Page:Popular Tales of the Germans (Volume 2).djvu/143

 find in his heart to knock at his own door. At length, however, he tole out, rapped very gently, and in a faint-hearted voice whipered, ‘Pray rie, dear wife, and open the door to thy huband.’ Jane no ooner heard the ound of his voice, than up he tarted, like a nimble roe, unfatened the door, and joyfully claped her huband in her arms; but he returned her heart-felt carees with great coldnes, and having et down his baket, threw himelf, in a fit of ullennes, along the bench. His orrowful figure and countenance pierced his overjoyed wife to the heart. ‘What grieves thee, my dear Stephen? what is the matter with thee? art thou not well?’ He made no reply to her affectionate enquiry, but by ighs and groans. She oon, however, drew from him the caue of his grief, for adverity having oftened his heart, he could not any longer conceal the fatal accident from his tender-hearted conort. Hearing that Number-Nip had practied this unlucky prank,