As always, the italicized parts are what I'm unsure about:
In the arbor of the Pronitt parish garden, thickly overgrown with pipe-leaf, the coffee table was set. A bowl piled high with freshly baked [Glumse] cakes stood in the middle of the table, framed by two old-fashioned vases of autumnal flowers. The lush yellow-gold of the dough with the many dark spots of the large and small raisins tempted even the finest taste; because no one was as good at [Glumse] cakes as the pastor's wife; for a long time she'd had this calling in the whole area. In a silver can, an old heirloom of the priest's family that has survived for centuries, the [Schmandt] gleamed. The coffee was not there yet; it would be prepared only when the visit was drawing near.
The priest sat in a comfortable garden chair and read the newspaper that had just arrived. He was a man of medium size and muscular build. On the stocky [Kumpfe] sat a big, angular head with white - but still very thick - hair, a firm mouth, and small, mouse-gray eyes that dreamed under bushy brows. Earlier they had certainly flashed; now they had become stiller - a true authentic scholarly head with a penchant for pensiveness, but not without inclination to action. In the stubbornness of this seventy years, still fresh moves, the expression of a maturity and clarity; the one to look at him
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thought that it was won only after many a hard battle.
His wife lookt much older and more worry worn than he, although she was ten years younger. She had a small, delicate face and a tired sound in her voice; she still suffered from the early death of the only, hopeful son. The oppositions of life that made him strong and firm had broken her. A foot pain that had appeared a year ago forced her to use a cane for help while walking; nevertheless she was constantly active in her housekeeping.
"Well I knew that Hans wouldn't forget his old teacher," the priest said as he put forth cigar and newspaper. "How often have we sat here and discussed all sorts of theological and philosophical questions! Even then he had the distinct nature of a lecturer. That he has completely passed over to priestly service really surprises me."
"It hasn't been a big jump for him," replied his wife, who - with events as with people - tried to bring out the littlest bit of good.
"Don't say that. He has a large and educated audience in Rodenburg, where he can work much good in the congregation."
"Eventually he will take over Bärwalde and become your patron."
"I couldn't think of a better - but isn't someone coming there? Right, he is it! Welcome and greetings in God, my dear Warsow! You don't even know how very happy you make the old man through your visit!"
With warmth, Hans returned the greeting of his former teacher. The quick walk through
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the fresh autumn air had woven a brownish shimmer around his pale face; his eyes shone youthfully. Now he sat with both ages under the dense pipe-leaf arbor as he so often did in earlier years, and memories from past times came alive.
A young girl appeared and brought the coffee.
"Hanna Teichgräber, Theo's daughter, who now lives with us as my and the grandmother's faithful assistant," introduced the old gentleman. And Hans' eye lingered with pleasure on the lovely vision, whose well-built body came in the simple linen dress with the white apron at the right length, while the yellow-blonde hair was combed to both sides over her forehead. A trace of purity and freshness lay on the rosy face, spoke from the velvet-blue eyes, in which - compared to someone of so few years - were strength and determination. The freshness of the swelling life that the maturity pushed against breathed around the whole figure.
The golden sunlight lay full and soft on the pipe-leaves and now and then forced itself an entrance into the silent dark of the arbor. Outside a few doves flew here and there and bathed the bright [Schwingen] in the air; in the fruit trees chirpt the sparrows so much louder than the day inclined itself.
Wonderfully, this image full of quiet calm and still, cherished peace touched Hans' soul. He thought about the inner struggles, the draining uneasiness that he suffered through recently. This contrast, however, was not reconciled to him; he knew that his life would still face many a difficult struggle. At the same time, he felt within himself strength and courage to take it on.
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A slight autumn fog crept over the earth; the air became even more pure, but at the same time also cool. The priest suggested a walk with Hans when one heard the approach of a carriage.
"The Bärwald taxi!" cried Hanna, and a peculiar vehicle rolled up: a single gray-upholstered seat with a high back on a strange, ornate, yellow-painted wheeled frame. On it lay, stretched out at length, Fritz Warsow, and with a casual hand he drove the gentle mare that one groomed to harness in front of this vehicle. Even two, possibly three, people could travel on the taxi; as far as space is concerned, they had to sit on both sides, back to back, and be very slim and little, and the third perhaps in front in order to hold the lead. But now Fritz was the absolute ruler and made himself comfortable.
The old priest wanted to introduce again, but Fritz interrupted him: "I have already had the pleasure to welcome the kind young lady on one of her Samaritan errands in Bärwald."
And when in this moment, a bottle of red wine appeared on the table, he couldn't refrain from telling the story about old Karenke and the ten bottles of Onkels though without in any way connecting it to Hanna's good work. The priest and his wife laughed, but she understood his intention very well. However, she didn't let herself lose her composure in the least; yes, from her eyes a quick, battle-brave look met him, a look that said, "Just wait! Perhaps my hour is coming too; then we'll get even!" That was just what he liked. He wanted to embarrass her, and she pickt up the gauntlet.
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The evening came creeping on soft feet. The sun sank lower, out of the valley rose the gold and hung itself in glistening chains on the white-gray cloud bank that lined the horizon. Once more the sun reached through with crimson hands and lookt on the earth with fiery eyes. The sparrows chirpt even more quietly; the doves too had gone to bed on their [Schlag] in the hayloft. It had become very quiet in the world; a faint wind came from the meadows and carried over autumnal scents. Deep evening-peace covered the parsonage, its garden, and its farmstead with broad, shadowing pinions; from the church across the way, the evening bells rang a few times, then they fell silent.
"Wonderful," Fritz said then. He had indulged himself until then in silent devotion of this celebratory evening mood while the others carried on a casual conversation around him. "When one sits here like this in the middle of this [Pfarridnlle] this evening, which fills the world with its Sabbath calm, then for one it's as it always has to stay on earth, as it could never become different. And when one then thinks about it, how all of a sudden going to war over these peaceful valleys, how it can wake us all up out of the carefree calm of the peaceful delight of nature!"
He could not continue talking. His words had fallen like a spark of fire in the small gathering. "War!?" cried Hans. "How do you get to war all of a sudden?"
"War!" the pastor said at the same time, and - his hands instinctively folded in his manner - he added: "God in mercy keep us from it!" The pastor's frail wife, however, had become deathly pale,
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a stuttering twitch ran over her bloodless lips, she wanted to say something, but the word died away before she could utter it.
Hanna noticed it and caressed her hand reassuringly: "Don't bother, Grandmother. The captain is inclined to be very belligerent to-day; he has been since his entrance, but he means no harm."
"I don't at all know why the government gets so excited about my word. We certainly cannot always stay in peace, and being prepared means everything here. Or did we want to hide from ourselves that we are surrounded all around by a world of enemies, who wait only for the given moment while we are still here lulling ourselves to sleep in the most delightful dreams of love and fraternization?"
"If the war comes, it comes from God, and we have to get used to it," opined the old priest. "To think about it now is possibly a little premature."
"I don't even know how you suddenly come up with these thoughts, Fritz," and with a quick, rebuking look, Hans pointed out the pastor's old wife; fear peered out of every feature of her wilted face.
Now Fritz saw what he caused. "You're right," he said, relenting, "it was just a silly idea that this peaceful evening gave me. Since we like to live and think in opposites."
