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People said "The Evening Bell is sounding, the sun is setting." For a strange
wondrous tone was heard in the narrow streets of a large town. It was like the
sound of a church-bell: but it was only heard for a moment, for the rolling of
the carriages and the voices of the multitude made too great a noise.
Those persons who were walking outside the town, where the houses were farther
apart, with gardens or little fields between them, could see the evening sky
still better, and heard the sound of the bell much more distinctly. It was as
if the tones came from a church in the still forest; people looked
thitherward, and felt their minds attuned most solemnly.
A long time passed, and people said to each other--"I wonder if there is a
church out in the wood? The bell has a tone that is wondrous sweet; let us
stroll thither, and examine the matter nearer." And the rich people drove out,
and the poor walked, but the way seemed strangely long to them; and when they
came to a clump of willows which grew on the skirts of the forest, they sat
down, and looked up at the long branches, and fancied they were now in the
depth of the green wood. The confectioner of the town came out, and set up his
booth there; and soon after came another confectioner, who hung a bell over
his stand, as a sign or ornament, but it had no clapper, and it was tarred
over to preserve it from the rain. When all the people returned home, they
said it had been very romantic, and that it was quite a different sort of
thing to a pic-nic or tea-party. There were three persons who asserted they
had penetrated to the end of the forest, and that they had always heard the
wonderful sounds of the bell, but it had seemed to them as if it had come from
the town. One wrote a whole poem about it, and said the bell sounded like the
voice of a mother to a good dear child, and that no melody was sweeter than
the tones of the bell. The king of the country was also observant of it, and
vowed that he who could discover whence the sounds proceeded, should have the
title of "Universal Bell-ringer," even if it were not really a bell.
Many persons now went to the wood, for the sake of getting the place, but one
only returned with a sort of explanation; for nobody went far enough, that one
not further than the others. However, he said that the sound proceeded from a
very large owl, in a hollow tree; a sort of learned owl, that continually
knocked its head against the branches. But whether the sound came from
his head or from the hollow tree, that no one could say with certainty. So now
he got the place of "Universal Bellringer," and wrote yearly a short treatise
"On the Owl"; but everybody was just as wise as before.
It was the day of confirmation. The clergyman had spoken so touchingly, the
children who were confirmed had been greatly moved; it was an eventful day for
them; from children they become all at once grown-up-persons; it was as if
their infant souls were now to fly all at once into persons with more
understanding. The sun was shining gloriously; the children that had been
confirmed went out of the town; and from the wood was borne towards them the
sounds of the unknown bell with wonderful distinctness. They all immediately
felt a wish to go thither; all except three. One of them had to go home to try
on a ball-dress; for it was just the dress and the ball which had caused her
to be confirmed this time, for otherwise she would not have come; the other
was a poor boy, who had borrowed his coat and boots to be confirmed in from
the innkeeper's son, and he was to give them back by a certain hour; the third
said that he never went to a strange place if his parents were not with
him--that he had always been a good boy hitherto, and would still be so now
that he was confirmed, and that one ought not to laugh at him for it: the
others, however, did make fun of him, after all.
There were three, therefore, that did not go; the others hastened on. The sun
shone, the birds sang, and the children sang too, and each held the other by
the hand; for as yet they had none of them any high office, and were all of
equal rank in the eye of God.
But two of the youngest soon grew tired, and both returned to town; two little
girls sat down, and twined garlands, so they did not go either; and when the
others reached the willow-tree, where the confectioner was, they said, "Now we
are there! In reality the bell does not exist; it is only a fancy that people
have taken into their heads!"
At the same moment the bell sounded deep in the wood, so clear and solemnly
that five or six determined to penetrate somewhat further. It was so thick,
and the foliage so dense, that it was quite fatiguing to proceed. Woodroof and
anemonies grew almost too high; blooming convolvuluses and blackberry-bushes
hung in long garlands from tree to tree, where the nightingale sang and the
sunbeams were playing: it was very beautiful, but it was no place for girls to
go; their clothes would get so torn. Large blocks of stone lay there,
overgrown with moss of every color; the fresh spring bubbled forth, and made a
strange gurgling sound.
"That surely cannot be the bell," said one of the children, lying down and
listening. "This must be looked to." So he remained, and let the others go on
without him.
They afterwards came to a little house, made of branches and the bark of
trees; a large wild apple-tree bent over it, as if it would shower down all
its blessings on the roof, where roses were blooming. The long stems twined
round the gable, on which there hung a small bell.
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