After the example of the great historian already alluded to, I shall touch but lightly on the early history of my hero; merely stating that thirty years before the present date, Johan Schmit was born to Johan Schmit the elder, by his wife Gretchen, after a similar presentation of five others; that he got through the usual maladies childhood is heir to, and was at the age of fifteen apprenticed to Herman Schwartz, a master-builder in the town of Bonn. There, after some years of hod-carrying, mortar-spreading, and stone-cutting--ascending steadily, both literally and metaphorically, the ladder of his profession--honest Johan took a prudent, diligent woman to wife, who lost no time in making him the father of three thriving heirs to his house and his hod. Johan was in tolerably good work, lived in the small house in the small street already mentioned, and kept his family, without much pinching on the part of the thrifty Gertrude, in their beer, thick bread, and sauerkraut. His work, his wife, his children, and his two companions, Karl Vratz, and Caspar Katzheim, with whom he drank very hoppy beer at the "Gold Apfel," just round the corner of the street, comprised the whole interests which occupied the heart and brain of Johan Schmit, of the little town of ----, on the Rhine. Johan had no other idea in his head when he rose in the morning than the day's work, the same as it was yesterday, and would be to-morrow; no other thought when he returned from it in the evening than that Frudchen had his supper ready for him, that little Wilhelm and Johan would run to meet him, and that little Rosechen, the baby, would crow out of her cradle at him, if awake, and that after his supper he would just walk down to the "Gold Apfel," and smoke a pipe with Karl and Caspar as usual. But Johan went to church occasionally with his wife, going through his routine of crossings, genuflexions, and sprinklings with holy water as orderly as any man. He heard the priest speak of doing his duty and obeying the church. Johan believed he did both; his duty--hard work--lay plainly before him; he was honest, sober, and kind to his family, and had certainly no idea or intention of disobeying the church. Thus, in a monotonous task of hard labor for daily bread and the support of an increasing family, plodded contentedly away the life of Johan Schmit of the little town of ----, on the Rhine.