I walked a great deal all about Heidelberg to many very picturesque places, maintaining deep interest in all I saw by much loving reading of Des Knaben Wunderhorn and
Uhland’s collection of old German songs—his own poems I knew long before—the Nibelungen and Hero-Book, and a great variety of other works. I had dropped the Occulta, and for a year or two read nothing of the kind except casually the works of Eckhartshausen and Justinus Kerner. I can now see that, as I became healthy and strong, owing to the easy, pleasant existence which I led, it was best for me after all. “Grappling with life” and earnestly studying a profession then might have extinguished me. My mental spring, though not broken, was badly bent, and it required a long time to straighten it.
Colquhoun was only eighteen, but far beyond his years in dissipation, and well-nigh advanced to cool cynicism. With him I made many an excursion all about the country. Wherever a Kirclweih or peasants’ ball was to be held, he always knew of it, and there we went. One morning early he came to my rooms. There was to be a really stunning duel fought early between a Senior and some very illustrious Schläger, and he had two English friends named Burnett who would go with us. So we went, and meeting with Rücker at the Pawkboden, it was proposed that we should go on together to Baden-Baden. To which I objected that I had only twenty florins in my pocket, and had no time to return home for more. “Never mind,” said Colquhoun; “Rücker has plenty of money; we can borrow from him.”
We went to Baden and to the first hotel, and had a fine dinner, and saw the Burnetts off. Then, of course, to the gaming-table, where Colquhoun speedily lost all his money, and I so much that I had but ten florins left. “Never mind; we’ll pump on Rücker,” said Colquhoun.
We went up to visit the old castle. While there, Rücker took off his overcoat, in which he had his pocket-book, and laid it over a chair. When we returned to the hotel the pocket-book was gone! There we were, with a hotel-bill to pay and never a cent wherewith to pay it. I had, however, still ten florins. Colquhoun suddenly remembered that he
had seen something in the town, price ten florins, which he must buy. It was something which he had promised to buy for a relative in England. It was a very serious case of necessity.
I doubted my dear friend, but having sworn him by all his gods that he would not gamble with the money, I gave it to him. So he, of course, went straight to the gaming-table, and, having luck, won enough to pay our debt and take us home.
I should mention that Rücker went up to the castle and found his pocket-book with all the money. “For not only doth Fortune favour the bold,” as is written in my great unpublished romance of “Flaxius the Immortal,” “but, while her hand is in, also helps their friends with no unsparing measure, as is marvellously confirmed by Machiavelli.”
Vacation came. My friends scattered far and wide. I joined with three German friends and one Frenchman, and we strapped on our knapsacks for a foot-journey into Switzerland. First we went to Freiburg in Baden, and saw the old Cathedral, and so on, singing, and stopping to drink, and meeting with other students from other universities, and resting in forests, amid mountains, by roaring streams, and entering cottages and chatting with girls. Hurra! frei ist der bursch!
One afternoon we walked sixteen miles through a rain which was like a waterfall. I was so drenched that it was with difficulty I kept my passport and letter of exchange from being ruined. When we came out of the storm there were six of us! Another student had, unseen, joined our party in the rain, and I had never noticed it!