Excerpt from Twenty Exercises in German Composition

When Karl told his mother that his father would1 not give him the musket, she asked whether it was right otz him in this way constantly to annoy the old gentleman. Since she knew, ' however, that her son would be punished if he came without [a] musket, she wished, if possible, to help him. Accord ingly, she went to her husband and told him that the Society of (the) Seven was [going] to meet in the evening,5 and that she believed there6 was something political [coming up]. A few minutes later, Hediger put on his hat and left. Then she laughingly told her son that he might now take the musket; for his father would certainly not return before ten o'clock.

After Karl had come back from the parade ground and had eaten his supper, he went down' to the lake. It was a glorious evening and the lake was beautifully lighted up by the moon. In a little boat which he hired he rowed along the shore until he saw that a slender maiden had stepped into another boat and was following8 him. She soon came up [alongside] and the young people, after they had greeted each other, rowed far out upon the lake, and did not draw in their oars until all was quiet and lonely about them. Then they began to talk, among other things, of the davs when 1� they had played together as children; and they remembered how they had built themselves a little cabin out of the boards that they found among the large piles of lumber on the shore. But although Karl recalled how they had often kissed each other in those days, Hermine, his friend, had quite forgotten such familiari ties; and when the young man attempted to draw near to her, she pushed his boat away so violently that he almost fell into the water.

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