n there. Mainz was a rich and important town at
that time, and was governed by an Archbishop, who was called an Elector,
because he was one of those who had the right of choosing an Emperor for
Germany, when one was wanted. Many Princes had also this right, but the
Archbishop of Mainz had the particular privilege of setting the crown on
the new Emperor's head, when he was crowned in the neighboring city of
Frankfort. Besides seeing all that was going on at Mainz, and purchasing
the different things that his mother wanted in the market, Hans' great
delight was to pay a visit to an uncle, who lived in the monastery of
St. Gothard, near the great cathedral.

This uncle was a monk, and called Father Gottlieb, and was considered at
that time a very learned man. He was good as well as learned, and full
of kindness to his little nephew Hans, who, from having so early lost
his own parent, looked up to Uncle Gottlieb as a real father, and loved
him as one.

[Illustration]

A monastery, I must tell you, was a place where a number of men lived
together away from the rest of the world, in order, as they thought, to
devote themselves more to the service of God, than if they were mixed up
with the business and pleasure of life. Whether they were right or wrong
in so doing, we will not now stop to inquire, but we must point out that
this custom had at that time a great many advantages, and certainly
enabled these monks to do a great deal of service to their
fellow-creatures. One of the most important of these services was with
regard to the making of books, such as we have before described. It was
in these monasteries, or houses of monks, that nearly all the books of
those times were written or transcribed, and a number of the monks were
always employed, if not in writing books, at all events in making copies
of those which had been written before. A room called the Scriptorium,
or writing-room, was to be found in every monastery, and most of the
monks could either write or read, and were looked upon in consequence as
very learned and wise. This made the visits of little Hans to his uncle
very pleasant. There was nothing he thought so great a treat as to have
something read to him out of one of Father Gottlieb's books, for he
possessed two of these precious volumes. One was a copy of the book of
Genesis, the first book in the Bible, you know, and the other was a
history of the lives of some of the holy men that have been called
sai