'Strike a bargain?' thought Peter. 'What can he want of me, what can I sell to him? Am I perhaps to serve him, or what is it that he can want?' They went at first uphill over a steep forest path, when all at once they stopped at a dark, deep, and almost perpendicular ravine. Michel leaped down as easily as he would go down marble steps; but Peter almost fell into a fit when he saw him below, rising up like a church steeple, reaching him an arm as long as a scaffolding pole, with a hand at the end as broad as the table in the ale-house, and calling in a voice which sounded like the deep tones of a death bell, 'Set yourself boldly on my hand, hold fast by the fingers and you will not fall off.' Peter, trembling, did as he was ordered, sat down upon his hand and held himself fast by the thumb of the giant. They now went down a long way and very deep, yet, to Peter's astonishment, it did not grow darker; on the contrary, the daylight seemed rather to increase in the chasm, and it was some time before Peter's eyes could bear it. Michel's stature became smaller as Peter came lower down, and he stood now in his former size before a house just like those of the wealthy peasants of the Schwarzwald. The room into which Peter was led differed in nothing but its appearance of solitariness from those of other people. The wooden clock, the stove of Dutch tiles, the broad benches and utensils on the shelves were the same as anywhere else. Michel told him to sit down at the large table, then went out of the room and returned with a pitcher of wine and glasses. Having filled these, they now began a conversation, and Dutch Michel expatiated on the pleasures of the world, talked of foreign countries, fine cities and rivers, so that Peter, at length, feeling a yearning after such sights, candidly told Michel his wish. 'If you had courage and strength in your body to undertake anything, could a few palpitations of your stupid heart make you tremble; and the offences against honour, or misfortunes, why should a rational fellow care for either? Did you feel it in your head when they but lately called you a cheat and a scoundrel? Or did it give you a pain in your stomach, when the bailiff came to eject you from your house? Tell me, where was it you felt pain?' 'In my heart,' replied Peter, putting his hand on his beating breast, for he felt as if his heart was anxiously turning within him.