Letter from Sigmund Freud to Eduard Silberstein, July 22, 1879

Vienna, July 22, 1879

Dear Berganza,

I write today having finished my examinations and started on my work and holiday assignment. You will want to know first how I got on in physiology so I shall write about that first. It so happened that Brücke1 was in a very bad mood, and I had no chance to shine; nevertheless His Eminence exaggerated [?]. I was the first of the candidates and Brücke greeted me very courteously when I came in and asked me to go straight up to the laboratory [several illegible words] to explain the microscope. That was not a very happy choice because I had not bothered about such minor matters, believing that the larger and more difficult apparatus would fall to me, the kind that allows one to talk at length and to show off one's profound knowledge. And so it happened that I was not very inspired and got muddled at one point during the description of the apparatus, although no one can say that I disgraced myself badly. While I was busy up at the desk, Brücke noticed that one of the candidates, sitting at the microscope, was doing something completely wrong, and shouted at him in annoyance, asking him what he thought he was doing, and from that moment on he was nervous and disagreeable to all of us. After the apparatus, I was given a very simple chemical reaction to do and when I was finished with that, seeing Brücke had not been watching what I was doing but was still being cross with the others, I stepped down to do my microscopic work. I don't need to add that everything went well, and when Brücke came over to my seat I was able to tell him that the result was so-and-so, and that one of the specimens had been very badly prepared, although one could still tell what it was. He agreed, and because of its poor quality took it away. Since I was the last to be seated, and, moreover, in such a way that the others could not see me, Brücke told me to change places lest the others think I was doing something different from them. One of the others did not pa