With such talk we came at nightfall to a little remote labourer's cottage: and though such boasting pleased me not, yet I said "Yea," chiefly because his rogue's temper was well known to me, and though I trusted him not at all, yet went I with him into the said house, in which a peasant was even then lighting a fire: to him said Oliver, "Hast thou aught ready cooked?" "Nay," said the peasant, "but I have still the cold leg of veal that I brought from Waldkirch." "Well then," said Oliver, "go bring it here and likewise the little cask of wine." So when the peasant was gone, "Brother," said I (for so I called him to be safer with him) "thou hast a willing host." "Oh, devil thank the rogue," says he, "I do keep his wife and child for him and also he doth earn good booty for himself; for I do leave for him all the clothes that I capture, for him to turn to his own profit." So I asked where he kept his wife and child; to which Oliver answered, he had them in safety in Freiburg, where he visited them twice a week, and brought him from thence his food, as well as powder and shot. And further he told me he had long practised this freebooter's trade, and that it profited him more than to serve any lord: nor did he think to give it up till he had properly filled his purse. "Brother," says I, "thou livest in a dangerous estate, and if thou art caught in such a villainy, how thinkest thou 'twould fare with thee?" "Aha," says he, "I perceive thou art still the old Simplicissimus: I know well that he that would win must stake somewhat: but remember that their lordships[31] of Nuremberg hang no man till they catch him." So I answered, "Yea, but put the case, brother, that thou art not caught, which is yet but unlikely, since the pitcher that goes often to the well must break at last, yet is such a life as thou leadest the most shameful in the world, so that I scarce can believe thou canst desire to die in it."