the vile man. Tell him it would be like selling the shroud out of
mother's coffin, or the golden curls off Ermengilda's head! Oh,
father, dear father! do hear me, for pity's sake!"

Strehla was moved by the boy's anguish. He loved his children,
though he was often weary of them, and their pain was pain to him.
But besides emotion, and stronger than emotion, was the anger that
August roused in him; he hated and despised himself for the barter
of the heirloom of his race, and every word of the child stung him
with a stinging sense of shame.

And he spoke in his wrath rather than in his sorrow.

"You are a little fool," he said harshly, as they had never heard
him speak. "You rave like a play-actor. Get up and go to bed. The
stove is sold. There is no more to be said. Children like you have
nothing to do with such matters. The stove is sold, and goes to
Munich to-morrow. What is it to you? Be thankful I can get bread
for you. Get on your legs I say, and go to bed."

Strehla took up the jug of ale as he paused, and drained it slowly
as a man who had no cares.

August sprang to his feet and threw his hair back off his face;
the blood rushed into his cheeks, making them scarlet; his great
soft eyes flamed alight with furious passion.

"You DARE not!" he cried aloud, "you dare not sell it, I say! It
is not yours alone; it is ours--"