"I told you, I think, my dear sir, that my father was a minister; nay more, my grandfathers on both sides were ministers, for my mother was a minister's daughter; my great-grandfather was at least a sexton, who had married the daughter of a shepherd--though of another flock. Farther I cannot trace my pedigree--but _ex ungue leonem_! You see that all of my family have pursued the same business, to keep flocks--of men or of sheep. The spirit of my ancestors seems to dwell in me. It was always my passion to carry animals to pasture, and even now I can stand by the hour leaning against a fence and looking at calves and colts. There is no doubt something paradisiacal in this kind of enjoyment which reminds us of the earliest times of mankind and me of my early youth. Sir, my first friend was a boy who kept the geese on the common; then a swineherd became my Pylades, and the intimate intercourse with this _Eumæus posthumus_ has given me a relish for certain parts of the Odyssey, which others lack who have not had the same previous training. When my Pylades obtained the rank of regular shepherd I left our native village, in tears, to go to college at Grunwald; there I entered an advanced class, but my teachers, as well as the boys, looked at me as a kind of monster; the latter mainly on account of my fabulous costume, of which a pair of trousers consisting of good ox-hide up to the knees was by no means the most remarkable part. My learning seemed to be as fabulous to the professors. I knew half of Virgil by heart; I read the New Testament as easily in the original as the others in the translation--and all this at thirteen! I am shocked even now when I think of it. Knowledge, however, was power, and I reaped the benefit at once. For my father, who had a numerous family, and who was as poor as a mouse in his own church, could give me next to nothing when I left home, except his blessing and letters to six families in town, who gave me as many free dinners every week. The seventh day, on which nobody invited me, became thus naturally my regular fast-day. I was, therefore, left entirely to myself; but I had no expensive habits; instead of them the talent to be content with bread and butter, to read with a train-oil lamp, and to write with pointed matches; to sit through my six hours' tuition, and to be able to give as many private lessons. Thus I could not only pay punctually the rent for my garret and the bills for the necessaries of life, but actually exchange, two months later, my ox-hide trousers, for another pair, of more suitable shape and material. But I kept forever the nickname of Leather-stocking, which my companions had given me, and which I had hoped to shake off on this solemn occasion. Other inconveniences at school I avoided mainly by a strict line of policy. I had found out that the biggest and strongest boys in any class were generally also the laziest and the most stupid. I never failed, therefore, to form an