The next morning I took leave of my mother, and my school life began.  In many points I was in advance of the other pupils in the second class, in others behind them; but this troubled me very little—­school seemed a necessary evil.  My real life commenced after its close, and here also my natural cheerfulness ruled my whole nature.  The town offered me few attractions, but the country was full of pleasures.  Unfortunately, I could not go to Komptendorf as often as I wished, for it was a two hours’ walk, and horses and carriages were not always at my disposal.  Yet many a Saturday found me there, enjoying the delight of chatting with my kind hostess about home news and other pleasant things, or reading aloud to her.

Even in the second year of my stay at Kottbus I went to every dance given on the estates in the neighbourhood and visited many a delightful home in the town.  Then there were long walks—­sometimes with Dr. Boltze and my school-mates, sometimes with friends, and often alone.

We frequently took a Sunday walk, which often began on Saturday afternoon, usually with merry companions and in the society of our stern master, who, gayer than the youngest of us, needed our care rather than we his.  In this way I visited the beautiful Muskau, and still more frequently the lovely woodlands of the Spree, a richly watered region intersected by numerous arms of the river and countless canals, resting as quietly under dense masses of foliage as a child asleep at noontide beneath the shadow of a tree.

The alders and willows, lindens and oaks, which grow along the banks, are superb; flocks of birds fly twittering and calling from one bush and branch to another; but all human intercourse is carried on, as in Venice, by boats which glide noiselessly to and fro.

Whoever desires a faithful and minute picture of this singular region, which reminded me of many scenes in Holland and many of Hobbema’s paintings, should read The Goddess of Noon.  It contains a number of descriptions whose truth and vividness are matchless.

Every trip into the woodlands of the Spree offered an abundance of beautiful and pleasurable experiences, but I remember with still greater enjoyment my leafy nooks on the river-bank.

CHAPTER XVIII.

The time of effervescence, and my school mates.

Although the events of my school-days at Kottbus long since blended together in my, memory, my life there is divided into two sharply defined portions.  The latter commences with Professor Tzschirner’s appointment and the reform in the school.