"This is all pretence," answered the Abbess. "You seek to plunder the convent. I have never seen your daughter since she was an infant; and you forge your cause of complaint, Count of Ehrenstein, in order to commit violence against a body of women whom you think helpless. But, thank God and our holy Mother, we are not without defence; and if you attempt to touch the gates, the consequences be upon your own head. Bid the men come up there, sister Louisa, and garnish the walls. I take Heaven to witness, that if blood be shed, it is this man's doing, for he seeks a vain pretence against me." One of the nuns here whispered a few words to the Abbess, and the Abbess replied with an impatient gesture; but in the mean time, at a signal from above, a number of men, armed in haste, with cross bows in their hands, began to hurry up, their heads and shoulders appearing at various parts of the wall, and over the battlements of the portal. At the same time, the great bell, which had ceased while the Abbess and the Count were speaking, commenced again its loud peal, and a crowd of people were seen hurrying down from the hills beyond, while several parties appeared running with whatever arms they could collect, from the farther end of the village to a postern behind the convent. Every thing, in short, seemed to promise, that there would speedily take place one of the scenes so common in those days, when nunnery or abbey was attacked by any of its unruly neighbours, and defended successfully or unsuccessfully, not alone by the vassals, who were bound by their tenure to serve in arms, but also by the peasantry, who had generally many motives for gratitude and kindly feeling towards the ecclesiastics and recluses who dwelt among them. The enterprise, however, seemed now somewhat more serious in the eyes of the Count of Ehrenstein than he had previously expected. The words of the Abbess were bold and resolute; her declaration that she had not seen his daughter since she was an infant, had been spoken in a frank and straightforward tone; the number of men who already crowded the walls was considerable, and more were likely soon to arrive. Besides this, the reputation of attacking a nunnery was not altogether that which the Count of Ehrenstein could have desired; and he felt that he could be by no means certain of what acts his soldiers might commit, to bring down discredit on his name, even if he should be successful.