The End of A Mission [antikvár]

One In the early fall of last year a trial took place at the County Court of Birglar about which the public heard very little. The three newspapers circulating in Birglar County, the Rhineland Review, the Rhineland Daily News, and the Duhr Volley Courier, sometimes published lengthy reports on cattle thefts, major traffic offences, and county fair brawls in their columns 'From the Courtroom', 'In the Courtroom', and 'Courtroom News', but in this instance they printed only a brief account which, strangely enough, was identical in all three papers: Johann and Georg Gruhl, father and son, appeared before a lenient judge. One of the favourite personalities in the public life of our town, County Court Judge Dr Stollfuss (who will be duly honoured in a subsequent issue) conducted the trial of Johann and Georg Gruhl of Hüskirchen, whose inexplicable behaviour last June gave rise to considerable alarm in some quarters. The trial, Judge Stoll-fuss's final one before his retirement, lasted one day, and the two Gruhls were sentenced to full restitution of property and six weeks' imprisonment. After conferring briefly with their defence attorney, Dr Hermes of Birglar, the two men accepted the light sentence. With the period of remand custody being taken into account, they could be released immediately. The local editors of the Rhineland Review and the Rhineland Daily News had already agreed some weeks before the trial be-gan that they would not compete in this matter, that they would not 'play up' the Gruhl case, there 'wasn't enough in it'. If - which was not likely to happen - readers complained about the absence of reports on the Gruhl trial, both editors were ready with an excuse which, as Krichel, the Review editor, said,