k. As he neared the landing-place, however, he became aware of
the presence of two monks, garbed exactly like his late passenger,
standing together, concealed by the shadow of the massive ruins.

"Here! here!" they cried.

"We would ye would ferry us over to yonder shore of the river," said
the foremost of the twain. "We go afar on a weighty errand from the
Convent of St. Thomas, and we must onwards this night. So be up
quick, friend, and run us over soon."

"Step in, then," said the ferryman, not over courteously, for he
remembered the trick played on him by their predecessor.

They entered the boat, and the ferryman put off. Just as the prow of
the boat touched the opposite bank of the river, both sprang ashore,
and disappeared at once from his view, like him who had gone before
them.

"Ah!" said the ferryman, "if they call that doing good, or acting
honestly, to cheat a hard-working poor fellow out of the reward of his
labour, I do not know what bad means, or what it is to act knavishly."

He waited a little while to see if they would return to pay him, but
finding that they failed to do so, he put across once more to his home
at Andernach.

"Hilloa! ferry," again hailed a voice from the shore to which he was
making, "hilloa!"

The ferryman made no reply to this suspicious hail, but pushed off his
boat from the landing-place, fully resolved in his own mind to have
nothing to do with any more such black cattle that night.

"Hilloa! ferry," was again repeated in a sterner voice. "Art dead or
asleep?"

"Here, ahoy!" cried the ferryman. "What would ye?"

He had thought of passing downwards to the other extremity of the
town, and there mooring his barque below the place she usually lay in,
lest any other monks might feel disposed to make him their slave
without offering any recompense. He had, however, scarcely entertained
the idea, when three black-robed men, clothed as the former, in long,
flowing garments, but more closely cowled, if possible, than they,
stood on the very edge of the stream, and beckoned him to them. It was
in vain for him to try to evade them, and as if to render any effort
to that effect more nugatory, the moon broke forth from the thick
clouds, and lit up the scene all around with a radiance like day.

"Step in, holy fathers! step in! quick!" said he, in a gruff voice,
after they had told him the same tale in the very same words as the
three others had used who had passed previously.