s of Redwitz. A
very black storm was rising in the sky, but only as yet appeared on
the horizon. E., who was with us, proposed to go home, but Dittmar
persisted, saying that the canal was but a few steps away. God permitted
that it should not be I who replied with these fatal words. So he went
on. The sunset was splendid: I see it still; its violet clouds all
fringed with gold, for I remember the smallest details of that evening.

"Dittmar went down first; he was the only one of us who knew how to
swim; so he walked before us to show us the depth. The water was about
up to our chests, and he, who preceded us, was up to his shoulders,
when he warned us not to go farther, because he was ceasing to feel
the bottom. He immediately gave up his footing and began to swim, but
scarcely had he made ten strokes when, having reached the place where
the river separates into two branches, he uttered a cry, and as he
was trying to get a foothold, disappeared. We ran at once to the bank,
hoping to be able to help him more easily; but we had neither poles nor
ropes within reach, and, as I have told you, neither of us could swim.
Then we called for help with all our might. At that moment Dittmar
reappeared, and by an unheard-of effort seized the end of a willow
branch that was hanging over the water; but the branch was not strong
enough to resist, and our friend sank again, as though he had been
struck by apoplexy. Can you imagine the state in which we were, we his
friends, bending over the river, our fixed and haggard eyes trying to
pierce its depth? My God, my God! how was it we did not go mad?

"A great crowd, however, had run at our cries. For two hours they sought
far him with boats and drag-hooks; and at last they succeeded in drawing
his body from the gulf. Yesterday we bore it solemnly to the field of
rest.

"Thus with the end of this spring has begun the serious summer of my
life. I greeted it in a grave and melancholy mood, and you behold me
now, if not consoled, at least strengthened by religion, which, thanks
to the merits of Christ, gives me the assurance of meeting my friend in
heaven, from the heights of which he will inspire me with strength to
support the trials of this life; and now I do not desire anything more
except to know you free from all anxiety in regard to me."

Instead of serving to unite the two groups of students in a common
grief, this accident, on the contrary, did but intensify their hatred of
each o