Page:Select Popular Tales from the German of Musaeus.djvu/89

Rh as his desires were by no means immoderate, and as he had helped himself, on this occasion, pretty liberally.

Peter now took his departure, considering how he should best secure the prize he had obtained, and live comfortably upon it at home, without exciting idle curiosity or malignant suspicion. It was also very desirable that his shrew of a wife should know nothing of the treasure of the Harz king, else he feared that she would never desist from harassing him until he had surrendered up to her the fruit of his toils. She should, therefore, partake of the stream, but remain quite ignorant of its source. The first point was easily accomplished, the other caused him to belabour his brains greatly without determining anything. Having securely packed them up, he transported his riches to the nearest village: here he purchased a wheelbarrow, and ordered a cooper to make him a tub with a double bottom; in the centre of this he deposited his treasure, filling up the false bottom at either end with nails. With this load he returned home very leisurely; and, as he was in no great hurry to arrive there, he tarried at every hospitable tavern, desiring the obsequious master to set before him of the best.

As he approached towards Ellrich, he was joined by a young man of smart appearance, but whose countenance was marked with grief. Our merry pilgrim struck by the stranger’s appearance inquired of him, “Young sir, whither art thou bound?” To which the other replied with a sigh, “I am journeying through the wide world, my good father, or perhaps, out of the world—anywhere, in short, where my feet carry me.”

“And wherefore should it be out of the world?” kindly asked the compassionate Peter. “What has the world done to offend thee so grievously?”

“To me the world has done nothing, neither have I done aught amiss to the world, and yet, methinks, we do not agree well together.”

Our good-natured traveller of the wheelbarrow, who, when things went well with himself, always delighted in seeing others in equally good spirits, exerted himself to cheer the desponding youth; but finding, at length, that his powers of eloquence were of no avail, he suspected that his gloomy mood might be occasioned chiefly by a vacancy in the region of the stomach, and that it was that organ, not either the heart or head of the patient, that was affected. He accordingly invited him to enter an inn, promising not to call upon him for his share of the reckoning; a proposal which his melancholy companion did not refuse. They here found a mirthful set of revellers, in whose society Master Peter soon found himself quite in his element; and, by degrees, waxed so full of joyous glee, and so liberal withal, that he insisted that no one but himself should have the honour of discharging the landlord’s bill. This proposition tended by no means to