To fulfil the prophecy of my teacher was my ambition.

The privations that I endured, the life I led, I will not recount to you.
I performed the most menial service, and worked months like a beast of burden.

For want of a shelter, I slept in deserted yards and tumble-down houses.

Upon a piece of bread and a drink of water I lived, saving, with miserly greediness, the money which I earned as messenger or day-laborer.

At the end of a year, I had earned sufficient to buy an old suit of clothes at a second-hand clothing-store, and present myself to the director of the Gymnasium, imploring him to receive me as pupil.
Bitterly weeping, I opened my heart to him, and disclosed the torture of my sad life as a child, and begged him to give me the opportunity to educate myself.