[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of thefile for those who may wish to sample the author's ideas before making anentire meal of them. D. W. ]

IN THE BLUE PIKE, Complete

By Georg Ebers

Volume 1. 

Translated from the German by Mary T. Safford

CHAPTER I. 

"May a thunderbolt strike you!" The imprecation suited the rough fellowwho uttered it. He had pointed out of doors as he spoke, and scarcelylowered the strange tones of his voice, yet of all the rabble whosurrounded him only two persons understood his meaning--a fading, sicklygirl, and the red-haired woman, only a few years her senior, who led theswearing man by a chain, like a tame bear. 

The Nuremberg magistrates had had Cyriax's tongue cropped for grossblasphemy, and listeners could scarcely comprehend the words he mangledin his gasping speech. 

The red-haired woman dropped the knife with which she was slicing breadand onions into a pot, and looked at her companion with an anxious, questioning glance. 

"Nuremberg Honourables, " he stammered as fast as he could, snatched hiswife's shawl from her shoulders, and drew it over his unkempt head. 

The woman beckoned to their travelling companions--a lame fellow ofmiddle age who, propped on crutches, leaned against the wall, an olderpock-marked man with a bloated face, and the sickly girl--calling to themin the harsh, metallic voice peculiar to hawkers and elderly singers atfairs. 

"Help Cyriax hide. You first, Jungel! They needn't recognise him assoon as they get in. Nuremberg magistrates are coming. Aristocraticblood-suckers of the Council. Who knows what may still be on the tallyfor us?"

Kuni, the pale-faced girl, wrapped her bright-coloured garment tighteraround her mutilated left leg, and obeyed. Lame Jungel, too, prepared tofulfil red-haired Gitta's wish. 

But Raban had glanced out, and hastily drew the cloth jerkin, patchedwith green and blue linen, closer through his belt, ejaculating anxiously:

"Young Groland of the Council. I know him. "

This exclamation induced the other vagabonds to glide along the wall tothe nearest door, intending to slip out. 

"A Groland?" asked Gitta, Cyriax's wife, cowering as if threatened with ablow from an invisible hand. "It was he--"

"He?" laughed the chain-bearer, while he crouched beside her, drawinghimself into the smallest space possible. "No, Redhead! The devildragged the man who did that down to the lower regions long ago, onaccount of my tongue. It's his son. The younger, the sharper. Thisstripling made Casper Rubling, --[Dice, in gambler's slang]--poor wretch, pay for his loaded dice with his eyesight. "

He thrust his hand hurriedly into his jerkin as he spoke, and gave Gittasomething which he had concealed there. It was a set of dice, but, withready presence of mind, she pressed them so hard into the crumb of theloaf of bread which she had just cut that it entirely concealed them. 

All this had passed wholly unnoticed in the corner of the long, wideroom, for all the numerous travellers whom it sheltered were entirelyoccupied with their own affairs. Nothing was understood except what wassaid between neighbour and neighbour, for a loud uproar pervaded thetavern of The Blue Pike. 

It was one of the most crowded inns, being situated on the main ferry atMiltenberg, where those journeying from Nuremberg, Augsburg, and otherSouth German cities, on their way to Frankfort and the Lower Rhine, rested and exchanged the saddle for the ship. Just at the present timemany persons of high and low degree were on their way to Cologne, whitherthe Emperor Maximilian, having been unable to come in April to Trier onthe Moselle, had summoned the Reichstag. 

The opening would take place in a few days, and attracted not onlyprinces, counts, and knights, exalted leaders and more modest servants ofthe Church, ambassadors from the cities, and other aristocrats, but alsohonest tradesfolk, thriving money-lenders with the citizen's cloak andthe yellow cap of the Jew, vagrants and strollers of every description, who hoped to practise their various feats to the best advantage, or tofill their pockets by cheating and robbery. 

This evening many had gathered in the spacious taproom of The Blue Pike. Now those already present were to be joined by the late arrivals whomCyriax had seen ride up. 

It was a stately band. Four aristocratic gentlemen at the head of thetroop were followed by an escort of twenty-five Nuremberg mercenaries, agay company whose crimson coats, with white slashes on the puffedsleeves, presented a showy spectacle. Their helmets and armour glitteredin the bright light of the setting sun of the last day of July, as theyturned their horses in front of the wide gateway of The Blue Pike to rideinto Miltenberg and ask lodgings of the citizens. 

The trampling of hoofs, the shouts of command, and the voices of thegentlemen and their attendants outside attracted many guests to the doorsand windows of the long, whitewashed building. 

The strollers, however, kept the place at theirs without difficulty; noone desired to come near them. 

The girl with the bandaged foot had now also turned her face toward thestreet. As her gaze rested on the youngest of the Nuremberg dignitaries, her pale cheeks flushed, and, as if unconsciously, the exclamation:"It is he!" fell from her lips. 

"Who?" asked red-haired Gitta, and was quickly answered in a low tone

"I mean Lienhard, Herr Groland. "

"The young one, " stuttered Cyriax. 

Then, raising the shawl, he continued inquisitively:

"Do you know him? For good or for evil?"

The girl, whose face, spite of its sunken cheeks and the dark rings underthe deep-set blue eyes, still bore distinct traces of former beauty, started and answered sharply, though not very loudly, for speech wasdifficult:

"Good is what you call evil, and evil is what you call good. Myacquaintance with Lienhard, Herr Groland, is my own affair, and, you maybe sure, will remain mine. " She glanced contemptuously away from theothers out of doors, but Cyriax, spite of his mutilated tongue, retortedquickly and harshly:

"I always said so. She'll die a saint yet. " Then grasping Kuni's armroughly, he dragged her down to him, and whispered jeeringly:

"Ratz has a full purse and sticks to his offer for the cart. If you puton airs long, he'll get it and the donkey, too, and you'll be left here. What was it about Groland? You can try how you'll manage on your stumpwithout us, if we're too bad for you. "

"We are not under eternal obligations to you on the child's account, "added red-haired Gitta in a gentler tone. "Don't vex my husband, orhe'll keep his word about the cart, and who else will be bothered with auseless creature like you?"

The girl lowered her eyes and looked at her crippled limb. 

How would she get on without the cart, which received her when the paingrew too sharp and the road was too hard and long?

So she turned to the others again, saying soothingly:

"It all happened in the time before I fell. " Then she looked out ofdoors once more, but she did not find what she sought. The Nurembergtravellers had ridden through the broad gateway into the large squarecourtyard, surrounded by stables on three sides. When Cyriax and hiswife again called to her, desiring to know what had passed between herand Groland, she clasped her hands around her knees, fixed her eyes onthe gaystuffs wound around the stump where her foot had been amputated, and in a low, reluctant tone, continued:

"You want to learn what I have to do with Herr Groland? It was about sixyears ago, in front of St. Sebald's church, in Nuremberg. A wedding wasto take place. The bridegroom was one of the Council--Lienhard Groland. The marriage was to be a very quiet one--the bridegroom's father layseriously ill. Yet there could have been no greater throng at theEmperor's nuptials. I stood in the midst of the crowd. A rosary droppedfrom the belt of the fat wife of a master workman--she was decked outlike a peacock--and fell just in front of me. It was a costly ornament, pure gold and Bohemian garnets. I did not let it lie there. "

"A miracle!" chuckled Cyriax, but the girl was obliged to conquer asevere attack of coughing before she could go on with her story. 

"The chaplet fairly burned my hand. I would gladly have given it back, but the woman was no longer before me. Perhaps I might have returned it, but I won't say so positively. However, there was no time to do it; thewedding party was coming, and on that account But what is the use oftalking? While I was still gazing, the owner discovered her loss. An officer seized me, and so I was taken to prison and the next day wasbrought before the magistrates. Herr Groland was one of them, and, sinceit wasn't certain that I would not have restored the property I found, heinterceded in my behalf. When the others still wished to punish me, hebesought my release because it was my first offence. So we met, and whenI admit that I am grateful to him for it, you know all. "

"H'm, " replied Cyriax, giggling, as he nudged his wife in the side andmade remarks concerning what he had just heard which induced even red-haired Gitta to declare that the loss of his tongue was scarcely amisfortune. 

Kuni indignantly turned her back upon the slanderer and gazed out of thewindow again. The Nuremberg Honourables had disappeared, but severalgrooms were unbuckling the knapsacks from the horses and carrying theminto the house. The aristocratic travellers were probably cleansingthemselves from the dust of the road before they entered the taproom. 

Kuni thought so, and gazed sometimes into vacancy, sometimes into her ownlap. Her eyes had a dreamy light, for the incident which she had justrelated rose before her mind with perfect clearness. 

It seemed as though she were gazing a second time at the weddingprocession which was approaching St. Sebald's, and the couple who led it. 

Never had she beheld anything fairer than the bride with the myrtlewreath on her beautifully formed head, whence a delicate lace veilfloated over her long, thick, golden hair. She could not help gazing ather as if spellbound. When she moved forward, holding her bridegroom'shand, she appeared to float over the rice and flowers strewn in her pathto the church--it was in February. As Kuni saw the bride raise her largeblue eyes to her lover's so tenderly and yet so modestly, and thebridegroom thank her with a long joyous look of love, she wondered whatmust be the feelings of a maiden who, so pure, so full of ardent love, and so fervently beloved in return, was permitted to approach the houseof God, accompanied by a thousand pious wishes, with the first and onlyman whom she loved, and to whom she wished to devote herself for herwhole life. Again, as at that time, a burning thrill ran through herlimbs. Then a bitter smile hovered around her lips. 

She had asked herself whether the heart of one who experienced such joys, to whom such a fate was allotted, would not burst from sheer joy. Nowthe wish, the hope, and every new resolve for good or ill were alikeover. At that hour, before the door of St. Sebald's, she had beencapable of all, all, perhaps even the best things, if any one hadcherished her in his heart as Lienhard Groland loved the beautiful womanat his side. 

She could not help remembering the spell with which the sight of thosetwo had forced her to watch their every movement, to gaze at them, andthem only, as if the world contained nothing else. How often she hadrepeated to herself that in that hour she was bewitched, whether by himor by her she could not decide. As the throng surged forward, she hadbeen crowded against the woman who lost the rosary. She had not had thefaintest thought of it when the bailiff suddenly snatched her from herrapturous gazing to stern reality, seizing with a rude grip the hand thatheld the jewel. Then, pursued by the reviling and hissing of thepopulace, she had been taken to prison. 

Now she again saw herself amid the vile rabble assembled there, againfelt how eagerly she inhaled the air as she was led across the courtyardof the townhall into the presence of the magistrates. Oh, if she couldbut take such a long, deep breath of God's pure air as she did then!But that time was past. Her poor, sunken chest would no longer permitit. Then she fancied that she was again standing before the judges, whowere called The Five. 

Four magistrates sat with the Pfander--[Chief of police]--at the tablecovered with a green cloth, but one, who surpassed all the others both instature and in manly beauty, was the selfsame Lienhard Groland, whoyesterday had led to the altar the wonderfully lovely girl who hadbewitched her. She felt how the blood had mounted into her cheeks whenshe again saw him who could know nothing of her except that she was ajade, who had stolen another person's property. Yet her glance soon methis, and he must have been blind had he not read in the radiant lustre ofher blue eyes, which had early learned to woo applause and promise love, what he was to her, and how gratefully her heart throbbed for him. 

After the other gentlemen had treated her harshly, and threatened to puther in the stocks, he interceded for her, and entreated his brothermagistrates to let mercy, in this instance, take the place of justice, because she was so young, and perhaps had intended to return the rosarylater. Finally he bent smiling toward his companions and said somethingto them in a subdued tone. The voice was so low that his intention tokeep her in ignorance of it was evident. But Kuni's hearing had been askeen as a bird's, and not a word escaped her. He could not helpregarding it as an evil omen for him and his young wife if a girl, hitherto unpunished, should be plunged into disgrace and perhaps mademiserable throughout the rest of a long life on account of his weddingprocession. 

How high her heart had throbbed at this request, and when it was granted, the discussion closed, and she herself informed that she would be setfree, she hurried after her preserver, who had left the Council chamberwith the other magistrates, to thank him. He permitted her to detainhim, and when she found herself alone in his presence, at first, withstreaming eyes, she was unable to utter a word. He laid his hand kindlyon her shoulder to soothe her, and then listened to her assurance that, though she was a strolling rope-dancer, she had never taken otherpeople's property. 

Now she closed her eyes to have a clearer vision of the picture evoked bymemory, which rose so vividly before her. Again she saw herself seizehis hand to kiss it humbly, yet with fervent devotion; again she met thepatronizing but friendly smile with which he withdrew it, and a thrill ofhappiness ran through every nerve, for she imagined she once more felthis slender white hand soothingly stroke her black hair and burningcheeks, as if she were a sick child who needed help. Later years hadnever granted her aught more blissful than that moment. 

As had often happened before, the memory of it overmastered her with suchpower that she could not escape it, but recalled his every look andmovement. Meanwhile, she imagined that she heard his voice, whose deep, pure tones had pleased her ear, alive to harmony, more than any to whichshe had ever listened, counselling her to give up her vagrant life, andagain received his assurance that he pitied her, and it would grieve himif she, who seemed worthy of a better fate, should be ruined, body andsoul, so young. Thus absorbed, she neither saw nor listened to anythingthat was occurring near her or in the large room of the tavern, but stoodgazing into vacancy as if rapt away from earth. 

True, Cyriax and the others had lowered their voices, for they weretalking about her and the aristocratic couple on whose wedding day Kunihad stolen the rosary. 

Raban, a tall, lank vagabond with red-rimmed eyes, whose ugly facebristled with a half-grown black beard, had a few more particulars togive concerning the bride and bridegroom. He wandered about the worldand, whenever he stretched out his hand to beg, gave the pretext that hewas collecting the price of blood required for a man whom he had killedin self-defence, that his own head might not fall under the axe of theexecutioner. His dead father had heated the furnaces in the smeltingworks at Eschenbach, near Nuremberg, and the bride was Katharina, theeldest of the three daughters of the owner, old Harsdorffer of theCouncil. He had been a man of steel and iron, and opposed LienhardGroland's father at every point, not excepting even their officialbusiness. When he discovered that the young man was carrying on a loveaffair with his daughter, he had summoned him before a court of justicefor a breach of the law which forbade minors to betroth themselveswithout parental consent. The magistrates sentenced Lienhard to fiveyears' exile from the city but, through the Emperor's mediation, he wasspared the punishment. Old Harsdorffer afterward succeeded in keepingthe suitor away from his daughter a long time, but finally relinquishedhis opposition. 

"The devil came soon enough and broke his stiff neck, " added Cyriax, onwhom the vagabond's story had had the same effect as a red rag upon abull. Spite of the old slanderer's mutilated tongue, invectives flowedfast enough from his lips when he thought of young Frau Groland's father. If the Groland outside resembled his father-in-law, he would like todrink him a pledge that should burn like the plague and ruin. 

He snatched a flask from his pocket as he spoke, and after a long pulland a still longer "A-ah!" he stammered:

"I've been obliged to bid farewell to my tongue, yet it feels as if itwere sticking in my throat like the dry sole of a shoe. That's whatcomes from talking in this dog-day heat. "

He looked into the empty bottle and was about to send Kuni out to fill itagain. In turning to do so he saw her pale face, wan with suffering, butwhich now glowed with a happy light that lent it a strange beauty. Howlarge her blue eyes were! When he had picked her up in Spain she wasalready a cripple and in sore distress. But Groland probably knew whathe was about when he released her. She must have been a pretty creatureenough at that time, and he knew that before her fall she was consideredone of the most skilful rope-dancers. 

An elderly woman with a boy, whose blindness helped her to arousecompassion, was crouching by Raban's side, and had just been greeted byKuni as an old acquaintance. They had journeyed from land to land inLoni's famous troupe, and as Raban handed Cyriax his own bottle, heturned from the dreaming girl, whose services he no longer needed, andwhispered to the blind boy's mother--who among the people of her owncalling still went by the name of Dancing Gundel--the question whetheryonder ailing cripple had once had any good looks, and what position shehad held among rope-dancers. 

The little gray-haired woman looked up with sparkling eyes. Under thename of "Phyllis" she had earned, ere her limbs were stiffened by age, great applause by her dainty egg-dance and all sorts of feats with thebalancing pole. The manager of the band had finally given her theposition of crier to support herself and her blind boy. This had madeher voice so hollow and hoarse that it was difficult to understand heras, with fervid eloquence, vainly striving to be heard by absent-mindedKuni, she began: "She surpassed even Maravella the Spaniard. And herfeats at Augsburg during the Reichstag--I tell you, Cyriax, when sheascended the rope to the belfry, with the pole and without--"

"I've just heard of that from another quarter, " he interrupted. "What Iwant to know is whether she pleased the eyes of men. "

"What's that to you?" interposed red-haired Gitta jealously, trying todraw him away from Gundel by the chain. 

Raban laughed heartily, and lame Jungel, chuckling, rapped on the floorwith his right crutch, exclaiming:

"Good for you!"

Kuni was accustomed to such outbursts of merriment. They were almostalways awakened by some trifle, and this time she did not even hear thelaughing. But Cyriax struck his wife so rudely on the hand that shejerked furiously at the chain and, with a muttered oath, blew on thebruised spot. Meanwhile Gundel was telling the group how manydistinguished gentlemen had formerly paid court to Kuni. She was asagile as a squirrel. Her pretty little face, with its sparkling blueeyes, attracted the men as bacon draws mice. Then, pleased to havelisteners, she related how the girl had lured florins and zecchins fromthe purse of many a wealthy ecclesiastic. She might have been as rich asthe Fuggers if she hadn't met with the accident and had understood how tokeep what she earned. But she could not hold on to her gold. She hadflung it away like useless rubbish. So long as she possessed anythingthere had been no want in Loni's company. She, Gundel, had caught herarm more than once when she was going to fling Hungarian ducats, insteadof coppers, to good-for-nothing beggars. She had often urged her, too, to think of old age, but Kuni--never cared for any one longer than a fewweeks, though there were some whom she might easily have induced to offerher the wedding ring. 

She glanced at Kuni again, but, perceiving that the girl did not yetvouchsafe her even a single look, she was vexed, and, moving nearer toCyriax, she added in a still lower tone:

"A more inconstant, faithless, colder heart than hers I never met, evenamong the most disorderly of Loni's band; for, blindly as the infatuatedlovers obeyed every one of her crazy whims, she laughed at the best andtruest. 'I hate them all, ' she would say. 'I wouldn't let one of themeven touch me with the tip of his finger if I could not use theirzecchins. 'With these, ' she said, 'she would help the rich to restoreto the poor what they had stolen from them. ' She really treated many aworthy gentleman like a dog, nay, a great deal worse; for she was tenderenough to all the animals that travelled with the company; the poodlesand the ponies, nay, even the parrots and the doves. She would play withthe children, too, even the smallest ones--isn't that so, Peperle?--liketheir own silly mothers. " She smoothed the blind boy's golden hair asshe spoke, then added, sighing:

"But the little fellow was too young to remember it. The rattle whichshe gave him at Augsburg--it was just before the accident--because shewas so fond of him--Saint Kunigunde, how could we keep such worthlessjewels in our sore need?--was made of pure silver. True, the simpletonswho were so madly in love with her, and with whom she played so cruelly, would have believed her capable of anything sooner than such kindness. There was a Swabian knight, a young fellow----"

Here she stopped, for Cyriax and the other vagabonds, even the girl ofwhom she was speaking, had started up and were gazing at the door. 

Kuni opened her eyes as wide as if a miracle had happened, and thecrimson spots on her sunken cheeks betrayed how deeply she was agitated. But she had never experienced anything of this kind; for while thinkingof the time when, through Lienhard Groland's intercession, she hadentered the house of the wealthy old Frau Schurstab, in order to becomeestranged from a vagabond life, and recalling how once, when he saw hersorrowful there, he had spoken kindly to her, it seemed as if she hadactually heard his own voice. As it still appeared to echo in her ears, she suddenly became aware that the words really did proceed from hislips. What she had heard in her dream and what now came from his ownmouth, as he stood at the door, blended into one. She would never havebelieved that the power of imagination could reproduce anything sofaithfully. 

Listening intently, she said to herself that, during the many thousandtimes when she had talked with him in fancy, it had also seemed as if sheheard him speak. And the same experience had befallen her eyes; forwhenever memory reverted to those distant days, she had beheld him justas he now looked standing on the threshold, where he was detained by thelandlady of The Pike. Only his face had become still more manly, hisbearing more dignified. The pleasant, winning expression of the beardedlips remained unchanged, and more than once she had seen his eyes sparklewith a far warmer light than now, while he was thanking the portly womanfor her cordial welcome. 

While Kuni's gaze still rested upon him as if spellbound, Cyriax nudgedher, stammering hurriedly:

"They will have to pass us. Move forward, women, in front of me. Spreadout your skirt, you Redhead! It might be my death if yonder Nurembergfine gentleman should see me here and recollect one thing and another. "

As he spoke he dragged Kuni roughly from the window, flung the sack whichhe had brought in from the cart down before him, and made them sit on it, while he stretched himself on the floor face downward, and pretended tobe asleep behind the women. 

This suited Kuni. If Lienhard Groland passed her now he could not helpseeing her, and she had no greater desire than to meet his glance oncemore before her life ended. Yet she dreaded this meeting with anintensity plainly revealed by the passionate throbbing of her heart andthe panting of her weakened lungs. There was a rushing noise in herears, and her eyes grew dim. Yet she was obliged to keep them wide open--what might not the next moment bring?

For the first time since her entrance she gazed around the large, longapartment, which would have deserved the name of hall had it not been toolow. 

The heated room, filled with buzzing flies, was crowded with travellers. The wife and daughter of a feather-curler, who were on their way with thehusband and father to the Reichstag, where many an aristocratic gentlemanwould need plumes for his own head and his wife's, had just dropped thecomb with which they were arranging each other's hair. The shoemaker andhis dame from Nuremberg paused in the sensible lecture they werealternately addressing to their apprentices. The Frankfort messenger putdown the needle with which he was mending the badgerskin in his knapsack. The travelling musicians who, to save a few pennies, had begun to eatbread, cheese, and radishes, instead of the warm meals provided for theothers, let their knives drop and set down the wine-jugs. The traders, who were hotly arguing over Italian politics and the future war withTurkey, were silent. The four monks, who had leaned their heads againstthe cornice of the wide, closed fireplace and, in spite of the flieswhich buzzed around them, had fallen asleep, awoke. The vender ofindulgences in the black cowl interrupted the impressive speech which hewas delivering to the people who surrounded his coffer. This group also--soldiers, travelling artisans, peasants, and tradesfolk with theirwives, who, like most of those present, were waiting for the vessel whichwas to sail down the Main early the next morning--gazed toward the door. Only the students and Bacchantes, --[Travelling scholars]--who were fairlyhanging on the lips of a short, slender scholar, with keen, intellectualfeatures, noticed neither the draught of air caused by the entrance ofthe distinguished arrivals and their followers, nor the general stiraroused by their appearance, until Dr. Eberbach, the insignificant, vivacious speaker, recognised in one of the group the famous Nuremberghumanist, Wilibald Pirckheimer. 

CHAPTER II. 

At first Dietel, the old waiter, whose bullet-shaped head was coveredwith thick gray hair, also failed to notice them. Without heeding theirentrance, he continued, --aided by two assistants who were scarcely beyondboyhood, --to set the large and small pine tables which he had placedwherever he could find room. 

The patched tablecloths which he spread over the tops were coarse andmuch worn; the dishes carried after him by the two assistants, whoseknees bent under the burden, were made of tin, and marred by many a dent. He swung his stout body to and fro with jerks like a grasshopper, and indoing so his shirt rose above his belt, but the white napkin under hisarm did not move a finger's width. In small things, as well as greatones, Dietel was very methodical. So he continued his occupationundisturbed till an inexperienced merchant's clerk from Ulm, who wantedto ride farther speedily, accosted him and asked for some special dish. Dietel drew his belt farther down and promptly snubbed the young man withthe angry retort; "Everybody must wait for his meal. We make noexceptions here. "

Interrupted in his work, he also saw the newcomers, and then cast apeevish glance at one corner of the room, where stood a table coveredwith fine linen and set with silver dishes, among them a platter on whichearly pears and juicy plums were spread invitingly. The landlady of ThePike had arranged them daintily upon fresh vine leaves an hour beforewith her own plump but nimble hands. Of course they were intended forthe gentlemen from Nuremberg and their guests. Dietel, too, now knewthem, and saw that the party numbered a person no less distinguished thanthe far-famed and highly learned Doctor and Imperial Councillor, ConradPeutinger. They were riding to Cologne together under the same escort. The citizens of Nuremberg were distinguished men, as well as their guest, but Dietel had served distinguished personages by the dozen at The BluePike for many years--among them even crowned heads--and they had wantedfor nothing. His skill, however, was not sufficient for these citydemigods; for the landlord of The Pike intended to look after their tablehimself. Tomfoolery! There was more than enough for him to do that dayover yonder in the room occupied by the lansquenets and the citysoldiers, where he usually directed affairs in person. It rousedDietel's ire. The cooking of The Blue Pike, which the landladysuperintended, could vie with any in the Frank country, on the Rhine, orin Swabia, yet, forsooth, it wasn't good enough for the Nuremberg guests. The Council cook, a fat, pompous fellow, accompanied them, and hadalready begun to bustle about the hearth beside the hostess. Theyreally would have required no service at all, for they brought their ownattendants. It certainly was not Dietel's usual custom to wish any oneevil, but if Gotz Berlichinger, who had recently attacked a party ofLeipsic merchants at Forchheim, or Hans von Geisslingen had fallen uponthem and subdued their arrogance, it would not have spoiled Dietel'sappetite. 

At last they moved forward. The others might treat them as they chose;he, at least, would neither say anything to them nor bow before them asthe ears did before Joseph in Holy Writ. Nevertheless, he looked out ofthe corner of his eye at them as he took from the basket of the round-checked kitchen maid, who had now found her way to him, one fresh brownroll after another, and placed them beside plate after plate. How wellrisen and how crusty they were! They fairly cracked under the pressureof the thumb, yet wheat rolls had been baked specially for the Nurembergparty. Was God's good gift too poor for the Honourables with the goldchains?

Now, even fragile little Dr. Eberbach, and the students and Bacchanteswho had stood around him like disciples, intently listening to his words, bowed respectfully. The ungodly, insolent fellows who surrounded theDominican Jacobus, the vender of indulgences, had turned from him, whilehe exhorted them, as if he were an importunate beggar. What did themerchants, artisans, and musicians know about the godless Greek and Latinwritings which brought the names of Pirckheimer and Peutinger before thepeople, yet how reverently many of these folk now bowed before them. Only the soldiers with swords at their sides held their heads erect. They proved that they were right in calling themselves "piouslansquenets. " The broad-shouldered knight, with the plumed hat andsuit of mail, who walked beside them, was Sir Hans von Obernitz, theSchultheiss of Nuremberg. He was said to be a descendant of the ancientBrandenstein race, and yet--was the world topsy-turvy?--he, too, waslistening to every word uttered by Wilibald Pirckheimer and Dr. Peutingeras if it were a revelation. The gray-haired leech and antiquary, Hartmann Schedel, whom Herr Wilibald, --spite of the gout which sometimesforced a slight grimace to distort his smooth-shaven, clever, almostover-plump face, --led by the arm like a careful son, resembled, with hislong, silver locks, a patriarch or an apostle. 

The young envoy of the Council, Herr Lienhard Groland, lingered behindthe others and seemed to be taking a survey of the room. 

What bright, keen eyes he had; how delicately cut was the oval face withthe strong, very slightly hooked nose; how thick were the waving brownlocks that fell upon the slender neck; how well the pointed beard suitedhis chin; with what austere majesty his head rose above the broad, plaited, snow-white ruff, which he must have just donned!

Now his eyes rested upon the vagrants, and Dietel perceived somethingwhich threw him completely off his balance; for the first time he changedthe position of his napkin, jerking it from its place under his left armto tuck it beneath the right one. He had known Kuni a long time. In herprosperous days, when she was the ornament of Loni's band and hadattracted men as a ripe pear draws wasps, she had often been at thetavern, and both he and the landlord of The Pike had greeted hercordially, for whoever sought her favour was obliged to order the bestand dearest of everything, not only for her and himself, but for a wholetableful of hungry guests. When she had met him just now he would neverhave recognised her had she not been in Gundel's company. True, thesight of her in this plight was not unexpected, yet it pierced him to theheart, for Kuni had been a remarkable girl, and yet was now in fargreater penury than many of much less worth whom he had watched stumblingalong the downward path before her. When he saw Lienhard Groland'sglance rest upon her, he noticed also how strangely her emaciated facechanged colour. Though it had just been as white as the napkin under hisarm, it now flushed as red as the balsam blossoms in the window, and thenpaled again. She had formerly gazed around her boldly enough, but nowshe lowered her eyes to the floor as modestly as any demure maiden on herway to church. 

And what did this mean?

The honourable member of the Nuremberg Council must be well acquaintedwith the girl, for his eyes had scarcely met hers ere a strange smileflitted over his grave, manly face. 

Now--was it in jest or earnest?--he even shook his finger at her. Hestopped in front of her a moment, too, and Dietel heard him exclaim:

"So here you are! On the highway again, in spite of everything?"

The distance which separated them and the loud talking of the guestsprevented the waiter's hearing her reply, "The captive bird can notendure the cage long, Herr Lienhard, " far less the words, added in alower tone:

"Yet flight has been over since my fall at Augsburg. My foot lies buriedthere with many other things which will never return. I can only move onwheels behind the person who takes me. " Then she paused and ventured tolook him full in the face. Her eyes met his beaming with a radiantlight, but directly after they were dimmed by a mist of tears. Yet sheforced them back, though the deep suffering from which they sprung wastouchingly apparent in the tone of her voice, as she continued:

"I have often wished, Herr Lienhard, that the cart was my coffin and thetavern the graveyard. "

Dietel noticed the fit of coughing which followed this speech, and thehasty movement with which the Nuremberg patrician thrust his hand intohis purse and tossed Kuni three coins. They did not shine with the dullwhite lustre of silver, but with the yellow glitter of gold. Thewaiter's eyes were sharp and he had his own ideas about thisunprecedented liberality. 

The travelling companions of the aristocratic burgomaster and ambassadorsof the proud city of Nuremberg had also noticed this incident. 

After they had taken their seats at the handsomely ornamented table, Wilibald Pirckheimer bent toward the ear of his young friend andcompanion in office, whispering:

"The lovely wife at home whom you toiled so hard to win, might, Iknow, rest quietly, secure in the possession of all the charms of foam-born Aphrodite, yet I warn you. Whoever is as sure of himself as youcares little for the opinion of others. And yet we stand high, friendLienhard, and therefore are seen by all; but the old Argus who watchesfor his neighbour's faults has a hundred sharp eyes, while among the godsthree are blind--Justice, Happiness, and Love. Besides, you flung goldto yonder worthless rabble. I would rather have given it to thetravelling musicians. They, like us humanists, are allied to the Musesand, moreover, are harmless, happy folk. "

Lienhard Groland listened till his older friend had finished. Then, after thanking him for his well-meant counsel, he answered, turning tothe others also:

"In better days rope-dancing was the profession of yonder poor, coughingcreature. Now, after a severe accident, she is dragging herself throughlife on one foot. I once knew her, for I succeeded in saving her fromterrible disgrace. "

"And, " replied Wilibald Pirckheimer, "we would rather show kindness asecond and a third time to any one on whom we have be stowed a favourthan to render it once to a person from whom we have received one. Thisis my own experience. But the wise man must guard against nothing morecarefully than to exceed moderation in his charity. How easily, whenCaius sees Cnejus lavish gold where silver or copper would serve, hethinks of Martial's apt words: 'Who gives great gifts, expects greatgifts again. '--[Martial, Epigram 5, 59, 3. ]--Do not misunderstand me. What could yonder poor thing bestow that would please even a groom? Butthe eyes of suspicion scan even the past. I have often seen you openyour purse, friend Lienhard, and this is right. Whoever hath ought togive, and my dead mother used to say that: 'No one ever became a beggarby giving at the proper time. '"

"And life is gladdened by what one gives to another, " remarked ConradPeutinger, the learned Augsburg city clerk, who valued his Padua title ofdoctor more than that of an imperial councillor. "It applies to alldepartments. Don't allow yourself to regret your generosity, friendLienhard. 'Nothing becomes man better than the pleasure of giving, ' saysTerentius. --[Terenz. Ad. 360]--Who is more liberal than the destinywhich adorns the apple tree that is to bear a hundred fruits, with tenthousand blossoms to please our eyes ere it satisfies our appetite?"

"To you, if to any one, it gives daily proof of liberality in bothlearning and the affairs of life, " Herr Wilibald assented. 

"If you will substitute 'God, our Lord, ' for 'destiny, ' I agree withyou, " observed the Abbot of St. AEgidius in Nuremberg. 

The portly old prelate nodded cordially to Dr. Peutinger as he spoke. The warm, human love with which he devoted himself to the care of soulsin his great parish consumed the lion's share of his time and strength. He spent only his leisure hours in the study of the ancient writers, inwhom he found pleasure, and rejoiced in the work of the humanists withoutsharing their opinions. 

"Yes, my dear Doctor, " he continued in his deep voice, in a tone of themost earnest conviction, "if envy were ever pardonable, he who presumedto feel it toward you might most speedily hope to find forgiveness. There is no physical or mental gift with which the Lord has not blessedyou, and to fill the measure to overflowing, he permitted you to win abeautiful and virtuous wife of noble lineage. "

"And allowed glorious daughters to grow up in your famous home, " criedlittle Dr. Eberbach, waving his wineglass enthusiastically. "Who has notheard of Juliane Peutinger, the youngest of humanists, but no longer oneof the least eminent, who, when a child only four years old, addressedthe Emperor Maximilian in excellent Latin. But when, as in the childJuliane, the wings of the intellect move so powerfully and soprematurely, who would not think of the words of the superb Ovid: 'Thehuman mind gains victories more surely than lances and arrows. '"

But, ere he had finished the verse which, like many another Latin one, he mingled with his German words, he noticed Lienhard Groland eagerlymotioning to him to stop. The latter knew only too well what had not yetreached the ears of Eberbach in Vienna. The marvellous child, whoseprecocious learning he had just extolled as a noble gift of Providence tothe father, was no longer among the living. Her bright eyes had closedere she reached maidenhood. 

Dr. Eberbach, in painful embarrassment, tried to apologize for hisheedlessness, but the Augsburg city clerk, with a friendly gesture, endeavoured to soothe his young fellow-scholar. 

"It brought the true nature of happiness very vividly before all oureyes, " he remarked with a faint sigh. "In itself it is not lasting. Asecond piece of good fortune is needed to maintain the first. Mine wasindeed great and beautiful enough. But we will let the dead rest. Whatmore have you heard concerning the first books of the Annales of Tacitus, said to have been discovered in the Corvey monastery? If the reportshould be verified----"

Here Eberbach, delighted to find an opportunity to afford the honouredman whom he had unwittingly grieved a little pleasure, eagerlyinterrupted. Hurriedly thrusting his hand into the breast of his blackdoublet, he drew forth several small sheets on which he had succeeded incopying the beginning of the precious new manuscript, and handed them toPeutinger, who, with ardent zeal, instantly became absorbed in the almostillegible characters of his young comrade in learning. WilibaldPirckheimer and Lienhard Groland also frequently forgot the fresh salmonand young partridges, which were served in succession, to share thisbrilliant novelty. The Abbot of St. AEgidius, too, showed his pleasurein the fortunate discovery, and did not grow quieter until theconversation turned upon the polemical writing which Reuchlin had justfinished. It had recently appeared in Frankfort under the title: The EyeMirror, and assailed with crushing severity those who blamed him foropposing the proposal to destroy the books of the Jews. 

"What in the world do we care about the writings of the Hebrews?" thedeep bass voice of Hans von Obernitz here interrupted the conversation. "A new Latin manuscript--that I value! But has this noble fragment ofTacitus created half as much stir as this miserable dispute?"

"There is more at stake, " said Lienhard Groland positively. "The Jewishwritings merely serve as a pretext for the Cologne inquisitors to attackthe great Reuchlin. He, the most profound and keenest student of thenoble Greek tongue, who also forced the venerable language in which theOld Testament speaks to discourse to us Germans--"

"The Hebrew!" cried Hans von Obernitz impatiently, passing his napkinover his thick moustache; "what do we want of it? How can a sagaciousman plunge into such annoyances on its account?"

"Because the excess of liberty which you gentlemen grant to the humanintellect blinds him, " observed the abbot. "His learning would throw thedoors wide open to heresy. The Scriptures are true. On them Tungern andKollin, whom you mention, rely. In the original Hebrew text they will begiven up to every one who wishes to seek an interpretation----"

"Then a new bridge will be built for truth, " declared the littleThuringian with flashing eyes. 

"The Cologne theologians hold a different opinion, " replied the abbot. 

"Because the Grand Inquisitor and his followers--Tungern, Kollin, andwhatever the rest may be called--are concerned about some thing verydifferent from the noblest daughter of Heaven, " said Lienhard Groland, and the other gentlemen assented. "You yourself, my lord abbot, admittedto me on the ride here that it angered you, too, to see the CologneDominicans pursue the noble scholar 'with such fierce hatred and bitterstings. '"--[Virgil, Aeneid, xi. 837. ]

"Because conflict between Christians always gives me pain, " replied theabbot. 

But here Dr. Eberbach impetuously broke in upon the conversation:

"For the sake of a fair woman Ilion suffered unspeakable tortures. But to us a single song of Homer is worth more than all these Hebrewwritings. And yet a Trojan war of the intellect has been kindledconcerning them. Here freedom of investigation, yonder with Hoogstratenand Tungern, fettering of the mind. Among us, the ardent yearning tohold aloft the new light which the revival of learning is kindling, yonder superior force is struggling to extinguish it. Here the rule ofthe thinking mind, in whose scales reason and counter-argument decide thematter; among the Cologne people it is the Grand Inquisitor's jailers, chains, dungeons, and the stake. "

"They will not go so far, " replied the abbot soothingly. "True, both thefront and the back stairs are open to the Dominicans in Rome. "

"Yet where should humanism find more zealous friends than in that veryplace, among the heads of the Church?" asked Dr. Peutinger. "From theTiber, I hope----"

Here he paused, for the new guest who had just entered the room attractedhis attention also. The landlord of The Blue Pike respectfully precededhim and ushered him directly to the Nuremberg party, while he requestedthe Dominican monks who accompanied him to wait. 

The late arrival was Prof. Arnold von Tungern, dean of the theologicalfaculty at the University of Cologne. This gentleman had just beenmentioned with the greatest aversion at the table he was now approaching, and his arrogant manner did little to lessen it. 

Nevertheless, his position compelled the Nuremberg dignitaries to invitehim to share their meal, which was now drawing to a close. The Colognetheologian accepted the courtesy with a patronizing gesture, as if itwere a matter of course. Nay, after he had taken his seat, he orderedthe landlord, as if he were the master, to see that this and that thingin the kitchen was not forgotten. 

Unwelcome as his presence doubtless was to his table companions, assympathizers with Reuchlin and other innovators, well as he doubtlessremembered their scornful attacks upon his Latin--he was a man tomaintain his place. So, with boastful self-conceit, allowing no one elsean opportunity to speak, he at once began to complain of the fatigues ofthe journey and to mention, with tiresome detail, the eminent personswhom he had met and who had treated him like a valued friend. The veinon the little doctor's high forehead swelled with wrath as he listened tothis boastful chatter, which did not cease until the first dish wasserved. To brave him, Eberbach turned the conversation to humanism, itsredeeming power over minds, and its despicable foes. His scornful jestsbuzzed around his enemy like a swarm of gnats; but Arnold von Tungernpretended not to hear them. Only now and then a tremor of the mouth, ashe slowly chewed his food, or a slight raising of the eye-brows, betrayedthat one shaft or another had not wholly missed its mark. 

The older gentlemen had sometimes interrupted the Thuringian, to try tochange the conversation, but always in vain, and the guest from Colognevouchsafed them only curt, dry answers. 

Not until a pause occurred between two courses did von Tungern alter hismanner. Then, like an inquisitor who has succeeded in convicting theperson accused, he leaned back in his chair with a satisfied, long-drawn"So-o, " wiped his moist chin, and began:

"You have showed me your state of mind plainly enough, my young HerrDoctor. Your name is Eberbach, if I am not mistaken. We will rememberit at a fitting opportunity. But, pugnaciously as your loud voicesummons to the strife, it will never destroy the sacred and venerablethings which are worthy to endure. Thanks to the foundation of rockwhich supports them, and the watchfulness of their defenders, they willstand firmer than the walls of Jericho, whose fate you doubtless wish tobestow upon them. But you, my valued friends"--here he turned to theenvoys--"who stand at the head of communities whose greatness is foundedupon their ancient order and system, beware of opening your ears and yourgates to the siren song and fierce outcries of the innovators andagitators. "

"Thanks for the counsel, " replied Wilibald Pirckheimer, with repellentcoldness; but Arnold von Tungern pretended to consider the humanist'sreply an assent, and, nodding approvingly, continued:

"How could you help exclaiming, with us and the pagan Ovid, 'We praisethe ancients!' And this is merely saying that what time has tested andmade venerable is the best. "--[Ovid. Fast. , 1, 225. ]

Here Doctor Peutinger tried to interrupt him, but the other cut him shortwith an arrogant wave of the hand, and in an instructive tone beganagain:

"The honourable Council of Nuremberg--so I am informed--set apraiseworthy example several years ago. There was a youthful member ofone of your patrician families--an Ebner, I believe, or a Stromer orTucher. He had imbibed in Padua mistaken ideas which, unhappily, areheld in high esteem by many from whom we should expect more discernment. So it chanced that when he returned home he ventured to contract a formalbetrothal with an honourable maiden of noble lineage, against theexplicit desire of her distinguished parents. The rebellious youth wastherefore summoned before a court of justice, and, on account of hisreckless offence and wanton violation of custom and law, banished fromthe city and sentenced to pay a fine----"

"A punishment which I endured calmly, Herr Professor, " interruptedLienhard Groland, "for I myself was that 'rebellious youth. ' Besides, it was by no means the teachings of humanism which led me to an act thatyou, learned sir, doubtless regard with sterner eyes than the Christiancharity which your clerical garb made me expect would permit. "

These words fell, with the winning earnestness peculiar to him, from thelips of the young man who, at a time when he cared for no other womanthan his new-made bride, had seen in the poor, endangered rope-dancer ahuman being worthy of aid. Only his fiery dark eyes met the professor'ssternly enough. 

The latter was still seeking a fitting reply, when the folding doors ofthe room were thrown wide open, and a belated party of travellersentered. They came opportunely, for they afforded a timely excuse towithhold an answer without attracting notice; yet at the head of the newguests of The Blue Pike was his Cologne colleague Conrad Kollin, who wasfollowed, as he himself had been, by a number of Dominican friars. 

Tungern, of course, went to greet him, and this made it easy to part fromhis table companions in a manner that aroused no comment; for whileKollin was surrounded and respectfully welcomed by the Dominican friarsand many other travellers, the humanists left the house. 

CHAPTER III. 

Dietel did not lose sight of the envoys. After whispering together ashort time they had risen and gone out. At the door the Abbot of St. AEgidius left them to greet Professor Kollin, and, with the easy kindnesscharacteristic of him, to say that the room had become too warm for theother gentlemen. They presented their compliments to the distinguishedcitizen of Cologne, and placed their table at the service of thenewcomer. 

Dietel's sharp ears had enabled him to catch these words; but then he wasobliged to move again, a table had to be set outside the house for theNuremberg travellers and their companions, and jugs of wine must befilled for them. 

Then he was called back to the taproom. While the landlord of The Pikewas serving a fresh meal to Professor Kollin at the table vacated by theNuremberg dignitaries, and Arnold von Tungern was emptying the full vialsof his wrath upon the little doctor and the whole body of humanists, theNuremberg travellers and their guests were now conversing freely, as ifrelieved from a nightmare, upon the topics which most deeply interestedthem. 

Dietel would far rather have served the Cologne theologians, whom heregarded as the appointed defenders of the true faith, than theinsignificant folk at the other tables who had just finished their meal. 

How unmannerly their behaviour was! Better wine had been served beforedessert, and they now shouted and sang so loudly and so out of tunethat the air played by the strolling musicians could scarcely bedistinguished. Many a table, too, groaned under blows from the clinchedfist of some excited reveller. Every one seemed animated by a singledesire-to drink again and again. 

Now the last pieces of bread and the cloths were removed from the tables. The carousers no longer needed Dietel. He could leave the task offilling the jugs to his young assistants. 

What were the envoys outside doing? They were well off. In here theatmosphere was stifling from the fumes emanating from the throng ofpeople, the wine, and the food. It seemed to draw all the flies from farand near. Whence did they come? They seemed to have increased bythousands since the early morning, when the room was empty. The outsideair appeared delightful to breathe. He longed to fill his lungs againwith the pure wind of heaven, and at the same time catch a few words ofthe conversation between the envoys to the Reichstag. 

So Dietel hobbled to the open window, where the strollers were resting. 

Cyriax was lying on the floor asleep, with the brandy bottle in his arms. Two of his companions, with their mouths wide open, were snoring at hisside. Raban, who begged for blood-money, was counting the copper coinswhich he had received. Red-haired Gitta was sewing another patch ofcloth upon her rough husband's already well-mended jerkin by the dimlight of a small lamp, into which she had put some fat and a bit of ragfor a wick. It was difficult to thread the needle. Had it not been forthe yellow blaze of the pitchpans fastened to the wall with iron clamps, which had already been burning an hour, she could scarcely havesucceeded. 

"Make room there, " the waiter called to the vagrants, giving the sleepingJungel a push with his club foot. The latter grasped his crutch, as hehad formerly seized the sword he carried as a foot soldier ere he losthis leg before Padua. Then, with a Spanish oath learned in theNetherlands, he turned over, still half asleep, on his side. So Dietelfound room, and, after vainly looking for Kuni among the others, gazedout at the starlit sky. 

Yonder, in front of the house, beside the tall oleanders which grew inwine casks cut in halves instead of in tubs, the learned and aristocraticgentlemen sat around the table with outstretched heads, examining by thelight of the torches the pages which Dr. Eberbach drew forth, one afteranother, from the inexhaustible folds of the front of his black robe. 

Dietel, the schoolmaster's son, who had once sat on the bench with thepupils of the Latin class, pricked up his cars; he heard foreign wordswhich interested him like echoes of memories of his childhood. He didnot understand them, yet he liked to listen, for they made him think ofhis dead father. He had always meant kindly, but he had been a morose, deeply embittered man. How pitilessly he had flogged him and the otherboys with hazel rods. And he would have been still harsher and sternerbut for his mother's intercession. 

A pleasant smile hovered around his lips as he remembered her. Insteadof continuing to listen to the Greek sentences which Herr WilibaldPirckheimer was reading aloud to the others, he could not help thinkingof the pious, gentle little woman who, with her cheerful kindness, sowell understood how to comfort and to sustain courage. She never railedor scolded; at the utmost she only wiped her eyes with her apron when thefarmers of his little native town in Hesse sent to the schoolmaster, forthe school tax, grain too bad for bread, hay too sour for the threegoats, and half-starved fowls. 

He thoughtfully patted the plump abdomen which, thanks to the fleshpotsof The Blue Pike, had grown so rotund in his fifteen years of service. 

"It pays better to provide for people's bodies than for their brains, " hesaid to himself. "The Nuremberg and Augsburg gentlemen outside are richfolk's children. For them learning is only the raisins, almonds, andcitron in the cake; knowledge agrees with them better than it did with myfather. He was the ninth child of respectable stocking weavers, but, asthe pastor perceived that he was gifted with special ability, his parentstook a portion of their savings to make him a scholar. The tuition feeand the boy were both confided to a Beanus--that is, an older pupil, whoasserted that he understood Latin--in order that he might look after theinexperienced little fellow and help him out of school as well as in. But, instead of using for his protigee the florins intrusted to him, theBeanus shamefully squandered the money saved for a beloved child by somany sacrifices. While he feasted on roast meat and wine, the little boyplaced in his charge went hungry. " Whenever, in after years, the old mandescribed this time of suffering, his son listened with clinched fists, and when Dietel saw a Beanus at The Blue Pike snatch the best pieces fromthe child in his care, he interfered in his behalf sternly enough. Nay, he probably brought to him from the kitchen, on his own account, a pieceof roast meat or a sausage. Many of the names which fell from the moistlips of the gentlemen outside--Lucian and Virgil, Ovid and Seneca, Homerand Plato--were perfectly familiar to him. The words the little doctorwas reading must belong to their writings. How attentively the otherslistened! Had not Dietel run away from the monks' school at Fulda he, too, might have enjoyed the witticisms of these sages, or even beenpermitted to sit at the same table with the great lights of the Churchfrom Cologne. 

Now it was all over with studying. 

And yet--it could not be so very serious a matter, for Doctor Eberbachhad just read something aloud at which the young Nuremberg ambassador, Lienhard Groland, could not help laughing heartily. It seemed to amusethe others wonderfully, too, and even caused the astute Dr. Peutinger tostrike his clinched fist upon the table with the exclamation, "A devil ofa fellow!" and Wilibald Pirckheimer to assent eagerly, praising Hutten'sardent love for his native land and courage in battling for itselevation; but this Hutten whom he so lauded was the ill-advised scion ofthe knightly race that occupied Castle Steckelberg in his Hessian home, whom he knew well. The state of his purse was evident from the fact thatthe landlord of The Pike had once been obliged to detain him because hecould not pay the bill--though it was by no means large--in any othercoin than merry tales. 

But even the best joke of the witty knight would have failed to produceits effect on the listening waiter just now; for the gentlemen outsidewere again discussing the Reuchlin controversy, and in doing so utteredsuch odious words about the Cologne theologians, whom Dietel knew asgodly gentlemen who consumed an ample supply of food, that he grew hotand cold by turns. He was a good man who would not hurt a fly. Yet, when he heard things and opinions which his mother had taught him to holdsacred assailed, he could become as angry as a savage brute. The littleimpious blasphemer Eberbach, especially, he would have been more thanready to lash with the best hazel rod which he had ever cut for his deadfather. But honest anger affords a certain degree of enjoyment, so itwas anything rather than agreeable to him to be called away. 

The feather curler and his table companions wanted Kitzing wine, but itwas in the cellar, and a trip there would have detained him too long fromhis post of listener. So he turned angrily back into the room, and toldthe business men that princes, bishops, and counts were satisfied withthe table wine of The Blue Pike, which had been already served to them, and the sceptre and crozier were of more importance than their twistedfeathers. "Those are not the wisest people, " he added sagely, "whodespise what is good to try to get better. So stick to the excellentBlue Pike wine and say no more about it!"

Without waiting for an answer from the astonished guests, he limped backto his window to resume his listening. The conversation, however, hadalready taken a new turn, for Dr. Peutinger was describing the Romanmonument which he had had put up in the courtyard of his Augsburg house, but, as this interested Dietel very little, he soon turned his attentionto the high road, whence a belated guest might still come to The BluePike. 

The landlady's little kitchen garden lay between it and the river Main, and there--no, it was no deception--there, behind the low hawthorn hedge, a human figure was moving. 

One of the vagabonds had certainly slipped into the garden to steal fruitor vegetables, or even honey from the bee hives. An unprecedentedoffence! Dietel's blood boiled, for the property of The Blue Pike wasas dear to him as his own. 

With prompt decision he went through the entry into the yard, where hemeant to unchain the butcher's dog to help him chase the abominablerobber. But some time was to elapse ere he could execute thispraiseworthy intention; for before he could cross the threshold thelandlord of The Pike appeared, berated him, and ordered him to be morecivil in the performance of his duties. The words were intended less forthe waiter than for the feather dealer and his friends. 

The latter had complained of Dietel to the landlord of The Pike, and, after he had received a reproof, they punished him for his rudeness byordering him to fetch one jug of wine from the cellar after another. Atlast, when, with many a malediction, he had brought up the fifth, histormentors released him, but then the best time was lost. Neverthelesshe continued the pursuit and entered the little garden with the dog, butthe thief had fled. 

After assuring himself of this fact he stood still, rubbing his narrowforehead with the tips of his fingers. 

The rogue was most probably one of the vagrants, and like a flash itentered his mind that the ropedancer, Kuni, who in her prosperous days, instead of eating meat and vegetables, preferred to satisfy her appetitewith fruits and sweet dainties, might be the culprit. Besides, when hehad looked around among the guests just before, she was no longer withthe other vagabonds. 

Certain of having found the right trail, he instantly went to the windowbelow which the strollers lay, thrust his head into the room from theoutside, and waked the wife of the tongueless swearer. She had fallenasleep on the floor with the sewing in her hand. The terror with whichshe started up at his call bore no favourable testimony to her goodconscience, but she had already recovered her bold unconcern when heimperiously demanded to know what had become of lame Kuni. 

"Ask the other travellers--the soldiers, the musicians, the monks, foraught I care, " was the scornful, irritating answer. But when Dietelangrily forbade such insolent mockery, she cried jeeringly:

"Do you think men don't care for her because she has lost her foot andhas that little cough? You ought to know better. 

"Master Dieter has a sweetheart for every finger, though the lower partof his own body isn't quite as handsome as it might be. "

"On account of my foot?" the waiter answered spitefully. "You'll soonfind that it knows how to chase. Besides, the Nuremberg city soldierswill help me in the search. If you don't tell me at once where the girlwent--by St. Eoban, my patron----"

Here red-haired Gitta interrupted him in a totally different tone; sheand her companions had nothing good to expect from the city soldiers. 

In a very humble manner she protested that Kuni was an extraordinarilycharitable creature. In a cart standing in the meadow by the highroadlay the widow of a beggar, Nickel; whom the peasants had hung on accountof many a swindling trick. A goose and some chickens had strayed off tohis premises. The woman had just given birth to twins when Nickel washung, and she was now in a violent fever, with frequent attacks ofconvulsions, and yet had to nurse the infants. The landlady of The Pikehad sent her some broth and a little milk for the children. As for Kuni, she had gone to carry some linen from her own scanty store to the twobabies, who were as naked as little frogs. He would find her with thesick mother. 

All this flowed from Gitta's lips with so much confidence that Dietel, whose heart was easily touched by such a deed of charity, though he by nomeans put full confidence in her, allowed himself to be induced to letthe city soldiers alone for the present and test the truth of her strangestatement himself. 

So he prepared to go in search of the cart, but the landlord of The Pikemet him at the door, and, angrily asking what ailed him that day, orderedhim to fetch the Erbach, more of which was wanted inside. Dietel wentdown into the cellar again, but this time he was not to leave it sospeedily, for the apprentice of a Nuremberg master shoemaker, whoseemployer was going to the Frankfort fair with his goods, and who madecommon cause with the feather dealer, stole after Dietel, and of his ownvolition, for his own pleasure, locked him in. The good Kitzing wine hadstrengthened his courage. Besides, experience taught him that an offencewould be more easily pardoned the more his master himself disliked theperson against whom it was committed. 

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Arrogant wave of the hand, and in an instructive toneHonest anger affords a certain degree of enjoymentOvid, 'We praise the ancients'Pays better to provide for people's bodies than for their brainsWho gives great gifts, expects great gifts againWho watches for his neighbour's faults has a hundred sharp eyes

IN THE BLUE PIKE

By Georg Ebers

Volume 2. 

CHAPTER IV. 

The ropedancer, Kuni, really had been with the sick mother and her babes, and had toiled for them with the utmost diligence. 

The unfortunate woman was in great distress. 

The man who had promised to take her in his cart to her native village ofSchweinfurt barely supported himself and his family by the tricks of histrained poodles. He made them perform their very best feats in thetaverns, under the village lindens, and at the fairs. But the childrenwho gazed at the four-footed artists, though they never failed to givehearty applause, frequently paid in no other coin. He would gladly havehelped the unfortunate woman, but to maintain the wretched mother and hertwins imposed too heavy a burden upon the kind-hearted vagabond, and hehad withdrawn his aid. 

Then the ropedancer met her. True, she herself was in danger of beingleft lying by the wayside; but she was alone, and the mother had herchildren. These were two budding hopes, while she had nothing more toexpect save the end--the sooner the better. There could be no newhappiness for her. 

And yet, to have found some one who was even more needy than she, liftedher out of herself, and to have power to be and do something in herbehalf pleased her, nay, even roused an emotion akin to that which, inbetter days, she had felt over a piece of good fortune which othersenvied. Perhaps she herself might be destined to die on the highway, without consolation, the very next day; but she could save this unhappywoman from it, and render her end easier. Oh, how rich Lienhard's goldcoins made her! Yet if, instead of three, there had been as many dozens, she would have placed the larger portion in the twins' pillows. How itmust soothe their mother's heart! Each one was a defence against hungerand want. Besides, the gold had been fairly burning her hand. It camefrom Lienhard. Had it not been for Cyriax and the crowd of people in theroom, she would have made him take it back--she alone knew why. 

How did this happen?

Why did every fibre of her being rebel against receiving even thesmallest trifle from the man to whom she would gladly have given thewhole world? Why, after she had summoned up courage and approachedLienhard to restore his gift, had she felt such keen resentment andbitter suffering when the landlord of The Blue Pike stopped her?

As she now seized his gold, it seemed as though she saw Lienhard beforeher. She had already told Cyriax how she met the aristocratic Nurembergpatrician, a member of the ancient and noble Groland family, whom hisnative city had now made an ambassador so young. But what secretly boundher to him had never passed her lips. 

Once in her life she had felt something which placed her upon an equalfooting with the best and purest of her sex--a great love for one fromwhom she asked nothing, nothing at all, save to be permitted to think ofhim and to sacrifice everything, everything for him--even life. Sostrange had been the course of this love, that people would have doubtedher sanity or her truthfulness had she described it to them. 

While standing before St. Sebald's church in Nuremberg, the vision of theyoung Councillor's bride at first made a far stronger impression upon hermind than his own. Then her gaze rested on Lienhard. As he had chosenthe fairest of women, the bride had also selected the tallest, moststately, and certainly the best and wisest of men. During herimprisonment the image of this rare couple had been constantly beforeher. Not until, through the young husband's intercession, she hadregained her liberty, after he prevented her kissing his hand and, to soothe her, had stroked her hair and cheeks in the magistrate's room, did the most ardent gratitude take possession of her soul. From thisemotion, which filled heart and mind, a glowing wealth of other feelingshad blossomed like buds upon a rosebush. Everything in her nature hadattracted her toward him, and the desire to devote herself to him, bodyand soul, shed the last drop of blood in her heart for him, completelyruled her. His image rose before her day and night, sometimes alone, sometimes with his beautiful bride. Not only to him, but to her also shewould joyfully have rendered the most menial service, merely to be nearthem and to be permitted to show that the desire to prove her gratitudehad become the object of her life. 

When, with good counsel for the future, he dismissed her from the chiefmagistrate's room, he had asked her where she was to be found in case heshould have anything to say to her. It seemed as though, from mingledalarm and joy, her heart would stop beating. If her lodgings, instead ofan insignificant tavern, had been her own palace, she would gladly haveopened all its gates to him, yet a feverish thrill ran through her limbsat the thought that he might seek her among her vagabond companions, andask in return for his kindness what he would never have presumed to seekhad she been the child of reputable parents, yet which, with mingledanger and happiness, she resolved not to refuse. 

During the day and the night when she expected his visit, she had becomeaware that she, who had never cared for any man save for the gifts hebestowed, was fired with love for Lienhard. Such ardent yearning couldtorture only a loving heart, yet what she felt was very unlike the lovewith which she was familiar in songs, and had seen in other girls; forshe by no means thought with jealous rancour of the woman to whom hebelonged, body and soul--his beautiful wife. It rather seemed to herthat she was his, and he would no longer be the same if he were separatedfrom her, nay, as if her very love was hers also. When she heard a noiseoutside of her little room she started, and eagerly as she yearned to seehim, blissful as she thought it must be to sink upon his breast and offerhim her lips to kiss, the bold ropedancer, who never cared for theopinions of others, could not shake off, even for a moment, the fear ofwronging the fair wife who had a better right to him. Instead of hatingher, or even wishing to share the heart of the man she loved with hisbride, she shrank from the approaching necessity of clouding her younghappiness as though it were the direst misfortune. Yet she felt that itsprevention lay, not in her own hands, but in those of Fate. Should itplease Destiny to lead Lienhard to her and inspire him with a desire forher love, all resistance, she knew, would be futile. So she began torepeat several paternosters that he might remain away from her. But heryearning was so great that she soon desisted, and again and again went tothe window with a fervent wish that he might come. 

In the terrible tumult of her heart she had forgotten to eat or to drinksince early morning, and at last, in the afternoon, some one knocked atthe door, and the landlady called her. 

While she was hurriedly smoothing her thick black hair and straighteningher best gown, which she had put on for him in the morning, she heard thehostess say that Herr Groland of the Council was waiting for herdownstairs. Every drop of blood left her glowing cheeks, and the kneeswhich never trembled on the rope shook as she descended the narrow steps. 

He came forward to meet her in the entry, holding out his hand with open-hearted frankness. How handsome and how good he was! No one wore thatlook who desired aught which must be hidden under the veil of darkness. Ere her excited blood had time to cool, he had beckoned to her to followhim into the street, where a sedan chair was standing. 

An elderly lady of dignified bearing looked out and met her eyes with apleasant glance. It was Frau Sophia, the widow of Herr Conrad Schurstabof the Council, one of the richest and most aristocratic noblewomen inthe city. Lienhard had told her about the charming prisoner who had beenreleased and begged her to help him bring her back to a respectable andorderly life. The lady needed an assistant who, now that it was hard forher to stoop, would inspect the linen closets, manage the poultry yard-her pride--and keep an eye on the children when they came to visit theirgrandmother. So she instantly accompanied Lienhard to the tavern, andKuni pleased her. But it would have been difficult not to feel somedegree of sympathy for the charming young creature who, in greatembarrassment, yet joyously as though released from a heavy burden, raised her large blue eyes to the kind stranger. 

It was cold in the street, and as Kuni had come out without any wrap, Frau Schurstab, in her friendly consideration, shortened the, conference. Lienhard Uroland had helped her with a few words, and when the sedanchair and the young Councillor moved down the street all the necessarydetails were settled. The vagrant had bound herself and assumed duties, though they were very light ones. She was to move that evening into thedistinguished widow's house, not as a servant, but as the old lady'sassistant. 

Loni, the manager of the company of rope-dancers, had watched thenegotiations from the taproom. During their progress each of the threewindows was filled with heads, but no one had been able to hear what waswhispered in the street. Just as the curious spectators were hoping thatnow they might perhaps guess what the aristocratic lady wanted with Kuni, the sedan chair began to move, and the young girl entered the hot room totell Loni that she would leave the company that day forever. 

"In-de-e-ed?" Loni asked in astonishment, lifting the gold circlet whichrested on his head. Then he passed his hand through the coal-black hairwhich, parted in the middle, fell in smooth strands upon his neck, andexerted all his powers of persuasion to convince her of the folly of herplan. After his arguments were exhausted he raised his voice louder. As usual, when excited by anger, he swung his lower right arm to and fro, feeling the prominent muscles with his left hand. But Kuni remainedresolute, and when be at last perceived that his opposition onlyincreased her obstinacy, he exclaimed:

"Then rush on to your destruction! The day will come when you will seewhere you belong. If only it doesn't arrive too late. A man growstwelve and a woman thirty-six months older every year. "

With these words he turned his back upon her, and the clown brought theamount of wages which was due. 

Many an eye grew dim with tears when Kuni bade farewell to hercompanions. Shortly after sunset she was welcomed to Frau Schurstab'shouse. 

The first greeting was friendly, and she received nothing but kindnessand indulgent treatment afterward. She had a sunny chamber of her own, and how large and soft her bed was! But while, when on the road withLoni's band, if they could reach no town, she had often slept soundly andsweetly on a heap of straw, here she spent one restless night afteranother. 

During the first a series of questions disturbed her slumber. Was itreally only the desire to take her from her vagabond life which hadinduced Lienhard to open this house to her? Did he not perhaps alsocherish the wish to keep her near him? He had certainly come to her withFrau Schurstab to protect her reputation. Had it not been so he mighthave left the matron at home; for Loni and everybody in the company knewthat she never troubled herself about gossip. Last year she had obtaineda leave of absence from Loni, who was making a tour of the little Franktowns, and spent the carnival season in revelry with a sergeant of theNurembreg soldiers. When the booty he had gained in Italy wassquandered, she gave him his dismissal. Her reputation among hercompanions was neither better nor worse than that of the other strollingplayers who, like her, were born on the highway, yet she was glad thatLienhard had tried to spare her. Or had he only come with the oldnoblewoman on account of his own fair name?

Perhaps--her pulses again throbbed faster at the thought--he had notventured to come alone because some feeling for her stirred in his ownheart, and, spite of his beautiful young wife, he did not feel safe fromher. Then Fran Schurstab was to serve as a shield. This conjectureflattered her vanity and reconciled her to the step which she had takenand already began to regret. 

But suppose he really felt no more for her than the forester who finds achild lost in the woods, and guides it into the right path? How wouldshe endure that? Yet, were it otherwise, if he was like the rest of men, if he profited by what her whole manner must betray to him, how shouldshe face his wife, who undoubtedly would soon come to call on her aunt?

All these questions roused a tumult of unprecedented violence in heryoung, ardent, inexperienced soul, which was renewed each successivenight. It became more and more difficult for her to understand why shehad left Loni's band and entered into relations for which she was notsuited, and in which she could never, never be at ease or feel happy. 

Nothing was lacking in this wealthy household, not even kindness andlove. Frau Sophia was indulgent and friendly, even when Kuni, whoseheart and brain were occupied with so many other thoughts, neglected orforgot anything. The matron's grandchildren, of whom she often hadcharge, soon became warmly attached to her. While among the rope-dancersshe had been fond of children, and many a little one who journeyed withthe band held out its arms to her more joyously than to its own mother. There was something in her nature that attracted them. Besides, herskilful hands could show them many a rare trick, and she could singnumerous songs new to the Schurstab boys and girls, which she had pickedup here and there. Then, too, she permitted many a prank which no oneelse would have allowed. Her duties connected with the household linenand the poultry yard, its owner's pride, were so easily performed, thatin her leisure hours she often voluntarily helped the housekeeper. Atfirst the latter eyed her askance, but she soon won her affection. Bothshe and her mistress showed her as much attention as the gardener bestowsupon a wild plant which he has transferred to good soil, where it thrivesunder his care. 

She kept aloof from the servants, and neither man nor maid molested her. Perhaps this was due to foolish arrogance, for after they had learnedfrom rumour that Kuni had danced on the tight rope, they consideredthemselves far superior. The younger maids timidly kept out of her way, and Kuni surpassed them in pride and looked down upon them, because herfree artist blood rebelled against placing herself on the plane of aservitor. She did not vouchsafe them a word, yet neither did she allowany of them to render her even the most trivial service. But she couldnot escape Seifried, the equerry of her mistress's eldest son. At first, according to her custom, she had roused the handsome fellow's hopes byfiery glances which she could not restrain. Now he felt that she caredfor him, and in his honest fashion offered to make her his beloved wife;but she refused his suit, at first kindly, then angrily. As he stillpersisted she begged the housekeeper, though she saw that matchmaking washer delight, to keep him away. 

Even in March Frau Sophia thanked Lienhard for the new inmate of herhousehold, who far exceeded her expectations. In April her praise becamestill warmer, only she regretted that Kuni's pretty face was losing itsfresh colour and her well-formed figure its roundness. She was sorry, too, that she so often seemed lost in thought, and appeared less merrywhile playing with the children. 

Lienhard and his young wife excused the girl's manner. Comfortable asshe was now, she was still a prisoned bird. It would be unnatural, nay, suspicious, if she did not sometimes long for the old freedom and herformer companions. She would also remember at times the applause of themultitude. The well-known Loni, her former employer, had besought him towin her back to his company, complaining loudly of her loss, because itwas difficult to replace her with an equally skilful young artist. Itwas now evident how mistaken the juggler had been when he asserted thatKuni, who was born among vagrants, would never live in a respectablefamily. He, Lienhard, had great pleasure in knowing that the girl, onthe road to ruin, had been saved by Frau Sophia's goodness. 

Lienhard's father had died shortly after Kuni entered her new home. Every impulse to love dalliance, she felt, must shrink before this greatsorrow. The idea sustained her hopes. She could not expect him to seekher again until the first bitterness of grief for the loss of thisbeloved relative had passed away. She could wait, and she succeeded indoing so patiently. 

But week after week went by and there was no change in his conduct. Thena great anxiety overpowered her, and this did not escape his notice; forone day, while his young wife hung on his arm and added a few brief wordsof sympathy, he asked Kuni if she was ill or if she needed anything; butshe answered curtly in the negative and hurried into the garden, wherethe children, with merry shouts, were helping the gardener to free thebeds of crocuses and budding tulips from the pine boughs which hadprotected them from the frosts of winter. 

Another sleepless night followed this incident. It was useless todeceive herself. She might as well mistake black for white as to believethat Lienhard cared for her. To no one save his fair young wife would hegrant even the smallest ray of the love of which he was doubtlesscapable, and in which she beheld the sun that dispensed life and light. She had learned this, for he had often met her in Frau Sophia's housesince his father's funeral. The child of the highway had never beentaught to conceal her feelings and maintain timid reserve. Her eyes hadtold him eloquently enough, first her deep sympathy, and afterward theemotions which so passionately stirred her heart. Had the feelings whichher glances were intended to reveal passed merely for the ardentgratitude of an impassioned soul?

Gratitude! For what?

His lukewarm interest had tempted her from a free, gay life, full ofconstant excitement, into the oppressive, wearisome monotony of thisquiet house, where she was dying of ennui. How narrow, how petty, howtiresome everything seemed, and what she had bartered for it was theworld, the whole wide, wide world. As the chicken lured the fox, thehope of satisfying the fervent longing of her heart, though even once andfor a few brief moments, had brought her into the snare. But the firewhich burned within had not been extinguished. An icy wind had fannedthe flames till they blazed higher and higher, threatening herdestruction. 

Frau Schurstab had made her attend church and go to the confessional. But the mass, whose meaning she did not understand, offered no solace tothe soul which yearned for love alone. Besides, it wearied her to remainso long in the same place, and the confession forced the girl, who hadnever shrunk from honestly expressing what she felt, into deception. Thepriest to whom she was taken was a frequent visitor at the Schurstabhouse, and she would have died ere she would have confided to him thesecret of her heart. Besides, to her the feeling which animated her wasno sin. She had not summoned it. It had taken possession of her againsther will and harmed no one except herself, not even the wife who was sosure of her husband. How could she have presumed to dispute with her thepossession of Herr Lienhard's love? Yet it seemed an insult that FrauKatharina had no fear that she could menace her happiness. Could theformer know that Kuni would have been content with so little--a tenderimpulse of his heart, a kiss, a hasty embrace? That would do the otherno injury. In the circles whence she had been brought no one grudgedanother such things. How little, she thought, would have been taken fromthe wealthy Katharina by the trifling gift which would have restored toher happiness and peace. The fact that Lienhard, though he never failedto notice her, would not understand, and always maintained the samepleasant, aristocratic reserve of manner, she sometimes attributed tofear, sometimes to cruelty, sometimes to arrogance; she would not believethat he saw in her only a person otherwise indifferent to him, whom hewished to accustom to the mode of life which he and his friends believedto be the right path, pleasing in the sight of God. Love, femininevanity, the need of approval, her own pride--all opposed this view. 

When the last snow of winter had melted, and the spring sunshine of Aprilwas unfolding the green leafage and opening bright flowers in themeadows, the hedges, the woods, and the gardens, she found the new homewhich she had entered during the frosts of February, and whose solidwalls excluded every breath of air, more and more unendurable. A gnawingfeeling of homesickness for the free out-of-door life, the wandering fromplace to place, the careless, untrammelled people to whom she belonged, took possession of her. She felt as though everything which surroundedher was too small, the house, the apartments, her own chamber, nay, hervery clothing. Only the hope of the first token that Lienhard was not socold and unconquerable as he seemed, that she would at last constrain himto pass the barrier which separated them, still detained her. 

Then came the day when, to avoid answering his question whether sheneeded anything, she had gone into the garden. Before reaching thechildren, who were playing among the crocuses and tulips, she had saidto herself that she must leave this house--it was foolish, nay mad, tocontinue to cherish the hope which had brought her hither. She wouldsuffer keenly in tearing it from her heart, but a wild delight seized herat the thought that this imprisonment would soon be over, that she wouldbe free once more, entirely her own mistress, released from everyrestraint and consideration. How rapturous was the idea that she wouldsoon be roving through the fields and woods again with gay, recklesscompanions! Was there anything more pleasurable than to forget herself, and devote her whole soul to the execution of some difficult anddangerous feat, to attract a thousand eyes by her bewitching grace, and, sustained by her enthusiasm, force a thousand hearts to throb anxiouslyand give loud applause as she flew over the rope?

Never had the children seen her more extravagantly gay than after herresolve to leave them. Yet when, at a late hour, Kuni went to bed, theold housekeeper heard her weeping so piteously in her chamber that sherose to ask what had happened. But the girl did not even open her door, and declared that she had probably had the nightmare. 

During the next few days she sometimes appeared more cheerful and docile, sometimes more dull and troubled than her household companions had everseen her. Frau Schurstab shook her head over her protegee's varyingmoods. But when the month of May began, and Lienhard told his aunt thatLoni, who had only remained in Nuremberg during Lent to spend the timewhen all public performances were prohibited, had applied to the Councilfor permission to give exhibitions with his company Easter week in theHaller Meadows, the matron was troubled about her protegee's peace ofmind. Her nephew had had the same thought, and advised her to move toher country estate, that Kuni might see and hear nothing of the jugglers;but she had noticed the clown with other members of the company, as theypassed through the streets on foot and mounted on horses and donkeys, inviting the people, with blare of trumpets and beating of drums, towitness the wonderful feats which Loni's famous band of artists wouldperform. 

Then Kuni packed her bundle. But when she heard the next morning that, before going to the country, Frau Schurstab would attend the christeningof her youngest grandson, and spend the whole day with the daughter whowas the little boy's mother, she untied it. 

One sunny May morning she was left alone, as she had expected. She couldnot be invited to the ceremony with the other guests, and she would notjoin the servants. The housekeeper and most of the men and maids hadaccompanied their mistress to help in the kitchen and to wait upon thevisitors. Deep silence reigned throughout the great empty house, butKuni's heart had never throbbed so loudly. If Lienhard came now, herfate would be decided, and she knew that he must come. Just before noon, he really did rap with the knocker on the outer door. He wanted thechristening gift, which Frau Schurstab had forgotten to take for theinfant. The money was in the chest in the matron's room. Kuni led theway. The house seemed to reel around her as she went up the stairsbehind him. The next moment, she felt, must decide her destiny. 

Now he laid his hand upon the doorknob, now he opened the door. Thewidow's chamber was before her. Thick silk curtains shut out the brightMay sunshine from the quiet room. How warm and pleasant it was!

She already saw herself in imagination kneeling by his side before thechest to help him search. While doing so, his fingers might touch hers, perhaps her hair might brush against his. But, instead of entering, heturned to her with careless unconcern, saying:

"It is fortunate that I have found you alone. Will you do me a favour, girl?"

He had intended to ask her to help him prepare a surprise for his aunt. The day after to-morrow was Frau Sophia Schurstab's birthday. Early inthe morning she must find among her feathered favourites a pair of rareIndia fowls, which he had received from Venice. 

As Kuni did not instantly assent, because the wild tumult of her bloodparalyzed her tongue, he noticed her confusion, and in an encouragingtone, gaily continued:

"What I have to ask is not too difficult. " As he spoke he passed hishand kindly over her dark hair, just as he had done a few months beforein the Town Hall. 

Then the blood mounted to her brain. Clasping his right hand, beneathwhose touch she had just trembled, in both her own, she passionatelyexclaimed:

"Ask whatever you desire. If you wanted to trample my heart under yourfeet, I would not stir. "

A look of ardent love from her sparkling blue eyes accompanied the words;but he had withdrawn his hand in astonishment, and raised a lofty barrierbetween them by answering coldly and sternly, "Keep the heart and yourdainty self for the equerry Seifried who is an honest man. "

The advice, and the lofty austerity with which it was given, pierced Kunilike the thrust of a dagger. Yet she succeeded controlling herself, and, without a word reply, preceded the harsh man into the sleeping room andsilently, tearlessly, pointed the chest. When he had taken out themoney, she bowed hastily and ran down the stairs. 

Probably she heard him call her name more than three times; doubtless, afterward she fancied that she remembered how his voice had sounded inbeseeching, tender, at last even imperious tones through the emptycorridors; but she did not turn, and hurried into her room. 

CHAPTER V. 

When, on the evening of the christening day, Lienhard accompanied hisaunt home, Kuni was nowhere to be found. Frau Sophia discovered in herchamber every article of clothing which she had obtained for her, eventhe beaver cap, the prayer-book, and the rosary which she had given. The young burgomaster, at her request, went to the manager of the rope-dancers, Loni, the next morning, but the latter asserted that he knewnothing about the girl. The truth was that he had sent her to Wurzburgwith part of his company. 

From that time she had remained with the ropedancers. At first themaster had watched her carefully, that she might not run away again. Buthe soon perceived this to be unnecessary; for he had never found anymember of the company more zealous, or seen one make more progress in theart. Now the only point was to keep her out of the way of other rope-dancers, English proprietors of circus companies, as well as the numerousknights and gentlemen who tried to take her from him. Her name hadbecome famous. When the crier proclaimed that the "flying maiden" wouldascend the rope to the steeple, Loni was sure of a great crowd ofspectators. Among her own profession she had obtained the nickname ofcrazy Kuni. 

Yet even at that time, and in the midst of the freest intercourse withGerman, Spanish, and other officers in Flanders and Brabant, youngknights and light-hearted priests on the Rhine, the Main, the Danube, theWeser, and the Elbe, whose purses the pretty, vivacious girl, with theshining raven hair and bright blue eyes, the mistress of her art, seemedto their owners worthy to empty, she had by no means forgotten Lienhard. This wrought mischief to many a gay gentleman of aristocratic lineage inthe great imperial and commercial cities; for it afforded Kuni specialpleasure to try her power upon Lienhard's equals in rank. When she wenton with the company, more than one patrician had good reason to rememberher with regret; for she, who shared the lion's portion of her earningswith her companions or flung it to the poor, was insatiably avaricioustoward these admirers. 

The weaker she found many of them, the higher, in her opinion, rose theimage of him who had made her feel his manly strength of resistance socruelly. His stern, inexorable nature seemed to her worthy of hate, yetfor three whole years the longing for him scarcely left her heart atpeace an hour. 

During this whole period she had not met him. Not until after she hadcome to Augsburg, where Loni's company was to give several performancesbefore the assembled Reichstag, did she see him again. Once she evensucceeded in attracting his gaze, and this was done in a way whichafforded her great satisfaction. His beautiful wife, clad in costlyvelvet robes, was walking by his side with eyes decorously downcast; buthe had surely recognised her--there was no doubt of that. Yet he omittedto inform his wife, even by a look, whom he had met here. Kuni watchedthe proud couple a long time, and, with the keen insight of a lovingheart, told herself that he would have pointed her out to Frau Katharina, if he did not remember her in some way--either in kindness or in anger. 

This little discovery had sufficed to transfigure, as it were, the restof the day, and awaken a throng of new hopes and questions. 

Even now she did not desire to win Frau Katharina's husband from her. She freely acknowledged that the other's beauty was tenfold greater thanher own; but whether the gifts of love which the woman with thecloudless, aristocratic composure could offer to her husband were notlike the beggar's pence, compared with the overflowing treasure of ardentpassion which she cherished for Lienhard, was a question to which shebelieved there could be but a single answer. Was this lady, restrictedby a thousand petty scruples, as well as by her stiff, heavy gala robes, a genuine woman at all? Ah! if he would only for once cast aside thefoolish considerations which prevented him also from being a genuine man, clasp her, whom he knew was his own, in his arms, and hold her as long ashe desired, he should learn what a strong, free, fearless woman, whosepliant limbs were as unfettered as her heart, could bestow upon him towhom she gave all the love that she possessed! And he must wantsomething of her which was to be concealed from the wife. She could notbe mistaken. She had never been deceived in a presentiment that was sopositive. Ever since she reached Augsburg, an inner voice had told her--and old Brigitta's cards confirmed it--that the destiny of her life wouldbe decided here, and he alone held her weal and woe in his hand. 

Yet she had misinterpreted his conduct to his wife. In spite of thefinery which Kuni owed to the generosity of the Knight of Neckerfels, whowas then a suitor for her favour, Lienhard had recognised her. The sightrecalled their last meeting and its painful termination, and therefore hehad omitted to attract Frau Katharina's attention to her immediately. But, ere Kuni disappeared, he had repaired the oversight, and bothdesired to ascertain the fate of their former charge. True, the wishcould not be instantly fulfilled, for Lienhard's time and strength werewholly claimed by the mission intrusted to him by the Emperor and theCouncil. 

The next afternoon Kuni ascended the rope to the steeple in the presenceof many princes and dignitaries. Firmly as ever she moved along the ropestretched through the wooden stay behind her, holding the balancing poleas she went. The clapping of hands and shouts of applause with which thecrowd greeted "the flying maiden" led her to kiss her hand to the rightand the left, and bow to the stand which had been erected for the crownedheads, counts, nobles, and their wives. In doing so, she looked down atthe aristocratic spectators to ascertain whether the Emperor and oneother were among them. In spite of the height of the topmost window ofthe steeple where she stood, her keen eyes showed her that Maximilian'sseat was still vacant. As it was hung with purple draperies and richlygarlanded, the monarch was evidently expected. This pleased her, and herheart throbbed faster as she saw on the stand all the nobles who wereentitled to admittance to the lists of a tournament, and, in the frontrow, the man whose presence she most desired. At Lienhard's right sathis dazzlingly beautiful wife, adorned with plumes and the most superbgold ornaments; at his left was a maiden of extremely peculiar charm. According to years she was still a child, but her delicate, mobilefeatures had a mature expression, which sometimes gave her a precociousair of superiority. The cut of her white robe and the little laurelwreath on her brown curls reminded Kuni of the pagan Genius on an ancientwork of marble which she had seen in Verona. Neither the girl's age norher light, airy costume harmonized with her surroundings; for the maidsand matrons near her were all far beyond childhood, and wore the richestholiday costumes of heavy brocades and velvets. The huge puffs on theupper part of the sleeves touched the cheeks of many of the wearers, andthe lace ruffs on the stiff collars rendered it easy, it is true, tomaintain their aristocratic, haughty dignity, but prevented any free, swift movement. 

The young girl who, as Kuni afterward learned, was the daughter of ConradPeutinger, of Augsburg, whom she had again seen that day in The BluePike, was then eleven years old. She was sometimes thought to be fifteenor even sixteen; her mobile face did not retain the same expression asingle instant. When the smile which gave her a childlike appearancevanished, and any earnest feeling stirred her soul, she really resembleda mature maiden. What a brilliant, versatile intellect must animate thisremarkable creature! Lienhard, shrewd and highly educated as he was, seemed to be completely absorbed in his neighbour; nay, in his animatedconversation with her he entirely forgot the beautiful wife at his side;at least, while Kuni looked down at him, he did not bestow a singleglance upon her. Now he shook his finger mischievously at the child, buthe seemed to be seeking, in mingled amusement and perplexity, to find afitting answer. And how brightly Lienhard's eyes sparkled as he fairlyhung upon the sweet red lips of the little marvel at his left--the heartside! A few minutes had sufficed to show the ropedancer all this, andsuggest the question whether it was possible that the most faithful ofhusbands would thus basely neglect, for the sake of a child, the youngwife whom he had won in spite of the hardest obstacles, on whose accounthe had so coldly and cruelly rejected her, the object of so much wooing, and who, this very day, was the fairest of all the beautiful ladies whosurrounded her. 

In an instant her active mind transported her to the soul of the hithertofavoured wife of the man whom she loved, and her strangely constitutedwoman's heart filled with resentment against the young creature below, who had not even attained womanhood, and yet seemed to gain, withouteffort, the prize for which she had vainly striven with painful longing. 

She, whose heart had remained free from jealousy of the woman who stoodbetween her and the man she loved, like a solid bulwark erected by Fateitself, was now suddenly overmastered by this passion. 

Yet she did not turn against the person to whom Lienhard belonged, as hedid to the city, or to his own family, and who was united to him by thewill of Heaven, but against the mysterious young creature at his side, who changed with every passing moment. 

This child--no, this maiden--must be a being of some special nature. Like the sirens of whom she had heard, she possessed the mysterious, enviable power of conquering the iron resistance of even the strongestman. 

Like a flash of lightning, Kuni, whose kind heart cherished resentmentagainst few and wished no one any evil, suddenly felt an ardent desire todrive the little witch from Lienhard's side, even by force, if necessary. Had she held a thunderbolt instead of a balance pole, she would gladlyhave struck down the treacherous child from her height--not only becausethis enchantress had so quickly won that for which she had vainlyyearned, alas! how long, but because it pierced her very heart to seeFrau Katharina's happiness clouded, nay, perhaps destroyed. A bitternessusually alien to her light, gay nature had taken possession of her, as, with the last glance she cast at Lienhard, she saw him bend low over thechild and, with fiery ardour, whisper something which transformed thedelicate pink flush in her cheeks to the hue of the poppy. 

Yes, the ropedancer was jealous of the laurel-crowned child. She, whocared so little for law and duty, virtue and morality, now felt offended, wounded, tortured by Lienhard's conduct. But there was no time to ponderover the reason now. She had already delayed too long ere movingforward. 

Yet even calm reflection would not have revealed the right answer to theproblem. How could she have suspected that what stirred her passionatesoul so fiercely was grief at the sight of the man whom she had regardedas the stronghold of integrity, the possessor of the firmest will, thesoul of inviolable fidelity, succumbing here, before the eyes of all, like a dissolute weakling, to the seductive arts of an immature kobold?These two, who gave to her, the orphaned vagrant, surrounded by unbridledrecklessness, physical and mental misery, a proof that there was still inmarriage real love and a happiness secure from every assault, were now, before her eyes, placing themselves on the same plane with the miserablecouples whom she met everywhere. She could not have expressed heremotions in words, but she vaguely felt that the world had become poorer, and that henceforth she must think of something more trivial when shetried to imagine the pure happiness which mortals are permitted to enjoy. She had seen the blossoms stripped from the scanty remnant of her faithin truth and goodness, which had begun to bloom afresh in her heartthrough the characters of this pair whose marriage procession she hadwatched. 

Loni had been beckoning a long time; now he waved his gay handkerchiefstill more impatiently, and she moved on. 

Her lips forced themselves into the customary smile with difficulty. Tripping forward was an easy matter for one so free from dizziness. Sheonly carried the pole because it was customary to begin with the leastdifficult feats. Yet, while gracefully placing one foot before theother, she said to herself--safe as she felt--that, while so muchagitated, she would be wiser not to look down again into the depthsbelow. She did avoid it, and with a swift run gained the end of the ropewithout effort, and went up and down it a second time. 

While, on reaching the end of her walk, she was chalking her soles again, the applause which had accompanied her during her dangerous pilgrimagestill rose to her ears, and came-most loudly of all from the stand whereLienhard sat among the distinguished spectators. He, too, had clappedhis hands lustily, and shouted, "Bravo!" Never had he beheld anyropedancer display so much grace, strength, and daring. His modestprotegee had become a magnificently developed woman. How could he haveimagined that the unfortunate young creature whom he had saved fromdisgrace would show such courage, such rare skill?

He confided his feelings, and the fact that he knew the artist, to hisyoung neighbour, but she had turned deadly pale and lowered her eyes. While looking on she had felt as though she herself was in danger offalling into the depths. Giddiness had seized her, and her heart, whosetendency to disease had long awakened the apprehension of the physicians, contracted convulsively. The sight of a fellow-being hovering in mortalperil above her head seemed unendurable. Not until she followedLienhard's advice and avoided looking up, did she regain her calmness. Her changeful temperament soon recovered its former cheerfulness, and thefriend at her side to whom the lovely child, with her precocious mentaldevelopment, appeared like the fairest marvel, took care, often as hehimself looked upward, that she should be guarded from a second attack ofweakness. 

The storm of applause from below, in which Lienhard also joined, fannedthe flames of desire for admiration in Kuni's breast to a fiery glow. She would show him, too, what she could do--compel him to applaud her. She would force him away from the little temptress, and oblige him togaze up at her whose art--she learned this daily--possessed the power tofix the attention of spectators like the thrall of the basilisk's eye. When on the rope she was no insignificant personage. He should tremblefor her as did the gray-haired, scarred captain of the foot soldiers, Mannsbach, the day before yesterday. He had told her that his heart hadthrobbed more anxiously during her daring feats than on the bloodiestfield of battle. 

She moved forward more swiftly to the time of the lively dancing tunewhich the city pipers were playing. Midway along the rope she turned, ran back to the cross-shaped trestle at the steeple window, handed thebalancing pole to Loni, and received a cage filled with doves. Each onebore around its neck a note containing an expression of homage to theEmperor Maximilian, and they were all trained to alight near the richlydecorated throne which was now occupied by the chivalrous monarch. Theclown who, with a comical show of respect, offered her what she neededfor her next feat, told her this. 

Loni, sure of being heard by no unbidden ear, called to her from thewindow:

"Art is honoured to-day, my girl. "

The clown added jocosely:

"Who else was ever permitted to walk over the anointed head of our lordthe Emperor?"

But Kuni would not have needed such encouragement. Doubtless she feltflattered by the consciousness of attracting even the sovereign's glance, but what she intended to do immediately was for the purpose of compellinganother person to watch her steps with fear and admiration. Crossing herfeet, she threw back her garlanded head and drew a long breath. Then shehastily straightened herself, and with the bird cage in one hand and thewinged staff of Mercury, which the clown had handed to her, in the other, she advanced to the centre of the rope. There she opened the cage assteadily as if she had been standing on the floor of her own room. Thebirds fluttered through the little door and went, with a swift flight, directly to their goal. Then, below and beside her, from every placeoccupied by spectators, and from hundreds of windows, rose thunders ofapplause; but it seemed to her as if the roaring of the surging sea wasin her ears. Her heart throbbed under her pink silk bodice like an ironhammer, and in the proud consciousness of having probably attainedalready what she desired, and, besides thousands of other eyes, fixedLienhard's upon her as if with chains and bonds, she was seized with theambitious desire to accomplish something still more amazing. The man towhom her heart clung, the Emperor, the countless multitude below, wereall at this time subject to her in heart and mind. They could think andfeel nothing except what concerned her, her art, and her fate. She couldand would show to Lienhard, to the Emperor, to all, what they had neverwitnessed. They should turn faint with sympathizing anxiety. She wouldmake then realize what genuine art, skill, and daring could accomplish. Everything else, even the desire for applause, was forgotten. Though herperformance might be called only a perilous feat, she felt it to be true, genuine art. Her whole soul was merged in the desire to execute, boldlyand yet gracefully, the greatest and most perfect performance attainableby a ropedancer. With beads of perspiration on her brow, and eyesuplifted, she threw the cage aside, swung her Mercury staff aloft, anddanced along the rope in waltz time, as though borne by the gods of thewind. Whirling swiftly around, her slender figure darted in gracefulcurves from one end of the narrow path to the other. Then the applausereached the degree of enthusiastic madness which she desired; even Loniclapped his hands from the steeple window. She had never seen him dothis to any of the company. Yes, she must have accomplished her purposewell; but she would show him and the others something still morewonderful. What she had just done was capable of many additional feats;she had tried it. 

With fluttering hands and pulses she instantly loosed from her pantingbosom and her hips the garland of roses and leaves twined about the upperportion of her body, and swung it around her in graceful curves as sheknelt and rose on the rope. 

She had often jumped rope on the low rope, turning completely around sothat she faced the other way. To repeat this performance on the onestretched to the steeple would certainly not be expected from her or fromany other. Suppose she should use the garland as a rope and venture toleap over it on this giddy height? Suppose she should even succeed inturning around? The rope was firm. If her plan was successful, shewould have accomplished something unprecedented; if she failed--if, whileturning, she lost her balance--her scanty stock of pleasure here belowwould be over, and also her great grief and insatiable yearning. Onething was certain: Lienhard would watch her breathlessly, nay, tremblefor her. Perhaps it was too much to hope that he would mourn hersincerely, should the leap cost her life; but he would surely pity her, and he could never forget the moment of the fall, and therefore herself. Loni would tear the gold circlet from his dyed black locks and, in hisexaggerated manner, call himself a son of misfortune, and her thegreatest artist who had ever trodden the rope. All Augsburg, all thedignitaries of the realm, even the Emperor, would pity her, and the endof her life would be as proud and as renowned as that of the chivalroushero who dies victor on the stricken field. If the early part of herlife had been insignificant and wretched, its close should be grand andbeautiful. 

Long consideration was foreign to Kuni's nature. While these thoughtswere darting with the speed of lightning through her excited brain, shestripped from the garland, with the presence of mind which her callingteaches even in serious peril, the roses which might have caught herfeet, and swung it in a wide circle above her. Then nimbly, yet carefulto maintain in every movement the grace without which the most difficultfeat would have seemed to her valueless, she summoned all the strengthand caution she possessed, went forward at a run, and--she did not knowherself just how it was done--dared the leap over the rope once, twice, and the third and fourth time even accomplished the turn successfully. It had not once cost her an effort to maintain her balance. 

Again she saw Loni clapping his hands at the window, and the acclamationsof the crowd, which echoed like peals of thunder from the lofty, gable-roofed houses, informed her that the boldness of the venture and theskill with which she had performed it were appreciated by thesespectators. True, she could not distinguish the voice of any individual, but she thought she knew that Lienhard was one of those who shouted"Bravo!" and clapped most loudly. He must have perceived now that shewas something more than a poor thief of a rosary, a useless bread-eaterin the Schurstab household. 

She straightened the garland again and, while preparing to take anotherrun, repeat the feat, and, if her buoyancy held out, try to whirl aroundtwice, which she had never failed to accomplish on the low rope, shecould not resist the temptation of casting a hasty glance at Lienhard;she had never ascended to the steeple without looking at him. 

Secure of herself, in the glad conciousness of success, she gazed down. 

There sat the illustrious Maximilian, still clapping his hands. Gratefully, yet with a passionate desire for fresh applause, the resolveto show him the very best which she could accomplish was strengthened. But the next moment the blood faded from her slightly rouged cheeks, forLienhard--was it possible, was it imaginable?--Lienhard Groland was notlooking up at her! Without moving his hands or vouchsafing her a singleglance, he was gazing into the face of the little wearer of the laurelwreath, with whom he was eagerly talking. He was under her thrall, bodyand soul. Yet it could not be, she could not have seen distinctly. Shemust look down once more, to correct the error. She did so, and atorturing anguish seized her heart. He was chatting with the child asbefore; nay, with still more warmth. As he now saw nothing which washappening upon the rope, he had probably also failed to heed what she hadperformed, dared, accomplished, mainly for his sake, at the peril of herlife, on the dizzy height. His wife was still clapping her hands at hisside, but Lienhard, as though deaf and blind to everything else, wasgazing at the page which the miserable little elf was just giving him. There was certainly writing on it--perhaps a charm which rendered himsubject to her. How else could he have brought himself to overlook sounkindly herself and her art--the best she had to bestow--for the sake ofthis child?

Then, besides the keenest sorrow, a fierce, burning hate took possessionof her soul. 

She had not appealed to her saint for years; but now, in a brief, ejaculatory prayer, she besought her to drive this child from Lienhard, punish her with misery, suffering, and destruction. A sharp pang whichshe had never before experienced pierced her to the heart. The pure, sunny air which she inhaled on her lofty height seemed like acrid smoke, and forced tears into the eyes which had not wept for many a long day. 

As, not knowing exactly what she was doing, with her ears deafened by theshouts of the crowd, among whom Lienhard now, with anxious suspense, watched her every movement, she again raised the rope and prepared tospring, she fancied that her narrow path rose higher and higher. Onemore step, and suddenly, with Loui's shriek of horror and the clown'sterrified "Jesus and Mary, she is falling!" ringing on the air, she feltas if the rope had parted directly in front of her. Then a hurricaneappeared to howl around her, bearing her away she knew not whither. Itseemed as though the tempest had seized the ends of the rope, and wasdealing terrible blows with them upon her shoulders, her back, and herfeet. Meanwhile the little wearer of the wreath was lying on a blackcloud opposite to her at Lienhard's feet. 

She still held the sheet in her hand, and was shouting to the angryelements the magic formulas which it contained. Their power Kuni knewit--had unchained them. Lienhard's deep voice mingled with her furiouscries until the roar of the sea, on whose rocky shore the hurricane musthave dashed her, drowned every other sound, and rolled over her, sometimes in scorching crimson, sometimes in icy crystal waves. Then, for a long time, she saw and heard nothing more. 

When her deadened imagination again began to stir, she fancied that shewas struggling with a huge crab, which was cutting her foot with shears. The little elf was urging it on, as the huntsmen cheer the hounds. Thepain and hate she felt would have been intolerable if Lienhard had madecommon cause with the terrible child. But he reproved her conduct, andeven struggled with the kobold who tried to prevent his releasing herfrom the crab. The elf proved stronger than he. The terrible shearscontinued to torture her. The more she suffered, the more eagerlyLienhard seemed trying to help her, and this soothed her and blended asweet sense of comfort with the burning pain. 

CHAPTER VI. 

Kuni remained under the spell of these delusions for many days andnights. When she at last regained her senses, she was lying on a plaincouch in a long, whitewashed hall. The well-scoured floor was strewnwith sand and pine needles. Other beds stood beside hers. On one wallhung a large wooden crucifix, painted with glaring colours; on the othera touching picture of the Mater Dolorosa, with the swords in her heart, looked down upon her. 

Beside Kuni's pallet stood a Gray Sister and an elderly man, evidently aphysician. His long black robe, tall dark cap, and gold headed cane borewitness to it. Bending forward, with eyeglasses on his prominent nose, he gazed intently into her face. 

Her return to consciousness seemed to please him, and he showed himselfto be a kind, experienced leech. With tireless solicitude he strove tocure the numerous injuries which she had received, and she soon learnedthrough him and the nun, that she had fallen from the rope and escapeddeath as if by a miracle. The triumphal arch under her, and the garlandswhich decorated the wooden structure, had caught her before she touchedthe pavement. True, her right leg was broken, and it had been necessaryto amputate her left foot in order to save her life. Many a wound andslash on her breast and head also needed healing, and her greatestornament, her long, thick, dark hair, had been cut off. 

Why had they called her, the ropedancer, back to a life whichhenceforward could offer her nothing save want and cruel suffering?She uttered this reproach to her preservers very indignantly; but asthe physician saw her eating a bunch of grapes with much enjoyment, he asked if this pleasure did not suffice to make her rejoice over thepreservation of her existence. There were a thousand similar gifts ofGod, which scarcely seemed worthy of notice, yet in the aggregateoutweighed a great sorrow which, moreover, habit daily diminished. 

The Sister tried, by other arguments, to reconcile her to the life whichhad been preserved, but the words her devout heart inspired and whichwere intended for a pious soul, produced little influence upon theneglected child of the highroad. Kuni felt most deeply the reference tothe sorely afflicted Mother of God. If such sorrow had been sent to thenoblest and purest of mortals, through whom God had deigned to give hisdivine Son to the world, what grief could be too great for her, thewandering vagabond? She often silently repeated this to herself; yetonly too frequently her impetuous heart rebelled against the misery whichshe felt that she would encounter. But many weeks were to pass beforeshe recovered; a severe relapse again endangered her life. 

During the first days of illness she had talked to Lienhard in herfevered visions, called him by name, and warned him against the spitefulelf who would ruin him. Frequently, too, oaths and horrible, coarseimprecations, such as are heard only from the mouths of the vagrantsamong whom she had grown to womanhood, fell from her burning lips. Whenshe improved, the leech asked in the jesting tone which elderly men arefond of using to young women whose heart secrets they think they havedetected, what wrong her lover had done her. The Sister, nay, even theabbess, wished to learn what she meant by the wicked witch whom she hadmentioned with such terrible curses during the ravings of the fever, butshe made no reply. In fact, she said very little, and her nurses thoughther a reserved creature with an obdurate nature; for she obstinatelyrejected the consolations of religion. 

Only to her confessor, a kind old priest, who knew how to discover thebest qualities in every one, did she open her heart so far as to revealthat she loved the husband of another and had once wished evil, ay, thevery worst evil, to a neighbour. But since the sin had been committedonly in thought, the kindly guardian of her conscience was quicklydisposed to grant her absolution if, as a penance, she would repeat agoodly number of paternosters and undertake a pilgrimage. If she had hadsound feet, she ought to have journeyed to Santiago di Compostella; but, since her condition precluded this, a visit to Altotting in Bavaria wouldsuffice. But Kuni by no means desired any mitigation of the penance. She silently resolved to undertake the pilgrimage to Compostella, at theWorld's End, --[Cape Finisterre]--in distant Spain, though she did notknow how it would be possible to accomplish this with her mutilated foot. Not even to her kind confessor did she reveal this design. The girl whohad relied upon herself from childhood, needed no explanation, noconfidante. 

Therefore, during the long days and nights which she was obliged to spendin bed, she pondered still more constantly upon her own past. That shehad been drawn and was still attracted to Lienhard with resistless power, was true; yet whom, save herself, had this wounded or injured? On theother hand, it had assuredly been a heavy sin that she had called downsuch terrible curses upon the child. Still, even now she might have hadgood reason to execrate the wearer of the wreath; for she alone, notLienhard, was the sole cause of her misfortune. Her prayer on the ropethat the saints would destroy the hated child, and the idea which thenoccupied her mind, that she was really a grown maiden, whose elfindelicacy of figure was due to her being one of the fays or elvesmentioned in the fairy tales, had made a deep impression upon her memory. 

Whenever she thought of that supplication she again felt the bitternessshe had tasted on the rope. Though she believed herself justified inhating the little mischief-maker, the prayer uttered before her fall didnot burden her soul much less heavily than a crime. Suppose the Sisterwas right, and that the saints heard every earnest petition?

She shuddered at the thought. The child was so young, so delicate. Though she had caused her misfortune, the evil was not doneintentionally. Such thoughts often induced Kuni to clasp her hands andpray to the saint not to fulfil the prayer she uttered at that time; butshe did not continue the petition long, a secret voice whispered thatevery living creature--man and beast--felt the impulse to inflict asimilar pang on those who caused suffering, and that she, who believedthe whole world wicked, need not be better than the rest. 

Meanwhile she longed more and more eagerly to know the name of the littlecreature that had brought so much trouble upon her, and whether she wasstill forcing herself between Lienhard and his beautiful wife. 

As soon as she was able to talk again, she began her inquiries. TheSister, who was entirely absorbed in her calling and never left the sceneof her wearisome toil, had little to tell; but the leech and the priest, in reply to her questions concerning what had happened during the periodof her unconsciousness, informed her that the Emperor had ordered thatshe should receive the most careful nursing, and had bestowed a donationupon the convent for the purpose. He had thought of her future, too. When she recovered, she would have the five heller pounds which thegenerous sovereign had left for her as a partial compensation for theinjuries sustained while employing her rare skill for the delight of themultitude and, above all, himself. A wealthy Nuremberg Honourable, Lienhard Groland, a member of the Council, had also interested himself inher and deposited the same amount with the abbess, in case she shouldrecover the use of her limbs and did not prefer to spend the remainder ofher life here, though only as a lay sister. In that case he would beready to defray the cost of admission. 

"That the lofty convent walls might rise between him and the sight ofme!" Kuni said to herself at this information, with a bitter smile. On the--other hand, her eyes filled with tears of genuine emotion andsincere shame, when she learned from the leech that Herr LienhardGroland's lovely wife had come daily to the convent to inquire about her, and had even honoured her couch with a visit several times. She did notremain absent until one day, in the noble lady's presence, Kuni, when herfever was fiercest, loaded the wearer of the wreath, whom her deliriumoften brought before her as a nightmare, with the most savage andblasphemous curses. The gracious young wife was overwhelmed with horror, which had doubtless prevented her return, unless her absence was due todeparture from the city. Besides, she had committed the care ofinquiring about her convalescence to an aristocratic friend in Augsburg, the wife of the learned city clerk, Doctor Peutinger, a member of thefamous Welser family of Augsburg. The latter had often inquired for herin person, until the illness of her own dear child had kept her at home. Yet, in spite of this, her housekeeper had appeared the day before toinform the abbess that, if the injured girl should recover and wished tolead a respectable life in future, she might be sure of a welcome andeasy duties in her own household. This surely ought to be a greatcomfort to Kuni, the physician added; for she could no longer pursuerope-dancing, and the Peutingers were lavishly endowed with worldly goodsand intellectual gifts, and, besides, were people of genuine Christianspirit. The convent, too, would be ready to receive her--the abbess hadtold him so--if Herr Groland, of Nuremberg, kept his promise of payingher admission dues. 

All these things awakened a new world of thoughts and feelings in theconvalescent. That they ought, above all, to have aroused sinceregratitude, she felt keenly, yet she could not succeed in being especiallythankful. It would be doing Lienhard a favour, she repeated to herself, if she should enter a convent, and she would rather have sought shelterin a lion's den than under the Peutinger roof. She had been informed theday before that the city clerk's wife was the mother of the child uponwhom she had called down misfortune and death. 

The keeper of an Augsburg bath-house, who had burned herself with boilingwater, occupied the next bed. She was recovering, and was a talkativewoman, whose intrusive loquacity at first annoyed Kuni, nay, when shecould not silence it, caused her pain. But her conversation soonrevealed that she knew every stick and stone in her native city. Kuniavailed herself of this, and did not need to ask many questions to learneverything that she desired to know about the little begarlanded elf. 

She was Juliane, the young daughter of Herr Conrad Peutinger, the cityclerk--a girl of unusual cleverness, and a degree of learning neverbefore found in a child eleven years old. The bath-house keeper had manywonderful stories to relate of her remarkable wisdom, with which evenhighly educated men could not vie. In doing so, she blamed the fatherand mother, who had been unnatural parents to the charming child; for tomake the marvel complete, and to gratify their own vanity, they had taxedthe little girl's mind with such foolish strenuousness that the frailbody suffered. She had heard this in her own bath-house from the lips ofthe child's aunt and from other distinguished friends of the Welsers andPeutingers. Unfortunately, these sensible women proved to have beenright; for soon after the close of the Reichstag, Juliane was attacked bya lingering illness, from which rumour now asserted that she would neverrecover. Some people even regarded the little girl's sickness as a justpunishment of God, to whom the constant devotion of the father and hisyoung daughter to the old pagans and their ungodly writings must havegiven grave offence. 

This news increased to the utmost the anxiety from which Kuni had longsuffered. Often as she thought of Lienhard, she remembered still morefrequently that it was she, who had prayed for sickness to visit thechild of a mother, who had so kindly offered her, the strolling player, whom good women usually shunned, the shelter of her distinguished house. 

The consciousness of owing a debt of gratitude to those, against whom shehad sinned so heavily, oppressed her. The kind proposal of the sickchild's mother seemed like a mockery. It was painful even to hear thename of Peutinger. 

Besides, the further she advanced toward recovery, the more unendurableappeared the absence of liberty. The kind efforts of the abbess to keepher in the cloister, and teach her to make herself useful there bysewing, were unsuccessful; for she could not turn the spinning wheel onaccount of her amputated foot, and she had neither inclination norpatience for the finer branches of needlework. 

Those who charged her with a lamentable lack of perseverance were right;the linen which she began to hem fell into her lap only too soon. Whenher eyes--which could see nothing here except a small walled yard--closedwhile she was working, the others thought that she was asleep; but hermind remained awake, though she had lowered her lids, and it wanderedrestlessly over valleys rivers, and mountains through the wide, wideworld. She saw herself in imagination travelling along the highway withnimble jugglers merry musicians, and other care-free vagrant folk, instead of plying the needle. Even the whirling dust, the rushing wind, and the refreshing rain outside seemed desirable compared with the heavyconvent air impregnated by a perpetual odour of lavender. 

When at last, in the month of March, little Afra, the fair-haired nieceof the portress, brought her the first snowdrop, and Kuni saw a pair ofstarlings enter the box on the budding linden before her window, shecould no longer bear her imprisonment in the convent. 

Within these walls she must fade, perhaps die and return to dust. Inspite of all the warnings, representations, entreaties, and promises ofthose who--she gratefully perceived it--meant well toward her, shepersisted in her desire to be dismissed, to live out of doors as she hadalways done. At last they paid her what was due, but she accepted onlythe Emperor's bounty, proudly refusing Lienhard Groland's money, earnestly as she was urged to add it to the other and to the viaticumbestowed by the nuns. 

CHAPTER VII. 

The April sun was shining brightly when the convent gates closed behindKuni. The lindens in the square were already putting forth young leaves, the birds were singing, and her heart swelled more joyously than it haddone for many years. 

True, the cough which had tormented her all winter attacked her in theshady cloister, but she had learned to use her wooden foot, and with acane in one hand and her little bundle in the other she moved sturdilyon. After making her pilgrimage to Compostella, she intended to seek herold employer, Loni. Perhaps he could give her a place as crier, or ifthe cough prevented that, in collecting the money or training thechildren. He was a kind-hearted man. If he were even tolerablyprosperous he would certainly let her travel with the band, and givethe girl who was injured in his service the bit of food she required. Besides, in former days, when she scattered gold with lavish hands, hehad predicted what had now befallen her, and when he left Augsburg he hadasked the nuns to tell her that if she should ever be in want she mustremember Loni. 

With the Emperor's five heller pounds, and the two florins which she hadreceived as a viaticum from the convent, she could journey a longdistance through the world; for there were plenty of carriers andtravellers with carts and wagons who would take her for a trifle, and thevagabonds on the highway rarely left people like her in the lurch. 

Probably, in former days, she had looked forward to the future withgreater strength and different expectations, yet, even as it was, inspite of the cough and the painful pricking in her scars, she found itpleasant so long as she was free and could follow whatever way she chose. She knew the city, and limped through the streets and alleys toward thetavern where the strolling players usually lodged. 

On the way she met a gentleman in a suit of light armour, whom sherecognised in the distance as the Knight of Neckerfels, who had beenpaying court to her before her fall. He was walking alone and looked herdirectly in the face, but he did not have the slightest idea that he hadmet madcap Kuni. It was only too evident that he supposed her to be atotal stranger. Yet it would have been impossible for any one torecognise her. 

Mirrors were not allowed in the convent, but a bright new tin plate hadshowed her her emaciated face with the broad scar on the forehead, thesunken eyes, and the whole narrow head, where the hair, which grew outagain very slowly, was just an ugly length. Now the sight of the bonyhand which grasped the cane brought a half-sorrowful, half-scornful, smile to her lips. Her arm had been plump and round, but was now littlelarger than a stick. Pretty Kuni, the ropedancer, no longer existed; shemust become accustomed to have the world regard her as a different andfar less important personage, whom Lienhard, too--and this was fortunate--would not have deemed worthy of a glance. 

And yet, if the inner self is the true one, there was little change inher. Her soul was moved by the same feelings, only there was now a touchof bitterness. One great advantage of her temperament, it is true, hadvanished with her physical beauty and strength--the capacity to hope forhappiness and joy. Perhaps it would never return; an oppressive feelingof guilt, usually foreign to her careless nature, had oppressed her eversince she had heard recently in the convent that the child on whom shehad called down death and destruction was lying hopelessly ill, and wouldscarcely live till the joyous Whitsuntide. 

This now came back to her mind. The jubilant sense of freedom desertedher; she walked thoughtfully on until she reached the neighbourhood ofJacob Fugger's house. 

A long funeral procession was moving slowly toward her. Some veryexalted and aristocratic person must be taking the journey to the grave, for it was headed by all the clergy in the city. Choristers, in the mostelaborate dress, swinging incense holders by delicate metal chains andbearing lanterns on long poles, surrounded the lofty cross. 

Every one of distinction in Augsburg, all the children who attendedschool, and all the members of the various ecclesiastical orders andguilds in the city marched before the bier. Kuni had never seen such afuneral procession. Perhaps the one she witnessed in Milan, when a greatnobleman was buried, was longer, but in this every individual seemed tofeel genuine grief. Even the schoolboys who, on such solemn occasions, usually play all sorts of secret pranks, walked as mournfully as if eachhad lost some relative who was specially dear to him. Among the girlsthere were few whose rosy cheeks were not constantly wet with tears. 

From the first Kuni had believed that she knew who was being borne to thegrave. Now she heard several women whispering near her mention the nameof Juliane Peutinger. A pale-faced gold embroiderer, who had recentlybordered a gala dress with leaves and tendrils for the dead girl'ssister, described, sobbing, the severe suffering amid which this fairestblossom of Augsburg girlhood had withered ere death finally broke theslender stem. 

Suddenly she stopped; a cry of mingled astonishment, lamentation, anddelight, sometimes rising, sometimes falling, ran through the crowd whichhad gathered along the sides of the street. 

The bier was in sight. 

Twelve youths bore the framework, covered with a richly embroidered bluecloth, on which the coffin rested. It was open, and the dead girl'scouch was so high that it seemed as though the sleeper was only restinglightly on the white silk pillow. A wreath again encircled her head, butthis time blossoming myrtles blended with the laurel in the browncurls that lay in thick, soft locks on the snowy pillows and the lace-trimmed shroud. 

Juliane's eyes were closed. Ah! how gladly Kuni would have kissed thoselong-lashed lids to win even one look of forgiveness from her whom hercurse had perhaps snatched from the green spring world!

She remembered the sunny radiance with which this sleeper's eyes hadsparkled as they met Lienhard's. They were the pure mirror of the keen, mobile intellect and the innocent, loving soul of this rare child. Nowdeath had closed them, and Juliane's end had been one of suffering. Thepale embroiderer had said so, and the sorrowful droop of the sweet littlemouth, which gave the wondrously beautiful, delicate, touching littleface so pathetic an expression, betrayed it. If the living girl hadmeasured her own young intellect with that of grown people, and her facehad worn the impress of precocious maturity, now it was that of acharming child who had died in suffering. 

Kuni also felt this, and asked herself how it had been possible for herheart to cherish such fierce hatred against this little one, who hadnumbered only eleven years. 

But had this Juliane resembled other children?

No, no! No Emperor's daughter of her age would have been accompanied tothe churchyard with such pageantry, such deep, universal grief. 

She had been the jewel of a great city. This was proclaimed by many aGreek and Latin maxim on tablets borne by the friends of the greathumanist who, with joyful pride, called her his daughter. 

Kuni could not read, but she heard at least one sentence translated by aBenedictine monk to the nun at his side: "He whose death compels thosewho knew him to weep, has the fairest end. "--[Seneca, Hippol. , 881. ]

If this were true, Juliane's end was indeed fair; for she herself, whomthe child had met only to inflict pain, had her eyes dimmed by tears, andwherever she turned she saw people weeping. 

Most of those who lined the street could have had no close relations withthe dead girl. But yonder black-robed mourners who followed the bierwere her parents, her brothers and sisters, her nearest relatives, themembers of the Council, and the family servants. And she, the wretched, reckless, sinful, crippled strolling player, for whom not a soul on earthcared, whose death would not have drawn even a single tear from any eye, to whom a speedy end could be only a benefit, was perhaps the cause ofthe premature drying up of this pure fountain of joy, which had refreshedso many hearts and animated them with the fairest hopes. 

The tall lady, whose noble face and majestic figure were shrouded in athick veil, was Juliane's mother--and she had offered the sick ropedancera home in her wealthy household. 

"If she had only known, " thought Kuni, "the injury I was inflicting uponher heart's treasure, she would rather have hunted me with dogs from herthreshold. "

In spite of the veil which floated around the stately figure of thegrieving mother, she could see her bosom rise and fall with her sobs ofanguish. Kuni's compassionate heart made it impossible for her to watchthis sorrow longer, and, covering her face with her hands, she turned herback upon the procession and, weeping aloud, limped away as fast as herinjured foot would let her. Meanwhile she sometimes said to herself thatshe was the worst of all sinners because she had cursed the dead girl andcalled down death and destruction upon her head, sometimes she listenedto the voice within, which told her that she had no reason to grieve overJuliane's death, and completely embitter her already wretched life byremorse and self-accusations; the dead girl was the sole cause of herterrible fall. But the defiant rebellion against the consciousness ofguilt, which moved her so deeply, always ceased abruptly as soon as itraised its head; for one fact was positive, if the curse she had calleddown upon the innocent child, who had done her no intentional wrong, hadreally caused Juliane's end, a whole life was not long enough to atonefor the sin which she had committed. Yet what atonement was still in herpower, after the death which she had summoned had performed its terriblework of executioner?

"Nothing, nothing at all!" she said to herself angrily, resolving, as shehad so often done with better success, to forget what had happened, castthe past into oblivion, and live in the present as before. But ere shecould attempt to fulfil this determination, the image of the tall, grief-bowed figure of the woman who had called Juliane her dear child rosebefore her mind, and it seemed as if a cold, heavy hand paralyzed thewings of the light-hearted temperament which had formerly borne herpleasantly over so many things. Then she told herself that, in order notto go to perdition herself, she must vow, sacrifice, undertake everythingfor the salvation of the dead girl and of her own heavily burdened soul. For the first time she felt a longing to confide her feelings to someone. If Lienhard had been within reach and disposed to listen to her, he would have understood, and known what course to advise. 

True, the thought that he was not looking at her when she took the fatalleap still haunted her. He could not have showed more offensively howlittle he cared for her--but perhaps he was under the influence of aspell; for she must be something to him. This was no vain self-deception; had it not been so, would he have come in person to her couchof pain, or cared for her so kindly after the accident?

In the convent she had reached the conviction that it would be degradingto think longer of the man who, in return for the most ardent love, offered nothing but alms in jingling coin; yet her poor heart wouldnot cease its yearning. 

Meanwhile she never wearied of seeking motives that would place hisconduct in a more favourable light. Whatever he might have withheld fromher, he was nevertheless the best and noblest of men, and as she limpedaimlessly on, the conviction strengthened that the mere sight of himwould dispel the mists which, on this sunny spring day, seemed to veileverything around and within her. 

But he remained absent, and suddenly it seemed more disgraceful to seekhim than to stand in the stocks. 

Yet the pilgrimage to Compostella, of which the confessor had spoken?For the very reason that it had been described to her as unattainable, it would perhaps be rated at a high value in heaven, and restore to herwhile on earth the peace she had lost. 

She pondered over this thought on her way to the tavern, where she founda corner to sleep, and a carrier who, on the day after the morrow, wouldtake her to the sea for a heller pound. Other pilgrims had also engagedpassage at Antwerp for Corunna, the harbour of Compostella, and her meanswere sufficient for the voyage. This assurance somewhat soothed herwhile she remained among people of her own calling. 

But she spent a sleepless night; for again and again the dead child'simage appeared vividly before her. Rising from the soft pillows in thecoffin, she shook her finger threateningly at her, or, weeping andwailing, pointed down to the flames--doubtless those of purgatory--whichwere blazing upward around her, and had already caught the hem of hershroud. 

Kuni arose soon after sunrise with a bewildered brain. Before settingout on her pilgrimage she wished to attend mass, and--that the HolyVirgin might be aware of her good intentions--repeat in church some ofthe paternosters which her confessor had imposed. 

She went out with the simple rosary that the abbess had given her uponher wrist, but when she had left the tavern behind she saw a great crowdin front of the new St. Ulrich's Church, and recognised among the throngsof people who had flocked thither her companion in suffering at theconvent, the keeper of the bath-house, who had been cured of her burnslong before. 

She had left her business to buy an indulgence for her own sins, and topurchase for the soul of her husband--whose death-bed confession, it istrue, had been a long one--for the last time, but for many centuries atonce, redemption from the fires of purgatory. The Dominican friarTetzel, from Nuremberg, was here with his coffer, and carried writtenpromises which secured certain remission of punishment for all sins, eventhose committed long ago, or to be committed in the future. The womanhad experienced the power of his papers herself. Tetzel had come toAugsburg about a year after her husband's death, and, as she knew howmany sins he had committed, she put her hand into her purse to free himfrom the flames. They must have burned very fiercely; for, while awakeat night and in her dreams, she had often heard him wailing andcomplaining piteously. But after she bought the paper he became quietand, on the third night, she saw him with her own eyes enter the room, and heard him promise her a great happiness in return for her faithfulremembrance. 

The very next Sunday, Veit Haselnuss, the bath-house proprietor, a well-to-do man who owned another house besides the one where he lived, invitedher to take a walk with him. She knew instantly that her late husbandwas beginning to pay his debt of gratitude with this visitor and, infact, a short time after, the worthy man asked her to be his wife, thoughshe had three little children, and his oldest daughter by his first wifewas already able to look after the housekeeping. The wedding took placeon Whitsunday, and she owed this great happiness entirely to thedispensation which had released the dead man's soul from the fires ofpurgatory and induced him to show his thankfulness. 

Kuni listened to her companion's rapid flood of talk, until she herselfenjoined silence to hear the black-robed priest who stood beside thecoffer. 

He was just urging his hearers, in a loud voice, to abandon the baseavarice which gathers pence. There was still time to gain, in exchangefor dead florins, living salvation. 

Let those who repented sin listen, and they would hear the voices ofwailing parents, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, and children, whohad preceded them to the other world. Whose heart was so utterly turnedto stone, whose parsimony, spite of all his love of money, was so strongthat he would allow these tortured souls to burn and suffer in theflames, when it was in his power, by putting his hand into his purse, to buy a dispensation which would as surely redeem them from the firesof purgatory as his Imperial Majesty's pardon would release an imprisonedthief from jail?

Scales seemed to fall from Kuni's eyes. She hastily forced her way tothe Dominican, who was just wiping the perspiration from his brow withthe hem of the white robe under his black cowl. 

Coughing and panting, he was preparing his voice for a fresh appeal, meanwhile opening the iron-bound box, and pointing out to the throng theplacard beside his head, which announced that the money obtained by theindulgences was intended for the Turkish war. Then, in fluent language, he explained to the bystanders that this meant that the Holy Father inRome intended to drive the hereditary foe of Christianity back to thesteppes and deserts of the land of Asia, where he belonged. In order toaccomplish this work, so pleasing to the Lord, the Church was ready tomake lavish use of the treasures of mercy intrusted to her. Deliverancefrom the flames of purgatory would never be more cheaply purchased thanat this opportunity. Then he thrust his little fat hand, on whichseveral valuable rings glittered, into the box, and held out to thebystanders a small bundle of papers like an open pack of cards. 

Kuni summoned up her courage and asked whether they would also possessthe power to remove a curse. Tetzel eagerly assented, adding that he hadpapers which would wash the soul as white from every sin as soap wouldcleanse a sooty hand, even though, instead of "curse, " its name was"parricide. "

The most costly had the power to transfer scoundrels roasting in thehottest flames of purgatory to the joys of paradise, as yonder sparrowhad just soared from the dust of the street to the elm bough. 

Kuni timidly asked the price of an indulgence, but the Dominicanunctuously explained that they were not sold like penny rolls at thebaker's; the heavier the sin, the higher the fine to be paid. First ofall, she must confess sincere contrition for what had been done andinform him how, in spite of her youth, she had been led into such heinousguilt. Kuni replied that she had long mourned her error most deeply, and then began to whisper to Tetzel how she had been induced to curse afellow-mortal. She desired nothing for herself. Her sole wish was torelease the dead girl from the flames of purgatory, and the curse which, by her guilt, burdened her soul. But the Dominican had only halflistened, and as many who wanted indulgences were crowding around hisbox, he interrupted Kuni by offering her a paper which he would make outin the name of the accursed Juliane Peutinger--if he had heard correctly. 

Such cases seemed to be very familiar to him, but the price he asked wasso large that the girl grew pale with terror. 

Yet she must have the redeeming paper, and Tetzel lowered his price afterher declaration that she possessed only five heller pounds and theconvent viaticum. Besides, she stated that she had already bargainedwith the carrier for the journey to the sea. 

This, however, had no influence upon the Dominican, as the indulgencemade the pilgrimage to Compostella unnecessary. Since it would redeemthe accursed person from the fires of purgatory, she, too, was absolvedfrom the vow which drew her thither. 

With stern decision he therefore insisted upon demanding the entire sumin her possession. He could only do it so cheaply because her face andher lost foot showed that she was destined to suffer part of the eternaltorture here on earth. 

Then Kuni yielded. The paper was made out in the name of Juliane, shegave up her little store, and returned to the inn a penniless beggar, butwith a lighter heart, carrying the precious paper under the handkerchiefcrossed over her bosom. But there the carrier refused her a seat withoutthe money which she had promised him, and the landlord demanded paymentfor her night's lodging and the bit of food she had eaten. 

Should she go back to the convent and ask for the little sum whichLienhard had left there for her?

The struggle was a hard one, but pride finally conquered. She renouncedthe kindly meant gift of her only friend. When the abbess returned themoney to him, he could not help perceiving that she was no beggar andscorned to be his debtor. If he then asked himself why, he would findthe right answer. She did not confess it to herself in plain words, butshe wished to remain conscious that, whether he desired it or not, shehad given her heart's best love to this one man without reward, merelybecause it was her pleasure to do it. At last she remembered that shestill possessed something valuable. She had not thought of it before, because it had been as much a part of herself as her eyes or her lips, and it would have seemed utterly impossible to part with it. Thisarticle was a tolerably heavy gold ring, with a sparkling ruby in thecentre. She had drawn it from her father's finger after he had taken hislast leap and she was called to his corpse. She did not even knowwhether he had received the circlet as a wedding ring from the mother ofwhom she had no remembrance, or where he obtained it. But she had heardthat it was of considerable value, and when she set off to sell thejewel, she did not find it very hard to gave it up. It seemed as if herfather, from the grave, was providing his poor child with the means sheneeded to continue to support her life. 

She had heard in the convent of Graslin, the goldsmith, who had bestowedon the chapel a silver shrine for the relics, and went to him. 

When she stood before the handsome gableroofed house which heoccupied she shrank back a little. At first he received her sternlyand repellantly enough, but, as soon as she introduced herself as theropedancer who had met with the accident, he showed himself to be akindly old gentleman. 

After one of the city soldiers had said that she told the truth and hadjust been dismissed from the convent, he paid her the full value of thering and added a florin out of sympathy and the admiration he felt forthe charm which still dwelt in her sparkling blue eyes. 

But Compostella was indeed far away. Her new supply of money wassufficient for the journey there, but how could she return? Besides, hercough troubled her very seriously, and it seemed as though she could nottravel that long distance alone. The dealer in indulgences had said thatthe paper made the pilgrimage unnecessary, and the confessor in theconvent had only commanded her to go to Altotting. With thisneighbouring goal before her, she turned her back upon Augsburgthe following morning. 

Her hope of meeting on the way compassionate people, who would give her aseat in their vehicles, was fulfilled. She reached Altotting sooner thanshe 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 oldchurch, at the end of her pilgrimage, she saw a picture in which theraked souls of children were soaring upward to heaven from the flamesblazing 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 thefires of purgatory. Many other votive pictures, the pilgrims at the inn, and a priest whom she questioned, confirmed it. She also heard fromvarious quarters that she had not paid too high a price for theindulgence. 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 fromTetzel, the Dominican; for she thought that she daily experienced itspower. 

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 nolonger needed to fear the horrible curse which she had called down uponthe little one, and once more thought of Lienhard with pleasure. When helearned in the other world how she had atoned for the wrong which she haddone his little favourite, she would be sure of his praise. 

To be held in light esteem, nay, even despised, was part of her calling, like her constant wandering. She had longed for applause in her art, butfor herself she had desired nothing save swift draughts of pleasure, since she had learned how little she was regarded by the only personwhose opinion she valued. She could never have expected that he wouldhold her in high esteem, since he was so indifferent to her art that hedid not even think it worth while to lift his eyes to the rope. Yet theidea that he placed her in the same rank with others in her professionseemed unendurable. But she need grieve over this no longer, and whenshe remembered that even the sorest want had not been able to induce herto touch his alms, she could have fairly shouted for joy amid all hermisery. The conviction that one man, who was the best and noblest of hissex, might deem her a poor, unfortunate girl, but never a creature whodeserved contempt, was the beam to which she clung, when the surges ofher pitiable, wandering life threatened to close over her and stifle her. 

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Buy indugence for sins to be committed in the futureMirrors were not allowed in the convent

IN THE BLUE PIKE

By Georg Ebers

Volume 3. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

As Kuni's troubled soul had derived so much benefit from the shortpilgrimage to Altotting, she hoped to obtain far more from a visit toSantiago di Compostella, famed throughout Christendom. 

True, her old master, Loni, whom she had met at Regensburg, permitted herto join his band, but when she perceived that he was far less prosperousthan before, and that she could not be useful to him in any way, she lefthim at Cologne because a kindhearted captain offered to take her toVlissingen without pay. Thence she really did set out upon thepilgrimage to Santiago di Compostella; but St. James, the patron saintof the Spaniards, whose untiring mercy so many praised, did not provespecially favourable to her. The voyage to Compostella, the principalplace where he was reverenced, which annually attracted thousands ofpilgrims, cost her her last penny, and the cold nights which she wasobliged to spend on deck increased her cough until it became almostunendurably violent. 

In Santiago di Compostella both her means and her strength wereexhausted. After vainly expecting for a long time some token of thesaint's helpful kindness, only two courses were left: either she mustremain in Compostella and join the beggars in the crowded road to theplace of pilgrimage, or she must accept the proposal made by tonguelessCyriax and go back with him to Germany. At first she had been afraid ofthe brutal fellow, who feigned insanity and was led about by his wifewith a chain; but once, when red-haired Gitta was seized by theInquisition, and spent two days and two nights in jail, and Kuni nursedher child in her place, she had found him more friendly. Besides, inCompostella, the swearer had been in his most cheerful mood. Every dayhad filled his purse, because there was no lack of people and heunderstood how to extort money by the terror which horrible outbreaks ofhis feigned malady inspired among the densely crowded pilgrims. His wifepossessed a remedy which would instantly calm his ravings, but it wasexpensive, and she had not the money to buy it. Not only in Compostella, but also on the long journey from Bavaria through the Swiss mountains, France, Navarre, and the whole of northern Spain, there were always kind-hearted or timid people from whom the money for the "dear prescription"could be obtained. 

A cart drawn by a donkey conveyed the child of this worthy couple. WhenKuni met her at Compostella she was a sickly little girl about two yearsold, with an unnaturally large head and thin, withered legs, who seemedto be mute because she used her mouth only to eat and to make a movementof the lips which sounded like "Baba. " This sound, Cyriax explained, wasa call that meant "papa. " That was the name aristocratic children gavetheir fathers, and it meant him alone, because the little girl resembledhim and loved him better than she did any one else. He really believedthis, and the stammering of the fragile child's livid lips won the roughfellow's tender love. 

The man who, when drunk, beat his wife till the blood came, and committedplenty of cruel deeds, trembled, wept, and could even pray with ferventpiety, when--which often happened--the frail little creature, shaken byconvulsions, seemed at the point of death. He had undertaken the longjourney to the "world's end, " not only because the pilgrimage toCompostella promised large profits, but also to urge St. James to curehis child. For his "sweet little Juli's" sake, and to obtain for her acheap nurse who would be entirely dependent upon him, he burdened himselfwith the lame ropedancer. But he had no reason to repent this; Gitta hadenough to do to lead him by the chain and answer the questions of thepeople, while Kuni nursed her charge with rare fidelity, mended theclothing of the father, mother, and child, as well or as badly as shecould, and also helped Gitta with the cooking. The sickly, obstinatelittle girl certainly did not deserve the name of a "sweet" child, yetKuni devoted herself to it with warm, almost passionate affection. 

The vagabond couple did not fail to notice this, and, on the whole, itpleased them. If Cyriax was vexed when little Juli began to show plainlyenough that she preferred her nurse even to him, he submitted because thelame girl watched the child through severe attacks of convulsions andfever as if it were her own, and willingly sacrificed her night's restfor its sake. True, he often talked loudly enough in Kuni's presence ofthe witch potion which the lame girl mixed in the porridge of his child, who loved him better than anything in the world, to estrange it from himand win it to herself. 

Kuni paid little heed to these offensive words; she knew that she hadgained the child's love by very different means from the "black art. "With far more reason, she dimly felt, the sick child might have beenreproached for exerting a secret spell upon her. Her name, "Julie, "which she owed to her patron saint, Kuni supposed was the same as"Juliane. " Besides, the daughter of the vagabond with the mutilatedtongue was born a few days after the death of little Fraulein Peutinger, and this circumstance, when Kuni knew it, seemed significant. Soon aftermeeting the vagrant pair she had listened to a conversation between twotravelling scholars, and learned some strange things. One believed thatthe old sages were right when they taught that the soul of a dead personcontinued its existence in other living creatures; for instance, thegreat Pythagoras had known positively, and proved that his own had dwelt, in former ages, in the breast of the hero Palamedes. 

The ropedancer remembered this statement, questioned other Bacchantesabout these things, and heard the doctrine of the transmigration of thesoul confirmed. Hence, during many a solitary ride, while the cartrolled slowly along, she pondered over the thought that Juliane's soulhad lived again in foolish Julie. How? Why? She did not rack herbrains on those points. What had been a fancy, slowly became a fixedbelief in the mind thus constantly dwelling upon one idea. At last sheimagined that whatever she did for Cyriax's child benefited the soul ofthe little Augsburg girl, whose life had been shortened by her wickedprayer on the rope. 

Yet she had not bought the indulgence in vain. But for that, shebelieved that Juliane's soul would still be burning in the flames ofpurgatory. The indulgence of the "Inquisitor" Tetzel had proved itspower, and rescued her from the fire. To demonstrate this fact shedevised many a proof. For instance, one day the idea entered her mindthat foolish Juli's brain was so weak because Juliane, during her briefexistence, had used more of hers than was fair. 

At first this had been a mere fancy; but, true to her nature, shereverted to it again and again, while in the cart which she alone sharedwith the child, until it had matured to an immovable conviction. Duringher changeful, wandering life, she had had no fixed religious principles. But, since the notion had entered her mind that Lienhard would reward herfor her love by giving her a share, even though a very small one, of hisheart, she had clung tenaciously to it, in spite of all rebuffs and theoffensive indifference with which he had treated her. On her sick bedand during her convalescence, she had dwelt upon the fear that her sinfulprayer had killed the little wearer of the laurel wreath, until she couldsay to herself that events had proved it. With the same firmness she nowheld to the belief that she had found the right idea concerning littleJuli's soul. 

With the passionate desire to atone to the patrician's daughter for thewrong which she had inflicted upon her, she clasped the vagabond's childto her heart with the love of the most faithful mother, and heraffectionate care seemed to benefit herself as well as the ailing littleone. Juli was as devoted to her Kuni as a faithful dog. The kindnesswhich the lame ropedancer showed to the fragile child was lavishlyreturned to her by a thousand proofs of the warmest attachment. 

So Kuni had found one heart which kept its whole treasure of love for heralone, one creature who could not do without her, one fragile human plantto which she could be useful and helpful day and night. 

Under the care of a faithful nurse little Juli gradually grew stronger, both physically and mentally. The little girl's wan cheeks began to berosy, the convulsions and fever attacked her less frequently. Besidesthe faint "Baba, " she learned to babble "Duni, " (instead of Kuni) andafterward "Mother, " and many other words. At last she talked nearly aswell as other children of her age. All this afforded the lame girl awealth of sweet joys wholly new to her, which afforded her heart suchwarmth and solace that, in spite of the cough which tormented her duringmany an hour of the day and night, she felt happier during her homewardjourney with the fierce blasphemer Cyriax, from whom she expected theworst things, than in the brilliant days of her fame as an artist. Doubtless, as they approached Germany, she often wondered what Lienhardwould think of her, if he should meet her amid such surroundings, as thecompanion of so worthless a couple; but the terror that overpowered herwas transformed into pleasant satisfaction at the thought that he wouldapprove, nay, praise her conduct, when she could show him the child, andtell him what she had done for it. 

This state of affairs had continued until two months before. Then, at Schaffhausen, her darling had suddenly been attacked with violentconvulsions, and the feeble intellect, which her love had so toilsomelyand faithfully waked from its slumber, only too soon attained eternalpeace. In all Kuni's sorrowful life she had scarcely experienced anygrief so bitter. When she closed the little eyes which had gazed intoher pale face so often and so tenderly, it seemed as if the sun, moon, and stars had lost their light, and henceforth she was condemned tolive in dreary gloom. 

What terrible days had followed the child's death! Cyriax raved as if hehad really been seized with the lunacy whose pretence helped him to beghis bread. Besides, he gave himself up to unbridled indulgence inbrandy, and, when drunk, he was capable of the most brutal acts. Thedead Juli's mother, who, spite of an evil youth and a lenient conscience, was by no means one of the worst of women, had to endure the harshesttreatment from her profligate companion. 

The blow which had fallen upon him filled him with savage rage, and helonged to inflict some pain upon all who came in his way that they, too, might feel what it was to suffer. 

The death of his "sweet little Juli" appeared to have hardened the lasttender spot in his brutal soul. 

Kuni was the only person toward whom at first he imposed some restraintupon himself. True, without any consideration for the girl's presence, he sometimes asked Gitta why they still burdened themselves with theuseless hobbler and did not sell the cart and the donkey. But thoughthere was no lack of good offers for the excellent Spanish beast ofburden, he allowed matters to remain as before. If the rage seething inhis heart led him, in his drunken frenzy, to make Kuni feel its effects, too, the pleading glance of the blue eyes, still large and expressive, with which she had so often hushed the wailing child, sufficed to soothehim. 

Yesterday, for the first time, he had seriously threatened to drive theropedancer away, and she knew that Cyriax was capable of anything. True, his wife was attached to Kuni, but she had little influence over hervicious husband. So the sick cripple might only too easily find herselfleft on the highway. 

Still, she had given Cyriax cause for the threat. All day and duringthe night she had been busy with the unfortunate mother and her twins, and therefore had frequently neglected to fill his brandy bottle. Butthis could not be helped, and she was not accustomed to think of thefuture. Whatever her heart urged she did, no matter what might happen. If Cyriax left her in the lurch, she must beg or starve unless chance, which so often mingled in her existence, willed otherwise. 

With the child's life the modest happiness which Kuni had enjoyed duringthe last few months had vanished, not only because the tonguelessblasphemer had become a different person, and she sorely missed thedelicate little creature who had filled and cheered her heart, but shehad also lost the peace of mind which she enjoyed during the existenceof her charge. 

The young Augsburg maiden, whom she thought she had bought out of theflames of purgatory, did not appear to her again, but the vagrant's childcame all the more frequently, and whenever she showed herself she wailedand wept bitterly. Sweet little Juli's soul must now--whether it hadbeen Juliane's or not--endure the tortures of purgatory, and this piercedKuni's heart the more deeply the more affectionately she remembered thesickly-child. 

Ever since she had used a black plaster, given to her at Singen by aquack, the stump of her foot had become sore again, and sharp paintortured her so cruelly that, especially when the cough racked heremaciated body and she was jolted to and fro in the springless cart overstony roads, she was afraid that she should lose her reason. 

At Pforzheim a barber had examined the wound and, shaking his head, pronounced the black plaster a malignant blood poisoner, and when sherefused to have the leg amputated, applied a yellow one, which proved nobetter. When Cyriax counted up his receipts in the evening, called tored-haired Gitta his favourite maxim, "Fools never die, " and handed toher--Kuni--the larger brandy bottle to fill, she had often summoned upher courage and begged him to buy an indulgence for his sweet littleJuli. The result was certain--she knew it from her own experience. 

Shortly after the child's death he had thrust his hand into his pursemore than once at such an appeal and given money for a few candles, butit had not been possible to persuade him to purchase the paper. 

This refusal was by no means due to mere parsimony. Kuni knew whatinduced him to maintain his resistance so obstinately, for in herpresence he had told pock-marked Ratz that he would not take theindulgence gratis. Wherever he might be, his family ought to go, and he did not wish to be anywhere that he would not find Juli. 

He did not doubt the continued life of the soul after death, butprecisely because he was sure that the gates of paradise would remainclosed to him throughout eternity he would not help to open them for thedead child. When his imagination tortured him with fancies that mice andbeetles were leaping and running out of his pockets and the breast of hisdoublet, he thought that his end was drawing near. If the devil then hadpower over his soul, his imps might drag him wherever they pleased, ifonly he might see little Juli there and hear her call "Baba" and"Father. " It would lessen the tortures of hell, however severe theymight be. Was it possible for him to conceive of any greater folly thanto rob himself of this consolation by transporting the child, through theindulgence, to the kingdom of heaven, where he could never see her again. He had accumulated a goodly sum by begging, it is true, but, strangelyenough, he did not think of purchasing salvation for himself in order tomeet his child again in heaven, instead of amid the flames of purgatory. Though he had become as rich as the Fuggers, paradise, he knew, wouldstill be closed to him. He was not fit for it. 

He hated everybody who was rich and respectable. He would rather be withhis child in the mire of hell than to go with her to a magnificent gardenof paradise where swearing was forbidden, where there was no brandy andno highroad, and which offered only pleasures which were none to him. 

So Kuni was forced to see the child remain in the fires of purgatory, which hurt her little less than her aching limb. 

At her entrance into The Blue Pike pain and mental suffering had drivenher to the verge of despair. But the day which began so sorrowfully wasfollowed by an evening of delight--she owed to it her new meeting withLienhard. 

From childhood she had been homeless, and every quarter of the globe towhich a highroad led was her native land. Yet in Spain and during thejourney back she had felt a gnawing longing for Germany, nay, nothing hadtroubled her more than the thought of dying and being buried outside ofits frontier. Her mother, a native of the Rhine country, had given herbirth during the fair at Cologne on the Spree; but, whenever homesicknessassailed her, it was always the steeples of St. Sebald and St. Ulrichwhich beckoned to her, and she had longed for the Frank country, theMain, or the richly wooded banks of the Pegnitz. Was this because, inNuremberg, for the only time in her life, she had been a member of adecorous household, or had the love which, wherever Cyriax's cart anddonkey carried her, always drew her heart back to the same ancient city, made it so dear to her?

Probably the latter, for yesterday she had yearned ardently to reachNuremberg; but since she had seen Lienhard again, she rejoiced that shewas in Miltenberg and at The Blue Pike. 

Never had he seemed to her so handsome, so manly. Besides, he had spokento her, listened to her reply, and even given her money with lavishgenerosity. It was like him! No one else would have been capable of it. 

She could live a long time on his three gold florins, if Cyriax abandonedher; yet the unexpected wealth burned in her hand and perplexed her. DidLienhard no longer know that she would not accept money from him? Hadshe robbed herself of the certainty that beautified existence; had shefailed to show him her superiority to other vagrant girls? Yet no! Whathe gave her was more, far more, than even a prince bestowed upon anordinary mendicant. He must measure her by a special standard. If hehad only given her the gold with a kind word, not flung it silently intoher lap. This half destroyed her pleasure in the present, and the amplesupply of money clouded her already disturbed peace of mind still more. Had it been possible, she would have returned the gift as she did thealms at Augsburg. But how was this to be accomplished in the over-crowded inn?

Yet, if she kept the florins, the sacrifice at the convent would lose alarge portion of its value, and the good opinion which her act atAugsburg must have inspired might be shadowed. 

For some time before leaving the room in the tavern she had turned thecoins restlessly over and over under her kerchief, and meanwhile, as ifin a dream, made but evasive answers to the questions and demands ofCyriax and Gitta. 

Then she glided nearer to the gentlemen at the table, intending to returnLienhard's gift; but the landlord of The Pike followed her suspiciously, and drove her back to her companions. 

Thence she had been called to the sick woman and went out of doors. Shefound the mother of the twins in the meadow by the Main and eagerlydevoted herself to them. 

The widow's burning head and gasping breath were no favourable symptoms. She herself felt that her end was approaching. Her tongue was parched. The water in the jug was warm and flat, yet she longed for a cool drink. During the day Kuni had noticed a well in the kitchen garden, and, inspite of her aching foot, hastened to it at once to draw the cool water. While doing so, the red and white pinks which she had noticed at noonagain caught her eye in the starlight night. The sick woman could enjoytheir fragrance now, and to-morrow, feast her eyes upon their brightcolours. 

From childhood she had always been fond of flowers. Stealing wasprohibited by her father as wicked and dangerous, and she had nevertransgressed his commands. When she picked up the costly rosary inNuremberg, she had intended to return it to the owner. But to pluck theflowers and fruit which the Lord caused to grow and ripen for every onewas a different thing, and had never troubled her conscience. So shecarelessly gathered a few pinks. Three should go to the sick woman, butLienhard Groland would have the largest and finest. She would try toslip the flowers into his hand, with the money, as a token of hergratitude. But even while saying to herself that these blossoms shouldbe her last greeting to him, she felt the red spots burning more hotly onher cheeks. Ah, if only he would accept the pinks! Then the most cruelthings might happen, she could bear them. 

While kneeling before the bed, the waiter, Dietel, noticed her. As shesaw him also, she hurried back to the suffering mother as fast as herlame limb would carry her, and raised the jug of fresh water to herparched lips. 

This had been a delicious refreshment to the sick woman, and when Kunisaw how much comfort her little service afforded the invalid, her heartgrew lighter. Had it been possible she, who was of no importance to anyone, would willingly have lain down on the heap of straw in the place ofthe mother upon whom two young lives depended. 

How delightful it was to bring aid! And she possessed the means of beinghelpful. 

So, with sparkling eyes, she pressed the three gold coins into thesufferer's burning hand, and told her that the village authorities wouldrear the twins for such a sum. Then the parched lips of the feveredwoman lauded the merciful kindness bestowed by the lame ropedancer--whoat that moment seemed to her as powerful as a queen--so warmly andtenderly that Kuni felt the blood again mount into her cheeks--this timewith shame at the praise which she deserved so little, yet which renderedher so happy. Finally, the sufferer expressed a desire for a priest, that she might not pass from earth without a sacrament. Her sinsoppressed her sorely. She, and she alone, was to blame for Nickel'sbeing hanged. Never in all her life had she been a glutton; but beforethe birth of the twins the devil had tormented her with a strange longingfor roast fowl, which she had been unable to repress and keep to herself. Solely for her gratification, Nickel stole the goose and the hens. Inspite of many a bad business in which his reckless nature had involvedhim, he was a good fellow, with a loving heart. 

For her sake he would have tried to steal the ring from the executioner'sfinger. Now he had gone into the other world unshriven, with the ropeabout his neck, for though the benefit of the sacrament was usuallygranted even to the worst criminals, the peasants strung Nickel up to thenearest tree as soon as they caught him, without heeding his entreaties. This made death even harder for her than the thought of the poor littlecreatures yonder in the bundle of rags. Kuni's charity had provided forthe orphans, but her Nickel would find no mercy from the heavenly Judgethroughout eternity. 

She had sobbed aloud as she spoke, and then writhed in such violentconvulsions that Kuni with difficulty prevented her from throwing herselfout of the hot straw in the cart upon the damp meadow. 

When she grew somewhat calmer, she repeated Nickel's name again and againtill it was heartrending to hear her. 

CHAPTER IX. 

As soon as the sufferer's condition would permit, Kuni left her, went tothe window of the taproom in The Blue Pike, and surveyed its inmates. 

Most of them were already asleep on heaps of straw, which were raised atthe head by chairs turned upside down. The richer guests had gone to thebedrooms, which, however, they were obliged to share with several others. Some of the strollers were lying on the floor with their knapsacks undertheir heads. A few of the musicians were still lingering over the winewhich the travelling merchants and artisans had ordered for them. Othershad gone with some of the vagrants into the little wood beyond themeadow, where they danced, fiddled, and sang. 

Their loud shouts were borne by the cool night breeze to the sufferer inthe cart. The gentlemen from Cologne, without troubling themselves aboutthe boisterous merriment of the burghers or the transformation of theroom into a sleeping apartment, were still sitting at the table talkingtogether eagerly. 

The dealer in the indulgences, too, had not yet gone to rest. A tall, broad-shouldered sergeant belonging to the escort had just purchased--for the larger part of the zecchins won as his share of the booty in theItalian war--the indulgence which he thought would secure him from thetortures of the fire of purgatory. Before opening the door, he struckhis broad breast as though relieved of a heavy burden. 

The ropedancer looked after him thoughtfully. The paper had nowlightened the sergeant's heart as it had formerly done her own. Wouldshe not have been wiser to give her money for the redemption of Nickel'slost soul than for the orphans, whom the charity of the people wouldperhaps have succoured without her? Probably, too, it would haveafforded still greater consolation to the poor dying woman, whom nothingtroubled so sorely as her guilt for the doom of her unfortunate husband. 

Yet, even thus she had succeeded in making the dying mother's departureeasier, and what she had commenced she intended to complete at once. 

With a tender smile that lent strange beauty to her pallid, grief-wornface she continued her survey. 

She had previously noticed an old priest, whose countenance bore theimpress of genuine kindness of heart. She soon found him again among thetravellers sleeping on the straw; but the old man's slumber was so soundthat she felt reluctant to wake him. Among the Dominicans from Cologne, most of whom were also asleep, there were none she would have trusted, nay, she even thought that one was the very person who, shortly beforeher fall from the rope, had pursued her with persistent importunity. But the Abbot of St. AEgidius in Nuremberg, who had dined with theambassadors from his native city, was also a man of benevolent, winningexpression. His cheeks were flushed, either by the heat or the winewhich he had drunk, but there was a look of attractive kindness upon hiswell-formed features. When he went through the room a short time before, Kuni had seen him pass his hand caressingly over the fair hair of thepretty little son of a potter's wife from Reren on the Rhine, whose cartwas standing outside in the meadow by the Main. He was scarcely of thesame mind as the gentleman from Cologne, for he had just waved his plumphand in protest. 

Perhaps she might even do him a favour by summoning him. But dared she, a poor vagabond, disturb so distinguished a gentleman at his wine?

Yet there was danger in delay. So she resolved to ask the assistance ofthe landlady of The Pike, coughed with her handkerchief pressed over herlips, in order not to disturb the sleepers, and turned to leave the room. 

But Gitta had just been to see the sick mother, and told Cyriax thatKuni, silly, softhearted thing, had wasted her gold coins on the dyingwoman. 

The blasphemer flew into a great rage, muttered a few words to pock-marked Ratz, and then staggered toward their lame travelling companion tobar her passage across the threshold, and ask, in angry, guttural tones, how much of the Groland gold she had flung into the dying woman's grave. 

"Is it any business of yours?" was the reply, uttered with difficultyamid her coughing. 

"Mine, mine--is it any business of mine?" gasped the tongueless man. Then he raised his heavy fist threateningly and stammered jeeringly:"Not--not a red heller more nor less than my cart--in the name of all thefiends--than my cart is of yours. Four heller pounds, Ratz, and thedonkey and cart are yours. "

"Done!" cried the vagrant, who already had his money ready; but thetongueless blasphemer chuckled with malicious pleasure:

"Now you have it, fool! Whoever doesn't share with me--you know that--doesn't ride with me. "

Then he staggered back to Gitta. 

The girl watched him silently for a while. At last she passed her handquickly across her brow, as if to dispel some unpleasant thought, andshook her burning head, half sadly, half disapprovingly. 

She had done a good deed--and this, this--But she had not performed itfor the sake of reward, she had only desired to aid the sufferer. 

Straightening herself proudly, she limped toward the kitchen. 

Here, frequently interrupted by fits of coughing, she told the landladyof The Pike in touching words that the sick mother, whom she had sokindly strengthened with nice broth, desired the sacrament, as her lifewould soon be over. The Lord Abbot of St. AEgidius in Nuremberg wasstill sitting over his wine. 

She went no further. The landlady, who, while Kuni was talking, hadwiped her pretty flushed face with her apron, pulled the rolled up whitelinen sleeves farther down over her plump arms, and gazed with mingledsurprise and approval into the girl's emaciated face, interrupted herwith the promise to do what she could for the poor woman. 

"If it were any one else, " she continued, significantly, "I would notventure to try it. But the Abbot of St. AEgidius, in his charity, scarcely asks, when help is needed, whence did you come, who are you, or what do you possess? I know him. Wait here a little while. If hecondescends to do it, you can take him to the poor creature at once. "

While speaking she smoothed, with two swift motions of her hands, thebrown hair which had become a little disordered while bustling to and froto attend to the business, dipped her hands into the water pail, driedthem quickly on her apron, untied it, and tossed it to the maid. Thenshe cleared her throat vigorously and left the kitchen. 

In reply to the anxious question of her husband, whom she met on thethreshold of the room, as to what she was seeking there, she answeredfirmly, "What is right and pious"; then modestly whispered her requestto the abbot. 

Her wish was fulfilled without delay, nay, it might really have beensupposed that the interruption was very opportune to the distinguishedprelate; for, with the brief exclamation, "Imperative official duty!"he rose from the table, and went first with the landlady to Kuni andafterward with the latter to the cart beside the laden potter's wain, whose white tilt gleamed in the darkness. 

The landlady had undertaken to send to the sexton, whose house was near, that he might immediately obtain everything the abbot needed for thedying woman's viaticum. 

Kuni told the sufferer what an exalted servant of the Church was ready toreceive her confession and give her the sacrament. 

Then she whispered that she might mention Nickel's burdened soul to theabbot. Whatever happened, she could now depart from earth in peace. 

Reserving for herself half of the flowers she had gathered in the gardenshe glided away, in order not to disturb the dying woman's confession. 

CHAPTER X. 

At the edge of the meadow Kuni paused to reflect. She would gladly haveflung herself down on the dewy grass to rest, stretched at full length onthe cool turf. She was worn out, and her foot ached and burned painfullyafter her long walk in the warm August night; but something else exerteda still stronger attraction over her poor longing heart; the desire tosee Lienhard again and give him the pinks as a token of gratitude for somuch kindness. 

He was still sitting with the other gentlemen at the table in front ofthe tavern. One of the torches threw its light full on his manly face. Kuni knew that he could not see her in the darkness surrounding herfigure, yet it seemed as though she was meeting the gaze of his sparklingdark eyes. Now he was speaking. How she longed to know what he said. Summoning up her courage, she glided along in the shadow of the wall andsat down behind the oleander bush on the sharp edge of the tub. No onenoticed her, but she was afraid that a fit of coughing might betray herpresence, so she pressed her apron firmly over her lips and sat strainingher ears to listen. In spite of the violent aching of her foot and theloud rattling in her chest, she thought it a specially favourabledispensation of Providence that she had found her way here just at thismoment; for Lienhard was still speaking. The others had asked him totell them connectedly how the beautiful Katharina Harsdtirffer had becomehis wife, in spite of the opposition of her stern father and though theHonourable Council had punished him for such insubordination withimprisonment and exile. 

He had already related this in detail when Kuni came to listen. Now, pointing to Wilibald Pirckheimer, who sat opposite, he went on with hisstory, describing how, thanks to the mediation of the latter and of thegreat artist, Albrecht Durer, he had obtained an audience at Innsbruckwith the Emperor Maximilian, how the sovereign had interceded personallyin behalf of himself and his betrothal, and how, in consequence of thisroyal intervention, he had attained the goal of his wishes. 

"Our Honourables, " he concluded, "now willingly permitted me to returnhome, and Hans Harsdtirffer, Katharina's father-Heaven rest his soul--relinquished his opposition to our marriage. Perhaps he would have doneso earlier, but for the keen antagonism which, owing to their totallydifferent natures, had arisen between the stern man and my lightheartedfather, and displayed itself in the Council as well as in all the affairsof life. Not until his old opponent, to whom I owed my existence, was onhis death-bed, did Herr Hans clasp hands with him in reconciliation, andconsent to our betrothal. "

"And I know, " Wilibald Pirckheimer interrupted, that among the manyobstacles which his foes placed in his path, and which clouded his activelife, you two, and your loyal love, gave him more light and greaterconsolation than anything else. I have often heard him gladlyacknowledge this, and as for you, friend Lienhard. "

"I know, " replied the young Honourable modestly, checking him, "that hewas right in deeming the immature youth, which I was at the time of myfirst wooing, unworthy of his daughter. "

"Though you had been the peer in strength and beauty of the valiantAchilles, and in wisdom of the subtle Ulysses, son of Laertes, I wouldnot contradict you, " interrupted Pirckheimer; "for, gentlemen, thisgallant husband's wife is a jewel of a peculiar kind. Nuremberg is proudof calling Frau Katharina her daughter. Far as the German language isspoken, her equal would be sought in vain. "

"You are an enviable man, " said little Dr. Eberbach, turning toLienhard. "But probably you will permit me one question. Even when aboy, --as we heard, you loved the child Katharina. As a youth, you tookthis love across the Alps to Padua and Bologna. But when, like the nobleVirgil, I perceive that 'Nowhere is there aught to trust-nowhere, '--[Virg. AEn. Iv, 373. ]--and find that the esteemed Catullus's words, 'No man passes through life without error, '--[Catull. Dist. I, 5. ]--are verified, I would fain learn whether in Italy also you held fast, insmall things as well as great ones, to the--among us men--rare bird ofthe fidelity sworn to the woman whom we love. I, who compared to you, am like a faun with pointed ears beside the handsome Ares, neverthelessknow by experience how easily the glowing eyes of that country kindleconflagrations. Was the armour of a former love really strong enough toguard your heart from every flame, even before any vow bound you to thechild whom you chose so early for the companion of your life"?

"It was the same before the priest's consecration as afterward, " repliedthe young Councillor, gravely and firmly. 

Then, changing his manner, he held out his brimming glass toward theThuringian and gaily continued:

"It ought not to seem so amazing to a man of your learning, myincredulous Herr Doctor. Surely your far-famed Propertius says, 'Love is benefited by many things, a faithful nature and resolutepersistence. ' Believe me, doctor, even without the counsel of yourexperienced Roman, I should have kept faith with the lovely child athome. From my boyhood, Katharina was to me the woman, the one above allothers, the worthy Tryphon, my teacher of Greek in Bologna, would havesaid. My heart's darling has always been my light, as Helios was thatof the Greeks, though there were the moon and so many planets and starsbesides. "

"And the vagrant we saw just now, on whom you bestowed a golden showerof remembrance as Father Zeus endowed the fair Danae?" asked DoctorPeutinger of Augsburg, shaking his finger mischievously at his youngfriend. "We humanists follow the saying of Tibullus: 'Whoever confesseslet him be forgiven, ' and know the world sufficiently to be aware thatwithin the walls of Ilium and without enormities are committed. "--[Horace, Epist. 1, 2, 16. ]

"A true statement, " replied Lienhard. "It probably applies to me as muchas to the young girl, but there was really nothing between us which borethe most distant resemblance to a love intrigue. As a magistrate, I acquitted her of a trivial misdemeanour which she committed while mywedding procession was on its way to the altar. I did this because I wasunwilling to have that happy hour become a source of pain to any one. In return, she grew deeply attached to me, who can tell whether frommere gratitude, or because a warmer feeling stirred her strange heart?At that time she was certainly a pretty, dainty creature, and yet, astruly as I hope to enjoy the love of my darling wife for many a year, there was nothing, absolutely nothing, between me and the blue-eyed, dark-haired wanderer which the confessor might not have witnessed. I myself wonder at this, because I by no means failed to see theropedancer's peculiar changeful charms, and the tempter pointed them outto me zealously enough. Besides, she has no ordinary nature. She hadaccomplished really marvellous feats in her art, until at Augsburg, during the Reichstag, when in the Emperor's presence, she risked the mostdaring ventures--"

"Could it be the same person who, before our poor Juliane's eyes, had theawful fall which frightened the child so terribly?" asked DoctorPeutinger earnestly. 

"The very same, " replied Lienhard in a tone of sincere pity; but theAugsburg doctor continued, sighing:

"With that sudden fright, which thrilled her sensitive nature to itsinmost depths, began the illness of the angel whose rich, loving heartthrobbed so tenderly for you also, Herr Lienhard. "

"As mine did for the peerless child, " replied the young Councillor witheager warmth. "While Juliane, who sickened at the sight of the girldancing on the edge of the grave, was pointing out to me some pages inthe manuscript of Lucian, which I was to take from you to Herr Wilibaldyonder, the unfortunate performer met with the terrible accident. We thought that she was killed, but, as if by a miracle, she lived. Ropedancing, of course, was over forever, as she had lost a foot. This, we supposed, would tend to her welfare and induce her to lead a regular, decorous life; but we were mistaken. In spite of her lameness, Kuni'srestless nature drove her back to the highroad. Yet she would have beenat liberty to remain in the convent as a lay sister without taking thevows. "

"My wife, too, had opened our house to her for Juliane's sake, " addedDoctor Peutinger. "The sick child could not get the fall which hadfrightened her so terribly out of her head. Her compassionate heart wasconstantly occupied with the poor girl, and when she urged her mother toprovide for her, she willingly gratified her wish and often inquiredabout the sufferer's health. How Juliane rejoiced when she heard thatthe bold and skilful dancer's life would be saved! But when, throughthe abbess, my wife offered her a situation in our home, the vagabonddisdained what the mother and daughter had planned for her, Heaven knowshow kindly. "

"She treated the gift which we--my wife and I--left in the convent forher in the same way, " added Lienhard. "Why did she refuse the aid Ioffered no less willingly? Probably because she was too proud to acceptalms from a man from whom her ardent heart vainly desired somethingbetter. "

Here Lienhard Groland hesitated, and it sounded like a confession as heeagerly continued:

"And, gentleman, she often seemed to me well worthy of a man's desire. Why should I deny it? Within and without the walls of Troy--we have justheard it--sin is committed, and had not the image of another woman stoodbetween us, as the Alps rise between Germany and Italy-perhaps--But ofwhat avail are conjectures? Will you believe that there were hours whenI felt as though I ought to make some atonement to the poor girl?"

"In your place I should have done it long ago, for the benefit of both, "protested little Doctor Eberbach merrily. "The commands of conscienceshould be obeyed, even when, by way of exception, it requires somethingpleasant. But how grave you look, sir. No offence! You are one of therare specimens of featherless birds endowed with reason, who unite to theausterity of Cato the amiability of Titus. "

"All due honour to Cato, " added Wilibald Pirckheimer with a slight bendof his stately head; "but in my young days we had a better understandingof the art of reconciling stern duty with indulgent compassion, whendealing with a beautiful Calypso whom our sternness threatened to wound. But everything in the good old days was not better than at the presenttime, and that you, whom I honour as the most faithful of husbands, maynot misunderstand me, Lienhard: To bend and to succumb are two differentthings. "

"Succumb!" Sir Hans von Obernitz, the Nuremberg magistrate, hereinterposed indignantly. "A Groland, who, moreover, is blessed with aloyal, lovely wife, succumb to the sparkling eyes of a vagabond wanton!The Pegnitz would flow up the castle cliff first. I should think wemight have less vulgar subjects to discuss. "

"The daring, skilful ropedancer certainly does not belong to the latter, "Doctor Peutinger eagerly retorted. "Besides, who would not desire toknow how the free, hot-blooded daughter of the highway settled theaccount with you, friend Lienhard? Love disdained is said to be themother of hatred, and from the days of Potiphar's wife has often causedcruel vengeance. Had this girl whom Sir Hans holds in such light esteemreally possessed an evil nature, like others of her class--"

"That she does not, " Lienhard Groland here warmly interrupted theAugsburg guest. 

"Whatever Kuni may lack, and whatever errors she may have committed, sheis, and will remain a rare creature, even among the few whose loftyspirit can not be bowed or broken by the deepest calamity. When I mether here again at The Blue Pike, among the most corrupt vagabonds, illand poor, perhaps already the victim of death, I thought it a fittingtime to renew the gift which she had refused. I would gladly do more forthe poor girl, and my wife at home certainly would not be vexed; she, too, is fond of Kuni, and--I repeat it--this girl has a good, nay, thebest nature. If, instead of among vagabonds, she had been born in arespectable household--"

Here the young envoy was suddenly interrupted. His table companions alsoraised their heads in surprise--a strange noise echoed through the nightair. 

Little Doctor Eberbach started up in affright, Hans von Obernitz, theNuremberg magistrate, grasped the hilt of his sword, but Doctor Schedelinstantly perceived that the sound which reached his aged ears wasnothing but a violent, long-repressed fit of coughing. He and the othergentlemen were gazing at the oleander tree whence, before any oneapproached it, a groan of pain was heard. 

The experienced physician shook his white locks gravely and said:

"Whoever uttered that is near the end of his sufferings. "

He made a movement to rise as he spoke; he felt that his help was needed. 

But another incident diverted the attention of his companions andhimself. 

CHAPTER XI. 

Dietel, the waiter, had at last been released from his confinement in thecellar, and instantly began the search for the thief in the garden withtwofold zeal. 

Without considering how long a time had passed since he first tried tobring the culprit into the clutches of the law, he had resumed thepursuit where it was interrupted. As a thoughtless child whose bird hasflown from the cage looks into the water jug to find it, he had turnedthe light of his lantern upon places where a kitten could not have hiddenitself, and had even been to the meadow on the bank of the Main to seekKuni with the widow of the thief Nickel; but here the sacrament was justbeing given to the sufferer, and to interrupt such a ceremony would havebeen a great crime. His eyes were keen, and the red pinks had gleamedfrom the straw on which the dying woman lay in the light of the lantern, whose long pole the sexton had thrust into the soft earth of the meadow. Those flowers must have come from the garden of the landlady of The Pike, and she valued her pinks more than anything else. The ropedancer hadgathered them for the sick woman, and certainly had not stopped at thatone act of theft. How far these vagabonds' impudence went! But he, whose duty it was to look after the property of The Blue Pike, wouldspoil their pleasure in thieving. 

The dog Phylax had soon put him on the trail, and before any of thegentlemen could reach the groaning person Dietel's triumphant shout rangfrom behind the oleander:

"Now we've caught the pilferer, and we'll make an example of her!"

His first glance had fallen on the little bunch of pinks in the girl'shand, and the vein on his forehead swelled with wrath at this damage tohis mistress's favourite flowers. 

But when he shook the culprit by the shoulder and, to his surprise, metwith no resistance, he threw the light of the lantern upon her face, andwhat he saw there suddenly troubled him, for the girl's lips, chin, anddress were covered with bright blood, and her head drooped on one side asif it had lost its support. 

This frightened him, and instead of continuing to boast of his success, he called for help. 

The Nuremberg gentlemen soon surrounded Kuni, and Doctor Hartmann Schedeltold the waiter to carry her, with the aid of his assistants, summoned byhis shout, into the house and provide her with a comfortable bed. 

Dietel obeyed the command without delay--nay, when he heard the famousleech whisper to the other gentlemen that the sufferer's life was but afailing lamp, his feelings were completely transformed. All the charityin his nature began to stir and grew more zealous as he gazed at Kuni'sface, distorted by pain. The idea of giving up to her his own neatlittle room behind the kitchen seemed like a revelation from St. Eoban, his patron. She should rest in his bed. The wanderer who, a few yearsago, had scattered her gold so readily and joyously for the pleasure ofothers certainly would not poison it. Her misery seemed to him atouching proof of the transitory nature of all earthly things. Poorsufferer! Yet she ought to find recovery on his couch, if anywhere; forhe had surrounded it with images of the saints, pious maxims, and littlerelics, bought chiefly from the venders who frequented the tavern. Amongthem was a leather strap from St. Elizabeth's shoe, whose healing powerhe had himself tested during an attack of bilious fever. 

The burden which he shared with his assistants was a light one, but hewas not to reach his destination without delay--the little bunch of pinksfell from the hand of the unconscious girl, and Dietel silently picked upthe stolen property which had just roused his wrath to such a degree, andplaced it carefully on the senseless sufferer's bosom. 

The second hinderance was more serious. Cyriax had heard that Kuni wasdying, and fearing that he might be obliged to pay the funeral expenseshe stuttered to the bystanders, with passionate gestures, that an hourago he had discharged the cripple whom he had dragged about with him, outof sheer sympathy, long enough. She was nothing more to him now than thecock in the courtyard, which was crowing to greet the approach of dawn. 

But the landlord of The Pike and others soon forced Cyriax out of theway. Kuni was laid on Dietel's bed, and the gray-haired leech examinedher with the utmost care. 

The landlady of The Pike helped to undress her, and when the good woman, holding her apron to her eyes from which tears were streaming, opened thedoor again and the Abbot of St. AEgidius approached the couch, to renderaid to the dying for the second time that night, he saw by HartmannSchedel's face that he had not come too soon. 

The ropedancer had recovered consciousness, and the kind prelate'spresence was a solace to her. The confession lasted a long time, and thestory which she had to confide to the priest must have been as strangeas it was interesting, for the abbot listened eagerly and with evidentemotion. When he had performed the duties of his office he remainedalone for a time; he could not immediately regain a mood in which hecared to rejoin the others. He did not ask for the gentlemen fromCologne; those from Nuremberg, whom he sought, had returned to thetable in front of the tavern long before. 

The waves of the Main were now reflecting the golden light of the morningsun. Dewdrops glittered on the grass and flowers in the meadow with thecart, and in the landlady's little garden. Carriers' men were harnessingthe freshly groomed bays to the pole. The brass rings on the highcollars of the stallions jingled loudly and merrily, and long whiplashescracked over the four and six-horse teams which were beginning the day'sjourney along the highroad. 

But even the rattling of the carts and the trampling of the horses'hoofs could not rouse the Cologne professors, who, with their clericalcompanions, had gone to rest, and slept in darkened rooms until late intothe morning. Most of the humbler guests had already left their strawbeds. 

Cyriax was one of the first who followed the road. He had sold hiscart and donkey, and wanted to burden his red-haired wife with hispossessions, but as she resolutely refused he had taken the bundle onhis own lazy shoulders. Now he dragged himself and his new load onward, swearing vehemently, for Ratz had remained with the cart in Miltenberg, where the sham lunatic no longer found it safe to stay. This time it washe who was obliged to pull his wife along by the chain, for she had longrefused, as if fairly frantic, to desert the dying girl who had nursedher child so faithfully. Again and again the doubly desolate womanlooked back toward the companion whom she had abandoned in her sufferinguntil they reached Frankfort. There Gitta left Cyriax and accompaniedRatz. The cart in which her child had lived and died, not its repulsiveowner, induced her to sever the bond which, for nine years, had bound herto the blasphemer. 

The travelling scholars set off singing merrily; but the strollingmusicians waited for the ship to sail down the Main, on whose voyage theycould earn money and have plenty to drink. 

The vagrants tramped along the highway, one after another, withouttroubling themselves about the dying ropedancer. 

"Everybody finds it hard enough to bear his own cross, " said Jungel, seizing his long crutches. Only "Dancing Gundel" lingered in Miltenbergthrough sympathy in the fate of the companion who had reached the heightof fame, while she, the former "Phyllis, " had gone swiftly downhill. It was a Christian duty, she said to the blind boy who begged theirbread, not to let Kuni, who had once held so lofty a position, take thelast journey without a suitable escort. When she heard that her formercompanion had received the sacrament, she exclaimed to her blind son, while slicing garlic into the barley porridge: "She will now be at rest. We shall earn a pretty penny at the mass in Frankfort if you can onlymanage to look as sorrowful when you hold out your hand as you do now!"

The monks, the dealer in indulgences, the burghers and artisans whowere just preparing to embark for the voyage down the Main, gazed inbewilderment at the distinguished gentlemen who, incredible as it seemed, had actually--for Dietel said so--foregone their morning nap for the sakeof a vagabond girl. The feather-curler shook his head as if somethingmarvellous had happened when he heard the ambassador of the HonourableCouncil of his own native city, the distinguished Herr Lienhard Groland, say to old Doctor Schedel:

"I will wait here with you, my venerable friend. Since the poor girl canlive only a few hours longer, I can join the others, if I hurry, beforethey leave Frankfort. "

"That's right, Lienhard, " cried Wilibald Pirckheimer, and the Abbot ofSt. AEgidius added approvingly:

"You will thereby do something which is pleasing in the sight of Heaven. Yes, gentlemen, I repeat it: there are few deathbeds beside which I havefound so little reason to be ashamed of the fate of being a mortal as bythe humble couch of this vagabond girl. If, before the judgment seatabove, intention and faith are weighed with the same scales as works, few who close their eyes behind silken curtains will be so sure of afavourable sentence as this poorest of the poor. "

"Did the girl really keep no portion of Herr Lienhard's rich gift forherself?" asked the Nuremberg imperial magistrate. 

"Nothing, " replied the abbot. "She gave the whole, down to her lastcopper, to the stranger, though she herself must remain here, poor, lame, and deserted--and she had only met the sick woman by accident upon thehighway. My duty forbids me to repeat the details, and how she boreherself even while at Augsburg, but, thanks to the confession which Ihave just received, I shall count this morning among those never to beforgotten. O gentlemen, death is a serious matter, and intercourse withthe dying is the best school for the priest. Then the inmost depths ofthe soul are opened to him. "

"And, " observed Wilibald Pirckheimer, "I think the psychologist wouldthen learn that, the deeper we penetrate the human breast, the darkeris the spectacle. "

"Yes, my learned friend, " the abbot answered, "but we also perceive thatthe deepest and darkest shafts contain the purest specimens of gold andsilver ore. "

"And were you really permitted to find such in this neglected vagabond, reverend sir?" asked Doctor Eberbach, with an incredulous smile. 

"As certainly, " answered the prelate with repellent dignity, "as that theSaviour was right when he called those who were pure in heart blessedabove those who were wise and overflowing with knowledge!"

Then, without waiting for the Thuringian's answer, he hastily turned tothe young ambassador and begged him to grant the dying girl, who clung tohim with tender devotion, a brief farewell. 

"Willingly, " replied Lienhard, requesting the physician to accompany him. 

The latter had just beckoned Doctor Peutinger to his side, to examinewith him the indulgence which he had found under the kerchief crossedover the sick girl's bosom. It did not secure redemption from the flamesof purgatory for the ropedancer's soul, as the gentlemen expected, butfor another, and that other--the learned humanist and Imperial Councillorwould not believe his own eyes--was his beloved, prematurely lost child. There, in large letters, was "Juliane Peutinger of Augsburg. "

Astonished, almost bewildered, the usually quiet statesman expressed hisamazement. 

The other gentlemen were preparing to examine the paper with him, whenthe abbot, without betraying the secret of Kuni's heart, which she hadconfided to him in her confession, told Juliane's father that theropedancer had scarcely left the convent ere she gave up both theEmperor's gift and the viaticum--in short, her whole property, whichwould have been large enough to support her a long time--in order to dowhat she could for the salvation of the child for whom her soul was moreconcerned than for her own welfare. 

The astonished father's eyes filled with tears of grateful emotion, andwhen Lienhard went with the gray-haired leech to the dying girl DoctorPeutinger begged permission to accompany them. The physician, however, requested him to remain away from the sufferer, who would be disturbed bythe sight of a strange face. Then Peutinger charged his young friend togive Kuni his kind greetings and thank her for the love with which shehad remembered his dear child. 

The young Councillor silently followed the physician to the sick bed, at whose head leaned a Gray Sister, who was one of the guests ofThe Blue Pike and had volunteered to nurse the patient. 

The nun shook her head sorrowfully as the two men crossed the threshold. She knew how the dying look, and that the hand of death already touchedthis sufferer. Yet her kind, colourless face, framed by the white sidesof her cap, quickly regained its usual quiet, placid expression. 

The regular features, now slightly flushed with the fever, of the patientin her charge, on the contrary, were constantly varying in expression. She had noticed the entrance of the visitors, and when she opened hersparkling blue eyes and saw the person to whom her poor heart clung withinsatiable yearning they were filled with a sunny radiance, and a smilehovered round her lips. 

She had known that he would come, that he would not let her die withoutgranting her one more glance. 

Now she would fain have nodded to him and expressed in very, veryappropriate words the delight, the embarrassment, the gratitude whichfilled her soul, but her panting chest could give no breath forutterance. Nay, extreme exhaustion even prevented the movement of herlips. But her heart and brain were by no means inactive. A wealth ofinternal and external experiences, long since forgotten, rose before hermind. First she fancied that she saw Lienhard, as at their firstmeeting, approaching the garlanded door of St. Sebald's with hisbeautiful bride, arrayed in her wedding robes. Then she was transportedto the court room and felt his hand stroke her hair. The hours at FrauSchurstab's when she had awaited his visits with an anxious heart cameback to her memory. Then she again saw herself upon the rope. Lienhardwas toying with the little elf below. But what she beheld this time wasfar from awakening new wicked wishes, for Juliane once more wore herlaurel crown and beckoned kindly to her like a dear, familiar friend. Finally, pale little Juli appeared, as if shrouded in mists. Last ofall, she saw herself filling the jug for the sick woman and gathering thered pinks for her and Lienhard in the landlady's little garden by theshimmering starlight. The flowers, whose fragrance was too strong, yetwhich she had not the strength to remove, lay on the coverlet before her. They were intended for Lienhard, and as she stretched her slender fingerstoward them and tried to clasp them she succeeded. She even foundstrength to hold out her right hand to him with a beseeching glance. And lo! ere her arm fell again the proud man had seized the flowers. Then she saw him fasten the pinks on the breast of his dark doublet, and heard the thrill of deep emotion in his voice, as he said:

"I thank you, dear Kuni, for the beautiful flowers. I will keep them. Your life was a hard one, but you have borne the burden bravely. I sawthis clearly, and not I alone. I am also to thank you and give you veryfriendly remembrances in the name of Doctor Peutinger, of Augsburg, little Juliane's father. He will think of you as a mistress of your art, a noble, high-minded girl, and I--I shall certainly do so. "

He clasped her burning hand as he spoke; but at these words she feltas she had probably done a few hours before, when, hidden behind theoleander, she listened to the conversation in which he mentioned herkindly. Again a warm wave of joy seemed to surge upward in her breast, and she fancied that her heart was much too small for such a wealth ofrapture, and it was already overflowing in hot waves, washing all grieffar, far away. 

Her gift had been accepted. 

The red pinks looked at her from his doublet, and she imagined thateverything around was steeped in rosy light, and that a musical tinklingand singing echoed in her ears. 

Never had she experienced such a feeling of happiness. 

Now she even succeeded in moving her lips, and the man, who still heldher little burning hand clasped in his first heard his own name veryfaintly uttered; then her parched lips almost inaudibly repeated theexclamation: "Too late!" and again, "Too late!"

The next instant she pressed her left hand upon her panting breast. Therosy hue around her blended with the red tint of the pinks, and anotherhaemorrhage bore the restless wanderer to that goal where every mortaljourney ends. 

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:

Repeated the exclamation: "Too late!" and again, "Too late!

ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS FOR THE ENTIRE "IN THE BLUE PIKE":

Arrogant wave of the hand, and in an instructive toneBuy indugence for sins to be committed in the futureHonest anger affords a certain degree of enjoymentMirrors were not allowed in the conventOvid, 'We praise the ancients'Pays better to provide for people's bodies than for their brainsRepeated the exclamation: "Too late!" and again, "Too late!Who watches for his neighbour's faults has a hundred sharp eyesWho gives great gifts, expects great gifts again