"My father-in-law and my father took counsel together, to make our engagement sure. I began to love her very much, and urged it on. I also was not disagreeable to her, which I had partly found out from herself, when the wife of the butcher, Burlacher, my mother's cousin, had invited us to her meadow before the Spalen gate to eat cherries, where we had been able to speak openly. It was determined that Dr. Hans Huber should make the proposal for me. When my father asked it of him, he readily assented, appointed Master Franz in the forenoon to meet him at the Minster, made the proposal, and gained his consent for a family marriage counsel. In the evening, when Dr. Hans came to me, he announced it to me with exultation, as was his wont, and congratulated me; but informed me that my father-in-law wished the affair to be kept quiet till my doctorate was over, when matters might proceed. I was well satisfied therewith, as my future father-in-law was at last inclined to consent. Formerly, he had always held back because he feared that my father was greatly in debt, and because he had boarders; for, as he said, he did not wish his daughter to be thrown into debts and disquietudes. But when he heard from my father that his debts were small in comparison with his property in land and houses, and that he himself intended to do away with the boarders, he was satisfied; and so much the more as Herr Caspar Krug, afterwards burgomaster, who had seen me, advised him, and because his son Ludwig told him he ought to thank God, as he had good hopes that I should become a renowned doctor, for I had shown my skill in curing his wife (who was weak after giving birth to two children) by giving her marchpane, which I had ordered when it was not yet the custom to do so. So my father-in-law was at last well pleased, and did not object to my going to his house to speak with his daughter. Yet I did this mostly in his absence, and secretly. I entered by the back door in the alley, and talked to her there in the lower part of the house, with due propriety and honour. Her father did not object, but appeared not to notice it; he also deferred matters as long as he could, for he did not like to give away his daughter, who, as he boasted, kept house so well for him.