It was four in the morning when they
entered Rambin, and they halted in the middle of the village, about
twenty paces from the house where John was born. The whole village
poured out to gaze on these Asiatic princes; for such the old sexton,
who had in his youth been at Moscow and Constantinople, said they
were. There John saw his father and mother, and his brother Andrew,
and his sister Trine. The old minister, Krabbe, stood there too, in
his black slippers and white nightcap, gaping and staring with the
rest.
John discovered himself to his parents, and Elizabeth to hers, and the
wedding-day was soon fixed, and such a wedding was never seen before
or since in the island of Rugen; for John sent to Stralsund and
Greifswald for whole boat-loads of wine, and sugar, and coffee, and
whole herds of oxen, sheep, and pigs. The quantity of harts and roes
and hares that were shot on the occasion it were vain to attempt to
tell, or to count the fish that were caught. There was not a musician
in Rugen and Pomerania that was not engaged, for John was immensely
rich, and he wished to display his wealth.
John did not neglect his old friend Klas Starkwolt, the cowherd. He
gave him enough to make him comfortable for the rest of his days, and
insisted on his coming and staying with him as often and as long as he
wished.
After his marriage, John made a progress through the country with his
beautiful Elizabeth and they purchased towns, and villages, and
lands, until he became master of nearly half Rugen and a very
considerable portion of the country.
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