‘A hit!’ said he, and smoothed his wrist.

Farina knelt by the body, and lifted the head on his breast.  ’Berthold!  Berthold!’ he cried; ‘no further harm shall hap to you, man!  Speak!’

‘You ken the scapegrace?’ said Guy, sauntering up.

’’Tis Berthold Schmidt, son of old Schmidt, the great goldsmith of Cologne.’

‘St. Dunstan was not at his elbow this time!’

‘A rival of mine,’ whispered Farina.

‘Oho!’ and the Goshawk wound a low hiss at his tongue’s tip.  ’Well! as I should have spoken if his ears had been open:  Justice struck the blow; and a gentle one.  This comes of taking a flying shot, and not standing up fair.  And that seems all that can be said.  Where lives he?’

Farina pointed to the house of the Lilies.

’Beshrew me! the dog has some right on his side.  Whew! yonder he lives?  He took us for some night-prowlers.  Why not come up fairly, and ask my business?

Smelling a flower is not worth a broken neck, nor defending your premises quite deserving a hole in the pate.  Now, my lad, you see what comes of dealing with cut and run blows; and let this be a warning to you.’

They took the body by head and feet, and laid him at the door of his father’s house.  Here the colour came to his cheek, and they wiped off the streaks of blood that stained him.  Guy proved he could be tender with a fallen foe, and Farina with an ill-fated rival.  It was who could suggest the soundest remedies, or easiest postures.  One lent a kerchief and nursed him; another ran to the city fountain and fetched him water.  Meantime the moon had dropped, and morning, grey and beamless, looked on the house-peaks and along the streets with steadier eye.  They now both discerned a body of men, far down, fronting Gottlieb’s house, and drawn up in some degree of order.  All their charity forsook them at once.

‘Possess thyself of the truncheon,’ said Guy:  ’You see it can damage.  More work before breakfast, and a fine account I must give of myself to my hostess of the Three Holy Kings!’

Farina recovered the destructive little instrument.

‘I am ready,’ said he.  ’But hark! there’s little work for us there, I fancy.  Those be lads of Cologne, no grunters of the wild.  ’Tis the White Rose Club.  Always too late for service.’

Voices singing a hunting glee, popular in that age, swelled up the clear morning air; and gradually the words became distinct.

The Kaiser went a-hunting,
A-hunting, tra-ra: 
With his bugle-horn at springing morn,
The Kaiser trampled bud and thorn: 
Tra-ra!

And the dew shakes green as the horsemen rear,
And a thousand feathers they flutter with fear;
And a pang drives quick to the heart of the deer;
For the Kaiser’s out a-hunting,
Tra-ra! 
Ta, ta, ta, ta,
Tra-ra, tra-ra,
Ta-ta, tra-ra, tra-ra!

the owner of the truncheon awoke to these reviving tones, and uttered a faint responsive ‘Tra-ra!’