here," thought Merry, "I'll e'en try
if I can get a lodging in heaven. Somewhere or other I must rest."

So he turned about and went on till he came to the door of heaven, and
there he knocked. Now the saint who had journeyed with Merry sat at
the door, and had charge of the entrance. Brother Merry recognised
him, and said--

"Are you here, old acquaintance? Then things will go better with me."

The saint replied--

"I suppose you want to get into heaven?"

"Ay, ay, brother, let me in; I must put up somewhere."

"No," said the saint; "you don't come in here."

"Well, if you won't let me in, take your dirty knapsack again. I'll
have nothing that can put me in mind of you," said Merry carelessly.

"Give it me, then," said the saint.

Brother Merry handed it through the grating into heaven, and the saint
took it and hung it up behind his chair.

"Now," said Brother Merry, "I wish I was in my own knapsack."

Instantly he was there; and thus, being once actually in heaven, the
saint was obliged to let him stay there.

FASTRADA.

By the side of the "Beautiful Doorway," leading into the cloisters of
the cathedral at Mainz, stands, worked into the wall, a fragment of
the tomb of Fastrada, the fourth wife of the mighty monarch
Charlemagne according to some authorities, the third according to
others. Fastrada figures in the following tradition related by the
author of the Rhyming Chronicle.

When the Kaiser, Karl, abode at Zurich, he dwelt in a house called
"The Hole," in front of which he caused a pillar to be erected with a
bell on the top of it, to the end that whoever demanded justice should
have the means of announcing himself. One day, as he sat at dinner in
his house, he heard the bell ring, and sent out his servants to bring
the claimant before him; but they could find no one. A second and a
third time the bell rang, but no human being was still to be seen. At
length the Kaiser himself went forth, and he found a large serpent,
which had twined itself round the shaft of the pillar, and was then in
the very act of pulling the bell rope.

"This is God's will," said the monarch. "Let the brute be brought
before me. I may deny justice to none of God's creatures--man or
beast."

The serpent was accordingly ushered into the imperial presence; and
the Kaiser spoke to it as he would to one of his own kind, gravely
asking what it required. The reptile made a most courteous reverence
to Charlemagne, and