He was a German lad who did not know enough to come in out of the rain; but he was exasperatingly good, and had a prodigious memory.

One Sunday he made himself the envy of all the youth and the talk of all the admiring village, by reciting three thousand verses of Scripture without missing a word; then he went off the very next day and got drowned.
Circumstances gave to his death a peculiar impressiveness.

We were all bathing in a muddy creek which had a deep hole in it, and in this hole the coopers had sunk a pile of green hickory hoop poles to soak, some twelve feet under water.

We were diving and 'seeing who could stay under longest.' We managed to remain down by holding on to the hoop poles.
Dutchy made such a poor success of it that he was hailed with laughter and derision every time his head appeared above water.

At last he seemed hurt with the taunts, and begged us to stand still on the bank and be fair with him and give him an honest count--'be friendly and kind just this once, and not miscount for the sake of having the fun of laughing at him.' Treacherous winks were exchanged, and all said 'All right, Dutchy--go ahead, we'll play fair.' Dutchy plunged in, but the boys, instead of beginning to count, followed the lead of one of their number and scampered to a range of blackberry bushes close by and hid behind it.