"P.S. As the price of letters to Spain and Portugal runs somewhat higher than to other places, I write, contrary to my usual habit and manner, somewhat small and _compresser_. Write small and light letters, but tolerably long ones, and _menagire_ also herein. Vale." Thus far the cautious Burgomaster Johann Schulte. He had the pleasure of seeing his son return safe from the land of monks, and united after many family negotiations to the maiden of his choice. Labour undoubtedly makes men firm and enduring, and it more especially serves the egotistic interests of men of sound capacity; but to any one whose vocation it is to be employed for the benefit of others, the service will be consecrated by a feeling of duty. Every employment which is capable of maintaining life gives man also a position. The journeyman is the official of his master, the housewife has the office of the keys, and every work develops even in the smallest circle a domain of moral duties. The German has never been deficient in a feeling of the duties of home and of his trade. There always have been citizens who were not only ready to die for their city, but who have sometimes passed a life of self-sacrifice for it. The Reformation elevated the feeling of duty to a higher domain of earthly action and the self-denial and self-sacrifice of the pious shepherd of souls should always be highly esteemed; but on closer observation, we perceive that the foundation of this more elevated feeling of duty was more especially of a religious nature. It was the command of God which men sought to obey; where the Scripture did not command with powerful voice, the feeling for the universal good was not so strongly developed, and the perception of the duties of their own position was uncertain. It is instructive to notice that it was the armies brought together by the war which first raised the citizen's idea of the duties of his calling. The soldier's feeling of honour not only developed itself in a noble esprit de corps, but became the source gradually of official honour in the citizen. First of all it gave him honour in the eyes of others when he fulfilled his duty, but also it afforded himself internal satisfaction and a just pride. Thus after the fidelity of the middle ages and the piety of the Reformation there arose a new domain of moral requirements. There was more of feeling than of the result of thought in it, but it was still an advance; though at first indeed only among the best. Two years after the paternal admonitions of Herr Burgomaster Schulte to his son, at a little distance south of Lisbon, the life of a Hamburger was put an end to by a fearful catastrophe. The account of it is given in an old narrative.