us said. "If you do not
assist me to eat it, it will be wasted. Tomorrow I shall breakfast
at Erfurt, and maybe dine, also. I will start as soon as I get
back."

"Well, well, sir, it shall be as you please," the man said; "but it
seems that we are reversing our parts, and that you have become the
host, and we your guests."

It was a pleasant meal by the torch light. Many a month had passed
since the peasants had tasted meat; and the bread, fresh from the
Prussian bakeries, was of a very different quality to the black
oaten bread to which they were accustomed. A horn of good wine
completed their enjoyment.

When the meal was done, the man said:

"Now, master, I will guide you to the wood."

There was no occasion to lead the horse; for it, as well as its
companion, had been trained to follow their master like dogs, and
to come to a whistle. The wood was but two or three hundred yards
off, and the peasant led the way through the trees to a small open
space in its centre. The saddle and bridle had been removed before
they left the cottage; and Fergus tethered the horse, by a foot
rope, to a sapling growing on the edge of the clearing. Then he
patted it on the neck, and left it beginning to crop the short
grass.

"It won't get much," the peasant said, "for my animal keeps it
pretty short. It is his best feeding place, now; and I generally
turn it out here, at night, when the day's work is done."

"What is its work, principally?"

"There is only one sort, now," the man said. "I cut faggots in the
forest, and take a cart load into Erfurt, twice a week. I hope, by
the spring, that all these troubles will be over, and then I
cultivate two or three acres of ground; but so long as these
French, and the Confederacy troops, who are as bad, are about, it
is no use to think of growing anything.

"Now, sir, is there anything that I can do for you?" he went on,
after they returned to the cottage, and had both lit their pipes
and seated themselves by the fire.

"I can see that you are not what you look. A farmer does not ride
about the country on a horse fit for a king, or put up at a cottage
like this."

"Yes; you can help me by leading me by quiet paths to Erfurt. I
tell you frankly that my business, there, is to find out how strong
the French and Confederacy army is, in and around the town; also
whether they are taking any precautions against an attack, and if
there are any signs that they intend to enter Hanover, or