of a sudden,” quoth
the old man, “a horror filled my breast, and
a resistless terror possessed me. So was I accursed
forevermore. A voice kept saying always to me:
‘Move on, O Jew! move on forever!’ From
home, from kin, from country, from all I knew and loved
I fled; nowhere could I tarry,-the nameless
horror burned in my bosom, and I heard continually
a voice crying unto me: ’Move on, O Jew!
move on forever!’ So, with the years, the centuries,
the ages, I have fled before that cry and in that
nameless horror; empires have risen and crumbled,
races have been born and are extinct, mountains have
been cast up and time hath levelled them,-still
I do live and still I wander hither and thither upon
the face of the earth, and am an accursed thing.
The gift of tongues is mine,-all men I
know, yet mankind knows me not. Death meets
me face to face, and passes me by; the sea devours
all other prey, but will not hide me in its depths;
wild beasts flee from me, and pestilences turn their
consuming breaths elsewhere. On and on and on
I go,-not to a home, nor to my people,
nor to my grave, but evermore into the tortures of
an eternity of sorrow. And evermore I feel the
nameless horror burn within, whilst evermore I see
the pleading eyes of him that bore the cross, and
evermore I hear his voice crying: ’Move
on, O Jew! move on forevermore!’”
“Thou art the Wandering Jew!” cried the
Father Miguel.
“I am he,” saith the aged
man. “I marvel not that thou dost revolt
against me, for thou standest in the shadow of that
same cross which I have spurned, and thou art illumined
with the love of him that went his way to Calvary.
But I beseech thee bear with me until I have told
thee all,-then drive me hence if thou art
so minded.”
“Speak on,” quoth the Father Miguel.
Then said the Jew: “How
came I here I scarcely know; the seasons are one to
me, and one day but as another; for the span of my
life, O priestly man! is eternity. This much
know you: from a far country I embarked upon
a ship,-I knew not whence ’t was bound,
nor cared I. I obeyed the voice that bade me go.
Anon a mighty tempest fell upon the ship and overwhelmed
it. The cruel sea brought peace to all but me;
a many days it tossed and buffeted me, then with a
cry of exultation cast me at last upon a shore I had
not seen before, a coast far, far westward whereon
abides no human thing. But in that solitude still
heard I from within the awful mandate that sent me
journeying onward, ‘Move on, O Jew! move on;’
and into vast forests I plunged, and mighty plains
I traversed; onward, onward, onward I went, with the
nameless horror in my bosom, and-that cry,
that awful cry! The rains beat upon me; the
sun wrought pitilessly with me; the thickets tore my
flesh; and the inhospitable shores bruised my weary
feet,-yet onward I went, plucking what
food I might from thorny bushes to stay my hunger,
and allaying my feverish thirst at pools where reptiles
crawled. Sometimes a monster beast stood in
my pathway and threatened to devour me; then would
I spread my two arms thus, and welcome death, crying:
’Rend thou this Jew in twain, O beast! strike
thy kindly fangs deep into this heart,-be
not afeard, for I shall make no battle with thee, nor
any outcry whatsoever!’ But, lo, the beast
would cower before me and skulk away. So there
is no death for me; the judgment spoken is irrevocable;
my sin is unpardonable, and the voice will not be hushed!”
Thus and so much spake the Jew, bowing
his hoary head upon his hands. Then was the Father
Miguel vastly troubled; yet he recoiled not from the
Jew,-nay, he took the old man by the hand
and sought to soothe him.
“Thy sin was most heinous, O
Jew!” quoth the Father; “but it falleth
in our blessed faith to know that whoso repenteth
of his sin, what it soever may be, the same shall
surely be forgiven. Thy punishment hath already
been severe, and God is merciful, for even as we are
all his children, even so his tenderness to us is
like unto the tenderness of a father unto his child-yea,
and infinitely tenderer and sweeter, for who
can estimate the love of our heavenly Father?
Thou didst deny thy succor to the Nazarene when he
besought it, yet so great compassion hath he that
if thou but callest upon him he will forget thy wrong,-leastwise
will pardon it. Therefore be thou persuaded by
me, and tarry here this night, that in the presence
of yonder symbol and the holy relics our prayers may
go up with thine unto our blessed Mother and to the
saints who haply shall intercede for thee in Paradise.
Rest here, O sufferer,-rest thou here,
and we shall presently give thee great comfort.”
The Jew, well-nigh fainting with fatigue, being persuaded
by the holy Father’s gentle words, gave finally
his consent unto this thing, and went anon unto the
cave beyond the shrine, and entered thereinto, and
lay upon a bed of skins and furs, and made as if to
sleep. And when he slept his sleep was seemingly
disturbed by visions, and he tossed as doth an one
that sees full evil things, and in that sleep he muttered
somewhat of a voice he seemed to hear, though round
about there was no sound whatsoever, save only the
soft music of the pine-trees on the mountain-side.
Meanwhile in the shrine, hewn out of those rocks,
did the Father Miguel bow before the sacred symbol
of his faith and plead for mercy for that same Jew
that slumbered anear. And when, as the deepening
blue mantle of night fell upon the hilltops and obscured
the valleys round about, Don Esclevador and his sturdy
men came clamoring along the mountain-side, the holy
Father met them a way off and bade them have regard
to the aged man that slept in yonder cave. But
when he told them of that Jew and of his misery and
of the secret causes thereof, out spake the noble
Don Esclevador, full hotly,-
“By our sweet Christ,”
he cried, “shall we not offend our blessed faith
and do most impiously in the Virgin’s sight if
we give this harbor and this succor unto so vile a
sinner as this Jew that hath denied our dear Lord!”
Which words had like to wrought great
evil with the Jew, for instantly the other men sprang
forward as if to awaken the Jew and drive him forth
into the night. But the Father Miguel stretched
forth his hands and commanded them to do no evil unto
the Jew, and so persuasively did he set forth the
godliness and the sweetness of compassion that presently
the whole company was moved with a gentle pity toward
that Jew. Therefore it befell anon, when night
came down from the skies and after they had feasted
upon their homely food as was their wont, that they
talked of the Jew, and thinking of their own hardships
and misfortunes (whereof it is not now to speak),
they had all the more compassion to that Jew, which
spake them passing fair, I ween.
Now all this while lay the Jew upon
the bed of skins and furs within the cave, and though
he slept (for he was exceeding weary), he tossed continually
from side to side, and spoke things in his sleep, as
if his heart were sorely troubled, and as if in his
dreams he beheld grievous things. And seeing
the old man, and hearing his broken speech, the others
moved softly hither and thither and made no noise soever
lest they should awaken him. And many an one-yes,
all that valiant company bowed down that night before
the symbol in the shrine, and with sweet reverence
called upon our blessed Virgin to plead in the cause
of that wretched Jew. Then sleep came to all,
and in dreams the noble Don Esclevador saw his sovereign
liege, and kneeled before his throne, and heard his
sovereign liege’s gracious voice; in dreams the
heartweary soldier sailed the blue waters of the Spanish
main, and pressed his native shore, and beheld once
again the lovelight in the dark eyes of her that awaited
him; in dreams the mountain-pines were kissed of the
singing winds, and murmured drowsily and tossed their
arms as do little children that dream of their play;
in dreams the Jew swayed hither and thither, scourged
by that nameless horror in his bosom, and seeing the
pleading eyes of our dying Master, and hearing that
awful mandate: “Move on, O Jew! move on
forever!” So each slept and dreamed his dreams,-all
slept but the Father Miguel, who alone throughout the
night kneeled in the shrine and called unto the saints
and unto our Mother Mary in prayer. And his
supplication was for that Jew; and the mists fell
upon that place and compassed it about, and it was
as if the heavens had reached down their lips to kiss
the holy shrine. And suddenly there came unto
the Jew a quiet as of death, so that he tossed no
more in his sleep and spake no word, but lay exceeding
still, smiling in his sleep as one who sees his home
in dreams, or his mother, or some other such beloved
thing.
It came to pass that early in the
morning the Jew came from the cavern to go upon his
way, and the Father Miguel besought him to take with
him a goodly loaf in his wallet as wise provision
against hunger. But the Jew denied this, and
then he said: “Last night while I slept
methought I stood once more in the city of the Great
King,-ay, in that very doorway where I
stood, swart and lusty, when I spurned him that went
his way to Calvary. In my bosom burned the terror
as of old, and my soul was consumed of a mighty anguish.
None of those that passed in that street knew me;
centuries had ground to dust all my kin. ‘O
God!’ I cried in agony, ’suffer my sin
to be forgotten,-suffer me to sleep, to
sleep forever beneath the burden of the cross I sometime
spurned!’ As I spake these words there stood
before me one in shining raiment, and lo! ’t
was he who bore the cross to Calvary! His eyes
that had pleaded to me on a time now fell compassionately
upon me, and the voice that had commanded me move
on forever, now broke full sweetly on my ears:
’Thou shalt go on no more, O Jew, but as thou
hast asked, so shall it be, and thou shalt sleep forever
beneath the cross.’ Then fell I into a
deep slumber, and, therefrom but just now awaking,
I feel within me what peace bespeaketh pardon for
my sin. This day am I ransomed; so suffer me
to go my way, O holy man.”
So went the Jew upon his way, not
groaningly and in toilsome wise, as was his wont,
but eagerly, as goeth one to meet his bride, or unto
some sweet reward. And the Father Miguel stood
long, looking after him and being sorely troubled
in mind; for he knew not what interpretation he should
make of all these things. And anon the Jew was
lost to sight in the forest.
But once, a little space thereafter,
while that Jose Conejos, the Castilian, clambered
up the yonder mountain-side, he saw amid the grasses
there the dead and withered body of an aged man, and
thereupon forthwith made he such clamor that Don Esclevador
hastened thither and saw it was the Jew; and since
there was no sign that wild beasts had wrought evil
with him, it was declared that the Jew had died of
age and fatigue and sorrow, albeit on the wrinkled
face there was a smile of peace that none had seen
thereon while yet the Jew lived. And it was
accounted to be a most wondrous thing that, whereas
never before had flowers of that kind been seen in
those mountains, there now bloomed all round about
flowers of the dye of blood, which thing the noble
Don Esclevador took full wisely to be a symbol of
our dear Lord’s most precious blood, whereby
not only you and I but even the Jew shall be redeemed
to Paradise.
Within the spot where they had found
the Jew they buried him, and there he sleeps unto
this very day. Above the grave the Father Miguel
said a prayer; and the ground of that mountain they
adjudged to be holy ground; but over the grave wherein
lay the Jew they set up neither cross nor symbol of
any kind, fearing to offend their holy faith.
But that very night, when that they
were returned unto their camp half a league distant,
there arose a mighty tempest, and there was such an
upheaval and rending of the earth as only God’s
hand could make; and there was a crashing and a groaning
as if the world were smitten in twain, and the winds
fled through the valleys in dismay, and the trees
of the forest shrieked in terror and fell upon their
faces. Then in the morning when the tempest
ceased and all the sky was calm and radiant they saw
that an impassable chasm lay between them and that
mountain-side wherein the Jew slept the sleep of death;
that God had traced with his finger a mighty gulf
about that holy ground which held the bones of the
transgressor. Between heaven and earth hung that
lonely grave, nor could any foot scale the precipice
that guarded it; but one might see that the spot was
beautiful with kindly mountain verdure and that flowers
of blood-red dye bloomed in that lonely place.
This was the happening in a summer-time
a many years ago; to the mellow grace of that summer
succeeded the purple glory of the autumn, and then
came on apace the hoary dignity of winter. But
the earth hath its resurrection too, and anon came
the beauteous spring-time with warmth and scents and
new life. The brooks leapt forth once more from
their hiding-places, the verdure awaked, and the trees
put forth their foliage. Then from the awful
mountain peaks the snow silently and slowly slipped
to the valleys, and in divers natural channels went
onward and ever downward to the southern sea, and now
at last ’t was summer-time again and the mellow
grace of August brooded over the earth. But
in that yonder mountain-side had fallen a symbol never
to be removed,-ay, upon that holy ground
where slept the Jew was stretched a cross, a mighty
cross of snow on which the sun never fell and which
no breath of wind ever disturbed. Elsewhere was
the tender warmth of verdure and the sacred passion
of the blood-red flowers, but over that lonely grave
was stretched the symbol of him that went his way
to Calvary, and in that grave slept the Jew.
Mightily marvelled Don Esclevador
and his warrior host at this thing; but the Father
Miguel knew its meaning; for he was minded of that
vision wherein it was foretold unto the Jew that, pardoned
for his sin, he should sleep forever under the burden
of the cross he spurned. All this the Father
Miguel showed unto Don Esclevador and the others, and
he said: “I deem that unto all ages this
holy symbol shall bear witness of our dear Christ’s
mercy and compassion. Though we, O exiled brothers,
sleep in this foreign land in graves which none shall
know, upon that mountain height beyond shall stretch
the eternal witness to our faith and to our Redeemer’s
love, minding all that look thereon, not of the pains
and the punishments of the Jew, but of the exceeding
mercy of our blessed Lord, and of the certain eternal
peace that cometh through his love!”
How long ago these things whereof
I speak befell, I shall not say. They never saw-that
Spanish host-they never saw their native
land, their sovereign liege, their loved ones’
faces again; they sleep, and they are dust among those
mighty mountains in the West. Where is the grave
of the Father Miguel, or of Don Esclevador, or of any
of the valiant Spanish exiles, it is not to tell;
God only knoweth, and the saints: all sleep in
the faith, and their reward is certain. But where
sleepeth the Jew all may see and know; for on that
awful mountain-side, in a spot inaccessible to man,
lieth the holy cross of snow. The winds pass
lightly over that solemn tomb, and never a sunbeam
lingereth there. White and majestic it lies
where God’s hands have placed it, and its mighty
arms stretch forth as in a benediction upon the fleeting
dust beneath.
So shall it bide forever upon that
mountain-side, and the memory of the Jew and of all
else human shall fade away and be forgotten in the
surpassing glory of the love and the compassion of
him that bore the redeeming burden to Calvary.