brow in water, as it were, it was that
faithfulest of all faithful friends, Uncle Christian Pfinzing, who
read the care in my eyes and face during the very last great banquet at
Herdegen's table, and led me into the oriel bay, and offered me all
his substance; and this is a goodly sum indeed and saved my trade from
shipwreck.

Next to him it is Cousin Maud that we three links the Schopper chain
ought ever to hold dearest in memory; and it was by a strange chance
that he and she died, not only on the same day, but, as it were, of the
same death. Death came upon him at the Schoppers' table with the cup in
his hand, after that Ann, his "watchman" had warned him to be temperate;
and this was three years after her husband's death. And Cousin Maud, as
she came forth from the kitchen, whither she had gone to heat her famous
spiced wine for Uncle Christian, who was already gone, fell dead into
Margery's arms when she heard the tidings of his sudden end.

Among the sundry matters which long dwelt in the minds both of
Margery and Ann, and were handed down to their grandchildren, were the
Magister's Latin verses in their praise. It is but a few years since
Master Peter Piehringer departed this life at a great age, and when
Gotz's boys went through their schooling so fast and so well they owed
it to his care and learning. But chiefly he devoted himself to Ann's
daughters, Margery and Agnes, and indeed it is ever so that our heart
goeth forth with a love like to that for our own sons or daughters to
the offspring of the woman we have loved, even when she has never been
our own.

Eppelein Gockel, my brother's faithful serving-man, was wed to Aunt
Jacoba's tiring-woman. After his master's death I made him to be host in
the tavern of "The Blue Sky," and whereas his wife was an active soul,
and his tales of the strange adventures he had known among the Godless
heathen brought much custom to his little tavern parlor, he throve to be
a man of great girth and presence.

By the seventh year after our home-coming my hardest cares for the
concerns of my trade were overpast, albeit I must even yet keep my
eyes open and give brain and body no rest. Half my life I spent in
journeying, and whereas I perceived that it was only by opening up other
branches of trade that I might fulfil the many claims which ever beset
me, I set myself to consider the matter; and inasmuch as that I had
seen in the house of Akusch how gladly the women of Egypt wou