tle doctor was reading must
belong to their writings. How attentively the others listened! Had not
Dietel run away from the monks' school at Fulda he, too, might have
enjoyed the witticisms of these sages, or even been permitted to sit at
the same table with the great lights of the Church from Cologne.

Now it was all over with studying.

And yet--it could not be so very serious a matter, for Doctor Eberbach
had just read something aloud at which the young Nuremberg ambassador,
Lienhard Groland, could not help laughing heartily. It seemed to amuse
the others wonderfully, too, and even caused the astute Dr. Peutinger to
strike his clinched fist upon the table with the exclamation, "A devil
of a fellow!" and Wilibald Pirckheimer to assent eagerly, praising
Hutten's ardent love for his native land and courage in battling for its
elevation; but this Hutten whom he so lauded was the ill-advised scion
of the knightly race that occupied Castle Steckelberg in his Hessian
home, whom he knew well. The state of his purse was evident from the
fact that the landlord of The Pike had once been obliged to detain him
because he could not pay the bill--though it was by no means large--in
any other coin than merry tales.

But even the best joke of the witty knight would have failed to produce
its effect on the listening waiter just now; for the gentlemen outside
were again discussing the Reuchlin controversy, and in doing so uttered
such odious words about the Cologne theologians, whom Dietel knew as
godly gentlemen who consumed an ample supply of food, that he grew hot
and cold by turns. He was a good man who would not hurt a fly. Yet, when
he heard things and opinions which his mother had taught him to hold
sacred assailed, he could become as angry as a savage brute. The little
impious blasphemer Eberbach, especially, he would have been more than
ready to lash with the best hazel rod which he had ever cut for his dead
father. But honest anger affords a certain degree of enjoyment, so it
was anything rather than agreeable to him to be called away.

The feather curler and his table companions wanted Kitzing wine, but
it was in the cellar, and a trip there would have detained him too long
from his post of listener. So he turned angrily back into the room, and
told the business men that princes, bishops, and counts were satisfied
with the table wine of The Blue Pike, which had been already served to
them, and the sceptre and crozier were