mart answer to their "Geheimrathsjoren." If they had called
us boobies we should probably have called them blockheads, or something
of that sort.

This troop, which was not over-well-dressed even before the beginning of
the conflict, was led by some boys whose father kept a so-called flower
cellar--that is, a basement shop for plants, wreaths, etc.--at the head
of Leipzigerstrasse. They often sought us out, but when they did not we
enticed them from their cellar by a particular sort of call, and as soon
as they appeared we all slipped into some courtyard, where a battle
speedily raged, in which our school knapsacks served as weapons of
offence and defence. When I got into a passion I was as wild as a
fighting cock, and even quiet Ludo could deal hard blows; and I can say
the same of most of the "Geheimrathsjoren" and "Knoten." It was not often
that any decided success attended the fight, for the janitor or some
inhabitant of the house usually interfered and brought it all to an
untimely end. I remember still how a fat woman, probably a cook, seized
me by the collar and pushed me out into the street, crying: "Fie! fie!
such young gentlemen ought to be ashamed of themselves."

Hegel, however, whose influence at that time was still great in the
learned circles of Berlin, had called shame "anger against what is
natural," and we liked what was natural. So the battles with the "Knoten"
were continued until the Berlin revolution called forth more serious
struggles, and our mother sent us away to Keilhau.

Our sisters went to school also, a school kept by Fraulein Sollmann in
the Dorotheenstrasse. And yet we had a tutor, I do not really know why.
Whether our mother had heard of the fights, and recognized the
impossibility of following us about everywhere, or whether the candidate
was to teach us the rudiments of Latin after we went to the Schmidt
school in the Leipziger Platz, at the beginning of my tenth year, I
neglected to inquire.

The Easter holidays always brought Brother Martin home. Then he told us
about Keilhau, and we longed to accompany him there; and yet we had so
many good schoolmates and friends at home, such spacious playgrounds and
beautiful toys! I recall with especial pleasure the army of tin soldiers
with which we fought battles, and the brass cannon that mowed down their
ranks. We could build castles and cathedrals with our blocks, and cooking
was a pleasure, too, when our sisters allowed us to act as scu