Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1871-10-09
@iseelIaneons.
CAUGHT IN HIS OWN TRAP,

holiday q little allotment OF time all your
own, upon which you need pay duty to no
man living, and within the compass of
which, if you be scholar, no one can
plague you about the date of Hegira, or.
''exact political significance" of the Licini
an Rogations; nor any shock fall upon
you, if you be man of business, from
alarming kilograms respecting the fall of
Utopian Consols, or the unhealthy de-
preston" or the Cloudland-Atlantis Grand
Central Railway. Surely there is no one
living who does not appreciate such fur
| lough from the fourth form boy who over
eats himself at Warwick or Kenilworth on
the half-yearly holiday, damped only by
| the horrid recollection that work begins
again next day, up to the wearied mer-
chant-prince who follows out the doctors
prescription of ''a complete change of
scene"by making Rome or Switzerland as
like London as possible for two months
every year.
Somewhat after this fashion, had ielt
inclined, might have soliloquized, as sat
| looking down upon the good town of
Heidelberg from the terrace of the "AIol-
ken-Kur,"- little wooden auberge,
perched upon projecting bluff, in which
a few soi-dtsant invalids play at curing
themselves by eating the greatest possible
amount of curds and whey. And, certain
| ly, the scene before me deserved more
| than passing glance. Above rose the
green, sloping crest of the Konigstuhl,
with all its waving woods, upon which the
fading sunshine fingered lovingly; all
around lay the leafy hillsides, between
which, like thread of gold. glittered the
winding stream of the Neckar immediate
ly below me lay the narrow streets and
tall, grim houses of the quaint little town,
above which the vast red towers of the
castle stood out in the glow of sunset like
pillars of fire f; and far out in the plain be-
yond, breaking with its shining curves the
monotony of the vast green level. could
just desery the broad, smooth flow of the
parent Rhine.
But at this moment my reflections are
broken in sufficiently unromantic way by
hat, which, driven by the wind, ricochets
off my shoulder, and is just rolling over
the brow of the hill, when l spring for
| ward and clutch it. Turning to look for
the owner, find myself face to face with
a quiet, pleasant-looking old gentleman in
frilled shirt and black silk stockings, the
very image of the Glass Dwarf in Wilhelm
Hauff's "Kaltes Herr y evidently a man of
some note by the respect with which the
habitues make way for him.
MANY thanks. mein Herr" says the old
man, as / restored his errant head-gear.
'I'm not quite so supple now as when l
took the prize at the Fryeberg Volksfest,
forty-three years ago, before | even
thought of becoming professor. It's only
you English who can keep up your train
ing forever.
"How did you guess that was an Eng
lishman?" asked l, somewhat surprised :;
for, indeed, with beard like pasha's,
and face bronzed by the sun of Egypt
and Syria, my appearance is anything but
Anglo-SaXon.
No one but an Englishman would have
caught that hat as You did," answered the
professor with little chuckling laugh !;
''it's just in their nature to jump up and
run after anything that passes. All if
you English would only employ your ire
pressible energies in the cause of science,
what might you not achieve. but no ; you
do not care to learn
''Do us the justice to believe, Herr Pro-
tessor, that the nation which produced
Bacon and Newton has still some rever-
| ence for science.
They were mighty men," replied the
| old gentleman, with reverential bend of
nation at large, not of few exceptional
celebrities. Ach Himmill! what set they
are, those English! A fine life they led me
when first began to practice medicine,
down yonder in Saxony. The first thing
| in the morning. king king at my door,
What is it?' An Englishman, who has
broken his leg in trying to climb the Teu-
felshOrn, which no one ever ascended
yet | set the Herr Englander's leg, and
leave him pretty comfortable. Not half
an hour later. king king again. What
now p AN Englishman, who has been half
drowned in swimming across the Elbe
against the current for wager roll
| the Herr Englander in warm blankets and
bring him round. Before have well set
tied in my chair again. king king! once
more. 'Mein Gott what's the matterp
AN Englishman, who has tried to run
twelve miles within the hour, because
some one said he couldn't and has broken
down under the strain Mein Herr, am
sorry to have to say,-but your country
men are equally devoid of fear and of rea-
| son There is but one man in England
whom cen truly reverence and his name
| is Herr Carlyle !"
Mr.. Carlyle, why he's an old friend of
mine | saw him the last time Twas in
England. I'm glad you admire him."
"Did you, mein Herr did you really P''
says the old man, with most unmistakable
| interest, Tell me all about him, be-
seech you he is a great man-worthy to
have been born a German!n
And for nearly twenty minutes we sit in
Judgment upon the biographer of Fred
erick the Great, till the strokes of seven,
booming from the town below, warn the
professor that it is time to be going home.
"You must come with me, Mein Herr
says he, rising from his seat; mo excuses,
| beg of you. 1t shall never be said that
Justus Weissenbart met with friend of
the Herr Carlyle without making him
welcome; and, besides, I've got some-
thing to show you which think will in
| terest you"
The old mans hearty manner was not
to be resisted; and about a quarter of an
hour later l stood before the door of a
/ tall prim lookinO Stopa houca or tho oox