Specimens of German Romance; Vol. II. Master Flea

Transcriber's Notes: 1. Page scan Source: http://www.archive.org/details/specimensofgerma02soanuoft 2. Footnotes are at the end of the book.
Introduction--Wherein the gentle reader learns as much of the life of Mr. Peregrine Tyss as is requisite for him to know. Presentation of Christmas-boxes at the bookbinder's, Lemmerhirt, in the Kelbecker-street, and beginning of the First Adventure.--The two Alinas.
Once upon a time--But what author will venture to begin his tale so now-a-days?--Obsolete! tedious!--Such is the cry of the gentle, or rather ungentle reader, who wishes to be plunged at once, medias in res , according to the wise advice of the old Roman poet. He feels as if some long-winded talker of a guest, who had just entered, was spreading himself out, and clearing his voice to begin an endless discourse, and he angrily closes the book which he had but just opened. The present editor, indeed, of the wonderful tale of Master Flea, thinks this beginning a very good beginning, not to say the best for every history, on which account the most excellent story-tellers that are, namely, nurses, old women, &c. have at all times made use of it; but as every author writes chiefly to be read, he,--that is, the aforesaid editor,--will not at any rate deprive the kind reader of the pleasure of actually being his reader. He tells him therefore at once, without more circumlocution, that this same Peregrine Tyss, of whose strange adventures this history is to treat, had never, on any Christmas evening, felt his heart so throb with anxious joyful expectation, as precisely on that with which begins the narration of his adventures.
Peregrine was in a dark chamber, next the show-room in which he was wont to receive his Christmas-box. There he crept gently up and down, listened a little at the door, and then seated himself quietly in a corner, and with shut eyes inhaled the mystic odours of the marchpane and gingerbread which streamed from the sanctuary. Then, again, there would shoot through him a sweet mysterious thrill when, on suddenly re-opening them, he was dazzled by the vivid beams of light which fell through the crevices of the door, and danced hither and thither upon the wall.