Long time the two sat quietly together: it struck eight. Gellert started
up, and cried irritably: "There, now, you have allowed me to forget that
I must be on my way to the University."

"The vacation has begun: Mr. Professor has no lecture to-day."

"No lecture to-day? Ah! and I believe today is just the time when I
could have told my young friends something that would have benefited
them for their whole lives."

There was a shuffling of many feet outside the door: the door opened,
and several boys from St Thomas' School-choir advanced and sang to
Gellert some of his own hymns; and as they chanted the verse--

"And haply there--oh! grant it, Heaven!
Some blessed saint will greet me too;
'All hail! all hail! to you was given
To save my life and soul, to you!'
O God! my God! what joy to be
The winner of a soul to thee!"

Gellert wept aloud, folded his hands, and raised his eyes to heaven.

A happier Christmas than that of 1768 had Gellert never seen; and it was
his last. Scarcely a year after, on the 13th of December, 1769, Gellert
died a pious, tranquil death, such as he had ever coveted.

As the long train which followed his bier moved to the churchyard of St.
John's, Leipzig, a peasant with his wife and children in holiday clothes
entered among the last. It was Christopher with his family. The whole