“My story!” chuckled the unashamed rascal. “Why, all Vienna knows my story. I am the brother of Rathherr Lech, of the Imperial-royal-city-police-bureau of Vienna. My brother is a great man; I am a vagabond. He deserves it, and I deserve it; but he is my brother for all that, and I put him in mind of it now and then.
“My brother, by his zeal and talent, has acquired great learning, and raised himself to a position of honour and independence. And why have I not done the same? Because I am lazy, have got weak eyes, and am fond of beer. I do not care for your wine; good Liesinger beer is the drink for me.
“My brother wished me to attain a lofty position in the world. I am the younger. He paid teachers to instruct me, and I learned a great deal; but it was dry work, and I sought change, after days of study, in beer-cellars, among a few choice boosers. And my eyes were weak, and close study made them worse; and many a day I stole from my lessons on the plea of failing sight. My brother, who is a good fellow, only that he does not sufficiently consider my weakness, employed physicians and oculists out of number; and among them I lost the sight of one eye. It was of no use; I did not like the labour of learning, and I made my weak eyes an excuse for doing less than I could have done.
“At last I gave it up altogether, and my brother got me into the ‘Institute for the Blind.’ That would not do for me at all; I was not blind enough for that. So, one day, when the door was open, and the weather fine, I strolled home again to my brother. This vexed him greatly; but he got over it, and then he placed me in the ‘Imperial Bounty.’ A stylish place, I can tell you, where few but nobles were allowed.
“But how could I, a lusty young fellow, be happy among that moping, musty, crampt-up lot of old respectables? Not I! so, as I could not easily get out in the day-time, I ran away one night, and went back to my old quarters. At first my brother would not see me; but that passed over, for he could not let me starve. He then obtained for me a post in the ‘Refuge for the Aged;’ about the dullest place in all Vienna. I was too young to be one of the members, so they gave me a birth, where I did nothing. But what was the use of that? I could not live among that company of
mumbling, bible-backed old people; and if I could, it was all the same, for they kicked me out at the end of a month for impropriety.
“It was lucky for me that I tumbled into a legacy about this time, of eighty gulden münz. I enjoyed myself while it lasted, and never troubled my brother with my presence.
“It did not last long; for, what with drinking beer, and wearing fine clothes, and taking a dashing lodging on the Glacis, I found my eighty guldens gone, just as I was in a position to enjoy them most. But I was never very proud; so, seeing that there was nothing to be done, but to go without beer, or to humble myself to my brother, the rath, I chose the latter course as the most reasonable, and made my peace with him at once.
“And what do you suppose he did for me? He said I had disgraced myself and him at all the other places, so he could do nothing but send me to the ‘Asylum for the Indigent.’ But I did not stay there long. There was no beer there; nothing but thin soup and rind-fleish (fresh boiled beef) all the year round. And a pretty lot of ill-bred, miserable ignoramuses they were—the indigent! Not a spark of life or jollity in the place.
“One day I coolly walked out of the ‘Asylum,’ made off to a house I well knew, and ran up a credit account in my brother’s name of good eight guldens for beer and tobacco. A glorious day! for I forgot all about the ‘asylum,’ and the ‘indigent,’ and every mortal pain and trouble in this inconvenient world.