They followed a path across some meadows, quite I across the valley to a little stone house under the shadow of the opposite mountain. In this house lived Father Hofer’s old friend Ampezzang.
The wife and son were fitting little spokes into the wheels, a task that looked very easy, indeed. But when Frau Ampezzang put a wheel rim and some spokes into John’s hand and told him to try, he could not do it at all. First the rim flew across the room; then he broke the spoke that he was trying to force into place. Young Ampezzang laughed, but Frau Ampezzang, seeing how red John’s face became, looked kindly at him and said it didn’t matter, as they had plenty of the little spokes, and some of them often were broken.