Kohlhaas, with the Prince’s approval of the idea, sat down and wrote a letter to Nagelschmidt in which he declared that the latter’s pretense of having taken the field in order to maintain the amnesty which had been violated with regard to him and his band, was a disgraceful and vicious fabrication.  He told him that, on his arrival in Dresden, he had neither been imprisoned nor handed over to a guard, also that his lawsuit was progressing exactly as he wished, and, as a warning for the rabble who had gathered around Nagelschmidt, he gave him over to the full vengeance of the law for the outrages which he had committed in the Ore Mountains after the publication of the amnesty.  Some portions of the criminal prosecution which the horse-dealer had instituted against him in the castle at Luetzen on account of the above-mentioned disgraceful acts, were also appended to the letter to enlighten the people concerning the good-for-nothing fellow, who even at that time had been destined for the gallows, and, as already stated, had only been saved by the edict issued by the Elector.  In consequence of this letter the Prince appeased Kohlhaas’ displeasure at the suspicion which, of necessity, they had been obliged to express in this hearing; he went on to declare that, while he remained in Dresden, the amnesty granted him should not be violated in any way; then, after presenting to the boys some fruit that was on his table, he shook hands with them once more, saluted Kohlhaas, and dismissed him.

The Lord High Chancellor, who nevertheless recognized the danger that was threatening the horse-dealer, did his utmost to bring his lawsuit to an end before it should be complicated and confused by new developments; this, however, was exactly what the diplomatic knights desired and aimed at.  Instead of silently acknowledging their guilt, as at first, and obtaining merely a less severe sentence, they now began with pettifogging and crafty subterfuges to deny this guilt itself entirely.  Sometimes they pretended that the black horses belonging to Kohlhaas had been detained at Tronka Castle on the arbitrary authority of the castellan and the steward, and that the Squire had known little, if anything, of their actions.  At other times they declared that, even on their arrival at the castle, the animals had been suffering from a violent and dangerous cough, and, in confirmation of the fact, they referred to witnesses whom they pledged themselves to produce.  Forced to withdraw these arguments after many long-drawn-out investigations and explanations, they even cited an electoral edict of twelve years before, in which the importation of horses from Brandenburg into Saxony had actually been forbidden, on account of a plague among the cattle.  This circumstance, according to them, made it as clear as day that the Squire not only had the authority, but also was under obligation, to hold up the horses that Kohlhaas had brought across the border.  Kohlhaas, meanwhile, had bought back