IV.

One day the fine young lord took a fancy to go and visit all the spots in
which, once on a time, he had dreamed away so many anxious hours. But he
would go alone, not choosing that any should witness his meeting with
those old friends, the haunts which might reveal to a companion the
poverty of his early life. He set forth without attendants, mounted on a
magnificent courser. He rode here, he rode there, not feeling even
surprised to see everything so much as it was when he had quitted the
country. The day began to go down--it was evening--when at last he came
to the Valley of Bushes. There was a small bird singing there, just as
it sang on that evening long ago. The sight of the white-thorn trees
awakened painful recollections in his mind,--no doubt, perhaps, even a
pang of remorse; and he spurred his courser in order to get clear of the
place. But the animal trembled, snorted, and refused to move a step. He
spurred his courser: the animal began to neigh violently.

"Is it some serpent that he sees?" said the fine young lord.

It was a little old man, who stepped out from among the bushes. He was
dressed in a black mantle. Out he came, right into the middle of the
road, closed his arms on his breast, and said in a dull voice, "Baron
Durer, can you tell me what is the distance from a shepherd's hovel to a
king's palace?"

"That which there is betwixt the earth and the sun," was the reply of the
haughty upstart.

At this, the old man threw his cloak open, and showed himself to the
Minister, as he had shown himself twenty years before, on that very spot,
to the scholar John Durer. The Counsellor was little changed in
appearance, except in his hair, which had been black, and was now white
as the snow of winter.

John Durer's visage was mostly pale; but when he recognized that old man,
it became as red as blood. It was the third time that he had blushed
face to face with his former patron. Then the old man cried in a louder
voice,--

"Does the scholar of the village remember one Counsellor Werter?"

"The Minister remembers nothing of the scholar," was the cold and
arrogant answer.

"What, then, does he remember?" said the old man, pressing a little
nearer.

"NOTHING!" cried the fine young lord, and he buried his spurs in the
sides of his courser. They went off at a fierce gallop.

V.

But the fine young lord had only answered the truth. Whether it was from
that sudden struggle of pr