t off suddenly, my
hair was singed or my forehead burned. Nothing worse ever happened,
for the angel was protecting me with his shield.

That was the element of fire. But we also came in contact with water,
which was not to be wondered at in a seaport.

In the autumn of 1831 a Berlin relative made me a present of a cannon,
not just an ordinary child's plaything, such as can be bought of any
coppersmith or tinner, but a so-called pattern-cannon, such as is seen
only in arsenals,--a splendid specimen, of great beauty and elegance,
the carriage firm and neat, the barrel highly polished and about a
foot and a half long. I was more than delighted, and determined to
proceed at once to a bombardment of Swinemuende. Two boys of my age and
my younger brother climbed with me into a boat lying at Klempin's
Clapper, and we rowed down-stream, with the cannon in the bow. When we
were about opposite the Society House I considered that the time had
arrived for the beginning of the bombardment, and fired three shots,
waiting after each shot to see whether the people on the "Bulwark"
took notice of us, and whether they showed due respect for the
seriousness of our actions. But neither of these things happened. A
thing that did happen, however, was that we meanwhile got out into the
current, were caught by it and carried away, and when we suddenly saw
ourselves between the embankments of the moles, I was suddenly seized
with a terrible fright. I realized that, if we kept on in this way, in
ten minutes more we should be out at sea and might drift away toward
Bornholm and the Swedish coast. It was a desperate situation, and we
finally resorted to the least brave, but most sensible, means
imaginable, and began to scream with all our might, all the time
beckoning and waving various objects, showing on the whole
considerable cleverness in the invention of distress signals. At last
we attracted the attention of some pilots standing on the West mole,
who shook their fingers threateningly at us, but finally, with smiling
countenances, threw us a rope. That rescued us from danger. One of the
pilots knew me; his son was one of my playmates. This doubtless
accounts for the fact that the seamen dismissed us with a few
epithets, which might have been worse. I took my cannon under my arm,
but not without having the satisfaction of seeing it admired. Then I
went home, after promising to send out Hans Ketelboeter, a lusty
sailor-boy who lived quite nea