schoolmaster at Wattwil, Herr Ambühl, wrote to me to tell me of this, adding that as she had no hope of ever seeing me again, she bade me a last farewell and gave me her blessing. It was a very beautiful letter and touched me to the heart. Besides this it said, among other matters, that when the rumour had reached my homeland that I had been pressed to go to sea, my little sisters and my mother had wanted to sell all their poor garments to buy me out. At that time I had nine brothers and sisters at home. One might think they would be enough for her. But a true mother will not lose a single one, for no two are the same. Indeed, three weeks earlier she had lain in childbed, and was hardly recovered when she came to Schaffhausen for my sake. O such is a mother's love!
41. Here and there, here and there:
On one occasion when we were to stay for some time at The Crossbow in Rottweil, my master wrote to Schaffhausen to say where he was, so that if his sergeants should recruit any more men they could be sent on after him. He soon received a reply; and enclosed with it were the present from my mother, the letter from Herr Ambühl and - I jumped for joy! - a letter from Ännchen was included. This last had been opened, for she had put a Zürich guilder in it for a present and it was gone. What cared I for that? The sweet sentiments in the note were lavish compensation for me. I will not call to mind the detailed answers which I returned without delay to these missives. The one to Ännchen was as long as a slow-worm.
On this occasion we remained only a short while at Rottweil, then we went back again to dear Schaffhausen; then from time to time we made short journeys to Diessenhofen, Stein am Rhein, Frauenfeld and so on. Every week muleteers came down from the Tockenburg, I naturally took a liking to them because they were my countrymen, and I was always glad when I heard the little bells that their beasts carried. Now I made closer acquaintance with them, and on two occasions gave them letters and small gifts for my sweetheart and my brothers and sisters, but I never received any reply. I could not think why this should be. The third time, I asked one such fellow to be sure and deliver the message. He glanced at the little package, wrinkled his brow and would say neither yea nor nay. I gave him a batz. "Well, well," now said my noble countryman, "I'll see that the message is delivered." And indeed I soon had proof that it had been received safe and sound. My earlier letters and packages, on the
other hand, had of course fallen by the wayside.
In Schaffhausen at that time there were five Prussian recruiting officers lodged at different inns. Every day one of them would entertain the others. So our turn came round every fifth day. Each time it cost a louis d'or, and for that there was indeed plenty of burgundy and champagne to drink. But it was not long before they had to shut up shop, as the saying goes [...], my master had made but a poor catch there, save only for three arch-rogues who had made the place too hot to hold them. We moved once more to Rottweil. In the course of several weeks there we obtained no more than one man, a deserter from service in Piedmont
36
, he, however, gave Markoni much pleasure because he was a fellow-countryman and could speak Polish to him. For the rest, we lived a pleasant life in Rottweil. Often, in particular, we went together with another recruiting officer, our honest landlord and several clergymen, to hunt in
the vicinity of the town.
In February 1756 we made a journey to Strassburg. On the way we stayed overnight at Hasslach in the Kinzingerthal. In that same night came that terrible earthquake
37
which was felt throughout all Europe. I, however, felt nothing of it, for that day I had tired myself to death riding a carthorse. But in the morning I saw all the streets full of fallen chimney-pots, and in the forest nearby the road was strewn with fallen trees piled one upon another, so that several times we had
36
A region of northern Italy, part of the Spanish kingdom of Sardinia.
37
This happened on 1st November 1755, not in February 1756 as Bräker states, probably he has confused two journeys to Strasbourg. The centre was at Lisbon, where about 30,000 people were killed, but tremors were felt in Scotland and Turkey. (Encyclopedia Britannica, 1911).
