with great resignation, and sighing deeply,
wandered out into the fields of buck-wheat, where he lay down and
listened anxiously to the distant uproar with which the excited
villagers hunted the fearful spectre; and to this day the true legend
of the "earth-man" is told in the district.

When all was quiet, Vendel rose and withdrew farther from the
dangerous vicinity of his hut. For three whole days he wandered
through thorns and bushes, sleeping in the open air, and supporting
life with earth-nuts and maize. Three miserable fast days they were,
which deprived him of at least twenty pounds of bodily weight, but
certainly prolonged his life by three years! On the fourth day he
heard a great deal of firing at about a mile's distance, and at
intervals the sound of great guns. He even saw some of the balls
lazily rebounding from the ground at the end of their flight, and,
picking up one, he put it into his pocket in testimony of the battle
he had seen, and of all he had gone through during the war.

Towards noon, the firing ceased, and in the evening, as Vendel was
preparing to lie down under the shelter of a ridge of potatoes, a form
started from the treacherous wood beside him in pelisse and dolmany,
with a red csako, short boots, and a musket in his hand. He looked
about him--perhaps he was pursued, perhaps pursuing--he seemed
evidently in a dilemma of some kind; as he approached, however, Vendel
recognised Matyas Kormas, one of the noble proprietors of the
district--but in what a plight! He who had gone out with such zeal,
torn and covered with mud; his hair and moustache, wont to be so
stiffly waxed, hanging dolefully about his face, and his countenance
expressive of anxiety and alarm. Vendel was much relieved, however, to
see that there were no marks of blood about him; but his ardour seemed
considerably abated, and he by no means now looked as if he could
devour his enemies.

"Good evening, Vendel!" he exclaimed in a mild tone, on recognising
the brewer; "can you tell me in what direction the village lies?"

Vendel immediately offered to conduct him, thinking he might have a
better chance of safety by returning with an armed man, the whole
country being now unsafe.

"I only wanted to know in order that I might keep away from it,"
replied Matyas, "for the enemy occupy it at present; but let us get
down into the underwood, Vendel; we can hide there together."

"Then are they really such ferocious people?" asked