BOOK VI
CHAPTER I
The green and bowery summer had passed away. It was midnight when two horsemen pulled up their steeds beneath a wide oak; which, with other lofty trees, skirted the side of a winding road in an extensive forest in the south of Germany.
“By heavens!” said one, who apparently was the master, “we must even lay our cloaks, I think, under this oak; for the road winds again, and assuredly cannot lead now to our village.”
“A starlit sky in autumn can scarcely be the fittest curtain for one so weak as you, sir; I should recommend travelling on, if we keep on our horses’ backs till dawn.”
“But if we are travelling in a directly contrary way to our voiturier, honest as we may suppose him to be, if he find in the morning no paymaster for his job, he may with justice make free with our baggage. And I shall be unusually mistaken if the road we are now pursuing does not lead back to the city.”
“City, town, or village, you must sleep under no forest tree, sir. Let us ride on. It will be hard if we do not find some huntsman’s or ranger’s cottage; and for aught we know a neat snug village, or some comfortable old manor-house, which has been in the family for two centuries; and where, with God’s blessing, they may chance to have wine as old as the bricks. I know not how you may feel, sir, but a ten hours’ ride when I was only prepared for half the time, and that, too, in an autumn night, makes me somewhat desirous of renewing my acquaintance with the kitchen-fire.”