overshadow all one's thoughts. To this must all opinions come; no
thought can enter there, which shall not be wedded to the fixed
idea. There it remains, and grows. It is like the watchman's wife,
in the tower of Waiblingen, who grew to such a size, that she could
not get down the narrow stair-case; and, when her husband died, his
successor was forced to marry the fat widow in the tower."

"I remember an old English comedy," said Flemming laughing, "in
which a scholar is described, as a creature, that can strike fire in
the morning at his tinder-box,--put on a pair of lined
slippers,--sit ruminating till dinner, and then go to his meat when
the bell rings;--one that hath a peculiar gift in a cough, and a
license to spit;--or, if you will have him defined by negatives, he
is one that cannot make a good leg;--one that cannot eat a mess of
broth cleanly. What think you of that?"

"That it is just as people are always represented in English
comedy," said the Baron. "The portrait is
over-charged,--caricatured."

"And yet," continued Flemming, "no longer ago than yesterday, in
the Preface of a work by Dr. Rosenkranz, Professor of Philosophy in
the University of Halle, I read this passage."

He opened a book and read.

"Here in Halle, where we have no public garden and no Tivoli, no
London Exchange, no Paris Chamber of Deputies, no Berlin nor Vienna
Theatres, no Strassburg Minster, nor Salzburg Alps,--no Grecian
ruins nor fantastic Catholicism, in fine, nothing, which after one's