And he himself lay down on his bed, bade farewell to his wife and son, and he begged Death that he might die. And she 23 ran outside the door with all the strength in her feet. “Go!” she cried. “It is the devils who shall slay you⁠—I shall not slay you!”

So the soldier remained alive and healthy. And he thought: “Shall I go straight into the burning pitch, for then the devils will throw me into the seething sulphur until such time as my sins shall have been melted from off me.” And he bade farewell from all, and he went with the knapsack in his hand straight into the burning pitch.

And he went on: maybe near, maybe far, maybe downhill, maybe uphill, maybe short, maybe long; and he at last arrived in the abyss, and he looked, and all round the burning cauldron there stood watchmen. As soon as he stopped at the gate a devil asked who was coming.

“A guilty soul to be tortured.”