"At last there came up to me a man, who, by his dress, must have been a _chasseur_, or forester. He said that he was just then in want of such a garment, and gave at once the money that I had demanded for it. Returning home, I made our priest say several masses, and as I could not contrive to station a cross in the Devil's Abyss, I placed one here, as a memorial of the Capuchin's cruel fate. "However, the deceased father must have had not a few sins to answer for; his ghost is said to wander about here still, and has been seen by divers people, so that the priest's labours have been of no great service in his behalf. Therefore, reverend father, I would earnestly entreat of you, when you have returned safe to your own convent, to read prayers now and then for the soul of your unfortunate brother, Medardus. Will you promise me this?" "You are in a mistake, my good friend," said I; "the Capuchin Medardus, who some years ago passed through your village, is not murdered; there is no need of masses for him, since he still lives, and must by his own labours and repentance work out the salvation of his soul. I am myself this very Medardus.--Look here!" With these words I threw open my tunic, and shewed him my name embroidered, as he had described, on the outside of the lapelle. Scarcely had the _bauer_ looked at the name, when he grew deadly pale, and stared at me with every sign of the utmost horror. Then suddenly he started up, and without uttering a word, ran as if he had been pursued by fiends into the wood. It was obvious that he took me for the ghost of this murdered Medardus, and all endeavours would have failed to convince him of his error. The remoteness of the place, and the deep stillness, broken only by the roaring of the not far distant river, were well suited to awake in my mind the most horrible imagery. I thought once more of my detestable _double_, and infected almost with the terror of the countryman, I felt myself agitated to my inmost heart, and believed that the frightful spectre of my second self would start out from some dark thicket against me. Summoning my utmost courage, I again stepped forward on my journey, but so much was I disturbed by the revived notion of my ghostly _double_, that not till after a considerable time had I leisure to recollect that the countryman's narrative had completely cleared up to me the mystery how the delirious monk had first got possession of the tunic, which, on our flight into Italy, he had left with me, and which I had recognized as unquestionably my own. The forester whom he had applied to for a new dress, had, of course, purchased it from the countryman in the market-town.