than the "low Barmen mists". While working as a clerk handling international correspondence, he took full advantage of the city's more liberal social life. He took dancing lessons, went horse-riding, swam in the Weser, and joined the Academy of Singing. A suavely attractive and vain young man, he sported a moustache as a political statement and engaged in the student practice of fencing, boasting of duels fought to defend his honour.

It was in Bremen that Engels began to