Page:In defense of Harriet Shelley, and other essays.djvu/271

 THE GERMAN CHICAGO

to 50 or 60, perhaps, then suddenly you find yourself up in the hundreds 140, maybe; the next will be 139 then you perceive by that sign that the num bers are now traveling toward you from the opposite direction. They will keep that sort of insanity up as long as you travel that street ; every now and then the numbers will turn and run the other way. As a rule, there is an arrow under the number, to show by the direction of its flight which way the numbers are proceeding. There are a good many suicides in Berlin; I have seen six reported in a single day. There is always a deal of learned and laborious arguing and ciphering going on as to the cause of this state of things. If they will set to work and number their houses in a rational way perhaps they will find out what was the matter.

More than a month ago Berlin began to prepare to celebrate Professor Virchow s seventieth birthday. When the birthday arrived, the middle of October, it seemed to me that all the world of science arrived with it; deputation after deputation came, bringing the homage and reverence of far cities and centers of learning, and during the whole of a long day the hero of it sat and received such witness of his great ness as has seldom been vouchsafed to any man in any walk of life in any time, ancient or modern. These demonstrations were continued in one form or another day after day, and were presently merged in similar demonstrations to his twin in science and achievement, Professor Helmholtz, whose seventieth birthday is separated from Virchow s by only about three weeks; so nearly as this did these two extraor-

�� �