all bodies of teachers, and so to help us a little nearer to that better day, when the highest ideals of ethical conduct The Nineteenth Century. shall have become the dominant forces in both private and public affairs. J. Hereford. 1. THE TCHELOPECK WOODS.* In the afternoon of the first of June, 1876-the day in which Boteff's band of rebels' was routed at "Voll," in the mountains, near Vratza, and Boteff himself fell pierced by a bullet of the Circassian horde, commanded by the fierce Djambalaz-on the left bank of the river Iskre, opposite the village Lutibrod, were sitting a company of women. They were from Lutibrod, and were waiting for their turn to cross the river by means of the only boat there. The greater part of them knew very little of what was going on just then, and, some of them did not care to know. The constant roving of the Bashi-bazouks for the last two days on the other side of Vratza did not concern them at all, and they continued to attend to their field labor. They were all women, for the men did not care to hazard their lives. Although the theatre of the battles between the insurgents and the Circassians was comparatively far from Lutibrod, the rumor had caused great anxiety there also, having set on the qui vive all the male inhabitants. This very day a few Turkish soldiers had gone into the village in order to lay hands upon suspicious persons; there were also soldiers stationed at one of the banks of the river to inspect the passengers that went and came across Translated from the Bulgarian for The Living Age by D. S. R. 1 Christo Boteff was the leader of the band of insurgents that crossed the Danube in 1876 from the river. At this hour the boat was on the other side and the women waited with patience its return to take them over. At last it came. The boatmana Lutibrod peasant hired by the village -touched with his only oar the bottom of the river in order to fix the boat to the bank, and shouted to the women: "Come on, hurry up!" This very moment two mounted policemen appeared on the road from Vratza, and as soon as they reached the bank they dismounted from their horses and pushed aside the women who were about to jump into the boat. One of these policemen, a stout, elderly Turk, cracked his whip and swore at them. "Back, ye infidel swine! Get away!" The women shrank back, willing to wait again. "Get away from here!" yelled the other policeman, rushing forward to Scourge them with his whip. But they shrieked and ran away. Meanwhile the boatman took hold of the reins and led the horses into the boat. One of the policemen, both of whom followed the horses in, turned angrily toward him and said: "No dog shall you receive in this boat." While to the women he beckoned to depart at once. At the sight of this the poor women, all broken down, started back toward Roumania to Bulgaria at Kouzloudoy, with the purpose of arousing the Bulgarians to a general insurrection against the tyrannical government of the Turks. The policemen looked at her. "What do you want?" asked the stouter one, in the Bulgarian language. She was about fifty years old, tall, bony and lean. In her arms she was carrying a child wrapped up in a torn blanket. "Let me cross over! Please do! God give you health-to you and to your children!" "Is it you, Elietza? Ah! you ghiaour (infidel)!" He recognized her, for she had baked pies for him at Tchelopeck. "Yes, it's I, Hadji Hassan Agha. Please let me cross over for this child's sake." "Whereto are you taking this worm?" "This is my grandson. His mother is dead; he is sick, and I am going to the monastery." "What will you do there?" "I want the priest to read to him for his health," spoke the woman in a beseeching voice, and extremely frightened. Hadji Hassan Agha and his companion took their seats in the boat, while the boatman reached for the oar. "For God's sake, please do me this kindness; think that you, too, have children! I shall pray for you, also!" The Turk meditated, then spoke, scornfully: "Come on, get in, you donkey." The woman jumped quickly into the boat and sat down beside the boatman. The latter turned the boat around and it floated away over the turbid waters of the Iskre, which had lately, from the heavy rains, spread considerably 2 Elietza means wife of Elia-the Bulgarian for Elijah. over the fields. The evening rays of the sun, which was about to hide itself behind the hills, made the river appear like a large silver belt. II. The poor Tchelopeck woman doubled her speed. The sooner she reached the monastery the better, she thought. On her bosom lay, half-dead, her two-yearold grandson-an orphan, who had been taken ill two weeks before. During the last two days the child was sinking very rapidly. Old women's medicines, all kinds of sorceries and the physician even could not help him. The village priest read to him; that also had no effect. Her only hope now was in the Holy Virgin. "The child must be taken to the monastery." That is what all the women of the village told her. When she looked at the child in the afternoon, she became very much alarmed; it looked as if it were dead. "Quick," said she; "may the Holy Virgin give him help!" So, in spite of the bad weather, she started at once for the Tcherepick monastery called "The Holy Virgin." Before crossing the river, while she was hurrying through the woods, down toward the Iskre, a young man peeped from among the oak trees, and then walked toward her. He was dressed in strange tight clothes with laces on the breast and carried a rifle in his hand. His face was pale and languid. "Bread, please! I am dying with hunger!" said he, standing before her. She understood the matter at once. "He must be one of those pursued by the police! Lord God!" whispered Elietza to herself, utterly frightened. She looked into her bag; but she had forgotten to put bread into it. There were only a few dry crusts in its bottom. She handed them to him at once. "Grandma, could I hide in this village?" But how could he hide in Tchelopeck? There is fire there now-he will be delivered to the Turks. And with this uniform on! "No, my son, it is impossible!" Thus she spoke to him as she gazed pitifully at his weary countenance, on which despair revealed itself. She pondered a little, and then said: "Hide yourself, my son, for the present, in this wood, and wait for me around here until to-night. I am afraid you will be seen if you enter the village now. I will bring you some bread and possibly clothes; these won't do. We are Christians." The worn face of the young man gleamed with hope. "I shall wait for you, grandma; go, grandma, I thank you! . . ." And she saw him limp away into the depth of the woods. Her eyes were filled with tears. She hurried down the hill meditating on what she had encountered. "I must do something for this miserable creature! What was he! Maybe God will have mercy on me and grant life to the child. The Holy Virgin only help me reach the monastery. Dear God, protect him; he is a Bulgarian, who has come forth to sacrifice his life and all for the Christian faith." She decided to tell everything to the abbot of the monastery, a kind-hearted old man; also to take some bread and peasant clothes, and start back as soon as possible, without staying over night, so as to meet the wandering refugee in the dark. And now she doubled her speed to save, if God willed it, two lives. III. The night's dark veil was already spreading itself over the Tcherepick monastery. The gorge of the Iskre kept cautious silence under the starry heavens; the river, sad and lonely, was babbling down the valley beside the monastery, losing itself in the creek between the lofty precipices. On the opposite side stood the rocky walls, hollowed here and there with caves, dark and dreary. Firm obelisks, on whose summits the eagles drowsed in their nests, towered far up in the skies. The monastery slept calm and desolate. All of a sudden there was a knock on its gate. The dogs began to bark. Another knock, and still another. The servant went out, followed by a monk, who came out from his cell without having on his robe and mitre. "John, who is knocking?" asked the monk, who stood perplexed by the fence on which black monastery clothes were hanging. The knocking continued. The monk gave a sign to the dogs to stop their barking, and said: "It must be some of those! What shall we do now? I won't let a single soul get in! Besides, the abbot is not here . . . wait, John, ask first!" "Who's there?" inquired the servant, in a loud voice, and then listened for Father Ephtimey, turning toward the servant. John, somewhat encouraged, neared the gate and looked through a crack. As soon as the monk was convinced that it was a woman knocking, and that there was no one else, he bade John unlock the gate. It was opened, and in came the woman. Without the slightest delay it was securely locked again. "What on earth brings you here at this late hour, Elietza," asked the monk, in an angry tone. "The child is sick, dangerously ill. Where is the abbot?" "He is in the city. want of him?" "To read to the child. .. You read." What do you "But what can I do for it at midnight, when it is sick," murmured the monk, still angry. "Yes, it is true that you cannot do anything, but God can." "Go to sleep now, and wait till to morrow. . . .” But the woman besought him urgently. She was stubborn in her persistence. Who knows what may happen before to morrow? The child is very badly off; illness waits not. Only God can help. She was ready to pay the dues. "You are crazy to make us open the gate at midnight, when insurgents are liable to get in. The Turks pursue them, and who will suffer for all that but the monastery!" As he was muttering these words he entered his cell and soon came out with his robe on, but nothing on his head. "Come!" The woman followed him into the chapel, which was entirely dark. He lit the waxlight which he held in his hand, and then taking the prayer-book said: "Bring the sick here!" The woman took the child to the light and uncovered its face. It was as pale as wax. "But it is dead," said the monk. The little eyes, SO deeply sunk, opened, sparkling at the meagre light, as if to refute the words of the monk. The latter muttered, impatiently, the prayers for health, made the cross on the child and closed the book. The woman kissed his hand, leaving in it two piasters (eight cents). "If it is written to live, he shall live. .. Now, go and sleep outside," said the monk, as he started with the little waxlight in his hand to go to his cell. "Wait, Father Ephtimey," . . . said the woman, in a wavering tone. turned round and grumbled. "Anything more?" The woman lowered her voice and spoke: ... He "There is one more thing to disclose to you...we are Christians." . . .The monk became furious. "What have you to communicate, and what about being Christians? Go out, go to sleep; we must not let the light burn; some of those' from the top there may see it, and come down to make us a visit." The monk meant the insurgents, and the woman understood so. There was anxiety on her face and her voice trembled. "Be not afraid, Father Ephtimey, nobody will come. . ." Then, in a still more mysterious manner, and changing her tone to a whisper, she commenced: "As I was coming from the village, there in the woods. . . in our woods" ... Fear and anger were on the face of the monk. He understood that this woman wished to tell him something dangerous, and he cried out: "I don't wish to hear anything, nor to have you tell me anything. What you know, let it stay with you. Or, have you come here to set the monastery on fire?" The woman was about to continue, but at this rude answer her words "Crazy or not, I am going. Work will be waiting for me to morrow at daybreak. Give me some bread and I go... I am hungry . . .' "Bread, as much as you wish. . . . Give it to her, John . . . But the gate shall not be opened again to-night." The woman, however, insisted upon going. The monk was indignant, for indeed it was dangerous to open the gate again. Wicked men might get in. Who knows what might happen? . . . Then it came into his mind that this woman had seen and met "those," and that this very thing might expose the monastery to peril, should the Turks find it out. "No, it is better to get rid of her, we shall be better off without her . . ." As soon as he thought of this he let her go. "Well, go," said he. The woman laid the child by the fence, put in her bag the loaf of bread which John brought to her, took the child again in her arms, and off she went. The door was closed and locked after her. IV. Grandma Elietza set out in the night to reach the spot where the famishing rebel was waiting for her. She had felt extremely embarrassed before the vehement monk, who represented the absent abbot; she dared not, she could not advise with him. Climbing the cliff, which was behind the monastery, she got into the road that crept over The the abyss, between whose granite walls the river continued its course. The stars above revealed to her the shapes of the opposite hills and ridges, solemn in the daytime, wrathful and malignant now. To the troubled soul of Elietza everything appeared ill-omened. When she reached the large elm-tree on the top, she sat down on the cold ground to meditate rather than to rest. lonely summits were slumbering on; grave silence dominated everything around; only the Iskre was heard murmuring away down somewhere in the abyss, in which the domes and the eaves of the monastery concealed themselves, without sending forth a single guiding light. From the right came the barking of the Lutibrod dogs. She rose up, but not to take the road that led directly to the village. She passed on the left side of it, by the banks of the ravine, and ran down through the wheat-fields. She was already on the bank of the river itself. The boat, God be praised! was there. Eleitza entered the cottage of the boatman to wake him. But there was nobody in it. It seems he was afraid to sleep there that night. She wondered what to do, and went to where the boat lay. The Iskre was boisterous. She gazed at the reflection of its dark waves and she shuddered! What was she to do? She would not even think of waiting till the morning, although the cocks had already begun to crow. But what else could she do? Nothing but to try to cross over by herself. She had seen the boatman row .. but that seemed dangerous to her, and yet there was no choice left to her, if she wished to find the young man who was waiting in the woods, almost starved to death and in great trouble and fear. So she laid the child on the sand and stooped down to unfasten the chain of the boat from the large stake, to which it was usually tied. Another disappointment! The chain was not only |