For instance:
The prisoner must pay, for the "privilege" of entering,
a sum equivalent to 20 cents of our money; for the privilege
of leaving, when his term had expired, 20 cents; for every
day spent in the prison, 12 cents; for fire and light,
12 cents a day. The jailer furnishes coffee, mornings,
for a small sum; dinners and suppers may be ordered
from outside if the prisoner chooses - and he is allowed
to pay for them, too.
Here and there, on the walls, appeared the names
of American students, and in one place the American
arms and motto were displayed in colored chalks.
With the help of my friend I translated many of the inscriptions.
Some of them were cheerful, others the reverse.
I will give the reader a few specimens:
"In my tenth semester (my best one), I am cast here
through the complaints of others. Let those who follow
me take warning."
"III TAGE OHNE GRUND ANGEBLICH AUS NEUGIERDE." Which is to say,
he had a curiosity to know what prison life was like;
so he made a breach in some law and got three days for it.
It is more than likely that he never had the same
curiosity again.
(TRANSLATION.) "E. Glinicke, four days for being too eager
a spectator of a row."
"F. Graf Bismarck - 27-29, II, '74." Which means that
Count Bismarck, son of the great statesman, was a prisoner
two days in 1874.
(TRANSLATION.) "R. Diergandt - for Love - 4 days."
Many people in this world have caught it heavier than
for the same indiscretion.
This one is terse. I translate:
"Four weeks for MISINTERPRETED GALLANTRY." I wish
the sufferer had explained a little more fully.
A four-week term is a rather serious matter.
There were many uncomplimentary references, on the walls,
to a certain unpopular dignitary. One sufferer had got
three days for not saluting him. Another had "here two days
slept and three nights lain awake," on account of this
same "Dr. K." In one place was a picture of Dr. K. hanging
on a gallows.
Here and there, lonesome prisoners had eased the heavy time
by altering the records left by predecessors. Leaving the
name standing, and the date and length of the captivity,
they had erased the description of the misdemeanor,
and written in its place, in staring capitals, "FOR THEFT!"
or "FOR MURDER!" or some other gaudy crime. In one place,
all by itself, stood this blood-curdling word:
"Rache!" [1]
1. "Revenge!"
There was no name signed, and no date. It was an
inscription well calculated to pique curiosity.
One would greatly like to know the nature of the wrong
that had been done, and what sort of vengeance was wanted,
and whether the prisoner ever achieved it or not.
But there was no way of finding out these things.
Occasionally, a name was followed simply by the remark,
"II days, for disturbing the peace," and without comment
upon the justice or injustice of the sentence.
In one place was a hilarious picture of a student of the
green cap corps with a bottle of champagne in each hand;
and below was the legend: "These make an evil fate endurable."
There were two prison cells, and neither had space left on
walls or ceiling for another name or portrait or picture.
The inside surfaces of the two doors were completely
covered with CARTES DE VISITE of former prisoners,
ingeniously let into the wood and protected from dirt
and injury by glass.
I very much wanted one of the sorry old tables which
the prisoners had spent so many years in ornamenting
with their pocket-knives, but red tape was in the way.
The custodian could not sell one without an order from
a superior; and that superior would have to get it from
HIS superior; and this one would have to get it from
a higher one - and so on up and up until the faculty
should sit on the matter and deliver final judgment.
The system was right, and nobody could find fault with it;
but it did not seem justifiable to bother so many people,
so I proceeded no further. It might have cost me more than
I could afford, anyway; for one of those prison tables,
which was at the time in a private museum in Heidelberg,
was afterward sold at auction for two hundred and fifty dollars.
It was not worth more than a dollar, or possibly a dollar
and half, before the captive students began their work
on it. Persons who saw it at the auction said it was
so curiously and wonderfully carved that it was worth
the money that was paid for it.
Among them many who have tasted the college prison's
dreary hospitality was a lively young fellow from one
of the Southern states of America, whose first year's
experience of German university life was rather peculiar.
The day he arrived in Heidelberg he enrolled his name
on the college books, and was so elated with the fact
that his dearest hope had found fruition and he was
actually a student of the old and renowned university,
that he set to work that very night to celebrate the event
by a grand lark in company with some other students.
In the course of his lark he managed to make a wide
breach in one of the university's most stringent laws.
Sequel: before noon, next day, he was in the college
prison - booked for three months. The twelve long weeks
dragged slowly by, and the day of deliverance came at last.
A great crowd of sympathizing fellow-students received
him with a rousing demonstration as he came forth,
and of course there was another grand lark - in the course
of which he managed to make a wide breach of the CITY'S
most stringent laws.
