a tone of
enthusiasm. The professor listened with attention and smiled.

As they went through the gate into the large court-yard, they saw
Angela standing under the lindens. She held a large dish in her hand.
About her pressed and crowded the representatives of all races and
nations of that multitude which material progress has raised from
slavish degradation. From Angela's hand rained golden corn among the
chattering brood, who, pressed by a ravenous appetite, hungrily shoved,
pushed, and upset each other. Even the chivalrous cocks had forgotten
their propriety, and greedily snatched up the yellow fruit without
gallantly cooing and offering the treasure to the females. Nimble ducks
glided between the legs of the turkeys and snatched up, quick as
lightning, the grains from their open bills. This did not please the
turkeys, who gobbled and struck their sharp bills into the bobbing
heads of the ducks. A solitary turkey cock alone scorned to participate
in the hungry pleasures of the common herd. He spread his wings stiffly
like a crinoline around his body, strutted about the yard, uttered a
gallant guttural gobble, and played the fine lady in style.

Near the gate stood the stalls. They all had double doors, so that the
upper part could be opened while the lower half remained closed. As the
two friends passed, they saw a massive head protruding through the open
half of one of those doors. The head was red, and was set upon the
powerful shoulders of a steer who had broken loose from his fastening
to take a walk about the yard. When he saw the strangers, he began to
snort, cock his ears, and shake his head, while his fiery eyes rolled
wildly in his head.

"A handsome beast," said Frank, as he stopped. "How wide his forehead,
how strong his horns, how powerful his chest!"

"His head," said Lutz, "would be an expressive symbol for the
evangelist Luke."

The steer was not pleased with these compliments. Bellowing angrily he
rushed against the door, which gave way. Slowly and powerfully came
forth from the darkness of the stall the colossal limbs of the
dangerous beast. The friends, unexpectedly placed in the power of this
terrible enemy, stood paralyzed. They beheld the colossus lashing his
sides with his tail, lowering his head threateningly, and maliciously
stealing toward them like a cat stealing to a mouse till she gets
within a sure spring of it. The steer had evidently the same design on
strangers. He thought to cr