more joyful than I had seen her for a long time, and smiled at me with her
sweet little mouth: but when she saw my snow-white hair, she gave a cry,
which made _Dom. Consul_ throw open the door of the judgment-chamber, and
say, "Ha, ha! thou knowest well what news I have brought thee; come in,
thou stubborn devil's brat!" Whereupon we stepped into the chamber to him,
and he lift up his voice and spake to me, after he had sat down with the
Sheriff, who was by.

He said that yestereven, after he had caused me to be carried like one
dead to Master Seep his ale-house, and that my stubborn child had been
brought to life again, he had once more adjured her, to the utmost of his
power, no longer to lie before the face of the living God, but to confess
the truth; whereupon she had borne herself very unruly, and had wrung her
hands and wept and sobbed, and at last answered that the young _nobilis_
never could have said such things, but that his father must have written
them, who hated her, as she had plainly seen when the Swedish king was at
Coserow. That he, _Dom. Consul_, had indeed doubted the truth of this at
the time, but as a just judge had gone that morning right early with the
_scriba_ to Mellenthin, to question the young lord himself.

That I might now see myself what horrible malice was in my daughter. For
that the old knight had led him to his son's bedside, who still lay sick
from vexation, and that he had confirmed all his father had written, and
had cursed the scandalous she-devil (as he called my daughter) for seeking
to rob him of his knightly honour. "What sayest thou now?" he continued;
"wilt thou still deny thy great wickedness? See here the _protocollum_
which the young lord hath signed _manu propria_!" But the wretched maid
had meanwhile fallen on the ground again, and the constable had no sooner
seen this than he ran into the kitchen, and came back with a burning
brimstone match, which he was about to hold under her nose.