lgrims, the people resisted with angry violence and threatened
fire and bloodshed.

So Samson summoned the wisest and holiest of the brotherhood, and took
them into counsel.

"This thing," said he, "cannot be of God, that one of His saints, the
founder of this house, should lead into sloth and luxury the children
of the house he has founded. Sooner could I believe that this is a
malignant snare of the most Evil One, who heals the bodily ailments of
a few that he may wreck the immortal souls of many."

Then arose Dom Walaric, the most aged of the monks, and said: "Already,
Father Abbot, hast thou spoken judgment. Grievously shall I lament
what must be done; but in one way only can we root out this corruption.
Let the bones of the holy man be unearthed and cast forth. He in the
high heavens will know that we do not use him despitefully, but that of
two evils this, indeed, is scarcely to be spoken of as an evil."

Wherefore, in a grassy bay of the land by the river a great pile of
faggots was reared, dry and quick for the touch of flame. And the
Abbot broke down the shrine and opened the tomb.

When the stone lid of the coffin had been lifted, the religious saw
that, though it had been long buried, the body showed no sign of decay.
Fresh and uncorrupted it lay in the sacred vestments; youthful and
comely of face, despite a marvellous old age and years of sepulture.

With many tears they raised what seemed rather a sleeping man than a
dead, and bore him to the river; and when they had heaped the faggots
about him, the Abbot blessed the body and the fuel, and with his own
hand set fire to the funeral pile.

The brethren restrained not their weeping and lamentation as they
witnessed that hallowed burning; and the Abbot, with heavy eyes,
tarried till the last ember had died out. Then were all the ashes of
the fire swept together and cast into the fleeting river, which bore
them through lands remote into the utmost sea that hath no outland
limit save the blue sky and the low light of the shifting stars.

The Countess Itha

In the days of King Coeur-de-Lion the good Count Hartmann ruled in
Kirchberg in the happy Swabian land. And never had that fair land been
happier than it was in those days, for the Count was a devout
Christian, a lover of peace in the midst of warlike and rapacious
barons, and a ruler just and merciful to his vassals. Among the green
and pleasant hills on his domain he had founded a mon