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'Yes, woe is me! This is his house, and here he lies dead in it."

Then the confederate said, "Heaven have mercy upon his soul! He was my confederate. We have worked and transacted business together, and since I have found him in such a state, it is only right that I should stop and accompany him to his grave, and throw a handful of earth over his coffin."

The woman told him that he would have to wait a long time for the funeral, and that he had better go away. But he answered,

"Heaven forbid! federate like this?

until he is buried."

How could I leave my former con-
I will wait, be it even three days,

When the woman whispered this to her husband in the hut, he told her to go to the clergyman, tell him that he was dead, and have him removed to the church in the cemetery; then, perhaps, his confederate would go away. The woman went to the clergyman and told him of her husband's death. The clergyman came up with some of his men, who put the pretended dead on a bier, carried him off and left him in the middle of the church, so that he might spend the night there according to custom, and then on the following day receive the benediction and be buried. When the clergyman with the other people were about to leave the church, the confederate said that he

could not leave his brother unguarded, with whom he had transacted business, and had eaten bread and salt, but that he would watch over him the whole night. Thus he remained in the church.

Now it happened that night that some robbers were passing near who had plundered a castle not far off, and had carried away a large sum of money, with quantities of clothes and arms. When the robbers approached the church and saw that there was a light in it, they said among themselves,

"Let us go into this church and there divide our booty." The confederate, when he perceived that armed men had entered into the church, hid himself in a corner. The robbers sat down on the ground, divided the money with a helmet and the clothes and arms, as well as they could. They were perfectly satisfied with the division of all their plunder, with the exception of one sword, which all of them believed to be of a very great value. One of the robbers took it in his hand, rose up and said,

"Wait a moment; I will try the sword on this dead person, whether it is really so good as you suppose. If I can cut off his head at one blow, then it is really good."

Having said this, the robber approached the bier, but in the same moment the pretended dead jumped up and cried with a terrible voice,

"Dead, where are you?"

And his confederate in the corner answered,

"Here we are; all ready to fight."

At the sound of these words, the robber who held the sword threw it down and fled; his companions left all their booty, which they had collected in heaps on the ground, jumped up and also fled away without daring to look behind. Having run away a long way off, the robbers stopped, and their captain cried out,

66

Stop! comrades, stop! We have walked over mountains and valleys, by day and by night; we have fought with men and attacked castles and palaces, and we have never been afraid so much of anybody as we have been this night of the dead. Is there not a brave man among us who would go and see what is going on in that church?"

Then one of the robbers said, "I won't do it." Another said, "I do not dare to do it." "And I," said a third, "would rather fight with ten living than one dead man."

At last there was found one robber who said that he would go back. Having returned, he approached carefully to a window in the church in order to see what was taking place inside it. In the church, meantime, the confederates divided all the robbers' money, clothes, and arms among themselves, but, in the end, could not agree about the twopence, and almost came to blows. All that

the robber could hear behind the window was,

"Where is my twopence? Give me my twopence." Suddenly the man who owed the twopence observed the robber standing close by; in an instant he stretched out his arm through the window, pulled off the robber's cap, and, giving it to his confederate, said,

"Confound your twopence ! Take this instead of your twopence!"

The robber, terrified, fled away without daring to look behind, and, having reached his companions, he cried out half dead with fear,

"Oh, comrades! Thank heaven that we have escaped alive from that dreadful place. We have divided the money among ourselves with the helmet, but there is risen such an enormous number of dead people that, when they had divided the money among themselves, there was scarcely left twopence for each of them. In fact, that was even wanting for one of them, so they pulled off my cap and gave it to him instead of the twopence!"

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