Through the long dark court ran a gutter, with blood always
standing in it, while at the end of one of the side wings a beef,
killed the night before, hung on a broad ladder leaning against the
house. Fortunately I never had to witness the preceding scenes, except
when pigs were slaughtered. Then it was sometimes unavoidable. One day
is still fresh in my memory. I was standing in the hall and gazing out
through the open back door into the court, where it just happened that
several persons were down on the ground struggling with a pig that was
squealing its last. I was paralyzed with horror. As soon as I
recovered control of myself I took to my heels, running down the
street, through the town gate, and out to the "Vineyard," a favorite
resort of the Ruppiners. But before I had finally reached that place I
sat down on the top of a hummock to rest and catch my breath. I stayed
away the whole forenoon. At dinner I was called upon to give an
account of myself. "For heaven's sake, boy, where have you been so
long?" I made a clean breast of the matter, saying that I had been put
to flight by the spectacle down in the court and that half way to the
"Vineyard" I had rested on a hummock and leaned my back against a
crumbling pillar. "Why, there you sat in perfect composure on Gallows
Hill," said my father, laughing. Feeling as though the noose were
being laid about my neck, I begged permission to leave the table.
It was also at this time that I entered the primary school, which was
nothing unusual, inasmuch as I was going on seven years of age.
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