had lost its support.

This frightened him, and instead of continuing to boast of his success,
he called for help.

The Nuremberg gentlemen soon surrounded Kuni, and Doctor Hartmann
Schedel told the waiter to carry her, with the aid of his assistants,
summoned by his shout, into the house and provide her with a comfortable
bed.

Dietel obeyed the command without delay--nay, when he heard the famous
leech whisper to the other gentlemen that the sufferer's life was but a
failing lamp, his feelings were completely transformed. All the charity
in his nature began to stir and grew more zealous as he gazed at Kuni's
face, distorted by pain. The idea of giving up to her his own neat
little room behind the kitchen seemed like a revelation from St. Eoban,
his patron. She should rest in his bed. The wanderer who, a few years
ago, had scattered her gold so readily and joyously for the pleasure
of others certainly would not poison it. Her misery seemed to him a
touching proof of the transitory nature of all earthly things. Poor
sufferer! Yet she ought to find recovery on his couch, if anywhere; for
he had surrounded it with images of the saints, pious maxims, and little
relics, bought chiefly from the venders who frequented the tavern. Among
them was a leather strap from St. Elizabeth's shoe, whose healing power
he had himself tested during an attack of bilious fever.

The burden which he shared with his assistants was a light one, but
he was not to reach his destination without delay--the little bunch of
pinks fell from the hand of the unconscious girl, and Dietel silently
picked up the stolen property which had just roused his wrath to such a
degree, and placed it carefully on the senseless sufferer's bosom.

The second hinderance was more serious. Cyriax had heard that Kuni was
dying, and fearing that he might be obliged to pay the funeral expenses
he stuttered to the bystanders, with passionate gestures, that an hour
ago he had discharged the cripple whom he had dragged about with him,
out of sheer sympathy, long enough. She was nothing more to him now than
the cock in the courtyard, which was crowing to greet the approach of
dawn.

But the landlord of The Pike and others soon forced Cyriax out of the
way. Kuni was laid on Dietel's bed, and the gray-haired leech examined
her with the utmost care.

The landlady of The Pike helped to undress her, and when the good woman,
holding her apron to her eyes from which tears were