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diff --git a/5785.txt b/5785.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a7bef22 --- /dev/null +++ b/5785.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3161 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Tramp Abroad, by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Tramp Abroad + Part 4 + +Author: Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +Release Date: March 1994 [EBook #5785] +Posting Date: June 3, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TRAMP ABROAD *** + + + + +Produced by Anonymous Volunteers, John Greenman and David Widger + + + + + + +A TRAMP ABROAD, Part 4. + +By Mark Twain + +(Samuel L. Clemens) + +First published in 1880 + +Illustrations taken from an 1880 First Edition + + * * * * * * + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS: + + + 1. PORTRAIT OF THE AUTHOR + 2. TITIAN'S MOSES + 3. THE AUTHOR'S MEMORIES + 119. BLACK FOREST GRANDEE + 120. THE GRANDEE'S DAUGHTER + 121. RICH OLD HUSS + 122. GRETCHEN + 123. PAUL HOCH + 124. HANS SCHMIDT + 125. ELECTING A NEW MEMBER + 126. OVERCOMING OBSTACLES + 127. FRIENDS + 128. PROSPECTING + 129. TAIL PIECE + 130. A GENERAL HOWL + 131. SEEKING A SITUATION + 132. STANDING GUARD + 133. RESULT OF A JOKE + 134. DESCENDING A FARM + 155. A GERMAN SABBATH + 136. AN OBJECT OF SYMPATHY + 137. A NON-CLASSICAL STYLE + 138. THE TRADITIONAL CHAMOIS + 139. HUNTING CHAMOIS THE TRUE WAY + 140. CHAMOIS HUNTER AS REPORTED + 141. MARKING ALPENSTOCKS + 142. IS SHE EIGHTEEN OR TWENTY + 143. I KNEW I WASN'T MISTAKEN + 144. HARRIS ASTONISHED + 145. TAIL PIECE + 146. THE LION OF LUCERNE + 147. HE LIKED CLOCKS + 148. "I WILL TELL YOU" + 149. COULDN'T WAIT + 150. DIDN'T CARE FOR STYLE + 151. A PAIR BETTER THAN FOUR + 152. TWO WASN'T NECESSARY + 153. JUST THE TRICK + 154. GOING TO MAKE THEM STARE + 155. NOT THROWN AWAY + 156. WHAT THE DOCTOR RECOMMENDED + 157. WANTED TO FEEL SAFE + 158. PREFERRED TO TRAMP ON FOOT + 159. DERN A DOG, ANYWAY + 160. TAIL PIECE + 161. THE GLACIER GARDEN + 162. LAKE AND MOUNTAINS (MONT PILATUS) + 163. MOUNTAIN PATHS + 164. "YOU'RE AN AMERICAN--SO AM I" + 165. ENTERPRISE + 166. THE CONSTANT SEARCHER + 167. THE MOUNTAIN BOY + 168. THE ENGLISHMAN + 169. THE JODLER + 170. ANOTHER VOCALIST + 171. THE FELSENTHOR + 172. A VIEW FROM THE STATION + 173. LOST IN THE MIST + 174. THE RIGI-KULM HOTEL + 175. WHAT AWAKENED US + 176. A SUMMIT SUNRISE + 177. TAIL PIECE + + + + +CONTENTS: + + +CHAPTER XXII The Black Forest--A Grandee and his Family--The Wealthy +Nabob--A New Standard of Wealth--Skeleton for a New Novel--Trying +Situation--The Common Council--Choosing a New Member Studying Natural +History--The Ant a Fraud--Eccentricities of the Ant--His Deceit and +Ignorance--A German Dish--Boiled Oranges + +CHAPTER XXIII Off for a Day's Tramp--Tramping and Talking--Story +Telling--Dentistry in Camp--Nicodemus Dodge--Seeking a Situation--A +Butt for Jokes--Jimmy Finn's Skeleton--Descending a Farm--Unexpected +Notoriety + +CHAPTER XXIV Sunday on the Continent--A Day of Rest--An Incident +at Church--An Object of Sympathy--Royalty at Church--Public Grounds +Concert--Power and Grades of Music--Hiring a Courier + +CHAPTER XXV Lucerne--Beauty of its Lake--The Wild Chamois--A Great +Error Exposed--Methods of Hunting the Chamois--Beauties of Lucerne--The +Alpenstock--Marking Alpenstocks--Guessing at Nationalities--An American +Party--An Unexpected Acquaintance--Getting Mixed Up--Following Blind +Trails--A Happy Half--hour--Defeat and Revenge + +CHAPTER XXVI Commerce of Lucerne--Benefits of Martyrdom--A Bit of +History--The Home of Cuckoo Clocks--A Satisfactory Revenge--The Alan +Who Put Up at Gadsby's--A Forgotten Story--Wanted to be Postmaster--A +Tennessean at Washington--He Concluded to Stay A While--Application of +the Story + +CHAPTER XXVII The Glacier Garden--Excursion on the Lake--Life on the +Mountains--A Specimen Tourist--"Where're you From?"--An Advertising +Dodge--A Righteous Verdict--The Guide-book Student--I Believe that's All + +CHAPTER XXVIII The Rigi-Kulm--Its Ascent--Stripping for Business--A +Mountain Lad--An English Tourist--Railroad up the Mountain--Villages and +Mountain--The Jodlers--About Ice Water--The Felsenthor--Too Late--Lost +in the Fog--The Rigi-Kulm Hotel--The Alpine Horn--Sunrise at Night + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +[The Black Forest and Its Treasures] + + +From Baden-Baden we made the customary trip into the Black Forest. We +were on foot most of the time. One cannot describe those noble woods, +nor the feeling with which they inspire him. A feature of the feeling, +however, is a deep sense of contentment; another feature of it is a +buoyant, boyish gladness; and a third and very conspicuous feature of +it is one's sense of the remoteness of the work-day world and his entire +emancipation from it and its affairs. + +Those woods stretch unbroken over a vast region; and everywhere they are +such dense woods, and so still, and so piney and fragrant. The stems of +the trees are trim and straight, and in many places all the ground is +hidden for miles under a thick cushion of moss of a vivid green color, +with not a decayed or ragged spot in its surface, and not a fallen leaf +or twig to mar its immaculate tidiness. A rich cathedral gloom pervades +the pillared aisles; so the stray flecks of sunlight that strike a trunk +here and a bough yonder are strongly accented, and when they strike the +moss they fairly seem to burn. But the weirdest effect, and the most +enchanting is that produced by the diffused light of the low afternoon +sun; no single ray is able to pierce its way in, then, but the diffused +light takes color from moss and foliage, and pervades the place like +a faint, green-tinted mist, the theatrical fire of fairyland. The +suggestion of mystery and the supernatural which haunts the forest at +all times is intensified by this unearthly glow. + +We found the Black Forest farmhouses and villages all that the Black +Forest stories have pictured them. The first genuine specimen which +we came upon was the mansion of a rich farmer and member of the Common +Council of the parish or district. He was an important personage in the +land and so was his wife also, of course. + + + +His daughter was the "catch" of the region, and she may be already +entering into immortality as the heroine of one of Auerbach's novels, +for all I know. We shall see, for if he puts her in I shall recognize +her by her Black Forest clothes, and her burned complexion, her plump +figure, her fat hands, her dull expression, her gentle spirit, +her generous feet, her bonnetless head, and the plaited tails of +hemp-colored hair hanging down her back. + + + +The house was big enough for a hotel; it was a hundred feet long and +fifty wide, and ten feet high, from ground to eaves; but from the eaves +to the comb of the mighty roof was as much as forty feet, or maybe even +more. This roof was of ancient mud-colored straw thatch a foot thick, +and was covered all over, except in a few trifling spots, with a +thriving and luxurious growth of green vegetation, mainly moss. The +mossless spots were places where repairs had been made by the insertion +of bright new masses of yellow straw. The eaves projected far down, like +sheltering, hospitable wings. Across the gable that fronted the road, +and about ten feet above the ground, ran a narrow porch, with a wooden +railing; a row of small windows filled with very small panes looked upon +the porch. Above were two or three other little windows, one clear up +under the sharp apex of the roof. Before the ground-floor door was a +huge pile of manure. The door of the second-story room on the side of +the house was open, and occupied by the rear elevation of a cow. Was +this probably the drawing-room? All of the front half of the house from +the ground up seemed to be occupied by the people, the cows, and the +chickens, and all the rear half by draught-animals and hay. But the +chief feature, all around this house, was the big heaps of manure. + +We became very familiar with the fertilizer in the Forest. We fell +unconsciously into the habit of judging of a man's station in life +by this outward and eloquent sign. Sometimes we said, "Here is a poor +devil, this is manifest." When we saw a stately accumulation, we said, +"Here is a banker." When we encountered a country-seat surrounded by an +Alpine pomp of manure, we said, "Doubtless a duke lives here." + +The importance of this feature has not been properly magnified in the +Black Forest stories. Manure is evidently the Black-Forester's main +treasure--his coin, his jewel, his pride, his Old Master, his ceramics, +his bric-a-brac, his darling, his title to public consideration, envy, +veneration, and his first solicitude when he gets ready to make his +will. The true Black Forest novel, if it is ever written, will be +skeletoned somewhat in this way: + +SKELETON FOR A BLACK FOREST NOVEL + +Rich old farmer, named Huss. + + + +Has inherited great wealth of manure, and by diligence has added to it. +It is double-starred in Baedeker. [1] The Black forest artist paints +it--his masterpiece. The king comes to see it. Gretchen Huss, +daughter and heiress. Paul Hoch, young neighbor, suitor for Gretchen's +hand--ostensibly; he really wants the manure. + + + +Hoch has a good many cart-loads of the Black Forest currency himself, +and therefore is a good catch; but he is sordid, mean, and without +sentiment, whereas Gretchen is all sentiment and poetry. Hans Schmidt, +young neighbor, full of sentiment, full of poetry, loves Gretchen, +Gretchen loves him. But he has no manure. Old Huss forbids him in the +house. His heart breaks, he goes away to die in the woods, far from the +cruel world--for he says, bitterly, "What is man, without manure?" + +1. When Baedeker's guide-books mention a thing and put two stars (**) +after it, it means well worth visiting. M.T. + +[Interval of six months.] + + + +Paul Hoch comes to old Huss and says, "I am at last as rich as you +required--come and view the pile." Old Huss views it and says, "It is +sufficient--take her and be happy,"--meaning Gretchen. + +[Interval of two weeks.] + +Wedding party assembled in old Huss's drawing-room. Hoch placid and +content, Gretchen weeping over her hard fate. Enter old Huss's head +bookkeeper. Huss says fiercely, "I gave you three weeks to find out why +your books don't balance, and to prove that you are not a defaulter; +the time is up--find me the missing property or you go to prison as +a thief." Bookkeeper: "I have found it." "Where?" Bookkeeper +(sternly--tragically): "In the bridegroom's pile!--behold the thief--see +him blench and tremble!" [Sensation.] Paul Hoch: "Lost, lost!"--falls +over the cow in a swoon and is handcuffed. Gretchen: "Saved!" Falls over +the calf in a swoon of joy, but is caught in the arms of Hans Schmidt, +who springs in at that moment. Old Huss: "What, you here, varlet? Unhand +the maid and quit the place." Hans (still supporting the insensible +girl): "Never! Cruel old man, know that I come with claims which even +you cannot despise." + + + +Huss: "What, YOU? name them." + +Hans: "Listen then. The world has forsaken me, I forsook the world, I +wandered in the solitude of the forest, longing for death but finding +none. I fed upon roots, and in my bitterness I dug for the bitterest, +loathing the sweeter kind. Digging, three days agone, I struck a manure +mine!--a Golconda, a limitless Bonanza, of solid manure! I can buy you +ALL, and have mountain ranges of manure left! Ha-ha, NOW thou smilest a +smile!" [Immense sensation.] Exhibition of specimens from the mine. Old +Huss (enthusiastically): "Wake her up, shake her up, noble young man, +she is yours!" Wedding takes place on the spot; bookkeeper restored to +his office and emoluments; Paul Hoch led off to jail. The Bonanza king +of the Black Forest lives to a good old age, blessed with the love of +his wife and of his twenty-seven children, and the still sweeter envy of +everybody around. + +We took our noon meal of fried trout one day at the Plow Inn, in a very +pretty village (Ottenhoefen), and then went into the public room to rest +and smoke. There we found nine or ten Black Forest grandees assembled +around a table. They were the Common Council of the parish. They had +gathered there at eight o'clock that morning to elect a new member, and +they had now been drinking beer four hours at the new member's expense. + + + +They were men of fifty or sixty years of age, with grave good-natured +faces, and were all dressed in the costume made familiar to us by the +Black Forest stories; broad, round-topped black felt hats with the brims +curled up all round; long red waistcoats with large metal buttons, black +alpaca coats with the waists up between the shoulders. There were no +speeches, there was but little talk, there were no frivolities; the +Council filled themselves gradually, steadily, but surely, with beer, +and conducted themselves with sedate decorum, as became men of position, +men of influence, men of manure. + +We had a hot afternoon tramp up the valley, along the grassy bank of a +rushing stream of clear water, past farmhouses, water-mills, and no end +of wayside crucifixes and saints and Virgins. These crucifixes, etc., +are set up in memory of departed friends, by survivors, and are almost +as frequent as telegraph-poles are in other lands. + +We followed the carriage-road, and had our usual luck; we traveled under +a beating sun, and always saw the shade leave the shady places before we +could get to them. In all our wanderings we seldom managed to strike +a piece of road at its time for being shady. We had a particularly hot +time of it on that particular afternoon, and with no comfort but what we +could get out of the fact that the peasants at work away up on the steep +mountainsides above our heads were even worse off than we were. By and +by it became impossible to endure the intolerable glare and heat +any longer; so we struck across the ravine and entered the deep cool +twilight of the forest, to hunt for what the guide-book called the "old +road." + +We found an old road, and it proved eventually to be the right one, +though we followed it at the time with the conviction that it was the +wrong one. If it was the wrong one there could be no use in hurrying; +therefore we did not hurry, but sat down frequently on the soft moss and +enjoyed the restful quiet and shade of the forest solitudes. There +had been distractions in the carriage-road--school-children, peasants, +wagons, troops of pedestrianizing students from all over Germany--but we +had the old road to ourselves. + +Now and then, while we rested, we watched the laborious ant at his work. +I found nothing new in him--certainly nothing to change my opinion of +him. It seems to me that in the matter of intellect the ant must be a +strangely overrated bird. During many summers, now, I have watched him, +when I ought to have been in better business, and I have not yet come +across a living ant that seemed to have any more sense than a dead one. +I refer to the ordinary ant, of course; I have had no experience of +those wonderful Swiss and African ones which vote, keep drilled armies, +hold slaves, and dispute about religion. Those particular ants may be +all that the naturalist paints them, but I am persuaded that the +average ant is a sham. I admit his industry, of course; he is the +hardest-working creature in the world--when anybody is looking--but +his leather-headedness is the point I make against him. He goes out +foraging, he makes a capture, and then what does he do? Go home? No--he +goes anywhere but home. He doesn't know where home is. His home may be +only three feet away--no matter, he can't find it. He makes his capture, +as I have said; it is generally something which can be of no sort of +use to himself or anybody else; it is usually seven times bigger than +it ought to be; he hunts out the awkwardest place to take hold of it; +he lifts it bodily up in the air by main force, and starts; not toward +home, but in the opposite direction; not calmly and wisely, but with a +frantic haste which is wasteful of his strength; he fetches up against +a pebble, and instead of going around it, he climbs over it backward +dragging his booty after him, tumbles down on the other side, jumps up +in a passion, kicks the dust off his clothes, moistens his hands, grabs +his property viciously, yanks it this way, then that, shoves it ahead +of him a moment, turns tail and lugs it after him another moment, +gets madder and madder, then presently hoists it into the air and goes +tearing away in an entirely new direction; comes to a weed; it never +occurs to him to go around it; no, he must climb it; and he does climb +it, dragging his worthless property to the top--which is as bright +a thing to do as it would be for me to carry a sack of flour from +Heidelberg to Paris by way of Strasburg steeple; when he gets up there +he finds that that is not the place; takes a cursory glance at the +scenery and either climbs down again or tumbles down, and starts off +once more--as usual, in a new direction. At the end of half an hour, he +fetches up within six inches of the place he started from and lays his +burden down; meantime he has been over all the ground for two yards +around, and climbed all the weeds and pebbles he came across. Now he +wipes the sweat from his brow, strokes his limbs, and then marches +aimlessly off, in as violently a hurry as ever. He does not remember to +have ever seen it before; he looks around to see which is not the way +home, grabs his bundle and starts; he goes through the same adventures +he had before; finally stops to rest, and a friend comes along. +Evidently the friend remarks that a last year's grasshopper leg is a +very noble acquisition, and inquires where he got it. + + + +Evidently the proprietor does not remember exactly where he did get +it, but thinks he got it "around here somewhere." Evidently the friend +contracts to help him freight it home. Then, with a judgment peculiarly +antic (pun not intended), they take hold of opposite ends of that +grasshopper leg and begin to tug with all their might in opposite +directions. Presently they take a rest and confer together. They decide +that something is wrong, they can't make out what. Then they go at +it again, just as before. Same result. Mutual recriminations follow. +Evidently each accuses the other of being an obstructionist. They lock +themselves together and chew each other's jaws for a while; then they +roll and tumble on the ground till one loses a horn or a leg and has to +haul off for repairs. They make up and go to work again in the same old +insane way, but the crippled ant is at a disadvantage; tug as he may, +the other one drags off the booty and him at the end of it. Instead +of giving up, he hangs on, and gets his shins bruised against every +obstruction that comes in the way. By and by, when that grasshopper leg +has been dragged all over the same old ground once more, it is finally +dumped at about the spot where it originally lay, the two perspiring +ants inspect it thoughtfully and decide that dried grasshopper legs +are a poor sort of property after all, and then each starts off in a +different direction to see if he can't find an old nail or something +else that is heavy enough to afford entertainment and at the same time +valueless enough to make an ant want to own it. + +There in the Black Forest, on the mountainside, I saw an ant go through +with such a performance as this with a dead spider of fully ten times +his own weight. The spider was not quite dead, but too far gone to +resist. He had a round body the size of a pea. The little ant--observing +that I was noticing--turned him on his back, sunk his fangs into his +throat, lifted him into the air and started vigorously off with him, +stumbling over little pebbles, stepping on the spider's legs and +tripping himself up, dragging him backward, shoving him bodily ahead, +dragging him up stones six inches high instead of going around them, +climbing weeds twenty times his own height and jumping from their +summits--and finally leaving him in the middle of the road to be +confiscated by any other fool of an ant that wanted him. I measured the +ground which this ass traversed, and arrived at the conclusion that what +he had accomplished inside of twenty minutes would constitute some +such job as this--relatively speaking--for a man; to wit: to strap two +eight-hundred-pound horses together, carry them eighteen hundred feet, +mainly over (not around) boulders averaging six feet high, and in the +course of the journey climb up and jump from the top of one precipice +like Niagara, and three steeples, each a hundred and twenty feet high; +and then put the horses down, in an exposed place, without anybody to +watch them, and go off to indulge in some other idiotic miracle for +vanity's sake. + + + +Science has recently discovered that the ant does not lay up anything +for winter use. This will knock him out of literature, to some extent. +He does not work, except when people are looking, and only then when the +observer has a green, naturalistic look, and seems to be taking notes. +This amounts to deception, and will injure him for the Sunday-schools. +He has not judgment enough to know what is good to eat from what isn't. +This amounts to ignorance, and will impair the world's respect for +him. He cannot stroll around a stump and find his way home again. This +amounts to idiocy, and once the damaging fact is established, thoughtful +people will cease to look up to him, the sentimental will cease to +fondle him. His vaunted industry is but a vanity and of no effect, since +he never gets home with anything he starts with. This disposes of the +last remnant of his reputation and wholly destroys his main usefulness +as a moral agent, since it will make the sluggard hesitate to go to him +any more. It is strange, beyond comprehension, that so manifest a humbug +as the ant has been able to fool so many nations and keep it up so many +ages without being found out. + +The ant is strong, but we saw another strong thing, where we had not +suspected the presence of much muscular power before. A toadstool--that +vegetable which springs to full growth in a single night--had torn loose +and lifted a matted mass of pine needles and dirt of twice its own bulk +into the air, and supported it there, like a column supporting a shed. +Ten thousand toadstools, with the right purchase, could lift a man, I +suppose. But what good would it do? + +All our afternoon's progress had been uphill. About five or half past we +reached the summit, and all of a sudden the dense curtain of the forest +parted and we looked down into a deep and beautiful gorge and out over a +wide panorama of wooded mountains with their summits shining in the sun +and their glade-furrowed sides dimmed with purple shade. The gorge under +our feet--called Allerheiligen--afforded room in the grassy level at its +head for a cozy and delightful human nest, shut away from the world and +its botherations, and consequently the monks of the old times had not +failed to spy it out; and here were the brown and comely ruins of their +church and convent to prove that priests had as fine an instinct seven +hundred years ago in ferreting out the choicest nooks and corners in a +land as priests have today. + +A big hotel crowds the ruins a little, now, and drives a brisk trade +with summer tourists. We descended into the gorge and had a supper which +would have been very satisfactory if the trout had not been boiled. +The Germans are pretty sure to boil a trout or anything else if left to +their own devices. This is an argument of some value in support of the +theory that they were the original colonists of the wild islands of the +coast of Scotland. A schooner laden with oranges was wrecked upon one +of those islands a few years ago, and the gentle savages rendered the +captain such willing assistance that he gave them as many oranges as +they wanted. Next day he asked them how they liked them. They shook +their heads and said: + +"Baked, they were tough; and even boiled, they warn't things for a +hungry man to hanker after." + +We went down the glen after supper. It is beautiful--a mixture of sylvan +loveliness and craggy wildness. A limpid torrent goes whistling down +the glen, and toward the foot of it winds through a narrow cleft between +lofty precipices and hurls itself over a succession of falls. After one +passes the last of these he has a backward glimpse at the falls which +is very pleasing--they rise in a seven-stepped stairway of foamy and +glittering cascades, and make a picture which is as charming as it is +unusual. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +[Nicodemus Dodge and the Skeleton] + + +We were satisfied that we could walk to Oppenau in one day, now that +we were in practice; so we set out the next morning after breakfast +determined to do it. It was all the way downhill, and we had the +loveliest summer weather for it. So we set the pedometer and then +stretched away on an easy, regular stride, down through the cloven +forest, drawing in the fragrant breath of the morning in deep refreshing +draughts, and wishing we might never have anything to do forever but +walk to Oppenau and keep on doing it and then doing it over again. + +Now, the true charm of pedestrianism does not lie in the walking, or +in the scenery, but in the talking. The walking is good to time the +movement of the tongue by, and to keep the blood and the brain stirred +up and active; the scenery and the woodsy smells are good to bear in +upon a man an unconscious and unobtrusive charm and solace to eye and +soul and sense; but the supreme pleasure comes from the talk. It is no +matter whether one talks wisdom or nonsense, the case is the same, the +bulk of the enjoyment lies in the wagging of the gladsome jaw and the +flapping of the sympathetic ear. + +And what motley variety of subjects a couple of people will casually +rake over in the course of a day's tramp! There being no constraint, +a change of subject is always in order, and so a body is not likely to +keep pegging at a single topic until it grows tiresome. We discussed +everything we knew, during the first fifteen or twenty minutes, that +morning, and then branched out into the glad, free, boundless realm of +the things we were not certain about. + +Harris said that if the best writer in the world once got the slovenly +habit of doubling up his "haves" he could never get rid of it while he +lived. That is to say, if a man gets the habit of saying "I should +have liked to have known more about it" instead of saying simply and +sensibly, "I should have liked to know more about it," that man's +disease is incurable. Harris said that his sort of lapse is to be found +in every copy of every newspaper that has ever been printed in English, +and in almost all of our books. He said he had observed it in Kirkham's +grammar and in Macaulay. Harris believed that milk-teeth are commoner in +men's mouths than those "doubled-up haves." + +I do not know that there have not been moments in the course of the +present session when I should have been very glad to have accepted the +proposal of my noble friend, and to have exchanged parts in some of our +evenings of work.--[From a Speech of the English Chancellor of the +Exchequer, August, 1879.] + +That changed the subject to dentistry. I said I believed the average +man dreaded tooth-pulling more than amputation, and that he would yell +quicker under the former operation than he would under the latter. The +philosopher Harris said that the average man would not yell in either +case if he had an audience. Then he continued: + +"When our brigade first went into camp on the Potomac, we used to be +brought up standing, occasionally, by an ear-splitting howl of anguish. +That meant that a soldier was getting a tooth pulled in a tent. But the +surgeons soon changed that; they instituted open-air dentistry. There +never was a howl afterward--that is, from the man who was having the +tooth pulled. At the daily dental hour there would always be about five +hundred soldiers gathered together in the neighborhood of that dental +chair waiting to see the performance--and help; and the moment the +surgeon took a grip on the candidate's tooth and began to lift, every +one of those five hundred rascals would clap his hand to his jaw and +begin to hop around on one leg and howl with all the lungs he had! +It was enough to raise your hair to hear that variegated and enormous +unanimous caterwaul burst out! + + + +With so big and so derisive an audience as that, a sufferer wouldn't +emit a sound though you pulled his head off. The surgeons said that +pretty often a patient was compelled to laugh, in the midst of his +pangs, but that they had never caught one crying out, after the open-air +exhibition was instituted." + +Dental surgeons suggested doctors, doctors suggested death, death +suggested skeletons--and so, by a logical process the conversation +melted out of one of these subjects and into the next, until the topic +of skeletons raised up Nicodemus Dodge out of the deep grave in my +memory where he had lain buried and forgotten for twenty-five years. +When I was a boy in a printing-office in Missouri, a loose-jointed, +long-legged, tow-headed, jeans-clad countrified cub of about sixteen +lounged in one day, and without removing his hands from the depths of +his trousers pockets or taking off his faded ruin of a slouch hat, whose +broken rim hung limp and ragged about his eyes and ears like a bug-eaten +cabbage leaf, stared indifferently around, then leaned his hip against +the editor's table, crossed his mighty brogans, aimed at a distant +fly from a crevice in his upper teeth, laid him low, and said with +composure: + +"Whar's the boss?" + +"I am the boss," said the editor, following this curious bit of +architecture wonderingly along up to its clock-face with his eye. + +"Don't want anybody fur to learn the business, 'tain't likely?" + +"Well, I don't know. Would you like to learn it?" + + + +"Pap's so po' he cain't run me no mo', so I want to git a show somers if +I kin, 'taint no diffunce what--I'm strong and hearty, and I don't turn +my back on no kind of work, hard nur soft." + +"Do you think you would like to learn the printing business?" + +"Well, I don't re'ly k'yer a durn what I DO learn, so's I git a chance +fur to make my way. I'd jist as soon learn print'n's anything." + +"Can you read?" + +"Yes--middlin'." + +"Write?" + +"Well, I've seed people could lay over me thar." + +"Cipher?" + +"Not good enough to keep store, I don't reckon, but up as fur as +twelve-times-twelve I ain't no slouch. 'Tother side of that is what gits +me." + +"Where is your home?" + +"I'm f'm old Shelby." + +"What's your father's religious denomination?" + +"Him? Oh, he's a blacksmith." + +"No, no--I don't mean his trade. What's his RELIGIOUS DENOMINATION?" + +"OH--I didn't understand you befo'. He's a Freemason." + +"No, no, you don't get my meaning yet. What I mean is, does he belong to +any CHURCH?" + +"NOW you're talkin'! Couldn't make out what you was a-tryin' to git +through yo' head no way. B'long to a CHURCH! Why, boss, he's ben the +pizenest kind of Free-will Babtis' for forty year. They ain't no pizener +ones 'n what HE is. Mighty good man, pap is. Everybody says that. If +they said any diffrunt they wouldn't say it whar I wuz--not MUCH they +wouldn't." + +"What is your own religion?" + +"Well, boss, you've kind o' got me, there--and yit you hain't got me so +mighty much, nuther. I think 't if a feller he'ps another feller when +he's in trouble, and don't cuss, and don't do no mean things, nur +noth'n' he ain' no business to do, and don't spell the Saviour's name +with a little g, he ain't runnin' no resks--he's about as saift as he +b'longed to a church." + +"But suppose he did spell it with a little g--what then?" + +"Well, if he done it a-purpose, I reckon he wouldn't stand no chance--he +OUGHTN'T to have no chance, anyway, I'm most rotten certain 'bout that." + +"What is your name?" + +"Nicodemus Dodge." + +"I think maybe you'll do, Nicodemus. We'll give you a trial, anyway." + +"All right." + +"When would you like to begin?" + +"Now." + +So, within ten minutes after we had first glimpsed this nondescript he +was one of us, and with his coat off and hard at it. + +Beyond that end of our establishment which was furthest from the street, +was a deserted garden, pathless, and thickly grown with the bloomy and +villainous "jimpson" weed and its common friend the stately sunflower. +In the midst of this mournful spot was a decayed and aged little "frame" +house with but one room, one window, and no ceiling--it had been a +smoke-house a generation before. Nicodemus was given this lonely and +ghostly den as a bedchamber. + +The village smarties recognized a treasure in Nicodemus, right away--a +butt to play jokes on. It was easy to see that he was inconceivably +green and confiding. George Jones had the glory of perpetrating the +first joke on him; he gave him a cigar with a firecracker in it and +winked to the crowd to come; the thing exploded presently and swept away +the bulk of Nicodemus's eyebrows and eyelashes. He simply said: + +"I consider them kind of seeg'yars dangersome,"--and seemed to suspect +nothing. The next evening Nicodemus waylaid George and poured a bucket +of ice-water over him. + +One day, while Nicodemus was in swimming, Tom McElroy "tied" his +clothes. Nicodemus made a bonfire of Tom's by way of retaliation. + +A third joke was played upon Nicodemus a day or two later--he walked +up the middle aisle of the village church, Sunday night, with a staring +handbill pinned between his shoulders. The joker spent the remainder +of the night, after church, in the cellar of a deserted house, and +Nicodemus sat on the cellar door till toward breakfast-time to make +sure that the prisoner remembered that if any noise was made, some rough +treatment would be the consequence. The cellar had two feet of stagnant +water in it, and was bottomed with six inches of soft mud. + + + +But I wander from the point. It was the subject of skeletons that +brought this boy back to my recollection. Before a very long time +had elapsed, the village smarties began to feel an uncomfortable +consciousness of not having made a very shining success out of their +attempts on the simpleton from "old Shelby." Experimenters grew scarce +and chary. Now the young doctor came to the rescue. There was delight +and applause when he proposed to scare Nicodemus to death, and explained +how he was going to do it. He had a noble new skeleton--the skeleton of +the late and only local celebrity, Jimmy Finn, the village drunkard--a +grisly piece of property which he had bought of Jimmy Finn himself, at +auction, for fifty dollars, under great competition, when Jimmy lay very +sick in the tan-yard a fortnight before his death. The fifty dollars had +gone promptly for whiskey and had considerably hurried up the change of +ownership in the skeleton. The doctor would put Jimmy Finn's skeleton in +Nicodemus's bed! + +This was done--about half past ten in the evening. About Nicodemus's +usual bedtime--midnight--the village jokers came creeping stealthily +through the jimpson weeds and sunflowers toward the lonely frame den. +They reached the window and peeped in. There sat the long-legged pauper, +on his bed, in a very short shirt, and nothing more; he was dangling +his legs contentedly back and forth, and wheezing the music of "Camptown +Races" out of a paper-overlaid comb which he was pressing against his +mouth; by him lay a new jewsharp, a new top, and solid india-rubber +ball, a handful of painted marbles, five pounds of "store" candy, and +a well-gnawed slab of gingerbread as big and as thick as a volume of +sheet-music. He had sold the skeleton to a traveling quack for three +dollars and was enjoying the result! + + + +Just as we had finished talking about skeletons and were drifting into +the subject of fossils, Harris and I heard a shout, and glanced up the +steep hillside. We saw men and women standing away up there looking +frightened, and there was a bulky object tumbling and floundering down +the steep slope toward us. We got out of the way, and when the object +landed in the road it proved to be a boy. He had tripped and fallen, and +there was nothing for him to do but trust to luck and take what might +come. + +When one starts to roll down a place like that, there is no stopping +till the bottom is reached. Think of people FARMING on a slant which is +so steep that the best you can say of it--if you want to be fastidiously +accurate--is, that it is a little steeper than a ladder and not quite +so steep as a mansard roof. But that is what they do. Some of the little +farms on the hillside opposite Heidelberg were stood up "edgeways." +The boy was wonderfully jolted up, and his head was bleeding, from cuts +which it had got from small stones on the way. + + + +Harris and I gathered him up and set him on a stone, and by that time +the men and women had scampered down and brought his cap. + +Men, women, and children flocked out from neighboring cottages +and joined the crowd; the pale boy was petted, and stared at, and +commiserated, and water was brought for him to drink and bathe his +bruises in. And such another clatter of tongues! All who had seen the +catastrophe were describing it at once, and each trying to talk louder +than his neighbor; and one youth of a superior genius ran a little way +up the hill, called attention, tripped, fell, rolled down among us, and +thus triumphantly showed exactly how the thing had been done. + +Harris and I were included in all the descriptions; how we were coming +along; how Hans Gross shouted; how we looked up startled; how we saw +Peter coming like a cannon-shot; how judiciously we got out of the way, +and let him come; and with what presence of mind we picked him up and +brushed him off and set him on a rock when the performance was over. +We were as much heroes as anybody else, except Peter, and were so +recognized; we were taken with Peter and the populace to Peter's +mother's cottage, and there we ate bread and cheese, and drank milk and +beer with everybody, and had a most sociable good time; and when we left +we had a handshake all around, and were receiving and shouting back LEB' +WOHL's until a turn in the road separated us from our cordial and kindly +new friends forever. + +We accomplished our undertaking. At half past eight in the evening +we stepped into Oppenau, just eleven hours and a half out of +Allerheiligen--one hundred and forty-six miles. This is the distance by +pedometer; the guide-book and the Imperial Ordinance maps make it only +ten and a quarter--a surprising blunder, for these two authorities are +usually singularly accurate in the matter of distances. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +[I Protect the Empress of Germany] + + +That was a thoroughly satisfactory walk--and the only one we were ever +to have which was all the way downhill. We took the train next morning +and returned to Baden-Baden through fearful fogs of dust. Every seat was +crowded, too; for it was Sunday, and consequently everybody was taking +a "pleasure" excursion. Hot! the sky was an oven--and a sound one, +too, with no cracks in it to let in any air. An odd time for a pleasure +excursion, certainly! + +Sunday is the great day on the continent--the free day, the happy day. +One can break the Sabbath in a hundred ways without committing any sin. + +We do not work on Sunday, because the commandment forbids it; the +Germans do not work on Sunday, because the commandment forbids it. We +rest on Sunday, because the commandment requires it; the Germans rest on +Sunday because the commandment requires it. But in the definition of +the word "rest" lies all the difference. With us, its Sunday meaning +is, stay in the house and keep still; with the Germans its Sunday and +week-day meanings seem to be the same--rest the TIRED PART, and never +mind the other parts of the frame; rest the tired part, and use the +means best calculated to rest that particular part. Thus: If one's +duties have kept him in the house all the week, it will rest him to +be out on Sunday; if his duties have required him to read weighty and +serious matter all the week, it will rest him to read light matter on +Sunday; if his occupation has busied him with death and funerals all the +week, it will rest him to go to the theater Sunday night and put in two +or three hours laughing at a comedy; if he is tired with digging ditches +or felling trees all the week, it will rest him to lie quiet in the +house on Sunday; if the hand, the arm, the brain, the tongue, or any +other member, is fatigued with inanition, it is not to be rested by +addeding a day's inanition; but if a member is fatigued with exertion, +inanition is the right rest for it. Such is the way in which the Germans +seem to define the word "rest"; that is to say, they rest a member by +recreating, recuperating, restoring its forces. But our definition is +less broad. We all rest alike on Sunday--by secluding ourselves and +keeping still, whether that is the surest way to rest the most of us or +not. The Germans make the actors, the preachers, etc., work on Sunday. +We encourage the preachers, the editors, the printers, etc., to work on +Sunday, and imagine that none of the sin of it falls upon us; but I do +not know how we are going to get around the fact that if it is wrong for +the printer to work at his trade on Sunday it must be equally wrong for +the preacher to work at his, since the commandment has made no exception +in his favor. We buy Monday morning's paper and read it, and thus +encourage Sunday printing. But I shall never do it again. + + + +The Germans remember the Sabbath-day to keep it holy, by abstaining +from work, as commanded; we keep it holy by abstaining from work, as +commanded, and by also abstaining from play, which is not commanded. +Perhaps we constructively BREAK the command to rest, because the resting +we do is in most cases only a name, and not a fact. + +These reasonings have sufficed, in a measure, to mend the rent in my +conscience which I made by traveling to Baden-Baden that Sunday. We +arrived in time to furbish up and get to the English church before +services began. We arrived in considerable style, too, for the landlord +had ordered the first carriage that could be found, since there was no +time to lose, and our coachman was so splendidly liveried that we were +probably mistaken for a brace of stray dukes; why else were we honored +with a pew all to ourselves, away up among the very elect at the left of +the chancel? That was my first thought. In the pew directly in front of +us sat an elderly lady, plainly and cheaply dressed; at her side sat +a young lady with a very sweet face, and she also was quite simply +dressed; but around us and about us were clothes and jewels which it +would do anybody's heart good to worship in. + +I thought it was pretty manifest that the elderly lady was embarrassed +at finding herself in such a conspicuous place arrayed in such cheap +apparel; I began to feel sorry for her and troubled about her. She +tried to seem very busy with her prayer-book and her responses, and +unconscious that she was out of place, but I said to myself, "She is +not succeeding--there is a distressed tremulousness in her voice which +betrays increasing embarrassment." Presently the Savior's name was +mentioned, and in her flurry she lost her head completely, and rose and +courtesied, instead of making a slight nod as everybody else did. The +sympathetic blood surged to my temples and I turned and gave those fine +birds what I intended to be a beseeching look, but my feelings got the +better of me and changed it into a look which said, "If any of you pets +of fortune laugh at this poor soul, you will deserve to be flayed for +it." Things went from bad to worse, and I shortly found myself mentally +taking the unfriended lady under my protection. My mind was wholly upon +her. I forgot all about the sermon. Her embarrassment took stronger +and stronger hold upon her; she got to snapping the lid of her +smelling-bottle--it made a loud, sharp sound, but in her trouble she +snapped and snapped away, unconscious of what she was doing. The last +extremity was reached when the collection-plate began its rounds; the +moderate people threw in pennies, the nobles and the rich contributed +silver, but she laid a twenty-mark gold piece upon the book-rest before +her with a sounding slap! I said to myself, "She has parted with all her +little hoard to buy the consideration of these unpitying people--it is a +sorrowful spectacle." I did not venture to look around this time; but +as the service closed, I said to myself, "Let them laugh, it is their +opportunity; but at the door of this church they shall see her step into +our fine carriage with us, and our gaudy coachman shall drive her home." + + + +Then she rose--and all the congregation stood while she walked down the +aisle. She was the Empress of Germany! + +No--she had not been so much embarrassed as I had supposed. My +imagination had got started on the wrong scent, and that is always +hopeless; one is sure, then, to go straight on misinterpreting +everything, clear through to the end. The young lady with her imperial +Majesty was a maid of honor--and I had been taking her for one of her +boarders, all the time. + +This is the only time I have ever had an Empress under my personal +protection; and considering my inexperience, I wonder I got through +with it so well. I should have been a little embarrassed myself if I had +known earlier what sort of a contract I had on my hands. + +We found that the Empress had been in Baden-Baden several days. It is +said that she never attends any but the English form of church service. + +I lay abed and read and rested from my journey's fatigues the remainder +of that Sunday, but I sent my agent to represent me at the afternoon +service, for I never allow anything to interfere with my habit of +attending church twice every Sunday. + +There was a vast crowd in the public grounds that night to hear the band +play the "Fremersberg." This piece tells one of the old legends of the +region; how a great noble of the Middle Ages got lost in the mountains, +and wandered about with his dogs in a violent storm, until at last +the faint tones of a monastery bell, calling the monks to a midnight +service, caught his ear, and he followed the direction the sounds came +from and was saved. A beautiful air ran through the music, without +ceasing, sometimes loud and strong, sometimes so soft that it could +hardly be distinguished--but it was always there; it swung grandly along +through the shrill whistling of the storm-wind, the rattling patter of +the rain, and the boom and crash of the thunder; it wound soft and low +through the lesser sounds, the distant ones, such as the throbbing +of the convent bell, the melodious winding of the hunter's horn, the +distressed bayings of his dogs, and the solemn chanting of the monks; +it rose again, with a jubilant ring, and mingled itself with the country +songs and dances of the peasants assembled in the convent hall to +cheer up the rescued huntsman while he ate his supper. The instruments +imitated all these sounds with a marvelous exactness. More than one man +started to raise his umbrella when the storm burst forth and the sheets +of mimic rain came driving by; it was hardly possible to keep from +putting your hand to your hat when the fierce wind began to rage and +shriek; and it was NOT possible to refrain from starting when those +sudden and charmingly real thunder-crashes were let loose. + + + +I suppose the "Fremersberg" is a very low-grade music; I know, indeed, +that it MUST be low-grade music, because it delighted me, warmed me, +moved me, stirred me, uplifted me, enraptured me, that I was full of +cry all the time, and mad with enthusiasm. My soul had never had such a +scouring out since I was born. The solemn and majestic chanting of the +monks was not done by instruments, but by men's voices; and it rose +and fell, and rose again in that rich confusion of warring sounds, and +pulsing bells, and the stately swing of that ever-present enchanting +air, and it seemed to me that nothing but the very lowest of low-grade +music COULD be so divinely beautiful. The great crowd which the +"Fremersberg" had called out was another evidence that it was low-grade +music; for only the few are educated up to a point where high-grade +music gives pleasure. I have never heard enough classic music to be able +to enjoy it. I dislike the opera because I want to love it and can't. + +I suppose there are two kinds of music--one kind which one feels, just +as an oyster might, and another sort which requires a higher faculty, +a faculty which must be assisted and developed by teaching. Yet if base +music gives certain of us wings, why should we want any other? But we +do. We want it because the higher and better like it. We want it without +giving it the necessary time and trouble; so we climb into that upper +tier, that dress-circle, by a lie; we PRETEND we like it. I know several +of that sort of people--and I propose to be one of them myself when I +get home with my fine European education. + +And then there is painting. What a red rag is to a bull, Turner's "Slave +Ship" was to me, before I studied art. Mr. Ruskin is educated in art +up to a point where that picture throws him into as mad an ecstasy of +pleasure as it used to throw me into one of rage, last year, when I was +ignorant. His cultivation enables him--and me, now--to see water in that +glaring yellow mud, and natural effects in those lurid explosions +of mixed smoke and flame, and crimson sunset glories; it reconciles +him--and me, now--to the floating of iron cable-chains and other +unfloatable things; it reconciles us to fishes swimming around on top +of the mud--I mean the water. The most of the picture is a manifest +impossibility--that is to say, a lie; and only rigid cultivation can +enable a man to find truth in a lie. But it enabled Mr. Ruskin to do +it, and it has enabled me to do it, and I am thankful for it. A Boston +newspaper reporter went and took a look at the Slave Ship floundering +about in that fierce conflagration of reds and yellows, and said it +reminded him of a tortoise-shell cat having a fit in a platter +of tomatoes. In my then uneducated state, that went home to my +non-cultivation, and I thought here is a man with an unobstructed eye. +Mr. Ruskin would have said: This person is an ass. That is what I would +say, now. + +Months after this was written, I happened into the National Gallery in +London, and soon became so fascinated with the Turner pictures that I +could hardly get away from the place. I went there often, afterward, +meaning to see the rest of the gallery, but the Turner spell was too +strong; it could not be shaken off. However, the Turners which attracted +me most did not remind me of the Slave Ship. + +However, our business in Baden-Baden this time, was to join our courier. +I had thought it best to hire one, as we should be in Italy, by and by, +and we did not know the language. Neither did he. We found him at the +hotel, ready to take charge of us. I asked him if he was "all fixed." He +said he was. That was very true. He had a trunk, two small satchels, +and an umbrella. I was to pay him fifty-five dollars a month and railway +fares. On the continent the railway fare on a trunk is about the same +it is on a man. Couriers do not have to pay any board and lodging. This +seems a great saving to the tourist--at first. It does not occur to the +tourist that SOMEBODY pays that man's board and lodging. It occurs to +him by and by, however, in one of his lucid moments. + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +[Hunted by the Little Chamois] + + + +Next morning we left in the train for Switzerland, and reached Lucerne +about ten o'clock at night. The first discovery I made was that the +beauty of the lake had not been exaggerated. Within a day or two I made +another discovery. This was, that the lauded chamois is not a wild goat; +that it is not a horned animal; that it is not shy; that it does not +avoid human society; and that there is no peril in hunting it. + + + +The chamois is a black or brown creature no bigger than a mustard seed; +you do not have to go after it, it comes after you; it arrives in vast +herds and skips and scampers all over your body, inside your clothes; +thus it is not shy, but extremely sociable; it is not afraid of man, on +the contrary, it will attack him; its bite is not dangerous, but neither +is it pleasant; its activity has not been overstated --if you try to put +your finger on it, it will skip a thousand times its own length at one +jump, and no eye is sharp enough to see where it lights. A great deal +of romantic nonsense has been written about the Swiss chamois and the +perils of hunting it, whereas the truth is that even women and children +hunt it, and fearlessly; indeed, everybody hunts it; the hunting is +going on all the time, day and night, in bed and out of it. It is poetic +foolishness to hunt it with a gun; very few people do that; there is +not one man in a million who can hit it with a gun. It is much easier to +catch it than it is to shoot it, and only the experienced chamois-hunter +can do either. Another common piece of exaggeration is that about the +"scarcity" of the chamois. It is the reverse of scarce. Droves of one +hundred million chamois are not unusual in the Swiss hotels. Indeed, +they are so numerous as to be a great pest. The romancers always dress +up the chamois-hunter in a fanciful and picturesque costume, whereas the +best way to hunt this game is to do it without any costume at all. + + + +The article of commerce called chamois-skin is another fraud; nobody +could skin a chamois, it is too small. The creature is a humbug in +every way, and everything which has been written about it is sentimental +exaggeration. It was no pleasure to me to find the chamois out, for he +had been one of my pet illusions; all my life it had been my dream to +see him in his native wilds some day, and engage in the adventurous +sport of chasing him from cliff to cliff. It is no pleasure to me to +expose him, now, and destroy the reader's delight in him and respect for +him, but still it must be done, for when an honest writer discovers an +imposition it is his simple duty to strip it bare and hurl it down from +its place of honor, no matter who suffers by it; any other course would +render him unworthy of the public confidence. + +Lucerne is a charming place. It begins at the water's edge, with a +fringe of hotels, and scrambles up and spreads itself over two or three +sharp hills in a crowded, disorderly, but picturesque way, offering +to the eye a heaped-up confusion of red roofs, quaint gables, dormer +windows, toothpick steeples, with here and there a bit of ancient +embattled wall bending itself over the ridges, worm-fashion, and here +and there an old square tower of heavy masonry. And also here and there +a town clock with only one hand--a hand which stretches across the dial +and has no joint in it; such a clock helps out the picture, but you +cannot tell the time of day by it. Between the curving line of hotels +and the lake is a broad avenue with lamps and a double rank of low shade +trees. The lake-front is walled with masonry like a pier, and has +a railing, to keep people from walking overboard. All day long the +vehicles dash along the avenue, and nurses, children, and tourists sit +in the shade of the trees, or lean on the railing and watch the schools +of fishes darting about in the clear water, or gaze out over the lake +at the stately border of snow-hooded mountain peaks. Little pleasure +steamers, black with people, are coming and going all the time; and +everywhere one sees young girls and young men paddling about in fanciful +rowboats, or skimming along by the help of sails when there is any wind. +The front rooms of the hotels have little railed balconies, where one +may take his private luncheon in calm, cool comfort and look down upon +this busy and pretty scene and enjoy it without having to do any of the +work connected with it. + +Most of the people, both male and female, are in walking costume, and +carry alpenstocks. Evidently, it is not considered safe to go about in +Switzerland, even in town, without an alpenstock. If the tourist forgets +and comes down to breakfast without his alpenstock he goes back and gets +it, and stands it up in the corner. When his touring in Switzerland is +finished, he does not throw that broomstick away, but lugs it home +with him, to the far corners of the earth, although this costs him +more trouble and bother than a baby or a courier could. You see, the +alpenstock is his trophy; his name is burned upon it; and if he has +climbed a hill, or jumped a brook, or traversed a brickyard with it, he +has the names of those places burned upon it, too. + + + +Thus it is his regimental flag, so to speak, and bears the record of his +achievements. It is worth three francs when he buys it, but a bonanza +could not purchase it after his great deeds have been inscribed upon it. +There are artisans all about Switzerland whose trade it is to burn +these things upon the alpenstock of the tourist. And observe, a man is +respected in Switzerland according to his alpenstock. I found I could +get no attention there, while I carried an unbranded one. However, +branding is not expected, so I soon remedied that. The effect upon +the next detachment of tourists was very marked. I felt repaid for my +trouble. + +Half of the summer horde in Switzerland is made up of English people; +the other half is made up of many nationalities, the Germans leading and +the Americans coming next. The Americans were not as numerous as I had +expected they would be. + +The seven-thirty table d'hote at the great Schweitzerhof furnished +a mighty array and variety of nationalities, but it offered a better +opportunity to observe costumes than people, for the multitude sat +at immensely long tables, and therefore the faces were mainly seen in +perspective; but the breakfasts were served at small round tables, +and then if one had the fortune to get a table in the midst of the +assemblage he could have as many faces to study as he could desire. +We used to try to guess out the nationalities, and generally succeeded +tolerably well. Sometimes we tried to guess people's names; but that +was a failure; that is a thing which probably requires a good deal of +practice. We presently dropped it and gave our efforts to less difficult +particulars. One morning I said: + +"There is an American party." + +Harris said: + +"Yes--but name the state." + +I named one state, Harris named another. We agreed upon one thing, +however--that the young girl with the party was very beautiful, and +very tastefully dressed. But we disagreed as to her age. I said she was +eighteen, Harris said she was twenty. The dispute between us waxed warm, +and I finally said, with a pretense of being in earnest: + +"Well, there is one way to settle the matter--I will go and ask her." + + + +Harris said, sarcastically, "Certainly, that is the thing to do. All you +need to do is to use the common formula over here: go and say, 'I'm an +American!' Of course she will be glad to see you." + +Then he hinted that perhaps there was no great danger of my venturing to +speak to her. + +I said, "I was only talking--I didn't intend to approach her, but I see +that you do not know what an intrepid person I am. I am not afraid of +any woman that walks. I will go and speak to this young girl." + +The thing I had in my mind was not difficult. I meant to address her +in the most respectful way and ask her to pardon me if her strong +resemblance to a former acquaintance of mine was deceiving me; and when +she should reply that the name I mentioned was not the name she bore, I +meant to beg pardon again, most respectfully, and retire. There would be +no harm done. I walked to her table, bowed to the gentleman, then turned +to her and was about to begin my little speech when she exclaimed: + +"I KNEW I wasn't mistaken--I told John it was you! John said it probably +wasn't, but I knew I was right. I said you would recognize me presently +and come over; and I'm glad you did, for I shouldn't have felt much +flattered if you had gone out of this room without recognizing me. +Sit down, sit down--how odd it is--you are the last person I was ever +expecting to see again." + + + +This was a stupefying surprise. It took my wits clear away, for an +instant. However, we shook hands cordially all around, and I sat down. +But truly this was the tightest place I ever was in. I seemed to vaguely +remember the girl's face, now, but I had no idea where I had seen it +before, or what name belonged with it. I immediately tried to get up a +diversion about Swiss scenery, to keep her from launching into topics +that might betray that I did not know her, but it was of no use, she +went right along upon matters which interested her more: + +"Oh dear, what a night that was, when the sea washed the forward boats +away--do you remember it?" + +"Oh, DON'T I!" said I--but I didn't. I wished the sea had washed the +rudder and the smoke-stack and the captain away--then I could have +located this questioner. + +"And don't you remember how frightened poor Mary was, and how she +cried?" + +"Indeed I do!" said I. "Dear me, how it all comes back!" + +I fervently wished it WOULD come back--but my memory was a blank. The +wise way would have been to frankly own up; but I could not bring myself +to do that, after the young girl had praised me so for recognizing her; +so I went on, deeper and deeper into the mire, hoping for a chance clue +but never getting one. The Unrecognizable continued, with vivacity: + +"Do you know, George married Mary, after all?" + +"Why, no! Did he?" + +"Indeed he did. He said he did not believe she was half as much to blame +as her father was, and I thought he was right. Didn't you?" + +"Of course he was. It was a perfectly plain case. I always said so." + +"Why, no you didn't!--at least that summer." + +"Oh, no, not that summer. No, you are perfectly right about that. It was +the following winter that I said it." + +"Well, as it turned out, Mary was not in the least to blame --it was all +her father's fault--at least his and old Darley's." + +It was necessary to say something--so I said: + +"I always regarded Darley as a troublesome old thing." + +"So he was, but then they always had a great affection for him, although +he had so many eccentricities. You remember that when the weather was +the least cold, he would try to come into the house." + +I was rather afraid to proceed. Evidently Darley was not a man--he +must be some other kind of animal--possibly a dog, maybe an elephant. +However, tails are common to all animals, so I ventured to say: + +"And what a tail he had!" + +"ONE! He had a thousand!" + +This was bewildering. I did not quite know what to say, so I only said: + +"Yes, he WAS rather well fixed in the matter of tails." + +"For a negro, and a crazy one at that, I should say he was," said she. + +It was getting pretty sultry for me. I said to myself, "Is it possible +she is going to stop there, and wait for me to speak? If she does, the +conversation is blocked. A negro with a thousand tails is a topic which +a person cannot talk upon fluently and instructively without more or +less preparation. As to diving rashly into such a vast subject--" + +But here, to my gratitude, she interrupted my thoughts by saying: + +"Yes, when it came to tales of his crazy woes, there was simply no +end to them if anybody would listen. His own quarters were comfortable +enough, but when the weather was cold, the family were sure to have his +company--nothing could keep him out of the house. But they always bore +it kindly because he had saved Tom's life, years before. You remember +Tom? + +"Oh, perfectly. Fine fellow he was, too." + +"Yes he was. And what a pretty little thing his child was!" + +"You may well say that. I never saw a prettier child." + +"I used to delight to pet it and dandle it and play with it." + +"So did I." + +"You named it. What WAS that name? I can't call it to mind." + +It appeared to me that the ice was getting pretty thin, here. I would +have given something to know what the child's was. However, I had the +good luck to think of a name that would fit either sex--so I brought it +out: + +"I named it Frances." + +"From a relative, I suppose? But you named the one that died, too--one +that I never saw. What did you call that one?" + +I was out of neutral names, but as the child was dead and she had +never seen it, I thought I might risk a name for it and trust to luck. +Therefore I said: + +"I called that one Thomas Henry." + +She said, musingly: + +"That is very singular ... very singular." + +I sat still and let the cold sweat run down. I was in a good deal of +trouble, but I believed I could worry through if she wouldn't ask me +to name any more children. I wondered where the lightning was going to +strike next. She was still ruminating over that last child's title, but +presently she said: + +"I have always been sorry you were away at the time--I would have had +you name my child." + +"YOUR child! Are you married?" + +"I have been married thirteen years." + +"Christened, you mean." + +`"No, married. The youth by your side is my son." + +"It seems incredible--even impossible. I do not mean any harm by it, but +would you mind telling me if you are any over eighteen?--that is to say, +will you tell me how old you are?" + +"I was just nineteen the day of the storm we were talking about. That +was my birthday." + +That did not help matters, much, as I did not know the date of the +storm. I tried to think of some non-committal thing to say, to keep up +my end of the talk, and render my poverty in the matter of reminiscences +as little noticeable as possible, but I seemed to be about out of +non-committal things. I was about to say, "You haven't changed a bit +since then"--but that was risky. I thought of saying, "You have improved +ever so much since then"--but that wouldn't answer, of course. I was +about to try a shy at the weather, for a saving change, when the girl +slipped in ahead of me and said: + +"How I have enjoyed this talk over those happy old times--haven't you?" + +"I never have spent such a half-hour in all my life before!" said I, +with emotion; and I could have added, with a near approach to truth, +"and I would rather be scalped than spend another one like it." I was +holily grateful to be through with the ordeal, and was about to make my +good-bys and get out, when the girl said: + +"But there is one thing that is ever so puzzling to me." + +"Why, what is that?" + +"That dead child's name. What did you say it was?" + +Here was another balmy place to be in: I had forgotten the child's name; +I hadn't imagined it would be needed again. However, I had to pretend to +know, anyway, so I said: + +"Joseph William." + +The youth at my side corrected me, and said: + +"No, Thomas Henry." + +I thanked him--in words--and said, with trepidation: + +"O yes--I was thinking of another child that I named--I have named +a great many, and I get them confused--this one was named Henry +Thompson--" + +"Thomas Henry," calmly interposed the boy. + +I thanked him again--strictly in words--and stammered out: + +"Thomas Henry--yes, Thomas Henry was the poor child's name. I named +him for Thomas--er--Thomas Carlyle, the great author, you know--and +Henry--er--er--Henry the Eighth. The parents were very grateful to have +a child named Thomas Henry." + +"That makes it more singular than ever," murmured my beautiful friend. + +"Does it? Why?" + +"Because when the parents speak of that child now, they always call it +Susan Amelia." + +That spiked my gun. I could not say anything. I was entirely out of +verbal obliquities; to go further would be to lie, and that I would not +do; so I simply sat still and suffered--sat mutely and resignedly there, +and sizzled--for I was being slowly fried to death in my own blushes. +Presently the enemy laughed a happy laugh and said: + +"I HAVE enjoyed this talk over old times, but you have not. I saw very +soon that you were only pretending to know me, and so as I had wasted a +compliment on you in the beginning, I made up my mind to punish you. And +I have succeeded pretty well. I was glad to see that you knew George and +Tom and Darley, for I had never heard of them before and therefore could +not be sure that you had; and I was glad to learn the names of those +imaginary children, too. One can get quite a fund of information out +of you if one goes at it cleverly. Mary and the storm, and the sweeping +away of the forward boats, were facts--all the rest was fiction. Mary +was my sister; her full name was Mary ------. NOW do you remember me?" + +"Yes," I said, "I do remember you now; and you are as hard-headed as you +were thirteen years ago in that ship, else you wouldn't have punished me +so. You haven't changed your nature nor your person, in any way at all; +you look as young as you did then, you are just as beautiful as you were +then, and you have transmitted a deal of your comeliness to this fine +boy. There--if that speech moves you any, let's fly the flag of truce, +with the understanding that I am conquered and confess it." + +All of which was agreed to and accomplished, on the spot. When I went +back to Harris, I said: + +"Now you see what a person with talent and address can do." + +"Excuse me, I see what a person of colossal ignorance and simplicity can +do. The idea of your going and intruding on a party of strangers, that +way, and talking for half an hour; why I never heard of a man in his +right mind doing such a thing before. What did you say to them?" + + + +"I never said any harm. I merely asked the girl what her name was." + +"I don't doubt it. Upon my word I don't. I think you were capable of it. +It was stupid in me to let you go over there and make such an exhibition +of yourself. But you know I couldn't really believe you would do such an +inexcusable thing. What will those people think of us? But how did you +say it?--I mean the manner of it. I hope you were not abrupt." + +"No, I was careful about that. I said, 'My friend and I would like to +know what your name is, if you don't mind.'" + +"No, that was not abrupt. There is a polish about it that does you +infinite credit. And I am glad you put me in; that was a delicate +attention which I appreciate at its full value. What did she do?" + +"She didn't do anything in particular. She told me her name." + +"Simply told you her name. Do you mean to say she did not show any +surprise?" + +"Well, now I come to think, she did show something; maybe it was +surprise; I hadn't thought of that--I took it for gratification." + +"Oh, undoubtedly you were right; it must have been gratification; it +could not be otherwise than gratifying to be assaulted by a stranger +with such a question as that. Then what did you do?" + +"I offered my hand and the party gave me a shake." + +"I saw it! I did not believe my own eyes, at the time. Did the gentleman +say anything about cutting your throat?" + +"No, they all seemed glad to see me, as far as I could judge." + +"And do you know, I believe they were. I think they said to themselves, +'Doubtless this curiosity has got away from his keeper--let us amuse +ourselves with him.' There is no other way of accounting for their +facile docility. You sat down. Did they ASK you to sit down?" + +"No, they did not ask me, but I suppose they did not think of it." + +"You have an unerring instinct. What else did you do? What did you talk +about?" + +"Well, I asked the girl how old she was." + +"UNdoubtedly. Your delicacy is beyond praise. Go on, go on--don't mind +my apparent misery--I always look so when I am steeped in a profound and +reverent joy. Go on--she told you her age?" + +"Yes, she told me her age, and all about her mother, and her +grandmother, and her other relations, and all about herself." + +"Did she volunteer these statistics?" + +"No, not exactly that. I asked the questions and she answered them." + +"This is divine. Go on--it is not possible that you forgot to inquire +into her politics?" + +"No, I thought of that. She is a democrat, her husband is a republican, +and both of them are Baptists." + +"Her husband? Is that child married?" + +"She is not a child. She is married, and that is her husband who is +there with her." + +"Has she any children." + +"Yes--seven and a half." + +"That is impossible." + +"No, she has them. She told me herself." + +"Well, but seven and a HALF? How do you make out the half? Where does +the half come in?" + +"There is a child which she had by another husband--not this one +but another one--so it is a stepchild, and they do not count in full +measure." + +"Another husband? Has she another husband?" + +"Yes, four. This one is number four." + +"I don't believe a word of it. It is impossible, upon its face. Is that +boy there her brother?" + +"No, that is her son. He is her youngest. He is not as old as he looked; +he is only eleven and a half." + +"These things are all manifestly impossible. This is a wretched +business. It is a plain case: they simply took your measure, and +concluded to fill you up. They seem to have succeeded. I am glad I am +not in the mess; they may at least be charitable enough to think there +ain't a pair of us. Are they going to stay here long?" + +"No, they leave before noon." + +"There is one man who is deeply grateful for that. How did you find out? +You asked, I suppose?" + +"No, along at first I inquired into their plans, in a general way, and +they said they were going to be here a week, and make trips round about; +but toward the end of the interview, when I said you and I would tour +around with them with pleasure, and offered to bring you over and +introduce you, they hesitated a little, and asked if you were from the +same establishment that I was. I said you were, and then they said they +had changed their mind and considered it necessary to start at once and +visit a sick relative in Siberia." + +"Ah, me, you struck the summit! You struck the loftiest altitude of +stupidity that human effort has ever reached. You shall have a monument +of jackasses' skulls as high as the Strasburg spire if you die before +I do. They wanted to know I was from the same 'establishment' that you +hailed from, did they? What did they mean by 'establishment'?" + +"I don't know; it never occurred to me to ask." + +"Well I know. They meant an asylum--an IDIOT asylum, do you understand? +So they DO think there's a pair of us, after all. Now what do you think +of yourself?" + +"Well, I don't know. I didn't know I was doing any harm; I didn't MEAN +to do any harm. They were very nice people, and they seemed to like me." + +Harris made some rude remarks and left for his bedroom--to break some +furniture, he said. He was a singularly irascible man; any little thing +would disturb his temper. + +I had been well scorched by the young woman, but no matter, I took it +out on Harris. One should always "get even" in some way, else the sore +place will go on hurting. + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +[The Nest of the Cuckoo-clock] + + +The Hofkirche is celebrated for its organ concerts. All summer long the +tourists flock to that church about six o'clock in the evening, and pay +their franc, and listen to the noise. They don't stay to hear all of +it, but get up and tramp out over the sounding stone floor, meeting late +comers who tramp in in a sounding and vigorous way. This tramping +back and forth is kept up nearly all the time, and is accented by +the continuous slamming of the door, and the coughing and barking and +sneezing of the crowd. Meantime, the big organ is booming and crashing +and thundering away, doing its best to prove that it is the biggest and +best organ in Europe, and that a tight little box of a church is the +most favorable place to average and appreciate its powers in. It is +true, there were some soft and merciful passages occasionally, but the +tramp-tramp of the tourists only allowed one to get fitful glimpses of +them, so to speak. Then right away the organist would let go another +avalanche. + +The commerce of Lucerne consists mainly in gimcrackery of the souvenir +sort; the shops are packed with Alpine crystals, photographs of +scenery, and wooden and ivory carvings. I will not conceal the fact that +miniature figures of the Lion of Lucerne are to be had in them. Millions +of them. But they are libels upon him, every one of them. There is a +subtle something about the majestic pathos of the original which the +copyist cannot get. Even the sun fails to get it; both the photographer +and the carver give you a dying lion, and that is all. The shape is +right, the attitude is right, the proportions are right, but that +indescribable something which makes the Lion of Lucerne the most +mournful and moving piece of stone in the world, is wanting. + +The Lion lies in his lair in the perpendicular face of a low cliff--for +he is carved from the living rock of the cliff. His size is colossal, +his attitude is noble. His head is bowed, the broken spear is sticking +in his shoulder, his protecting paw rests upon the lilies of France. +Vines hang down the cliff and wave in the wind, and a clear stream +trickles from above and empties into a pond at the base, and in the +smooth surface of the pond the lion is mirrored, among the water-lilies. + + + +Around about are green trees and grass. The place is a sheltered, +reposeful woodland nook, remote from noise and stir and confusion--and +all this is fitting, for lions do die in such places, and not on granite +pedestals in public squares fenced with fancy iron railings. The Lion of +Lucerne would be impressive anywhere, but nowhere so impressive as where +he is. + +Martyrdom is the luckiest fate that can befall some people. Louis XVI +did not die in his bed, consequently history is very gentle with him; +she is charitable toward his failings, and she finds in him high virtues +which are not usually considered to be virtues when they are lodged in +kings. She makes him out to be a person with a meek and modest spirit, +the heart of a female saint, and a wrong head. None of these qualities +are kingly but the last. Taken together they make a character which +would have fared harshly at the hands of history if its owner had had +the ill luck to miss martyrdom. With the best intentions to do the right +thing, he always managed to do the wrong one. Moreover, nothing could +get the female saint out of him. He knew, well enough, that in national +emergencies he must not consider how he ought to act, as a man, but how +he ought to act as a king; so he honestly tried to sink the man and be +the king--but it was a failure, he only succeeded in being the female +saint. He was not instant in season, but out of season. He could not be +persuaded to do a thing while it could do any good--he was iron, he was +adamant in his stubbornness then--but as soon as the thing had reached a +point where it would be positively harmful to do it, do it he would, and +nothing could stop him. He did not do it because it would be harmful, +but because he hoped it was not yet too late to achieve by it the good +which it would have done if applied earlier. His comprehension was +always a train or two behindhand. If a national toe required amputating, +he could not see that it needed anything more than poulticing; when +others saw that the mortification had reached the knee, he first +perceived that the toe needed cutting off--so he cut it off; and he +severed the leg at the knee when others saw that the disease had reached +the thigh. He was good, and honest, and well meaning, in the matter of +chasing national diseases, but he never could overtake one. As a private +man, he would have been lovable; but viewed as a king, he was strictly +contemptible. + +His was a most unroyal career, but the most pitiable spectacle in it was +his sentimental treachery to his Swiss guard on that memorable 10th of +August, when he allowed those heroes to be massacred in his cause, and +forbade them to shed the "sacred French blood" purporting to be flowing +in the veins of the red-capped mob of miscreants that was raging around +the palace. He meant to be kingly, but he was only the female saint once +more. Some of his biographers think that upon this occasion the spirit +of Saint Louis had descended upon him. It must have found pretty cramped +quarters. If Napoleon the First had stood in the shoes of Louis XVI that +day, instead of being merely a casual and unknown looker-on, there would +be no Lion of Lucerne, now, but there would be a well-stocked Communist +graveyard in Paris which would answer just as well to remember the 10th +of August by. + +Martyrdom made a saint of Mary Queen of Scots three hundred years ago, +and she has hardly lost all of her saintship yet. Martyrdom made a saint +of the trivial and foolish Marie Antoinette, and her biographers +still keep her fragrant with the odor of sanctity to this day, while +unconsciously proving upon almost every page they write that the only +calamitous instinct which her husband lacked, she supplied--the instinct +to root out and get rid of an honest, able, and loyal official, wherever +she found him. The hideous but beneficent French Revolution would have +been deferred, or would have fallen short of completeness, or even +might not have happened at all, if Marie Antoinette had made the unwise +mistake of not being born. The world owes a great deal to the French +Revolution, and consequently to its two chief promoters, Louis the Poor +in Spirit and his queen. + +We did not buy any wooden images of the Lion, nor any ivory or ebony +or marble or chalk or sugar or chocolate ones, or even any photographic +slanders of him. The truth is, these copies were so common, so +universal, in the shops and everywhere, that they presently became as +intolerable to the wearied eye as the latest popular melody usually +becomes to the harassed ear. In Lucerne, too, the wood carvings of +other sorts, which had been so pleasant to look upon when one saw them +occasionally at home, soon began to fatigue us. We grew very tired +of seeing wooden quails and chickens picking and strutting around +clock-faces, and still more tired of seeing wooden images of the alleged +chamois skipping about wooden rocks, or lying upon them in family +groups, or peering alertly up from behind them. The first day, I would +have bought a hundred and fifty of these clocks if I had the money--and +I did buy three--but on the third day the disease had run its course, +I had convalesced, and was in the market once more--trying to sell. +However, I had no luck; which was just as well, for the things will be +pretty enough, no doubt, when I get them home. + +For years my pet aversion had been the cuckoo clock; now here I was, at +last, right in the creature's home; so wherever I went that distressing +"HOO'hoo! HOO'hoo! HOO'hoo!" was always in my ears. For a nervous man, +this was a fine state of things. Some sounds are hatefuler than others, +but no sound is quite so inane, and silly, and aggravating as the +"HOO'hoo" of a cuckoo clock, I think. I bought one, and am carrying it +home to a certain person; for I have always said that if the opportunity +ever happened, I would do that man an ill turn. + + + +What I meant, was, that I would break one of his legs, or something of +that sort; but in Lucerne I instantly saw that I could impair his mind. +That would be more lasting, and more satisfactory every way. So I bought +the cuckoo clock; and if I ever get home with it, he is "my meat," as +they say in the mines. I thought of another candidate--a book-reviewer +whom I could name if I wanted to--but after thinking it over, I didn't +buy him a clock. I couldn't injure his mind. + +We visited the two long, covered wooden bridges which span the green and +brilliant Reuss just below where it goes plunging and hurrahing out +of the lake. These rambling, sway-backed tunnels are very attractive +things, with their alcoved outlooks upon the lovely and inspiriting +water. They contain two or three hundred queer old pictures, by old +Swiss masters--old boss sign-painters, who flourished before the +decadence of art. + +The lake is alive with fishes, plainly visible to the eye, for the water +is very clear. The parapets in front of the hotels were usually fringed +with fishers of all ages. One day I thought I would stop and see a +fish caught. The result brought back to my mind, very forcibly, a +circumstance which I had not thought of before for twelve years. This +one: + +THE MAN WHO PUT UP AT GADSBY'S + +When my odd friend Riley and I were newspaper correspondents in +Washington, in the winter of '67, we were coming down Pennsylvania +Avenue one night, near midnight, in a driving storm of snow, when the +flash of a street-lamp fell upon a man who was eagerly tearing along in +the opposite direction. "This is lucky! You are Mr. Riley, ain't you?" + +Riley was the most self-possessed and solemnly deliberate person in the +republic. He stopped, looked his man over from head to foot, and finally +said: + +"I am Mr. Riley. Did you happen to be looking for me?" + +"That's just what I was doing," said the man, joyously, "and it's the +biggest luck in the world that I've found you. My name is Lykins. I'm +one of the teachers of the high school--San Francisco. As soon as I +heard the San Francisco postmastership was vacant, I made up my mind to +get it--and here I am." + +"Yes," said Riley, slowly, "as you have remarked ... Mr. Lykins ... here +you are. And have you got it?" + +"Well, not exactly GOT it, but the next thing to it. I've brought a +petition, signed by the Superintendent of Public Instruction, and all +the teachers, and by more than two hundred other people. Now I want you, +if you'll be so good, to go around with me to the Pacific delegation, +for I want to rush this thing through and get along home." + +"If the matter is so pressing, you will prefer that we visit the +delegation tonight," said Riley, in a voice which had nothing mocking in +it--to an unaccustomed ear. + +"Oh, tonight, by all means! I haven't got any time to fool around. I +want their promise before I go to bed--I ain't the talking kind, I'm the +DOING kind!" + +"Yes ... you've come to the right place for that. When did you arrive?" + +"Just an hour ago." + +"When are you intending to leave?" + +"For New York tomorrow evening--for San Francisco next morning." + +"Just so.... What are you going to do tomorrow?" + +"DO! Why, I've got to go to the President with the petition and the +delegation, and get the appointment, haven't I?" + +"Yes ... very true ... that is correct. And then what?" + +"Executive session of the Senate at 2 P.M.--got to get the appointment +confirmed--I reckon you'll grant that?" + +"Yes ... yes," said Riley, meditatively, "you are right again. Then +you take the train for New York in the evening, and the steamer for San +Francisco next morning?" + +"That's it--that's the way I map it out!" + +Riley considered a while, and then said: + +"You couldn't stay ... a day ... well, say two days longer?" + +"Bless your soul, no! It's not my style. I ain't a man to go fooling +around--I'm a man that DOES things, I tell you." + +The storm was raging, the thick snow blowing in gusts. Riley stood +silent, apparently deep in a reverie, during a minute or more, then he +looked up and said: + +"Have you ever heard about that man who put up at Gadsby's, once? ... +But I see you haven't." + +He backed Mr. Lykins against an iron fence, buttonholed him, fastened +him with his eye, like the Ancient Mariner, and proceeded to unfold +his narrative as placidly and peacefully as if we were all stretched +comfortably in a blossomy summer meadow instead of being persecuted by a +wintry midnight tempest: + + + +"I will tell you about that man. It was in Jackson's time. Gadsby's was +the principal hotel, then. Well, this man arrived from Tennessee +about nine o'clock, one morning, with a black coachman and a splendid +four-horse carriage and an elegant dog, which he was evidently fond +of and proud of; he drove up before Gadsby's, and the clerk and the +landlord and everybody rushed out to take charge of him, but he said, +'Never mind,' and jumped out and told the coachman to wait-- + + + +said he hadn't time to take anything to eat, he only had a little claim +against the government to collect, would run across the way, to +the Treasury, and fetch the money, and then get right along back to +Tennessee, for he was in considerable of a hurry. + +"Well, about eleven o'clock that night he came back and ordered a bed +and told them to put the horses up--said he would collect the claim in +the morning. This was in January, you understand--January, 1834--the 3d +of January--Wednesday. + + + +"Well, on the 5th of February, he sold the fine carriage, and bought +a cheap second-hand one--said it would answer just as well to take the +money home in, and he didn't care for style. + +"On the 11th of August he sold a pair of the fine horses--said he'd +often thought a pair was better than four, to go over the rough mountain +roads with where a body had to be careful about his driving--and there +wasn't so much of his claim but he could lug the money home with a pair +easy enough. + + + +"On the 13th of December he sold another horse--said two warn't +necessary to drag that old light vehicle with--in fact, one could snatch +it along faster than was absolutely necessary, now that it was good +solid winter weather and the roads in splendid condition. + + + +"On the 17th of February, 1835, he sold the old carriage and bought a +cheap second-hand buggy--said a buggy was just the trick to skim along +mushy, slushy early spring roads with, and he had always wanted to try a +buggy on those mountain roads, anyway. + + + +"On the 1st August he sold the buggy and bought the remains of an old +sulky--said he just wanted to see those green Tennesseans stare and gawk +when they saw him come a-ripping along in a sulky--didn't believe they'd +ever heard of a sulky in their lives. + + + +"Well, on the 29th of August he sold his colored coachman--said he +didn't need a coachman for a sulky--wouldn't be room enough for two in +it anyway--and, besides, it wasn't every day that Providence sent a man +a fool who was willing to pay nine hundred dollars for such a third-rate +negro as that--been wanting to get rid of the creature for years, but +didn't like to THROW him away. + + + +"Eighteen months later--that is to say, on the 15th of February, +1837--he sold the sulky and bought a saddle--said horseback-riding was +what the doctor had always recommended HIM to take, and dog'd if he +wanted to risk HIS neck going over those mountain roads on wheels in the +dead of winter, not if he knew himself. + + + +"On the 9th of April he sold the saddle--said he wasn't going to risk +HIS life with any perishable saddle-girth that ever was made, over a +rainy, miry April road, while he could ride bareback and know and feel +he was safe--always HAD despised to ride on a saddle, anyway. + + + +"On the 24th of April he sold his horse--said 'I'm just fifty-seven +today, hale and hearty--it would be a PRETTY howdy-do for me to be +wasting such a trip as that and such weather as this, on a horse, when +there ain't anything in the world so splendid as a tramp on foot through +the fresh spring woods and over the cheery mountains, to a man that IS +a man--and I can make my dog carry my claim in a little bundle, anyway, +when it's collected. So tomorrow I'll be up bright and early, make my +little old collection, and mosey off to Tennessee, on my own hind legs, +with a rousing good-by to Gadsby's.' + + + +"On the 22d of June he sold his dog--said 'Dern a dog, anyway, where +you're just starting off on a rattling bully pleasure tramp through the +summer woods and hills--perfect nuisance--chases the squirrels, barks +at everything, goes a-capering and splattering around in the fords--man +can't get any chance to reflect and enjoy nature--and I'd a blamed sight +ruther carry the claim myself, it's a mighty sight safer; a dog's +mighty uncertain in a financial way--always noticed it--well, GOOD-by, +boys--last call--I'm off for Tennessee with a good leg and a gay heart, +early in the morning.'" + + + +There was a pause and a silence--except the noise of the wind and the +pelting snow. Mr. Lykins said, impatiently: + +"Well?" + +Riley said: + +"Well,--that was thirty years ago." + +"Very well, very well--what of it?" + +"I'm great friends with that old patriarch. He comes every evening to +tell me good-by. I saw him an hour ago--he's off for Tennessee early +tomorrow morning--as usual; said he calculated to get his claim through +and be off before night-owls like me have turned out of bed. The tears +were in his eyes, he was so glad he was going to see his old Tennessee +and his friends once more." + +Another silent pause. The stranger broke it: + +"Is that all?" + +"That is all." + +"Well, for the TIME of night, and the KIND of night, it seems to me the +story was full long enough. But what's it all FOR?" + +"Oh, nothing in particular." + +"Well, where's the point of it?" + +"Oh, there isn't any particular point to it. Only, if you are not in +TOO much of a hurry to rush off to San Francisco with that post-office +appointment, Mr. Lykins, I'd advise you to 'PUT UP AT GADSBY'S' for a +spell, and take it easy. Good-by. GOD bless you!" + +So saying, Riley blandly turned on his heel and left the astonished +school-teacher standing there, a musing and motionless snow image +shining in the broad glow of the street-lamp. + +He never got that post-office. + +To go back to Lucerne and its fishers, I concluded, after about +nine hours' waiting, that the man who proposes to tarry till he sees +something hook one of those well-fed and experienced fishes will find +it wisdom to "put up at Gadsby's" and take it easy. It is likely that +a fish has not been caught on that lake pier for forty years; but no +matter, the patient fisher watches his cork there all the day long, just +the same, and seems to enjoy it. One may see the fisher-loafers just as +thick and contented and happy and patient all along the Seine at Paris, +but tradition says that the only thing ever caught there in modern times +is a thing they don't fish for at all--the recent dog and the translated +cat. + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +[I Spare an Awful Bore] + + +Close by the Lion of Lucerne is what they call the "Glacier Garden"--and +it is the only one in the world. It is on high ground. Four or five +years ago, some workmen who were digging foundations for a house came +upon this interesting relic of a long-departed age. Scientific men +perceived in it a confirmation of their theories concerning the glacial +period; so through their persuasions the little tract of ground was +bought and permanently protected against being built upon. The soil was +removed, and there lay the rasped and guttered track which the ancient +glacier had made as it moved along upon its slow and tedious journey. +This track was perforated by huge pot-shaped holes in the bed-rock, +formed by the furious washing-around in them of boulders by the +turbulent torrent which flows beneath all glaciers. These huge round +boulders still remain in the holes; they and the walls of the holes are +worn smooth by the long-continued chafing which they gave each other in +those old days. + + + +It took a mighty force to churn these big lumps of stone around in that +vigorous way. The neighboring country had a very different shape, at +that time--the valleys have risen up and become hills, since, and the +hills have become valleys. The boulders discovered in the pots had +traveled a great distance, for there is no rock like them nearer than +the distant Rhone Glacier. + +For some days we were content to enjoy looking at the blue lake +Lucerne and at the piled-up masses of snow-mountains that border it all +around--an enticing spectacle, this last, for there is a strange and +fascinating beauty and charm about a majestic snow-peak with the sun +blazing upon it or the moonlight softly enriching it--but finally we +concluded to try a bit of excursioning around on a steamboat, and a dash +on foot at the Rigi. Very well, we had a delightful trip to Fluelen, on +a breezy, sunny day. Everybody sat on the upper deck, on benches, under +an awning; everybody talked, laughed, and exclaimed at the wonderful +scenery; in truth, a trip on that lake is almost the perfection of +pleasuring. + + + +The mountains were a never-ceasing marvel. Sometimes they rose straight +up out of the lake, and towered aloft and overshadowed our pygmy steamer +with their prodigious bulk in the most impressive way. Not snow-clad +mountains, these, yet they climbed high enough toward the sky to meet +the clouds and veil their foreheads in them. They were not barren and +repulsive, but clothed in green, and restful and pleasant to the eye. +And they were so almost straight-up-and-down, sometimes, that one could +not imagine a man being able to keep his footing upon such a surface, +yet there are paths, and the Swiss people go up and down them every day. + + + +Sometimes one of these monster precipices had the slight inclination of +the huge ship-houses in dockyards--then high aloft, toward the sky, it +took a little stronger inclination, like that of a mansard roof--and +perched on this dizzy mansard one's eye detected little things like +martin boxes, and presently perceived that these were the dwellings of +peasants--an airy place for a home, truly. And suppose a peasant should +walk in his sleep, or his child should fall out of the front +yard?--the friends would have a tedious long journey down out of those +cloud-heights before they found the remains. And yet those far-away +homes looked ever so seductive, they were so remote from the troubled +world, they dozed in such an atmosphere of peace and dreams--surely no +one who has learned to live up there would ever want to live on a meaner +level. + +We swept through the prettiest little curving arms of the lake, among +these colossal green walls, enjoying new delights, always, as the +stately panorama unfolded itself before us and rerolled and hid itself +behind us; and now and then we had the thrilling surprise of bursting +suddenly upon a tremendous white mass like the distant and dominating +Jungfrau, or some kindred giant, looming head and shoulders above a +tumbled waste of lesser Alps. + +Once, while I was hungrily taking in one of these surprises, and doing +my best to get all I possibly could of it while it should last, I was +interrupted by a young and care-free voice: + +"You're an American, I think--so'm I." + +He was about eighteen, or possibly nineteen; slender and of medium +height; open, frank, happy face; a restless but independent eye; a snub +nose, which had the air of drawing back with a decent reserve from +the silky new-born mustache below it until it should be introduced; a +loosely hung jaw, calculated to work easily in the sockets. He wore a +low-crowned, narrow-brimmed straw hat, with a broad blue ribbon +around it which had a white anchor embroidered on it in front; nobby +short-tailed coat, pantaloons, vest, all trim and neat and up with the +fashion; red-striped stockings, very low-quarter patent-leather shoes, +tied with black ribbon; blue ribbon around his neck, wide-open collar; +tiny diamond studs; wrinkleless kids; projecting cuffs, fastened with +large oxidized silver sleeve-buttons, bearing the device of a dog's +face--English pug. He carried a slim cane, surmounted with an English +pug's head with red glass eyes. Under his arm he carried a German +grammar--Otto's. His hair was short, straight, and smooth, and presently +when he turned his head a moment, I saw that it was nicely parted +behind. He took a cigarette out of a dainty box, stuck it into a +meerschaum holder which he carried in a morocco case, and reached for my +cigar. While he was lighting, I said: + +"Yes--I am an American." + + + +"I knew it--I can always tell them. What ship did you come over in?" + +"HOLSATIA." + +"We came in the BATAVIA--Cunard, you know. What kind of passage did you +have?" + +"Tolerably rough." + +"So did we. Captain said he'd hardly ever seen it rougher. Where are you +from?" + +"New England." + +"So'm I. I'm from New Bloomfield. Anybody with you?" + +"Yes--a friend." + +"Our whole family's along. It's awful slow, going around alone--don't +you think so?" + +"Rather slow." + +"Ever been over here before?" + +"Yes." + +"I haven't. My first trip. But we've been all around--Paris and +everywhere. I'm to enter Harvard next year. Studying German all the +time, now. Can't enter till I know German. I know considerable French--I +get along pretty well in Paris, or anywhere where they speak French. +What hotel are you stopping at?" + +"Schweitzerhof." + +"No! is that so? I never see you in the reception-room. I go to +the reception-room a good deal of the time, because there's so many +Americans there. I make lots of acquaintances. I know an American as +soon as I see him--and so I speak to him and make his acquaintance. I +like to be always making acquaintances--don't you?" + +"Lord, yes!" + +"You see it breaks up a trip like this, first rate. I never got bored on +a trip like this, if I can make acquaintances and have somebody to +talk to. But I think a trip like this would be an awful bore, if a body +couldn't find anybody to get acquainted with and talk to on a trip like +this. I'm fond of talking, ain't you? + +"Passionately." + +"Have you felt bored, on this trip?" + +"Not all the time, part of it." + +"That's it!--you see you ought to go around and get acquainted, and +talk. That's my way. That's the way I always do--I just go 'round, +'round, 'round and talk, talk, talk--I never get bored. You been up the +Rigi yet?" + +"No." + +"Going?" + +"I think so." + +"What hotel you going to stop at?" + +"I don't know. Is there more than one?" + +"Three. You stop at the Schreiber--you'll find it full of Americans. +What ship did you say you came over in?" + +"CITY OF ANTWERP." + +"German, I guess. You going to Geneva?" + +"Yes." + +"What hotel you going to stop at?" + +"Hotel de l'Ecu de Geneve." + +"Don't you do it! No Americans there! You stop at one of those big +hotels over the bridge--they're packed full of Americans." + +"But I want to practice my Arabic." + +"Good gracious, do you speak Arabic?" + +"Yes--well enough to get along." + +"Why, hang it, you won't get along in Geneva--THEY don't speak Arabic, +they speak French. What hotel are you stopping at here?" + +"Hotel Pension-Beaurivage." + +"Sho, you ought to stop at the Schweitzerhof. Didn't you know the +Schweitzerhof was the best hotel in Switzerland?-- look at your +Baedeker." + +"Yes, I know--but I had an idea there warn't any Americans there." + +"No Americans! Why, bless your soul, it's just alive with them! I'm in +the great reception-room most all the time. I make lots of acquaintances +there. Not as many as I did at first, because now only the new ones stop +in there--the others go right along through. Where are you from?" + +"Arkansaw." + +"Is that so? I'm from New England--New Bloomfield's my town when I'm at +home. I'm having a mighty good time today, ain't you?" + +"Divine." + +"That's what I call it. I like this knocking around, loose and easy, and +making acquaintances and talking. I know an American, soon as I see him; +so I go and speak to him and make his acquaintance. I ain't ever bored, +on a trip like this, if I can make new acquaintances and talk. I'm awful +fond of talking when I can get hold of the right kind of a person, ain't +you?" + +"I prefer it to any other dissipation." + +"That's my notion, too. Now some people like to take a book and sit +down and read, and read, and read, or moon around yawping at the lake or +these mountains and things, but that ain't my way; no, sir, if they like +it, let 'em do it, I don't object; but as for me, talking's what I like. +You been up the Rigi?" + +"Yes." + +"What hotel did you stop at?" + +"Schreiber." + +"That's the place!--I stopped there too. FULL of Americans, WASN'T it? +It always is--always is. That's what they say. Everybody says that. What +ship did you come over in?" + +"VILLE DE PARIS." + +"French, I reckon. What kind of a passage did ... excuse me a minute, +there's some Americans I haven't seen before." + +And away he went. He went uninjured, too--I had the murderous impulse to +harpoon him in the back with my alpenstock, but as I raised the weapon +the disposition left me; I found I hadn't the heart to kill him, he was +such a joyous, innocent, good-natured numbskull. + +Half an hour later I was sitting on a bench inspecting, with strong +interest, a noble monolith which we were skimming by--a monolith not +shaped by man, but by Nature's free great hand--a massy pyramidal rock +eighty feet high, devised by Nature ten million years ago against the +day when a man worthy of it should need it for his monument. The time +came at last, and now this grand remembrancer bears Schiller's name in +huge letters upon its face. Curiously enough, this rock was not degraded +or defiled in any way. It is said that two years ago a stranger let +himself down from the top of it with ropes and pulleys, and painted all +over it, in blue letters bigger than those in Schiller's name, these +words: "Try Sozodont;" "Buy Sun Stove Polish;" "Helmbold's Buchu;" "Try +Benzaline for the Blood." He was captured and it turned out that he was +an American. Upon his trial the judge said to him: + +"You are from a land where any insolent that wants to is privileged +to profane and insult Nature, and, through her, Nature's God, if by +so doing he can put a sordid penny in his pocket. But here the case is +different. Because you are a foreigner and ignorant, I will make your +sentence light; if you were a native I would deal strenuously with +you. Hear and obey: --You will immediately remove every trace of +your offensive work from the Schiller monument; you pay a fine of ten +thousand francs; you will suffer two years' imprisonment at hard labor; +you will then be horsewhipped, tarred and feathered, deprived of your +ears, ridden on a rail to the confines of the canton, and banished +forever. The severest penalties are omitted in your case--not as a grace +to you, but to that great republic which had the misfortune to give you +birth." + + + +The steamer's benches were ranged back to back across the deck. My back +hair was mingling innocently with the back hair of a couple of +ladies. Presently they were addressed by some one and I overheard this +conversation: + +"You are Americans, I think? So'm I." + +"Yes--we are Americans." + +"I knew it--I can always tell them. What ship did you come over in?" + +"CITY OF CHESTER." + +"Oh, yes--Inman line. We came in the BATAVIA--Cunard you know. What kind +of a passage did you have?" + +"Pretty fair." + +"That was luck. We had it awful rough. Captain said he'd hardly seen it +rougher. Where are you from?" + +"New Jersey." + +"So'm I. No--I didn't mean that; I'm from New England. New Bloomfield's +my place. These your children?--belong to both of you?" + +"Only to one of us; they are mine; my friend is not married." + +"Single, I reckon? So'm I. Are you two ladies traveling alone?" + +"No--my husband is with us." + +"Our whole family's along. It's awful slow, going around alone--don't +you think so?" + +"I suppose it must be." + + + +"Hi, there's Mount Pilatus coming in sight again. Named after Pontius +Pilate, you know, that shot the apple off of William Tell's head. +Guide-book tells all about it, they say. I didn't read it--an American +told me. I don't read when I'm knocking around like this, having a good +time. Did you ever see the chapel where William Tell used to preach?" + +"I did not know he ever preached there." + +"Oh, yes, he did. That American told me so. He don't ever shut up +his guide-book. He knows more about this lake than the fishes in it. +Besides, they CALL it 'Tell's Chapel'--you know that yourself. You ever +been over here before?" + +"Yes." + +"I haven't. It's my first trip. But we've been all around--Paris and +everywhere. I'm to enter Harvard next year. Studying German all the time +now. Can't enter till I know German. This book's Otto's grammar. It's a +mighty good book to get the ICH HABE GEHABT HABEN's out of. But I don't +really study when I'm knocking around this way. If the notion takes me, +I just run over my little old ICH HABE GEHABT, DU HAST GEHABT, ER HAT +GEHABT, WIR HABEN GEHABT, IHR HABEN GEHABT, SIE HABEN GEHABT--kind of +'Now-I-lay-me-down-to-sleep' fashion, you know, and after that, maybe +I don't buckle to it for three days. It's awful undermining to the +intellect, German is; you want to take it in small doses, or first you +know your brains all run together, and you feel them sloshing around in +your head same as so much drawn butter. But French is different; FRENCH +ain't anything. I ain't any more afraid of French than a tramp's afraid +of pie; I can rattle off my little J'AI, TU AS, IL A, and the rest of +it, just as easy as a-b-c. I get along pretty well in Paris, or anywhere +where they speak French. What hotel are you stopping at?" + +"The Schweitzerhof." + +"No! is that so? I never see you in the big reception-room. I go in +there a good deal of the time, because there's so many Americans there. +I make lots of acquaintances. You been up the Rigi yet?" + +"No." + +"Going?" + +"We think of it." + +"What hotel you going to stop at?" + +"I don't know." + +"Well, then you stop at the Schreiber--it's full of Americans. What ship +did you come over in?" + +"CITY OF CHESTER." + +"Oh, yes, I remember I asked you that before. But I always ask everybody +what ship they came over in, and so sometimes I forget and ask again. +You going to Geneva?" + +"Yes." + +"What hotel you going to stop at?" + +"We expect to stop in a pension." + +"I don't hardly believe you'll like that; there's very few Americans in +the pensions. What hotel are you stopping at here?" + +"The Schweitzerhof." + +"Oh, yes. I asked you that before, too. But I always ask everybody what +hotel they're stopping at, and so I've got my head all mixed up with +hotels. But it makes talk, and I love to talk. It refreshes me up +so--don't it you--on a trip like this?" + +"Yes--sometimes." + +"Well, it does me, too. As long as I'm talking I never feel bored--ain't +that the way with you?" + +"Yes--generally. But there are exception to the rule." + +"Oh, of course. I don't care to talk to everybody, MYSELF. If a person +starts in to jabber-jabber-jabber about scenery, and history, and +pictures, and all sorts of tiresome things, I get the fan-tods mighty +soon. I say 'Well, I must be going now--hope I'll see you again'--and +then I take a walk. Where you from?" + +"New Jersey." + +"Why, bother it all, I asked you THAT before, too. Have you seen the +Lion of Lucerne?" + +"Not yet." + +"Nor I, either. But the man who told me about Mount Pilatus says it's +one of the things to see. It's twenty-eight feet long. It don't seem +reasonable, but he said so, anyway. He saw it yesterday; said it was +dying, then, so I reckon it's dead by this time. But that ain't any +matter, of course they'll stuff it. Did you say the children are +yours--or HERS?" + +"Mine." + +"Oh, so you did. Are you going up the ... no, I asked you that. What +ship ... no, I asked you that, too. What hotel are you ... no, you told +me that. Let me see ... um .... Oh, what kind of voy ... no, we've +been over that ground, too. Um ... um ... well, I believe that is all. +BONJOUR--I am very glad to have made your acquaintance, ladies. GUTEN +TAG." + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +[The Jodel and Its Native Wilds] + + +The Rigi-Kulm is an imposing Alpine mass, six thousand feet high, which +stands by itself, and commands a mighty prospect of blue lakes, green +valleys, and snowy mountains--a compact and magnificent picture +three hundred miles in circumference. The ascent is made by rail, or +horseback, or on foot, as one may prefer. I and my agent panoplied +ourselves in walking-costume, one bright morning, and started down +the lake on the steamboat; we got ashore at the village of Waeggis; +three-quarters of an hour distant from Lucerne. This village is at the +foot of the mountain. + +We were soon tramping leisurely up the leafy mule-path, and then the +talk began to flow, as usual. It was twelve o'clock noon, and a breezy, +cloudless day; the ascent was gradual, and the glimpses, from under +the curtaining boughs, of blue water, and tiny sailboats, and beetling +cliffs, were as charming as glimpses of dreamland. All the circumstances +were perfect--and the anticipations, too, for we should soon be +enjoying, for the first time, that wonderful spectacle, an Alpine +sunrise--the object of our journey. There was (apparently) no real need +for hurry, for the guide-book made the walking-distance from Waeggis to +the summit only three hours and a quarter. I say "apparently," because +the guide-book had already fooled us once--about the distance from +Allerheiligen to Oppenau--and for aught I knew it might be getting +ready to fool us again. We were only certain as to the altitudes--we +calculated to find out for ourselves how many hours it is from the +bottom to the top. The summit is six thousand feet above the sea, but +only forty-five hundred feet above the lake. When we had walked half an +hour, we were fairly into the swing and humor of the undertaking, so we +cleared for action; that is to say, we got a boy whom we met to carry +our alpenstocks and satchels and overcoats and things for us; that left +us free for business. I suppose we must have stopped oftener to stretch +out on the grass in the shade and take a bit of a smoke than this boy +was used to, for presently he asked if it had been our idea to hire him +by the job, or by the year? We told him he could move along if he was +in a hurry. He said he wasn't in such a very particular hurry, but he +wanted to get to the top while he was young. + + + +We told him to clear out, then, and leave the things at the uppermost +hotel and say we should be along presently. He said he would secure us a +hotel if he could, but if they were all full he would ask them to build +another one and hurry up and get the paint and plaster dry against we +arrived. Still gently chaffing us, he pushed ahead, up the trail, and +soon disappeared. By six o'clock we were pretty high up in the air, +and the view of lake and mountains had greatly grown in breadth and +interest. We halted awhile at a little public house, where we had bread +and cheese and a quart or two of fresh milk, out on the porch, with the +big panorama all before us--and then moved on again. + + + +Ten minutes afterward we met a hot, red-faced man plunging down the +mountain, making mighty strides, swinging his alpenstock ahead of him, +and taking a grip on the ground with its iron point to support these +big strides. He stopped, fanned himself with his hat, swabbed the +perspiration from his face and neck with a red handkerchief, panted +a moment or two, and asked how far to Waeggis. I said three hours. He +looked surprised, and said: + +"Why, it seems as if I could toss a biscuit into the lake from here, +it's so close by. Is that an inn, there?" + +I said it was. + +"Well," said he, "I can't stand another three hours, I've had enough +today; I'll take a bed there." + +I asked: + +"Are we nearly to the top?" + +"Nearly to the TOP? Why, bless your soul, you haven't really started, +yet." + +I said we would put up at the inn, too. So we turned back and ordered a +hot supper, and had quite a jolly evening of it with this Englishman. + +The German landlady gave us neat rooms and nice beds, and when I and my +agent turned in, it was with the resolution to be up early and make the +utmost of our first Alpine sunrise. But of course we were dead tired, +and slept like policemen; so when we awoke in the morning and ran to the +window it was already too late, because it was half past eleven. It +was a sharp disappointment. However, we ordered breakfast and told the +landlady to call the Englishman, but she said he was already up and off +at daybreak--and swearing like mad about something or other. We could +not find out what the matter was. He had asked the landlady the altitude +of her place above the level of the lake, and she told him fourteen +hundred and ninety-five feet. That was all that was said; then he lost +his temper. He said that between ------fools and guide-books, a man +could acquire ignorance enough in twenty-four hours in a country like +this to last him a year. Harris believed our boy had been loading him +up with misinformation; and this was probably the case, for his epithet +described that boy to a dot. + +We got under way about the turn of noon, and pulled out for the summit +again, with a fresh and vigorous step. When we had gone about two +hundred yards, and stopped to rest, I glanced to the left while I was +lighting my pipe, and in the distance detected a long worm of black +smoke crawling lazily up the steep mountain. Of course that was the +locomotive. We propped ourselves on our elbows at once, to gaze, for we +had never seen a mountain railway yet. Presently we could make out the +train. It seemed incredible that that thing should creep straight up a +sharp slant like the roof of a house--but there it was, and it was doing +that very miracle. + +In the course of a couple hours we reached a fine breezy altitude where +the little shepherd huts had big stones all over their roofs to hold +them down to the earth when the great storms rage. The country was wild +and rocky about here, but there were plenty of trees, plenty of moss, +and grass. + +Away off on the opposite shore of the lake we could see some villages, +and now for the first time we could observe the real difference between +their proportions and those of the giant mountains at whose feet they +slept. When one is in one of those villages it seems spacious, and +its houses seem high and not out of proportion to the mountain that +overhangs them--but from our altitude, what a change! The mountains were +bigger and grander than ever, as they stood there thinking their solemn +thoughts with their heads in the drifting clouds, but the villages +at their feet--when the painstaking eye could trace them up and find +them--were so reduced, almost invisible, and lay so flat against the +ground, that the exactest simile I can devise is to compare them to +ant-deposits of granulated dirt overshadowed by the huge bulk of a +cathedral. The steamboats skimming along under the stupendous precipices +were diminished by distance to the daintiest little toys, the sailboats +and rowboats to shallops proper for fairies that keep house in the cups +of lilies and ride to court on the backs of bumblebees. + + + +Presently we came upon half a dozen sheep nibbling grass in the spray +of a stream of clear water that sprang from a rock wall a hundred feet +high, and all at once our ears were startled with a melodious "Lul ... +l ... l l l llul-lul-LAhee-o-o-o!" pealing joyously from a near but +invisible source, and recognized that we were hearing for the first +time the famous Alpine JODEL in its own native wilds. And we recognized, +also, that it was that sort of quaint commingling of baritone and +falsetto which at home we call "Tyrolese warbling." + + + +The jodeling (pronounced yOdling--emphasis on the O) continued, and +was very pleasant and inspiriting to hear. Now the jodeler appeared--a +shepherd boy of sixteen--and in our gladness and gratitude we gave him +a franc to jodel some more. So he jodeled and we listened. We moved +on, presently, and he generously jodeled us out of sight. After about +fifteen minutes we came across another shepherd boy who was jodeling, +and gave him half a franc to keep it up. He also jodeled us out of +sight. After that, we found a jodeler every ten minutes; we gave the +first one eight cents, the second one six cents, the third one four, the +fourth one a penny, contributed nothing to Nos. 5, 6, and 7, and during +the remainder of the day hired the rest of the jodelers, at a franc +apiece, not to jodel any more. There is somewhat too much of the +jodeling in the Alps. + +About the middle of the afternoon we passed through a prodigious natural +gateway called the Felsenthor, formed by two enormous upright rocks, +with a third lying across the top. There was a very attractive little +hotel close by, but our energies were not conquered yet, so we went on. + + + +Three hours afterward we came to the railway-track. It was planted +straight up the mountain with the slant of a ladder that leans against a +house, and it seemed to us that man would need good nerves who proposed +to travel up it or down it either. + +During the latter part of the afternoon we cooled our roasting interiors +with ice-cold water from clear streams, the only really satisfying water +we had tasted since we left home, for at the hotels on the continent +they merely give you a tumbler of ice to soak your water in, and that +only modifies its hotness, doesn't make it cold. Water can only be made +cold enough for summer comfort by being prepared in a refrigerator or +a closed ice-pitcher. Europeans say ice-water impairs digestion. How do +they know?--they never drink any. + +At ten minutes past six we reached the Kaltbad station, where there is +a spacious hotel with great verandas which command a majestic expanse of +lake and mountain scenery. We were pretty well fagged out, now, but as +we did not wish to miss the Alpine sunrise, we got through our dinner +as quickly as possible and hurried off to bed. It was unspeakably +comfortable to stretch our weary limbs between the cool, damp sheets. +And how we did sleep!--for there is no opiate like Alpine pedestrianism. + + + +In the morning we both awoke and leaped out of bed at the same instant +and ran and stripped aside the window-curtains; but we suffered a bitter +disappointment again: it was already half past three in the afternoon. + +We dressed sullenly and in ill spirits, each accusing the other of +oversleeping. Harris said if we had brought the courier along, as we +ought to have done, we should not have missed these sunrises. I said he +knew very well that one of us would have to sit up and wake the +courier; and I added that we were having trouble enough to take care +of ourselves, on this climb, without having to take care of a courier +besides. + +During breakfast our spirits came up a little, since we found by this +guide-book that in the hotels on the summit the tourist is not left to +trust to luck for his sunrise, but is roused betimes by a man who goes +through the halls with a great Alpine horn, blowing blasts that would +raise the dead. And there was another consoling thing: the guide-book +said that up there on the summit the guests did not wait to dress much, +but seized a red bed blanket and sailed out arrayed like an Indian. This +was good; this would be romantic; two hundred and fifty people grouped +on the windy summit, with their hair flying and their red blankets +flapping, in the solemn presence of the coming sun, would be a striking +and memorable spectacle. So it was good luck, not ill luck, that we had +missed those other sunrises. + +We were informed by the guide-book that we were now 3,228 feet above +the level of the lake--therefore full two-thirds of our journey had been +accomplished. We got away at a quarter past four P.M.; a hundred yards +above the hotel the railway divided; one track went straight up the +steep hill, the other one turned square off to the right, with a very +slight grade. We took the latter, and followed it more than a mile, +turned a rocky corner, and came in sight of a handsome new hotel. If we +had gone on, we should have arrived at the summit, but Harris +preferred to ask a lot of questions--as usual, of a man who didn't know +anything--and he told us to go back and follow the other route. We did +so. We could ill afford this loss of time. + +We climbed and climbed; and we kept on climbing; we reached about forty +summits, but there was always another one just ahead. It came on to +rain, and it rained in dead earnest. We were soaked through and it +was bitter cold. Next a smoky fog of clouds covered the whole region +densely, and we took to the railway-ties to keep from getting lost. +Sometimes we slopped along in a narrow path on the left-hand side of the +track, but by and by when the fog blew aside a little and we saw that we +were treading the rampart of a precipice and that our left elbows were +projecting over a perfectly boundless and bottomless vacancy, we gasped, +and jumped for the ties again. + + + +The night shut down, dark and drizzly and cold. About eight in the +evening the fog lifted and showed us a well-worn path which led up a +very steep rise to the left. We took it, and as soon as we had got far +enough from the railway to render the finding it again an impossibility, +the fog shut down on us once more. + +We were in a bleak, unsheltered place, now, and had to trudge right +along, in order to keep warm, though we rather expected to go over a +precipice, sooner or later. About nine o'clock we made an important +discovery--that we were not in any path. We groped around a while on our +hands and knees, but we could not find it; so we sat down in the mud and +the wet scant grass to wait. + +We were terrified into this by being suddenly confronted with a vast +body which showed itself vaguely for an instant and in the next instant +was smothered in the fog again. It was really the hotel we were after, +monstrously magnified by the fog, but we took it for the face of a +precipice, and decided not to try to claw up it. + +We sat there an hour, with chattering teeth and quivering bodies, and +quarreled over all sorts of trifles, but gave most of our attention to +abusing each other for the stupidity of deserting the railway-track. We +sat with our backs to the precipice, because what little wind there was +came from that quarter. At some time or other the fog thinned a little; +we did not know when, for we were facing the empty universe and the +thinness could not show; but at last Harris happened to look around, and +there stood a huge, dim, spectral hotel where the precipice had been. +One could faintly discern the windows and chimneys, and a dull blur of +lights. Our first emotion was deep, unutterable gratitude, our next was +a foolish rage, born of the suspicion that possibly the hotel had been +visible three-quarters of an hour while we sat there in those cold +puddles quarreling. + + + +Yes, it was the Rigi-Kulm hotel--the one that occupies the extreme +summit, and whose remote little sparkle of lights we had often seen +glinting high aloft among the stars from our balcony away down yonder +in Lucerne. The crusty portier and the crusty clerks gave us the +surly reception which their kind deal out in prosperous times, but by +mollifying them with an extra display of obsequiousness and servility +we finally got them to show us to the room which our boy had engaged for +us. + +We got into some dry clothing, and while our supper was preparing we +loafed forsakenly through a couple of vast cavernous drawing-rooms, +one of which had a stove in it. This stove was in a corner, and densely +walled around with people. We could not get near the fire, so we moved +at large in the artic spaces, among a multitude of people who sat +silent, smileless, forlorn, and shivering--thinking what fools they were +to come, perhaps. There were some Americans and some Germans, but one +could see that the great majority were English. + +We lounged into an apartment where there was a great crowd, to see +what was going on. It was a memento-magazine. The tourists were eagerly +buying all sorts and styles of paper-cutters, marked "Souvenir of the +Rigi," with handles made of the little curved horn of the ostensible +chamois; there were all manner of wooden goblets and such things, +similarly marked. I was going to buy a paper-cutter, but I believed +I could remember the cold comfort of the Rigi-Kulm without it, so I +smothered the impulse. + +Supper warmed us, and we went immediately to bed--but first, as Mr. +Baedeker requests all tourists to call his attention to any errors which +they may find in his guide-books, I dropped him a line to inform him he +missed it by just about three days. I had previously informed him of his +mistake about the distance from Allerheiligen to Oppenau, and had also +informed the Ordnance Depart of the German government of the same error +in the imperial maps. I will add, here, that I never got any answer to +those letters, or any thanks from either of those sources; and, what is +still more discourteous, these corrections have not been made, either in +the maps or the guide-books. But I will write again when I get time, for +my letters may have miscarried. + +We curled up in the clammy beds, and went to sleep without rocking. We +were so sodden with fatigue that we never stirred nor turned over till +the blooming blasts of the Alpine horn aroused us. + + + +It may well be imagined that we did not lose any time. We snatched on +a few odds and ends of clothing, cocooned ourselves in the proper red +blankets, and plunged along the halls and out into the whistling wind +bareheaded. We saw a tall wooden scaffolding on the very peak of the +summit, a hundred yards away, and made for it. We rushed up the stairs +to the top of this scaffolding, and stood there, above the vast outlying +world, with hair flying and ruddy blankets waving and cracking in the +fierce breeze. + + + +"Fifteen minutes too late, at last!" said Harris, in a vexed voice. "The +sun is clear above the horizon." + +"No matter," I said, "it is a most magnificent spectacle, and we will +see it do the rest of its rising anyway." + +In a moment we were deeply absorbed in the marvel before us, and dead to +everything else. The great cloud-barred disk of the sun stood just above +a limitless expanse of tossing white-caps--so to speak--a billowy chaos +of massy mountain domes and peaks draped in imperishable snow, and +flooded with an opaline glory of changing and dissolving splendors, +while through rifts in a black cloud-bank above the sun, radiating +lances of diamond dust shot to the zenith. The cloven valleys of the +lower world swam in a tinted mist which veiled the ruggedness of their +crags and ribs and ragged forests, and turned all the forbidding region +into a soft and rich and sensuous paradise. + +We could not speak. We could hardly breathe. We could only gaze in +drunken ecstasy and drink in it. Presently Harris exclaimed: + +"Why--nation, it's going DOWN!" + +Perfectly true. We had missed the MORNING hornblow, and slept all day. +This was stupefying. + +Harris said: + +"Look here, the sun isn't the spectacle--it's US--stacked up here on top +of this gallows, in these idiotic blankets, and two hundred and fifty +well-dressed men and women down here gawking up at us and not caring +a straw whether the sun rises or sets, as long as they've got such a +ridiculous spectacle as this to set down in their memorandum-books. They +seem to be laughing their ribs loose, and there's one girl there that +appears to be going all to pieces. I never saw such a man as you before. +I think you are the very last possibility in the way of an ass." + +"What have I done?" I answered, with heat. + +"What have you done? You've got up at half past seven o'clock in the +evening to see the sun rise, that's what you've done." + +"And have you done any better, I'd like to know? I've always used to +get up with the lark, till I came under the petrifying influence of your +turgid intellect." + +"YOU used to get up with the lark--Oh, no doubt--you'll get up with the +hangman one of these days. But you ought to be ashamed to be jawing +here like this, in a red blanket, on a forty-foot scaffold on top of the +Alps. And no end of people down here to boot; this isn't any place for +an exhibition of temper." + +And so the customary quarrel went on. When the sun was fairly down, we +slipped back to the hotel in the charitable gloaming, and went to bed +again. We had encountered the horn-blower on the way, and he had tried +to collect compensation, not only for announcing the sunset, which we +did see, but for the sunrise, which we had totally missed; but we said +no, we only took our solar rations on the "European plan"--pay for what +you get. He promised to make us hear his horn in the morning, if we were +alive. + + + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's A Tramp Abroad, by Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A TRAMP ABROAD *** + +***** This file should be named 5785.txt or 5785.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/5/7/8/5785/ + +Produced by Anonymous Volunteers, John Greenman and David Widger + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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