The seventy-fourth comic: #3 Max und Moritz

Max und Moritz is a fairly short morality tale, showing seven pranks by the two boys played on various people in the village they live in - usually to their own benefit, in particular to fill their bellies. It's mostly done told in rhyming couplets combined with a few drawings - at most one or two per page, to enhance the story but not as a vital part of it. In that sense, it's more an illustrated children's book than a full comic, but knowing how there is a version of comics that uses these (Tom Poes comes to mind for me) it is part of the heritage. The boys get away with some pretty horrible stuff, ruining people's lives, but they get the violent comeuppance that feels like the hallmark of the time. It's not the most complicated stories, but there's some variety in the different setups and it makes for a nice diversion.

The full story is available online, if you want to read it yourself with an English translation.