There were many more brilliant displays met Hans' eyes that evening than this humble spectacle, and yet not one had the same attraction for him. What would he not have given to be among that group--to have watched all the evolutions, many of which were now hidden from his view--perchance to be permitted to move some of the regiments, and suggest his own ideas of tactics! Ah, that would have been happiness indeed! How long he might have watched there is no saying, when a slight incident occurred which interrupted him--slight and trivial enough was it, and yet in all its seeming insignificance to be the turning point of his destiny!
It chanced that one of the little soldiers, from some accident or other, would not stand upright, and a little boy, whose black eyes and sunburnt cheeks bespoke a hasty temper, in endeavouring to set him on his legs, broke one of them off. "Ah, thou worthless thing!" cried he passionately, "thou art no use now to King or Kaiser, for thou art as lame as Hans Jörgle;" and as he spoke he opened the little pane of the window, and flung the little figure into the street.
"Shame on thee, Carl!" said the old man reprovingly; "he would have done for many a thing yet. The best scout we ever had on the Turkish frontier was so lame, you couldn't think him able to walk. Besides, don't you remember the Tyrol proverb?--
So never despise those who are unfit for thine own duties; mayhap, what thou deemest imperfection, may fit them for something far above thee."
Oh, how Hans drank in these words! the grief that filled him, on the insulting comparison of the child was now changed to gratitude, and seizing the little soldier, his own sad emblem, he kissed it a hundred times, and then placed it in his bosom.
Hanserl's mother was asleep when he reached home, so, creeping silently to his bed, he lay down in his clothes, dreading lest he might awaken her; and with what a happy heart did he lie down that night! How full of gratitude and of love as he thought over the blessed words! How he wished to remain awake all night long and think over them, fancying, as he could do, the various destinies which, even to such as him, might still fall! But sleep, that will not come when wooed, stole over him as he lay, and in a deep, heavy slumber, he clasped the little wooden figure in his hands.