Long Conrad told us that there was no school to-day on account of the homage. We had to wait a long time till this was over. At last the balcony of the Council House was filled with gay gentlemen, flags and trumpets; and our burgomaster, in his celebrated red coat, delivered an oration, which stretched out like india-rubber, or like a night-cap into which one has thrown a stone--only that it was not the stone of wisdom--and I could distinctly understand many of his phrases; for instance, that “We are now to be made happy”--and at the last words the trumpets and drums sounded, and the flags waved, and the people cried hurrah!--and as I, myself, cried hurrah! I held fast to the old Prince-Elector. And that was necessary, for I began to grow giddy; it seemed to me that the people were standing on their heads while the world whizzed round, and the Prince-Elector, with his long wig, nodded and whispered, “Hold fast to me!” and not till the cannon re-echoed along the wall did I become sobered, and climbed slowly down from the great bronze horse. As I went home I saw crazy Aloysius again dancing on one leg while he chattered the names of French generals, and crooked Gumpertz was rolling in the gutter drunk and growling _ça ira, ça ira_--and I said to my mother that we were all to be made happy, and so there was no school to-day. The next day the world was again all in order, and we had school as before, and things were got by heart as before--the Roman kings, chronology--the _nomina_ in _im_, the _verba irregularia_--Greek, Hebrew, geography, German, mental arithmetic--Lord! my head is still giddy with it!--all must be learnt by heart. And much of it was eventually to my advantage. For had I not learnt the Roman kings by heart it would subsequently have been a matter of perfect indifference to me whether Niebuhr had or had not proved that they never really existed. And had I not learnt chronology how could I ever in later years have found out any one in Berlin, where one house is as like another as drops of water, or as grenadiers, and where it is impossible to find a friend unless you have the number of his house in your head. Therefore I associated with every friend some historical event which had happened in a year corresponding to the number of his house, so that the one recalled the other, and some curious point in history always occurred to me whenever I met an acquaintance. For instance, when I met my tailor I at once thought of the battle of Marathon; if I saw the well-dressed banker, Christian Gumpel, I remembered the destruction of Jerusalem; if a Portuguese friend, deeply in debt, of the flight of Mahomet; if the University Judge, a man whose probity is well known, of the death of Haman; and if Wadzeek, I was at once reminded of Cleopatra. _Ach, lieber Himmel!_ the poor creature is dead now; our tears are dry, and we may say of her with Hamlet, “Take her for all in all; she was a hag--we oft shall look upon her like