times happens that an excellent anatomist does not
know how to cure a fever. Werner usually made fun of his patients in
private; but once I saw him weeping over a dying soldier... He was poor,
and dreamed of millions, but he would not take a single step out of his
way for the sake of money. He once told me that he would rather do a
favour to an enemy than to a friend, because, in the latter case,
it would mean selling his beneficence, whilst hatred only increases
proportionately to the magnanimity of the adversary. He had a malicious
tongue; and more than one good, simple soul has acquired the reputation
of a vulgar fool through being labelled with one of his epigrams. His
rivals, envious medical men of the watering-place, spread the report
that he was in the habit of drawing caricatures of his patients. The
patients were incensed, and almost all of them discarded him. His
friends, that is to say all the genuinely well-bred people who were
serving in the Caucasus, vainly endeavoured to restore his fallen
credit.

His outward appearance was of the type which, at the first glance,
creates an unpleasant impression, but which you get to like in course of
time, when the eye learns to read in the irregular features the stamp of
a tried and lofty soul. Instances have been known of women falling madly
in love with men of that sort, and having no desire to exchange their
ugliness for the beauty of the freshest and rosiest of Endymions.
We must give women their due: they possess an instinct for spiritual
beauty, for which reason, possibly, men such as Werner love women so
passionately.

Werner was small and lean and as weak as a baby. One of his legs was
shorter than the other, as was the case with Byron. In comparison with
his body, his head seemed enormous. His hair was cropped close, and
the unevennesses of his cranium, thus laid bare, would have struck a
phrenologist by reason of the strange intertexture of contradictory
propensities. His little, ever restless, black eyes seemed as if they
were endeavouring to fathom your thoughts. Taste and neatness were to be
observed in his dress. His small, lean, sinewy hands flaunted themselves
in bright-yellow gloves. His frock-coat, cravat and waistcoat were
invariably of black. The young men dubbed him Mephistopheles; he
pretended to be angry at the nickname, but in reality it flattered his
vanity. Werner and I soon understood each other and became friends,
because I, for my part, a