o think about it for a while." To
himself he said, "Before I get into the clutches of one of these
peasant-camels, I'll run away with a baboon."

"Well, you must excuse me now," said Buchmaier. "I must go afield: I'm
just trading for a horse, and must see how he behaves in harness. See
you to-night, I hope. Goodbye, meanwhile. Going up street, Mat?"

"Yes. Good-bye, Mr. Teacher, and if the time is long take it double."

The teacher did not quite understand the last speech of Mat, which was
a figure derived from a long thread or string. When the door closed
upon the peasants he gave it another push, as if to assure himself that
he was now alone. He was oppressed in spirit, though without knowing
why. At length the story of the Lauterbacher recurred to him. He
regarded it as a piece of coarse vulgarity, sufficient to make him
forget all the well-meant attentions otherwise rendered. Such is man.
Once irritated, he remembers only what has offended him, and forgets
the greatest kindnesses accompanying it.

Rousing himself from his reverie, he proceeded to unpack his trunks.
The sight of the familiar objects tended in some degree to soothe his
spirits; but his meditative mood would not be dispelled. "I am like a
hermit in the wilderness," thought he. "What makes me happy has to the
people round me no existence. This squire is nothing but a shrewd
peasant a little proud of his coarseness. There may be a spark of mind
slumbering in their bodies; but it is smothered in ashes. Let me summon
up all my strength to guard against being transformed into a peasant.
Every day of my life I will upheave my soul from its inmost fastenings,
and not suffer a blur to settle upon it.

"I have seen teachers enter into office filled with the free
aspirations of the time, and in a few years they had sunk into the
slough of routine and become peasants like the peasants around them.
Even their exterior was careless and slouchy." Writing "Memento" upon a
bit of paper, he stuck it into the looking-glass.

At last he threw off his languor and walked out into the fields and on
the road by which he had come. The farmers working here and there said,
"How goes it, Mr. Teacher? 'Getting used to it?" He answered kindly but
curtly: their familiarity struck him as odd, and almost offensive. He
did not know that these people thought they had a claim upon him
because they had first seen him and received his first salutations.

After a long ramble, he fou