all stood erect and
firm,, with their hands in their pockets, as if thus silently
manifesting their intention not to interfere.

Eight forest officers were heard; their evidence was entirely identical.
Brandes, on the tenth day of the month, had ordered them to go the
rounds because he had evidently secured information concerning a plan of
the "Blue Smocks"; he had, however, expressed himself but vaguely
regarding the matter. At about two o'clock at night they had gone out
and had come upon many traces of destruction, which put the
head-forester in a very bad humor; otherwise, everything had been quiet.
About four o'clock Brandes had said, "We have been led astray; let us go
home." When they had come around Bremer mountain and the wind had
changed at the same time, they had distinctly heard chopping in the Mast
forest and concluded from the quick succession of the strokes that the
"Blue Smocks" were at work. They had deliberated a while whether it were
practical to attack the bold band with such a small force, and then had
slowly approached the source of the sound without any fixed
determination. Then followed the scene with Frederick. Finally, after
Brandes had sent them away without instructions they had gone forward a
while and then, when they noticed that the noise in the woods, still
rather far away, had entirely ceased, they had stopped to wait for the
head-forester.

They had grown tired of waiting, and after about ten minutes had
gone on toward the scene of devastation. It was all over; not another
sound was to be heard in the forest; of twenty fallen trees eight were
still left, the rest had been made way with. It was incomprehensible to
them how this had been accomplished, since no wagon tracks were to be
found. Moreover, the dryness of the season and the fact that the earth
was strewn with pine-needles had prevented their distinguishing any
footprints, although the ground in the vicinity looked as if it had been
firmly stamped down. Then, having come to the conclusion that there was
no point in waiting for the head-forester, they had quickly walked to
the other side of the wood in the hope of perhaps catching a glimpse of
the thieves. Here one of them had caught his bottle-string in the
brambles on the way out of the wood, and when he had looked around he
had seen something flash in the shrubbery; it was the belt-buckle of the
head-forester whom they then found lying behind the brambles, stretched
out, wit