From Doornburg we walked to Jena, where we arrived to dinner. It rained torrents, but Strauss was not to be balked of what he came for. We trudged like _Schwarmer_ (enthusiasts), as he said, through mud and rain, to all the Goethe and Schiller relics, the library, the observatory, and, last of all, the Princess's garden, where the statue of the eagle with its three poetical inscriptions long detained us. Returned to our inn and about to take a final leave of Strauss; now, I thought, or never, was the time to fulfil the object for which I had accompanied him thus far. All day, hitherto, our talk had been of the poets--Greek, Roman, English, and German, and so much erudition, taste, and feeling, I had rarely found united. His mind seemed to have fed on poetry and nothing else; and I know not how it was, but I could not till now resolve to speak the word which I knew would disenchant him. Now, however, the probability that we should never see each other again on this side eternity gave a solemn, perhaps superstitious, turn to my thoughts. As he sat there in silence before me, like the sphinx of which he had spoken so mysteriously in descanting that morning on the master piece of Sophocles, I felt that now I must speak out, or else look to be devoured. I at once entered on the subject, therefore, and delivered myself of all the objections I had so elaborately arranged and prepared. His answer was evasive; and the topic was changed into an argument. Strauss was to leave with the diligence at eight o'clock for Rudolstadt. I cordially shook hands with him, bade God bless him, and, hiring a conveyance, drove directly back to Weimar. On the way home, I conceived the plan of a poem, which, if it were completed, I would insert here. It will probably never be completed. Instead of it, therefore, I will communicate something far more interesting--a copy of verses written by Strauss himself, on returning from his pilgrimage to the tomb of the poets; and with which I conclude what I had to say regarding Dr. David Strauss in Weimar. [Dr. Strauss, as a poet, being almost a _lusus naturæ_, according to English ideas of him, we have thought it right to translate this poem. Here, accordingly, is the best English version possible to us in the little time allowed by an inexorable printer:--] On pilgrim staff I homeward come, Way worn, but still with pleasure warmed; At the great prophet's holy tomb, The pious rites I have performed. I, in his garden's shady walk, Recalled the prints of footsteps lost: And from the tree his care had raised, I plucked a greeting from his ghost. I saw in letters and in poems, His honored hand's laborious toil; And many loving recollections, Inquiry won me for my spoil. Through every chamber, small and homely, With holy reverence did I roam, Where oft the gods in radiant concourse Came thronging to their loved one's home.