time he thought, "These fruit-trees around every village are
the best friends of man. Man comes first, cattle next, and then the
orchard-trees,--for they also need the special care of man to prune and
graft them and remove the caterpillars. How strange it is! All around
is grass and puny herbage, and suddenly a great stem rears itself aloft
and its crest is all white with blossoms.

"God's earth is full of wondrous beauty,
A lovely place to dwell upon;
Then to rejoice shall be my duty
Till in the earth I make my wonne."

Though so well entertained by communing with himself, he entered into
conversation with more than one of the travellers he overtook, or who
overtook him. They all were pleased with his open, kindly talk; and he
quite rejoiced to find the world full of such good-humored people.

It was dark when he reached Hechingen. Though it was but five hours'
walk to his home, and he felt no fatigue, he kept his promise to his
friends. He wished, moreover, to come home in the daytime. "It was dark
when I went away," he said to himself as he sat at the inn, "and it
must be light when I return." He was even vain enough to wish that his
father's house was at the other end of the village, so that his green
knapsack and student's dress might attract universal attention.

The sun shone brightly when Ivo awoke. It was a happier waking than
that on which the lantern of the convent used to look down. It was a
beautiful day,--a day of jubilee for the birds in the air and the buds
on the trees.

He longed for wings; and, in default of them, he flung his cap high in
the air as he walked briskly along. He suddenly stopped, sat down on
the wayside, and, repeating the words of Exodus iii. 5,--"Put off thy
shoes from off thy feet; for the place whereon thou standest is holy
ground,"--he obeyed the precept. Like an unshod colt, he 'bounded along
for a time; but soon he found that the life of the convent had unfitted
him for such exercise. Compressing his lips with pain, and resuming his
shoes, he again thought of the beautiful Psalm,--"He shall give his
angels charge over thee, lest thou dash thy foot against a stone."
Psalm xci. 11, 12.

At Haigerloch he bought two "pretzels,"--one for his mother and the
other for Emmerence. "Didn't she give me the duck when I went away?" he
argued to himself, to quiet his ecclesiastical conscience. He avoided
the short turns which the footpa