CHAPTER XVIII.

THE TIME OF EFFERVESCENCE, AND MY SCHOOL MATES.

Although the events of my school-days at Kottbus long since blended
together in my, memory, my life there is divided into two sharply
defined portions. The latter commences with Professor Tzschirner's
appointment and the reform in the school.

From the first day of the latter's government I can recall what was
taught us in the class and how it influenced me, while I have entirely
forgotten what occurred during the interim. This seems strange; for,
while Langethal's, Middendorf's, and Barop's instruction, which I
received when so much younger, remains vividly impressed on my memory,
and it is the same with Tzschirner's lessons, the knowledge I acquired
between my fifteenth and seventeenth year is effaced as completely as
though I had passed a sponge over the slate of my memory. A chasm yawns
between these periods of instruction, and I cannot ascribe this
circumstance entirely to the amusements which withdrew my thoughts from
study; for they continued under Tzschirner's rule, though with some
restrictions. I wish I could believe that everything which befel me
then had remained entirely without influence on my inner life.

A demon--I can find no other name--urged me to all sorts of follies, many
of which I still remember with pleasure, and, thank Heaven, not a single
one which a strict teacher--supposing that he had not forgotten how to
put himself into the place of a youth--would seriously censure. The
effervescing spirits which did not find vent in such pranks obtained