Page - 138 - in The Forest Farm - Tales of the Austrian Tyrol

God has made this world!” At last, when his time was up, Heidepeter was set free. He hurried to his home, and found his wife and child both doing well. The very next day he went into his workshop and planed and carved a stag out of some boards. And this he nailed to the weather-stained grey wooden wall of his house in everlasting remembrance. The dwellers of the Wilderness had by now come to respect the determined Heidepeter, because he had been brave enough to tackle the old devil—as they called the Count under their breath; they had never expected this of the good-natured man. It was, however, the first and last time it happened: Peter saw there was nothing to be gained that way, and the burden of years and oppression took the heart out of him. He came to the conclusion this world is a valley of sorrow, and who can better it? The reasonablest thing is to endure. He no longer opposed himself to the Count; indeed, he used to say it was better to suffer wrong than do wrong. And he went on in his own quiet way, and the people, because of his gentle, submissive bearing, called him a milksop.[19] Footnotes: [17] This is a chapter out of Rosegger’s Heidepeter’s Gabriel: a book which is largely autobiographical —Heidepeter being undoubtedly the author’s father—and which gives a picture of the small peasant community in a poor mountain district called, from its bare and lonely character, the Wilderness. [18] Heide-Peter means literally Moor-Peter, or Peter of the Moor. [19] Dalkerd: a South German word, evidently meaning milksop.