Page 61, line 19.—The "chiffre banal" is the common cipher.
Page 62, line 15.—"Veimers,"—so Jean Paul spells it. "Vehmic (or Fehmic) courts were secret tribunals, established in Germany in the Middle Ages, terrible from the secrecy with which they carried on their proceedings, as well as from their organization and the extent of their authority. The members, who at one time are said to have amounted to not less than one hundred thousand, were bound by a horrible oath to secrecy, and to obey and carry out the laws of the order. These tribunals are said to have originated with Charlemagne; but it was not till the thirteenth century that they reached their greatest prominence. The lawlessness and anarchy which prevailed at that time gave them work to do, and they gathered strength in the performance of it. They were professedly established to support virtue and honor; but there is no doubt they were often perverted to the gratification of private malice and tyranny. Westphalia was the great centre of their jurisdiction, and was hence termed the Red Land." See Wigand's Fehmgerichte Westphalens, 1827. A very good popular account of this court may also be found in Markham's History of Germany, Chap. XXI. (Supplement).—Line 17. "Pointeurs." See note to p. 221.
Page 63, line 12.—The author refers here to a process of slipping off the outer coating of the quill by soaking it in boiling water.
Page 64, line 12. "Wooden legs."—Spindle-shanks would better express the author's slur.—Line 26. The cul de Paris is what is technically called the bishop or bustle.
Page 76, line 26.—"Flying [i. e. transient] teachers" (journeymen).
Page 80, line 32. "Ah, what bliss," &c.—Compare a passage in Faust (p. 58 in Brooks's translation), beginning, "O for a wing," &c.
Page 82, line 17. "Fatal."—This German word is hard to translate here. Perhaps plaguy or confounded would help give the idea.
Page 84, line 14.—"The lost son" means of course the Prodigal Son.
Page 86, line 5. "Diabolically possessed,"—"des Teufels auf Bänder." Literally, "the Devil on ribbons"; or, as we should say, death on ribbons.
Page 87, line 2.—Jean Paul may well have recalled his own sore experience on the subject of queues. See his biography, as referred to in Carlyle's article on Richter.—In the next paragraph, "the everlasting rogue" is, in German, the persistent Mæcenas,—alluding to Albano's lavishing of his patronage on the blind girl.—In the next paragraph, the translator is responsible for the play on the word monkey; Jean Paul having simply Capuchinades.