"Your Reverence!" said Kohlhaas flushing, and seized his hand--

"Well?"

"Even the Lord did not forgive all his enemies. Let me forgive the
Elector, my two gentlemen the castellan and the steward, the lords
Hinz and Kunz, and whoever else may have injured me in this affair;
but, if it is possible, suffer me to force the Squire to fatten my
black horses again for me."

At these words Luther turned his back on him, with a displeased
glance, and rang the bell. In answer to the summons an amanuensis came
into the anteroom with a light, and Kohlhaas, wiping his eyes, rose
from his knees disconcerted; and since the amanuensis was working in
vain at the door, which was bolted, and Luther had sat down again to
his papers, Kohlhaas opened the door for the man. Luther glanced for
an instant over his shoulder at the stranger, and said to the
amanuensis, "Light the way!" whereupon the latter, somewhat surprised
at the sight of the visitor, took down from the wall the key to the
outside door and stepped back to the half-opened door of the room,
waiting for the stranger to take his departure. Kohlhaas, holding his
hat nervously in both hands, said, "And so, most reverend Sir, I
cannot partake of the benefit of reconciliation, which I solicited of
you?"

Luther answered shortly, "Reconciliation with your Savior--no! With
the sovereign--that depends upon the success of the attempt which I
promised you to make." And then he motioned to the amanuensis to carry
out, without further delay, the command he had given him. Kohlhaas
laid both hands on his heart with an expression of painful emotion,
and disappeared after the man who was lighting him down the stairs.

On the next morning Luther dispatched a message to the Elector of
Saxony in which, after a bitter allusion to the lords, Hinz and Kunz
Tronka, Chamberlain and Cup-bearer to his Highness, who, as was
generally known, had suppressed the petition, he informed the
sovereign, with the candor that was peculiar to him, that under such
notorious circumstances there was nothing to do but to accept the
proposition of the horse-dealer and to grant him an amnesty for what
had occurred so that he might have opportunity to renew his lawsuit.
Public opinion, Luther remarked, was on the side of this man to a very
dangerous extent--so much so that, even in Wittenberg, which had three
times been burnt down by him, there was a voice raised in his favor.
And since, if his offer were refused