The shouts were dying out now; the fumes of the wine being danced off. So Ellak gave the order to burn the dead. In a moment's time, the whole troop were seated on horseback, and riding in closed ranks to the funeral-pile. The horses of the two deceased men, were then stabbed by the eldest amongst the Huns, and laid beside their late masters bodies. Calling out some monstrous conjurations, he lifted the firebrand and lighted the pile. Boëthius' "comfort of Philosophy," pinelogs, manuscripts and corpses vied with each other, which could burn the brightest, and a mighty pillar of flames and smoke, rose up to the sky. With wrestling, warlike exercises and races, the memory of the dead was celebrated. The sun had sunk far down in the west, and so the whole body of Huns entered the monastery, there to pass the night.-- It was on the Thursday before Easter, when all this happened on the island of Reichenau. The tidings of this invasion soon reached the fishermen's huts around Radolfszell. When Moengal, the parish-priest, held the early morning-service, he still counted six of his flock, but in the afternoon, there were only three; including himself. Gloomily he sat in the little room in which he had once hospitably entertained Ekkehard, when the pillar of smoke from the Hunnic funeral-pile rose into the air. It was dense and black enough for him to suppose the whole monastery to be in flames, and the scent of burning came over the lake. "Hihahoi!!" cried Moengal, "_jam proximus ardet Ucalegon_, already it is burning at neighbour Ucalogon's! Then it is time for me also to get ready. Out with ye now, my old Cambutta!" Cambutta, however, was no serving maid, but a huge bludgeon, a real Irish shilelah, and Moengal's favourite weapon. The chalice and ciborium, he packed up and put into his leathern game-bag. This was all he possessed of gold or silver. Then he called his hounds, his hawk and two falcons together, and giving them all the meat and fish his pantry boasted, he said: "Children, eat as much as ever you can, so that nothing is left for those cursed plagues, when they come!" The vat in the cellar, he knocked to pieces, so that the sparkling wine streamed forth. "Not a drop of wine shall the devils drink, in Moengal's house." Only the jug which contained the vinegar, was left in its place. On the fresh, delicious butter in the wooden tun, he emptied a basket full of ashes. His fishing-tackle and other sporting-utensils he buried in the ground; then he smashed the windows, and strewed the fragments about in the room. Some he even put into the chinks of the floor, with the points turned upwards,--all in honour of the Huns! Hawk and falcons then received their liberty. "Farewell!" cried he, "and keep near, for soon you will get dead heathens to pick!"