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this time it fell out just as on the former occasion. His wife exchanged the ashes with a dustman for two or three pieces of soap, while her husband was just gone out to carry some work to a customer. When he returned, and was told of the bargain with the ashes, he was so enraged that he gave his wife a beating.

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When another year had passed, the three students came for the third time, and found the weaver in rags and misery. They said, throwing at the same time a piece of lead at his feet: Of what use is a nutmeg to a cow? To give thee money again would prove us to be greater fools than thou art. We will never come to thee again." Thereupon they went away in anger, and the weaver picked up the piece of lead and laid it on the window-sill. Soon after his neighbour entered the room-he was a fisherman-bade him good day, and said: "My friend, have you perchance a piece of lead, or anything heavy, that I can use for my net? for I have just now nothing of the kind at hand." The weaver gave him the piece of lead which the students had left, for which the fisherman thanked him, and promised that he should have in return the first large fish he caught. "Very well," replied the weaver, "but it is not worth speaking about." Soon after, the fisherman actually brought a fine fish, weighing four or five pounds, and obliged his neighbour to accept it. He immediately cut up the fish, and found a great stone in its belly. This stone the weaver also laid in the window-sill. In the evening, when it became dark, the stone began to shine, and the darker it grew the brighter the stone became, and just like a candle. "That's a cheap lamp," said the weaver to his wife; wouldst thou not like to dispose of it as thou didst the two hundred dollars?" and he placed the stone so that it illumined the whole room.

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The next evening a merchant chanced to ride past the house, who, on seeing the brilliant stone, alighted, and entered the room, looked at it, and offered ten dollars for it. The weaver answered: "The stone is not for sale." What, not for twenty dollars?" said the stranger. "Not even for that," replied the weaver. The merchant, however, kept on bidding and bidding for the stone, till at last he offered a thousand dollars; for the

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stone was a precious diamond, and really worth much more. Now the weaver struck the bargain, and was the richest man in the village.

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His wife would have the last word, and took much credit to herself, saying: 'See, husband, how well it was that I threw away the money twice; for thou hast me to thank for this good luck."

THE MAN IN THE MOON *.

VERY, very long ago there was a man who went into the forest one Sunday to cut wood. Having chopped a large quantity of brushwood, he tied it together, thrust a stick through the bundle, threw it over his shoulder, and was on his way home, when there met him on the road a comely man, dressed in his Sunday clothes, who was going to church. He stopped, and, accosting the wood-cutter, said: "Dost thou not know that on earth this is Sunday, the day on which God rested from his works, after he had created the world, with all the beasts of the field, and also man? Dost thou not know what is written in the fourth commandment, Thou shalt keep holy the Sabbath-day?'" The questioner was our Lord himself. The wood-cutter was hardened, and answered: "Whether it is Sunday on earth or Monday (Moonday) in heaven, what does it concern thee.

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or me?"

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For this thou shalt for ever bear thy bundle of wood," said the Lord; "and because the Sunday on earth is profaned by thee, thou shalt have an everlasting Monday, and stand in the moon, a warning to all such as break the Sunday by work."

From that time the man stands in the moon, with his faggot of brushwood, and will stand there to all eternity.

*See Chaucer, Testament of Cresseide, 260-263, Shakspeare, Tempest, ii. 2. Mids. Night's Dream, i. 3; also Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, p. 679.

H H

LORA, THE GODDESS OF LOVE.

THE mountain-fortress of Lora is so called from a goddess of that name. Before Charles, the conqueror of Saxony, and his missionary, Winfrid*, had baptized the subjugated inhabitants of the Harz, Lora was held in great veneration by the Saxons of those parts. To her was consecrated a large awe-inspiring forest, the remains of which, even at the present day, almost involuntarily, and as it were by enchantment, transport our thoughts back to ages long passed away. The only memorial of it, at the present day,

is a wood of small extent, the abode of numberless flocks of birds, called the Ruhensburg, between the Reinhartsberg, Bleicherode, and the fortress of Lora, together with some detached woods, among which well-built villages, watered by the Wipper, now enliven the delightful landscape, to which the distant Brocken serves as a background.

From this forest the youths, in time of old, offered to the goddess Lora, in the autumn, the first-fruits of the chase; and in the spring, the young maidens, singing joyful songs, brought wreaths of flowers to the goddess. With the finest wreath the high priest of Lora solemnly adorned the head of that maiden who had most distinguished herself by the feminine virtues: by constancy in love, and by unshaken fidelity to her beloved.

In the middle of the mountain on which Lora was principally worshiped there gushed forth a spring, to which a pilgrimage was made by unhappy lovers, especially young maidens, whom death had bereft of their beloved, in the hope that, by drinking of those waters, they might obtain peace and forgetfulness. On the summit of this mountain a noble Saxon lady, whose lover had fallen in a battle with the Franks, built the Ruhensburgt, from which the wood

* The apostle of Germany, better known by his ecclesiastical name of Boniface. He was born at Crediton in the year 680, and was murdered by the pagan Frisians in 755. Boniface placed the crown on the head of Pepin, the first monarch of the Carlovingian race, and, besides! many monasteries in Germany, founded the sees of Erfurt, Buraburg, Eichstädt, and Würzburg. He died archbishop of Mentz.

+ From ruhe, peace of mind, quiet, and burg, castle.

derives its present name. She called the spot the Ruhensburg, because in the wood the goddess sent her a new lover worthy of her, whose love comforted the mourner, and gave back to her heart its long-lost peace.

But terrible was this sacred forest to the faithless lover. There Hermtrud expiated her crime with her life. She was betrothed to Eilgern, a noble Saxon youth. The defence of his country tore him from her. At parting, she swore to him, with hypocritical tears, eternal fidelity; but in a few days after, Lora saw the violator of faith and duty in the arms of Herrman. The culprits had concealed themselves in the Buchen, a wood not far from the Ruhensburg. Here Lora startled them by a deer that came rushing through the thicket; and Hermtrud fled, and entered, without reflection, Lora's sacred grove. The mountain trembled, and the earth darted forth flames, which consumed the false-hearted fair one. The priests hastened to the spot, collected Hermtrud's ashes, and buried them in a little valley at the foot of the mountain. Here may

still be heard at twilight the mournful wail of the false one, a warning to all faithless lovers not to enter the sacred grove.

Winfrid, the terror of the Saxon gods, together with his companions, destroyed the Ruhensburg; for Lora's might had then fled. The following act of revenge exhausted her last remaining powers. Not far from the Reinhartsberg she overtook Winfrid, exulting in his spiritual victories. His carriage and horses suddenly stuck fast in the mire; and he would have been instantly swallowed up, had not his prayers to the Holy Virgin saved him. In memory of this danger he erected three crosses, which are yet to be seen, on the spot where the abyss opened its jaws to receive him, and in his misery dedicated, in Lora's wood, a chapel to the Virgin. From this event the place is still called ÊLEND (Misery).

THE HORSESHOES ON THE CHURCH-DOOR.

COUNT ERNEST, of Klettenberg, rode once, on a Sunday morning, to a great drinking-match at Elrich. Many knights were invited thither to drink for a prize; the reward offered was a gold chain.

The old, well-proved knights continued drinking for many hours, until the victory should be decided; and one here, another there, fell under the influence of the monstrous bumpers, and were laid on the floor as poor weaklings, amid the loud scornful laugh of their companions. At length four only of the so-called noblemen remained on the battle-field; and of these, three leaned against the wall, exulting with stammering tongues and trembling hands that they could still hold the huge beaker. Only Ernest von Klettenberg could keep on his feet; who, seizing triumphantly the gold chain, which lay on the table, hung it : round his neck.

That he might show himself to the people as victor, he tottered out of the hall, and ordered his horse to be brought. Four esquires lifted him into the saddle, and he rode, amid the cries of the rushing multitude, through the town, on his way home to Klettenberg. As he passed through the suburb, he heard vespers being sung in the church which was dedicated to St. Nicholas. Count Ernest, in his drunken frenzy, rode through the open door, in the midst of the assembled congregation, straight up to the altar. The song of devotion passed first into dumb astonishment, and then into a wild scream.

But not long did Count Ernest enjoy his outrage. For as the spurred horse trod on the steps of the altar, behold! oh, wonderful! its four shoes fell off, and it sank down together with its rider. In perpetual remembrance of this event, the four horseshoes were nailed to the church-door, where they remained for ages, an object of wonder, on account of their size and of that awful catastrophe.

* The same Count probably whose monument is to be seen in the conventual church at Walkenried, where he appears kneeling, as if praying for forgiveness for similar juvenile sins to that here related.

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