We (Alcibiade and I) are here duly received into the employment of Herr Stickl, Jeweller to the Court. This may appear a matter of no importance to any but ourselves; nevertheless the “Herr” is bound duly to notify the circumstance to the police, with date and certification, and must also instruct the Forsteher, or chief of the Guild of goldsmiths and jewellers, of the matter, that we may be properly registered by corporation and police. This is item number one. But I am still unhoused, and here my good friend and fellow-workman, Alcibiade Tourniquet, native of Argenteuil, stands me in good stead. Tourniquet claims to be a Parisian, and has lofty notions about style and appearances. He lives in Jerusalem Strasse in a grand house, with a _porte cochère_, and a wide, scrambling staircase. He offers me a share in his apartment, which is light and commodious; and as his landlady generously consents to provide an additional bed for my accommodation, on condition of doubling the rent, that matter is satisfactorily arranged. Alcibiade has experiences to relate, and this is one of them:
“Pense donc!” cries he. “I arrive in Berlin a perfect stranger. Without work and without friends, I find living at an hotel too expensive: Bon!—I look about me for some quiet little chambre garni, and finding one to my liking, up a great many stairs, genteelly furnished, and not too dear, I move myself and my little baggage into it without further inquiry. Bon! Imagine me on the first night of residence, snugly coiled up between my two feather beds in true German fashion, dreaming of la belle France, and of the grapes at Argenteuil, when rap, rap, rap! comes a tantamarre at the chamber door, and I start up wide awake all at once, and hear a shuffling noise outside, and a rough voice which calls to be admitted. ‘Diable! qu’est que tu veux, donc?’ I inquire. But before I can make up my mind whether to admit them or not, crack! goes the door, and half a dozen Prussian police take my citadel by storm, and surround me in a moment. I complain indignantly, but it is of no use. I hurl at them—not my boots—but all the hard words I know of in their own abominable language, together with a considerable quantity of good French, but all of no avail; for they make me dress myself and carry me off bodily with bag and baggage to the police-bureau. And what was it all about, pense tu? Just this: they said I had got into a suspected house, and that it was for my own protection I was made a prisoner of! Nom de Dieu! that might be all very well, but there was no necessity to pull me out of bed to take care of me; and it was not till I had shown that my papers were all _en regle_, and threatened an appeal to the French Ambassador, that they gave me these soft words, and expressed their regret at my discomfiture. Du reste, what can you expect? they are only Prussians.” This is item number two.