The shoemaker had a large ledger made for himself in which he entered all goods he had manufactured, adding the names of those who had furnished the materials and of those who had bought the finished goods, together with a brief remark about the quality of the product.  Footgear of the same kind bore their continuous numbers, and the book lay in the large drawer of his shop.

Even if the beautiful daughter of the Millsdorf dyer did not take a step outside her parents’ home, and even though she visited neither friends nor relatives, yet the shoemaker of Gschaid knew how to arrange it so that she saw him from afar when she walked to church, when she was in her garden, and when she looked out upon the meadows from the windows of her room.  On account of this unceasing spying the dyer’s wife by dint of her long and persevering prayers had brought it about that her obstinate husband yielded and that the shoemaker—­as he had, in fact, become a better man—­led the beautiful and wealthy Millsdorf girl home to Gschaid as his wife.  However, the dyer was a man who meant to have his own way.  The right sort of man, he said, ought to ply his trade in a manner to prosper and ought, therefore, to be able to maintain his wife, children, himself, and his servants, to keep house and home in good condition, and yet save a goodly amount—­which savings were, after all, the main aids to honor and dignity in the world.  Therefore, he said, his daughter would receive nothing from home but an excellent outfit; all else it was and remained the duty of the husband to provide.  The dyeing works in Millsdorf and the farming he carried on were a dignified and honorable business by themselves which had to exist for their own sake.  All property belonging to them had to serve as capital, for which reason he would not give away any part of them.  But when he, the dyer, and his wife, were deceased, then both the dye-works and the farm in Millsdorf would fall to their only daughter, the shoemaker’s wife in Gschaid, and she and her husband could do with the property what they pleased:  they would inherit it, however, only if worthy of inheriting it; if unworthy, it would go to their children, and if there were none, to other relatives, with the exception of the lawful portion.  Neither did the shoemaker demand anything, but proudly gave the dyer to understand that he had cared but for his beautiful daughter and that he was able to maintain her as she had been maintained at home.  And when she was his wife, he gave her clothes not only finer than those the women of Gschaid and the Gschaid valley owned, but also than she had ever worn at home.  And as to food and drink, he insisted on having it better, and her treatment more considerate than she had enjoyed in her own father’s house.  Moreover, in order to show his independence of his father-in-law, he bought more and more ground with his savings so that he came to own a goodly property.