"Justice!" said the woman bitterly, "we will say nothing about that, judge. But the sovereign has to decide whether he will have our property or not. He cannot take the farm, he cannot wish to accept stolen goods. For his decision you, his servants, are bound to wait: the farm won't run away. "Woman," said counsellor Von Eilenthal pompously, "cherish not vain delusions. I can tell you the answer you will receive from the royal cabinet; I know it: the sovereign referred your application to his excellency the prime-minister, and the minister desired the chamber to report upon it--I myself made out the report." "Then is our fate indeed decided!" said the farmer. "Your own sense of what is right tells it you; justice must have its free course." "These are hard times for us poor people," said the woman. "Our persecutors are set as judges over us, and interpose between the children of the soil and their sovereign, so that our complaints cannot be heard. Their voices alone are heard; ours, never." "My good woman, the officials do but their duty." "Yes, yes, _Herr Regierungsrath_, that is well known--everyone for himself. You now have doubtless wellnigh gained your end; you have reduced enough poor people to yet greater poverty, and may expect a place in the ministry or a president's chair--that has always been your aim." The counsellor turned to the judge: "Let us proceed with our business," he said. All hope had now fled from the breasts of the Oberhages, and departure was inevitable. The farmer's brother offered him an asylum; the honest-hearted peasants, indignant at the crying injustice of the case, and commiserating a misfortune which all felt might some day be their own, volunteered their carts and their labour to transport such part of the farmer's property as he was allowed to carry away. This was but a very limited portion, consisting solely of personal effects. Farm implements, live and dead stock, the corn and vegetables in the granaries, the tall stacks of hay and straw, must all be left behind. They stood upon the inventory, and were the property of the state. But the severest cut of all, for the frugal and industrious housewife, was yet to come. Her eldest daughter, a blooming maiden of nineteen, came up to her, followed by the counsellor, the judge, and the Oberhages' lawyer. The girl looked pale and frightened. "Mother," she said, "you sent me to the linen-room, to give out the linen to be put on the carts." "Well, what then?" cried the woman in anxious astonishment. "The gentlemen have taken the key from me, and will not let me have the linen." "Who has done that?--who will not?" demanded the woman violently, flushing crimson with anger. It was plain that her household gods were attacked. "His worship the judge." "His worship the judge? My linen? What have you to do with my linen?"