Halloh des Schwarzen.  Ohne Scherz; es ist oft zum Verzweifeln."[84] This process of self-diagnosis may be due in part to his medical studies, but much more, we think, to his morbid imagination, which led him, on more than one occasion, to play the madman in so realistic a manner that strangers were frightened out of their wits and even his friends became alarmed, lest it might be earnest and not jest which they were witnessing.

Lenau was not without a certain sense of humor, grim humor though it was, and here and there in his letters there is an admixture of levity with the all-pervading melancholy.  An example may be quoted from a letter to Kerner in Weinsberg, dated 1832:  “Heute bin ich wieder bei Reinbecks auf ein grosses Spargelessen.  Spargel wie Kirchthuerme werden da gefressen.  Ich allein verschlinge 50-60 solcher Kirchthuerme und komme mir dabei vor, wie eine Parodie unserer politisch-prosaischen, durchaus unheiligen Zeit, die auch schon das Maul aufsperrt, um alles Heilige, und namentlich die guten glaeubigen Kirchthuerme wie Spargelstangen zu verschlingen.”  The letter concludes with the signature:  “Ich umarme Dich, bis Dir die Rippen krachen.  Dein Niembsch."[85] Not infrequently this humor was at his own expense, especially when describing an unpleasant condition or situation, as for example in a letter to Sophie Loewenthal in the year 1844:  “Jetzt lebe ich hier in Saus und Braus,—­d. h. es saust und braust mir der Kopf von einem leidigen Schnupfen."[86] Again, on finding himself on one occasion very unwell and uncomfortable in Stuttgart, he writes as follows:  “Bestaendiges Unwohlsein, Kopfschmerz, Schlaflosigkeit, Mattigkeit, schlechte Verdauung, Rhabarber, Druckfehler, und Aerger ueber den traegen Fortschlich meiner Geschaefte, das waren die Freuden meiner letzten Woche.  Emilie will es nicht gelten lassen, dass die Stuttgarter Luft nichts als die Ausduenstung des Teufels sei.—­Ich schnappe nach Luft, wie ein Spatz unter der Luftpumpe.—­In vielen der hiesigen Strassen riecht es am Ende auch lenzhaft, naemlich pestilenzhaft, und die guten Stuttgarter merken das gar nicht; ‘suess duftet die Heimat.’"[87] In his fondness for bringing together the incongruous, for introducing the element of surprise, and in the fact that his humor is almost always of the impatient, disgruntled, cynical type, Lenau reminds us not a little of Heine in his “Reisebilder” and some other prose works.  Hoelderlin, on the other hand, may be said to have been utterly devoid of humor.

Lack of self-control, perhaps the most characteristic trait among men of genius, was even more pronounced in Lenau than in Hoelderlin.  This shows itself in the extreme irregularity of his habits of life.  For instance, it was his custom to work long past the midnight hour, and then take his rest until nearly noon.  He could never get his coffee quite strong enough to suit him, although it was prepared almost in the form of a concentrated tincture and he drank