As we Were jolting along the streets I silently gazed at my charioteer, who was enthroned with more audacity than grace side-wise upon his box, so that I could see his profile; I noticed certain dark shadows in his face, which looked as if he had inadvertently come into close contact with a boot-brush. As soon as we had reached the shady precincts of the Thiergarten the sluices of his eloquence were opened, and indeed this worthy youth repaid me for all that I had heretofore missed. “How is business going on?” I asked. “Well, it’s only just going so-so,” he replied, “but up to last week it was going fine; we’ve had the whole town to sweep.” “Sweep?” I asked, somewhat puzzled. “Well yes, you see,” he said, “that’s because all winter folks had to sit at home and have a fire, and now, you see, it’s warm again----” “Aha,--I understand,” I interrupted; a rare point this for my note-book: “The second-class cab-driver manifests a surprising aptitude for simile; when the awaking spring-time entices men to leave their dark houses and entrust themselves to his vehicle, he expresses this by saying that he has swept the whole town.” In the joy of my heart I offered him a cigar; he did not decline, at the same time remarking that he preferred snuff to tobacco, which, as he said, was better adapted to his calling. Again I opened my note-book: “The second-class cab-driver does not disdain tobacco, preferring however to indulge in snuff.” “You see,” I said, after having secured this important fact in writing for all future times, “how it is always well to open one’s eyes to learn new things; up to this day I have never seen a cab-driver use snuff.” “Oh, as for them fellows----,” he replied, shrugging his shoulders, “why should they snuff? I was talking about our business.” “How so?” I stammered, with a puzzled look. He leaned down to me. “I’m only taking this cab out to-day, because my father don’t feel just right; the old hurdle belongs to him.” The trees in the Thiergarten began to dance before my very eyes. “What is your calling?” I shrieked in mortal agony. With a smile he looked down upon me: “I’m a chimney-sweep,” he said. “Stop!” I called out to him in a voice of thunder; “I want to get out here!” That afternoon I returned to my rooms with a bowed head; I had the feeling that everybody must know I had been out riding with a chimney-sweep. As I entered the house I noticed that there was a gateway beside the street-door bearing the inscription: “Cabs and carriages by the hour.” I had only lived in that particular house for a few days, and so had paid no attention to this before. Now, as my eyes were resting thoughtfully upon this sign, I made the observation that it is in hours of deep contrition that the soul of man ripens to grand purposes; for a thought arose within me, the boldness of which almost made me grow dizzy.