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SUMMER PLEASURES AND RAMBLES.
Wholly unlike these, genuinely and solely a product of Keilhau, was the great battle-game which we called Bergwacht, one of my brightest memories of those years.
Long preparations were needed, and these, too, were delightful.
On the wooded plain at the summit of the Kolm, a mountain which belonged mainly to the institute, war was waged during the summer every Saturday evening until far into the night, whenever the weather was fine, which does not happen too often in Thuringia.
The whole body of pupils was divided into three, afterwards into four sections, each of which had its own citadel.

After two had declared war against two others, the battle raged until one party captured the strongholds of the other.

This was done as soon as a combatant had set foot on the hearth of a hostile fortress.
The battle itself was fought with stakes blunted at the tops.

Every one touched by the weapon of an enemy must declare himself a prisoner.