So stood the matter, when the fight with Witte the baker began out in the market-place. My father was just rushing out at the door to set things to rights, when Witte was dragged in. He still exchanged occasional blows with his guards, mingling "_bougres_" and "_sacrés_" with "rogues and vagabonds." His entrance into the court did not increase its stillness; he cursed, he swore, and my father had enough to do, only to get him a little quieter. "My pipe, Herr Burmeister! It was a legacy from my father. And to have it snatched out of my mouth before my very eyes! Am I a Stemhagen burgher or not?" The French chattered and jabbered away together; Colonel von Toll had gone out, and the judge commanded that the baker should be bound, thrown into a waggon and taken along with the army. What more should be done with him would easily be determined; he had raised his hand against the French, that was quite enough. Then my father stepped up to the Judge and explained that the baker was a well-conducted man, that he had always borne his share of the burden of the war-taxes and levies, and that he had not attacked the French power but had only attacked a thief; or did the French regard a silver-topped pipe as contribution of war? This exasperated the Frenchman; he snorted at my father, and gave him to understand that he himself was not by any means too safe. My father was a brave man, and, when he once saw that a thing was right, he was as obstinate as only a real Mecklenburger can be. He knew, he said, that no honest man was now safe in his own country; but, for his part, he held it to be his duty to stand by his fellow-citizens in a just cause, and he would do so even if there were so many French in the country that one could feed the pigs with them. The judge foamed with rage, and sputtered out the command to arrest my father at once and lead him out of the room. As this command was about to be carried out, old Witte sprang towards the judge shouting, "thieves and villains;" and Miller Voss too was ready in a moment to aid with fist and tongue. At this moment Colonel von Toll came back again; and, when he had learned what was the meaning of the tumult, he said that the baker was in the right about the pipe; he had himself inquired into the matter, but that it was quite a secondary affair. This baker was the same man who had got the chasseur's horse standing in his stable, and it seemed to him that there had been a conspiracy to commit a murder,--and, as he said that, he looked very sharply at my father--and the truth must come out, he would pledge his life; and, if it could not be got out here, he knew a place where it could--and that place was Stettin.