misguided flock to M. Vigelius, the pastor of Benz, for such time as the
Lord still should prove me. In about an hour I saw through the window how
that an empty coach drove to the castle, and the Sheriff and _Dom. Consul_
straightway stepped thereinto with my child; _item_, the constable climbed
up behind. Hereupon I left everything on the table and ran to the coach,
asking humbly whither they were about to take my poor child; and when I
heard they were going to the Streckelberg to look after the amber, I
begged them to take me also, and to suffer me to sit by my child, for who
could tell how much longer I might yet sit by her! This was granted to me,
and on the way the Sheriff ordered me to take up my abode in the castle
and to dine at his table as often as I pleased, and that he would,
moreover, send my child her meat from his own table. For that he had a
Christian heart, and well knew that we were to forgive our enemies. But I
refused his kindness with humble thanks, as my child did also, seeing we
were not yet so poor that we could not maintain ourselves. As we passed by
the watermill the ungodly varlet there again thrust his head out of a hole
and pulled wry faces at my child; but, dear reader, he got something to
remember it by; for the Sheriff beckoned to the constable to fetch the
fellow out, and after he had reproached him with the tricks he had twice
played my child, the constable had to take the coachman his new whip and
to give him fifty lashes, which, God knows, were not laid on with a
feather. He bellowed like a bull, which, however, no one heard for the
noise of the mill-wheels, and when at last he did as though he could not
stir, we left him lying on the ground and went on our way.

As we drove through Uekeritze a number of people flocked together, but
were quiet enough, save one fellow who, _salva venia_, mocked at us with
unseemly gestures in the midst of the road when he saw us coming. The
constable had to jump down again, but could not catch him, and the others
would not give him up, but pretended that they had only looked at our