"The devil, or his deputy, may take us now if he be ready," I said to him, which but the more enraged him, so that he rushed from us puffing and wheezing as he floundered across the meadow, the very swaying of his broad back expressing his indignation at our disregard for the majesty of the law. "Brother Jabez," said Brother Enoch, as the majesty of the law disappeared down the road beyond the meadow, "dost thou know if we pay not the levy we shall be arrested and taken to jail?" "If the constable be a man of his word, I doubt not thou art a true prophet," I replied, "but thou knowest Ecclesiastes sayeth there is 'a time of war and a time of peace.' It seemeth my duty to oppose this unjust tax, and now is the time to set our faces firmly against the levy. If we five must go alone, so be it." Just then some one laid hold of mine arm, and turning about I saw Brother Martin--Martin Brämer being his secular name--our tailor. I asked him: "What hast to say, Brother Martin, shall we pay the taxes?" "Will they hang us if we pay not the king's officer?" he asked, still with the image of the king in his eye, looking first at me and then at Brother Enoch and then at the four Eckerlings. "That I do not know," I said, after a pause. "Brother Enoch," said I, turning to him, "thou art learned in the laws of the province. What will be done with us?" "Most likely ye will be imprisoned until ye promise to pay the taxes," said our learned brother, who afterward became one of the justices of our province. "And our good Brother Jabez is so stubborn in this, if we pay not the levies, then must we abide in jail for all our days," sighed Brother Martin, "for I know he will never make such promise." "Ye tailors are ever a timid folk," I broke in with some impatience. "'Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof.'" And yet with all the differences about the taxes, when the constable returned with five or six neighbors who liked not our Sabbatarian views and who answered willingly to the summons to arrest the "rebels" and "heretics," as it pleased them to call us, I rejoiced exceedingly to see that not only the whole Brotherhood but even the Sisters were united in their determination to oppose the tax. And so when the constable and his eager minions came rushing across the meadow as though they were about to storm some walled city, they found us quietly gathered at the foot of Mount Sinai, our hands meekly folded across our breasts, no one saying a word, except that Brother Beissel, as guardian of our flock, stood somewhat in advance of the Brothers and Sisters, with me close to him, to meet the first onset of the doughty constable and his deputies.