"Shame, shame, Rudolph!" said the Landamman. "Can spleen and envy have weight with so brave a man as you, from whom my sons ought to learn temperance, forbearance, and candour, as well as manly courage and dexterity?"
The Bernese coloured high under this rebuke, to which he ventured not to attempt a reply.
"To your sports till sunset, my children," continued Arnold; "while I and my worthy friend occupy our time with a walk, for which the evening is now favourable."
"Methinks," said the English merchant, "I should like to visit the ruins of yonder castle, situated by the waterfall. There is something of melancholy dignity in such a scene which reconciles us to the misfortunes of our own time, by showing that our ancestors, who were perhaps more intelligent or more powerful, have nevertheless, in their days, encountered cares and distresses similar to those which we now groan under."
"Have with you, my worthy sir," replied his host; "there will be time also upon the road to talk of things that you should know."
The slow step of the two elderly men carried them by degrees from the limits of the lawn, where shout and laugh and halloo were again revived. Young Philipson, whose success as an archer had obliterated all recollection of former failure, made other attempts to mingle in the manly pastimes of the country, and gained a considerable portion of applause. The young men, who had but lately been so ready to join in ridiculing him, now began to consider him as a person to be looked up and appealed to; while Rudolph Donnerhugel saw with resentment that he was no longer without a rival in the opinion of his male cousins, perhaps of his kinswoman also. The proud young Swiss reflected with bitterness that he had fallen under the Landamman's displeasure, declined in reputation with his companions, of whom he had been hitherto the leader, and even hazarded a more mortifying disappointment, all, as his swelling heart expressed it, through the means of a stranger stripling, of neither blood nor fame, who could not step from one rock to another without the encouragement of a girl.
In this irritated mood, he drew near the young Englishman, and while he seemed to address him on the chances of the sports which were still proceeding, he conveyed, in a whisper, matter of a far different tendency. Striking Arthur's shoulder with the frank bluntness of a mountaineer, he said aloud: "Yonder bolt of Ernest whistled through the air like a falcon when she stoops down the wind!" and then proceeded in a deep low voice, "You merchants sell gloves—do you ever deal in single gauntlets, or only in pairs?"
"I sell no single glove," said Arthur, instantly apprehending him, and sufficiently disposed to resent the scornful looks of the Bernese champion during the time of their meal, and his having but lately imputed his successful shooting to chance or sorcery,—"I sell no single glove, sir, but never refuse to exchange one."
"You are apt, I see," said Rudolph. "Look at the players while I speak, or our purpose will be suspected.—You are quicker, I say, of apprehension than I expected. If we exchange our gloves, how shall each redeem his own?"
"With our good swords," said Arthur Philipson.