“Ay, that's true,” sighed Dalton. “I suppose nobody is satisfied in this world.”
“But they can be if they will but look upward,” cried Hans, enthusiastically; “if they will learn to think humbly of themselves, and on how slight a claim they possess all the blessings of their lot; if they will but bethink them that the sun and the flowers, the ever-rolling sea, and the leafy forest are all their inheritance,—that for them, as for all, the organ peals through the dim-vaulted aisle with promises of eternal happiness,—and lastly, that, with all the wild contentions of men's passions, there is ever gushing up in the human heart a well of kind and affectionate thoughts; like those springs we read of, of pure water amid the salt ocean, and which, taken at the source, are sweet and good to drink from. Men are not so bad by nature; it is the prizes for which they struggle, the goals they strive for, corrupt them! Make of this fair earth a gaming-table, and you will have all the base passions of the gamester around it.”
“Bad luck to it for gambling,” said Dalton, whose intelligence was just able to grasp at the illustration; “I wish I 'd never seen a card; and that reminds me, Hans, that maybe you 'd give me a bit of advice. There was a run against me last night in that thieving place. The 'red' came up fourteen times, and I, backing against it every time, sometimes ten, sometimes twenty,——ay, faix! as high as fifty 'Naps.' you may think what a squeeze I got! And when I went to old Kraus this morning, this is what he sticks in my hand instead of a roll of banknotes.” With these words Dalton presented to Hans the printed summons of the “Tribunal.”
“A Gerichts-Ruf!” said Hans, with a voice of deep reverence; for he entertained a most German terror for the law and its authority. “This is a serious affair.”
“I suppose it is,” sighed Dalton; “but I hope we 're in a Christian country, where the law is open?”
Hans nodded, and Peter went on:——
“What I mean is, that nothing can be done in a hurry; that when we have a man on our side, he can oppose and obstruct, and give delays, picking a hole here and finding a flaw there; asking for vouchers for this and proofs for that, and then waiting for witnesses that never come, and looking for papers that never existed; making Chancery of it, Hans, my boy,—making Chancery of it.”
“Not here,—not with us!” said Hans, gravely. “You must answer to this charge to-day, and before four o'clock too, or to-morrow there will be writ of 'contumacy' against you. You have n't got the money?”
“Of course I haven't, nor a ten-pound note towards it.”
“Then you must provide security.”