aching home. In August, 1621,
the peasant had the prospect of a moderate harvest; in trade and
commerce there was some degree of stagnation, but there was much of
that excited eagerness which is the natural offspring of a great
defensive movement, and manly youths were more allured than intimidated
by the wild conduct of the soldiery. It had indeed been long remarked,
that there was something unusual about the money which circulated in
the country. The good heavy Imperial coin became more and more scarce,
in its place much new money was current, badly coined, and of a red
colour. The increasing rise in the price of foreign goods appeared
still more strange. Everything became dearer. Whoever wished to make a
present to a godchild, or to pay foreign tradesmen, had to give an
increasing _agio_ for his old pure Joachim's thaler. But in the local
trade, betwixt town and country, the extensive new coinage was taken
without hesitation, indeed it was exchanged or bartered with an
increased activity. The mass of the people did not observe that the
different kinds of coin with which it was the custom to pay, became in
their hands, worthless lead; but the sharper ones, who had an inkling
of the state of things, became, for the most part, accomplices in the
dishonest usury of the Princes. It may be distinctly perceived how the
people came to a knowledge of their situation, and we still feel
dismayed at the sudden terror, anguish, and despair of the masses, and
are struck by the anxieties and manly indignation of the thoughtful;
and in reading the old narratives, we still feel somewhat of the
indignation with which the guilty were regarded. When we consider
the many wonderful errors of public opinion at that time, and the
well-meaning zeal of individuals who gave good counsel, we may be
permitted in this period of calamity and humiliation, to feel a proud
satisfaction at the sagacity with which even then, some men of the
people discovered the ground of the evil, and, in one of the most
difficult national questions, found the right answer, and by it a
remedy, at least for the worst misfortunes. Before we attempt to give a
picture of the "_Kipper_ and _Wipper_" years, we must make some remarks
on the coining of that period.

In the olden time, all technical dexterity was environed with dignity,
secrecy, and an apparatus of forms. Nothing is more characteristic of
the peculiarity of the German nature, than its virtuosoship; even the
m