The sergeant pounced on it, exclaiming:
"A thaler profit, comrades!—we'll have a drink at once!"
Beer was ordered from the inn, in which they were quartered; and while they were drinking, the sergeant turned to me and said:
"Are you thirsty lad? You are? Very well, then, go into the yard, lift your face to the clouds, and open your mouth wide—it's raining heavily! When you have quenched your thirst from the clouds, stand guard at the gate."
I had to obey, and stand guard; but I did not quench my thirst with rain water.
After a while I heard loud voices in the bar-room. The inn-keeper's wife was accusing the soldiers of stealing the thaler given to her by the sergeant for the beer. She said it had been taken from the drawer, while she was attending to her work in the kitchen.
"Which of you fellows stole the thaler?" angrily demanded the sergeant.
No one answered; whereupon the sergeant proceeded to flog the men, one after the other, with a bunch of hazel-switches. But the thaler was not found.
Then the five soldiers seized the sergeant, and paid back what he had loaned them; as each had received six blows, the number delivered to him in payment amounted to thirty.
"Fine discipline!" I said to myself. "Fine discipline, where the sergeant flogs his men, and the men flog the sergeant in turn! It's a fine service I've got into, I must say."