TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

276
GODDESSES.
been to work ; it was the eve of the Three-kings (Twelfthday), and
on the bank of the rivulet Orla he came upon Perchtha, her broken
plough surrounded by weeping heimchen.
with thee, so help me mend !
(
Hast thou a hatchet
she cried to the terrified traveller.
He gave what help he could, but the fallen chips offered him for
wages he would not touch : I have plenty of them at home, says he.
When he got home, he told what had happened to him, and while
his people shook their heads incredulously, he pulled off one of his
shoes, which something had got into, that hurt his foot, and out
rolled a bright new gold-piece. A twelvemonth passed, and one of
his men, who had heard him tell the tale, set out on Perchtha s
night, and waited by the Orla, just where his master had met
Perchtha; in a little while, on she came with her infant train:
What seekest thou here at this hour ? she cried in anger, and
when he stammered out an answer, she continued : I am better
provided with tools this time, so take thou thy due ! and with
those words she dug her hatchet into the fellow s shoulder. The
same story is repeated near Kaulsdorf at a part of the brook which
is called the water over the way, at Presswitz near the Saal-house,
and on the sandhill between Possneck and the forester s lodge of
Reichenbach. Below the Gleitsch, a curiously shaped rock near
Tischdorf, the story varies in so far, that there Perchtha along with
the heimchen was driving a waggon, and had just broken the axle,
when she fell in with a countryman, who helped her out with a
makeshift axle, and was paid in chips, which however he disdained,
and only carried a piece home in his shoe. P. 133 : A spinninggirl
walked over from the JSTeidenberg during that night, she had
done every bit of her spinning, and was in high when
spirits,
Perchtha came marching up the hill towards her, with a great troop
of the heimchen-folk, all children of one sort and size, one set of
them toiling to push a heavy plough, another party
loaded with
farming-tools ; they loudly complained that they had no longer a
home. At this singular procession the spinner began to laugh out
loud, Perchtha enraged stept up to the giddy thing, Uew upon her,
and struck her blind on the spot. The poor girl had a trouble to
could no
find her way into the village, she led a wretched life,
When the
longer work, but sat mournful by the wayside begging.
year was past and Perchtha visited Altar again, the blind one, not
knowing one from another, asked an alms of the high dame as she