not without a feeling of satisfaction at his own penetration:

"So you are an orphan! Yes, yes! So long as the mother's wings cover it,
the young bird doesn't fly so thoughtlessly out of the warm nest into the
wide world. I suppose the Latin school grew too narrow for the young
nobleman?"

Ulrich raised himself, exclaiming in an eager, defiant tone:

"I won't go back to the monastery; that I will not."

"So that's the way the hare jumps!" cried the fool laughing. "You've been
a bad Latin scholar, and the timber in the forest is dearer to you, than
the wood in the school-room benches. To be sure, they send out no green
shoots. Dear Lord, how his face is burning!" So saying, Pellicanus laid
his hand on the boy's forehead and when he felt that it was hot, deemed
it better to stop his examination for the day, and only asked his patient
his name.

"Ulrich," was the reply.

"And what else?"

"Let me alone!" pleaded the boy, drawing the coverlet over his head
again.

The jester obeyed his wish, and opened the door leading into the
tap-room, for some one had knocked. The artist's servant entered, to
fetch his master's portmanteau. Old Count von Hochburg had invited Moor
to be his guest, and the painter intended to spend the night at the
castle. Pellicanus was to take care of the boy, and if necessary send for
the surgeon again. An hour after, the sick jester lay shivering in his
bed, coughing before sleeping and between naps. Ulrich too could obtain
no slumber.

At first he wept softly, for he now clearly realized, for the first time,
that he had lost his father and should never see Ruth, the doctor, nor
the doctor's dumb wife Elizabeth again. Then he wondered how he had come
to Einmendingen, what sort of a place it was, and who the queer little
man could be, who had taken him for a young noble--the quaint little man
with the cough, and a big head, whose eyes sparkled so through his tears.
The jester's mistake made him laugh, and he remembered that Ruth had once
advised him to command the "word," to transform him into a count.

Suppose he should say to-morrow, that his father had been a knight?

But the wicked thought only glided through his mind; even before he had
reflected upon it, he felt ashamed of himself, for he was no liar.

Deny his father! That was very wrong, and when he stretched himself out
to sleep, the image of the valiant smith stood with tangible distinctness
before his soul. Gravely and sternly h