was heard ringing from the frozen road, as of a regular body of cavalry
advancing rapidly upon their encampment. There was no time to be lost;
the officer instantly withdrew his yagers from the wood, posted a
strong guard at the wood side, sounded the alarm throughout the camp,
agreeably to the system of signals previously concerted, mounted about
thirty men, whose horses and themselves were kept in perfect equipment
during each of the night-watches, and then advancing to the head of the
barriers, prepared to receive the party of strangers in whatever
character they should happen to present themselves.

All this had been done with so much promptitude and decision, that, on
reaching the barriers, the officer found the strangers not yet come up.
In fact, they had halted at a strong outpost about a quarter of a mile
in advance of Waldenhausen; and though one or two patrollers came
dropping in from by-roads on the forest-heath, who reported them as
enemies, from the indistinct view they had caught of their equipments,
it had already become doubtful from their movements whether they would
really prove so.

Two of their party were now descried upon the road, and nearly close up
with the gates of Waldenhausen; they were accompanied by several of the
guard from the outpost; and, immediately on being hailed, they
exclaimed, "Friends, and from Klosterheim!"

He who spoke was a young cavalier, magnificent alike in his person,
dress, and style of his appointments. He was superbly mounted, wore the
decorations of a major-general in the imperial service, and scarcely
needed the explanations which he gave to exonerate himself from the
suspicion of being a leader of robbers under Holkerstein. Fortunately
enough, also, at a period when officers of the most distinguished merit