money in my face. Had my blood been something cooler I had remembered that the beard I had brought from the fortifications disfigured my features even to hideousness, but my evil heart had infected my reason; tears such as I had never wept before ran down my cheeks.

"The boy knows not who I am nor whence I come,' I said, half aloud, to myself, and yet he shuns me like a mischievous animal: am I then marked upon my forehead, or have I ceased to resemble a human being because I feel that I can no longer love one?' The contempt of this boy grieved me more bitterly than a three years' service at the galleys; for I had done good to him, and could accuse him of no personal hatred.

6

"I sat down in a timber-yard opposite the church; what I precisely wanted I know not, yet I know that I rose up in irritation, as of all my passing acquaintance none had vouchsafed me even a greeting-no, not one. I left my station indignantly to seek a lodging. As I turned the corner of a street I ran against my Johanna. Landlord!' she exclaimed aloud, and made a movement to embrace me; thou back again, dear Christian; God be thanked that thou art returned.' Her dress proclaimed hunger and misery; her countenance displayed a shameful disease; her appearance announced her debased to the most abandoned creature. I quickly guessed what might have happened here; some dragoons whom I had met led me to conjecture that there lay a garrison in the little town. Soldier's wench,' I exclaimed, and laughing turned my back on her. It pleased me that there was still a creature below me in the ranks of the living; I had never loved her.

"My mother was dead; my creditors had paid themselves with my little house; I had no longer any one or anything. All the world fled from me as a poisonous thing, but I had at last forgotten how to feel ashamed. Formerly I had avoided the sight of man, for contempt was to me unbearable; now I pushed myself forward, and delighted to terrify them. I felt glad that I had nothing more to lose, nothing more to guard. I no longer needed any good qualities, because no one any longer expected them from me.

"The whole world was open to me; I might perhaps have passed for an honest man in some strange province, but I had lost the spirit even to appear one. Despair and disgrace had at last forced me into this frame of mind. To learn to do without honour was all that remained for me, for I no longer dared lay claim to it. Had my idleness and my pride survived my degradation, I must have slain myself.

"What I now resolved upon I know not myself; I wished to do something evil-of so much I was dimly conscious. I wished to deserve my fate. The laws I imagined were a benefit to the world, I therefore took the resolution of setting them at defiance;

hitherto I had sinned from necessity and levity, now I did it from my free choice-for my pleasure.

"My first act was to prosecute my poaching. The chase generally had by degrees become a passion with me, and besides that I had to live. But it was not this alone; it pleased me to insult the princely edict, and to injure my sovereign to the extent of my power. I was no longer apprehensive of being taken, for I had now a bullet ready for any detector, and this I knew, that my shot never missed its man. I killed all the game that came across me; I converted but a small portion of it into money on the borders, the greater part I suffered to rot. I lived miserably, in order only to afford the expense of powder and lead. My devastations in the chase became notorious, but suspicion no longer oppressed me; my aspect extinguished it; my name was forgotten.

"I led this kind of life for several months. One morning I had, according to my custom, wandered through the wood to follow the track of a stag. I had wearied myself in vain during two hours, and I already began to give up my prey when I suddenly discovered it within shot. I was about to take aim and fire, but suddenly the sight of a hat that lay on the ground a few steps before me startled me. I examined more closely and distinguished the huntsman Robert, who from behind the thick trunk of an oak took aim at the very stag for which I had designed the shot. A death-like chillness ran through my bones at this sight. That was just the man whom, of all living things, I hated the most fearfully, and this man was given into the power of my bullet. It seemed to me in this moment as if the whole world lay in my musket-shot, and the hatred of my whole life crowded itself together in the single finger with which I should make the murderous pressure. An invisible, fearful hand hovered above me, the hand of fate pointed irrevocably to this dark hour. My arm trembled as I held my gun in frightful indecision; my teeth chattered as in a fever shivering; the breath stopped chokingly in my lungs. For a moment the direction of my gun wavered uncertainly between the man and the stag; for a moment-and then another—and yet another. Revenge and conscience struggled obstinately and doubtfully; but revenge conquered, and the huntsman lay dead on the ground.

"My weapon fell with the shot. 'Murderer! I stammered slowly. The forest was silent as a churchyard; I heard distinctly that I said murderer. As I stole nearer the man died. Long stood I speechless by the dead; at length a loud fit of laughter relieved me. Will you now keep a secret, my good friend?" said I, and stepped up boldly, at the same time turning the face of the murdered man upwards. The eyes were wide open. I became serious and grew suddenly silent again; it began to grow strange

to me.

"Until now I had sinned to be even with my disgrace; now something had happened for which I had not yet paid the penalty. An hour before I think no man could have persuaded me that there was yet something worse than I under heaven, now I began to believe that one hour ago I was much to be envied.

"The judgment of God never came into my mind, but only some, I know not what, confused recollection of cords and swords, and the execution of an infanticide which I had seen when a school-boy. Something particularly frightful to me lay in the thought, that from henceforward my life was forfeited. I remember nothing more. I wished directly that he had still lived. I laboured to acquire a lively recollection of all the evil which the deceased had caused me when alive, but, strange! my memory appeared extinguished; I could call forth nothing more of all that which a quarter of an hour before had brought me to madness. I could not conceive how I had come to do this murder.

"Still I stood by the corpse. The cracking of whips and the rumbling of waggons coming through the wood brought me to myself: it was scarcely a quarter of a mile from the high road where the deed was done; I must think of my safety.

On the way

"I involuntarily lost myself deeper in the forest. it occurred to me that the murdered man had formerly possessed a watch; I required money to reach the border, and yet I wanted courage to turn back to the place where the dead man lay. Here a thought startled me of the devil, and of the omnipresence of God. I collected my whole courage; determined to fight against all hell, I went back to the place. I found what I had expected, and in a green purse something less than a dollar in money. Just as I was about to take both I suddenly stopped and considered; it was no fit of shame, nor of fear to increase my guilt by robbery, I think it was scorn which made me throw the watch from me again and keep only half the money. I chose to be taken for a personal enemy of the murdered man, but not for his plunderer.

66 Now I fled towards the forest. I knew that the wood extended itself northwards four German miles, and there formed the boundary of the country. I continued running breathlessly until mid-day. The hastiness of my flight had dispelled the anguish of my conscience, but this returned more frightfully as my strength grew fainter and fainter. A thousand horrible figures went past me, and struck like sharp knives into my breast. A frightful choice was now left me between a life full of a restless fear of death, and a violent suicide, and I was obliged to choose. I had not the heart to leave the world by self-murder, and I was terrified at the prospect of remaining in it. Divided between the certain torments of life and the uncertain fear of eternity, alike unfit to live or die, I got over the sixth hour of my flight-an hour pressed full of tortures which no living man can describe.

"Thoughtfully and slowly, my hat drawn unconsciously far over my face, as if this could make me not to be recognised in the eyes of inanimate nature, I had insensibly followed a narrow footpath which led me through the darkest part of the thicket, when suddenly a rough authoritative voice behind me called ‘Halt!' The voice was quite close; my distraction and the hat pulled over my eyes had prevented me from looking about me. I looked up and saw a wild-looking man come towards me, who carried a great knotty club. His figure approached to gigantic-at least my first surprise led me to believe so--and the colour of his skin was of a yellow mulatto-black, from which the white of a squinting eye stood out hideously. He had, instead of a girdle, a thick cord wrapped twice round a green woollen coat, in which was stuck a broad butcher's knife, with a pistol. The call was repeated, and a strong arm held me fast. The sound of a human being had put me in fear, but the sight of a villain gave me courage. In the condition in which I now was I had cause to tremble before every honest man, but no longer any before a robber.

"Who goes there?" said the apparition.

"One like you,' was the reply, if you are really what you

seem.'

"The road leads not out in that direction; what seek you here?"

666

"What right have you to ask? I answered boldly.

"The man looked at me twice from head to foot; it appeared as if he wished to compare my figure with his own, and my answer with my figure.

"You speak roughly, like a beggar,' he said at last.

"That may be, I was one even yesterday.'

"The man laughed. One could have sworn it,' he cried, 'you would not now pass for anything better.'

"For something worse then.' I attempted to go on.

"Softly, friend, what drives you on so? How much time have you to lose?'

"I thought for a moment; I know not how the words came upon my tongue. Life is short,' I said slowly, and hell endures for

ever.'

"He looked at me hard.

'I will be damned,' he said at last,

'but you have strolled near a gallows somewhere.'

"That may happen yet; therefore au revoir, camarade.' "So be it, camarade,' he cried, as he drew a tin bottle out of his hunting pocket, took a hearty draught from it, and handed

it to me.

"Flight and anxiety had consumed my strength, and the whole of this frightful day nothing had passed my lips. I was already afraid of fainting in the forest, where for three miles round I could hope for no refreshment. It may be judged how cheerfully I

pledged the offered toast. New strength flew to my body with this refreshing draught, fresh courage to my heart, and hope, and the love of life. I began to believe that I was not yet quite miserable; this welcome drink could do so much. Yes, I confess it, my condition again bordered on a happy one, for after a thousand disappointed hopes I had found a being who appeared to resemble me. In the condition to which I had sunk, I had drunk in fellowship with the spirits of hell in order to have a confidant.

6

"The man stretched himself on the grass; I did the same. "Your drink has done me good,' I said; we must become acquaintances.'

"He struck fire to light his pipe.

"Have you been long at this business?'

"He looked at me steadfastly. 'What do you mean by that?' "Has this been often bloody?' I drew the knife from his girdle.

"Who are you?' he exclaimed terribly, and threw the pipe from him.

“A murderer like you, but only a beginner.'

"The man looked at me fixedly, and took his pipe again. "You do not live here?' he said at last.

"Three miles from hence; the landlord of the Sun, at L if you have heard of me.'

"The man sprang up like one possessed. "The poacher Wolf,' he exclaimed hastily.

"The same.'

6

"Welcome, comrade, welcome,' he cried, and shook me forcibly by the hand. It is capital that I have you at last, Wolf. For days and years I have been thinking how to catch you. I know you well; I know of all; I have long reckoned on you.'

"Reckoned upon me! and wherefore?"

"The whole country is full of you; you have enemies, a bailiff has oppressed you, Wolf; they have ruined you, their dealing with you cries to Heaven.' The man grew hot. Because you have shot a couple of boars, which the prince fed upon our fields and acres, they have sent you about for years to the house of correction and the fortifications; they have robbed you of your house and business; they have made you a beggar. Is it come to this, brother, that a man is to be of no more value than a hare? Are we not better than the beasts of the field? And a lad like endure this!'

"Could I alter it?'

you could

"That we will see. But tell me where do you come from now, and what are you doing in arms?'

"I told him my whole history. The man, without waiting until I had finished, sprang up with joyful impatience and drew

near me.