tly, my friends!" said the rector soothingly. "We must do nothing
hastily. So much is certain, however: they have designs upon our lives,
and would wipe us clean out."

"Not a doubt of it, else why should they be so friendly towards us? Why
should they distribute among us such a lot of food? We have never yet
asked an alms from our masters, and hitherto they have snatched the
food from our very mouths. If they caress us now it is because they fear
us."

"Yes, they would destroy us. The other day they gave me a glass of
brandy to drink at the tavern. I saw at once that it was not the usual
sort of stuff, and, to make certain, I dipped a bit of bread in it and
threw it to a dog, and he would not eat it."

"And why do the parsons preach so much about the scourge of God, the
pestilence? Why we have never had a better promise of harvest than now.
How do they know when Death will come? Only God can know beforehand whom
He will destroy and whom He will keep alive."

"Suspend your judgments, my good friends," resumed the rector, with an
affectation of benevolence, "you can see that the hand of God is over us
all. He can work great wonders, and it is not impossible that these
wonders will come. You can perceive from the signs of Heaven that great
changes are about to come on the earth. On Good Friday a bloody rain
fell near the hill of Madi; not long ago a flaming sword was visible in
the sky three nights running; everywhere about curious big fungi have
shot up from the ground, which turn red or green immediately they are
broken. Earth and sky seem to feel that the hand of God is about to
press heavily upon us."

("Deuce take this instructor of the people for befooling them so!"
thought Mr. Korde in his dog-kennel.)

"Did you notice, my brothers, how the rats roamed all about the roads
in broad daylight a fortnight ago, how they scuttled away from our
landlords' granaries, and set out for another village, and how they
stiffened and died in heaps on the way?"

"There you are!" shouted one wiseacre, "the corn in the granary was
poisoned!"

("Plague take thee, thou clodpole!" growled the cantor in his
hiding-place; "it was the rats that were poisoned, not the corn.")

"And we borrowed of that very corn a fortnight ago to last us till
harvest time."

"Then now we'll pay them back with interest!" bellowed one of the
rustics, fiercely flourishing a pitchfork.

("I'll swear that's one of my pupils, he is so pugnacious," t