Well, by that evening when Uncle Christian thus pledged my brother, Herdegen was quite himself again in mind and body.  At first it had seemed as though a wall had been raised up between us; but after that I had told him that I had concealed from Ann all that I had seen by ill-hap at the moss-hut, he was as kind and trusting as of old, and he showed himself more ready to give Ann the pledge she required than I had looked to find him, stiff-necked as he ever was.  And he hearkened unmoved when I told him what Ann had said:  “That she was ready to follow him to death, but not to shame.”

“That,” quoth he, “she need never fear from any true man, and with all his wildness he might yet call himself that.”  Then he stretched himself at full length on his chair, and threw his arms in the air, and cried: 

“Oh, Margery.  If you could but slip for one half-hour into your mad brother’s skin.  In your own, which is so purely white, you can never, till the day of doom, understand what I am.  If ever I have seemed weary it is but to keep up a mannerly appearance; verily I could break forth ten times a day and shoot skywards like a rocket for sheer joy in life.  When that mood comes over me there is no holding me, and I should dare swear that the whole fair earth had been made and created for my sole and free use, with all that therein is—­and above all other creatures the dear, sweet daughters of Eve!—­and I can tell you, Margery, the women agree with me.  I have only to open my arms and they flutter into them, and not to close them tight—­that, Margery, is too much to look for; yet is there but one true bliss, and but one Ann, and the best of all joys is to clasp her to my heart and kiss her lips.  I will keep faith with her; I will have nought to say to the rest.  But how shall I keep them away from me?  Can I wish that those rascals had put my eyes out, had crippled my limbs, had thrashed me to a scare-crow, to the end that the maids should turn their backs on me?  Nay, and even no rain-torrent could cool the hot blood of the Schoppers; no oak staff nor stone pitcher could kill the wild cravings within.  There is nothing for it but to cast my body among thorns like Saint Francis.  But what would even that profit me?  You see yourself how well this skin heals of the worst wounds!”

Hereupon I earnestly admonished him of his devoir to that lady who was so truly his, and with whom he had exchanged rings.  But he cried:  “Do you believe that I did not tell myself, every hour of the day, that she was a thousand-fold more worth than all the rest put together?  Never could I deem any maid so sweet as she has been ever since we were children together; nay, and if I lost her I should utterly perish, for it is from her that I, a half-ruined wretch, get all that yet is best in me!”

And many a time did I hear him utter the like; and when I saw his large blue eyes flash as he spoke, while he pushed the golden curls back from his brow, verily he was so goodly a youth to look upon that it was easy to view that the daughters of Eve might be ready to cast themselves into his arms.