h sharp
thorns. The peasants felt them soon enough, for at Sindelfingen they
found their master in Captain Georg Truchsess of Waldberg.

Marx fell into his troopers' hands and was hung on the gallows, but only
in mockery and as a warning to others; for before he and his companions
perished, the men took them down, cut their oath-fingers from their
hands, and drove them back into their old servitude. When he at last
returned home, his house had been taken from his family, whom he found
in extreme poverty. The father of Adam, the smith, to whom he had
formerly sold charcoal, redeemed the house, gave him work, and once,
when a band of horsemen came to the city searching for rebellious
peasants, the old man did not forbid him to hide three whole days in his
barn.

Since that time everything had been quiet in Swabia, and neither in
forest, stream nor meadow had any freedom existed.

Marx had only himself to provide for; his wife was dead, and his sons
were raftsmen, who took pine logs to Mayence and Cologne, sometimes even
as far as Holland. He owed gratitude to no one but Adam, and showed in
his way that he was conscious of it, for he taught Ulrich all sorts of
things which were of no advantage to a boy, except to give him pleasure,
though even in so doing he did not forget his own profit. Ulrich was now
fifteen, and could manage a cross-bow and hit the mark like a skilful
hunter, and as the lad did not lack a love for the chase, Marx afforded
him the pleasure. All he had heard about the equal rights of men he
engrafted into the boy's soul, and when to-day, for the hundredth time,
Ulrich expressed a doubt whether it was not stealing to kill game that
belonged to the count, the charcoal-burner straightened his mouth, and
said:

"Forest, stream and meadow are free. Surely you know that."

The boy gazed thoughtfully at the ground for a time, and then asked:

"The fields too?"

"The fields?" repeated Marx, in surprise. "The fields? The fields are a
different matter." He glanced as he spoke, at the field of oats he had
sown in the autumn, and which now bore blades a finger long. "The fields
are man's work and belong to him who tills them, but the forest, stream
and meadow were made by God. Do you understand? What God created for
Adam and Eve is everybody's property."

As the sun rose higher, and the cuckoo began to raise its voice,
Ulrich's name was shouted loudly several times in rapid succession
through the forest. T