It was an exciting moment when these pupils of mine went up for their
teacher's examination, I being present as auditor.
I continued to teach this course until the Autumn of 1868. When I left,
I was gratified by one of the ladies rising and, in a little speech,
thanking me for the good instruction I had given.
XIX.
Meanwhile, I pursued my studies with ardour and enjoyment, read a very
great deal of _belles-lettres_, and continued to work at German
philosophy, inasmuch as I now, though without special profit, plunged
into a study of Trendelenburg. My thoughts were very much more
stimulated by Gabriel Sibbern, on account of his consistent scepticism.
It was just about this time that I made his acquaintance. Old before his
time, bald at forty, tormented with gout, although he had always lived a
most abstemious life, Gabriel Sibbern, with his serene face, clever eyes
and independent thoughts, was an emancipating phenomenon. He had
divested himself of all Danish prejudices. "There is still a great deal
of phlogiston in our philosophy," he used to say sometimes.
I had long been anxious to come to a clear scientific understanding of
the musical elements in speech. I had busied myself a great deal with
metrical art. Bruecke's _Inquiries_ were not yet in existence, but I
was fascinated by Apel's attempt to make use of notes (crotchets,
quavers, dotted quavers, and semi-quavers) as metrical signs, and by
J.
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