The Hentzes took in eight resident German pupils who attended the various schools in the town, mostly sons of wealthy Hamburg business-people.  Hentze was always urging me to associate more with these lads, three of whom were of my own age, but I could discover no common ground whatever on which to meet them.  The things that interested me did not appeal to them, and vice versa.  They seemed to me dull youths, heavy alike in mind and body.  From lack of sufficient fresh air and exercise they had all dull eyes, and flabby, white faces that quivered like blancmanges when they walked.  In addition, they obstinately refused to talk German with me, looking on me as affording an excellent opportunity for obtaining a gratuitous lesson in English.  One of Hentze’s pupils was a great contrast, physically, to the rest, for he was very spare and thin, and seldom opened his mouth.  I was to see a great deal of this silent, slim lad later on.

Mr. Spiegelberg was a prominent member of the so-called English and French Club in Brunswick.  This was not in the least what its name would seem to indicate; the members of the Club were not bursting with overwhelming love for our language and institutions, nor were they consumed with enthusiastic admiration for French art and literature.  They were merely some fifteen very practical Brunswick commercial men, who, realising that a good working knowledge of English and French would prove extremely useful to them in their business relations, met at each other’s houses in rotation on one night a week during the winter months, when the host of the evening provided copious supplies of wine, beer and cigars.  For one hour and a half the members of the Club had to talk English or French as the case might be, under a penalty of a fine of one thaler (three shillings) for every lapse into their native German.  Mr. Spiegelberg informed me that I had been elected an honorary member of the English and French Club, which flattered my vanity enormously at the time.  In the light of more mature experience I quite understand that the presence of a youth to whom knotty points in both languages could be submitted would be a considerable asset to the Club, but I then attributed my election solely to my engaging personality.  These Club evenings amused me enormously, though incidentally they resulted in my acquiring a precocious love of strong, rank Hamburg cigars.  Let us imagine fifteen portly, be-spectacled, middle-aged or elderly men seated around a table groaning under a collection of bottles of all shapes and sizes, addressing each other in laboured inverted English.  The German love of titles is a matter of common knowledge.  All these business men had honorific appellations which they translated into English and introduced scrupulously into every sentence.  The conversation was something like this: 

“But, Mr. Over-Inspector of Railways, I do not think that you understand rightly what Mr. Factory Director Spiegelberg says.  Mr. Factory Director also spins jute.  To make concurrenz with Dundee in Schottland, he must produce cheaply.  To produce cheaply he must become...no, obtain new machinery from Leeds in England.  If that machinery is duty-payable, Mr. Factory Director cannot produce so cheaply.  That seems to me clear.  Once our German industries established are, then we will see.  That is another matter.”