arge and small graves behind the executioner's house, they are my
estates."

"It is hard, hard to leave them," said the smith, with drooping head.
"All this comes upon you on account of the kindness you have shown my
boy; you have had a poor reward from us."

"Reward?" asked the other, a subtle smile hovering around his lips. "I
expect none, neither from you nor fate. I belong to a poor sect, that
does not consider whether its deeds will be repaid or not. We love
goodness, set a high value on it, and practise it, so far as our power
extends, because it is so beautiful. What have men called good? Only that
which keeps the soul calm. And what is evil? That which fills it with
disquiet. I tell you, that the hearts of those who pursue virtue, though
they are driven from their homes, hunted and tortured like noxious
beasts, are more tranquil than those of their powerful persecutors, who
practise evil. He who seeks any other reward for virtue, than virtue
itself, will not lack disappointment. It is neither you nor Ulrich, who
drives me hence, but the mysterious ancient curse, that pursues my people
when they seek to rest; it is, it is. . . . Another time, to-morrow. This is
enough for to-day."

When the doctor was alone, he pressed his hand to his brow and groaned
aloud. His whole life passed before his mind, and he found in it, besides
terrible suffering, great and noble joys, and not an hour in which his
desire for virtue was weakened. He had spent happy years here in the
peace of his simple home, and now must again set forth and wander on and
on, with nothing before his eyes save an uncertain goal, at the end of a
long, toilsome road. What had hitherto been his happiness, increased his
misery in this hour. It was hard, unspeakably hard, to drag his wife and
child through want and sorrow, and could Elizabeth, his wife, bear it
again?

He found her in the tiny garden behind the horse, kneeling before a
flower-bed to weed it. As he greeted her pleasantly, she rose and
beckoned to him.

"Let us sit down," he said, leading her to the bench before the hedge,
that separated the garden from the forest. There he meant to tell her,
that they must again shake the dust from their feet.

She had lost the power of speech on the rack in Portugal, and could only
falter a few unintelligible words, when greatly excited, but her hearing
had remained, and her husband understood how to read the expression of
her eyes. A great sorrow had