THE REMINISCENCES OF CARL SCHURZ
a model institution. The schoolrooms were in an old Franciscan monastery, and I remember with a shudder the tortures to my sensitive musical ear when my father, in order to present me to the principal, led me through a long corridor, in each window-recess of which stood a young man practising finger-exercises on the violin, so that at least a dozen instruments giving out discordant sounds were to be heard at the same time. The instruction I received from the well-equipped master was excellent, and at the same time I continued my lessons in Latin and my musical studies. I also began to live among strangers, boarding during the winter in the modest home of a butcher's widow. In the summer I walked to school from Liblar to Brühl and back every day of the week—a walk of about eight miles.
And then came a heavy blow. One gloomy winter's day, returning from school to my lodging, I found my father awaiting me with tears in his eyes. Several times his voice failed in attempting to tell me that my brother Heribert, after an illness of only a few days, had died. Only the Monday before I had left him a picture of health. This was a dreadful shock. My father and I wandered home through the forest holding one another by the hand and weeping silently as we walked. For a long time I could not console myself over this loss. Whenever I was alone in the woods I would call my brother loudly by name and pray God, if He would not give him back, at least to allow his spirit to appear to me.
Then I felt a want of mental occupation on my lonely way between Brühl and Liblar and so I accustomed myself to reading while I walked. My father, whose literary judgment was somewhat determined by current tradition, counted Klopstock among the great German poets, whom one “must have read,” and so he gave me the “Messiah” as appropriate read-
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