lood," said the Miller good-naturedly. "Our
souls will stumble so long as they go about on two legs, and each bears
within himself a rock of offence."

"I thank you father, for not punishing me more severely."

"That is not my office," replied the Baptist. "I have enough to punish
in myself."

"Ah, you are good, but I dare not think what others will think of me."

"People must be allowed to talk, as geese cannot," rejoined the Miller.
"Make your peace with God and then be satisfied. Look there is George
with the cart."

Joyfully cracking his whip, stood the little devil of the previous
night close to his horse. "Now we shall lay you down gently in the
waggon and then close the linen curtains." Getting her down was only
managed with much pain and difficulty; then the well known Miller drove
back unquestioned through the town to the portal of the Otto Heinrich
building. The careful Barbara had seen the cart crossing the drawbridge
and was immediately at hand. The Miller gave her no information. The
young lady had hurt her foot falling was all he said, and carefully was
she carried up the steps. Barbara by the Miller's advice wrapped the
leg in wet cloths, till the father at his return at mid-day could apply
a more surgically correct bandage. The brave Baptist had quietly
withdrawn to escape being thanked. The father himself forbade his
feverish child to talk, and appeared to be quite contented with the
short account given by Klytia. It was sufficient for him that the cure
proceeded satisfactorily, and the old Barbara scolded about the open
turnip-pit in which more than one person had twisted his foot. When
Erastus however asked later on for a more detailed account, he was
surprised at his daughter's request to be allowed not to mention the
cause of her accident. He shook his head, without however pressing his
inquiries. "She must have come to grief through the fault of another,"
he thought, and was at last glad that she spared him any fresh
troubles, as his own business began to demand more attention.

Nothing was heard of Magister Laurenzano in Heidelberg, except that he
asked for leave of absence till the re-opening of the College, and
wished especially to be relieved from his office of preacher at the
Stift.

In the bright town of Speyer with its own independent Bishopric, the
throng composing the parliament was so numerous that any individual man
was soon lost to sight. Any person who however might have entere