hould wed was the dearest wish of his old age. Not
a farthing was to be taken from the moneyed capital for twenty years to
come, and this was expressly recorded; nor might the trade be sold, or
cease to be carried on. If Kunz should die within that space, then he
charged the head clerk of the house to conduct the business under the
same pledge. And if and when Kunz should wed, then should he pay only
half the profits to his brother instead of two-thirds.

The eldest son of Herdegen and Ann was to fall next heir to the
business; but if this marriage came to nought, or they had no male
issue, then Herdegen's son-in-law, or my son, or Kunz's.

Likewise he believed that he had made good provision for the maintenance
of the young pair, inasmuch as though it could scarce be hoped that
Herdegen would be able to take the lead of the trading house, yet his
own fortune was not so great as to assure to Ann a life so free from
burthens, and in all ways so easy as he desired for her, and as beseemed
the mistress of so ancient a Nuremberg family.

His landed estates he had for the most part devised to the holy Church,
and the remainder in equal halves to Herdegen and to me.

Three thousand gulden, which he had lent to the Convent of
Vierzehnheiligen, and of which he might at any time require the
repayment, he had set apart to ransom Herdegen and pay for his
home-coming.

Of his possessions in hard coin, three thousand gulden were for
Herdegen's share, and one thousand each for Ann and me as a bride-gift,
and he had devised goodly sums of money to the hospitals and poor of the
city, and the serving-folk and retainers of the household.

But then where was the great and well-nigh royal treasure of which old
Im Hoff had, not so long since, been possessed; so that in the time of
the Diet he had paid down in hard coin thirty thousand Hungarian ducats
to buy himself a Baron's title? Master Holzschuher could tell us well
enough. When that old man had once said to Ann that she could scarce
believe how great profit might be gained in a few years by well-directed
trading with Venice, he spoke not without book. After endowing many
churches and convents in Franconia while he was yet living, with truly
lordly generosity, and providing for masses for his soul and other pious
offices, he had still a sum of forty and four thousand Hungarian ducats
to dispose of. And these moneys, notwithstanding Master Holzschuher's
entreaties that he would dev