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The Beast of Apatin

 A true story from the old days, as told by Luga-Nazl
(taken from the Donauschwäbischer Heimat Kalender 1955)
translated by Diana Lambing

Many who still like to talk about the Gelsekenich (the beast) don’t really know what took place all those years ago. The Apatin villagers themselves don’t know much about it any more because they were shrewd. They themselves haven’t spoken about it since the event and other people didn’t know much about it either. And so the story gradually became forgotten. Everyone knows that it was something to do with a Gelsekenich, but exactly what it was, and what had actually happened, no-one remembers. But, in order that the story won’t be forgotten, someone who heard the story as told by their grandfather now recounts the tale: 

It all happened quite a long time ago, about a year after the first settlers arrived. At that time, there were few villages in the Batschka – only Karpoka, Nowosele and a couple of others. In those days, Karpoka wasn’t situated where it is today. In those days, Karpoka and Bokele was one village and it was actually in Karpoka that the Gelsekenich story began. All this needs to be mentioned first, as otherwise the whole story won’t make much sense. Then – just as had happened in Karpoka, in the old village, when a great tragedy had happened and the people had to move their village further away from the river Danube – gypsies came into Apatin with their dilapidated old carts and scrawny old horses, begging us to let them settle near Apatin. A huge disaster had happened ‘down there’ and they had had to leave, but didn’t know where to go. The wanted to be close to good German people because they were workers too and they wanted to make and sell their wooden troughs. They didn’t say what had happened ‘down there’. When the old women asked a gypsy woman what had happened, she just wailed and told them some confusing story, but what it was about, and what had actually happened ‘down there’, they couldn’t get out of her. Just, ‘Oh dear God, my poor husband! I loved him so much! And my two little children - I had such a lovely little boy and such a pretty little girl! Oh dear God! And within three days they were all gone!’ And then she wailed and cried until we gave her something to make her go away. The other villagers didn’t ask much about it, though. In those days, they had to look out for themselves in order to make any progress. They let the gypsies settle near Apatin and then went about their own daily work. 

So that was in the summer, and in that same winter the Apatiners founded their Fire Brigade. The following spring, the new uniforms arrived and the new Fire Brigade was really proud of itself and decided to have a big Majalis festival on the Weispitz.The Fire Brigade musicians had rehearsed all winter long and the whole village was thrilled that there would be a big festival in the summer, when most of the work with the fruit and grain was over. They would rather have held it a little earlier, but the musicians had to learn a couple more dances and the Fire Brigade had to learn how to march first. Since the founding of the Fire Brigade, there had been no fires and that didn’t really please the Fire Brigade as they would have liked to have shown everyone how quickly they could put out even the biggest fire. There was no school yet in those days and the new parish hall hadn’t been built yet, either. At that time, only the church had been built and the Apatiners were very proud of it. When the Fire Brigade’s flag was blessed, the priest preached a long sermon and also told them that they should keep a special eye on the church. ‘In our church', the priest said, ‘is a picture of Our Lady – the Black Madonna. It was formerly in the mother country from whence we all came, in another church which burned down. The whole village burned down that time and afterwards there was nothing left for the people to do but to immigrate to Hungary. They were so poor, and if our church was to burn down again, then our whole village would be extinguished, too. And where would we go then?’ And so the priest impressed upon the Fire Brigade the need to keep a special watchful eye on the church and the Fire Brigade happily promised to do so. In those days, the pump and the hose were housed in a shed right next to the priest’s cowshed which was built onto the presbytery. When the priest’s door was open, it looked as though it was all one cow stall or shed. Originally it had been the priest’s shed, but he had given it over to the Fire Brigade so they had somewhere to keep their hose. 

So now it was summer and time for the Majalis festival. Already in the early hours of the morning, the whole village was on the Weispitz. There, they ate and danced, but more importantly, they drank. The Apatiners had always been a hale and hearty people, and to dance with an Apatiner wasn’t easy for outsiders. You had to be pretty nippy on your feet if you wanted to keep up with them. But merry people can usually take anything. By the early evening everybody was already pretty drunk, but the drunkest of all were the Fire Brigade. Well, it was their festival! They were all dressed up in their new uniforms which had cost them quite a bit. They drank as only they knew how to drink and by evening they didn’t recognise each other any more. But just as things were getting really merry, someone from the village came riding up on a horse. It was one of the village servants who had had to go home to feed the horses. ‘The church is on fire! Everybody, our new church is on fire! The smoke is coming out of the church spire!’ he was just about able to scream out, he was so shocked and exhausted from the ride. The only people who understood what he was shouting were those standing right next to him and who realised that something was the matter just by the look on his face. ‘Jesus, Maria and Joseph – the church is on fire!’ the old women screamed. ‘The new church is on fire!’ everybody was now screaming. The men stumbled to the wagons and untied the horses so they could harness them and ride back to the village. The Fire Brigade ran around wildly shouting ‘Fire!’ There was chaos everywhere because everyone was so drunk and disorientated. They stumbled and fell over the roots of the trees. The men who had wanted to immediately ride into the village, never got onto their horses because they were quite disorientated from the wine and the shock of it all. The screams of the women and children had driven the horses crazy and one of them ran off with another couple of horses following. Well, no-one knew what to do next. Everyone was running around, bumping into trees, shouting and swearing and falling over each other, calling out and asking questions and wailing, and no-one really knew if they were coming or going. Everyone was in such a state of shock.  

And so all the Apatiners stumbled back to the town, falling over, picking themselves up again and carrying on along the way, all the time crying and tripping over. The women were a little quicker, but what could they do against such a big fire in the church? So they thought they’d better help bring their men into the town. The children, both boys and girls, helped as well and when it was already quite dark the first ones arrived back in town. During all the excitement, they didn’t at first look to see where or what was burning. Soon it became dark. The priest’s door was open because the cows had only just come back from pasture. The cook was in such a shock, she hadn’t tied the priest’s cow up. She just wailed and ran around the priest like a madwoman. The priest didn’t know what was going on either, as he’d had rather more than usual to drink at the festival. 

The first men arrived at the priest’s house but stumbled into the cow stall instead of the fire shed and instead of pulling out the pump and hose, they pulled out the cow and, just like they’d learned at fire practice, they pumped the cow’s head up and down. Somebody else grabbed the cow’s tail and held onto it as if it were a hose. The men were sweating and wondering why no water was coming out and all the time they were pumping faster and faster so the fire could be extinguished before the whole church, and possibly the whole village, burned down. Pumping furiously, the women screamed next to them ‘Pump faster, men, pump faster so our church won’t burn down’. Many of the women went into the priest’s garden and knelt in front of the statue in the garden and prayed with the curate. What they were praying for, they weren’t sure, and every now and then someone would say a totally unsuitable prayer. A couple of the women were running around the church and gathering the children and taking them to the priest’s garden so they could pray, too. A couple of men were running around as well, and carried water from the well for the pump and poured it over the cow’s back. In their enthusiasm, they didn’t even notice that the cow was so agitated, it had taken several steps forward and to the right and left. They just carried on pumping furiously. Then someone came up and saw straight away that the hose was leaking badly just at the point where it screws onto the pump and where it gets a bit thicker. ‘Michael, the hose is leaking!’ he yelled and was already running to the priest’s yard to get a length of string. The priest’s straw and hay store wasn’t far away and he pulled out a hand full of straw and, on the way back to the pump, plaited a strong length of twine. Then he wanted to tie it around the part that was still leaking a little. But it must have hurt the cow because she stamped her feet and flayed around, and because he was tying it tighter she tore herself away and ran off. She tore away from the pumping men and ran into the other cows and men. What happened next, nobody knows any more. All the cows ran off and all the men were lying around on the ground, one on top of the other. Those who had been holding the tail, thinking it was the hose, were dragged along with the cow, first tripping over a couple of other men, and then most of them carried on being dragged along. When they finally let go, they were all lying around, some here, some there. Some were yelling because they’d been head-butted by the cow; others were hurt from being trampled by it. There was screaming and chaos everywhere. Everything was mixed up and when the women came back from their prayers, they picked out their men in the dark. Every woman got her husband and went home with him, undressed him and put him to bed.  

Relations with the gypsies weren’t too good around this time. Later in the year when they arrived in the village, selling the wooden troughs they had made to the villagers, they drank away the money they had earned and when winter arrived they had nothing to eat and went begging. The young gypsy women went after the men from the village and the wives didn’t like that, so they wouldn’t give the gypsies anything else. ‘Where’s the money we gave you for the wooden troughs? You’ve spent it all on drink, haven’t you!’ they said, and refused to give the gypsies anything more. That didn’t seem right to the gypsies as the winter would be long and to have not even any potatoes to eat, that was hard. The gypsies had already for some time been planning revenge on the Apatiners. They’d heard about the fire and they got together to work out how they could get their own back on the villagers. What was discussed, we didn’t understand as they spoke the gypsy language. But one afternoon the gypsy foreman went to see the mayor of Apatin and told him ‘That wasn’t a fire you had – it was a swarm of mosquitoes’ he said. ‘A swarm of mosquitoes, just like the one in Karpoka. The Gelsekenich does that. He sends one swarm after another to the villages where good, rich people live, and when they’re all there, the Gelsekenich comes and then they all swarm all over the people and suck their blood out so they die, and then the Gelsekenich eats them all up. That’s just what happened in Karpoka, where nearly everyone died and that's what would have happened to the rest of them if they hadn’t moved away and built a new village somewhere else a bit further away from the Danube.’ 

‘Yes, but we don’t want to move away from the Danube. Our people are all building boats – they only started building a couple of new ones last week. And the fishing, too - our fishermen live off this and they travel around all the villages every Friday selling the fish. The Danube is our wealth. Without the Danube, what would we do? The Sentiwan villagers are further inland. They wouldn’t only laugh at us – they wouldn’t accept us, either, and then where would we go?’ 

Then the judiciary joined in. They had good businesses, too - were they to leave everything, just because of a Gelsekenich? 

‘Yes, that’s all well and fine’, one of the jurors said, ‘but we can’t leave Apatin. We can’t just abandon everything and leave it all to the gypsies. The Danube is our life and without the Danube we Apatiners can’t exist. We will have to find another solution. Nothing in the world will make us leave and we won’t be beaten by a Gelsekenich. But what? What can we do?’  

‘Yes, mayor, if only we knew exactly where the Gelsekenich is. We have many strong men – perhaps we can get rid of the Gelsekenich some other way?’ 

‘I know what – we could capture the Gelsekenich and kill it. If the mosquito swarm has no leader, it won’t do any harm and will fly away again.’ 

‘Do you gypsies know where the Gelsekenich is? Didn’t you hear of its whereabouts? Perhaps we could kill it. Perhaps we could catch it, or something, so it wouldn’t be a danger to us any more.’  

‘Yes, do you gypsies know where it is? Can you tell us how big it is and whether it’s dangerous, and whether we could find it and kill it?’  

‘Oh yes, I know. I wanted to kill the Gelsekenich myself, too, but there weren’t enough men. And there were even fewer Karpoka men left… because they all had so little blood left in them, they nearly all died. They took me quite close to the Gelsekenich, but it was big and strong and they were all frightened of it and so we crept away, packed our things and left. It’s not easy dealing with the Gelsekenich. You can’t stab it because you don’t know where its heart is and whether it’s big or long. And if you don’t stab it straight in the heart, then it would all be over. It would eat us all up straight away, and then the whole village. You’d have to catch it first and tie it up securely. Yes, you have to catch the Gelsekenich first! But whether the Gelsekenich is still there, I don’t know. It was still in Karpoka afterwards. But it would most likely be in the woods near the Danube, close to Karpoka. We’d have to look for it. We gypsies would soon find it and would like to help you look for it. We’ve lost many of our people to the Gelsekenich – men, women, children – lots of lovely little children. It ate my wife and my daughter, too.’ 

‘Well, if that’s the case, then there’s nothing left to do but to look for the Gelsekenich, creep up to it and tie it up tightly and beat it to death. The gypsies should help us. They know their way around down there better than we do. They were there. They should lead us to it and we’ll arm ourselves with rope and things and when we know where it is, then we’ll have so many strong men that we’ll be able to pounce on it and overwhelm it. There’s nothing much else we can do.’ 

And so the council decided not to move away from the Danube, but instead to catch and kill the Gelsekenich. The gypsies would lead the way and the men would arm themselves well with ropes, forks, hooks and meat cleavers. They would start heading off towards Karpoka, Nowoleso etc. at four in the morning, until they found the Gelsekenich. There, on the command of the Fire Brigade chief, they would all grab it. It was important that everyone would pounce on the Gelsekenich at the same time, press it hard to the ground, tie it up tightly and, dead or alive, bring it into Apatin. 

And so it was. The mayor and the judiciary wrote out a list of who was to join in and the mayor’s representative went to the people for their agreement.  

A fortnight before the Feast of the Assumption, it was time. The gypsy foreman and his men arrived at the spot soon after midnight and waited until everyone else had arrived. He’d brought four gypsies with him. The mayor of Apatin thought at first that was too few, but the other men thought it would be enough. They had actually thought that the four gypsies wouldn’t be able to find the Gelsekenich and that they wouldn’t have to carry out the dangerous mission yet. They were namely all very frightened, but they didn’t want to lose face. 

The women of Apatin had always loved their men, and because they loved them so much, they accompanied them to the town hall that morning where the men and the gypsies were to meet up. There, the women had all gone up to the gypsies and had asked them if it really was dangerous and whether anything could happen to their husbands. They wanted to know whether it had a big mouth and sharp teeth and whether it could bite hard; whether it had lots of feet with claws on the end; whether it had a tail and if it could kill people with it, and other such things they wanted to know. But because it was rather cold, they all kept their hands underneath their aprons and were fumbling about with something. It wasn’t long before Leni-Bässl clutched her heart and called Gypsy-Joschka to the side, whispered something in his ear and pressed something in his hand. Ross-Neni did the same with Gypsy-Djuri, and when every single woman had dealt with the gypsies, they gave their husbands a kiss – they whispered something in their ear, too – and then they went home. 

At 4 a.m. prompt they set off. The four gypsies were in front, and behind them marched 140 of the strongest men from Apatin. They walked for hours. When, at nearly midday, the gypsies were close to the spot where, on the other side of the Danube the Estuter mountain was, they waved for the men to stay put. So that they wouldn’t be seen, the men lay down – they were very tired, anyway. At this opportunity, the gypsies slipped into the woods and pretended to look for the Gelsekenich there. In fact, they were tired, too, and sat down and smoked a pipe, muttering and laughing as they did so. What they were muttering, we don’t know. And so it went on until evening. They got to the spot where the gypsies had all along said that the Gelsekenich must be. Since the days of the Turks, the place had been called Kamrisch, and even the Romans had a fort in the area. The Gelsekenich would also have known that to attack from there would be most favourable and so had settled itself there. The Apatin men hid themselves in the bushes, not because they were frightened, but so that the Gelsekenich wouldn’t see them. But deep down in their hearts they were still very nervous. However, they’d all brought a good bottle of brandy with them and, because they thought 'it’s now or never', they wouldn’t need the brandy any more, they drank it all. So much in one go, that really was a bit too much! But they all felt a lot better afterwards and soon became rather noisy. If the leader hadn’t crept around all the time, checking on the men, they would have become as noisy as they had been at the Majalis festival on the Weispitz, when the church was on fire. The men didn’t hear anything more from the gypsies, nor did they see them, either. They were sitting in the bushes, smoking pipes and drinking brandy which the Apatin council had given them for leading the expedition. 

Shortly before midnight, the gypsies came creeping back. The leader, who had been sitting under a bush right at the front, saw and recognised them immediately. When they got a little closer, he gave them a signal. They sat in the bushes with him and told him exactly what had happened. They had found the Gelsekenich. ‘He’s asleep’ they said. The gypsies then went from man to man and said they would lead the men to ten paces away from the Gelsekenich where they would hide themselves. When everyone was there, the gypsies would take five ropes and tie the ends together and then pass the long rope around so that everyone could hold onto it. When the leader pulled the rope, everyone should let go, charge forward and grab the beast. Because they couldn’t see very well, it was important that everybody pushed hard down on the Gelsekenich so it couldn’t move. It would then be tied up, carried back to Apatin and slaughtered in front of everyone. The leader explained to the gypsies where the men were and then the gypsies went on their way. They had hardly gone a few paces when the leader called the gypsy foreman back: ‘Psst! Come back here a minute, foreman, I have to tell you something!’ The gypsy foreman heard him and came back. ‘You know’, the leader said, ‘it’s dark now and I am a bit frightened of the Gelsekenich. Nobody would notice if I wasn’t here. I have 30 Gulden coins here. You take my place and act as though you were me, that’s to say, as if I were here. I’ll stay here and when it’s all over you can call me. But don’t tell anyone what we’ve done. When you next need anything, just send your wife to my old woman – she secretly promised me that she would give her bacon, ham and brandy if you would make sure that nothing happened to me.’ That was fine by the gypsy foreman and he promised the leader faithfully that no-one would hear about it and that nobody would notice. ‘I’ll do that, no problem’ he said as he pocked the 30 Gulden and went off to give instructions to all the men. 

When Gypsy-Joschka got to the butcher, Tontschi-Vettr, the butcher nearly jumped out of his skin. ‘Just stay there, Tschonti-Vetter, no need to be frightened!’ he said quietly. ‘Ross-Neni gave me 20 Gulden to help you catch the Gelsekenich.’ 

Gypsy-Djurka went to Klemme-Matz-Vettr from Stuhlrichter Street. He’d got his 20 Gulden from Leni-Bässl so that her husband wouldn’t have to help catch the Gelsekenich and Djurka would take his place. He also had to look for Christus-Belte-Sepp-Vettr because he’d got 20 Gulden from his wife, Kati-Bässl, and another 10 Gulden from his mother-in-law. And he had to look for a couple of other customers, too, whom he had to tell that they needn’t help, as he would take their place and would do whatever needed to be done. And so each gypsy had a couple of customers and, just as all the women had discussed, not a single Apatin man would put himself in danger. They had all been bought off by their wives, who had paid the gypsies. Nobody knew about anyone else’s deal, and everyone thought that all the others would catch the Gelsekenich. And so they each hid themselves better. 

When the gypsies had finished dividing the money and leading the men to the Gelsekenich, i.e. when they were all well hidden, they went to the leader and told him that everyone was there and that they would soon begin. He needed to keep himself really well hidden so no-one would see him. The leader did just that, and so that he wouldn’t touch any of the other men, the gypsies showed him exactly where he should hide. 

Up until now, everything had gone smoothly and the gypsies were happy with the men. But, just like the first time when the gypsies had disappeared earlier, they didn’t go looking for the beast this time, either. The quickly went to the Boklemo gypsies and there they all quickly cobbled together something resembling what could pass for a Gelsekenich, out of wooden bits, rags, straw and other such things. When the so-called Gelsekenich was nearly finished, they went back to the Apatin men. During this time, the Boklemo gypsies stuffed the cobbled-together Gelsekenich with straw and built a rack to carry it on. While the Apatin men were all still well hidden, the gypsies took the rope, tied the Gelsekenich tightly to the rack and carried it to the Danube, where the Gelsekenich was supposed to have lived. They managed to do this just before daybreak. When they had done this, they reported back to the Apatin men. ‘We’ve got it, we’ve got the Gelsekenich!’ they shouted to the leader from a distance. And then they went to the other men and sent them all to the leader. ‘It’s this big, and so thin, the Gelsekenich!’ They told the leader further ‘It was high time we caught the Gelsekenich because when it’s so thin and hungry, then it would probably do just what it did to the Karpoka villagers. That’s why there was such a big mosquito swarm in Apatin – that was already the beginning!’ 

By now, the first Apatin men had arrived and they shouted for joy that the Gelsekenich had been caught and couldn’t hurt them any more. Every man told their story and made themselves sound really important by telling what they had done, and how, so that the Gelsekenich wouldn’t be able to move any more. If you’d heard them, you would have thought that they’d all taken part! Nobody said what it actually looked like, but when one of the gypsies said that it had such long feet, then everyone yelled ‘Oh Jesus, what big feet!’, and when another gypsy said that it had flailed around with its long feet, then everyone talked about the flailing around and how they had grabbed it by the feet and tied them together. They were so engrossed in their story-telling that they had completely forgotten about the Gelsekenich, and soon realised they had to work out how to get the Gelsekenich back to Apatin. If they had had any brandy left, they would have drunk themselves to death out of pure joy and courage; but drinking water from the dirty Danube was out of the question, and it stank anyway. To drink water from the Danube, even out of pure joy – that wasn’t on! 

When the excitement was over, however, they went about constructing a rack by chopping down tree branches, because the gypsies had thrown theirs into the river so it wouldn’t be seen. Towards midday they had finished, and had a break. At first, everyone wanted to carry it, but when it came to evening, they were quite tired and the leader had to decide who was to carry it and who could have a rest. 

The gypsies didn't have to help carry it, and because they were so fleet-footed, they arrived in Apatin by the evening. The women were already waiting there for their husbands. They had all gathered by the Danube and, through sheer worry about their husbands, they talked and talked. Nobody heard or listened to what anybody else was saying, because they were all talking and shouting at once, saying that nothing would have happened to them, etc. That's why, to this day, the Apatin women are known for talking so much – they all talk constantly, but nobody listens! I don't know whether it's exactly true, but my wife talks all day long and she never hears anything I say. It's as though I'd been born dumb and have never said anything in my whole life. So I suppose it's true, what they say about Apatin women! All the judiciary from the district were down by the Danube. When the men arrived back with the Gelsekenich, they were to notify the district council. The councillors had gathered collectively in the town hall so they could decide what should be done, and whether a back-up needed to be sent. 

When the gypsies could be seen arriving back, the women already started to run towards them from a distance and surrounded them. Here, we saw once again how much the Apatin women loved their men. None of them, not one single one, asked about the Gelsekenich. They only wanted to know whether their husbands were still alive and whether they were coming back soon. But the gypsies only gave a very short, quick explanation and told the women that their husbands would tell them what had happened. They also told of how the men had done everything, how they had bravely confronted the beast and overwhelmed it within a couple of minutes; who had grabbed the feet, who the tail, who the throat and so on – they knew all the exact details and briefly told the women. They also told them that they no longer need be afraid; that the Gelsekenich's mouth was huge with sharp teeth but that it had been tied up tightly and that nothing could happen to them now. The men would probably arrive back early tomorrow morning, because they were carrying the Gelsekenich and had to make frequent stops to rest. And once again, the Apatin women demonstrated how much they loved their husbands. They ran straight back home, fetched bacon, ham, sausages and bread and went to meet their husbands. Of course, they also took wine and brandy. 

The gypsies, too, went straight to the council and reported what had happened. The district councillors were satisfied and proud of their men and how they'd coped with everything so quickly and efficiently. They were proud of the gypsies, too, and promised them that they would build a school for them. They would get teachers, too, and a priest as well. Even a church would be built in the lower part of the town and from now on, the gypsies would have a good life in Apatin. The promises were fulfilled, albeit much later, but the people of Apatin kept their word, even if it did take a while. Kleiner-Lehrer (the teacher) opened the school; Dr.Jakob Eggert, the abbot from Odschak, had the church built, and the first gypsy priest was Father Berencz, who printed the Danube newspaper, although the gypsies didn't read it because, in spite of the school and the church, they weren't really interested in reading, and they weren't bothered about God, either. They didn't live by the saying 'Work and pray' in their lives. They thought it only applied to the people of Apatin. 

And now, on with the story! The gypsies had told the district council that the Gelsekenich was very thin and that it had been high time that it was caught, as it wouldn't have been long before it would have come to the town. When it's full up, it doesn't harm anyone – but when it's hungry… oh dear! And it must be hungry by now. That's why the incident with the mosquito swarm had happened. Another couple of days and it would have been too late and it would have been the end for everyone. 

The matter of what to do with the Gelsekenich was also discussed. Should they kill it? Burn it? Hang it? Imprison it and let it starve to death? The gypsies thought that would be a shame. Firstly, everyone should be told about the Gelsekenich – all the people and children of Apatin, and outside  visitors, too, so they could all come and have a good look at it. In a fortnight's time it would be the Kirchweih church festival, anyway. Lots of outsiders would be coming to Apatin. 'We could make a sort of purse, and every outsider who wanted to look at the Gelsekenich would have to pay one Kreutzer. With the money, we could build a new fire station, so that the priest's cow would be left in peace the next time it was dark and a fire broke out.' The priest was all for this suggestion, as since the time the Fire Brigade had mistaken his cow for their pump, he hadn't been able to milk her. 'Yes, but if it's only a weak old thing, like the gypsies said, then the outsiders will say we could have easily overwhelmed it and caught I, even in our sleep. I would suggest, we've got 14 days until Kirchweih – we should fatten the Gelsekenich up a bit so people won't say that it's got no strength left at all to defend itself.' Everyone agreed to this idea, but when it was suggested that every householder should donate something – the rich farmers, a cow; the poorer ones, a sheep or a calf; and the cottagers and craftsmen a chicken, or something small – even a rabbit – as long as it wasn't a fish, because no-one kept fish – well, then they all scratched their heads. 'But just think', one of them said, 'If we hadn't captured it, we would have all been killed, and now that we have caught it, we can't let ourselves become a laughing stock, just because of a couple of cows!' The priest agreed to the suggestion, too. 'Now I can get rid of my cow', he thought to himself. 'It'll be all the same to the Gelsekenich whether it's a cow that gives milk, or not. I'll swap my cow for another one and then the farmer can give the wild cow to the Gelsekenich. The Fire Brigade owes me that, at least, as it was them who made my cow go wild.' Dr. Amann-Kruwl and Sautr-Niki promised straight away to swap the priest's wild cow for a good one. 'But what shall we do with the Gelsekenich when the Kirchweih is over?' the mayor asked. 

'Oh, something could be done with it', Amann-Kruwl thought. 

'Well', said gypsy Joschka, 'if the Gelsekenich was fat enough, we could slaughter it and roast it. All the people and all the gypsies at the Kirchweih would have plenty to eat, and its meat is really good.' 

'And if it's got a lot of fat', said Schoppr-Matheiss-Vettr, 'we've never got enough grease for our barges, tugs, barrels and things. Its fat could be better for that than the stuff we use.' 

'Yes, that's true', the others said, and immediately decided that the Gelsekenich would be slaughtered on the second day of the Kirchweih, its fat drained and its meat roasted. To make sure that it would all be done on time, they also decided to build a large stall near the church where they could keep the Gelsekenich and fatten it up for the Kirchweih. 

And so it was. Every afternoon, an ox was slaughtered and the meat was fed to the Gelsekenich towards evening. Every day, five buckets of blood were set next to the Gelsekenich, because the mosquitoes and their king didn't drink water, nor wine – they only drank blood. But make sure you don't forget! On the second day, towards noon, the men arrived with the Gelsekenich. You could hear the women, who had gone to meet them with the food, shouting and celebrating from afar. They had torn branches from the trees on the way and were waving them with joy. Then they saw that everyone in Apatin was excited, too, and were waiting on the Danube for the Gelsekenich and the brave men. The men entered the town with the Gelsekenich in a triumphant procession and the schoolchildren recited speeches and sang songs. The Fire Brigade musicians turned out and the Dalarda choral society, too. The choirmaster had put on a shirt with a stiff collar and sang louder than usual on that day, and the priest, who was in his Vespers robes, came with all his ministers. There was such a festive atmosphere, just like the time when the people of Apatin had welcomed Dr. Kraft's representative. 

The Gelsekenich's stall was now ready, too. The carpenters had built it free of charge in exchange for the dripping. But the Gelsekenich wasn't locked up in the stall immediately. Everyone was allowed to look at it first, and that took quite a long time until everyone had had a good look at it. Only towards evening did the people slowly begin to disperse, and then the Gelsekenich was locked up and given its food at the same time. The gypsies had decided to cut the rope, with which it had been tied up, when it was asleep, so it could get up and eat. The gypsy foreman had got the key and the Apatiners were happy to get to bed a bit earlier that day, as they were all really tired and hadn't slept much in the past couple of days. 

The following morning, both the meat and the blood had gone. The Gelsekenich was obviously very hungry and had eaten everything. The next morning was the same, but it hadn't got any fatter. Well, such a thing doesn't happen overnight – it takes a while to build up strength and put on weight. By the third morning, it was already a little fatter. The gypsies had stuffed a bit more straw into it during the night and made the beast look a bit fatter. That really pleased all the Apatiners. They soon began to come, one after another, to look at it. Even outsiders from other villages were already coming to have a look at it that day, and because the mayor's assistant had already got the purse to collect the viewing fees, the first monies were collected. 

That night, the priest's first cow was given to the Gelsekenich and, keeping to their word, the priest now had six new cows from the best stables in his stall to replace the wild one the Fire Brigade had terrified. The Gelsekenich had not only put on weight through eating the priest's cow – it had grown, too. By the fifth day, it had grown so much that it was lying all hunched up as it could no longer stretch itself out. This encouraged the Apatin people and they decided that from now on it would get three cows and ten buckets of blood every evening. And so the Gelsekenich grew fatter and fatter. 

On the day before the Feast of the Assumption, everything was ready. The preparations had already begun two days previously. The coopers had made a huge tub for the slaughter – it was five times bigger than the largest barrel they had made up until then. Every household brought its cauldrons to the church. Water was heated up in them. The council allowed 18 Klafters of wood to be used for the fire to roast the Gelsekenich. On the day of the Assumption, strangers from the whole world came to see the Gelsekenich. Many people from Budapest apparently were there. The government had sent a delegation which was to thank the people of Apatin for freeing the towns and villages along the Danube from the great danger. Vienna, Regensburg and Ulm were also notified, but in those days there was no railway so the towns couldn't send their representatives in time. Later, however, when it was all over and the people of Apatin wanted nothing more to do with it, a courier came from Germany who, in the name of the Kaiser and of the whole German Empire, wanted to thank the people of Apatin for their heroic deed. 

The crack of dawn on the day after the Assumption was the start of the big day. The people had been looking forward to it the whole night long and hadn't been able to sleep for excitement. At 2 a.m. the butchers were ready with their meat cleavers and sharp knives. The district councillors appeared at the Spitze together with the mayor; the priest, with his chaplain, was dressed in his finery with a red cummerbund around his waist; the Fishermen's Society, the Boys' Brigade, the Missions Society and all the other 20 or 30 different clubs and societies of Apatin, all with their flags. The Dalarda Society sang alternatively with the Fire Brigade musicians, and even the Archbishop from Kalotscha had sent his secretary to Apatin in thanks and recognition of the brave deed of his Christian men. At 6 a.m. on the dot, it all began. The Gelsekenich had eaten well and was still asleep. The gypsies had quickly tied it up again and bound its feet together with a couple of ropes, and tied another rope to it to pull it along. First of all, though, the stall had to be dismantled because the beast wouldn't have been able to get through the door. Pulling it out wasn't difficult – when there are so many people available, it isn't difficult to pull such a beast along flat ground, even if it measures over 10 metres and is as big as a house! When it had been pulled completely clear (the gypsies said they'd already slaughtered it), everyone helped to drag the big, fat thing into the huge slaughtering vat. Once they'd got it in, they carried the hot water in their cauldrons and poured it into the vat, just like they did when slaughtering a pig. But when they started stirring the pot with their spoons and saw only filthy old rags and straw and stuff slopping around, they looked at each other in disbelief and, without a word, they quietly dispersed and all went home. And since that day, not a word has ever been said about the Gelsekenich in Apatin. The gypsies kept quiet and were glad to be left in peace. They now had enough money, and also enough meat, sausages, ham and suchlike, and didn't need to go begging in the town again for a long time. And since that time, only so much is known about the Gelsekenich in Apatin – i.e. that there was once, long ago, a Gelsekenich that was captured and slaughtered. But because nothing was ever said about it afterwards, no-one in recent years knew any more details of the story and what had happened all those years ago.