From Memory's Shrine by Carmen Sylva — Read

A more fiery soul than that of Ernst Moritz Arndt can surely never have lived upon this earth. He must have been fully eighty years old at the time when I knew him, but age seemed to count for nothing with him. His eye was as bright, his voice as clear and ringing, his gait as quick and elastic as had he still been in the prime of life, and the most impassioned speech from youthful lips would have seemed tame and cold beside the lava-flood of eloquence that poured forth inexhaustibly from his kindly and expressive, although perfectly toothless mouth. The loss of his teeth was indeed the only real sign of age Arndt bore on his person, and it was apparently a matter of so little moment to him, that I have often wondered since, whether our modern practice of repairing by artificial means the ravages of time, be after all so unquestionable an advantage as some would pretend. The mouth which nature alone has moulded year by year seems to me to retain in any case much more character and expression than that which has been fitted out and shaped anew by the dentist's skill. However that may be, it is certain that Arndt at all events felt not in the least inconvenienced by the loss, nor did it detract from our pleasure in listening to him.

It was during our stay in Bonn, whither we had migrated in order to be near a celebrated doctor, that we saw the venerable poet so constantly. Two years of my childhood were spent in the charming little University town, in the hope that my younger brother, an invalid from his birth, and my mother, whose health then gave much cause for anxiety, might both of them derive great and lasting benefit from the treatment of the great specialist. And if these hopes were doomed to disappointment, -- and it seemed indeed, as an old friend of our family afterwards remarked, as if the very best efforts of medical skill must here for ever prove unavailing, -- there were on the other hand certain compensations attendant on our stay, in the shape of the opportunities for intercourse it afforded with so many highly interesting people. And first and foremost among these Arndt must be reckoned, as the most constant and ever welcome guest. His visits were indeed of quite unconventional length, for he would often stay for hours at a time, now reading aloud to my mother one of her favourite Swedish books, now relating to us children some thrilling episode of the War of Liberation, in which he had played so conspicuous a part.