When released from prison, he was attached for six weeks to the class of culprits who are never permitted to leave the barracks, but are bound to answer the call at every moment. He now cursed his resolution to become a soldier, which bound him for six years to the land of his birth. He would have gone away, far as could be.
One morning his mother Maria came with a letter from Matthew, in America. He had sent four hundred florins for Aloys to buy a field with, or, if he wished to join him, to buy himself clear of the army.
Aloys and Matthew of the Hill, with his wife and eight children,--Mechtilde among them,--left for America that same autumn.
While at sea he often hummed the curious but well-known old song, which he had never understood before:--
"Here, here, here, and here,
The ship is on her way;
There, there, there, and there,
The skipper goes to stay;
When the winds do rave and roar
As though the ship could swim no more,