"What are your swords for, if you are not knights?" he cried,desperately struggling inside his captor's grip, and seeing throughhis half-closed lids the sunshine shining on aluminum scabbards.

"What does he want?" asked the officer in command of the garrison,whose staff all this bright and martial array was. He was ridingout from the barracks to an inspection on the Rudolfplatz. He wasa young man, and had little children himself, and was half amused,half touched, to look at the tiny figure of the little dusty boy.

"I want to build a monastery, like Findelkind of Arlberg, and tohelp the poor," exclaimed our Findelkind, valorously, though his heartwas beating like that of a little mouse caught in a trap; for thehorses were trampling up the dust around him, and the orderly'sgrip was hard.

The officers laughed aloud; and indeed he looked a poor littlescrap of a figure, somewhat ill able to help even himself.