I have already remarked that such excursions to Berlin occurred frequently in those days, but still more frequent were journeys into the provinces, because it was incumbent upon my father to look about for a new apothecary’s shop to buy.  If he had had his way about it he doubtless would never have changed this state of affairs and would have declared the interim permanent.  For, whereas his passion for gaming was in reality forced upon him by his need to kill time, he had by nature a genuine passion for his horse and carriage, and to drive around in the world the whole of life in search of an apothecary’s shop, without being able to find one, would have been, I presume, just the ideal occupation for him.  But he saw that it was out of the question; a few years of travel would have consumed his means.  So he only took great care to guard against too hasty purchases, and that answered the same purpose.  The more critically he proceeded the longer he could continue his journeys and provide new quarters every evening for his beloved white horse, which, by the way, was a charming animal.  I say “his white horse,” for he was more concerned about good quarters for the horse than for himself.  And so, for three-fourths of a year, till Christmas, 1826, he was on the road a great deal, not to say most, of the time, covering, to be sure, quite an extensive territory, which, beside the Province of Brandenburg, included Saxony, Thuringia, and finally Pomerania.

In later life this period of travel was a favorite topic of conversation with my father, and likewise with my mother, who ordinarily assumed a rather indifferent attitude toward the favorite themes of my father.  That she made an exception in this case was due in part to the fact that during his journeyings my father had written to his young wife many “love letters,” which as letters it was my mother’s chief delight to ridicule, so long as she lived.  “For I would have you know, children,” she was wont to say, “I still have your father’s love letters; one always keeps such charming things.  One of these I even know by heart, at least the beginning.  The letter came from Eisleben, and in it your father wrote to me:  ’I arrived here this afternoon and have found very good quarters.  Also for the horse, whose neck and shoulders are somewhat galled.  However, I will not write you today about that, but about the fact that this is the place where Martin Luther was born on the 10th of November, 1483, nine years before the discovery of America.’  There you have your father as a lover.  You see, he would have been qualified to publish a Letter Writer.”

All this was said by my mother not only with considerable seriousness, but also, unfortunately, with bitterness.  It always grieved her that my father, much as he loved her, had never shown the slightest familiarity with the ways of tenderness.