All hope had now fled from the breasts of the Oberhages, and departure was inevitable. The farmer's brother offered him an asylum; the honest-hearted peasants, indignant at the crying injustice of the case, and commiserating a misfortune which all felt might some day be their own, volunteered their carts and their labour to transport such part of the farmer's property as he was allowed to carry away. This was but a very limited portion, consisting solely of personal effects. Farm implements, live and dead stock, the corn and vegetables in the granaries, the tall stacks of hay and straw, must all be left behind. They stood upon the inventory, and were the property of the state. But the severest cut of all, for the frugal and industrious housewife, was yet to come. Her eldest daughter, a blooming maiden of nineteen, came up to her, followed by the counsellor, the judge, and the Oberhages' lawyer. The girl looked pale and frightened.
"Mother," she said, "you sent me to the linen-room, to give out the linen to be put on the carts."
"Well, what then?" cried the woman in anxious astonishment.
"The gentlemen have taken the key from me, and will not let me have the linen."
"Who has done that?—who will not?" demanded the woman violently, flushing crimson with anger. It was plain that her household gods were attacked.
"His worship the judge."
"His worship the judge? My linen? What have you to do with my linen?"
"Dear Mrs Oberhage, I have already explained to you that you are allowed to take away from the farm only your own property—your own personal effects."
"And is not the linen my own property?"
"No."