The knight was well contented with this reception; and alighting from
his horse, which his host assisted him to relieve from saddle and
bridle, he let him hasten away to the fresh pasture, and thus spoke:
"Even had I found you less hospitable and kindly disposed, my worthy
old friend, you would still, I suspect, hardly have got rid of me
to-day; for here, I perceive, a broad lake lies before us, and as to
riding back into that wood of wonders, with the shades of evening
deepening around me, may Heaven in its grace preserve me from the
thought."

"Pray, not a word of the wood, or of returning into it!" said the
fisherman, and took his guest into the cottage.

There beside the hearth, from which a frugal fire was diffusing its
light through the clean twilight room, sat the fisherman's aged wife
in a great chair. At the entrance of their noble guest, she rose and
gave him a courteous welcome, but sat down again in her seat of
honour, not making the slightest offer of it to the stranger. Upon
this the fisherman said with a smile:

"You must not be offended with her, young gentleman, because she has
not given up to you the best chair in the house; it is a custom among
poor people to look upon this as the privilege of the aged."

"Why, husband!" cried the old lady, with a quiet smile, "where can
your wits be wandering? Our guest, to say the least of him, must
belong to a Christian country; and how is it possible, then, that so
well-bred a young man as he appears to be could dream of driving old
people from their chairs? Take a seat, my young master," continued