Transcriber's Note:
1. Page scan source:http://www.archive.org/details/anoldstorymyfar02reutgoog
Each volume sold separately at the price of M 1,60.
COLLECTION
OF
GERMAN AUTHORS
TAUCHNITZ EDITION.
VOL. 34.
AN OLD STORY OF MY FARMING DAYS.
By FRITZ REUTER.
IN THREE VOLUMES.--VOL. 1.
LEIPZIG: BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ.
LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON & COMPANY, LIMITED.
ST. DUNSTAN'S HOUSE, FETTER LANE, FLEET STREET E.C.
PARIS: LIBRAIRIE C. REINWALD, 15, RUE DES SAINTS-PÈRES; THE
GALIGNANI LIBRARY, 224, RUE DE RIVOLI.
This Collection of German Authors may be introduced
into England or any other country.
COLLECTION
OF
GERMAN AUTHORS.
VOL. 34.
AN OLD STORY
OF MY FARMING DAYS BY FRITZ REUTER.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
TAUCHNITZ EDITION:
By the same Author,
IN THE YEAR '13: . . . . . . . . 1 vol.
AN OLD STORY
OF MY FARMING DAYS
(UT MINE STROMTID)
BY
FRITZ REUTER,
AUTHOR OF "IN THE YEAR '13:"
FROM THE GERMAN
BY
M. W. MACDOWALL.
IN THREE VOLUMES.
VOL. I.
Authorized Edition.
LEIPZIG 1878
BERNHARD TAUCHNITZ.
LONDON: SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE & RIVINGTON.
CROWN BUILDINGS, 188, FLEET STREET.
PARIS: C. REINWALD & CIE, 15, RUE DES SAINTS PÈRES.
Well, well, it was not always so.--The father of the man who now ridesto town with white reins for his horse, and who drinks his couple ofbottles of champagne, had probably nothing better than small beer withwhich to quench his thirst, and had his reins tied together with hiswife's garter. Ah, those were hard times in Mecklenburg when wheat wassold in barrels on the public road for sixteen pence a bushel, goodmeasure too, to the labourers to feed their pigs with, and when, as inRostock, a whole load of oats was given in exchange for a loaf ofsugar.
Mecklenburg is a beautiful and a rich land, just the kind of countrythat delights a farmer, but at the time of which I am speaking therewas great poverty and distress throughout the length and breadth of it,and the collector knocked at every door, and demanded that the rentshould be paid, and whoever had anything to give, gave his last penny,and he who had nothing to give was sold up.
Let no one imagine from this that our country-people hobbled about theland like scare-crows during these hard times, or that one could readthe "Vater-unser" through their sunken cheeks--Nay!--they were as trueMecklenburgers every bit then as now, only they had to managedifferently. Now-a-days one says: "Butter costs a