lovely evening in the autumn of the year, and the sun was now westering his course towards the remote hills; and that young couple sat there, watching with unspeaking rapture the magnificent Sun's going down. And the declining rays glistened on the surface of a small calm lake near them, and further off were multiplied in the waters of a winding river, which sparkled in them like burnished steel or silver. Then, like a thick black curtain, darkness was slowly drawn over their prospect; and after a little while we heard the tones of the evening hymn, and a low calm voice pleaded humbly in prayer; and soon after all sounds ceased, and the inmates of the castle were hushed in repose. Then succeeded an hour or two of stillness, and after that was borne to us on the night wind the tramp of a thousand feet; and louder they grew and yet louder, and they drew near that lonely building. And rude knocking was heard at its gate; and the passage was forced in; and lights flared up on all sides; and there were shrieks, and groans, and commingling cries of men engaged in deepest battle. And savage numbers prevailed, and the supplication for mercy was met by the sweep of the broadsword, or the thrust of the skein, or the low short laugh of derision. And the tumult grew lesser, and

the cries died away, and then all was hushed in the silence of death.

Then we had a vision of a rough and stormy ocean, and a struggling bark was wildly contending on it with the mad tempest; and there were terrified fugitives crouching low on her deck, and looking with eager eyes towards a blue low-lying shore they were with difficulty approaching. And then the scene changed to a plainly, furnished room in an inferior street, and the wanderers were there and knew of their safety; but the strong man's cheek was flushed with disease, and fever was feeding on his strength, and his head was sick, and his heart was broken.

And then in a gorgeous aisle of an ancient minster we saw a crowd to assemble, and a grave was dug, and a long procession issued from a lowarched door near at hand, and proeeeded towards the grave. And the nobles of the land were there; and poets read their eulogies of the de ceased, and cast the verses and the pens that indited them into the pit. And then there was the rumbling of earth upon the coffin-lid-and the hol low thumping of the sexton's spadeand suppressed sobs and tears-and the dying away of departing footsteps. Dust and ashes! and- -our dream was ended.

The ladies thought more pity of his lameness than ever, and there were no bounds to their sympathy with the Queen of Hungary and all the young princesses, to say nothing of the ladies of honour, and fair aristocracy of that realm in general, that had lost such a principal dancer. As for the common people, they delighted more and more in the stranger, and were wonderfully tickled to see now a town's-councillor, now a dignitary of the church, now this, now that other worshipful personage, take the harlequin leap with him, and show a light pair of heels in spite of themselves. And indeed it was in some sort not undelectable (had you felt that it was quite right) to behold how men of weight, and who occupied space in the public eye, after an improvised saltatory exhibition and tour de force of this kind, would walk on (if haply they limped not), making efforts more than human, to maintain an air of unembarrassed dignity, and to look as if nothing particular had happened, and as if the little boys were not grinning at them.

Jocund and cheerful of mood, however, as our stranger for the most part appeared, he had now and then strange humours enough, under the influence of which he would present himself to his adoptive fellow citizens under an aspect somewhat unusual and terrifying. For so it was, that he would go about the streets at night, and knock at the house doors, and when the people opened, there stood he in white corpseclothes, and lifted up such a doleful wailing, such unearthly howls and cries, as were never heard by Christian ears, at least in Berlin, which was ever a well-ordered and soberly-disposed town. Whereat, as was natural, the people were much troubled in their minds, and passed the remaining part of the night in agitation and dismay, not knowing what to think. And some there were who, combining in their reflection these ghastly freaks of the stranger, with what was reported of his Hungarian origin, fell upon doubtfull cogitations whether he were not, at bottom, a vampire, and could not sleep for very fear. But on the following day again was he all apologies, and

would beseech his good neighbours that they would not take ill of him that which he was constrained to do, in order to remind himself and them of the mortality of this poor body, and of their inmortal souls, of the welfare of which it behoved them ever to be mindful, and to use their best endeavours for the same. And so would he weep a little, which people found uncommonly touching.

There was no funeral, of high or low, in Berlin but our stranger attended it, followed the corpse with reverent steps,* and bore himself so exceeding sorrowfully, that for downright sobbing and crying of well-a-day, he could not join in the psalms that were sung. But if, on such melancholy occasions, he gave himself up wholly to compassion, and to a disconsolateness that put to shame the very chief mourner, and filled with the bitterest feelings of envy and despair the bosoms of the professional saulies, so was he also, on the other hand, all enjoyment and satisfaction at the weddings of the good burghers, which in those days were held with great state and festivity at the town-hall; here he was wont to show that he could sympathize in the joy as well as in the grief of his neighbours; and, as at a funeral he often out-mourned the nearest relations of the defunct, so at a marriage it sometimes seemed that his happiness went beyond that of the very bridegroom. At such festivals he sang, in a clear, agreeable voice, songs in every variety of mode, played on the lute, danced for hours together with the young bride and the young maidens, on the sound leg, managing the lame one itself with an infinity of dexterity and grace, so that it seemed, if anything, rather a beauty than a blemish. Withal, he behaved himself in all respects with the greatest decorum and suitability. But what was best of all, and what made our stranger always welcome to a wedding party was, that he always made bride and bridegroom the handsomest presents of gold chains, buckles, and other such-like costly gear.

It could not be but that the piety, virtue, bountifulness, and good man

ners of the stranger, should fill the whole town of Berlin with their fame, and at length come to the most serene hearing of Electoral Highness itself. The exalted personage who at that time governed Brandenburg was of opinion that such an estimable man as he of whom all these stories were told would surely be a great ornament to his court, and sent a message to the stranger, to ask if he would not like to receive some appointment that would attach him to the same. To which gracious communication, however, the stranger returned an answer, in vermilion letters, on a sheet of parchment an ell and a half in breadth, by the same in length, that he tendered most submissively his unworthy thanks for the proffered high honour, but prayed his sacred and most serene lord" graciously to accord him permission to abide in that tranquil sphere of private life, which was so entirely and in all respects congenial to his disposition. Berlin, he added, he had chosen before many other cities for his abode, because he had nowhere else found such delightful worthy people, so much honourable faith and sincerity, and so much taste for refined and graceful manners, which were things altogether after his own heart, and in his own

way.

The Elector and the whole court were lost in admiration of the beautiful language in which the letter of the stranger was couched; and with that there was an end of the matter.

At this juncture it came to pass that the honourable wife of worshipful Master Town's-councillor Walther Lütkins showed herself for the first time in a hopeful way, and old Barbara Roloffin, the midwife, prophesied that the comely dame, who was health and good spirits personified, would, without any manner of doubt, be brought to bed of a lovely boy; in consequence, Master Walther Lütkins was a right glad and hopeful man.

The stranger, who had been at Master Lütkins' wedding, was in the habit since that time of now and then calling at the house; and thus it came to pass, that once dropping in unexpectedly in the dusk of evening, he stood, before either of them was aware, face to face with Barbara Roloffin.

The moment old Barbara looked

upon the stranger, she uttered a ery of joy, and it was as if on a sudden the deep furrows and complicated wrinkles of her face unfolded themselves into smoothed plumpness, as if the bloodless lips and cheeks bloomed out into rosy freshness, as if, in short, youth and beauty, long departed, were returning to take up their abode anew in that old crazy frame. “Ah! blessed sight," cried the hag. "Ah! fair, fair fall the day! and do I behold the squire's own worship here bodily where I stand? Eh! take my fairest greeting, fair sir." And with that she had well nigh sunk at the stranger's feet. The eyes of the latter seemed to flash fire, and he gnashed out at the old woman some wrathful words, which none present understood, but at the utterance of which she, wan and wrinkled as before, drew back with a low whimpering cry into a corner.

"My dear Master Lütkins," said now the stranger to the town's-councillor, "look you well to it, and be on your guard, that no bad business happen in your house, and, in especial, that all turn out well, and be of prosperous issue, as regards the accouchement of your precious wife. That old Barbara Roloffin is in no wise so skilful in her craft as you may very possibly suppose. I know her long, and can avouch that many a mother and child have ere now perished under her hands."

Both Master and Dame Lütkins had felt, during all that had passed, very uncomfortable and queer in their minds, and conceived no slight suspicion against Barbara Roloffin (especially when they thought how strangely the old creature had altered in the presence of their guest) as one that to all appearance was given to the practice of something not unlike the black art. Ac, cordingly they forbad her ever to cross the threshold again, and looked out for another midwife. At this, old Barbara waxed exceeding ireful, and was heard to threaten that Master Lütkins and his dame should sorely rue the affront and wrong they had put upon her.

Dame Lütkins' time came, and all Master Walther's joyful expectation was changed into bitter grief and disappointment, when, instead of the promised "lovely boy," he was presented by his wife with a frightful changeling. The thing was as brown as a chesnut,

had horns, great globose eyes, no nose, its mouth was wide and like a beast's, with a white mis-grown tongue, and of neck there was not a trace; the head was planted between the shoulders, the body was puffed and wrinkly like a toad's, the arms were appended to the loins, and no crane ever had a longer or a thinner pair of legs.

Master Lütkins, at sight of this "delicate monster," made sore plaint, and bemoaned himself in a piteous manner. "Oh just heaven!" cried he, "what am I, unlucky town's-councillor, to make of such a son? Is it any way possible that this my heir should ever tread in his father's respected footsteps? Was ever a chesnut-coloured town's-councillor before heard of? Was ever a town's-councillor seen that had horns on his head?"

The stranger comforted poor Master Lütkins, as well as it was possible to do. A good education, he urged, would do wonders.

Notwith

standing the little stranger was certainly, as to externals, a rank dissenter, yet he doubted not that it had a very orthodox stomach and brains, which were, after all, the essential points. Further, he would venture to say, it glowred around it very sagaciously with its globose eyes, and that in the forehead between the horns, there was room for a great deal of wisdom. He did not see why the infant Lütkins might not yet one day stand before the world, a worthy successor to its father. "Town's-councillors, esteemed Master Lütkins," proceeded he, "have been done brown ere now, if none were exactly born of that colour; and as to-but enough— your offspring, if he come not to the honours that sit so becomingly on his sire, may yet attain others; if no town's-councillor, he may yet turn out at least a good doctor, a learned professor, a wise clerk: and you may trust me, who have in my time had not a little to do with the learned order, that such a horribly ill-favoured visage, so far from being prejudicial, is ofttimes a great advantage, gaining for its possessor the credit of being twice as learned as he is, and consequently redounding infinitely to his honour and consideration."

What effect the consolatory discourses of our stranger had upon Master Walther Lütkins, this true his

tory specifieth not; but certain it is, that they did by no means abate his ire against old Barbara Roloffin, to whom in his heart he could not but ascribe his misfortune, especially when he heard that she had sat on the door step from the moment his wife was put to bed, and when Dame Lütkins herself declared with floods of tears, that all the time of her pains she had had old Barbara's withered features before her eyes, and could not, strive as she would, get quit thereof.

Unhappily, Master Lütkin's suspicion, strong as it was, would not serve as the ground of a judicial process; it was enough subjectively, or for Master Walther, but it was not enough objectively, or for the Judge. However, it was so ordered (for murder will out) that, soon after, not only this, but all the atrocities of Barbara Roloffin were brought, with the most conclusive evidence, to the clear light of day. It came to pass, namely, that, some time after these occurrences, there arose one day, about noon, a great storm, and that the wind blew with a force that nothing could resist. Just at the moment that the gale came on in its greatest fury, sweeping the streets of everything but the solid pavement, Barbara Roliffin, as it was disposed, was making such haste as her old limbs were capable of to some woman then in child-bed, when on a sudden, in the sight of several people who were looking out of the windows of their respective houses-for all in the streets had fled to the nearest shelter, and there was not a soul in Berlin unhoused but the hag herself— she was snatched up, as if by some invisible hand, and hurried away whirring like a great cockchafer, through the air, over the house tops and church steeples, and dropped without hurt or harm, on a green meadow before the walls of Berlin.

Now was there no room left for doubt of the infernal arts of old Barbara Roloffin: Master Lütkins hesitated no longer to come forward with his complaint, and the old woman was attached bodily, and put in prison. Being brought to trial, she denied everything stubbornly, as might be expected of so depraved a soul. Being asked if she had not flown in the air, she made answer, no, but had been blown away by the wind, as the judge him