custom-house the shores of the river were strewn with them. . .
After all this we had to empty our purses to show that we had money
enough for our journey, and that we should not be forced to beg in
order to get through. While we underwent this inquisition, another
officer made a tour of inspection around us, to observe our general
bearing, etc. . .After having kept us thus on coals for two hours
they gave us back our passports, and we went our way. At one
o'clock we arrived at Salzburg as hungry as wolves, but at the gate
we had still to wait and give up our passports again in exchange
for receipts, in virtue of which we could obtain permits from the
police to remain in the city. From our inn, we sent a waiter to get
these permits, but he presently returned with the news that we must
go in person to take them; there was, however, no hurry; it would
do in three or four hours! We had no farther difficulty except that
it was made a condition of our stay that we should not appear in
student's dress. This dress, they said, was forbidden in Austria.
They begged More to have his hair cut, otherwise it would be
shortened gratis, and also informed us that at our age it was not
becoming to dispense with cravats. Happily, I had two with me, and
Braun tied his handkerchief around his neck. It astonished me,
also, to see that we were not entered on the list of strangers
published every evening. So it was also, as we found, with other
students, though the persons who came with them by the same
conveyance, even the children, were duly inscribed. It seems this
is a precaution against any gathering of students. . .
The letter concludes in haste for the mail, and if the story of the
journey was finished the final chapter has not been preserved. Some
extracts from the home letters of Agassiz's friend Braun, which are
in place here, throw light on their university life for the coming
year.* (* See "Life of Alexander Braun", by his daughter, Madame
Cecile Mettenius.)
ALEXANDER BRAUN TO HIS FATHER.
MUNICH, November 18, 1828.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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