“But I thought I was near Haslach!” he cried with amazement.

The woodcutter burst out laughing.

“Haslach!—­you are two leagues away from it!  I see how it is.  You went wrong at the old oak-tree.  You took the right instead of the left path.  When you are in the woods you must look well about you.  A few yards wrong at starting come to leagues at the end!”

Bernard Hertzog at this discovery was in consternation.

“Six leagues from Saverne,” he murmured, “and all mountains!—­and if I have to go two more to-morrow, that will be eight!”

“Oh, don’t mind that!  I will guide you to the road down the valley.  And don’t forget.  You are very fortunate.”

“Fortunate?  You are joking with me, Christian.”

“Yes, you are lucky.  You might have had to spend the night in the woods.  There is a thunderstorm coming on from Schneeberg; if that had overtaken you you might have had some reason to complain, with the rain at your back and thunder and lightning all round.  But now you shall sleep in a good bed,” pointing to the box in the corner; “you will sleep there like a log, and to-morrow, when the sun is up, we will start; you will be rested, and you will get there in very good time.”

“You are very kind, Christian,” said Uncle Bernard with tears in his eyes.  “Give me a potato, and then I will go to bed.  I am more tired than anything else.  I am not hungry.  One hot potato will be quite enough for me.”

“Here is a couple as mealy as chestnuts.  Taste that, master; take a small glass of kirschwasser, and then lie down.  I have to set to work again.  I have got to saw fifteen more planks before I can go to bed.”

Christian rose, set the bottle of kirschwasser on the window-sill, and went out.  The alternate movement of the saw, which had for a time ceased, now recommenced amidst the rushing of the stream.

Maitre Hertzog, astonished as he was to find himself in those remote solitudes between Dagsberg and the ruins of Nideck, sat long meditating what he must do to rejoin his household gods; then, gliding down the stream of his usual meditations, he went over the fabulous, heroic, or barbarous legends and chronicles of the former lords of that land.  He went back to the Tribocci, that German nation settled about Strasbourg, remembering Clovis, Chilperic, Theodoric, Dagobert, the furious struggle between Brunehaut, Queen of Austrasia, and Fredegonde, queen of Chilperic of France, and many heroes and heroines besides.  All these fierce personages passed in review before his eyes.  The vague murmuring of the trees, the inky blackness of the rocks, favoured this strange invocation.  All the distinguished personages of his chronicle were there, and the boar, and the wolf, and the bear were among them.

At last, unable to hold out any longer, the good man hung his three-cornered hat upon a peg in the wall and lay down upon the heath.  The cricket sang its monotonous song upon the hearth, a few surviving sparks were running hither and thither in the smouldering fire, his eyelids dropped, and he slept a deep, sound sleep.