ange old man, with
the long hoary beard, and to contend with one another in inquiring of
him what he wanted. He thought it so ridiculous to make inquiries of
strangers, before his own house, after his wife and children, and
still more so, after himself, that he mentioned the first neighbour
whose name occurred to him, Kirt Stiffen. All were silent, and looked
at one another, till an old woman said--

"He has left here these twelve years. He lives at Sachsenberg; you'll
hardly get there to-day."

"Velten Maier?"

"God help him!" said an old crone leaning on a crutch. "He has been
confined these fifteen years in the house, which he'll never leave
again."

He recognised, as he thought, his suddenly aged neighbour; but he had
lost all desire of asking any more questions. At last a brisk young
woman, with a boy of a twelvemonth old in her arms, and with a little
girl holding her hand, made her way through the gaping crowd, and they
looked for all the world like his wife and children.

"What is your name?" said Peter, astonished.

"Maria."

"And your father?"

"God have mercy on him, Peter Klaus. It is twenty years since we
sought him day and night on the Kyffhauser, when his goats came home
without him. I was only seven years old when it happened."

The goatherd could no longer contain himself.

"I am Peter Klaus," he cried, "and no other," and he took the babe
from his daughter's arms.

All stood like statues for a minute, till one and then another began
to cry--

"Here's Peter Klaus come back again! Welcome, neighbour, welcome,
after twenty years; welcome, Peter Klaus!"

THE LEGEND OF RHEINECK.

Graf Ulric Von Rheineck was a very wild youth. Recklessly and without
consideration did he plunge into every excess. Dissipation grew to be
the habit of his life, and no sensual indulgence did he deny himself
which could be procured by any means whatever. Amply provided for as
he was, the revenues of his wide possessions, which comprehended Thal
Rheineck, and the adjacent country, to the shore of the Rhine, and as
far as the mouth of the Aar, were soon discovered to be insufficient
for all his absorbing necessities. One by one his broad lands were
alienated from him, piece after piece of that noble possession fell
from his house, until finally he found himself without a single inch
of ground which he could call his own, save the small and unproductive
spot on which Rheineck stood. This he had no power to