The town of Heidelberg nestles in one of the loveliest valleys in Europe. The Neckar winds between a series of steep, high, thickly wooded hills.
It is amid such pleasant scenes that the famous university is situated, and that several hundred German students are gathered to pursue their studies.
One of my chief objects in visiting Heidelberg was to see the university, and to observe the curious student customs of which I had heard so much; and my journey was amply repaid by what I saw.
The university itself was far less imposing than I had imagined; compared with the picturesque and hoary old college palaces of Oxford and Cambridge, or even with our own cosey Harvard and Yale edifices and greens, it seemed very insignificant.
The buildings occupy a cheerless square in a central part of the quaint old German town. They are very plain, modest, and unpretending. The lecture-rooms are on one side of the square; in the rear are the museum and reading room, while opposite the lecture-rooms is a row of jewelry, clothing, confectionery, and other shops. I was most interested, however, in the students and their ways.
As soon as you enter the town and pass up the main street, you espy groups of the students here and there. You are at once struck with the contrast they present to American or English students. Very odd to American eyes are their dress and manners. Let me describe one to you as an example.
THE GERMAN STUDENT.
The Heidelberg student is a rather large, heavy-looking fellow, with round face, broad shoulders, and a very awkward gait. His hair is cropped close to his head, and on one side of the head, in jaunty fashion, he wears a small round cap,—too small by far to cover it, as caps generally do. It is of red or blue or green, and worked with fanciful figures of gold or silver thread.
On his feet are heavy boots, which rise, outside his trousers, nearly to the knees. His body is covered with a gay frock-coat, of green or gray or black. As he walks the street with his college mates, he puffs away on a very curious long pipe, the bowl being of porcelain, on which is painted some fanciful scene, or perhaps a view of the grand old castle. Sometimes the stem of the pipe is two or three feet long. In his hand he carries a cane, or rather stick (for it is too short to be used as a cane), with some curiously carved figure for a handle.