all, I must run the risk that if they so snapped at the cat they might by chance catch me by the ear or nose and bite it off. My collar and jerkin were so bloody that they were like to a smith's travise on St. Stephen's Day, when the horses are let blood; nor could I devise any means to save myself from this torment, but at last must cast myself on the ground that the dogs might so seize the cat, unless I was willing to allow my poll to continue to be their battle-ground: 'tis true the dogs did then kill the cat, but I had by no means so noble sport from this as I had hoped, but only mockery and such a face as now thou seest before thee. At which I was so enraged that I shot both dogs dead, and did so bastinado my mistress that had given me cause for this fool's trick that she ran away from me, doubtless because she could no longer love so horrible a mask." _Chap. xxi._: A BRIEF EXAMPLE OF THAT TRADE WHICH OLIVER FOLLOWED, WHEREIN HE WAS A MASTER AND SIMPLICISSIMUS SHOULD BE A PRENTICE Fain would I have laughed at this story of Oliver's, yet must show compassion only: and even as I began to tell him my history we saw a coach come up the road with two outriders. On that we came down from the church-tower and posted ourselves in a house that stood by the wayside and was very convenient for the waylaying of passengers. I must keep my loaded piece in reserve, but Oliver with one shot brought down at once one rider and his horse before they were ware of us: upon which the other forthwith fled: and while I, with my piece cocked, made the coachman halt and descend, Oliver leapt upon him and with his broad sword did cleave his head to the teeth, yea, and would thereafter have butchered the lady and the children that sat in the carriage and already looked more like dead folk than live ones: but I roundly said, that I would not have, but told him if he would do such a deed he must first slay me. "Ah," says he, "thou foolish Simplicissimus, I had never believed thou wert so wicked a fellow as thou dost seem." "But brother," said I, "what hast thou against these innocents? an they were men that could defend themselves 'twere another story." "How," he answered: "cook your eggs and there will be no chickens hatched. I know these young cockatrices well: their father the major is a proper skinflint, and the worst jacket-duster in the world." And with such words he would have gone on to slay them: yet I restrained him so long that in the end I softened him: and 'twas a major's wife, her maids, and three fair children, for whom it grieved me much: these we shut up in a cellar that they might not too soon betray us, in which they had nothing to eat but fruit and turnips till they might chance to be released by some one: thereafter we plundered the coach, and rode off with seven fine horses into the wood where it was thickest.