Rowdy close of the Auerbach chapter: New Year excess, girls, a portrait of the town and colleagues' romances [needs a human eye]
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Translated from Willi's German.
...I had a run-in with the police. At New Year I had the greatest drunk of my life. There were so many girls that one could easily have the prettiest of them - Marthe Ehrlich, Lotte, Valli Helm, Muehlgruen 2, and so on.
Auerbach itself is a curtain- and linen-manufacturing town of 25,000 inhabitants, lying in the Goeltzsch valley. It offers little for strangers, though a few excursions into the Ore Mountains and to Klingenthal are very beautiful. On the whole it may be said that I made my quarters here for a long time.
Genner had got his bride going, and Fridolin got engaged to Martha Krause when he came back, discharged from hospital, having been venereally ill.
Willi's original German, as transcribed.
hatte ich [einen Anstand(?)] mit der Polizei. Neujahr hatte ich den
größten Rausch eines Lebens. Mädchen gab es soviel daß man
die schönsten leicht haben konnte, Marthe(?) Ehrlich, Lotte,
Valli(?) Helm, [illegible], Mühlgrün 2. u. s. w. Auerbach selbst ist
eine Gardinen und Wäschefabrikstadt mit 25000 Einwohner und
liegt im Göltzschtal. Es bietet für Fremde nicht viel.
Einige Ausflüge ins Erzgebirge, Klingenthal sind sehr schön.
Im Ganzen ist [zu sagen?], daß [ich(?)] hier lange das Lager hatte.
[Genner(?)] hatte seine Braut [mobil(?)] gemacht, Fridolin hat sich
mit Martha Krause verlobt als er vom Krankenhaus entlassen wieder [kam]
(Geschlechtskrank)
Places: Auerbach im Vogtland, Goeltzschtal, Erzgebirge, Klingenthal, Muehlgruen
Interesting facts
The Ore Mountains. The Erzgebirge, or Ore Mountains, run along the Saxon-Bohemian border and are named for centuries of silver, tin and cobalt mining.
Klingenthal instruments. Klingenthal, up in the Erzgebirge, was a noted centre of musical-instrument making, especially harmonicas and accordions.
The Goeltzsch Viaduct. The Goeltzsch valley he names is crossed by the Goeltzsch Viaduct, completed in 1851 and still the largest brick-built bridge in the world.
