cried her warm-hearted son, 'and has it come to
this--that in our own Freiberg, where not even a beggar is allowed to
starve, the good and honoured wife of the town servant himself cannot
get enough to eat?'

'Your father locks everything up as if I was a thief,' said the woman,
'and he has been out ever since mid-day, so we couldn't get anything.'

'Here, dear mother,' cried Conrad, 'take this. I always take good care
now-a-days to have a crust of bread in my pocket. I only wish I could
give you something nice to eat with it, but that's all I have.'

The woman broke off a morsel for the expectant cat before beginning to
satisfy her own hunger. 'Puss is only a dumb creature,' she said by
way of excuse, 'but she is as faithful as many Christians, and a good
deal kinder than your stepfather.'

'Yes, mother,' replied Conrad, 'so she is. All he wanted was your
little house, and now that's gone he is just showing us what he really
is.'

'It was for your sake I promised to be his wife,' said the woman, 'that
there might be somebody to look after you when I am gone.'

'I know, I know!' said Conrad. 'And how very kind and sweet-spoken he
always used to be to me while he was courting you!'

'He is coming!' said the woman in sudden terror. 'I can hear his step.
Quick, hide yourself!'

There was let into the wall of the room, just below the window, a seat,
from which, in order to conceal household articles laid there, a low
curtain had been hung, thus making a sort of rude cupboard. Conrad
crept behind this curtain with all speed, just as his mother succeeded
in hiding her crust of bread in her pocket. Immediately afterwards
Juechziger entered the room without a word of greeting to his wife. He
threw his hat on the seat beneath which his stepson was crouching, and
said angrily: 'It's a dog's life now-a-days. On one's legs day and
night, always in danger, and never a kreuzer[1] by way of reward. All
for the fatherland, forsooth, say the patriots! I am my own
fatherland, and I keep my patriotism in my purse. Ever since the fat
citizens and journeymen took to cutting about the streets with their
pop-guns, they are all grown such big men that if one of them happens
to set eyes on you, you must jump out of his way like a bewitched frog.
Wife! Wife, I say! Here's a batzen.[2] Run across to Seiler's and
fetch me a herring. I begin to feel horribly hungry.'

The blind woman stood for some seconds like one astou