I recollected those precipices which entice with an irresistible power; those wells or pits, which the police have been compelled to close, because men threw themselves into them; those trees which had been cut down because they inspired men with the idea of hanging themselves; that contagion of suicides, of robberies, of murders, at certain epochs, by desperate means; that strange and subtile enticement of example, which makes you yawn because another yawns, suffer because you see another suffer, kill yourself because you see others kill themselves—­and my hair stood up with horror.

How could this Fledermausse, this base, sordid creature, have derived so profound a law of human nature? how had she found the means to use this law to the profit or indulgence of her sanguinary instincts?  This I could not comprehend; it surpassed my wildest imaginations.

But reflecting longer upon this inexplicable mystery, I resolved to turn the fatal law against her, and to draw the old murderess into her own net.

So many innocent victims called out for vengeance!

I felt myself to be on the right path.

I went to all the old-clothes sellers in Nuremberg, and returned in the afternoon to the Inn Boeuf-Gras, with an enormous packet under my arm.

Nichel Schmidt had known me for a long time; his wife was fat and good-looking; I had painted her portrait.

“Ah, Master Christian,” said he, squeezing my hand, “what happy circumstance brings you here?  What procures me the pleasure of seeing you?”

“My dear Monsieur Schmidt, I feel a vehement, insatiable desire to sleep in the Green Room.”

We were standing on the threshold of the inn, and I pointed to the room.  The good man looked at me distrustfully.

“Fear nothing,” I said; “I have no desire to hang myself.”.

“A la bonne heure! a la bonne heure! For frankly that would give me pain; an artist of such merit!  When do you wish the room, Master Christian?”

“This evening.”

“Impossible! it is occupied!”

“Monsieur can enter immediately,” said a voice just behind me, “I will not be in the way.”

We turned around in great surprise; the peasant of Nassau stood before us, with his three-cornered hat, and his packet at the end of his walking stick.  He had just learned the history of his three predecessors in the Green Room, and was trembling with rage.

“Rooms like yours!” cried he, stuttering; “but it is murderous to put people there—­it is assassination!  You deserve to be sent to the galleys immediately!”

“Go—­go—­calm yourself,” said the innkeeper; “that did not prevent you from sleeping well.”

“Happily, I said my prayers at night,” said the peasant; “without that, where would I be?” and he withdrew, with his hands raised to heaven.

“Well,” said Nichel Schmidt, stupefied, “the room is vacant, but I entreat you, do not serve me a bad trick.”