"I have no stomach for fisticuffs and whizzing beer-mugs," said Gerlach.
"Never mind, come along. I have undertaken to initiate you into the mysteries of elections, and you are to get a correct idea of the life action of a cultivated state."
They entered an obscure alley where a fetid, sultry atmosphere assailed them. Greifmann stopped before a lofty house, and pointed to a transparency on which a brimming beer-tankard was represented. A wild tumult was audible through the windows, through which the cry of "Shund!" rose at times like the swell of a great wave from the midst of corrupted waters. As they were passing the doorway a dense fog of tobacco smoke mingled with divers filthy odors assailed their nostrils. Seraphin, who was accustomed to inhaling the pure atmosphere of the country, showed an inclination to retreat, and had already half-way faced about when his companion seized and held him. "Courage, my friend! wade into the slough boldly," cried he into the struggling youth's ear. "Hereafter, when you will be riding through woodland and meadows, the recollection of this subterranean den will enable you to appreciate the pure atmosphere of the country twice as well. Look at those sodden faces and swollen heads. Those fellows are literally wallowing and seething in beer, and they feel as comfortable as ten thousand cannibals. It is really a joy to be among men who are natural."
The millionaires, having with no little difficulty succeeded in finding seats, were accosted by a female waiter.
"Do the gentlemen wish to have election beer?"
"No," replied Gerlach.
His abrupt tone in declining excited the surprise of the fellows who sat next to them. Several of them stared at the landholder.
"So you don't want any election beer?" cried a fellow who was pretty well fired.
"Why not? May be it isn't good enough for you?"
"Oh, yes! oh, yes!" replied the banker hastily. "You see, Mr. Shund" -
"That's good! You call me Shund," interrupted the fellow with a coarse laugh. "My name isn't Shund-my name is Koenig-yes, Koenig-with all due respect to you."
"Well, Mr. Koenig-you see, Mr. Koenig, we decline drinking election beer because we are not entitled to it-we do not belong to this place."
"Ah, yes-well, that's honest!" lauded Koenig. "Being that you are a couple of honest fellows, you must partake of some of the good things of our feast. I say, Kate," cried he to the female waiter, "bring these gentlemen some of the election sausages."
Greifmann, perceiving that Seraphin was about putting in a protest, nudged him.
"What feast are you celebrating to-day?" inquired the banker.
"That I will explain to you. We are to have an election here to-morrow; these men on the ticket, you see, are to be elected." And he drew forth one of Spitzkopf's tickets. "Every one of us has received a ticket like this, and we are all going to vote according to the ticket-of course, you know, we don't do it for nothing. To-day and to-morrow, what we eat and drink is free of charge. And if Satan's own grandmother were on the ticket, I would vote for her."
"The first one on the list is Mr. Hans Shund. What sort of a man is he?" asked Seraphin. "No doubt he is the most honorable and most respectable man in the place!"
"Ha! ha! that's funny! The most honorable man in the place! Really you make me laugh. Never mind, however, I don't mean to be impolite. You are a stranger hereabout, and cannot, of course, be expected to know anything of it. Shund, you see, was formerly-that, is a couple of days ago-Shund was a man of whom nobody knew any good. For my part, I wouldn't just like to be sticking in Shund's hide. Well, that's the way things are: you know it won't do to babble it all just as it is. But you understand me. To make a long story short, since day before yesterday Shund is the honestest man in the world. Our men of money have made him that, you know," giving a sly wink. "What the men of money do, is well done, of course, for the proverb says, 'Whose bread I eat, his song I sing.'"
"Shut your mouth, Koenig! What stuff is that you are talking there?" said another fellow roughly. "Hans Shund is a free-spirited, clever, first-class, distinguished man. Taken altogether, he is a liberal man. For this reason he will be elected councilman to-morrow, then mayor of the city, and finally member of the assembly."
"That's so, that's so, my partner is right," confirmed Koenig. "But listen, Flachsen, you will agree that formerly-you know, formerly-he was an arrant scoundrel."
"Why was he? Why?" inquired Flachsen.
"Why? Ha, ha! I say, Flachsen, go to Shund's wife, she can tell you best. Go to those whom he has reduced to beggary, for instance, to Holt over there. They all can tell you what Shund is, or rather what he has been. But don't get mad, brother Flachsen! Spite of all that, I shall vote for Shund. That's settled." And he poured the contents of his beer-pot down his throat.
"As you gentlemen are strangers, I will undertake to explain this business for you," said Flachsen, who evidently was an agent for the lower classes, and who did his best to put on an appearance of learning by affecting high-sounding words of foreign origin.
"Shund is quite a rational man, learned and full of intelligence. But the priests have calumniated him horribly because he will not howl with them. For this reason we intend to elect him, not for the sake of the free beer. When Shund will have been elected, a system of economy will be inaugurated, taxes will be removed, and the encyclical letter with which the Pope has tried to stultify the people, together with the syllabus, will be sent to the dogs. And in the legislative assembly the liberal-minded Shund will manage to have the priests excluded from the schools, and we will have none but secular schools. In short, the dismal rule of the priesthood that would like to keep the people in leading-strings will be put an end to, and liberal views will control our affairs. As for Shund's doings outside of legitimate wedlock, that is one of the boons of liberty-it is a right of humanity; and when Koenig lets loose against Shund's money speculations, he is only talking so much bigoted nonsense."
Flachsen's apologetic discourse was interrupted by a row that took place at the next table. There sat a victim of Shund's usury, the land-cultivator Holt. He drank no beer, but wine, to dispel gloomy thoughts and the temptations of desperation. It had cost him no ordinary struggle to listen quietly to eulogies passed on Shund. He had maintained silence, and had at times smiled a very peculiar smile. His bruised heart must have suffered a fearful contraction as he heard men sounding the praises of a wretch whom he knew to be wicked and devoid of conscience. For a long time he succeeded in restraining himself. But the wine he had drunk at last fanned his smouldering passion into a hot flame of rage, and, clenching his fist, he struck the table violently.
"The fellow whom you extol is a scoundrel!" cried he.
"Who is a scoundrel?" roared several voices.
"Your man, your councilman, your mayor, is a scoundrel! Shund is a scoundrel!" cried the ruined countryman passionately.
"And you, Holt, are a fool!"
"You are drunk, Holt!"
"Holt is an ass," maintained Flachsen. "He cannot read, otherwise he would have seen in the Evening Gazette that Shund is a man of honor, a friend of the people, a progressive man, a liberal man, a brilliant genius, a despiser of religion, a death-dealer to superstition, a-a-I don't remember what all besides. Had you read all that in the evening paper, you fool, you wouldn't presume to open your foul mouth against a man of honor like Hans Shund. Yes, stare; if you had read the evening paper, you would have seen the enumeration of the great qualities and deeds of Hans Shund in black and white."
"The evening paper, indeed!" cried Holt contemptuously. "Does the evening paper also mention how Shund brought about the ruin of the father of a family of eight children?"
"What's that you say, you dog?" yelled a furious fellow. "That's a lie against Shund!"
"Easy, Graeulich, easy," replied Holt to the last speaker, who was about to set upon him. "It is not a lie, for I am the man whom Shund has strangled with his usurer's clutches. He has reduced me to beggary-me and my wife and my children."
Graeulich lowered his fists,