Seppi and Leneli, "I this was a dreadful position for Peter. He
had solemnly promised not to tell a living soul what he had seen
and heard, but if he didn't tell, his parents and friends would
be murdered before morning.

"That evening his father and a number of other men were gathered
together in the town hall of Lucerne to talk over community
affairs, when Peter suddenly burst into the room, his eyes as big
as saucers.

"The men gathered about him, thinking he must have some
tremendous piece of news, but Peter spoke never a word to them.
Instead, he marched up to the great porcelain stove that stood in
the room.

"'O Stove,' said Peter, 'I have just heard terrible things which
I have promised not to tell to a living soul, but you, O Stove,
have no soul, so to you I will say that the Austrians are now in
the tunnel underneath the walls and that at midnight they will
break in and sack the town.'

"At first the men thought Peter had gone crazy, but when he had
finished telling the stove all he had seen and heard, they flew
to alarm the town and get their weapons.

"At midnight, when the Austrians came up through the hole in the
stable floor, they were received by a little army of men of
Lucerne, and in the battle that followed they were completely
whipped and driven from the town forever. And it was Peter who
saved the city.