The brothers laughed no longer; but gnashed their teeth with rage, for they knew they could not wrest their inheritance from Würtemberg; they had lost for ever the beautiful castle and all the estates belonging to it, all they were to inherit was a paltry florin.
Wolf slipped it into his pocket and he and Schalk stalked from the castle without so much as a word to the Commissioner of Würtemberg. They rode home, each to his own castle, but on the following morning Wolf rode over to Schalksberg and suggested they should go to the little town of Balingen which had gone to Würtemberg with the rest of the estates, and, just to show the folks they did not care, spend their inheritance on a quart of wine in which to drink each other’s healths. So they rode together to the inn at Balingen, called for a quart of red wine, and drank to each other.
When it was finished they called for the landlord, and Wolf flung the florin upon the table, but the landlord shook his head and told them that early that morning a messenger had come from Würtemberg and had paraded the town, with beat of drum, and proclaimed that the State had ordered all florin pieces to be called in and the use of them discontinued—“and therefore,” said the landlord, “I must ask you to pay me in a different coin.”
The brothers looked at each other and turned pale. Neither of them had any other money with him and so they were obliged to owe the landlord for the quart of wine.
They went on their way silently, for they did not feel in the mood for conversation, but when they came to the cross roads, where the way to the right led to Hohenzollern and that to the left to Schalksberg, Schalk said: “Well, our inheritance, it seems, was not worth a florin, moreover, the wine we thought to purchase with it was bad!”
“Yes,” replied Wolf thoughtfully, “and the old woman’s prediction has come true, for did she not say ‘We shall see some day if your inheritance be worth so much as a florin’? We have not been able to pay for a quart of wine with ours.”
Then they parted company and rode back to their castles, angry with themselves and the whole world.
THE COLD HEART.
IF ever you should travel through the country of Suabia you should take a peep at the Black Forest, not only that you may admire the magnificent pine-trees, but that you may study the people living there, for they are quite unlike any of their neighbours. The inhabitants of the Black Forest near the town of Baden are tall and broad and it would almost seem as though the invigorating scent of the pine-trees had strengthened their bodies and their characters too, for they are fearless, frank and honest. Their principal industries are glass-making and clock-making. The costume they wear, too, is different from the ordinary run of peasants, and gives them a strange and somewhat dignified appearance.