The Complete Short Works of Georg EbersEbers, Georg
General
The Complete Short Works of Georg Ebers
Ebers, Georg
German fiction -- Translations into English
But Compostella was indeed far away. Her new supply of money was
sufficient for the journey there, but how could she return? Besides, her
cough troubled her very seriously, and it seemed as though she could not
travel that long distance alone. The dealer in indulgences had said
that the paper made the pilgrimage unnecessary, and the confessor in
the convent had only commanded her to go to Altotting. With this
neighbouring goal before her, she turned her back upon Augsburg the
following morning.
Her hope of meeting on the way compassionate people, who would give her
a seat in their vehicles, was fulfilled. She reached Altotting sooner
than she had expected. During the journey, sometimes in a peasant's
cart, sometimes in a freight wagon, she had thought often of little
Juliane, and always with a quiet, nay, a contented heart. In the famous
old church, at the end of her pilgrimage, she saw a picture in which the
raked souls of children were soaring upward to heaven from the flames
blazing around them in purgatory.
The confessor had sent her to the right place.
Here a fervent prayer had the power to rescue a child's soul from the
fires of purgatory. Many other votive pictures, the pilgrims at the
inn, and a priest whom she questioned, confirmed it. She also heard
from various quarters that she had not paid too high a price for the
indulgence. This strengthened her courage and henceforward, nay, even
during the time of sore privation which she afterward endured, she
blessed a thousand times her resolve to buy the ransoming paper from
Tetzel, the Dominican; for she thought that she daily experienced its
power.
Whenever Juliane appeared, her face wore a friendly expression--nay,
once, in a dream, she floated before her as if she wished to thank her,
in the form of a beautiful angel with large pink and white wings. She no
longer needed to fear the horrible curse which she had called down upon
the little one, and once more thought of Lienhard with pleasure. When
he learned in the other world how she had atoned for the wrong which she
had done his little favourite, she would be sure of his praise.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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