know how to punish those who abuse our magnanimity. If you do not
answer me this time, sir, by Heaven I will have you carried off under
arrest and let a court-martial pronounce judgment on you!"

The chief magistrate continued dumb. The pale and terror-stricken
countenances of those present were turned toward him. The members
of the Council implored and besought him to put aside this unnatural
stubbornness.

Von Kircheisen answered their pleadings with a loud-sounding laugh.
He then stared at the general, his features worked and struggled,
writhed, and finally he opened his mouth.

"Ah! God be praised, he is going to speak," cried the second
burgomaster.

But no, he did not speak; he only distorted his face. A cry of dismay
sounded from the lips of the deputation, a cry of anger from the
Russian general, who, turning to his adjutant, ordered him immediately
to arrest the burgomaster and carry him off. And now there arose an
indescribable scene of confusion and terror. Pale with fright, the
Council and deputation of merchants had flocked around Von Kircheisen
to protect him from the advancing soldiers who sought to arrest him,
while he, in the midst of all the horror and tumult, continued to
giggle and make grimaces. The enraged soldiery had already commenced
to push aside Kircheisen's defenders with blows from the butts of
their muskets, when a man made his way through the crowd. It was
Gotzkowsky, who, with a loud and full voice, demanded the cause of
this singular uproar. A hundred voices were ready to answer him, and
explain the scene in confused, unintelligible jargon.

But General Bachmann beckoned him to his side. "Tell me, sir, is this
chief burgomaster a fool or a drunkard, or is he, indeed, so demented
as to intend to mock us?"

As Gotzkowsky looked at the deathly pale, convulsed countenance of the
magistrate, who renewed his shrill, screeching laugh, he comprehended
the racking and terrible torture which the unfortunate man was
suffering. He hastened to him, seized him by the arm, and led the
tottering figure toward the general.

"This man is neither a fool nor a madman, your excellency; suffering
has robbed him of speech, and he laughs, not in derision, but from the
convulsion of intense sorrow."

And as the offended and angry general would not believe him, and
commanded his soldiers anew to arrest the burgomaster, and the
soldiers with renewed rage pressed on him, Gotzkowsky placed himself
before