"Franz, you think to intimidate me, but you only fill me with disgust. What good could you hope to reap by such a dreadful piece of cruelty? On the contrary, nothing would ever prosper in your hands afterwards. Do you remember those two young men, both in love with the same girl, who went out together one day to take an eagle's nest? One returned, the other did not: the fact was, one had let down his companion from the top of the cliff to the nest, and then drawn up the rope, and left him to starve, or be torn to pieces by the parent-birds. Think what a miserable end he himself came to afterwards!" "Ah, there's no knowing what a fellow may be driven to, when he's jealous," said Franz, after a pause--"It's best not to make him desperate." "He had better not allow himself to become desperate." "Well, Theresa, here we come to two paths,--one leads to the Wirthhaus, the other does not; which shall I take?" "Whichever you like; it is quite indifferent to me. The path is yours as much as mine." "If I take the path to the Wirthhaus, I shall still try and hope to make myself agreeable to you. If I take the path to the left, I shall renounce you for ever!" "You had better, then, take the path to the left." "Fish and all?" holding the basket a little towards her, but as if his elbow were tied to his side. "Fish and all," said Theresa, without intermitting her knitting. "Then farewell, Theresa, for ever!" cried Franz, in a tone intended to be fiercely tragic. "You have had your last chance of me!" And shouldering his smelts, he strode off. He was in a very tempestuous state of mind; and many things Theresa had said had cut him more deeply than she thought; but to no good purpose. When a stone came tumbling upon him from the mountain-top, he shook his fist savagely, and muttered, "Even the little people" (_i. e._ fairies) "are against me!"--and then, considering that if he provoked them, they might lead him a weary dance after the hidden treasure, he muttered a spell supposed to have a propitiating effect. As the pass widened, he beheld from the height on which he stood, Innsbruck, white and nest-like, basking in the valley afar off, and turned in his mind whether it were worth his while to carry thither the fish we have called smelts for want of an English name for them.