The wanderings and fortunes of some German emigrantsGerstäcker, Friedrich
General
The wanderings and fortunes of some German emigrants
Gerstäcker, Friedrich
Germany -- Emigration and immigration -- Fiction; Immigrants -- Fiction
Is there any need of further description of these happy people?
Hardly--Love and Friendship made to them their rude home in the woods a
paradise, and the old doctor, who had been already vegetating there for
many long years past, forsaken and alone, completely revived, in the
midst of them, to a new and almost-forgotten existence.
What became of the other settlers remained for the most part unknown.
Von Schwanthal had gone to Arkansas, as already mentioned; the elder
Siebert was subsequently met by Becher in New Orleans, but he was not
destined long to enjoy the fruits of his breach of trust; he died of
yellow fever, and was robbed, by a mulatto woman, who had waited on him
during his brief sickness, of everything which he called his, and, by
reason of total absence of funds, was earthed away with a thousand
others whom "Yellow Jack" had swept off about the same time, in the
Potter's field, in a wet, swampy soil. The brewer made his way to
Cincinnati, and was quite hearty, when the shoemaker subsequently met
him there; Herbold, too, started a distillery, somewhere in Ohio state,
and Schmidt was, after a lapse of some years, reported to have been seen
in Illinois. The poor tailor fared, perhaps, the most strangely; he was
very lucky at first, went to Little Rock, got work there, and earned so
much money that he was enabled to begin business on his own account, in
a small way; but then bad times came, money got scarce, and saving had
to be practised, to which rule of conduct, Meier, who, by this time, had
begun to play the dandy a little, would, on no account, conform. The
natural consequence did not fail to ensue: he got into debt, and
accepted an offer of marriage from a rather elderly lady, on condition
that she should pay his debts; this was done, and Meier was now to
become a happy husband. But not wishing to carry the joke to that
length, he endeavoured to escape southward, on a steamer which happened
to be there at the time, but was discovered, and, on that very day,
united in the holy bands of matrimony to his forgiving bride.
Next year, they learnt that Dr. Normann, or Wæhler--perhaps even that
was not his real name--had been transferred to the Penitentiary of the
State; but of Turner, no further trace was ever found, save that Pastor
Hehrmann affirmed at a subsequent period that he had seen him at St.
Louis, whither he had gone on business; he had too quickly disappeared
again, however, for the former to make himself certain of the fact. Nor
did any one know the name there.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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