'Respected Herr Burgomaster,' he began humbly, 'permit the most unworthy of all your servants to be first in wishing you a happy new year, and congratulating you on the honour you have now attained. The new year promises to be a very hard one, and your new office will be harder still. I thank God that in these difficult times we are so happy as to have your worship for our Burgomaster.'

'I am obliged to you, Jüchziger,' replied Schönleben feelingly. 'I am obliged to you for all your kind wishes. Yes, these are indeed hard times in which I undertake the management of public business. The care of more than sixty thousand souls is laid on me at a time when even a Solomon would have had need of all his wisdom. This thought has been much in my mind, and last night I followed the wise king's example,—I commended myself earnestly to God, praying Him to teach me the right, and then to give me strength and courage to do it.'

'To maintain the right with strength and courage against all comers, against friends as well as foes,' said Jüchziger. 'For, alas! how many are there who would be only too glad to interfere with your worship's rights as Burgomaster, and put all your wise intentions aside to carry out their own selfish schemes,—men who would be only too glad, in a word, to leave you the mere name of acting-Burgomaster, and nothing more. I am quite sure it is your worship's kindly heart that has made you give ear to them until misfortune is hanging over the town, and the citizens and the rest are all bemoaning themselves, while your worship's false friends raise their heads like snakes, as they are, to sting you the moment your worship's back is turned.'

Schönleben stood silent, gazing thoughtfully on the ground.

'Did either your worship or any of our other worthy magistrates give orders for every armed journeyman to receive a gulden a week and two pounds of bread a day?' continued Jüchziger in an injured tone; 'or that on this very New Year's Day, eight hundred Freiberg citizens should tear up the pavement in the streets of their own city to protect the houses from the Swedish cannon? Do you know, respected Herr Burgomaster, that that young Swedish turncoat who was so impudent to you in the St. Peter's Tower, and demanded to be made a citizen, has been admitted by the commandant into the City Guard, contrary to all custom and right? Who will guarantee that the pretended Saxon is not really a spy, plotting to betray the city into the hands of the Swedes the first chance he gets?'

'Is this really so?' asked Schönleben with displeasure.

'If you doubt my word, your worship can easily see for yourself,' replied Jüchziger. 'The fellow struts about the streets every day in his Defensioner's uniform, until he nearly runs himself off his legs.'

'Tell Badehorn, the captain of the City Guard, to meet me here in an hour's time,' said Schönleben angrily; 'and bid him be ready to explain why he has admitted a stranger among his men in this irregular way.'

'The soldier,' continued Jüchziger, 'risks nothing in war but just his life. The citizen risks a great deal more, for he has a wife and children, hearth and home. When a town is taken, the soldiers are either made prisoners of war or allowed to march out unhurt; it is into the citizen's house that the enemy comes, to ill-use his wife, children, and servants. These Swedes now are pressing the siege of our town so hard that we cannot possibly hold out for long. They say that even if Torstenson offers us fair terms, the commandant means to refuse them without even asking your worship anything about it, and so to give the town up to be stormed and pillaged. Now I, in my humble way, should have thought your worship's voice ought to count for something in this matter. Your worship knows what is for the good of the town a great deal better than a soldier of fortune that has only been here a few weeks.'

The Burgomaster made no reply. His thoughtful air, however, as he stood absently drumming on the window-pane, showed that the mischief-maker had not spoken in vain. By way of striking while the iron was hot, Jüchziger continued: 'As I was on my way to your worship's house this morning, I saw the Herr Burgomaster Richzenhayn going to call on the commandant, no doubt meaning to offer him a new year's greeting. Are you going to do the same, most noble sir, or don't you think a Burgomaster of the free city of Freiberg—which, with refugees, now counts over sixty thousand souls—is at least as good a man as the commander of two hundred and ninety soldiers?'