ble Honor
had extraordinarily good luck that day. The rabbit in controversy--a
very small, quite a baby rabbit--was really one his Honorable and
Most Supreme Highness had himself wounded, and which he, Fiddles, had
finished. He was bringing it to his Honor when the estimable gendarme
had stopped him.

"'And what day was that?' interrupted the Mayor.

"'On last Wednesday.'

"'The cobbler said it was Tuesday,' insisted Cocked Hat. 'On this point
hangs the case. Now on which day did your Honor take the field with your
dogs?'

"There was a dead silence, during which the Mayor's eyes rested on the
culprit. Fiddles returned the look, head up, a smile on his lips that
would have fooled the devil himself. Then his Honor turned to me
and said: 'My memory is not always very good, but this time the
cobbler's--who is a meddlesome person--is even more defective. Yes,
I think it quite possible I was hunting on last Wednesday. I can
sympathize with the young man as to the size of the rabbit. They are
running very small this year. My decision, therefore, is that you can
let the young man go.'

"Oh, but that was a great night at the inn. Gretchen was so happy that
she spilled the beer down the apothecary's back and the landlady could
talk of nothing but Fiddles's release. But the real fun began an hour
later, when shouts for the Herr Mahler, interwoven with the music of a
concertina, made me step to the door. Outside, in the road, stood
four young men--all pals of Fiddles, all bareheaded, and all carrying
lanterns. They had come to crown the American with a gold chaplet cut
from gilt paper, after which I was to be conducted to the public house
where bumpers of beer were to be drunk until the last pfennig was spent.

"On hearing this, Gretchen, the landlady, the apothecary, the hostler,
and the stable-boy--not the cobbler, you may be sure--burst forth with
cries of: 'Hip! Hip!--Hock! Donder und Blitzen!' or whatever they do
yell when they are mad with joy.

"Then the landlady broke out in a fresh place: 'No public-house for
you! This is my treat! All of you come inside. Gretchen, get the mugs
full--all the mugs--Sit down! Sit down! The Herr Painter at the top of
the table, the Herr Feudels-Shimmer on the right; all the other Herrs
anywhere in between. Hock the Mahler! Hock the Hunter! Hock everybody
but the cobbler!' Here a groan went round. 'Hock! Hip and Blather
skitzen for the good and honorable Mayor, who always loves the pe