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Book i^ O 
 CoinTiglil X" 
 
 COI'VKICWIT DEPOSIT. 
 
National 
 Library of Kindergarten Literature 
 
 Exiited by 
 National Kindergarten Association 
 
 Volume 1 
 
Sketches of FroebePs 
 Life and Times 
 
 WITH INTRODUCTION 
 BY THE 
 
 Hon. P:1p! CLAXTON 
 
 United States Commissioner of Education 
 
 c^e 
 
 1914 
 MILTON BRADLEY COMPANY 
 
 Springfield, Massachusetts 
 
LB637 
 
 5s 
 
 Copyright, 1914, 
 By Milton Bradley Co. 
 
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 'Ci,A'J745(;7 
 
 M (7/9/". 
 
 7U I. 
 
CONTENTS 
 
 PACK 
 
 Introduction P, p, Qaxton vii 
 
 Education: Froebel, John Jay Chapman 1 
 From "Causes and Consequences." 
 
 In Keilhau, Georg Ebers 28 
 
 From "The Story of my Life." 
 
 Infant Gardens, . . . James L. Hughes 124 
 
 From " Dickens as an Educator." 
 
 Girlhood Days at Keilhau, 
 
 Henrietta Schrader, Berlin 147 
 Translated by Bertha Hofer Hcgner 
 Edited by Amalic Hofer Jerome, and 
 reprinted from Kindergarten Magazine 
 l)y her permission. 
 
 Bibliography, I95 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 SEEK ye first the Kingdom of God." 
 — On his first Monday morning in 
 school, the boy Friedrich Froebel 
 heard the children, all standing, repeat 
 these words. They were the words 
 of the text of the sermon to which the children 
 had listened on Sunday. Every morning of the 
 week they were repeated over and over again, 
 by individual children and by the whole group, 
 until they made an impression upon him," as 
 none had ever done before and none had ever 
 done after." Writing of this event forty years 
 later, he says, "Perhaps even then, the simple 
 boy heard and felt that these words would be 
 the foundation and the salvation of his life, 
 bringing to him that conviction which was to 
 become later on to the working, striving man, 
 a source of incomparable courage, of unflinching, 
 ever-ready, and cheerful self-sacrifice. In short, 
 my introduction into that school was my birth 
 into the higher, spiritual life." He who would 
 understand Froebel's life and philosophy of 
 education must bear this statement in mind, 
 
vili INTRODUCTION 
 
 and remember that for Froebel, the Kingdom 
 of God meant the realization of the divine 
 spirit in the individual man and woman, and 
 of the divine order in human society. 
 
 No other educator has realized so fully the 
 unity of nature, man, and God. No other has 
 seen more clearly the vision of redeemed hu- 
 manity, living in harmony with nature, governed 
 by love, and rejoicing in ever-progressing crea- 
 tive work. No other has ever understood better 
 that the Kingdom of God is the Kingdom of 
 love, of light, of life, of truth, and of intelligent, 
 skillful, effective service. For him, all roads 
 lead to God. For him, God is the all-pervading, 
 creative spirit of the Universe. The soul of 
 man is a part of the divine essence. The edu- 
 cation of man consists in the unfolding and 
 revelation of this divine essence, through well- 
 guided, spontaneous, creative activity. God 
 is a creator, and man, made in his image, is a 
 creator also. Education does not consist alone 
 or chiefly in instruction or training, but rather — 
 development and growth. The teacher is there- 
 fore a gardener, watching patiently and intelli- 
 gently for the budding points of the soul, the 
 nascent stages of interest, supplying suitable 
 environment — food, light, and air — and pro- 
 tecting the child against those who, in their 
 ignorance and ruthless zeal, would hamper and 
 restrain, dwarf and warp, or unduly stimulate 
 
INTRODUCTION ix 
 
 the child by untimely prescription. The school 
 is a garden in which children live and grow 
 through healthy, happy, vigorous, active child- 
 hood, to strong purposeful manhood. Man, 
 the child, is an active animal, a struggler alive 
 and happy only in activity. 
 
 With a full understanding of the importance 
 of spontaneous activity and the dangers of 
 narrow prescription, Froebel avoided the dangers 
 and absurdities of leaving the child, without 
 guidance, to the unlicensed freedom of the 
 savage. "The development of the child's inner 
 being must be on the one hand spontaneous, 
 and, on the other, in accord with the universal 
 trend of life." To know, interpret, and apply 
 the trend of life in guiding the spontaneous 
 activities of the child, is a task worthy the 
 understanding and skill of the wisest and best. 
 "Would there might be for the human being, 
 for my child, even from its first advent into the 
 world, a correct comprehension of its being, a 
 suitable fostering and management, an education 
 truly leading to the all-sided attainment of its 
 destiny." That there might be such loving 
 fostering, such intelligent leading, he plead 
 "that we live with our children, live for them, 
 and give our lives to them." 
 
 And this is not mere sentiment, it is the 
 highest statesmanship and the truest principle 
 of economics. Charles Dickens, the advocate 
 
X INTRODUCTION 
 
 of the kindergarten in England, was right when 
 he declared, "there would be fewer sullen, 
 quarrelsome, dull-witted men and women, if 
 there were fewer children starved and fed im- 
 properly in heart and brain. Society can be 
 improved only by making men and women 
 better by wholesome education in childhood 
 and infancy." When this principle is fully 
 recognized in our democracy there will be a new 
 perspective in legislation and a new adjustment 
 of the agencies of government. 
 
 It has been said that Froebel discovered 
 infancy as the most important part of the life 
 of the individual and its proper treatment as 
 the most important problem in education. 
 Truly a great discovery, and probably his most 
 important contribution to education and his 
 surest guarantee of immortality. Out of this 
 discovery came the kindergarten which in some 
 form must continue as an integral part of the 
 world's system of education. Much of the 
 program of the kindergarten grows out of the 
 fact that the child cannot be developed alone, 
 in contact only with nature, or even in contact 
 with older people. The child is a social being 
 and must have the society of other children. 
 This social contact is most useful in play and 
 co-operative work — a principle too often for- 
 gotten even by scientific students of the child 
 and its education. "We are not wholesome 
 
INTRODUCTION » 
 
 unless we are self-forgetting" and we are most 
 self-forgetting in spontaneous social activity. 
 Life is the child's greatest teacher and it can- 
 not teach its best lessons unless it be full and 
 varied. 
 
 "Turning the attention upon selfish ends, no 
 matter how remote or momentary, hurts the 
 organization, contracts the intellect, dries up 
 the emotions, and is felt as unhappiness. Turn- 
 ing the attention toward public ends benefits 
 the organism, enlarges the intellect, and is felt 
 as happiness." The social life of the kinder- 
 garten effectively directs the attention of the 
 child toward unselfish ends. 
 
 Froebel's philosophy of education did not end 
 with the development of the individual child, 
 however important that may be. It includes 
 the race. "Humanity is not fixed and sta- 
 tionary, but is steadily and progressively 
 growing, in a state of ever-living development, 
 ever ascending from one stage of culture to 
 another, its goal partaking of the infinite and 
 eternal." The welfare and happiness of the 
 race is not less important than the welfare and 
 happiness of the individual. The education of 
 each must have regard to that of the other. 
 
 The value of the vocational and practical in 
 education was understood by Froebel, and he is 
 not the least among the forces that have given 
 modern education its industrial tendency. But 
 
xii INTRODUCTION 
 
 his philosophy comprehends also the life that 
 cannot live by bread alone. In a time when 
 there is danger of over-emphasis on the trade 
 school and narrow preparation for vocational 
 efficiency alone, there is need that we refresh 
 ourselves with the call of his high aim "to make 
 the man whose feet shall stand on God's earth, 
 rooted fast in nature, while his head towers up 
 to heaven and reads its secrets with steady gaze, 
 whose heart shall embrace both earth and 
 heaven, shall enjoy the life of earth and nature 
 with all its wealth of form and at the same time 
 shall recognize the purity and peace of heaven, 
 that unites in its love, God's earth with God's 
 heaven." 
 
 To this end the publication of the matter 
 making up the four sections of this book will 
 render valuable service. Henrietta Schrader's 
 "Girlhood Days at Keilhau," and Georg 
 Ebers' recollections of his school days at Froe- 
 bel's school, give the personal touch, while the 
 selections from Dickens and Chapman present 
 Froebel's philosophy of education from different 
 points of view. 
 
 P. P. CLAXTON. 
 
 Washington, D.C., January 17, 1914. 
 
PREFACE 
 
 THIS volume is the first of a series 
 which the National Kindergarten 
 Association has undertaken to pre- 
 pare for the use of teachers and 
 students. 
 During the three quarters of a century which 
 spans the life of the kindergarten, book after 
 book has made its appearance, its pages filled 
 with descriptions and interpretations of this or 
 that aspect of Froebel's system of education, and 
 we are grateful for the steady output of helpful 
 and attractive literature. More numerous, how- 
 ever, than the entire books on the subject are the 
 significant single essays and sketches and studies 
 of kindergarten philosophy and practice which 
 have been contributed from time to time by 
 well known educators and writers, and which 
 have been published in educational magazines 
 or records or reports. 
 
 Scattered thus over a wide range of space and 
 time, this valuable literary material is inaccess- 
 ible except to those who live within reach of the 
 large city and university libraries. It is there- 
 fore the purpose of the National Kindergarten 
 Association to gather such material into per- 
 
xiv PREFACE 
 
 manent and convenient form and offer it to the 
 public. Such articles as have been selected have 
 abiding value and therefore are never out of 
 season. 
 
 The subsequent volumes of the series will deal 
 with the Program or Course of Study in the 
 Kindergarten: Kindergarten Philosophy and 
 Psychology: The Kindergarten and Society: 
 Kindergarten and the Arts: Games: Excur- 
 sions: Gardening, and other related topics. 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 Reprinted by permission from Causes and Consequences, by John 
 Jay Chapman. (Mofifat, Yard & Co., Publishers.) 
 
 I HAVE two boys, aged seven and four. 
 They required a governess and I got one. 
 After a couple of months, during which 
 the usual experiences in the training of 
 young children were gone through, I discovered 
 that it was I who was being educated. My 
 mind was being swayed and drawn to a point of 
 view. I was in contact with a method so pro- 
 found that it seemed as if I were dealing with, 
 or rather being dealt with by, the forces of nature. 
 I was in the presence of great genius. What was 
 it? The text-book on Froebel by Hughes in the 
 International Series on Education made the 
 matter clear. 
 
 Froebel was an experimental psychologist 
 who used the terms of the German philosophy 
 of his day. But the facts of life, the thing he was 
 studying, was never for a moment absent from 
 his mind. He lived in an age when the ideas of 
 evolution were in the air, and before they had 
 received their conclusive proof by being applied 
 to morphology. 
 
2 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 This application has for a time killed philoso- 
 phy, for it has identified the new ideas with the 
 physical sciences, and led men to study the 
 human mind in psychology and from without, 
 whereas the mind and its laws can, in the 
 nature of things, be studied only through intro- 
 spection. Froebel had a scientific intellect of 
 the very first caliber; he had the conception of 
 flux, of change, of evolution, to start with; and 
 he took up introspectively the study of the laws 
 of the human mind, choosing that province of 
 the universe where they are most visibly and 
 typically exposed, — the mind of the growing 
 child. 
 
 The "laws" which he states are little more 
 than a description of the phenomena that he 
 observed. They are statements of the results of 
 his experiments, and the language he employs 
 can be translated to suit the education of almost 
 any one. His attention was so concentrated 
 upon fact that his terminology does not mislead. 
 It can be translated into the language of meta- 
 physics, of Christian theology, or of modern 
 science, and it remains incorruptibly coherent. 
 
 His method of study was the only method 
 which can obtain results in philosophy, self-study 
 unconsciously carried on. He observed the child, 
 and guessed at what was going on in its mind by 
 a comparison with what he knew of himself. 
 He was anxious to train young children intelli- 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 3 
 
 gently, and he found it necessary to describe 
 and formulate his knowledge of the operation of 
 their minds. It turns out that he made a state- 
 ment of the universe more comprehensive, a 
 philosophy more universal, than any other of 
 which we have any record. 
 
 But this is not the most important thing he 
 did. He devised a method based upon his 
 experiments and set agoing the kindergarten 
 upon its course in conquest of the world. If it 
 had not been for this, he might never have been 
 heard of, for the world has small use for systems 
 of philosophy, however profound, expressed in 
 terms which have been superseded and are 
 become inexpressive. But Froebel started a 
 practice. He showed the way. He put in the 
 hands of persons to whom his philosophy must 
 ever remain a mystery, the means of working 
 out those practical ends for which that philoso- 
 phy was designed. 
 
 The greatness of Froebel lies in this, that he 
 saw the essential. What sort of an animal is 
 man? asks the morphologist, for he is beginning 
 to reach this point in his studies; and before he 
 has asked it, Froebel has answered him. 
 
 "Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast 
 thou ordained strength." 
 
 It may be said at once that the substance of 
 everything Froebel says was known before. 
 Solomon and Orpheus, Marcus Aurelius, Emer- 
 
4 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 son, and all of us have known it. Otherwise 
 Froebel would be unimportant. It is his correla- 
 tion and his formulation of the main facts about 
 human life that make him important. It is as a 
 summary of wisdom, as a focus of idea, as a lens 
 through which the rest of the ideas in the world 
 can be viewed, that he is great. 
 
 The laws he discovered may be stated in a 
 paragraph. The child is a growing organism. 
 It is a unity. It develops through creative 
 activity. It is benefited by contact with other 
 children and is happy in proportion as it is 
 unselfishly employed. 
 
 Let us assume for a moment that these things 
 are true, that they are the most important 
 truths about the child ; and let us see how they 
 must affect our views of life, of politics, sociology, 
 art, religion, conduct. There is of course no 
 moment at which the child ceases to be a child. 
 The laws of its growth and being are not at any 
 discoverable time superseded by any new laws, 
 Man as a creature, as an organism, has here by 
 Froebel, and for the first time in history, been 
 ingenuously studied, and the main laws of him 
 noted. With the discovery that he is a unity, 
 there vanishes every classification of science 
 made since the days of Aristotle. They are 
 convenient dogmas, thumb rule distinctions, 
 useful as aids in the further pushing of our 
 studies into the workings of this unity. Take 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 5 
 
 up now a book of political economy, a poem, a 
 history: this thought of Froebel's runs through 
 it like quicksilver. The scheme of thought of 
 the writer is by it dissolved at once into human 
 elements. You find you are studying the opera- 
 tion of the mind of some one, whom you picture 
 to yourself as a man, as a unit; you are inter- 
 preting this by your own experience. It is all 
 psychology, you are pushing your analysis. The 
 universe is receiving its interpretation through 
 you yourself. We are thus brought to the point 
 of view of the mystic, as the only conceivable 
 point of view. 
 
 "That the organism develops by creative 
 activity," This might have come as a deduction 
 from Darwin. It is an expression in metaphys- 
 ical language of the "struggle for life." Froebel 
 discovered it independently. The consequences 
 of a belief in it are so tremendous, that no man 
 who is not prepared to spend the rest of his life 
 completely dominated by the idea, ought even 
 to pause to consider it. 
 
 Your capacities, your beliefs, your develop- 
 ment, your spiritual existence, are the result of 
 what you do. Active creation of some sort, 
 occupation which takes your entire attention 
 and calls upon you, merely incidentally and as a 
 matter of course, for thought, resource, individ- 
 ual or original force; this will develop you and 
 nothing else will. 
 
6 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 The connection between this thought and the 
 previous one is apparent. It is only by such 
 creative activity that the organism as a unit 
 gets into play. If you set a man copying or 
 memorizing, you have occupied only a fraction 
 of him. It you set him to making something, 
 the minute he begins, his attention is concen- 
 trated. Willy nilly he is trying to make some- 
 thing significant, he is endeavoring to express 
 himself, the forces and powers within him begin 
 coming to his succor, offering aid and suggestion. 
 Before he knows it, his whole being is in opera- 
 tion. The result is a statement of some sort, 
 and in the process of making it the creature has 
 developed. But when you say "significant" 
 you have already implied the existence of other 
 organisms. He is not expressing himself only, 
 he is expressing them all, and here comes Froebel 
 with his third great discovery, that it is by con- 
 stant personal intercourse with others that the 
 power to express is gained. And on top of this 
 comes the last law, so closely related to the third 
 as to be merely a new view of it, but discovered 
 by experiment, tested by practice, announced 
 empirically and as a fact, that the child is un- 
 selfish and only really happy when at work 
 creatively and for the use and behoof of others. 
 
 This conclusion throws back its rays over the 
 course of the argument, and we are compelled 
 to see, what we have already known, that 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 1 
 
 unselfishness and intellectual development are 
 one and the same thing, that there is no failure 
 of intellect which cannot be expressed in terms 
 of selfishness, and no selfishness that cannot be 
 expressed as intellectual shortcoming. Crim- 
 inology has reached the same point by another 
 route. 
 
 The matter is really very simple, for anything 
 self-regardant means a return of the organism 
 upon itself, a stepping on your own toes, and 
 brings self-consciousness, discomfort, pain. Self- 
 sacrifice on the other hand brings fulfillment. 
 The self-sacrifice is always illusory, and the 
 development real. This becomes frightfully 
 apparent in ingenuous and unhappy love affairs, 
 for the organism robbed of fulfillment returns 
 upon itself. 
 
 It makes little difference what province of 
 thought we begin with in applying these views 
 to the world. They give results like a table of 
 logarithms. They do more than this, they 
 unravel the most complex situations, they give 
 the key to conduct and put a compass in the 
 hands of progress. They explain history, they 
 support religion, they justify instinct, they 
 interpret character. They give the formula for 
 doing consciously what mankind has been doing 
 unconsciously in so far as it has been doing what 
 any one of us in his soul approves of or cares to 
 imitate. 
 
8 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 Let us take up the most obvious deductions. 
 If people develop according to their activities, 
 their opinions will be a mere reflex of their 
 conduct. What they see in the world comes out 
 of what they do in the world. Here in a mere 
 niche of Froebel we find the whole of Emerson. 
 
 The power and permanence of Sainte-Beuve 
 are due to his having applied this theory to the 
 interpretation of literature. He is not content 
 till he has seen the relation between the conduct 
 and the opinions, the conduct and the art of a 
 character. 
 
 Or take Emerson himself, why was it that 
 being so much he was not more? How came it 
 that after his magnificent prologue in the Phi 
 Beta Kappa address, which is like the opening of 
 a symphony, he relapsed into iteration and 
 brilliant but momentary visions of his own 
 horizon? He kept repeating his theme till he 
 piped himself into fragmentary inconsequence. 
 The reason is that he had learned all he knew 
 before he retired to Concord and contemplation. 
 Active life would have made him blossom annu- 
 ally and last like Gladstone. 
 
 Or take Goethe: all that is questionable in 
 him results from his violation of two of Froebel's 
 laws of psychology. He fixed his attention upon 
 self-development and thereby gradually ossified. 
 Every moment of egotism was an intellectual 
 loss. His contact with people, meanwhile. 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 9 
 
 became more and more formal as he grew older, 
 and his work more and more inexpressive. 
 
 Give me a man's beliefs, and I will give you 
 his occupation. What has happened to that 
 radical that he seems to have become so moder- 
 ate and reasonable? You find that for six 
 months he has been clerk to the Civil Service 
 Reform Club. Why is the mystical poetry of 
 this intellectual man as vacant as the fashion 
 print he edits for his daily bread? His employ- 
 ment has tracked his mind to these unearthly 
 regions. He is dead here too. 
 
 There is no such thing as independent belief, 
 based on evidence and reflection. The thing we 
 call belief is a mere record left by conduct. If 
 you sincerely go through the regimen of Loyola's 
 manual, you will come out a Jesuit. You can no 
 more resist it than you can resist the operation 
 of ether. This man is an optimist. It means 
 that he has struggled. That man is a pessimist. 
 It means that he has shirked. Here is one who 
 has been in touch with all movements for good 
 during a dismal era of corruption, and yet he 
 has no faith. It means that the whole of him 
 has not been enlisted. His conscience has 
 drawn him forward. It is not enough. There 
 is compromise in him. He is not an absolute 
 fighter. 
 
 Here is the most excellent gentleman in 
 America, an old idealist untouchably transcen- 
 
10 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 dental, an educated man. To your amazement 
 he thinks that it is occasionally necessary to 
 subsidize the powers of evil. He was bred a 
 banker. 
 
 Here is a village schoolma'am who from a rag 
 of information in a county paper has divined 
 the true inwardness of a complicated controversy 
 at Washington which you happen to know all 
 about. She has been reforming a poorhouse. 
 
 A is a clergyman, good but ineffective. He 
 relies on beneficence and persuasion. He does 
 not know the world better than a club loafer 
 knows it. The only entry to it is by attack, the 
 only progress by action. 
 
 B is a good fellow, yet betrays a momentary 
 want of delicacy which gives you a shock, and 
 which you forgive him, saying: "It is a coarse- 
 ness of natural fiber." It is no such thing. 
 There is in every man a natural fiber as fine as a 
 poet's. His coarseness is the residuum of an act. 
 
 You meet a man whom you have known as a 
 court stenographer, and whom you have sup- 
 posed to be drowned in worldly cares. At a 
 chophouse he gives you a discourse on Plato's 
 Phaedrus, which he interprets in a novel way. 
 The brains of the man surprise you. This man, 
 though he looks sordid, positively must have 
 been sending a younger brother to college during 
 many years. There is no other explanation of 
 him. 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 11 
 
 The nemesis of conduct then stalks about in 
 the form of a natural law, not as the pseudo 
 science of fancy, but as a mode of growth, 
 modestly formulated by a great naturalist. 
 
 Take the matter up on its other side. You 
 can only discover in the universe, try how you 
 will, strain your eyes how you please, you can 
 only see what you have lived. Out of our ac- 
 tivity comes our character, and it is with this 
 that we see beauty or ugliness, hope or despair. 
 It is by this that we gauge the operation of 
 economic law and of all other spiritual forces. 
 It is with this that we interpret all things. What 
 we see is only our own lives. 
 
 We are all more or less in contact with human 
 life. We live in a pandemonium, a paradise of 
 illustrations, and if we have only eyes to see, 
 there is enough in any tenement house to-day to 
 lay bare the heart and progress of Greek art. 
 
 But the worst is to come — the horror that 
 makes intellect a plaything. By a double 
 consequence the past fetters the future. Once 
 take any course and our eyes begin to see it as 
 right, our hearts to justify it. Only lighting can 
 save us, and we see nothing to fight for. Thral- 
 dom enters, and night like death where no voice 
 reaches. The eternal struggle is for vision. 
 
 How idiotic are the compliments or the 
 contempt of the inexperienced! Nothing but 
 life teaches, Hallam thinks Juliet immodest, 
 
12 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 and he had read all the literatures of Europe. 
 If you want to understand the Greek civilization 
 you have got to be Sophocles. If you want to 
 understand the New Testament you have got 
 to be Christ. If you want to understand that 
 most complex and difficult of all things, the 
 present, you must be some or all of it, some of it 
 any way. You must have it ground into you by 
 a contact so wrenchingly close, by a struggle so 
 severe, that you lose consciousness, and after- 
 wards — next year — you will understand. 
 
 Here is the reaction familiar to all men since 
 the dawn of history, which makes the man of 
 action the hero of all times. It goes in courage, 
 it comes out power. 
 
 This reaction, this transformation, goes for- 
 ward in the very stuff that we are made of, and 
 if we come to look at it closely, we are obliged to 
 speak of it in terms of consciousness. There are 
 so many different kinds of consciousness that 
 the best we can do is to remind some one else of 
 the kind we mean. The hand of the violinist is 
 unconscious to the extent that it is functioning 
 properly, and as his command over music 
 develops this unconsciousness creeps up his 
 arm and possesses his brain and being, until he, 
 as he plays, is completely wwself-conscious and 
 his music is the mere projection of an organism 
 which is functioning freely. 
 
 But this condition of complete concentration 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 13 
 
 makes us in a different sense of the word self- 
 conscious in the highest degree, self-comprehend- 
 ing, self-controlled, self-expressing. And it is in 
 this philosophical sense that the word self- 
 conscious is used by the Germans, and may 
 sometimes be conveniently used by us, if we can 
 do so without foregoing the right to use the 
 words conscious and unconscious in their popular 
 sense at other times. 
 
 The discovery of Froebel was that this 
 mastery over our own powers was to be obtained 
 only through creative activity. The suggestion, 
 it may be noted, is destined to reorganize every 
 school of violin playing in Europe. For we have 
 here the major canon of a rational criticism. 
 We find that in the old vocabulary such words 
 as genius, temperament, style, originality, etc., 
 have always been fumblingly used to denote 
 different degrees in which some man's brain was 
 working freely and with full self-consciousness. 
 A deliverance of this kind has always been 
 designated as "creative,' ' no matter in what field 
 it was found. 
 
 Approaching the matter more closely, we see 
 that the whole of the man must have responded 
 in real life to every particle of experience which 
 he uses in his work. An imitation means some- 
 thing which does not represent an original 
 unitary vibration. 
 
 Goethe puts in the mouth of the mad Gretchen 
 
14 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 a snatch of German song in imitation of Ophelia. 
 The treatment does not fit the character. It 
 has only been through that part of Goethe's 
 mind with which he read Shakespeare. As a 
 sequel to this suggestion, the peasant of the 
 early scenes has lavished upon her all the 
 various reminiscences of the pathetic that 
 Goethe could muster. It is moving, but it is 
 inorganic. It is not true. 
 
 For note this, that while it takes the whole of 
 a man to do anything true, no matter how 
 small, anything that the whole of him does is 
 right. Hence the inimitable grotesques of 
 greatness, the puns in tragedy. These things 
 belong to the very arcana of nature. By and by, 
 when the reasons are understood, nature will be 
 respected. No one will attempt to imitate 
 genius, or to reproduce an artistic effect of any 
 kind. 
 
 If we look at recent literature by the light of 
 this canon, we find the reason for its inferiority. 
 It is the work of half minds, of men upon whose 
 intelligence the weight of a dogma is pressing. 
 
 The eclipse of philosophy was of course 
 reflected in fiction. There is the same trouble 
 with Herbert Spencer as with Zola. Each of 
 them thinks to wrest the secrets of sociology 
 from external observation. Their books lack 
 objectivity and are ephemeral. Kant and Balzac 
 did better because their method was truer. 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 15 
 
 Everything good that has been done in the 
 last fifty years has been done in the teeth of 
 current science. The whole raft of English 
 scientists are children playing with Raphael's 
 brushes the moment they leave some specialty. 
 There never lived a set of men more blinded by 
 dogma, blinded to the meaning of the past, to 
 the trend of the future, by the belief that they 
 had found new truth. Not one of them can lift 
 the stone and show what lies under Darwin's 
 demonstration. They run about with little 
 pamphlets and proclaim a New Universe like 
 Frenchmen. They bundle up all beliefs into a 
 great Dogma of Unbelief, and throw away the 
 kernel of life with the shell. This was inevitable. 
 A generation or two v/as well sacrificed, in this 
 last fusillade of the Dogma of Science — the old 
 guard dogma that dies but never surrenders. 
 Hereafter it will be plain that the whole matter 
 is a matter of symbols on the one hand, knowl- 
 edge of human nature on the other. 
 
 Herbert Spencer has been a useful church- 
 warden to science, but his knowledge of life was 
 so trifling, his own personal development so 
 one-sided, that his sociology is a farce. 
 
 This canon of criticism explains in a very 
 simple manner the art ages, times when appar- 
 ently every one could paint, or speak, or com- 
 pose. The art which is lost is really the art of 
 courageous action. Neither war nor dogma 
 
16 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 nor revolution is necessary, for feeling can no 
 more be lost than force, and the power to express 
 it depends upon an interest in life. The past 
 has enriched us with conventions, and whenever 
 a man or a group of men arises who uses them 
 and is not subdued to them, we have art. The 
 thing is easy. To the doers it is a mere knack 
 of the attention. 
 
 We had almost thought that art was finished, 
 and we find we are standing at the beginning of 
 all things. Froebel has found a formula which 
 fits every human activity. 
 
 Let us take the supreme case, the apogee of 
 human development, and what will it be? 
 
 The sum of all possible human knowledge is, 
 as we have seen, an expansion of our under- 
 standing of human nature, and this is got by 
 intercourse, by dealing with men, by getting 
 them to do something. In order to make them 
 do it, in order to govern, you must understand, 
 and the rulers of mankind are the wisest of the 
 species. They summarize society. Solomon, 
 Caesar, Hildebrand, Lincoln, Bismarck, these 
 men knew their world. 
 
 But if a virtuous ruler be the prototype of all 
 possible human fulfillment, there is no other art 
 or province of employment to which the same 
 views do not apply. When any man reaps 
 some of the power which his toil has sown, and 
 throws it out as a note or a book or a statue, it 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 17 
 
 has an organic relation to the human soul and 
 is valuable forever. There is only one rule of 
 art. Let a man work at a thing till it looks 
 right to him. Let him adjust and refine it till, 
 as he looks at it, it passes straight into him, and 
 he grows for a moment unconscious again, that 
 the forces which produced it may be satisfied. 
 As it stands then, it is the best he can do. In so 
 far as we completely develop this power we be- 
 come completely happy and completely useful, for 
 our acts, our statements, our notes, our books, 
 our statues, become universally significant. 
 
 Once feel this truth, and you begin to lose the 
 sense of your identity, to know that your 
 destiny, your self, is an organic part of all men. 
 It is they that speak. It is themselves that 
 have been found and expressed. It was this 
 toward which we tended, this that we cared for 
 — action, art, intellect, unselfishness, are they 
 not one thing? 
 
 The complete development of every individual 
 is necessary to our complete happiness. And 
 there is no reason why any one who has ever 
 been to a dull dinner party should doubt this. 
 Nay, history gives proof that solitude is danger- 
 ous. Man cannot sing, nor write, nor paint, 
 nor reform, nor build, nor do anything except 
 die, alone. The reasons for this are showered 
 upon us by the idea of Froebel, no matter which 
 side of it is turned toward us. 
 
18 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 This philosophy which seemed so dry till we 
 began to see what it meant, begins now to cir- 
 cumscribe God and include everything. For 
 Christ himself was one whose thoughts were 
 laws and whose deeds are universal truth. 
 Shakespeare's plays are universal truth. They 
 are the projection of a completely developed 
 and completely unconscious human intellect. 
 They educated Germany, and it is to the study 
 of them that Hegel's view of life is due. The 
 great educational forces in the world are propor- 
 tioned in power to the development of the 
 individual man in the epochs they date from. 
 Here and there, out of a hotbed, arises a personal 
 influence which directs thought for a thousand 
 years and qualifies time forever. 
 
 The division of the old ethics into egoism 
 and altruism receives the sanction of science. 
 The turning of the attention upon selfish ends, 
 no matter how remote nor how momentary, 
 hurts the organism, contracts the intellect, 
 dries up the emotions, and is felt as unhappiness. 
 The turning of the attention toward public aims 
 benefits the organism, enlarges the intellect, 
 and is felt as happiness. There is no complexity 
 possible, for any mixed motive is a selfish 
 motive. 
 
 All the virtues are different names for the 
 injunction of self-mastery, by which the internal 
 struggle is made more severe, and the force 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 19 
 
 cooped in and controlled until it is released in 
 the functioning of the whole man. 
 
 In any sincere struggle for right, then, no 
 matter how petty, we are fighting for mankind, 
 and this is just what everybody has always 
 known, always believed. 
 
 It is thrown at us as a great paradox, that 
 somebody must pay the bills; that if you live 
 upon charity and can succeed in getting yourself 
 crucified, you are still a mere product of thrift 
 and selfishness somewhere. But the paradox is 
 the same if put the other way, for selfishness 
 would never support you. 
 
 The question is purely one of fact, what thing 
 comes first, what thing satisfies the heart of 
 man. He may support himself merely as a 
 means to help others. A man may start a 
 pauper and die a millionaire, and yet never 
 think a thought or do an act which does not add 
 to the welfare of man. It is a question of 
 ultimate controlling intention. 
 
 Man the microcosm is a kingdom where 
 reigns continual war. Now he is a furnace of 
 love, the next moment he is a mean scamp. We 
 know very little about the mechanism by which 
 these microcosms communicate with one an- 
 other. It seems likely that every iota of feeling 
 must be either transmitted or transformed; 
 that if a spasm of selfishness be conveyed, or 
 some part of it, even by a glimpse of the eye, it 
 
20 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 must leave a record of injury and start on a 
 career of injury, just so much loss to the world. 
 On the other hand it may be transformed into 
 the other kind of force and expended later in 
 good. 
 
 The thing is governed by some simple law, 
 although man has not yet been able to reduce 
 it to algebra. What is most curious is this, 
 that the tendency of any man to believe in the 
 reaction as a law, is not dependent upon his 
 scientific training, but upon his moral experience. 
 The best heads in physics will still betray a 
 belief that a man must be able to afford to be 
 unselfish, that selfishness often does good, that 
 it is a muddled up affair, and a thing outside of 
 science which they will get round to later. 
 Everybody sees a few degrees in the arc of this 
 law. Read the index on the quadrant and you 
 will have his character. Now and then some 
 saint swears he sees a circle. 
 
 Let us press the inquest. It is not likely that 
 life itself is duplex or consists of two kinds of 
 force, one egoistic, one altruistic. The likelihood 
 is the other way. There is only one force which 
 vibrates through these organisms. It is abso- 
 lutely beneficent only when it completely con- 
 trols one of them, so that the whole thing 
 sings together. 
 
 This music is the highest, but the notes that 
 go to make it up are everywhere. Altruism 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 21 
 
 does not arise, is not imposed from without, at 
 any period or by any crisis, by progress or by 
 society. The spiral unwinds with the unwind- 
 ing life upon the globe. It is the form of illusion 
 under which all life proceeds. It is the law of 
 mind. The eye treats space and color as entities. 
 It cannot see on any other terms. The stomach 
 digests food, but not its own lining. We are 
 obliged to think in terms of the objective 
 universe. We are not wholesome unless we are 
 self- forgetting. There is no cranny in all the 
 million manifestations of nature where you can 
 interfere between the organism and its object 
 without representing disease. 
 
 And man is more than a mere altruistic 
 animal. At least the religions of Humanity 
 have never expressed him. At those times 
 when he is entirely unselfish and therefore 
 entirely himself, when he feels himself to be one 
 single well-spring, all unselfishness, all love, all 
 reverence, all service to something not himself, 
 yet something personal, he has faith. The 
 theologies are attempts to formulate this state of 
 mind in order that it may be preserved. It is 
 clear enough that every mind must speak in its 
 own symbols, and that the symbols of one must 
 always appear to another as illusions. Yet each 
 man for himself knows he faces a reality. This 
 is a psychological necessity. Destroy the belief, 
 and on the instant he changes. Show him that 
 
22 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 he is the victim of an illusion, and he is divided, 
 a half man. A man whose mind is divided, as, 
 for instance, by the consciousness of a personal 
 motive, cannot believe. He stands Hke the 
 wicked king in the play of Hamlet; unable to 
 pray. It is a psychological impossibility. 
 
 The concern of mankind for their forms of 
 doctrine is gratuitous. Faith re-appears under 
 new names. You cannot convince a lover that 
 he is bent on self-development, nor any decent 
 man that he does not believe in, is not controlled 
 by, something higher than himself. The question 
 is not one of words. 
 
 We may trace this reverent attitude of mind 
 upward through the acts and activities of the 
 spirit, and it makes no difference whether we 
 regard religion as the source and origin of them 
 all or as the summary of them all. 
 
 In Shakespeare's plays we see a cycle of 
 human beings, the most living that we have 
 ever met with, and the absence of mystical or 
 emotional religion from many of the plays is one 
 of the wonders of nature. There is no God any- 
 where, and God is everywhere; we are not 
 offended. The reason may be that the element 
 has been employed in the act of creation. 
 Religion has been consumed in the development 
 of character. It is felt in the relation of Shake- 
 speare to the characters. It is here seen as 
 artistic perfection. The same is true of the 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 23 
 
 Greek statues and of the Sistine Sibyls, and of 
 other work left by those two periods, the only 
 other periods in which the individual attained 
 completion. 
 
 Observe that in all this philosophy there is no 
 dogma anywhere, no term whose definition you 
 have to learn, no term which makes the lying 
 claim that it can be used twice with the same 
 connotation. Froebel had the instinct of a poet 
 and knew his language was figurative. It was 
 this that freed him from the Middle Ages and 
 gave him to the future. He took theology as 
 lightly as he took metaphysics. He did not 
 impose them, he evoked them. He lived and 
 thought in the spirit. 
 
 If you turn from Froebel's analysis of human 
 nature to Goethe's, there seem to be a thousand 
 years between them. The one is scientific, the 
 other is mediaeval. The one has freed himself 
 from the influences of the revival of learning, 
 the other has not. The one is open, the other is 
 closed. The one is free, the other is self-con- 
 scious. But Froebel has not yet set free the 
 rest of the race, and of course the literature and 
 practices of the kindergartners are full of dogmas. 
 The terms of Froebel are a snare to those whose 
 interest in childhood came later than their 
 interest in education and whose attention is 
 fixed upon the terms rather than upon the child. 
 He is easy reading to the other sort. 
 
24 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 But more important than Froebel's formu- 
 lation of these great truths was his formulation 
 of subsidiary truths. I do not mean his labored 
 systems, but his practical suggestions born of 
 experience as to how to help another person to 
 develop. It was these methods, this attitude of 
 the teacher towards the child, of the individual 
 towards his fellow, that came at me in my 
 own house unexpectedly, emanating from some 
 unknown mind, which seemed so great as 
 practically to include Christianity. 
 
 "Do not imagine," he says at every moment, 
 "that you can do anything for this creature 
 except by getting it to move spontaneously. 
 You have not begun till you have done this, and 
 remember that anything else you do is just so 
 much harm." 
 
 He was never tired of suggesting devices for 
 doing this. The following passage gives in a 
 few words the answer to the most important 
 practical question in life: how we ought to 
 approach another human being. The thing is 
 said so simply, it seems almost • commonplace, 
 yet it comes from one greater than Kant. 
 
 "Between educator and pupil, between re- 
 quest and obedience, there should invisibly rule 
 a third something to which educator and pupil 
 are equally subject. This third something is the 
 right, the best, necessarily conditioned and ex- 
 pressed without arbitrariness in the circum- 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 25 
 
 stances. The calm recognition, the clear 
 knowledge, and the serene, cheerful obedience 
 to the rule of this third something, is the par- 
 ticular feature that should be constantly and 
 clearly manifest in the bearing and the conduct 
 of the educator and teacher, and often firmly 
 and sternly emphasized by him." 
 
 Beneath this statement there lies a law of 
 reaction. The human organism responds in 
 kind. Strike a man and he strikes, sneer and he 
 sneers, forget and he forgets. If you wish to 
 convince him that you are right, concede that 
 from his point of view he is right, then move 
 the point and he follows. If you keep your 
 temper in teaching a child, you teach him to 
 keep his temper, and this is more important 
 than his lesson. 
 
 The difficulty we find is to resist the reaction 
 in ourselves to some one else's initiative. The 
 affair is outside the province of reason, and 
 results from a transfer of force by means which 
 we do not understand. The command to "turn 
 the other cheek" is a picturesque figure for the 
 attitude which will enable you to prevail the 
 quickest and by the highest means, and which 
 Froebel enables us to see in its scientific aspect. 
 
 But it is unnecessary to illustrate further 
 what any one who comes in contact with a 
 kindergarten will, through all the mists of 
 dogma and ignorance which overspread the 
 
26 EDUCATION: FROEBEL 
 
 place, discover for himself. We have a science 
 founded upon human nature, applied to educa- 
 tion. Mr. Hughes in his closing paragraph 
 uses the language of theology, but he makes no 
 overstatement : — 
 
 "When Froebel's ethical teaching has wrought 
 its perfect work in the homes, the schools, and 
 the churches, then his complete ideal, which is 
 the gospel ideal in practice, will be the greatest 
 controlling and uplifting force in the world." 
 
 One word more about the relation between 
 Froebel's thought and current science. 
 
 The view of man as an active animal, a 
 struggler, alive and happy only in activity, falls 
 in naturally with what we know of the animal 
 kingdom. The philosophers are at war over 
 science and religion, over the origin of the non- 
 self-regarding instincts. By an external con- 
 sideration of the animal hierarchy they have 
 come to certain conclusions which they strive to 
 apply to the highest animal, man. There is 
 great boggling over him, because these non- 
 self-regarding instincts, which are not very 
 apparent from the outside, seem to conflict 
 with certain generalizations relative to the 
 conservation of species. The scientists look 
 into a drop of water and see animals eating 
 each other up. What they have not seen is that 
 all this ferocity goes forward, subject to customs 
 as rigid as a military code, and that it is this 
 
EDUCATION: FROEBEL 27 
 
 code which conserves the species. The "struggle 
 for existence" as it is commonly conceived 
 would exterminate in short order any species 
 that indulged in it. 
 
 Meanwhile Froebel, beginning at the other 
 end of the scale and studying life from the 
 inside, has established certain facts, certain 
 laws, which have as great a weight, and deserve 
 as much to be carried downward in the scale, as 
 the generalizations of the naturalists (very likely 
 imperfect) have to be carried upward. 
 
 The animal man is unselfish. It is impossible 
 to make his organism vibrate as a unity except 
 by some emotion which can be shown to be non- 
 self-regarding. At what point in the scale of 
 nature does this quality begin to manifest 
 itself? Is the dog happy when he is selfish: do 
 the laws of psychology outlined by Froebel 
 apply, and to what extent do they apply, to the 
 horse or the monkey? These things must be 
 patiently studied, and the corrections must be 
 made. In the mean time, in dealing with man 
 himself, we are obliged to rely upon the latest 
 scientific report of him, however imperfect, and 
 until Froebel's laws are destroyed, we need not 
 attempt to adjust our ideas of man to the 
 dogmas developed by the study of the lower 
 animals. 
 
IN KEILHAU 
 
 Reprinted by permission from The Story of my Life, by Georg 
 fibers. 
 
 KEILHAU! How much is comprised 
 in that one short word ! 
 It recalls to my memory the 
 pure happiness of the fairest period 
 of boyhood, a throng of honored, beloved, and 
 merry figures, and hundreds of stirring, bright. 
 and amusing scenes in a period of life rich in 
 instruction and amusement, as well as the stage 
 so lavishly endowed by Nature on which they 
 were performed. Jean Paul has termed melan- 
 choly the blending of joy and pain, and it was 
 doubtless a kindred feeling which filled my 
 heart in the days before my departure, and 
 induced me to be particularly good and obliging 
 to everybody in the house. My mother took us 
 once more to my father's grave in the Drei- 
 faltigkeits cemetery, where I made many good 
 resolutions. Only the best reports should reach 
 home from Keilhau, and I had already obtained 
 excellent ones in Berlin. 
 
 On the evening of our departure there were 
 numerous kisses and farewell glances at all that 
 was left behind ; but when we were seated in the 
 
IN KEILHAU 29 
 
 car with my mother, rushing through the land- 
 scape adorned with the most luxuriant spring 
 foHage, my heart suddenly expanded, and the 
 pleasure of travel and delight in the many new 
 scenes before me destroyed every other feeling. 
 The first vineyard I saw at Naumburg — I had 
 long forgotten those on the Rhine — interested 
 me deeply; the Rudelsburg at Kosen, the ruins 
 of a real ancient castle, pleased me no less be- 
 cause I had never heard Franz Kugler's song: 
 
 "Beside the Saale's verdant strand 
 Once stood full many a castle grand, 
 But roofless ruins are they all; 
 The wind sweeps through from hall to hall; 
 Slow drift the clouds above," 
 
 which refers to this charming part of the Thu- 
 ringian hill country. We were soon to learn to 
 sing it at Keilhau. Weimar was the first goal of 
 this journey. We had heard much of our classic 
 poets; nay, I knew Schiller's Bell and some of 
 Goethe's poems by heart, and we had heard 
 them mentioned with deep reverence. Now we 
 were to see their home, and a strange emotion 
 took possession of me when we entered it. 
 
 Every detail of this first journey has remained 
 stamped on my memory. I even know what we 
 ordered for supper at the hotel where we spent 
 the night. But my mother had a severe head- 
 ache, so we saw none of the sights of Weimar 
 
30 IN KEILHAU 
 
 except the Goethe house in the city and the other 
 one in the park. I cannot tell what my feelings 
 were, they are too strongly blended with later 
 impressions. I only know that the latter espe- 
 cially seemed to me very small. I had imagined 
 the "Goethe House" like the palace of the 
 Prince of Prussia or Prince Radziwill in Wilhelm- 
 strasse. The Grand Duke's palace, on the 
 contrary, appeared aristocratic and stately. We 
 looked at it very closely, because it was the 
 birthplace of the Princess of Prussia, of whom 
 Fraulein Lamperi had told us so much. 
 
 The next morning my m.other v/as well again. 
 The railroad connecting Weimar and Rudolstadt, 
 near which Keilhau is located, was built long 
 after, so we continued our journey in an open 
 carriage and reached Rudolstadt about noon. 
 
 After we had rested a short time, the carriage 
 which was to take us to Keilhau drove up. 
 
 As we were getting in, an old gentleman ap- 
 proached, who instantly made a strong impres- 
 sion upon me. In outward appearance he bore a 
 marked resemblance to Wilhelm Grimm. I 
 should have noticed him among hundreds; for 
 long gray locks, parted in the middle, floated 
 around a nobly formed head, his massive yet 
 refined features bore the stamp of a most kindly 
 nature, and his eyes were the mirror of a pure, 
 childlike soul. The rare charm of their sunny 
 sparkle, when his warm heart expanded to 
 
IN KEILHAU 31 
 
 pleasure or his keen intellect had succeeded in 
 solving any problem, comes back vividly to my 
 memory as I write, and they beamed brightly 
 enough when he perceived our companion. 
 They were old acquaintances, for my mother had 
 been to Keilhau several times on Martin's ac- 
 count. She addressed him by the name of 
 Middendorf, and we recognized him as one of 
 the heads of the institute, of whom we had heard 
 many pleasant things. 
 
 He had driven to Rudolstadt with the "old 
 bay," but he willingly accepted a seat in pur car- 
 riage. 
 
 We had scarcely left the street with the hotel 
 behind us, when he began to speak of Schiller, 
 and pointed out the mountain which bore his 
 name and to which in his "Walk" he had cried: 
 
 "Hail! oh my Mount, with radiant crimson 
 peak." 
 
 Then he told us of the Lengefeld sisters, whom 
 the poet had so often met here, and one of whom, 
 Charlotte, afterward became his wife. All this 
 was done in a way which had no touch of peda- 
 gogy or of anything specially prepared for chil- 
 dren, yet every word was easily understood and 
 interested us. Besides, his voice had a deep, 
 musical tone, to which my ear was susceptible at 
 an early age. He understood children of our 
 disposition and knew what pleased them. 
 
32 IN KEILHAU 
 
 In Schaale, the first village through which we 
 passed, he said, pointing to the stream which 
 flowed into the Saale close by: "Look, boys, 
 now we are coming into our own neighborhood, 
 the valley of the Schaal. It owes its name to 
 this brook, which rises in our own meadows, and 
 I suppose you would like to know why our village 
 is called Keilhau?" 
 
 While speaking, he pointed up the stream and 
 briefly described its course. 
 
 We assented. 
 
 We had passed the village of Schaale. The one 
 before us, with the church, was called Eichfeld, 
 and at our right was another which we could not 
 see, Lichtstadt. In ancient times, he told us, the 
 mountain sides and the bottom of the whole 
 valley had been clothed with dense oak forests. 
 Then people came who wanted to till the ground. 
 They began to clear (lichten) these woods at 
 Lichtstadt. This was a difficult task, and they 
 had used axes (Keile) for the purpose. At 
 Eichfeld they felled the oaks (Eiche), and carried 
 the trunks to Schaale, where the bark (Schale) 
 was stripped off to make tan for the tanners on 
 the Saale. So the name of Lichtstadt came from 
 the clearing of the forests, Eichfeld from the felling 
 of the oaks, Schaale from stripping off the hark, 
 and Keilhau from the hewing with axes. 
 
 This simple tale of ancient times had sprung 
 from the Thuringian soil, so rich in legends, and, 
 
IN KEILHAU 33 
 
 little as it might satisfy the etymologist, it de- 
 lighted me. I believed it, and when afterward I 
 looked down from a height into the valley and 
 saw the Saale, my imagination clothed the bare 
 or pine-clad mountain slopes with huge oak for- 
 ests, and beheld the giant forms of the ancient 
 Thuringians felling the trees with their heavy 
 axes. 
 
 The idea of violence which seemed to be con- 
 nected with the name of Keilhau had suddenly 
 disappeared. It had gained meaning to me, 
 and Herr Middendorf had given us an excellent 
 proof of a fundamental requirement of Friedrich 
 Froebel, the founder of the institution: "The 
 external must be spiritualized and given an inner 
 significance." 
 
 The same talented pedagogue had said, "Our 
 education associates instruction with the external 
 world which surrounds the human being as child 
 and youth"; and Middendorf carried out this 
 precept when, at the first meeting, he questioned 
 us about the trees and bushes by the wayside, 
 and when we were obliged to confess our igno- 
 rance of most of them, he mentioned their names 
 and described their peculiarities. 
 
 At last we reached the Keilhau plain, a bowl 
 whose walls formed tolerably high mountains 
 which surrounded it on all sides except toward 
 Rudolstadt, where an opening permitted the 
 Schaalbach to wind through meadows and fields. 
 
34 IN KEILHAU 
 
 So the village lies like an egg in a nest open in one 
 direction, like the beetle in the calyx of a flower 
 which has lost one of its leaves. Nature has 
 girded it on three sides with protecting walls 
 which keep the wind from entering the valley, 
 and to this, and the delicious, crystal-clear water 
 which flows from the mountains into the pumps, 
 its surprising healthfulness is doubtless due. 
 During my residence there of four and a half 
 years there was no epidemic disease among the 
 boys, and on the fiftieth jubilee of the institute, 
 in 1867, which I attended, the statement was 
 made that during the half century of its existence 
 only one pupil had died, and he had had heart 
 disease when his parents sent him to the school. 
 
 We must have arrived on Sunday, for we met 
 on the road several peasants in long blue coats, 
 and peasant women in dark cloth cloaks with 
 gold-embroidered borders, and little black caps 
 from which ribbons three or four feet long hung 
 down the wearers' backs. The cloaks descended 
 from mother to daughter. They were very 
 heavy, yet I afterward saw peasant women wear 
 them to church in summer. 
 
 At last we drove into the broad village street. 
 At the right, opposite to the first houses, lay a 
 small pond called the village pool, on which ducks 
 and geese floated, and whose dark surface, 
 glittering with many hues, reflected the shep- 
 herd's hut. After we had passed some very fine 
 
IN KEILHAU 35 
 
 farmhouses, we reached the "Plan," where 
 bright waters plashed into a stone trough, a 
 linden tree shaded the dancing-ground, and a 
 pretty house was pointed out as the schoolhouse 
 of the village children. 
 
 A short distance farther away the church rose 
 in the background. But we had no time to look 
 at it, for we were already driving up to the 
 institute itself, which was at the end of the 
 village, and consisted of two rows of houses with 
 an open space closed at the rear by the wide 
 front of a large building. 
 
 The bakery, a small dwelling, and the large 
 gymnasium were at our left ; on the right, the so- 
 called Lower House, with the residences of the 
 head-masters' families, and the school and sleep- 
 ing-rooms of the smaller pupils, whom we dubbed 
 the " Panzen," and among whom were boys only 
 eight and nine years old. 
 
 The large house before whose central door — to 
 which a flight of stone steps led — we stopped, 
 was the Upper House, our future home. 
 
 Almost at the same moment we heard a loud 
 noise inside, and an army of boys came rushing 
 down the steps. These were the "pupils," and 
 my heart began to throb faster. 
 
 They gathered around the Rudolstadt carriage 
 boldly enough and stared at us. I noticed that 
 almost all were bareheaded. Many wore their 
 hair falling in long locks down their backs. The 
 
36 IN KEILHAU 
 
 few who had any coverings used black velvet 
 caps, such as in Berlin would be seen only at the 
 theater or in an artist's studio. 
 
 Middendorf had stepped quickly among the 
 lads, and as they came running up to take his 
 hand or hang on his arm we saw how they loved 
 him. 
 
 But we had little time for observation. 
 Barop, the head-master, was already hastening 
 down the steps, welcoming my mother and our- 
 selves with his deep, musical tones, in a pure 
 Westphalian dialect. 
 
 Entering the Institute. 
 
 Barop's voice sounded so sincere and cordial 
 that it banished every thought of fear, otherwise 
 his appearance might have inspired boys of our 
 age with a certain degree of timidity, for he was 
 a broad-shouldered man of gigantic stature, who, 
 like Middendorf, v/ore his gray hair parted in the 
 middle, though it was cut somewhat shorter. A 
 pair of dark eyes sparkled under heavy, bushy 
 brows, which gave them the aspect of clear 
 springs shaded by dense thickets. They now gazed 
 kindly at us, but later we were to learn their 
 irresistible power. I have said, and I still think, 
 that the eyes of the artist, Peter Cornelius, are 
 the most forceful I have ever seen, for the very 
 genius of art gazed from them. Those of our 
 Barop produced no weaker influence in their 
 
IN KEILHAU 37 
 
 way, for they revealed scarcely less impressively 
 the character of a man. To them, especially, 
 was due the implicit obedience that every one 
 rendered him. When they flashed with indigna- 
 tion the defiance of the boldest and most re- 
 fractory quailed. But they could sparkle 
 cheerily, too, and whoever met his frank, kindly 
 gaze felt honored and uplifted. 
 
 Earnest, thoroughly natural, able, strong, 
 rehable, rigidly just, free from any touch of 
 caprice, he lacked no quality demanded by his 
 arduous profession, and hence he whom even 
 the youngest addressed as "Barop" never failed 
 for an instant to receive the respect which was 
 his due, and, moreover, had from us all the 
 voluntary gift of affection, nay, of love. He 
 was, I repeat, every inch a man. 
 
 When very young, the conviction that the 
 education of German boys was his real calling 
 obtained so firm a hold upon his mind that he 
 could not be dissuaded from giving up the study 
 of the law, in which he had made considerable 
 progress at Halle, and devoting himself to 
 pedagogy. 
 
 His father, a busy lawyer, had threatened him 
 with disinheritance if he did not relinquish his 
 intention of accepting the by no means brilliant 
 position of a teacher at Keilhau ; but he remained 
 loyal to his choice, though his father executed 
 his threat and cast him off. After the old gentle- 
 
38 IN KEILHAU 
 
 man's death his brothers and sisters voluntarily 
 restored his portion of the property, but, as he 
 himself told me long after, the quarrel with one 
 so dear to him saddened his life for years. For 
 the sake of the "fidelity to one's self" which he 
 required from others he had lost his father's love, 
 but he had obeyed a resistless inner voice, and 
 the genuineness of his vocation was to be 
 brilliantly proved. 
 
 Success followed his efforts, though he assumed 
 the management of the Keilhau Institute under 
 the most difficult circumstances. 
 
 Beneath its roof he had found in the niece of 
 Friedrich Froebel a beloved wife, peculiarly 
 suited both to him and to her future position. 
 She was as little as he was big, but what energy, 
 what tireless activity this dainty, delicate 
 woman possessed ! To each one of us she showed 
 a mother's sympathy, managed the whole great 
 household down to the smallest details, and 
 certainly neglected nothing in the care of her 
 own sons and daughters. 
 
 A third master, the archdeacon Langethal, 
 was one of the founders of the institution, but 
 had left it several years before. 
 
 As I mention him with the same warmth that 
 I speak of Middendorf and Barop, many readers 
 will suspect that this portion of my reminis- 
 cences contains a receipt for favors, and that 
 reverence and gratitude, nay, perhaps the fear 
 
IN KEILHAU 39 
 
 of injuring an institution still existing, induces 
 me to show only the lights and cover the shad- 
 ows with the mantle of love. 
 
 I will not deny that a boy from eleven to fifteen 
 years readily overlooks in those who occupy an 
 almost paternal relation to him faults which 
 would be immediately noted by the unclouded 
 eyes of a critical observer; but I consider myself 
 justified in describing what I saw in my youth 
 exactly as it impressed itself on my memory. I 
 have never perceived the smallest liaw or even a 
 trait or act worthy of censure in either Barop, 
 Middendorf, or Langethal. Finally, I may say 
 that, after having learned in later years from 
 abundant data willingly placed at my disposal 
 by Johannes Barop, our teacher's son and the 
 present master of the institute, the most minute 
 details concerning their character and work, 
 none of these images have sustained any ma- 
 terial injury. 
 
 In Friedrich Froebel, the real founder of the 
 institute, who repeatedly lived among us for 
 months, I have learned to know from his own 
 works and the comprehensive amount of litera- 
 ture devoted to him, a really talented idealist, 
 who on the one hand cannot be absolved from an 
 amazing contempt for or indifference to the 
 material demands of life, and on the other 
 possessed a certain artless selfishness which 
 gave him courage, whenever he wished to pro- 
 
40 IN KEILHAU 
 
 mote objects undoubtedly pure and noble, to 
 deal arbitrarily with other lives, even where it 
 could hardly redound to their advantage. I 
 shall have more to say of him later. 
 
 The source of Middendorf's greatness in the 
 sphere where life and his own choice had placed 
 him may even be imputed to him as a fault. He, 
 the most enthusiastic of all Froebel's disciples, 
 remained to his life's end a lovable child, in 
 whom the powers of a rich poetic soul surpassed 
 those of the thoughtful, well-trained mind. He 
 would have been ill-adapted for any practical 
 position, but no one could be better suited to 
 enter into the soul-life of young human beings, 
 cherish and ennoble them. 
 
 A deeper insight into the lives of Barop and 
 Langethal taught me to prize these men more 
 and more. 
 
 They have all rested under the sod for decades, 
 and though their institute, to which I owe so 
 much, has remained dear and precious, and the 
 years I spent in the pleasant Thuringian moun- 
 tain valley are numbered among the fairest in 
 my Hfe, I must renounce making proselytes for 
 the Keilhau Institute, because when I saw its 
 present head for the last time, as a very young 
 man, I heard from him, to my sincere regret, 
 that, since the introduction of the law of military 
 service, he found himself compelled to make the 
 course of study at Rudolstadt conform to the 
 
IN KEILHAU 41 
 
 system of teaching in a Realschule.* He was 
 forced to do so in order to give his graduates the 
 certificate for the one year's miHtary service. 
 
 The classics, formerly held in such high esteem 
 beneath its roof, must now rank below the 
 sciences and modern languages, which are re- 
 garded as most important. But love for Ger- 
 many and the development of German character, 
 which Froebel made the foundation of his 
 method of education, are too deeply rooted there 
 ever to be extirpated. Both are as zealously 
 fostered in Keilhau now as in former years. 
 
 After a cordial greeting from Barop, we had 
 desks assigned us in the schoolroom, which were 
 supplied with piles of books, writing materials, 
 and other necessaries. Ludo's bed stood in the 
 same dormitory with mine. Both were hard 
 enough, but this had not damped our gay spirits, 
 and when we were taken to the other boys we 
 were soon playing merrily with the rest. 
 
 The first difficulty occurred after supper, and 
 proved to be one of the most serious I encoun- 
 tered during my stay in the school. 
 
 My mother had unpacked our trunks and ar- 
 ranged everything in order. Among the articles 
 were some which were new to the boys, and 
 special notice was attracted by several pairs of 
 kid gloves and a box of pomade which belonged 
 
 * School in which the arts and sciences as well as the 
 languages are taught. — Tr. 
 
42 IN KEILHAU 
 
 in our pretty leather dressing-case, a gift from 
 my grandmother. 
 
 Dandified, or, as we should now term them, 
 "dudish" afifairs, were not allowed at Keilhau; 
 so various witticisms were made which culmi- 
 nated when a pupil of about our own age from 
 a city on the Weser called us Berlin pomade-pots. 
 This vexed me, but a Berlin boy always has an 
 answer ready, and mine was defiant enough. 
 The matter might have ended here had not the 
 same lad stroked my hair to see how Berlin 
 pomade smelt. From a child nothing has been 
 more unendurable than to feel a stranger's hand 
 touch me, especially on the head, and, before I 
 was aware of it, I had dealt my enemy a resound- 
 ing slap. Of course, he instantly rushed at me, 
 and there would have been a violent scuflfle had 
 not the older pupils interfered. If we wanted to 
 do anything, we must wrestle. This suited my 
 antagonist, and I, too, was not averse to the 
 contest, for I had unusually strong arms, a 
 well-developed chest, and had practiced wres- 
 tling in the Berlin gymnasium. 
 
 The struggle began under the direction of the 
 older pupils, and the grip on which I had relied 
 did not fail. It consisted in clutching the an- 
 tagonist just above the hips. If the latter were 
 not greatly my superior, and I could exert my 
 whole strength to clasp him to me, he was lost. 
 This time the clever trick did its duty, and my 
 
IN KEILHAU 43 
 
 adversary was speedily stretched on the ground. 
 I turned my back on him, but he rose, panting 
 breathlessly, "It's like a bear squeezing one.** 
 In reply to every question from the older boys 
 who stood around us laughing, he always made 
 the same answer, "Like a bear." 
 
 I had reason to remember this very common 
 incident in boy life, for it gave me the nickname 
 used by old and young till after my departure. 
 Henceforward I was always called "the bear.'* 
 Last year I had the pleasure of receiving a visit 
 from Dr. Bareuther, a member of the Austrian 
 Senate and a pupil of Keilhau. We had not met 
 for forty years, and his first words were: "Look 
 at me. Bear. Who am I?" 
 
 My brother had brought his nickname with 
 him, and everybody called him Ludo instead of 
 Ludwig. The pretty, bright, agile lad, who also 
 never flinched, soon became especially popular, 
 and my companions were also fond of me, as I 
 learned, when, during the last years of my stay 
 at the institute, they elected me captain of the 
 first Bergwart — that is, commander-in-chief of 
 the whole body of pupils. 
 
 My first fight secured my position forever. 
 We doubtless owed our initiation on the second 
 day into everything which was done by the 
 pupils, both openly and secretly, to the good 
 impression made by Martin. There was nothing 
 wrong, and even where mischief was concerned 
 
44 IN KEILHAU 
 
 I can term it to-day "harmless," The new boys 
 or "foxes" were not neglected or "hazed," as in 
 many other schools. Only every one, even the 
 newly arrived younger teachers, was obliged to 
 submit to the "initiation." This took place in 
 winter, and consisted in being buried in the snow 
 and having pockets, clothing, nay, even shirts, 
 filled with the clean but wet mass. Yet I remem- 
 ber no cold caused by this rude baptism. My 
 mother remained several days with us, and as 
 the weather was fine she accompanied us to the 
 neighboring heights — the Kirschberg, to which, 
 after the peaceful cemetery of the institute was 
 left behind, a zigzag path led; the Kolm, at 
 whose foot rose the Upper House; and the 
 Steiger, from whose base flowed the Schaalbach, 
 and whose summit afforded a view of a great 
 portion of the Thuringian Mountains. 
 
 We older pupils afterwards had a tall tower 
 erected there as a monument to Barop, and the 
 prospect from its lofty summit, which is more 
 than a thousand feet high, is magnificent. 
 
 Even before the completion of this lookout, 
 the view was one of the most beautiful and 
 widest far or near, and we were treated like most 
 newcomers. During the ascent our eyes were 
 bandaged, and when the handkerchief was 
 removed a marvelous picture appeared before 
 our astonished gaze. In the foreground, toward 
 the left, rose the wooded height crowned by the 
 
IN KEILHAU 45 
 
 stately ruins of the Blankenburg. Beyond 
 opened the beautiful leafy bed of the Saale, 
 proudly dominated by the Leuchtenburg. Be- 
 fore us there was scarcely any barrier to the 
 vision; for behind the nearer ranges of hills one 
 chain of the wooded Thuringian Mountains 
 towered beyond another, and where the horizon 
 seemed to close the grand picture, peak after 
 peak blended with the sky and the clouds, and 
 the light veil of mist floating about them seemed 
 to merge all into an indivisible whole. 
 
 I have gazed from this spot into the distance 
 at every hour of the day and season of the year. 
 But the fairest time of all on the Steiger was at 
 sunset, on clear autumn days, when the scene 
 close at hand, where the threads of gossamer 
 were floating, was steeped in golden light, the 
 distance in such exquisite tints — from crimson 
 to the deepest violet blue, edged with a line of 
 light — the Saale glimmered with a silvery luster 
 amid its fringe of alders, and the sun flashed on 
 the glittering panes of the Leuchtenburg. 
 
 We were now old enough to enjoy the magnifi- 
 cence of this prospect. My young heart swelled 
 at the sight; and if in after years my eyes could 
 grasp the charm of a beautiful landscape and my 
 pen successfully describe it, I learned the art here. 
 
 It was pleasant, too, that my mother saw all 
 this with us, though she must often have gone to 
 rest very much wearied from her rambles. But 
 
46 IN KEILHAU 
 
 teachers and pupils vied with each other in atten- 
 tions to her. She had won all hearts. We 
 noticed and rejoiced in it till the day came when 
 she left us. 
 
 She was obliged to start very early in the 
 morning, in order to reach Berlin the same 
 evening. The other boys were not up, but 
 Barop, Middendorf, and several other teachers 
 had risen to take leave of her. A few more 
 kisses, a wave of her handkerchief, and the 
 carriage vanished in the village. Ludo and I 
 were alone, and I vividly remember the moment 
 when we suddenly began to weep and sob as 
 bitterly as if it had been an eternal farewell. 
 How often one human being becomes the sun of 
 another's life! And it is most frequently the 
 mother who plays this beautiful part. 
 
 Yet the anguish of parting did not last very 
 long, and whoever had watched the boys playing 
 ball an hour later would have heard our voices 
 among the merriest. Afterwards we rarely had 
 attacks of homesickness, there were so many new 
 things in Keilhau, and even familiar objects 
 seemed changed in form and purpose. 
 
 From the city we were in every sense trans- 
 ferred to the woods. 
 
 True, we had grown up in the beautiful park 
 of the Thiergarten, but only on its edge ; to live 
 in and with Nature, "become one with her," as 
 Middendorf said, we had not learned. 
 
IN KEILHAU 47 
 
 I once read in a novel by Jensen, as a well- 
 attested fact, that during an inquiry made in a 
 charity school in the capital a considerable 
 number of pupils had never seen a butterfly or 
 a sunset. We were certainly not to be classed 
 among such children. But our intercourse with 
 Nature had been limited to formal visits which 
 we were permitted to pay the august lady at 
 stated intervals. In Keilhau she became a 
 famiUar friend, and we therefore were soon 
 initiated into many of her secrets; for none 
 seemed to be withheld from our Middendorf and 
 Barop, whom duty and inclination alike 
 prompted to sharpen our ears also for her 
 language. 
 
 The Keilhau games and walks usually led up 
 the mountains or into the forest, and here the 
 older pupils acted as teachers, but not in any 
 pedagogical way. Their own interest in what- 
 ever was worthy of note in Nature was so keen 
 that they could not help pointing it out to their 
 less experienced companions. 
 
 On our "picnics" from Berlin we had taken 
 dainty mugs in order to drink from the wells; 
 now we learned to seek and find the springs 
 themselves, and how delicious the crystal fluid 
 tastes from the hollow of the hand, Diogenes's 
 drinking-cup ! 
 
 Old Councillor Wellmer, in the Cred6 House, 
 in Berlin, a zealous entomologist, owned a large 
 
48 IN KEILHAU 
 
 collection of beetles, and had carefully impaled 
 his pets on long slender pins in neat boxes, 
 which filled numerous glass cases. They lacked 
 nothing but life. In Keilhau we found every 
 variety of insect in central Germany, on the 
 bushes and in the moss, the turf, the bark of 
 trees, or on the flowers and blades of grass, and 
 they were alive and allowed us to watch them. 
 Instead of neatly written labels, living lips told 
 us their names. 
 
 We had listened to the notes of the birds in the 
 Thiergarten; but our mother, the tutor, the 
 placards, our nice clothing, prohibited our 
 following the feathered songsters into the 
 thickets. But in Keilhau we were allowed to 
 pursue them to their nests. The woods were 
 open to every one, and nothing could injure our 
 plain jackets and stout boots. Even in my 
 second year at Keilhau I could distinguish all the 
 notes of the numerous birds in the Thuringian 
 forests, and, with Ludo, began the collection of 
 eggs whose increase afforded us so much pleasure. 
 Our teachers' love for all animate creation had 
 made them impose bounds on the zeal of the 
 egg-hunters, who were required always to leave 
 one egg in the nest, and if it contained but one 
 not to molest it. How many trees we climbed, 
 what steep cliffs we scaled, through what crevices 
 we squeezed to add a rare egg to our collection; 
 nay, we even risked our limbs and necks! Life 
 
IN KEILHAU 49 
 
 is valued so much less by the young, to whom it 
 is brightest, and before whom it still stretches in 
 a long vista, than by the old, for whom its 
 charms are already beginning to fade, and who 
 are near its end. 
 
 I shall never forget the afternoon when, sup- 
 plied with ropes and poles, we went to the Owl 
 Mountain, which originally owed its name to 
 Middendorf, because when he came to Keilhau 
 he noticed that its xocky slope served as a home 
 for several pairs of horned owls. Since then their 
 numbers had increased, and for some time larger 
 night birds had been flying in and out of a 
 certain crevice. 
 
 It was still the laying season, and their nests 
 must be there. Climbing the steep precipice 
 was no easy task, but we succeeded, and were 
 then lowered from above into the crevice. At 
 that time we set to work with the delight of 
 discoverers, but now I frown when I consider 
 that those who let first the daring Albrecht von 
 Calm, of Brunswick, and then me into the chasm 
 by ropes were boys of thirteen or fourteen at the 
 utmost. Marbod, my companion's brother, 
 was one of the strongest of our number, and we 
 were obliged to force our way like chimney 
 sweeps by pressing our hands and feet against 
 the walls of the narrow rough crevice. Yet it 
 now seems a miracle that the adventure resulted 
 in no injury. Unfortunately, we found the 
 
50 IN KEILHAU 
 
 young birds already hatched, and were compelled 
 to return with our errand unperformed. But we 
 afterward obtained such eggs, and their form is 
 more nearly ball-shape than that seen in those 
 of most other birds. We knew how the eggs of 
 all the feathered guests of Germany were colored 
 and marked, and the chest of drawers contain- 
 ing our collection stood for years in my mother's 
 attic. When I inquired about it a few years ago, 
 it could not be found, and Ludo, who had helped 
 in gathering it, lamented its loss with me. 
 
 FRIEDRICH FROEBEL'S IDEAL OF EDUCATION 
 
 Dangerous enterprises were of course forbid- 
 den, but the teachers of the institute neglected 
 no means of training our bodies to endure every 
 exertion and peril; for Froebel was still alive, 
 and the ideal of education, for whose realization 
 he had established the Keilhau school, had 
 become to his assistants and followers strong 
 and healthy realities. But Froebel's purpose did 
 not require the culture of physical strength. 
 His most marked postulates were the preserva- 
 tion and development of the individuality of the 
 boys intrusted to his care, and their training in 
 German character and German nature; for he 
 beheld the sum of all the traits of higher, purer 
 manhood united in those of the true German.* 
 
 *What he terms "German" in his writings means 
 manly and human in its higher sense. 
 
IN KEILHAU 51 
 
 Love for the heart, strength for the character, 
 seemed to him the highest gifts with which he 
 could endow his pupils for life. 
 
 He sought to rear the boy to unity with him- 
 self, with God, with Nature, and with mankind, 
 and the way led to trust in God through religion, 
 trust in himself by developing the strength of 
 mind and body, and confidence in mankind— 
 that is, in others, by active relations with life 
 and a loving interest in the past and present 
 destinies of our fellow-men. This required an 
 eye and heart open to our surroundings, socia- 
 bility, and a deeper insight into history. Here 
 Nature seems to be forgotten. But Nature 
 comes into the category of religion, for to him 
 religion means: To know and feel at one with 
 ourselves, with God, and with man; to be loyal 
 to ourselves, to God, and to Nature; and to re- 
 main in continual active, living relations with 
 God. 
 
 The teacher must lead the pupils to men as 
 well as to God and Nature, and direct them 
 from action to perception and thought. For 
 action he takes special degrees, capacity, skill, 
 trustworthiness; for perception, consciousness, 
 insight, clearness. Only the practical and 
 clear-sighted man can maintain himself as a 
 thinker, opening out as a teacher new trains 
 of thought, and comprehending the basis of 
 
52 IN KEILHAU 
 
 what is already acquired and the laws which 
 govern it. 
 
 Froebel wishes to have the child regarded as a 
 bud on the great tree of life, and therefore each 
 pupil needs to be considered individually, devel- 
 oped mentally and physically, fostered and 
 trained as a bud on the huge tree of the human 
 race. Even as a system of instruction, education 
 ought not to be a rigid plan, incapable of mod- 
 ification; it should be adapted to the individu- 
 ality of the child, the period in which it is growing 
 to maturity, and its environment. The child 
 should be led to feel, work, and act by its own 
 experiences in the present and in its home, not 
 by the opinions of others or by fixed, prescribed 
 rules. From independent, carefully directed 
 acts and knowledge, perceptions, and thoughts, 
 the product of this education must come forth — 
 a man, or, as it is elsewhere stated, a thorough 
 German. At Keilhau he is to be perfected, 
 converted into a finished production without 
 a flaw. If the institute has fulfilled its duty to 
 the individual, he will be: 
 
 To Ms native land, a brave son in the hour of 
 peril, in the spirit of self-sacrifice and sturdy 
 strength. 
 
 To the family, a faithful child and a father who 
 will secure prosperity. 
 
 To the state, an upright, honest, industrious 
 citizen. 
 
IN KEILHAU 63 
 
 To the army, a clear-sighted, strong, healthy, 
 brave soldier and leader. 
 
 To the trades, arts, and sciences, a skilled helper, 
 an active promoter, a worker accustomed to 
 thorough investigation, who has grown to 
 maturity in close intercourse with Nature. 
 
 To Jesus Christ, a faithful disciple and brother; 
 a loving, obedient child of God. 
 
 To mankind, a human being according to the 
 image of God, and not according to that of a 
 fashion journal. 
 
 No one is reared for the drawing-room; but 
 where there is a drawing-room in which mental 
 gifts are fostered and truth finds an abode, a 
 true graduate of Keilhau will be an ornament. 
 "No instruction in bowing and tying cravats is 
 necessary; people learn that only too quickly," 
 said Froebel. 
 
 The right education must be a harmonious 
 one, and must be thoroughly in unison with the 
 necessary phenomena and demands of human 
 life. 
 
 Thus the Keilhau system of education must 
 claim the whole man, his inner as well as his outer 
 existence. Its purpose is to watch the nature of 
 each individual boy, his peculiarities, traits, 
 talents, above all, his character, and afford to all 
 the necessary development and culture. It 
 follows step by step the development of the 
 human being, from the almost instinctive 
 
54 IN KEILHAU 
 
 impulse to feeling, consciousness, and will. At 
 each one of these steps each child is permitted to 
 have only what he can bear, understand, and 
 assimilate, while at the same time it serves as a 
 ladder to the next higher step of development 
 and culture. In this way Froebel, whose own 
 notes, collected from different sources, we are 
 here following, hopes to guard against a defective 
 or misdirected education; for what the pupil 
 knows and can do has sprung, as it were, from 
 his own brain. Nothing has been learned, but 
 developed from within. Therefore the boy who 
 is sent into the world will understand how to use 
 it, and possess the means for his own further 
 development and perfection from step to step. 
 Every human being has a talent for some 
 calling or vocation, and strength for its develop- 
 ment. It is the task of the institute to cultivate 
 the powers which are especially requisite for the 
 future fulfillment of the calling appointed by 
 Nature herself. Here, too, the advance must be 
 step by step. Where talent or inclination lead, 
 every individual will be prepared to deal with 
 even the greatest obstacles, and must possess 
 even the capacity to represent externally what 
 has been perceived and thought — that is, to 
 speak and write clearly and accurately — for in 
 this way the intellectual power of the individual 
 will first be made active and visible to others. 
 We perceive that Froebel strongly antagonizes 
 
IN KEILHAU 55 
 
 the Roman postulate that knowledge should be 
 imparted to boys according to a thoroughly 
 tested method and succession approved by the 
 mature human intellect, and which seem most 
 useful to it for later life. 
 
 The systematic method which, up to the time 
 of Pestalozzi, prevailed in Germany, and is 
 again embodied in our present mode of educa- 
 tion, seemed to him objectionable. The Swiss 
 reformer pointed out that the mother's heart 
 had instinctively found the only correct system 
 of instruction, and set before the pedagogue the 
 task of watching and cultivating the child's 
 talents with maternal love and care. He utterly 
 rejected the old system, and Froebel stationed 
 himself as a fellow-combatant at his side, but 
 went still further.* This stand required a high 
 degree of courage at the time of the founding of 
 Keilhau, when Hegel's influence was omnipotent 
 in educational circles, for Hegel set before the 
 school the task of imparting culture, and forgot 
 that it lacked the most essential conditions; for 
 the school can give only knowledge, while true 
 education demands a close relation between the 
 person to be educated and the world from which 
 
 * Pestalozzi seemed to him in too great haste to fit the 
 child for practical life. His mind should first lie before 
 the teacher like an open book, and the instruction should 
 then relate to whatever most warmly interested the 
 pupil. After this was mastered, progress should first be 
 made step by step. 
 
56 IN KEILHAU 
 
 the school, as Hegel conceived it, is widely 
 sundered. 
 
 Froebel recognized that the extent of the 
 knowledge imparted to each pupil was of less 
 importance, and that the school could not be ex- 
 pected to bestow on each individual a thor- 
 oughly completed education, but an intellect so 
 well trained that when the time came for him to 
 enter into relations with the world and higher 
 instructors he would have at his disposal the 
 means to draw from both that form of culture 
 which the school is unable to impart. He there- 
 fore turned his back abruptly on the old system, 
 denied that the main object of education was to 
 meet the needs of after-life, and opposed having 
 the interests of the child sacrificed to those of the 
 man; for the child in his eyes is sacred, an 
 independent blessing bestowed upon him by 
 God, towards whom he has the one duty of 
 restoring to those who confided it to him in a 
 higher degree of perfection, with unfolded mind 
 and soul, and a body and character steeled 
 against every peril. "A child," he says, "who 
 knows how to do right in his own childish sphere, 
 will grow naturally into an upright manhood." 
 
 With regard to instruction, his view, briefly 
 stated, is as follows: The boy whose special tal- 
 ents are carefully developed, to whom we give 
 the power of absorbing and reproducing every- 
 thing which is connected with his talent, will 
 
IN KEILHAU 57 
 
 know how to assimilate, by his own work in the 
 world and wider educational advantages, every- 
 thing which will render him a perfect and 
 thoroughly educated man. With half the 
 amount of preliminary knowledge in the province 
 of his specialty, the boy or youth dismissed by us 
 as a harmoniously developed man, to whom we 
 have given the methods requisite for the acquisi- 
 tion of all desirable branches of knowledge, will 
 accomplish more than his intellectual twin who 
 has been trained according to the ideas of the 
 Romans (and, let us add, Hegel). 
 
 I think Froebel is right. If his educational 
 principles were the common property of man- 
 kind, we might hope for a realization of Jean 
 Paul's prediction that the world would end with 
 a child's paradise. We enjoyed a foretaste of 
 this paradise in Keilhau. But when I survey 
 our modern gymnasia I am forced to believe 
 that if they should succeed in equipping their 
 pupils with still greater numbers of rules for the 
 future, the happiness of the child would be 
 wholly sacrificed to the interests of the man, 
 and the life of this world would close with the 
 birth of overwise graybeards. I might well be 
 tempted to devote still more time to the educa- 
 tional principles of the man who, from the depths 
 of his full, warm heart, addressed to parents 
 the appeal, "Come, let us live for our children," 
 but it would lead me beyond the allotted limits. 
 
58 TN KEILHAU 
 
 Many of Froebel's pedagogical principles un- 
 doubtedly appear at first sight a pallid theorem, 
 partly a matter of course, partly impracticable. 
 During our stay in Keilhau we never heard of 
 these claims, concerning which we pupils were 
 the subject of experiment. Far less did we feel 
 that we were being educated according to any 
 fixed method. We perceived very little of any 
 form of government. The relation between 
 us and our teachers was so natural and 
 affectionate that it seemed as if no other was 
 possible. 
 
 Yet, when I compared our life at Keilhau with 
 the principles previously mentioned, I found 
 that Barop, Middendorf, and old Langethal, as 
 well as the sub-teachers Bagge, Budstedt, and 
 Schafi"ner, had followed them in our education, 
 and succeeded in applying many of those which 
 seemed the most difficult to carry into execution. 
 This filled me with sincere admiration, though 
 I soon perceived that it could have been done 
 only by men in whom Froebel had transplanted 
 his ideal, men who were no less enthusiastic 
 concerning their profession than he, and whose 
 personality predestined them to solve success- 
 fully tasks which presented difficulties almost 
 unconquerable by others. 
 
 Every boy was to be educated according to his 
 peculiar temperament, with special regard to his 
 disposition, talents, and character. Although 
 
IN KEILHAU 59 
 
 there were sixty of us, this was actually done in 
 the case of each individual. 
 
 Thus the teachers perceived that the endow- 
 ments of my brother, with whom I had hitherto 
 shared everything, required a totally different 
 system of education from mine. While I was set 
 to studying Greek, he was released from it and 
 assigned to modern languages and the arts and 
 sciences. They considered me better suited for 
 a life of study, him qualified for some practical 
 calling or a miHtary career. 
 
 Even in the tasks allotted to each, and the 
 opinions passed upon our physical and mental 
 achievements, there never was any fixed stand- 
 ard. These teachers always kept in view the 
 whole individual, and especially his character. 
 Thereby the parents of a Keilhau pupil were far 
 better informed in many respects than those of 
 our gymnasiasts, who so often yield to the 
 temptation of estimating their sons' work by the 
 greater or less number of errors in their Latin 
 exercises. 
 
 It afforded me genuine pleasure to look 
 through the Keilhau reports. Each contained 
 a description of character, with a criticism of the 
 work accomplished, partly with reference to the 
 pupil's capacity, partly to the demands of the 
 school. Some are little masterpieces of psy- 
 chological penetration. 
 
 Many of those who have followed these 
 
60 IN KEILHAU 
 
 statements will ask how the German nature 
 and German character can be developed in the 
 boys. 
 
 It was thoroughly done in Keilhau. 
 
 But the solution of the problem required men 
 like Langethal and Middendorf, who, even in 
 their personal appearance models of German 
 strength and dignity, had fought for their native 
 land, and who were surpassed in depth and 
 warmth of feeling by no man. 
 
 I repeat that what Froebel termed German 
 was really the higher traits of human character; 
 but nothing was more deeply imprinted on our 
 souls than love for our native land. Here the 
 young voices not only extolled the warlike deeds 
 of the brave Prussians, but recited with equal 
 fervor all the songs with which true patriotism 
 has inspired German poets. Perhaps this 
 delight in Germanism went too far in* many 
 respects; it fostered hatred and scorn of every- 
 thing "foreign," and was the cause of the long 
 hair, and cap, pike, and broad shirt collar worn by 
 many a pupil. Yet their number was not very 
 large, and Ludo, our most intimate friends, and 
 I never joined them. 
 
 Barop himself smiled at their "Teutonism" 
 but indulged it, and it was stimulated by some 
 of the teachers, especially the magnificent 
 Zeller, so full of vigor and joy in existence. I 
 can still see the gigantic young Swiss, as he 
 
IN KEILHAU 61 
 
 made the pines tremble with his "Odin, Odin, 
 death to the Romans!" 
 
 One of the pupils, Count zur Lippe, whose 
 name was Hermann, was called "Arminius," in 
 memory of the conqueror of Varus. But these 
 were external things. 
 
 On the other hand, how vividly, during the 
 history lesson, Langethal, the old warrior of 
 1813, described the course of the conflict for 
 liberty! 
 
 Friedrich Froebel had also pronounced esteem 
 for manual labor to be genuinely and originally 
 German, and therefore each pupil was assigned 
 a place where he could wield spades and pickaxes, 
 roll stones, sow, and reap. 
 
 These occupations were intended to strengthen 
 the body, according to Froebel's rules, and 
 absorbed the greater part of the hours not 
 devoted to instruction. 
 
 Midway up the Dissauberg was the spacious 
 wrestling-ground with the shooting-stand, and 
 in the courtyard of the institute the gymnasium 
 for every spare moment of the winter. There 
 fencing was practiced with fleurets (thrusting 
 swords), not rapiers, which Barop rightly 
 believed had less effect upon developing the 
 agility of youthful bodies. Even when boys of 
 twelve, Ludo and I, like most of the other pupils, 
 had our own excellent rifles, a Christmas gift 
 from our mother, and how quickly our keen 
 
62 IN KEILHAU 
 
 young eyes learned to hit the bull's-eye ! There 
 was good swimming in the pond of the institute, 
 and skating was practiced there on the frozen 
 surface of the neighboring meadow; then we 
 had our coasting parties at the "Upper House" 
 and down the long slope of the Dissau, the 
 climbing and rambling, the wrestling, and jump- 
 ing over the backs of comrades, the ditches, 
 hedges, and fences, the games of prisoner's base 
 which no Keilhau pupil will ever forget, the 
 ball-playing and the various games of running 
 for which there was always time, although at 
 the end of the year we had acquired a sufficient 
 amount of knowledge. The stiffest boy who 
 came to Keilhau grew nimble, the biceps of the 
 veriest weakling enlarged, the most timid nature 
 was roused to courage. Indeed, here, if any- 
 where, it required courage to be cowardly. 
 
 If Froebel and Langethal had seen in the prin- 
 ciple of comradeship the best furtherance of 
 discipline, it was proved here; for we formed 
 one large family, and if any act really worthy of 
 punishment — no mere ebullition of youthful 
 spirits — was committed by any of the pupils, 
 Barop summoned us all, formed us into a court 
 of justice, and we examined into the afifair and 
 fixed the penalty ourselves. For dishonorable 
 acts, expulsion from the institute; for grave 
 offenses, confinement to the room — a punish- 
 ment which pledged even us, who imposed it, to 
 
IN KEILHAU 63 
 
 avoid all intercourse with the culprit for a 
 certain length of time. For lighter misde- 
 meanors the offender was confined to the 
 house or the courtyard. If trivial matters 
 were to be censured this Areopagus was not 
 convened. 
 
 And we, the judges, were rigid executors of the 
 punishment. Barop afterwards told me that he 
 was frequently compelled to urge us to be more 
 gentle. Old Froebel regarded these meetings as 
 means for coming into unity with life. The 
 same purpose was served by the form of our 
 intercourse with one another, the pedestrian 
 excursions, and the many incidents related by 
 our teachers of their own lives, especially the 
 historical instruction which was connected with 
 the history of civilization and so arranged as to 
 seek to make us familiar not only with the deeds 
 of nations and bloody battles, but with the life 
 of the human race. 
 
 In spite of, or on account of, the court of jus- 
 tice I have just mentioned, there could be no 
 informers among us, for Barop only half listened 
 to the accuser, and often sent him harshly from 
 the room without summoning the schoolmate 
 whom he accused. Besides, we ourselves knew 
 how to punish the sycophant so that he 
 took good care not to act as tale-bearer a 
 second time. 
 
64 IN KEILHAU 
 
 Manners, and FroebeVs Kindergarten. 
 
 The wives of the teachers had even more to do 
 with our deportment than the dancing-master, 
 especially Frau Barop and her husband's sister, 
 Frau von Born, who had settled in Keilhau on 
 account of having her sons educated there. 
 
 The fact that the head-master's daughters 
 and several girls, who were friends or relatives of 
 his family, shared many of our lessons, also 
 contributed essentially to soften the manners of 
 the young German savages. 
 
 I mention our "manners" especially because, 
 as I afterwards learned, they had been the 
 subject of sharp differences of opinion between 
 Friedrich Froebel and Langethal, and because 
 the arguments of the former are so character- 
 istic that I deem them worthy of record. 
 
 There could be no lack of delicacy of feeling 
 on the part of the founder of the kindergarten 
 system, who had said, "If you are talking with 
 any one, and your child comes to ask you about 
 anything which interests him, break off your con- 
 versation, no matter what may be the rank of 
 the person who is speaking to you," and who 
 also directed that the child should receive not 
 only love but respect. The first postulate shows 
 that he valued the demands of the soul far above 
 social forms. Thus it happened that during 
 the first years of the institute, which he then 
 governed himself, he was reproached with pay- 
 
IN KEILHAU 65 
 
 ing too little attention to the outward forms, 
 the "behavior," the manners, of the boys in- 
 trusted to his care. His characteristic answer 
 was: "I place no value on these forms unless 
 they depend upon and express the inner self. 
 Where that is thoroughly trained for life and 
 work, externals may be left to themselves, and 
 will supplement the other." The opponent 
 admits this, but declares that the Keilhau 
 method, which made no account of outward 
 form, may defer this "supplement" in a way 
 disastrous to certain pupils. Froebel's answer 
 is: "Certainly, a wax pear can be made much 
 more quickly and is just as beautiful as those on 
 the tree, which require a much longer time to 
 ripen. But the wax pear is only to look at, can 
 barely be touched, far less could it afford refresh- 
 ment to the thirsty and the sick. It is empty — a 
 mere nothing! The child's nature, it is said, 
 resembles wax. Very well, we don't grudge wax 
 fruits to any one who likes them. But nothing 
 must be expected from them if we are ill and 
 thirsty; and what is to become of them when 
 temptations and trials come, and to whom do 
 they not come? Our educational products must 
 mature slowly, but thoroughly, to genuine 
 human beings whose inner selves will be de- 
 ficient in no respect. Let the tailor provide for 
 the clothes." 
 
 Froebel himself was certainly very careless in 
 
66 IN KEILHAU 
 
 the choice of his. The long cloth coat in which 
 I always saw him was fashioned by the village 
 tailor, and the old gentleman probably liked the 
 garment because half a dozen children hung by 
 the tails when he crossed the courtyard. It 
 needed to be durable; but the well-fitting coats 
 worn by Barop and Langethal were equally so, 
 and both men believed that the good gardener 
 should also care for the form of the fruit he 
 cultivates, because, when ripe, it is more valuable 
 if it looks well. They, too, cared nothing for wax 
 fruits; nay, did not even consider them, because 
 they did not recognize them as fruit at all. 
 
 Froebel's conversion was delayed, but after 
 his marriage it was all the more thorough. The 
 choice of this intellectual and kindly natured 
 man, who set no value on the external forms of 
 life, was, I might say, "naturally" a very ele- 
 gant woman, a native of Berlin, the widow of 
 the Kriegsrath Hof meister. She speedily opened 
 Froebel's eyes to the aesthetic and artistic ele- 
 ment in the lives of the boys intrusted to his 
 care — the element to which Langethal, from the 
 time of his entrance into the institution, had 
 directed his attention. 
 
 So in Keilhau, too, woman was to pave the 
 way to greater refinement. 
 
 This had occurred long before our entrance 
 into the institution. Froebel did not allude to 
 wax pears now when he saw the pupils well 
 
IN KEILHAU 67 
 
 dressed and courteous in manner; nay, after- 
 wards, in establishing the kindergarten, he 
 praised and sought to utilize the comprehensive 
 influence upon humanity of "woman," the 
 guardian of lofty morality. Wives and mothers 
 owe him as great a debt of gratitude as children, 
 and should never forget the saying, "The 
 mother's heart alone is the true source of the 
 welfare of the child, and the salvation of human- 
 ity. The fundamental necessity of the hour is 
 to prepare this soil for the noble human blossom, 
 and render it fit for its mission." 
 
 To meet the need mentioned in this sentence 
 the whole labor of the evening of his life was de- 
 voted. Amid many cares and in defiance of 
 strong opposition he exerted his best powers for 
 the realization of his ideal, finding courage to do 
 so in the conviction uttered in the saying, "Only 
 through the pure hands and full hearts of wives 
 and mothers can the kingdom of God become a 
 reaUty." 
 
 Unfortunately, I cannot enter more compre- 
 hensively here into the details of the kindergarten 
 system — it is connected with Keilhau only in so 
 far that both were founded by the same man. 
 Old Froebel was often visited there by female 
 kindergarten teachers and pedagogues who 
 wished to learn something of this new institute. 
 We called the former " Schakelinen " ; the latter, 
 according to a popular etymology, "Schakale." 
 
68 IN KEILHAU 
 
 The odd name bestowed upon the female 
 kindergarten teachers was derived, as I learned 
 afterwards, from no beast of prey, but from a 
 figure in Jean Paul's "Levana," endowed with 
 beautiful gifts. Her name is Madame Jacque- 
 line, and she was used by the author to give 
 expression to his own opinions of female educa- 
 tion. Froebel has adopted many suggestions of 
 Jean Paul, but the idea of the kindergarten arose 
 from his own unhappy childhood. He wished to 
 make the first five years of life, which to him had 
 been a chain of sorrows, happy and fruitful to 
 children — especially to those who, like him, 
 were motherless. 
 
 Sullen tempers, the rod, and the strictest, 
 almost cruel, constraint had overshadowed his 
 childhood, and now his effort was directed to- 
 wards having the whole world of little people 
 join joyously in his favorite cry, "Friede, 
 Freude, Freiheit!" (Peace, Pleasure, Liberty!) 
 which corresponds with the motto of the Jahn 
 gymnasium, "Frisch, Fromm, Frohlich, Frei." 
 
 He also desired to utiHze for public instruction 
 the educational talents which woman undoubt- 
 edly possesses. 
 
 As in his youth, shoulder to shoulder with 
 Pestalozzi, he had striven to rear growing boys 
 in a motherly fashion to be worthy men, he now 
 wished to turn to account, for the benefit of the 
 whole wide circle of younger children, the trait 
 
IN KEILHAU 69 
 
 of maternal solicitude which exists in every 
 woman. Women were to be trained for teachers, 
 and the places where children received their first 
 instruction were to resemble nurseries as closely 
 as possible. He also desired to see the maternal 
 tone prevail in this instruction. 
 
 He, through whose whole life had run the echo 
 of the Saviour's words, "Suffer little children to 
 come unto me," understood the child's nature 
 and knew that its impulse to play must be used, 
 in order to afford it suitable future nourishment 
 for the mind and soul. 
 
 The instruction, the activity, and the move- 
 ments of the child should be associated with the 
 things which most interest him, and meanwhile 
 it should be constantly employed in some 
 creative occupation adapted to its intelligence. 
 
 If, for instance, butter was spoken of, by the 
 help of suitable motions the cow was milked, the 
 milk was poured into a pan and skimmed, the 
 cream was churned, the butter was made into 
 pats and finally sent to market. Then came the 
 payment, which required little accounts. When 
 the game was over, a different one followed, 
 perhaps something which rendered the little 
 hands skillful by preparing fine weaving from 
 strips of paper; for Froebel had perceived that 
 change brought rest. 
 
 Every kindergarten should have a small 
 garden, to afford an opportunity to watch the 
 
70 IN KEILHAU 
 
 development of the plants, though only one at a 
 time — for instance, the bean. By watching the 
 clouds in the sky he directed the childish intel- 
 ligence to the rivers, seas, and circulation of 
 moisture. In the autumn the observation of the 
 chrysalis state of insects was connected with 
 that of the various stages of their existence. 
 
 In this way the child can be guided in its play 
 to a certain creative activity, rendered familiar 
 with the life of Nature, the claims of the house- 
 hold, the toil of the peasants, mechanics, etc., 
 and at the same time increase its dexterity in 
 using its fingers and the suppleness of its body. 
 It learns to play, to obey, and to submit to the 
 rules of the school, and is protected from the 
 contradictory orders of unreasonable mothers 
 and nurses. 
 
 Women and girls, too, M^ere benefited by the 
 kindergarten. 
 
 Mothers, whose time, inclination, or talents, 
 forbade them to devote sufficient time to the 
 child, were relieved by the kindergarten. Girls 
 learned, as if in a preparatory school of future 
 wife and motherhood, how to give the little one 
 what it needed, and, as Froebel expresses it, to 
 become the mediators between Nature and mind. 
 
 Yet even this enterprise, the outcome of pure 
 love for the most innocent and harmless crea- 
 tures, was prohibited and persecuted as perilous 
 to the state under Frederick William IV, during 
 
IN KEILHAU 71 
 
 the period of the reaction which followed the 
 insurrection of 1848. 
 
 THE FOUNDERS OF THE KEILHAU INSTITUTE, AND 
 A GLIMPSE AT THE HISTORY OF THE SCHOOL 
 
 I was well acquainted with the three founders 
 of our institute — Friedrich Froebel, Middendorf , 
 and Langethal — and the two latter were my 
 teachers. Froebel was decidedly "the master 
 who planned it." 
 
 When we came to Keilhau he was already 
 sixty-six years old, a man of lofty stature, with 
 a face which seemed to be carved with a dull 
 knife out of brown wood. 
 
 His long nose, strong chin, and large ears, be- 
 hind which the long locks, parted in the middle, 
 were smoothly brushed, would have rendered 
 him positively ugly, had not his "Come, let us 
 live for our children" beamed so invitingly in his 
 clear eyes. People did not think whether he was 
 handsome or not; his features bore the impress 
 of his intellectual power so distinctly that the 
 first glance revealed the presence of a remarkable 
 man. 
 
 Yet I must confess — and his portrait agrees 
 with my memory — that his face by no means sug- 
 gested the idealist and man of feeling; it seemed 
 rather expressive of shrewdness, and to have 
 been lined and worn by severe conflicts concern- 
 ing the most diverse interests. But his voice 
 
72 IN KEILHAU 
 
 and his glance were unusually winning, and his 
 power over the heart of the child was limitless. 
 A few words were sufficient to win completely 
 the shyest boy whom he desired to attract; and 
 thus it happened that, even when he had been 
 with us only a few weeks, he was never seen 
 crossing the courtyard without a group of the 
 younger pupils hanging to his coat-tails and 
 clasping his hands and arms. 
 
 Usually they were persuading him to tell 
 stories, and when he condescended to do so, older 
 ones flocked around him too, and they were 
 never disappointed. What fire, what animation 
 the old man had retained ! We never called him 
 anything but "Oheim." The word "Onkel" he 
 detested as foreign, because it was derived from 
 "avunculus" and "oncle." With the high 
 appreciation he had of "Xante" — whom he 
 termed, next to the mother, the most important 
 factor of education in the family — our "Oheim" 
 was probably specially agreeable to him. 
 
 He was thoroughly a self-made man. The son 
 of a pastor in Oberweissbach, in Thuringia, he 
 had had a dreary childhood; for his mother died 
 young, and he soon had a stepmother, who 
 treated him with the utmost tenderness until 
 her own children were born. Then an inde- 
 scribably sad time began for the neglected boy, 
 whose dreamy temperament vexed even his own 
 father. Yet in this solitude his love for Nature 
 
IN KEILHAU 73 
 
 awoke. He studied plants, animals, minerals; 
 and while his young heart vainly longed for love, 
 he would have gladly displayed affection himself, 
 if his timidity would have permitted him to do 
 so. His family, seeing him prefer to dissect the 
 bones of some animal rather than to talk with 
 his parents, probably considered him a very 
 unlovable child when they sent him, in his tenth 
 year, to school in the city of Ilm. 
 
 He was received into the home of the pastor, 
 his uncle Hoffman, whose mother-in-law, who 
 kept the house, treated him in the most cordial 
 manner, and helped him to conquer the diffidence 
 acquired during the solitude of the first years of 
 his childhood. This excellent woman first made 
 him familiar with the maternal feminine solici- 
 tude, closer observation of which afterwards led 
 him, as well as Pestalozzi, to a reform of the 
 system of educating youth. 
 
 In his sixteenth year he went to a forester for 
 instruction, but did not remain long. Meantime 
 he had gained some mathematical knowledge, 
 and devoted himself to surveying. By this and 
 similar work he earned a living, until, at the end 
 of seven years, he went to Frankfort-on-the- 
 Main to learn the rudiments of building. There 
 Fate brought him into contact with the peda- 
 gogue Gruner, a follower of Pestalozzi's method, 
 and this experienced man, after their first 
 conversation, exclaimed: 
 
74 IN KEILHAU 
 
 "You must become a schoolmaster!" 
 
 I have often noticed in hfe that a word at the 
 right time and place has sufficed to give the 
 destiny of a human being a different turn, and 
 the remark of the Frankfort educator fell into 
 Froebel's soul like a spark. He now saw his real 
 profession clearly and distinctly before him. 
 
 The restless years of wandering, during which, 
 unloved and scarcely heeded, he had been thrust 
 from one place to another, had awakened in his 
 warm heart a longing to keep others from the 
 same fate. He, who had been guided by no kind 
 hand and felt miserable and at variance with 
 himself, had long been ceaselessly troubled by 
 the problem of how the young human plant 
 could be trained to harmony with itself and to 
 sturdy industry. Gruner showed him that 
 others were already devoting their best powers 
 to solve it, and offered him an opportunity to try 
 his ability in his model school. 
 
 Froebel joyfully accepted this offer, cast aside 
 every other thought, and, with the enthusiasm 
 peculiar to him, threw himself into the new call- 
 ing in a manner which led Gruner to praise the 
 "fire and life" he understood how to awaken in 
 his pupils. He also left it to Froebel to arrange 
 the plan of instruction which the Frankfort 
 Senate wanted for the "model school," and 
 succeeded in keeping him two years in his 
 institution. 
 
IN KEILHAU 75 
 
 When a certain Frau von Holzhausen was 
 looking for a man who would have the ability to 
 lead her spoiled sons into the right path, and 
 Froebel had been recommended, he separated 
 from Gruner and performed his task with rare 
 fidelity and a skill bordering upon genius. The 
 children, who were physically puny, recovered 
 under his care, and the grateful mother made 
 him their private tutor from 1807 till 1810. He 
 chose Verdun, where Pestalozzi was then living, 
 as his place of residence, and made himself 
 thoroughly familiar with his method of educa- 
 tion. As a whole, he could agree with him; but, 
 as has already been mentioned, in some respects 
 he went further than the Swiss reformer. He 
 himself called these years his "university course 
 as a pedagogue," but they also furnished him 
 with the means to continue the studies in natural 
 history which he had commenced in Jena. He 
 had laid aside for this purpose part of his salary 
 as tutor, and was permitted, from 1810 to 1812, 
 to complete in Gottingen his astronomical and 
 mineralogical studies. Yet the wish to try his 
 powers as a pedagogue never deserted him ; and 
 when, in 1812, the position of teacher in the 
 Plamann Institute in Berlin was offered him, he 
 accepted it. During his leisure hours he devoted 
 himself to gymnastic exercises, and even late in 
 Hfe his eyes sparkled when he spoke of his friend, 
 old Jahn, and the political elevation of Prussia. 
 
76 IN KEILHAU 
 
 When the summons "To my People" called 
 the German youth to war, Froebel had already 
 entered his thirty-first year, but this did not 
 prevent his resigning his office and being one of 
 the first to take up arms. He went to the field 
 with the Lutzow Jagers, and soon after made 
 the acquaintance among his comrades of the 
 theological students Langethal and Middendorf. 
 When, after the Peace of Paris, the young 
 friends parted, they vowed eternal fidelity, and 
 each solemnly promised to obey the other's 
 summons, should it ever come. As soon as 
 Froebel took off the dark uniform of the black 
 Jagers he received a position as curator of the 
 museum of mineralogy in the Berlin University, 
 which he filled so admirably that the position of 
 Professor of Mineralogy was offered to him from 
 Sweden. But he declined, for another vocation 
 summoned him which duty and inclination for- 
 bade him to refuse. 
 
 His brother, a pastor in the Thuringian village 
 of Griesheim on the Ilm, died, leaving three sons 
 who needed an instructor. The widow wished 
 her brother-in-law Friedrich to fill this office, 
 and another brother, a farmer in Osterode, 
 wanted his two boys to join the trio. When 
 Froebel, in the spring of 1817, resigned his posi- 
 tion, his friend Langethal begged him to take 
 his brother Eduard as another pupil, and thus 
 Pestalozzi's enthusiastic disciple and comrade 
 
IN KEILHAU 77 
 
 found his dearest wish fulfilled. He was now 
 the head of his own school for boys, and these 
 first six pupils — as he hoped with the confidence 
 in the star of success peculiar to so many men of 
 genius — must soon increase to twenty. Some of 
 these boys were specially gifted: one became 
 the scholar and politician Julius Froebel, who 
 belonged to the Frankfort Parliament of 1848, 
 and another the Jena Professor of Botany, 
 Eduard Langethal. 
 
 The new principal of the school could not 
 teach alone, but he only needed to remind his old 
 army comrade, Middendorf, of his promise, to 
 induce him to interrupt his studies in BerHn, 
 which were nearly completed, and join him. He 
 also had his eye on Langethal, if his hope should 
 be fulfilled. He knew what a treasure he would 
 possess for his object in this rare man. 
 
 There was great joy in the little Griesheim 
 circle, and the Thuringian (Froebel) did not 
 regret for a moment that he had resigned his 
 secure position; but the Westphalian (Midden- 
 dorf) saw here the realization of the ideal which 
 Froebel's kindling words had impressed upon 
 his soul beside many a watch-fire. 
 
 The character of the two men is admirably 
 described in the following passage from a letter 
 of "the oldest pupil": 
 
 "Both had seen much of the serious side of 
 life, and returned from the war with the higher 
 
78 IN KEILHAU 
 
 inspiration which is hallowed by deep religious 
 feeling. The idea of devoting their powers with 
 self-denial and sacrifice to the service of their 
 native land had become a fixed resolution; the 
 devious paths which so many men entered were 
 far from their thoughts. The youth, the young 
 generation of their native land, were alone 
 worthy of their efforts. They meant to train 
 them to a harmonious development of mind and 
 body; and upon these young people their pure 
 spirit of patriotism exerted a vast influence. 
 When we recall the mighty power which Froebel 
 could exercise at pleasure over his fellow men, 
 and especially over children, we shall deem it 
 natural that a child suddenly transported into 
 this circle could forget its past." 
 
 When I entered it, though at that time it was 
 much modified and established on firm founda- 
 tions, I met with a similar experience. It was 
 not only the open air, the forest, the life in 
 Nature which so captivated new arrivals at 
 Keilhau, but the moral earnestness and the ideal 
 aspiration which consecrated and ennobled life. 
 Then, too, there was that "nerve-strengthen- 
 ing" patriotism which pervaded everything, 
 filling the place of the superficial philanthropy 
 of the Basedow system of education. 
 
 But Froebel's influence was soon to draw, as if 
 by magnetic power, the man who had formed an 
 alliance with him amid blood and steel, and whg 
 
IN KEILHAU 79 
 
 was destined to lend the right soHdity to the 
 newly erected structure of the institute — I mean 
 Heinrich Langethal, the most beloved and 
 influential of my teachers, who stood beside 
 Froebel's inspiring genius and Middendorf's 
 lovable warmth of feeling as the character, and 
 at the same time the fully developed and trained 
 intellect, whose guidance was so necessary to 
 the institute. 
 
 The life of this rare teacher can be followed 
 step by step from the first years of his childhood 
 in his autobiography and many other docu- 
 ments, but I can only attempt here to sketch in 
 broad outlines the character of the man whose 
 influence upon my whole inner life has been, up 
 to the present hour, a decisive one. 
 
 The recollection of him makes me inclined to 
 agree with the opinion to which a noble lady 
 sought to convert me — namely, that our lives 
 are far more frequently directed into a certain 
 channel by the influence of an unusual person- 
 ality than by events, experiences, or individual 
 reflections. 
 
 Langethal was my teacher for several years. 
 When I knew him he was totally blind, and his 
 eyes, which are said to have flashed so brightly 
 and boldly on the foe in war, and gazed so 
 winningly into the faces of friends in time of 
 peace, had lost their luster. But his noble 
 features seemed transfigured by the cheerful 
 
80 IN KEILHAU 
 
 earnestness which is pecuHar to the old man, 
 who, even though only with the eye of the mind, 
 looks back upon a well-spent, worthy life, and 
 who does not fear death, because he knows that 
 God who leads all to the goal allotted by Nature 
 destined him also for no other. His tall figure 
 could vie with Barop's, and his musical voice 
 was unusually deep. It possessed a resistless 
 power when, excited himself, he desired to fill 
 our young souls with his own enthusiasm. The 
 blind old man, who had nothing more to com- 
 mand and direct, moved through our merry, 
 noisy life like a silent admonition to good and 
 noble things. Outside of the lessons he never 
 raised his voice for orders or censure, yet we 
 obediently followed his signs. To be allowed to 
 lead him was an honor and pleasure. He made 
 us acquainted with Homer, and taught us 
 ancient and modern history. To this day I 
 rejoice that not one of us ever thought of using 
 a pons asinorum, or copied passage, though he 
 was perfectly sightless, and we were obliged to 
 translate to him and learn by heart whole sec- 
 tions of the Iliad. To have done so would have 
 seemed as shameful as the pillage of an unguarded 
 sanctuary or the abuse of a wounded hero. 
 
 And he certainly was one ! 
 
 We knew this from his comrades in the war 
 and his stories of 1813, which were at once so 
 vivid and so modest. 
 
IN KEILHAU 81 
 
 When he explained Homer or taught ancient 
 history a special fervor animated him; for he 
 was one of the chosen few whose eyes were 
 opened by destiny to the full beauty and sub- 
 limity of ancient Greece. 
 
 I have listened at the university to many a 
 famous interpreter of the Hellenic and Roman 
 poets, and many a great historian, but not one 
 of them ever gave me so distinct an impression 
 of living with the ancients as Heinrich Langethal. 
 There was something akin to them in his pure, 
 lofty soul, ever thirsting for truth and beauty, 
 and, besides, he had graduated from the school 
 of a most renowned teacher. 
 
 The outward aspect of the tall old man was 
 eminently aristocratic, yet his birthplace was 
 the house of a plain though prosperous mechanic. 
 He was born at Erfurt, in 1792. When very 
 young his father, a man unusually sensible and 
 well-informed for his station in life, intrusted 
 him with the education of a younger brother, 
 the one who, as I have mentioned, afterwards 
 became a professor at Jena, and the boy's prog- 
 ress was so rapid that other parents had 
 requested to have their sons share the hours of 
 instruction. 
 
 After completing his studies at the grammar 
 school he wanted to go to Berlin, for, though the 
 once famous university still existed in Erfurt, it 
 had greatly deteriorated. His description of it 
 
82 IN KEILHAU 
 
 is half lamentable, half amusing, for at that 
 time it was attended by thirty students, for 
 whom seventy professors were employed. Never- 
 theless, there were many obstacles to be sur- 
 mounted ere he could obtain permission to 
 attend the Berlin University; for the law 
 required every native of Erfurt, who intended 
 afterwards to aspire to any office, to study at 
 least two years in his native city — at that time 
 French. But, in defiance of all hindrances, he 
 found his way to Berlin, and in 1811 was entered 
 in the university just established there as the 
 first student from Erfurt. He wished to devote 
 himself to theology, and Neander, De Wette, 
 Marheineke, Schleiermacher, etc., must have 
 exerted a great power of attraction over a young 
 man who desired to pursue that study. 
 
 At the latter's lectures he became acquainted 
 with Middendorf. At first he obtained little 
 from either. Schleiermacher seemed to him too 
 temporizing and obscure. "He makes veils."* 
 He thought the young Westphalian, at their 
 first meeting, merely "a nice fellow." But in 
 time he learned to understand the great theolo- 
 gian, and the "favorite teacher" noticed him 
 and took him into his house. 
 
 But first Fichte, and then Friedrich August 
 Wolf, attracted him far more powerfully than 
 Schleiermacher. Whenever he spoke of Wolf 
 
 * A play upon the name, which means veil-maker. 
 
IN KEILHAU 83 
 
 his calm features glowed and his blind eyes 
 seemed to sparkle. He owed all that was best 
 in him to the great investigator, who sharpened 
 his pupil's appreciation of the exhaustless store 
 of lofty ideas and the magic of beauty contained 
 in classic antiquity, and had he been allowed to 
 follow his own inclination, he would have turned 
 his back on theology, to devote all his energies 
 to the pursuit of philology and archeology. 
 
 The Homeric question which Wolf had pro- 
 pounded in connection with Goethe, and which 
 at that time stirred the whole learned world, 
 had also moved Langethal so deeply that, even 
 when an old man, he enjoyed nothing more than 
 to speak of it to us and make us familiar with 
 the pros and cons which rendered him an up- 
 holder of his revered teacher. He had been 
 allowed to attend the lectures on the first four 
 books of the Iliad, and — I have living witnesses 
 of the fact — he knew them all verse by verse, 
 and corrected us when we read or recited them 
 as if he had the copy in his hand. 
 
 True, he refreshed his naturally excellent 
 memory by having them all read aloud. I shall 
 never forget his joyous mirth as he listened to my 
 delivery of Wolf's translation of Aristophanes's 
 Acharnians; but I was pleased that he selected 
 me to supply the dear blind eyes. Whenever he 
 called me for this purpose he already had the 
 book in the side pocket of his long coat, and when 
 
84 IN KEILHAU 
 
 beckoning significantly, he cried, "Come, Bear," 
 I knew what was before me, and would have 
 gladly resigned the most enjoyable game, though 
 he sometimes had books read which were by no 
 means easy for me to understand. I was then 
 fourteen or fifteen years old. 
 
 Need I say that it was my intercourse with 
 this man which implanted in my heart the love 
 of ancient days that has accompanied me 
 throughout my life? 
 
 The elevation of the Prussian nation led 
 Langethal also from the university to the war. 
 Rumor first brought to Berlin the tidings of the 
 destruction of the great army on the icy plains 
 of Russia; then its remnants, starving, worn, 
 ragged, appeared in the capital; and the street- 
 boys, who not long before had been forced by 
 the French soldiers to clean their boots, now 
 with little generosity — they were only "street- 
 boys" — shouted sneeringly, "Say, mounseer, 
 want your boots blacked?" 
 
 Then came the news of the convention of 
 York, and at last the irresolute king put an end 
 to the doubts and delays which probably stirred 
 the blood of every one who is familiar with 
 Droysen's classic "Life of Field-Marshal York." 
 From Breslau came the summons "To my 
 People," which, like a warm spring wind, melted 
 the ice and woke in the hearts of the German 
 youth a matchless budding and blossoming. 
 
IN KEILHAU 85 
 
 The snowdrops which bloomed during those 
 March days of 1813 ushered in the long-desired 
 day of freedom, and the call "To arms ! " found 
 the loudest echo in the hearts of the students. 
 It stirred the young, yet even in those days 
 circumspect, Langethal, too, and showed him his 
 duty. But difficulties confronted him; for 
 Pastor Ritschel, a native of Erfurt, to whom he 
 confided his intention, warned him not to write 
 to his father. Erfurt, his own birthplace, was 
 still under French rule, and were he to com- 
 municate his plan in writing and the letter 
 should be opened in the "black room," with 
 other suspicious mail matter, it might cost the 
 life of the man whose son was preparing to 
 commit high treason by fighting against the 
 ruler of his country — Napoleon, the Emperor of 
 France. 
 
 "Where will you get the uniform, if your 
 father won't help you, and you want to join the 
 black Jiigers?" asked the pastor, and received 
 the answer: 
 
 "The cape of my cloak will supply the 
 trousers. I can have a red collar put on my 
 cloak, my coat can be dyed black and turned 
 into a uniform, and I have a hanger." 
 
 "That's right!" cried the worthy minister, 
 and gave his young friend ten thalers. 
 
 Middendorf, too, reported to the Lutzow 
 Jagers at once, and so did the son of Professor 
 
86 IN KEILHAU 
 
 Bellermann, and their mutual friend Bauer, 
 spite of his delicate health, which seemed to unfit 
 him for any exertion. 
 
 They set off on the 11th of April, and while 
 the spring was budding alike in the outside 
 world and in young breasts, a new flower of 
 friendship expanded in the hearts of these three 
 champions of the same sacred cause; for Lan- 
 gethal and Middendorf found their Froebel. 
 This was in Dresden, and the league formed 
 there was never to be dissolved. They kept 
 their eyes fixed steadfastly on the ideals of 
 youth, until in old age the sight of all three 
 failed. Part of the blessings which were promised 
 to the nation when they set forth to battle they 
 were permitted to see seven lustra later, in 1848, 
 but they did not live to experience the realization 
 of their fairest youthful dream, the union of 
 Germany. 
 
 I must deny myself the pleasure of describing 
 the battles and the marches of the Lutzow corps, 
 which extended to Aachen and Oudenarde; but 
 will mention here that Langethal rose to the 
 rank of sergeant, and had to perform the duties 
 of a first lieutenant; and that, towards the end 
 of the campaign, Middendorf was sent with 
 Lieutenant Reil to induce Bliicher to receive 
 the corps in his vanguard. The old commander 
 gratified their wish; they had proved their 
 fitness for the post when they won the victory 
 
IN KEILHAU 87 
 
 at the Gohrde, where two thousand Frenchmen 
 were killed and as many more taken prisoners. 
 The sight of the battle-field had seemed unendur- 
 able to the gentle nature of Middendorf. He 
 had formed a poetical idea of the campaign as an 
 expedition against the hereditary foe. Now 
 that he had confronted the bloodstained face of 
 war with all its horrors, he fell into a state of 
 melancholy from which he could scarcely rouse 
 himself. 
 
 After this battle the three friends were 
 quartered in Castle Gohrde, and there enjoyed 
 a delightful season of rest after months of severe 
 hardships. Their corps had been used as the 
 extreme vanguard against Davoust's force, 
 which was thrice their superior in numbers, and 
 in consequence they were subjected to great 
 fatigues. They had almost forgotten how it 
 seemed to sleep in a bed and eat at a table. One 
 night march had followed another. They had 
 often seized their food from the kettles and eaten 
 it at the next stopping-place, but all was cheer- 
 fully done; the light-heartedness of youth did 
 not vanish from their enthusiastic hearts. 
 There was even no lack of intellectual aliment, 
 for a little field-library had been established by 
 the exchange of books. Langethal told us of his 
 night's rest in a ditch, which was to entail 
 disastrous consequences. Utterly exhausted, 
 sleep overpowered him in the midst of a pouring 
 
88 IN KEILHAU 
 
 rain, and when he awoke he discovered that he 
 was up to his neck in water. His damp bed — 
 the ditch — had gradually filled, but the sleep 
 was so profound that even the rising moisture 
 had not roused him. The very next morning he 
 was attacked with a disease of the eyes, to which 
 he attributed his subsequent blindness. 
 
 On the 26th of August there was a prospect of 
 improvement in the condition of the corps. 
 Davoust had sent forty wagons of provisions to 
 Hamburg, and the men were ordered to capture 
 them. The attack was successful, but at what 
 a price! Theodor Korner, the noble young poet 
 whose songs will commemorate the deeds of the 
 Lutzow corps so long as German men and boys 
 sing his "Thou Sword at my Side," or raise 
 their voices in the refrain of the Lutzow Jagers* 
 song: 
 
 "Do you ask the name of yon reckless band? 
 'Tis Lutzow's black troopers dashing swift 
 through the land!" 
 
 Langethal first saw the body of the author of 
 "Lyre and Sword" and "Zriny" under an oak 
 at Wobbelin; but he was to see it once more 
 under quite difTerent circumstances. He has 
 mentioned it in his autobiography, and I have 
 heard him describe several times his visit to the 
 corpse of Theodor Korner. 
 
 He had been quartered in Wobbelin, and 
 
IN KEILHAU 89 
 
 shared his room with an Oberjager von Behren- 
 horst, son of the postmaster-general in Dessau, 
 who had taken part in the battle of Jena as a 
 young lieutenant and returned home with a 
 darkened spirit. At the summons "To my 
 People," he had enlisted at once as a private 
 soldier in the Lutzow corps, where he rose 
 rapidly to the rank of Oberjager. During the 
 war he had often met Langethal and Mid- 
 dendorf; but the quiet, reserved man, pre- 
 maturely grave for his years, attached himself 
 so closely to Korner that he needed no other 
 friend. 
 
 After the death of the poet on the 26th of 
 August, 1813, he moved silently about as though 
 completely crushed. On the night which 
 followed the 27th he invited his roommate 
 Langethal to go with him to the body of his 
 friend. Both went first to the village church, 
 where the dead Jagers lay in two long black 
 rows. A solemn stillness pervaded the little 
 house of God, which had become during this 
 night the abode of death, and the nocturnal 
 visitors gazed silently at the pallid, rigid features 
 of one lifeless young form after another, but 
 without finding him whom they sought. 
 
 During this mute review of corpses it seemed 
 to Langethal as if Death were singing a deep, 
 heartrending choral, and he longed to pray for 
 these young, crushed human blossoms; but his 
 
90 IN KEILHAU 
 
 companion led the way into the guard's little 
 room. There lay the poet, "the radiance of an 
 angel on his face," though his body bore many 
 traces of the fury of the battle. Deeply moved, 
 Langethal stood gazing down upon the form of 
 the man who had died for his native land, while 
 Behrenhorst knelt on the floor beside him, 
 silently giving himself up to the anguish of his 
 soul. He remained in this attitude a long time, 
 then suddenly started up, threw his arms 
 upward, and exclaimed, "Korner, I'll follow 
 you!" 
 
 With these words Behrenhorst darted out of 
 the little room into the darkness; and a few 
 weeks after he, too, had fallen for the sacred 
 cause of his native land. 
 
 They had seen another beloved comrade 
 perish in the battle of Gohrde, a handsome 
 young man of delicate figure and an unusually 
 reserved manner. 
 
 Middendorf, with whom he — his name was 
 Prohaska — had been on more intimate terms 
 than the others, once asked him, when he 
 timidly avoided the girls and women who cast 
 kindly glances at him, if his heart never beat 
 faster, and received the answer, " I have but one 
 love to give, and that belongs to our native 
 land." 
 
 While the battle was raging, Middendorf was 
 fighting close beside his comrade. When the 
 
IN KEILHAU 91 
 
 enemy fired a volley the others stooped, but 
 Prohaska stood erect, exclaiming, when he was 
 warned, "No bowing! I'll make no obeisance to 
 the French!" 
 
 A few minutes after, the brave soldier, stricken 
 by a bullet, fell on the greensward. His friends 
 bore him off the field, and Prohaska — Eleonore 
 Prohaska — proved to be a girl ! 
 
 While in Castle Gohrde, Froebel talked with 
 his friends about his favorite plan, which he 
 had already had in view in Gottingen, of estab- 
 lishing a school for boys, and while developing 
 his educational ideal to them and at the same 
 time mentioning that he had passed his thirtieth 
 birthday, and alluding to the postponement of 
 his plan by the war, he exclaimed, to explain 
 why he had taken up arms: 
 
 "How can I train boys whose devotion I 
 claim, unless I have proved by my own deeds 
 how a man should show devotion to the general 
 welfare?" 
 
 These words made a deep impression upon the 
 two friends, and increased Middendorf's enthu- 
 siastic reverence for the older comrade, whose 
 experiences and ideas had opened a new world 
 to him. 
 
 The Peace of Paris, and the enrollment of the 
 Lutzow corps in the line, brought the trio back 
 to Berlin to civil life. 
 
 There also each frequently sought the others, 
 
92 IN KEILHAU 
 
 until, in the spring of 1817, Froebel resigned the 
 permanent position in the Bureau of Mineralogy 
 in order to establish his institute. 
 
 Middendorf had been bribed by the saying of 
 his admired friend that he "had found the unity 
 of Hfe." It gave the young philosopher food for 
 thought, and, because he felt that he had vainly 
 sought this unity and was dissatisfied, he hoped 
 to secure it through the society of the man who 
 had become everything to him. His wish was 
 fulfilled, for as an educator he grew as it were 
 into his own motto, "Lucid, genuine, and true 
 to Hfe." 
 
 Middendorf gave up little when he followed 
 Froebel. 
 
 The case was different with Langethal. He 
 had entered as a tutor the Bendemann house- 
 hold at Charlottenburg, where he found a second 
 home. He taught with brilliant success children 
 richly gifted in mind and heart, whose love he 
 won. It was "a glorious family" which per- 
 mitted him to share its rich social life, and in 
 whose highly gifted circle he could be sure of 
 finding warm sympathy in his intellectual 
 interests. Protected from all external anxieties, 
 he had under their roof ample leisure for indus- 
 trious labor and also for intercourse with his 
 own friends. 
 
 In July, 1817, he passed the last examination 
 with the greatest distinction, receiving the "very 
 
IN KEILHAU 93 
 
 good," rarely bestowed; and a brilliant career 
 lay before him. 
 
 Directly after this success three pulpits were 
 offered to him, but he accepted neither, because 
 he longed for rest and quiet occupation. 
 
 The summons from Froebel to devote himself 
 to his infant institute, where Langethal had 
 placed his younger brother, also reached him. 
 The little school moved on St. John's Day, 1817, 
 from Griesheim to Keilhau, where the widow of 
 Pastor Froebel had been offered a larger farm. 
 The place which she and her children's teacher 
 found was wonderfully adapted to Froebel's 
 purpose, and seemed to promise great advantages 
 both to the pupils and to the institute. There 
 was much building and arranging to be accom- 
 plished, but means to do so were obtained, and 
 the first pupil described very amusingly the 
 entrance into the new home, the furnishing, the 
 discovery of all the beauties and advantages 
 which we found as an old possession in Keilhau, 
 and the endeavor, so characteristic of Midden- 
 dorf, to adapt even the less attractive points to 
 his own poetic ideas. 
 
 Only the hours of instruction fared badly, and 
 Froebel felt that he needed a man of fully devel- 
 oped strength in order to give the proper 
 foundation to the instruction of the boys who 
 were intrusted to his care. He knew a man of 
 this stamp in the student F. A. Wolf, whose 
 
94 IN KEILHAU 
 
 talent for teaching had been admirably proved 
 in the Bendemann family. 
 
 "Langethal," as the first pupil describes him, 
 "was at that time a very handsome man of five- 
 and-twenty years. His brow was grave, but his 
 features expressed kindness of heart, gentleness, 
 and benevolence. The dignity of his whole 
 bearing was enhanced by the sonorous tones of 
 his voice — he retained them until old age — and 
 his whole manner revealed manly firmness. 
 Middendorf was more pleasing to women, 
 Langethal to men. Middendorf attracted those 
 who saw, Langethal those who heard him, and 
 the confidence he inspired was even more lasting 
 than that aroused by Middendorf. 
 
 What marvel that Froebel made every effort 
 to win this rare power for the young institute? 
 But Langethal declined, to the great vexation of 
 Middendorf. Diesterweg called the latter "a St. 
 John," but our dear, bUnd teacher added, "And 
 Froebel was his Christus." 
 
 The enthusiastic young Westphalian, who had 
 once believed he saw in this man every masculine 
 virtue, and whose life appeared emblematical, 
 patiently accepted everything, and considered 
 every one a "renegade" who had ever followed 
 Froebel and did not bow implicitly to his will. 
 So he was angered by Langethal's refusal. The 
 latter had been offered, with brilliant prospects 
 for the present and still fairer ones for the future. 
 
IN KEILHAU 95 
 
 a position as a tutor in Silesia, a place which 
 secured him the rest he desired, combined with 
 occupation suited to his tastes. He was to share 
 the labor of teaching with another instructor, 
 who was to take charge of the exact sciences, 
 with which he was less familiar, and he was also 
 permitted to teach his brother with the young 
 Counts Stolberg. 
 
 He accepted, but before going to Silesia he 
 wished to visit his Keilhau friends and take his 
 brother away with him. He did so, and the 
 "diplomacy" with which Froebel succeeded in 
 changing the decision of the resolute young man 
 and gaining him over to his own interests, is 
 really remarkable. It won for the infant 
 institute in the person of Langethal — if the 
 expression is allowable — the backbone. 
 
 Froebel had sent Middendorf to meet his 
 friend, and the latter, on the way, told him of 
 the happiness which he had found in his new 
 home and occupation. Then they entered 
 Keilhau, and the splendid landscape which 
 surrounds it needs no praise. 
 
 Froebel received his former comrade with the 
 utmost cordiality, and the sight of the robust, 
 healthy, merry boys who were lying on the floor 
 that evening, building forts and castles with the 
 wooden blocks which Froebel had had made for 
 them according to his own plan, excited the 
 keenest interest. He had come to take his 
 
96 IN KEILHAU 
 
 brother away; but when he saw him, among 
 other happy companions of his own age, complete 
 the finest structure of all — a Gothic cathedral 
 — it seemed almost wrong to tear the child from 
 this circle. 
 
 He gazed sadly at his brother when he came 
 to bid him "good-night," and then remained 
 alone with Froebel. The latter was less talkative 
 than usual, waiting for his friend to tell him of 
 the future which awaited him in Silesia. When 
 he heard that a second tutor was to relieve 
 Langethal of half his work, he exclaimed, with 
 the greatest anxiety: 
 
 "You do not know him, and yet intend to 
 finish a work of education with him? What 
 great chances you are hazarding!" 
 
 The next morning Froebel asked his friend 
 what goal in life he had set before him, and 
 Langethal replied : 
 
 "Like the apostle, I would fain proclaim the 
 gospel to all men according to the best of my 
 powers, in order to bring them into close com- 
 munion with the Redeemer." 
 
 Froebel answered, thoughtfully: 
 ' " If you desire that, you must, like the apostles, 
 know men. You must be able to enter into the 
 life of every one — here a peasant, there a 
 mechanic. If you cannot, do not hope for suc- 
 cess; your influence will not extend far." 
 
 How wise and convincing the words sounded j 
 
IN KEILHAU 97 
 
 And Froebel touched the sensitive spot in the 
 young minister, who was thoroughly imbued 
 with the sacred beauty of his Hfe-task. yet 
 certamly knew the Gospels, his classic authors 
 and apostolic fathers much better than he did 
 the world. 
 
 He thoughtfully followed Froebel, who. with 
 Middendorf and the boys, led him up the 
 ^teiger, the mountain whose summit afforded 
 the magnificent view I have described. It was 
 the hour when the setting sun pours its most 
 exquisite light over the mountains and valleys 
 The heart of the young clergyman, tortured by 
 anxious doubts, swelled at the sight of this 
 magnificence, and Froebel, seeing what was 
 passing m his mind, exclaimed: 
 
 "Come, comrade, let us have one of our old 
 war-songs." 
 
 The musical "black Jager" of yore willingly 
 assented; and how clearly and enthusiastically 
 the chorus of boyish voices chimed in! 
 
 When it died away, the older man passed his 
 arm around his friend's shoulders, and, pointing 
 to the beautiful region lying before them in the 
 sunset glow, exclaimed: 
 
 "Why seek so far away what is dose at hand? 
 A work IS established here which must be built 
 by the hand of God! Implicit devotion and 
 sslf-sacnfice are needed." 
 
 While speaking, he gazed steadfastly into his 
 
98 IN KEILHAU 
 
 friend's tearful eyes, as if he had found his true 
 object in life, and when he held out his hand 
 Langethal clasped it — he could not help it. 
 
 That very day a letter to the Counts Stolberg 
 informed them that they must seek another 
 tutor for their sons, and Froebel and Keilhau 
 could congratulate themselves on having gained 
 their Langethal. 
 
 The management of the school was hencefor- 
 ward in the hands of a man of character, while 
 the extensive knowledge and the excellent 
 method of a well-trained scholar had been 
 obtained for the educational department. The 
 new institute now prospered rapidly. The 
 renown of the fresh, healthful life and the able 
 tuition of the pupils spread far beyond the limits 
 of Thuringia. The material difficulties with 
 which the head-master had had to struggle after 
 the erection of the large new buildings were also 
 removed when Froebel's prosperous brother in 
 Osterode decided to take part in the work and 
 move to Keilhau. He understood farming, and, 
 by purchasing more land and woodlands, 
 transformed the peasant holding into a con- 
 siderable estate. 
 
 When Froebel's restless spirit drew him to 
 Switzerland to undertake new educational enter- 
 prises, and some one was needed who could 
 direct the business management, Barop, the 
 steadfast man of whom I have already spoken, 
 
IN KEILHAU 99 
 
 was secured. Deeply esteemed and sincerely 
 beloved, he managed the institute during the 
 time that we three brothers were pupils there. 
 He had found many things within to arrange on 
 a more practical foundation, many without to 
 correct : for the long locks of most of the pupils ; 
 the circumstance that three Lutzow Jagers, one 
 of whom had delivered the oration at a students' 
 political meeting, had established the school; 
 that Barop had been persecuted as a demagogue 
 on account of his connection with a students' 
 political society; and, finally, Froebel's relations 
 with Switzerland and the liberal educational 
 methods of the school, had roused the suspicions 
 of the Berlin demagogue-hunters, and therefore 
 demagogic tendencies, from which in reality it 
 had always held aloof, were attributed to the 
 institute. 
 
 Yes, we were free, in so far that everything 
 which could restrict or retard our physical and 
 mental development was kept away from us, 
 and our teachers might call themselves so 
 because, with virile energy, they had understood 
 how to protect the institute from every injurious 
 and narrowing outside influence. The smallest 
 and the largest pupil was free, for he was per- 
 mitted to be wholly and entirely his natural self, 
 so long as he kept within the limits imposed by 
 the existing laws. But license was nowhere 
 more sternly prohibited than at Keilhau; and 
 
100 IN KEILHAU 
 
 the deep religious feeling of its head-masters — 
 Barop, Langethal, and Middendorf — ought to 
 have taught the suspicious spies in Berlin that 
 the command, "Render unto Caesar the things 
 that are Csesar's," would never be violated here. 
 The time I spent in Keilhau was during the 
 period of the worst reaction, and I now know 
 that our teachers would have sat on the Left in 
 the Prussian Landtag; yet we never heard a 
 disrespectful word spoken of Frederick William 
 IV, and we were instructed to show the utmost 
 respect to the prince of the little country of 
 Rudolstadt to which Keilhau belonged. Barop, 
 spite of his liberal tendencies, was highly 
 esteemed by this petty sovereign, decorated 
 with an order, and raised to the rank of Coun- 
 cillor of Education. From a hundred isolated 
 recollections and words which have lingered in 
 my memory I have gathered that our teachers 
 were liberals in a very moderate way, yet they 
 were certainly guilty of "demagogic aspirations" 
 in so far as that they desired for their native 
 land only what we, thank Heaven, now possess: 
 its unity, and a popular representation, by a 
 free election of all its states, in a German 
 Parliament. What enthusiasm for the Emperor 
 William, Bismarck, and Von Moltke, Langethal, 
 Middendorf, and Barop would have inspired in 
 our hearts had they been permitted to witness 
 the great events of 1870 and 1871! 
 
IN KEILHAU 101 
 
 Besides, politics were kept from us, and this 
 had become known in wider circles when we 
 entered the institute, for most of the pupils 
 belonged to loyal families. Many were sons of 
 the higher officials, officers, and landed pro- 
 prietors; and as long locks had long since be- 
 come the exception, and the Keilhau pupils were 
 as well mannered as possible, many noblemen, 
 among them chamberlains and other court offi- 
 cials, decided to send their boys to the institute. 
 
 The great manufacturers and merchants who 
 placed their sons in the institute were also not 
 men favorable to revolution, and many of our 
 comrades became officers in the German army. 
 Others are able scholars, clergymen, and mem- 
 bers of Parliament; others again government 
 officials, who fill high positions; and others still 
 are at the head of large industrial or mercantile 
 enterprises. I have not heard of a single indi- 
 vidual who has gone to ruin, and of very many 
 who have accomplished things really worthy of 
 note. But wherever I have met an old pupil of 
 Keilhau, I have found in him the same love for 
 the institute, have seen his eyes sparkle more 
 brightly when we talked of Langethal, Midden- 
 dorf, and Barop. ,Not one has turned out a 
 sneak or a hypocrite. 
 
 The present institution is said to be an admira- 
 ble one; but the "Realschule" of Keilhau, which 
 has been forced to abandon its former human- 
 
102 IN KEILHAD 
 
 istic foundation, can scarcely train to so great 
 a variety of callings the boys now intrusted to 
 its care. 
 
 IN THE FOREST AND ON THE MOOR 
 
 The little country of Rudolstadt in which Keil- 
 hau lies had had its revolution, though it was 
 but a small and bloodless one. True, the in- 
 surrection had nothing to do with human beings, 
 but involved the destruction of living creatures. 
 Greater liberty in hunting was demanded. 
 
 This might seem a trivial matter, yet it was of 
 the utmost importance to both disputants. The 
 wide forests of the country had hitherto been 
 the hunting-grounds of the prince, and not a gun 
 could be fired there without his permission. To 
 give up these "happy hunting-grounds" was a 
 severe demand upon the eager sportsman who 
 occupied the Rudolstadt throne, and the rustic 
 population would gladly have spared him had it 
 been possible. 
 
 But the game in Rudolstadt had become a 
 veritable torment, which destroyed the husband- 
 men's hopes of harvests. The peasant, to save 
 his fields from the stags and does which broke 
 into them in herds at sunset, tried to keep them 
 out by means of clappers and bad odors. I 
 have seen and smelled the so-called "French- 
 man's oil" with which the posts were smeared, 
 that its really diabolical odor — I don't know 
 
IN KEILHAU 103 
 
 from what horrors it was compounded — might 
 preserve the crops. The ornament of the forests 
 had become the object of the keenest hate, and 
 as soon as — shortly before we entered Keilhau — 
 hunting was freely permitted, the peasants gave 
 full vent to their rage, set off for the woods with 
 the old muskets they had kept hidden in the 
 garrets, or other still more primitive weapons, 
 and shot or struck down all the game they 
 encountered. Roast venison was cheap for 
 weeks on Rudolstadt tables, and the pupils had 
 many an unexpected pleasure. 
 
 The hunting exploits of the older scholars 
 were only learned by us younger ones as secrets, 
 and did not reach the teachers' ears until long 
 after. But the woods furnished other pleasures 
 besides those enjoyed by the sportsman. Every 
 ramble through the forest enriched our knowl- 
 edge of plants and animals, and I soon knew the 
 different varieties of stones also; yet we did not 
 suspect that this knowledge was imparted ac- 
 cording to a certain system. We were taught as 
 it were by stealth, and how many pleasant, 
 delicious things attracted us to the class-rooms 
 on the wooded heights! 
 
 Vegetation was very abundant in the richly 
 watered mountain valley. Our favorite spring 
 was the Schaalbach at the foot of the Steiger,* 
 
 * We pupils bought it of the peasant who owned it and 
 gave it to Barop. 
 
104 IN KEILHAU 
 
 because there was a fowling-floor connected 
 with it, where I spent many a pleasant evening. 
 It could be used only after breeding-time, and 
 consisted of a hut built of boughs where the bird- 
 catcher lodged. Flowing water rippled over the 
 little wooden rods on which the feathered den- 
 izens of the woods alighted to quench their 
 thirst before going to sleep. When some of them 
 — frequently six at a time — had settled on the 
 perches in the trough, it was drawn into the hut 
 by a rope, a net was spread over the water and 
 there was nothing more to do except take the 
 captives out. 
 
 The name of the director of this amusement 
 was Merbod. He could imitate the voices of all 
 the birds, and was a merry, versatile fellow, who 
 knew how to do a thousand things, and of whom 
 we boys were very fond. 
 
 The peasant Bredernitz often took us to his 
 crow-hut, which was a hole in the ground covered 
 with boughs and pieces of turf, where the hunters 
 lay concealed. The owl, which lured the crows 
 and other birds of prey, was fastened on a perch, 
 and when they flew up, often in large flocks, to 
 tease the old crosspatch which sat blinking 
 angrily, they were shot down from loopholes 
 which had been left in the hut. The hawks 
 which prey upon doves and hares, the crows and 
 magpies, can thus easily be decimated. 
 
 We had learned to use our guns in the play- 
 
IN KEILHAU 105 
 
 ground. The utmost caution was enforced, and 
 although, as I have already remarked, we 
 handled our own guns when we were only lads of 
 twelve years old, I cannot recall a single accident 
 which occurred. 
 
 Once, during the summer, there was a Schut- 
 zenfest, in which a large wooden eagle was shot 
 from the pole. Whoever brought down the last 
 splinter became king. This honor once fell to 
 my share, and I was permitted to choose a queen. 
 I crowned Marie Breimann, a pretty, slender 
 young girl from Brunswick, whose Greek profile 
 and thick silken hair had captivated my fancy. 
 She and Adelheid Barop, the head-master's 
 daughter, were taught in our classes, but Marie 
 attracted me more strongly than the diUgent 
 Keilhau lassies with their beautiful black eyes 
 and the other two blooming and graceful West- 
 phahan girls who were also schoolmates. But 
 the girls occupied a very small place in our lives. 
 They could neither wrestle, shoot, nor climb, so 
 we gave them little thought, and anything like 
 actual flirtation was unknown — we had so many 
 better things in our heads. Wrestling and other 
 sports threw everything else into the shade. 
 Pretty Marie, however, probably suspected 
 which of my schoolmates I liked best, and up to 
 the time of my leaving the institute I allowed no 
 other goddess to rival her. But there were 
 plenty of amusements at Keilhau besides bird- 
 
106 IN KEILHAU 
 
 shooting. I will mention the principal ones 
 which came during the year, for to describe 
 them in regular order would be impossible. 
 
 Of the longer walks which we took in the 
 spring and summer the most beautiful was the 
 one leading through Blankenburg to the entrance 
 of the Schwarzathal, and thence through the 
 lofty, majestically formed group of cliffs at 
 whose foot the clear, swift Schwarza flows, 
 dashing and foaming, to Schwarzburg. 
 
 How clearly our songs echoed from the granite 
 walls of the river valley, and how lively it always 
 was at "The Stag," whose landlord possessed a 
 certain power of attraction to us boys in his own 
 person; for, as the stoutest man in Thuringia, he 
 was a feast for the eyes! His jollity equaled his 
 corpulence, and how merrily he used to jest with 
 us lads! 
 
 Of the shorter expeditions I will mention only 
 the two we took most frequently, which led us in 
 less than an hour to Blankenburg or Greifen- 
 stein, a large ruin, many parts of which were in 
 tolerable preservation. It had been the home of 
 Count Gunther von Schwarzburg, who paid 
 with his life for the honor of wearing the 
 German imperial crown a few short months. 
 
 We also enjoyed being sent to the little town 
 of Blankenburg on errands, for it was the home 
 of our drawing-master, the artist Unger, one of 
 those original characters whom we rarely meet 
 
IN KEILHAU 107 
 
 now. When we knew him, the handsome, 
 broad-shouldered man, with his thick red beard, 
 looked as one might imagine Odin. Summer 
 and winter his dress was a gray woolen jacket, 
 into which a short pipe was thrust, and around 
 his hips a broad leather belt, from which hung 
 a bag containing his drawing materials. He 
 cared nothing for public opinion, and, as an 
 independent bachelor, desired nothing except 
 "to be let alone," for he professed the utmost 
 contempt for the corrupt brood yclept "man- 
 kind." He never came to our entertainments, 
 probably because he would be obliged to wear 
 something in place of his woolen jacket, and 
 because he avoided women, whom he called 
 "the roots of all evil." I still remember how 
 once, after emptying the vials of his wrath upon 
 mankind, he said, in reply to the question 
 whether he included Barop among the iniquitous 
 brood, "Why, of course not; he doesn't belong 
 to it!" 
 
 There was no lack of opportunity to visit him, 
 for a great many persons employed to work for 
 the school lived in Blankenburg, and we were 
 known to be carefully watched there. 
 
 I remember two memorable expeditions to 
 the little town. Once my brother Ludo burned 
 his arm terribly during a puppet-show by the 
 explosion of some powder provided for the toy 
 cannon. 
 
108 IN KEILHAU 
 
 The poor fellow suffered so severely that I 
 could not restrain my tears, and though it was 
 dark, and snow lay on the mountains, off I went 
 to Blankenburg to get the old surgeon, calling to 
 some of my schoolmates at the door to tell 
 them of my destination. It was no easy matter 
 to wade through the snow; but, fortunately, 
 the stars gave me sufficient light to keep in the 
 right path as I dashed down the mountain to 
 Blankenburg. How often I plunged into ditches 
 filled with snow and slid down short descents 
 I don't know; but as I write these lines I can 
 vividly remember the relief with which I at last 
 trod the pavement of the little town. Old 
 Wetzel was at home, and a carriage soon con- 
 veyed us over the only road to the institute. 
 I was not punished. Barop only laid his hand 
 on my head, and said, "I am glad you are back 
 again. Bear." 
 
 Another trip to Blankenburg entailed re- 
 sults far more serious — nay, almost cost me 
 my life. 
 
 I was then fifteen, and one Sunday afternoon 
 I went with Barop's permission to visit the 
 Hamburgers, but on condition that I should 
 return by nine o'clock at latest. 
 
 Time, however, slipped by in pleasant conver- 
 sation until a later hour, and as thunder clouds 
 were rising my host tried to keep me overnight. 
 But I thought this would not be allowable, and, 
 
IN KEILHAU 109 
 
 armed with an umbrella, I set off along the road, 
 with which I was perfectly familiar. 
 
 But the storm soon burst, and it grew so dark 
 that, except when the Hghtning flashed, I could 
 not see my hand before my face. Yet on I went, 
 though wondering that the path along which I 
 groped my way led upward, until the lightning 
 showed me that, by mistake, I had taken the 
 road to Greifenstein. I turned back, and while 
 feeling my way through the gloom the earth 
 seemed to vanish under my feet, and I plunged 
 headlong into a viewless gulf — not through 
 empty space, however, but a wet, tangled mass 
 which beat against my face, until at last there 
 was a jerk which shook me from head to foot. 
 
 I no longer fell, but I heard above me the sound 
 of something tearing, and the thought darted 
 through my mind that I was hanging by my 
 trousers. Groping around, I found vine-leaves, 
 branches, and lattice-work, to which I clung, 
 and tearing away with my foot the cloth which 
 had caught on the end of a lath, I again brought 
 my head where it should be, and discovered that 
 I was hanging on a vine-clad wall. A flash of 
 lightning showed me the ground not very far 
 below and, by the help of the espalier and the 
 vines, I at last stood in a garden. 
 
 Almost by a miracle I escaped with a few 
 scratches; but when I afterwards went to look 
 at the scene of this disaster cold chills ran down 
 
110 IN KEILHAU 
 
 my back, for half the distance whence I plunged 
 into the garden would have been enough to 
 break my neck. 
 
 Our games were similar to those which lads of 
 the same age play now, but there were some 
 additional ones that could only take place in a 
 wooded mountain valley like Keilhau; such, for 
 instance, were our Indian games, which engrossed 
 us at the time when we were pleased with 
 Cooper's "Leather-Stocking," but I need not 
 describe them. 
 
 When I was one of the older pupils a party of 
 us surprised some "Panzen" — as we called the 
 younger ones — one hot afternoon engaged in a 
 very singular game of their own invention. 
 They had undressed to the skin in the midst of 
 the thickest woods and were performing Para- 
 dise and the Fall of Man, as they had probably 
 just been taught in their religious lesson. For 
 the expulsion of Adam and our universal mother 
 Eve, the angel — in this case there were two of 
 them — used, instead of the flaming sword, stout 
 hazel rods, with which they performed their 
 part of warders so over-zealously that a quarrel 
 followed, which we older ones stopped. 
 
 Thus many bands of pupils invented games of 
 their own, but, thank Heaven, rarely devised 
 such absurdities. Our later Homeric battles any 
 teacher would have witnessed with pleasure. 
 Froebel would have greeted them as signs of 
 
IN KEILHAU 111 
 
 creative imagination and "individual life" in 
 the boys. 
 
 SUMMER PLEASURES AND RAMBLES 
 
 Wholly unlike these, genuinely and solely a 
 product of Keilhau, was the great battle-game 
 which we called Bergwacht, one of my brightest 
 memories of those years. 
 
 Long preparations were needed, and these, 
 too, were delightful. 
 
 On the wooded plain at the summit of the 
 Kolm, a mountain which belonged mainly to the 
 institute, war was waged during the summer 
 every Saturday evening until far into the night, 
 whenever the weather was fine, which does not 
 happen too often in Thuringia. 
 
 The whole body of pupils was divided into 
 three, afterwards into four sections, each of 
 which had its own citadel. After two had de- 
 clared war against two others, the battle raged 
 until one party captured the strongholds of the 
 other. This was done as soon as a combatant 
 had set foot on the hearth of a hostile fortress. 
 
 The battle itself was fought with stakes 
 blunted at the tops. Every one touched by the 
 weapon of an enemy must declare himself a 
 prisoner. To admit this, whenever it happened, 
 was a point of honor. 
 
 In order to keep all the combatants in action, 
 a fourth division was added soon after our 
 
112 IN KEILHAU 
 
 arrival, and of course it was necessary to build 
 a stronghold like the others. This consisted of 
 a hut with a stone roof, in which fifteen or 
 twenty boys could easily find room and rest, a 
 strong wall which protected us up to our fore- 
 heads, and surrounded the front of the citadel in 
 a semicircle, as well as a large altar-like hearth 
 which rose in the midst of the semicircular space 
 surrounded by the wall. 
 
 We built this fortress ourselves, except that 
 our teacher of handicrafts, the sapper Sabdm, 
 sometimes gave us a hint. The first thing was 
 to mark out the plan, then with the aid of levers 
 pry the rocks out of the fields, and by means of 
 a two-wheeled cart convey them to the site 
 chosen, fit them neatly together, stuff the 
 interstices with moss, and finally put on a roof 
 made of pine logs which we felled ourselves, 
 earth, moss, and branches. 
 
 How quickly we learned to use the plummet, 
 take levels, hew the stone, wield the axes! And 
 what a delight it was when the work was finished 
 and we saw our own building! Perhaps we 
 might not have accomplished it without the 
 sapper, but every boy believed that if he were 
 cast, like Robinson Crusoe, on a desert island, he 
 could build a hut of his own. 
 
 As soon as this citadel was completed, prep- 
 arations for the impending battle were made. 
 The walls and encircling walls of all were pre- 
 
IN KEILHAU 113 
 
 pared, and we were drilled in the use of the poles. 
 This, too, afforded us the utmost pleasure. 
 Touching the head of an enemy was strictly 
 prohibited ; yet many a slight wound was given 
 while fighting in the gloom of the woods. 
 
 Each of the four Bergwachts had its leader. 
 The captain of the first was director of the 
 whole game, and instead of a lance wore a 
 rapier. I considered it a great honor when 
 this dignity was conferred on me. One of its 
 consequences was that my portrait was sketched 
 by "Old Unger" in the so-called "Bergwacht 
 Book," which contained the likenesses of all my 
 predecessors. 
 
 During the summer months all eyes, even as 
 early as Thursday, were watching the weather. 
 When Saturday evening proved pleasant and 
 Barop had given his consent, there was great 
 rejoicing in the institute, and the morning hours 
 must have yielded the teachers little satisfaction. 
 Directly after dinner everybody seized his pole 
 and the other "Bergwacht" equipments. The 
 alliances were formed under the captain's 
 guidance. We will say that the contest was to 
 begin with the first and third Bergwacht pitted 
 against the second and fourth, and be followed 
 by another, with the first and second against the 
 third and fourth. 
 
 We assembled in the courtyard just before 
 sunset. Barop made a little speech, exhorting 
 
114 IN KEILHAU 
 
 US to fight steadily, and especially to observe all 
 the rules and yield ourselves captives as soon as 
 an enemy's pole touched us. He never neglected 
 on these occasions to admonish us that, should 
 our native land ever need the armed aid of her 
 sons, we should march to battle as joyously as 
 we now did to the Bergwacht, which was to 
 train us to skill in her defense. 
 
 Then the procession set off in good order, four 
 or six pupils harnessing themselves voluntarily 
 to the cart in which the kegs of beer were dragged 
 up the Kolm. Off we went, singing merrily, 
 and at the top the women were waiting for us 
 with a lunch. Then the warriors scattered, the 
 fire was lighted on every hearth, the plan of 
 battle was discussed, some were sent out to 
 reconnoitre, others kept to defend the citadel. 
 
 At last the conflict began. Could I ever for- 
 get the scenes in the forest! No Indian tribe on 
 the war-path ever strained every sense more 
 keenly to watch, surround, and surprise the foe. 
 And the hand-to-hand fray! What delight it 
 was to burst from the shelter of the thicket and 
 touch with our poles two, three, or four of the 
 surprised enemies ere they thought of defense! 
 And what self-denial it required when — spite of 
 the most skillful parry — we felt the touch of the 
 pole, to confess it, and be led off as a prisoner! 
 
 Voices and shouts echoed through the woods, 
 and the glare of five fires pierced the darkness — 
 
IN KEILHAU 115 
 
 five — for flames were also blazing where the 
 women were cooking the supper. But the light 
 was brightest, the shouts of the combatants 
 were loudest, in the vicinity of the forts. The 
 effort of the besiegers was to spy out unguarded 
 places, and occupy the attention of the garrison 
 so that a comrade might leap over the wall and 
 set his foot on the hearth. The object of the 
 garrison was to prevent this. 
 
 What was that? An exulting cry rang through 
 the night air. A warrior had succeeded in pene- 
 trating the hostile citadel untouched and setting 
 his foot on the hearth! 
 
 Two or three times we enjoyed the delight of 
 battle; and when towards midnight it closed, we 
 threw ourselves — glowing from the strife and 
 blackened by the smoke of the hearth fires — 
 down on the greensward around the women's 
 fire, where boiled eggs and other good things 
 were served, and meanwhile the mugs of foam- 
 ing beer were passed around the circle. One 
 patriotic song after another was sung, and at 
 last each Bergwacht withdrew to its citadel and 
 lay down on the moss to sleep under the shelter- 
 ing roof. Two sentinels marched up and down, 
 relieved every half hour until the early dawn of 
 the summer Sunday brightened the eastern sky. 
 Then "Huup!"— the Keilhau shout which 
 summoned us back to the institute — rang out, 
 and a hymn, the march back, a bath in the pond, 
 
116 IN KEILHAU 
 
 and finally the most delicious rest, if good luck 
 permitted, on the heaps of hay which had not 
 been gathered in. On the Sunday following the 
 Bergwacht we were not required to attend 
 church, where we should merely have gone to 
 sleep. Barop, though usually very strict in the 
 observance of religious duties, never demanded 
 anything for the sake of mere appearances. 
 
 And the bed of my own planning! It consisted 
 of wood and stones, and was covered with a 
 thick layer of moss, raised at the head in a slant- 
 ing direction. It looked like other beds, but the 
 place where it stood requires some description, 
 for it was a Keilhau specialty, a favor be- 
 stowed by our teachers on the pupils. 
 
 Midway up the slope of the Kolm where our 
 citadels stood, on the side facing the institute, 
 each boy had a piece of ground where he might 
 build, dig, or plant, as he chose. They descended 
 from one to another: Ludo's and mine had 
 come down from Martin and another pupil who 
 left the school at the same time. But I was not 
 satisfied with what my predecessors had created. 
 I spared the beautiful vine which twined around 
 a fir-tree, but in the place of a flower-bed and a 
 bench which I found there Ludo and I built a 
 hearth, and for myself the bed already men- 
 tioned, which my brother of course was permitted 
 to occupy with me. 
 
 How many hours I have spent on its soft 
 
IN KEILHAU 117 
 
 cushions, reading or dreaming or imagining 
 things! If I could only remember them as they 
 hovered before me, what epics and tales I could 
 write ! 
 
 No doubt we ought to be grateful to God for 
 this as well as for so many other blessings; but 
 why are we permitted to be young only once in 
 our lives, only once to be borne aloft on the 
 wings of a tireless power of imagination, so 
 easily satisfied with ourselves, so full of love, 
 faith, and hope, so open to every joy and so 
 blind to every care and doubt, and everything 
 which threatens to cloud and extinguish the 
 sunlight in the soul? 
 
 Dear bed in my plot of ground at Keilhau, you 
 ought, in accordance with a remark of Barop, to 
 cause me serious self-examination, for he said, 
 probably with no thought of my mossy couch, 
 "From the way in which the pupils use their 
 plots of ground and the things they place in them, 
 I can form a very correct opinion of their dis- 
 positions and tastes." But you, beloved couch, 
 should have the best place in my garden if you 
 could restore me but for one half hour the 
 dreams which visited me on your gray-green 
 pillows, when I was a lad of fourteen or fifteen. 
 
 I have passed over the Rudolstadt Schutzen- 
 fest, its music, its merry-go-round, and the 
 capital sausages cooked in the open air, and 
 have intentionally omitted many other delightful 
 
118 IN KEILHAU 
 
 things. I cannot help wondering now where we 
 found time for all these summer pleasures. 
 
 True, with the exception of a few days at Whit- 
 suntide, we had no vacation from Easter until 
 the first of September. But even in August one 
 thought, one joyous anticipation, filled every 
 heart. 
 
 The annual autumn excursion was coming! 
 
 After we were divided into traveling parties 
 and had ascertained which teacher was to 
 accompany us — a matter that seemed very 
 important — we diligently practiced the most 
 beautiful songs; and on many an evening Barop 
 or Middendorf told us of the places through 
 which we were to pass, their history, and the 
 legends which were associated with them. They 
 were aided in this by one of the sub-teachers, 
 Bagge, a poetically gifted young clergyman, who 
 possessed great personal beauty and a heart 
 capable of entering into the intellectual life of 
 the boys who were intrusted to his care. 
 
 He instructed us in the German language and 
 literature. Possibly because he thought that he 
 discovered in me a talent for poetic expression, 
 he showed me unusual favor, even read his own 
 verses aloud to me, and set me special tasks in 
 verse-writing, which he criticised with me when 
 I had finished. The first long poem I wrote of 
 my own impulse was a description of the wonder- 
 ful forms assumed by the stalactite formations 
 
IN KEILHAU 119 
 
 in the Sophie Cave in Switzerland, which we had 
 visited. Unfortunately, the book containing it 
 is lost, but I remember the following lines, 
 referring to the industrious sprites which I 
 imagined as the sculptors of the wondrous 
 shapes: 
 
 "Priestly robes and a high altar the sprites 
 
 created here, 
 And in the rock-hewn cauldron poured the 
 
 holy water clear, 
 Within whose depths reflected, by the torches' 
 
 flickering rays, 
 Beneath the surface glimmering my own face 
 
 met my gaze ; 
 And when I thus beheld it, so small it seemed 
 
 to me. 
 That yonder stone-carved giant looked on with 
 
 mocking glee. 
 Ay, laugh, if that's your pleasure, Goliath 
 
 huge and old, 
 / soon shall fare forth singing, you still your 
 
 place must hold." 
 
 Another sub-teacher was also a favorite 
 traveling companion. His name was SchafTner, 
 and he, too, with his thick, black beard, was a 
 handsome man. To those pupils who, like my 
 brother Ludo, were pursuing the study of the 
 sciences, he, the mathematician of the institute, 
 must have been an unusually clear and com- 
 
120 IN KEILHAU 
 
 petent teacher. I was under his charge only a 
 short time, and his branch of knowledge was 
 unfortunately my weak point. Shortly before 
 my departure he married a younger sister of 
 Barop's wife, and established an educational 
 institution very similar to Keilhau at Gumperda, 
 at Schwarza in Thuringia. 
 
 Herr Vodoz, our French teacher, a cheery, 
 vigorous Swiss, with a perfect forest of curls on 
 his head, was also one of the most popular 
 guides; and so was Dr. Budstedt, who gave 
 instruction in the classics. He was not a hand- 
 some man, but he deserved the name of "anima 
 Candida.*' He used to storm at the slightest 
 occasion, but he was quickly appeased again. 
 As a teacher I think he did his full duty, but I 
 no longer remember anything about his methods. 
 
 The traveling party which Barop accom- 
 panied were very proud of the honor. Midden- 
 dorf's age permitted him to go only with the 
 youngest pupils, who made the shortest trips. 
 
 These excursions led the little boys into the 
 Thuringian forest, the Hartz Mountains, Sax- 
 ony and Bohemia, Nuremberg and Wurzburg, 
 and the older ones by way of Baireuth and 
 Regensburg to Ulm. The large boys in the first 
 traveling party, which was usually headed by 
 Barop himself, extended their journey as far as 
 Switzerland. 
 
 I visited in after-years nearly all the places to 
 
IN KEILHAU 121 
 
 which we went at that time, and some, with 
 which important events in my Hfe were asso- 
 ciated, I shall mention later. It would not be 
 easy to reproduce from memory the first impres- 
 sions received without mingling with them 
 more recent ones. 
 
 Thus, I well remember how Nuremberg 
 affected me and how much it pleased me. I 
 express this in my description of the journey; 
 but in the author of "Gred," who often sought 
 this delightful city, and made himself familiar 
 with life there in the days of its mediaeval 
 prosperity, these childish impressions became 
 something wholly new. And yet they are 
 inseparable from the conception and contents 
 of the Nuremberg novel. 
 
 My mother kept the old books containing the 
 accounts of these excursions, which occupied 
 from two to three weeks, and they possessed 
 a certain interest for me, principally because 
 they proved how skillfully our teachers under- 
 stood how to carry out Froebel's principles on 
 these occasions. Our records of travel also 
 explain in detail what this educator meant by 
 the words "unity with life"; for our attention 
 was directed not only to beautiful views or 
 magnificent works of art and architecture, but 
 to noteworthy public institutions or great 
 manufactories. Our teachers took the utmost 
 care that we should understand what we saw. 
 
122 IN KEILHAU 
 
 The cultivation of the fields, the building of 
 the peasants* huts, the national costumes, were 
 all brought under our notice, thus making us 
 familiar with life outside of the school, and 
 opening our eyes to things concerning which the 
 pupil of an ordinary model grammar school 
 rarely inquires, yet which are of great importance 
 to the world to which we belong. 
 
 Our material life was sensibly arranged. 
 
 During the rest at noon a cold lunch was 
 served, and an abundant hot meal was not 
 enjoyed until evening. 
 
 In the large cities we dined at good hotels at 
 the table d'hote, and — as in Dresden, Prague, 
 and Coburg — were taken to the theater. 
 
 But we often spent the night in the villages, 
 and then chairs were turned upside down, loose 
 straw was spread on the backs and over the 
 floor, and, wrapped in the shawl which almost 
 every boy carried buckled to his knapsack, we 
 slept, only half undressed, as comfortably as in 
 the softest bed. 
 
 While walking we usually sang songs, among 
 them very nonsensical ones, if only we could 
 keep step well to their time. Often one of the 
 teachers told us a story. Schaffner and Bagge 
 could do this best, but we often met other 
 pedestrians with whom we entered into con- 
 versation. How delightful is the memory of 
 these tramps! Progress on foot is slow, but not 
 
IN KEILHAU 123 
 
 only do we see ten times better than from a 
 carriage or the window of a car, but we hear and 
 learn something while talking with the me- 
 chanics, citizens, and peasants who are going 
 the same way, or the landlords, bar-maids, and 
 table companions we meet in the taverns, 
 whose guests live according to the custom of the 
 country instead of the international pattern of 
 our great hotels. 
 
 As a young married man, I always anticipated 
 as the greatest future happiness taking pedes- 
 trian tours with my sons like the Keilhau ones; 
 but Fate ordained otherwise. 
 
 On our return to the institute we were received 
 with great rejoicing; and how much the different 
 parties, now united, had to tell one another! 
 
 Study recommenced on the first of October, 
 and during the leisure days before that time the 
 village church festival was celebrated under' the 
 village linden, with plenty of cakes, and a dance 
 of the peasants, in which we older ones took part. 
 
 But we were obliged to devote several hours 
 of every day to describing our journey for our 
 relatives at home. Each one filled a large book, 
 which was to be neatly written. The exercise 
 afforded better practice in describing personal 
 experiences than a dozen essays which had been 
 previously read with the teacher. 
 
INFANT GARDENS 
 
 Reprinted by permission from Dickens as an Educator, by James L. 
 Hughes. 
 
 DICKENS wrote the following article 
 for Household Words in 1855. It 
 reveals a surprising mastery of the 
 vital principles of " the new educa- 
 tion." He wrote the article to direct attention 
 to the work of the Baroness Von Biilow, who had 
 come to England to introduce the kindergarten 
 system. Dickens's works show that he had long 
 been a close student of Froebel's philosophy. 
 The article must always take a front rank as a 
 strikingly clear, comprehensive, and sympathetic 
 exposition of the principles and processes of the 
 kindergarten. Kindergartens were called "in- 
 fant gardens" when first introduced into Eng- 
 land. 
 
 Seventy or eighty years ago there was a son 
 born to the Pastor Froebel, who exercised his 
 calling in the village of Oberweissbach, in the 
 principality of Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt. The 
 son, who was called Frederick, proved to be a 
 child of unusually quick sensibilities, keenly 
 alive to all impressions, hurt by discords of all 
 
INFANT GARDENS 125 
 
 kinds; by quarreling of men, women, and 
 children, by ill-assorted colors, inharmonious 
 sounds. He was, to a morbid extent, capable of 
 receiving delight from the beauties of Nature, 
 and, as a very little boy, would spend much of 
 his time in studying and enjoying, for their own 
 sake, the lines and angles in the Gothic archi- 
 tecture of his father's church. Who does not 
 know what must be the central point of all the 
 happiness of such a child? The voice of its 
 mother is the sweetest of sweet sounds, the face 
 of its mother is the fairest of fair sights, the 
 loving touch of her lip is the symbol to it of all 
 pleasures of the sense and of the soul. Against 
 the thousand shocks and terrors that are ready 
 to afflict a child too exquisitely sensitive, the 
 mother is the sole protectress, and her help is 
 all-sufhcient. Frederick Froebel lost his mother 
 in the first years of his childhood, and his youth 
 was tortured with incessant craving for a 
 sympathy that was not to be found. 
 
 The Pastor Froebel was too busy to attend to 
 all the little fancies of his son. It was his good 
 practice to be the peaceful arbiter of the disputes 
 occurring in the village, and, as he took his boy 
 with him when he went out, he made the child 
 familiar with all the quarrels of the parish. Thus 
 were suggested, week after week, comparisons 
 between the harmony of Nature and the spite 
 and scandal current among men. A dreamy, 
 
126 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 fervent love of God, a fanciful boy's wish that he 
 could make men quiet and affectionate, took 
 strong possession of young Frederick, and grew 
 with his advancing years. He studied a good 
 deal. Following out his love of Nature, he 
 sought to become acquainted with the sciences 
 by which her ways and aspects are explained; 
 his contemplation of the architecture of the 
 village church ripened into a thorough taste for 
 mathematics, and he enjoyed agricultural life 
 practically, as a worker on his father's land. At 
 last he went to Pestalozzi's school in Switzerland. 
 Then followed troublous times, and patriotic 
 war in Germany, where even poets fought 
 against the enemy with lyre and sword. The 
 quick instincts, and high, generous impulses of 
 Frederick Froebel were engaged at once, and 
 he went out to battle on behalf of Fatherland in 
 the ranks of the boldest, for he was one of 
 Lutzow's regiment — a troop of riders that earned 
 by its daring an immortal name. Their fame 
 has even penetrated to our English concert 
 rooms, where many a fair English maiden has 
 been made familiar with the dare-devil patriots 
 of which it was composed by the refrain of the 
 German song in honor of their prowess — "Das 
 ist Lutzow's fliegende, wilde Jagd." Having 
 performed his duty to his country in the ranks 
 of its defenders, Froebel fell back upon his love 
 of nature and his study of triangles, squares, and 
 
INFANT GARDENS 127 
 
 cubes. He had made interest that placed him in 
 a position which, in many respects, curiously 
 satisfied his tastes — that of Inspector to the 
 Mineralogical Museum in Berlin. The post was 
 lucrative, its duties were agreeable to him, but 
 the object of his life's desire was yet to be 
 attained. 
 
 For the unsatisfied cravings of his childhood 
 had borne fruit within him. He remembered 
 the quick feelings and perceptions, the incessant 
 nimbleness of mind proper to his first years, and 
 how he had been hemmed in and cramped for 
 want of right encouragement and sympathy. 
 He remembered, too, the ill-conditioned people 
 whose disputes had been made part of his 
 experience, the dogged children, cruel fathers, 
 sullen husbands, angry wives, quarrelsome 
 neighbors; and surely he did not err when he 
 connected the two memories together. How 
 many men and women go about pale-skinned 
 and weak of limb, because their physical health 
 during infancy and childhood was not established 
 by judicious management! It is just so, thought 
 Froebel, with our minds. There would be fewer 
 sullen, quarrelsome, dull-witted men or women 
 if there were fewer children starved or fed 
 improperly in heart and brain. To improve 
 society — to make men and women better — it is 
 requisite to begin quite at the beginning, and 
 to secure for them a wholesome education dur- 
 
128 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 ing infancy and childhood. Strongly possessed 
 with this idea, and feeling that the usual 
 methods of education, by restraint and penalty, 
 aim at the accomplishment of far too little, and 
 by checking natural development even do posi- 
 tive mischief, Froebel determined upon the 
 devotion of his entire energy, throughout his 
 life, to a strong effort for the establishment 
 of schools that should do justice and honor to 
 the nature of a child. He resigned his appoint- 
 ment at Berlin, and threw himself, with only 
 the resources of a fixed will, a full mind, and a 
 right purpose, on the chances of the future. 
 
 At Keilhau, a village of Thuringia, he took 
 a peasant's cottage, in which he proposed to 
 establish his first school — a village boys' school. 
 It was necessary to enlarge the cottage; and, 
 while that was being done, Froebel lived on 
 potatoes, bread, and water. So scanty was his 
 stock of capital on which his enterprise was 
 started, that, in order honestly to pay his work- 
 men, he was forced to carry his principle of self- 
 denial to the utmost. He bought each week 
 two large rye loaves, and marked on them with 
 chalk each day's allowance. Perhaps he is the 
 only man in the world who ever, in so literal a 
 way, chalked out for himself a scheme of diet. 
 
 After laboring for many years among the 
 boys at Keilhau, Froebel — married to a wife who 
 shared his zeal, and made it her labor to help to 
 
INFANT GARDENS 129 
 
 the utmost in carrying out the idea of her 
 husband's life — felt that there was more to be 
 accomplished. His boys came to him with many 
 a twist in mind or temper, caught by wriggling 
 up through the bewilderments of a neglected 
 infancy. The first sproutings of the human 
 mind need thoughtful culture; there is no period 
 of life, indeed, in which culture is so essential. 
 And yet, in nine out of ten cases, it is precisely 
 while the little blades of thought and buds of 
 love are frail and tender that no heed is taken to 
 maintain the soil about them wholesome, and 
 the air about them free from blight. There must 
 be Infant Gardens, Froebel said; and straight- 
 way formed his plans, and set to work for their 
 accomplishment. 
 
 He had become familiar in cottages with the 
 instincts of mothers, and the faculties with 
 which young children are endowed by Nature. 
 He never lost his own childhood from memory, 
 and, being denied the blessing of an infant of his 
 own, regarded all the little ones with equal love. 
 The direction of his boys' school — now flourish- 
 ing vigorously — he committed to the care of a 
 relation, while he set out upon a tour through 
 parts of Germany and Switzerland to lecture 
 upon infant training and to found Infant 
 Gardens where he could. He founded them at 
 Hamburg, Leipzig, Dresden, and elsewhere. 
 While laboring in this way he was always 
 
130 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 exercising the same spirit of self-denial that had 
 marked the outset of his educational career. 
 Whatever he could earn was for the children, to 
 promote their cause. He would not spend upon 
 himself the money that would help in the 
 accomplishment of his desire, that childhood 
 should be made as happy as God in his wisdom 
 had designed it should be, and that full play 
 should be given to its energies and powers. 
 Many a night's lodging he took, while on his 
 travels, in the open fields, with an umbrella for 
 his bedroom and a knapsack for his pillow. 
 
 So beautiful a self-devotion to a noble cause 
 won recognition. One of the best friends of his 
 old age was the Duchess Ida of Weimar, sister to 
 Queen Adelaide of England, and his death took 
 place on the 21st of June, three years ago, at a 
 country seat of the Duke of Meiningen. He 
 died at the age of seventy, peacefully, upon a 
 summer day, delighting in the beautiful scenery 
 that lay outside his window, and in the flowers 
 brought by friends to his bedside. Nature, he 
 said, bore witness to the promises of revelation. 
 So Froebel passed away, 
 
 "And Nature's pleasant robe of green. 
 Humanity's appointed shroud, enwraps 
 His monument and his memory." 
 
 Wise and good people have been endeavoring 
 of late to obtain in this country a hearing for the 
 
INFANT GARDENS 131 
 
 views of this good teacher, and a trial for his 
 system. Only fourteen years have elapsed since 
 the first Infant Garden was established, and 
 already Infant Gardens have been introduced 
 into most of the larger towns of Germany. Let 
 us now welcome them with all our hearts to 
 England. 
 
 The whole principle of Froebel's teaching is 
 based on a perfect love for children, and a full 
 and genial recognition of their nature, a deter- 
 mination that their hearts shall not be starved 
 for want of sympathy; that since they are by 
 Infinite Wisdom so created as to find happiness 
 in the active exercise and development of all 
 their faculties, we, who have children round 
 about us, shall no longer repress their energies, 
 tie up their bodies, shut their mouths, and 
 declare that they worry us by the incessant 
 putting of the questions which the Father of us 
 all has placed in their mouths, so that the 
 teachable one forever cries to those who under- 
 take to be its guide, "What shall I do?" To be 
 ready at all times with a wise answer to that 
 question, ought to be the ambition of every one 
 upon whom a child's nature depends for the 
 means of healthy growth. The frolic of childhood 
 is not pure exuberance and waste. "There is 
 often a high meaning in childish play," said 
 Froebel. Let us study it, and act upon hints— 
 or more than hints— that Nature gives. They 
 
132 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 fall into a fatal error who despise all that a child 
 does as frivolous. Nothing is trifling that forms 
 part of a child's life. 
 
 "That which the mother awakens and fosters, 
 When she joyously sings and plays; 
 That which her love so tenderly shelters, 
 Bears a blessing to future days." 
 
 We quote Froebel again, in these lines, and 
 we quote others in which he bids us 
 
 "Break not suddenly the dream 
 The blessed dream of infancy; 
 In which the soul unites with all 
 In earth, or heaven, or sea, or sky." 
 
 But enough has already been said to show 
 what he would have done. How would he do it? 
 
 Of course it must be borne in mind, through- 
 out the following sketch of Froebel's scheme of 
 infant training, that certain qualities of mind 
 are necessary to the teacher. Let nobody 
 suppose that any scheme of education can attain 
 its end, as a mere scheme, apart from the 
 qualifications of those persons by whom it is to 
 be carried out. Very young children can be 
 trained successfully by no person who wants 
 hearty liking for them, and who can take part 
 only with a proud sense of restraint in their 
 chatter and their play. It is in truth no con- 
 descension to become in spirit as a child with 
 
INFANT GARDENS 133 
 
 children, and nobody is fit to teach the young 
 who holds a different opinion. Unvarying 
 cheerfulness and kindness, the refinement that 
 belongs naturally to a pure, well-constituted 
 woman's mind are absolutely necessary to the 
 management of one of Froebel's Infant Gardens, 
 Then, again, let it be understood that Froebel 
 never wished his system of training to be con- 
 verted into mere routine to the exclusion of all 
 that spontaneous action in which more than 
 half of every child's education must consist. It 
 was his purpose to show the direction in which 
 it was most useful to proceed, how best to assist 
 the growth of the mind by following the indica- 
 tions Nature furnishes. Nothing was farther 
 from his design, in doing that, than the imposi- 
 tion of a check on any wholesome energies. 
 Blindman's buff, romps, puzzles, fairy tales, 
 everything in fact that exercises soundly any set 
 of the child's faculties, must be admitted as a 
 part of Froebel's system. The cardinal point of 
 his doctrine is— take care that you do not 
 exercise a part only of the child's mind or body; 
 but take thorough pains to see that you encour- 
 age the development of its whole nature. If 
 pains— and great pains— be not taken to see 
 that this is done, probably it is not done. The 
 Infant Gardens are designed to help in doing it. 
 The mind of a young child must not be 
 trained at the expense of its body. Every 
 
134 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 muscle ought, if possible, to be brought daily 
 into action; and, in the case of a child suffered 
 to obey the laws of Nature by free tumbling and 
 romping, that is done in the best manner possible. 
 Every mother knows that by carrying an infant 
 always on the same arm its growth is liable to be 
 perverted. Every father knows the child's 
 delight at being vigorously danced up and down, 
 and much of this delight arises from the play 
 then given to its muscles. As the child grows, 
 the most unaccustomed positions into which it 
 can be safely twisted are those from which it will 
 receive the greatest pleasure. That is because 
 play is thus given to the muscles in a form they 
 do not often get, and Nature — always watchful 
 on the child's behalf — cries, We will have some 
 more of that. It does us good. As it is with the 
 body, so it is with the mind, and Froebel's 
 scheme of infant education is, for both, a system 
 of gymnastics. 
 
 He begins with the newborn infant, and 
 demands that, if possible, it shall not be taken 
 from its mother. He sets his face strongly 
 against the custom of committing the child 
 during the tenderest and most impressible period 
 of its whole life to the care and companionship 
 of an ignorant nursemaid, or of servants who 
 have not the mother's instinct, or the knowledge 
 that can tell them how to behave in its presence. 
 Only the mother should, if possible, be the 
 
INFANT GARDENS 135 
 
 child's chief companion and teacher during at 
 least the first three years of its life, and she 
 should have thought it worth while to prepare 
 herself for the right fulfillment of her duties. 
 Instead of tambour work, or Arabic, or any 
 other useless thing that may be taught at girls' 
 schools, surely it would be a great blessing if 
 young ladies were to spend some of their time in 
 an Infant Garden, that might be attached to 
 every academy. Let them all learn from 
 Froebel what are the requirements of a child, 
 and be prepared for the wise performance of 
 what is after all to be the most momentous 
 business of their lives. 
 
 The carrying out of this hint is indeed neces- 
 sary to the complete and general adoption of the 
 infant-garden system. Froebel desired his 
 infants to be taught only by women, and 
 required that they should be women as well 
 educated and refined as possible, preferring 
 amiable unmarried girls. Thus he would have 
 our maidens spending some part of their time in 
 playing with little ones, learning to understand 
 them, teaching them to understand; our wives 
 he would have busy at home, making good use 
 of their experience, developing carefully and 
 thoughtfully the minds of their children, sole 
 teachers for the first three years of their life; 
 afterward, either helped by throwing them 
 among other children in an Infant Garden for 
 
136 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 two or three hours every day, or, if there be at 
 home no lack of little company, having Infant 
 Gardens of their own. 
 
 Believing that it is natural to address infants 
 in song, Froebel encouraged nursery songs, and 
 added to their number. Those contributed by 
 him to the common stock were of course con- 
 tributed for the sake of some use that he had for 
 each; in the same spirit — knowing play to be 
 essential to a child — he invented games; and 
 those added by him to the common stock are all 
 meant to be used for direct teaching. It does 
 not in the least follow, and it was not the case, 
 that he would have us make all nursery rhymes 
 and garden sports abstrusely didactic. He 
 meant no more than to put his own teaching 
 into songs and games, to show clearly that 
 whatever is necessary to be said or done to a 
 young child may be said or done merrily or 
 playfully; and although he was essentially a 
 schoolmaster, he had no faith in the terrors 
 commonly associated with his calling. 
 
 Froebel's nursery songs are associated almost 
 invariably with bodily activity on the part of the 
 child. He is always, as soon as he becomes old 
 enough, to do something while the song is going 
 on, and the movements assigned to him are 
 cunningly contrived so that not even a joint of 
 a little finger shall be left unexercised. If he be 
 none the better, he is none the worse for this. 
 
INFANT GARDENS 137 
 
 The child is indeed unlucky that depends only 
 on care of this description for the full play of its 
 body; but there are some children so unfortu- 
 nate, and there are some parents who will be 
 usefully reminded by those songs, of the necessity 
 of procuring means for the free action of every 
 joint and limb. What is done for the body is 
 done in the same spirit for the mind, and ideas 
 are formed, not by song only. The beginning of 
 a most ingenious course of mental training by a 
 series of playthings is made almost from the 
 very first. 
 
 A box containing six soft balls, differing in 
 color, is given to the child. It is Froebel's 
 " first gift." Long before it can speak the infant 
 can hold one of these Httle balls in its fingers, 
 become famihar with its spherical shape and its 
 color. It stands still, it springs, it rolls. As 
 the child grows, he can roll it and run after it, 
 watch it with sharp eyes, and compare the color 
 of one ball with the color of another, prick up 
 his ears at the songs connected with his various 
 games with it, use it as a bond of playfellowship 
 with other children, practice with it first efforts 
 at self-denial, and so forth. One ball is sus- 
 pended by a string, it jumps — it rolls — here — 
 there— over — up; turns left— turns right — ding- 
 dong— tip-tap— falls— spins; fifty ideas may be 
 connected with it. The six balls, three of the 
 primary colors, three of the secondary, may be 
 
138 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 built up in a pyramid ; they may be set rolling, 
 and used in combination in a great many 
 ways giving sufficient exercise to the young wits 
 that have all knowledge and experience before 
 them. 
 
 Froebel's "second gift" is a small box con- 
 taining a ball, cube, and roller (the last two 
 perforated), with a stick and string. With 
 these forms of the cube, sphere, and cylinder, 
 there is a great deal to be done and learned. 
 They can be played with at first according to 
 the child's own humor: will run, jump, repre- 
 sent carts, or anything. The ancient Egyptians, 
 in their young days as a nation, piled three cubes 
 on one another and called them the three Graces. 
 A child will, in the same way, see fishes in stones, 
 and be content to put a cylinder upon a cube, 
 and say that is papa on horseback. Of this 
 element of ready fancy in all childish sport 
 Froebel took full advantage. The ball, cube, 
 and cylinder may be spun, swung, rolled, and 
 balanced in so many ways as to display prac- 
 tically all their properties. The cube, spun upon 
 the stick piercing it through opposite edges, will 
 look like a circle, and so forth. As the child 
 grows older, each of the forms may be examined 
 definitely, and he may learn from observation to 
 describe it. The ball may be rolled down an 
 inclined plane and the acceleration of its speed 
 observed. Most of the elementary laws of 
 
INFANT GARDENS 139 
 
 mechanics may be made practically obvious to 
 the child's understanding. 
 
 The "third gift" is the cube divided once in 
 every direction. By the time a child gets this to 
 play with he is three years old — of age ripe for 
 admission to an Infant Garden. The Infant 
 Garden is intended for the help of children 
 between three years old and seven. Instruction 
 in it — always by means of play — is given for 
 only two or three hours in the day ; such instruc- 
 tion sets each child, if reasonably helped at 
 home, in the right train of education for the 
 remainder of its time. 
 
 An Infant Garden must be held in a large 
 room abounding in clear space for child's play, 
 and connected with a garden into which the 
 children may adjourn whenever weather will 
 permit. The garden is meant chiefly to assure, 
 more perfectly, the association of wholesome 
 bodily exercise with mental activity. If climate 
 but permitted, Froebel would have all young 
 children taught entirely in the pure, fresh air, 
 while frolicking in sunshine among flowers. By 
 his system he aimed at securing for them bodily 
 as well as mental health, and he held it to be 
 unnatural that they should be cooped up in 
 close rooms, and glued to forms, when all their 
 limbs twitch with desire for action, and there is 
 a warm sunshine out of doors. The garden, too, 
 should be their own; every child the master or 
 
140 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 mistress of a plot in it, sowing seeds and watch- 
 ing day by day the growth of plants, instructed 
 playfully and simply in the meaning of what is 
 observed. When weather forbids use of the 
 garden, there is the great, airy room which should 
 contain cupboards, with a place for every child's 
 toys and implements; so that a habit of the 
 strictest neatness may be properly maintained. 
 Up to the age of seven there is to be no book 
 work and no ink work; but only at school a free 
 and brisk, but systematic strengthening of the 
 body, of the senses, of the intellect, and of the 
 affections, managed in such a way as to leave 
 the child prompt for subsequent instruction, 
 already comprehending the elements of a good 
 deal of knowledge. 
 
 We must endeavor to show in part how that 
 is done. The third gift — the cube divided once 
 in every direction — enables the child to begin 
 the work of construction in accordance with its 
 own ideas, and insensibly brings the ideas into 
 the control of a sense of harmony and fitness. 
 The cube divided into eight parts will manufac- 
 ture many things; and, while the child is at 
 work, helped by quiet suggestion now and then, 
 the teacher talks of what he is about, asks many 
 questions, answers more, mixes up little songs 
 and stories with the play. Pillars, ruined 
 castles, triumphal arches, city gates, bridges, 
 crosses, towers, all can be completed tc the 
 
INFANT GARDENS 141 
 
 perfect satisfaction of a child, with the eight 
 little cubes. They are all so many texts on 
 which useful and pleasant talk can be established. 
 Then they are capable also of harmonious 
 arrangement into patterns, and this is a great 
 pleasure to the child. He learns the charm of 
 symmetry, exercises taste in the preference of 
 this or that among the hundred combinations 
 of which his eight cubes are susceptible. 
 
 Then follows the "fourth gift," a cube divided 
 into eight planes cut lengthways. More things 
 can be done with this than with the other. 
 Without strain on the mind, in sheer play, 
 mingled with songs, nothing is wanted but a 
 liberal supply of little cubes, to make clear to 
 the children the elements of arithmetic. The 
 cubes are the things numbered. Addition is 
 done with them; they are subtracted from 
 each other; they are multiplied; they are di- 
 vided. Besides these four elementary rules they 
 cause children to be thoroughly at home in the 
 principle of fractions, to multiply and divide 
 fractions— as real things; all in good time it will 
 become easy enough to let written figures 
 represent them— to go through the rule of three, 
 square root, and cube root. As a child has 
 instilled into him the principles of arithmetic, so 
 he acquires insensibly the groundwork of 
 geometry, the sister science. 
 
 Froebel's "fifth gift" is an extension of the 
 
142 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 third, a cube divided into twenty-seven equal 
 cubes, and three of these further divided into 
 halves, three into quarters. This brings with it 
 the teaching of a great deal of geometry, much 
 help to the lessons in number, magnificent 
 accessions to the power of the little architect, 
 who is provided, now, with pointed roofs and 
 other glories, and the means of producing an 
 almost infinite variety of symmetrical patterns, 
 both more complex and more beautiful than 
 heretofore. 
 
 The "sixth gift" is a cube so divided as to 
 extend still farther the child's power of combin- 
 ing and discussing it. When its resources are 
 exhausted and combined with those of the 
 "seventh gift" (a box containing every form 
 supplied in the preceding series), the little 
 pupil — seven years old — has had his inventive 
 and artistic powers exercised, and his mind 
 stored with facts that have been absolutely 
 comprehended. He has acquired also a sense of 
 pleasure in the occupation of his mind. 
 
 But he has not been trained in this way only. 
 We leave out of account the bodily exercise 
 connected with the entire round of occupation, 
 and speak only of the mental discipline. There 
 are some other "gifts" that are brought into 
 service as the child becomes able to use them. 
 One is a box containing pieces of wood, or paste- 
 board, cut into sundry forms. With these the 
 
INFANT GARDENS 143 
 
 letters of the alphabet can be constructed; and, 
 after letters, words, in such a way as to create 
 out of the game a series of pleasant spelling 
 lessons. The letters are arranged upon a slate 
 ruled into little squares, by which the eye is 
 guided in preserving regularity. Then follows 
 the gift of a bundle of small sticks, which 
 represent so many straight lines; and, by laying 
 them upon his slate, the child can make letters, 
 patterns, pictures; drawing, in fact, with lines 
 that have not to be made with pen or pencil, but 
 are provided ready made and laid down with the 
 fingers. This kind of Stick-work having been 
 brought to perfection, there is a capital extension 
 of the idea with what is called Pea-work. By 
 the help of peas softened in water, sticks may be 
 joined together, letters, skeletons of cubes, 
 crosses, prisms may be built; houses, towers, 
 churches may be constructed, having due 
 breadth as well as length and height, strong 
 enough to be carried about or kept as specimens 
 of ingenuity. Then follows a gift of flat sticks, 
 to be used in plaiting. After that there is a 
 world of ingenuity to be expended on the plait- 
 ing, folding, cutting, and pricking of plain or 
 colored paper. Children five years old, trained 
 in the Infant Garden, will delight in plaiting 
 slips of paper variously colored into patterns 
 of their own invention, and will work with a 
 sense of symmetry so much refined by training 
 
144 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 as to produce patterns of exceeding beauty. By 
 cutting paper, too, patterns are produced in the 
 Infant Garden that would often, though the 
 work of very little hands, be received in schools 
 of design with acclamation. Then there are 
 games by which the first truths of astronomy, 
 and other laws of Nature, are made as familiar 
 as they are interesting. For our own parts, we 
 have been perfectly amazed at the work we have 
 seen done by children of six or seven — bright, 
 merry creatures, who have all the spirit of their 
 childhood active in them, repressed by no 
 parent's selfish love of ease and silence, cowed by 
 no dull-witted teacher of the ABC and the 
 pothooks. 
 
 Froebel discourages the cramping of an infant's 
 hand upon a pen, but his slate ruled into little 
 squares, or paper prepared in the same way, is 
 used by him for easy training in the elements of 
 drawing. Modeling in wet clay is one of the 
 most important occupations of the children who 
 have reached about the sixth year, and is used 
 as much as possible, not merely to encourage 
 imitation, but to give some play to the creative 
 power. Finally, there is the best possible use 
 made of the paint-box, and children engaged 
 upon the coloring of pictures and the arrange- 
 ment of nosegays are further taught to enjoy, 
 not merely what is bright, but also what is 
 harmonious and beautiful. 
 
INFANT GARDENS 145 
 
 We have not left ourselves as much space as is 
 requisite to show how truly all such labor 
 becomes play to the child. Fourteen years' 
 evidence suffices for a demonstration of the 
 admirable working of a system of this kind; but 
 as we think there are some parents who may be 
 willing to inquire a Httle further into the subject 
 here commended earnestly to their attention, 
 we will end by a citation of the source from 
 which we have ourselves derived what informa- 
 tion we possess. 
 
 At the educational exhibition in St. Martin's 
 Hall, last year, there was a large display of the 
 material used and results produced in Infant 
 Gardens which attracted much attention. The 
 Baroness von Marenholtz, enthusiastic in her 
 advocacy of the children's cause, came then to 
 England, and did very much to procure the 
 establishment in this country of some experi- 
 mental Infant Gardens. By her, several months 
 ago — and at about the same time by M. and 
 Madame Rong6, who had already established 
 the first English Infant Garden — our attention 
 was invited to the subject. We were also made 
 acquainted with M. Hoffman, one of Froebel's 
 pupils, who explained the system theoretically 
 at the Polytechnic Institution. When in this 
 country, the Baroness von Marenholtz published 
 a book called Woman's Educational Mission, 
 being an explanation of Frederick Froebel's 
 
146 INFANT GARDENS 
 
 System of Infant Gardens. We have made use 
 of the book in the preceding notice, but it 
 appeared without the necessary illustrations, and 
 is therefore a less perfect guide to the subject 
 than a work published more recently by M. and 
 Madame Ronge: A Practical Guide to the 
 English Kindergarten. This last book we exhort 
 everybody to consult who is desirous of a closer 
 insight into Froebel's system than we have been 
 able here to give. It not only explains what the 
 system is, but, by help of an unstinted supply of 
 little sketches, enables any one at once to study 
 it at home and bring it into active operation. It 
 suggests conversations, games; gives many of 
 Froebel's songs, and even furnishes the music 
 (which usually consists of popular tunes — Mary 
 Blane, Rousseau's Dream, etc.) to which they 
 may be sung. Furthermore, it is well to say that 
 any one interested in this subject, whom time 
 and space do not forbid, may see an Infant 
 Garden in full work by calling, on a Tuesday 
 morning between the hours of ten and one, on 
 M. and Madame Ronge, at number 32 Tavistock 
 Place, Tavistock Square. That day these 
 earliest and heartiest of our established infant 
 gardeners have set apart, for the help of a good 
 cause, to interruptions and investigations from 
 the world without, trusting, of course, we 
 suppose, that no one will disturb them for the 
 satisfaction of mere idle curiosity. 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT 
 KEILHAU* 
 
 HENRIETTA SCHRADER, BERLIN 
 Reprinted by permission of Amalie Hofer Jerome. 
 
 I 
 
 A WORD about my personal connec- 
 tions with Friedrich Froebel and 
 his family will not be out of place 
 in these reminiscences. My ma- 
 ternal grandfather, Superintendent and Con- 
 sistorial Assessor Hoffmann of Nette, near 
 Hildesheim in the former Kingdom of Hanover, 
 was born in Thuringia, where his father was 
 pastor. One of the sisters of my grandfather 
 married the Pastor Froebel in Oberweissbach in 
 1782, the youngest child of this marriage being 
 Friedrich Froebel, the mother dying shortly 
 after his birth. Christian, the older brother of 
 Froebel, born in 1770, also left Thuringia for 
 the Province of Hanover, settling in the little 
 town of Osterode, in the Hartz, where he 
 established a linen industry, and married a wife 
 from this place. Osterode and Nette being so 
 near together the families had constant inter- 
 
 *Translated by Bertha Hofer Hegner. Edited by Amalie 
 Hofer Jerome. 
 
148 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 course with each other. My grandfather had 
 three daughters, Johanna, Luise, and Christiane, 
 the second of which was my mother. The 
 Froebels in Osterode had besides several sons the 
 three daughters Albertine, Emilie, and EHse, 
 who were about the age of the daughters of the 
 Hoffmann family, with whom they were most 
 cordial friends. Among other relatives coming 
 to Nette was Friedrich Froebel, who frequently 
 visited his uncle. Our mother often told us 
 afterwards that these visits of Friedrich were 
 among her choicest recollections. In 1817 
 Froebel established his boys' school in Keilhau, 
 near Rudolstadt, in Thurlngia. In 1818 he 
 married Henrietta Wilhelmine Hofifmeister, of 
 Berlin. In 1820 Christian Froebel moved to 
 Keilhau to take charge of the domestic manage- 
 ment of the Institute. The two friends of 
 Froebel, Middendorf and Langethal, joined him 
 at Keilhau in 1817. In 1826 Langethal married 
 the adopted daughter of Froebel, and in the 
 same year Albertine Froebel became the wife of 
 Middendorf. In 1828 Barop joined the Keilhau 
 Institute and married Emilie Froebel. In 1830 
 the fianc^ of Elise Froebel, Karl, who was a 
 teacher in the Keilhau school, died, and also my 
 grandparents in Nette. My mother married the 
 Pastor Breymann in Mahlum, Province Braun- 
 schweig, which was about an hour and a half 
 journey from Nette. During the summer of 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 149 
 
 1826 my parents went in company with our 
 Aunt Christiane to Thuringia, visiting the 
 several families of our relations, and spending 
 • considerable time at Keilhau. From this time 
 onward a cordial and constant correspondence 
 was kept up between my mother and Albertine 
 Middendorf, and in this way our parents took 
 the deepest interest in the vicissitudes of the 
 Institute, and the difficulties which swept over 
 Keilhau so soon after their visit. 
 
 Frequent guests came from Keilhau to our 
 home who brought accounts of the work there, 
 and kept us informed of the varied changes 
 experienced by our beloved friends. Thus the 
 year 1848 arrived. In 1839 the wife of Friedrich 
 Froebel had passed away, and Barop had become 
 the principal of the Keilhau school. Eight 
 children had been born to him, and four to the 
 Middendorf family, three sons and an only 
 daughter, Alwina. Christian Froebel and his 
 wife were still active in conducting the eco- 
 nomics of the school, although the former had 
 grown entirely blind. Langethal had left 
 Keilhau to take a parsonage in Schlesien. 
 Friedrich Froebel had spent the larger part of 
 1836 in Switzerland, and after his return had 
 opened a new institution at Blankenburg near 
 by, which was devoted to the especial training of 
 women and children. Unfortunately he was 
 obliged to abandon this work on account of 
 
150 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 financial difficulty, and he returned to Keilhau in 
 1840, where he took residence in a peasant's 
 house near the Institute, and during the winter 
 conducted the training of several kindergartners 
 who lived in Keilhau, boarding at the Institute. 
 Froebel made frequent journeys during this 
 summer to other cities in the interest of his 
 educational idea, having at this time no imme- 
 diate part in the management of the Keilhau 
 school. Several young girls had been admitted 
 to the Institute in company with the daughters 
 of the principal, Barop, and it was finally decided 
 by my parents to send our eleven-year-old sister 
 to join them. Our many relatives there urged 
 me to accompany my sister, and in response to 
 the hearty invitations, Marie and I started in 
 May, 1848, for Thuringia, the land which had 
 cradled our Grandfather Hoffmann. 
 
 I take the following notes from my journals 
 and letters, written during the summer of 1848 
 in Rudolstadt and Keilhau : 
 
 Rudolstadt, May, 1848. — You have been think- 
 ing, dearest mother, that Marie and I are 
 already in Keilhau, but we are still here; but all 
 obstacles are at last removed, and we shall soon 
 reach our place of destination. The trunk has 
 arrived, and I am recovered from my cold, but 
 how are you, dear mother? Are you quite well? 
 To-day is Sunday, and you are going to our dear 
 little church at this very moment, thinking of 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 151 
 
 your absent children and remembering them in 
 your prayers. Dear mother, it is most beautiful 
 here, and in these lovely surroundings I miss one 
 thing only, and that is your and father's true 
 heartedness. If we could enjoy all this goodness 
 and beauty together with you, how happy I 
 should be. I am sad when I think that I can be 
 of no help to you now with the children and in 
 the house, and that father has so many added 
 expenses on account of our travel. But the 
 thought that I shall be a better help to you after 
 I have had this lovely visit comforts me. 
 
 Monday. — At last we are arrived in Keilhau, 
 where all gave us a friendly reception. The first 
 to welcome us was Frau von Born, the sister of 
 Barop, who is living here in order that she may 
 not be separated from her sons, who are being 
 educated in the school. Next came the five 
 daughters of the Barop family, all sturdy, strong 
 girls, with dark hair and brown eyes, dressed in 
 rustic simplicity, which seems to be necessary 
 here. Their father is an earnest, stately man, 
 wearing his hair very long, with a straight part 
 in the middle. He inspired us with the greatest 
 respect, but gave us a most cordial welcome. 
 When Elise Froebel appeared my heart grew 
 warm, for she gave us such a bright, loving look. 
 What an active life she leads here, and her 
 helper in the home, Malchen, led us at once to 
 the dining-room, where we were to take supper 
 
152 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 with the family. A loud cheering greeted us in 
 this room, which was filled with boys and 
 bearded men, who were all engaged in a lively 
 conversation. We had potato salad and cold 
 meat, which tasted unusually good. As soon as 
 any one of the boys had finished his supper, he 
 was allowed to leave the table, and each inva- 
 riably rushed boisterously out into the court, 
 where all were soon taking part in happy games. 
 Frau Barop is ill, and we have not yet seen her. 
 After supper we visited the grandparents, that 
 is, Christian Froebel and his wife, who live in the 
 "lower house." The grandfather is quite blind, 
 although otherwise a hale and hearty man, 
 helping everywhere, even folding up the clothes, 
 and helping with the laundry. The grandmother 
 is a tiny, trim little woman, very quiet but keen 
 and thoughtful. We had to tell them many 
 things, and the grandfather told us much about 
 the dear grandparents at Nette, and what a 
 cultured, wise man the grandfather was, and 
 how many times he had enjoyed eating carp 
 and drinking a glass of wine with him. Then 
 Frau Middendorf came. I had imagined her 
 very different. She is very bright and happy. 
 Everything here seems so bright, and happy, 
 and strong. Marie and I have a beautiful little 
 attic room. A soft rain fell quietly as we went to 
 bed, and the sound on the roof was like music, 
 which sound put us to sleep. 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 153 
 
 To-day we have taken some beautiful walks, 
 climbing to the top of the Kolm, which slopes 
 back from the school and belongs to the grounds. 
 The boys and teachers were all busy laying out 
 the comfortable footpaths and building hermit- 
 ages, and resting places in different parts of the 
 grounds. During the Whitsuntide holidays the 
 pupils live on the hillside all day long, working, 
 planting flowers, repairing the walks and build- 
 ings, and cooking on their rudely constructed 
 stoves. We saw some boiling potatoes, and 
 others making pancakes. We climbed up to the 
 tower, from the top of which we could look down 
 into the beautiful valley. Did you climb here, 
 too, dear parents, when you were here on your 
 visit? I am sure you did, for it is the most 
 beautiful spot about Keilhau. I look out over 
 the broad, rich valley, encircled by blue hills, 
 with the pines rustling back of me. When I 
 close my eyes it seems as if I were being carried 
 by wings on this refreshing air, which is all 
 around us. There is something strangely 
 indescribable about these surroundings. I think 
 it must be the spirit in Keilhau which permeates 
 everything. I have the feeling that this same 
 spirit must also quicken me, and that it will 
 penetrate through the chaos of thoughts and 
 feelings which ever struggle and toss about 
 within me. I feel that it will lead me to a clear- 
 ness of my inner being. 
 
154 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 Tuesday. — Last night we sat in the moonlight 
 under a beautiful birch tree on the Kolm. My 
 dear mother, if I only could tell you all I feel and 
 wish to do. But there is so much that is unutter- 
 able in this unique place. I seem to grow freer 
 every moment, and am gaining new insight into 
 a life which I cannot yet put into words. I feel 
 as if I had been here a long, long time; as if this 
 were my real home; and yet at the same time 
 every fiber of my heart is attached to my old 
 home. Every one is kind and good to us here, 
 and we move freely in this new circle. I am all 
 over the house, now upstairs, now down, then 
 visiting the grandparents. I always find some- 
 thing to do and some one to help. They are 
 always ready to give me such work to do as I can. 
 The Institute is fairly blooming at this time. 
 At Easter twenty boarding-school pupils were 
 refused because there was no room. I can easily 
 understand why parents wish their children to 
 live here. You should see how good everything 
 tastes. The large crocks of milk and baskets of 
 bread that are brought for breakfast disappear 
 rapidly. It is the same way at dinner and 
 supper, and there is plenty of everything sub- 
 stantial. There are no sweets or luxuries, and 
 the very things which I did not relish at home 
 taste excellent here. The spicy mountain air 
 must have something to do with it, and the 
 exercise out of doors, and because very little 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 155 
 
 attention is paid to non-essentials. Every one is 
 interested in the higher things. Just at present 
 political matters are being discussed, but the 
 real storms of poUtics do not touch Keilhau, 
 which lies so peacefully and quietly surrounded 
 by these hills, there is no room for quarreling. 
 The rustling of the trees brings peace to my 
 heart, the blue skies fill me with hope, and the 
 beautiful sun over the shady trees warms my 
 soul. The moon and stars shine mildly upon us 
 at night, bringing peace. This summer visit to 
 Keilhau is surely the brightest spot in all my life. 
 Later. — With all my careful listening I have 
 not been able to learn what stand is taken here 
 with regard to politics, or to what party Keilhau 
 belongs. This much I understand, that we 
 should have a free and united Germany. But 
 what do they call free here? Marie with her 
 brightness and freshness is liked by everybody 
 and is happy. As soon as she is entirely at 
 home I will go to Rudolstadt, and come back 
 later for a permanent stay. Middendorf and 
 Froebel have not yet returned from their 
 travels. How are the children, the stout Erich 
 and sweet Hedchen? Were you not pleased 
 with the pretty cuttings made by Adolph, which 
 you sent me? They are very much admired 
 here, and the teachers think he must have a 
 great talent for drawing for it was all free hand 
 cutting. 
 
156 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 Diary. Rudolstadt, middle of May. — To-day 
 we went to church. The building is large and 
 beautifully arched, but the furnishing was gaudy, 
 and made one feel restless. These words were 
 in gold letters on black marble over the altar, 
 and impressed me deeply: "Master, remain 
 with us, for the evening is coming." Yes, we 
 may well pray the Master to be with us just 
 now. We need to hold fast to heaven at this 
 time, when the earth is at variance with itself. 
 I do not wish to leave it now, but am eager to 
 see how these current experiences will unwind 
 themselves. I am only grateful that I am not 
 one of the causes of all this tangle in which so 
 many lose themselves, dragging so many others 
 with them through the defeat of the uprising 
 party. But are not all these people tools in 
 God's hands? If I could only see how all things 
 fit together, and how it will all end ! The pastor 
 also spoke of the present upheavals, taking his 
 text from David's psalm, "The Lord will 
 destroy the godless." There was little food for 
 the soul in this sermon, and I went home unsat- 
 isfied and empty. I am always searching for 
 something in church that I cannot find. I look 
 for a clearer understanding of the Bible and its 
 application to life, but so much remains dark to 
 me. I can do nothing with many of the texts, 
 and the pressing exhortation of the minister 
 that we should turn from the godless has no 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 157 
 
 effect upon me. Who is godless, and who has 
 a right to call another godless? It may be hard 
 to explain the Bible and inspire men to do the 
 good, but I always think, who serves God with 
 fervent love and holy zeal is not only a minister 
 in the pulpit, but a pastor of souls in the world. 
 If I were a minister sitting before the Book of 
 Books on a Saturday evening here in the silence, 
 with eyes lifted to heaven asking for light, 
 would it be denied me? No, never. Whitsuntide 
 comes once each year as the festival of the Holy 
 Ghost, but every one can celebrate his own 
 Whitsuntide if he entreats the Holy Ghost to 
 illuminate him. A believer celebrates the 
 festivals of the Church many, many times in his 
 own heart. If I were only a man and had been 
 educated like a man, and could talk about these 
 things which stir the heart, like a man! But it 
 must be better for me to be a woman. The 
 limitations that are put about our sex soften the 
 emotions, keep my heart warm, and curb my 
 pride. Is it less worthy to hold still, to work 
 quietly, to be patient, than it is to struggle, and 
 quarrel, and advocate? To be a woman of quiet 
 dignity, is not this something high? Was not 
 Jesus born of a woman? Was it not the women 
 who were true to him until his death, and who 
 first proclaimed his resurrection with the cry, 
 "The Lord is arisen"? This is my comfort. 
 
158 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 that women are not excluded from all that is 
 highest and best in the world. 
 
 II 
 
 From my letters, 1848. — The peasants around 
 Keilhau are celebrating their May festival, 
 much as they do with us at home. However, 
 they keep their holiday in a much simpler way 
 here. They dance down the green in front of the 
 Institute, the musician sitting near by; occa- 
 sionally one of them steps into the midst of the 
 circle with his bass viol, which is the signal for 
 all of us to join in the dance. Yesterday being 
 Sunday, all were happy and gay, and to-day the 
 jollity of the peasants continues. The children 
 are all anxious to drop their studies in order to 
 participate, but the mild, gentle Middendorf 
 stood his ground and said: "Only when the 
 work is all done is it good to dance." The kind 
 expression on his face sent the children all back 
 again to their work in a happy mood. This 
 Middendorf is so refreshing. He reminds me 
 much of Pastor W., although Middendorf 's 
 presence and appearance are far more ideal. 
 I love Elise Froebel more and more every day. 
 I think she loves me also. She impresses me as 
 one of those strong ones upon whom others can 
 lean. It seems as if I always had been here. 
 Usually I am most fond of such great and 
 aristocratic people as one finds at the von C's; 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 159 
 
 you were so often angry with me because nothing 
 seemed good enough or great enough for me. 
 Here at Keilhau there is nothing of the aristo- 
 cratic, in fact, everything aesthetic is lacking, 
 and as I look upon the arrangements and manner 
 of life here, much seems countrified and crude 
 according to our ideas. I cannot understand 
 why it never seems unpleasant or jarring. If 
 I had children whom I wished to send away 
 from home, I should bring them to this place. 
 You can hardly imagine how attached the old 
 students who have left Keilhau are to the 
 Institute. They speak of their stay here as the 
 happiest time of their lives. Every day brings 
 many guests, among them many of the old 
 pupils who come back to stay for a longer or 
 shorter time. How happy I shall be to have 
 brother Karl make me a visit here! This life 
 will be very new to him. Last week we all went 
 together to Justinshoehe to see the fireworks in 
 honor of the opening of Parliament. If only the 
 men had not strewn ashes on their heads at the 
 close of the ceremony! People at Rudolstadt 
 vie with each other to see which shall have more 
 worldly goods than the other. This seems to be 
 their one aim in life. What would become of 
 the world if each one had everything he wished? 
 I am sure that egotism is the cause of all their 
 trouble. If they would only cease their "freedom 
 cry," and work to do away with egotism, which 
 
160 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 is at the root of all rivalry, then the tree of 
 freedom would have a chance to grow green and 
 flourish! I have ceased being interested in 
 parties, although I still like to hear the men talk 
 about them. It amuses me when they begin to 
 quarrel in their arguments, jumping to the 
 tables and shouting to be understood. One of 
 the teachers by the name of Schweizer is a 
 Republican; he, together with Herr L., speaks 
 zealously against the king and the kingdom. 
 Uncle Froebel has not yet returned, and I am 
 growing very anxious to see him. I do not 
 exactly understand his relationship to every one 
 here in the Institute, and yet it seems to be all 
 his work. With the exception of Middendorf , no 
 one speaks cordially of him. In Rudolstadt he 
 is not given recognition in the same way as are 
 Barop, Middendorf, uncle, and aunt. These call 
 Froebel unpractical and an idealist, and consider 
 it good fortune that he has retired from the 
 Institute, which they think was only saved by 
 Middendorf and Barop. The other uncle at 
 Koenigsee is also unfriendly toward Froebel. 
 They say that he constantly borrowed money 
 for his work, and when the uncle would no 
 longer help him in this way, Froebel grew angry 
 with him, although he still owed him for what he 
 had already used. My dear parents, you do not 
 know how all this grieves me, although I try to 
 think that things are different from what they 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 161 
 
 seem. I am sure that when a man desires with 
 his whole heart to work for humanity as uncle 
 does, that he must first work with himself, and 
 above everything else stand as a righteous, good 
 citizen. Good-by, my dear ones. 
 
 The first day of Whitsuntide in Keilhau {from 
 my diary). — We went to church this morning, 
 but I was not uplifted. In the afternoon Mid- 
 dendorf read aloud to us from the life and work 
 of two men of whom I cannot think highly. 
 I wonder that Middendorf can honor and 
 befriend such men! I have the privilege of 
 attending his class in religious instruction, and 
 have there learned to know what is his most 
 profound religious sentiment. I am sure that 
 he is a Christian ; he meets my whole ideal of a 
 true Christian, and yet can he be mistaken in his 
 belief? Later in the day Middendorf, together 
 with several of the teachers, some of the students, 
 and the ladies, took a long walk into some 
 beautiful neighboring grounds. Here we sat 
 down while Middendorf read us a flower fairy 
 story, and it seemed to me that we were in an 
 enchanted garden. In the evening the music 
 teacher, together with his pupils, gave us a home 
 concert. I have been very happy to-day, 
 neither my head nor my heart has tormented 
 me. I have felt myself free, sailing on through 
 Hfe. 
 
 Tuesday. — Yesterday was a very happy day. 
 
162 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 In the evening there was a hunt ball. After 
 dinner the sharpshooters formed in line, and the 
 older pupils with their teachers all went to the 
 trial grounds. The little ones were taken by 
 Middendorf up the hill. At four o'clock Elise 
 Froebel and I carried baskets of cakes to them, 
 and after the lunch time we made four wreaths 
 to crown the kings and queens of the festival. 
 While we were busy with the wreaths a drum- 
 beat announced the successful sharpshooter 
 among the older pupils who had struck the 
 heart of the target, which was a red and gold 
 eagle. He invited Luise Levin to share the 
 honor of the day with him by being the queen of 
 the festival. Luise had previously cared for the 
 house, but is now one of the devoted teachers in 
 the Institute, and hopes soon to take a position 
 as a kindergartner. She is always caring for me. 
 Elise Froebel crowned the king and queen with 
 the wreaths we had made, and the sharpshooters 
 and teachers presented the gun with great 
 ceremony to their successful companion, the 
 entire company joining in the cheers, and we all 
 marched toward the house singing gayly. When 
 we reached home, one of the leaders among the 
 Republicans attempted to raise a cry against 
 the government, but he was unsuccessful. The 
 gifts were presented to the different students, 
 when one of the teachers announced: "The 
 king and queen must now make all the people 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 163 
 
 happy." The two wearing the wreaths, whether 
 they wished to or not, were obHged to dance 
 through the great hall in the presence of the 
 laughing, gay company, to music which was 
 without time or rhyme. The little children 
 came into the hall, and sister Marie was their 
 queen. We took our supper on the lawn soon 
 after, but the older pupils were full of excite- 
 ment, and soon hurried away to make their 
 toilet for the ball. One by one reappeared, in 
 festive attire, the students, with white trousers 
 and gloves, leaving a trail of eau de Cologne 
 behind them. The ball opened brilliantly, and 
 not until the gray morning dawned did we finish 
 the last cotillon. 
 
 Sunday, June 17 , Keilhau. — Dearest parents, 
 at last uncle is here! Immediately after the 
 festival I returned to Rudolstadt, and on Friday 
 evening the following note was handed to me: 
 " Uncle has returned to Keilhau, and longs to see 
 Fraulein Henrietta Breymann; perhaps to-mor- 
 row. Please pardon the liberty." Signed R. 
 How this good news stirred and excited me! 
 I decided to go back to Keilhau the next morn- 
 ing. On second thought the words "perhaps 
 to-morrow" seemed to Infer that there was no 
 great hurry. Nevertheless I started, accom- 
 panied by Marie and her brother, as early as 
 five o'clock in the morning. The way to Keilhau 
 never seemed so long or laborious. I was met on 
 
164 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 my early arrival by the astonishment of all, and 
 R. smiled when he saw me. He said uncle had 
 merely asked him, in case he should see me on 
 Friday at Rudolstadt, to let me know that he 
 had returned. He was, therefore, amused at my 
 eagerness. But uncle came at last, and fairly 
 folded his arms about me, his ever thoughtful 
 look smiling upon me. "I have longed to see 
 you, my dear child, and thank you for coming." 
 Soon after breakfast he took me by the hand 
 and led me out of doors. " I know you well, my 
 child, from your letters and talks with Luise. 
 Have confidence also in me. I think I find in you 
 a searching soul, and perhaps I can help you find 
 that for which you search, of which you are 
 perhaps yourself unconscious. Tell me frankly 
 what you wish your life to be?" I can hardly 
 describe the feeling which swept over me as 
 uncle thus spoke to me. I at once told him 
 everything, everything that I had felt in body 
 and mind, how I had longed with my whole 
 heart to do good, but had done so little as yet. 
 Yes, dear parents, I confessed to him how I did 
 not enjoy doing daily duties at home, and how 
 it was hard for me to do over and over again 
 household work, and how at the same time 
 I longed to make your home burden Hghter, and 
 help share the care of the children. I told him 
 how often I felt useless and weak enough to die, 
 and how it seemed that death would be my only 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 165 
 
 salvation. He was so still, letting me pour out 
 all I had to say, and when I was quiet again, he 
 put his arms about me: "My dear child, it is 
 not given me to be a father in the literal sense, 
 but for this very reason I can devote my life to 
 others, and so to you I can also be a father. It 
 is not without a purpose that God has given you 
 a mind of greater strength than your body; do 
 not rebel against nature. Your mind is seeking 
 clearness, is looking for work. Many people 
 grow sick in body because the mind cannot free 
 itself. Make yourself free and you will see that 
 the soul is greater than the body, and must 
 triumph. Never seek to flee from the body, for 
 before you can be an angel in heaven you must 
 be one on earth. I want to help you be one here, 
 and I am sure you will find the happiness and 
 peace for which you are seeking." He continued 
 to speak so confidentially and appealingly and 
 so beautifully. Could I but give to you every 
 word as it reechoes! He opened a new world 
 for me, and led me to look into the inner life, 
 and I seem to understand that no one lives here 
 on earth in vain, and the meaning came clear to 
 me how God is mighty in the weak. Yes, I am 
 sure that humanity is a unit, and to each is 
 given a place in the whole if he but recognize it. 
 Now I have come to a turning-point in my life, 
 and I see its high purposes, and my path is 
 suddenly clear before me, — I am to give myself 
 
166 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 to childhood and its nurture. Dear parents, I 
 can now help you better, too. I can keep dear 
 sister Hedchen from experiencing the lonesome- 
 ness which tormented me when a little child, and 
 through me you can teach Adolph, Wilhelm, and 
 Erich, and so I can help you all. If it is yours or 
 God's will, I can find work away from home, 
 too, for my plan now is to devote myself to the 
 teachings of uncle, and to study French and 
 English at the same time. What joy it brings 
 to me to feel that I have a definite life work! 
 I have told Luise all about my plan, and she 
 agrees with me that it is right, and will soon talk 
 it over with uncle. 
 
 Keilhau, June, 1848 {copy from my journal). — 
 I have finished a long letter to my parents, and 
 have told them my life-work plans. Will these, 
 indeed, come to fulfillment? God grant it. At 
 last, at last I am to find a rest within myself; 
 I am to have a definite aim in life, one which 
 will give me the right to think, one which will 
 enlarge my heart, and the pursuit of which will 
 not necessarily separate me from the loved ones 
 at home, but rather make me capable of being 
 a better daughter and a better sister. I have 
 given my confidence to Luise, and I feel that we 
 are coming nearer and closer together each day. 
 We speak to each other as "thou." She wishes 
 to do everything possible to further my plans, 
 and I will ask Middendorf to give me permission 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 167 
 
 to follow some science lessons at the Institute. 
 She tells me that I have made a deep impression 
 upon uncle. He said to her: "Henrietta is one 
 of us, that I have already discovered. Have 
 you noticed how her character shows itself in 
 her appearance and dress?" When uncle first 
 saw me I wore a blue and white striped dress, 
 blue being his favorite color. The waist was 
 finished at the neck and belt with blue satin 
 ribbons; each bow was fastened with a silver 
 pin, the head of which was a cube. It seemed 
 that these pins especially pleased Froebel. 
 Luise tells me that the cube is a symbol of the 
 fundamental idea of Froebel's educational 
 scheme. She says that Froebel illustrates the 
 law of mediation in the second play gift for the 
 children by means of the sphere, cube, and 
 cylinder. Luise has told me many interesting 
 things about his work, much of which is not 
 yet clear to me, and it even seems mysterious. 
 I have never heard or read of such ideas as they 
 have here, but I shall certainly understand it all 
 if I am only permitted to stay with uncle. If 
 only his course of lessons can be given here next 
 winter, and if I only can stay at Keilhau! 
 
 Froebel lives in a country house across the 
 way from the Institute. His living room is very 
 comfortable, and Luise has told me that his first 
 wife was a most cultured woman, one who 
 craved beautiful and attractive surroundings. 
 
168 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 Many of the lovely things in his sitting-room 
 came from her, and he prizes them highly. 
 Fresh flowers are a necessity to him, and Luise 
 keeps them always in his room. So long as the 
 lilies last his table is never without them. He 
 calls the lily and the calla his "life-flowers," 
 and he always has calla growing in pots wherever 
 he settles down to live. He has explained 
 many things to Luise about the calla, with 
 reference to the laws of life. If I could only 
 understand these deep things! Hitherto I have 
 loved nature above all else, but I have never 
 studied her, for no one has ever before called my 
 attention to the necessity for such study. 
 Froebel thinks, too, that I should spend much 
 time with the plants, and he has said to me: 
 "Plants, in their fettered silence, reveal far 
 more of the law which governs life than do 
 animals or man with all their freedom of motion, 
 their passions, and free will. Through the 
 latter men too often fall into mistaken ways, 
 and bring discord into life." Also from the 
 stones and the crystals uncle reads much by 
 which to interpret the human soul. In the 
 formation of these he finds a correspondence to 
 the law of human evolution. Luise showed me 
 a box containing various forms of wood, which 
 is called the chest of "solids," which uncle 
 explains in his study course. Shall I ever fathom 
 it all? 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 169 
 
 At one time uncle conducted an institute for 
 
 kindergartners in the next village, Blankenburg, 
 
 but it was given up on account of insufficient 
 
 money. It is said that he demanded great 
 
 moneys for this institution of both Barop and 
 
 Middendorf, and was often unpractical and 
 
 dictatorial. Luise is very sad that uncle is not 
 
 better understood. She clings to him with 
 
 daughterly affection. She cares for him, and 
 
 believes in the greatness of his idea. The other 
 
 women of Keilhau do not seem to feel the same. 
 
 One sees a bitterness among them whenever the 
 
 conversation turns on the subject of uncle. 
 
 I see very little of the v/omen as I stay on. They 
 
 are entirely occupied with their households and 
 
 families. They do their own cooking, and take 
 
 turns in doing the household work. My noble 
 
 Elise has so much to do, now in the cellar, now 
 
 in the kitchen, at the wash-house, or in the 
 
 garden. What a pity that she cannot spend 
 
 more time with the boys and the teachers, for 
 
 she has a sureness and tact in association with 
 
 them which is very helpful, and all rejoice when 
 
 she comes among them for a free hour with her 
 
 hand work. One feels in her presence a goodness 
 
 which has a lovely influence upon all. 
 
 The Institute buildings are divided into what 
 is called the "upper and the lower house," 
 between which a new addition is being built, 
 which is intended later to receive the youngest 
 
170 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 boys. In the upper house is the family room, in 
 which there is an old but comfortable sofa, in 
 fact, the only one which I have ever seen in the 
 Institute; otherwise the entire room is extremely 
 plain, without adornment, or even a shimmer of 
 beauty, — but I love this room. One or another 
 who has a free hour, or wishes to chat or read 
 a little if he finds company, comes here. Re- 
 cently, when it was too cold and damp in the 
 garden, we all sat there, and in assigned parts 
 read "Don Carlos," but I must write you all 
 about this at another time. On the floor above 
 the Barops have their home, but I have not yet 
 visited them. Frau Barop is a delicate, gentle 
 lady, much loved by the boys. In the lower 
 house live the grandparents, Middendorf, sister 
 Marie, and the five Barop daughters, who meet 
 together with the students only in class hours 
 and on special occasions. I am all day long in 
 the dining-room, or in the family room of the 
 upper house, or in the garden. I take a fine 
 walk nearly every day, usually after the after- 
 noon 'coffee, otherwise after supper between 
 seven and eight o'clock, when I always look for 
 one of the women to accompany me, Elise, 
 Luise, and Frau von Born, or Malchen, and when 
 they say they have no time to go with me, I help 
 them with the work so that they may be free 
 and have an hour to wander in the beautiful 
 outdoor world. Occasionally some of the 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 171 
 
 gentlemen join us. Yesterday evening uncle 
 took me up the Kolm, several others following 
 us. It was a genuine summer evening ; the trees 
 rustled softly, and fireworms flitted in the warm 
 evening light. Some one had presented me with 
 a beautiful bouquet of roses, and I put several 
 glowworms in among the petals. The effect 
 was fairy-like. Uncle took one of the dark red 
 roses and put it in my hair, and was much 
 pleased over the magic illumination on my head 
 made by the glowworms in the rose. 
 
 Ill 
 
 Keilhau in June {from my Journal). — Uncle 
 is unremitting in his work. He writes letters 
 day and night, besides traveling about a great 
 deal. Together with several men from else- 
 where, whom he has won over to the cause, he 
 has called a meeting of educators, to be held at 
 Rudolstadt, in August. Ladies are to be invited 
 also. Uncle's ideas about the education of 
 women and children are being discussed in many 
 journals, but Luise tells me that they are as yet 
 little understood and often attacked. At this 
 gathering of educators, the kindergarten is to be 
 openly discussed, and although Luise is a little 
 anxious about the great day, she firmly believes 
 that the good cause will come out victorious. 
 When she has a minute's time she helps uncle 
 with his correspondence. She seldom has any 
 
172 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 time to herself, as the household duties are many, 
 and Luise must help in these. 
 
 Why cannot the women arrange their house- 
 work so that there is some time left for other 
 things? Why do they not give more time to the 
 teaching of the boys? The young men, the 
 teachers, and the visiting students, who came 
 back for a few weeks, are always greatly pleased 
 to have the women join them. I like to talk 
 with this one and the other one, and we seem to 
 be benefited by this exchange of ideas. How 
 delightful such society is ! In former days uncle's 
 wife is said to have added much to the intellec- 
 tual life of this circle of men, as well as to have 
 mothered the young boys. Middendorf thinks 
 very highly of her, but the women say she was 
 not plain enough, and that her housekeeping 
 was not practical. Is it then not possible to be 
 both spiritually minded and practical at the 
 same time? It must be possible. 
 
 Saturday evening I went with Luise to visit 
 uncle, and helped her copy letters. I must 
 confess that I would have enjoyed taking a walk 
 quite as well. Uncle begrudges himself all rest. 
 Toward evening he goes with a great company 
 of Keilhau children to Eichfeld and Schaale, to 
 play the games which are to be given by the 
 children at the educational meeting. Some of 
 his former pupils of the training class will help 
 him in the games. It would be impossible for 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 173 
 
 me to play in such games before people, — am 
 I very self-conscious? 
 
 Uncle values the play of children highly. He 
 has said to me: "The plays of a child are his 
 first deeds. We must put such material in his 
 way that he may unconsciously develop into all 
 that is thoughtful and useful; we must ever 
 direct the play toward that which is uplifting, 
 so that even the play of his life may be noble. 
 When we play with children we must never try 
 to bring them up to our ideas, but must look 
 down into their hearts, and become childlike, 
 and must thoughtfully and gently study their 
 tendencies and motives; inasmuch as we do this 
 will we reach the child's inner nature and help 
 him unfold beautifully. We must cherish the 
 child's nature, from his birth on through his 
 whole life ; yes, nurture it, — for this is your work. 
 An educator must always look, like a gardener, 
 to the future. He must know that the seed he 
 sows, and the garden he lays out, will in time 
 appear altogether different from the day he 
 plants; not that they are become a new or 
 entirely different thing — they have only devel- 
 oped what was within them. Such is the 
 relationship between child and adult; the child 
 is man in the germ. This should be a holything 
 to us w^hile still in its dependency. This germ- 
 power must be understood, and when you 
 understand it, you have found the Ariadne 
 
174 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 thread which will guide you through the laby- 
 rinth of life. Verily, young women and mothers, 
 you have great things in your power. A new 
 sense is stirring everywhere, and you are called 
 in the new times to accomplish the great and 
 the untried." 
 
 Why is it that nearly all of the gentlemen 
 here make light remarks ridiculing the games 
 which uncle plays with the children, and often 
 slighting remarks about the kindergarten? I 
 must confess that I cannot always be angry 
 with them for these remarks, and am often 
 tempted to laugh with them. But as often as 
 I hear uncle speak about the meaning of these 
 things, I see all in another light and feel heartily 
 ashamed of myself. Uncle fairly stirs my soul 
 with his thoughts. If only I could see the 
 connection between his principles and these 
 gam^es, which are very strange to me! New 
 light will come, I am sure, when we begin our 
 course of lessons in October, and then I can 
 better defend the cause of "Herrn Froebel" 
 when the gentlemen make their attacks. I 
 shall study diligently with uncle when the class 
 begins, meanwhile I must enjoy the blissful 
 freedom which I feel here. I must take deep, 
 deep draughts of this air which surrounds us, 
 in which the natural and spiritual seem to melt 
 into one. 
 
 A letter. — This is what my heart has said over 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 175 
 
 -and over again these last few days: "If only 
 dear father were here!" or, " If I were only with 
 you now, dearest mother, and v/ith all of you in 
 our dear home! " All is darkened and troubled 
 within me. If only a single ray of light might 
 break through this inner chaos! It is true that 
 I have grown richer and older in experience 
 during the past weeks; I have pressed forward 
 through many dark places; and when I think of 
 all that I have thought out and worked through 
 in my short Hfe, I tremble at the thought of all 
 that still awaits me before I may behold the 
 pure light of truth. I long for rest; I yearn to 
 lose myself in the eternity of truth. At the same 
 time I ask, Does the soul ever rest? The answer 
 comes, No, no, I cannot conceive of spirit 
 without activity. Thus thinking on an eternity 
 of working and striving, I grow weary, and long 
 for an endless sleep, such as death,— a sleep 
 without dreams, without pictures; deep down in 
 the cool, still earth, with the light of the sun, 
 the dew of the flowers, and the rustling of the 
 trees over me. 
 
 It is grown quite clear to me that I am not 
 intended to stand and work in the great world. 
 I am unable to guide the helm out on the agitated 
 world-ocean. Only where I understand all, can 
 prove all, and grasp the meaning of all, only 
 there can I be happy and make others happy. 
 And yet, the quiet stream by which I loiter, 
 
176 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 does it not run on to the great ocean? do not its 
 water drops mingle with those of the ocean's 
 huge waves, which rise and fall in ceaseless 
 changings? 
 
 September 3. — The above I wrote some time 
 ago, while the impressions of the Rudolstadt 
 teachers' convention were still confusing and 
 confounding me. Fourteen days are now passed, 
 and this quiet Sunday morning, while all is 
 restful within me, I will try to give you a sketch 
 of our recent experience, which is now being so 
 widely discussed. Have patience with me if 
 I do not tell what happened in the right order, 
 for it was the first time in my life that I ever 
 attended anything like a teachers' convention, 
 and so I was deeply impressed by all I saw and 
 heard. Activity and progress surround us. The 
 old schoolmasters are waking from their long 
 sleep, and it is evident that a renewed and 
 unified spirit of the people can only be attained 
 by national education. And the Froebel kinder- 
 garten was acknowledged at the teachers' 
 convention as the foundation of such an educa- 
 tion. The kindergarten was shown to be the 
 connection between the family and the school, 
 and by means of these methods the children are 
 brought into vital connection with the life- 
 whole, which like a tree grows up out of the 
 germ of sacred family life. 
 
 Froebel spared no pains to bring about the 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 177 
 
 convention. No journey was too far, no weather 
 so bad that it could keep him from carrying 
 out his plans. He secured accommodations for 
 two to three hundred people in Rudolstadt, 
 and every one gladly received them. Here in 
 Keilhau also were guests, and among them some 
 of the kindergartners previously trained by 
 Froebel. There was excitement and bustle on 
 all sides. Over those of us only who stand 
 faithfully for Froebel hung a cloud of depression. 
 We feared for his peculiarities of speech ; for so 
 many new thoughts surge up while he is speak- 
 ing, and his sentences often grow lengthy and 
 tangled, and his meaning grows involved and 
 indefinite, and who would presume to make his 
 meaning clear to others when he himself failed. 
 
 Luise and Amalie Krueger, and other kinder- 
 gartners, dreaded playing the games with the 
 children of Keilhau and Eichfeld, for neither of 
 these places have a kindergarten. The children 
 were especially trained for this occasion, that 
 the people might have a practical example of the 
 Froebel children's games. 
 
 At last the great day came, finding some of us 
 full of fear and trembling. All eagerly took their 
 way to Rudolstadt. Thursday was spent in 
 general preparations. Dr. Sommer of Salzungen, 
 and Dr. Kell of Leipzig, were made president 
 and vice president. Eight directors were 
 selected, and Middendorf was made one of 
 
178 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 them. The evenings were spent in music. 
 Early the second morning all the kindergartners 
 gathered at the house of Frau Baehring, where 
 I found them, and together we went to the hotel 
 "Ritter," where the first session was being held. 
 Many people were already assembled when the 
 kindergarten children from Saalfeld came in 
 their wagon, which was covered with wreaths 
 and flowers. The lower part of the hall was 
 filled with teachers, while the galleries were 
 crowded with visitors, prompted either by 
 curiosity or interest. The citizens of Rudolstadt 
 stood guard at the open doors of the hall. 
 Under the royal box a platform was placed, 
 decorated with flowers and green wreaths. Here 
 the presidents and directors took their seats. 
 Over this platform v/as hung a picture of Jesus 
 blessing the little children, while on either side 
 were appropriate mottoes. Unfortunately I can 
 remember but one of these, which read as 
 follows: "Come let us give our lives to the 
 children." 
 
 IV 
 
 {Continued from letter describing the Rudolstadt 
 Convention). — When the entire company were 
 gathered together and in order, all arose and 
 sang with deep feeling, to the melody of 
 "Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott," appropriate 
 words, which had been composed by Midden- 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 179 
 
 dorf, each stanza of which closed with an 
 exhortation to Hve with the children. After 
 appropriate greetings, the president explained 
 in a few clear, concise sentences, that there 
 was need for a new foundation for education, 
 and expressed the hope that those attending 
 the convention might seek to learn and test 
 the true spirit of the kindergarten in order to 
 see whether this might not be the new founda- 
 tion required. 
 
 Then Froebel arose, but before he began to 
 speak, he put both hands to his head and 
 trembled visibly for a moment. Then he raised 
 his head, and from the eyes of the seventy-year- 
 old man streamed a soulful light. Now he stood 
 calm and firm before us. 
 
 He led a little girl, with her mother, to a table 
 upon which were placed the various occupation 
 materials. He left the child to build with the 
 blocks. The lovely little girl gave one frank 
 look into the faces of the assembled company, 
 and then hid her head in her mother's lap. 
 Froebel spoke to the child, and soon had her full 
 confidence. He then turned to the company,' 
 taking for his theme — "I lead you now into the 
 holy of holies — the family." 
 
 I cannot begin to give you his words in detail. 
 I was so much affected by his speech that I did 
 not always follow his meaning closely. But 
 I remember that he said, among other things: 
 
180 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 "The new education must be founded upon 
 a different law of development, for our children 
 and youth everywhere are in need of suitable 
 material by which they may work out their 
 activities. The child is developed, not alone 
 through knowing, but also through working, 
 and his self-activity is above all others the 
 incentive for his development." 
 
 Now the children came marching and singing 
 into the hall, led by the following kindergartners : 
 Luise Levin, Christiana Erdmann, Amalie 
 Krueger, Auguste Steiner, Ida Weiler, Augusta 
 Harold, and several others. This Froebeltook as 
 an illustration by which to lead usfromtheconsid- 
 eration of family life to that of tha community. 
 
 It is true that Froebel went into much detail 
 about plays and games, and his explanations of 
 them did not seem altogether clear to me. But 
 tha hearts of tha people were opened, and made 
 receptive. The touching unconsciousness of the 
 children, their clear and irresistible voices, had 
 onca mora aroused in tha entire company the 
 great love of childhood, and such love, I am 
 sure, not only believes and hopes, but has also 
 great tolerance. A deep satisfaction seemed to 
 rest upon the company. 
 
 I wrote down at the time some of Froebel's 
 statements about play, and I will here copy 
 them from my notebook: "The gesture-plays 
 ara very important as symbols of ideas, which 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 181 
 
 the children are not yet old enough to under- 
 stand." As an illustration he mentioned the 
 circle-play in which one child stands in the 
 middle of the ring, and how in spite of the great 
 variety of children, unity is secured by the fact 
 that all respond to one central point. At one 
 time the children formed three circles, one 
 within the other, to illustrate the bark, wood, 
 and marrow of the tree, which he said might 
 equally well be made to stand for happiness, 
 unity, and love. Through such thoughtful 
 representations, Froebel hopes to instill in men 
 the idea of harmony; through these he believes 
 might be aroused the three fundamental activ- 
 ities of the soul, — will, intellect, and feeling, — 
 and by means of physical activity, and word 
 and rhyme, he beUeves that these may be 
 translated into action. I have noticed for many 
 years how seldom bodily and spiritual activities 
 are in harmony. Man seems to lean either 
 entirely to the one or to the other. How highly 
 important it is for the genuine woman that she 
 should blend her household work with her 
 spiritual endeavors, and yet how seldom are 
 these two activities harmonized. When they 
 are found, such women stand out Hke single 
 stars in a dark night. May I be a worthy 
 reflection of one such woman — my own, noble, 
 beloved mother. Froebel's plays seem to me to 
 be so arranged that they will supply various 
 
182 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 great needs. The child is not led into abstract 
 v/orlds, but is encouraged to embody his ideas in 
 appropriate physical action. Body and soul are 
 thus mingled in unity. 
 
 So closed the first morning of the convention. 
 The afternoon was set apart for the plays which 
 were arranged for the older children. They 
 assembled in the open air at the appointed place. 
 Froebel stepped into the midst and seemed to be 
 possessed with such a zealous play spirit that he 
 omitted all words of introduction or explanation 
 concerning what was to come. The visitors felt 
 a little disappointed on this account, and the 
 wish was expressed that Middendorf, whose 
 sympathetic nature had won all hearts, should 
 step into the children's circle, and make explana- 
 tions, but because of deep considerateness, he 
 did not consent. Knowing Froebel's zeal so 
 well, he knew that such interference would not 
 be accepted. 
 
 Yes, if Froebel had but the character of a 
 Middendorf! The latter seems to me truly like 
 the Christ, always full of love and consideration 
 for others. Froebel also lives for others. He 
 sacrifices everything for his idea, the accom- 
 plishing of which he expects will bring blessedness 
 to all mankind ; in so doing he fails to consider 
 the individual, and is often harsh and tyrannical 
 even to the beloved, noble Middendorf, who is 
 his truest friend. 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 183 
 
 So the afternoon games were stretched out, 
 and we all feared that Froebel's work would 
 suffer a fall, just as in the morning we had hoped 
 for the highest success. Ridiculing remarks 
 were made about the games by onlookers. 
 Froebel was excited and disturbed beyond all 
 description, and became unconscious of everyone 
 and everything about him. Beautiful as such 
 unconsciousness is in one sense, on this day it 
 worked serious mischief, and I must confess that 
 I could not understand how these endless plays 
 especially illustrated Froebel's idea. Yes, I 
 must confess that some of them seemed even 
 ridiculous. The idea that playing according to 
 directions should make men noble, seemed to me 
 so narrow and limited and unnatural. At last 
 came the closing song. The poor kindergartners, 
 especially my good Luise, were thoroughly 
 exhausted, and one gentleman who had joined 
 our party proposed that we should go to the inn 
 for refreshments. We ordered tea, and antici- 
 pated a quiet hour after the great excitement of 
 the day. But soon a number of strangers, both 
 gentlemen and ladies, joined us, and in a short 
 time we were all in earnest discussion concerning 
 Froebel and his ideas. We soon realized that 
 sincere voices were being raised against him, 
 and we feared for him. I was especially uncom- 
 fortable over my own feeling of disagreement in 
 the matter. During the afternoon games I 
 
184 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 found myself next to a Dresden woman, whom 
 I had noticed with the greatest interest at the 
 morning session. It was Fraulein Johanna 
 Kuestner, who had accompanied Thekla von 
 Gumpert, a special friend of uncle. Her exquisite 
 figure, her pale, plain, but noble face, which 
 expressed great intelligence and sympathy, 
 attracted me to her, and I was filled with the 
 desire to know her better. The afternoon 
 brought me my wish. But one hour was needed 
 for us to grow well acquainted and love each 
 other. Oh how this little inner world in which 
 I here live expands and widens! Johanna has 
 taught her younger sisters since she was eighteen 
 years old, but she feels a certain emptiness in 
 the work, and that she has not yet found the 
 right path in education. She joined us, to our 
 great pleasure, at this afternoon tea and discus- 
 sion, which little by little became very gay as 
 one by one became weary of the serious debate. 
 Eight o'clock found us again in the "Ritter- 
 saale," not for discussion, but for a happy, 
 social time. The citizens of Rudolstadt had 
 provided a concert for their guests, the program 
 of which was altogether too overpowering for me. 
 I longed to go by myself out into the stillness of 
 nature. I proposed this to Luise, and together 
 we quietly left the hall with its oppressive 
 atmosphere. What a pleasure it was to take 
 a deep, refreshing breath! Middendorf and one 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 185 
 
 of his young friends followed us, and after 
 leaving the hall in the distance we still heard the 
 closing chorus, which was given by a strong 
 Mannerchor. We watched the people pour out 
 from the "Ritter," but I was so weary of the 
 confusion that I turned my eyes toward the dark 
 hills. Moon and stars shone out through the 
 white clouds. The music had already quieted 
 the storm within me, and the mild night com- 
 pleted the peace which fell upon me. Silently 
 we walked on together. Oh beloved ones, those 
 were priceless moments! 
 
 Saturday morning promised a sultry day. We 
 feared storm and rain, and the air was heavy 
 and oppressive. Nevertheless the convention 
 was better attended than the day before, and 
 although the program was announced to begin 
 at seven o'clock, an hour was spent in informal 
 discussions for and against Froebel's work. 
 I tried to make notes of the different points, but 
 was so frequently carried away by the deep 
 meaning of the speakers that I forgot all about 
 my writing. I only regret that I cannot give 
 you, dear parents, a complete account of the 
 program, although I know that the chief points 
 are written in my soul. 
 
 Dr. K. was the first speaker: "We are 
 certainly all agreed that the establishing of 
 kindergartens is a necessity; and that in the 
 same even children from two to six years old, of 
 
186 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 different classes, can be prepared to live together 
 in unity; that by means of them the home 
 training is completed ; that they help the home 
 life, and that they provide a more uniform 
 preparation for all children to later school life. 
 However great and important these ideas seem, 
 I did not recognize them in the demonstration 
 of the kindergarten which was made for us 
 yesterday. Froebel has a subjective and 
 individualized personality, and his educational 
 ideas emphatically reflect the same. It will 
 require an entire generation to simplify kinder- 
 garten practice, and set it free from its too 
 emphatic symbolism. I hold that it is an injury 
 to child nature to lead him too early to observing 
 and discriminating the geometric forms as 
 illustrated in the cube, folding paper, etc. The 
 Froebel gifts, as they are supposed to be pre- 
 sented to the child, suggest too strongly the 
 dissecting knife method. Froebel will not 
 stubbornly hold to his method of presenting the 
 same if we can show him a more normal and 
 natural application of his kindergarten idea, and 
 if we reject all artificiality and place the same 
 upon the simple platform of nature." 
 
 Froebel made a short reply to this address, 
 which was followed with closest interest. He 
 proved that his educational method corrob- 
 orated not only nature's lav/s, but also those of 
 Christianity, and that it is, therefore, simple and 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 187 
 
 in correspondence with the laws of development, 
 which govern child nature. His words were 
 clear, and were met with great favor. 
 
 He was followed by a young schoolmaster, 
 who was sent out to investigate the Froebel 
 method by the Minister of Education of Dresden. 
 He spoke in substance: "Froebel stands before 
 us as child, man, hero, and helper, as well as 
 friend and father, and with this last title, let us 
 claim him. His work is like an overflowing 
 fountain, out of which we have much to draw, 
 but which needs clarifying. I look into Froebel's 
 creative genius as into a holy chaos; myriads of 
 thoughts crowd upon him, and there is no time 
 for him to bring each of these into simple, 
 readable form. He is, indeed, the creator of the 
 kindergarten, but not its builder. His scheme 
 requires modification, and his philosophy, to- 
 gether with what he calls his system, are not 
 clear to me. We do not need a system for the 
 living together of little children. I shudder at 
 such a plan, as I do before Froebel's so-called 
 'Kindergarten Philosophy.' Right here may 
 I ask the question, Do children in the kinder- 
 garten play, or do they work?" 
 
 Froebel arose. His face was red with anger as 
 he forbade such to call him father who do not 
 understand him, nor wish to understand him. 
 He declared his system to be clear, and his 
 philosophy simple for such as are able to rec- 
 
188 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 ognize the organic plan of the universe, together 
 with the laws which govern the same. "The 
 smallest child must be guided according to these 
 laws, for he is a part of the whole. These laws 
 must hold good in his earliest plays, for they are 
 written within the nature of the child, and all 
 his doings are symbolic of them, and my kinder- 
 garten games and occupations therefore appeal 
 to him. The rules of these plays and occupa- 
 tions, which are indicated to the child through 
 the correct guiding of the adult, prepare him for 
 all actions of his later life. The child has 
 intimations of these laws in his innocent aspira- 
 tion; he expresses them symbolically in his 
 daily activities, and therefore the kindergarten 
 reinforces the institutional life which stands to 
 every human being as God's law. The children 
 play in the kindergarten, but these plays are 
 founded on world-wide truths, and the child is 
 therefore led through play out upon the true 
 path of life." 
 
 "Where shall we find women capable of 
 understanding Froebel's teachings, or of apply- 
 ing them? Where and how are they to be 
 trained for such a work?" Some one from the 
 audience asked these questions. Froebel replied : 
 "When Napoleon needed able generals, he found 
 them. So I will find able gardeners when once 
 I am given the garden." The Dresden school- 
 master who had been so frankly reproved again 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 189 
 
 took up the word: "Froebel expects his kinder- 
 gartens, which he promises will bring such 
 upHfting to the human race, to be conducted by 
 women, or, in other words, that his deeply 
 philosophical ideas shall be made practical by 
 women. I must confess that the thought of 
 'philosophical' women makes me shudder." He 
 continued in this manner for some time, and 
 a lengthy discussion on the education of women 
 followed. 
 
 My heart-beats were almost audible, so 
 indignant was I at these remarks of the men who 
 evidently thought us women inferior beings! 
 And are we then only here to serve the men, to 
 be under their command, to have our life pro- 
 gram dictated entirely by them, to be nothing of 
 ourselves? To be sure there is nothing higher 
 or more beautiful in life than to serve the man 
 one loves and honors, but it would never occur 
 to me to respect a man who considered me, as 
 compared with himself, an inferior creature, for 
 the great and only reason that he is a man and 
 I a woman, especially if I should find him 
 stupid, foolish, or unmoral, and unfortunately 
 I know so many, many foolish and stupid men! 
 
 It brought peace to my heart to think that 
 Froebel and Middendorf had such a different 
 opinion of women from the majority of men; 
 that they honored us as worthy to fill a position 
 as guardians of childhood even though unmar- 
 
190 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 ried; that we, as unmarried, might still work 
 together with them in good sense and sincerity, 
 to uplift human society; that we might be 
 something or become something in and of 
 ourselves. 
 
 My impulse was to go straight to these lordly 
 speakers and tell them what I here write to you, 
 but I could not bring myself to speak in the 
 open meeting. Who, indeed, would arise and 
 defend us poor creatures? 
 
 Johanna Kuestner arose. A deep stillness 
 pervaded, while in a few clear words she asked 
 that women also be treated as complete human 
 beings. She added that we must be treated as 
 such, and that in the future we would demand an 
 altogether different education from that in the 
 past, in order that we might be capable of 
 carrying forward scientific and philosophical 
 studies. With these words she turned to the 
 speaker to whom philosophical women were 
 such a horror. No conclusion was reached with 
 reference to the education and position of 
 women. The discussion turned again to the 
 methods and means of the kindergarten occupa- 
 tions, to the dangers of playful work, and other 
 miscellaneous considerations of the subject of 
 play. Then one speaker argued emphatically 
 that there was no necessity for the founding of 
 kindergartens. He held that the family was the 
 only correct place for the training of children 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 191 
 
 before they reached the school age, and that so 
 far as he was concerned, it was entirely an 
 unnatural development to drag little children 
 out of their small circle of experience. Another 
 speaker urged that the kindergarten be instituted 
 only where there is an abnormal family environ- 
 ment; such as where the mother is obliged to 
 work outside the home for support. 
 
 Until two o'clock the discussion swung back 
 and forth. On the whole only a few voices 
 were raised against the establishment of the 
 kindergarten, and the chief difference of opinion 
 was as to the method of introducing and carry- 
 ing forward the work, and how the organization 
 and introduction of same might be made with 
 reference to the organized school system. At 
 last a vote was taken that the kindergarten be 
 universally introduced, but the "how" this 
 should be done was left for the afternoon session. 
 
 These men who spoke so emphatically against 
 the method and manner of the Froebel kinder- 
 garten, what did they know of the subject? For 
 a few hours only they had seen children playing, 
 building, weaving, and folding. How could 
 they judge of the entire scheme, which, no 
 doubt, would take years of study to understand ? 
 This is what I frankly told the Dresden school- 
 master at the close of the meeting, after Luise 
 and I had had a long conversation with him. 
 You can imagine how frightened I was in the 
 
192 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 afternoon, when this same gentleman opened 
 his speech with the following words: "There 
 are those among the honored ladies here who 
 feel that I am incapable of passing final judg- 
 ment upon Froebel's scheme, and yet I have 
 been sent to this place in order to investigate, 
 test, and prove this subject, and after seeing 
 and hearing all that I did yesterday and to-day 
 I am unable to withdraw a single word which 
 I have spoken, although I am willing to confess 
 that possibly the entire matter is not yet clearly 
 understood by me, and, perhaps, has not yet 
 been presented in its fullest light." Several 
 times he made reference to the "right honorable 
 ladies," and, looking our way, smiled at us. 
 I was glad in the end that our impulsive words 
 had made such an impression upon him. 
 
 Nevertheless, this all-important afternoon 
 witnessed a great battle between Froebel and 
 his opposers. I was frightened and anxious. 
 If you could have witnessed how uncle struggled 
 and battled against those who wished to take 
 away his kindergarten idea by consigning it to 
 the place of a children's asylum! I could hardly 
 contain myself. To be sure, I myself often feel 
 opposed to many phases of Froebel's method, 
 but does that reduce to nothing his entire 
 scheme of development? It is a different 
 matter to interpret Froebel's educational phi- 
 losophy in various ways from condemning it 
 
GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 193 
 
 altogether, and that is what these men have 
 done. They are willing to have kindergartens, 
 but only in a superficial way, and if possible 
 they wish Froebel himself to have very little 
 to do with them. But his life is as closely 
 bound up with the kindergarten as are body and 
 spirit, and if they insist upon making a separa- 
 tion between them it would kill him. 
 
 Up to this point Middendorf had not spoken 
 a word, but the moment in which Froebel began 
 to waver, he made the effort to arise, and, as he 
 told me afterwards, his intention was to call 
 upon the students of Froebel that they might 
 testify how his teachings had brought light to 
 their minds, and had given them a greater 
 insight into the child's soul; that they them- 
 selves had found peace and joy in their work, 
 and how true happiness had been brought to the 
 children. I had reached the highest point of 
 excitement in this awful moment, scarcely 
 knowing what to expect next, when all at once 
 the debate took an entirely new direction. The 
 excitement and storm which had laid hold of 
 Froebel seemed suddenly to leave him, and a 
 restful calm came over him as he held out his 
 hand in token of peace. The manner and spirit 
 in which he did this brought response from 
 many hearts, and all were drawn nearer together 
 at once. The closing resolution, to which the 
 majority gave cordial assent, was as follows: 
 
194 GIRLHOOD DAYS AT KEILHAU 
 
 "Resolved, That the state governments, as 
 well as the national government, shall be urged 
 to seriously consider the claims of the kinder- 
 garten, and bring into use the rich educational 
 material presented by Froebel, to found the 
 kindergartens, and to provide for the training 
 of kindergartners, and, where necessary, make 
 financial provision for the same." 
 
 After this resolution was formulated and 
 accepted a thundering cheer was given "Father 
 Froebel," which at the same time served as the 
 closing benediction upon the exciting days at 
 Rudolstadt. The doors were thrown open, the 
 delegates of the assembly poured forth into the 
 coolness. Later in the evening there were 
 illuminations, and all enjoyed the promenade 
 under the linden and chestnut trees. Songs 
 were sung, and I can tell you that I relieved my 
 aroused feelings by singing v/ith all my might. 
 Could you only have been with me there, dear 
 parents, on this triumphant, happy evening 
 which followed after the days of earnest struggle ! 
 Many playful remarks were exchanged between 
 Froebel and his opposers, but the last toast 
 sounded as follows: " Long live Froebel, woman- 
 kind, and harmony." 
 
BIBLIOGRAPHY 
 
 Autobiography of Froebel translated and annotated by 
 E. Michaelis and H. K. Moore. 
 
 Friedrlch Froebel. A Biographical Sketch. M. H. 
 Kriege. 
 
 Froebel and Education by Self-Activity. H. Courthope 
 Bowen. 
 
 Froebel's Letters. Edited by A. H. Heineman. 
 
 Froebel the Man and His Work. A. L. Page. 
 
 Kindergarten and Child Culture. Henry Barnard. 
 
 Life of Friedrich Froebel. D. J. Snider. 
 
 Reminiscences of Friedrich Froebel. Baroness von 
 Marenholtz Biilow. 
 
 Froebel in His Study. A. H. Heineman. Kindergarten 
 Magazine, Sept. Oct. Dec. 1891. 
 
 Froebel and Diesterwcg at Hamburg in 1850. A. H. 
 Heineman. Kindergarten Magazine, Dec. 1891. 
 
 The German Froebel Union. Amalie Hofer. Kinder- 
 garten Magazine, Oct. 1894. 
 
 Frau Luise Levin Froebel. Bertha Johnston. Kinder- 
 garten Magazine, March, 1900. 
 
 Friedrich Froebel. A Biographical Sketch. Bertha John- 
 ston. Kindergarten Magazine, April, 1901. 
 
 Diestcrweg. Maria Kraus-Boelte. Kindergarten Mag- 
 azine, Jan. 1902. 
 
 How I Came into the Froebel Service. Dr. Pappenheim. 
 Kindergarten Magazine, Jan. 1902. 
 
 Froebel Festivals in Thuringia, Germany. Eleanora 
 Heerwart. Kindergarten Magazine, Jan. 1902. 
 
 How Froebel Came to Hamburg. As told by Elizabeth 
 Peabody in a letter dated 1867. Kindergarten Mag- 
 azine, February, 1902. 
 
 Frau Schradcr Interprets Froebel on Co-education. 
 Kindergarten Magazine, December, 1902. 
 
 A Study of the Original Kindergartens. Grace Owen. 
 Elementary School Teacher, December, 1906.