CHAPTER I
“Quod felix faustumque sit!”
There is a happiness which no poet has yet properly sung, which no lady-reader, let her be ever so amiable, has experienced or ever will experience in this world. This is a condition of happiness which alone belongs to the male sex, and even then alone to the elect. It is a moment of life which seizes upon our feelings, our minds, our whole being. Tears have been shed by the innocent, sleepless nights been passed, during which the pious mother, the loving sister, have put up prayers to God for this critical moment in the life of the son or the brother.
Happy moment, which no woman, let her be ever so good, so beautiful, or intellectual, can experience—that of becoming a student, or, to describe it by a more usual term, the passing of the first examination!
The cadet who becomes an officer, the scholar who becomes an academical burgher, the apprentice who becomes a journeyman, all know, in a greater or less degree, this loosening of the wings, this bounding over the limits of maturity into the lists of philosophy. We all strive after a wider field, and rush thither like the stream which at length loses itself in the ocean.
Then for the first time does the youthful soul rightly feel her freedom, and, therefore, feels it doubly; the soul struggles for activity, she comprehends her individuality; it has been proved and not found too light; she is still in possession of the dreams of childhood, which have not yet proved delusive. Not even the joy of love, not the enthusiasm for art and science, so thrills through all the nerves as the words, “Now am I a student!”
This spring-day of life, on which the ice-covering of the school is broken, when the tree of Hope puts forth its buds and the sun of Freedom shines, falls with us, as is well known, in the month of October, just when Nature loses her foliage, when the evenings begin to grow darker, and when heavy winter-clouds draw together, as though they would say to youth,—“Your spring, the birth of the examination, is only a dream! even now does your life become earnest!” But our happy youths think not of these things, neither will we be joyous with the gay, and pay a visit to their circle. In such a one our story takes its commencement.
CHAPTER II
“At last we separate: To Jutland one, to Fünen others go; And still the quick thought comes, —A day so bright, so full of fun, Never again on us shall rise.”
It was in October of the year 1829. Examen artium had been passed through. Several young students were assembled in the evening at the abode of one of their comrades, a young Copenhagener of eighteen, whose parents were giving him and his new friends a banquet in honor of the examination. The mother and sister had arranged everything in the nicest manner, the father had given excellent wine out of the cellar, and the student himself, here the rex convivii, had provided tobacco, genuine Oronoko-canaster. With regard to Latin, the invitation—which was, of course, composed in Latin—informed the guests that each should bring his own.
The company, consisting of one and twenty persons—and these were only the most intimate friends—was already assembled. About one third of the friends were from the provinces, the remainder out of Copenhagen.
“Old Father Homer shall stand in the middle of the table!” said one of the liveliest guests, whilst he took down from the stove a plaster bust and placed it upon the covered table.
“Yes, certainly, he will have drunk as much as the other poets!” said an older one. “Give me one of thy exercise-books, Ludwig! I will cut him out a wreath of vine-leaves, since we have no roses and since I cannot cut out any.”
“I have no libation!” cried a third,—“Favete linguis.” And he sprinkled a small quantity of salt, from the point of a knife, upon the bust, at the same time raising his glass to moisten it with a few drops of wine.
“Do not use my Homer as you would an ox!” cried the host. “Homer shall have the place of honor, between the bowl and the garland-cake! He is especially my poet! It was he who in Greek assisted me to laudabilis et quidem egregie. Now we will mutually drink healths! Jörgen shall be magister bibendi, and then we will sing ‘Gaudeamus igitur,’ and ‘Integer vitae.’”
“The Sexton with the cardinal’s hat shall be the precentor!” cried one of the youths from the provinces, pointing toward a rosy-cheeked companion.
“O, now I am no longer sexton!” returned the other laughing. “If thou bringest old histories up again, thou wilt receive thy old school-name, ‘the Smoke-squirter.’”
“But that is a very nice little history!” said the other. “We called him ‘Sexton,’ from the office his father held; but that, after all, is not particularly witty. It was better with the hat, for it did, indeed, resemble a cardinal’s hat. I, in the mean time, got my name in a more amusing manner.”
“He lived near the school,” pursued the other; “he could always slip home when we had out free quarters of an hour: and then one day he had filled his mouth with tobacco smoke, intending to blow it into our faces; but when he entered the passage with his filled cheeks the quarter of an hour was over, and we were again in class: the rector was still standing in the doorway; he could not, therefore, blow the smoke out of his mouth, and so wished to slip in as he was. ‘What have you there in your mouth?’ asked the rector; but Philip could answer nothing, without at the same time losing the smoke. ‘Now, cannot you speak?’ cried the rector, and gave him a box on the ear, so that the smoke burst through nose and mouth. This looked quite exquisite; the affair caused the rector such pleasure, that he presented the poor sinner with the nota bene.”
“Integer vitae!” broke in the Precentor, and harmoniously followed the other voices. After this, a young Copenhagener exhibited his dramatic talent by mimicking most illusively the professors of the Academy, and giving their peculiarities, yet in such a good-natured manner that it must have amused even the offended parties themselves. Now followed the healths—“Vivant omnes hi et hae!”
“A health to the prettiest girl!” boldly cried one of the merriest brothers. “The prettiest girl!” repeated a pair of the younger ones, and pushed their glasses toward each other, whilst the blood rushed to their cheeks at this their boldness, for they had never thought of a beloved being, which, nevertheless, belonged to their new life. The roundelay now commenced, in which each one must give the Christian name of his lady-love, and assuredly every second youth caught a name out of the air; some, however, repeated a name with a certain palpitation of the heart. The discourse became more animated; the approaching military exercises, the handsome uniform, the reception in the students’ club, and its pleasures, were all matters of the highest interest. But there was the future philologicum and philosophicum—yes, that also was discussed; there they must exhibit their knowledge of Latin.
“What do you think,” said one of the party, “if once a week we alternately met at each other’s rooms, and held disputations? No Danish word must be spoken. This might be an excellent scheme.”
“I agree to that!” cried several.
“Regular laws must be drawn up.”
“Yes, and we must have our best Latin scholar, the Jutlander, Otto Thostrup, with us! He wrote his themes in hexameters.”
“He is not invited here this evening,” remarked the neighbor, the young Baron Wilhelm of Funen, the only nobleman in the company.
“Otto Thostrup!” answered the host. “Yes, truly he’s a clever fellow, but he seems to me so haughty. There is something about him that does not please me at all. We are still no dunces, although he did receive nine prae caeteris!”
“Yet it was very provoking,” cried another, “that he received the only Non in mathematics. Otherwise he would have been called in. Now he will only have to vex himself about his many brilliant characters.”
“Yes, and he is well versed in mathematics!” added Wilhelm “There was something incorrect in the writing; the inspector was to blame for that, but how I know not. Thostrup is terribly vehement, and can set all respect at defiance; he became angry,