of water soon failed, and though another engine came up shortly after, it was sometime before it could be put in order, so that by the time they got fairly to work, the fire had made its way nearly through the house.  The water was first brought in barrels drawn by horses, till some officer came and opened the fire plug.  The police were busy at work seizing those who came by and setting them to work; and as the alarm had drawn a great many together, they at last began to effect something.  All the military are obliged to bo out, and the officers appeared eager to use their authority while they could, for every one was ordering and commanding, till all was a scene of perfect confusion and uproar.  I could not help laughing heartily, so ludicrous did the scene appear.  There were little, miserable engines, not much bigger than a hand-cart, and looking as if they had not been used for half a century, the horses running backwards and forwards, dragging barrels which were emptied into tubs, after which the water was finally dipped up in buckets, and emptied into the engines!  These machines can only play into the second or third story, after which the hose was taken up in the houses on the opposite side of the street, and made to play across.  After four hours the fire was overcome, the house being thoroughly burnt out; it happened to have double fire walls, which prevented those adjoining from catching easily.

CHAPTER XV.

THE DEAD AND THE DEAF—­MENDELSSOHN THE COMPOSER.

It is now a luxury to breathe.  These spring days are the perfection of delightful weather.  Imagine the delicious temperature of our Indian summer joined to the life and freshness of spring, add to this a sky of the purest azure, and a breeze filled with the odor of violets,—­the most exquisite of all perfumes—­and you have some idea of it.  The meadows are beginning to bloom, and I have already heard the larks singing high up in the sky.  Those sacred birds, the storks, have returned and taken possession of their old nests on the chimney-tops; they are sometimes seen walking about in the fields, with a very grave and serious air, as if conscious of the estimation in which they are held.  Everybody is out in the open air; the woods, although they still look wintry, are filled with people, and the boatmen on the Main are busy ferrying gay parties across.  The spring has been so long in coming, that all are determined to enjoy it well, while it lasts.

We visited the cemetery a few days ago.  The dead-house, where corpses are placed in the hope of resuscitation, is an appendage to cemeteries found only in Germany.  We were shown into a narrow chamber, on each side of which were six cells, into which one could distinctly see, by means of a large plate of glass.  In each of these is a bier for the body, directly above which hangs a cord, having on the end ten thimbles, which are put upon the fingers of the corpse, so that the