Kurz had invited the rector to be his companion, to his own detriment, for a little man appears to fearful disadvantage beside a long-legged fellow, and nature, in cheating Kurz of his rightful dimensions, appeared to have endowed the rector with the surplus. So they walked along the road, and the rector made a joke; he said that they two together reminded him of the metre, which the Romans called a dactyl, long, short, short; long, short, short. That provoked Kurz, since it was disparaging to his legs and his capabilities as a pedestrian; he took the longest possible steps. "Now we can pass for a spondee," said the rector. "Do me the favor, brother-in-law," said Kurz, angrily, and wholly out of breath, "to spare me your learned witticisms. They are altogether too much for me." And he wiped off the sweat from his face, pulled off his coat, and hung it over his stick. In his belief, Kurz was properly a materialist, but by trade he was a mercer. There were always remnants left over, in this business, which was quite a convenience to a man of his short stature, since he could use them up for himself. When he had cleared out his old stock last year, he had a piece of ladies' dress goods left on hand, on which were represented giraffes plucking at a palm-tree. He could not think of throwing it away, and he could not get rid of it, so he had it made up into a summer coat for himself, and he was now marching on the Rexow farm, with this banner over his shoulder, as if he were the youngest standard-bearer in the army of a German prince, who bore a giraffe and a palm-tree in his shield; and rector Baldrian stalked by his side, in a yellow nankeen coat, like a right file-leader, in the body-guard of the German prince, who might, for a change, have adopted yellow nankeen as a uniform. "Dear me!" sighed Frau Nüssler, "Kurz is bringing the rector with him." "Sure enough," said Bräsig, "but he shall not incommode us much to-day, I will cut his speeches short." For they both had, not without reason, a great terror of the rector's circumstantiality. The two guests entered, and the rector delivered a long oration upon his joy in seeing them again, and the happy opportunity of coming with Kurz; to which Bräsig replied curtly, that long legs were the best opportunities for one who was going across country, and turned away, so that the rector, while Frau Nüssler was occupied with Kurz, found his audience limited to Jochen, who listened in the most exemplary manner to the whole discourse, and finally said, "Good day, brother-in-law, sit down a little while."