The humour of Germany

by Unknown

GOD AND THE LOVER.

Then full of longing hieing,

Straight I sought the Father, sighing:

O may I, may I, may I,

May I love the girl?

“You blackguard!” he outswore,

“If you want your back beat sore,

Then you may love the girl.”

Then full of longing hieing,

Straight I sought the good Priest, sighing:

O may I, may I, may I,

May I love the girl?

“My dear son, by my soul,

If you seek for Hell’s deep hole,

Then you may love the girl.”

Then full of longing hieing,

Straight I sought the Lord God, sighing:

O may I, may I, may I,

May I love the girl?

“My boy,” laughed he, “go take her:

Why the devil did I make her?—

Faith, you may love the girl!”

Old German.

UNINTENTIONAL WITTICISMS OF THE ABSENT-MINDED GERMAN PROFESSOR.

IN the day of Achilles the Greeks had no books except Homer.

A panic seized the Persians at Marathon, and crying, “Lord Jesus, there are the Athenasians,” they rushed for the sea.

Alexander would undoubtedly have subjugated the whole of Asia, but he will soon die.

Alexander was poisoned twenty-one years before his death.

The death of Alexander was felt by all Asia, but not until after his death.

Demetrius was the son of his father, and had an army of 100,000 Reichsthalers.

Charilaus was born very young.

This is a common incident in Roman history, which, however, does not occur often.

Servius came to Rome and was born there.

At the battle of Cannæ the Roman army consisted of 30,000 men, 20,000 were made prisoners, 40,000 fell, and 120,000 escaped.

If Cæsar had not crossed the Rubicon there is no knowing where he would have gone.

Brutus and Cassius murdered Cæsar in a manner very detrimental to his health.

His brother, whom he had caused to be murdered, he at last proscribed.

Varus was the only Roman general who succeeded in being conquered by the Germans.

Gallus was murdered in the presence of the populace, and he met the same fate once more at the hands of an assassin.

Julianus first killed himself, then his father, and then himself.

Tacitus says the ancient Germans were as tall as our Gardes du Corps.

The Cimbers and Teutons are descended from each other.

Alfons was two years old when he was born.

So did King Alfons surrender the eastern part of his career.

Returning from Spain, the roads were so poor that it was necessary to take eight waggons to one horse.

Richard III. murdered all his successors.

After the execution of Mary Stuart, Elizabeth appeared in Parliament, in one hand a handkerchief, in the other a tear.

It is unnecessary to say anything about Newton except that he died.

Danton was not executed until he had cut his own throat.

To be sure Marat was murdered, but he died first of a disease so virulent as to rob him of life.

Maximilian I. had hopes of seeing the throne upon his head.

After the battle of Leipsic there were a large number of horses that had lost three or four or more legs running about without a master.

Gustavus Adolphus, King of Sweden, lived until shortly before his death.

Stanislaus was not yet in existence when his father was born.

Suwarow marched at so rapid a pace with his army that neither the infantry, nor cavalry, nor artillery could keep up with him.

The Polish army was beaten by Suwarow because it ran away and fled.

A bitter war ensued on page 94.

The earth like all bodies has parallel circles, which intersect, and this is mathematical geography.

He drew his sword and shot him.

Gotha is not much farther from Erfurt than Erfurt is from Gotha.

I am unable to give you the titles of books about Africa just now. I have them in my head, but not on paper.

Among the most excellent products of Egypt the climate must be counted.

The sources of the Nile are much farther south than where Bruce discovered them.

The eye-sight of the Hottentots is so well developed that they can hear the tramp of a horse at an incredible distance.

The walls of Babylon were so broad that four waggons could go on top of each other.

North America consists of a great number of large and small islands, very few of which are surrounded by water.

When Humboldt ascended Mount Chimborazo he found the air so thin that he could not read without glasses.

There is so much coal-smoke in London that even when the sun does not shine you cannot see the sky.

There would be far less leather produced by the English if they tanned only their own hides.

There are many propositions in mathematics that can only be proved by beginning over again.

The theory of parallel lines explains itself, for it tends toward infinity.

Professor: “That impertinent fellow, Sustorf, must be reported.” Pupil: “Herr Professor, his name is not Sustorf; it is Thomas.” Professor: “Well, then, we will not report him.”

It must strike four soon, for it struck a quarter-to half-an-hour ago.

I see a great many pupils who are absent.

If any of you would like to read up this subject, you will find something to the point in a book the title of which I have forgotten. It is in the forty-second chapter.

“WITH A SINGLE BOUND HE WAS OUTSIDE THE DOOR.”

THE INCARCERATION OF THE HERR PROFESSOR.

WHEN he got to the hall before the door of the schoolroom, the Herr Director heard a tremendous uproar. Forty boyish voices were shouting “Encore,” and “Da capo!”

Professor Samuel Heinzerling began to frown.

Now there was a lull in the wild chorus, and a clear, penetrating voice was heard in a tone of absurd magniloquence—

“That will do faw to-day, Heppenheimer. It ith vewy evident you’ve come to clath unprepared. I’m vewy much put out by thuch conduct. Thit down!”

Thundering applause.

The professor seemed turned to a stone.

By all the gods of Greece, that was his voice, his manner, and no mistake. To be sure, there was an exaggeration of caricature, but the likeness was so evident that none but a connoisseur would be able to distinguish the slight shade of difference. It was little short of sacrilege. To think that one of his pupils should have the audacity to ridicule him, the sovereign authority over all school matters; him, the author of “A Latin Grammar for use in schools, specially adapted to the higher classes;” him, the renowned follower of Kant, from the hallowed heights of his own platform! Proh pudor! Honos sit auribus! This was a prank such as none but the soul of the arch-rogue Wilhelm Rumpf could bring forth.

“Will you take a pathage, Möwicke,” the voice of the godless pupil continued. “What, you are indithpothed? Deaw me, when I heaw young men of your age thay they are indithpothed that lookth ill, it lookth vewy ill indeed. Knebel, put down in the clath-book: Möwicke, being called upon to tranthlate, wath indithpothed.”

The professor was unable to control his temper longer.

With a sudden movement he opened the door, and stepped in among the startled boys.

His intuition had been correct.

It was indeed Wilhelm Rumpf, the greatest good-for-nothing the class could boast of, who had committed the unpardonable offence against the majesty of his person. For four weeks only this lad had been one of Samuel Heinzerling’s pupils, and already there was no scamp in class from first to last who did not own his superiority. His collar drawn up high in front, an immense pair of paper spectacles upon his nose, in his left hand a book, in his right the traditional tiny lead-pencil, there he stood upon the platform, just about to commit himself further when the indignant professor crossed the threshold.

“Wumpf!” said Samuel with dignity, “Wumpf! you will go to the cawcer[11] faw two dayth. Knebel, put down in the clath-book: Wumpf, condemned to two dayth in the cawcer faw childith and unworthy conduct. Heppenheimer, call the pedell!”

“Why, Herr Professor,—I did not—I only——” stammered Rumpf, putting the paper spectacles in his pocket, and walking back to his seat.

“Not another word!”

“I thought——”

“Be thtill, I tell you!”

“But won’t you permit me——”

“Knebel, put down: Wumpf hath one day added to the owiginal penalty faw obthtinathy. I am tiwed of fighting it out with you. You ought to be athamed to the vewy depth of your thoul!”

“Andiatur et altera pars, Herr Professor. This is a precept to which you have always called our attention!”

“Vewy good! You thall not thay that I am untrue to my printhipleth. What have you to thay faw yourthelf?”

“I can only assure you, sir, that it was not my intention to do anything disrespectful. I was only exercising myself in the art of mimicry.”

“It would have been better to exerthithe yourthelf in Latin thtyle and in Greek compothition.”

“I do that also, Herr Professor. But aside from those branches of knowledge, art also has her privileges.”

“Thertainly, I have never denied that. Do you pretend to call your nonthenthe, art? It ith an art that you will never be able to live on.”

“There’s no knowing, Herr Professor!”

“Be thtill, I tell you! If you go on at this wate you will be shipwecked soonaw or lataw in life. Knipke, go and see why Heppenheimer doeth not come back with the pedell.”

“Oh, just this once, Herr Professor,” whispered Rumpf coaxingly. “You might let me off just this once.”

“No indeed! You go to cawcer. But we will not let thith dithagreeable affair intewupt our work. Hutzler, begin the wepetition.”

“Herr Professor, I was ill when we translated this. Here is my certificate.”

“Indeed! So you were ill, ath uthual. Do you know, Hutzler, it stwikes me that you are oftener ill than well.”

“Unfortunately, Herr Professor, my delicate constitution——”

“Delicate? Eh, delicate? You don’t thay tho, Hutzler! I with every man under the sun were ath delicate ath you are. Lathy, that’s what you are, but not delicate——”

“Lazy? When I have a high fever you don’t expect me to——”

“I know all that! Dare thay you dwank too much beer. You twanthlate, Gildemeister.”

“Absent!” cried a number of voices at once.

Samuel shook his head sadly.

“Doeth nobody know what ith the matter with Gildemeister?”

“He has a cold!” replied one of the lads.

“Cold! When I wath hith age I never had a cold. But why don’t Knipke and Heppenheimer come back? Schwarz, you go and thee if you can’t find them, but mind you come wight back!”

Schwarz went, and returned after ten minutes with the pedell and the others.

“Herr Inaddler was occupied with papering his wall,” said Heppenheimer in a respectful tone; “he had to change his coat.”

“Ah, indeed! And doeth it take you half-an-hour to do that? Inaddlaw, theemth to me you are beginning to neglect your offith!”

“I beg your pardon, Herr Professor; the young gentleman came to my door just two minutes ago.”

“Oh!” cried three indignant voices.

“Well, it theemth witheth to let thith matter wetht! Here, take Wumpf to the cawcer. Wumpf, you will behave yourself and not be continually calling the pedell ath you did the latht time you were there. Inaddlaw, don’t let anything induthe you to let him come out into the hall.”

“Very good, Herr Professor.”

Wilhelm Rumpf bit his lip, turned to go, and disappeared with Inaddler in the dim twilight of the hall.

“What is it you did, Herr Rumpf?” asked the pedell sympathetically, as they were passing upstairs.

“Nothing.”

“Oh, but, begging your pardon, you must have done something?”

“I only did what the professor does all the time.”

“You don’t say so! How is that?”

“Well, you just listen to me. Don’t you thee, dear Inaddlaw, this fellow Wumpf is a pawfect scapegwace, and there ith no penalty severe enough faw him.”

“Good gracious!” stammered the pedell, clasping his hands above his head. “To think that such things are possible! It’s positively uncanny, Herr Rumpf, that it is! Heaven knows if I didn’t see you right here before me with my own eyes I’d swear that it’s the Herr Professor in person whose voice I hear this minute. You’ll make your fortune with such a gift as that some day, sir. Why, once when I was drinking my beer over at Lotze’s there was a magician who’d imitate anything you wanted him to, twittering birds and neighing horses, barking dogs and ranting priests. But it didn’t come up to your performance!”

“Yeth, yeth, dear Inaddlaw! I dare thay you’re wight!” replied Rumpf, still continuing in the voice and tone of the professor.

“You don’t mean to say you kept this thing up in his presence? Well, I must say, Herr Rumpf, there’s a time for everything. No wonder the Herr Professor was very much put out.”

“Now weally! Do you think tho?”

“I shall have to ask you to stop this now. You see, it’s not compatible with the dignity of my office. Will you please walk into this room?”

“Thertainly——”

“Herr Rumpf, I shall tell the Herr Professor that your punishment is altogether too lenient.”

“What bithiness ith that of yours, you abthurd old fellow? I can do what I pleathe.”

“That you cannot do.”

“You will thee that I can. I can talk ath it thuits me, and whoever doeth not like it can thtop up hith ears.”

“You wait and see.”

“Wait for what?”

“I shall inform the Herr Professor.”

“Give him my compliments.”

Inaddler turned the key and slowly walked away.

---

Inaddler, having done what was incumbent upon him, devoted himself lustily to his interrupted occupation. He dipped his brush into the tremendous pot of paste and supplied strip after strip of wall paper with the faintly fragrant liquid.

Wilhelm Rumpf sat yawning upon the seat of his prison, and assured himself in a soliloquy that he was heartily sick of the gymnasium and of the uncalled-for restrictions of school life.

Herr Samuel Heinzerling scratched his head, pushed his large round-eyed spectacles up high on his nose and shook his pedagogical head three or four times.

“A mithewable boy, thith fellow Wumpf,” he murmured, “but I half believe I could win him by gentler methodth more weadily than I can by severity. I will make one more attempt to appeal to hith conscienthe. It ith a pity to let him go on like thith. He ith one of my motht gifted pupilth!”

He touched the bell.

After two minutes Annie appeared, Inaddler’s daughter. She was evidently about to go out, for a tiny hat surmounted by feathers was perched jauntily upon her curly head.

“What can I do for you, Herr Professor?” she asked with a dainty curtsey.

“Where is your father?” whispered Samuel, with a remarkably pure pronunciation for him.

“He is papering. Is there anything you wish him to do, Herr Professor?”

“Ah, he ith papawing. Well, then, I will not dithturb him. It ith of no consequenth, Annie; I dare thay the key is on the cawcer?”

“I will run and ask, Herr Professor.”

She ran down the stairs like a deer, and was back in a few seconds.

“Yes, sir; the keys are on the hall door as well as on the cell. Is there anything else?”

“No; I thank you.”

Annie turned to go, while Samuel looked after her with a smile. He passed his hand once or twice over his closely-shaved chin, then he took his hat from the table and ascended the stairs to the carcer.

Wilhelm Rumpf was greatly surprised when after so short a time of imprisonment the door turned on its hinges. His astonishment reached its climax when he recognised Professor Samuel Heinzerling.

“Well, Wumpf?” said that philosopher with dignity.

“What do you wish, Herr Professor?” responded the pupil in a tone of resolute obstinacy.

“I have come to athk if you are not beginning to thee that thuch puerilenetheth are out of plathe altogether in a gymnathium, and that——”

“I am not at all aware of having done——”

“What, Wumpf? I did not expect to find you tho thtubborn! I wish you would put yourthelf in my plathe. I am sure you would be much more thevere with thith unmanageable Wilhelm Wumpf than I have been, eh?”

“Herr Professor——”

“Surely thuch childish conduct ith not what one would expect of a young man of good family. You’d betht be on your guard, for the next time I catch you in a thcwape I shall expel you!”

“Expel me?”

“Yes, Wumpf, expel you. So you would do well to turn over a new leaf, and let your dithgratheful nonthenthe go. I wepeat it, put yourself in my place!”

Wilhelm Rumpf lowered his head. He felt that his expulsion was only a matter of time. Suddenly a diabolical thought took possession of his brain.

“If I must get expelled,” he said to himself, “it shall be with flying colours.”

He smiled like the villainous hero of a sensational novel after some dark deed, and said in a tone of simulated humility—

“You say, sir, I should put myself in your place?”

“Yes, Wumpf, that ith what I thay.”

“Well then, seeing you will have it so,—I wish you much pleasure!”

And with a single bound he was outside the door, turned the key, and left the poor professor to his deplorable fate.

“Wumpf! what ith thith you are up to? I’ll exthpel you thith vewy day! Open the door at onthe! At onthe, I thay!”

“I give you two hours’ cawcer,” replied Rumpf with dignity. “You told me to put mythelf in your plathe!”

“Wumpf! you will thee what will happen! Open the door; I inthitht upon it!”

“You have no wight to talk to me in that tone. Jutht at pwethent I am the Herr Profeththor! You are merely the pupil Wilhelm Wumpf. Be thtill! I will not bwook oppothition!”

“Dear Wumpf! I will fawgive you thith onthe. Pleathe open the door like a good fellow. Your penalty shall be a vewy slight one. I give you my word faw it, you shall not be exthpelled. Do you hear what I thay?”

Dear Rumpf did not hear. He had crept stealthily along the hall and was now hastening downstairs to complete his escape.

As he was passing the pedell’s door a tempting idea took possession of him.

He put his eye to the keyhole. Inaddler was standing upon a ladder, his back to the door, and was just attempting to put a heavily-pasted strip of paper in place. Wilhelm Rumpf just lifted the latch, and called out with the purest Heinzerling accent of which he was capable—

“I am going now, Inaddlaw. Keep an eye on that fellow Wumpf. The lad is cawying on at a gweat wate. He ith thtill keeping up hith impertinent nonthenthe. You keep wight on with your work. All I want to thay ith that you are not to open the door faw him on any conthideration. The fellow ith quite capable of knocking you down and wunning away. Do you hear what I thay, Inaddlaw?”

“Very good, Herr Professor. Excuse me for not getting down——”

“Thtay wight where you are, I thay, and finish your papawing. Good mawning.”

“Your servant, Herr Professor.”

Wilhelm Rumpf went upstairs again, and once more entered the hallowed precincts of the carcer. Samuel Heinzerling was raging terribly. Now he seemed to have discovered the bell, for just as Rumpf sought refuge behind an enormous linen chest belonging to the Inaddler family, it resounded shrilly through the hall like the yell of indignant demons.

“Help!” moaned the professor. “Help! Inaddlaw; you will lothe your plathe thith very day, if you don’t come up thith minute! Help! Fire! fire! Murder! Wobbers! Help!”

The pedell, recalled to his duty by the uninterrupted sound of the bell, left his private occupation and put in an appearance before the door of the prison. Deceitful Wilhelm Rumpf crept deeper into his hiding-place. Samuel Heinzerling, utterly exhausted from calling and crying, threw himself down upon his seat. His bosom was palpitating; his nostrils worked like a pair of good bellows.

“Herr Rumpf,” said Inaddler, giving a warning knock on the door, “look out, I’m making a note of all your doings!”

“The Lord be praithed that you are here, Inaddlaw! Open the door, I thay! Thith mithewable thcoundwel hath locked me in. Thuch conduct ith unheard of!”

“Let me tell you, Herr Rumpf, you’d better stop your joking. You may be quite sure I’ll tell the Herr Professor how you called him a miserable scoundrel!”

“Have you lotht your wits, Inaddlaw?” shouted Samuel in a tone of supreme indignation. “The devil! don’t you hear me thay how Wumpf, the knave, hath locked me in here when I came to thee him, and talk like a father to him! I thay, don’t keep me waiting! Open the door at onthe!”

“You must take me to be very stupid, Herr Rumpf. The professor was at my door this moment, and has my word for it that I won’t let you out. And now I advise you to behave yourself, and stop ringing that bell, else I’ll take it down, sure as fate!”

“Inaddlaw, I’ll thee to it that you are thent to gaol for depriving me of my freedom!”

“Now just you listen to me, will you? It’s positively childish this everlasting imitating of the Herr Professor. There is no denying that the professor lisps a bit, and pronounces his r’s in a funny way, but never so long as I knew him was he guilty of such a silly twaddle as you are indulging in. And now then, for the last time, all I can say is, be quiet, and conduct yourself like a gentleman——”

“But I wepeat to you, upon my honour, that confounded scoundwel turned the key behind me, before I knew what he wath about! Inaddlaw! Knave, ass! You must know me! Have the goodneth to considaw!”

“What? You call me an ass? You call me a knave? I’d have you to know it’s a question who is the greatest ass or the greatest knave, you or I! Well I never in all my born days! The impudence! A green boy like you calling an honest old man an ass! You are an ass yourself! Do you understand! But you’ll get your deserts!”

“You are an ass and a fool!” moaned Heinzerling in despair. “So you wefuse to open the door?”

“I’d never think of doing such a thing.”

“Good, vewy good!” groaned the philosopher with a dying voice. “Vewy good! I’ll stay wight here in the cawcer then! Do you hear, Inaddlaw? Wight here in the cawcer!”

“I am glad to hear you are beginning to come around to common sense. And now I hope you’ll let me alone. I’ve no more time to listen to your farce!”

“Inaddlaw!” cried Samuel, getting enraged once more. “Hour by hour I’ll thit here, do you understand? Hour by hour. Like a thcamp of a thchoolboy I’ll bear the dithgwace of it! Do you hear me, Inaddlaw?”

“I’m going now. You’d better do your translation.”

“Holy heavens, I’m lothing my weason! Am I cwathy? Man, won’t you look through the keyhole. Then at leatht you might thee——”

“You don’t catch me. I haven’t forgotten how you blew in my eyes the other day!”

“Well, then, go to the devil by all meanths. There’s no wawing with such pawverse thtupidity. Just wait till I come out of thith. You won’t have thith plathe of pedell much longer, I’ll pwomithe you that!”

Inaddler felt his way downstairs in a very ill humour. This lad Rumpf was surely the most impertinent fellow he had ever come across. An ass did he call him? Thunder and lightning! Ever since the decease of Mrs. Inaddler the like had not occurred to him——!

These miserable schoolboys!

Meanwhile Samuel Heinzerling passed up and down his cell with long steps. His whole appearance bore a certain resemblance to an African lion condemned to imprisonment by human sagacity without losing thereby any of the original pride and strength of his noble nature. His hands crossed on his back, his head with its grey mane inclined wofully toward one shoulder, his lips tightly shut—so he walked back and forth, back and forth, the darkest and most misanthropic thoughts in his bosom.

Suddenly a broad smile flitted across his features.

“Most abthurd thith ith!” he muttered to himself. “Weally, though thith ith a very disagweeable affair for me to be in, there ith no denying the humour of the thituation——”

He stood still.

“Ith there weally any dithgwace in being outwitted by a thchoolboy? Go to, Thamuel! Did not a thelebrated king hold the ladder faw a thief to thteal his watch? Wath not even Pwince Bithmarck locked in by wuthless hands? Not to name a hundred other cases. And thtill hithtory treath thith king with rethpect. And thtill Bithmarck hath lotht none of hith reputation ath the betht diplomatitht in Europe. No, no, Thamuel! Your dignity ath thchool-mathter, ath thitizen, ath philothopher, need not thuffer by thith mortifying thituation. Retht assured, Thamuel——”

He continued his walk in a self-satisfied mood; but soon he interrupted himself anew.

“But thothe boyth!” he stammered, turning pale. “When thothe boyth hear how I wath impwithoned at the cawcer! Fearful thought! I might ath well give up my authowity ath a teacher at onthe. And they will hear it. There ith no help faw it! Ye godth, ye godth, why do ye thmite me thus?”

“Herr Professor,” whispered a familiar voice at the door of the cell, “you are not yet dishonoured. Your authority is as unassailable as ever——”

“Wumpf!” muttered Samuel; “you godleth fellow you! Open that door, I thay, thith minute! Conthider your earth boxed! Conthider yourthelf expelled!”

“Herr Professor, I’ve come to save you! Do not insult me!”

“To thave me? What impertinenthe! Open the door, or I’ll——”

“Will you hear me speak, Herr Professor? I assure you all will end well.”

Samuel considered.

“Vewy well,” he said at last; “I’ll condethend to hear you. Thpeak——”

“I only wanted to show you that my art is not quite without practical import. Forgive me if in doing so I have seemingly left out of consideration the very high esteem and respect in which I am happily conscious of always having held you!”

“You are a wogue, Wumpf!”

“Herr Professor! suppose you dispense me from the carcer penalty, withdraw your threat regarding expulsion, and permit me to guard the most complete silence over what has passed!”

“It would never do, Wumpf. You mutht hold out your time——”

“Yes? Well, then, good-bye to you, Herr Professor! Don’t ring the bell too often!”

“Wumpf! hear what I thay to you! Wumpf!”

“Well——?”

“You are in many wespects an extwaawdinawy lad, Wumpf; and tho I am quite willing to make an extheption in your favour,—open the door!”

“Will you dispense me from carcer?”

“Yeth.”

“Do you intend to expel me?”

“No, in the devil’th name.”

“Give me your word of honour, Herr Professor!”

“Wumpf, how dare you?”

“Your word of honour, Herr Professor!”

“Vewy good, you have it!”

“Jupiter Ultor is witness.”

“What?”

“I call upon the gods for witnesses.”

“Open the door, I thay!”

“Presently, Herr Professor. You are sure you bear me no grudge?”

“No, no, no! Will you open that door?”

“You give me full absolution?”

“Yes, under the condition that you tell nobody a word of your guilty conduct. I have told you that I take you to be an extwaawdinawy lad, Wumpf——”

“Thank you for your good opinion. My word of honour then that so long as you are in your present position at the town gymnasium no word shall pass my lips!”

With that he turned the key and opened the door.

Like the king in Uhland’s ballad did Samuel Heinzerling step out into the pure air of heaven. He took a deep breath; then, brushing his hair from his brow as if trying to remember something, he said—

“Wumpf, I can take a joke ath well ath any man; but I wish you would do me the favour not to mimic me in future. You—you weally do it too well!”

“Your wish is my law!”

“Vewy good! And now you’d betht hathten down to the clath-woom. It’th not yet a quarter to—you’ll be just in time!”

“But how can I do that, Herr Professor? They all know that you have given me three days!”

“Vewy good! I’ll go with you.”

They quickly walked downstairs.

“Inaddlaw!” called the professor into the basement door.

The pedell appeared at once and officiously asked what was his behest.

“I have dithpenthed Wumpf fwom his penalty faw sevewal weasons,” said Samuel.

“Ah! that is what you came back for. Well, all I wish to say is that Herr Rumpf was not at all quiet in his cell. It’s none of my business, I suppose, but he shouted and swore like a good ’un——”

“Well, never mind, Inaddlaw; I have thpecial motiveth faw dealing leniently with him thith time. You may wemove the key to the cawcer.”

Ernest Eckstein.

OUR WAR-CORRESPONDENT.

THE natural and justifiable mistrust which the reading public brings to bear upon published reports from military headquarters has caused us to send our extra special correspondent, Herr Wippchen, whose presence has already graced several official festivities at the porter brewery, as well as two general assemblies of the architects’ club, to be an eye-witness upon the field occupied just now by the oriental question.

No sooner was our intention made public than four managers of the most renowned life insurance companies applied to us, declaring their willingness to insure the life of our Wippchen against all the dangers of war upon the most reasonable conditions.

Yesterday, at eleven o’clock in the forenoon, Herr Wippchen set out on his journey, favoured by the most glorious weather. In the evening we had his first report from Bernau,[12] which we here publish:—

Bernau, May 3, 1877.

After travelling for two hours I arrived here, and in this friendly little town I found rooms far from the deafening noise of the railway, where I can devote myself with leisure to my task. It is my purpose to give you a battle of some dimensions every day. Certain it is that the position of Bernau is decidedly favourable to my enterprise, for not only is it possible to take the train for the battle-field twice a day, but also to write to Berlin much more frequently.

On the train it was the opinion of many that the die had fallen, and that the temple of Janus would not be sheathed again for weeks to come. Indeed, at the “Kaiserhof,” the night before we left, we were quite unanimous about that.

I am sorry to say that I am not supplied with the necessary maps. The geography I had when I went to school is rather old, and the map of Turkey is partly torn out.

It was a capital idea to send me here. There is no denying the fact that a war-correspondent should not be constantly seen in the streets of the town where his reports are printed.

The most important thing to-day seems to me to be the fact that this oriental war is not the first in history. There is no denying that there have been several others, none of which have ended with the annihilation of Russia or Turkey. Both arose again like Aphrodite out of the ashes.

To be sure, Russia says the beard of the prophet must be shaved from the earth, because Turkey persecutes and torments Christianity. But how if Turkey should suddenly turn and say that in Russia too the Christians sigh under the bed of Procrustes, and that the lash of civilisation must be applied to the Russians! What then?

And as for England, there is no denying that England will never look on and permit the aggrandisement of Russia from without. But with all its Armada it will never be able to hinder its aggrandisement within.

Where is Ariadne’s thread to guide us out of the Scylla of this Augean stable?

I enclose my first letter from the battle-field, and at the same time I would ask you to send me a couple of those new gold 5-mark pieces, which the inhabitants of Bernau are curious to see.

Leowa, April 24.

Rosy-fingered Eos had but just struck five when I arose from the naked earth and betook myself to the Pruth to see the Russian troops cross it. There is no denying that there may have been about 13,000 men; Tschetschentians, Svanetians, Zaporopian Kossaks, Lesghians, mostly adults, were all marching towards Glatz. They sang a song which I should like to call “The Watch on the Pruth.” When General Strobelew saw me he declared me to be a spy, and condemned me to the knout for life. At that, of course, I turned my back upon him; but even as I did it, I lay upon the bench, and two Kossaks raised the knout of Damocles above me to execute the stroke of death, when the general declared I should be let off this once with a black eye. One of the Kossaks proceeded to strike me one, and the general shook my hand heartily, assuring me that soon no Christian should sigh at the hands of the Turk. I saluted him by laying two fingers of my right hand upon my injured eye, and the general turned to continue his way.

The Roumanians who had hastened to the spot to witness the passage of the Pruth cursed with ringing hurrahs, and waved their hats with clenched fists.

I hastened to Kars, where there is a skirmish going on.

Batum, April 26.

The Russians and Turks had pitched into each other near Batum. I stood upon a pile of corpses where I had a good view. The Turks struck to the right and left with such vehemence that all their crooked swords were soon fully straightened out. The Russians did not wait to be told twice, and knew no mercy. The thunder of the cannons was terrible. Boom! boom! only a good deal louder. Ill-luck would have it that I came to stand right between a Russian and a Turk, and they both shot at me at the same moment. I stooped down quickly, and both fell down lifeless, each having been pierced by the other’s ball. It was a marvellous escape. The scythe of Charon spared me by a miracle, as it were.

For hours the battle raged. Finally it was left undecided. The Russians, as well as the Turks, were victorious. Exhausted with hardships, and with the display of courage, I at last fell asleep upon a drum, and did not awake until a Russian beat the retreat upon me. C’est la guerre!

Soon there will be more or less more.

To Herr Wippchen at Bernau.

Since the 3rd you have not sent us a single skirmish, for we presume you do not expect us to look upon your request for a further remittance, with which we unfortunately complied, in the light of a war report. You seem to take the oriental complication as an opportunity to live in the country at our expense. Do you think this is acting like our own correspondent? If so, you mistake. If we do not receive one of the bloodiest battles by return post, we shall look about for another war-correspondent. It was only yesterday that one of the profession offered his services, declaring his readiness to furnish us with war at 5-pfennige a line. We wish to bring this to your notice, saluting you in the firm expectation of a desperate conflict.

Yours cordially,
The Editor.

Paris, May 14, 1878.

Here I sit in my cosy pro doma, which I have rented with my hard-earned savings on the bulwarks of the temple (Boulevard du Temple). It was so hot at the exhibition that it seemed as if Helios had poured out all the tropics upon it, and when at last I turned to leave I found that all the cabs were filled with weary visitors.

The soirée at Minister Waddington’s was a very brilliant affair. The entire aristocracy and plebeocracy of Paris was present. Especially the Prince of Wales. He looks for all the world exactly like his mother. When I was presented to him, he at once got entangled in a lengthy toast. It is well known that the prince is a connoisseur in delicately done slices of bread. He closed with the words, “In this sense I seize the empty glass and fill it to the alliance between Germany and England.” I answered with, “God save the Queen,” in which I joined with fervour. I then added, “In this toast every German will join so long as he calls his soul his own upon this terrestrial globe.”

“To be, or not to be,” replied the prince, and thereupon he toasted on the alliance between England and the terrestrial globe. I recommended the prince to the favour of heaven, whereupon he toasted the alliance between England and heaven. He then joined other groups, and toasted every one of them. Presently he left the soirée, not without having favoured the footman in the ante-chamber, who helped him on with his overcoat, with a toast. When he was in his carriage, he was overheard to pronounce several toasts to the Paris vehicles, the driver, the moon and stars, and the institution of street-gas.

No wonder the prince is very popular in Paris society!

Yesterday His Serenity the Shah left. A few hours before his departure I saw him at the exhibition standing before a piece of soap (savon). “How much is this letter-weight?” he inquired, and thereupon bought it.

Julius Stettenheim.

SCHNORPS’ SWALLOW-TAIL.

HE played the bass viol in the orchestra of the theatre.

The bass viol had come to be the hereditary instrument for all the male members of the Schnorps family, who were invariably musical, and I remember an anecdote from the life of Aegidius Schnorps, the grandfather of my hero, which well deserves to be handed down to posterity.

Of course Aegidius played the hereditary instrument. But he did not play it at the Royal Theatre; he had not yet arrived at such distinction. Instead of that he was a member of a rather obscure band which used to gather its laurels at country dances on Sundays and special holidays. The leader was supposed to furnish the bass viol, but the Schnorpses had always had their own instrument, and prided themselves not a little upon this family possession. Although the peasants were not at all particular about any involuntary variations that might perchance find their way into the tune, for ’tis easy to pipe to those that want to dance, it so happened that one day Father Aegidius produced tones of such singular impurity that the leader, whose week-day occupation was that of an honest shoemaker, called out, greatly enraged, “Confound you, Aegedi, why don’t you play right?” “Hold your tongue, shoemaker!” replied the indignant Schnorps. “I can play as I please; this bass belongs to me.”

Ah yes, they were always very self-sufficient, were the Schnorpses, and had little respect for the rest of the world. They were always trying to force their square heads through thick and thin.

After Aegidius came Sebastian Schnorps, who of course also devoted himself to the grumbling bass, and who was gathered unto his fathers in the very midst of his professional activity, inasmuch as he and his instrument fell down together from a high ladder, by means of which he had intended to reach a place in a barn which should furnish him the necessary acoustic conditions for evolving seraphic tones, and properly affecting the crowd of dancing peasants beneath him.

Peace be unto his ashes!

After him came Gottlieb Schnorps, the man who is to occupy our attention to-day. It were really needless to say that the hereditary proclivity had come down to him, if it were not incumbent upon me to do justice to him by mentioning the fact that he was a musician of a better sort than his ancestors. He had worked his way up from a country fiddler, had studied a little, and though in his general manner and bearing he had remained true to the family traditions of the Schnorpses, he had struck out a new path in going to see something of the world, and one day he came back with the contract of a court engagement in his pocket, and with a wife whom the dear God must have created for his special convenience, so well were her characteristics adapted to his.

---

They arranged their life as they thought best. Either he quarrelled with his wife or she with him, or both of them with the children, or the latter among each other—between times the bass viol grumbled, for Schnorps was always hard at work developing his musical faculties—in short, their home life was a lively one.

If Schnorps had only been a little neater in his personal appearance!—but in this respect he did little honour to the Royal Orchestra. His shabbiness had grown proverbial. He had a special predilection for an enormous cravat to conceal the doubtful purity of his linen from the eyes of the curious. His coat was seldom brushed, and the lower part of his coat-sleeves shone like a mirror.

The pride of his heart was a dress-coat, which he donned only on extraordinary occasions. He had brought himself to purchase this piece of wearing apparel only by dint of the rigorous etiquette of the Royal Theatre, which authoritatively demanded the use of a dress-coat on certain days. It never occurred to him to have a new one, and he wandered from junk-shop to junk-shop until he found a specimen at Solomon Hoffa’s, which he purchased for one thaler and some odd groschens, and which he thereafter wore to the horror of all respectable people, and to the annoyance of the entire orchestra.

It was really too shabbily old-fashioned. In fact, it was a disgrace to the corporation. The collar was of such goodly size as to almost completely hide the square head of Schnorps; the sleeves were so tight that Gottlieb could only with difficulty properly belabour his bass viol, and the broad tails stood out like the arms of a windmill from the lank legs of the wearer.

One morning he received a formidable-looking square letter, with the well-known official green seal, in which he was notified in the politest of language, but with all possible decision, that when taking part in the orchestra in future he was to appear in a coat which was more in harmony with the dignity of a Royal Theatre, and less likely to excite the risibility of the audience.

This left no room for doubt, it was certainly plain enough. Schnorps raged—talked about tyranny, interference with personal freedom, scolded his wife, and flogged all the young Schnorpses; but there was no help for it—the acquisition of a new coat loomed upon the horizon as an inexorable necessity.

And now occurred what had never occurred before. For several days in succession the townspeople saw the bass violinist Schnorps and his spouse walk about from one clothing shop to another. In each one they entered into lengthy negotiations, only to pass on after a time grumbling and scolding about the outrageous prices, until at last the firm of J. M. Lindenfeld had the good fortune to come to terms with Herr and Frau Schnorps about a new and handsome swallow-tail coat.

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“IT WAS A DISGRACE TO THE CORPORATION.”

“I’ll tell you what, Sally,” said the bass violinist one day to his better-half; “though I’ve been forced by pure tyranny to spend a sinful lot of money on that new dress-coat, there’s no earthly reason why I shouldn’t get all the good I can out of the old one. I wish you’d just send for old Peter and tell him to make Michel a jacket out of it; it will last the boy many a year.”

Old Peter was a tailor whose chief art lay in mending and patching up old garments, and Michel was the eldest sprout and heir pretendent to the bass viol of the Schnorpses.

The tailor came, made a very close and conscientious examination of the old swallow-tail by the aid of a pair of enormous horn spectacles, and finally declared, with great decision, that the article in question had had its day, and that there was not the slightest possibility of renovating it.

This was a terrible shock for Schnorps, for Peter’s judgment was considered quite incontrovertible, and when there was anything to be made out of an old garment he did it. This he had proved time and time again in the wardrobe of the Schnorpses. So there was nothing for it but to stow away the old dress-coat among other venerable relics, and it might have stayed there to this day if Frau Sally Schnorps had not hit upon a brilliant plan.

Hoods were quite the fashion just then, and why not make a hood out of a dress-coat? It might be trimmed with a quantity of ribbons and laces to conceal the shabbiness of the cloth, which latter could still further be improved upon by being turned. She was very proud of this idea, and forthwith called upon a deaf old seamstress, who often worked for her, and who was quite noted for her stupidity, but aside from that was a poor, unassuming woman who patiently worked for her living without expecting any generous remuneration. This last quality had served to gain her the good will of Frau Schnorps, into the mysteries of whose housekeeping she was thoroughly initiated.

She came and found the wife of the bass violinist at the door, about to go out, while Schnorps was rehearsing for the opera. In brief words Frau Sally explained to her that in the big wardrobe upstairs there was a dress-coat of her husband’s which was quite worth the trouble of making over, and which she wished to be metamorphosed into a hood for herself.

“Very well, very well, I’ll see to it all right, Frau Schnorps,” replied the old woman; and while Frau Sally Schnorps went to market, her mind quite at rest, she entered the house where the youngest of the Schnorpses, who had been left to guard the domestic hearth, handed over the dress-coat, which she thereupon took home to “make over.” And she did it. When she came back, after a day or two, the old dress-coat had become a new head-covering, which, to be sure, was rather heavily decorated with lace and various trimmings, but for this very reason exactly suited the taste of Madam Schnorps. It is true, her husband said, that now you could see that the dress-coat had really not been so bad, and that the money which went for the new one might have been put to some better use, but there was no use crying over spilt milk, the tyrannical intendant had decreed that it should be so, and he philosophically added —

“For every evil under the sun

There is a remedy or there’s none.

If there is one, try and find it,

If there isn’t, never mind it.”

When autumn came the wife of the musician walked forth proudly in her new hood, and about the same time her husband received an invitation to spend the evening at the house of an old general, who was a great lover of music, and famous for his bachelor’s suppers, which added a great attraction to his musical evenings. The old gentleman had a high opinion of Gottlieb Schnorps as a musician, and would have liked to ask him long ago, but he had never been able to bring himself to do so on account of Schnorps’s shabbiness, and the bass violinist was indebted for this invitation chiefly to his new coat.

Schnorps was highly elated to receive it, and his mouth watered at the thought of all the culinary delights which would await him after the music.

When the auspicious day came he devoted an unusual amount of care and attention to his toilet. Although it was only Thursday, he permitted himself the luxury of a clean shirt, bought himself—and this was the rarest of extravagances—a pair of white cotton gloves, even went so far as to brush his black trousers with a certain amount of energy, a thing he never did on ordinary occasions, so as not to wear out the cloth.

“Get my dress-coat out, Sally,” he said in the evening, and she went upstairs in obedience to his behest.

Now it was that something horrible occurred!

As Schnorps’s spouse opened the door of the wardrobe and put her hand in behind all the ancestral garments, she screamed aloud, for there, like a ghost of bygone days, the old swallow-tail grinned at her in the full glory of its invulnerable perfection. She turned it about again and again, and thought she was losing her reason—there was not a particle of doubt of it, it was undeniably the same coat which she had fondly believed she had been wearing on her head in the elaborated and decorative shape of a new hood. In wild excitement she turned the contents of the wardrobe topsy-turvy; trousers and coats were flung about to the right and to the left, but there was no vestige to be seen of the new dress-coat, and with convincing force the certainty came to her that the stupid old seamstress had cut up the new garment instead of the old to manufacture her head-gear therefrom.

So that was the reason it looked so well! Ah, now everything was clear.

“If Schnorps gets wind of this he’ll murder me,” sighed Frau Sally, and so much was certain, this affair must be hushed up for the time being.

But how was she to accomplish this?

She glanced out of the window at the neighbouring house, and a saving idea flitted through her mind. Stealthily she crept downstairs and out at the back door, and hastily entering the house across the way she poured out the sad tale of her misfortunes into the sympathetic ear of her neighbour, imploring her to help her out of her difficulties by lending her the dress-coat of her husband just for this one night.

The good-natured woman was easily won, and an hour later Schnorps, happily unconscious of the state of affairs, and attired in his neighbour’s dress-coat, was on his way to the general, the servant of the latter walking behind him and dragging along his heavy bass viol.

The coat was somewhat tight, which fact caused its wearer to remark, as he was putting it on, that he was really growing stout in spite of his moderate way of living.

Poor innocent Schnorps!

The musical performance had passed off greatly to the satisfaction of the old general, and the ensuing excellent supper was no less to the satisfaction of his guests. The bass violinist indulged himself most freely in the good things set before him, and manifested a degree of steady perseverance as if he had fasted for a fortnight to fitly prepare himself for this special feast. He left nothing undone, plateful after plateful vanished, one glass of delicious wine after another disappeared in the bottomless pit of his eating apparatus, and whenever he thought himself unobserved he helped himself freely to generous handfuls of sweets, depositing them in the voluminous pockets of his dress-coat.

Ah, he was a kind father, when he had nothing to lose thereby, and he was quite willing to be a bringer of dainties to his dear ones at home.

The guests remained until very late, and of course Schnorps was the last to go. It was somewhere near two in the morning when he reeled home in a condition which really put every well-intentioned cab-driver under the moral obligation of turning out for him.

Arrived at the door of his house, he indulged in some profoundly philosophical reflections about the preposterous size of keys, and the smallness of the corresponding keyholes—so profound, in fact, that he sat for a long, long time upon the stone-steps, his head buried in his hands, and his eyes closed, until at dawn a cool breath of air roused him from his meditations, so that he rose shivering and passed into the house.

After several hours of refreshing sleep he awoke in no very enviable condition. He looked about him with wondering eyes, and suddenly he opened them to abnormal width as if to pierce the object upon which they fell.

It was the new swallow-tail. Merciful heavens, how it looked! During his siesta on the door-steps he had sat upon the cream-filled candies he had in his pocket, and the mixture of chocolate, sugar, and fruit had formed into a sticky crust on the tails of his coat which was truly horrible to behold.

The bass violinist jumped out of bed at a single bound, and examined the luckless coat, which in the very flower of its youth had been called upon to endure such hardships.

“When my old woman sees that, there’ll be a row,” he muttered, passing his hand desperately through his bristling locks. He seized a brush and began to belabour the swallow-tail with an amount of energy such as he had never before displayed; but although his perseverance was rewarded by the disappearance of some of the smaller stains, the large blurs which had been caused by the crushed chocolate-drops would yield to no amount of brushing, the less so as they were still moist, and by rubbing acquired a more formidable appearance.

Meanwhile he heard his wife beginning to stir in her room, and poor terrified Schnorps, who at times quaked in his shoes before his fair spouse, puzzled his head to find some remedy for his trouble. Suddenly it occurred to him that years ago he had bought a bottle of benzine which he knew must be somewhere in his room.

“HE SEIZED A BRUSH AND BEGAN TO BELABOUR THE SWALLOW-TAIL.”

He found a dozen bottles on top of the wardrobe, but how was he to know which was the one he wanted? He rummaged until he discovered one at the sight of which the certainty dawned within his dizzy brain that this was it. He spread out the unfortunate coat upon the table, poured a generous supply of the liquid supposed to be benzine upon it, and was about to rub it in with his handkerchief when a horrible sight appeared before him.

Wherever a drop of the fluid had fallen, the cloth turned red; and before the perplexed violinist could find an explanation for this remarkable metamorphosis, there appeared upon the coat an infinite number of large and small holes which sealed its doom for now and eternity.

It so happened that instead of benzine, Schnorps had laid hold of a bottle of sulphuric acid, which he had once used to clean the screws of his instrument.

When he realised what had happened, he certainly expected to go mad, and he weakly fell back in his chair, gazing fixedly upon his murdered swallow-tail. His head whirled—the new coat—his wife—the 15 thalers—the intendant—sulphuric acid—all was swallowed up in one wild eddy, and it was some time before he regained any self-possession.

Ye saints! it would never do to have his wife get hold of this! The first thing to do was to remove the article in question. Hastily he dressed himself, slipped on his felt slippers, hid the dress-coat beneath his dressing-gown, and stealthily crept upstairs, where he hid it, with many misgivings, in the utmost depths of the old wardrobe.

It was high time, for when he came back his better-half appeared upon the scene. Never had she inspired him with such terror as at this moment, and yet never since the days of their honeymoon had he bidden her good-morning as tenderly as he did to-day. She too was unusually amiable, a fact which only weighed the more upon his guilty conscience.

“Well, did you have a pleasant evening?” she asked.

“Oh yes, very nice—yes—quite nice!” he replied, in an embarrassed tone of voice.

“Oh, indeed!” she said, glancing about her as if she were looking for something, which caused poor Schnorps to tremble again.

“What are you looking for, dear?”

She gazed at him in surprise. Dear? He had only called her so once before, and that was when he asked her if she would have him.

“Nothing—that is—where’s your new coat?”

“The coat,” he answered, shaking in his shoes; “what do you want it for?”

“I should like to put it away,” she said very gently.

“You needn’t do that. I put it where it belongs.”

“Where it belongs?” she asked in great excitement.

“Why yes,” replied Schnorps; “upstairs in the wardrobe.”

“Ah, so,” she remarked, greatly relieved—“in the wardrobe! Yes, yes! Well, come and have your breakfast, Gottlieb; I am coming down in a minute.”

With these words she walked out, and now it was Schnorps’ turn to take a deep breath of relief.

He finished dressing and gradually became more tranquil—but it was the tranquillity that precedes a mighty storm.

The reader can readily imagine what followed.

After a pause of ten minutes, the shrill voice of Frau Sally rang through the house in a manner which made all the inmates start and tremble. Intending to return the borrowed coat to its rightful possessor, she had discovered the catastrophe, and raged like a lunatic.

At first Schnorps tried to defend himself and to comfort her, but when he began to understand all the details and complications of the hapless tale,—when he heard that he had ruined his neighbour’s coat, and that his own had long ago gone to perdition by means of his wife’s thoughtlessness and the old seamstress’s stupidity, then his wrath knew no bounds.

It was really too much. To have to pay for two new dress-coats, and to have none! it was death to him, it would bring him to an untimely grave.

I will cast the mantle of Christian charity over the ensuing scene; but to this day the neighbours talk about the row that took place at the house of the Schnorpses after the general’s party.

Fritz Brentano.

THE MAN OF ORDER.

SO far as I am concerned, I must confess that I am not greatly interested either in painted Empresses, or in Cardinals, or in Pashas. My attention was riveted upon a lank, lean man, who must have been of unusual length when he was standing up, a man with white hair and a grey beard, round blue glasses before his eyes, beneath them a nose shaped like a potato, and a thin-lipped mouth drawn down at the corners in a sardonic smile. On his head there was a straw hat, the brim of which was of a width such as I had never before met with. This person sat upon a camp-stool, holding with his left hand a parasol lined with green over the afore-mentioned straw hat, and with his right hand guiding a small telescope screwed to a stick, which was fastened in the ground. There is no need to say that the ruler and guider of this telescope was reconnoitring the châlet across the way. What pleased me best was the fussiness, the apparatus, and the intensity of research which served the man’s curiosity. Surely this was the last of the Mohicans, one of the last original characters which are disappearing more and more out of the insipid level of our most modern mediocrity and uniformity. Who was the man? The dear old village of Ragaz has, by no means to the delight of everybody, grown into a “fashionable” resort, and one meets queer enough figures there every summer. But one like the man with a telescope and camp-stool, who had improvised an observatory on the spur of the moment, is an exotic plant, even in the Ragaz of to-day, and is well worth the trouble of observation.

“WHO WAS THE MAN?”

What a pity, I thought, that Amadeus Hoffmann is no more among the living, or Edgar Poe. For either of them this fellow would have been a find.

Gradually the spectators dispersed, as neither the empress, who had been turned out of her empire, nor the cardinal, who had taken the hint that he was superfluous, condescended to show themselves, and as it was getting rather dull to gaze upon the red fez of the pasha, which was just visible above the railing of the verandah at the right. At last there were only two left: the telescope man, who continued his observations, and my worthy self observing the obdurate observer.

Finally, we both accomplished our purpose—he in seeing Madonna Eugenia and the Prince-Cardinal leave the house in quick succession, I in being a witness to the geometrical correctness with which the discoverer took down his observatory.

His motions were as measured as if he felt it incumbent upon him to keep time to the music of the spheres. His very manner of getting up showed a man who never puts one foot before the other without having incontestably assured himself where he was about to tread. When his long bony figure had drawn itself out to its full length his first object was to see clearly. For this purpose he cautiously removed his spectacles from his potato-shaped nose and wiped the large, round blue glasses emphatically with a piece of soft leather he produced out of his right vest-pocket. Having put back the piece of leather and the spectacles to their original place, he commenced the work of packing up, without haste and without delay. At first the telescope was unscrewed, reduced to its smallest dimensions, wiped on all sides with a large red silk handkerchief, and enclosed in a leather case, out of which he had carefully blown the dust, and which he now laid down gently upon the camp-stool. Hereupon he pulled out the stick which had served as a holder for his telescope until now, but which, upon nearer acquaintance, proved to be a perfect miracle, a very encyclopædia of a stick, so to say. It was evidently the pride and joy of its happy possessor. There could be no doubt of that from the satisfaction with which he touched the various springs of the complicated apparatus to display the countless metamorphoses which made the stick appear in turn as a common cane, as an umbrella, as a hoe, as a geological hammer, as a pocket-dagger, as a candle-snuffer, as a reading-desk, as a corkscrew, as a cup, as a chisel, as an inkstand, and as various other things. At last I should really not have been surprised if this Chinese puzzle had suddenly put on the garb of a speaker in Parliament.

The man could read open admiration, the most unselfish of human sympathy, from my countenance, and consequently felt impelled to say, as he pointed to his stick, having reduced it to its most primitive form: “It is the result of five years of theoretic studies and three years of practical constructive experiments. Ay, sir, with genius and order one can accomplish some pretty good things upon this disorderly earth.”

With that he leaned his miraculous staff carefully against a tree, buckled his telescope-case to a broad strap which hung across his right shoulder like a bandoleer, took up his camp-stool, devoted himself assiduously to reducing it to infinitesimal dimensions, and buckled the object, which in its present shape no person would ever have suspected of being a chair, to his strap. He then took up his encyclopædic stick, lightly pricked the ground with the point, and remarked, in the full consciousness of work well done: “All’s in order! Cardinal, Pasha, Ex-empress, all done up in good order.”

“Heilige Ordnung, segensreiche,” I began, quoting Schiller.

“Yes, sir; that is the wisest word ever the immortal Marbach sage pronounced. To say that, he must have been a man of order himself. And that he was so is proved to-day by his printed note-book. Unfortunately his collection of pill-bills has not yet been published. Nor Goethe’s Rhine-wine bills. Neither, I am sorry to say, have we as yet any printed proofs of the number of pipe-lighters which were twisted for Johann Heinrich Voss by his prudent housewife Ernestine. At the same time I must admit that gradually we are reducing our history of literature to something like order. There is nothing like a basis of scientific research. This alone will bring light into chaos. When we have once succeeded in establishing the relation of Goethe’s digestion to his poetic production, then we may set to work to discover the relation of the first part of Faust to the second. Happily there are men living and working who know that the so-called minutiæ and bagatelles of life are in reality the most important things. I know a Leipsic professor who has brought together scientific proof to show that true literature is that which has been contemptuously dubbed waste-paper-basket-literature. I know another Alexandrian ditto of Leipsic who is to edit a work which his friends have signalled in advance as about to create a new epoch in literature, the title of which will be, ‘The Wash-bills of our Classic and Romantic Poets, being a Collection of Records and Documents for a Prospective Inductive Analytical History of German Literature of the Eighteenth and Nineteenth Centuries.’ I know a third Byzantian of Leipsic, who plans to bring the art of writing diplomatic history up to the acme of perfection. He has made the different kinds of snuff which Frederick the Great indulged in the objects of his preliminary investigations, in order to be able to furnish proof of the effect which each individual sort had upon the brain-nerves of said Frederick, and consequently upon the destiny of the human race. Do you see, sir, that is what I call a truly scientific spirit, a healthy realism that, a spirit of sterling accuracy! Three groans for anything like disorder! It is incredible what a mischief-maker disorder is in these days! There was a fellow the other day had the audacity to spell Goethe G-ö-t-h-e throughout an entire book! Would you believe it? Fortunately he got his fingers whacked right heartily with the academical rattan. ‘Göthe’! what do you think of it? Of course it is idiotic in German to write the diphthongs ä, ö, ü as if they were æ, œ, ue—I’ll admit that, and I dare say Goethe himself would to-day save himself the trouble of putting in the extra e, but the orthography of G-o-e-t-h-e has once been established, and in the interest of order I would advise none but anarchists and rebels to be so godless as to leave out the e. The law of order is supreme, in great and in the greatest, in small and in the smallest.”

He stopped exhausted and gasped for breath. “On earth and in the heavens,” I added at haphazard.

“In the heavens? Not that I know of!” he said, drawing down the corners of his mouth. At the same time he touched his lifted cane, allowing the candle-snuffers to protrude for a moment, as if he were about to snuff out all anarchic stars in the firmament. “Do you know, in the so-called heavens there is not much order? The disorderly conduct of the comets should have been interfered with long ago. And then this transit of Venus, what do you say to that? Do you call that order? Venus should go in a decent and orderly manner above or below the sun, but certainly not straight before his Majesty’s very nose. Why, it is like snapping his fingers at the sun; it’s disrespectful, it’s opposed to all decorum, to all order.”

So saying he darted away from me—we had meanwhile reached the hotel “Hof Ragaz,” and entering the right wing had walked upstairs—and like a whirlwind he pounced upon a table standing in the hall, about which evidently there was something not in order.

“There it is again!” he muttered, slowly passing the tip of his fore-finger over the top of the table until upon the dusty surface the word “Dust” appeared in large type capitals.

“Hang those women!” grumbled the owner of the magic staff. “Will you believe me when I tell you that yesterday I wrote the same cry of warning upon the top of this table? All in vain!”

And setting down his elaborately-constructed cane with well-tempered force upon the first step of the staircase leading to the third storey, he continued: “Tell me, dear sir, did you ever in the course of your experience meet with a person of the feminine sex, be it child, girl, or matron, who could ever be prevailed upon by means of exhortation, kindness, severity, diplomacy, or force to fully shut the latch of a door, or turn down the bolt of a window-sash?”

“No, to tell the truth, I have never met a feminine person of that description.”

“I thought so!” he continued, with a triumphant smile. “Oh, if you knew all the trouble, all the untold trouble, I have taken for years to teach the women-folks at home to properly shut doors and windows. All in vain! But do you know how I punish the disorderly batch at home? Whenever I find a door left upon the latch, or a window with the bolt but half-turned, I at once lift the door or the sash out of the hinges and lean it against the wall. This has the desired effect of vexing the women and giving them additional work, especially in winter. There’s nothing like the law of order. But do you call that order, eh?”

And with a degree of moral indignation he pointed to a row of milk-stains upon the stairs. One of the chamber-maids, hastening up or down stairs with a breakfast-tray, had not kept an eye properly upon the milk-pitcher.

What did our fanatic in the cause of order? Something I had never seen before. He pulled a piece of chalk out of his pocket, and step by step he marked a neat circle round about each drop of milk.

“You see,” he said, “this is the way I do at home to call the attention of the women to such offences against all sense of decency and modesty, which of course they never see and correct of their own accord. Oh, disorder, thy name is woman.”

Johannes Scherr.

THE LUXURY OF GOING ABOUT INCOGNITO.

FOR six years the couple had lived in a very small town, in which each inhabitant could furnish a detailed biography of his neighbour, possessed an intimate knowledge of his daily menu, and knew just when the post delivered a package to him—the size and shape of which package being made the subject of conversation at the next coffee-party, where also unfailing conclusions were arrived at as to the contents and sender of the object in question. Judge Schwarz, being a person of distinction in town, naturally suffered more than others under the zealous observation of his neighbours, and was quite sure that he could not have a button sewed on his coat without having his friends mention the fact to each other and make their comments upon it;—ay, he went so far as to believe himself particularly favoured by good fortune if the local paper did not get hold of the important event and retail it to its readers the next morning in a sprightly editorial.

This consciousness had in the course of years reached such a stage in the judge’s mind as to become utterly unendurable; and as in certain individuals painful inner experiences seek to become personified in some external object, so all this small-town gossip, this puerile mutual observation and control, seemed to concentrate itself in the person of the Apothecary Lebermann, a good-natured but essentially prosy person, possessed of an insatiable curiosity, who was interested in the whole world, and wanted to know everything—on the other hand taking for granted that others had as lively a concern about him and the experiences of his daily life.

On the day on which our story begins the judge was returning from court in rather an irritable mood, and his face darkened perceptibly as he saw the apothecary coming to meet him.

While it was, as we have said, Herr Lebermann’s justifiable peculiarity to desire to know everything, and with a rare toughness of purpose to work upon his neighbour with queries until the other would fling the desired information at his head in a fit of uncontrollable indignation, the judge was the most uncommunicative of mortals. It was his intention that no one should know what he did, or where he bought his things, or with whom he kept up a correspondence—ay, even his Christian name was to him a matter of deep secrecy; in fact, a sharp altercation between him and his wife had once been brought about by no other cause than that she had failed to fully understand his feelings in this respect, and unadvisedly addressing him one day on the railroad with the harmless remark, “See the charming view, Karl!” had unmasked him before his fellow-travellers.

Here these two gentlemen, as unlike as possible in their peculiarities, met upon the street, and while the judge was as nimble as an eel in trying to escape the apothecary, the latter was equally assiduous in his efforts to detain him, and opened the conversation with the apparently unnecessary question, “Coming from court so early to-day, Herr Schwarz?”

“No!” replied the judge unkindly.

“No?” repeated Herr Lebermann, in a tone of surprise. “This is the way I generally see you come. Where have you been, then?”

Apparently the judge was deaf.

“Seems to me you generally come from court at this time of day,” persisted Herr Lebermann; “Ah, I see, you don’t care to tell me,” he added pleasantly, “but I know all about it just the same!”

“If you know it there’s no need of asking,” growled the judge.

“And now you’re on your way home,” remarked Herr Lebermann, with the blissful serenity of a man who has accomplished his purpose of knowing all about the aims and intents of other people. “I’ll walk along with you a bit. I am always out for a constitutional at this time of day!”

“That’s a wise thing to do!” remarked Herr Schwarz with fatal indifference.

“And when I get home I eat my sandwich,” the apothecary confidentially informed him; “only one, you know, so as not to take away my appetite for dinner! By the way, that reminds me—how does it agree with you to dine so much later?”

The judge gave him a scathing look. “How do you know that I dine later than usual?” he asked indignantly.

“You see, your cook is the sister of our maid, and she told her about it. You dine at half-past two, don’t you?”

“Sometimes,” cried the irritated judge, struggling to control his temper; “here we are at my house—good morning, Herr Lebermann!”

“One moment!” said the apothecary, taking possession of the judge’s button-hole while the latter was angrily seeking to escape; “there seems to be company at your house.”

“Why?” asked Schwarz, trembling with ire—he had fetched his sister-in-law from the station twelve hours ago, long after nightfall, and had hoped that the fact of her presence was as yet unknown.

“Well, I saw your maid buy three little tarts at the pastry-cook’s this morning,” said the apothecary innocently; “she generally takes only two—so I thought, perhaps——”

The judge darted a glance of utter contempt at his companion.

“Why did you not take it for granted I might desire to eat two tarts to-day?” he said with alarming politeness, and then walked into the house full of wrath.

Weighty decisions were ripening within him, and the result of his deliberation became apparent as he sat down to lunch with his ladies, and suddenly delivered himself of the astonishing words: “We’ll start for Berlin this evening!”

Helen dropped her fork and gazed at her husband with wide-open eyes. “This evening?”

“When I say this evening I don’t mean next year,” growled the paterfamilias. “That’s just like a woman! Here you’ve always been talking and begging to go and travel—to go and leave this miserable little place for awhile, and now when I offer to go, you raise objections!”

“My dear Karl!” began his wife soothingly, “I was only taken by surprise at your sudden resolve. What can have occurred to bring it about?”

“I’m tired of this small town gossip, and more especially of the apothecary!” said Karl, energetically. “Confound it—I can’t blow my nose but that Lebermann sends to inquire if I have a cold! I want to go and see what life is like in a large town, where I can go about incognito. I can just manage to get away over Sunday. We’ll take three round-trip tickets and go to Berlin this evening. Go and pack your things!”

He folded his napkin and got up. A low exclamation from Annchen interrupted him.

“Three?—shall I go too?”

“HELEN WAS SOFTLY CARESSING ON ONE SIDE, HIS LITTLE SISTER-IN-LAW PATTING HIS SHOULDER ON THE OTHER.”

There was such an unmistakable expression of rapture upon her charming face that a smile stole across the features of her growling brother-in-law.

“Well, I should think so,” he said; “did you suppose we would leave you at home?”

“Thank you, Karl—thank you!” cried Annchen, in a state of bliss; and while Helen was softly caressing her “bear” upon one side, his little sister-in-law was patting his shoulder upon the other, crying, “Thank you, Karl,—I think you are perfectly lovely!”

“Well, you’re the first person that has told me so since I was two years old,” remarked the judge, whose dudgeon was melting under the beams of the rapture he had been the cause of, like snow before the summer’s sun. “Now I know how to tame such shy little birds. What, Helen? Perfectly lovely, am I?”

And with a half-ironical, half-flattered shrug of his shoulders he left the room to devote himself to assiduous studies of the time-table, which to him, as to most people who rarely travel, was a book of seven seals.

The day on which this memorable resolution was formed was a cold, windy autumn day, making it imperative to choose warm clothing for the night journey. All day the ladies were occupied with putting their wearing apparel in order, which, in the face of this journey, proved to be inadequate in many respects.

“We’ll buy all that in Berlin,” said Helen consolingly to her sister, who was putting on her plain little straw hat with a look of deep concern, quite unconscious of the fact how charmingly becoming it was to her rosy face. The judge walked up and down in the room, casting brief remarks at his ladies from time to time. “Don’t take your entire outfit along just for two or three days,” he remarked warningly.

Evening came fast enough; every moment was made the most of, and when the lamps were lit there was still this and that waiting to be attended to. At the last moment—they were just sitting down to tea—a thought struck the paterfamilias; he touched the bell.

“Did you attend to what I told you this morning?” he asked the maid in his mystifying fashion.

Pauline looked at her master with no very intelligent expression in her face.

“What do you mean, sir?”

“Did you get what I told you?” queried the judge. Pauline was silent, thereby giving most decided expression to her bewilderment.

“Why, Karl, do tell her what you mean,” implored Helen; “there’s no time to be lost—we must be going!”

“Very well,” replied the judge discontentedly; “of course it is more than you can endure not to know what I am referring to! Did you go and fetch my fur-lined great-coat from the furrier’s?”

Pauline blushed guiltily.

“Oh, dear me, I forgot all about it, sir—I’ll run there now as fast as I can!”

“Yes, and you’ll run back no doubt when we are in the cars,” said her master contemptuously. “Well, then, I shall take my death of cold on the journey—at any rate I shall be spared the trouble of telling Lebermann just how my funeral came off!”

“Well, well, Karl,” said Helen, soothing his dismal forebodings; “seems to me there might be some other way out of your difficulty. Pauline can fetch the great-coat to the station and hand it to you there. Do you understand, Pauline?”

Pauline nodded humbly and departed, while the judge arose and took up the leather bag containing the money and tickets, and enjoined his ladies to make haste. “Put on your things, children—I think the carriage is coming!”

As the party reached the station their happy mood was somewhat dampened, for Pauline and the great-coat were not in sight. All in vain did eager eyes pierce the darkness of night, and all were about to succumb to fate and take their seats in the car, when the long-expected one, like Schiller’s diver, appeared breathless upon the scene, holding the coat on high, and swinging it like a triumphal banner. The judge without delay slipped into the warmer garment, and indeed it was high time, for already the conductor was slamming to the doors of the other compartments,—a sharp whistle, and the train started.

Our three travellers were in the rosiest mood imaginable. Helen, who had not set foot outside of the provincial town, which was now her home, since her marriage, pictured to herself the glories of Berlin in the brightest of hues, and Annchen dreamed vague, golden dreams, and indulged in exquisite air-castles, in which at the decisive moment her unknown hero was always seen leaning out of some window.

The judge was gleefully rubbing his hands.

“Now then—at last we are free of that miserable place,” he said, making himself comfortable in his corner of the compartment. “Now let us all go to sleep and open our eyes to-morrow morning in Berlin!”

The train sped through the night air; and it was not until it had reached Berlin that the Schwarzes awoke with the proud consciousness of being in the Imperial Capital.

The judge put his somewhat dishevelled head out of the window.

“See the hurry and bustle of the crowd,” he said cheerfully. “This is rather different from the streets of Solau! Here the individual disappears like a drop in the ocean, and no one knows or cares what his neighbour is about. Come, children, we must get out!”

He stretched himself with lazy ease, and took his hand-luggage down out of the net, then jumped down himself after his ladies.

“Look you, there’s not a person knows us here,” he continued; “we can do exactly as we please for three days—it’s like being at a grand masquerade!”

“Good morning, Herr Judge!” a voice cried at that moment behind him. “Shall I fetch you a cab?”

The addressed started perceptibly. A porter quite unknown to himself or his ladies stood before him and held out his hand for the luggage, with a peculiar, knowing smile upon his features, then quickly piled them upon his back with skilful dexterity.

“How do you know who I am?” asked the judge, somewhat irritated at this unexpected violation of his incognito.

His unknown friend, however, had already turned upon his heel in search of a cab, and was now storing his burden upon the top.

A glorious autumn morning was dawning over town, and the unknown splendour before them beckoned invitingly to our unsophisticated friends.

“Look here, Karl,” began Helen, who had meanwhile conferred with Annchen as to their mutual wishes, “what do you say to going on foot to the hotel? As we are only to be here for so short a time, we should make the most of every moment, and seems to me, after last night’s journey, a walk would be much more refreshing to us than a ride in a close cab!”

“Oh, yes!” cried Annchen, whose beaming eyes gazed upon the new world of wonders as a child might gaze upon fairyland.

“All right, go a-head!” replied the judge, whom the air of the metropolis had suddenly changed into a jovial fellow. “I’ll run and buy a map of Berlin, and then join you!”

He paid for the cab while the ladies were walking slowly a-head, and gave a fee to make sure that the charioteer would safely deposit the trunks at the hotel; but as he was turning back to the station to buy the map the cab-driver called out—

“Thank you kindly, Herr Judge!”

That good gentleman was perceptibly taken aback; he cast a suspicious glance behind him,—there stood the porter who had addressed him in like manner, and the two men were grinning diabolically.

“Aha,” said the judge to himself, “that fellow noticed that his foolish speech vexed me, and now they are having a laugh at me in company. I suppose that’s Berlin humour, and it has got to be endured!”

In possession of a Berlin town-map, which rivalled a moderate-sized bed-screen in size, the judge hastened to join his ladies, who had been caught by a shop window in the Friedrichstrasse as securely as flies caught in a fly-trap.

“That’s right,” said the judge indulgently, “take your time looking at these things. Where you are as utterly unknown as we are here, there is no harm in looking at show-windows.”

He thereupon gave the objects in the window a close inspection.

“Well, Herr Schwarz, what is it that’s taking your fancy?” suddenly cried a shrill voice, and a shoemaker’s apprentice with undisguised mirth in his rogue’s visage slipped by him laughing.

The judge was speechless.

“This is getting worse and worse!” he exclaimed; “there’s something wrong here! Come, children, this is positively uncanny. This looks like the artful device of some scoundrel. Let us hurry up and go to the hotel. The next time any one calls me Herr Judge or Herr Schwarz, it will be the worse for him!”

The sisters were growing nervous also.

“Yes, yes,” assented Helen, “we’ll go to the hotel—it is very unpleasant here in the streets! I don’t understand how it is, Karl,” she added; “you must bear a striking resemblance to some popular town celebrity, whose name happens to be Schwarz into the bargain!”

“And who happens to be a judge as well?” asked Karl sarcastically. “That’s very probable, my child! I have always said that no sooner do you set out to have a good time than immediately something occurs to frustrate your plans!”

They had walked on, eagerly discussing the possible cause of this unusual occurrence, and suddenly they discovered that they had lost their bearings.

“Where are we, anyway?” asked Annchen with a trembling voice. “I thought we were to be in Unter den Linden by this time?”

“That is so, Karl,” added Helen; “you are taking us nobody knows where! These streets are not at all attractive, and I am tired out!”

Karl forthwith produced his tremendous map of the town.

“Wait one moment,” he said with dignity; “I’ll tell you immediately.”

And he then and there unfolded the enormous sheet. A playful morning wind, however, mercilessly jerked it hither and thither, and there was nothing for it but to beg the ladies to stand on either side as banner-holders, and help him save it from destruction. But it took Karl longer than he thought to find his way about, and while he was still engaged in the effort, a tall, elegant-looking man walked down the street, and, with evident amusement, glanced at the conspicuous group, especially noting the charming person of little Annchen. The face of the stranger wore a pleasant, good-humoured expression, and, moreover, was so handsome and attractive that there was no perceptible reason why Annchen, raising her eyes at that moment, should suddenly blush to the roots of her hair, her hand at the same time trembling so that she could scarcely hold the map over which Karl and Helen were still chanting a woful duet in search of their hotel.

The stranger, evidently struck by the appearance of the lovely, embarrassed girl, walked on slowly and then turned and came back. There was undisguised merriment and a half-controlled laugh upon his lips as he passed around behind Karl and before the fair banner-holders.

“Good morning, Herr Judge Schwarz,” he said, taking his hat off low to the ladies, and turned to pass on his way.

But he had reckoned without his host. In a paroxysm of rage the judge darted after him.

“Sir, what does this mean? How do you know my name and title?” he cried, panting with indignation, while Helen vainly tried to appease him.

Karl shook off her hand impatiently.

“How can you have the effrontery to address me by my name?” he repeated in a tone of thunder.

“My dear sir,” replied the stranger, laughing, “if your name is to be kept secret, allow me to call your attention to the fact that it would be the part of wisdom not to wear it plainly upon your back!”

Karl gazed upon the stranger in speechless astonishment. Helen turned her husband dexterously around. Ah, here was the solution of the riddle! That benighted furrier had forgotten, in the press of business, to remove the slip of paper from the judge’s great-coat, by which that valuable garment had been distinguished from others entrusted to his keeping, and poor Karl had been walking about for an hour in Berlin with an enormous placard on his back bearing the inscription, “Herr Judge Schwarz!”

While Helen and Anna were occupied in removing this enemy of the much-desired incognito from the back of their liege lord and master, Annchen found time to whisper to her sister, “That was Kurt!”

“Nonsense!” cried Helen in surprise, now giving Karl’s tormentor a scrutinising glance, while the latter was vainly endeavouring to pacify the enraged Karl—more likely, I regret to say, for the sake of the pretty damsel than for brotherly love. But Karl was obstinate, and would have nothing to do with forgiveness, and even the kind offer of the unknown to show him the way had no further effect than to extract a surly reply, “You may, for all I care!”

“WALKING ABOUT FOR AN HOUR IN BERLIN WITH A PLACARD ON HIS BACK.”

“We want to go to the R—— Hotel,” added the judge reluctantly, “if you know where that is?”

The stranger laughed again.

“Oh yes, I know perfectly well,” he said; “it is not at all out of my way, if you will allow me to escort you there.”

“No, thank you,” said Karl curtly; “just tell me the way to go. My bump of locality is very well developed, but in this confounded town there’s no finding one’s way about.”

“Allow me to mention my name,” said the stranger after he had given brief directions as to the way, lifting his hat.

“Don’t trouble yourself, thank you,” growled the judge; “it is not my habit to make acquaintances upon the street. Come along, children.”

And after a brief and not very reassuring farewell to the young man, he gave an arm to each of his ladies, and drew them along after him.

The stranger, thus brusquely dismissed, looked after the three departing figures for a moment, gave a low whistle, and went on his way still laughing.

Meanwhile Helen, touched by the look of disappointment on her sister’s face, had smartly reproached her husband for showing so little politeness to the stranger.

“I don’t understand you, Karl,” she said. “How could you be so rude to the young man? It was only too natural that, under the circumstances, he indulged in the harmless joke of addressing you!”

“The impudence of it!” cried Karl in a rage.

“In fact, you ought to be grateful to him,” Helen added boldly, “for without him and his explanation you would still be walking about with the slip on your back, like a book from the circulating library. The young fellow looked very nice!” Karl stood stock-still.

“I’ll tell you what, children,” he said energetically, “now leave me in peace about your unknown friend! That’s the way all women are—that’s what a woman’s opinion is worth! Looked nice, did he? And such creatures are all for equality with men! If you are on the jury, and a convicted murderer has blue calf’s eyes, every one of you would acquit him! I’d have you to know that it is my firm conviction the man was a sharper!”

“Shame on you, Karl!” cried Anna, her just ire getting the better of her shyness. Her hero a sharper,—this was too bad!

Her brother-in-law gave her a penetrating look.

“What business is it of yours, if I may be permitted to ask?”

“Annchen has seen him at D——!” said Helen, endeavouring to hide her sister’s embarrassment.

“What?” asked Karl suspiciously, “you know the fellow? What’s his name?”

That, as we know, was a very inconvenient question. That the unknown was called Kurt would scarcely suffice to satisfy the judge by way of personal information, and that was all Annchen knew about him. So she was silent, and confined herself to blushing once more, which, however pretty it might look, could scarcely be regarded as a satisfactory explanation, at least not to this unsentimental brother-in-law and judge.

“Aha!” said Karl, with a lordly air, “you are so well acquainted that you do not so much as know his name! Take my word for it, the man was a sharper—that is my firm opinion. Such fellows always look very elegant and well-bred. Not another word about him!”

Meanwhile they had safely reached the hotel, and it was time to yield to the imperious need for rest and sleep. This, to be sure, was not indulged in for long, for excitement and the wish to enjoy Berlin to the full soon drove the pleasure-seekers out again.

In the dining-room the question, “What now?” was discussed at length by the couple, while Annchen listened to everything that was proposed with unmistakable indifference. To her Berlin had grown to be nothing but an enormous frame to hold the likeness of the adorable, who had crossed her path once more this morning in so surprising a fashion, and, alas! seemed utterly unconscious of the fact that he had ever seen her before.

The unknown, whom we will herewith introduce to our readers as Dr. Rüdiger, had meanwhile also reached the R—— Hotel, at which he too, as good luck would have it, had put up.

Himself unnoticed, he observed how the judge and his ladies, after a short parley with the portier, left the hotel, and no sooner had they turned the next corner than he too approached that personage.

“Has Herr Judge Schwarz gone out already?” he asked nonchalantly.

“Yes, sir, Herr Schwarz and the ladies have just gone,” replied the portier, who in his person united the dignity of a Spanish grandee with eely suavity.

“That’s too bad!” remarked the wily Rüdiger. “We were going to make an engagement for this evening!”

“Herr Schwarz ordered tickets to the opera for to-morrow night,” said the portier.

“Ah! that’s capital,” replied Rüdiger. “You may procure a ticket for me in the same box; I will come and ask you for it.”

He walked away cheerfully, and patiently did the principal sights of Berlin, in the secret hope that fortune would favour him and bring about a meeting between him and the Schwarz family. But for the present this hope came to naught.

Meanwhile our party had set out on their trip of pleasure. First they had devoted themselves to show-windows, and with many an admiring ejaculation had come to the conclusion that Berlin was the only place worth sojourning in. Then they pantingly followed two closed Imperial carriages, and endeavoured to make each other believe that they had caught a sight of the persons within. Finally, after the museum had been hurried through with profound awe and moderate comprehension, they all experienced decided pangs of hunger, and, with the intention of dining cosily together, they entered a superb restaurant on the ground floor.

The judge escorted his ladies to an inviting little table near one of the windows, from where one had a fine view of the streets and the busy crowds—not, to be sure, with the additional advantage mentioned in the well-known song—

“Across the lands we gaze, oh!

While we are all unseen——,”

for every glass of wine and every forkful of meat could be closely scrutinised by the passers-by.

But the pleasing knowledge of being quite unknown comforted the judge for this drawback of his position.

The waiter’s question as to what they wished to have for dinner might have appeared as an insult to the judge in his exceeding love of secrecy; being, however, very hungry he generously forgave him, and the three together assiduously studied the menu, which sported a variety of names which might have been made to stand for almost anything, so that whatever one ordered there was always a pleasant surprise in view.

Soon a bottle with a promising silvery cork stood upon the table in a dainty cooler, and the judge was just raising his glass to drink the ladies’ health: “Children,” he said, “I can’t tell you how delightful this is, to feel that one is sitting here free of all good friends and neighbours. Here’s to our incognito!”

There was a playful tap at the window. Karl, poor fellow, started as if he had beheld a ghost—indeed I know not but a ghost even would have been a more welcome sight at that particular moment than the smiling face of Herr Lebermann, who, with the unmistakable consciousness of giving the judge and his family a great and unexpected pleasure, pressed his nose flat against the window-pane.

“THE SMILING FACE OF HERR LEBERMANN.”

The judge dropped his fork. “For heaven’s sake—Lebermann!” he stammered with difficulty.

A further critical remark was suppressed, for the good Lebermann, with a happy smile upon his face, stood before our pleasure-seekers.

“Well now, you’d never have supposed you’d find me here, would you?” he asked, full of rapture.

“No—that is the last thing I should have thought of,” replied Karl mildly. “What brought you here?”

“I’ll tell you all about it in a minute,” replied Herr Lebermann, having given a chivalrous greeting to the ladies and proved himself thoroughly well-informed by looking at Annchen with the words, “Ah, this, I suppose, is your visitor that came the other night!”

He drew a chair up to the table and ordered a beef-steak.

The judge looked about him wildly, and was apparently so greatly in danger of indulging in unwary remarks, that Helen, to avert the storm, imprudently reminded the apothecary of his promised narrative.

“Well, you see,” began the interesting arrival, “I noticed some time ago that there was something wrong with my molar tooth—the third in the upper row,” he added, to expel every doubt. “I believe I mentioned it to you once, Herr Judge?”

“It’s quite possible!” sighed Karl brokenly.

“Yes, yes, I remember it quite well! We were sitting at König’s in the restaurant—it is not very long ago! Well, never mind! So, then, the day before yesterday, in the afternoon, that tooth began to hurt me.”

“Too bad!” said Helen pitifully, feeling it incumbent upon her to say something polite.

“It wasn’t very bad,” said Herr Lebermann consolingly, “but still I felt it, you know! Yesterday, in the morning, the head-man had left open the back-door to the shop, and then there is always a draught; you have no idea how it blows. Time and time again I have said to him: ‘Herr Semmler,’ says I, ‘don’t leave that back-door unlatched,’ but he can’t get over the habit! You will say, you wouldn’t be put upon!”

He looked at his victims expectantly.

“I don’t say any such thing!” growled Karl, his soul burning within him. “Hurry up, children—we must be going!”

“I shall be through in a minute,” said Herr Lebermann. “Where did I stop? Ah yes, I know! That miserable Semmler. When I tell him courteously it has no effect, and I don’t like to be curt to him, for he is a decent enough fellow, and it’s hard to find such another nowadays. He is quite to be depended upon. He has a little property too——”

“Yes, but Herr Lebermann,” interrupted Helen, who already saw her husband in spirit rush at him with a knife, “you were going to tell us what brought you to Berlin!”

Herr Lebermann cut up his beef-steak with much deliberation.

“I was just about to tell you,” he said with a courteous bow to Helen. “Well, you see, last night the door was left open again. I was somewhat heated. I had on a heavy over-coat,—perhaps I had walked faster than usual,—I shouldn’t at all wonder if I had!—I entered the shop—and there was a tremendous draught! You really have no idea how bad it was—and at that very moment my tooth was at it again! I was quite beside myself, went upstairs to talk to my wife. It is really very convenient to have our lodgings in the same house now. ‘Clara!’ says I, ‘my tooth!’ ‘The one that was stopped?’ says she. ‘Yes,’ says I. Do you know my Clara, Frau Schwarz?”

Helen gave an affirmative nod—she felt her eyelids growing heavy. Karl nervously drummed on the table, and Annchen was the only one who was not bored, for she was looking out upon the street in feverish excitement, hoping to catch a glimpse of her unknown hero, and hearing never a word that was spoken about her.

“Well,” continued Lebermann, “my wife, resolute as she is, said ‘Lebermann’—she always calls me Lebermann now, since our youngest is not called Fatty any more, but Robert, and you know my name is Robert too, and there was everlasting confusion—Robert—Robert—there was no knowing which Robert was meant. Well, to make a long story short, she said, ‘Lebermann,’ says she, ‘this is a serious matter. You’d best go to the right man at once!’ No sooner said than done. I went and got a round-trip ticket—took the cars—came here—went to the dentist the first thing this morning—and now I’m free of all that, and I have had the rare good fortune of meeting you! This is delightful—really delightful!”

“So it is,” said Karl, who was on the utmost verge of human endurance. “And now we must be going! Good-day to you, Herr Lebermann!”

“Where do you put up?” asked the apothecary.

“Nowhere as yet,” lied Karl, with a bold brow, appeasing his conscience with the thought that they had not yet spent a night at the hotel. “Waiter—what’s to pay?”

“And where shall we meet again?” asked this kind neighbour, who seemed fully determined to dog the steps of his countrymen like a fearful nightly apparition.

“Well, that’s the last thing—I mean to say we haven’t any definite plans as yet,” said Karl, taking his hat from the hook, while the ladies, much cast down by the turn their happily-begun travels had taken, were also getting ready to go.

Annchen was struggling with her mantelet, when suddenly she heard a very engaging voice behind her: “Permit me to be of assistance,” and Dr. Rüdiger stood before the group with the happiest face in the world.

As far as the judge’s expression at that particular moment was concerned, it is only to be regretted that there was no photographer on the spot. He gave the uncalled helper a crushing look, offered his arm to his wife, beckoned Annchen to his side, and without a word, bowed coldly to Lebermann and left the restaurant.

This was really too bad! After several hours’ chase Rüdiger had at last succeeded in finding his lovely heroine once more, and at that very moment she was taken from him again. The only straw of refuge for him to cling to was Herr Lebermann, whom he had found in the company of the Schwarz family, and who might therefore be expected to give him some information.

“The judge was in a great hurry,” he said, turning with an assumed air of placidity to the apothecary, who at once made room for the new-comer at his table.

“Yes, that’s just like my friend Schwarz,” he said deliberately, “he’s always excited—always on the go. I’m not at all like him. I am much more quiet, and that’s the very reason we get on so famously! My wife always says: ‘Lebermann,’—my name is Lebermann, Apothecary Lebermann, from Solau——”

“Dr. Rüdiger!” remarked his new friend with a bow.

“Happy to meet you! Well, my wife says: ‘Lebermann, you are the most imperturbable man I ever saw.’ So you know my friend Schwarz, Dr. Rüdiger? Ah, by the way, I did not understand exactly whether he has found a hotel—do you know where he is staying?”

“At the R—— Hotel,” replied Rüdiger innocently, thereby doing the worst service he could to the family to which he wished to make himself agreeable.

“Ah, I am glad to hear it; I shall go and order a room immediately,” said Lebermann joyously; “he will be so pleased, I know.”

The judge and his ladies had taken up their wanderings again not in the best of spirits. The fact that the world is round had never struck them as so vexatious as now, when, in consequence of this dire roundness, Herr Lebermann was always rolling towards them.

“What with this bad luck we are having,” remarked the judge bitterly, “it’s quite likely the fellow will cross our path again. After to-day’s experience I am confident I could climb up on Mount Vesuvius to escape from men, and when I reach the top the volcano would be sure to spit out Lebermann. Hello! where are we now?” he added discontentedly. “We are always losing our way in this wretched town. In this respect really I prefer Solau!”

He disappeared once more behind his large map and began to search diligently for his hotel, or rather for the street that it was in.

A small street urchin, with a bright, saucy face, at this moment came singing and skipping along the side-walk. At sight of the deeply-absorbed family an expression of unalloyed bliss passed over his face, and with the exclamation, “Who lives behind there?” he put his finger straight through the map; thereupon he took flight with a perfect shriek of laughter ere the judge had recovered from his consternation sufficiently to take up the chase with any hope of success.

Helen and Annchen looked at their protector with some misgivings, in the uneasy expectation of seeing him beside himself with ire; but, lo and behold, he was quite the contrary! Herr Schwarz, who had been steadily regarding the injured map, strangely enough looked very well pleased, and taking a deep breath he said, “This is a good thing, now—if the lad hasn’t punched a hole in the spot I have always had such a deal of trouble to find. This really simplifies matters greatly.”

Hans Arnold.

THE INNER LIFE OF THE SECOND-CLASS CAB-DRIVER.

“A WRITER who would describe things that he has not seen with his own eyes is a feeble rhapsodist; his characters are unreal, and his productions will never touch the hearts of his readers!” Amen! My friend Otto put his glass down on the table with such vehemence that the red wine in it spattered on the table-cloth. I am very shy by nature; people who talk loud and set down their glass energetically, looking at me at the same time, as much as to say, “Any objections?” always awe me. That is the reason my friend Otto awed me. We sat opposite at the table in the Italian wine-room; while he was speaking he looked firmly at me; there was no doubt of it, he counted me in with these blameworthy authors. Our other friends who sat at table with us gazed at me in silence; it was evident that I was expected to say a weighty word in self-defence. I myself felt it incumbent upon me,—but unfortunately nothing appropriate occurred to me. After a lengthy pause I mildly remarked, “Quite true, one should dip down into the fulness of human life.” My friend Otto laughed scornfully into his glass, our friends gave me a look of pity—I had undoubtedly made a fool of myself.

At the same time, the words of my friend Otto would never have made such an impression upon me if my conscience had not troubled me. A plan was ripening within me for a great social novel, delineating the life of the lower classes in Berlin. Realism—that was my programme. In spirit I saw my likeness in all the illustrated papers; behind my name I read, “The German Zola,” in a parenthesis. I had not yet fully decided upon the contents of the novel; but so much was sure, the hero should be a second-class cab-driver,—if that didn’t take, I didn’t know what would.

“KEPT ME WAITING AT THE DOOR WHILE HE WAS AMUSING HIMSELF WITH HIS ADORED.”

As I was walking home, I was tortured with tormenting doubts called forth by the words of my friend. “So you would delineate a second-class cab-driver?” I said to myself. “What do you know about a second-class cab-driver? That in summer he wears a coat trimmed with galloons, and a cocked hat, and in winter a mantle, high boots lined with straw, and a fur cap—everybody knows that. But have you ever listened to the conversation with which at the stopping-places he makes time pass for himself and his colleagues? Have you ever followed him into the gin-shops where he refreshes himself with a glass of half-and-half and a sandwich? Do you know aught about his likes and dislikes? Or of the mutual relation between him and his horse? In a word, have you any knowledge of the inner life of a second-class cab-driver? Be honest with yourself, you have none; and here you are going to write a social novel about him! Well I never!” The last word I said half-audibly to myself while I was opening the street-door in a very ill humour.

I did not sleep well that night. I was perpetually pondering over the inner life of the second-class cab-driver.

When I arose, sighing, the next morning, I perceived that I should accomplish nothing by going on in this way, and I resolved to devote myself to practical studies. Armed with my note-book, I stepped out into the street.

It was a glorious spring morning, but I was indifferent to the fact; my eyes were riveted upon second-class cabs and their charioteers. At the next corner there was a stopping-place for six such; my heart beat faster as I beheld them. Heretofore these fellows had appeared to me in the light of ordinary mortals; now it struck me that there was a sly smile upon their faces, as if they were conscious of the fact of possessing something which they would take care not to divulge—the inner life of the second-class cab-driver.

I jumped into the foremost cab; it was open, and sported cushions of red plush. The driver sat nodding upon the box, and for the present his inner life was hidden by the sound of a tremendous snoring.

“Thou shalt be my hero!” spoke a voice within me. After some fruitless efforts, I at last succeeded in waking him. I named some street at random, where he was to take me, and resolved to enter into conversation with him.

“Been on many trips to-day?” I asked in a winning voice, while he was putting his horse in motion. He did not seem to hear me, at least he paid no attention to my remark.

“Been on many trips to-day?” I repeated, still more pleasantly.

He turned his head about. “You’re right there,” he said. “It’s a double trip.”

I was taken back by this unexpected result of my speech. “Double trip?” I asked.

“Well, don’t you believe it?” he asked indignantly. I was vexed that I had unwisely entered upon a double trip, and subsided.

“Pronounced faculty for justice,” I put down in my note-book, “which occasionally amounts to unbending doggedness.” As the note seemed too scant, I added, “Brusque and uncommunicative.”

We had reached a part of the town which offered no possible attractions to me; so there was nothing for it but to drive back again. I jumped into the first cab I saw, and as I was just about to open conversation with the driver I perceived that it was a first-class cab. What was a first-class cab-driver to me? Besides, it cost me a shilling. I was terribly vexed with myself.

I now resolved to be more cautious in my choice of cabs. Long I strolled about the streets, keeping an eye on all the stopping-places I passed, until at last I beheld a young second-class cab-driver, who, as soon as he saw my gaze fixed upon him, leaped with jerky haste upon his box.

“At last,” I said to myself while getting in, “this is a genuine wide-awake Berlin cab-driver, such as I want.”

I tested his conversational powers with two or three casual remarks—my efforts were crowned with success. I told him to drive to the Thiergarten, as the most favourable place to listen undisturbed to his communications.

As we Were jolting along the streets I silently gazed at my charioteer, who was enthroned with more audacity than grace side-wise upon his box, so that I could see his profile; I noticed certain dark shadows in his face, which looked as if he had inadvertently come into close contact with a boot-brush.

As soon as we had reached the shady precincts of the Thiergarten the sluices of his eloquence were opened, and indeed this worthy youth repaid me for all that I had heretofore missed.

“How is business going on?” I asked.

“Well, it’s only just going so-so,” he replied, “but up to last week it was going fine; we’ve had the whole town to sweep.”

“Sweep?” I asked, somewhat puzzled.

“Well yes, you see,” he said, “that’s because all winter folks had to sit at home and have a fire, and now, you see, it’s warm again——”

“Aha,—I understand,” I interrupted; a rare point this for my note-book: “The second-class cab-driver manifests a surprising aptitude for simile; when the awaking spring-time entices men to leave their dark houses and entrust themselves to his vehicle, he expresses this by saying that he has swept the whole town.”

In the joy of my heart I offered him a cigar; he did not decline, at the same time remarking that he preferred snuff to tobacco, which, as he said, was better adapted to his calling.

Again I opened my note-book: “The second-class cab-driver does not disdain tobacco, preferring however to indulge in snuff.”

“You see,” I said, after having secured this important fact in writing for all future times, “how it is always well to open one’s eyes to learn new things; up to this day I have never seen a cab-driver use snuff.”

“Oh, as for them fellows——,” he replied, shrugging his shoulders, “why should they snuff? I was talking about our business.”

“How so?” I stammered, with a puzzled look. He leaned down to me. “I’m only taking this cab out to-day, because my father don’t feel just right; the old hurdle belongs to him.”

The trees in the Thiergarten began to dance before my very eyes.

“What is your calling?” I shrieked in mortal agony. With a smile he looked down upon me: “I’m a chimney-sweep,” he said.

“Stop!” I called out to him in a voice of thunder; “I want to get out here!”

That afternoon I returned to my rooms with a bowed head; I had the feeling that everybody must know I had been out riding with a chimney-sweep.

As I entered the house I noticed that there was a gateway beside the street-door bearing the inscription: “Cabs and carriages by the hour.” I had only lived in that particular house for a few days, and so had paid no attention to this before. Now, as my eyes were resting thoughtfully upon this sign, I made the observation that it is in hours of deep contrition that the soul of man ripens to grand purposes; for a thought arose within me, the boldness of which almost made me grow dizzy.

In my unhappy experience with the chimney-sweep I had seen that one can be a cab-driver on time,—how would it be if for twenty-four hours I myself were to fill such a post?

I seized my hat, so that the sacred fire of my first decision should not be cooled off by pedantic considerations, entered the yard below, and the office of the cab-owner.

At first he was little inclined to favour my plan; then gradually it dawned upon him that I should certainly be a very cheap cab-driver, who would cost him nothing, and moreover put thirty shillings into his pocket, a sum which I then and there counted upon the table. He began to treat me with a certain air of gentle indulgence, such as one bestows upon a person who is not fully in his right mind, and whom it is best not to irritate. One favourable circumstance was that he had just had a new coat and a new pair of trousers made for one of his drivers; provided these garments fitted me, I should put them on to-morrow. As far as the hat was concerned, he would let me take the one belonging to Gustav, the driver whose place I was to take.

“So then,—to-morrow morning at five o’clock,” he said, “right here in the yard!”

“I shall be here to-morrow morning at five o’clock,” I replied with an easy air, as if it were a daily habit of mine to get up at five. I was turning to go, when he called after me, “But you must leave your eye-glasses at home!” and he pointed to my nose; “that will never do for a cab-driver!”

“You are right,” I rejoined; “I shall get me a pair of steel spectacles.”

With that I left him, and partook myself to a masquerade-shop, where I procured a large beard to cover the lower part of my face, and a wig; beside my original object of disguising myself as far as possible, the thought of Gustav’s cocked hat made a special head-gear seem desirable. Beard and wig were sprinkled with grey, and must needs give me an air of homely dignity. In the shop of an optician I completed my outfit, looking through his entire stock of clumsy, old-fashioned spectacles. I could not find the desired steel spectacles, but there was a pair of horn ones with enormous circular glasses, by means of which my face gained an owl-like expression. That was what I wanted. Putting my treasures in my pocket, I stepped out upon the street, very well satisfied with myself. The energetic way in which I had seized upon this great enterprise pleased me; all my arrangements struck me as being exceedingly practical; I had a happy presentiment as to the success of my undertaking; this success I involuntarily carried into my thoughts of the novel that was to be, and I began to conjecture what remuneration I should demand. “I can’t let you have it cheap, gentlemen,” I said half-audibly with a triumphant smile, as I opened the door of the wine-room where I expected to meet my friends.

To evade every possibility of being recognised by them, I meant to tell them that I should be going out of town to-morrow.

This part of my programme also ran off smoothly. My friend Otto and all my other friends were present, and while my heart was leaping within me for proud joy over my new-discovered talent for adventure, I unfolded my fictitious plan of travel as coolly as possible.

The only person who seemed to be interested was my friend Otto.

“Going out of town?” he said. “Is it certain?”

“Quite certain,” I replied; “I shall be leaving to-morrow morning.”

“Where to?”

“Humph—a short trip to the country—to visit some relatives.”

“For how long?” he queried further.

“That depends; two or three days at the most.” It was really strange that he should be so inquisitive—and withal there was a peculiar look in his eyes. “He can’t know?” I asked myself involuntarily, but I did not complete my sentence. “That is all nonsense,” I said to myself; “he doesn’t even know anything about the novel—how could he guess anything?” Indeed, he seemed quite satisfied at last, and when I had left them all I walked home with the consciousness that things were going finely.

“Are you the gentleman?” asked a deep, grumbling voice, when in the grey dawn of morning I entered the yard next morning.

Without breakfast, for I had not wished to betray myself to my landlady, with a false beard on my face and a wig on my head, and an enormous pair of horn spectacles on my nose—my feelings can readily be imagined. And with all that I felt it incumbent upon me to feign a cheerful manner to keep Gustav—for I judged him to be the possessor of the bass voice—in good spirits.

“The weather will be gorgeous to-day,” I said, apparently in the best of humour, while my teeth were chattering with cold. Gustav grunted like a bear disturbed in his winter’s sleep.

“Can I put on the things?” I asked.

Gustav pointed to the office. “In there,” he said; “I’ll be hitching up while you’re about it.”

Soon after I came forth attired as a cab-driver.

In the middle of the yard stood the cab with a horse before it, which in the light of early dawn looked like some antediluvian animal. Gustav was occupied with the harness, and seemed disinclined to take notice of me.

“Here we are,” I said in a tone of assumed gaiety, which was not at all in keeping with my inmost mood. I seemed unspeakably ridiculous to myself.

Gustav looked at me askance, and made some inarticulate ejaculation. His conduct was not particularly encouraging. Upon the box I saw some sort of a receptacle with an open top.

“Aha,” I said, stepping up to it, “I presume this is the fodder-chest?”

Gustav looked at the receptacle and then at me. “That there?” he said; “sure, that’s my hat.”

“Ah, so——” I stammered in embarrassment; “your hat? Permit me.”

It was with strange feelings that I took the hat from the box and held it in my hand.

“Number twelve thirty-two,” said Gustav laconically.

“Twelve thirty-two,” I repeated. It was the first time in my life that I felt I had a number.

“At noon you have to feed him the first time,” Gustav informed me.

“Feed whom?” I asked involuntarily; my thoughts were occupied with the hat, and I thought that was what he was referring to.

Gustav seemed to consider it beneath him to answer my insipid question.

“Between four and five,” he continued, “he gets his fodder again; do you know how to go to work to feed a horse?”

He held the nose-bag in his hands and looked at me as if he had strong doubts as to my efficiency.

“I have sometimes seen it done at the stopping-places,” I replied dejectedly, “but we might as well make a trial.”

“Well, then, go ahead,” he said, handing the receptacle to me.

It was with some difficulty that I got the strap which held the bag adjusted around the horse’s neck; Gustav stood behind me with a critical air.

“That ain’t right,” he said; “take the bit out first.”

He now showed me how to take the bit out of the horse’s mouth, and then made me do it.

The horse put his nose in the bag, and when he observed that there was nothing in it, he shook his ears, as much as to say, “I don’t think much of such practical jokes!” The horse seemed to share his master’s opinion of me, for Gustav was anything but satisfied, as his grunting tones proved.

“Well now, go ahead!” he said at last, scanning me once more from head to foot. From under the seat he produced a dark bundle, which upon being unfolded proved to be his mantle; he thereupon proceeded to put it around my shoulders.

“Bless us! This is heavy,” I said, groaning under the burden.

As I seized the lines Gustav imparted his final instructions. “Here is the check,” he said, putting a piece of metal with the number of my cab into my hand; “now drive to the Schlesische Bahnhof and wait there; maybe you’ll get a job when the early train comes in. Give the check to the policeman; do you understand?”

“Yes, yes,” I said; “I have often arrived by that station myself.”

“And then when you’re ready to start give him a good whack with your whip,” he continued.

“Whom?” I was about to ask once more, for I thought he was still talking of the policeman, but fortunately I suppressed my dulness.

“For when he has been standing awhile,” explained Gustav, “the nag gets awfully lazy and his bones get stiff; but when he’s going he does very well, and then all you have to do is to let him jog along.”

“Very well,” I said, seizing the whip, which he handed to me; “I’ll do precisely as you say.”

Gustav opened the gateway preparatory to setting out. I jerked the reins and called out—“Go along!”

The steed in my cab, however, did not pay the least attention to my manipulations; so far as I could see, he had fallen asleep again.

I now began to belabour his back with the whip; even that was but half successful; he gave a little shrug of disdain, and stood still as if fastened to the ground.

“You must hit around further to the front!” cried Gustav from the gate; “he don’t feel anything on his back any more!”

So I whipped him on the neck, but, lo and behold, he did not seem to approve of such treatment. He threw his head back, shook his ears as much as to say, “Have the goodness to desist from such foolishness!” And when I paid no attention to his objections, he suddenly lifted his hinder part and “thump” went his hoofs against the cab, making me shake and tremble upon my box.

Now Gustav came walking up to me slowly.

“Give it to me,” he said, taking the whip out of my hand; “I’ll have a talk with him.”

The way Gustav “talked to him” seemed to make a decided impression upon the steed, for before I knew it he started in a canter, so that I was obliged to seize the reins convulsively in both hands.

“My hat,” I shrieked, for I felt that the cocked hat was parting company with my head in a graceful curve. It was not until I was out on the street that I succeeded in quieting the excited nag.

“Dear me, this—is—a—malicious beast!” I called out breathless to Gustav, who was running after us with the hat and whip.

“He’s only a bit ticklish,” he replied consolingly.

I replaced the cocked hat upon the spot assigned to it. Gustav turned to go.

I passed along the quiet streets with my vehicle on the way to the Schlesische Bahnhof. I now had time to examine my steed more closely. He was white, with a tinge of yellow, corresponding to the colour a white beard assumes if its owner frequently moistens it with beer.

“THE WAY GUSTAV ‘TALKED TO HIM’ SEEMED TO MAKE A DECIDED IMPRESSION UPON THE STEED.”

So we reached the Schlesische Bahnhof, where I joined the row of waiting cabs.

I had now reached my first station, and I sat upon my box with attentive ears, so that no word of the conversation of my new colleagues should escape me.

For the present there was little hope of accomplishing my purpose, for the only thing I heard was a grand snoring-chorus—the assembled drivers were making up for their interrupted morning’s sleep.

I tried to reason myself into the belief that the situation was very original and interesting, but the thought of my orphaned bed at home, and its discarded warmth and softness, would not be banished, and all at once the consciousness that I was cold and hungry and bored beyond endurance was borne in upon me with unrelenting sternness.

A vender of small sausages appeared upon the scene, and, although under ordinary circumstances the possibility of horse-meat would have caused me to abstain, I hastily came down from my box and purchased a pair of his charges.

“Can you give me some paper,” I said, “to wrap them up in?”

The sausage-man looked at me in surprise. “Bless my buttons,” he said,—“paper?”

I perceived that I was betraying myself. So I turned quickly away, and seeing the policeman at that moment, I handed him my check. Then I scrambled up on the box once more, and devoured the sausages. I thereupon moved into a corner of the box, wrapped myself up close in my mantle, and fell asleep. A tremendous uproar awoke me. The train had arrived; the cabs from the right and left were set in rattling motion; in the portico stood a man bellowing, “One thousand two hundred and thirty-two,” at the top of his voice. He seemed to have been occupied in this way for some time, for his face was purple with the exertion.

“Very good,” I said, smiling to myself; “there is a passenger who can’t find his cab; probably it will come to an altercation between him and the driver, and some of the most characteristic of Berlin phrases and expressions will come to light. Novelist, prick up your ears; don’t let anything escape you.”

“IN THE PORTICO STOOD A MAN BELLOWING, ‘ONE THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY-TWO!’”

“One thousand two hundred and thirty-two!” called out the man once more. I looked at him closely; he seemed to be a travelling merchant; a medley of trunks, bandboxes, and travelling-bags were lying about him on the ground.

I looked about me smiling. “One thousand two hundred and thirty-two seems to be sleeping as sweetly as need be,” I said to myself.

At that moment a voice struck my ear: “Twelve thirty-two—what’s the matter, old noodle-head? Are you sitting on your ears?”

Quick as a flash I turned around. One of the small boys that hang around stations to help passengers find their cabs had pulled open the door of my cab.

My stars! It occurred to me then that I myself was number one thousand two hundred and thirty-two.

Before I had time to reprove the impudent lad, the passenger, who was quite blue in the face, began to fly at me.

“Look ye here,” he cried in a loud voice, “it’s likely you left your ears at home! Here I’ve been standing an hour injuring my lungs by yelling out your confounded number!”

I was trembling with rage. “Sir,” I said, inclining my head to him from my box, “I must politely request you to address me in a more befitting manner!”

“I don’t want any of your impudence,” bellowed the azure-hued merchant. “It’s your business to prick up your ears, that’s all; and if you don’t do it, I’ll ask you to accompany me to the police-station!”

My blood was boiling with indignation, and, what was worse, I dared not reply, for fear my language would betray me.

“Boys, fetch my things!” the merchant called out to the lads who were clustering about, and all the trunks, handbags, and bandboxes were set in motion.

Meanwhile my colleagues—as many of them as had not driven away—gathered about us, and I now heard my fill of the peculiarities of the Berlin vernacular that I had previously longed for.

“Better put your spectacles on your ears, so you’ll hear better,” cried one.

I tried to keep silent—but could I let such a brutal speech pass unchallenged? “It is very bad taste,” I replied with dignity, “to reproach a person for physical infirmities; if my near-sightedness enjoins the necessity of wearing spectacles——”

“Don’t lose your breath, cabby,” cried a second, and a general laugh interrupted my speech.

“Cabby sees with his ears and hears with his eyes,” shrieked one of the wretched boys. There was a laugh again; I was perspiring with indignation.

“Take that up on the box,” cried my passenger in an insolent tone, thumping a heavy brass-nailed trunk down on my feet.

I was about to recommend greater caution when he handed me a couple of curtain-poles wrapped in paper and tied together with a cord.

“Take that too,” he commanded, “and see that it doesn’t slip down.”

So it was a provincial upholsterer who was treating me thus! In spite of that, there was nothing for it but to obey his orders. I set the curtain-poles up on end and put my left arm around them.

Now there was an uproar among the boys once more. “Cabby, hold the crow-bars tight!” cried one. “Cabby with the crow-bars!” yelled the boys, shrieking, bellowing, and whistling in a diabolical chorus.

“To the tavern ‘Green Tree’ in the Klosterstrasse!” cried the overbearing voice of the upholsterer. He got into the cab, and shut the door with a bang.

I seized the reins, the nag stood still, as if it were none of his concern.

“Go along with ye, you wretched beast! Hello there! Skip along!” I muttered between my teeth; the abominable quadruped persisted in stubborn indifference. I brought the whip down upon him “toward the front,” as Gustav had advised me, and, sure enough, suddenly the cab quivered, struck with the hoofs of the balking steed.

An infernal concert of wild jubilations arose about me. I sat upon my box in a state of wretched helplessness, and, to make matters worse, the travelling merchant put his head out of the cab.

“How long is it going to take you to get started?” he called out, following up his words with a perfect volley of oaths. “Did anybody ever see the like of this?”

One of my colleagues of the box was moved with brotherly pity, seized the malicious steed by the head, and put him in motion.

The other drivers sat on their boxes taking a nap, and there was no opportunity of entering into conversation with them. I was very much depressed, took off my mantle, for it was growing warm, climbed up into my seat, and drove away to try my luck elsewhere.

As we were jolting slowly across the Schlossplatz, there came straight across the square from the red Schloss a figure, the sight of which made my blood run cold—it was my friend Otto.

Supposing he should recognise me,—I dared not think the thought, I felt myself blush and then turn pale under my beard. I turned my head to the other side, toward the Schloss, but as I involuntarily looked at him askance, it seemed to me that he was standing still. In fact so he was,—he stood there beckoning to me! I was seized with horror! “Beckon away as hard as you please,” I said to myself, driving on. Now I heard his voice: “Hello there, cabman!” I pretended not to hear, and still drove on.

Then he came rushing with tremendous strides across the square.

“Confound you!” he cried. “Don’t you hear me?”

There was no further possibility of escape; I must needs pull up.

Like a criminal over whom sentence of death has just been passed, I hung my head; with the corner of my left eye I saw that my friend Otto had on his best suit, and was carrying his summer overcoat over his arm.

“Kanonierstrasse No.——,” he said, jumping airily into the cab. I started involuntarily. What did he want to go to the Kanonierstrasse for? I knew that he did not live there—none of our boon companions lived there, I knew that also,—but some one dwelt within that house whom I knew very well, and that was Emma, my friend of the ballet, my Emma! That Emma was true, true as gold, I knew, thank Heaven! At the same time a vague unrest took possession of me, and in flying haste did I urge my steed in the direction of the Kanonierstrasse.

I riveted my eyes upon the house long before we reached it. Did my suspicion deceive me? Up there between the hyacinths did I not see some one look out? The wheels of my cab came rattling up before the door, no further mistake was possible; out of Emma’s window inclined a head with raven curls—it was hers! At the same moment my friend Otto impetuously pulled open the door of the cab, jumped out, and threw kisses to her. Then he put his hand to his mouth and called out: “I’ll wait for you down here with the cab. Come down, and we will have a drive in the Thiergarten.”

I fell back into the corner of my seat. This was too much! The wretch! My own faithless beloved I was to take on a drive in the Thiergarten!

Through my horn spectacles I cast one annihilating glance above; it fell upon no one, for Emma had left the window.

For a moment I considered—should I tear the wig, spectacles, and beard from off my face, and so drop my disguise before the traitors? But the ridicule, the eternal ridicule! It seemed to me the whole Kanonierstrasse would stand on its head in appreciation of the joke.

“Turn the top down,” commanded my friend Otto. “It is stifling in here.”

Worse and worse! But what could I do? I scrambled down and began to do as I was bid. Meanwhile the street-door opened and Emma floated across the threshold. A sombre oath escaped me.

“Now drive to the Thiergarten,” said my friend Otto.

“Very well,” I replied, with terrible irony in my savage voice.

The wretched couple behind my back seemed to be in the best of spirits, and as the cab was now open I could understand every word they spoke.

“Did you receive my post-card?” asked the villain.

“Of course I did,” replied the faithless one. “I did not know he was going out of town. Are you quite sure he’s gone? I’m in mortal terror.”

“Never fear, my love,” he replied; “I was in his rooms this morning. He must have left very early.”

I was furious. So this was the meaning of his interested questions the night before!

Full of wrath I brought down my whip upon my horse.

“Don’t beat that horse so!” cried my friend Otto from the cab; “we are in no particular hurry.”

I burst into a roar of hysterical laughter. The villain! he was pitiful toward the horse, more than toward his friend. Again the nag was called upon to bear the brunt of my indignation at my friend Otto.

“The fellow must be mad,” said my friend Otto.

“Don’t talk so loud,” begged Emma.

“Nonsense,” he replied. “I told you that he is as deaf as a poker; moreover, look at him. I believe he has false hair!”

My wig had evidently become dislocated. I heard them giggle. For a moment I considered the propriety of turning my whip to good purpose behind me—but that of course would have betrayed me.

The noise of passing carriages on Leipzigerstrasse made it impossible for me to hear what was passing between the couple; it was not until we had reached more quiet streets that I again caught some bits of their conversation. I perceived that I was again the subject thereof.

“How do you get along with him?” asked my friend Otto.

“Oh well,” responded Emma, “he’s a good enough fellow.”

Whack,—the nag caught it again then, for the tone in which she said it roused my ire.

“That’s so,” continued my friend Otto; “but he is a bore, an intolerable bore.”

The knave! With bated breath I listened to hear what she would reply to this calumny.

Emma giggled; that was as much as to say, “You are right.”

I was in a fever of wrath.

“Does he ever read any of his things to you?” asked my friend Otto.

“Does he write?” she queried in surprise. The uneducated goose! The superficial hussy! Did she not know that I had already published two volumes of lyrical poetry? And she asks if I write!

“I should think so,” replied my friend Otto, with an infamous roar of laughter. “Every little while he hatches a new poem a yard or two long, and reads it to his friends.”

Emma shook with laughter.

“So far he has spared me,” she observed.

“Never fear, my love, never fear,” I muttered into my false beard; “you shan’t have any more opportunity to be bored by me!”

In my mind I was composing the crushing farewell-note I intended to write to the faithless one on the morrow.

After a time which seemed endless to me we reached the garden restaurant called “Charlottenhof.”

“Hold on, driver!” bellowed my friend Otto, who, taking me to be deaf, considered it necessary to address me in his loudest tones. Then he turned to Emma.

“Come, sweetheart,” he said, “we will have a glass of beer.” He helped her get down. “Wait till we come back,” he said to me. At the gate stood a waiter: “Fetch a glass of beer for the driver,” he added, and before I had time to enter protest he had stepped into the garden, arm-in-arm with his lady-love.

Fully an hour and a half did my friend Otto see best to keep me waiting at the door, while he was amusing himself in the garden with his adored.

I occupied myself with writing my obituary in spirit, and tears of emotion over my sad fate trickled down my beard. “By the fickleness of a heartless woman”—thus read the last page of my obituary—“and the depravity of a man whom he took to be his friend, was this poet’s heart broken, and this glorious possibility of immeasurable promise for Germany was nipped in the bud.”

Ernst von Wildenbruch.

BON-MOTS.

EVERYBODY is a genius, at least once in his life. The only difference is that the so called geniuses have their good ideas thicker. This shows how wise it is to put everything on paper.

It always grieves me when a man of talent dies, for earth has more need of him than heaven.

This book had the effect which all good books have: it made the dull duller, the wise wiser, and the other millions remained unchanged.

One of the greatest discoveries which human reason has made in modern times is, in my opinion, the art of judging books without having read them.

He had a couple of warts on his nose in a position which made them likely to be mistaken for the heads of nails, by means of which that feature might have been fastened to his face.

It is no art to say a thing in few words when you have something to say, like Tacitus. But when you have nothing to say, and write a big book, that’s what I call merit.

He combined the qualities of the greatest men in history: he carried his head on one side like Alexander the Great, he was always scratching his head like Cæsar, he could drink coffee like Leibnitz, and when he was comfortable in his easy-chair he would forget to eat and drink like Newton, and like him it was often necessary to wake him.

“Our forests are growing thinner, the supply of wood is declining, what shall we do?” Oh, when our forests are used up there is surely nothing to hinder our burning books until there is a new supply.

Of all commodities in the market there is none more remarkable than books. Printed by persons who do not understand them; sold by people who do not understand them; bound, reviewed, and read by people who do not understand them; and, best of all, written by people who do not understand them.

He was a most meritorious boy: before he was six years old he could say the Lord’s Prayer backwards.

I have found throughout life that when all other means fail there is nothing that will give you a surer clue to a man’s character than a joke which he takes amiss.

I suppose there is no man in the world who, if he turns thief for a thousand thalers, would not for half the money have preferred to remain the honest fellow he was.

Whosoever says he hates all kinds of flattery, and says it in good faith, has surely not become acquainted with all kinds, in matter or in form. To be sure, people of sense hate ordinary flattery, because they must necessarily feel mortified at the amount of credulity with which the flatterer credits them. That is, they hate ordinary flattery, because to them it is no flattery. According to my experience, there is no very great difference in human nature. Each has his own coin for which he will sell himself. It is human invention to differentiate between human beings; it is pride which supports these distinctions. Nobility of soul is very much of a piece with nobility of birth.

To make persons of discernment believe that you are somewhat which you are not is as a general thing more difficult than to become what you would appear to be.

If you would know what other people think about an affair which concerns you, consider what you would think of them under like circumstances. Do not take any one for more moral in this matter than you are, or for more credulous. This remark is more than half true, and this is saying a great deal for a maxim which a person lays down in his thirtieth year, as I do this one.

One may rail at the faults of a great man, but one must not rail at the man for all that.

It is safe to take it as a sure sign that you are growing better when paying your debts gives you as much pleasure as making money.

Virtue which is the result of good intention is not worth much. Impulse or custom is the thing.

That a false hypothesis is often to be preferred to the true one is shown by the theory of the freedom of human volition. Certainly we are not free, but it requires a very profound study of philosophy not to be misled by this knowledge. Freedom is the easiest explanation, and will remain the most popular one because appearances are for it.—Lichtenberg.

The story was told how St. Dionysius, after he had been beheaded, walked two miles with his head in his hand. “Two miles?” asked one of the company. “Yes, two miles; there is not the least doubt of it,” was the reply. “I will gladly believe you,” said a lady, wittier than the others; “on such occasions it is only the first step which is difficult.”

The French ambassador came to Charles V. with the request that Milan should be ceded to his master the king. Whereupon the emperor merely replied, “The wish of my brother, the King of France, is my own.”

The Duchess of Klingston desired to be admitted to the court circle at Berlin. She requested the Russian minister to take occasion to assure the king of her high esteem, and to tell him that she had been heard to say her fortune was in Rome, her fleet at Venice, and her heart in Berlin. When the king heard this he quickly responded with, “My compliments to the Duchess, and tell her I greatly fear she has favoured us with the least of her possessions.”

A great gentleman said to his servant in a moment of caprice, “Tell me, John, supposing the devil should come to get one of us, which one do you think he would take?”

“He’d take me, without a doubt, your honour.”

“Why so, you absurd fellow?”

“Because he has some chance of losing me, but he is quite sure of you,” was the reply.

A witty king, in travelling through his lands, passed a small provincial town in which great honour was shown him by the magistrate and burgomaster, the latter greeting the monarch in a solemn address. The most conspicuous thing about the portly little man was the well-rounded expansion of his spotless white vest. The day was very cold, and the speech was interminable. Suddenly the king interrupted the speaker, and, as if concerned about his health, pointing to the snowy vest, he graciously remarked, “My dear sir, I fear your Mont Blanc will catch cold!”

The presence of a university makes the country stupid for miles about.—Börne.

With them (the troubadours) it is always the winter that goes and the spring that comes, and the ennui that remains.—Schiller.

If called upon to choose between the pangs of conscience and the pangs of toothache I should unhesitatingly choose the former.

In other countries when a citizen becomes dissatisfied with his government he emigrates, in France he requests the government to emigrate.—Heine.

THE EARLY DAYS OF A GENIUS.

THE ancients considered it as a piece of rare good fortune if the gods permitted a person to be born in a celebrated town. As, however, this good fortune has not befallen some very celebrated men, since Bethlehem, Eisleben, Stratford, Kamenz, and Marbach were not originally brilliant points in the thoughts of men, I trust Hans Unwirrsch was not put out by the fact of first seeing the light of day in a small town called Neustadt. There are not a few towns and boroughs bearing the same name; but they have never quarrelled over the honour of counting our hero among their citizens. Johannes Jakob Nikolaus Unwirrsch did not make his birthplace any more celebrated in the world.

Ten thousand inhabitants did this poor little town have in 1819; to-day it has one hundred and fifty more. It lay, and still lies, in a broad valley, surrounded by hills and mountains, down the sides of which the forest comes straggling into the precincts of the town. In spite of its name it is no longer new; painfully has it struggled along through stormy centuries, and is now enjoying a peaceful, sleepy old age. The hope of making a mark in the world it has gradually given up, and feels none the less contented for this. The sound of its church-bells makes an agreeable impression upon the wanderer, as he steps out of the woods on the nearest hill-top; and when it so happens that the sun is mirrored in the windows of the two churches and the houses, this same wanderer seldom remembers that all is not gold that glitters, and that evening-bells, fruitful fields, green meadows, and a pretty little town in a valley, is not enough by far to make an idyl. Amyntas, Palæmon, Daphnis, and Doris often lead anything but an idyllic life in the valley below. As the fleecing of lambs and sheep had gone somewhat out of fashion, people were reduced to pitching into each other’s wool, and sometimes fleeced each other with a will. But there was much marrying and giving in marriage, and altogether people passed through life with a measure of comfort; that they found living not particularly dear, bore a part in this happy consummation. The devil take things when fruit and cider fail, and milk and honey is rare in Arcadia!

But we shall probably have further opportunity to lose words about this here and there, and if not it is no matter. For the present we must turn back to the young Arcadian, Hans Unwirrsch, and see how he finds his way about in life.

A very uneducated woman was the wife of the shoemaker. She could read and write in an exigency, but her philosophical education had been completely neglected; she wept easily, and with pleasure. Born in darkness, she remained in darkness; suckled her child, set him on his feet, and taught him to walk—put him on his feet for life, and taught him to walk for life. That is great praise, and the most cultured mother can do no more for her child.

In a low, dark room, into which but little fresh air and still less sunshine came, did Hans awake to consciousness; and that was well in one respect. Later on he was not too much afraid of the caves, in which by far the greater part of humanity partaking of the blessings of civilisation are obliged to spend their lives. All his life he took light and air for what they are, luxuries which fate gives or denies, and which it seems to deny more willingly than to give.

The room on the street-side, which had at the same time been Meister Anton’s workshop, was kept unchanged in its former condition. With anxious care did the widow see to it that none of the tools belonging to the deceased were moved. Her uncle Grünebaum had declared his willingness to purchase all the unnecessary implements at an acceptable price; but Frau Christine could not bring herself to sell a single piece. In all her leisure hours she sat at her wonted seat beside the shoemaker’s work-table, and in the evening it was, as we know, only by the light of the glass-ball that she could knit or sew or read her hymnal.

The poor woman worked hard to gain an honest living for herself and her child. In the little bedroom, the windows of which looked out into the yard, she lay many a night wakeful and anxious, while Hans Unwirrsch in his father’s large bedstead was dreaming of the large rolls and buttered slices of bread that the neighbours’ happy children enjoyed. Wise Meister Grünebaum did what he could by his relatives, but he was not very successful in his trade; he was too fond of delivering long speeches at the ale-house; and his customers were more willing to give him a pair of shaky boots to be mended than to order a new pair of him. It was with difficulty that he kept his head above water; but he was never chary about giving advice, indeed he gave it gladly and in large quantities, and unfortunately we must call attention to the not unusual fact that the quantity stood for the most part in no proper relation to the quality. Cousin Schlotterbeck, though by no means so wise as Meister Grünebaum, was more practical, and it was upon her advice that Frau Christine became a washerwoman, getting up in the morning between two and three, and returning at night tired and aching, to still the primary, physical hunger of her child, and translate his dreams into reality.

Hans Unwirrsch retained faint, odd, and uncertain memories of this period of his life, which he has reported to his nearest friends. He had a light sleep from early youth, and so he often awoke by the light of a match, with which in cold, dark nights of winter his mother lit her lamp to prepare for her early walk. He lay in his warm pillow, and did not stir until his mother bent over him to see if she had awakened the little sleeper by the pattering of her slippers. Then he would throw his arms about her neck and laugh, while she gave him a kiss and an exhortation to go quickly to sleep again, for the day was far distant. This exhortation he would obey at once, or else later. In the latter case he looked at the burning lamp through his half-closed eye-lids, and at his mother and the shadows on the wall.

Strange it is that all his recollections seem to be of winter; there was a misty atmosphere about the flame of the lamp; his breath made a cloud between him and the light; the frozen window-panes glittered, it was bitter cold, and the comfort he felt in his safe, warm bed was intermingled with terror of the bitter cold without, which made him pull the blanket over his nose.

He never could understand why his mother got up so early, while it was so dark and so cold, and while such queer, black shadows were gliding along the wall, nodding, rising, and bending. Still more vague were his thoughts about the places his mother went to; in accordance with his momentary mood, he pictured them more or less pleasantly, mingling in all sorts of details taken from fairy-tales, and fragments out of the conversations of grown persons that he had overheard, and which in these misty moments between sleeping and waking took on more and more of a gaudy colouring.

At last his mother was dressed, and once more she bent over the child’s bed. Again he received a kiss, a great deal of good advice, and many enticing promises, if he would lie still, not cry, and go to sleep again. The assurance was added that the morning, and with it Cousin Schlotterbeck, would be coming ere long; the lamp was blown out, the room grew dark, the door creaked, the steps of his mother passed away; soon he was fast asleep, and when he awoke again Cousin Schlotterbeck was generally sitting by his bedside, and in the adjoining room he could hear the fire crackle in the stove.

Cousin Schlotterbeck, although she was not much older than Frau Christine Unwirrsch, had always been Cousin Schlotterbeck. No one in the Kröppelstrasse knew her by any other designation, and she was as well known in the Kröppelstrasse as the “old Fritz,” as the Emperor Napoleon, and old Blücher, although she had no further resemblance to these celebrated heroes than that she used snuff like the Prussian king, and had a hooked nose like the “Corsican bloodhound.”

Of right she should have filled a chapter by herself in this book, for she had a gift of which not every one can boast: to her the dead had not departed this earth; she saw them walk the streets, she met them on the market-place as one sees the living, and comes upon them unexpectedly around the corner. There was nothing weird about this to her; she spoke of it as of something quite natural and unsurprising, and to her there was no difference whatever between the Burgomaster Eckerlein, who had died in the year 1769, and often met her in his wig and red velvet coat near the apothecary’s shop, and the grandson of this man, who owned this same apothecary’s shop in the year 1820, and who was now looking out of the window with no faculty for seeing his grandfather walking below.

Even in the minds of Cousin Schlotterbeck’s acquaintances this strange “gift” of hers no longer awakened horror. The unbelieving ceased scoffing at it, and the believing—of whom there was a goodly number—did not cross themselves any more. Upon the character of the good little woman this high favour had no perverting influence. She was not made supercilious by her marvellous seer’s gift; she took it as an undeserved favour of God, and remained more humble than many other people who did not see nearly as much as the oldish spinster in the Kröppelstrasse.

As far as her external appearance is concerned, Cousin Schlotterbeck was of medium height, but she stooped perceptibly, and walked with a far-protruding head. Her clothes hung about her like something that does not belong there, and her nose was, as we have said, very sharp and very hooked. It would have impressed one disagreeably, this nose would, if it had not been for the eyes. But her eyes did penance for every sin her nose committed; they were remarkable eyes, and saw remarkable things. Clear and beaming they were up to her old age,—blue, young eyes in an old, old, dried-up face! Hans Unwirrsch never forgot them, although he looked into much more beautiful eyes in his life.

To learning, Cousin Schlotterbeck was devoted in a naïve way. She had a tremendous admiration for wisdom, and particularly for theological wisdom; little Hans was indebted to her for an introduction to all the erudition of which he made himself more or less a possessor in later times. She could tell fairy-tales which would have delighted the hearts of the Brothers Grimm, and when the wicked queen put the golden pin into her stepdaughter’s head, Hans Unwirrsch felt the point of it piercing through to his very diaphragm.

Hans and the cousin were inseparable during the first years of the boy’s life. From early morning till late at night the ghost-seer took the part of a mother to the child; without her advice and help did nothing occur which related to him; many a time did she appease his hunger, and many a more subtle hunger did she awake in him.

Hans Unwirrsch was a precocious child, and learned to talk almost before he walked; reading was to him but play. Cousin Schlotterbeck understood this difficult art very well, and managed to stumble through the most incomprehensible big words.

She liked to read aloud, and indulged in a nasal eloquence which was very impressive to the child. Her library consisted principally of a Bible, a hymnal, and a long row of almanacs standing in unbroken line from the year 1790, each of which contained a touching, or comic, or sensational narrative, as well as a goodly stock of receipts and nostrums, and a fine collection of funny anecdotes. For a susceptible childish imagination there lay a world of rare wonder in these old pamphlets, and spirits of all kinds arose out of them, smiling, grinning, threatening, and leading the young soul through various horrors and delights. A still greater impression, however, did the “book of books,” the Bible, make upon the boy. With shuddering rapture did Hans sit at the feet of his cousin, and dive into the mysteries of chaos; the earth was void and empty, until the light came dividing the darkness and the water under the land from the water over the land. When sun, moon, and stars began their dance, and signs, times, days, and years appeared, then he breathed anew; and when the earth brought forth grass, and leaves, and fruit-trees, and when the water, and the air, and the earth began to be peopled with moving and living animals, then he clapped his little hands, and felt ground under him once more.

“WITH SHUDDERING RAPTURE DID HANS SIT AT THE FEET OF HIS COUSIN.”

But his days did not pass only with reading and listening to stories. As soon as Hans Unwirrsch did not throw his hands about aimlessly any more, or put them into his mouth, his mother and cousin made haste to introduce him to the great principle of labour. Cousin Schlotterbeck was an ingenious woman, who managed to earn an extra penny by dressing dolls for a large factory, an occupation which was interesting enough for a child, and in which Hans liked to be helpful. Ladies and gentlemen, peasants and shepherds, and many other little personages of various social positions and ages, arose under the skilful fingers of his cousin, who worked away bravely with glue and with her needle, with bright bits of cloth and gilt paper, of which she gave a proper share to each, in exact proportion to the price. It was a philosophical occupation, which left one free to harbour a great many ideas, and Hans Unwirrsch took kindly to it, although, of course, his childish pleasure in the toys was soon lost. He who has grown up in a shop of Jack-in-the-boxes, takes little pleasure in each individual Jack-in-the-box, be he ever so gaudy and agile in turning up his toes.

After Martinmas, which momentous day unfortunately could not be celebrated with roast goose, Cousin Schlotterbeck devoted herself to independent fabrication. She could very profitably apply her talent to plastic art; she formed little men out of raisins, to be sold at Christmas, and for more humble minds she made churls out of dried plums. The first fellow of this latter kind, who was manufactured by Hans without help, gave him as much pleasure as the hopeful art student experiences at the sight of the picture which gained him the prix de Rome.

In his fifth year Johannes Jakob Nikolaus Unwirrsch was a little awkward fellow, in a pair of breeches which had been cut and designed for him to grow into. Out of bluish-grey eyes he looked merrily into the world and into the Kröppelstrasse, his nose had nothing characteristic as yet, his mouth promised fair to grow very large, and kept its promise. The yellow hair of the boy curled naturally, and was the prettiest thing about him. He had in every respect an excellent stomach, like all people who are designed to hunger a great deal in life; he got through with his A B C with no more difficulty than with the biggest slice of brown bread and with the fullest soup plate. The two women, his mother and his cousin, spoiled him, of course, to the best of their ability, and honoured him as crown-prince, hero, and world’s wonder, so that it was well when the Government interfered, and declared him old enough to go to school. Hans Unwirrsch set his foot on the lowest round of the ladder, which stands by the fruitful tree of knowledge, the door of the poor-school opened to him, and Silberlöffel, the schoolmaster, promised Cousin Schlotterbeck at the door that her “precious boy” should neither be murdered by himself nor by the hundred and sixty good-for-nothings who were subject to his rule.

“Cousin” departed with a corner of her apron up to her eyes, and would not be comforted, until near the town well she met the pastor Primarius Holzapfel, who had died in the year eighteen hundred and fifteen, attired in his black surplice, with an enormous ruff about his neck, and a Bible in his hand. “Cousin” had been well acquainted with the pastor and his parents. His father had been a woodcutter, and his mother had died in the Hospital of the Holy Spirit; Primarius the pastor, with whose praise the town still rung, had occupied the very place in the poor-school to which Silberlöffel was taking little Hans.

In a dark street, in a one-storey building, which had once been an engine-house, the community had instituted a school for poor children, after having refused for a long time to give up any building for so superfluous an object. It was a damp hole; almost at any time of day you could see the water run down the walls; fungi flourished in the corners and under the teacher’s desk. The tables and benches were moist and sticky, and during vacation they were always covered with a thin coating of mould. The windows it would be best not to mention; it was no wonder if in their vicinity there were also interesting growths of fungus. Neither was it a wonder if in the extremities of the teacher rheumatic knots formed, and in his lungs the most exquisite tubercles. It was no wonder if at times half of the pupils were ill with a fever. If the community had been called upon to put a marble monument on every child’s grave which was dug in the churchyard by its guilt, it would soon have supplied a new building for the school.

Karl Silberlöffel was the name the teacher signed to the receipts for the enormous sums which he received quarterly from the State. Alas, the poor fellow had received this name as it were by the irony of fate; he had not been born with a silver spoon in his mouth. How can the Government be expected to bother about the schoolmaster Silberlöffel so long as the question as to what is the smallest possible amount of knowledge that may be permitted to the lower classes without harm and discomfort to the higher is still unsolved? For a long time to come the gentlemen puzzling over this question will consider the common schoolmasters as their enemies, and will look upon it as an absurd and altogether preposterous demand when dangerous and revolutionary idealists require them to do good unto their enemies, and at least dress them decently and feed them tolerably well.

Later in life our hero often invited the country schoolmaster at Grunzenow to his Sunday dinner or his Christmas punch, remembering these first school-days and the poor-teacher Silberlöffel. Neither did he object when the schoolmaster on the Baltic put some of the good, nourishing things set before him into his pocket for his seven boys at home; he himself would fetch him an old paper to wrap them in, and help him crowd the bundle into his coat pocket.

In the engine house at Neustadt the girls sat on the right-hand side and the boys on the left. Between these two divisions there was a passage from the door up to the teacher’s desk, and in this passage Silberlöffel walked, coughing, up and down, without one of his charge being moved thereby to pity. Long, very long, was the poor fellow; thin, very thin, was he; very melancholy did he look, and he had good cause.

Another in his place would have raised his spirits, and warmed himself in the damp, cold room by lustily whipping the boys; but he was beyond that even. His faint ventures in this line were considered as a good joke merely; his authority was below zero. A pitiful reproach to all well-dressed people were the garments of this worthy man; especially the hat acted a perfect tragedy with its possessor. The point between the two was which should survive the other, and the hat seemed to know that it would carry the prize. A diabolical taunt seemed to grin from out of its boils and scratches. The villain knew that it would also survive the successor of the consumptive man; it was utterly indifferent to the mould and the dampness of the engine-house.

“COUPLING TWO AND TWO OF THEM TOGETHER BY FIRMLY TWISTING THE ENDS OF THEIR HAIR INTO A KNOT.”

Hans Unwirrsch entered the swarm of poor scholars by no means with sentimental feelings. After having conquered the first surprise and embarrassment, after having made himself at home in his new surroundings, he proved himself to be no better than any other scapegrace, and to the best of his ability took part in the pleasures and pains of this praiseworthy public institution. Friends and enemies among the boys were soon discovered; congenial spirits attached themselves to him, the uncongenial tried to pull him out of his views of life by the hairs of his head, and in single combat as in general skirmish he often came to grief, which, however, he bore like a manly chap, without seeking refuge behind his teacher. As a manly chap he also had, at this period of his life, a healthy aversion toward the female sex upon the benches at the right of the passage. He was fond of putting shoemaker’s wax on the girls’ seats, and of coupling two and two of them together by firmly twisting the ends of their hair into a knot; he looked upon them with sovereign disdain as inferior creatures, who knew no other means of defence than shrieking, and through whom the schoolmaster was better informed about the left half of his school than the boys relished. At first there was not the least trace of chivalrous impulses and feelings within his bosom, but the time which was to hail the first awaking dawn in this respect was not far distant, and soon there was one little creature on the other side of the school who made her influence felt upon Hans Unwirrsch. There came a time when he could not bear to see one little fellow-pupil cry, and when he felt a nameless longing, which was not directed toward the great slices of bread and butter and hunches of cake which he saw other children devour upon the street; but for the present he impudently put his hands in the pockets of his baggy breeches, set his legs far apart, put himself firmly on his feet, and sought to emancipate himself as far as possible from the absolutism of womankind. No more now did he sit quiet and patient at the feet of Cousin Schlotterbeck and listen reverently to her teachings and exhortations, her fairy-tales and almanac stories, and her Bible readings. To the great discomfort of the good old lady did he daily manifest a more critical spirit. The almanac stories he knew by heart; no sooner did the “Cousin” begin a fairy-tale than he interrupted her to suggest emendations and ask impertinently ironical questions; to her kind exhortations he always offered confusing objections, which more than once put the good lady quite out of countenance. When, as was her custom, the good soul got entangled in a long-breathed genealogical row of biblical names, Hans took a truly diabolical pleasure therein, and tried to drive the poor creature deeper into the thorns, so that she at last with angry virulence would clap the book to and call her quondam “little lamb” a “saucy good-for-nothing.” Behind her back he was up to all sorts of trickery; yes, he went so far as to caricature her person before a select audience in the Kröppelstrasse, consisting of persons of his own age. In short, Hans Jakob Nikolaus Unwirrsch had now reached that stage in life during which loving relations with darkly melancholy looks and warning gestures prognosticated to this hopeful scion or youthful acquaintance a dark future, the beggar’s staff, prison, penitentiary, and at last, as an agreeable conclusion, a disgraceful death on the gallows. It is well that prophecies usually are not fulfilled.

Naturally Hans now felt more drawn to his Uncle Grünebaum than to his mother and cousin. The original cobbler had much about him that was attractive to the youthful mind. To Hans, when in the company of this worthy man, time seldom seemed to drag.

“READING THE ‘TOWN AND COUNTRY HERALD’ WITH A LOUD VOICE TO HIMSELF AND HIS BIRDS.”

Very dirty and neglected did the household and surroundings of Uncle Grünebaum look to any respectable woman. In his workshop it looked as if brownies had made their home, not with kindly intentions, but in the most bitter ire. A wilder topsy-turvy can scarcely be pictured. Uncle Grünebaum spent the greater part of his day and of his work-hours in hunting for something or other. The tool he was in search of was never to be found, and rummaging for it did not benefit the general aspect of things. Over and above all there was a perpetual noise of whistling, singing, and screeching birds in large and small cages upon the walls; a tree-frog in a glass by the window foretold the weather. But as for the political weather, Meister Grünebaum foretold it to himself, reading the Town and Country Herald with a loud voice to himself and his birds, an occupation which also took up a good deal of his work-time. The worthy Uncle Grünebaum did only just so much cobbling as was necessary to keep him and his birds alive, and to pay for the Herald. His glass at the alehouse was oftener scored than is good for a respectable citizen and shoemaker.

During this period of his restless life Hans decidedly preferred the street and its details to domestic happiness, to the quiet undisturbed peace of his own home. Oh, thou blessed time of dirty hands and bleeding noses, of torn jackets and rumbled hair! Woe to the man who has never known thee! It were better for him if he had not known some other things which loving relations and friends with the darkly melancholy look blandly praised and recommended!

Wilhelm Raabe.

NEWSPAPER HUMOUR.

Shoemakers Apprentice (passing by a baker’s stand): “Got any stale rolls?”

Baker: “Yes, my lad.”

Apprentice: “Serves you right. You should have sold ’em when they were fresh.”

In Court.—Judge: “How is it that you picked up a number of comparatively worthless articles, and left the money, which was close at hand, untouched?”

Criminal: “I hope your honour won’t find fault with me for that. My wife has been hard enough on me about it.”

Restaurant-keeper (to guest reading his paper): “I am very sorry, sir, to be obliged to ask you not to lunch here in future. You shake your head all the time. I know it’s the politics, but others don’t know it, and it’s hurting my reputation.”

At a Restaurant.—“This beefsteak is so tough the knife won’t go through.”

Restaurant-keeper: “Waiter, another knife for the gentleman.”

“GOODNESS, HOW YOU LOOK, CHILD!”

Father: “Goodness, how you look, child!”

Frankie: “I fell into the canal.”

Father: “What! With your new trousers on?”

Frankie: “I didn’t have time to take ’em off.”

“Allow me, Mademoiselle, to present this to you.”

“No, no, I do not wish to accept a present.”

“It is a volume of my poems.”

“Ah, that is different. I could not have permitted you to give me anything valuable.”

Judge (to an individual notorious for thievish proclivities): “I was told you stole wood the other day. That is not true, is it, Peter?”

Peter: “Nay, Herr Judge.”

Judge: “The policeman says he found the wood at your house. That can’t be so?”

Peter: “Nay, Herr Judge.”

Judge: “Well, Peter, I’ll sentence you to six weeks in gaol. That’s not too much, is it?”

Peter: “Nay, Herr Judge.”

“I wonder why that gentleman over there is holding the paper up before his face for such an interminable length of time?”

“The explanation is very simple. Because his tailor happens to be sitting at our table.”

A Considerate Youth.—Aunt: “Well, Fritz, I hear you were flogged in school to-day?”

Fritz: “Yes, but it didn’t hurt.”

Aunt: “I thought I heard you cry.”

Fritz: “I did that to please the teacher.”

“You advertise your socks to have fast colours, and now I had on a pair for two days, and for a fortnight I have not been able to get the colour off from my feet.”

“Well, don’t you call that a fast colour? What more can you wish?”

At the Livery Stable.—“How much do you ask for this horse by the hour?”

“One thaler.”

“That is, I trust, counting up to the time when the horse returns? It is quite likely I shall be here somewhat later!”

Doctor: “I know just what will help you. You must drink two cups of very strong tea every morning.”

Patient: “Why, that is just what I have done for years.”

Doctor: “Then you must stop it.”

“Henry, my cigars are disappearing at a great rate. Is it possible that within the short time you have been in my service——”

“Never fear, sir; I have three boxes full left from my last master.”

Lieutenant A. (relating his gallant adventures at the ball): “A crowd of ladies stood about me, waiting for me to say something very brilliant.”

Lieutenant B.: “Of course you kept them in suspense.”

Lieutenant A.: “Most certainly I did.”

New Burgomaster: “No celebrity ever been born in this town?”

First Citizen: “Not yet, unfortunately; but all that will be different under your administration.”

A. (to a young doctor): “How many rooms have you?”

B.: “First, there is a waiting-room.”

A.: “Pardon me for interrupting you. What do you call a waiting-room? Is it a room in which your patients wait for you, or one in which you wait for patients?”

A.: “Dr. Krampel has saved my life.”

B.: “I did not know that you were ever in his treatment.”

A.: “No, when I consulted him he advised me to go to another physician.”

Poetry and Prose.—“Tell me what it was that inspired you to write this glorious poem?”

Poet: “My youngest needed a new suit of clothes.”

Lady (roguishly to her partner): “So you too are a conductor on the road to Hades?”

Young Physician: “You mistake, I am less than that—in fact, merely a brakesman!”

Baroness: “Your daughter will find a kind mistress in me. I trust she is accustomed to work and to early rising?”

Peasant: “That she is, ma’am. She can serve you as an example.”

COQUETRY AVENGED.

Coquetry Avenged.—Lady: “Ah, Herr Lieutenant, I have rejected many addresses!”

Lieutenant: “Is that so? Well, you have had time to do so!”

Judge: “Prisoner, do you confess your guilt?”

Prisoner: “No. The words of my counsel have convinced me of my innocence.”

Lady: “And so you are a friend of my son Edward? I shall be delighted to hear what news you can tell me about him. Is he enjoying his studies at the university, and has he grown accustomed to the intricacies of town-life? Has he learned to find his way about?”

Student: “Oh yes, he is all right so far as that is concerned. Only he has some difficulty in finding his way home from the tavern.”

“Come, John, get up on the mare!”

“Pray, why should I make such a detour to get around to the other side?”

At the Ball.—Gentleman: “Do you play on the piano?”

Lady: “No.”

Gentleman: “Ah, then you sing?”

Lady: “No, sir,—neither have I had the influenza.”

Maid (to her young mistress, who has written a love-letter for her at her request): “Oh, thank you so much, Miss! The letter is beautiful. But please don’t forget to put a postscript: Excuse bad writin’ and spellin’!”

“It is very provoking that your wife should have read my last letter to you. I thought you said she never opens your letters?”

“She doesn’t generally, but you committed the folly of writing ‘Private’ upon the envelope.”

If you ask a man for the date of his birth, he tells you only the year; if you ask a woman, she never tells you more than the day.

Custodian of the Schloss at Heidelberg (explaining the functions of his office to stranger): “What the professors are to the university, that we are to the Schloss.”

In Court.—Defendant: “Gentlemen, I have much to say in favour of my client. First——”

Prisoner (interrupting him): “You’d better not give yourself any trouble trying to pull me through, Herr Doctor. I take it the gentlemen haven’t much faith left in either of us.”

A.: “I wish I knew something to give my uncle for his birthday. He is such an old miser that no matter what I buy him, I’m sure he will not use it.”

B.: “Why, that’s glorious! All you have to do is to fill half-a-dozen of bottles with water, cork and seal them well, and stick on a label, ‘Old Rhine Wine, 1780.’”

Frederick, a tailor’s apprentice, has lent a shilling to Henry, a barbers journeyman. To show his gratitude, Henry says: “Frederick, if you should ever get into straits, if all your friends should fall off from you; if your father and mother, your sister and brother, should leave you in the lurch, then come to me, and take my word for it, I’ll shave you, and never charge you a penny!”

Stranger: “Beg pardon, sir, will you tell me which road I must take to get to the university?”

First Student: “I don’t know precisely myself. It is only two years since I came here. It is more likely you know, Bummer—you’ve been here for eight years.”

Second Student: “I? I have forgotten long ago.”