IT has been snowing all night. The Passeyrthal is mantled in a garment of white; at first not thicker than the fleece of a young lamb, but now ankle-deep; and there is more snow above, ready to fall.

A young girl, with drooping head and careworn mien, is issuing from am Sand with her milk-pail, and making her way to the cow-house, while it is yet scarcely day-dawn. Suddenly she stumbled over a man, bending down to the ground, and so intently engaged in measuring a foot-print on the snow, as not to have been aware of her vicinity. Instantly her voice is raised in shrill indignation.

"You pitiful priest! You mean, sneaking man! You may measure that foot-print as long as you will, for it was not made by father! You base, wicked Frenchman!—"

"My pretty girl—"

"Call me so again if you dare! Oh, you wretch! it isn't the first time you've tried the power of your sweet words with me! Caitiff priest! Some of these days your frock will be pulled off; aye, and your mask first! Oh, you wicked, wicked man!"

Donay was actually petrified by her objurgations. He slunk away; but still, with an eye to his original purpose, in the track of the footsteps he had been measuring. Theresa, white with rage, was standing like a statue, watching his retreating form, when she found a strong arm thrown around her, and drawing her into the cow-house. Rudolf was shaking with suppressed laughter.

"Theresa! let the old hound follow the false scent," said he. "What do you think I did? I found this fellow lurking about, overnight; so I got a pair of the Sandwirth's old laced boots, put them over my own, and trudged right away with them to the edge of a steep bank, where the snow has drifted to the depth of seven or eight feet! Then I crawled along to the top of the hedge, without minding scratches, shovelling the snow about, here and there, so as to leave no track by which I could be traced, and returned in my own boots. Into that pitfall he'll go! Ha, ha, ha!—And serve him right!"

"Quite right," said Theresa, between laughing and crying; "but, you see, he has got the measure of father's foot."

"But that won't hinder his being led astray. And I shall deceive them all, rogues as they are, over and over again, as you'll see, with this precious pair of old boots. Two parties of spies have been buried under avalanches already. And though they go peering and prowling about every dwelling and outhouse in the valley, asking their sly questions, 'Where's Sandvird? when was he last seen?' they always get the same stupid, indifferent-like answer, 'I don't know.'"

Rudolf drawled this out in such ludicrous caricature, that Theresa could not help laughing heartily. "But it is too shocking to laugh about," said she, checking herself with a deep sigh. "Poor father!"

"I am convinced he will escape them, Theresa. He is not a sanguine man; but when we parted, he said with such steadiness, 'I trust in God, in my faithful brothers, and in a certain nook in Passeyr,' that I believed him."

"How did mother bear up?"

"Oh, bravely. We travelled quite silently, for more reasons than one. Our voices might have been heard—they might have brought an avalanche down upon us from the Oetzberg—and our hearts were heavy. When we got to the chÂlet, however,—(it lies very high up, quite among the glaciers!) we found it situated in a kind of little kessel,[D] so as to be very unlikely to be discovered. A thicket of pines shelters it; there is a little pool or pond near the door; a stable below, a loft above, in which Johann and I slept—or rather, he whimpered himself to sleep, but I lay awake, thinking matters over."

"No wonder!—Ah!—" (sighing.)

"Well, I thought it was no good to stay there till it got too light, especially as it was snowing, which would prevent my retracing our track if I delayed, and effaced mine along with it if I were quick. The Sandwirth was serious, but quite calm and hearty. Your good mother offered me some breakfast, but I would not diminish their little store."

"That reminds me, Rudolf! They will soon be in want of food!"

"Soon, but not just yet. I think we may leave them alone another week."

"Oh, only think if their stock should fall short! Cold, peril, and famine too!"

"Well, then, at the end of this week, which will be in four days, I will start off with a fresh supply if I can."

"If you can?"

"Yes, Theresa; remember everything does not depend on me; the weather may be tempestuous, the search more vigorous and less easily baffled; but what man can do, I will do, rely upon it."

Theresa rewarded him with a grateful look, and then began to milk the cow. He stood by her the while.

"How everything has changed, Theresa!"

"Changed indeed—"

"I am not changed."

"Nor I."

"The winter, with its snows and its ice-blasts, is not more different from the summer, with its ripe fruits and sunshine, than the prospects of the Tyrolese now are, from what they were a few months, even weeks, ago!"

"No. Still I am glad we tried to free ourselves, though it did not please God to give us success. We can feel self-respect. Even our enemies must, I think, reluctantly respect us."

"Not they! Mark you, Theresa: I believe that when people lose self-respect, they also lose by degrees even the perception of what is respectable. Sometimes, o' nights, such big, swelling thoughts fill my head,—I think, 'Surely, what we have done, this Anno Domini Nine, will live? people will talk of it hereafter, when we have long been dead and buried?' And then I think, 'Ah, no! See how the emperor,—"our Franzel," as we used fondly to call him, who was most of all beholden to us, and who put us up to what we did,—'see how he has fallen off from us, like a snow-drift from the hill-side, that the river in the ravine below sweeps away for ever! See how it's the fashion already—how it was the fashion, even while we were winning glorious victories—for the Austrian counts and barons to look down on us, with a contemptuous pity, as a set of honest-hearted loggerheads!'—I say, you sir!" shouted Rudolf, interrupting himself, as he caught the twinkle of an eye gazing in upon them through a chink between the logs; and rushing out, he collared the spy, and gave him a good shake.

"Why, how now?" cried the intruder, who proved to be Franz. "What's this for?—what have I been a doing?"

"Spying and prying," said Rudolf, bluntly.

"Spying and prying?" quoth he. "Why, what have I come this long way all across the snow for, but to ask after the Sandwirth, and to offer Theresa a root of the gems-wurz, which, if he eats before sunrise, will make him bullet-proof? There now!"

And Franz drew himself up like a man aggrieved.

"Thanks," said Theresa, carrying her milk-pail towards the dairy; "but how am I to get it to him?"

"Oh, you know where he is!" said Franz, insinuatingly.

"No, I don't," said Theresa, who therein, as far as her personal acquaintance with the locality was concerned, spoke the truth.

"Will you like me to look for him, then?" said Franz, slily.

"No, I should not," answered Theresa, very quickly; adding, "I don't want you to meddle at all in our affairs."

"Well, certainly, one has not much encouragement to do so, except for good-will," said Franz, following her into the house, and putting his cold hands on the stove to warm them; "they're likely to do what I am doing now—burn their fingers."

Rudolf's mother, who had come to be a companion to Theresa in her parents' absence, now poured out the porridge, and summoned the family to breakfast. Theresa said to Franz, "You'll join us, I suppose?" to which reluctant half-invitation, he replied by drawing a stool to the table, and taking his share with the rest.

He pricked up his ears to catch any allusion to the Sandwirth, but none was made. A cloud had settled heavily on them all; but they had already learnt the needful lesson of silence.

Franz, after lounging about in his usual way, left am Sand, announcing his intention of going to Meran. Before he had proceeded far, however, some one said "Hist!" and he looked round and saw Donay.

"Well?" said the priest, coming up to him, and walking with him.

"Well," said Franz, "I've been there, and breakfasted there, but to no good. Theresa wouldn't drop a word that one could lay hold of."

"Ah, there are other things besides words that sharp people can lay hold of," said Father Donay. "For example, I have laid hold of something that certifies to me the Sandwirth has been to his house and from it, within these twelve hours."

"Aye? And yet, father, we've watched that house as a cat watches a mouse!"

"Pooh, pooh!"

"What's your proof?"

"His footprints, my son. One day, at Innsbruck, when your famous Hofer was lodging in the imperial palace, he kept me waiting some time. I left without seeing him; but, before I did so, happening to observe a pair of his clumsy boots lying on the parquetÉ floor, which they graced as well as he graced the palace, I soiled my hands so far as to take their length and breadth."

"That was far-sighted of you, father!" said Franz, with a kind of sympathetic admiration.

"Well, I did not know at the time all that might come of it—I merely amused myself by showing the clumsy proportions to one or two in the camp; but there must have been something pre-ordained—I was but an instrument," said this pious priest. "On coming to am Sand this morning, to look about a little, what should I see but numerous footprints in the new-fallen snow, different from those of any who are supposed to be sleeping in the house, namely, women and children. I dropped on my knees, and—measured them! they were Hofer's! I afterwards tracked them across the pastures, full half a mile, till—plump!—into the snow I sank till it was above my head!"

Franz burst out laughing, and suddenly stopped short, as he saw Father Donay turn red with wrath.

"You are rude to laugh," said the priest, with displeasure. "I nearly lost my life, I can tell you! When I floundered out, I found so many foot-tracks that I got confused, and could make none of them out to be Hofer's; yet, whoever it was who had walked up to that spot, must have turned back or gone on, unless, indeed, they could have been smothered in the snow."

"Which he may have been, in the darkness of night," cried Franz.

"Well, I think not; he might have floundered about as I did," said Father Donay. "Life is equally dear to us all, I suppose.—So, now I leave it to you to find where he is, whether there or anywhere else; and, when you do, you know your reward."

"Well, I can't say I like this job," cried Franz, after a pause. "Do you know, father, in a miracle-play, I once played Judas—"

"Well, you've only got to play Judas again," said the priest, with a sinister smile.

"What, and hang myself?" cried Franz, hoarsely. "Why, father, what is it you are asking me?"

"You fool!" cried Father Donay, in a rage, "the cases are not parallel: your allusion is blasphemous. Let me hear no more of it, I pray."

Franz walked on, silent and astounded, doubting which of them were the wickeder man. "The Sandwirth," resumed he, at length, with a choke in his voice, "has never done me a wrong—on the contrary, nothing but good. It is only Theresa—"

"Ah, if you can put up with that girl's scorn, you can put up with anything," said Father Donay contemptuously.

"I can't put up with it, and won't!" cried Franz; "but it's making her pay pretty dearly, too, if her father gets shot."

"Don't be such a dolt as to suppose it," said Father Donay pacifyingly; "the worst he and she will get is a good fright. He will be tried by court-martial; probably acquitted, or reprimanded, or sentenced to a short imprisonment, from which, at Austria's intercession, he will be released."

"If I were sure of that—" said Franz, hesitating.

"Why, don't you know I speak with authority? You know my credentials pretty well," said Father Donay. "I have all but told you who empowers me—"

"And you have promised me absolution, if any unforeseen evil comes of it—" said Franz, still uneasily.

"How should I do otherwise, my son? I will promise it twenty times, if that will make it any stronger."

"No, no—of course it will not. Well, then, I'll think about it, father: and—"

"And, if somebody else should do it while you are only thinking about it, he'll get the reward instead of you."

"That won't suit me at all!" cried Franz. "Why, if I make up my mind to do an ill turn, I may as well do it as not; the sin—that is, the—whatever it is, will be the same—"

"The intention, but not the reward," said Father Donay. "Heaven notes our intentions; man only notes works."

"I wish I were fairly out of this work," exclaimed Franz. "If Theresa, now, were to come across me at this moment, she might overcome me with a straw!"

"Truly, I believe you!" said Father Donay, with ineffable scorn; "and men of straw, or men knocked down by straws, are not the men we pay."

"Ah!" cried Franz, grinding his teeth, "if you were not a priest, I should think some evil spirit was within you."

"And I, without any if," coolly replied Donay, "think an evil spirit is within you—the spirit of irresolution. Come! no more of this child's play. Are you going to throw away a cup of good milk because there's a cow-hair in it?"

"Not I," cried Franz recklessly. "Nothing venture, nothing have. Give me a fortnight, and I'll hunt him up. When I was keeping the herds up the mountains this summer, I made myself pretty well acquainted with all the nooks and corners of 'em; and I guess the man we are after to be in a certain chÂlet in a certain spot that I chanced upon one day, when I was seeking for cream o' the moon."

"Cream o' the moon, indeed!" repeated Father Donay, ironically. "Well—if you find him, and enable us to find him, that will be better than moonshine."

"But, father! if I find him, and point out to you the place where he is, you may find him yourselves. I wash my hands of taking him."

"Wash your hands by all means. We'll take him."

"Very well—that's to be all, then?"

"All, and enough."

"Just so. Good bye then, father—here we are at St. Martin—"

"Benedicite, my son."

The place of Hofer's concealment, a picturesque little cow-house—nothing better—was about twelve miles from his home, among the glaciers of the Oetzthal, near the Timbler Joch, and in a position that, for many months of every year, the snow made quite inaccessible. The winter of the Year Nine, however, was comparatively mild; and the chÂlet might be reached with considerable fatigue, difficulty, and danger.

At the door of this cow-house, then, stood the man who—we will not say had strutted his little hour on life's stage, for Hofer had never endeavoured to ape a grandeur that he had not; he was a plain, simple, upright man from first to last. He had attained a great, though brief power, and had not abused it: he had fallen from it, but not into despair.

In the profound loneliness and inaction of his present life, after so stirring a campaign, there might have been a chance of his mind preying on itself, had it not been for the constant sense of danger. His heart did not indeed prey on itself, but feed on itself it did. He mused much on his late career, and on the anxious question, had he been wasteful of human life or not? At this moment, he was reading, for the twentieth time, a letter which had found its way to him even in this secluded spot—it was from the emperor himself—the beloved Franzel! strenuously urging him to leave his desolate retreat and take refuge in Vienna, and pledging his imperial word for his safety. Yes, this plain, homely man had thus been sued by his sovereign, and had refused. He would not forsake his family or his country.

His faithful wife had accompanied him, as in love and duty bound, feeling her home to be under whatever roof sheltered the head of her husband. She had her distaff and knitting; and as they sat among the trusses of hay chattering of this and that, many a simple wile did the good woman successfully use to lure her Anderl's thoughts from anxious themes. Now, it was to explain some family genealogy, some intermarriage she professed nearly to have forgotten—then, when he had wondered how she could be so forgetful, she would branch off into correlative domestic histories, harmless jests, recollections of wedding-feasts, baptisms, and burials; then, broach some knotty point, or ask him to recall some old legend or fairy-tale, or local superstition.

Hofer had brought Johann with him partly out of fondness, and to amuse Anna, partly lest he should be seized as hostage; and partly because he knew the little fellow to be without reticence, and as likely to betray him from heedlessness as an enemy might be from mischief.