style="font-size:15px;"> Aloys rose early in the morning, brushed up his shako, burnished the plating of his sword, and the buckler and buttons, more than if he had been ordered on guard before the staff. At the first sound of the church-bell he was completely dressed, and at the second bell he walked into the village.
Two little boys were talking as they passed him.
"Why, that's the gawk, a'n't it?" said one.
"No, it a'n't," said the other.
"Yes, it is," rejoined the first.
Aloys looked at them grimly, and they ran away with their hymn-books. Amid the friendly greetings of the villagers he approached the church. He passed Mary Ann's house; but no one looked out: he looked behind him again and again as he walked up the hill. The third bell rang, and he entered the church; Mary Ann was not there: he stood at the door; but she was not among the late-comers. The singing began, but Mary Ann's voice was not heard: he would have known it among a thousand. What was the universal admiration to him now? she did not see him, for whom he had travelled the long road, and for whom he now stood firm and straight as a statue. He heard little of the sermon; but, when the minister pronounced the bans of Mary Ann Bomiller, of Nordstetten, and George Melzer, of Wiesenstetten, poor Aloys no longer stood like a statue. His knees knocked under him, and his teeth chattered. He was the first who left the church. He ran home like a crazy man, threw his sword and his shako on the floor, hid himself in the hay-loft, and wept. More than once he thought of hanging himself, but he could not rise for dejection: all his limbs were palsied. Then he would remember his poor mother, and sob and cry aloud.
At last his mother came and found him in the hay-loft, cried with him, and tried to comfort him. "It was high time they were married," was the burden of her tale of Mary Ann. He wept long and loud; but at last he followed his mother like a lamb into the room. Seeing his picture, he tore it from the wall and dashed it to pieces on the floor. For hours he sat behind the table and covered his face with his hands. Then suddenly he rose, whistled a merry tune, and asked for his dinner. He could not eat, however, but dressed himself, and went into the village. From the Adler he heard the sound of music and dancing. In passing Jacob's house, he cast down his eyes, as if he had reason to be ashamed; but when it was behind him he looked as proud as ever. Having reported himself and left his passport in the squire's hands, he went to the ball-room. He looked everywhere for Mary Ann, though he dreaded nothing more than to meet her. George was there, however. He came up to Aloys and stretched out his hand, saying, "Comrade, how are you?" Aloys looked at him as if he would have poisoned him with his eyes, then turned on his heel without a word of answer. It occurred to him that he ought to have said, "Comrade! the devil is your comrade, not I;" but it was too late now.
All the boys and girls now made him drink out of their glasses; but the wine tasted of wormwood. He sat down at a table and called for a "bottle of the best," and drank glass after glass, although it gave him no pleasure. Mechtilde, the daughter of his cousin Matthew of the Hill, stood near him, and he asked her to drink with him. She complied very readily, and remained at his side. Nobody was attentive to her: she had no sweetheart, and had not danced a round that day, as every one was constantly dancing with his or her sweetheart, or changing partners with some other.
"Mechtilde, wouldn't you like to dance?" said Aloys.
"Yes: come, let's try."
She took Aloys by the hand. He rose, put on his gloves, looked around the floor as if he had lost something, and then danced to the amazement of all the company. From politeness he took Mechtilde to a seat after the dance: by this he imposed a burden on himself, for she did not budge from his side all the evening. He cared but little for her conversation, and only pushed the glass toward her occasionally by way of invitation. His eyes were fixed fiercely on George, who sat not far from him. When some one asked the latter where Mary Ann was, he said, laughing, "She is poorly." Aloys bit his pipe till the mouthpiece broke off, and then spat it out with a "Pah!" which made George look at him furiously, thinking the exclamation addressed to him. Seeing that Aloys was quiet, he shrugged his shoulders in derision and began singing bad songs, which all had pretty much the same burden: -
"A bright boy will run through
Many a shoe;
An old fool will tear
Never a pair."
At midnight Aloys took his sword from the wall to go. George and his party now began to sing the "teaser," keeping time with their fists on the table: -
"Hey, Bob, 'ye goin' home?
'Ye gettin' scared? 'Ye gettin' sick?
Got no money, and can't get tick?
Hey, Bob, 'ye goin' home?"
Aloys turned back with some of his friends and called for two bottles more. They now sang songs of their own, while George and his gang were singing at the other table. George got up and cried, "Gawk, shut up!" Then Aloys seized a full bottle and hurled it at his head, sprang over the table, and caught him by the throat. The tables fell down, the glasses chinked on the floor, the music stopped. For a while all was still, as if the two were to throttle each other in silence: then suddenly the room was filled with shouting, whistling, scolding, and quarrelling. The bystanders interfered; but, according to custom, each party only restrained the adversary of the party he sided with, so as to give the latter a chance of drubbing his opponent undisturbed. Mechtilde held George by the head until his hair came out by handfuls. The legs of chairs were now broken off, and all hands whacked each other to their hearts' content. Aloys and George remained as if fastened together by their teeth. At length Aloys gained his feet, and threw George down with such violence that he seemed to have broken his neck, and then kneeled down on him, and would have throttled him had not the watchman entered and put an end to the row. The musicians were sent home and the two chief combatants taken to the lock-up.
With his face black and blue, pale and haggard, Aloys left the village next day. His furlough had another day to run; but what should he do at home? He was glad enough to go soldiering again; and nothing would have pleased him better than a war. The squire had endorsed the story of the fracas on his passport, and a severe punishment awaited him on his return. He looked neither to the right nor to the left, but walked away almost without knowing it, and hoping never to return. At Horb, on seeing the signpost to Freudenstadt, which is on the way to Strasbourg, he stopped a long time and thought of deserting to France. Unexpectedly he found himself addressed by Mechtilde, who asked, "Why, Aloys, are you going back to Stuttgart already?"
"Yes," he answered, and went on his way. Mechtilde had come like an angel from heaven. With a friendly good-bye, they parted.
As he walked, he found himself ever and anon humming the song he had heard George sing so long ago, and which now, indeed, suited poor Mary Ann's case: -
"In a day, in a day,
Pride and beauty fade away.
Do thy checks with gladness tingle
Where the snows and roses mingle?
Oh, the roses all decay!"
At Stuttgart he never said a word to the sentry at the Tuebingen gate nor to the one at the barrack-gate. Like a criminal, he hardly raised his eyes. For eight days he did penance in a dark cell, – the "third degree" of punishment. At times he became so impatient that he could have dashed his head against the wall; and then again he would lie for days and nights half asleep.
When released from prison, he was attached for six weeks to the class of culprits who are never permitted to leave the barracks, but are bound to answer the call at every moment. He now cursed his resolution to become a soldier, which bound him for six years to the land of his birth. He would have gone away, far as could be.
One morning his mother Maria came with
