"Aye, many times, many times," answered Old Hans, nodding. "Hundreds of times did we smoke and drink together--me and him." "Ah, that was a glorious privilege, Hans," said the Young Comrade fervently. "To hear him speak and touch his hand--the hand that wrote such great truths for the poor working people--I would have gladly died, Hans. Why, even when I touch your hand now, and think that it held _his_ hand so often, I feel big--strong--inspired." "Ach, but my poor old hand is nothing," answered Old Hans with a deprecating smile. "Touching the hand of such a man matters nothing at all, for genius is not contagious like the smallpox," he added. "But tell me about him, Hans," pleaded the Young Comrade again. "Tell me how he looked and spoke--tell me everything." "Well, you see, we played together as boys in the Old Country, in Treves. Many a time did we fight then! Once he punched my eye and made it swell up so that I could hardly see at all, but I punched his nose and made it bleed like--well, like a pig." "What! you made him _bleed_?" "Ach! that was not much; all boys fight so." "Well?" "My father was a shoemaker, you see, and we lived not far away from where Karl's people lived. Many a time my father sent me to their house--on the Bruckergrasse--with mended shoes. Then I would see Karl, who was just as big as I was, but not so old by a year. Such a fine boy! Curly-headed he was, and fat--like a little barrel almost. [Illustration: BIRTHPLACE OF KARL MARX.] "So, when I took the shoes sometimes I would stop and play with him a bit--play with Karl and the girls. He was always playing with girls--with his sister, Sophie, and little Jenny von Westphalen. "Sometimes I liked it not so--playing with girls. They were older than we boys and wanted everything to go their way, and I liked not that girls should boss boys. So once I teased him about it--told him that he was a baby to play with girls. Then it was that we fought and he gave me a black eye and I gave him a bloody nose in return. "Sometimes the Old Man, Karl's father, would come into my father's shop and stay a long while chatting. He was a lawyer and father only a shoemaker; he was quite rich, while father was poor, terribly poor. But it made no difference to Herr Marx. He would chat with father by the hour. "You see, he was born a Jew, but--before Karl was born--he turned Christian. Father had done the same thing, years before I was born. Why he did it father would never tell me, but once I heard him and Heinrich Marx--that was the name of Karl's father--talking about it, so I got a pretty good idea of the reason. "'Of course, I am not a believer in the Christian doctrines, friend Wilhelm.' he said to my father. 'I don't believe that Jesus was God, nor that he was a Messiah from God. But I do believe in a God--in one God and no more.