quarter-day out of their wages, and bestowed on the poore, or other godly vse.

THE NOVELIST.

No. CVII.

THE WOOD KING.

By Miss Emma Roberts.

Already the pile of heaped-up fagots reached above the low roof of his hut; but Carl Scheffler still continued lopping off branches, and binding fresh bundles together, almost unconscious that the sun had set, and that the labours of the day being over, the neighbouring peasants were hastening to the skittle-ground to pass away an hour in sport. The wood-cutter's hut was perched upon an eminence a little out of the public path; but he heard the merry songs of his comrades as they proceeded gaily to the place of rendezvous, at the Golden Stag in the village below. Many of his intimate acquaintance paused as they approached the corner of the road nearest to his hut, and the wild wood rang with their loud halloes; but the call, which in other times had been echoed by the woodman's glad voice, was now unanswered; he busied himself with his work; his brow darkened as the joyous sounds came over his ear; he threw aside his hatchet, resumed, it again, and again casting it from him, exclaimed, "Why, let them go, I will not carry this chafed and wounded spirit to their revels; my hand is not steady enough for a bowling-match; and since Linda will doubtless choose a richer partner, I have no heart for the dance."

It was easy to perceive that Carl Scheffler was smarting under a recent disappointment: he had borne up bravely against the misfortunes which, from a state of comparative affluence, had reduced him to depend upon his own arm for subsistence, fondly trusting that ere long his prospects would amend; and that, at the return of the Count of Holberg to his ancestorial dominions, he should obtain a forester's place, and be enabled to claim the hand of Linda Von Kleist, to whom, in happier times, he had been betrothed. But these dreams had vanished; the count's bailiff having seen Linda, the flower of the hamlet, became his rival, and consequently his enemy: he had bestowed the office promised to Carl upon another; and Linda's father ungratefully withdrawing the consent given when the lover's affairs were in a more flourishing condition, had forbidden him the house. Buoyed up with the hope that Linda would remain faithful, and by her unabated attachment console him under the pressure of his calamities, Carl did not at first give way to despair; but Linda was too obedient, or perchance too indifferent, to disobey her father's commands. He sought her at the accustomed spot—she came not, sent not: he hovered round her residence, and if chance favoured him with a glimpse of his beloved, it was only to add to his misery, for she withdrew hastily from his sight. A rumour of the intended marriage of his perjured mistress reached his ears, and, struck to the soul, he endeavoured, by manual labour, to exhaust his strength and banish the recollection of his misery. He toiled all day in feverish desperation; and now that there was no more to be done, sat down to ponder over his altered prospects. The bailiff possessed the ear of his master, and it was useless to hope that the count would repair the injustice committed by so trusted a servant. The situation which above all others he had coveted, which would have given him the free range of the forest, the jovial hunter's life which suited his daring spirit, delighting in the perils of the chase, and, above all, a home for Linda, was lost, and for ever; henceforward he must relinquish all expectation of regaining the station which the misfortunes that had brought his parents to the grave had deprived him of, and be content to earn a sordid meal by bending his back to burthens befitting the brute creation alone; to hew wood, and to bear it to the neighbouring towns; to delve the ground at the bidding of a master, and to perform the offices of a menial hireling. "At least not here," cried the wretched young man, "not in the face of all my former friends; there is a refuge left where I may hide my sorrows and my wrongs. Fair earth, and thou fair sky, I gaze upon you for the last time; buried from the face of day in the centre of the deepest mine, I'll spend the remnant of my life unpitied and unknown." Determined to execute this resolution on the instant, Carl hastily collected such parts of his slender property as were portable; and having completed his arrangements, prepared to cross the Brocken, and shaped his course towards the Rammelsburg. The last rich gleam of crimson had faded from the sky; but there was light enough in the summer night to guide him on his way. A few bright and beautiful stars gemmed the wide concave of heaven; the air was soft and balmy, scarcely agitating the leaves of the forest trees; the fragrance-weeping limes gave out their richest scent, and the gentle gush of fountains, and the tricklings of the mountain springs, came in music on the ear; and had the traveller been more at ease, the calm and tranquil scene must have diffused its soothing influence over his heart. Carl, disregarding every thing save his own melancholy destiny, strode along almost choked by bitter thought, and so little heedful of the road, that he soon became involved in thickets whose paths were unknown to him; he looked up to the heavens, and shaping his course by one of the stars, was somewhat surprised to find himself still involved in the impenetrable mazes of the wood. Compelled to give more attention than heretofore to his route, he once or twice thought that he distinguished a human figure moving through the darkness of the forest. At first, not disposed to fall in with a companion, he remained silent, lest the person, whoever he might be, should choose to enter into conversation with him; then not quite certain whether he was right in his conjecture—for upon casting a second glance upon the object which attracted him, he more than once discovered it to be some stunted trunk or fantastic tree—he became anxious to ascertain whether he was in reality, alone, or if some other midnight wanderer trod the waste, and he looked narrowly around; all was still, silent, and solitary; and fancying that he had been deceived by the flitting shadows of the night, he was again relapsing into his former reverie, when he became aware of the presence of a man dressed in the garb of a forester, and having his cap wreathed with a garland of green leaves, who stood close at his side. Carl's tongue moved to utter a salutation, but the words stuck in his throat, an indescribable sensation of horror thrilled through his frame; tales of the demons of the Hartz rushed upon his memory—but he recovered instantly from the sudden shock. The desperate state of his fortune gave him courage, and, looking up, he was surprised at the consternation which the stranger had occasioned: he was a person of ordinary appearance, who, accosting him frankly, exclaimed, "Ho, comrade, thou art, I see, bent on the same errand as myself; but wherefore dost thou seek the treasures of the Nibelungen without the protecting wreath?"—"The treasures of the Nibelungen?" returned Carl; "I have indeed heard of such a thing, and that it was hidden in the bosom of the Hartz by a princess of the olden time; but I never was mad enough to think of so wild a chase as a search after riches, which has baffled the wisest of our ancestors, must surely prove."—"Belike then," replied the forester, "thou art well to do in the world, and therefore needest not to replenish thy wallets with gold,—travelling perchance to take possession of some rich inheritance."—"No, by St. Roelas," cried the woodcutter, "thou hast guessed wide of the mark. I am going to hide my poverty in the mine of Rammelsburg."—"The mine of Rammelsburg!" echoed the stranger, and laughed scornfully, so that the deep woods rang with the sound; and Carl feeling his old