’Tis a live nose, and if I am alive myself, said the inn-keeper’s wife, I will touch it. _Votum feci sancto Nicolao, ait peregrinus, nasum meum intactum fore usque ad --Quodnam tempus? illico respondit illa._ I have made a vow to saint _Nicolas_ this day, said the stranger, that my nose shall not be touched till --Here the stranger, suspending his voice, looked up. ------Till when? said she hastily. _Minimo tangetur, inquit ille (manibus in pectus compositis) usque ad illam horam ------Quam horam? ait illa ------Nullam, respondit peregrinus, donec pervenio ad --Quem locum, --obsecro? ait illa ----Peregrinus nil respondens mulo conscenso discessit._ It never shall be touched, said he, clasping his hands and bringing them close to his breast, till that hour --What hour? cried the inn-keeper’s wife. --Never! --never! said the stranger, never till I am got --For Heaven’s sake, into what place? said she ------The stranger rode away without saying a word. The stranger had not got half a league on his way towards _Frankfort_ before all the city of _Strasburg_ was in an uproar about his nose. The _Compline_ bells were just ringing to call the _Strasburgers_ to their devotions, and shut up the duties of the day in prayer: --no soul in all _Strasburg_ heard ’em--the city was like a swarm of bees------men, women, and children (the _Compline_ bells tinkling all the time) flying here and there--in at one door, out at another----this way and that way--long ways and cross ways--up one street, down another street----in at this alley, out of that------did you see it? did you see it? did you see it? O! did you see it? ------who saw it? who did see it? for mercy’s sake, who saw it? Alack o’day! I was at vespers! --I was washing, I was starching, I was scouring, I was quilting ----God help me! I never saw it ----I never touch’d it! ----would I had been a centinel, a bandy-legg’d drummer, a trumpeter, a trumpeter’s wife, was the general cry and lamentation in every street and corner of _Strasburg_. Whilst all this confusion and disorder triumphed throughout the great city of _Strasburg_, was the courteous stranger going on as gently upon his mule in his way to _Frankfort_, as if he had no concern at all in the affair------talking all the way he rode in broken sentences, sometimes to his mule--sometimes to himself--sometimes to his Julia. O Julia, my lovely Julia! --nay, I cannot stop to let thee bite that thistle----that ever the suspected tongue of a rival should have robbed me of enjoyment when I was upon the point of tasting it.---- ----Pugh! --’tis nothing but a thistle--never mind it----thou shalt have a better supper at night. ----Banish’d from my country----my friends----from thee.---- Poor devil, thou’rt sadly tired with thy journey! ----come--get on a little faster--there’s nothing in my cloak-bag but two shirts----a crimson-sattin pair of breeches, and a fringed ----Dear Julia.