I alighted at the Ghost (Geist) tavern, and hastened at once to satisfy my most earnest desire and to approach the minster, which had long since been pointed out to me by fellow-travellers, and had been before my eyes for a great distance. When I first perceived this Colossus through the narrow lanes, and then stood too near before it, in the truly confined little square, it made upon me an impression quite of its own kind, which I, being unable to analyse it on the spot, carried with me only indistinctly for this time, as I hastily ascended the building, so as not to neglect the beautiful moment of a high and cheerful sun, which was to disclose to me at once the broad, rich land.
Arrival at Strasburg.
And now, from the platform, I saw before me the beautiful region in which I should for a long time live and reside: the handsome city, the wide-spreading meadows around it, thickly set and interwoven with magnificent trees, that striking richness of vegetation which follows in the windings of the Rhine, marks its banks, islands, and aits. Nor is the level ground, stretching down from the south, and watered by the Iller, less adorned with varied green. Even westward, towards the mountains, there are many low grounds which afford quite as charming a view of wood and meadow-growth, just as the northern and more hilly part is intersected by innumerable little brooks, which promote a rapid vegetation everywhere. If one imagines, between these luxuriant outstretched meads, between these joyously scattered groves, all land adapted for tillage, excellently prepared, verdant, and ripening, and the best and richest spots marked by hamlets and farm-houses, and this great and immeasurable plain, prepared for roan, like a new paradise, bounded far and near by mountains partly cultivated, partly overgrown with woods; one will then conceive the rapture with which I blessed my fate, that it had destined me, for some time, so beautiful a dwelling-place.
Such a fresh glance into a new land in which we are to abide for a time, has still the peculiarity, both pleasant and foreboding, that the whole lies before us like an unwritten tablet. As yet no sorrows and joys which relate to ourselves are recorded upon it; this cheerful, varied, animated plain is still mute for us; the eye is only fixed on the objects so far as they are intrinsically important, and neither affection nor passion have especially to render prominent this or that spot. But a presentiment of the future already disquiets the young heart, and an unsatisfied craving secretly demands that which is to come and may come, and which, at all events, whether for good or ill, will imperceptibly assume the character of the spot in which we find ourselves.
Descended from the height, I still tarried awhile before the face of the venerable pile; but what I could not quite clearly make out, either the first or the following time, was that I regarded this miracle as a monster, which must have terrified me, if it had not, at the same time, appeared to me comprehensible by its regularity, and even pleasing in its finish. Yet I by no means busied myself with meditating on this contradiction, but suffered a monument so astonishing quietly to work upon me by its presence.
Meyer.
I took small, but well-situated and pleasant lodgings, on the summer side of the Fish-market, a fine long street, where the everlasting motion came to the assistance of every unoccupied moment. I then delivered my letters of introduction, and found among my patrons a merchant who, with his family, was devoted to those pious opinions sufficiently known to me, although, as far as regarded external worship, he had not separated from the Church. He was a man of intelligence withal, and by no means hypocritical in his actions. The company of boarders which was recommended to me, and, indeed, I to it, was very agreeable and entertaining. A couple of old maids had long kept up this boarding-house with regularity and good success; there might have been about ten persons, older and younger. Of these latter, one named Meyer, a native of Lindau, is most vividly present to me. From his form and face he might have been considered one of the handsomest of men, if, at the same time, he had not had something of the sloven in his whole appearance. In like manner his splendid natural talents were deformed by an incredible levity, and his excellent temper by an unbounded dissoluteness. He had an open, joyous face, more round than oval; the organs of the senses, the eyes, nose, mouth, and ears, could be called rich; they showed a decided fulness, without being too large. The mouth was particularly charming, from the curling lips, and his whole physiognomy had the peculiar expression of a rake, from the circumstance that his eyebrows met across his nose, which, in a handsome face, always produces a pleasant expression of sensuality. By his jovialness, sincerity, and good-nature, he made himself beloved by all. His memory was incredible; attention at the lectures cost him nothing; he retained all that he heard, and was intellectual enough to take some interest in everything, and this the more easily, as he was studying medicine. All impressions remained lively with him, and his waggery in repeating the lectures and mimicking the professors often went so far, that when he had heard three different lectures in one morning, he would, at the dinner-table, interchange the professors with each other, paragraphwise, and often even more abruptly, which parti-coloured lecture frequently entertained us, but often, too, became troublesome.
The rest were more or less polite, steady, serious people. A pensioned knight of the order of St. Louis was one of these; but the majority were students, all really good and well-disposed, only they were not allowed to go beyond their usual allowance of wine. That this should not be easily done was the care of our president, one Doctor Salzmann. Already in the sixties and unmarried, he had attended this dinner-table for many years, and maintained its good order and respectability. He possessed a handsome property, kept himself close and neat in his exterior, even belonging to those who always go in shoes and stockings, and with their hat under their arm. To put on the hat, was with him an extraordinary action. He commonly carried an umbrella, wisely reflecting that the finest summer-days often bring thunderstorms and passing showers over the country.
With this man I talked over my design of continuing to study jurisprudence at Strasburg, so as to be able to take my degree as soon as possible. Since he was exactly informed of everything, I asked him about the lectures I should have to hear, and what he generally thought of the matter. To this he replied, that it was not in Strasburg as in the German universities, where they try to educate jurists in the large and learned sense of the term. Here, in conformity with the relation towards France, all was really directed to the practical, and managed in accordance with the opinions of the French, who readily stop at what is given. They tried to impart to every one certain general principles and preliminary knowledge, they compressed as much as possible, and communicated only what was most necessary. Hereupon he made me acquainted with a man, in whom, as a Repetent,[1] great confidence was entertained; which he very soon managed to gain from me also. By way of introduction, I began to speak with him on subjects of jurisprudence, and he wondered not a little at my swaggering; for during my residence at Leipzig, I had gained more of an insight into the requisites for the law than I have hitherto taken occasion to state in my narrative, though all I had acquired could only be reckoned as a general encyclopedical survey, and not as proper definite knowledge. University life, even if in the course of it we may not have to boast of our own proper industry, nevertheless affords endless advantages in every kind of cultivation, because we are always surrounded by men who either possess or are seeking science, so that, even if unconsciously, we are constantly drawing some nourishment from such an atmosphere.
Taste for Medical Studies.