is, the four hounds sprang up and placed themselves
growling before Oswald, and the three men half raised their bodies from
the straw, their flashing eyes peering from their dark brown faces, and
their well scoured muskets glistening in their hands. Oswald instantly
arose and drew his sword.

'Put up your weapon!' the man now cried in an altered tone, seizing his
goblet. 'I but wished to be certain of my man. Come, be again quietly
seated, and do me justice in a fresh goblet. The Bohemian goose and
Silesian swan!'

'Huss and Luther!' cried Oswald touching glasses and emptying his own
with a lighter heart, while the hounds and soldiers again stretched
themselves upon the straw.

'Do not be offended that I thought it necessary to prove you,' said the
Bohemian; 'but the tricks and artifices of the papists are so manifold,
that these precautions are rendered quite necessary. You might have
been a spy of the Jesuits. Since we now understand each other, however,
I may converse with you without reserve. You are not safe even here.
For my old friend, our host, I will indeed be answerable; but the
converters sometimes come over the border to us; especially when they
deem that they have important game in view; and you appear to me as
though you might be of some consequence. Therefore, if it be agreeable,
I will conduct you and your little wife to a place, where you may dwell
in peace behind the everlasting walls which the Lord himself has built
for the defence of persecuted innocents.'

'There is no falsehood in that face!' answered Oswald; 'and I accept
your offer with gratitude.'

'You will not indeed find our residence very elegant,' said the
Bohemian; 'and that delicate female form may be wholly unaccustomed to
such quarters; but necessity reconciles one to privations, and a very
little suffices for our actual necessities.'

'Be not concerned on that account,' said Faith, who had now seated
herself near Oswald. 'A safe shelter is all we wish.'

'Well, eat your supper,' said the Bohemian, 'and retire quickly to
rest, that you may be ready to start by day-break in the morning. I
have been long accustomed to watch through the night, and will guard
you faithfully. With the rising sun we shall be among the rocks.'

CHAPTER XVIII.

Wrapped in his cloak, Oswald was yet sweetly and soundly sleeping upon
the floor, before the only bed in the house, in which his fair
companion was slumber