"Look!"
Then she could not choose but look. But oh, horror! in place of the
coin and jewels, armour and apparel, it was filled with wasted forms
bowed with misery and distress! the tear-worn orphan, the neglected
sick. Here she saw lying a youth, wan and emaciated, struck down in
all the promise of boyhood, and his mother tore her hair in agony by
his side. And there stood a father, gaunt and grey, vainly grappling
with Hunger, who was stealing away his children one by one from before
his face. Here----
But she could bear no more. She sank upon the ground, and hid her
face for very shame.
"The ransom of these, it is, you have spent upon yourself!" thundered
the pitiless knight; and every word was a death-knell....
The baron and his servants continued their search for the unknown
knight, but for long they found him not; one said he had seen him go
this way, and another that. Till at last an artless peasant maiden
told them she had seen him take the path of the mountain, across
the stream, and the baroness following behind with weak and unsteady
steps. The baron hasted his steps to pursue the way she pointed.
But he only found the lifeless body of Klein-Else kneeling against
the hoary rock!