_Chap. vi._: A story of a trick that Simplicissimus played at the spa
_Chap. vii._: How Herzbruder died and how Simplicissimus again fell to wanton courses
_Chap. viii._: How Simplicissimus found his second marriage turn out, and how he met with his dad and learned who his parents had been
_Chap. ix._: In what manner the pains of childbirth came upon him, and how he became a widower
_Chap. x._: Relation of certain peasants concerning the wonderful Mummelsee
_Chap. xi._: Of the marvellous thanksgiving of a patient, and of the holy thoughts thereby awakened in Simplicissimus
_Chap. xii._: How Simplicissimus journeyed with the sylphs to the centre of the earth
_Chap. xvii._: How Simplicissimus returned from the middle of the earth, and of his strange fancies, his air-castles, his calculations; and how he reckoned without his host
_Chap. xviii._: How Simplicissimus wasted his spring in the wrong place
_Chap. xx._: Treats of a trifling promenade from the Black Forest to Moscow in Russia
_Chap. xxi._: How Simplicissimus further fared in Moscow
_Chap. xxii._: By what a short and merry road he came home to his dad
_Chap. xxiii._: Is very short and concerneth Simplicissimus alone
_Chap. xxiv._: Why and in what fashion Simplicissimus left the world again
_Chap. xix._: How Simplicissimus and a carpenter escaped from a shipwreck with their lives and were thereafter provided with a land of their own
_Chap. xx._: How they hired a fair cook-maid and by God's help were rid of her again
_Chap. xxi._: How they thereafter kept house together and how they set to work
_Chap. xxii._: Further sequel of the above story, and how Simon Meron left the island and this life, and how Simplicissimus remained the sole lord of the island
_Chap. xxiii._: In which the hermit concludes his story and therewith ends these his six books
"Continuatio," _chap. xiii._: How Simplicissimus in return for a night's lodging, taught his host a curious art
[Illustration: Frontispiece of the First Edition from the Ducal Library. Wolf Buettel.]
The translation here presented to the public is intended rather as a contribution to the history, or perhaps it should be said the sociology, of the momentous period to which the romance of "Simplicissimus" belongs, than as a specimen of literature. Effective though its situations are, consistent and artistic though its composition is (up to a certain point), its interest lies chiefly in the pictures, or rather photographs, of contemporary manners and characters which it presents. It has been said with some truth that if succeeding romancers had striven as perseveringly as our author to embody the spirit and reflect the ways of the people, German fiction might long ago have reached as high a development as the English novel. As it is, there is little of such spirit to be discovered in the prose romances which appeared between the time of Grimmelshausen and that of Jean Paul Richter. But the influence of the latter was completely swept away in the torrent of idealism by which the fictions of the idolised Goethe and his followers were characterised, and his domestic realism has only of late made its reappearance in disquieting and sordid forms.