Our excursion actually took place, and was joined by several more young people of the same rank.  They were men of the middle, or, if you please, of the lower, class, who were not wanting in brains, and who, moreover, as they had gone through school, were possessed of various knowledge and a certain degree of culture.  In a large, rich city, there are many modes of gaining a livelihood.  These eked out a living by copying for the lawyers, and by advancing the children of the lower order more than is usual in common schools.  With grown-up children, who were about to be confirmed, they went through the religious courses; then, again, they assisted factors and merchants in some way, and were thus enabled to enjoy themselves frugally in the evenings, and particularly on Sundays and festivals.

On the way there, while they highly extolled my love-letter, they confessed to me that they had made a very merry use of it; viz., that it had been copied in a feigned hand, and, with a few pertinent allusions, had been sent to a conceited young man, who was now firmly persuaded that a lady to whom he had paid distant court was excessively enamored of him, and sought an opportunity for closer acquaintance.  They at the same time told me in confidence, that he desired nothing more now than to be able to answer her in verse; but that neither he nor they were skilful enough, so that they earnestly solicited me to compose the much-desired reply.

Mystifications are and will continue to be an amusement for idle people, whether more or less ingenious.  A venial wickedness, a self-complacent malice, is an enjoyment for those who have neither resources in themselves nor a wholesome external activity.  No age is quite exempt from such pruriences.  We had often tricked each other in our childish years:  many sports turn upon mystification and trick.  The present jest did not seem to me to go farther:  I gave my consent.  They imparted to me many particulars which the letter ought to contain, and we brought it home already finished.

A little while afterwards I was urgently invited, through my friend, to take part in one of the evening-feasts of that society.  The lover, he said, was willing to bear the expense on this occasion, and desired expressly to thank the friend who had shown himself so excellent a poetical secretary.

We came together late enough, the meal was most frugal, the wine drinkable; while, as for the conversation, it turned almost entirely on jokes upon the young man, who was present, and certainly not very bright, and who, after repeated readings of the letter, almost believed that he had written it himself.