12
'The mischief is in it!' grumbled Berthold. 'If matters are to go on in this way, we shall be a year and a day hence still travelling this cursed road? Hark ye, old boy, you are an odd fellow! what tempted you to think of wandering through our rough country, without meat or drink or even a coat, but with a fiddle as large as a ton, and an empty wallet as heavy as seven three stone cheeses! 'Tis a perfect tempting of Providence! Why the deuce do you drag after you that ass's burden of old rubbish, without so much as the convenience of a cloak in your bundle!
'It is all very true,' sighed Almerich. 'I am not yet accustomed to be the lame, feeble man you now see me. Thirty years I could skip like a leveret over hills and dales; but farewell to friend Almerich, I shall never leave this place! However it is all one---perish here, or die there, a dying bed is ever a hard one, even though it should be of down and silk?'
'Now really,' replied Berthold, 'you are too whimsical, fiddler! The cold blast never hurts a tough fellow who is accustomed to run about the mountains,---there, slip into my coat, and walk smartly on, for a shower is approaching, and that rascally wallet is weighing me down to the ground.'
'Patience, child, patience!' said Almerich--'This coat is quite warm from your
