Section eight of The Awful German Language by Mark Twain. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain recording by Kirsten Weber, Section eight, a fourth of July Oration in the German Tongue, delivered at a banquet of the Anglo
American Club of Students by the author of this book. Gentlemen, since I arrived a month ago in this old wonderland, this vast garden of Germany, my English tongue has so often proved a useless piece of baggage to me, and so troublesome to carry around in a country where they haven't the checking system for luggage, that I finally set to work and learned the German language also s freutmich dos dies zoist then a smo in ein Haupzechlich degree
herflich sign. Thus one of eine an occasion like this zigin reide in the srahedes landesvorign he boards ausrechenzol dafio habe ich aus reinischer for Ligenheit no for gengenhite. No, I mean herflichkite, ou s rhinischer herflich kite Habeich resolved to tackle this business in the German language um gottess villain. Also the missenzo frindlich sign on felzei mich di interlarding
fon einoo's by English alvater hi unda. Then ifind the dusty Deutsche is not a very copious language, and so when you've really got anything to say, you've got to draw on a language that can stand the strain. Ven haba man khan nicht mineem ree de fustian zu vedechim schpieta, dasselber ibazettes ven e zartiodinste ferlangen vollen haavenwan soolenzein hette. I don't know what vollenhaven waden sooleenzein hette means, but I notice they always put it at the end of
a German sentence, merely for general literary gorgeousness. I suppose this is a great and justly honored day, a day which is worthy of veneration, in which it is held by the true patriots of all climes and all nationalities, A day which offers a fruitful theme for thought and speech. Oundt mineem freunde no minn frind den mins frindees, Well take your choice. They're all the same price. I don't
know which one is right. Also, ich habe gata von gevisensign m, as Gerta says in his Paradise lost i I, that is to say, ich, but let us change cars. Also the unblischofile grosspretan and americana hiatsu zamingetrophen in burach concord istah welcome and in spiriting spectacle, And what has moved you to it? Can the terse German tongue rise to the expression of this impulse? Is it front shaft spitzigungen,
shnatfa aunitan felzamlung infamilion eigen timikaiten nine oh nine. This is a crisp and noble word, but it fails to pierce the marrow of the impulse which has gathered the friendly meeting and produced these umblik and the unblich veliaist good susan good for the algen in foreign land and a forei country in the unlikacha alist verlija heidelblga phrase nentmann and a yeah frelich naturally a the ausicht of
Dame kernig stool maya grus ist geist lichers lopot. Because these intistrop in balichim concord i'm glsen taktsufayan, whose high benefits were not for one land and one locality, but have conferred a measure of good upon all land that know liberty to day and love it. Hundo t yare fo rubo varndi England, unti Americana finder a bahiit zinziyatlichen freinder gottzei duck. May this good fellowship endure. May these
banners here blended in amity, so remain. May they never any more wave over opposing hosts, or be stained with blood which was kindred, is kindred, and always will be kindred. Until a line drawn upon a map shall be able to say this bars the ancestral blood from flowing in the veins of the descendant. End of section eight. End of the Awful German Language by Mark Twain. Recording by Kirsten Webber