that the State-mistress had been forced to resign, and that the entire ministry, greatly moved, had wept according to rule.  I need hardly explain that this all referred to certain beer dignitaries in Halle.  Then the two Chinese, who two years before had been exhibited in Berlin, and who were now appointed lecturers on Chinese esthetics in Halle, were discussed.  Then jokes were made.  Some one supposed a case in which a live German might be exhibited for money in China, and to this end a placard was fabricated, in which the mandarins Tsching-Tschang-Tschung and Hi-Ha-Ho certified that the man was a genuine Teuton, including a list of his accomplishments, which consisted principally of philosophizing, smoking, and endless patience.  It concluded with the notice that visitors were prohibited from bringing any dogs with them at twelve o’clock (the hour for feeding the captive), as these animals would be sure to snap from the poor German all his titbits.

A young Burschenschafter, who had recently passed his period of purification in Berlin, spoke much, but very partially, of this city.  He had frequented both Wisotzki and the theatre, but judged falsely of both.  “For youth is ever ready with a word,” etc.  He spoke of the sumptuousness of the costumes, of scandals among actors and actresses, and similar matters.  The youth knew not that in Berlin, where outside show exerts the greatest influence (as is abundantly evidenced by the commonness of the phrase “so people do"), this ostentation must flourish on the stage preeminently, and consequently that the special care of the management must be for “the color of the beard with which a part is played” and for the truthfulness of the costumes which are designed by sworn historians and sewed by scientifically instructed tailors.  And this is indispensable.  For if Maria Stuart wore an apron belonging to the time of Queen Anne, the banker, Christian Gumpel, would with justice complain that thereby all illusion was destroyed; and if Lord Burleigh in a moment of forgetfulness should don the hose of Henry the Fourth, then the War-Councilor Von Steinzopf’s wife, nee Lilienthau, would not get the anachronism out of her head for the whole evening....  But little as this young man had comprehended the conditions of the Berlin drama, still less was he aware that the Spontini Janissary opera, with its kettledrums, elephants, trumpets, and gongs, is a heroic means of inspiring our enervated people with warlike enthusiasm—­a means once shrewdly recommended by Plato and Cicero.  Least of all did the youth comprehend the diplomatic significance of the ballet.  It was with great trouble that I finally made him understand that there was really more political science in Hoguet’s feet than in Buchholz’s head, that all his tours de danse signified diplomatic negotiations, and that his every movement hinted at state matters; as, for instance, when he bent forward anxiously, stretching