he staves must have sprung as well. Overcome with rage and fury,
Master Martin seized the stave which Valentine was shaving at, and,
with a loud roar of, "Cursed hound!" dealt Conrad a heavy blow with it
across the back.

When Conrad felt the blow, he turned quickly round, and stood for a
moment as if unconscious, and then his eyes flamed with wild anger; he
gnashed his teeth, howled out, "Struck!" got down, with one spring,
from the scaffold, seized the broad-axe which was on the ground, and
aimed with it a tremendous stroke at the master, which would have split
his skull, had not Friedrich drawn him aside, so that it missed his
head; but it fell on his arm, whence the blood at once streamed out.
Martin, stout and unwieldy, lost his balance and stumbled over the
bench, at which an apprentice was working, and on to the ground. All
the rest now threw themselves around Conrad, who was raging, and
wielding the bloody broad-axe in the air, yelling, in a terrible voice.

"To Hell with him!--to Hell with him!"

Exerting all his gigantic strength, he sent them flying from him in all
directions, and was raising his weapon for a second stroke, which would
certainly have given Master Martin his quietus as he lay coughing and
groaning on the ground, but Rosa, pale as death, appeared at the door;
and the moment Conrad saw her, he paused like a stone image, with the
uplifted weapon in his hand. Then he threw it away far from him, struck
his hands together in front of his breast, cried--in a voice which went
to every one's heart--"Gracious God of Heaven! what have I done?" and
darted out of the building. Nobody thought of following him.

Master Martin was now set on his legs again, by dint of some effort,
and it was found that the blade of the broad-axe had struck the fleshy
part of his arm without doing very much mischief. Old Master
Holzschuer, whom Martin had dragged over also in his fall, was got out
from amongst the timber; and Frau Martha's children, who were
frightened and crying, were pacified. Master Martin was much
confounded; but on the whole thought that if that devil of a wicked
fellow had only not damaged the beautiful _cask_, he himself was not
much the worse. Carrying chairs were brought for the old gentlemen, for
Herr Holzschuer was more or less the worse for his tumble, too, and
expressed a very mean opinion of a calling which was carried on where
there were so many lethal weapons at hand, advising Friedrich to r