he ran against him and pushed the ghost down the stairs, so that it fell
down the ten steps and remained lying there in a corner. Thereupon he
rang the bell, went home, and without saying a word went to bed, and
fell asleep. The sexton's wife waited a long time for her husband, but
he did not come back. At length she became uneasy, and wakened the boy,
and asked: 'Do you know where my husband is? He climbed up the tower
before you did.' 'No, I don't know,' replied the boy, 'but someone was
standing by the sounding hole on the other side of the steps, and as he
would neither gave an answer nor go away, I took him for a scoundrel,
and threw him downstairs. Just go there and you will see if it was he.
I should be sorry if it were.' The woman ran away and found her husband,
who was lying moaning in the corner, and had broken his leg.

She carried him down, and then with loud screams she hastened to the
boy's father, 'Your boy,' cried she, 'has been the cause of a great
misfortune! He has thrown my husband down the steps so that he broke his
leg. Take the good-for-nothing fellow out of our house.' The father was
terrified, and ran thither and scolded the boy. 'What wicked tricks
are these?' said he. 'The devil must have put them into your head.'
'Father,' he replied, 'do listen to me. I am quite innocent. He was
standing there by night like one intent on doing evil. I did not know
who it was, and I entreated him three times either to speak or to go
away.' 'Ah,' said the father, 'I have nothing but unhappiness with you.
Go out of my sight. I will see you no more.'

'Yes, father, right willingly, wait only until it is day. Then will I
go forth and learn how to shudder, and then I shall, at any rate,
understand one art which will support me.' 'Learn what you will,' spoke
the father, 'it is all the same to me. Here are fifty talers for you.
Take these and go into the wide world, and tell no one from whence you
come, and who is your father, for I have reason to be ashamed of you.'
'Yes, father, it shall be as you will. If you desire nothing more than
that, I can easily keep it in mind.'

When the day dawned, therefore, the boy put his fifty talers into his
pocket, and went forth on the great highway, and continually said to
himself: 'If I could but shudder! If I could but shudder!' Then a man
approached who heard this conversation which the youth was holding with
himself, and when they had walked a little farther to where they c