he flowery spray that lends it grace."

Some of these rhymes had been carved there by my grandfather, for
example these lines:

"By horse and wain I've journeyed up and down,
Yet found no match for this my native town."

And under our coat of arms was this posy.

"While the chain on the scutcheon holds firm and fast
The fool on the crest will be game to the last."

Of the goodly carved seats, and the cushions covered with motley woven
stuffs from the Levant, right pleasant to behold, of all the fine
treasures on the walls, the Venice mirrors, and the metal cage with a
grey parrot therein, which Jordan Kubbelmg, the falconer from Brunswick,
had given to my dear mother, I will say no more; but I would have it
understood that all was clean and bright, well ordered and of good
choice, and above all snug and warm. Nay, and if it had all been far
less costly and good to look at, there was, as it were, a breath of home
which must have gladdened any man's heart: inasmuch as all these goodly
things were not of yesterday nor of to-day, but had long been a joy to
many an one dear to us; so that our welfare in that dwelling was but
the continuing of the good living which our parents and grandparents had
known before us.

Howbeit, those who will read this writing know what a patrician's
house in Nuremberg is wont to be; and he who hath lived through a like
childhood himself needs not to be told how well hide and seek may be
played in a great hall, or what various and merry pastime can be devised
in the twilight, in a dining hall where the lights hang from the huge
beams of the ceiling; and we for certain knew every game that was worthy
to be named.

But by this time all this was past and gone; only the love of song would
never die out in the dwelling of the man who had been well-pleased
to hear himself called by his fellows "Schopper the Singer." Ah! how
marvellous well did their voices sound, Ann's and my brother's, when
they sang German songs to the lute or the mandoline, or perchance
Italian airs, as they might choose. But there was one which I could
never weary of hearing and which, meseemed, must work on Herdegen's
wayward heart as a cordial. The words were those of Master Walther von
der Vogelweirde, and were as follows:

"True love is neither man nor maid,
No body hath nor yet a soul,
Nor any semblance here below,
Its name we hear, itse