And so it might have come to pass that I should attain the most exalted position of all, for, although I am not naturally ambitious, I would yet not have refused the nomination for Pope, had the choice of the conclave fallen on me. It is, at all events, a very respectable office, and has a good income attached to it; and I do not doubt that I could have discharged the duties of my position with the requisite address. I would have seated myself composedly on the throne of St. Peter, presenting my toe for the kisses of all good Christians, the priests as well as the laity. With a becoming dignity I would have let myself be carried in triumph through the pillared halls of the great basilica, and only when it tottered very threateningly would I have clung to the arms of the golden throne, which is borne on the shoulders of six stalwart camerieri in crimson uniform. By their side walk bald-headed monks of the Capuchin order, carrying burning torches. Then follow lackeys in gala dress, bearing aloft immense fans of peacocks' feathers, with which they gently fan the Prince of the Church. It is all just like Horace Vernet's beautiful painting of such a procession. With a like imperturbable sacerdotal gravity--for I can be very serious if it be absolutely necessary--from the lofty Lateran I would have pronounced the annual benediction over all Christendom. Here, standing on the balcony, _in pontificalibus_ and with the triple crown upon my head, surrounded by my scarlet-hatted cardinals and mitred bishops, priests in suits of gold brocade and monks of every hue, I would have presented my holiness to the view of the swarming multitudes below, who, kneeling and with bowed heads, extended farther than the eye could reach; and I could composedly have stretched out my hands and blessed the city and the world. But, as thou well knowest, gentle reader, I have not become a Pope, nor a cardinal, nor even a papal nuncio. In the spiritual as well as in the worldly hierarchy I have attained neither office nor rank; I have accomplished nothing in this beautiful world; nothing has become of me--nothing but a poet. But no, I will not feign a hypocritical humility, I will not depreciate that name. It is much to be a poet, especially to be a great lyric poet, in Germany, among a people who in two things--in philosophy and in poetry--have surpassed all other nations. I will not with a sham modesty--the invention of worthless vagabonds--depreciate my fame as a poet. None of my countrymen have won the laurel at so early an age; and if my colleague, Wolfgang Goethe, complacently writes that "the Chinese with trembling hand paints Werther and Lotte on porcelain," I can, if boasting is to be in order, match his Chinese fame with one still more legendary, for I have recently learned that my poems have been translated into the Japanese language.