sion of particular topics under the personal guidance of Professor
or assistant. The number of students admitted here is limited,
fifteen to twenty-five being the ordinary run. The members are
divided into two classes, “ordentlich” (ordinary) and “ ausser
ordeutlich ” (extraordinary). Strange as it may seem the former
do all the work. Here the work is thorough and the investiga
tion exhaustive. The Professor goes very slowly, entering often
into tiresome details, at least so it seems to the listeners. The
ground covered is inconsiderable, but what is done is well done.
Know all of something not something of everything is the German
instructor’s motto.
As a result of the German, system we find their university
graduates foremost among the thinkers and investigators of the
world. Though they may be bigoted and narrow in their view,
they are usually sincere in their belief. There is also a tendency
toward the theoretical to the disregard of the practical. Idealism
finds a ready following in their masses, and we find much more
preaching than practice from the side of morality.
In the lecture room the boys are models of propriety. Their
deportment is exemplary from the time they enter the class room
till they leave it. Tittle or no whispering is indulged in before
the teacher’s arrival and none after it. The actions of an ordinary
American student would be considered beneath the dignity of the
average German collegian. Nowhere, on college or university
ground, do they show a least bit of boisterousness, there being
no noise or confusion in the corridors at any time. They are
proud of their reputation, and they seek to maintain it by every
way possible.
However outside, as a boy among the boys, the German un
bends and can make himself as ridiculous as is necessary. In the
city he is as free as a bird, his student-card absolving him lrom
all power of police or municipal authority. All breach of public
discipline is reported to the university court, which deals with the
offender as the occasion demands. Confinement in the prison of
the institution is the customary penalty, Kvery university has a
jail connected with it, being as it is a city within a city. A penalty
of this character is little feared by the student body. Oftentimes
it is courted and regarded as a big lark. Kvery one confined here
usually writes or carves his name on the walls, making of it an
autograph album on a large scale. Many of the best known public
the Fatherland spent some time in this retreat; Bismarck, for
instance, having been sentenced there more than once.
The Free Lance ,
[DECEJMBBR,