Classic Poem

Was once an old bell-founder
At Breslau in the town,
A cunning master-workman,
A man of great renown.

Already, white and yellow,
He'd cast full many a bell
For churches and for chapels,
God's holy praise to swell.

And all his bells they sounded
So full and clear and pure:
He poured his faith and love in,
Of that all men were sure.

But of all bells that ever
He cast, was one the crown,
That was the bell for sinners
At Breslau in the town.

In Magdalen Church tower
The master-piece is hung,
And many a heart has melted
Beneath its iron tongue.

How well the faithful master
Upon his work had thought!
By day and night how truly
His cunning hand had wrought!

And when the hour has come now,
And all stands ready there,
The form walled up and steady,
The mixture bright and fair:

Then calls he to the fire-watch
His boy with earnest tone:
" I leave thee by the kettle
A moment here alone;

" To nerve me for the casting
With yet one drink I'll go;
That gives the gluey bell-stuff
A full and even flow.

" But mind me, boy, and touch not
The stopple, now give heed:
Else with thy life thou'lt rue it,
Rash child, the desperate deed!"

The boy stands by the kettle,
Peeps down into the glow:
It bubbles, boils and billows,
Runs wildly to and fro.

And in his ears it hisses,
And in his blood it leaps,
And now, in all his fingers,
Toward the stopple creeps.

He's feeling of the stopple:
Woe! he has turned it round!
What was't he did? He knows not;
In terror flees the ground.

He flies to meet his master,
Confesses to his face
The fault he has committed,
And will his knees embrace.

But scarce the boding master
The boy's first word has caught, —
Impetuous anger swallows
Each cool and sober thought.

It clenched his sharp knife for him,
And through the boy's heart ran;
Then rushed he to the kettle
Like a distracted man.

Perchance, he yet may save it,
Still stop the rushing stream; —
But lo! the casting's over,
Gone is each globule's gleam!

He breaks the mould with trembling,
And sees, yet fain would not,
The bell stand whole before him,
Without a speck or spot.

The boy lies on the ground there,
He sees his work no more;
Ah, master, frantic master,
Thy thrust was all too sore!

He yields him up to judgment,
Himself accuses he:
It moves the judge to pity
The wretched man to see.

Yet is there none can save him,
And blood cries out for blood:
Yet hears he his death-sentence
With calm, unbending mood.

And when the day has broken,
The day his doom shall seal,
They offer for his solace
The Lord's last holy meal.

" I thank you," says the master,
" Dear gentlemen and true,
But 'tis another favor
My heart desires of you.

" Once would I hear, Oh, let me!
The sound of my new bell!
'Tis mine own hand hath made it:
Would know, if ill or well."

The old man's prayer was granted,
It seemed so small a thing
To them, that his death hour
His favorite bell should ring.

The master hears it tolling
So full, so clear, so pure:
His eyes with tears run over,
For joy it must be, sure.

And lo! as if transfigured,
His fading eyeballs gleam:
That sound to him hath spoken
Far more than sound, I deem!

And he has bowed his neck down
Calmly to meet the stroke,
And, sure, death's solemn promise,
Life, following, hath not broke.

Ay, of all bells that ever
He cast, is this the crown,
The bell of Church St. Magdalen
At Breslau in the town.

It was, from that time forward,
Baptized the sinner's bell:
Whether it still is called so,
Is more than I can tell.