"I can't help it, your reverence; the fellow is a trial. He knows nothing, he understands nothing; he wanders about the mountains from morning to night, and grows stupider every day. He'll never make a decent forester; 'tis all trouble lost." The words were spoken by a man whose appearance betrayed his forester's calling. He was provided with gun and hunting-pouch, and was sturdy and powerful of frame, with broad shoulders and coarse features. His hair and beard were neglected, his dress--a mixture of hunting and peasant's costume--was careless in the extreme, and his speech was as rude as his exterior; thus he confronted the priest. The pair were in the parsonage of Saint Michael, a small hamlet high up among the mountains, and a place of pilgrimage. The priest, seated at his writing-table, shook his gray head disapprovingly. "As I have often told you, Wolfram, you do not understand how to treat Michael. You can never do anything with him by threats and abuse; you only make him shyer, and he is already shy enough in his intercourse with human kind." "That all comes from his stupidity," the forester explained. "The boy does not see daylight clearly; he has to be shaken hard to rouse him, since I made your reverence a promise not to beat him again." "And I hope you have kept your word. The child has been much sinned against; you and your wife maltreated him daily before I came here." "It did him good. All boys need the stick, and Michael always needed a double portion. Well, he got it. When I stopped, my wife began; but it never did any good,--it never made him any the cleverer." "No; but he would have been ruined by your rough treatment if I had not interfered." Wolfram laughed aloud. "Ruined? Michael? Not a bit of it. He could have borne ten times as much; he's as strong as a bear. It's a perfect shame; the fellow could tear up trees by the roots, and he lets himself be teased by the village children without ever stirring a finger. I know right well why he wouldn't come along with me to-day, but chose to follow me. He won't come through the village; he chooses to come the longer way, through the forest, as he always does when he comes to you, the cowardly fellow!" "Michael is no coward," said the pastor, gravely. "You ought to know that, Wolfram; you have told me yourself that there is no controlling him when he once gets angry." "Yes, he's right crazy then, and must be let alone. If I didn't know that he's not all right here"--he touched his forehead--"I'd take him in hand, but it's a terrible cross. It's strange, too, that he shoots so well, when he sees the game, though that's not often. He stares up into the trees and the sky, and a stag will run away right under his nose. I'm not curious, but, indeed, I'd like to know where the moon-calf comes from."