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Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy, stories by Frank R Stockton |
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Hans, The Herb-Gatherer |
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Many years ago, when people had not quite so much sense as they have now, there was a poor widow woman who was sick. I do not know what was the matter with her, but she had been confined to her bed for a long time. She had no doctor, for in those days many of the poor people, besides having but little money, had little faith in a regular physician. They would rather depend upon wonderful herbs and simples, which were reported to have a sort of magical power, and they often used to resort to charms and secret incantations when they wished to be cured of disease. This widow, whose name was Dame Martha, was a sensible woman, in the main, but she knew very little about sickness, and believed that she ought to do pretty much as her neighbors told her. And so she followed their advice, and got no better. There was an old man in the neighborhood named Hans, who made it a regular business to gather herbs and roots for moral and medical purposes. He was very particular as to time and place when he went out to collect his remedies, and some things he would not touch unless he found them growing in the corner of a churchyard--or perhaps under a gallows--and other plants he never gathered unless the moon was in its first quarter, and there was a yellow streak in the northwest, about a half-hour after sunset. He had some herbs which he said were good for chills and fever; others which made children obedient; others which caused an old man's gray hair to turn black and his teeth to grow again--if he only took it long enough; and he had, besides, remedies which would cure chickens that had the pip, horses that kicked, old women with the rheumatism, dogs that howled at the moon, boys who played truant, and cats that stole milk. Now, to our enlightened minds it is very evident that this Hans was nothing more than an old simpleton; but it is very doubtful if he thought so himself, and it is certain that his neighbors did not. They resorted to him on all occasions when things went wrong with them, whether it was the butter that would not come in their churns, or their little babies who had fevers. Therefore, you may be sure that Dame Martha sent for Hans as soon as she was taken ill, and for about a year or so she had been using his herbs, making plasters of his roots, putting little shells that he brought under her pillow, and powwowing three times a day over bunches of dried weeds ornamented with feathers from the tails of yellow hens that had died of old age. But all that Hans, could do for her was of no manner of use. In vain he went out at night with his lantern, and gathered leaves and roots in the most particular way. Whether the moon was full or on the wane; whether the tail of the Great Dipper was above the steeple of the old church, or whether it had not yet risen as high as the roof; whether the bats flew to the east or the west when he first saw them; or whether the Jack o'lanterns sailed near the ground (when they were carried by a little Jack), or whether they were high (when a tall Jack bore them), it made no difference. His herbs were powerless, and Dame Martha did not get well. About half a mile from the widow's cottage there lived a young girl named Patsey Moore. She was the daughter of the village Squire, and a prettier girl or a better one than Patsey is not often met with. When she heard of Dame Martha's illness she sometimes used to stop at the cottage on her way to school, and leave with her some nice little thing that a sick person might like to eat. One day in spring, when the fields were full of blossoms and the air full of sunshine and delicious odors, Patsey stopped on her way from school to gather a bunch of wild-flowers. They grew so thickly and there were so many different kinds, that she soon had a bouquet that was quite fit for a parlor. On her way home she stopped at Dame Martha's cottage. "I am sorry, Dame Martha," said she, "that I have nothing nice for you to-day, but I thought perhaps you would like to have some flowers, as it's Spring-time and you can't go out." "Indeed, Miss Patsey," said the sick woman, "you could'nt have brought me anything that would do my heart more good. It's like hearing the birds sing and sittin' under the hedges in the blossoms, to hear you talk and to see them flowers." Patsey was very much pleased, of course, at this, and after that she brought Dame Martha a bouquet every day. And soon the good woman looked for Patsey and her beautiful flowers as longingly and eagerly as she looked for the rising of the sun. Old Hans very seldom came to see her now, and she took no more of his medicines. It was of no use, and she had paid him every penny that she had to spare, besides a great many other things in the way of little odds and ends that lay about the house. But when Patsey stopped in, one afternoon, a month or two after she had brought the first bunch of flowers, she said to the widow: "Dame Martha, I believe you are a great deal better." "Better!" said the good woman, "I'll tell you what it is, Miss Patsey, I've been a thinking over the matter a deal for the last week, and I've been a-trying my appetite, and a-trying my eyes, and a-trying how I could walk about, and work, and sew, and I just tell you what it is, Miss Patsey, I'm well!" And so it was. The widow was well, and nobody could see any reason for it, except good Dame Martha herself. She always persisted that it was those beautiful bunches of flowers that Patsey had brought her every day. "Oh, Miss Patsey!" she said, "If you'd been a-coming to me with them violets and buttercups, instead of old Hans with his nasty bitter yarbs, I'd a been off that bed many a day ago. There was nothing but darkness, and the shadows of tomb-stones, and the damp smells of the lonely bogs about his roots and his leaves. But there was the heavenly sunshine in your flowers, Miss Patsey, and I could smell the sweet fields, when I looked at them, and hear the hum of the bees!" It may be that Dame Martha gave a little too much credit to Patsey's flowers, but I am not at all sure about it. Certain it is, that the daily visits of a bright young girl, with her heart full of kindness and sympathy, and her hands full of flowers from the fragrant fields, would be far more welcome and of far more advantage to many sick chambers than all the old herb-gatherers in the world, with their bitter, grave-yard roots, and their rank, evil-smelling plants that grow down in the swamps among the frogs and snakes. Perhaps you know some sick person. Try Patsey's treatment. |
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