Unlike the easy-going Spaniard, who thinks nothing
of Sunday, working on that as on any other day, the
Saxon hails Sunday as (excepting Easter and Christmas
Days) his real day of rest, — rest in its truest sense,
religious worship and moderate recreation. As a rule,
whether Lutheran or Roman Catholic, the Saxon
miner goes to church on Sunday morning. At one

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322 SPANISH BLACK COUNTBT.
o'clock the German Sunday is considered, so far as
the strictly religious observance is concerned, at an
end; and at two o'clock the amusements or recrea-
tions of the day commence.
These recreations consist of concerts in the restau-
rants or beer-gardens of the town. He cannot, so
poorly is he paid, afford to go to the garden where
the military band plays, and where the fee for admis-
sion is three groschen (i. e. threepence), so he goes to
hear one of his own bands play. In the garden he
meets his sweetheart, who comes attended by her
mother and others of the family, and, when once the
nervous eye of love- has espied its object, lie gets a
seat at the same table, and soon gets into conversation
with the fair-haired girl of his choice.
Soon, after a few interviews of this kind, the couple
become engaged, and then the lady is supposed to be
his property, and he has the privilege of always
paying for her share of refreshments, but never for
that of her mother !

Then evening draws on and dancing commences,
the officer in plain clothes not thinking it beneath
him to stand as vis-cl-vis to the homely miner and his
girl.
