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Erckmann-Chatrian

"The Man-Wolf and Other Tales"

--_Transl_.


THE SCAPEGOAT.

Doesn't everybody at Tubingen know the lamentable history of the quarrel
between the Seigneur Kaspar Evig and the young Jew Elias Hirsch? Kaspar
Evig was courting Mademoiselle Eva Salomon, the daughter of the old
picture-dealer in the Rue de Jericho. One day he found my friend Elias
In the broker's shop, and, on what pretext I know not, he boxed his ears
soundly three or four times.
Elias Hirsch, who had begun his medical studies only about five months
before, was called upon by a council of the students to challenge the
Seigneur Kaspar to fight, a step which he took with the greatest
repugnance, for it was quite to be expected that a seigneur should be
a perfect swordsman.
For all that Elias put himself well on the defensive, and, watching his
opportunity, inserted his finely-pointed sword so neatly between the ribs
of the above-mentioned seigneur as considerably to affect his breathing,
the consequence of which was that he was dead in ten minutes.
The Rector Diemer, being informed of this transaction by credible
witnesses, listened coldly and remarked briefly--
"I understand you, gentlemen.


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