ith glasses on his nose and a belly
like an alderman. He looked like a regular Vicar, sure enough, who was
going to begin reading mass the next day. And all the time he was
nothing, absolutely nothing.

The only person who remained calm under these blows of fate was the
quondam _stud. lit._ Matthew Fottner.

If he had studied longer and more, I should be fain to think he had
learned this calm of soul from the seven wise men.

As it is, I must assume that it was inborn.

He had, to be sure, gained no treasure of classical learning for his
future life, but he figured that in any case seven fat years had been
accorded him, which no one could ever take from him again. Not even the
Bridge Farmer with all his rage.

Why should man torment himself with thoughts of the future? The past is
worth something, too, and especially such a jolly one as he had had in
the secret tap-room of the Star Brewery, where he had sat with his
boon-companions and had gradually mastered the art of draining a glass
of beer at a draught. Where he had sung all the bully songs in the
collection, such as "_Crambambuli_" and the "_Bier la la_," and the
ever memorable and eternally beautiful "_Drum Bruederchen er-her-go
bi-ba-hamus._"

Such recollections are also a treasure for life; and even if the
sun-dried country bumpkins didn't understand it, jolly it had been all
the same.

And the future couldn't be so terribly bad either.

For the time being he resolved to go into the army; he would have to
serve his three years anyhow, and so it would be better if he reported
right now. In this way he would get out of the Bridge Farmer's sight
and be left in peace. He tried for the First Regiment of His Majesty's
Grenadiers, and was accepted.

And if the Bridge Farmer wanted to, he could now sit in the Hofgarten
and look with pride at the file-leader of the second company.

That head, which stuck up so big and red out of the collar of his
uniform, had been fattened at the farmer's expense; and if it might
have looked good over the black cassock, with the tonsure on the back
of it, yet any just man must have admitted that it didn't make such a
bad appearance over the white braid and the bright blue uniform.

To be sure, the present calling of the Fottner lad was not pleasing to
God; but he himself liked it.

The food was not bad, and the one-year volunteers willingly treated
the big fellow to a glass of beer when he introduced himself as
fellow-stu