These words gave a fresh hope to the Count of Ehrenstein; for to have delayed the investigation, even for a short time, would have delivered him from the immediate presence of the Imperial guards, whose proximity did not at all please him, and would have enabled him to employ any of those many means of resisting right, which were often resorted to successfully in those days. But the instant after, a trumpet sounded at the door of the chapel, and the name of Father George was pronounced. After a moment's pause, the crowd that filled the lower part of the building, began to move and fall back on either hand, and the tall form and fine countenance of the monk was seen advancing up the aisle. "This is all concerted," muttered the Count of Ehrenstein to himself; "the cause is judged before it is heard." The Emperor, however, without noticing his half audible words, raised his voice and addressed Father George of Altenburg, even before he had reached the table, saying, "Father, we have ever heard that you are a good and holy man, and we now call upon you to speak truth, and to tell us who is that young man now standing before us, as you will answer to God." "This," said Father George, laying his left hand upon Ferdinand's shoulder, "is Ferdinand of Ehrenstein, the son of my beloved friend, the late Count." "Can you prove this fact?" inquired the monarch; "for this is a matter of serious import, and we must not decide hastily, even upon the showing of a holy man like you. From whom did you receive this boy, that you so well know he is Ferdinand of Ehrenstein?" "From his own mother, my lord the Emperor," replied Father George; "that is to say, not from her own hands; for unhappily I was not present when she was seized with the fever at Nuremburg; but at the point of death, when she had received extreme unction, and had taken leave of all worldly things, she sent him to me by one who had been faithful and true to her, and who brought him safely to the abbey, and delivered him into my hands, in the time of Abbot Waldimer." "But what proof had you that this was the son of the Countess of Ehrenstein; how did you know that it was not the son of some one else?" "I had often seen the boy before;" replied Father George: "from his infancy up to that hour, I had never been two months without holding him on my knee. He changed, it is true, from the soft infant in the nurse's arms, to the light, wild, vigorous boy; but in that slow and gradual change something still remained which showed the same being was there before my eyes: one day bore over to the next the lineaments of my dead friend's child; and though in each two months I could see a difference in the boy, yet there were the same eyes looked upon me, the same lips smiled when I spoke to him. It was like a sapling that I watched and nourished, increasing in height, putting forth leaves and flowers, but still the same, whether as the tall tree or the young shoot."