Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, no. 41, March, 1861 | Page 3

this examination, he can never become a regular student.
Even should he have attended regularly any of the many private
academies, or the _Realschule_, where thorough instruction is given,
but with less special, though no slight attention to Latin and Greek, and
more to mathematics and practical branches, even then he must acquire
from one of the gymnasia the exemption-and-maturity-right. In the
slang of student-life, the gymnasiast is styled a _Frog_, the school itself
a _Pond_; between the time of his declaration of maturity and his
reception as student, he is called a Mule.
The course is no light one the candidate has gone through,--nine or ten
years of classical training, Latin the whole time, Greek the last six or
seven years, Hebrew the last four, generally optional, though in many
cases required at future examinations. The modern languages have not
been neglected: French he has pursued seven years, English or Italian
the last three or four. Beside all these, the elements of Philosophy,
Moral and Natural, History, Mathematics, etc. In fine, the certificate of
maturity would in most cases equal, in many surpass, what our colleges
is styled the degree of A.M. Of course, the parallel must not be

understood as existing with respect to many of the older institutions in
the United States, which presuppose, in the entering freshman, a
preparatory course of several years.
The classical training so strictly required of natives who enter these
high-schools is not so rigidly inquired into in the case of
foreigners,--though in this respect the regulations differ in various
states. In Prussia and generally, the passport is all-sufficient; but in
Würtemberg, a diploma or some certificate of former studies must be
exhibited before admission. The officers of some of the universities, as
Tübingen, for instance, are very particular in enforcing all the rules,
inquiring of the applicant, whatever be his age or nationality, whether
he has a written permission from his parents to study abroad and in
their university, whether he has the money necessary to pay the debts
he may contract, and such other minute questions as will strike an
American especially as particularly impertinent. The precaution is
carried so far, that, when no positive information is given as to means
of subsistence, the letter of credit must be delivered into the hands of
the beadle as security. Yet such little incidents are but slight
annoyances at most, which a little good-humor and desire to conform to
the habits and ways of doing of the country will remove. He who goes
abroad always ready to bristle up against what does not exactly
conform to his preconceived ideas of propriety, measuring and
weighing all things with his own national weights and measures, will
be continually making himself disagreeable and unhappy, and in the
end profit little by his absence from home.
The conclusion of the training-system in the gymnasia usually occurs
before the nineteenth or twentieth year. With the reception of the
certificate of maturity the youth may be said to have donned the virile
toga. He enjoys during his university years a degree of liberty such as
he never enjoyed before, never will enjoy again when his student-days
are over. Having taken out his matriculation-papers, and given the
Handschlag (taken the oath) to obey the laws of the land and the
statutes of the university, he has become a student,--a _Fox_, as the
freshman is styled,--he chooses his own career, his own professors,
hears the lectures he pleases, attends or omits as he pleases, leads the
life of a god for a triennium or a quadrennium, fights his duels, drinks
his beer, sings his club-and-corps songs.--But of student-life more in

due time.--There is no check, no constraint whatever, during the whole
time the studies last. At the expiration of three or four, sometimes even
five years, an examination takes place before the degree of Doctor can
be conferred,--not a severe one by any means, confined as it is to the
special branch to which the candidate wishes to devote himself. In the
Medical and Law Departments it is more serious than in the
Philosophical. This examination is followed by a public discussion in
presence of the dean and professors of the faculty, held in Latin, on
some thesis that has been treated and printed in the same language by
the candidate. His former fellow-students, and any one present that
wishes, stand as opponents. This disputation, whatever may have been
its merits in former days, has degenerated in the present into a mere
piece of acted mummery, where the partakers not only stutter and
stammer over bad Latin, but even help themselves, when their memory
fails utterly, with the previously written notes of their extempore
objections and answers. The principal requisite for the attainment of the
Doctor's degree, when the necessary amount of