himself up to a similar degree of respect.  Young, well and nobly minded, he had on his travels and at other times shown himself truly desirable.  Winckelmann was in the highest degree delighted with him, and, whenever he mentioned him, loaded him with the handsomest epithets.  The laying out of a park, then unique, the taste for architecture, which Von Erdmannsdorf supported by his activity, every thing spoke in favor of a prince, who, while he was a shining example for the rest, gave promise of a golden age for his servants and subjects.  We young people now learned with rejoicings that Winckelmann would return back from Italy, visit his princely friend, call on Oeser by the way, and so come within our sphere of vision.  We made no pretensions to speaking with him, but we hoped to see him; and, as at that time of life one willingly changes every occasion into a party of pleasure, we had already agreed upon a journey to Dessau, where in a beautiful spot, made glorious by art, in a land well governed and at the same time externally adorned, we thought to lie in wait, now here, now there, in order to see with our own eyes these men so highly exalted above us walking about.  Oeser himself was quite elated if he only thought of it, and the news of Winckelmann’s death fell down into the midst of us like a thunderbolt from a clear sky.  I still remember the place where I first heard it:  it was in the court of the Pleissenburg, not far from the little gate through which one used to go up to Oeser’s residence.  One of my fellow-pupils met me, and told me that Oeser was not to be seen, with the reason why.  This monstrous event [Footnote:  Winckelmann was assassinated.—­TRANS.] produced a monstrous effect:  there was an universal mourning and lamentation, and Winckelmann’s untimely death sharpened the attention paid to the value of his life.  Perhaps, indeed, the effect of his activity, if he had continued it to a more advanced age, would probably not have been so great as it now necessarily became, when, like many other extraordinary men, he was distinguished by fate through a strange and calamitous end.

Now, while I was infinitely lamenting the death of Winckelmann, I did not think that I should soon find myself in the case of being apprehensive about my own life; since, during all these events, my bodily condition had not taken the most favorable turn.  I had already brought with me from home a certain touch of hypochondria, which, in this new sedentary and lounging life, was rather increased than diminished.  The pain in my chest, which I had felt from time to time ever since the accident at Auerstaedt, and which after a fall from horseback had perceptibly increased, made me dejected.  By an unfortunate diet I destroyed my powers of digestion; the heavy Merseburg beer clouded my brain; coffee, which gave me a peculiarly melancholy tone, especially when taken with milk after dinner, paralyzed my bowels, and seemed completely to suspend