rmed at the Hiltners.

The old faith offered so much more to charm the senses than the new one!
Therefore it seemed a special cause for thanksgiving that singing and
playing upon the organ occupied a prominent place in the Protestant
religious service, and that Luther most warmly commended the fostering
of music to those who professed the evangelical belief. Besides, her
adopted son Erasmus, the new Wittenberg master of arts, had devoted
himself eagerly to music, and composed several hymns which, if Damian
Feys permitted it, would be sung in the Convivium musicum.

Frau Sabina Hiltner had often met Barbara there, and had noticed with
admiration and pleasure the great progress which this richly gifted
young creature had made under the direction of the Netherland master.

Other members of the Convivium, on the contrary, bore Barbara a grudge
because she remained a Catholic, and many a mother of a daughter whom
Barbara, as a singer, had cast too far into the shade, would gladly have
thrust her out of the circle of music-loving citizens.

Frau Sabina and Master Feys, who, like the much-envied girl, was a
professor of the old faith, interceded for her all the more warmly.

Besides, it afforded Frau Hiltner scarcely less pleasure to hear Barbara
than it did Martina, and she could also fix her eyes with genuine
devotion upon the girl's wonderfully beautiful and nobly formed
features. The mother and daughter owed to this peerless singer the best
enjoyment which the Collegium afforded them, and, when envy and just
displeasure approached Frau Sabina to accuse Barbara of insubordination,
obstinacy, pride, and forwardness, which were unseemly for one so young,
as well as exchanging coquettish glances with the masculine members of
the choir, the profoundly respected wife of the syndic and her young
daughter warmly defended the persecuted girl.

In this her husband strongly supported her, for, when necessary, he
dealt weighty blows and upheld what he deemed just without fear of man
and with the powerful aids of his strong intellect and the weight of the
esteem he had won by a stainless, industrious life.

Doubtless Frau Sabina also perceived something unusual in Barbara's
nature and conduct, traits of defiance, almost rebellion, which would
have troubled her in her Martina, who, though no beauty, was a pretty
girl, with the most winning, childlike charm; but she secretly asked
herself whether she would not accept it gratefully