He was then about two leagues from Graufthal, in front of the Dripping Pan public-house, where the inhabitants of St.-Jean des Choux came to eat bacon omelettes, and to dance with their sweethearts. A number of people were there: mowers in their shirt-sleeves, and peasant-girls of the neighbourhood in short petticoats, whirling like the wind round the arbour. They raised the leg, stamped, and made passes, double passes, triple passes, and shouted enough to crack the clouds. Coucou Peter, the fiddler, the famous Coucou Peter, welcomed in all the beershops, breweries, and taverns of Alsace—the good, the jovial Coucou Peter—was seated on a barrel of beer in a recess of the garden, in his big drugget jacket, garnished with steel buttons the size of crown-pieces, with fresh-coloured, plump-looking cheeks, and his hat surmounted by a cock’s feather. He was scraping with full elbow-power an old country waltz, and formed in himself the whole orchestra of the Dripping Pan. Wine, beer, and kirschwasser flowed on the tables, and vigorous kisses, quite openly given, stimulated the universal enjoyment. In spite of all his cares for the future of the world and of civilisation, Frantz Mathéus could not withhold his admiration from this pleasant sight. He pulled up behind the arbour, and laughed heartily at the little kissings and lovemakings which he discovered through the hornbeam hedge. But while the good man was giving himself up to these curious observations, the fiddler suddenly stopped in the midst of a flourish, sprang from his barrel, and cried, in a ringing voice— “Ha! ha! ha!—the Doctor! Good Doctor Frantz! Hi, there! Make way for me, that I may bring you the inventor of the peregrination of souls and the transformation of men into potatoes!” It must be understood that the illustrious philosopher had committed the imprudence of communicating his psychologico-anthropo-zoological meditations to Coucou Peter, who had no fear of compromising the system by disrespectful allusions. “Ho, Dr. Mathéus!” he cried, coming out of his retreat, “you’ve come in the nick of time. Hey for jollity!” And throwing his hat into the air, he leaped the ditch, climbed over the paling, and seized Bruno by the bridle. There was a general hurrah, for all the good people present knew Mathéus. “Come in, Doctor! Take a glass of wine, Doctor!—no, a glass of kirschwasser—this way, Doctor!” One took him by the collar, another by the arm, a third by the tail of his coat; and they shouted, and the women laughed, till poor Frantz did not know which way to turn. Bruno was led into the shade, and a feed of oats given him, and two minutes afterwards the illustrious philosopher found himself seated between Petrus Brentz the gamekeeper, and Tobie Müller, the landlord of the Dripping Pan. Before him danced Coucou Peter, now on one leg, now on the other, and playing the famous Hopser of Lutzelstein with a seductive energy that was truly amazing. “Take my jug,” cried Tobie.