It was about the hour of vespers; and an unusually dense crowd of the town's people of Hammelburg, of all ages, ranks, and sexes, swarmed in the small open space before the fine old Gothic church of the town, and stood in many a checkered group--here, of fat thriving _bourgeois_ and their portly wives, dragging in their hands chubby and rebellious little urchins, who looked all but spherical in their monstrous puffed hose or short wadded multifold petticoats, the miniature reproductions of the paternal and maternal monstrosities of attire--there, of more noisy and clamorous artizans, in humbler and less preposterous dress--on the one side, of chattering serving-damsels, almost crushed under their high pyramidical black caps, worn in imitation of an ancient fashion of their betters--on the other, of grave counsellors and _schreibers_ in their black costumes, interlarding their pompous phrases with most canine Latin--here again, of the plumed and checkered soldiers of the civic guard--there, of ragged-robed beggars, whose whine had become a second nature--all in a constant ferment of movement and noise, until the square might be fancied to look like the living and crawling mass of an old worm-eaten cheese. The congregation of the multitude had been induced by a report prevalent throughout the town, that the Prince Bishop, whose arrival from Fulda at his castle of Saaleck, close at hand, had been announced, was about to make his entrance in grand state, and that a holy and solemn service to celebrate this event was to be performed at the high church. Already, however, other rumours were afloat among the crowd; and it began to be confidently stated, that a sudden change of plans had forced the Prince Bishop to renounce his intention. Listening with anxiety, on the outskirts of a group, to the discussion upon the probabilities or improbabilities of the service taking place in the absence of the Prince, stood Magdalena. She was attired in her usual dark semi-monastic dress; but to this was now added the scrip, wallet, and tall crossheaded staff of the wandering pilgrim. As the prevailing opinion appeared to be that the Ober-Amtmann would attend, at all events, at the celebration of the church rites intended to be performed, Magdalena turned away with a calmer air, murmuring to herself the words-- "I shall see her once more--once, and for the last time: and God surely will forgive the sin, if such it be. One look of last farewell! and then again a long expiation of penitence and prayer." So saying, she traversed the small square to the broad stairs of the church, where she sat herself down upon the highest step, among a group of beggar women and ragged children, and, sinking her head to the ground, seemed to dispose herself to wait with patience.