to which he belonged.

"True," the servitor began, "in such heat it is easier to walk in the
thin cowl than in armour. The holy Father is right there. But when it
is necessary to be nimble, the knight has his dancing dress also. Oh, my
lord, what a sight it was when you were waltzing with the lovely Jungfrau
Eva! Look at Heinz Schorlin, the brave hero of Marchfield, and the girl
with the angel face who is with him!' said those around me, as I was
gazing down from the balcony. And just think--I can't help speaking of
it again--that now respectable people dare to point their fingers at the
sisters and join in the base calumny uttered by a scoundrel!"

Then Heinz fulfilled Biberli's secret longing to be questioned about the
Es and the charges against them, and he forged the iron.

Not from thirst, he said, but to ascertain what fruit had grown from the
hellish seeds sown by Siebenburg, and probably the still worse ones of
the Eysvogel women, he went from tavern to tavern, and there he heard
things which made him clench his fists, and, at the Red Ox, roused him to
such violent protest that he went out of the tap-room faster than he
entered it.

Thereupon, without departing far from the truth, he related what was said
about the beautiful Es in Nuremberg.

It was everywhere positively asserted that a knight belonging to the
Emperor's train had been caught at the Ortlieb mansion, either in a
nocturnal interview or while climbing into the window. Both sisters were
said to be guilty. But the sharpest arrows were aimed at Els, the
betrothed bride of the son of a patrician family, whom many a girl would