THE Court Chaplain Eisenhart walked up the village street towards the schoolhouse. It was April, in the year 1750, and a soft west wind was blowing up the street, across the oak woods of the near forest. Between the forest and the village lay a valley of meadows, planted with thorn bushes and old birch trees with snow-white stems: the fresh green leaves trembled continually in the restless wind. On the other side of the street a lofty crag rose precipitously above a rushing mountain torrent. This rock is the spur of other lofty hills, planted with oak and beech trees, through the openings of which a boy may frequently be seen, driving an ox or gathering firewood on his half-trodden path. Here and there in the distance the smoke of charcoal-burners ascends into the sky. Between the street and the torrent stand the houses of the village, with high thatched roofs and walls of timber and of mud, and, at the back, projecting stages and steps above the rushing water. A paradise in the late spring, in summer, and in autumn, these wild and romantic woods, traversed only by a few forest paths, are terrible in winter, and the contrast is part of their charm. The schoolhouse stands in the upper part of the village, on the opposite side of the street to the rest of the houses, looking across the valley to the western sun. Two large birch trees are before the open door. The Court Chaplain pauses before he goes in. How it comes to pass that a Court Chaplain should be walking up the street of this forest village we shall see anon. At first sight there does not seem to be much schoolwork going on. A boy, or we should rather say a child, of fifteen is seated at an open window looking over the forest. He is fair-haired and blue-eyed; but it is the deep blue of an angel's, not the cold gray blue of a courtier's eyes. Around him are seated several children, both boys and girls; and, far from teaching, he appears to be relating stories to them. The story, whatever it is, ceases as the Court Chaplain goes in, and both raconteur and audience rise. "I have something to say to thee, schoolmaster," said the Chaplain, "send the children away. Thou wilt not teach them anything more to-day, I suspect." The children went away lingeringly, not at all like children just let loose from school. When they were gone the expression of the Chaplain's face changed--he looked at the little schoolmaster very kindly, and sat down on one of the benches, which were black and worn with age. "Last year, little one," he said, "when the Herr Rector took thee away from the Latin school and from thy father's tailoring, and confirmed thee, and thou tookest thy first communion, and he made thee schoolmaster here, many wise people shook their heads. I do not think," he continued, with a smile, "that they have ceased shaking them when they have seen in how strange a manner thou keepest school."