the face of the country, like the grim and exaggerated cobwebs patching the ceiling of a disused apartment in an antiquated mansion.

One day, when he had returned from the chase, and had sat down to dinner with his nobles, in even a better eating cue than usual,—and he had a royal appetite in ordinary,-and had commenced the attack upon a boar which he had killed with his own hand, and which had been that day roasted,-whole, of course,-his chief huntsman suddenly entered the dining hall.

"May it please your majesty, a man craves admission to your majesty, who”.

"Were he an angel, he must wait the completion of our meal. I thought thou hadst known that, Hans Weller."

The huntsman was a favourite, and, after a low inclination of the head, ventured a reply

"He refuses, please your majesty, to wait an instant longer than whilst I can report your answer."

"Ranch und blitz!" exclaimed the monarch, deserting the boar, and springing on his feet in amazement" refuses to wait!-what mould of man may he be that sends us such a message?" "A little man, your majesty,-scarce as high as his dogs."

66 Dogs!-what dogs?"

"I was about to tell your majesty: he has two dogs, staghounds. Gütiger Gott! such hounds!"

"How!-equal to my Molch?"

"Molch is a two-month's pup to them! Germany cannot furnish two such other!"

"Away with thee! bring the schlem hither, with his dogs!

And the huntsman went.

Presently he returned, bringing with him a man, scarce four feet high, and whose proportions corresponded with his height. The man was perfectly black,-so black, that his eyes had no whites, and his teeth were like polished jet. His clothing was a close dress of dark red, buttoned at the neck, and extending midway down his legs. Round his shoulders was slung a loose cloak of blue. His head was uncovered, save by the thick hair which twenty torturing irons appeared to have united in crisping and burning. In his hand he held a leash, that confined two mighty staghounds, whose fierce eager - eyes, broad chests, and muscular haunches, bespoke their spirit and their power.

The

The owner of these animals entered the chamber as unconcernedly as if entering an assembly of Westphalian swine herds. Making an indifferent sort of inclination to the king, he stood still, surveying the nobles with a contemptuous curiosity, that bespoke marvellous self-possession. Some frowned, and some muttered. prime minister, who had been deservedly raised to his station for being seven feet high, and an excellent hand at spearing a boar,-the prime minister frowned at the black man ?-One would think that the frown of so big a man ought to have extinguished a creature of four feet.-The prime minister might as well have frowned on a stone.

"So!" said the king; "is it thou that canst not wait our leisure?"

"Yea!" said the black.-His voice was like the roar of a furnace.

"Who, and what art thou ?"

"Who am I? I have no name, though I am called by many names. Thou mayst call me Reichter Brand,-What am I? Why, I am the owner of these dogs,-which is all it concerns thee to know."

"Thou art, at least, a most impudent bosewicht," said the easy king. "But, what of thy dogs?-bring them nearer!"

The king and his courtiers examined the dogs with the eyes of sportsmen. The animals were faultless, and raised admiration by their size and apparent strength.

"Wilt thou sell these dogs, Reichter?" asked the monarch.

"It was therefore I came hither."

"What is their price?"

"Hear me! you shall, to-morrow, hunt with these dogs. All they kill shall be mine, and the dogs are yours."

"Man!" exclaimed the king, rejoicing at the easy terms upon which the owner of the dogs insisted, "thou shalt have more than thou askest; thou shalt not only have the game, but wherewithal to buy sauce, I warrant thee! A hunt to-morrow morning, my lords!-you will not fail us."

"Stay!" exclaimed the bishop of Prague, "your majesty must be informed, that to-morrow is St. Martin's day; on which you are bound by your vow, made on the recovery of the royal lady, your daughter, from a dangerous illness,

to partake of no amusement, to take no meat, and, save the pure spring, to taste no liquor."

"Thou art right-thou hast done well to remind us; we must delay, till the following day, our intended sport. Thou shalt lodge, meanwhile, to thy liking- -so hold thee in readiness!" "I may not stop here," replied Reichter, "after to-morrow; therefore, determine !"

"Mayst not stop! Why, what, in Heaven's name, should be the mighty need for such a one as thou to be a stickler for times! Wait, man! thou shalt gain the more for thy dogs."

"Not for thy treasury, king of Bohemia !— to-morrow, or never!"

"Obstinate schelm!" exclaimed the king; "thou shalt stay;-dost thou dispute with us? -Stay thou shalt let to-morrow pass-the day after it we will hunt, and the dogs shall be mine."

"That they shall, and without condition or price, if thou find me here after to-morrow noon," returned the unabashed Black.

"seize

""Tis very well," replied the king; him!-a day's confinement may cool this madman's temper."

An eminent lord of the treasury stepped forward to obey the monarch's command. But he was stayed; and, to his astonishment, found himself suddenly laid prostrate, and under the foot of one of the dogs, which detained him with the hold of a lion.

The Black drew off the dog. majesty determined?" said he.

"Has your

The overthrow of the courtier had redoubled

the king's anxiety to become the owner of these powerful animals. "I know not," said he, doubtingly; "I would St. Martin had had some other day. Canst thou not," addressing the bishop, "absolve me from this vow?"

"I may not," returned the prelate; "it was made before the pontiff himself; I cannot, and dare not dissolve it."

The king blasphemed inwardly. "I see not," said he, made a casuist by the emergency, "if I kept holy some other day-or say two-which I would not grudge,-in lieu of to-morrow, why the saint might not be as well pleased. Where is Pierre le Tambour?-Fetch him hither!"

Now, when Madam Nature compounded the essentials and the accidentals of Pierre le Tambour, and placed him in the age of this king of Bohemia of whom we are talking-she played one of those freaks from which the old lady is not wholly free, and anticipated some centuries. Pierre le Tambour was a Frenchman; he was likewise un philosophe,-one of that species of philosophers of whom the race was well known, some twenty or thirty years ago, when they saw fit to philosophize the wits out of all, and the heads off many of their countrymen. How he came to be born so many years before his time, Heaven knows!-how he became a member of the court of the king of Bohemia, befell thus. Having publicly preached the doctrines of Epicurus, at Montpellier, the canons of that place made it much too hot to hold him; so, flying to Bohemia, where it appeared to Le Tambour that men approached more nearly to an unsophisti