breast heaved, and his breath remained
suspended with expectation. Mat had already opened his mouth to speak,
but John, the blacksmith, stopped his mouth; for at this moment the old
squire, who alone of all present had occupied a chair, was seen to
rise. With heavy steps, hardly lifting his feet, he came up to the
green table and spoke. At first he panted a little, and often stopped
for breath, but soon his speech became quite fluent:--"Many thanks to
your honor," said he, "for the good opinion your honor has of me and of
some others; but what Buchmaier has said I say, to the last I dot. If
there was any more proof wanted that the gentlemenfolks look at us as
if we were under age, or little children, your honor has given it just
now. No, your honor: I am seventy-six years old, and have been squire
for twenty years; we are not children, and we don't do things because
we have been misled into doing them by naughty boys. My axe sha'n't go
out of my hand until I am laid between six boards myself. If there are
any children here, let them say so. I am a man, and know what I am
about; and, if there's punishing to be done, I am ready to be punished
as well as another."

"So are we!" said all the farmers with one voice. Mat could be heard
above the rest.

Buchmaier's face was as if bathed in light: he pressed his axe closer
to his bosom.

The necessary formalities were soon concluded and the minutes signed.
After Buchmaier had requested a copy of the latter, the farmers quietly
left the court-house.

Several other communes also remonstrated against the ordinance, and the
matter was carried up to the Provincial Government. Those communes who
had protested so violently with the axes themselves were mulcted in a
heavy fine. Judge Rellings, however, was removed after a time, and the
ordinance became obsolete. The men carried their axes on their left
arms, as they had done before.

I may have something more to tell of Buchmaier at some other time.

THE HOSTILE BROTHERS.

In the little cold alley called the "Knee-Cap" is a little house,
with a stable, a shed, and three windows glazed with paper. At the
dormer-window a shutter dangles by one hinge, threatening every moment
to fall. The patch of garden, small as it is, has a division-line of
leafless thorns to cut it into two equal halves. The premises were
inhabited by two brothers, who had been in constant warfare for
fourteen years. As in the