Thereupon the company sat down, with the Sexton at the head of the table. The latter did not for a moment forget his solemn dignity, nor his wife her basket, which she put down close beside her. The Pastor's maid, on the other hand, had unassumingly set hers aside. During the meal, which was piled up on the dishes in veritable mountains, not a word was spoken. The Sexton gravely devoured portions that might be called enormous, while his wife was not a great way behind him. Here again it was the maid who showed herself to be most modest. As for the Hunter, he confined his attention almost entirely to looking on; for the day's ceremonies were not to his liking.
After the meal was over the Sexton, smirking solemnly, said to the two maids who had waited on the table:
"Now, if it please God, we will receive our legitimate dues and the good-will accompanying them."
The maids, who had already cleared off the table, then went out. The Sexton sat down on a chair in the middle of the room, while the two women, his wife and the maid, took seats on either side of him, putting the newly-opened baskets down in front of them. After the expectation which the faces of the three expressed had lasted for several minutes, the two maids re-entered, accompanied by their master, the Justice. The first was holding aloft a roomy basket of wickerwork, in which some hens were anxiously clucking and flapping their wings. She put it down in front of the Sexton, who glanced into it and counted:
"One, two, three, four, five, six—it is all right."
Thereupon the second maid counted out from a large piece of cloth into a basket in front of the Pastor's maid, three score eggs and six round cheeses, not without the Sexton's carefully counting them all over after her. After this was done, the Sexton said:
"So then the Pastor is provided for, and now comes the Sexton."
Thereupon thirteen eggs and a single cheese were put into the basket in front of his wife, who tested the freshness of each egg by shaking and smelling it, and rejected two. After this proceeding the Sexton stood up and said to the Justice:
"How is it, Justice, about the second cheese which the Sexton still has the right to expect from the farm?"
"You yourself know, Sexton, that the right to the second cheese has never been recognized by the Oberhof," replied the Justice. "This alleged second cheese was due from the Baumann estate, which more than a hundred years ago was united under one hand with the Oberhof. Later on, the two were again divided, and the Oberhof is obligated for only one cheese."