On October 7 he left London to graduate at Göttingen; he went by Hamburg.
You will be pleased, as a lover of the fine arts, to hear that I am taking lessons in drawing. You will not be surprised that I receive in this study, as well as in music and dancing, full approbation from my masters for application and accuracy. At the same time they honestly tell me that ease is wanting, and you will also readily believe that I have the assurance not to be discouraged with this character, while they all assert that I may confidently expect sufficient advancement in due time....
I have not exhibited myself at a public dance. My master, who is a very sensible fellow, advising me against it, as he observed that a person seldom loses the character which he obtains from the first impressions; but we have agreed that I may venture at the next _pique nique_.
On the alternate Sundays we have a dance: either a tea dance or a supper dance; one from four to eight, and the other from five to one. This is called a _pique nique_, and in its constitution resembles a Scotch oyster dance.
Blumenbach has shown me many civilities, but I am most at home at Arnemann's, under whose roof I live, and who has been long in Britain, and brought an English wife home with him. You need not be afraid of my following his example and marrying a German lady. I am not likely to lose my heart here, though there are some tolerably agreeable girls with whom I wish to be more acquainted for the sake of exercise in the language; for conversation with women gives both a fluency of expression and a delicacy of manners which are never to be learned from men.
On April 30 he passed his examination before the Medical Faculty.
I made [says he] no preparatory study, as is usual here, and also at Edinburgh not uncommon, under the name of grinding. The examination lasted between four and five hours. The four examiners were seated round a table, well furnished with cakes, sweetmeats, and wine, which helped to pass the time agreeably. The questions were well calculated to sound the depth of a student's knowledge in practical physics, surgery, anatomy, chemistry, materia medica, and physiology; but the professors were not very severe in exacting accurate answers. Most of them were pleased to express their approbation of my replies. We were all previously obliged to give a summary account of the manner in which our lives had been spent.