Paula's journal,
and it would have been almost impossible for a growing girl of active
mind to take no note of opinions which she heard everywhere expressed.

Our entire circle was loyal; especially Privy-Councillor Seiffart, one
of our most intimate friends, a sarcastic Conservative, who was credited
with the expresssion, "The limited intellect of subjects," which,
however, belonged to his superior, Minister von Rochow. Still, almost
all my mother's acquaintances, and the younger ones without exception,
felt a desire for better political conditions and a constitution for the
brave, loyal, reflecting, and well-educated Prussian people. In the
same house with us lived two men who had suffered for their political
convictions--the brothers Grimm. They had been ejected from their chairs
among the seven professors of Gottingen, who were sacrificed to the
arbitrary humour of King Ernst August of Hanover.

Their dignified figures are among the noblest and most memorable
recollections of the Lennestrasse. They were, it might be said, one
person, for they were seldom seen apart; yet each had preserved his own
distinct individuality.

If ever the external appearance of distinguished men corresponded with
the idea formed of them from their deeds and works, it was so in their
case. One did not need to know them to perceive at the first glance
that they were labourers in the department of intellectual life, though
whether as scientists or poets even a practised observer would have
found it difficult to determine. Their long, flowing, wavy hair, and an
atmosphere of ideality which enveloped them both, might have inclined
one to the latter supposition; while the form of their brows, indicating
deep thought and severe mental labor, and their slightly stooping
shoulders, would have suggested the former. Wilhelm's milder features
were really those of a poet, while Jakob's sterner cast of countenance,
and his piercing eyes, indicated more naturally a searcher after
knowledge.

But just as certainly as that they both belonged to the strongest
champions of German science, the Muse had kissed them in their cradle.
Not only their manner of restoring our German legends, but almost all
their writings, give evidence of a poetical mode of viewing things,
and of an intuition peculiar to the spirit of poetry. Many of their
writings, too, are full of poetical beauties.

That both were men in the fullest meaning of the word was revealed at
the