name and freedom fair,
Through sin, through sin alone.

The flow'ret was thine own, thine own,
Why cast away what thou didst win?
Thou knight no more, but slave of sin,
Thou'rt fearfully alone!"

"Have a care!" shouted he at the close in a pealing voice, as he pulled
the strings so mightily that they all broke with a clanging wail, and
a cloud of dust rose from the old lute, which spread round him like a
mist.

Sintram had been watching him narrowly whilst he was singing, and more
and more did he feel convinced that it was impossible that this man and
his fellow-traveller of the morning could be one and the same. Nay, the
doubt rose to certainty, when the stranger again looked round at
him with the same timid, anxious air, and with many excuses and low
reverences hung the lute in its old place, and then ran out of the hall
as if bewildered with terror, in strange contrast with the proud and
stately bearing which he had shown to Biorn.

The eyes of the boy were now directed to his father, and he saw that he
had sunk back senseless in his seat, as if struck by a blow. Sintram's
cries called Rolf and other attendants into the hall; and only by great
labour did their united efforts awake the lord of the castle. His looks
were still wild and disordered; but he allowed himself to be taken to
rest, quiet and yielding.

CHAPTER 5

An illness followed this sudden attack; and during the course of it the
stout old knight, in the midst of his delirious ravings, did not cease
to affirm confidently that he must and should recover. He laughed
proudly when his fever-fits came on, and rebuked them for daring to
attack him so needlessly. Then he murmured to himself, "That was not
the right one yet; there must still be another one out in the cold
mountains."

Always at such words Sintram involuntarily shuddered; they seemed to
strengthen his notion that he who had ridden with him, and he who had
sat at table in the castle, were two quite distinct persons; and he
knew not why, but this thought was inexpressibly awful to him. Biorn
recovered, and appeared to have entirely forgotten his adventure with
the palmer. He hunted in the mountains; he carried on his usual wild
warfare with his neighbours; and Sintram, as he grew up, became his
almost constant companion; whereby each year a fearful strength of body
and spirit was