"'From this stone shall spring forth a tree; a mighty cherry-tree; from the trunk of the tree shall be fashioned a cradle; and in that cradle shall be rocked a young baby, who, in later years, shall become a priest. To this priest shall my treasure belong. But even he may not be able to find the treasure until another cherry-tree shall have grown upon the tower, from a stone dropped by a bird of passage. When all these conditions have been complied with, then shall the priest find the treasure at the foot of my tree, and not until then.' "Then the careful knight, fearing for the safety of his treasure, even after such precautions, called upon a ghost to come and watch over the castle tower, that peradventure, daring robbers who might presume to thrust aside the spells which bound the treasure, would fear to cope with a ghost." "And did the priest ever come?" queried Teresa. "Not yet, child; the cherry-tree at the top of the tower is but yet a sapling; there are long years yet to wait." "But we don't believe in ghosts, father," interrupted Ferdinand. "Why could not some one go and dig at the root of the tree and see if the treasure were really there?" "One could if he chose, no doubt," answered Herr Müller, "but no one has." "Would you, Ferdinand?" asked Teresa. "Oh, I might, if I were a grown man and had a lot of soldiers with me." "Do you know another legend, Herr Müller?" asked Teresa, shortly. "Well, there is the legend of Endersdorf in Moravia. "A shepherd once lived in the neighborhood, and although he had always been exceedingly poor, often almost to the verge of starvation, yet, one morning, his neighbors found that he had suddenly become exceedingly rich. Every one made conjectures concerning the source of his wealth, but none of them became the confidante of the shepherd, so that none were ever the wiser. The erstwhile poor shepherd left his humble cot and built himself a magnificent estate and palace upon the spot; he surrounded himself with retainers and sportsmen and gave himself up quite naturally to a life of ease and indolence. Most of his time was spent in following the hounds; but with all his newly-acquired wealth, and notwithstanding the memory of days when a few pence meant a fortune to him, the shepherd lost all sense of pity, and none about the country-side were quite so penurious and selfish as he. To such poor wayfarers as accosted him, in mercy's name, to befriend them, he turned a deaf ear, until his name was the synonym for all that was miserable and hard-hearted. "Now, it happened, that one day a poor beggar came to the gate of the rich shepherd, asking for alms. The shepherd was about to leave the gate in company with a noisy crowd of hunters and followers, on his way to the chase. Taking no pity on the poor man's condition, he suddenly conceived the idea of making the beggar his prey.