tell him I want to be lord of the sun
and moon."

The fisherman was half asleep; but the thought frightened him so much
that he started and fell out of bed.

"Alas! wife," said he, "cannot you be content to be pope?"

"No," said she, "I am very uneasy, and cannot bear to see the sun and
moon rise without my leave. Go to the fish directly."

Then the man went trembling for fear. As he was going down to the
shore a dreadful storm arose, so that the trees and the rocks shook,
the heavens became black, the lightning played, the thunder rolled,
and the sea was covered with black waves like mountains, with a white
crown of foam upon them. The fisherman came to the shore, and said--

"O man of the sea,
Come listen to me,
For Alice, my wife,
The plague of my life,
Hath sent me to beg a boon of thee!"

"What does she want now?" asked the fish.

"Ah!" said he, "she wants to be lord of the sun and moon."

"Go home," replied the fish, "to your ditch again."

And there they live to this very day.

THE MOUSE TOWER.

To the traveller who has traversed the delightful environs of the
Rhine, from the city of Mentz as far as Coblentz, or from the clear
waves of this old Germanic stream gazed upon the grand creations of
Nature, all upon so magnificent a scale, the appearance of the old
decayed tower which forms the subject of the ensuing tradition forms
no uninteresting object. It rises before him as he mounts the Rhine
from the little island below Bingen, toward the left shore. He listens
to the old shipmaster as he relates with earnest tone the wonderful
story of the tower, and, shuddering at the description of the
frightful punishment of priestly pride and cruelty, exclaims in strong
emotion--

"The Lord be with us!"

For, as the saying runs, it was about the year of Our Lord 968, when
Hatto II., Duke of the Ostro-franks, surnamed Bonosus, Abbot of Fulda,
a man of singular skill and great spiritual endowments, was elected
Archbishop of Mentz. He was also a harsh man, and being extremely
avaricious, heaped up treasure which he guarded with the utmost care.

It so happened, under his spiritual sway, that a cruel famine began to
prevail in the city of Mentz and its adjacent parts, insomuch that in
a short time numbers of the poorer people fell victims to utter want.
Crowds of wretches were to be seen assembled before the Archbishop's
palace in the act of beseeching wit