About this time Goethe made the acquaintance of a man by whose friendship he laid great store. This was Merck, paymaster of the forces of Darmstadt, who was about eight years older than Goethe. He was a tall, meagre, rather awkward-looking man, somewhat cynical, but an ardent student of literature, and thoroughly loyal to his friends. Towards the close of 1771, a bookseller at Frankfort, asked Merck to edit the “Frankfurter Gelehrten Anzeigen” (“The Frankfort Learned Notices,” or “The Frankfort Review,” as we might say), a new literary periodical which was to appear at the beginning of 1772. Merck accepted the offer, and went to Frankfort to make arrangements with contributors. During this visit Goethe met him, and they at once became friends. Goethe joined the staff of the “Gelehrten Anzeigen,” and during the next two years wrote for it a good many reviews of all kinds of books. The opinions expressed in these reviews give evidence of a free and vigorous judgment, and they are set forth in a fresh, incisive, and picturesque style. It may be safely said that all great poets are great critics, and in his first efforts at criticism Goethe gave sufficiently clear indications that in the maturity of his powers he would be no exception to the general rule. He visited Merck several times at Darmstadt, where he became an intimate friend of Herder’s betrothed, who often wrote about him to her lover at Bückeburg. On one occasion, when walking to Darmstadt from Frankfort, he was overtaken by a tempest, and had to take refuge in a hut. Here he recited aloud, exactly as the words occurred to him, the “Wanderers Sturmlied” (the “Wanderer’s Storm-song”), a series of wild, irregular verses, in which he celebrates the power of Jupiter Pluvius, and apostrophises the Genius that makes the poet’s spirit independent of the accidents of time and place. To this period, also, belongs “The Wanderer,” a fine poem--suggested, no doubt, by his experiences at Niederbronn--in which a poet converses with a simple young mother in a hut built of stones taken from the ruins of an ancient temple. It had always been intended that Goethe, as his father had done before him, and as it was the custom of many young advocates still to do, should perfect himself in his profession by practising for some time in connection with the imperial chamber at Wetzlar. Accordingly, he took rooms at Wetzlar, in May, 1772. The work of each advocate at the imperial chamber was exactly what the advocate himself chose to make it, and Goethe chose to make his a mere form. Wetzlar, a little town on the left bank of the Lahn, is situated in a charming country, and he did not feel disposed to burrow among musty law-books when, in bright summer weather, he had a chance of wandering in secluded valleys, and filling his sketch-book with studies of landscape. He also spent a good deal of time in reading Greek poets, taking especial delight in Pindar.