He was the ninth child of respectable stocking weavers, but, as the pastor perceived that he was gifted with special ability, his parents took a portion of their savings to make him a scholar.

The tuition fee and the boy were both confided to a Beanus--that is, an older pupil, who asserted that he understood Latin--in order that he might look after the inexperienced little fellow and help him out of school as well as in.

But, instead of using for his protigee the florins intrusted to him, the Beanus shamefully squandered the money saved for a beloved child by so many sacrifices.

While he feasted on roast meat and wine, the little boy placed in his charge went hungry." Whenever, in after years, the old man described this time of suffering, his son listened with clinched fists, and when Dietel saw a Beanus at The Blue Pike snatch the best pieces from the child in his care, he interfered in his behalf sternly enough.

Nay, he probably brought to him from the kitchen, on his own account, a piece of roast meat or a sausage.