No stomach could hold all that quantity
at one time, of course - but there are ways of frequently
creating a vacuum, which those who have been much at sea
will understand.
One sees so many students abroad at all hours, that he
presently begins to wonder if they ever have any
working-hours. Some of them have, some of them haven't.
Each can choose for himself whether he will work or play;
for German university life is a very free life;
it seems to have no restraints. The student does not live
in the college buildings, but hires his own lodgings,
in any locality he prefers, and he takes his meals when
and where he pleases. He goes to bed when it suits him,
and does not get up at all unless he wants to.
He is not entered at the university for any particular
length of time; so he is likely to change about.
He passes no examinations upon entering college.
He merely pays a trifling fee of five or ten dollars,
receives a card entitling him to the privileges of
the university, and that is the end of it. He is now ready
for business - or play, as he shall prefer. If he elects
to work, he finds a large list of lectures to choose from.
He selects the subjects which he will study, and enters
his name for these studies; but he can skip attendance.
The result of this system is, that lecture-courses upon
specialties of an unusual nature are often delivered
to very slim audiences, while those upon more practical
and every-day matters of education are delivered to very
large ones. I heard of one case where, day after day,
the lecturer's audience consisted of three students - and always
the same three. But one day two of them remained away.
The lecturer began as usual -
"Gentlemen," - then, without a smile, he corrected himself,
saying -
"Sir," - and went on with his discourse.
It is said that the vast majority of the Heidelberg students
are hard workers, and make the most of their opportunities;
that they have no surplus means to spend in dissipation,
and no time to spare for frolicking. One lecture follows
right on the heels of another, with very little time
for the student to get out of one hall and into the next;
but the industrious ones manage it by going on a trot.
The professors assist them in the saving of their time
by being promptly in their little boxed-up pulpits when the
hours strike, and as promptly out again when the hour finishes.
I entered an empty lecture-room one day just before the
clock struck. The place had simple, unpainted pine desks
and benches for about two hundred persons.
About a minute before the clock struck, a hundred
and fifty students swarmed in, rushed to their seats,
immediately spread open their notebooks and dipped their
pens in ink. When the clock began to strike, a burly
professor entered, was received with a round of applause,
moved swiftly down the center aisle, said "Gentlemen,"
and began to talk as he climbed his pulpit steps; and by
the time he had arrived in his box and faced his audience,
his lecture was well under way and all the pens were going.
He had no notes, he talked with prodigious rapidity and
energy for an hour - then the students began to remind
him in certain well-understood ways that his time was up;
he seized his hat, still talking, proceeded swiftly down
his pulpit steps, got out the last word of his discourse
as he struck the floor; everybody rose respectfully,
and he swept rapidly down the aisle and disappeared.
An instant rush for some other lecture-room followed,
and in a minute I was alone with the empty benches
once more.
Yes, without doubt, idle students are not the rule.
Out of eight hundred in the town, I knew the faces of only
about fifty; but these I saw everywhere, and daily.
They walked about the streets and the wooded hills,
they drove in cabs, they boated on the river, they sipped
beer and coffee, afternoons, in the Schloss gardens.
A good many of them wore colored caps of the corps.
They were finely and fashionably dressed, their manners
were quite superb, and they led an easy, careless,
comfortable life. If a dozen of them sat together and a lady
or a gentleman passed whom one of them knew and saluted,
they all rose to their feet and took off their caps.
The members of a corps always received a fellow-member
in this way, too; but they paid no attention to members
of other corps; they did not seem to see them. This was not
a discourtesy; it was only a part of the elaborate and rigid
corps etiquette.
There seems to be no chilly distance existing between the
German students and the professor; but, on the contrary,
a companionable intercourse, the opposite of chilliness
and reserve. When the professor enters a beer-hall
in the evening where students are gathered together,
these rise up and take off their caps, and invite the old
gentleman to sit with them and partake. He accepts,
and the pleasant talk and the beer flow for an hour or two,
and by and by the professor, properly charged and comfortable,
gives a cordial good night, while the students stand
bowing and uncovered; and then he moves on his happy
way homeward with all his vast cargo of learning afloat
in his hold. Nobody finds fault or feels outraged;
no harm has been done.
It seemed to be a part of corps etiquette to keep a dog
or so, too.
