delivered three times in the week, and the
roads from the spring thaw then were very bad; thus the news came
slowly at intervals through the provinces, where it was not stopped by
the march of troops and the confusion of the struggle between the
advancing Russians and retreating French. But every sheet, every report
that conveyed new information, was received with eager sympathy. It was
talked of in families, and in all the society of the cities, but the
excitement was seldom expressed with any vehemence. There was a
pathetic feeling in all hearts, but it no longer showed itself in words
and gestures. For a century the Germans had found pleasure in their
tears, had given vent to much feeling about nothing; now that great
objects engrossed their life they were calm, there was no speechifying,
with bated breath they restrained the disquiet of their hearts. If
important news came, the master of the house announced it to his
family, and quietly wiped away the tears that were in his eyes. This
tranquillity and self-control was the peculiarity of that time.

Small flying sheets were read with delight, especially what the
faithful Arndt addressed to his countrymen. New songs spread through
the country, in small parts, according to the custom of the
ballad-singers, "printed this year;" generally bad and coarse, full of
hate and scorn, they were forerunners of the beautiful poetic effusions
of youthful vigor which were sung some months later by the Prussian
battalions when they went to battle. The best of these songs were sung
in families to the harpsichord, or the husband played the melody on the
flute--which was then a favourite domestic instrument--and the mother
sang the words with her children; for weeks this was the great evening
amusement. These verses had more effect on the smaller circles of the
people than on the more cultivated, they soon supplanted the old street
songs. Sometimes the citizens bought the frightful caricatures of
Napoleon and his army which then were sold through the country as
flying-sheets, but often betrayed, by their Parisian dialect, that they
were composed by the French. The coarseness and malicious vulgarity
which now offend us, were easily overlooked, because they served to
express hatred; it was only in the larger cities that they occupied the
people in the streets, in the country they exercised little influence.

Such was the disposition of the people when they received the
proclamations of