In consequence of the violent coming in contact of hope and reality I had a little headache.  But when I saw upon my ramble a gentleman, ornamented with ribbons and stars, alight from a magnificent carriage, who had a pale yellow complexion, a deeply-wrinkled brow, and above his eyebrows an intelligible trace of ill-humour; when I saw a young count, with whom I had become acquainted in the University of Upsala, walking along as if he were about to fall on his nose from age and weariness of life, I held up my head, inhaled the air, which accidentally (unfortunately) at this place was filled with the smell of smoked sausage, and extolled poverty, and a pure heart.

I found at length, in a remote street, a little room, which was more suited to my gloomy prospects than to the bright hopes which I cherished two hours before.

I had obtained permission to spend the winter in Stockholm, and had thought of spending it in quite a different way to what now was to be expected.  But what was to be done?  To let the courage sink was the worst of all; to lay the hands in the lap and look up to heaven, not much better.  “The sun breaks forth when one least expects it,” thought I, as heavy autumn clouds descended upon the city.  I determined to use all the means I could to obtain for myself a decent substance with a somewhat pleasanter prospect for the future, than was opened to me under the miserable protection of Pastor G., and, in the meantime, to earn my daily bread by copying,—­a sorrowful expedient in a sorrowful condition.

Thus I passed my days amid fruitless endeavors to find ears which might not be deaf, amid the heart-wearing occupation of writing out fairly the empty productions of empty heads, with my dinners becoming more and more scanty, and with ascending hopes, until that evening against whose date I afterwards made a cross in my calendar.

My host had just left me with the friendly admonition to pay the first quarter’s rent on the following day, if I did not prefer (the politeness is French) to march forth again with bag and baggage on a voyage of discovery through the streets of the city.

It was just eight o’clock, on an indescribably cold November evening, when I was revived with this affectionate salutation on my return from a visit to a sick person, for whom I, perhaps—­ really somewhat inconsiderately, had emptied my purse.

I snuffed my sleepy, thin candle with my fingers, and glanced around the little dark chamber, for the further use of which I must soon see myself compelled to gold-making.

“Diogenes dwelt worse,” sighed I, with a submissive mind, as I drew a lame table from the window where the wind and rain were not contented to stop outside.  At that moment my eye fell upon a brilliantly blazing fire in a kitchen, which lay, Tantalus-like, directly opposite to my modest room, where the fireplace was as dark as possible.

“Cooks, men and women, have the happiest lot of all serving mortals!” thought I, as, with a secret desire to play that fire-tending game, I contemplated the well-fed dame, amid iron pots and stewpans, standing there like an empress in the glory of the firelight, and with the fire-tongs sceptre rummaging about majestically in the glowing realm.