however, nearly one hundred who will not be present at his performance.  Among these there must be some brave, determined, devout young men, who, in the name of God, of science, and of their teachers, would willingly enter the lists against these actors, and create a disturbance.  We must employ some of these young men to visit the theatre to-night, and to groan and hiss when the other students applaud.  This will be all-sufficient to raise a riot amongst these hot-blooded young men.  After that, our course is plain; we have but to send in our account of the affair to the General Directory, and there will be no danger of a second refusal to our petition.”

“An excellent idea!”

“I am afraid, however, it will be difficult to find any students who will put their lives in such jeopardy.”

“We must seek them among those to whose advantage it is to stand well with the president.”

“There are some who receive a yearly stipend through me, and others who live only for science, and never visit the theatre.  I name, for example, the industrious young student Lupinus.  I shall speak to him, and I am sure he will not refuse to assist us; he is small and not very strong, it is true, but he stands well with the students, and will carry others with him.  I know five others upon whom I can count, and that is enough for our purpose.  I will give them these tickets which Eckhof left here.  He desired that we should make use of them, and we will do so, but to serve our own purpose, and not his.”

Having arrived at this happy conclusion, the three professors separated.

CHAPTER II.

The student Lupinus.

Young Lupinus sat quiet and alone, as was usual with him, in his room, before his writing-table, which was covered with books and folios.  He was thinner and paler than when we first met him in Berlin.  His deeply-sunken eyes were encircled with those dark rings which are usually the outward sign of mental suffering.  His bloodless lips were firmly pressed together, and the small hand, upon which his pale brow rested, was transparently thin and white.

Lupinus was working, or appeared to be so.  Before him lay one of those venerable folios which excite the reverence of the learned.  The eyes of the young man rested, it is true, upon the open page, but so long, and so uninterruptedly, that it was evident his thoughts were elsewhere.

The professors would, no doubt, have been rejoiced had they seen him bent thus earnestly and attentively over this volume.  If, however, they had seen what really claimed his attention, they would have been seized with horror.  Upon his open book lay a playbill, the bill for that evening, and upon this “thing of horror” rested the eyes of the young student.