new it--from the
first. And mind you, when a guide is required,' he added, 'I know all
the forest paths.'

Otto rode away, chuckling. This talk with Fritz had vastly entertained
him; nor was he altogether discontented with his bearing at the farm;
men, he was able to tell himself, had behaved worse under smaller
provocation. And, to harmonise all, the road and the April air were both
delightful to his soul.

Up and down, and to and fro, ever mounting through the wooded foothills,
the broad white high-road wound onward into Grunewald. On either hand
the pines stood coolly rooted--green moss prospering, springs welling
forth between their knuckled spurs; and though some were broad and
stalwart, and others spiry and slender, yet all stood firm in the same
attitude and with the same expression, like a silent army presenting
arms.

The road lay all the way apart from towns and villages, which it left on
either hand. Here and there, indeed, in the bottom of green glens, the
Prince could spy a few congregated roofs, or perhaps above him, on a
shoulder, the solitary cabin of a woodman. But the highway was an
international undertaking and with its face set for distant cities,
scorned the little life of Grunewald. Hence it was exceeding solitary.
Near the frontier Otto met a detachment of his own troops marching in the
hot dust; and he was recognised and somewhat feebly cheered as he rode
by. But from that time forth and for a long while he was alone with the
great woods.

Gradually the spell of pleasure relaxed; his own thoughts returned, like
stinging insects, in a cloud; and the talk of the night before, like a
shower of buffets, fell upon his memory. He looked east and west for any
comforter; and presently he was aware of a cross-road coming steeply down
hill, and a horseman cautiously descending. A human voice or presence,
like a spring in the desert, was now welcome in itself, and Otto drew
bridle to await the coming of this stranger. He proved to be a very
red-faced, thick-lipped countryman, with a pair of fat saddle-bags and a
stone bottle at his waist; who, as soon as the Prince hailed him,
jovially, if somewhat thickly, answered. At the same time he gave a
beery yaw in the saddle. It was clear his bottle was no longer full.

'Do you ride towards Mittwalden?' asked the Prince.

'As far as the cross-road to Tannenbrunn,' the man replied. 'Will you
bear company?'

'With pleasure. I have even waited