miles and a half. Here we sold, to prevent dying of hunger, a shirt
and Schell's waistcoat for eighteen grosch, or nine schostacks. I had
shot a pullet the day before, which necessity obliged us to eat raw. I
also killed a crow, which I devoured alone, Schell refusing to taste.
Youth and hard travelling created a voracious appetite, and our eighteen
grosch were soon expended.

Feb. 24.--We came through Benzen to Lettel, four miles. Here we halted a
day, to learn the road to Hammer, in Brandenburg, where my sister lived.
I happened luckily to meet with the wife of a Prussian soldier who lived
at Lettel, and belonged to Kolschen, where she was born a vassal of my
sister's husband. I told her who I was, and she became our guide.

Feb. 26.--To Kurschen and Falkenwalde.

Feb. 27.--Through Neuendorf and Oost, and afterwards through a pathless
wood, five miles and a half to Hammer, and here I knocked at my sister's
door at nine o'clock in the evening.

CHAPTER VIII.

A maidservant came to the door, whom I knew; her name was Mary, and she
had been born and brought up in my father's house. She was terrified at
seeing a sturdy fellow in a beggar's dress; which perceiving, I asked,
"Molly, do not you know me?" She answered, "No;" and I then discovered
myself to her. I asked whether my brother-in-law was at home. Mary
replied, "Yes; but he is sick in bed." "Tell my sister, then," said I,
"that I am here." She showed me into a room, and my sister presently
came.

She was alarmed at seeing me, not knowing that I had escaped from Glatz,
and ran to inform her husband, but did not return.

A quarter of an hour after the good Mary came weeping, and told us her
master commanded us to quit the premises instantly, or he should be
obliged to have us arrested, and delivered up as prisoners. My sister's
husband forcibly detained her, and I saw her no more.

What my feelings must be, at such a moment, let the reader imagine. I
was too proud, too enraged, to ask money; I furiously left the house,
uttering a thousand menaces against its inhabitants, while the
kind-hearted Mary, still weeping, slipped three ducats into my hand,
which I accepted.

And, now behold us once more in the wood, which was not above a hundred
paces from the house, half dead with hunger and fatigue, not daring to
enter any habitation, while in the states of Brandenburg, and dragging
our weary steps all night through snow and rain, until our g