_Peasant_: “That she is, ma’am. She can serve you as an exam_The humour of Germany

[Illustration: COQUETRY AVENGED.]

_Coquetry Avenged._--_Lady_: “Ah, Herr Lieutenant, I have rejected many

addresses!”

_Lieutenant_: “Is that so? Well, you have had time to do so!”

_Judge_: “Prisoner, do you confess your guilt?”

_Prisoner_: “No. The words of my counsel have convinced me of my

innocence.”

_Lady_: “And so you are a friend of my son Edward? I shall be delighted

to hear what news you can tell me about him. Is he enjoying his studies

at the university, and has he grown accustomed to the intricacies of

town-life? Has he learned to find his way about?”

_Student_: “Oh yes, he is all right so far as that is concerned. Only

he has some difficulty in finding his way home from the tavern.”

“COME, John, get up on the mare!”

“Pray, why should I make such a detour to get around to the other side?”

AT THE BALL.--_Gentleman_: “Do you play on the piano?”

_Lady_: “No.”

_Gentleman_: “Ah, then you sing?”

_Lady_: “No, sir,--neither have I had the influenza.”

_Maid_ (to her young mistress, who has written a love-letter for her at

her request): “Oh, thank you so much, Miss! The letter is beautiful.

But please don’t forget to put a postscript: Excuse bad writin’ and

spellin’!”

“IT is very provoking that your wife should have read my last letter to

you. I thought you said she never opens your letters?”

“She doesn’t generally, but you committed the folly of writing

‘Private’ upon the envelope.”

IF you ask a man for the date of his birth, he tells you only the year;

if you ask a woman, she never tells you more than the day.

_Custodian of the Schloss at Heidelberg_ (explaining the functions of

his office to stranger): “What the professors are to the university,

that _we_ are to the Schloss.”

IN COURT.--_Defendant_: “Gentlemen, I have much to say in favour of my

client. First----”

_Prisoner_ (interrupting him): “You’d better not give yourself any

trouble trying to pull me through, Herr Doctor. I take it the gentlemen

haven’t much faith left in either of us.”

_A._: “I wish I knew something to give my uncle for his birthday. He is

such an old miser that no matter what I buy him, I’m sure he will not

use it.”

_B._: “Why, that’s glorious! All you have to do is to fill half-a-dozen

of bottles with water, cork and seal them well, and stick on a label,

‘Old Rhine Wine, 1780.’”

FREDERICK, a tailor’s apprentice, has lent a shilling to Henry, a

barbers journeyman. To show his gratitude, Henry says: “Frederick, if

you should ever get into straits, if all your friends should fall off

from you; if your father and mother, your sister and brother, should

leave you in the lurch, then come to me, and take my word for it, _I’ll

shave you, and never charge you a penny_!”

_Stranger_: “Beg pardon, sir, will you tell me which road I must take

to get to the university?”

_First Student_: “I don’t know precisely myself. It is only two years

since I came here. It is more likely you know, Bummer--you’ve been here

for eight years.”

_Second Student_: “I? I have forgotten long ago.”

NOTE.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS are here tendered to Herr Wilhelm Raabe, for his kind

permission to include the translation from _Hunger-Pastor_; to Herr

Julius Stinde, for his kind permission to translate from the _Familie

Buchholz_; to Herr W. H. Riehl and his publisher, to translate from

_Jörg Muckenhuber_; to Herr Friedrich Theodor v. Vischer, and to the

Deutsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart, to translate from Herr v. Vischer’s

_Auch Einer_; to Herr Ernst Eckstein, to translate from _Besuch im

Carcer_; to Messrs. Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner, & Co., Limited, and

to Mr. Leland, for their kind permission to include Mr. Leland’s

translations of Scheffel and others (see _Gaudeamus_, published by

Messrs. Kegan Paul). Best thanks are also to be accorded to various

German authors and publishers, who have so courteously sanctioned

translated extracts.

BIOGRAPHICAL INDEX OF WRITERS.

HUGO VON TRIMBERG is said to have been the rector of a school near

Bamberg, 1260-1309. He wrote several books of a didactic and satirical

type, including _The Runner_ and _The Gatherer_, the latter of which he

tells us was lost during his lifetime. He severely denounces everything

and everybody pertaining to the younger generation, and chants the

praises of the “good old times.” His writings are somewhat desultory,

and their chief interest lies in the inserted fables which serve him to

spin out a moral.

HANS SACHS was born at Nuremberg, on 5th November 1494. In his

fifteenth year he was apprenticed to a shoemaker, and was instructed

in the elements of “master-singing” by the linen-draper Nunnenbeck. As

a travelling journeyman in his trade he visited the schools of all the

celebrated master-singers of Germany. Returning after five years to his

native town, he devoted himself to his calling of shoemaker and to the

art of song. His first poetic production was a hymn which he composed

in Munich in 1514. The Reformation inspired him to an allegorical ode

in honour of Luther, entitled “Die Wittembergisch Nachtigal,” which

was followed by a great number of short religious poems. He died at

Nuremberg in 1576, his last years having been clouded by insanity. He

was an extraordinarily prolific writer of songs, plays, and farces.

CHRISTOFFEL VON GRIMMELSHAUSEN (1620-1676) was born at Gelnhausen.

During his youth he served in the army, and his experiences of life

as a soldier in the Thirty Years’ War are related in the romance of

_Simplicius Simplicissimus_. During his later years he was mayor of the

small town of Renchen, in the Black Forest. In his various writings he

made use of a whimsical collection of _noms-de-plume_, thereby somewhat

complicating the task of literary research.

LUDWIG TIECK (1773-1853) was the son of a rope-maker in Berlin. In

his studies at the universities of Halle, Göttingen, and Erlangen,

he devoted special attention to the Romanic languages, and later,

at Berlin, to the history of art, Old German poetry, and modern

literature. He soon found himself in opposition to the views of poetry

then popular. After his marriage, he lived for a while in Jena on

intimate terms with the two Schlegels, removing with them to Dresden,

and later publishing an “Almanac of the Muses” in company with A. W.

Schlegel. After 1840 he received a pension from Frederick William IV.

of Prussia; he took up his residence at Berlin, where he died. He

contributed a great deal to the Shakespeare literature of Germany, with

the aid of historical and literary studies on this subject made during

a visit to London in 1818, and wrote many dramas, lyrics, and novels,

as well as works of severe literary criticism.

JEAN PAUL FRIEDRICH RICHTER, commonly called Jean Paul, was born in

1763 at Wunsiedel, in the Baireuth district. His writings abound in

pleasing recollections of his youthful days, though these were spent

in poverty. After passing through the gymnasium at Hof, and pursuing

a course of studies at Leipsic, he made some attempts in satire, but

without success. He was for some time employed as private tutor in

several families, and after the publication of an incomplete romance

entitled _The Invisible Lodge_, gained a reputation as a humorist. His

later works include _Hesperus_, _The Life of Quintus Fixlein_, _Titan_,

_Siebenkäs_, _Wild Oats_, and several other discursive romances. He

was induced by his friendship for Herder to revisit Weimar in 1798,

remaining there until 1800, when he went to Berlin. A few years

afterwards he received a pension, which enabled him to live in modest

and comfortable circumstances at Baireuth, where he died in 1825.

AUGUST FRIEDRICH FERDINAND VON KOTZEBUE (1761-1819) was born at Weimar,

where his father held a high position at court. He studied at Jena,

and subsequently held several political offices in Russia, as well as

Germany. His first writings did much to rob him of public respect.

In 1798 he went to Vienna to take charge of the court theatre. Soon

after, when on his way to St. Petersburg, he was sent to Siberia. He

continued to write during his exile, was recalled, and came to live at

Jena, which place he left, however, because of his perpetual animosity

for Goethe. He was intensely unpatriotic, and indulged himself

repeatedly in his writings in pouring out invectives upon German

Liberal politicians on the one hand, and upon the Romantic school and

the reform of the drama attempted by Schiller on the other. His motives

in literature, as in politics, were purely mercenary. So venomous was

he in his attacks upon the ideals of the German “Burschenschaften”

that he aroused the fanaticism of a young student, Ludwig Sand, who,

moreover, suspecting him of acting as a Russian spy, assassinated him

at Mannheim.

JOHANN HEINRICH DANIEL ZSCHOKKE (1771-1848), born in Magdeburg, and

educated at the gymnasium connected with the monastery at that place.

In 1788 he left his native town, and joining a company of actors, he

roamed about as a playwright. He then studied philosophy, theology,

history, and art at Frankfort-on-Oder, and became a tutor there. He

filled several responsible political positions in Switzerland, until

he retired in 1841 to his country-house near Aarau, where he died.

He wrote a number of dramas, _Aballino, the Great Bandit_, _The Iron

Mask_, etc., as well es countless romances, novels, and books of travel.

LOUIS CHARLES ADELBERT VON CHAMISSO (1781-1838) was a member of

the old and aristocratic French family Chamisso de Boncourt, who

were expelled from France by the Revolution, in which they lost

their estates. Adelbert lived with his parents in Berlin, where he

subsequently entered the Prussian army, accompanied the navigator

Otto von Kotzebue on a voyage round the world, and then held for

some years an appointment at the Botanic Garden in Berlin, where he

died. He was a very versatile writer. Besides his lyrics and the

fantastic story of _Peter Schlemihl_, which gained him a name in German

literature, he wrote _De animalibus quibusdam e classe vermium Linnæi_,

_Über die Hawaiisprache_, and _Bemerkungen und Ansichten auf einer

Entdeckungsreise unter Kotzebue_.

HEINRICH HEINE (1799-1856) was born at Düsseldorf, of Jewish parents.

He devoted himself to a mercantile calling at Hamburg for a while, then

studied law at Berlin, Bonn, and Göttingen, adopted Christianity in

1825, edited the _Political Annals_ in company with Murhard, lived at

Berlin, Munich, and Hamburg, and finally in Paris, where he received a

pension for his literary services up to his death.

MORITZ GOTTLIEB SAPHIR was born in 1795 at a small Hungarian town,

where his grandfather, under the decree of the Emperor Joseph II.

compelling the Jews to take family names, had adopted the name of

Saphir. Intending at first to become a merchant, this idea soon grew

distasteful to him. He went to Prague to study the Talmud; then began

to devote himself entirely to literature, and soon wrote some verses,

which showed his satirical talent. At Vienna his satirical muse made

him so many enemies that he went to Berlin, where he wrote and edited

a great many humorous books. He was obliged to leave Berlin also,

and going to live at Munich, he got into trouble on account of some

satirical passages which were supposed to refer to the King of Bavaria,

and which resulted in his imprisonment. He died at Baden, near Vienna,

in 1858.

WILHELM HAUFF was born at Stuttgart in 1802, studied theology

at Tübingen, became tutor in a private family at Stuttgart, and

subsequently edited a paper in that town. He aimed at improving the

public taste, which had been greatly influenced by H. Clauren. With

this object he wrote a novel, _The Man in the Moon_, purporting to

be written by Clauren. Having lost the ensuing law-suit, Hauff wrote

his celebrated _Controversy about the Man in the Moon_. He also wrote

_Die Memoiren des Satans_, _Lichtenstein_, _Die Bettlerin von Pont

des Arts_, _Die Phantasien im Bremer Rathskeller_, etc. He died at

Stuttgart, September 18th, 1827.

EDUARD MÖRIKE (1804-1875), born at Ludwigsburg, studied at Tübingen,

was pastor at Keber-Sulzbach, near Heilbronn, then teacher at

Stuttgart. He belonged to the Suabian school of poets, wrote verses and

novels, among the latter, _Das Stuttgarter Hutzelmännlein_, _Iris_,

_Idylle am Bodensee_, etc.

FRIEDRICH THEODOR VON VISCHER (1807-1889), a celebrated writer on

Æsthetics of the Hegelian school. He was born at Ludwigsburg, studied

theology, and accepted a position as vicar at Harrheim. He went to

Tübingen in 1833, and became first an extraordinary and then ordinary

professor of æsthetics and German literature. On account of the too

great liberality of his inaugural address he was at once suspended

for two years. In 1848 he entered the Frankfort Parliament, where he

occupied a position as an extreme radical. In 1855 he was called to the

Polytechnical Institute at Zürich, and later filled a similar position

at Stuttgart. Besides his greatest work, entitled _Æsthetics, or the

Science of the Beautiful_, he wrote _The Sublime and the Comic_, and a

third part to Goethe’s _Faust_, a parody of Goethe’s second part, as

well as a great deal of prose and verse in a satirical and aphoristic

vein, and many critical works on æsthetics.

FRITZ REUTER (1810-1874), born at Stavenhagen, in Mecklenburg-Schwerin,

studied law at Rostock, went to Jena in 1832 and joined the

Burschenschaft, which was then in very ill favour with the strongly

Conservative government as promulgating Liberal tendencies. He was

imprisoned, and after being in custody a year was sentenced to death.

This sentence was modified by the king to lifelong imprisonment. He

was taken to Fort Dömitz, and remained there until 1840, when he was

released in consequence of the Prussian amnesty. He took charge of his

father’s estate at Stavenhagen, later going to Treptow as a tutor in

a private family; later he devoted himself exclusively to literature

at Neubrandenburg and then at Eisenach, where he died. His novels,

comedies, and poems were all written in the Low-German dialect. Some of

the best known are _Seed-Time and Harvest_, _Olle Kamellen_, _Ut mine

Festungstid_ (Aus meiner Festungszeit), _Die Reis’na Constantinopel_.

ERNST KOSSAK (1814-1880), born at Marienwerder, and died at Berlin.

Wrote _Aus dem Wanderbuch eines litterarischen Handwerksburschen_,

_Historietten_, _Berliner Silhouetten_, etc.

GOTTFRIED KELLER (1815-1887), born at Zürich, took up

landscape-painting, and went to Vienna to continue his art studies.

Returning to his native town in 1842, he gave up painting and devoted

himself entirely to literary pursuits. Receiving some pecuniary aid

from the Zurich Senate, he went to Heidelberg in 1848, and to Berlin in

1850, to study philosophy and dramaturgy. He then returned to Zürich.

Among his novels, _Der grüne Heinrich_ and _Die Leute von Seldwyla_ are

best known.

FRIEDRICH WILHELM VON HACKLÄNDER (1816-1877), novelist and

comedy-writer, born at Burtscheid, near Aachen. Entered the mercantile

profession, left it for the army, which he soon found distasteful.

Discovering a talent for story-telling, he wrote many novels and

sketches about military life, and some more ambitious works of fiction,

as _Europäisches Sklavenleben_.

RICHARD VOLKMANN (_nom-de-plume_ Richard Leander), 1830-1891, son

of the celebrated physiologist Alfred Wilhelm Volkmann, resided at

Halle, in the office of President of the Chirurgical Hospital and

Medical Professor at the University. Besides a number of scientific

works he wrote _Poems_, _Aus der Burschenzeit_, and _Träumereien an

französischen Kaminen_.

HEINRICH SCHAUMBERGER (1843-1874), born at Neustadt-a-d-Heide, was a

Common school-teacher; he was consumptive, and died at Davost. Wrote

_Volkserzählungen_, _Vater und Sohn_, _Im Hirtenhaus_, etc.

PETRI KETTENFEIER ROSEGGER, born at Alpl in Obersteiermark, in 1843. He

was the son of peasants, and received only a most elementary education.

Being too delicate for a yeoman, he was apprenticed to a tailor in

his seventeenth year. During the time of his apprenticeship he became

interested in books, and tried his hand at literature. The editor of a

paper to whom he had sent some of his work became interested in him,

and through his intercession he was admitted to the Mercantile Academy

at Graz. He subsequently received a stipend enabling him to complete

his education. He then went to Graz, where he edited a monthly magazine

and devoted himself to literary work. His novels, under the title of

_Ausgewählte Schriften_, comprising twenty-three volumes, are published

at Vienna.

WILHELM HEINRICH RIEHL, born 1823, at the little town of Biebrich on

the Rhine. Studied at Marburg, Tübingen, Bonn, and Giessen. Edited

several papers, and after having been made a member of the _Deutsche

Nationalversammlung_ founded the _Nassauische Allgemeine Zeitung_,

at the same time undertaking the musical management of the Wiesbaden

Theatre. In 1854 he was made Professor of Jurisprudence and Science

of Government at Munich. Later he became a member of the Academy of

Science, and Director of the Bavarian National Museum. His books,

published at Stuttgart, are mostly on historical subjects--_Civilised

Society_, _Natural History of the German People_, etc.

FRANZ VON SCHÖNTHAN, born at Vienna in 1849, entered the navy, which he

left after four years to go on the stage. After having written a number

of novels and comedies he was engaged as comedy-writer for the Wallner

Theatre at Berlin. He subsequently filled a position at the Vienna

Theatre.

JULIUS STINDE, born 1841, at Kirch-Michel, in Holstein. Studied natural

science. Occupied a position as chemist in a factory at Hamburg.

Subsequently took charge of the Hamburg _Gewerbeblatt_, and devoted

himself solely to literature, more especially to the popularisation

of science. Later he wrote comedies in Low-German, which were very

well received. Among his humorous writings, the _Familie Buchholz_ has

contributed most to his international popularity.

BOGUMIL GOLTZ (1801-1870), humorous and didactic writer, born at

Warsaw; studied at Breslau. Bought several estates, in the management

of which he was unsuccessful. Lost the greater part of his fortune and

settled down at Thorn, to live the life of a literary recluse, though

he often travelled. Wrote _Typen der Gesellschaft_, _Der Mensch und die

Leute_, _Zur Physiognomie und Charakteristik des Volkes_, etc.

EDUARD PÖTZL, born 1851, at Vienna. Editor of _Neues Wiener Tageblatt_.

Wrote humorous novels and sketches, dealing with Vienna life and the

Austrian courts of justice.

PAUL LINDAU, born in 1839, at Magdeburg. Editor of the well-known

review, _Nord und Süd_; dramatic writer. Lived at Paris for several

years as a literary correspondent to a number of German papers.

Founded the _Gegenwart_. Has written many dramas and novels in a vein

of caustic satire and wit. Also well known as a translator of French

comedies.

ERNST ECKSTEIN, born 1845 at Giessen. Wrote many satirical epics and

literary essays. Founded the humorous paper _Der Schalk_. Well known

through his comedies and dramas, and as a prolific novelist.

JULIUS STETTENHEIM, born at Hamburg, 1831, now living at Berlin. Editor

of the _Wespen_ and of _Humoristisches Deutschland_. Wrote numberless

_humoresques_, of which _Wippchen’s sämtliche Kriegsberichte_ is best

known.

JOHANNES SCHERR, born 1817, at Hohenrechberg. After studying at Zürich

and Tübingen, he taught for a while at Stuttgart, and took a prominent

part in Liberal politics. In 1849 he fled to Switzerland on account

of political difficulties, and in 1860, after an interval of literary

activity, was made Professor of History and Literature at Zürich. His

most prominent works are a number of histories dealing with certain

tendencies and developments of civilisation. He also wrote humorous and

_Peasant_: “That she is, ma’am. She can serve you as an example.”