



Produced by Charles Bowen, from page scans provided by the Web Archive




Transcriber's Note:

   1. Page scan source:
      http://www.archive.org/details/studentlifegerm02corngoog

   2. The diphthong oe is represented by [oe].





                                  THE

                        STUDENT-LIFE OF GERMANY.






                                  THE



                        STUDENT-LIFE OF GERMANY:


                           BY WILLIAM HOWITT.
   AUTHOR OF "THE RURAL LIFE OF ENGLAND," "BOOK OF THE SEASONS," ETC.


               FROM THE UNPUBLISHED MS. OF DR. CORNELIUS.


                     CONTAINING NEARLY FORTY OF THE


                       MOST FAMOUS STUDENT SONGS.


[Illustration]

                                   THINK OFT, YE BRETHREN;
            THINK OF THE GLADNESS OF OUR YOUTHFUL PRIME,--
            IT COMETH NOT AGAIN,--THAT GOLDEN TIME!

                                                 The Commers Book.



                             PHILADELPHIA:
                            CAREY AND HART.
                               MDCCCXLII.






            C. Sherman &, Co. Printers, 19 St. James Street






"How shall I call thee, thou high, thou rough, thou noble, thou
barbaric, thou loveable, unharmonious, song-full, repelling, yet
refreshing life of the Burschen years? How shall I describe you, ye
golden hours, ye choral-songs of brotherly love? What tone shall
I give to you to make myself understood? What colours to thee, thou
never-comprehended chaos? I shall describe thee? Never! Thy ludicrous
outside lies open; the layman sees that; one can describe that to him;
but thy inner and lovely ore, the miner only knows who goes singing
with his brethren into the deep shaft. He brings up gold; pure, solid
gold; be it much or little, it is still of high value. But this is not
his whole booty. What he sees there, he may not describe to the layman:
it were all too strange, and too precious for his ear. There are
spirits in the deep that no other ear can comprehend; no other eye
perceive. Music floats through those halls, which to every uninitiated
ear sounds empty and unmeaning. But to him who has felt with it and
sung with it, it gives a peculiar consecration; when he, moreover,
smiles over the hole in his cap which he has brought back with him as a
symbol.

"Old Grandfather! now know I what thou undertook when thou held thy
annual, solitary, intercalary day! Thou too hadst thy companions in the
days of thy youth, and the water stood in thy gray eyelashes when thou
marked one in thy stambook as entombed."

                                  _Hauff's Rathskeller in Bremen_.






                                PREFACE.


We have had various peeps and snatches of the Student-life of Germany,
from time to time, in our periodicals, but we have nothing like a
complete, and faithful account of it. Some of those accounts too, are
by English writers, who had at best but a partial and passing view of
this singular state of existence, and could not, however much they
might have seen of it, enter into it and comprehend it with the fulness
of apprehension and feeling which a native possesses. When I,
therefore, was thrown, on my first visit to Germany, into the midst of
its students, I began to inquire for a volume written by a German,
which should lay open the whole interior of that, whose surface was so
strange and so picturesque. I was told that no such thing, of any value
or completeness existed, and that, indeed, the students themselves were
jealous of the laws and customs of their ancient Burschendom being laid
open to the public. Yet, finding myself amongst those whose knowledge
and talents most entirely qualified them for making this exposition, I
did not cease till I had prevailed on one of the most gifted to
undertake the task, assisted by the experience of friends, who, like
himself, had passed through the mysteries of this singular life. The
present volume is the result; and I present it to the public with the
confident assurance, that whatever they may think of the portraiture,
they may depend upon its faithfulness. Spite of what that young and
popular writer, Hauff, has left on record in the extract which
immediately precedes these remarks, we have now penetrated the depths
of the Burschen-life; we have traversed its chaos, which he terms a
never-comprehended one; and have made the music of its most hidden
halls, audible and intelligible to all ears. I do not hesitate for a
moment to assert, that, taken as a whole, this volume will be found to
contain more that is entirely new and curious, than any one which has
issued from the press for years. The institutions and customs which it
describes, form the most singular state of social existence to be found
in the bosom of civilized Europe; and what renders them the more
curious and worthy of investigation is, that they are no recent and
evanescent frolic of eccentricity, but are as fast rooted into the
antiquity of German mind and manners as the universities themselves.
They have been modified and softened by time and advancing refinement,
but are not a whit nearer being rooted out, apparently, than they were
three hundred years ago. This state of things is here depicted by a
German himself, who has passed through it; and with that peculiar
feeling and appreciation which a German only can possess. It is in this
light that they are to be regarded. I do not here present myself as an
advocate or a caviller at this scheme of things, but merely as a
spectator, who, beholding something strange and curious, brings it to
the observation of his countrymen, in all truthfulness and simplicity
of representation, that they may judge of it for themselves. It has
been translated under the author's own eye, as it was written, and as
he is also acquainted with the English language, it may be reasonably
presumed to give a faithful transcript of his thoughts.

The two features of this Student-life which will meet with the most
repugnance in the English mind, are the Beer-duel, and the Sword-duel.
I have no desire to defend, far less to recommend either. I am, though
no advocate of a watery suction, miscalled Temperance, neither a
violent wine-bibber, nor "a fighting character." I do not even, like
our worthy friend Sir Thomas Fowell Buxton, while planning Niger
expeditions of civilization, brew XXX in London; nor, like many of my
countrymen, while attending church, or chapel in England, insist on
bombarding the Chinese because they wont be poisoned with my opium. I
merely let the worthy and learned author tell his own tale; and he, in
telling it as a German and fellow-countryman of those concerned,
assures us that these features are daily becoming more diminished by
the progress of refinement.

It is to be hoped that the publication of this volume may even hasten
this desirable end, for no people are so much alive to the opinion of
other nations as the Germans. One thing, however, as an Englishman, I
may say, which the author could not say--and that is, that when reading
of the beer and sword duels of these students, we must take into
account what are the weapons and the perils in both cases. We are not
to suppose then, that their beer is any thing like the XXX just spoken
of, or their wine like sherry or port, three-fourths brandy. No; they
who know German wine, know that it is a very gentle and innocent,
rather acidulous, and rather cooling fluid, and that their beer is far
more mighty of the hop than of the malt. It is a well-bittered and
amiable table-beer, which even Father Mathew might take as a healthy
stomachic, and which one might rather expect, in Sam Welter's phrase,
to make its swallowers "swell wisibly before our wery eyes," than grow
riotous under its influence. When to this we add, that the sword-duel
is rather a trial of skill in fencing than any thing dangerous, and
that a scratch across the cheek, or prick into a stuffed jerkin, is in
ninety-nine cases out of a hundred the worst of its accidents, fears on
the subject diminish at a rapid rate. If, however, any one thinks these
youths had better be at their books than crossing swords or swallowing
choppins, I assure him I am quite of the same opinion; and I here
exhort the students, as soon as they get this volume, which they
speedily will, to forsake the Hirschgasse and the Kneip, and follow the
advice, but not the _example_ of the English. Shall I advise them to
imitate the students of Cambridge? Let any one read "The Student-Life
of Cambridge" in a late number of the _Westminster Review_, and say
whether that would be reasonable. Shall I advise them to practise the
vice and the mockeries which are practised there, by those who give the
most public and prominent character to the social student-life of
England--for it is not meant to assert that the generality of the
Oxford and Cambridge students are of such a class? Why, Kneips and the
Hirschgasse are heaven and innocence to them. Shall I advise them to
quit their songs for the grossnesses sung by the wild portion of
the students at Cambridge and Oxford? No! the songs of the German
students, even when on no higher a theme than wine, and with the bold
free-spokenness which is startling to our modes of thinking, are the
effusions of the first spirits of their nation, and are sung to some of
the finest melodies which ever emanated from that most musical of
people. It is here that the tables must be turned, and that we must
call on the English to imitate the Germans, and not the Germans the
English. If the English will drink, let them drink wine as cooling, and
beer as thin and bitter, as the Germans; if they will fight duels, let
them abandon bullets that fly through a man and let the soul out after
them, and be content with a scratched nose or punctured padding. If
they will sing over their wine, let them not sing the vile trash that
is heard in the haunts of our students, but the spiritual effusions of
such writers as Schiller, Goethe, Koerner, Arndt, Claudius, Hauff,
Follen, Uhland, etc. No, one cannot read of English students--of their
guzzlings and their songs--without feeling a sense of commonplaceness,
a something low, gross, unimaginative and vulgar.[1] On the
contrary, amid all the follies and mad frolics and nonsense of German
student-life--of which God knows there is plenty--he must be destitute
of poetry himself who does not feel it there. If there be a man who can
read through this volume and not feel its poetry, and not perceive the
high and beautiful sentiment which pervades it; the profound love of
nature, and the glorious love of country,--let that man march off to
Cambridge or Oxford; let him give his suppers or his breakfasts; let
him hurry in his nightgown to morning prayers; let him become a
first-rower, or a senior-wrangler if he will; but that man is no more
fit to take his stand by the student revellers of Germany, than Caliban
is by Hyperion. No, in the student-life, which is entered into as a
brief season of youthful hilarity, which in this world can come but
once; a season in which knowledge is not only to be gathered, but life
to be enjoyed--friendships for life to be knit up--love, perhaps for
life, to be kindled--and the spirit of patriotism to be cherished to a
degree which no after-chills and oppressions of ordinary life shall
ever be able utterly to extinguish; in this life there is a feeling and
a sentiment to which our student-life is a stranger. It is from the
bosom of this life that some of the noblest poets, the profoundest
philosophers, and the most devoted patriots which the world ever saw,
have gone forth. It was from the heart of this life that Theodore
Koerner sprung, for the cause of his country and mankind, and sung and
fought and died; it was from this that Goethe and Schiller, Hauff and
Tieck, and a thousand others, have issued to glorify valour, or
consecrate patriotism, or beautify the regions of the human soul by
their songs and their imaginative prose. It was from this that the
whole body of ardent youth arose, and quitting their Kneips and their
Chores, called all their country to reassert its liberty, to drive out
its foes, and at the people's head, fought with the spirit of the
ancient heroes, and chased from their soil for ever, the tyrant and
overrunner of humbled Europe.

And yet there are those who are continually forgetting these things;
asserting that all the student songs, and student clanship, and student
freedom, end in smoke and vapour, and without any permanent result, and
that they depart at the termination of their academical career their
several ways, and sink into obscurity and insignificance. What! would
they not have them become good citizens, sober judges, domestic men?
But they who say that no high effects remain, know nothing of the youth
of Germany. They cannot have seen how the new Rhine-song went through
the whole country like an electric flash when France threatened to
march to the banks of that noble river, and how every German student
vowed if such a deed were perpetrated, they would go forth and fight to
a man. They cannot know, as I do, that the loves and friendships formed
by these youths are more permanent and indissoluble than any class of
men with whom I have yet become acquainted; nor that in private
society, where, and in my own house, I have seen much of them,
they are amongst the most accomplished, gentlemanly, temperate,
correctly-mannered, cordial-hearted, and intellectual men that European
society possesses. But all such persons I willingly turn over to the
perusal of this volume, the work of a young but learned author, who has
recently passed, by a splendid examination, out of this student-life
itself without having ever fought a single duel, or very probably got
half or even quarter seas over. If the perusal of this volume should
have the good effect of lessening amongst the German youth the tendency
to the beer or the sword duel, and of inspiring our English youth with
a more intellectual and poetical taste in their pleasures, certainly we
may say, in the style of all good old prefaces, "that it will not have
been written in vain."

_Heidelberg, April 6th_, 1841.




                               CONTENTS.


                               CHAPTER I.

   General Plan, Officers, and Courts, of a German University--Charm of
     this life to those who have passed through it--Explanation of
     the term _Bursche_, or Student--Right to found or dissolve
     Universities, retained by the Sovereign Princes--Offices and mode
     of government--The Curatorium--Rector, Prorector--Senate, greater
     and less--Different orders of Professors and Teachers--mode of
     their remuneration--University Board of Finance--its Court of
     Justice--Academical freedom, and mode of matriculation--Inferior
     officers, and penalties for offences against the Academical
     laws--College terms--mode of Lecturing, and duties of Lecturers--
     necessary Examinations of the Students, and consequent
     Certificates--Sciences taught--Privileges and endowments to enable
     young men without property to enjoy all the advantages of the
     Universities--the great extent to which this is made available,
     and great advantages to the State derived from it--Opinion of
     Goethe on this head--Great Men that this has produced--no German,
     however exalted in rank, can hold a high position in society,
     without making himself master of the knowledge thus opened to the
     people


                              CHAPTER II.

   General View of Student-Life.--Student-life an admirable field for
     bringing a young man speedily to a knowledge of life, and to a
     sense of self-government and self-dependence--Prejudice,
     especially amongst foreigners, that Students must become exposed
     to many unpleasantnesses--these groundless--every individual
     Student independent, and at liberty to associate just as little,
     or as mach as he pleases with the rest--Equality the law of the
     German Students--their opinion that the English are the slaves of
     the Aristocracy--their surprise at the Aristocratic prejudices of
     the English--Academic freedom dear to every German Student--its
     value acknowledged by all the greatest men--Influence of the
     associate life of the Students on their minds and manners--
     including, as it does, the natives of so many Countries--Chores,
     or Unions--Landsmannschafts--the Burschenschaft--Wearing of Union
     Badges forbidden--Public Processions, and Costumes of the
     Professors


                              CHAPTER III.

   The Chores, or Unions.--Their nature, constitution, and
     distinguishing colours--each Chore formed of the natives of a
     particular State--what is requisite for the formation of a New
     Chore--is acknowledged and recorded at the Allgemeine, or General
     Social Meeting of the Chores--Constitution of a Chore--its
     Officers, Code of Laws--its Beer-court, and Court of Honour--its
     Boon-companions, and various ranks of members--its Chore-Convent,
     or Board of Administration--the Proscription, or Bann, as
     exercised both against Members and offending Tradesmen, or even
     the University itself--Classes of Students termed Camels, etc.
     etc.


                              CHAPTER IV.

   The Burschenschaft.--The origin of this celebrated Society to be
     found in the patriotic desire to free Germany from the domination
     of Buonaparte--this feeling at first high and holy--quickened by
     the union of Learned and Literary men in the Poet-League of
     Goettengen, to advance the Language and Literature of the
     Country--the triumphs of Literature at their height under Schiller
     and Goethe, when the French Invasion took place--the indignant
     enthusiasm excited by this on the minds of the Students--the
     formation of Burschenschafts--these in different Universities
     united by one general bond--their effect in rousing Germany to
     the expulsion of the French--these feelings immortalized in the
     songs of Theodore Koerner--the People's Battle at Leipsic--the
     expulsion of the French followed by a demand for the restoration
     of the Germanic Empire--Act of Confederation of the German States
     signed--Formation of the Holy Alliance of Sovereigns--
     Disappointment of the People--Agitations of the Burschenschaft--
     Beautiful ceremonies at the celebration of the Peace Anniversary
     at Jena, etc. 1816--farther proceedings of the Borschenschaft--the
     celebrated Festival in the Wartburg in 1817, at which the Writings
     of Kotzebue ware burnt--Congress of Universities at Jena in 1818,
     and Publication of the Constitution of the Burschenschaft--the
     influence of these events on the mind of George Sand, and its
     consequences


                               CHAPTER V.

   The Narrative of Sand.--His origin and education--his early enmity
     to the French--his conscientious but excitable disposition--the
     effect on his mind of the burning of Kotzebue's Writings--his
     personal appearance--Kotzebue in the pay of Russia, to give
     information of the popular movements and opinions in Germany--
     Seizure and publication of one of his bulletins to that
     Government, and consequent popular excitement--Sand conceives the
     idea of putting Kotzebue to death, as a traitor to German
     freedom--his long mental struggles against this idea--the final
     surrender to it, and preparation for carrying it into effect--his
     paper called "Death-blow to August Von Kotzebue"--his letter to
     his parents, and brother and sisters, on setting out on this
     project--his perpetration of the deed, his trial, and execution at
     Mannheim--Consequence of this and similar attempts--The
     prohibition of the Burschenschaft, and persecution of its
     members--The Song "We Builded," etc, as sung at the breaking up
     of the Burschenschaft in June in 1819


                              CHAPTER VI.

   Ceremonial Introduction to University and Burschen Life--The Student
     youth of Germany, driven from the Burschenschaft, have fallen back
     on their Chore-life--Complaints of late years that youths coming
     to the University become involved in the dissipations of
     Chore-life, to the prevention of their studies and detriment of
     health and morals--these views combated by the Author--the
     existence of a temporary excitement on entering University-life
     accounted for--the Author, as one who passed through this life,
     testifies to its advantages--Every University its own particular
     tone and character--Peep at the past Life of the Universities, as
     revealed in Zacchariae's "Renommist," and in a Drawing of 1730--
     Singular and rude Customs formerly practised on the admission of
     Students to the Universities--Freshmen or Branen, then subjected
     also to many humiliations--the present condition of the Freshman,
     now termed a Fox--Curious Anecdotes connected with the condition
     of a Fox--Different ranks which a Student passes through who joins
     a Chore, or Verbindung--in the Gymnasium, or school preparatory to
     the University, he is a Frog--then successively a Mule, a Camel, a
     Fox, a Fat-Fox, a Burnt-Fox, a Young Bursch, Old Bursch, and Mossy
     Head--Satirical explanation of Student terms, by Herr Schluck--
     Initiatory ceremonies at a Union of the Chores on creating the
     different degrees of Foxes--Singing of "The Landsfather"--The
     Fox-Ride, and its accompanying song--Burning of the Burnt-Foxes,
     with the accompanying song, etc.


                              CHAPTER VII.

   The Duel.--This is a practice of the Middle Ages, that has firmly
     maintained itself amongst the Students--the Author's opinion of
     it--its actual good or evil in the system--to be regarded
     principally as a trial of skill in fence--mode in which these
     Duels are contracted, settled, conducted, and fought out--At
     Heidelberg these take place in a well-known house in the
     Hirschgasse--Duel Costume, and different species of Duel--Anecdote
     of a little Jew who fought one--the Duel prohibited by the laws--
     the Academical enactments against it--Attempts of the Beadles to
     seize the Combatants--their watchers--the Red Fisherman, their
     great champion--Students' dogs sometimes join in the contest--
     Penalties, and University Prison


                             CHAPTER VIII.

   Characters connecting themselves with Student Life.--The Hofrath
     Diehl--his History--the Flower-Boy, and Frau Gotlieben the
     Fruitwoman


                              CHAPTER IX.

   Private Life of the Student.--Visit of Mr. Traveller, the
     Englishman, to the room of the Student Freisleben--his surprise at
     what he saw--his friendly welcome--Description of the Room and its
     various Decorations--Student word for comfortable--the Boot-Fox--
     Origin of the word _School Foxery_, or pedantry--Wages of a
     Boot-Fox--Expense of Living at the University--_Pendulums_
     and _Knoten_--origin of the latter term--the House Philistine
     and his duties--the Philose, the Besom, the House-Bursch,
     and Room-Bursch--What it means to "Tail a Lecture"--
     Dissertation-on-Dogs--A visit to the annual Dog-Muster---Students'
     Dogs--their characteristics--one at a duel swallows up a Student's
     nose--the little Dog Tambourli--the Student's love for his Pipe--
     Pipes of various kinds, and in all their parts, described--Origin
     of the word Fidibus--the philosophy of Smoking


                               CHAPTER X.

   Rural and Summer Amusements of the Student.--Beauties of the
     neighbourhood of Heidelberg--The Wolfebrunnen--the surrounding
     Woods and Mountains of the Odenwald and Black Forest--Historical
     associations--the Student sometimes takes longer excursions than
     into these scenes--Excursions in a one-engine--Water excursions--
     Field sports--The Students' Shooting ground--Kirchweihs, or
     Wakes, described--the Students there--Scenes which arise with the
     Handwerksburschen


                              CHAPTER XI.

   Winter Amusements of the Student.--He joins gladly Social Parties at
     the houses of the Inhabitants and of the English--finds much
     amusement at the Reading-rooms, Billiard-table, and Balls and
     Concerts at the Museum--Serenades--Song, "The Departure"--Skating
     --pushing Ladies on the Ice in Sledges--gaiety of these scenes--
     sledging parties by Torch-light--Whims of the Students on such
     occasions--Instances of their schemes to satirize the attempts of
     the Senate to check their expense in such things--in the evening
     joins his Kneip


                              CHAPTER XII.

   The Student's Evening Party, with its Conversations, Discussions,
     Songs, and Customs.--The Student Hoffman entertains his Friends--
     Description of his Rooms--his Friends Freisleben, Von Kronen,
     Eckhard, Enderlin, Pittschaft, Mr. Traveller--their opinion of
     Englishmen and English Ladies--Melancholy story of Krusenstern and
     Avensleben--The Radonen Cake--Sketch of the history of
     Universities, given by Von Kronen--Discussion on Phrenology--
     English and German Literature compared--German Romance ludicrously
     described by Lichtenberg--the Students sing Schiller's song of
     "The Four Elements," also "There Twinkle Three Stars" from
     Koerner--they sing a Roundelay--Anecdotes of Stambooks--Drink to
     their Ladies--Drink and sing as a Roundelay the humorous song of
     "The Kraehwinkle Landsturm"--sing a Lumpitus of the first verse of
     various celebrated songs in rotation--sing "The Binschgauer"--
     Merriments before parting--The songs of "Ye Brothers, when no more
     I'm drinking," "The Pope," "Brothers, in this Place of Festive
     Meeting," "So crown with leaves the love-o'erbrimming Beakers"


                             CHAPTER XIII.

   General System of German Education.--Glance at the progress of
     popular Education, from the ancient Nations and Times down to the
     present--Popular Folks'-schools of the Middle Ages--Gerbardus
     Magnus--his Institution at Deventer---his ideas followed out by
     Montaigne, Bacon, etc.--the Burger class erect Schools--the
     Reformation--School of Conrad Celtes, for the restoration of
     Classical antiquity--Services of Erasmus, Reuchlin, Dalberg,
     Agricola, Pirkheimer, etc.--the origin of the plans of Pestalozzi
     to be found in the writings of Ratich and Comenius--Services of
     Fenelon, Spencer, and Franke--Improvements by Ziedler, Hein, and
     Sulzer--Influence of Locke, Rousseau, Crousatz, in developing the
     modern School-systems--Description of the German School-system,
     and what is taught in each class of Schools, viz. the Elementary,
     or Proper Folks'-Schools; the Real Schools, called also Middle
     Schools, Higher Burger Schools, etc; the Gymnasia; the
     Universities


                              CHAPTER XIV.

   Song, an indispensable requisite to the Student, as to all
     Germans.--Song and Poetry a necessity to the German--the Germans
     rich in Popular Songs--Universal singing of the Common People--A
     popular Song at any crisis passes like an electric flash through
     the whole People--"Prince Eugene," a specimen of a class of Songs
     very common amongst the People--All classes, in town or country,
     have their peculiar Songs--the Student is affluent in Songs--the
     Commers-Book a collection of them--Sing in their Kneips--their
     Songs often heard on summer evenings in the open air with fine
     effect--one of the finest "From High Olympus," etc.--the
     Roundelay--the Student has his Songs of Love, Wine, Fatherland,
     and Friendship--Student-life regarded as a joyous season that
     comes but once, therefore they sing and rejoice in it--Accompany
     their Deceased Brethren to the tomb also with Song--"Gaudeamus
     igitur"


                              CHAPTER XV.

   Drinking Customs of Student-life, ancient and modern.--The Author's
     opinions on festive drinking--Song of Old Noah--Master Schluck's
     persiflage on the Burschen-Comment, or Student Code of Drinking
     Laws--Notice of some of the chief of the different classes of
     Student Songs--"The Maiden Song" as formerly sung--account of it
     in Zacchariae's Renommist--Drinking Customs of a past age in the
     Universities--anecdotes of these--Phrases collected by
     Lichtenberg descriptive of a Drunkard--the General Beer-Code of
     Heidelberg


                              CHAPTER XVI.

   The Commers.--The Commerses, general and special--their social
     Festive Meetings, held on various occasions--Description of the
     General Commers--certain Songs sung, as "Heidelberg live thou,"
     etc.--the Singing of "The Consecration Song, or Landsfather," and
     singular ceremonies attending it--the Ceremony of the Smollis--
     Smollering constitutes a Brotherhood to last for life--Drinking
     Laws of the Commers--Herr Schluck's Comments on a Commers--the
     Excesses of the Ancient Commerses abandoned


                             CHAPTER XVII.

   The Special Commers.--Description of a train of Students going out
     to a Special Commers in the country--their arrival there--
     description of the Room and mode of holding the Commers--Ceremony,
     and Song of "The Prince of Fooling"--Frolics and Gambols of the
     Students the next day in the village--An old ballad describing
     these in 1650--the Commers over, they return often by water, with
     music and fireworks--close it with drinking Crambambuli--the Song
     of Crambambuli--The Lumpin Bell


                             CHAPTER XVIII.

   New Year's Eve.--Spent by the Friends at the rooms of Freisleben--
     Conversation sallies--Glee-wine made, and the English song, "Down
     with the Sorrows," etc., by Mrs. Howitt, sung by Hoffmann to the
     guitar--"The Song of Wine"--"The Table-Song," by Goethe


                              CHAPTER XIX.

   New Year's Eve, continued.--Sketch of the History of Heidelberg
     University--A Salamander rubbed to the honour of the Professors


                              CHAPTER XX.

   New Year's Eve, continued.--University Stories--Singular Story of
     the feats of activity, strength, and eccentric humour of Von
     Plauen--his Banishment from the University--his Imprisonment and
     Escape--Story of the Student Schwartzkopf, who became the
     celebrated robber, "The Black Peter;" with his deeds, capture,
     and strange final escape--Story of the Student Stark--Fire-arms
     announce the entrance of the New Year, and the friends rush forth
     to witness the Procession of the Students to give a "Vivat" to
     their chief Professors--this described--Breaking up of the ice on
     the river--the exploit of the Red Fisherman


                              CHAPTER XXI.

   The Marching-Forth.--Modes in which the Student generally quits the
     University--The Marching-Forth when the Bann is laid by the
     Students on the University itself, and march forth in a body--
     various instances of this--the one which arose out of the building
     of the Museum in Heidelberg in 1827--the cry of "Bursch, come
     forth!" raised, and all the Students, in procession, quitted the
     city--the progress of negotiation and return of the Students--
     Marching-Forth from Heidelberg on account of dispute with the
     Military--Marching-Forth from Goettingen in 1818--progress and
     event of it--An