r money, and you offer me a stone!"

"Well, perhaps a hundred thousand guilders may satisfy you for a start.
If you went the right way to work, you would soon be a millionaire."

"A hundred thousand?" cried the poor charcoal-burner in an ecstasy.
"There, don't beat so violently in my breast, we shall soon have done
with one another. Good, Michael! give me the stone and the money, and
you may relieve this habitation of its restless inmate."

"Ah, I was sure that you were a sensible fellow!" answered the
Dutchman, smiling amiably. "Come, we will have just one more glass, and
then I will count out the money for you!"

Whereupon they returned to the other room, and sat down to their wine,
drinking glass after glass, until Peter fell into a deep sleep.

* * * * *

Charcoal-Peter was awakened by the joyous fanfare of a posthorn, and
behold he was sitting in a coach, which was bowling along a handsome
broad highway, and when he leaned out of the window he could see the
Black-Forest lying far behind him in the distance. At first he could
not believe that it was he himself who could be thus sitting in this
coach. His clothes were not the same that he had been wearing the day
before; yet he remembered everything that had happened so clearly, that
at last he doubted no longer, but cried out: "I am Charcoal-Peter,
that's certain--Charcoal-Peter Munk and no other!"

He fell to wondering why it was that he could feel no regret,
considering that, for the first time in his life, he had left the
peaceful homestead and the forest where he had lived so long. Even when
the thought of his mother occurred to him, helpless and wretched as she
must be now, no tear came to his eyes, not a sigh escaped him--he felt
so absolutely indifferent to everything. "Truly," he muttered, "tears
and sighs, homesickness and melancholy, all come from the heart; thanks
to Dutch Michael, mine is cold and made of stone."

He laid his hand on his breast; all was still within; there was no
movement whatever. "If he has kept his word as to the hundred thousand
guilders as he has with regard to my heart, I shall be quite content,"
he cried, beginning to examine everything in the coach. He found
wearing apparel in such quantity and of such variety as he could
possibly desire, but no money. At last he came upon a pocket in which
he found many thousands of thalers in gold, besides bills drawn on
business houses in all the grea