Perhaps not every one knows what a Commers is. It is a particular kind of drinking bout, in which the students from one section, or of one society, unite. Almost every participant of a Commers wears the conventional costume of the German student: a short jacket, high boots, and a little cap with colored vizor. The students generally assemble at midday and carouse till morning, drinking, singing, smoking, and occasionally they hire a band. Such a Commers was at this moment held in L---- at a little inn called the Sun, in a garden adjoining the street. Flags were flying from the inn and over the garden itself. The students sat round tables under the spreading lindens; a huge bulldog under one of the tables. The musicians were under a trellis at one side, playing with great spirit, and refreshing themselves from time to time with mugs of beer. A great crowd had collected in the street before the unpretending little inn. The good citizens of L---- were not of the stuff to let slip a good opportunity of seeing strange guests. I mingled with the crowd of lookers-on. It gave me an immense satisfaction to watch the faces of the students, their embraces, their exclamations, the innocent affectations of youth, the eager glances, the unrestrained laughter--the best laughter in the world. All this generous ferment of young, fresh life, this striving forward, no matter whither so it be forward, this rollicking, untrammelled existence excited and infected me. Why not join them, I thought? "Assja, have you had enough?" suddenly asked in Russian a man's voice behind me. "Let us wait a little longer," answered another voice, a woman's, in the same tongue. I turned hastily. My eyes fell on a handsome young fellow in a loose jacket and cap. On his arm hung a girl of medium height, with a straw hat which entirely hid the upper part of her face. "You are Russians?" I said aloud involuntarily. The young man smiled and answered, "Yes; we are Russians." "I did not expect, in such an out-of-the-way place----" I began. "Nor did we," he interrupted me. "But what does that signify? All the better. Permit me to introduce myself. My name is Gagin, and this is"--he paused for an instant--"my sister. May we ask your name?"