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+The Project Gutenberg EBook The Story of My Life, by Georg Ebers, v4
+#157 in our series by Georg Ebers
+
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+Title: The Story of My Life, Volume 4.
+
+Author: Georg Ebers
+
+Release Date: April, 2004  [EBook #5596]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on August 24, 2002]
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+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STORY OF MY LIFE, BY EBERS, V4***
+
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+This eBook was produced by David Widger <widger@cecomet.net>
+
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+[NOTE: There is a short list of bookmarks, or pointers, at the end of the
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+
+
+THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF GEORG EBERS
+
+THE STORY OF MY LIFE FROM CHILDHOOD TO MANHOOD
+
+Volume 4.
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+THE FOUNDERS OF THE KEILHAU INSTITUTE, AND A GLIMPSE AT
+THE HISTORY OF THE SCHOOL.
+
+I was well acquainted with the three founders of our institute--Fredrich
+Froebel, Middendorf, and Langethal--and the two latter were my teachers.
+Froebel was decidedly "the master who planned it."
+
+When we came to Keilhau he was already sixty-six years old, a man of
+lofty stature, with a face which seemed to be carved with a dull knife
+out of brown wood.
+
+His long nose, strong chin, and large ears, behind which the long locks,
+parted in the middle, were smoothly brushed, would have rendered him
+positively ugly, had not his "Come, let us live for our children," beamed
+so invitingly in his clear eyes.  People did not think whether he was
+handsome or not; his features bore the impress of his intellectual power
+so distinctly that the first glance revealed the presence of a remarkable
+man.
+
+Yet I must confess--and his portrait agrees with my memory--that his face
+by no means suggested the idealist and man of feeling; it seemed rather
+expressive of shrewdness, and to have been lined and worn by severe
+conflicts concerning the most diverse interests.  But his voice and his
+glance were unusually winning, and his power over the heart of the child
+was limitless.  A few words were sufficient to win completely the shyest
+boy whom he desired to attract; and thus it happened that, even when he
+had been with us only a few weeks, he was never seen crossing the court-
+yard without a group of the younger pupils hanging to his coattails and
+clasping his hands and arms.
+
+Usually they were persuading him to tell stories, and when he
+condescended to do so, older ones flocked around him too, and they were
+never disappointed.  What fire, what animation the old man had retained!
+We never called him anything but "Oheim."  The  word "Onkel" he detested
+as foreign, because  it  was derived from "avunculus" and "oncle."  With
+the high  appreciation he had of "Tante"--whom he termed, next to the
+mother, the most important factor of education in the family--our "Oheim"
+was probably specially agreeable to him.
+
+He was thoroughly a self-made man.  The son of a pastor in Oberweissbach,
+in Thuringia, he had had a dreary childhood; for his mother died young,
+and he soon had a step-mother, who treated him with the utmost tenderness
+until her own children were born.  Then an indescribably sad time began
+for the neglected boy, whose dreamy temperament vexed even his own
+father.  Yet in this solitude his love for Nature awoke.  He studied
+plants, animals, minerals; and while his young heart vainly longed for
+love, he would have gladly displayed affection himself, if his timidity
+would have permitted him to do so.  His family, seeing him prefer to
+dissect the bones of some animal rather than to talk with his parents,
+probably considered him a very unlovable child when they sent him, in his
+tenth year, to school in the city of Ilm.
+
+He was received into the home of the pastor, his uncle Hoffman, whose
+mother-in-law, who kept the house, treated him in the most cordial
+manner, and helped him to conquer the diffidence acquired during the
+solitude of the first years of his childhood.  This excellent woman
+first made him familiar with the maternal feminine solicitude, closer
+observation of which afterwards led him, as well as Pestalozzi, to a
+reform of the system of educating youth.
+
+In his sixteenth year he went to a forester for instruction, but did not
+remain long.  Meantime he had gained some mathematical knowledge, and
+devoted himself to surveying.  By this and similar work he earned a
+living, until, at the end of seven years, he went to Frankfort-on-the-
+Main to learn the rudiments of building.  There Fate brought him into
+contact with the pedagogue Gruner, a follower of Pestalozzi's method,
+and this experienced man, after their first conversation, exclaimed:
+"You must become a schoolmaster!"
+
+I have often noticed in life that a word at the right time and place has
+sufficed to give the destiny of a human being a different turn, and the
+remark of the Frankfort educator fell into Froebel's soul like a spark.
+He now saw his real profession clearly and distinctly before him.
+
+The restless years of wandering, during which, unloved and scarcely
+heeded, he had been thrust from one place to another, had awakened in his
+warm heart a longing to keep others from the same fate.  He, who had been
+guided by no kind hand and felt miserable and at variance with himself,
+had long been ceaselessly troubled by the problem of how the young human
+plant could be trained to harmony with itself and to sturdy industry.
+Gruner showed him that others were already devoting their best powers to
+solve it, and offered him an opportunity to try his ability in his model
+school.
+
+Froebel joyfully accepted this offer, cast aside every other thought,
+and, with the enthusiasm peculiar to him, threw himself into the new
+calling in a manner which led Gruner to praise the "fire and life" he
+understood how to awaken in his pupils.  He also left it to Froebel to
+arrange the plan of instruction which the Frankfort Senate wanted for the
+"model school," and succeeded in keeping him two years in his
+institution.
+
+When a certain Frau von Holzhausen was looking for a man who would have
+the ability to lead her spoiled sons into the right path, and Froebel had
+been recommended, he separated from Gruner and performed his task with
+rare fidelity and a skill bordering upon genius.  The children, who were
+physically puny, recovered under his care, and the grateful mother made
+him their private tutor from 1807 till 1810.  He chose Verdun, where
+Pestalozzi was then living, as his place of residence, and made himself
+thoroughly familiar with his method of education.  As a whole, he could
+agree with him; but, as has already been mentioned, in some respects he
+went further than the Swiss reformer.  He himself called these years his
+"university course as a pedagogue," but they also furnished him with the
+means to continue the studies in natural history which he had commenced
+in Jena.  He had laid aside for this purpose part of his salary as tutor,
+and was permitted, from 1810 to 1812, to complete in Gottingen his
+astronomical and mineralogical studies.  Yet the wish to try his powers
+as a pedagogue never deserted him; and when, in 1812, the position of
+teacher in the Plamann Institute in Berlin was offered him, he accepted
+it.  During his leisure hours he devoted himself to gymnastic exercises,
+and even late in life his eyes sparkled when he spoke of his friend, old
+Jahn, and the political elevation of Prussia.
+
+When the summons "To my People" called the German youth to war, Froebel
+had already entered his thirty-first year, but this did not prevent his
+resigning his office and being one of the first to take up arms.  He went
+to the field with the Lutzow Jagers, and soon after made the acquaintance
+among his comrades of the theological students Langethal and Middendorf.
+When, after the Peace of Paris, the young friends parted, they vowed
+eternal fidelity, and each solemnly promised to obey the other's summons,
+should it ever come.  As soon as Froebel took off the dark uniform of the
+black Jagers he received a position as curator of the museum of
+mineralogy in the Berlin University, which he filled so admirably that
+the position of Professor of Mineralogy was offered to him from Sweden.
+But he declined, for another vocation summoned him which duty and
+inclination forbade him to refuse.
+
+His brother, a pastor in the Thuringian village of Griesheim on the Ilm,
+died, leaving three sons who needed an instructor.  The widow wished her
+brother-in-law Friedrich to fill this office, and another brother, a
+farmer in Osterode, wanted his two boys to join the trio.  When Froebel,
+in the spring of 1817, resigned his position, his friend Langethal begged
+him to take his brother Eduard as another pupil, and thus Pestalozzi's
+enthusiastic disciple and comrade found his dearest wish fulfilled.  He
+was now the head of his own school for boys, and these first six pupils--
+as he hoped with the confidence in the star of success peculiar to so
+many men of genius--must soon increase to twenty.  Some of these boys
+were specially gifted: one became the scholar and politician Julius
+Froebel, who belonged to the Frankfort Parliament of 1848, and another
+the Jena Professor of Botany, Eduard Langethal.
+
+The new principal of the school could not teach alone, but he only needed
+to remind his old army comrade, Middendorf, of his promise, to induce him
+to interrupt his studies in Berlin, which were nearly completed, and join
+him.  He also had his eye on Langethal, if his hope should be fulfilled.
+He knew what a treasure he would possess for his object in this rare man.
+
+There was great joy in the little Griesheim circle, and the Thuringian
+(Froebel) did not regret for a moment that he had resigned his secure
+position; but the Westphalian (Middendorf) saw here the realization of
+the ideal which Froebel's kindling words had impressed upon his soul
+beside many a watch-fire.
+
+The character of the two men is admirably described in the following
+passage from a letter of "the oldest pupil":
+
+"Both had seen much of the serious side of life, and returned from the
+war with the higher inspiration which is hallowed by deep religious
+feeling.  The idea of devoting their powers with self-denial and
+sacrifice to the service of their native land had become a fixed
+resolution; the devious paths which so many men entered were far from
+their thoughts.  The youth, the young generation of their native land,
+were alone worthy of their efforts.  They meant to train them to a
+harmonious development of mind and body; and upon these young people
+their pure spirit of patriotism exerted a vast influence.  When we recall
+the mighty power which Froebel could exercise at pleasure over his
+fellowmen, and especially over children, we shall deem it natural that a
+child suddenly transported into this circle could forget its past."
+
+When I entered it, though at that time it was much modified and
+established on firm foundations, I met with a similar experience.  It was
+not only the open air, the forest, the life in Nature which so captivated
+new arrivals at Keilhau, but the moral earnestness and the ideal
+aspiration which consecrated and ennobled life.  Then, too, there was
+that "nerve-strengthening" patriotism which pervaded everything, filling
+the place of the superficial philanthropy of the Basedow system of
+education.
+
+But Froebel's influence was soon to draw, as if by magnetic power, the
+man who had formed an alliance with him amid blood and steel, and who was
+destined to lend the right solidity to the newly erected structure of the
+institute--I mean Heinrich Langethal, the most beloved and influential of
+my teachers, who stood beside Froebel's inspiring genius and Middendorf's
+lovable warmth of feeling as the character, and at the same time the
+fully developed and trained intellect, whose guidance was so necessary to
+the institute.
+
+The life of this rare teacher can be followed step by step from the first
+years of his childhood in his autobiography and many other documents, but
+I can only attempt here to sketch in broad outlines the character of the
+man whose influence upon my whole inner life has been, up to the present
+hour, a decisive one.
+
+The recollection of him makes me inclined to agree with the opinion to
+which a noble lady sought to convert me--namely, that our lives are far
+more frequently directed into a certain channel by the influence of an
+unusual personality than by events, experiences, or individual
+reflections.
+
+Langethal was my teacher for several years.  When I knew him he was
+totally blind, and his eyes, which are said to have flashed so brightly
+and boldly on the foe in war, and gazed so winningly into the faces of
+friends in time of peace, had lost their lustre.  But his noble features
+seemed transfigured by the cheerful earnestness which is peculiar to the
+old man, who, even though only with the eye of the mind, looks back upon
+a well-spent, worthy life, and who does not fear death, because he knows
+that God who leads all to the goal allotted by Nature destined him also
+for no other.  His tall figure could vie with Barop's, and his musical
+voice was unusually deep.  It possessed a resistless power when, excited
+himself, he desired to fill our young souls with his own enthusiasm.  The
+blind old man, who had nothing more to command and direct, moved through
+our merry, noisy life like a silent admonition to good and noble things.
+Outside of the lessons he never raised his voice for orders or censure,
+yet we obediently followed his signs.  To be allowed to lead him was an
+honor and pleasure.  He made us acquainted with Homer, and taught us
+ancient and modern history.  To this day I rejoice that not one of us
+ever thought of using 'pons asinorum,' or copied passage, though he was
+perfectly sightless, and we were obliged to translate to him and learn by
+heart whole sections of the Iliad.  To have done so would have seemed as
+shameful as the pillage of an unguarded sanctuary or the abuse of a
+wounded hero.
+
+And he certainly was one!
+
+We knew this from his comrades in the war and his stories of 1813, which
+were at once so vivid and so modest.
+
+When he explained Homer or taught ancient history a special fervor
+animated him; for he was one of the chosen few whose eyes were opened by
+destiny to the full beauty and sublimity of ancient Greece.
+
+I have listened at the university to many a famous interpreter of the
+Hellenic and Roman poets, and many a great historian, but not one of them
+ever gave me so distinct an impression of living with the ancients as
+Heinrich Langethal.  There was something akin to them in his pure, lofty
+soul, ever thirsting for truth and beauty, and, besides, he had graduated
+from the school of a most renowned teacher.
+
+The outward aspect of the tall old man was eminently aristocratic, yet
+his birthplace was the house of a plain though prosperous mechanic.  He
+was born at Erfurt, in 1792.  When very young his father, a man unusually
+sensible and well-informed for his station in life, entrusted him with
+the education of a younger brother, the one who, as I have mentioned,
+afterwards became a professor at Jena, and the boy's progress was so
+rapid that other parents had requested to have their sons share the hours
+of instruction.
+
+After completing his studies at the grammar-school he wanted to go to
+Berlin, for, though the once famous university still existed in Erfurt,
+it had greatly deteriorated.  His description of it is half lamentable,
+half amusing, for at that time it was attended by thirty students, for
+whom seventy professors were employed.  Nevertheless, there were many
+obstacles to be surmounted ere he could obtain permission to attend the
+Berlin University; for the law required every native of Erfurt, who
+intended afterwards to aspire to any office, to study at least two years
+in his native city--at that time French.  But, in defiance of all
+hindrances, he found his way to Berlin, and in 1811 was entered in the
+university just established there as the first student from Erfurt.  He
+wished to devote himself to theology, and Neander, De Wette, Marheineke,
+Schleiermacher, etc., must have exerted a great power of attraction over
+a young man who desired to pursue that study.
+
+At the latter's lectures he became acquainted with Middendorf.  At first
+he obtained little from either.  Schleiermacher seemed to him too
+temporizing and obscure.  "He makes veils."  He thought the young
+Westphalian, at their first meeting, merely "a nice fellow."  But in time
+he learned to understand the great theologian, and the "favourite
+teacher" noticed him and took him into his house.
+
+But first Fichte, and then Friedrich August Wolf, attracted him far more
+powerfully than Schleiermacher.  Whenever he spoke of Wolf his calm
+features glowed and his blind eyes seemed to sparkle.  He owed all that
+was best in him to the great investigator, who sharpened his pupil's
+appreciation of the exhaustless store of lofty ideas and the magic of
+beauty contained in classic antiquity, and had he been allowed to follow
+his own inclination, he would have turned his back on theology, to devote
+all his energies to the pursuit of philology and archaeology.
+
+The Homeric question which Wolf had propounded in connection with Goethe,
+and which at that time stirred the whole learned world, had also moved
+Langethal so deeply that, even when an old man, he enjoyed nothing more
+than to speak of it to us and make us familiar with the pros and cons
+which rendered him an upholder of his revered teacher.  He had been
+allowed to attend the lectures on the first four books of the Iliad, and
+--I have living witnesses of the fact--he knew them all verse by verse,
+and corrected us when we read or recited them as if he had the copy in
+his hand.
+
+True, he refreshed his naturally excellent memory by having them all read
+aloud.  I shall never forget his joyous mirth as he listened to my
+delivery of Wolf's translation of Aristophanes's Acharnians; but I was
+pleased that he selected me to supply the dear blind eyes.  Whenever he
+called me for this purpose he already had the book in the side pocket of
+his long coat, and when, beckoning significantly, he cried, "Come, Bear,"
+I knew what was before me, and would have gladly resigned the most
+enjoyable game, though he sometimes had books read which were by no means
+easy for me to understand.  I was then fourteen or fifteen years old.
+
+Need I say that it was my intercourse with this man which implanted in my
+heart the love of ancient days that has accompanied me throughout my
+life?
+
+The elevation of the Prussian nation led Langethal also from the
+university to the war.  Rumor first brought to Berlin the tidings of the
+destruction of the great army on the icy plains of Russia; then its
+remnants, starving, worn, ragged, appeared in the capital; and the
+street-boys, who not long before had been forced by the French soldiers
+to clean their boots, now with little generosity--they were only "street-
+boys"--shouted sneeringly, "Say, mounseer, want your boots blacked?"
+
+Then came the news of the convention of York, and at last the irresolute
+king put an end to the doubts and delays which probably stirred the blood
+of every one who is familiar with Droysen's classic "Life of Field-
+Marshal York."  From Breslau came the summons "To my People," which, like
+a warm spring wind, melted the ice and woke in the hearts of the German
+youth a matchless budding and blossoming.
+
+The snow-drops which bloomed during those March days of 1813 ushered in
+the long-desired day of freedom, and the call "To arms!" found the
+loudest echo in the hearts of the students.  It stirred the young, yet
+even in those days circumspect Langethal, too, and showed him his duty
+But difficulties confronted him; for Pastor Ritschel, a native of Erfurt,
+to whom he confided his intention, warned him not to write to his father.
+Erfurt, his own birthplace, was still under French rule, and were he to
+communicate his plan in writing and the letter should be opened in the
+"black room," with other suspicious mail matter, it might cost the life
+of the man whose son was preparing to commit high-treason by fighting
+against the ruler of his country--Napoleon, the Emperor of France.
+
+"Where will you get the uniform, if your father won't help you, and you
+want to join the black Jagers?" asked the pastor, and received the answer:
+
+"The cape of my cloak will supply the trousers.  I can have a red collar
+put on my cloak, my coat can be dyed black and turned into a uniform, and
+I have a hanger."
+
+"That's right!" cried the worthy minister, and gave his young friend ten
+thalers.
+
+Middendorf, too, reported to the Lutzow Jagers at once, and so did the
+son of Professor Bellermann, and their mutual friend Bauer, spite of his
+delicate health which seemed to unfit him for any exertion.
+
+They set off on the 11th of April, and while the spring was budding alike
+in the outside world and in young breasts, a new flower of friendship
+expanded in the hearts of these three champions of the same sacred cause;
+for Langethal and Middendorf found their Froebel.  This was in Dresden,
+and the league formed there was never to be dissolved.  They kept their
+eyes fixed steadfastly on the ideals of youth, until in old age the sight
+of all three failed.  Part of the blessings which were promised to the
+nation when they set forth to battle they were permitted to see seven
+lustra later, in 1848, but they did not live to experience the
+realization of their fairest youthful dream, the union of Germany.
+
+I must deny myself the pleasure of describing the battles and the marches
+of the Lutzow corps, which extended to Aachen and Oudenarde; but will
+mention here that Langethal rose to the rank of sergeant, and had to
+perform the duties of a first lieutenant; and that, towards the end of
+the campaign, Middendorf was sent with Lieutenant Reil to induce Blucher
+to receive the corps in his vanguard.  The old commander gratified their
+wish; they had proved their fitness for the post when they won the
+victory at the Gohrde, where two thousand Frenchmen were killed and as
+many more taken prisoners.  The sight of the battlefield had seemed
+unendurable to the gentle nature of Middendorf he had formed a poetical
+idea of the campaign as an expedition against the hereditary foe.  Now
+that he had confronted the bloodstained face of war with all its horrors,
+he fell into a state of melancholy from which he could scarcely rouse
+himself.
+
+After this battle the three friends were quartered in Castle Gohrde, and
+there enjoyed a delightful season of rest after months of severe
+hardships.  Their corps had been used as the extreme vanguard against
+Davoust's force, which was thrice their superior in numbers, and in
+consequence they were subjected to great fatigues.  They had almost
+forgotten how it seemed to sleep in a bed and eat at a table.  One night
+march had followed another.  They had often seized their food from the
+kettles and eaten it at the next stopping-place, but all was cheerfully
+done; the light-heartedness of youth did not vanish from their
+enthusiastic hearts.  There was even no lack of intellectual aliment,
+for a little field-library had been established by the exchange of books.
+Langethal told us of his night's rest in a ditch, which was to entail
+disastrous consequences.  Utterly exhausted, sleep overpowered him in the
+midst of a pouring rain, and when he awoke he discovered that he was up
+to his neck in water.  His damp bed--the ditch--had gradually filled, but
+the sleep was so profound that even the rising moisture had not roused
+him.  The very next morning he was attacked with a disease of the eyes,
+to which he attributed his subsequent blindness.
+
+On the 26th of August there was a prospect of improvement in the
+condition of the corps.  Davoust had sent forty wagons of provisions to
+Hamburg, and the men were ordered to capture them.  The attack was
+successful, but at what a price!  Theodor Korner, the noble young poet
+whose songs will commemorate the deeds of the Lutzow corps so long as
+German men and boys sing his "Thou Sword at my Side," or raise their
+voices in the refrain of the Lutzow Jagers' song:
+
+"Do you ask the name of yon reckless band?
+'Tis Lutzow's black troopers dashing swift through the land!"
+
+Langethal first saw the body of the author of "Lyre and Sword" and
+"Zriny" under an oak at Wobbelin; but he was to see it once more under
+quite different circumstances.  He has mentioned it in his autobiography,
+and I have heard him describe several times his visit to the corpse of
+Theodor Korner.
+
+He had been quartered in Wobbelin, and shared his room with an Oberjager
+von Behrenhorst, son of the postmaster-general in Dessau, who had taken
+part in the battle of Jena as a young lieutenant and returned home with a
+darkened spirit.
+
+At the summons "To my People," he had enlisted at once as a private
+soldier in the Lutzow corps, where he rose rapidly to the rank of
+Oberjager.  During the war he had often met Langethal and Middendorf;
+but the quiet, reserved man, prematurely grave for his years, attached
+himself so closely to Korner that he needed no other friend.
+
+After the death of the poet on the 26th of August, 1813, he moved
+silently about as though completely crushed.  On the night which followed
+the 27th he invited his room-mate Langethal to go with him to the body of
+his friend.  Both went first to the village church, where the dead Jagers
+lay in two long black rows.  A solemn stillness pervaded the little house
+of God, which had become during this night the abode of death, and the
+nocturnal visitors gazed silently at the pallid, rigid features of one
+lifeless young form after another, but without finding him whom they
+sought.
+
+During this mute review of corpses it seemed to Langethal as if Death
+were singing a deep, heartrending choral, and he longed to pray for these
+young, crushed human blossoms; but his companion led the way into the
+guard's little room.  There lay the poet, "the radiance of an angel on
+his face," though his body bore many traces of the fury of the battle.
+Deeply moved, Langethal stood gazing down upon the form of the man who
+had died for his native land, while Behrenhorst knelt on the floor beside
+him, silently giving himself up to the anguish of his soul.  He remained
+in this attitude a long time, then suddenly started up, threw his arms
+upward, and exclaimed, "Korner, I'll follow you!"
+
+With these words Behrenhorst darted out of the little room into the
+darkness; and a few weeks after he, too, had fallen for the sacred cause
+of his native land.
+
+They had seen another beloved comrade perish in the battle of Gohrde, a
+handsome young man of delicate figure and an unusually reserved manner.
+
+Middendorf, with whom he--his name was Prohaska--had been on more
+intimate terms than the others, once asked him, when he timidly avoided
+the girls and women who cast kindly glances at him, if his heart never
+beat faster, and received the answer, "I have but one love to give, and
+that belongs to our native land."
+
+While the battle was raging, Middendorf was fighting close beside his
+comrade.  When the enemy fired a volley the others stooped, but Prohaska
+stood erect, exclaiming, when he was warned, "No bowing!  I'll make no
+obeisance to the French!"
+
+A few minutes after, the brave soldier, stricken by a bullet, fell on the
+greensward.  His friends bore him off the field, and Prohaska--Eleonore
+Prohaska--proved to be a girl!
+
+While in Castle Gohrde, Froebel talked with his friends about his
+favourite plan, which he had already had a view in Gottingen, of
+establishing a school for boys, and while developing his educational
+ideal to them and at the same time mentioning that he had passed his
+thirtieth birthday, and alluding to the postponement of his plan by the
+war, he exclaimed, to explain why he had taken up arms:
+
+"How can I train boys whose devotion I claim, unless I have proved by my
+own deeds how a man should show devotion to the general welfare?"
+
+These words made a deep impression upon the two friends, and increased
+Middendorf's enthusiastic reverence for the older comrade, whose
+experiences and ideas had opened a new world to him.
+
+The Peace of Paris, and the enrolment of the Lutzow corps in the line,
+brought the trio back to Berlin to civil life.
+
+There also each frequently sought the others, until, in the spring of
+1817, Froebel resigned the permanent position in the Bureau of Mineralogy
+in order to establish his institute.
+
+Middendorf had been bribed by the saying of his admired friend that he
+"had found the unity of life."  It gave the young philosopher food for
+thought, and, because he felt that he had vainly sought this unity and
+was dissatisfied, he hoped to secure it through the society of the man
+who had become everything to him His wish was fulfilled, for as an
+educator he grew as it were into his own motto, "Lucid, genuine, and true
+to life."
+
+Middendorf gave up little when he followed Froebel.
+
+The case was different with Langethal.  He had entered as a tutor the
+Bendemann household at Charlottenburg, where he found a second home.  He
+taught with brilliant success children richly gifted in mind and heart,
+whose love he won.  It was "a glorious family" which permitted him to
+share its rich social life, and in whose highly gifted circle he could be
+sure of finding warm sympathy in his intellectual interests.  Protected
+from all external anxieties, he had under their roof ample leisure for
+industrious labour and also for intercourse with his own friends.
+
+In July, 1817, he passed the last examination with the greatest
+distinction, receiving the "very good," rarely bestowed; and a brilliant
+career lay before him.
+
+Directly after this success three pulpits were offered to him, but he
+accepted neither, because he longed for rest and quiet occupation.
+
+The summons from Froebel to devote himself to his infant institute, where
+Langethal had placed his younger brother, also reached him.  The little
+school moved on St. John's Day, 1817, from Griesheim to Keilhau, where
+the widow of Pastor Froebel had been offered a larger farm.  The place
+which she and her children's teacher found was wonderfully adapted to
+Froebel's purpose, and seemed to promise great advantages both to the
+pupils and to the institute.  There was much building and arranging to be
+accomplished, but means to do so were obtained, and the first pupil
+described very amusingly the entrance into the new home, the furnishing,
+the discovery of all the beauties and advantages which we found as an old
+possession in Keilhau, and the endeavour, so characteristic of
+Middendorf, to adapt even the less attractive points to his own poetic
+ideas.
+
+Only the hours of instruction fared badly, and Froebel felt that he
+needed a man of fully developed strength in order to give the proper
+foundation to the instruction of the boys who were entrusted to his care.
+He knew a man of this stamp in the student F. A. Wolfs, whose talent for
+teaching had been admirably proved in the Bendemann family.
+
+"Langethal," as the first pupil describes him, was at that time a very
+handsome man of five-and-twenty years.  His brow was grave, but his
+features expressed kindness of heart, gentleness, and benevolence.  The
+dignity of his whole bearing was enhanced by the sonorous tones of his
+voice--he retained them until old age--and his whole manner revealed
+manly firmness.  Middendorf was more pleasing to women, Langethal to men.
+Middendorf attracted those who saw, Langethal those who heard him, and
+the confidence he inspired was even more lasting than that aroused by
+Middendorf.
+
+What marvel that Froebel made every effort to win this rare power for the
+young institute?  But Langethal declined, to the great vexation of
+Middendorf.  Diesterweg  called  the  latter "a St. John," but our dear,
+blind teacher added, "And Froebel was his Christus."
+
+The enthusiastic young Westphalian, who had once believed he saw in this
+man every masculine virtue, and whose life appeared emblematical,
+patiently accepted everything, and considered every one a "renegade" who
+had ever followed Froebel and did not bow implicitly to his will.  So he
+was angered by Langethal's refusal.  The latter had been offered, with
+brilliant prospects for the present and still fairer ones for the future,
+a position as a tutor in Silesia, a place which secured him the rest he
+desired, combined with occupation suited to his tastes.  He was to share
+the labour of teaching with another instructor, who was to take charge of
+the exact sciences, with which he was less familiar, and he was also
+permitted to teach his brother with the young Counts Stolberg.
+
+He accepted, but before going to Silesia he wished to visit his Keilhau
+friends and take his brother away with him.  He did so, and the
+"diplomacy" with which Froebel succeeded in changing the decision of the
+resolute young man and gaining him over to his own interests, is really
+remarkable.  It won for the infant institute in the person of Langethal--
+if the expression is allowable--the backbone.
+
+Froebel had sent Middendorf to meet his friend, and the latter, on the
+way, told him of the happiness which he had found in his new home and
+occupation.  Then they entered Keilhau, and the splendid landscape which
+surrounds it needs no praise.
+
+Froebel received his former comrade with the utmost cordiality, and the
+sight of the robust, healthy, merry boys who were lying on the floor that
+evening, building forts and castles with the wooden blocks which Froebel
+had had made for them according to his own plan, excited the keenest
+interest.  He had come to take his brother away; but when he saw him,
+among other happy companions of his own age, complete the finest
+structure of all--a Gothic cathedral--it seemed almost wrong to tear the
+child from this circle.
+
+He gazed sadly at his brother when he came to bid him "good-night," and
+then remained alone with Froebel.  The latter was less talkative than
+usual, waiting for his friend to tell him of the future which awaited him
+in Silesia.  When he heard that a second tutor was to relieve Langethal
+of half his work, he exclaimed, with the greatest anxiety:
+
+"You do not know him, and yet intend to finish a work of education with
+him?  What great chances you are hazarding!"
+
+The next morning Froebel asked his friend what goal in life he had set
+before him, and Langethal replied:
+
+"Like the apostle, I would fain proclaim the gospel to all men according
+to the best of my powers, in order to bring them into close communion
+with the Redeemer."
+
+Froebel answered, thoughtfully:
+
+"If you desire that, you must, like the apostles, know men.  You must be
+able to enter into the life of every one--here a peasant, there a
+mechanic.  If you can not, do not hope for success; your influence will
+not extend far."
+
+How wise and convincing the words sounded!  And Froebel touched the
+sensitive spot in the young minister, who was thoroughly imbued with the
+sacred beauty of his life-task, yet certainly knew the Gospels, his
+classic authors, and apostolic fathers much better than he did the world.
+
+He thoughtfully followed Froebel, who, with Middendorf and the boys, led
+him up the Steiger, the mountain whose summit afforded the magnificent
+view I have described.  It was the hour when the setting sun pours its
+most exquisite light over the mountains and valleys.  The heart of the
+young clergyman, tortured by anxious doubts, swelled at the sight of this
+magnificence, and Froebel, seeing what was passing in his mind,
+exclaimed:
+
+"Come, comrade, let us have one of our old war-songs."
+
+The musical "black Jager" of yore willingly assented; and how clearly and
+enthusiastically the chorus of boyish voices chimed in!
+
+When it died away, the older man passed his arm around his friend's
+shoulders, and, pointing to the beautiful region lying before them in the
+sunset glow, exclaimed:
+
+"Why seek so far away what is close at hand?  A work is established here
+which must be built by the hand of God!  Implicit devotion and self-
+sacrifice are needed."
+
+While speaking, he gazed steadfastly into his friend's tearful eyes, as
+if he had found his true object in life, and when he held out his hand
+Langethal clasped it--he could not help it.
+
+That very day a letter to the Counts Stolberg informed them that they
+must seek another tutor for their sons, and Froebel and Keilhau could
+congratulate themselves on having gained their Langethal.
+
+The management of the school was henceforward in the hands of a man of
+character, while the extensive knowledge and the excellent method of a
+well-trained scholar had been obtained for the educational department.
+The new institute now prospered rapidly.  The renown of the fresh,
+healthful life and the able tuition of the pupils spread far beyond the
+limits of Thuringia.  The material difficulties with which the head-
+master had had to struggle after the erection of the large new buildings
+were also removed when Froebel's prosperous brother in Osterode decided
+to take part in the work and move to Keilhau.  He understood farming,
+and, by purchasing more land and woodlands, transformed the peasant
+holding into a considerable estate.
+
+When Froebel's restless spirit drew him to Switzerland to undertake new
+educational enterprises, and some one was needed who could direct the
+business management, Barop, the steadfast man of whom I have already
+spoken, was secured.  Deeply esteemed and sincerely beloved, he managed
+the institute during the time that we three brothers were pupils there.
+He had found many things within to arrange on a more practical
+foundation, many without to correct: for the long locks of most of the
+pupils; the circumstance that three Lutzen Jagers, one of whom had
+delivered the oration at a students' political meeting, had established
+the school; that Barop had been persecuted as a demagogue on account of
+his connection with a students' political society; and, finally,
+Froebel's relations with Switzerland and the liberal educational methods
+of the school, had roused the suspicions of the Berlin demagogue-hunters,
+and therefore demagogic tendencies, from which in reality it had always
+held aloof, were attributed to the institute.
+
+Yes, we were free, in so far that everything which could restrict or
+retard our physical and mental development was kept away from us, and our
+teachers might call themselves so because, with virile energy, they had
+understood how to protect the institute from every injurious and
+narrowing outside influence.  The smallest and the largest pupil was
+free, for he was permitted to be wholly and entirely his natural self,
+so long as he kept within the limits imposed by the existing laws.  But
+license was nowhere more sternly prohibited than at Keilhau; and the deep
+religious feeling of its head-masters--Barop, Langethal, and Middendorf--
+ought to have taught the suspicious spies in Berlin that the command,
+"Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's," would never be
+violated here.
+
+The time I spent in Keilhau was during the period of the worst reaction,
+and I now know that our teachers would have sat on the Left in the
+Prussian Landtag; yet we never heard a disrespectful word spoken of
+Frederick William IV, and we were instructed to show the utmost respect
+to the prince of the little country of Rudolstadt to which Keilhau
+belonged.  Barop, spite of his liberal tendencies, was highly esteemed by
+this petty sovereign, decorated with an order, and raised to the rank of
+Councillor of Education.  From a hundred isolated recollections and words
+which have lingered in my memory I have gathered that our teachers were
+liberals in a very moderate way, yet they were certainly guilty of
+"demagogic aspirations" in so far as that they desired for their native
+land only what we, thank Heaven, now possess its unity, and a popular
+representation, by a free election of all its states, in a German
+Parliament.  What enthusiasm for the Emperor William, Bismarck, and Von
+Moltke, Langethal, Middendorf, and Barop would have inspired in our
+hearts had they been permitted to witness the great events of 1870 and
+1871!
+
+Besides, politics were kept from us, and this had become known in wider
+circles when we entered the institute, for most of the pupils belonged to
+loyal families.  Many were sons of the higher officials, officers, and
+landed proprietors; and as long locks had long since become the
+exception, and the Keilhau pupils were as well mannered as possible, many
+noblemen, among them chamberlains and other court officials, decided to
+send their boys to the institute.
+
+The great manufacturers and merchants who placed their sons in the
+institute were also not men favourable to revolution, and many of our
+comrades became officers in the German army.  Others are able scholars,
+clergymen, and members of Parliament; others again government officials,
+who fill high positions; and others still are at the head of large
+industrial or mercantile enterprises.  I have not heard of a single
+individual who has gone to ruin, and of very many who have accomplished
+things really worthy of note.  But wherever I have met an old pupil of
+Keilhau, I have found in him the same love for the institute, have seen
+his eyes sparkle more brightly when we talked of Langethal, Middendorf,
+and Barop.  Not one has turned out a sneak or a hypocrite.
+
+The present institution is said to be an admirable one; but the
+"Realschule" of Keilhau, which has been forced to abandon its former
+humanistic foundation, can scarcely train to so great a variety of
+callings the boys now entrusted to its care.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+
+The little country of Rudolstadt in which Keilhau lies had had its
+revolution, though it was but a small and bloodless one.  True, the
+insurrection had nothing to do with human beings, but involved the
+destruction of living creatures.  Greater liberty in hunting was
+demanded.
+
+This might seem a trivial matter, yet it was of the utmost importance to
+both disputants.  The wide forests of the country had hitherto been the
+hunting-grounds of the prince, and not a gun could be fired there without
+his permission.  To give up these "happy hunting-grounds" was a severe
+demand upon the eager sportsman who occupied the Rudolstadt throne, and
+the rustic population would gladly have spared him had it been possible.
+
+But the game in Rudolstadt had become a veritable torment, which
+destroyed the husbandmen's hopes of harvests.  The peasant, to save his
+fields from the stags and does which broke into them in herds at sunset,
+tried to keep them out by means of clappers and bad odours.  I have seen
+and smelled the so-called "Frenchman's oil" with which the posts were
+smeared, that its really diabolical odour--I don't know from what horrors
+it was compounded--might preserve the crops.  The ornament of the forests
+had become the object of the keenest hate, and as soon as--shortly before
+we entered Keilhau--hunting was freely permitted, the peasants gave full
+vent to their rage, set off for the woods with the old muskets they had
+kept hidden in the garrets, or other still more primitive weapons, and
+shot or struck down all the game they encountered.  Roast venison was
+cheap for weeks on Rudolstadt tables, and the pupils had many an
+unexpected pleasure.
+
+The hunting exploits of the older scholars were only learned by us
+younger ones as secrets, and did not reach the teachers' ears until long
+after.
+
+But the woods furnished other pleasures besides those enjoyed by the
+sportsman.  Every ramble through the forest enriched our knowledge of
+plants and animals, and I soon knew the different varieties of stones
+also; yet we did not suspect that this knowledge was imparted according
+to a certain system.  We were taught as it were by stealth, and how many
+pleasant, delicious things attracted us to the class-rooms on the wooded
+heights!
+
+Vegetation was very abundant in the richly watered mountain valley.  Our
+favourite spring was the Schaalbach at the foot of the Steiger,--[We
+pupils bought it of the peasant who owned it and gave it to Barop.]--
+because there was a fowling-floor connected with it, where I spent many a
+pleasant evening.  It could be used only after breeding-time, and
+consisted of a hut built of boughs where the birdcatcher lodged.  Flowing
+water rippled over the little wooden rods on which the feathered denizens
+of the woods alighted to quench their thirst before going to sleep.  When
+some of them--frequently six at a time--had settled on the perches in the
+trough, it was drawn into the but by a rope, a net was spread over the
+water and there was nothing more to do except take the captives out.
+
+The name of the director of this amusement was Merbod.  He could imitate
+the voices of all the birds, and was a merry, versatile fellow, who knew
+how to do a thousand things, and of whom we boys were very fond.
+
+The peasant Bredernitz often took us to his crow-hut, which was a hole in
+the ground covered with boughs and pieces of turf, where the hunters lay
+concealed.  The owl, which lured the crows and other birds of prey, was
+fastened on a perch, and when they flew up, often in large flocks, to
+tease the old cross-patch which sat blinking angrily, they were shot down
+from loop-holes which had been left in the hut.  The hawks which prey
+upon doves and hares, the crows and magpies, can thus easily be
+decimated.
+
+We had learned to use our guns in the playground.  The utmost caution was
+enforced, and although, as I have already remarked, we handled our own
+guns when we were only lads of twelve years old, I can not recall a
+single accident which occurred.
+
+Once, during the summer, there was a Schutzenfest, in which a large
+wooden eagle was shot from the pole.  Whoever brought down the last
+splinter became king.  This honour once fell to my share, and I was
+permitted to choose a queen.  I crowned Marie Breimann, a pretty, slender
+young girl from Brunswick, whose Greek profile and thick silken hair had
+captivated my fancy.  She and Adelheid Barop, the head-master's daughter,
+were taught in our classes, but Marie attracted me more strongly than the
+diligent Keilhau lassies with their beautiful black eyes and the other
+two blooming and graceful Westphalian girls who were also schoolmates.
+But the girls occupied a very small place in our lives.  They could
+neither wrestle, shoot, nor climb, so we gave them little thought, and
+anything like actual flirtation was unknown--we had so many better things
+in our heads.  Wrestling and other sports threw everything else into the
+shade.  Pretty Marie, however, probably suspected which of my school-
+mates I liked best, and up to the time of my leaving the institute I
+allowed no other goddess to rival her.  But there were plenty of
+amusements at Keilhau besides bird-shooting.
+
+I will mention the principal ones which came during the year, for to
+describe them in regular order would be impossible.
+
+Of the longer walks which we took in the spring and summer the most
+beautiful was the one leading through Blankenburg to the entrance of the
+Schwarzathal, and thence through the lofty, majestically formed group of
+cliffs at whose foot the clear, swift Schwarza flows, dashing and
+foaming, to Schwarzburg.
+
+How clearly our songs echoed from the granite walls of the river valley,
+and how lively it always was at "The Stag," whose landlord possessed a
+certain power of attraction to us boys in his own person; for, as the
+stoutest man in Thuringia, he was a feast for the eyes!  His jollity
+equalled his corpulence, and how merrily he used to jest with us lads!
+
+Of the shorter expeditions I will mention only the two we took most
+frequently, which led us in less than an hour to Blankenburg or
+Greifenstein, a large ruin, many parts of which were in tolerable
+preservation.  It had been the home of Count Gunther von Schwarzburg, who
+paid with his life for the honour of wearing the German imperial crown a
+few short months.
+
+We also enjoyed being sent to the little town of Blankenburg on errands,
+for it was the home of our drawing-master, the artist Unger, one of those
+original characters whom we rarely meet now.  When we knew him, the
+handsome, broad-shouldered man, with his thick red beard, looked as one
+might imagine Odin.  Summer and winter his dress was a grey woollen
+jacket, into which a short pipe was thrust, and around his hips a broad
+leather belt, from which hung a bag containing his drawing materials.  He
+cared nothing for public opinion, and, as an independent bachelor,
+desired nothing except "to be let alone," for he professed the utmost
+contempt for the corrupt brood yclept "mankind."  He never came to our
+entertainments, probably because he would be obliged to wear something in
+place of his woollen jacket, and because he avoided women, whom he called
+"the roots of all evil."  I still remember how once, after emptying the
+vials of his wrath upon mankind, he said, in reply to the question
+whether he included Barop among the iniquitous brood, "Why, of course
+not; he doesn't belong to it!"
+
+There was no lack of opportunity to visit him, for a great many persons
+employed to work for the school lived in Blankenburg, and we were known
+to be carefully watched there.
+
+I remember two memorable expeditions to the little town.  Once my brother
+burned his arm terribly during a puppet-show by the explosion of some
+powder provided for the toy cannon.
+
+The poor fellow suffered so severely that I could not restrain my tears,
+and though it was dark, and snow lay on the mountains, off I went to
+Blankenburg to get the old surgeon, calling to some of my school-mates at
+the door to tell them of my destination.  It was no easy matter to wade
+through the snow; but, fortunately, the stars gave me sufficient light to
+keep in the right path as I dashed down the mountain to Blankenburg.  How
+often I plunged into ditches filled with snow and slid down short
+descents I don't know; but as I write these lines I can vividly remember
+the relief with which I at last trod the pavement of the little town.
+Old Wetzel was at home, and a carriage soon conveyed us over the only
+road to the institute.  I was not punished.  Barop only laid his hand on
+my head, and said, "I am glad you are back again, Bear."
+
+Another trip to Blankenburg entailed results far more serious--nay,
+almost cost me my life.
+
+I was then fifteen, and one Sunday afternoon I went with Barop's
+permission to visit the Hamburgers, but on condition that I should return
+by nine o'clock at latest.
+
+Time, however, slipped by in pleasant conversation until a later hour,
+and as thunder-clouds were rising my host tried to keep me overnight.
+But I thought this would not be allowable, and, armed with an umbrella,
+I set off along the road, with which I was perfectly familiar.
+
+But the storm soon burst, and it grew so dark that, except when the
+lightning flashed, I could not see my hand before my face.  Yet on I
+went, though wondering that the path along which I groped my way led
+upward, until the lightning showed me that, by mistake, I had taken the
+road to Greifenstein.  I turned back, and while feeling my way through
+the gloom the earth seemed to vanish under my feet, and I plunged
+headlong into a viewless gulf--not through empty space, however, but a
+wet, tangled mass which beat against my face, until at last there was a
+jerk which shook me from head to foot.
+
+I no longer fell, but I heard above me the sound of something tearing,
+and the thought darted through my mind that I was hanging by my trousers.
+Groping around, I found vine-leaves, branches, and lattice-work, to which
+I clung, and tearing away with my foot the cloth which had caught on the
+end of a lath, I again brought my head where it should be, and discovered
+that I was hanging on a vine-clad wall.  A flash of lightning showed me
+the ground not very far below and, by the help of the espalier and the
+vines I at last stood in a garden.
+
+Almost by a miracle I escaped with a few scratches; but when I afterwards
+went to look at the scene of this disaster cold chills ran down my back,
+for half the distance whence I plunged into the garden would have been
+enough to break my neck.
+
+Our games were similar to those which lads of the same age play now, but
+there were some additional ones that could only take place in a wooded
+mountain valley like Keilhau; such, for instance, were our Indian games,
+which engrossed us at the time when we were pleased with Cooper's
+"Leather-Stocking," but I need not describe them.
+
+When I was one of the older pupils a party of us surprised some "Panzen"
+--as we called the younger ones--one hot afternoon engaged in a very
+singular game of their own invention.  They had undressed to the skin in
+the midst of the thickest woods and were performing Paradise and the Fall
+of Man, as they had probably just been taught in their religious lesson.
+For the expulsion of Adam and our universal mother Eve, the angel--in
+this case there were two of them--used, instead of the flaming sword,
+stout hazel rods, with which they performed their part of warders so
+overzealously that a quarrel followed, which we older ones stopped.
+
+Thus many bands of pupils invented games of their own, but, thank Heaven,
+rarely devised such absurdities.  Our later Homeric battles any teacher
+would have witnessed with pleasure.  Froebel would have greeted them as
+signs of creative imagination and "individual life" in the boys.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+
+SUMMER PLEASURES AND RAMBLES
+
+Wholly unlike these, genuinely and solely a product of Keilhau, was the
+great battle-game which we called Bergwacht, one of my brightest memories
+of those years.
+
+Long preparations were needed, and these, too, were delightful.
+
+On the wooded plain at the summit of the Kolm, a mountain which belonged
+mainly to the institute, war was waged during the summer every Saturday
+evening until far into the night, whenever the weather was fine, which
+does not happen too often in Thuringia.
+
+The whole body of pupils was divided into three, afterwards into four
+sections, each of which had its own citadel.  After two had declared war
+against two others, the battle raged until one party captured the
+strongholds of the other.  This was done as soon as a combatant had set
+foot on the hearth of a hostile fortress.
+
+The battle itself was fought with stakes blunted at the tops.  Every one
+touched by the weapon of an enemy must declare himself a prisoner.  To
+admit this, whenever it happened, was a point of honour.
+
+In order to keep all the combatants in action, a fourth division was
+added soon after our arrival, and of course it was necessary to build a
+strong hold like the others.  This consisted of a hut with a stone roof,
+in which fifteen or twenty boys could easily find room and rest, a strong
+wall which protected us up to our foreheads, and surrounded the front of
+the citadel in a semicircle, as well as a large altar-like hearth which
+rose in the midst of the semicircular space surrounded by the wall.
+
+We built this fortress ourselves, except that our teacher of handicrafts,
+the sapper Sabum, sometimes gave us a hint.  The first thing was to mark
+out the plan, then with the aid of levers pry the rocks out of the
+fields, and by means of a two-wheeled cart convey them to the site
+chosen, fit them neatly together, stuff the interstices with moss, and
+finally put on a roof made of pine logs which we felled ourselves, earth,
+moss, and branches.
+
+How quickly we learned to use the plummet, take levels, hew the stone,
+wield the axes!  And what a delight it was when the work was finished and
+we saw our own building!  Perhaps we might not have accomplished it
+without the sapper, but every boy believed that if he were cast, like
+Robinson Crusoe, on a desert island, he could build a hut of his own.
+
+As soon as this citadel was completed, preparations for the impending
+battle were made.  The walls and encircling walls of all were prepared,
+and we were drilled in the use of the poles.  This, too, afforded us the
+utmost pleasure.  Touching the head of an enemy was strictly prohibited;
+yet many a slight wound was given while fighting in the gloom of the
+woods.
+
+Each of the four Bergwachts had its leader.  The captain of the first was
+director of the whole game, and instead of a lance wore a rapier.  I
+considered it a great honour when this dignity was conferred on me.  One
+of its consequences was that my portrait was sketched by "Old Unger" in
+the so-called "Bergwacht Book," which contained the likenesses of all my
+predecessors.
+
+During the summer months all eyes, even as early as Thursday, were
+watching the weather.  When Saturday evening proved pleasant and Barop
+had given his consent, there was great rejoicing in the institute, and
+the morning hours must have yielded the teachers little satisfaction.
+
+Directly after dinner everybody seized his pole and the other "Bergwacht"
+equipments.  The alliances were formed under the captain's guidance.  We
+will say that the contest was to begin with the first and third Bergwacht
+pitted against the second and fourth, and be followed by another, with
+the first and second against the third and fourth.
+
+We assembled in the court-yard just before sunset.  Barop made a little
+speech, exhorting us to fight steadily, and especially to observe all the
+rules and yield ourselves captives as soon as an enemy's pole touched us.
+He never neglected on these occasions to admonish us that, should our
+native land ever need the armed aid of her sons, we should march to
+battle as joyously as we now did to the Bergwacht, which was to train us
+to skill in her defence.
+
+Then the procession set off in good order, four or six pupils harnessing
+themselves voluntarily to the cart in which the kegs of beer were dragged
+up the Kolm.  Off we went, singing merrily, and at the top the women were
+waiting for us with a lunch.  Then the warriors scattered, the fire was
+lighted on every hearth, the plan of battle was discussed, some were sent
+out to reconnoitre, others kept to defend the citadel.
+
+At last the conflict began.  Could I ever forget the scenes in the
+forest!  No Indian tribe on the war-path ever strained every sense more
+keenly to watch, surround, and surprise the foe.  And the hand-to-hand
+fray!  What delight it was to burst from the shelter of the thicket and
+touch with our poles two, three, or four of the surprised enemies ere
+they thought of defence!  And what self-denial it required when--spite of
+the most skilful parry--we felt the touch of the pole, to confess it, and
+be led off as a prisoner!
+
+Voices and shouts echoed through the woods, and the glare of five fires
+pierced the darkness--five--for flames were also blazing where the women
+were cooking the supper.  But the light was brightest, the shouts of the
+combatants were loudest, in the vicinity of the forts.  The effort of the
+besiegers was to spy out unguarded places, and occupy the attention of
+the garrison so that a comrade might leap over the wall and set his foot
+on the hearth.  The object of the garrison was to prevent this.
+
+What was that?  An exulting cry rang through the night air.  A warrior
+had succeeded in penetrating the hostile citadel untouched and setting
+his foot on the hearth!
+
+Two or three times we enjoyed the delight of battle; and when towards
+midnight it closed, we threw ourselves-glowing from the strife and
+blackened by the smoke of the hearth-fires-down on the greensward around
+the women's fire, where boiled eggs and other good things were served,
+and meanwhile the mugs of foaming beer were passed around the circle.
+One patriotic song after another was sung, and at last each Bergwacht
+withdrew to its citadel and lay down on the moss to sleep under the
+sheltering roof.  Two sentinels marched up and down, relieved every half
+hour until the early dawn of the summer Sunday brightened the eastern
+sky.
+
+Then "Huup!"--the Keilhau shout which summoned us back to the institute-
+rang out, and a hymn, the march back, a bath in the pond, and finally the
+most delicious rest, if good luck permitted, on the heaps of hay which
+had not been gathered in.  On the Sunday following the Bergwacht we were
+not required to attend church, where we should merely have gone to sleep.
+Barop, though usually very strict in the observance of religious duties,
+never demanded anything for the sake of mere appearances.
+
+And the bed of my own planning!  It consisted of wood and stones, and was
+covered with a thick layer of moss, raised at the head in a slanting
+direction.  It looked like other beds, but the place where it stood
+requires some description, for it was a Keilhau specialty, a favour
+bestowed by our teachers on the pupils.
+
+Midway up the slope of the Kolm where our citadels stood, on the side
+facing the institute, each boy had a piece of ground where he might
+build, dig, or plant, as he chose.  They descended from one to another:
+Ludo's and mine had come down from Martin and another pupil who left the
+school at the same time.  But I was not satisfied with what my
+predecessors had created.  I spared the beautiful vine which twined
+around a fir-tree, but in the place of a flower-bed and a bench which I
+found there Ludo and I built a hearth, and for myself the bed already
+mentioned, which my brother of course was permitted to occupy with me.
+
+How many hours I have spent on its soft cushions, reading or dreaming or
+imagining things!  If I could only remember them as they hovered before
+me, what epics and tales I could write!
+
+No doubt we ought to be grateful to God for this as well as for so many
+other blessings; but why are we permitted to be young only once in our
+lives, only once to be borne aloft on the wings of a tireless power of
+imagination, so easily satisfied with ourselves, so full of love, faith,
+and hope, so open to every joy and so blind to every care and doubt, and
+everything which threatens to cloud and extinguish the sunlight in the
+soul?
+
+Dear bed in my plot of ground at Keilhau, you ought, in accordance with a
+remark of Barop, to cause me serious self-examination, for he said,
+probably with no thought of my mossy couch, "From the way in which the
+pupils use their plots of ground and the things they place in them, I can
+form a very correct opinion of their dispositions and tastes."  But you,
+beloved couch, should have the best place in my garden if you could
+restore me but for one half hour the dreams which visited me on your
+grey-green pillows, when I was a lad of fourteen or fifteen.
+
+I have passed over the Rudolstadt Schutzenfest, its music, its merry-go-
+round, and the capital sausages cooked in the open air, and have
+intentionally omitted many other delightful things.  I cannot help
+wondering now where we found time for all these summer pleasures.
+
+True, with the exception of a few days at Whitsuntide, we had no vacation
+from Easter until the first of September.  But even in August one
+thought, one joyous anticipation, filled every heart.  The annual autumn
+excursion was coming!
+
+After we were divided into travelling parties and had ascertained which
+teacher was to accompany us--a matter that seemed very important--we
+diligently practised the most beautiful songs; and on many an evening
+Barop or Middendorf told us of the places through which we were to pass,
+their history, and the legends which were associated with them.  They
+were aided in this by one of the sub-teachers, Bagge, a poetically gifted
+young clergyman, who possessed great personal beauty and a heart capable
+of entering into the intellectual life of the boys who were entrusted to
+his care.
+
+He instructed us in the German language and literature.  Possibly because
+he thought that he discovered in me a talent for poetic expression, he
+showed me unusual favor, even read his own verses aloud to me, and set me
+special tasks in verse-writing, which he criticised with me when I had
+finished.  The first long poem I wrote of my own impulse was a
+description of the wonderful forms assumed by the stalactite formations
+in the Sophie Cave in Switzerland, which we had visited.  Unfortunately,
+the book containing it is lost, but I remember the following lines,
+referring to the industrious sprites which I imagined as the sculptors of
+the wondrous shapes:
+
+    "Priestly robes and a high altar the sprites created here,
+     And in the rock-hewn cauldron poured the holy water clear,
+     Within whose depths reflected, by the torches' flickering rays,
+     Beneath the surface glimmering my own face met my gaze;
+     And when I thus beheld it, so small it seemed to me,
+     That yonder stone-carved giant looked on with mocking glee.
+     Ay, laugh, if that's your pleasure, Goliath huge and old,
+     I soon shall fare forth singing, you still your place must hold."
+
+Another sub-teacher was also a favourite travelling-companion.  His name
+was Schaffner, and he, too, with his thick, black beard, was a handsome
+man.  To those pupils who, like my brother Ludo, were pursuing the study
+of the sciences, he, the mathematician of the institute, must have been
+an unusually clear and competent teacher.  I was under his charge only a
+short time, and his branch of knowledge was unfortunately my weak point.
+Shortly before my departure he married a younger sister of Barop's wife,
+and established an educational institution very similar to Keilhau at
+Gumperda, at Schwarza in Thuringia.
+
+Herr Vodoz, our French teacher, a cheery, vigorous Swiss, with a perfect
+forest of curls on his head, was also one of the most popular guides; and
+so was Dr. Budstedt, who gave instruction in the classics.  He was not a
+handsome man, but he deserved the name of "anima candida."  He used to
+storm at the slightest occasion, but he was quickly appeased again.  As a
+teacher I think he did his full duty, but I no longer remember anything
+about his methods.
+
+The travelling party which Barop accompanied were very proud of the
+honour.  Middendorf's age permitted him to go only with the youngest
+pupils, who made the shortest trips.
+
+These excursions led the little boys into the Thuringian Forest, the
+Hartz Mountains, Saxony and Bohemia, Nuremberg and Wurzburg, and the
+older ones by way of Baireuth and Regensburg to Ulm.  The large boys in
+the first travelling party, which was usually headed by Barop himself,
+extended their journey as far as Switzerland.
+
+I visited in after-years nearly all the places to which we went at that
+time, and some, with which important events in my life were associated,
+I shall mention later.  It would not be easy to reproduce from memory the
+first impressions received without mingling with them more recent ones.
+
+Thus, I well remember how Nuremberg affected me and how much it pleased
+me.  I express this in my description of the journey; but in the author
+of Gred, who often sought this delightful city, and made himself familiar
+with life there in the days of its mediaval prosperity, these childish
+impressions became something wholly new.  And yet they are inseparable
+from the conception and contents of the Nuremberg novel.
+
+My mother kept the old books containing the accounts of these excursions,
+which occupied from two to three weeks, and they possessed a certain
+interest for me, principally because they proved how skilfully our
+teachers understood how to carry out Froebel's principles on these
+occasions.  Our records of travel also explain in detail what this
+educator meant by the words "unity with life"; for our attention was
+directed not only to beautiful views or magnificent works of art and
+architecture, but to noteworthy public institutions or great
+manufactories.  Our teachers took the utmost care that we should
+understand what we saw.
+
+The cultivation of the fields, the building of the peasants' huts, the
+national costumes, were all brought under our notice, thus making us
+familiar with life outside of the school, and opening our eyes to things
+concerning which the pupil of an ordinary model grammar-school rarely
+inquires, yet which are of great importance to the world to which we
+belong.
+
+Our material life was sensibly arranged.  During the rest at noon a cold
+lunch was served, and an abundant hot meal was not enjoyed until evening.
+
+In the large cities we dined at good hotels at the table d'hote, and--as
+in Dresden, Prague, and Coburg--were taken to the theatre.
+
+But we often spent the night in the villages, and then chairs were turned
+upside down, loose straw was spread on the backs and over the floor, and,
+wrapped in the shawl which almost every boy carried buckled to his
+knapsack, we slept, only half undressed, as comfortably as in the softest
+bed.
+
+While walking we usually sung songs, among them very nonsensical ones,
+if only we could keep step well to their time.  Often one of the teachers
+told us a story.  Schaffner and Bagge could do this best, but we often
+met other pedestrians with whom we entered into conversation.  How
+delightful is the memory of these tramps!  Progress on foot is slow, but
+not only do we see ten times better than from a carriage or the window of
+a car, but we hear and learn something while talking with the mechanics,
+citizens, and peasants who are going the same way, or the landlords,
+bar-maids, and table companions we meet in the taverns, whose guests live
+according to the custom of the country instead of the international
+pattern of our great hotels.
+
+As a young married man, I always anticipated as the greatest future
+happiness taking pedestrian tours with my sons like the Keilhau ones;
+but Fate ordained otherwise.
+
+On our return to the institute we were received with great rejoicing;
+and how much the different parties, now united, had to tell one another!
+
+Study recommenced on the first of October, and during the leisure days
+before that time the village church festival was celebrated under the
+village linden, with plenty of cakes, and a dance of the peasants, in
+which we older ones took part.  But we were obliged to devote several
+hours of every day to describing our journey for our relatives at home.
+Each one filled a large book, which was to be neatly written.  The
+exercise afforded better practice in describing personal experiences than
+a dozen essays which had been previously read with the teacher.
+
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+
+AUTUMN, WINTER, EASTER AND DEPARTURE
+
+Autumn had come, and this season of the year, which afterwards was to be
+the most fraught with suffering, at that time seemed perhaps the
+pleasantest; for none afforded a better opportunity for wrestling and
+playing.  It brought delicious fruit, and never was the fire lighted more
+frequently on the hearth in the plots of ground assigned to the pupils--
+baking and boiling were pleasant during the cool afternoons.
+
+No month seemed to us so cheery as October.  During its course the apples
+and pears were gathered, and an old privilege allowed the pupils "to
+glean"--that is, to claim the fruit left on the trees.  This tested the
+keenness of our young eyes, but it sometimes happened that we confounded
+trees still untouched with those which had been harvested.  "Nitimur in
+vetitum semper cupimusque negata,"--[The forbidden charms, and the
+unexpected lures us.]--is an excellent saying of Ovid, whose truth, when
+he tested it in person, was the cause of his exile.  It sometimes brought
+us into conflict with the owners of the trees, and it was only natural
+that "Froebel's youngsters" often excited the peasants' ire.
+
+Gellert, it is true, has sung:
+
+                   "Enjoy what the Lord has granted,
+                    Grieve not for aught withheld."
+
+but the popular saying is, "Forbidden fruit tastes sweetest," and the
+proverb was right in regard to us Keilhau boys.
+
+Whatever fruit is meant in the story related in Genesis of the fall of
+man, none could make it clearer to German children than the apple.  The
+Keilhau ones were kept in a cellar, and through the opening we thrust a
+pole to which the blade of a rapier was fastened.  This sometimes brought
+us up four or five apples at once, which hung on the blade like the flock
+of ducks that Baron Munchausen's musket pierced with the ramrod.
+
+We were all honest boys, yet not one, not even the sons of the heads of
+the institute, ever thought of blaming or checking the zest for this
+appropriation of other people's property.
+
+The apple and morality must stand in a very peculiar relation to each
+other.
+
+Scarcely was the last fruit gathered, when other pleasures greeted us.
+
+The 18th of October, the anniversary of the battle of Leipsic, was
+celebrated in Thuringia by kindling bonfires on the highest mountains,
+but ours was always the largest and brightest far and wide.  While the
+flames soared heavenward, we enthusiastically sang patriotic songs.  The
+old Lutzow Jagers, who had fought for the freedom of Germany, led the
+chorus and gazed with tearful eyes at the boys whom they were rearing for
+the future supporters and champions of their native land.
+
+Then winter came.
+
+Snow and ice usually appeared in our mountain valley in the latter half
+of November.  We welcomed them, for winter brought coasting parties down
+the mountains, skating, snow-balling, the clumsy snow-man, and that most
+active of mortals, the dancing-master, who not only instructed us in the
+art of Terpsichore, but also gave us rules of decorum which were an
+abomination to Uncle Froebel.
+
+An opportunity to put them into practice was close at hand, for the 29th
+of November was Barop's birthday, which was celebrated by a little dance
+after the play.
+
+Those who took part in the performance were excused from study for
+several days before, for with the sapper's help we built the stage, and
+even painted the scenes.  The piece was rehearsed till it was absolutely
+faultless.
+
+I took an active part in all these matters during my entire residence at
+the institute, and we three Ebers brothers had the reputation of being
+among the best actors, though Martin far surpassed us.  We had invented
+another variety of theatrical performances which we often enjoyed on
+winter evenings after supper, unless one of the teachers read aloud to
+us, or we boys performed the classic dramas.  While I was one of the
+younger pupils, we used the large and complete puppet-show which belonged
+to the institute; but afterwards we preferred to act ourselves, and
+arranged the performance according to a plan of our own.
+
+One of us who had seen a play during the vacation at home told the others
+the plot.  The whole was divided into scenes, and each character was
+assigned to some representative who was left to personate it according to
+his own conception, choosing the words and gestures which he deemed most
+appropriate.
+
+I enjoyed nothing more than these performances; and my mother, who
+witnessed several of them during one of her visits, afterwards said that
+it was surprising how well we had managed the affair and acted our parts.
+
+For a long time I was the moving spirit in this play, and we had no lack
+of talented mimes, personators of sentimental heroes, and droll
+comedians.  The women's parts, of course, were also taken by boys.  Ludo
+made a wonderfully pretty girl.  I was sometimes one thing, sometimes
+another, but almost always stage manager.
+
+These merry improvisations were certainly well fitted to strengthen the
+creative power and activity of our intellects.  There was no lack of
+admirable stage properties, for the large wardrobe of the institute was
+at our disposal whenever we wanted to act, which was at least once a week
+during the whole winter, except in the Advent season, when everything was
+obliged to yield to the demand of the approaching Christmas festival.
+Then we were all busy in making presents for our relatives.  The younger
+ones manufactured various cardboard trifles; the older pupils, as embryo
+cabinet-makers, all sorts of pretty and useful things, especially boxes.
+
+Unluckily, I did not excel as a cabinet-maker, though I managed to finish
+tolerable boxes; but my mother had two made by the more skilful hands of
+Ludo, which were provided with locks and hinges, so neatly finished,
+veneered, and polished that many a trained cabinet-maker's apprentice
+could have done no better.  It was one of Froebel's principles--as I have
+already mentioned--to follow the "German taste for manual labor," and
+have us work with spades and pickaxes (in our plots of ground), and with
+squares, chisels, and saws (in the pasteboard and carving lessons).
+
+A clever elderly man, the sapper, or Sabuim, already mentioned--I think
+I never heard his real name--instructed us in the trades of the book
+binder and cabinet-maker.  He was said to have served under Napoleon as a
+sapper, and afterwards settled in our neighbourhood, and found occupation
+in Keilhau.  He was skilful in all kinds of manual labour, and an
+excellent teacher.  The nearer Christmas came the busier were the
+workshops; and while usually there was no noise, they now resounded
+with Christmas songs, among which:
+
+         "Up, up, my lads!  why do ye sleep so long?
+          The night has passed, and day begins to dawn";
+
+or our Berlin one:
+
+         "Something will happen to-morrow, my children,"
+
+were most frequently heard.
+
+Christmas thoughts filled our hearts and minds.  Christmas at home had
+been so delightful that the first year I felt troubled by the idea that
+the festival must be celebrated away from my mother and without her.  But
+after we had shared the Keilhau holiday, and what preceded and followed
+it, we could not decide which was the most enjoyable.
+
+Once our mother was present, though the cause of her coming was not
+exactly a joyous one.  About a week before the Christmas of my third year
+at Keilhau I went to the hayloft at dusk, and while scuffling with a
+companion the hay slipped with us and we both fell to the barn-floor.
+My school-mate sustained an internal injury, while I escaped with the
+fracture of two bones, fortunately only of the left arm.  The severe
+suffering which has darkened so large a portion of my life has been
+attributed to this fracture, but the idea is probably incorrect;
+otherwise the consequences would have appeared earlier.
+
+At first the arm was very painful; yet the thought of having lost the
+Christmas pleasures was almost worse.  But the experience that the days
+from which we expect least often afford us most happiness was again
+verified.  Barop had thought it his duty to inform my mother of this
+serious accident, and two or three days later she arrived.  Though I
+could not play out of doors with the others, there was enough to enjoy
+in the house with her and some of my comrades.
+
+Every incident of that Christmas has remained in my memory, and, though
+Fate should grant me many more years of life, I would never forget them.
+First came the suspense and excitement when the wagon from Rudolstadt
+filled with boxes drove into the court-yard, and then the watching for
+those which might be meant for us.
+
+On Christmas eve, when at home the bell summoned us to the Christmas-tree
+the delight of anticipation reached its climax, and expressed itself in
+song, in gayer talk, and now and then some harmless scuffle.
+
+Then we went to bed, with the firm resolve of waking early; but the sleep
+of youth is sounder than any resolution, and suddenly unwonted sounds
+roused us, perhaps from the dreams of the manger at Bethlehem and the
+radiant Christmas-tree.
+
+Was it the voice of the angels which appeared to the shepherds?  The
+melody was a Christmas choral played by the Rudolstadt band, which had
+been summoned to waken us thus pleasantly.
+
+Never did we leave our beds more quickly than in the darkness of that
+early morning, illuminated as usual only by a tallow dip.  Rarely was the
+process of washing more speedily accomplished--in winter we were often
+obliged to break a crust of ice which had formed over the water; but this
+time haste was useless, for no one was admitted into the great hall
+before the signal was given.  At last it sounded, and when we had pressed
+through the wide-open doors, what splendours greeted our enraptured eyes
+and ears!
+
+The whole room was most elaborately decorated with garlands of pine.
+Wherever the light entered the windows we saw transparencies representing
+biblical Christmas scenes.  Christmas-trees--splendid firs of stately
+height and size, which two days before were the ornaments of the forest-
+glittered in the light of the candles, which was reflected from the ruddy
+cheeks of the apples and the gilded and silvered nuts.  Meanwhile the
+air, "O night so calm, so holy!" floated from the instruments of the
+musicians.
+
+Scarcely had we taken our places when a chorus of many voices singing the
+angel's greeting, "Glory to God in the highest, peace on earth," recalled
+to our happy hearts the sacredness of the morning.  Violins and horns
+blended with the voices; then, before even the most excited could feel
+the least emotion of impatience, the music ceased.  Barop stepped
+forward, and in the deep, earnest tones peculiar to him exclaimed,
+"Now see what pleasures the love of your friends has prepared for you!"
+
+The devout, ennobling feelings which had inspired every heart were
+scattered to the four winds; we dispersed like a flock of doves
+threatened by a hawk, and the search for the places marked by a label
+began.
+
+One had already seen his name; a near-sighted fellow went searching from
+table to table; and here and there one boy called to another to point out
+what his sharp eyes had detected.  On every table stood a Stolle, the
+Saxon Christmas bread called in Keilhau Schuttchen, and a large plate of
+nuts and cakes, the gift of the institute.  Beside these, either on the
+tables or the floor, were the boxes from home.  They were already opened,
+but the unpacking was left to us--a wise thing; for what pleasure it
+afforded us to take out the various gifts, unwrap them, admire, examine,
+and show them to others!
+
+Those were happy days, for we saw only joyous faces, and our own hearts
+had room for no other feelings than the heaven-born sisters Love, Joy,
+and Gratitude.
+
+We entered with fresh zeal upon the season of work which followed.  It
+was the hardest of the twelve months, for it carried us to Easter, the
+close of the school year, and was interrupted only by the carnival with
+its merry masquerade.
+
+All sorts of examinations closed the term of instruction.  On Palm Sunday
+the confirmation services took place, which were attended by the parents
+of many of the pupils, and in which the whole institute shared.
+
+Then came the vacation.  It lasted three weeks, and was the only time we
+were allowed to return home.  And what varied pleasures awaited us there!
+Martha, whom we left a young lady of seventeen, remained unaltered in her
+charming, gentle grace, but Paula changed every year.  One Easter we
+found the plump school-girl transformed into a slender young lady.  The
+next vacation she had been confirmed, wore long dresses, had lost every
+trace of boyishness, even rarely showed any touch of her former drollery.
+
+She did not care to go to the theatre, of which Martha was very fond,
+unless serious dramas were performed.  We, on the contrary, liked farces.
+I still remember a political quip which was frequently repeated at the
+Konigstadt Theatre, and whose point was a jeer at the aspirations of the
+revolution: "Property is theft, or a Dream of a Red Republican."
+
+We were in the midst of the reaction and those who had fought at the
+barricades on the 18th of March applauded when the couplet was sung, of
+which I remember these lines:
+
+                   "Ah! what bliss is the aspiration
+                    To dangle from a lamp-post
+                    As a martyr for the nation!"
+
+During these vacations politics was naturally a matter of utter
+indifference to us, and toward their close we usually paid a visit to my
+grandmother and aunt in Dresden.
+
+So the years passed till Easter (1852) came, and with it our confirmation
+and my separation from Ludo, who was to follow a different career.  We
+had double instruction in confirmation, first with the village boys from
+the pastor of Eichfeld, and afterwards from Middendorf at the institute.
+
+Unfortunately, I have entirely forgotten what the Eichfeld clergyman
+taught us, but Middendorf's lessons made all the deeper impression.
+
+He led us through life to God and the Saviour, and thence back again to
+life.
+
+How often, after one of these lessons, silence reigned, and teachers and
+pupils rose from their seats with tearful eyes!
+
+Afterwards I learned from a book which had been kept that what he gave us
+had been drawn chiefly from the rich experiences of his own life and the
+Gospels, supplemented by the writings of his favourite teacher,
+Schleiermacher.  By contemplation, the consideration of the universe with
+the soul rather than with the mind, we should enter into close relations
+with God and become conscious of our dependence upon him, and this
+consciousness Middendorf with his teacher Schleiermacher called
+"religion."
+
+But the old Lutzow Jager, who in the year 1813 had taken up arms at the
+Berlin University, had also sat at the feet of Fichte, and therefore
+crowned his system by declaring, like the latter, that religion was not
+feeling but perception.  Whoever attained this, arrived at a clear
+understanding of his own ego (Middendorf's mental understanding of life),
+perfect harmony with himself and the true sanctification of his soul.
+This man who, according to our Middendorf, is the really religious human
+being, will be in harmony with God and Nature, and find an answer to the
+highest of all questions.
+
+Froebel's declaration that he had found "the unity of life," which had
+brought Middendorf to Keilhau, probably referred to Fichte.  The phrase
+had doubtless frequently been used by them in conversations about this
+philosopher, and neither needed an explanation, since Fichte's opinions
+were familiar to both.
+
+We candidates for confirmation at that time knew the Berlin philosopher
+only by name, and sentences like "unity with one's self," "to grasp and
+fulfil," "inward purity of life," etc., which every one who was taught by
+Middendorf must remember, at first seemed perplexing; but our teacher,
+who considered it of the utmost importance to be understood, and whose
+purpose was not to give us mere words, but to enrich our souls with
+possessions that would last all our lives, did not cease his explanations
+until even the least gifted understood their real meaning.
+
+This natural, childlike old man never lectured; he was only a pedagogue
+in the sense of the ancients--that is, a guide of boys.  Though precepts
+tinctured by philosophy mingled with his teachings, they only served as
+points of departure for statements which came to him from the soul and
+found their way to it.
+
+He possessed a comprehensive knowledge of the religions of all nations,
+and described each with equal love and an endeavour to show us all their
+merits.  I remember how warmly he praised Confucius's command not to love
+our fellow-men but to respect them, and how sensible and beautiful it
+seemed to me, too, in those days.  He lingered longest on Buddhism; and
+it surprises me now to discover how well, with the aids then at his
+command, he understood the touching charity of Buddha and the deep
+wisdom and grandeur of his doctrine.
+
+But he showed us the other religions mainly to place Christianity and
+its renewing and redeeming power in a brighter light.  The former served,
+as it were, for a foil to the picture of our Saviour's religion and
+character, which he desired to imprint upon the soul.  Whether he
+succeeded in bringing us into complete "unity" with the personality of
+Christ, to which he stood in such close relations, is doubtful, but he
+certainly taught us to understand and love him; and this love, though I
+have also listened to the views of those who attribute the creation and
+life of the world to mechanical causes, and believe the Deity to be a
+product of the human intellect, has never grown cold up to the present
+day.
+
+The code of ethics which Middendorf taught was very simple.  His motto,
+as I have said, was, "True, pure, and upright in life."  He might have
+added, "and with a heart full of love"; for this was what distinguished
+him from so many, what made him a Christian in the most beautiful sense
+of the word, and he neglected nothing to render our young hearts an
+abiding-place for this love.
+
+Of course, our mother came to attend our confirmation, which first took
+place with the peasant boys--who all wore sprigs of lavender in their
+button-holes--in the village church at Eichfeld, and then, with
+Middendorf officiating, in the hall of the institute at Keilhau.
+
+Few boys ever approached the communion-table for the first time in a more
+devout mood, or with hearts more open to all good things, than did we two
+brothers that day on our mother's right and left hand.
+
+No matter how much I may have erred, Middendorf's teachings and counsels
+have not been wholly lost in any stage of my career.
+
+After the confirmation I went away with my mother and Ludo for the
+vacation, and three weeks later I returned to the institute without my
+brother.
+
+I missed him everywhere.  His greater discretion had kept me from many
+a folly, and my need of loving some one found satisfaction in him.
+Besides, his mere presence was a perpetual reminder of my mother.
+
+Keilhau was no longer what it had been.  New scenes always seem desirable
+to young people, and for the first time I longed to go away, though I
+knew nothing of my destination except that it would be a gymnasium.
+
+Yet I loved the institute and its teachers, though I did not realize
+until later how great was my debt of gratitude.  Here, and by them, the
+foundation of my whole future life was laid, and if I sometimes felt it
+reel under my feet, the Froebel method was not in fault.
+
+The institute could not dismiss us as finished men; the desired "unity
+with life" can be attained only upon its stage--the world--in the motley
+throng of fellow-men, but minds and bodies were carefully trained
+according to their individual peculiarities, and I might consider myself
+capable of receiving higher lessons.  True, my character was not yet
+steeled sufficiently to resist every temptation, but I no longer need
+fear the danger of crossing the barrier which Froebel set for men
+"worthy" in his sense.
+
+My acquirements were deficient in many respects what the French term
+"justesse d'esprit" had to a certain degree become mine, as in the case
+of every Keilhau boy, through our system of education.
+
+Though I could not boast of "being one with Nature," we had formed a
+friendly alliance, and I learned by my own experience the truth of
+Goethe's words, that it was the only book which offers valuable contents
+on every page.
+
+I was not yet familiar with life, but I had learned to look about with
+open eyes.
+
+I had not become a master in any handicraft, but I had learned with
+paste-pot and knife, saw, plane, and chisel--nay, even axe and handspike-
+-what manual labour meant and how to use my hands.
+
+I had by no means attained to union with God, but I had acquired the
+ability and desire to recognize his government in Nature as well as in
+life; for Middendorf had understood how to lead us into a genuine filial
+relation with him and awaken in our young hearts love for him who kindles
+in the hearts of men the pure flame of love for their neighbours.
+
+The Greek words which Langethal wrote in my album, and which mean "Be
+truthful in love," were beginning to be as natural to me as abhorrence of
+cowardice and falsehood had long been.
+
+Love for our native land was imprinted indelibly on my soul, and lives
+there joyously, ready to sacrifice for the freedom and greatness of
+Germany even what I hold dearest.
+
+
+
+
+ETEXT EDITOR'S BOOKMARKS:
+
+A word at the right time and place
+Confucius's command not to love our fellow-men but to respect
+
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STORY OF MY LIFE, BY EBERS, V4 ***
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