"--a new illustration of the old verse: "Behold,
he slumbereth not, and he sleepeth not--the keeper of Israel."

* * *

A great tournament at the court of the lords of Trimberg, the Franconian
town on the Saale! From high battlements stream the pennons of the noble
race, announcing rare festivities to all the country round. The
mountain-side is astir with knights equipped with helmet, shield, and
lance, and attended by pages and armor-bearers, minnesingers and
minstrels. Yonder is Walther von der Vogelweide, engaged in earnest
conversation with Wolfram von Eschenbach, Otto von Botenlaube, Hildebold
von Schwanegau, and Reinmar von Brennenberg. In that group of notables,
curiously enough, we discern a Jew, whose beautiful features reflect
harmonious soul life.

"Suesskind von Trimberg," they call him, and when the pleasure of the
feast in the lordly hall of the castle is to be heightened by song and
music, he too steps forth, with fearlessness and dignity, to sing of
freedom of thought, to the prevalence of which in this company the
despised Jew owed his admission to a circle of knights and poets:[45]

"O thought! free gift to humankind!
By thee both fools and wise are led,
But who thy paths hath all defined,
A man he is in heart and head.
With thee, his weakness being fled,
He can both stone and steel command,
Thy pinions bear him o'er the land.

O thought that swifter art than light,
That mightier art than tempest's roar!
Didst thou not raise me in thy flight,
What were my song, my minstrel lore,
And what the gold from _Minne's_ store?
Beyond the heights an eagle vaunts,
O bear me to the spirit's haunts!"

His song meets with the approval of the knights, who give generous
encouragement to the minstrel. Raising his eyes to the proud, beautiful
mistress of the castle, he again strikes his lyre and sings:

"Pure woman is to man a crown,
For her he strives to win renown.
Did she not grace and animate,
How mean and low the castle great!
By true companionship, the wife
Makes blithe and free a man's whole life;
Her light turns bright the darkest day.
Her praise and worth I'll sing alway."

The lady inclines her fair head in token of thanks, and the lord of
castle Trimberg fills the golden goblet, and hands it, the mark of
honor, to the poet, who drains it, and then modestly steps back into the
circle of his comp