Page:Legends of Rubezahl, and Other Tales (1845).djvu/151

 another finger was tapping at the gates of the prison of Hirschberg. This was Brother Graurock, who, moved by zealous zeal, was up by daybreak, with intent to complete the conversion of his penitent, and to deliver him, already half a saint, into the hands of the executioner. Rubezahl having once undertaken the part of the delinquent, thought himself bound to go through with it, for the honour of justice. He therefore affected the most calm resignation to his fate, to the great joy of the pious ecclesiastic, who failed not to regard the happy result as the good seed of his own exertions. To fortify this most promising frame of mind, he addressed to his penitent one last discourse full of consolatory matter, to which Mr Rubezahl listened with exemplary attention. When he had finished, he ordered the prisoner’s chains to be taken off, that he might hear his confession, and give him absolution. But first a thought struck him: he would make the culprit once more go over the confession of faith, which it had cost him so much labour to impress upon his memory, in order that when at the gallows he might repeat it fluently, and without any mistake, for the benefit of the spectators. What was the good monk’s horror on finding that the wretched blockhead, overwhelmed with his fears, had in the course of the night clean forgotten the whole lesson? The indefatigable confessor, perfectly certain that nothing short of the