lently appointed to
set up the ninepins for them.

At first his knees knocked together as he did this, while he marked,
with half-stolen glances, the long beards and goodly paunches of the
noble knights. By degrees, however, he grew more confident, and looked
at everything about him with a steady gaze--nay, at last, he ventured
so far as to take a draught from a pitcher which stood near him, the
fragrance of which appeared to him delightful. He felt quite revived
by the draught, and as often as he felt at all tired, received new
strength from application to the inexhaustible pitcher. But at length
sleep overcame him.

When he awoke, he found himself once more in the enclosed green space,
where he was accustomed to leave his goats. He rubbed his eyes, but
could discover neither dog nor goats, and stared with surprise at the
height to which the grass had grown, and at the bushes and trees,
which he never remembered to have noticed. Shaking his head, he
proceeded along the roads and paths which he was accustomed to
traverse daily with his herd, but could nowhere see any traces of his
goats. Below him he saw Sittendorf; and at last he descended with
quickened step, there to make inquiries after his herd.

The people whom he met at his entrance to the town were unknown to
him, and dressed and spoke differently from those whom he had known
there. Moreover, they all stared at him when he inquired about his
goats, and began stroking their chins. At last, almost involuntarily,
he did the same, and found to his great astonishment that his beard
had grown to be a foot long. He began now to think himself and the
world altogether bewitched, and yet he felt sure that the mountain
from which he had descended was the Kyffhauser; and the houses here,
with their fore-courts, were all familiar to him. Moreover, several
lads whom he heard telling the name of the place to a traveller called
it Sittendorf.

Shaking his head, he proceeded into the town straight to his own
house. He found it sadly fallen to decay. Before it lay a strange
herd-boy in tattered garments, and near him an old worn-out dog, which
growled and showed his teeth at Peter when he called him. He entered
by the opening, which had formerly been closed by a door, but found
all within so desolate and empty that he staggered out again like a
drunkard, and called his wife and children. No one heard; no voice
answered him.

Women and children now began to surround the str