f this life: "The homelier and more practical
life; the life spent with nature, especially forest nature; the life of
study, devoted to mathematics and languages, for which he found a good
supply of books ready to hand; and the time spent in gaining a knowledge
of plants, in which he was much helped by books on botany lent him by a
neighboring doctor."[149] But he obtained little help from the forester,
so at the end of three years Froebel withdrew, and soon thereafter
entered the university of Jena. He seems to have studied hard during the
year and a half he spent at Jena, but to have accomplished little. He
became involved in debt, and was imprisoned for nine weeks in the
university "Carcer."[150] After his liberation, he left the university.

=As Teacher.=--Meeting with little success in various enterprises in
which he engaged, he at last drifted to Frankfurt-am-Main, where he made
the acquaintance of Dr. Gruner, head master of the Model School. Dr.
Gruner quickly discovered Froebel's talent, and urged him to accept a
position under him as teacher. Froebel reluctantly consented, but in
speaking later of his first experience in the schoolroom, he says, "It
seemed as if I had found something I had never known, but always longed
for, always missed; as if my life had at last discovered its native
element. I felt as happy as the fish in the water, the bird in the air."

Although Froebel succeeded at once in his new profession, thereby
justifying Dr. Gruner's opinion of him, he felt that he needed special
preparation for the work of teaching. Accordingly, in 1808, after two
years' experience in teaching, having in the meantime visited Pestalozzi
at Yverdon, and having read his works, he gave up his position and
joined the institute at Yverdon.

He took with him three of his pupils to tutor, and "it thus happened,"
he tells us, "that I was there both as teacher and scholar, educator and
pupil." Froebel spent two years at Yverdon, and his testimony concerning
Pestalozzi is interesting. He says, "He set one's soul on fire for a
higher and nobler life, though he had not made clear or sure the exact
road toward it, nor indicated the means whereby to attain it." This sums
up in a word the secret and extent of Pestalozzi's power. Dittes thinks
that "the origin of the kindergarten is due to the pedagogical revival
of Pestalozzi." Froebel himself, speaking of his experience at Yverdon,
says, "I studied the boys' play, the whole se