Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, no. 41, March, 1861 | Page 9

sword-slashing, he would long ago have been dubbed a Doctor in all
the faculties. He hears a lecture now and then for form's sake, though it
is rather an unusual thing for him. By his side, but retiring and earnest,
may be one of the younger professors, who the hour before stood as a
teacher, and now sits among some of his former hearers to profit by the
experience of his older professional brother. Where the court resides
and many officers are garrisoned, the hall presents a spangled
appearance of bright epaulettes and glittering uniforms. It is no unusual
thing for young men during their years of service to attend the courses
regularly. The uncomfortable sword is laid on the knee, where it may
not dangle and clink with every motion of the wearer,--no easy task in
the very narrow space left between desk and desk. In the last century, it
was a universal custom for all students to wear the sword; but this
academic privilege, as it was considered, leading to numerous abuses,
laws were enacted against it, as well as other eccentricities in dress.

The regular students are provided with portfolios, or rather, soft
leathern pouches, which they can fold and pocket, containing the heft or
quire of paper on which the lecture is transcribed by them wholly or in
part. These hefts are often the object of much care and labor. Each
plants his ink-horn firmly in front of him. As the time approaches, and
all are in readiness with pen in hand, there is a universal buzz
throughout the room. Though, when the auditory is large, many nations
are represented, as well as the various provinces of the Confederation,
still the language heard is predominantly that of the country. Though
Poles and Greeks, English and Russians, may be in abundance, still
they rarely congregate in nationalities,--save the Poles, who speak their
own language at all times and places, and cling the more fondly to their
own idiom since they have been robbed of everything else. After some
fifteen minutes of expectation the professor enters. All is still in an
instant. He advances with hasty strides and bent-down head to his
rostrum, an elevated platform, on which stands a plain, high, pine desk.
He unfolds his notes, looks over the rim of his spectacles at the
attentive hearers, who sit ready to write down the words of wisdom he
is about to utter, and begins with the short address, "_Meine Herren._"
There is then an uninterrupted gliding of pens for three-quarters of an
hour, until, above the monotony, rarely the eloquence, of the speaker,
the great clock in the centre of the building gives the significant sound
of relief to busy fingers and rest to ear and brain unaccustomed to such
slow, entangled, lisping, laborious, in rare instances manly delivery.
The lecture is at an end, and each prepares to enter another auditorium,
or wends his way home, to study out the notes taken, consult the
authorities quoted, complete or even copy his work anew. In the study
of these hefts consists the main preparation for future examinations, as
text-books are rarely used, save in Austria, and the examiners are the
professors themselves, who will not ask the candidate much beyond
what they have embraced in their own lesson.
With a remarkable degree of skill, the practised German student can
take down, even when the delivery is by no means slow, the pith and
essence of a whole lecture. Yet there is much abuse in this; and it has
called forth, ever since the invention of printing has made the
multiplication of books by transcription unnecessary, much just, though
at times unjust criticism. A German writer has said, that the man of

genius takes his notes on a slip of paper, he of good abilities on a
half-page, while the dunce must fill a whole sheet. Now the reverse
would be quite as true in many cases. For though thoughtless writing
may be little more than wasted labor, yet there is nothing that can fix
more steadily thoughts and facts in the mind than the precision and
constant attention required in following a lecture with the pen,
especially when the words of the professor are not taken down with
slavish exactitude, but when, as is most generally the case, merely the
thoughts are noted in the hearer's own language. The ideas thus gained
have been assimilated and become the listener's own property. There is
thus generated a steady transfusion, the surest remedy against flagging
mental activity. Many a foreigner writes down the lecture in his own
tongue, and values highly this training of constant translation, though,
before many months, the mere transposition from one language into the
other must become purely mechanical. It is amusing to see the puzzled