Page:Libussa, Duchess of Bohemia; also, The Man Without a Name.djvu/106

On the demise of the first owner the property descended to his lawful heir; and an heir was never wanting till the time of the thirty years war, when the last of the race of Lauenstein flourished, upon bringing whom into existence Nature seemed to have exhausted all her powers. Mother Nature, indeed, had been so lavish of the stuff for his body, that at the time when he was of full size his weight equalled that of Finatzi in Presburg, who weighed in his fifty-sixth year four hundred and eighty-eight pounds; nor was the size of the good squire of Lauenstein an inch less than that of Paul Bulterbrod of Holstein, who exhibited himself in Paris to the astonished gaze of its pleasure-loving inhabitants. Squire Sigmund was, however, a very handsome man before the bumpkin epoch of his body. He lived upon his estate in ease and respectability, without diminishing the income which his forefathers had amassed, but making a wise use of the goods of this world. As soon as his predecessor made room for him, and left him in possession of Lauenstein, he took, according to the custom of all his ancestors, a consort, and was seriously intent upon the propagation of the noble race which he represented. His wishes were accomplished, and his spouse presented him with a firstling of their