"It is not for me to reign over a people and to settle the affairs of this world," replied he evasively. "That will be seen," said Duchess Hadwig. "I do not think that the power of commanding has ever embarrassed anyone, least of all a son of the Church." So Ekkehard submitted; the more readily, as the commission was a proof of confidence on her part. Early on the next morning he rode over to the Hohenkrähen on horseback, taking Audifax with him, to show him the way. "A happy journey, Sir Chancellor!" called out a laughing voice behind him. It was the voice of Praxedis. They soon reached the old hag's dwelling, which was a stone hut, built on a projecting part of the high rock, about half way up. Mighty oaks and beech-trees spread their boughs over it, hiding the summit of the Hohenkrähen. Three high stone steps led into the inside, which was a dark, but airy chamber. On the floor, there lay heaps of dried herbs, giving out a strong fragrance. Three bleached horses' skulls grinned down fantastically from the walls; whilst beneath them hung the huge antlers of a stag. In the door-post was cut a double, intricate triangle; and on the floor, a tame wood-pecker, and a raven with cropped wings, were hopping about. The inhabitant of this abode, was seated beside the flickering fire on the hearth; sewing some garment. By her side stood a high, roughly hewn weather-beaten stone. From time to time, she bent down to the hearth, and held out her meagre hand over the coals; for the cold of November was beginning to be felt, especially on the mountains. The boughs of an old beech-tree came almost into the room through the window. A faint breeze was stirring them; and the leaves being withered and sere, trembled and fell off; a few of them falling right into the chamber. The woman of the wood was old and lonely; and suffering probably from the cold. "There you are lying now, despised and faded and dead," she said to the leaves--"and I am like you." A peculiar expression now came to her old wrinkled face. She was thinking of former times, when she also had been young and blooming, and had had a sweetheart of her own. But his fate had driven him far away from his native fir-woods. Plundering Normans, coming up the Rhine, robbing and burning wherever they came, had carried him off as a prisoner, like so many others; and he had staid with them more than a year, and had become a seaman, and in the rough sea-air he had got to be rough and hard also. When at last they gave him his liberty, and he returned to his Suabian woods, he still carried with him the longing for the North-Sea, and pined for his wild sailor life. The home-faces were no longer pleasant to his eyes; those of the monks and priests least of all; and as misfortune would have it, in the heat of passion he slew a monk who had upbraided him, so that he could no longer remain in his home.