"Only Tetzel's lying theses," said Christopher. She seemed relieved.
"In my early days," she said, "I learned to listen too eagerly to sounds like that. But in those times they burned other things than books or papers in the market-places."
"Tetzel threatens to do so again," said Christopher.
"No doubt they will, if they can," she replied, and relapsed into silence.
XV.
Fritz's Story.
Augustinian Convent, Mainz, November, 1517.
Seven years have passed since I have written anything in this old chronicle of mine, and as in the quiet of this convent once more I open it, the ink on the first pages is already brown with time; yet a strange familiar fragrance breathes from them, as of early spring flowers. My childhood comes back to me, with all its devout simplicity; my youth, with all its rich prospects and its buoyant, ardent, hopes. My childhood seems like one of those green quiet valleys in my native forests, like the valley of my native Eisenach itself, when that one reach of the forest, and that one quiet town with its spires and church bells, and that one lowly home with its love, its cares, and its twilight talks in the lumber room, were all the world I could see.
Youth rises before me like that first journey through the forest to the University of Erfurt, when the world opened to me like the plains from the breezy heights, a battle-field for glorious achievement, an unbounded ocean for adventure and discovery, a vast field for noble work.