gth footsteps were heard on the stairs approaching the apartment.
The exile, strong as he was, trembled so much that he was obliged to
hold by the table, his body was bent forward, his eye was fixed on the
door, as if he would read his fate on the countenance of the
messengers--the door opened and they entered.

CHAPTER XXIV.

Deserted as thou art, by all forsaken,
Thy fortunes ruin'd and thy power gone,
Thou still shalt find fidelity unshaken,
Although you find it in myself alone.
Thy humble vassal, 'till the hour of death,
I'll hail my sovereign with my latest breath.
L. UHLAND.

Albert's expectation was also raised to the highest pitch. His eye
examined the two men as they entered, and he at once recognised the
fifer of Hardt as one, and the pedlar he had met at the Golden Stag of
Pfullingen as the other. The latter disburthened himself of a pack
which he carried on his back, tore a plaister from his eye, erected
himself from a bent position, which he had assumed for the purpose of
disguise, and stood before the assembled group, the short-set,
strong-built man, with open bold features, which the exile had already
described in the cavern.

"Maxx Stumpf!" cried the exile in a trembling tone of voice, "what
means that gloomy countenance? You bring us good news, don't you? they
will open the gates to us, and with us hold out to the last man?"

Maxx Stumpf von Schweinsberg looked about him in confusion. "Prepare
for the worst, sir!" he said, "the intelligence I bring you is not
good."

"How?" answered the other, whilst the blush of rage flew into his
cheeks, and the veins of his forehead began to swell, "how, do you mean
they hesitate, they waver? It is impossible! be not precipitate in what
you say, recollect it is of the nobles of the land of whom you speak."

"And still I will say it," Schweinsberg answered, making a step
forward. "In the face of the Emperor and the Empire, I will say they
are traitors."

"Thou liest!" cried the exile with a terrible voice. "Traitors, did you
say? Thou liest! Dost thou dare to rob forty knights of their honour?
Ha! own it, that you lie."

"Would to God I were a knight without honour--a dog that betrays his
master! But the whole forty have broken their oaths--you have lost your
country. My Lord Duke, Tuebingen i