I must say at once that when I matriculated at Leipzig, in the summer of 1841, I was still very young and very immature. I had determined to study philology, chiefly Greek and Latin, but the fare spread out by the professors was much too tempting. I read Greek and Latin without difficulty; I often read classical authors without ever attempting to translate them; I also wrote and spoke Latin easily. Some of the professors lectured in Latin, and at our academic societies Latin was always spoken. I soon became a member of the classical seminary under Gottfried Hermann, and of the Latin Society under Professor Haupt. Admission to these seminaries and societies was obtained by submitting essays, and it was no doubt a distinction to belong to them. It was also useful, for not only had we to write essays and discuss them with the other members, generally teachers, and with the professor, but we could also get some useful advice from the professor for our private studies. In that respect the German universities do very little for the students, unless one has the good fortune to belong to one of these societies. The young men are let loose, and they can choose whatever lectures they want. I still have my _Collegien-Buch_, in which every professor has to attest what lectures one has attended. The number of lectures on various subjects which I attended is quite amazing, and I should have attended still more if the honorarium had not frightened me away. Every professor lectured _publice_ and _privatim_, and for the more important courses, four lectures a week, he charged ten shillings, for more special courses less or nothing. This seems little, but it was often too much for me; and if one added these honoraria to the salary of a popular professor, his income was considerable, and was more than the income of most public servants. I have known professors who had four or five hundred auditors. This gave them £250 twice a year, and that, added to their salary, was considered a good income at that time. All this has been much changed. Salaries have been raised, and likewise the honoraria, so that I well remember the case of Professor von Savigny, who, when he was chosen Minister of Justice at Berlin, declared that he would gladly accept if only his salary was raised to what his income had been as Professor of Law. Of course, professors of Arabic or Sanskrit were badly off, and _Privatdocenten_ (tutors) fared still worse, but the _professores ordinarii_, particularly if they lectured on an obligatory subject and were likewise examiners, were very well off. In fact, it struck me sometimes as very unworthy of them to keep a _famulus_, a student who had to tell every one who wished to hear a distinguished professor once or twice, that he would not allow him to come a third time.