iiliiiil FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF EUROP- EAN BAILEY Hi • ass ■ 111 " —^ mBm m I ilMii Js^illilB »&£«§!& ram 8 !|9£ggw BSS8§BR£3§8£S WmB|, 6833388 Hi **& 1 HRBK hHL_ - • Bb£&B §H| fill IIP Class Jt Book__ Copyright^ . COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF EUROPE FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF EUROPE BT JOSEPH WHITMAN BAILEY AUTHOR OF " THE ST. JOHN RIVER," ETC. fllllllir Kj^ THE GRAFTON PRESS PUBLISHERS NEW YORK J> .IbliARY ot OONWKESSJ! I wo Oopics rtettivtsi MAY 29 1908 ■ i ..'.si/ A xxci «<-.| Copyright, 1908 By THE GRAFTON PRESS PREFACE The title of this little volume might well serve for its preface also. On his first return from abroad, the novice, possibly because familiarity has some tendency to blunt intuition and dim the vividness of national contrasts, is apt to be more closely questioned about his impressions than is the veteran traveler. Such im- pressions, however, while frequently they may be of value in disclosing new view-points, should, in many cases, be offered tentatively, and rather as personal opinions than finalities. Our journey was undertaken without pre-consultation of guide-books. When visit- ing a famous place, first the results of observation and direct local inquiry were noted; then Baedeker and his professional brethren were consulted, but merely for corroboration or a few essential statistics. We can recommend every step of the tour herein described to those entering upon their European novitiate; indeed, we have hopes that the book, with all its limitations, may prove a convenient vade-mecum to more experi- enced travelers, and help them to while away a few hours of oceanic monotony. CONTENTS The Voyage 11 Liverpool 14 London 16 Hampton Court 29 Warwick 31 A Drive to Kenilworth 33 Stratford-on-Avon 35 Oxford 36 Windsor and Eton 39 Antwerp 42 Brussels .43 The Hague . . 47 Amsterdam 49 Cologne 50 The Rhine 52 Heidelberg 56 Lucerne 58 The Rigi and Mt. Pilatus 60 Interlaken and the Grindelwald 63 The City and Lake of Geneva 66 The Journey to Paris 68 Paris 70 Versailles 75 St. Albans 77 Torquay and Vicinity 79 Chester 83 Eaton Hall 85 Conway and Carnarvon 88 De Omnibus Rebus 91 The Homeward Voyage 97 ILLUSTRATIONS The Rhine Frontispiece "Stray dogs and cats of the early Georgian Era" . Facing page 28 Kenilworth Castle from the Tilt-yard . . "34 The Hague " "48^ The Rhine " " 54 / "Do not laugh again in France" 69 Parc de Versailles Facing page 76 Farm near Torquay " "80 Water Tower and Roman Remains at Chester ' 84 FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF EUROPE THE VOYAGE Having, in other years, devoted vacations wholly to forest exploration, with Indian and canoe, a pleasing thrill of novelty pervaded us as we paced the deck of the Canadian Pacific steamship Empress of Ireland, which sailed from Quebec for Liverpool on July 12, 1907. As a feature of this route, Quebec, the terminus a quo, presents the most foreign appearance of any Amer- ican city north of Mexico, while Liverpool, the termi- nus ad quern, is credited, against the vigorous protest of sturdy Britishers, with more marked American pro- clivities than any other city of Europe. Swiftly we glided down the St. Lawrence's world- famed estuary, obtaining fine views of the Lauren- tides, the many islands, and Montmorenci's silvery cas- cade. On the journey from Montreal, the day previous the rivers had swept turbidly in semi-flood, while the fields exhibited charming color diversity, now dark green with oats, now lighter green with hay, in places golden with buttercups, or spangled like drifted snow with myriads of white daisies. We doubted if Europe would disclose fairer scenes. Our ponderous vessel closely skirted Gaspe's rugged peninsula, where many pellucid salmon streams have 12 First Impressions of Europe carved deep forest-clad ravines, and on the fourteenth, at evening, passed out through dreaded Belle Isle Straits into open sea. A few fine icebergs, one of them black with birds, floated about Belle Isle, glittering re- splendently in the sunshine, but resembling, when shad- owed by clouds, the weird canvas imitations so often seen at beach resorts. The Straits looked unexpectedly wide, while along their desolate north shore patches of verdant grass alternated with banks of spotless snow. Bleak Labrador's semi-arctic coasts are thus, indeed, seen from afar by many people, although visited by few. Clear and very cold weather prevailed near Belle Isle, a truly brumal temperature, which the balmy Gulf Stream soon raised so steadily and rapidly, that a lady, quite forty years of age, moved hastily (perhaps needlessly) one day from a sunny spot on deck, observing, " I do not wish to be broiled chicken! " Our fellow passengers, as a rule, were rather staid people, little inclined to festivity, vocal or terpsichorean. Human aggregations, however, always include pe- culiar characters. Everybody from the saloon to the steerage soon became acquainted with Major , a gallant and efficient officer until affected by sunstroke in India, but now ever amusing, disdainful of sobriety, and continually rebuffed for over-attention to the ladies. One freakish woman dressed even for break- fast in black silk, low-necked, and publicly announced, perhaps to clear the path for fresh victims, that she had given her husband "a peach of a funeral" before sailing. Alfred Bertrand, a Swiss explorer of the High Zambesi, and a good friend of the late H. M. Stanley, walked sturdily to and fro in all weathers, and proved instructively entertaining. We sat at the Doctor's table, The Voyage 13 next to a chatty and attractive little pink and white Euphrosyne. A sleep-talking gentleman shared the stateroom with Pater and me, and prattled merrily the livelong night. Between Belle Isle and the north Irish coast exactly four days of rough voyaging elapsed. On the sixteenth the seas became mountainous, spray-drenching the upper decks. Dark threatening water-ridges, Alps of the Atlantic, rolled by unceasingly, topped with seeth- ing froth, and those filmy moisture veils that drift like dry dust, and look so icy cold. Several passengers toppled from deck chairs, and finally through Heaven's mercy our sleep-talking friend, unceremoniously pitched from his berth, remained silent for half an hour. Gales swept upon us from all points. Some made our Em- press pitch, in others she rolled, but at worst she es- caped the unpleasantly multifarious movements of small coast steamers. Our party, — Pater, Sister and I — withstood, with stoic calm and fair success, Old Ocean's restless vagaries. On the sixteenth and seven- teenth the water appeared intensely blue, even in foamy parts, while the wake resembled a broad lane painted with indigo. So remarkable a color, we thought, could hardly be due wholly to sky reflection. Excepting a few birds, no ocean life, not even a play- ful porpoise within the waves or a lonely sail above them, varied throughout the voyage the monotonous prospect of dull gray heaving sea; while darkness and fog effectually hid Old Erin and the proud little Isle of Man. At length, when actually within the outer Mersey, a vessel that seemed as strangely foreign as anything subsequently observed in our travels spread to the breeze her grotesquely patched sails, brightly 14 First Impressions of Europe gleaming, quite unlike the white or gray canvas of America, as if coated with a lustrous copper bronze. Several similar ships soon splashed about in the silt- laden waves; while the shores rapidly converged, and the smoke of distant factories clouded the eastern sky- line. Then we went below, where the stewards and their many satellites now haunted the great steamer, seek- ing from passengers the gold that should, we thought, be paid if at all by the wealthy corporation they served. LIVERPOOL Once only in life can we have the peculiar sensation produced by a first view of "foreign parts." Ascend- ing the Mersey, great banks and beaches of brown sand, bare at first, afterwards lined with long rows of cottages, appeared on both sides; then the little harbor steamers, sturdy craft, safer but less graceful than ours, dodged about everywhere. In mid-harbor the great Lusitania swung gently with the tide, preparatory to her maiden voyage. Wiseacres asserted, as usual, that no greater vessel would ever be launched; and we recalled with amusement an article published in the " New York Evening Post " of March 12, 1815, which said of the steamer Robert Fulton (three hundred and forty-seven tons) " it is hardly possible that anything of the kind can excel her in elegance and convenience." If Liverpool really resembles any American town, it must be in its rapid growth, predominance of com- mercialism, and scarcity of mediaeval monuments; for our buildings are much less sombre than Liverpool's, and its streets, while thronged with shoppers, lack the Liverpool 15 breezy effervescence of Yankeedom. Then observe all those dark colossal lions before St. George's Hall, surely as typically British as the smoke wreathed dome of St. Paul's. Our first English walk, from the dock to the North- western Hotel, aroused a strange feeling scarcely sus- ceptible of analysis. After luncheon we enjoyed an extended 'bus ride, now clattering down aristocratic av- enues, now threading tortuous lanes, narrow, dirty and malodorous. Liverpool's "shimmy" sections are bad indeed, and as capable as the more famous White- chapel of disclosing a Fagin, an "Artful Dodger," or a Bill Sykes. Dire poverty, as evidened by beggar girls in tattered rags, all too boldly invades the chief thoroughfares. The two-storied omnibuses and trams, common to Liverpool and many other English and continental towns, afford much pleasure. Such lofty vehicles might prove unsafe in our more uneven streets. New Brighton, a popular and somewhat cheap shore resort on the Birkenhead side, where the sand is too soft for a good beach, suggests Coney Island as viewed through the large end of a telescope. Cheap restau- rants and merry-go-rounds cluster grotesquely in one part along a narrow walk facetiously called " Kctm and Eggs promenade." The New Brighton visitor should return to Liverpool by water, and at night, when so many lights sparkle from city-girt shores, great ships, countless tugs and various small craft. 16 First Impressions of Europe LONDON Rarely indeed do famous places at first view corre- spond with our preconceived and too exalted ideals. Even London, with its twenty-mile spread, its prestige of age, history and wealth, its unique centralization of all things British, whether social or politic, proves no exception to the rule. We experienced a vague disap- pointment, in first rambling about its great commer- cial arteries, all of which, after the analogy of the human heart, are supposedly vitalized by the homely Old Lady of Threadneedle Street, at beholding a less irresistible surging of the human tide than had been anticipated. London, biggest of all cities, should, we argued, look the biggest; but in fact no views unfolded comparable to the gay scenes of New York's fascinat- ing Broadway. Possibly an absence of immense office buildings and "sky-scraping" hotels, the Himalayas of human industry, accounted for the difference. Near the Savoy, a policeman as if reading our thoughts ex- plained, quite apologetically, the reasons why the Strand was not just then gorged with traffic; indeed these legal myrmidons suffer wounded pride whenever strangers find this famous street uncrowded, — false to its traditional hurry-skurry. However, in its huge and beautiful parks, its vast collections all more complete than ours, in garden, gallery and museum, and in the many venerable buildings that mark successive steps in England's political and social evolution, London fully realizes expectations. The Thames below Lambeth Palace presents con- trasts as marked as those of New York's East River. Great public buildings, esplanades and luxurious hotels London 17 fronting the north bank, while on the Surrey side, the Brooklyn of England, dilapidated quays project, and numerous old boats and scows at ebb-tide recline like lazy alligators on the black and viscous ooze. Many small steamers operated by the London County Coun- cil ply between Putney and Greenwich, thus affording a unique excursion through the entire metropolitan dis- trict. Below London Bridge, in "The Pool," sailing vessels, steamers, tugs and barges wriggle about in the yellow muddy waves like vehicles in busy Cheapside, while powerful currents add to their difficulties. The tide laves grim old warehouses, such as inspired the pen of Dickens and the pencil of Whistler; and involun- tarily we searched the murky eddies, as if expecting to behold the Thames-borne body of Quilp. Here many vessels have tanned sails, stained a dark-brownish red. Above Westminster Bridge, the river is much less fre- quented now than in Tudor times, when, as the Lon- don streets were dreadfully rough, and the rumbling 'bus was unknown, gay courtiers and fair ladies usually " took water," as the phrase went, and floated up and down the stream in brightly canopied barges. Among London's famous places the British Museum invites the most frequent inspection, as every fresh ramble through its great halls usually discloses many things previously overlooked. In all its wealth of ex- hibits, so varied and so well arranged, that most in- teresting to us, even more so than the Rosetta Stone, the Elgin Marbles, or the illuminated manuscripts in the vast library, was the neolithic man, crouching be- side his cooking tools in a tomb hewn from solid rock, and still retaining, although he wandered by the Nile some thousands of years before the Pharaohs, a strong B 18 First Impressions of Europe suggestion of his actual appearance in life. The Muse- um's South Kensington branch, devoted to natural history, affords almost as much interest as the main in- stitution, particularly in its artistically arranged illus- trations of mimicry in animal life. Having innocently appropriated a mere half day for St. Paul's and the Tower, we were much astonished when by luncheon hour the venerable Cathedral had been but cursorily inspected, the Tower as yet un- visited. The sunbeams, which from windows far above streamed softly and mysteriously into the yellow-gray interior of St. Paul's, produced impressions not easily erased, even though the stained glass is not comparable to that of some other churches. As viewed from the Stone Gallery girting the famous dome, London hazy with dust and smoke spreads indefinitely on all sides, while luckily no Singer and Flat-iron buildings, like those of our " Gotham," arise yet higher to obstruct the view. In the Whispering Gallery, when a custodian whispers with lips close to the wall, the sound many times magnified passes around the tower, seemingly not as an echo but in the very stone, to astonished lis- teners on the opposite side. Here, in a land of many tips, we withheld, experimentally, the usual six-pence; whereupon the poor old custodian suggestively rattling pennies in his trousers pockets hobbled so woefully after us, that the experiment was abandoned, as savor- ing of Spanish cruelty. Sir Christopher Wren's mas- sive account book in the church library, used while building the Cathedral, contains the following, among interesting subscriptions towards rebuilding after the Great Fire, — " I will give one thousand pounds a yeare Whithall 20 March 1677-8-Charles R." Of course London 19 the Merry Monarch never really paid anything. In the crypt, Wellington's massive and sombre funeral car, constructed with all its elaborate carving in eighteen days but at enormous cost, reminded us by contrast of a sign, " Economy in funerals," displayed by a shrewd undertaker in Liverpool. St. Paul's has outwardly that frosty appearance characteristic of many old Lon- don buildings, as if a flurry of smoke-stained snow rested on the dark weather-beaten stone. Passing the Fire Monument (commemorative of the "Annus Mirabilis" — 1666), which has in marked de- gree the "frosty" characteristic of London antiquities, and also noisy, dirty Billingsgate, an institution much better avoided, we entered the curtilage of the Tower. An unfortunate commingling of recent buildings, mostly barracks, with the more ancient piles rather impairs the tout ensemble of this most darkly famous of all fortresses. St. John's Chapel, while yet displaying the distinctive chiselling of its Norman builders, rather be- lies its great age. The White Tower, founded by the Conqueror, designed by Gundulph, Bishop of Roches- ter, and modernized by Wren, contains the splendid martial museum, — old armor, feudal and post-feudal weapons of strange design, instruments of torture, and rare relics of England's old wars, — all of which, however, hinder a true conception of the tower itself. Here brightly gleam the steel armors of Henry VIII and the all-gilt suit of mail presented to Charles II. Indeed, in all collections, especially the Crown jewels, the second Charles would seem to have been a greater recipient of gifts than other monarchs, a probable re- sult of the mental pendulum's wide swing after the joy- ful Restoration. A Governor's order, for which we 20 First Impressions of Europe carelessly neglected to apply, is necessary to visit the Tower dungeons and Little Ease. Tower Hill, apart from its awful associations, possesses little interest. The very ghosts that dance there in the pale moonlight have no longer a scaffold to hang their shrouds upon. The Wakefield Tower holds the regalia of England, a dazzling array, valued at three or four million pounds, resplendent with sparkling diamonds, lustrous pearls, and the dull sheen of beaten gold. Possibly the jewels exhibited are mere copies, and the originals carefully secreted elsewhere. The crown of Edward VII, its velvet parts changed by him from crimson to royal purple, properly surmounts the pile. Such an aston- ishing number of elegantly wrought gold maces and sceptres, articles more frequently changed than the other regalia, might sufficiently tempt some modern brigand to emulate Colonel Blood of treasonable memory. Mural tablets and inscriptions, carved by illustrious state prisoners, adorn a circular chamber of the Beau- champ Tower. One carving, evidently the result of many successive attempts, occupies a square cutting two inches deep; another, and the most artistic of all, displays the "Bear and Ragged Staff" of Leicester. The profound impression created by these closely clustered inscriptions greatly diminishes when we learn that many of them during a renovation in 1854 were removed to the Beauchamp Tower from other parts of the fortress. Our calm reflections on the mutations of royal favoritism were rudely disturbed by a noisy party of "Cook's Sheep," led by a red-skirted " beef -eater," who sonorously shouted "Souvenirs for sale." Returning from the Tower we fortunately witnessed the Lord Mayor, his suite and guests, leaving the Man- London 21 sion House for Guildhall. What a display of blue and gold was there! Carriages that looked as if dipped bodily into vats of molten yellow metal, and fat, rubi- cund, powdered-haired coachmen, who seemed to have taken a swim in the same material. No wonder a typ- ical London crowd had gathered to applaud. The Guildhall buildings contain an interesting museum of London antiquities not generally visited, with relics of Roman occupation and the black whipping post of old Newgate. The aldermen meet in a circular chamber, a gem in its carving, but of recent date. All the great London parks, — and where may greater be found? — Hyde, Battersea, St. James's, Regent's, Victoria, Kensington Gardens, — provide charming fa- cilities for exercise and recreation. St. James's is the most historic. Here beside the placid Serpentine King Charles II delighted to watch the noisy waterfowl, as on warm summer days they splashed about amid the reeds and lilies, while His jovial Majesty's pretty mis- tresses and fawning courtiers lingered in the adjoining arbors, and, with or without the royal connivance, hatched many an unworthy little plot. Regent's and Battersea Parks excel in shrubberies and flowers. At Hyde Park we wandered over acres of meadow, coun- try-like with pasturing sheep; or watched, although fashion's tide was in ebb, an unending stream of aris- tocratic carriages and riders down famous Rotten Row, a name curiously corrupted from Route du Roi. The celebrated " Zoo " in Regent's Park is as extensive and complete as other London collections; and capacious animal houses and lofty aviaries, separated by shrub- beries and shaded walks, scatter widely over undulat- ing land. King Edward has enriched the Zoo with 22 First Impressions of Europe a cross-bred zebra horse from the Transvaal, a curious freak, which resembles a common brown horse in shape and color, but has zebra stripes. Buckingham Palace, His Majesty's present city resi- dence, dark and grim as viewed from St. James's Park, faces a black court-yard unadorned by a single grass blade and of much the same color as the building; while a lofty railing, black below, glittering with gilt above, augments the general Satanic effect. St. James Palace, used even yet for royal receptions and levees, presents some rambling old black structures partially erected by Henry VIII on the site of an ancient " Hos- pital for leprous maids." "Though I do not think so lowly of St. James's as others," observes Windham, an eighteenth-century writer, "yet still I must say, if it does not look like a palace, it does not look like any- thing else." A visit to Madame Tussaud's, undeservedly slighted by hypercritics, affords unique historical instruction. Before the invention of electro-lighting or possibly even gas (for the exhibition is a century old) visitors fre- quently confounded wax figures with living spectators, an error barely possible to-day. Some representations, notably President Roosevelt's, are much exaggerated. Madame Tussaud herself in waxen effigy has stood sen- tinel for many years over the u Sleeping Beauty," whose pectoral oscillations suggest grave pulmonary difficul- ties. A figure-grouping which places Harry Thaw of New York in a private niche with Bismarck, and causes Martin Luther to extend his hands as if in bless- ing over Mary Queen of Scots can hardly be com- mended. In the Chamber of Horrors, said to be less thrilling than that in New York, a goodly company of London 23 noted criminals, appropriately pale and cadaverous, huddle together on a platform. Beneath hang rusty instruments of crime and faded documentary evidence used at the trials. The valuable collection of relics at Madame Tussaud's, including the old treadmill, pil- lory, and the carriage used by Napoleon in his last Russian campaign, quite rivals the waxworks. At the Law Courts, then in session, we first beheld the real iron-gray legal wig, an admirable adornment not altogether unlike a corrugated wasp's nest. A young attorney called our attention to the amazing simplicity of modern practice. Even that grand old weapon the demurrer, if we correctly followed him, has become ob- solete. Surely at such ruthless change the ghost of William Tidd, Esq., of the Inner Temple, must haunt the place in lamentation. A permit courteously signed by Lord S enabled us to view the " Lords Spiritual and Temporal in Par- liament assembled," most aristocratic of all legisla- tive and judicial bodies. The Peers' chamber, espe- cially when irradiated by sunlight streaming through the fine stained windows, matches in soft beauty any cathedral nave. At least a hundred peers attended the debate, certainly no indication that this much-abused body has become effete. Lansdowne, the conserva- tive leader, eulogized Lord Cromer's Egyptian admin- istration, and recommended a national gift of fifty thousand pounds to His worthy Lordship; a gift sub- sequently conferred, although opposed by radicals in the Commons. The various peers, undivided except on state occasions by titulary rank, have no special seats, and usually take what positions they please on the comfortable red benches. Silk hats may be worn 24 First Impressions of Europe during debate, except when a message from the King is read. Careful scrutiny detects no common type of British peer. Old and young, tall and short, dark and fair, they exhibit the diversity of any group of well- dressed men picked out at random. A few have the features supposedly inherited by a Beauchamp, Ver- non or de Vere; others, dukes among them, resemble plain farmers and tradesmen. All peers, dukes ex- cepted, are addressed merely as Lord , without the special titles. As we glanced over this august as- sembly, from the venerable peer who replied to Lord Lansdowne to His Grace of Sutherland, who was nearest (and wore red stockings), we thought by how frayed and slender a thread hung the imposing prestige of hereditary nobility, when undefended as of yore by martial fealty. New methods of land taxation, of which at times distant rumblings are heard, or abolition of primogeniture, would quickly cause partition of the vast estates, and transform palatial halls, not owned by Royalty, into free national museums of sculpture, antiquities and art. While Britain's titled Solons once regarded trade rather superciliously, "The principal reason," as stated in 1645, " why the judges do sit in the House of Peers upon woolsacks is to put them in mind of preserving the trade and manufacture of wool " — the export of which article was wholly prohibited in Queen Elizabeth's time. The Commons, where the debate turned on old age pensions, presented a less spectacular scene than that in the Lords. We finally passed out through West- minister Hall which, while impressive, is markedly wanting in ornamental detail and in monuments illus- trative of its wonderful history. London 25 The Tate Gallery, Grosvenor Road, Vauxhall, mag- netizes most lovers of modern art. One room is wholly devoted to Turner, the undoubted '* King of Impres- sionists." Turner certainly had a more distinctive style than other artists, not excepting Corot; in fact his landscapes occasionally suggest Vesuvian craters in semi-eruption. Modern paintings, we reflect, when not mythical, scriptural, allegorical or idealistic, chiefly derive merit as faithful portrayals of nature; yet in visiting a fair country people not unfrequently pay slight attention to real scenery, and gloat rapturously over the imitation. As our party crossed a charming Alpine pass, in August, several co-travelers, worship- pers at the shrine of Millet, turned carelessly from the windows to play bridge whist. The Collegiate Church of St. Peter in Westminster, commonly called Westminster Abbey, contains, of all the buildings we visited abroad, by far the most of human interest. Opened for service in 1269, the world- famed Abbey has now acquired the characteristic " frosty " look, and bears within and without the stamp of profound antiquity. Within its chapels ragged time-corroded ornamentation assumes almost stalactitic forms. Soft color effects are, however, absent. So vast an aggregation of tablets, tombs, statuary and in- scriptions, and all so picturesquely grouped, arouses wonder. The oldest human remains in the Abbey, those of King Sebert, date from a. d. 616, and were of course originally interred elsewhere. Nearby lies Ed- ward the Confessor, of saintly memory, obiit 1065, whose tomb when pried open in 1685 contained "all his bones and much dust." The last royal burial, that of George II, took place in 1760. Of the modern no- 26 First Impressions of Europe bility the Percy family alone, by ancient grant, have a present right to Abbey interment, irrespective of the Dean of Westminster's permission. All the Plantag- enets, save Richard of the lion's heart and weighty battle-axe, and one other, now lie, we believe, in a single tomb. Queen Elizabeth's unprepossessing fea- tures, taken from her death mask at the age of seventy- two surmount, yet scarcely adorn, her imposing sepul- chre. Although Stow says of her funeral, " there was such a general sighing, groaning and weeping as the like hath not beene seene or knowne in the memory of man," we should accept his statement cum grano salis, as political predilection strongly influenced these old writers. The noted loyalist Evelyn, on witnessing Cromwell's body borne with huge pomp and circum- stance to its very brief sepulture in the Abbey, remarked with supreme satisfaction, " It was the joyfullest fun- eral I ever saw, with none that cried except dogs." When the first Edward's dark tomb, nine feet long (the longest in the Abbey), was opened to ascertain if it really contained that sinewy spindle-legged autocrat, old " Longshanks " appeared intact and excellently mummified, his giant stature, historically six feet and seven inches, having shrunk to six feet two. Henry VII founded the superbly ornamented chapel wherein his tomb now rests, grandest of all the Abbey's sepulchral monuments. A removal of remains unworthily buried in Westminster Abbey would leave much vacant space. The huge tomb of George Villiers, and of his son, that " Man so various that he seemed to be Not one, but all mankind's epitome," would in such case vanish. Perhaps, however, it is as well to let " Steenie " rest in peace. London £7 A new-world visitor, sauntering amid ancient crypts and mouldering monuments, begins to feel a personal ghostly intangibility, and is half inclined to search the graveyards for his own humble "hie jacet" Or- dinary English graveyard inscriptions, by the way, are little older than the early American, as the gentry received intra-church burial; and monuments of the "mute inglorious Miltons" have largely per- ished. The London houses of the nobleman and the opu- lent citizen contrast less strongly now than in quasi- feudal times, when palaces, like the Protector Somer- set's, lined the Thames, and civic London presented a tangled labyrinth of narrow lanes. The sombrous town house of His wealthy Grace of Devonshire attracts special attention, as also does Apsley House, jocosely called ■' No 1 London " by a contemporary, where once "the Iron Duke," less popular in politics than in the field, securely barred his windows against an excited mob. One George Johnson, a man of no celebrity, — many similar George Johnsons have thrived precariously in the London fog — acted as our guide through the cele- brated east side "slums" which we explored from Bishopsgate to Mile End. Whitechapel, while possi- bly more destitute and criminal than New York's east side, is yet less picturesque, as the higher New York tenements discharge more wretched polyglot humanity into a given space. We paid the penny admission to the Hebrew old-clothes market near infamous Petticoat Lane, where degraded humanity throngs the narrow spaces between pyramidal stacks of filthy rags, seem- ingly not worth a shilling a ton; and where careful 28 First Impressions of Europe steering alone prevents the collection of unpleasant in- vertebrate souvenirs. Dirty Dick's ancient tavern in Bishopsgate has im- proved, outwardly at least, since the following verse appeared in " Household Words," — "Outside, the old plaster, all spatter and stain, Looked spotty in sunshine, and streaky in rain, The window-sills sprouted with mildewy grass, And the panes, being broken, were known to be glass." When the tavern was remodelled in 1870, a layer of cats, dogs, and rats, mummified by purely natural processes, was, inter alia, found in the sub-soil. Sub- sequent owners arranged these weird relics about the tavern's walls and rafters, and over wine casks; so many stray dogs and cats of the early Georgian era, with broken ribs protruding through their blackened skins, now peer at you through festoons of cobwebs. Luckily the wine is rare and old at Dirty Dick's. You need it when you get there. The Old Cheshire Cheese, in Wine Office Court, off Fleet Street, is yet more famous. One Sunday after- noon, having found its main entrance closed, we called down a side passage to inquire if the place were open. Back from the depths, in a shrill female voice, came the waspish reply "You know it isn't;" and, legally speaking, we felt that the issue was sufficiently complete without a replication. The natural desire, when first in England, to see places rather than people, subsides, we believe, in sub- sequent visits, until the underlying social element of our natures finally transcends mere place-longing. With us, the magnetism of the Tower, the Abbey, St. Paul's, a hundred other things before unseen, pre- •5b x Hampton Court 29 vented extended search for scattered friends in Lon- don's many-fringing suburban belts. Yet Dr. P- called on us, our classical mentor in boyhood, whom we had not seen since we donned the toga virilis. The Doctor now acts as a trustee under the will of Cecil Rhodes, rents a charming Thames-side estate, thirty miles above the metropolis and is bathed, through his companioncy of St. Michael and St. George, in the sub- dued halo of Knighthood's outer zone. Then we dined most enjoyably at the pleasant home of Colonel M , of Grove Park on the Surrey side; which faces Shooter's Hill over which the old Dover stage once splashed through mud and mire, as described by Dickens in opening his " Tale of Two Cities." Pater and Sister at- tended a reception in Park Lane, and visited a fash- ionable ladies' club, where "the room in which we smoke" was pointed out, and brandies and soda were served. HAMPTON COURT On the delightful 'bus ride from London to Hamp- ton Court via Hammersmith Bridge and Twickenham, each succeeding village or town seems quainter than those already passed. The little cottages with sagging tiled roofs, almost smothered beneath vines, roses, honeysuckle and various flowering plants, merit de- scription solely by artists and poets. Field cultivation between the villages, unlike that of less populous coun- tries, is rather intensive than extensive. Such vege- tables and grass, darkly green, in places almost blue, and growing rankly in the moist climate, we had not previously seen. The road, hard as adamant, like most 30 First Impressions of Europe excellent English roads, and free from dust, crossed and recrossed the Thames, here an inferior stream flow- ing, turbid with sediment, between banks of slippery mud. Passing Pope's Villa and the site of his Grotto we soon traversed Bushey Park, with its mile-long avenue of fine old chestnuts, a fit approach to the palace of the Great Cardinal. Wolsey on erecting huge Hampton Court trembled for his prestige if not for his head, as the jealous king wished his own castles to surpass those of his subjects; but, with consummate tact, the Cardinal smoothed the royal irritation, politely conveying Hampton Court to his master. The Palace, as extensively remodelled by King Henry, contains pic- ture galleries of much interest, and lofty rooms yet dec- orated with the original tapestries and allegorical fres- coes. It surrounds several quadrangles, and a broad stone-flagged arcade, which in turn circles about a fountain and a plot of richly verdant grass. The state beds of George II, and of William III and Mary his Queen, high enough to require theodolitic measurement, and festooned with many-colored silken draperies, all ghost-like with the cankering touch of time, aroused a pleasurable envy. Delightful gardens brilliant with flowers, where bits of shrubbery strangely trimmed as- sumed fantastic shapes, including forms of birds, spread from the Palace to the River Thames, here gay with pleasure craft. The famous grape-vine of Hampton Court, planted in 1768, and now a very labyrinth of twisting stems and tendrils, carefully preserved under glass, has produced over two thousand bunches of grapes in a single year. As we returned to London, ragged little boys scam- pered beside the 'bus extending hats for pennies. They Warwick 31 subsist largely by this performance; and as visitors like to see how far they can run, their little faces lengthen- ing dejectedly with increasing doubt of reward, each penny given is fairly earned. WARWICK Shortly after William the Bastard, conquering son of Robert the Devil, had received a crown for his suc- cessful piratic raid at Hastings, Warwick became a borough of two hundred and sixty-one houses, " whereof one hundred and thirty were possessed by the King, one hundred and twelve by his barons, and the residue, being nineteen, by so many burgesses " — a truly aristo- cratic arrangement. Consideration of these and other facts added a piquant mental sauce to our dinner at the old fashioned Warwick Arms. Having dined we repaired at once to the castle, which dates in part from a. d. 916. Scott considered it the best-preserved feudal monument in England, a preservation largely due to the whig per- suasion of its owners during the civil wars, when Kenilworth suffered so badly. From a large room over- looking the Avon, Piers Gaveston, unfortunate favor- ite of Edward II, irregularly tried and sentenced by a group of fierce old barons, went forth to his execution on a neighboring hill. The state apartments contain no end of fine paintings and warlike relics, the latter largely Cromwellian. A portrait of Charles I by Van- dyck, one of four immense and heavily framed pic- tures in the dining hall, recalls the episode of Crom- well, described by Scott in " Woodstock." 32 First Impressions of Europe The castle is approached between high walls, vividly green in their damp mossy garb and shadowed by foliage that completely arches the path. In its construc- tion some ledge in situ was utilized, and the natural inequalities duly smoothed with masonry. Rusty iron fangs, remnants of the old portcullis, still protrude above the arched postern. A vegetation almost trop- ical shrouds portions of the castle wall, while shrubs, vines and flowers half fill the moat. Behind the castle, the grounds, unsurpassed even amid England's wealth of proud estates in soft restful beauty, slope to the gentle Avon. Huge cedars of Lebanon (originally brought from Palestine, so runs the tale, by Warwick crusaders) with trunks embraced by creeping vines, and foliage that excelled any we had previously seen, spread their knarled branches hori- zontally and widely. A narrow path over the rich sward leads to a little foamy fall on the Avon, and passes beneath high battlements, profusely decorated earlier in the season with a wonderful display of roses. A glass conservatory rich in rare flowers and plants covers the mighty Warwick Vase of the fourth century b. c, skillfully fished by Sir William Hamilton from a lake near Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli. Altogether, na- ture and man, and, miserabile dictu, the unsatisfied creditors of man (for the present Warwick family possess little genius in finance) have mutually com- bined to preserve the attractions of a spot so famous. The Beauchamp Chapel, named from Warwick's first Norman earl, protects beneath its groined roof some wondrous sarcophagi, considered the finest in England, barring a few in Westminster Abbey. Richard Beauchamp, the fifteenth earl, reposes here; Leicester A Drive to Kenilworth 33 also, exalted favorite of the Virgin Queen; and his brother Ambrose Dudley, in a tomb empanelled on all sides with colored coat armor. In this ancient chapel, where by the tread of centuries solid stone steps are worn entirely through, the visitor stands indeed con- fronted with spectres of a bygone age. In St. Mary's Church, adjoining the Beauchamp Chapel, the tomb of Fulk, Lord Greville, murdered by his valet in 1628, is surmounted by the helmet of the deceased. From elevated cells or "watch towers" the cunning priests, in the days of papal supremacy, de- tected any thefts of church ornaments by ostensible worshippers. In the cellar we stumbled against the ducking-stool for "nagging" housewives; a cumbrous yet ingenious antique, by which, according to Misson the victims were "plunged into the water as often as the sentence directed, in order to cool their immoderate heat." Apropos of the ducking-stool, Sir Richard Steele remarks, "There are perverse jades that fall to men's lots with whom it requires more than common proficiency in philosophy to be able to live." A DRIVE TO KENILWORTH The Warwick road passes Guy's Cliff Mill, where the big dilapidated wheel revolves to-day, as it has for centuries, freighted with slime and moss, splashing and churning the waters of the Avon. We find mention of this mill in Domesday Book. Guy's Cliff itself, a pa- latial mansion in a splendid park, indescribably pic- turesque as viewed up the lily-spangled Avon from the little rustic bridge near the mill, derives its name from C 34 First Impressions of Europe the semi-mythical Guy of Warwick. Lord Percy, son of Northumberland's Earl, now enjoys the magnificent seat, a pile hardly less impressive than Warwick Castle. Beyond Guy's Cliff Wootton Court nestles snugly at the end of a long shadowy avenue. A new turn of the road discloses peasants' cottages, one an artist's inspi- ration, embraced by twining plants, spangled with flowers, and roofed with extremely thick masses of dusky yellow thatch. Finally, for novelties are here very plentiful, a swift shallow stream unenclosed by bridge or culvert flows directly across the adamantine way, which seems quite proof against aqueous erosion. Kenilworth Castle is deeply impressive; a mighty ruin in pinkish-red sandstone, decorated with vines and flowers, unshadowed by trees. Great red walls uprise, with broken Gothic windows, all surrounded by open, gently-sloping lawns. Time-ravaged and weather- moulded, strangely effective in coloring, it is now as much a work of nature as of man. A lack of ornamen- tal detail results from its long desertion. We observed no tablets, inscriptions or coats of arms on the totter- ing walls, although a few exist. Dungeons in the strict sense have, we believe, never been found in this castle; yet many rooms, now caves, are surely deep and dark enough for any doleful purpose. One great pit, per- haps twenty feet wide, and very deep, although in the heart of the ruin, is said to have been a cesspool. When such crude ideas of sanitation prevailed the fell microbe must have increased prodigiously, and proved at times an enemy within the bastions more deadly than any besieging host outside. At Kenilworth, unlike Warwick and Hampton Court, we might, once through the entrance gate, roam at will Stratford-on-Avon 35 and recline unmolested on the grassy lawns. Would that time had permitted us to view its towers when bathed in silvery moonlight, and to brave the flitting ghosts of the ambitious Dudley, the famous John of Gaunt, and the noble Simon de Montfort. STRATFORD-ON-AVON The thorough harmony in the appearance and ar- rangement of streets and buildings in slumbering little Stratford appeals at once to the weary pilgrim. We had but one fault to find, — William Shakespeare was born there. If the "Immortal Bard" had arisen else- where, and his path across life's stage, and so many other stages, had but avoided this modern Mecca, how pleasure and profit might have combined as we inves- tigated the quaint old houses everywhere visible. As it was, everything had been explored, rummaged, writ- ten and rewritten of in poetry and prose, pictured and painted, until the veriest scintilla of novelty had be- come effectually erased. This difficulty, irksome to the inquiring, of finding anything not already known to all the world, while discernible in every beaten track of Europe, is particularly marked at fair Stratford on the Avon. The Shakespeare House, although noteworthy apart from association, is surpassed in picturesqueness by other antiquities, notably the ancient row which in- cluded Shakespeare's school. The Bard's direct line expired with the death of his granddaughter, Elizabeth Hall, in 1670, and the old homestead, now public property, was finally alienated 36 First Impressions of Europe in 1806 by descendants of his sister Joan. It contains among numerous literary and other curiosities the desk of the poet's schoolmaster, wonderfully hacked and sliced by industrious pupils. Countless autographs em- bellish that plain low-studded room where Shakespeare was born, including Sir Walter Scott's, conspicuously scratched on a window pane. Ann Hathaway's cot- tage, over the fields in Shottery, where to-day the thatched roof, creeping vine and brilliant flower- garden attractively combine, may well have proved more seductive to " The Poet of All Time " than his own paternal roof. In a little graveyard, accidentally happened upon, the tombstones bore such strange inscriptions as " Plum Pudding," "Scotch Whiskey," etc. At first glance it seemed that excessive use of these delectable articles had caused human demises, but in reality pet animals were here taking their long rest. Prolix encomiums in Latin and Greek perpetuated sacred memories of the fiery stallion, the green-eyed kitten and the ever faith- ful and much lamented puppy. OXFORD Venerable Oxford was not, as we had supposed, a collection of broad shaded avenues, where flat-capped scholars leisurely sauntered along, construing ^Eschylus; but a large and lively city, pressing so closely up to many colleges as to mar their approaches. A maze of academic structures, mostly ancient, all classical, con- stitutes the University; of which strangers can rarely form true impressions, as such a body, unlike antiqui- Oxford 37 ties which may be viewed in a general historic light, has its peculiar system, only understood by special study. We sought lodging at the Wolsey, where in 1525 the sumptuous " Cardinal of St. Cecilia beyond the Tiber " resided during the erection of Christ Church just over the way; but we speedily removed to the Wy cliff e Hotel, preferring tidy rooms, even if unhallowed by prelatic memories. In and about Oxford we enjoyed the guidance of Mr. M , Pater's former pupil at the University of New Brunswick, as well as the first Rhodes scholar in Baliol and a winner of the Glad- stone prize. Of the Academic buildings, all too briefly visited, the Magdalen "quad," with its carved griffins and age- worn stone, most strongly appealed to us, although that of Christ Church, where the stonework is lighter and more pleasing, yet of plainer design, is usually preferred. A brilliant ball is held annually in Christ Church "quad," when the English girls (if a resident Cana- dian's impartiality may be relied upon) waltz less grace- fully than their cousins of gay and wintry Montreal. Poor rugged Dr. Johnson once hastily retired from this "quad" to avoid the contemptuous glances levelled at the holes in his boots. In the dining hall of Christ Church, a notable apartment beautifully roofed with carved oak, historic association evidently vanquishes modern comfort, and the ancient backless benches must seriously hamper gastronomic joy. Here we find Hol- bein's original portrait of Henry VIII amid a wealth of famous pictures. A row of fifteen or more carved stone heads, an interesting achievement of Sir Chris- topher Wren in his younger days, arrests our attention 38 First Impressions of Europe in approaching Magdalen; and we much admire also the strange little open-air pulpit from which John Wes- ley once preached, attained by entrance from the sec- ond story of that most typical old college. Addison's Walk, a fine two-mile promenade densely bordered with trees and shrubbery, skirts the level meadow on a raised embankment, and follows the little river Cherwell, and a branch channel that bends sinuously through the Magdalen grounds, with black swans gracefully floating upon its surface. A rich pad- dock, too, well stocked with sleek deer, adjoins Mag- dalen; a simply unrivalled combination of velvet lawn with deep leafy glade. We paddled three or four miles up the Cherwell, starting from Folly Bridge on the Thames, here called the Isis, and taking tea in the little garden grotto of a country tavern. While this little river may not com- pare with the boisterous foam-flecked salmon streams, which meander about New Brunswick's dark forests of fir, it is unquestionably more charming than Amer- ica's rural streams. The gentle current often over- arched by foliage flows amid stunted willows, ash, and masses of fine English may; while low walls evidently ancient and deep covered with moss and fern restrain undue erosion. Trees and grasses everywhere display enchanting combinations of the richest greens. The stream, in passing a mill, where the facilities for an easy "carry" would astonish the rude Canadian voyageur, descends a vertical fall of three or four feet. Bulrushes, thickly massed, extend entirely across the brink, the water bursting through them at the very edge of the incline. Above the mill tall meadow grass mar- gins a wider channel. Countless little boats, mostly Windsor and Eton 39 punts, occasionally so crowded as wholly to choke the channel, and often poled or punted by girls, ply be- tween the fall and the Isis. Some have phonographic attachments that give forth the usual jocular and squeaky music. In the Cher's lower outlet, amorous couples often curiously entangled profit by the partial retirement conveniently afforded by many overhanging bushes. Honi soit qui trial y pense. WINDSOR AND ETON His sagacious Majesty, Edward VII, enjoys at Wind- sor a castle of grand and lofty situation, sufficiently ca- pacious to include nearly seven hundred halls, rooms and meandering passages. As with London's Tower, the effectiveness of unity in age and original design is lost by the interspersion of old and new structures, dat- ing downward, respectively, from the ancient Curfew Tower of the Conqueror's time. The Royal Mews adjoin, where at the time of our visit sixty-five fine horses and ponies neighed and pranced in their immac- ulate stalls. A high-walled Elizabethan terrace over- looks the " silver-streaming Thames," Eton and a wide sweep of fertile hill and dale; while a deep intermural ravine, laid out with garden walks and often red with roses, partially surrounds the great Keep or Round Tower. Windsor Castle experienced its most injurious "restoration" when the merry Charles established his frivolous court there, and appropriated the Devil's Tower, let us hope with more merriment than justice, to the numerous Maids of Honor. St. George's Chapel, where the Garter Knights are 40 First Impressions of Europe installed, contains, aside from its indescribably beau- tiful nave, the dust of "bluff King Hal," first Defender of the Faith; the two well-cemented segments of Charles I and also the Princess Charlotte's most im- pressive and mournful monument, where the royal lady beneath a winding sheet is surrounded by her maids, all weeping, with their bowed heads closely mantled, as if in fact they had wept their mistress to death after the fashion of Undine. Notwithstanding the publicity of royal interments scepticism regarding the true disposal of the remains becomes periodically epidemic. Investigation at St. George's Chapel in 1813, proved that the first Charles, like the first Edward, possessed, although minus one ear, a high post-mortem durability; while of His polygamous Majesty, King Henry VIII, a mere naked skeleton remained, its lank osseous chin yet strangely decorated with a tuft of beard. Some suits of mail in Windsor's old-armor collec- tions are valued at from £15,000 to £20,000 apiece, and derive, particularly the fine armor used by Charles I in his boyhood, much added interest from their historic wearers. The state bedstead, with its rich silken bedding used by many sovereigns and most recently by the visit- ing King and Queen of Norway, aroused our usual keen appreciation of such articles. Windsor's state apartments, wonders of gilded grandeur which well embody the popular idea of royalty, include, among endless great rooms, the Wellington Chamber, and far- famed St. George's Hall, where the ceiling is embossed with armorial bearings of all the Garter Knights. This most illustrious order of the Garter, so coveted alike by prince and peer, and properly symbolized by Windsor and Eton 41 an article that so charmingly combines use with orna- ment, has a history yet partially shrouded by the mists of time. Opinions differ as to whether the original gar- ter was black or sky-blue. It may have been the King's garter. Historians now discredit the old legend of its discovery on the carpet by Edward III, to the mingled satisfaction and confusion of that fair Countess of Salisbury, whose valiant husband perished in tourna- ment at Windsor in 1358. In the Curfew Tower, the oldest part of Windsor, dungeons contained in the massive walls open into a central space. Torture instruments formerly embel- lished the cells. In the ceiling a bit of rusty pipe re- calls the dreadful water-torture, which usually caused insanity within two days, and death in three or four. All the prisoners, judging by the arrangement of the cells, possibly heard the screams and confessions of any one, perhaps even saw torture administered. One cell, completely dark, opens back of another, a hideous place indeed, where poor Queen Ann Boleyn was tempo- rarily imprisoned. An excavation in its wall, seven or eight feet deep, marks an industrious prisoner's at- tempt to escape. We sat in the stocks in this dungeon, and found them quite as comfortable as the Oxford benches. Eton's venerable buildings or " cloisters " founded by King Henry VI in 1440, while not extensive, have a time-ravaged and appropriately classical appearance. A person in seedy attire who astonished us by declin- ing a tip kindly pointed out the various magnalia, in- cluding the smooth athletic field, suggestive of forgot- ten passages in Gray's famous poem. In approaching Eton many proud little fellows passed us, wearing 42 First Impressions of Europe black coats and tall silk hats. The very air seemed redolent of crystallized orthodoxy. ANTWERP Leaving London from Liverpool Street Station on July 31, at evening, we watched for miles the twinkling lights of seemingly endless suburbs, boarded the crowded Antwerp packet at Harwich, and passed a fairly comfortable night on a gently undulating sea. Continental Europe at first view disclosed lowlands, bordering the "lazy old Scheldt,'' the muddy inlet up which we steamed; richly green meadows, lined with rows of trees that branched much too high above ground to be graceful, a result of typical Dutch tree culture. Many steamers swept gracefully seaward, un- freighted, for a strike was in progress, and floating lightly, with propellers half above water, raising minia- ture Niagaras of spray. Antwerp Harbor, reached af- ter some hours' steaming, presented for miles busy nau- tical scenes more spectacular than those of Liverpool. On landing we joined by prearrangement a tourist party from Philadelphia, thirty in all, to make "the grand tour " under conductorship of the veteran guide, Charles Zerelli. Antwerp, which is attractive in many ways, might aptly be called "the White City" from the light color of its buildings, due either to paint or materials of con- struction. A well-dressed people thronged the streets, but little suggesting that European poverty, so much talked of. Perhaps the most noticeable difference be- tween Antwerp (and indeed all the cities of Continen- Brussels 43 tal Europe that we visited) and English and American cities, consisted in the number of open air " palm gar- dens," usually crowded with respectable people of both sexes and all ages, even to young children; where nu- merous little tables dotted the sidewalks or interior hotel courts, and refreshments principally liquid were served at all hours. While however local options and temperance unions but slightly trouble Europe, gross intoxication seems rare. It was in Montreal after the return voyage that we first observed, at least in public places, poor wandering wayfarers obfuscated (pardon the phrase) by multifarious potations. Antwerp's splendid cathedral, with its "consecrated grove of stately columns," contains Rubens' much ad- mired masterpiece, " The Descent from the Cross," and the more impressive work of a pupil of Rubens, deco- rating the lofty dome one hundred and eighty feet above. Aside from general design much of the interior stone- work is plain, and without the carving and color effects, respectively, of St. Paul's and Westminster Abbey. Indeed many great European cathedrals are now much stripped of ornament, the result probably of iconoclasm and spoliation in war. BRUSSELS The capital of crowded little Belgium impressed us at first glance as the most artistic city we had seen; and we retained this impression most tenaciously, even after the famous Parisian boulevards had ceased to be novelties. Having registered and dined at Hotel de Bordeaux, 44 First Impressions of Europe we made a wide pedestrian tour. Brussels possesses an extraordinary feature in its Boulevard du Midi, where a shaded esplanade extending fully a mile and a half contains a grotesque collection of booths, exhibi- tions and shows of all sorts, with clowns, fortune-tellers, brass bands, dancing monkeys, saloons, merry-go- rounds, tinselled tambourine girls and what-not-else. Coney Island seemed to be visiting Belgium. We re- turned through narrow lanes inhabited by the poor, where Hebrews predominated, as indicated by nu- merous old-clothes markets; and the colored garments worn and the curious variety of wares exposed for sale greatly heightened artistic effects. At night the streets glowed with electric brilliancy, especially the Grand Boulevard. Indeed all these coast cities have splendid illumination. On our entering a theatre, a rather pretty girl strolling about the foyer in fanciful attire indicated, pantomimi- cally, a wish to accompany us towards the proscenium, a flattering offer declined however by suitable counter- pantomime. At this little theatre, where an English comedy company received enthusiastic applause, we were possibly the only person present to understand a word of the play. A round-about drive disclosed the new law courts, among the world's largest buildings, which overlook all Brussels; the legislative halls; the more ancient Hotel de Ville; and the celebrated Manikin Fountain, in a street nearby, a chubby little carved cupid, erected in 1645, which scatters its spray in too natural a manner to admit of criticism. In that most interesting spot of all Brussels, the little square between Hotel de Ville and the Prince's Palace, twenty-four of the old nobility, Brussels 45 including Counts Egmont and Horn, fell victims to the wrath of Bloody Alva, who in those sad days personally resided in the Palace. Dark gray buildings touched with gilt surround this famous spot. Historically, how- ever, we naturally hold England in higher esteem than continental Europe, possibly excepting France; and we prefer places that recall the vicissitudes of Charles I to those memorializing Charles V, or His gory Grace of Alva. The Cathedral of St. Gudule, now above six cen- turies old, displays superb stained windows; also a pul- pit, wondrously carved by Verbniggen, which repre- sents the Tree of Knowledge and the first summary ejectment, that of Adam and his tempting consort from Eden's delicious by-ways. At the Royal Art Gallery the countless pictures of martyred saints and winged seraphim would appease the most sanctimonious appe- tite. Many are by Rubens. The four thousand or more widely scattered pictures marked "Rubens" are by the way considered mostly works of his pupils, for the renowned artist, notwithstanding longevity and a re- markable capacity for speedy work, could hardly have produced half so many. Such wholesale unacknowl- edged appropriation of merit largely due to others should detract appreciably from Rubens' fame. The small Weirtz gallery, sole repository, we believe, of that artist's works, is memorably unique. Immense pic- tures here surrounded us; one measured fifty feet by thirty. Peeping through a small aperture at one corner of the room the vicissitudes of a young woman picto- rially appear, who from "Folly" passes to "Hunger" and from "Hunger" to "Crime." Another peephole discloses a not too cheerful view of a man buried alive 46 First Impressions of Europe and struggling to raise his coffin lid. "Napoleon in Hell " is excellent, both in theme and execution. Across the room was what appeared to be a stuffed black dog, but this also, on nearer view, resolved into a picture. But adieu to Brussels! Late one afternoon we re- passed Antwerp, crossed the broad Rhine estuaries; obtained fleeting glimpses of Rotterdam, where bright lights glistened attractively over numerous canals, and registered at nine p. m. at the Hotel du Passage in the Hague. Between Brussels and Antwerp the country rather resembles England. Artistic taste in field cultivation is occasionally so over-indulged that the extra labor must appreciably lessen profit. Some hay-stacks, even, are quasi-Gothic, with quite respectable pointed arches. Extensive tree nurseries often border the track south- west of Rotterdam, for timber growth is here as care- fully conserved as it is wantonly wasted in America. The Dutch lowland scenery, with luxuriant grass, lily- spotted ditches and more windmills than Don Quixote would care to tilt with, pleased some of our party greatly; others thought "Brave little Holland" a bit monotonous and moist, with oppressively heavy air. A fierce old Dutch guard disturbed our personal cog- itations en route by calling attention, a little vehemently, to the mysterious legend " Verboden te Rooken " — " It is forbidden to smoke." The Hague 47 THE HAGUE Brilliant illuminations, music, thronging crowds, en- livened our first night at The Hague. It was no less an event than Queen Wilhelmina's birthday. Our hotel faced a lofty glass-roofed arcade, a Paradise for ladies, lined on each side with attractive shops; where at night, especially during the celebration, the many noises, hu- man, canine and feline, so reverberated as effectually to banish " tired Nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep." Generally speaking, The Hague is a large city, not very ancient in appearance, and less picturesque to our mind than Antwerp or Brussels. Its chief business streets, centrally grouped, are narrow; but new streets which are much wider extend on all sides, intersected by numerous canals. We observed no pleasure boats on these waterways; and such craft are indeed so un- common on most rivers and lakes we visited in northern Europe as to suggest that aquatic tendencies must, as regards the white race, be largely confined to Anglo- Saxons. The Hague is aptly mentioned in the old Pepysian diary as "a most sweet town, with bridges and a river in every street." Scheveningen, the " Dutch Brighton," attained from The Hague by a long street beauteous with shade trees and attractive mansions, presents no marked features aside from countless basket chairs on the sand, which, save for their greenish-yellow color, faintly resemble beehives or perhaps beaver houses. Groups of Dutch women stroll about in quaint native garb, and scatter like flocks of frightened wild geese at sight of the tour- ist's camera. The Hague's old Spanish Prison, fraught with dark 48 First Impressions of Europe memories of the Inquisition, leaves most lasting im- pressions. One room, a museum of torture instruments, contains the "Hanging Gallows" (in which the con- demned hung head downwards), the "Limb Breaker" (a heavy mallet for smashing arms and legs), the grim rack, now red with rust, thumb screws, pincers for tearing out human tongues, and similar gentle contriv- ances. An executioner's stone block is worn two inches deep by use. From the apparent effects of single axe- blows, averaging two to sever a head, a lugubrious his- tory is recorded. Another block, used in the torture by dripping water, is also deeply worn, — but a slight indication of its actual use, as the drops fell constantly, even if no hapless victim sat chained beneath. In one cell prisoners overlooked the kitchen from a little round window and, while slowly starving to death, watched the aproned cook prepare the tasty viands they could never share. A dark cavernous cell, ornamented in the sixteenth century by an imprisoned priest, with de- signs drawn in his own blood, is yet more grewsome. It seems incredible that blood stains, though shaded from light, should so long retain a suggestion of original coloring; yet, by lamplight, they seem genuine, and where thickest may be scaled with a knife blade. Long might these massive walls have re-echoed screams of the unfortunate, had good " Father William " not risen to rend the Spanish yoke. Amsterdam 49 AMSTERDAM Amsterdam (the Dam of the Amster) has been called the Northern or Vulgar Venice from its many canals of varying width yet never-varying foulness. Six hundred bridges span the sluggish waters, under which pass hundreds of canal boats, usually self-pro- pelled. All Amsterdam is picturesque, if the visitor can effectually sever the picturesque from the malo- dorous. Here at last our exact preconceived idea of a European city became realized ; narrow irregular streets teeming with activities, and long rows of buildings that from age and sinking foundations leaned over the side- walks. The city has deeper and more diversified color- ing than Brussels or Antwerp, with many very light window frames on dark buildings. The Queen's Palace, hard by our quarters at Hotel de Suisse, in Kal- verstraat, was built in the fifteenth century, and boasts one of Europe's grandest halls, with floors, walls, and ceiling of pure Italian marble. Our ladies, apparently unable to dissociate sight and smell, failed to appre- ciate Amsterdam, and pined for The Hague, where in- numerable souvenirs could be conveniently purchased within the grand arcade. Seventy-five thousand Jews, collected in one section of Amsterdam, form so grotesque an assemblage that, despite filth and foul odors, tourists continually drive in carriages down the long narrow lanes they inhabit. Hideous human deformity is here all too common. As our party passed several ladies nearly fainted, so closely did fat bloated women and ragged children sur- round the carriages, laughing and gesticulating in high appreciation of our visit. All sorts of indescribable D 50 First Impressions of Europe objects fluttered from windows, for the purpose of drying or for sale. The scene quite out-Hebrewed Hes- ter Street in New York. Between Amsterdam and Cologne the land slowly rises, the scenery becomes more diversified and attrac- tive, and the farmhouses, in rural parts, scatter more widely. A little fort guards the Dutch border, point- ing its guns southward in charming defiance of any possible friction between Holland and Germany. By judiciously tipping the guard, we secured the use be- tween meals of the dining car, with ample window space and complete seclusion. COLOGNE Cologne's leading "lions" are of course the stupen- dous cathedral, scarcely yet finished after centuries of toil, and the church of St. Ursula. The front view of the Cathedral, where its wealth of carved fretwork soars so loftily, is the most impressive. Within, the many massive columns grand as they are prevent, as in Antwerp Cathedral, a sufficiently comprehensive view. Brussels Cathedral is, in this respect, more pleas- ing. We attempt no vain description of these great cathedrals, already depicted by masters of every art, — indeed the view of each succeeding edifice sadly bleaches the memory of those previously visited. St. Ursula is said to contain the bones of eleven thou- sand virgins martyred by Huns in the year 453. Such a massacre, if proved, of victims so charming, so young and so pure, would indelibly stain the history of Cologne. But in all probability the miscellaneous contents of Cologne 51 some graveyard have been emptied into this remarkable church. The hollow walls of the nave are alleged to be completely bone-filled; and many bones are in fact visible through apertures purposely provided. Rows of skulls appear on shelves, the lower portions wrapped in needlework and embroidery often inlaid with gems. The adjoining chapel, however, displays the acme of osteological art. The lower part of its walls is variously carved and brightly gilded, while above extends a great interwoven basket-work of bones; limb bones, clavi- cles, ribs, bones enough to sink a small vessel, bones turned yellow and powdery with age, — all forming a fantastic mortuary mosaic. Professor Muller attrib- utes the virgin story to the insertion of a single letter in the name of St. Undecemilla, a virgin martyr, the record becoming " Undecem millia Virg. Mart." Many skulls show sword dents, arrow holes and other marks of strife which indicates that the virgins, if virgins they were, did not easily succumb. A stone chest in the main church, very old and weighty, is supposed to con- tain a young sister of Charlemagne. Aside from vir- gins' bones, St. Ursula presents interesting combina- tions of Norman and Gothic styles. Our visit to Cologne, colonized by Nero's mother with Roman veterans in a. d. 51, and the most ancient of all Rhine-fringing cities, was ridiculously brief; but a hasty walk disclosed various old structures which in- vited inquiry, and the famous bridge of boats across the river. 52 First Impressions of Europe THE RHINE Frequent comparisons are drawn between the Rhine and other rivers, notably the Hudson and St. John of North America. When, however, we reached Mayence at evening, after the long steamer trip of one hundred and forty miles from Cologne, few of our party were unwilling to rank the Rhine above all competitors. The most beautiful and celebrated part, the Rhine Gorge, extends approximately from Bonn to Bingen, one hun- dred miles, the river carving a sinuous narrow valley through the mountains. A comparatively low country extends up to Bonn, where fine estates line the bank, and for miles above Cologne the spires of its great cathedral, the loftiest in the world, cast their lengthening shadows over the landscape. Ruined Drachenfels (Dragon's Rock), most impressive of all the castles because first seen, and immortalized by Byron's glowing, if inaccurate, pen, soon frowns from its lofty pinnacle, eight hundred and fifty-five feet above the river. Having ambitiously de- termined to describe all these castles, we duly noted a moss-clad ruin peeping from thick foliage; the impres- sive fortified crags, opposite Coblence, of Ehrenbreit- stein aptly called the Rhine's Gibraltar; the great castle of Stolzenfels, orange-yellow in color and finely pre- served, overlooking the village of Capellan; and equally great Markburg, three miles above, better preserved than Drachenfels, yet showing age in every stone. Markburg crests an almost unscalable promontory, hun- dreds of feet above the water. An enemy, pushed from its battlements would, in most places, roll to the very base of the cliffs. Above the twin castles of Sterren- The Rhine 53 berg and Liebenstein, each as loftily situated as Mark- burg, the Rhine resembled a softened Saguenay, rugged hills uprising on both sides from the water's edge. Then castle followed castle, so thick and fast that we reluctantly closed our journal, despairing of effective description. Altogether, about a dozen additional cas- tles, mostly on the left bank, cast broken shadows down the great slopes. The Mouse Tower, a curious little stronghold, light brick-red in color, almost covered a small island, which split the rapid current. Rhine ruins are never monotonous, varying in size from single turrets to mighty feudal fortifications, and differ, respectively, in original construction and pres- ent state of decay. Some witnessed the heroic days of Charlemagne, that mightiest potentate of the Middle Ages. Commanding coignes of vantage were seized, on precipitous mountain spurs, where on one side flowed the glassy river, far below, while on the other deep and rugged ravines prevented access, save by tortuous path and causeway. Wild nature and legendary romance unite indeed in the Rhine Gorge. We wondered how so many robber barons subsisted in such a place, with garrisons large enough for effective defense. Feudal castles usually adjoined villages, where the knight de- fended the cottagers, and they, willingly or unwillingly, fed the Knight's retainers; but here many castles stood apparently remote from suitable sources of supply. Al- though the Rhine in the Middle Ages formed the prin- cipal commercial pathway for bearing northward the treasures of the Levant, and each passing barge was forced to pay toll to the avaricious lords of thirty-two castles, yet the cargoes usually wafted down the noble stream would hardly seem to have been suitable for the 54 First Impressions of Europe feeding and armament of mail-clad knights and their lusty retainers. The terminal fortresses of the gorge, if their owners chose to make toll equivalent to confis- cation, apparently held the intermediate ones largely at mercy. In 1842 the Rhenish toll-levy was still claimed, as of right, by the Duke of Nassau, and by him alone. The famous Hanseatic League, so largely instrumental in curbing these feudal exactions, was formed at Mayence, where, over night, we pleasantly dreamed that laurel-crowned Charlemagne, and not Zerelli, personally conducted our tour. Aside from castles, the most unique Rhine feature is the prodigious number of little stone terraces, used in grape cultivation, and ranged one above another, form- ing irregular striw along the steep slopes. Wherever forests are cleared, and the soil is not denuded, appear the terrace and vine. Opposite Bingen rises a great bare hill, treeless and shrubless, where this peculiar cultivation extends to the very summit; and halfway up, of stone of like color with the terraces, stands a fine old ruin, fairly saturated with poetic inspiration. Viewed in the crimson sunset glow, the whole land- scape creates the dreamy impression that you must be on Mars, or some other strange planet. At Bingen, so delightfully situated, the Rhine-gorge ends, and the river suddenly expands, becoming bounded by lowlands, with distant hills, yet retaining much beauty. Below Coblence black volcanic basalts, rifted, fissured and markedly columnar, largely compose the Rhine cliffs, a formation conducive to picturesqueness and fertility, and probably contemporaneous with the Giant's Cause- way and the Hudson Palisades. The St. John or Hudson, in exceptional parts, might The Rhine 55 rival the Rhine if restored to its purely natural state, but, as it is, probably no other river so perfectly com- bines enchanting scenery with human interest. More- over, the Rhine, in its castellated portion, is a true river, while the St. John below Gagetown, and the Hud- son below Troy, are, strictly speaking, estuaries. A river may, like the Saguenay, be impressive to the verge of awe, yet withal monotonous; but on the Rhine no two views correspond. Sharp and frequent bends always bring out the serrated contours in fine relief and afford many contrasting views of the same castle. The towns and villages big and little, which nestle snugly under the cliffs or cover picturesque intervales, usually contain one or more old stone watch-towers of Norman aspect, and ecclesiastical edifices, some yet in use, others exhibiting tottering walls and broken Gothic windows. Some Rhine slopes are wholly wooded. Of the castles, a few are surrounded by true forest, others by clustering trees and shrubs, yet others by mere cliffs quite naked or supporting thin growths of lichen and moss. The river channel has approxi- mately even width from Bonn to Bingen, enclosing comparatively few islands, and these small, while the current, everywhere swift, breaks into small foamy waves at one point, near Rheinfels. No inflowing tor- rents or waterfalls, at least in the summer season, give forth their noisy rumblings. In places, artificially paved banks restrain the waters, especially below Bonn, while an incredible number of little jetties, each a foot or so in height, extend far into the stream, to direct currents and scour the river bottom. Indeed few ob- jects in Europe, from broad rivers to steep Alpine slopes, have not been man-moulded in some degree. 56 First Impressions of Europe The glacier-fed Rhine, high all summer long, dis- charges into the lowlands, so great is the Alpine precip- itation, a volume of yellowish-green water computed to rival Niagara's downpour. Many neatly painted steamers, often adorned with broad green stripes, ply on its surface, especially below Bonn, and, by disturb- ing the narrow channel with their waves and momen- tum, impair, from the canoeists' standpoint, an other- wise ideal stream. HEIDELBERG A traveler, if limited to one castle, might well choose Heidelberg, considered the grandest ruin in Germany, if not in northern Europe. Boldly situated where the valleys of the Rhine and Neckar converge, three hun- dred and thirty feet above the water, massive, vast and splendid, its giddy ramparts and weathered towers di- rectly overlook the old university town, slumbering so far beneath. Many calamities (including a great fire caused by lightning in 1764), and frequent restorations have made of it a comparatively modern ruin, half cas- tle, half palace, and little of it now antedates the fif- teenth century. The stonework is pink, less reddish than that of Kenilworth. Rows of mural niches fac- ing the inner court contain fine statuary, carved in yellow sandstone. In one of the lofty turrets a young lady of our party became lost — indeed she had a pro- pensity to get lost whenever possible — and narrowly escaped a night in the instructive society of rats, bats and owls. The French captured Heidelberg Castle in 1689, and blew out with powder a huge section of the Heidelberg 57 principal round tower, which fell in one mighty frag- ment that yet stands, thirty or forty feet high, caressed by twining plants, and leaning ominously over the an- cieni moat. Little stairways in a lofty cellar conduct visitors over the great wine tun, last filled in 1769; a truly huge re- ceptacle, capable of holding forty-nine thousand gal- lons, whence the wine, pumped by machinery into rooms above, undoubtedly provoked many a mid- night brawl. Even a Dutchman would pause in drain- ing such a mighty tank, — or the president of a Heidel- berg students' club, elected, as is sometimes the case, solely for his bibacious attainments. In the castle grounds ivy spreads over the earth in extensive beds a foot or more thick, and ascends many trees as well, — a most astonishing display. Flowers, however, would seem to grow less profusely here than in England. Warwick alone, of all the castles we visited, can claim a prettier environment, a fairer dream- land of shrubbery and trees, than Heidelberg; while in territorial outlook this great German fortress vies with Windsor. Behind the castle and within the outer walls winds a deep gulch, possibly wholly artificial, spanned by massive bridges, where sunlight glistens through dense foliage upon ivy and moist mosses beneath. In the centre of a little pond reclines a giant carved in stone, overgrown with ivy and flowers, much weathered, and seemingly of high antiquity. Heidelberg Castle becomes suffused with a delicate pink glow, when viewed at sunset from the upper bridge over the gently flowing Neckar, which we reach by a short walk through quaint old streets. It is grand, yet we prefer a ruin which, without restorative touch, 58 First Impressions of Europe crowns some remote precipitous peak, and discloses the toes of the robber baron himself peeping above the soil. Some Rhine ruins are partially of this nature. Picture postals of the famous Heidelberg rapier duels, ghastly and highly colored, are for sale in the city shops; but these encounters are, in fact, more san- guineous than deadly, as a wire mask largely protects the fighter's face. LUCERNE A fair agricultural country spreads in undulations between Heidelberg and Bale, with completely vine- covered hills, and several isolated mediaeval ruins. At Bale we bid farewell to the Rhine, there also beautiful and swift, and of a lighter green than the Niagara. Between Bale and Lucerne, sixty miles, the scenery becomes increasingly attractive, with mingled wood- lands, valleys and villages, but no remarkable features. The Aar is crossed, old Rhine's chief tributary, its curling emerald current fed with melted Jungfrau snows. When near Lucerne the first touch of real Al- pine romance exalted us. Much Swiss scenery, apart from the mountainous portions, is marred by the num- ber of scattered trees, not gracefully clustered, but "peppered" everywhere at random over the fields. Lucerne and its surroundings are indeed charming. The almost torrential lake outlet bisects the town, a rushing bluish-green stream, clear as crystal, and of astonishing volume for its limited drainage area. Among other structures, two wooden footbridges with peaked and shingled roofs, the Capellbriicke and Lucerne 59 Spreuerbriicke, some centuries old, cross this impet- uous outlet. Within the bridges we find ancient col- ored pictures, peaked to fit the roofs, one of them rep- resenting "The dance of death." A pointed octagon tower containing a shrine and lighted candles adorns the lower bridge. Visitors wonder why these bridges zig-zag instead of following straight lines, and how they were ever built at all in such powerful rapids. In the more ancient part of Lucerne some strange old buildings, outwardly frescoed with quaint designs and figures, surround a little cobbled square. It seemed perfunctory to visit Thorwaldsen's cele- brated Lion, already so familiar from photographs, yet, as with the Albert Memorial in London, the live color- ing of the reality vastly bettered expectations. Sorry would we have been to miss that colossal work of art. The Lion is carved in pale gray rock, in fact, almost white, with red-lettered inscriptions, and is circled at the sides and above with a fringe of foliage, while in front nestles a little pond, rich with grasses, ferns and water-lilies. A fine view of Lucerne, especially when electro- lighted, is obtained from a hotel west of the Reuss, reached by inclined railway. Far and near the scat- tered lights from other hotels, perched high on distant mountains, sparkle like stars. 60 First Impressions of Europe THE RIGI AND MT. PILATUS More tourists have stood on the Rigi-Kulm than on any other Swiss peak. The mountain's situation, so near Lucerne, has always made access easy, while the first of the many inclined railways that now form so marked a Swiss feature, was that which, crossing many a leafy gulch and rock-broken torrent, twisted grad- ually upward to its treeless summit. The Rigi views, ever delightful and diversified, plainly excel those from Mt. Washington in New Hampshire. A gentleman from Banff, too, in the Canadian Province of Alberta, reluctantly declared his Rigi preference, as even world- famous Banff discloses no such circled lakes, all so in- tensely blue. Southward uprises a tremendous Alpine range, the Todi chain, snow-clad, and of broken con- tour; northerly and westerly extends undulating culti- vated land, dotted with hamlets, stretching away to the distant valley of the Rhine. Ascending Rigi, fine ever- green groves delight the eye, steep sloping meadows, besprinkled with flowers, and a few rugged ravines. Near the summit the railway follows a narrow ridge, affording almost vertical views to a great depth on both sides. A landscape of strong and varied coloring spreads beneath, with red-roofed cottages and lakes blue as indigo, a blue not wholly sky-reflected, as with eastern American lakes, but much deeper. Yet Rigi scenery is not wild; its lawn-like verdure excepting on the vertical north side extends to the top, with few rock exposures, debris or taluses. Our Appalachian Club would rejoice to find at Rigi a railway of imperishable build, instead of the wooden trestles and rotten ties that creak so mournfully beneath the passing trains on The Rigi and Mt. Pilatus 61 our Mt. Washington. The neat grass plots, too, on Rigi-Kulm, are preferable to those heaps of rusty tin cans and miscellaneous refuse that decorate New Hampshire's rocky dome. A stout Ohio judge, who was with us, appreciatively remarked, " I not only take off my hat, but I lay down." By late authorities, which give for many Swiss moun- tains heights that exceed those accepted as correct a half century ago, Rigi-Kulm stands 4,200 feet above Lucerne and 5,906 feet above the sea. Surely the little Swiss nation deserves high praise in thus elevating the Alps in the very face of the mighty avalanche and in- cessant fluvial erosion! Lake Lucerne is the most beautiful in Switzerland, possibly in the world. Each far-extending arm or bay unfolds fresh views, all diverse and deliciously pic- turesque. Most charming of all is the eastern end, the profoundly deep Lake of Uri, narrowly enclosed in an amphitheatre of steep and lofty slopes, which spread upward to mingle snowy crowns with gleaming gla- ciers. The view into this lacustrine pit, from half-way up Rigi, excelled any obtained above. Mount Pilatus, which may be also ascended by rail to the summit, 6,998 feet above the sea, is wholly un- like Rigi. The slope is much steeper. Wild chasms yawn beneath, and rough precipices, over which tall spruces and firs extend. At Rigi we virtually climbed an inclined lawn and garden, in broad cars, with easy motion; at Pilatus the little puffing engine pushed us up with unpleasant vibration, on a much narrower track, continuously and unpleasantly steep; while the four or five dark and dripping tunnels collected the usual nauseous mixture of steam and coal smoke. Lit- 62 First Impressions of Europe tie cliff caves and grass, dotted at times with small flow- ers, yellow, red and blue, add scenic variety to Pilatus. The finest scenery for the first half of the ascent is on the right hand, thenceforward all the great gulfs and unscalable rock-faces border the left or west side of the track. The sky was tumultuous, now partially bright and clear, now with clouds sweeping up the shaggy moun- tain, obscuring all below. Once, wherever we looked from the Kulm, drifting clouds hid all below, the sun meanwhile shining brightly overhead. A calm pre- vailed, strangely enough at such a height, without suffi- cient wind to stir a grass blade. The railway station and hotel surmount a narrow ridge, overlooking north- wardly a most appalling precipice. Some hundred feet below, by the way we came, reposes a delightful little vale, where rich grass, on which cattle feed, sur- rounds an extensive snow bank. Views from Pilatus lack the Rigi color-brilliance, but no Rigi view equals, and we doubt if, given the most favorable atmospheric conditions, any earthly view can excel that over Lake Lucerne from half-way down Pilatus, where wild forest ravines, sheer precipices and splintered peaks compose the foreground, and every grand Alpine com- bination looms up beyond. Pilatus, named, by one account, from an improbable legend about Pontius Pilate, its top usually garlanded with cloud wreaths, even when sunshine bathes much loftier peaks, frowns threateningly over the city of Lu- cerne. The railway has proved unprofitable, for not- withstanding the grandeur and sublimity, the nervous person, giddy with peering into the profound gulfs and startled at the train's uncanny habit of slipping back- Interlaken and the Grindelwald 63 ward when halts are made for water, usually rests con- tent with one experience. INTERLAKEN AND THE GRINDELWALD The views between Lucerne and Interlaken, espe- cially at Brunig Pass, an elevation of 3,379 feet, and about Lake Brienz, are memorable, — the best that we obtained from trains during our travels; yet withal varied and pretty rather than wild or impressive. Some superb waterfalls, of great height although compara- tively small volume, freshened the dark cliffs and cone- topped evergreens with their drifting silvery sprays. The engine changed several times, as often happens in Switzerland, from the ordinary track to that called " rack and pinion." As we steamed down Lake Brienz, eight hundred feet of water lay beneath us; indeed Al- pine waters, generally, rival in depth America's huge inland seas. A vast amphitheatre of great hills, sug- gesting a natural coliseum, surrounds the lake; Lu- cerne-like irregularities and diversities are absent and one grand view discloses everything. At the upper end, Giessbach Fall, a beautiful descent of 1,100 feet in seven pitches, floats its misty veils above the pyramidal fir-tops. Both Brienz and its turbulent outlet, which, eager to add its quota to the majestic Rhine, pours through Interlaken, with great haste and astonishing volume, are milkish green from the peculiar white glacial silt called " rock flour." Interlaken is the most tourist favored, and deservedly so, of all Swiss resorts. Our restful Hotel Belle Site faced the celebrated mountain gap, and the glistening 64 First Impressions of Europe snows of the Jungfrau, a favorite view with photogra- phers. A visitor once waited here three weeks to obtain a cloudless view up the Gap. We, more fortune- favored, found each dark rock-face and scintillant snow-field clearly printing itself against an azure sky. In one section of Interlaken ancient unpainted wooden houses, irregularly grouped in wild disregard of street lines, with leaning walls, sagging roofs and broken balconies, still serve to shelter the humble poor. These rickety malodorous dwellings, like better Swiss cot- tages in the mountains, often have the color of burned sienna, with deep stains, while occasional masses of bright flowers about the balconies contrast oddly with the general decay. A fine old church tower rises near by, dating from 1285. By rail and coach we ascended the Grindelwald to the Upper Glacier, 4,300 feet above the sea, where an artificial grotto, which extends fifty feet into the clear blue ice, remains practically unchanged from year to year; an indication of feebleness, or even retrogression, in the general glacial movement. August temperatures of well above 80° Fahrenheit, although sufficient to cause the usual torrent, creamy white with rock flour, to burst forth from the glacier's base, have little effect upon its great solid mass. The glacier is most attractive a fourth of the way up, where rough bluish pinnacles form the surface. It possesses as a whole much of interest, yet little of grandeur. The great gulch between Grindelwald and Inter- laken's alluvial plain, where the winding course out- lines each beetling precipice in bold relief, presents impressive scenery; yet the valley, notwithstanding the huge cliffs and snows above is, like Rigi, rather Interlaken and the Grindelwald 65 beautiful than wild, cultivation existing wherever pos- sible, and green fields mingling with the lower snow patches. The stream within, augmented in its devious windings by feeders from the Lower Glacier and numer- ous gullies, and thoroughly opaque with white sedi- ment, becomes a most tumultuous roaring torrent. Aside from the vale of Grindelwald, we rather skirted than actually entered the Alps. In Swiss travel generally, it is preferable to avoid cities, and seek hotels far up ravines, whence high-altitude ex- cursions involve less sudden change than that experi- enced in reaching perpetual snows within a few hours of leaving sun-baked valleys. Alpine exhilaration seems at times to cause peculiar cerebral instability. As we penetrated the romantic Grindelwald, about all of the party decided to ascend Jungfrau before returning, a decision ignominiously revoked at dinner by fully one- third of them. After dinner the Jungfrau volunteers dwindled down to the Judge and Richard Roe, and they, in turn, wavered until the last available train puffed off. Later, descend- ing the valley, the Judge proposed to Roe to leave the Interlaken train, ascend Scheinige Platte, and join the party, a day late, at Geneva. Roe promptly as- sented to the confusion of His Honor, who merely wished to create a better impression, after the Jungfrau episode; in truth he cordially disliked high altitudes, even Rigi-Kulm. The more sedative air of a yet lower level caused Mr. Roe to suggest that Scheinige Platte attractions were probably exaggerated; whereupon the Judge, feeling safe ground, and shrewdly guessing that we had passed the proper station, ostensibly pre- pared to start for the mountain at once. Finally Zerelli, E 66 First Impressions of Europe the long suffering guide, wearied with all their ques- tions about Scheinige Platte, answered by loud snoring, an excellent method of determining their Alpine am- bitions and perplexities* THE CITY AND LAKE OF GENEVA The scenery, on our journey by rail from Interlaken via Berne to Lausanne, and thence by steamer to Ge- neva, aside from lakes, resembled that of Germany; pretty, but without special features, until we ap- proached Lausanne. Then, indeed, a grand pano- ramic view was revealed; down great slopes as com- pletely vine-clad as the Rhine's, over little slumbering hamlets far beneath, and southward across the waters, wide and so intensely blue, to the distant peaks of the Pennine Alps. Geneva, or Leman, which in area slightly exceeds Lake Constance, is Europe's largest lake, west of Russia, and its circumnavigation by steamer requires a full day. Contemporaneous differ- ences of level, called seiches, are observed on its surface, due to variances in atmospheric pressure. Near the western end Mt. Blanc, the silvered dome of Europe, cuts sharply into the skyline, while in the foreground attractive villages border the water-front with walled gardens. Geneva itself proved disappointing, probably be- cause extremely hot weather prevailed, and the potent stimulus of Alpine environment had been too suddenly withdrawn from us. Its principal feature is the outlet of the mighty Rhone, whose wondrously cerulean The City and Lake of Geneva 67 waters after encompassing a small island devoted to memories of Rousseau, soon break into powerful rap- ids. A line of great roofed laundry barges, equipped with every abluent appliance, hangs by chains in these rushing waters. Myriads of wash-boards project over the gurgling eddies; and wrinkled harridans, while busily plying their useful calling, chuckle in senile mirth when beer is carried out to them over gang- planks. Although contrasting rivers frequently unite, the famous "meeting of the waters" just below Geneva, where the Rhone and Arve converge, is probably un- paralleled; the Rhone water so blue — blue even as small quantities appear in a porcelain tub — the smaller Arve so unwholesomely silted with ochreish "Alpine flour," finely ground detritus washed from the tre- mendous Mer de Glace. The Rhone is Europe's swiftest river, one of the world's swiftest, and keeps up its mad pace from source to mouth. Threading Geneva's narrower lanes and courts we thought how, after all, the oldest towns we had visited, in their very existence, extended but half-way down the dim historical perspective. Geographical discovery in early times actually developed more slowly, north of Italy, than it has over darkest Africa in our day. Polyb- ius and Ptolemy were puzzled about the true sources of the Rhone and Rhine ; and in the time of Herodotus the whole Alpine range was unknown to the Greeks. European travel, also, has lost, merely within two centuries, its early flavor of romance. The courtly Evelyn hunted wolves near Paris, narrowly escaped from fierce Swiss brigands, robbed by footpads, re- mained all night roped to a tree, and in crossing the 68 First Impressions of Europe English channel had, as he says, "a pleasant passage, although chased for some hours by a pyrate." THE JOURNEY TO PARIS A beautiful cool day, following an oppressive week, enhanced the enjoyment of our long journey from Geneva to Paris. We rested at hill-perched Lausanne where in June, 1787, Gibbon, inspired by the incom- parable prospect, finished his monumental history of Rome. Charming rose beds here border the inclined railway from the station to the lake. Between Leman's broad expanse and the Swiss frontier there lies a charm- ing country, with ever-varying semi-mountainous views and deep ravines, quite Canadian-like in their dark mantles of spruce and fir. Beyond Pontparlier the flat valley of the Saone, embracing the old Province of Burgundy, is less interesting. Indeed from the frontier to Paris we found the usual scarceness of detached cottages between the villages, and little to reflect upon save Dijon's venerable towers. At the Pontparlier customhouse trouble awaited our most corpulent and merry co-traveler, a teacher from Baltimore. He was feeling particularly joyous, when the French officials, noting no ostensible cause for merriment, concluded that he must be "laughing at France," arrested him, and dragged him off to a building nearby for examination and search. The party became greatly excited. Several Irish members rolled up their coat sleeves, demanding immediate trial by combat. Gendarmes boarded the train. Mean- while the prisoner and his guards held lively debate, The Journey to Paris 69 70 First Impressions of Europe neither side at all comprehending the other. Zerelli appeared, pale in his wholesome dread of the consti- tuted authorities, and stated that the prisoner desired to apologize, a statement the prisoner vehemently denied. Zerelli, however, won his point by lifting the merry man's hat from his head and humbly bowing himself, all of which he declared to be done by proxy. The commissionnaire finally dismissed our friend, now much fatigued by the ordeal, with the peculiar parting injunction " Do not laugh again in France! " Later we changed to a much overcrowded train, and waited for dinner, anxiously if not ravenously, until after nine o'clock. Informed at last that all the delec- table French messes were prepared, we traversed four or five carriages only to find the "diner" closed, and to stand another half hour in the adjoining vestibule. Our first impressions of France found expression in malediction ill-suppressed. PARIS The world's gay metropolis of fashion and art, pat- ronized even yet by the holy St. Genevieve who died there fourteen centuries ago, quite suggests, when viewed comprehensively, an enlarged Brussels. The expectant stranger as his eye first roams over Paris may experience, as with London, some contraction of cherished preconceptions. The colorings seem less vivid, the street perspectives less impressive, the famous buildings a little less magnificent than, from the hear- say of lecture, book and painting, he has been led to expect If he is obliged to depart, however, as we were, Paris 71 after a brief week's visit, the painful sense of small accomplishment provokes exasperation. Parts of Paris, to strangers, present geographical puzzles, as many curving boulevards closely alike in appearance intersect at low angles, while in London, by contrast, narrow clustered lanes more often separate the great streets. In both cities many leading streets with their continuations are polynomial, which height- ens the confusion. In Paris a few steps take you from the Boulevard des Capucines with three names, to the Boulevard Haussman, having, with its prolongations, no less than seven. So, in London, Nottinghill, Bays- water Road, Oxford and New Oxford Streets, Holborn, Newgate Street, Cheapside, Cornhill and Leadenhall, all virtually form one lengthy thoroughfare that twists through the metropolis like a distended boa-constrictor. Each city has its muddy much-walled river. The Seine, without perceptible current at low water, is more canal-like than the Thames. In both streams fisher- men patiently dangle lines all day, and hook more snags and tin cans than edible aqueous vertebrates. A single week in Paris merely enables the visitor to flit sparrow-like from place to place, collecting hosts of misty impressions. The magnificent gothic Cathe- dral of Notre Dame, with its immense stained windows, a product of the twelfth century, lingers in the memory, and so does the gloomy conciergerie, where Marie Antoinette paused in her mournful descent from palace to guillotine. At Notre Dame the priesthood's custom- ary osteological taste is indicated by the cervical verte- brae of a bishop, killed in the Revolution. One stands in awe before Napoleon's massive unlettered tomb at the Church of the Invalides, where light streams 72 First Impressions of Europe through blue glass windows upon walls and floor of white marble. This veneration of the great Corsican markedly contrasts with the rude disposal, after the English Restoration, of iron-souled Cromwell's re- mains, yet Cromwell's life presents some decided Napo- leonic analogies. After driving through a squalid section, where swarms of dirty little boys fought like tom-cats for pennies thrown to them, we happened upon the famous ceme- tery of Pere Lachaise. Over the vaults, little stone houses, five to eight feet high, inwardly decorated with artificial flowers, are in places closely ranged, as if bordering miniature streets, and leave little intervening room for trees or shrubbery. Lovers of romance con- stantly throw fresh flowers upon the large tomb of Abelard and Eloise, although this couple's pathetic story closed nearly eight centuries ago. Abelard's remains, originally deposited at Cluny, and five times carried from one spot to another, were finally interred at Pere Lachaise in 1817. Wherever we went in the Parisian parks and boule- vards, and especially in the Champs-Elysees, the leaves had turned a rusty brown; a surprising fact, as else- where the foliage, rural and urban, was fresh and green, even at a later time. Nightly and daily we rambled about, starting from Hotel St. Petersburg, Rue Cau- martin, a central situation; and varied our walks from a leisurely afternoon stroll in the shady Jardin des Tuileries, where soft music filled the air, to a midnight excursion down the Rue de La Fayette (a locality not too safe), or to a survey of picture shops in the Palais Royal's enticing arcades. Oftentimes we rested, for a glass of wine, where little flower-decked tables dotted Paris 73 broad sidewalks. After-effects of our slight overdose of Rubens, taken in the Netherlands, rather than normal lack of appreciation, caused a regretful neglect of the great art collections. As with most good things of life, satiety follows a too steady diet of "artocathe- dralism." Ville d'Avray, an odd little village of many walls, and to us the most interesting spot in Europe, slumbers peacefully beside the road to Versailles and quite near Paris. A century ago King Louis Philippe, that mon- arch of many vicissitudes, bestowed, probably during his exile at the court of Ferdinand of Naples, the titular emoluments of this quaint hamlet upon an ancestral connection of ours. We failed, through sheer inability to make the natives understand us, to find its ruined chateau and grassy pond so often sketched by Corot. Everywhere about Paris, indeed, we experienced greater linguistic difficulties than had confronted us in former years among humble Canadian habitants. Well says Bacon, "He that travelleth into a country before he hath some entrance into the language, goeth to school and not to travel." A distinguishing feature of Paris is the Bohemian life; not a typically French life, for it is absent in other cities of France, but simply Parisian. It seems as if mere accident had started Paris this way, and that, once so started, the volatile Frenchman had striven to make the city justify its peculiar reputation. Cer- tainly in some sections affairs seem largely conducted, from midnight to dawn, under the distinguished pat- ronage of the Devil. Our guide through this Bohemia, M. de M , attributed his youthful appearance, — he was forty-two years of age and seemed twenty-five 74 First Impressions of Europe — to his habit of retiring, except on special occasions, at half past one every night, while his brother Bohemians preferred to witness the advent of rosy dawn. De M , whose cards were inscribed "the gentleman guide," performed his duties largely con amove, as he derived a snug income from a certain unique invention (the result of two years' patient industry) by which, on dropping a few centimes into a box, various young ladies in attenuated attire, who appeared pictorially on the sides of the box, were made to arise, as if by magic, and dance and kick distractedly. A moderate aspect of erratic Parisian life unfolds at the Boule Cafe, Moulin Rouge and Dead Rat, gay re- sorts about the Boulevard de Clichy, where the legal limitations of less favored cities are but slightly ex- ceeded. Small parties of wealthy " Americanos " or English, gentlemen apparently, with closely veiled la- dies of their own station, frequently take central po- sitions amid the festivities, and sit motionless, like stat- uary, taking no active part, although keenly alert to all things said and done. The Parisian, confident in the rectitude of his peculiar life, regards these "animated busts" as hypocrites, and purposely stirs his compan- ions to excesses, whereat the statuary is aroused to feeble signs of life, — for is not this the wickedness they have come so far to see ? A venerable bearded wizard, at his desk in the Moulin Rouge, professionally investigates French titles of nobility, and possesses a mine of genealogical data. Although no charlatan, as might be supposed, he would, we fear, if sufficiently paid, "cook the evidence," in favor of young Monsieur, who contemplates bride- hunting in New York or Chicago. A wizard's pedigree Versailles 75 bureau is oddly located in such a vortex of bacchana- lian revelry. VERSAILLES The all-day drive from Paris to Versailles by way of the extensive Bois de Boulogne and historic Pare de St. Cloud, returning by Sevres, of pottery fame, and other straggling Parisian suburbs, cannot fail to at- tract all visitors not hopelessly blase. For miles of the way, the Eiffel Tower, man's best effort to reach Heaven from a low level, is seen to thrust skyward, and high above all meaner objects, its delicate steel tracery, painted bright orange yellow. As on the way to Hamp- ton Court, ragged children, here girls as well as boys, run beside the 'bus for centimes, the boys turning fre- quent hand springs. Versailles is rich in palaces. The Fourteenth and mightiest Louis built the Grand Trianon, a low palace of mixed pink and yellow material, for his favorite Madame de Maintenon, whom he nicknamed Madame Stability, rather for her mental than her corporal at- tractions. An adjoining coach-house holds the sedan chair of Marie Antoinette; highly carved state car- riages of Napoleon and other monarchs, more bril- liantly gilt-coated, if possible, than those of London's worshipful Lord Mayor; and a half dozen ancient royal sleighs of odd construction. These sleighs have posterior mid-air projections, where once sat footmen warming their feet in lined sockets attached to the main bodies of the sleighs. The principal palace, surely a fifth of a mile long, 76 First Impressions of Europe might well have inspired Le Grand Monarque, aside from his absorption of political functions, to exclaim " Uetat? C'est moi" as he gazed from its rear windows over the magnificent sloping park, where lawns, gar- dens, forests, shrubberies and artificial lakes form a tout ensemble outri vailing Wolsey's performance at Hampton Court. Small paths, branching from the broad central avenue, lead to cosy grottoes in forest glades, where groups of statuary encircle little ponds. One grotto is as striking as that at the Lion of Lucerne. Trees, by careful training, rear umbrageous gothic arches over the paths, while in the bordering glades, darkly shadowed by thick foliage, ivy twists up every trunk. All this is behind the palace. The broad cob- blestone courtyard in front is wholly unrelieved by shrubberies or grass. Within the palace great picture galleries exemplify all qualities of brushwork, from famous masterpieces to deplorable daubs. Our guide, when questioned about a crude battle scene, sub-infernally splashed with yel- low and crimson, remarked apologetically, "The ex- hibition is not intended to be wholly artistic, but to represent also the military glory of France. " It is sin- ful to have art galleries here at all, unless it be possible without blocking side windows, adding new dome- shaped roofs with skylights, and otherwise transform- ing a place so fraught with historical memories. The chapel and long ballroom are the most imposing apart- ments at Versailles. Antiquities are few, aside from the gorgeous gilded bedsteads of Louis XIV and of the Empress Josephine, as well as Napoleon's short and massive couch, which vaguely suggests the great man himself, and has its due share of gilt and yellow silk. St. Albans 77 Josephine's couch, a miniature Eiffel Tower in height, supports a wealth of weird ghost-like draperies. As we stood where Marie Antoinette, hearing that the populace lacked bread, had recommended cake as an agreeable substitute, an uncontrollable ebullition of democratic fervor possessed our worthy judicial friend from Ohio. The great White Palace — Versailles, while light pink in front, is almost white in the rear — looms up most grandly from positions well down in the park, its vast extent requiring a long perspective. ST. ALBANS Having decided, after our return to England via Boulogne and Folkestone, to inspect the antiquities in and about St. Albans, we were most fortunate, in alighting from the train at that reposeful town, to meet the verger of a north-country cathedral, well versed, as most vergers are not, in ecclesiastical architecture, and bent upon investigations similar to ours. The famous Abbey, a cathedral since 1877, can boast of a Norman Tower, seemingly its newest and best preserved part although in fact the oldest, composed of Roman material from the neighboring ruins of Ver- ulamium. Native clays, when moulded by Roman hands, invariably attained this unequalled perfection of solidity and durability. The body of the church, originally built with the cemented flint stones and red brick of the Romans, and restored, in part, through Lord Grimthorpe's industrious ingenuity, with wholly different material, now presents an odd appearance. 78 First Impressions of Europe St. Michael's church, where Bacon, the versatile sage of St. Albans, was laid to rest, dates originally from far off Saxon times, and exhibits the typical struc- tural variations of many epochs. Experts can deter- mine the age of these churches from the architecture with extraordinary accuracy. Our verger, requesting his brother of St. Michael's to withhold information until his own opinion was first expressed, proceeded to indicate correctly the age of each succeeding restora- tive touch in the venerable windows, walls and arch- ways amid which we stood. A "squint" or circular aperture in the outer wall of St. Michael's permitted lepers, without spreading their dread malady, to re- ceive the necessary spiritual edification. Verulam or Verulamium, for several centuries Rome's capitol of her British Province, and probably the first Roman foundation in England, occupied the site of the chief fortress of the ancient Britons, finally captured by assaults of Caesar's legions, after a prolonged de- fence by the intrepid Cassivelaunus. We viewed here a profoundly historic spot. Except in a few places, only the contour of the ground now marks the city's site. In an open field stands the largest remnant of the old wall, perhaps fifty feet long by fifteen in height, built with rough masses of cemented flint stones, interstratified with occasional layers of thin red brick tiles. Beneath this flinty rampart we leisurely stretched ourselves out on the grass, while the verger told us how he had once assisted in opening St. Cuthbert's long- closed tomb, and described similar weird cryptic ad- ventures. Before us lay a placid vale, once an artificial lake rippled by prows of ornamented Roman galleys. No sound, other than the lowing of cattle, or mellow Torquay and Vicinity 79 chimes from distant belfries, drifted over those smooth pastures, where formerly fierce gladiators, the human tigers of a merciless age, struggled, with net and trident, to the amphitheatre's hoarse applause. Verulamium closely resembled Pompeii in area and general plan. It was used as a quarry for two centuries, and from this vandalism many old buildings of St. Albans derive their materials. An attractive shaded lane, partly bounded by a deep fossa or ditch, supposedly pre-Roman, leads from the present town past the eastern end of Verulamium. The Round House, duly placarded as "The oldest inhabited house in England," and now used as a tavern, faces this lane. Its foundation, more ancient than the oaken superstructure, is said to date from a. d. 795. Having dined with the verger at the Bell Tavern and caught the last London train, we closed a day's outing of which the memory should long be green. As our " conducted " tour fortunately terminated at Paris, we were enjoying once more the esprit de corps of a "free lance," uncircumscribed by vexatious dates and sched- ules. TORQUAY AND VICINITY Between London and Torquay a more pleasing land- scape unfolds than that of the Midlands, with wider views, more graceful tree groupings, and broader fields, less patchworked with hedges — for hedges even, while far superior to America's low stone walls and ragged wooden fences, may become monotonous when, in number and arrangement, they suggest a boundless 80 First Impressions of Europe checker-board. Below Exeter some of the villages seem fairly wedged into crannies of the bright red sea-cliffs. Torquay, while par excellence the most fashionable and attractive of English shore resorts, is a modern place, with few antiquities, barring a remnant of old Tor Abbey. Yet it hardly looks youthful, as high and massive walls border the more elevated streets and lanes — formidable lithic entrenchments, said to prevent trespassing, yet so situated in places along the beach as to seem of meagre value for use or ornament, unless to withstand spray-splash during storms. One gentle- man's estate bounds the highway by a vertical escarp- ment some fifteen feet high, yet the inevitable wall above is as lofty as ever, and exhibits the usual embel- lishment of broken bottles. The wall-building pro- pensity seems here carried to an extreme. Pleasant gardened villas and singularly exuberant vegetation completely cover Torquay's steep slopes, while the busi- ness section extends compactly along the underlying harbor front. The coast scenery thereabouts is soothing and delightful, especially at Anstey Cove, a rugged nook, closed in by precipitous sea-sculptured cliffs, pink and gray in coloring. Our one break in travel's constant routine was the week we spent at Le Chalet, the residence of our friends in Torquay, a pretty terraced estate, which commands extensive and picturesque views of all Tor Bay, where beautiful yachts, one with bright green sails, ride at anchor, and vicious little torpedo-boats dart swiftly hither and thither like black scorpions. As it was re- gatta week, pyrotechnic displays of wonderful bril- liancy appeared from the lawn at night. Great crowds follow the regattas, which completely alter the aspect Torquay and Vicinity 81 of these coast towns, and are held successively in many places. Booths, merry-go-rounds, side-shows worthy of a Barnum, all hastily erected, display flags and col- ored bunting, while buildings and squares gayly sparkle with electric lights and Chinese lanterns. When not stirred up by regattas Devon people pass the idle hour much as we do. Croquet seems in vogue; also bridge- whist, and that seductive provoker of gossip and in- digestion, the five o'clock tea. Small steamers ascend the famous estuary of the Dart, twelve miles in length, to where that little river disembogues, just below the ancient village of Totnes. The estuary affords the best scenery of its kind in Eng- land; and a few enthusiasts call it, rather ambitiously, the " English Rhine." In places fine forest covers the slopes, extending so closely to the water that the wide spreading foliage is gently tide-kissed. The regatta was in progress at Dartmouth, and after our steamer had returned down the estuary, we partook of a late dinner, with roast fowl and champagne, at the Royal Castle Inn, watching the while a gorgeous display of parti-colored lights in the square outside. Navy people much patronize this famous and typical old tavern, which, in its antique construction, so vividly recalled the Maypole of Dickens that we looked about instinc- tively for Mr. Willet, honest Gabriel Varden and Bar- naby's loquacious raven. A feature of European scenery, aside from decay of Roman and feudal foundations, is its stability. In America charming cascades, like the Shawanegan, are constantly being harnessed to unsightly pulp-mills, and fine woodlands become dismal flame-scorched plains, where mantles of purple fire-weed surround F 82 First Impressions of Europe the gaunt black skeletons of noble trees. By contrast the early European guide-books, omitting mention of the railways and hotels, will serve fairly well for twenti- eth century use. We find a minute description of the Dart, a half century old, which aptly fits that snug brackish inlet as it appears to-day. Kent's Cavern near Torquay has helped very largely to determine the age of prehistoric man. As we suc- cessively passed on our journey from old taverns to feudal castles, from Saxon abbeys to Roman walls, the limit of available retrospect seemed reached, but here at Kent's Cavern lived the men who chipped flint arrow- heads, as they crouched beside their smouldering fires, and who had watched the hairy mammoth wallowing in the Thames, while lions and hyenas wrangled for prey on the present site of St. Paul's. The cavern ex- tends irregularly inward about a hundred yards, with branch passages, ever varying in width and height and gradually sloping downward. Alternate layers of stalactite and marl expose innumerable bones of cave mammals, with occasional human remains and imple- ments. Stalactites and stalagmites of all shapes and sizes illustrate how curiously Dame Nature combines chemistry with mechanics in her dark subterranean laboratories. The cave, even if well lighted, could hardly be beau- tiful, as the lime deposits are mostly stained a dull reddish brown. Bones of cave bears and hyenas look strangely in the solid mass overhead, instead of beneath your feet, a condition due to artificial excavation. Human inscriptions, bearing date of 1571, and of the seventeenth century, and cased with transparent stalag- mite, in places a twentieth of an inch thick, afford a Chester 83 rough yet valuable key to the time required to form the greater deposits, many feet in depth, where bones of man and mammoth repose side by side. CHESTER Chester, anciently Deva, which overlooks the broad- ening estuary of the Dee, a once greater commercial channel than the Mersey, claims to be the most per- fectly walled of British cities. Little Conway, over the Welsh border, disdainfully, and we think justly, scouts Chester's mural precedence. The Chester walls, which vary from twelve to forty feet in height, are sur- prisingly narrow, usually not above five feet broad, and have Roman subfoundations. In places small trees and shrubs press closely up on one side, while on the other lie open fields. The walls often wind pictur- esquely through back yards and small gardens, and again become one-sided, flagged of the same width as elsewhere, but at present so graded up as to serve merely ior retaining the highway. In the little Phoenix or Newton Tower, at an angle of the wall, ill-fated Charles 1 descried his army defeated on Rowton Moor. Numer- o is Roman relics, including props of a hypocaust, ornament an enclosure adjoining the Water Tower. H ^re we met a gentleman who fully shared our admira- ti( n of the surrounding novelties, and we wondered if he came from Tasmania or Borneo, until he remarked th? t his home was in Liverpool, just fifteen miles away. Having descended the wall to visit the ancient Cathe- dral, and its dreamy old cloisters once traversed by the sandalled friar, various familiar names were seen 84 First Impressions of Europe on sculptured stone and monumental brass. How often, in England, well-known names and places appear by mere accident! In such manner Shooter's Hill first confronted us; and in the London anatomical museum, the day before leaving for Chester, we paused to inspect a peculiar skull, which proved to be that of Eugene Aram. The famous Rows are not overhead oaken projec- tions, as might naturally be expected, but stone-paved terraces, some six or seven feet above the street level, having shops on one or both sides of the walk, and just high enough to admit of other small shops beneath. This unique street-terrace formation may be partly due to peculiar topographical conditions brought about by the Romans, who, it is said, carved down the two principal streets through solid rock to a depth of ten or twelve feet. Stanley Palace, dating from 1591, and the most interesting of Chester's wooden antiquities, overlooks a little court leading from the principal street. It was the town house of the unfortunate Earl of Derby, and there within a small chamber, a mere mural recess, he lay concealed for many days prior to his execution in 1657. A trap-door and a dark subterranean passage, now somewhat obstructed, lead to Chester Castle, a half-mile distant. These small town "palaces" of the old noblesse, pleasure resorts in peaceful times, often contrast strongly with their formidable castles in the country. Derby Palace narrowly escaped transporta- tion to Chicago during the World's Fair, but local pride fortunately vanquished commercial vandalism. Quaint old gabled houses — God's Providence House, Bishop Lloyds, the Yacht Inn, where Swift stayed, a 1 ■''■-' W$ \ ■ w -Jt.* z£S*~ tar .-.' . ..'.• ■ ' : ■'"■■/■ ii ■■A.'' ii Eaton Hall 85 score of others, Tudor and pre-Tudor — greet the Ches- ter wanderer at every turn. Venerable St. John's Church, of pleasing interior from its warm red sand- stone, closely adjoins the fine ruin of a yet more an- cient church, to-day a mere ivy-wreathed lithic skeleton, in part of unknown age. The soft sandstone on many old Chester buildings yields rather easily to "the cor- roding tooth of time." Entering a paper shop under Bridge Street Row, and descending steps in the rear, we stood beside a great stone tank, perhaps ten feet deep by five feet wide, undoubtedly Roman, and possi- bly once a plunge bath. An aperture in the adjoining wall disclosed a little vista of clustered Roman columns, short and sturdy, supporting concrete ; the whole, when not too closely examined, resembling a natural cave, braced by thick stalactites. The Romans probably lighted fires here to heat the air above, a partial sub- stitute for the modern Turkish bath. EATON HALL In England, local and family history are inseparable. As, in early days, the Percy and the Beauchamp in- delibly impressed their names on many a stricken field and ivied tower, so the Grosvenors, although of less ancient renown, have long dominated the vicinage of Chester. Eaton Hall, the splendid mansion of that family's ducal chief, extensively remodelled some years ago at a cost of nearly two million pounds, adorns the ancestral park of the same name; and overlooks at the rear a garden red with flowers that gently slopes to the Dee. A visitor, having conjured up imaginative pic- 86 First Impressions of Europe tures of now ruined castles in the brave days when valiant knights and their faithful squires, returning wearied from the tourney or the chase, reclined on rush-covered floors to harken to the minstrel's lay and the spluttering of damp logs in the great open chim- neys, may observe to-day at Eaton Hall what furnishing and adornment a great modern peer finds essential to his proud position. In the entrance hall massive coats of arms, in heavy gilt frames, overhang the fireplaces. We pause before a carved representation of the old lawsuit between Sir Robert Grosvenor and the Lord Scroope, regarding alleged armorial infringements; most celebrated, probably, of all such controversies, where a jury of forty stout knights and barons, rigid on the score of their old noblesse, unravelled hundreds of ill-written depositions, including that of the poet Chaucer. When gentility hinged solely on armorial inheritance, any theft of quarterings became serious. Many years after the Grosvenor-Scroope controversy, Queen Elizabeth, "having founde divers and sundry persones presumptuouslie and contemptuouslie to usurpe the Dignities of Gentlemen," caused the plebeian offenders to be "at theire perills reprooved and con- trowled." The splendid family portraits range downward from the earlier Grosvenors to the beautiful duchess of the present day. Two great companion pictures, a superbly ferocious combat of bear and hounds from the brush of our old friend Rubens, and an equally doubtful strife of hounds and lion by Snyders, were painted in competition. What a pity the great masters did not turn their attention more often from Madonnas and de- parted saints! The ducal library, grandest of all the Eaton Hall 87 apartments, and used on occasion for balls, contains twelve thousand rarely-bound volumes. Any wealthy city might be proud of a chapel such as that at Eaton Hall — a very epitome of architectural taste and ele- gance. The bold equestrian statue of Hugh Lupus before the Hall's chief entrance, and the inscription "Hugh Lupus Grosvenor" on the late Duke's tomb in Chester, suggest a present claim of descent from Gilbertus Le Grosvenor, reputed nephew to the wolfish Hugh — a pedigree severely criticised of late.* Possibly His Grace of Westminster may have to seek consolation in his family motto " Semper virtus non stemma." Earl Hugh Lupus, so gluttonous and magnificently prodigal, is described by Ordericus, a contemporary, as "given much to his belly, whereby in time he grew so fat that he could scarce crawle." In the late afternoon, with a London gentleman and his niece, co-explorers of the Grosvenor domain, we returned to Chester by steamer down the Dee; surely a nice little river, of scenery as pleasing as, while more contracted than, that of the Dart's estuary. Near Chester a few fine estates with flowery gardens slope quite abruptly to the water. Houses are more scarce above; and low and level fields alternate with woodland patches and more elevated ground. Above Dee Bridge, erected by submissive Chester in 1280 under peremp- tory mandate from the stern uncompromising Edward, the river pitches by a small fall into a famous salmon pool, more murky than Canada's green and amber pools, yet said to contain, in season, many fish. * See "The Ancestor," No. 1, p. 166. 88 First Impressions of Europe CONWAY AND CARNARVON Few monuments of mediaeval war compare with Conway and Carnarvon castles, erected about con- temporaneously and from plans by the same architect, in the relentless strife of u Longshanks " versus Llewel- lyn. At Conway Castle, now as ruinous as Kenilworth, ivy, grass and flowering plants crown the crumbling gray stone turrets and battlements. The Great Hall — the principal room in any castle — was here a hundred and thirty feet long; its roof supported by stone arches, of which only one remains intact. Countless birds, nesting in these ruins, and amid the ivy, twitter noisily at evening, when undisturbed by prowling tourists. We quietly smoked, and watched them, where the lowering sun cast an orange glow through breaches in the walls down into the very chamber where the first Edward, with his first queen, Eleanor of Castile, spent Christmas Eve, six centuries ago. Carnarvon Castle is larger than Conway, darker in color, every way more grim and prison-like, a maze of dark stairways and passages, in threading which we often lost our way. It is also better preserved, although the Great Hall has been carted off long since for its material. Constant repairs have obviated a general restoration. Lofty chambered walls and yet loftier turrets surround three acres of inner court, carpeted with verdant grass. Carnarvon, grander though less picturesque than Conway, exhibits the octagonal tower, Conway having that of the smooth rounded type. Each of these castles, unlike Warwick, Kenilworth, Windsor and many others, dates wholly from a single period, and was constructed for a single purpose, Conway and Carnarvon 89 ultimately accomplished after fierce unremitting con- flict and dreadful loss of life. In all these ruined castles the great towers, which once contained the larger and better rooms, excepting the banquet halls, oddly enough now form but hollow cylinders of impressive depth, pitted with sockets that held floor timbers long since decayed. We find open fireplaces, yet darkly smoke- stained, in wholly inacces- sible situations, often fifty feet or more above the ground level. Conway town, so cosy and compact, pleased us im- mensely, as it occupies a charming site, with exceptional scenic variety, bare rugged hills, undulating farm land, a patch of forest, verdant meadows, the tidal estuary and the open sea beyond. At the Castle Hotel, so an- cient, homelike and old-fashioned, no noisy city traffic disturbs the jaded traveler's repose. Conway seems literally squeezed small by its mighty surrounding walls; beside which those of Chester look diminutive in all save length. The masonry, much decayed, seems hardly safe in places. A narrow grassy path, only four or five feet wide, but well-railed, follows the top, and overlooks chimney pots and small trees, often at a rather dizzy height. Stray towers uprise, one a lofty commanding view-point. Within these grim walls the fierce Llewellyn once got "Long- shanks" cooped up. Starvation nearly forced the de- termined old fellow into surrender. Near the north gate a little two-storied house in- scribed "the smallest house in England," a statement readily believed, is wedged tightly between higher buildings, and cannot exceed five feet in width by eight or nine in depth. Conway has also the Plas Mawyr, 90 First Impressions of Europe to which many legends in default of historic facts are attached — a Tudor mansion of 1580, centrally situated, and surpassing anything even in Chester as an archi- tectural antique. The peasantry about Conway, ac- cording to our landlady, adhere tenaciously to Welsh racial characteristics, which include a morbid love of spectacular funerals. Wales pleased us, scenically, above central or south- ern England. Between Chester and Carnarvon the railway usually skirts the sea or low flats dotted with stray stone houses; while southward many villages in endless chain, nestle beneath the highlands. Over Conway Mountain (808 feet) and other hills, mostly bare of trees, adjoining it southwesterly, extend carpets of small-bladed grass, scarlet heather in extensive beds, and yellow gorse, forming that gold and purple land- scape so often painted. Remains of a formidable fortress supposedly early British crown Conway Moun- tain, and form a quadrangle fifty feet in length, bordered by piles of small loose stones, that resemble fallen walls of a burned building, and disclose in one place only, for three or four feet, the original masonry. Some pe- culiar stone circles, barely elevated above the ground level, indicate semi-savage abodes of our early ancestors. We wandered leisurely about this mountain, to enjoy our first unqualified freedom since leaving America. Elsewhere the street line, grim wall, impenetrable hedge, danger of trespass, had restrained us, and had caused a slight mental depression, which, when half slumbering on this cool summit, and fanned by fragrant sea breezes, we first had opportunity to analyze. We wondered if natives ever experienced this constraintive feeling. England even in its populous parts has "walks," so De Omnibus Rebus 91 called, ways of prescription or ancient grant, which by traversing green fields, and crossing babbling brooks offer some relief to street-jaded pedestrians. A few patches of open moorland and forest also remain, rarely found by strangers. But America surely pos- sesses a decided advantage over England in its great uninhabited areas, where man may freely commune with nature — an advantage likely to continue far be- yond our day, notwithstanding a pernicious tendency in certain parts to sell or lease vast wilderness tracts to millionaires. DE OMNIBUS REBUS A surprise in many interurban parts of Europe is the fewness of scattered houses between the towns and villages, a feature which lessens the interest of railway travel. Some views disclose no habitations, and many sections of New England seem, by comparison, more populous. The country people reside mostly in com- pact villages whence they emerge to till the soil, instead of living in the more scattered American way. In England these conditions may have arisen partly from the large aristocratic land holdings (seven hundred and ten persons now own one-quarter of all England and Wales), and partly because the villagers, in early times, huddled together for mutual protection, or for protec- tion by their powerful over-lords. America's more careless pioneers, scornful of the lurking savage, scat- tered widely through the forest. Such village segrega- tion is noticeable in parts of the English midlands, on leaving London from St. Pancras; in journeying from 92 First Impressions of Europe Switzerland to Paris via Dijon; and on leaving Paris from the Gare du Nord for Boulogne. It seems less marked in western Germany and parts of Switzerland, and is usually not found at all along sea-coasts and river banks. European railways are unduly maligned in America. The lines are of better average construction than ours, and display a wealth of expensive masonry and grade- avoiding tunnels. English trains closely conform to schedule time, and passengers can barely note the very gentle beginning and cessation of motion at the sta- tions. Train speed is not great in Belgium, Holland and Switzerland, while in England, on an average, it exceeds ours, and in France may be about the same. Some fast English expresses cover above two hundred miles without stopping, and "slip carriages," un- hitched without delaying the train, not infrequently accommodate passengers for intermediate stations. Many Swiss engines are adapted for alternation be- tween the ordinary track and the "rack and pinion." The first locomotive, by the way, ever made to run on ordinary smooth rails, was Puffing Billy, invented by William Hedley in 1813. European trains less fre- quently collide, or roll over embankments than do ours, for which we find a partial excuse in our greater per capita mileage and the annual track-disruption by frosts. The commodious foreign stations, which con- tain refreshment rooms where liquors may be obtained with or without food, are often approached by pictur- esque flower beds. In England the want of a general checking system is effectually obviated by the numer- ous porters, who fairly swarm about, eager, for six- pence, to perform about any act short of high treason. De Omnibus Rebus 93 An excellent practice is that of booking special seats in advance. Writers have noted the silent reserve of the English when casually met in traveling. We found them actually chatty, and ready enough to initiate the conversational " ice breaking." How like a toy train! we thought, as a line of com- pact little cars left the Northwestern Station at Liver- pool, the engine emitting diminutive whistles or squeaks, wholly unlike the American locomotive's unearthly screech. The freight or " goods " cars, tiny contriv- ances indeed to serve for a great country's transportation business, were yet more wonderful to unaccustomed eyes. On the Continent the engines vary much in construction; a few acquiring through their coloring a picturesqueness long lost to American rolling stock. Photographs and pictures of places along the line, very helpful to inquiring tourists, adorn the compartments on English railroads; an advantage, however, which certain disadvantages outweigh. Fewer passengers se- cure window seats than in America, while partitions obstruct the most comfortable sight-line. All things considered, American cars on English lines would seem a proper combination. On our way to Chester the front carriage was twice oddly mentioned as "the top of the train." The subject of hotels and restaurants is a delicate one, opinions varying widely. Personally we think that a given sum of money produces a better equivalent in food and service in our own large eastern cities than in England or Continental countries. English country inns, however, although rapidly becoming too high- priced, excel, as is generally conceded, those of rural America. An element of special service, of adaptation 94 First Impressions of Europe to wishes of particular guests, enters more into the management, much as it does with the railways. On the Continent, as our hotel service was pre-arranged by others, little chance offered for experiment. What distressing meals and wretched service, with few ex- ceptions, we there endured! Instead of a few good dishes, numerous small courses too largely of meat often spiced, and yet more often greasy and unsavory, were placed before us; and the waiter disappeared so long between each course that we feared he had per- ished — or hoped he had. Luncheon often occupied an hour and a half, and dinner rather more; doubtless not too long at a private table with friends, but exas- perating when on a strenuous tour, where time was all- important. Our last Continental meal, on the dining car between Paris and Boulogne, might well have upset those contemplating the Channel trip, aside from sub- sequent freaks of wind and wave. The dining cars generally — a comparatively new institution abroad — do not compare favorably with ours. In dear old fog-soaked London the bread, although wholesome, and the pastry, have, like the metropolitan hats and boots, a rather peculiar specific gravity. A lighter loaf, although too often sour, is baked on the Continent. The meats are everywhere better than the sweets. Ice cream is served in unhappily microscopic portions, while "ice cream sodas," possibly better avoided in any case, are usually mere lofty glasses of unsubstantial froth. An American visitor in England, if "sweet- toothed," must, unless strawberries be ripe, largely forego his native combinations of fresh fruits and creams; and cultivate an appetite for marmalade, jam tart, and coffee served with boiled milk instead of cream. De Omnibus Rebus 95 The custom at restaurants of charging separately for the smallest items, such as cream, when obtainable, with coffee, or perhaps even a few lumps of sugar, makes a meal of reasonable variety rather costly. The waiter searches the table so diligently to find how many little bits of bread and butter have been disposed of, that you feel like giving him a cuff instead of a tip. A London hotel, on our second visit, charged the price of a single cigar, mistakenly omitted from the former reckoning. It is pleasant, however, when reaching a little English inn at some unusual hour, to know that the proprietor will bestir himself for your comfort, and that the cooks and waiters have not scattered to remote ends of the village, as sometimes happens in the American country side. After all, between England and America, it is a case of chacun a son gout, while both countries, we firmly believe, are dietetic Elysiums compared with Continental Europe. The tipping system, which like other settled customs has defenders, seems to us, except in the case of railway porters, a pure nuisance. Tip-seekers, greedy for coin, haunt all localities. Six-penny and shilling tips become expensive, while penny tipping involves the transpor- tation of much weight in copper. The politeness of officials and servants is partially due to expectation of tips, and is therefore metamorphosed beggary. Our irreproachable conductor at Warwick Castle, who strutted so proudly before us, became, at tipping time, as obsequious as any Shoreditch mendicant. Yet more real politeness probably prevails in Europe than America. How "much-thanked" the traveler becomes, whether deserving of it or not! Thanks accompany both the giving and receipt of anything. 96 First Impressions of Europe The waiter, requested to bring a napkin (which he usually fails to bring without request) thanks you heartily for being gracious enough to receive it. One fellow, a barber we think, repeated the usual formula, " Thank you, thank you, sir," when his back was turned to us, and we had said or done nothing to merit ap- proval. Should such a man be followed from his day's work, he might doubtless be found automatically mut- tering " Oh thank you, sir, thank you, thank you." The wandering stranger from America's once peace- loving shores, having been taught to believe that Eu- rope is an "armed camp," naturally looks for frequent military movements. In fact, unless special search be made, this militarism seldom becomes conspicuous. We saw barely five hundred soldiers, all told, and most of these were in Switzerland. The last "res" in our " de omnibus" very properly relates to the weather. This was everywhere cool and pleasant, except in journeying from Heidelberg to Geneva, where, although the nights were tolerable, the mercury at mid-day became much too frisky. Nothing, however, approached the discomfort of an American " hot wave." In London no trouble arose in keeping umbrellas washed, but the numerous showers, excepting one deluge in Whitechapel, were not severe. We recall no violent electric storms. A modified law of supply and demand applies to travel. While voyageurs of the Western woods will go far to inspect a Trappist monastery, where it overlooks the tossing amber-hued cataracts of the Mistassini, tourists in Europe pass such things daily with little comment or inquiry. New facts are not easily dis- covered abroad, as every square mile has undergone The Homeward Voyage 97 minute research. As in wilderness travel the novice, stimulated by unwonted environment, sometimes pre- sents natural phenomena in a way quite new to veteran explorers, we can but hope, as an excuse for recording these "First Impressions of Europe," that a novice, wandering amid feudal antiquities, may likewise have viewed some things in unaccustomed lights. THE HOMEWARD VOYAGE As the Empress of Britain, sister ship to the Ireland, bore us outward at evening past the brown sand banks of the outer Mersey, and New Brighton's high tower, the Old World's last conspicuous landmark, sank gradually below the horizon, a restful feeling followed the thought that our much-planned European trip had really become a fait accompli. Gulls — who could tell how many ? — circled about the stern, and often hovered seemingly motionless above the waves; but by morning they had departed. No other life, human or infra- human, if we except three shapely porpoises that gam- bolled playfully in the very middle of the Atlantic's great watery waste, greeted our sea-weary eyes until we entered the vast St. Lawrence estuary. Our long passenger list included men of note. Eng- land, Canada and " the States " had about equal repre- sentation in the saloon. Baronets abounded; among them Sir Charles Tupper, Canada's aged Tory chief- tain, bent with political responsibilities and the frosts of many winters. Leaning against the taffrail, appar- ently watching for porpoises, stood the Lord High Chancellor, speaker of the House of Lords, an elderly G 98 First Impressions of Europe peer, of dignified and benevolent appearance, as anxious to see the frothy whirlpools of Niagara as we had been to view the Tower of London. A host of modish girls, mostly American, reclined Cleopatra-like on deck chairs awaiting the usual Atlantic opportunities. These large Canadian boats, as they do not sail directly from very populous centres, carry, we believe, a rather higher average type of tourist than the more southerly lines. The American lady abroad has frequent cause to regret that unstable distribution of wealth which enables her obtrusive country-women of the common class to overrun Europe in annually increasing num- bers. Untutored Europeans, other than emigrants, seldom travel far from home, so America suffers from hastily drawn comparisons. On our second day out, although old Neptune, that hoary brine-soaked son of Saturn, apparently slum- bered and failed to agitate the waters with his tri- forked sceptre, two-thirds of the passengers succumbed to marine influences. On the fourth day a wireless message from the Empress of Ireland, stating that Belle Isle was ice-free and the weather clear, removed all anxiety about that rather hazardous passage. At midnight of the seventh day we stepped upon the Quebec dock. The boat-train's conductor would, at first, allow but one of our dress-suit cases to be taken on the Pullman, the baggage man refused to check the other, and a third knowing official announced that neither suit-case could be checked without prior search by the American customs. This absurd business was argued for two hours. At Montreal Junction, where we arrived three hours late, the Boston express, al- though notified of several American passengers, glided The Homeward Voyage 99 off in plain sight. Such mismanagement as this, strongly contrasting with the excellent steamboat ar- rangements, temporarily changed our kindly thoughts of the home-land to something like profanity; and our opinion of European railways rose in proportion. The familiar landscape, however, viewed through car win- dows of now ample width, proved very soothing. Well did old Virgil understand the retrospect of petty human tribulations when he added to his epic the famous line — "Forsan et hcec ohm meminisse juvabit." ^AY 29 1908 / LIBRAR^SSESI 1 ' I |1 II '■.'■■■■'■ msaggsm mSSmT ■■L HHMhI^^B ; ra HHHhmN ■BBBB • nmniMffl WHS §§§ 1 Mt$§l IB ■. 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