Letter from Bunsen to his parents, Gottingen: 1st January, 1813 - At ten o'clock I went with Becker of Gotha (son of a well-known author who is now imprisoned on that account by the French at Magdeburg), with Ulrich of Jena, and Susemiehl of Kiel (both students of medicine), and also with my old friend and countryman Wolrad Schumacher, to the room of my Osnabruck friend for a social meeting. Thus we were a company from all parts of our fatherland, and composed of all faculties : three philologers, Abeken and myself, each reckoned as half a theologian, one student of divinity, two of medicine, and one of law. Outside, the entire long street shone with light and reverberated with music, vocal and instrumental. Then the clock struck twelve, all doors and windows burst open, and the street was alive with human heads and the voice of congratulation. We, however, in deep silence, touched glasses to honour the expiring year, and severally embraced without the power of uttering a word, till after a pause we joined in the fine song of Voss : ' The year's last hour tolls forth with deep'ning chime a solemn sound.' Then did the gloom of the imminent parting and the probability that for the last time on earth I now looked upon many of those around me, so possess my mind, that I could not refrain from tears, and by the time they came to the last verse I was wholly overcome, which seldom happens to me.