Page:The Works of J. W. von Goethe, Volume 13.djvu/78

56 get off with two hundred thalers — what do I say? with three hundred. N. B. Not including what has already gone to the devil."

Dissatisfied with college, he sought instruction elsewhere. At the table where he dined daily, kept by Hofrath Ludwig, the rector, he met several medical students. He heard little talked of but medicine and botany, and the names of Haller, Linnæus, and Buffon were incessantly cited with respect. His ready quickness to interest himself in all that interested those around him threw him at once into these studies, which hereafter he was to pursue with passionate ardour, but which at present he only lightly touched. Another source of instruction awaited him, one which through life he ever gratefully acknowledged, namely, the society of women.

"Willst du genau erfahren was sich ziemt,

So frage nur bei edlen Frauen an!"

So he speaks in "Tasso;" and here, in Leipsic, he was glad to learn from Frau Böhme not only some of the requisites for society, but also some principles of poetic criticism. This delicate, accomplished woman was able to draw him into society, to teach him l'ombre and piquet, to correct some of his awkwardness, and lastly to make him own that the poets he admired were a deplorable set, and that his own imitations of them deserved no better fate than the flames. He had got rid of his absurd wardrobe at one fell swoop, without a murmur at the expense. He now had also to cast away the poetic wardrobe brought from home with pride. He saw that it was poetic frippery—saw that his own poems were lifeless; accordingly, a holocaust was made of all his writings, prose and verse, and the kitchen fire wafted them into space.