Poppenhausen, not only to refresh myself there, but to procure a messenger who would seek and recover my wife and children. But I learnt there that the Poppenhausen children had also been carried away, and that there were marching columns on many roads, so that the life of a messenger would be in deadly peril. Meanwhile my parishioners dressed a cow for me, which had escaped the soldiers; this I looked for with a hungry stomach. So we had meat enough to eat, but without salt and bread. After my repast I learned by post that my wife was come, and thus it had come to pass. She had been taken with her two children, by some musketeers, to Altenhausen, where, from fear of dishonour, she and her children had sprung over the bridge into the water. From thence she was drawn out by the soldiers, and brought into the village, where she was made to help in the kitchen to prepare the supper. Meanwhile there came another troop of soldiers who were higher in rank and more in number, and drove the others from their quarters. My wife took this opportunity to escape. She wended her way out, and left the two children with the soldiers. A poor beggar-woman led her through secret byways out of the village, and brought her to an old cave in a wood, where she passed that night and remained the next day till evening. On that day the people came forth from all quarters, and thus my wife set out and came safe and unharmed to me, so that we were all joyful and thankful to God. "How murder and fire meanwhile had gone on at Heldburg, I will also relate. The town of Heldburg had militia and trained bands, and it was ordered that if the enemy came there, the city should be defended. For it was always hoped that Duke Bernhard's people were not far distant, and that the country would be relieved. When therefore the town was fired, my honoured father-in-law, with many citizens and other folks, hastened out of the town, and arrived in the night with my wife and two children to Poppenhausen, and my wife prepared him a good invalid bed. For my parsonage house had been filled with all kinds of furniture left by noblemen and magistrates in their flight; and although pilferers had been there, there was enough still left. The following day a whole troop of horsemen came to the parsonage, examined my belongings, but let them alone because there was one there who was wounded: they ordered supper and went out to plunder, and returned towards evening, bringing all kinds of booty; then it was necessary to boil and roast, and the neighbouring women helped thereto with good will. When the horsemen were about to depart, they advised my father-in-law not to be too confident, as this tumult would last yet eight days, and as the road led past there, he and his daughter might suffer violence, and as the neighbouring villages were Popish, he had better remove to a Protestant one. This my father-in-law did, and went at night in the fog for