into his sunny native valley, to the place with the old gabled houses,
to his father's house which stood amidst the fruit-trees, and the
thread to which his fingers still clung involuntarily led him into the
room where it had been spun from his mother's distaff. And there she
sat and span the thread, with her pale face and soft wrinkles and kind
eyes, and directly the boy stood near her she told him tales of the
Saviour. He listened to her and was a happy child. That was his
dream. And when he awoke in the prison cell, his mother's gentle voice
still sounded in his ears: "My child, you must cling to Jesus."


Konrad was taken every day for half an hour into the dirty and sunless
courtyard. But he dreaded that half-hour. It stirred a vain longing
for light. And the rough and insolent fellow-prisoners with whom he
was brought in contact! He preferred to be alone in his quiet cell.

During his imprisonment he had often asked for work, but was always
informed that nothing of the sort had been provided for by the
authorities. Besides--work was an honourable thing, and it must first
be proved that he was worthy of it. But now it was not a time for
work, rather a time for preparation. What could he do in order to get
through these days? Or what could he do in order to keep the days from
flying so quickly? Look how a flash of lightning seems sometimes to
pass over the floor. Then it is gone again. High up in the opposite
wall, on which the sun sometimes shone, was a casement window, and its
glass doors, swayed by the breeze, were reflected in the prison.
Konrad was terrified by these sparks from heaven; he would grope on the
ground as if for a gold piece that had rolled away.

Then came visitors, unexpected, alarming visitors! The judge's stiff