CHAPTER VIII
Mr. and Miss Jones, of Manchester--The benefits of cocoa--A hint to thePeace Society--The window as a mediaeval argument--The favouriteChristian recreation--The language of the guide--How to repair theravages of time--George tries a bottle--The fate of the German beerdrinker--Harris and I resolve to do a good action--The usual sort ofstatue--Harris and his friends--A pepperless Paradise--Women and towns.
We were on our way to Prague, and were waiting in the great hall of theDresden Station until such time as the powers-that-be should permit us onto the platform. George, who had wandered to the bookstall, returned tous with a wild look in his eyes. He said:
"I've seen it."
I said, "Seen what?"
He was too excited to answer intelligently. He said
"It's here. It's coming this way, both of them. If you wait, you'll seeit for yourselves. I'm not joking; it's the real thing."
As is usual about this period, some paragraphs, more or less serious, hadbeen appearing in the papers concerning the sea-serpent, and I thoughtfor the moment he must be referring to this. A moment's reflection,however, told me that here, in the middle of Europe, three hundred milesfrom the coast, such a thing was impossible. Before I could question himfurther, he seized me by the arm.
"Look!" he said; "now am I exaggerating?"
I turned my head and saw what, I suppose, few living Englishmen have everseen before--the travelling Britisher according to the Continental idea,accompanied by his daughter. They were coming towards us in the fleshand blood, unless we were dreaming, alive and concrete--the English"Milor" and the English "Mees," as for generations they have beenportrayed in the Continental comic press and upon the Continental stage.They were perfect in every detail. The man was tall and thin, with sandyhair, a huge nose, and long Dundreary whiskers. Over a pepper-and-saltsuit he wore a light overcoat, reaching almost to his heels. His whitehelmet was ornamented with a green veil; a pair of opera-glasses hung athis side, and in his lavender-gloved hand he carried an alpenstock alittle taller than himself. His daughter was long and angular. Herdress I cannot describe: my grandfather, poor gentleman, might have beenable to do so; it would have been more familiar to him. I can only saythat it appeared to me unnecessarily short, exhibiting a pair ofankles--if I may be permitted to refer to such points--that, from anartistic point of view, called rather for concealment. Her hat made methink of Mrs. Hemans; but why I cannot explain. She wore side-springboots--"prunella," I believe, used to be the trade name--mittens, andpince-nez. She also carried an alpenstock (there is not a mountainwithin a hundred miles of Dresden) and a black bag strapped to her waist.Her teeth stuck out like a rabbit's, and her figure was that of a bolsteron stilts.
Harris rushed for his camera, and of course could not find it; he nevercan when he wants it. Whenever we see Harris scuttling up and down likea lost dog, shouting, "Where's my camera? What the dickens have I donewith my camera? Don't either of you remember where I put mycamera?"--then we know that for the first time that day he has comeacross something worth photographing. Later on, he remembered it was inhis bag; that is where it would be on an occasion like this.
They were not content with appearance; they acted the thing to theletter. They walked gaping round them at every step. The gentleman hadan open Baedeker in his hand, and the lady carried a phrase book. Theytalked French that nobody could understand, and German that they couldnot translate themselves! The man poked at officials with his alpenstockto attract their attention, and the lady, her eye catching sight of anadvertisement of somebody's cocoa, said "Shocking!" and turned the otherway.
Really, there was some excuse for her. One notices, even in England, thehome of the proprieties, that the lady who drinks cocoa appears,according to the poster, to require very little else in this world; ayard or so of art muslin at the most. On the Continent she dispenses, sofar as one can judge, with every other necessity of life. Not only iscocoa food and drink to her, it should be clothes also, according to theidea of the cocoa manufacturer. But this by the way.
Of course, they immediately became the centre of attraction. By beingable to render them some slight assistance, I gained the advantage offive minutes' conversation with them. They were very affable. Thegentleman told me his name was Jones, and that he came from Manchester,but he did not seem to know what part of Manchester, or where Manchesterwas. I asked him where he was going to, but he evidently did not know.He said it depended. I asked him if he did not find an alpenstock aclumsy thing to walk about with through a crowded town; he admitted thatoccasionally it did get in the way. I asked him if he did not find aveil interfere with his view of things; he explained that you only woreit when the flies became troublesome. I enquired of the lady if she didnot find the wind blow cold; she said she had noticed it, especially atthe corners. I did not ask these questions one after another as I havehere put them down; I mixed them up with general conversation, and weparted on good terms.
I have pondered much upon the apparition, and have come to a definiteopinion. A man I met later at Frankfort, and to whom I described thepair, said he had seen them himself in Paris, three weeks after thetermination of the Fashoda incident; while a traveller for some Englishsteel works whom we met in Strassburg remembered having seen them inBerlin during the excitement caused by the Transvaal question. Myconclusion is that they were actors out of work, hired to do this thingin the interest of international peace. The French Foreign Office,wishful to allay the anger of the Parisian mob clamouring for war withEngland, secured this admirable couple and sent them round the town. Youcannot be amused at a thing, and at the same time want to kill it. TheFrench nation saw the English citizen and citizeness--no caricature, butthe living reality--and their indignation exploded in laughter. Thesuccess of the stratagem prompted them later on to offer their servicesto the German Government, with the beneficial results that we all know.
Our own Government might learn the lesson. It might be as well to keepnear Downing Street a few small, fat Frenchmen, to be sent round thecountry when occasion called for it, shrugging their shoulders and eatingfrog sandwiches; or a file of untidy, lank-haired Germans might beretained, to walk about, smoking long pipes, saying "So." The publicwould laugh and exclaim, "War with such? It would be too absurd."Failing the Government, I recommend the scheme to the Peace Society.
Our visit to Prague we were compelled to lengthen somewhat. Prague isone of the most interesting towns in Europe. Its stones are saturatedwith history and romance; its every suburb must have been a battlefield.It is the town that conceived the Reformation and hatched the ThirtyYears' War. But half Prague's troubles, one imagines, might have beensaved to it, had it possessed windows less large and temptinglyconvenient. The first of these mighty catastrophes it set rolling bythrowing the seven Catholic councillors from the windows of its Rathhauson to the pikes of the Hussites below. Later, it gave the signal for thesecond by again throwing the Imperial councillors from the windows of theold Burg in the Hradschin--Prague's second "Fenstersturz." Since, otherfateful questions have been decide in Prague, one assumes from theirhaving been concluded without violence that such must have been discussedin cellars. The window, as an argument, one feels, would always haveproved too strong a temptation to any true-born Praguer.
In the Teynkirche stands the worm-eaten pulpit from which preached JohnHuss. One may hear from the selfsame desk to-day the voice of a Papistpriest, while in far-off Constance a rude block of stone, half ivyhidden, marks the spot where Huss and Jerome died burning at the stake.History is fond of her little ironies. In this same Teynkirche liesburied Tycho Brahe, the astronomer, who made the common mistake ofthinking the earth, with its eleven hundred creeds and one humanity, thecentre of the universe; but who otherwise observed the stars clearly.
Through Prague's dirty, palace-bordered alleys must have pressed often inhot haste blind Ziska and open-minded Wallenstein--they have dubbed him"The Hero" in Prague; and the town is
honestly proud of having owned himfor citizen. In his gloomy palace in the Waldstein-Platz they show as asacred spot the cabinet where he prayed, and seem to have persuadedthemselves he really had a soul. Its steep, winding ways must have beenchoked a dozen times, now by Sigismund's flying legions, followed byfierce-killing Tarborites, and now by pale Protestants pursued by thevictorious Catholics of Maximilian. Now Saxons, now Bavarians, and nowFrench; now the saints of Gustavus Adolphus, and now the steel fightingmachines of Frederick the Great, have thundered at its gates and foughtupon its bridges.
The Jews have always been an important feature of Prague. Occasionallythey have assisted the Christians in their favourite occupation ofslaughtering one another, and the great flag suspended from the vaultingof the Altneuschule testifies to the courage with which they helpedCatholic Ferdinand to resist the Protestant Swedes. The Prague Ghettowas one of the first to be established in Europe, and in the tinysynagogue, still standing, the Jew of Prague has worshipped for eighthundred years, his women folk devoutly listening, without, at the earholes provided for them in the massive walls. A Jewish cemeteryadjacent, "Bethchajim, or the House of Life," seems as though it werebursting with its dead. Within its narrow acre it was the law ofcenturies that here or nowhere must the bones of Israel rest. So theworn and broken tombstones lie piled in close confusion, as though tossedand tumbled by the struggling host beneath.
The Ghetto walls have long been levelled, but the living Jews of Praguestill cling to their foetid lanes, though these are being rapidlyreplaced by fine new streets that promise to eventually transform thisquarter into the handsomest part of the town.
At Dresden they advised us not to talk German in Prague. For yearsracial animosity between the German minority and the Czech majority hasraged throughout Bohemia, and to be mistaken for a German in certainstreets of Prague is inconvenient to a man whose staying powers in a raceare not what once they were. However, we did talk German in certainstreets in Prague; it was a case of talking German or nothing. The Czechdialect is said to be of great antiquity and of highly scientificcultivation. Its alphabet contains forty-two letters, suggestive to astranger of Chinese. It is not a language to be picked up in a hurry. Wedecided that on the whole there would be less risk to our constitution inkeeping to German, and as a matter of fact no harm came to us. Theexplanation I can only surmise. The Praguer is an exceedingly acuteperson; some subtle falsity of accent, some slight grammaticalinaccuracy, may have crept into our German, revealing to him the factthat, in spite of all appearances to the contrary, we were no true-bornDeutscher. I do not assert this; I put it forward as a possibility.
To avoid unnecessary danger, however, we did our sight-seeing with theaid of a guide. No guide I have ever come across is perfect. This onehad two distinct failings. His English was decidedly weak. Indeed, itwas not English at all. I do not know what you would call it. It wasnot altogether his fault; he had learnt English from a Scotch lady. Iunderstand Scotch fairly well--to keep abreast of modern Englishliterature this is necessary,--but to understand broad Scotch talked witha Sclavonic accent, occasionally relieved by German modifications, taxesthe intelligence. For the first hour it was difficult to rid one's selfof the conviction that the man was choking. Every moment we expected himto die on our hands. In the course of the morning we grew accustomed tohim, and rid ourselves of the instinct to throw him on his back everytime he opened his mouth, and tear his clothes from him. Later, we cameto understand a part of what he said, and this led to the discovery ofhis second failing.
It would seem he had lately invented a hair-restorer, which he hadpersuaded a local chemist to take up and advertise. Half his time he hadbeen pointing out to us, not the beauties of Prague, but the benefitslikely to accrue to the human race from the use of this concoction; andthe conventional agreement with which, under the impression he was waxingeloquent concerning views and architecture, we had met his enthusiasm hehad attributed to sympathetic interest in this wretched wash of his.
The result was that now there was no keeping him away from the subject.Ruined palaces and crumbling churches he dismissed with curt reference asmere frivolities, encouraging a morbid taste for the decadent. His duty,as he saw it, was not to lead us to dwell upon the ravages of time, butrather to direct our attention to the means of repairing them. What hadwe to do with broken-headed heroes, or bald-headed saints? Our interestshould be surely in the living world; in the maidens with their flowingtresses, or the flowing tresses they might have, by judicious use of"Kophkeo," in the young men with their fierce moustaches--as pictured onthe label.
Unconsciously, in his own mind, he had divided the world into twosections. The Past ("Before Use"), a sickly, disagreeable-looking,uninteresting world. The Future ("After Use") a fat, jolly, God-bless-everybody sort of world; and this unfitted him as a guide to scenes ofmediaeval history.
He sent us each a bottle of the stuff to our hotel. It appeared that inthe early part of our converse with him we had, unwittingly, clamouredfor it. Personally, I can neither praise it nor condemn it. A longseries of disappointments has disheartened me; added to which a permanentatmosphere of paraffin, however faint, is apt to cause remark, especiallyin the case of a married man. Now, I never try even the sample.
I gave my bottle to George. He asked for it to send to a man he knew inLeeds. I learnt later that Harris had given him his bottle also, to sendto the same man.
A suggestion of onions has clung to this tour since we left Prague.George has noticed it himself. He attributes it to the prevalence ofgarlic in European cooking.
It was in Prague that Harris and I did a kind and friendly thing toGeorge. We had noticed for some time past that George was getting toofond of Pilsener beer. This German beer is an insidious drink,especially in hot weather; but it does not do to imbibe too freely of it.It does not get into your head, but after a time it spoils your waist. Ialways say to myself on entering Germany:
"Now, I will drink no German beer. The white wine of the country, with alittle soda-water; perhaps occasionally a glass of Ems or potash. Butbeer, never--or, at all events, hardly ever."
It is a good and useful resolution, which I recommend to all travellers.I only wish I could keep to it myself. George, although I urged him,refused to bind himself by any such hard and fast limit. He said that inmoderation German beer was good.
"One glass in the morning," said George, "one in the evening, or eventwo. That will do no harm to anyone."
Maybe he was right. It was his half-dozen glasses that troubled Harrisand myself.
"We ought to do something to stop it," said Harris; "it is becomingserious."
"It's hereditary, so he has explained to me," I answered. "It seems hisfamily have always been thirsty."
"There is Apollinaris water," replied Harris, "which, I believe, with alittle lemon squeezed into it, is practically harmless. What I amthinking about is his figure. He will lose all his natural elegance."
We talked the matter over, and, Providence aiding us, we fixed upon aplan. For the ornamentation of the town a new statue had just been cast.I forget of whom it was a statue. I only remember that in the essentialsit was the usual sort of street statue, representing the usual sort ofgentleman, with the usual stiff neck, riding the usual sort of horse--thehorse that always walks on its hind legs, keeping its front paws forbeating time. But in detail it possessed individuality. Instead of theusual sword or baton, the man was holding, stretched out in his hand, hisown plumed hat; and the horse, instead of the usual waterfall for a tail,possessed a somewhat attenuated appendage that somehow appeared out ofkeeping with his ostentatious behaviour. One felt that a horse with atail like that would not have pranced so much.
It stood in a small square not far from the further end of theKarlsbrucke, but it stood there only temporarily. Before decidingfinally where to fix it, the town authorities had resolved, verysensibly, to judge by practical test where it would look best.Accordingly, they had made
three rough copies of the statue--mere woodenprofiles, things that would not bear looking at closely, but which,viewed from a little distance, produced all the effect that wasnecessary. One of these they had set up at the approach to the Franz-Josefsbrucke, a second stood in the open space behind the theatre, andthe third in the centre of the Wenzelsplatz.
"If George is not in the secret of this thing," said Harris--we werewalking by ourselves for an hour, he having remained behind in the hotelto write a letter to his aunt,--"if he has not observed these statues,then by their aid we will make a better and a thinner man of him, andthat this very evening."
So during dinner we sounded him, judiciously; and finding him ignorant ofthe matter, we took him out, and led him by side-streets to the placewhere stood the real statue. George was for looking at it and passingon, as is his way with statues, but we insisted on his pulling up andviewing the thing conscientiously. We walked him round that statue fourtimes, and showed it to him from every possible point of view. I think,on the whole, we rather bored him with the thing, but our object was toimpress it upon him. We told him the history of the man who rode uponthe horse, the name of the artist who had made the statue, how much itweighed, how much it measured. We worked that statue into his system. Bythe time we had done with him he knew more about that statue, for thetime being, than he knew about anything else. We soaked him in thatstatue, and only let him go at last on the condition that he would comeagain with us in the morning, when we could all see it better, and forsuch purpose we saw to it that he made a note in his pocket-book of theplace where the statue stood.
Then we accompanied him to his favourite beer hall, and sat beside him,telling him anecdotes of men who, unaccustomed to German beer, anddrinking too much of it, had gone mad and developed homicidal mania; ofmen who had died young through drinking German beer; of lovers thatGerman beer had been the means of parting for ever from beautiful girls.
At ten o'clock we started to walk back to the hotel. It was a stormy-looking night, with heavy clouds drifting over a light moon. Harrissaid:
"We won't go back the same way we came; we'll walk back by the river. Itis lovely in the moonlight."
Harris told a sad history, as we walked, about a man he once knew, who isnow in a home for harmless imbeciles. He said he recalled the storybecause it was on just such another night as this that he was walkingwith that man the very last time he ever saw the poor fellow. They werestrolling down the Thames Embankment, Harris said, and the man frightenedhim then by persisting that he saw the statue of the Duke of Wellingtonat the corner of Westminster Bridge, when, as everybody knows, it standsin Piccadilly.
It was at this exact instant that we came in sight of the first of thesewooden copies. It occupied the centre of a small, railed-in square alittle above us on the opposite side of the way. George suddenly stoodstill and leant against the wall of the quay.
"What's the matter?" I said; "feeling giddy?"
He said: "I do, a little. Let's rest here a moment."
He stood there with his eyes glued to the thing.
He said, speaking huskily:
"Talking of statues, what always strikes me is how very much one statueis like another statue."
Harris said: "I cannot agree with you there--pictures, if you like. Somepictures are very like other pictures, but with a statue there is alwayssomething distinctive. Take that statue we saw early in the evening,"continued Harris, "before we went into the concert hall. It representeda man sitting on a horse. In Prague you will see other statues of men onhorses, but nothing at all like that one."
"Yes they are," said George; "they are all alike. It's always the samehorse, and it's always the same man. They are all exactly alike. It'sidiotic nonsense to say they are not."
He appeared to be angry with Harris.
"What makes you think so?" I asked.
"What makes me think so?" retorted George, now turning upon me. "Why,look at that damned thing over there!"
I said: "What damned thing?"
"Why, that thing," said George; "look at it! There is the same horsewith half a tail, standing on its hind legs; the same man without hishat; the same--"
Harris said: "You are talking now about the statue we saw in theRingplatz."
"No, I'm not," replied George; "I'm talking about the statue over there."
"What statue?" said Harris.
George looked at Harris; but Harris is a man who might, with care, havebeen a fair amateur actor. His face merely expressed friendly sorrow,mingled with alarm. Next, George turned his gaze on me. I endeavoured,so far as lay with me, to copy Harris's expression, adding to it on myown account a touch of reproof.
"Will you have a cab?" I said as kindly as I could to George. "I'll runand get one."
"What the devil do I want with a cab?" he answered, ungraciously. "Can'tyou fellows understand a joke? It's like being out with a couple ofconfounded old women," saying which, he started off across the bridge,leaving us to follow.
"I am so glad that was only a joke of yours," said Harris, on ourovertaking him. "I knew a case of softening of the brain that began--"
"Oh, you're a silly ass!" said George, cutting him short; "you knoweverything."
He was really most unpleasant in his manner.
We took him round by the riverside of the theatre. We told him it wasthe shortest way, and, as a matter of fact, it was. In the open spacebehind the theatre stood the second of these wooden apparitions. Georgelooked at it, and again stood still.
"What's the matter?" said Harris, kindly. "You are not ill, are you?"
"I don't believe this is the shortest way," said George.
"I assure you it is," persisted Harris.
"Well, I'm going the other," said George; and he turned and went, we, asbefore, following him.
Along the Ferdinand Strasse Harris and I talked about private lunaticasylums, which, Harris said, were not well managed in England. He said afriend of his, a patient in a lunatic asylum--
George said, interrupting: "You appear to have a large number of friendsin lunatic asylums."
He said it in a most insulting tone, as though to imply that that iswhere one would look for the majority of Harris's friends. But Harrisdid not get angry; he merely replied, quite mildly:
"Well, it really is extraordinary, when one comes to think of it, howmany of them have gone that way sooner or later. I get quite nervoussometimes, now."
At the corner of the Wenzelsplatz, Harris, who was a few steps ahead ofus, paused.
"It's a fine street, isn't it?" he said, sticking his hands in hispockets, and gazing up at it admiringly.
George and I followed suit. Two hundred yards away from us, in its verycentre, was the third of these ghostly statues. I think it was the bestof the three--the most like, the most deceptive. It stood boldlyoutlined against the wild sky: the horse on its hind legs, with itscuriously attenuated tail; the man bareheaded, pointing with his plumedhat to the now entirely visible moon.
"I think, if you don't mind," said George--he spoke with almost apathetic ring in his voice, his aggressiveness had completely fallen fromhim,--"that I will have that cab, if there's one handy."
"I thought you were looking queer," said Harris, kindly. "It's yourhead, isn't it?"
"Perhaps it is," answered George.
"I have noticed it coming on," said Harris; "but I didn't like to sayanything to you. You fancy you see things, don't you?"
"No, no; it isn't that," replied George, rather quickly. "I don't knowwhat it is."
"I do," said Harris, solemnly, "and I'll tell you. It's this German beerthat you are drinking. I have known a case where a man--"
"Don't tell me about him just now," said George. "I dare say it's true,but somehow I don't feel I want to hear about him."
"You are not used to it," said Harris.
"I shall give it up from to-night," said George. "I think you must beright; it doesn't seem to agree with me."
We took him home, and saw him to bed. He was very gentle and quitegrateful.
One evening later on, after a long day's ride, followed by a mostsatisfactory dinner, we started him on a big cigar, and, removing thingsfrom his reach, told him of this stratagem that for his good we hadplanned.
"How many copies of that statue did you say we saw?" asked George, afterwe had finished.
"Three," replied Harris.
"Only three?" said George. "Are you sure?"
"Positive," replied Harris. "Why?"
"Oh, nothing!" answered George.
But I don't think he quite believed Harris.
From Prague we travelled to Nuremberg, through Carlsbad. Good Germans,when they die, go, they say, to Carlsbad, as good Americans to Paris.This I doubt, seeing that it is a small place with no convenience for acrowd. In Carlsbad, you rise at five, the fashionable hour forpromenade, when the band plays under the Colonnade, and the Sprudel isfilled with a packed throng over a mile long, being from six to eight inthe morning. Here you may hear more languages spoken than the Tower ofBabel could have echoed. Polish Jews and Russian princes, Chinesemandarins and Turkish pashas, Norwegians looking as if they had steppedout of Ibsen's plays, women from the Boulevards, Spanish grandees andEnglish countesses, mountaineers from Montenegro and millionaires fromChicago, you will find every dozen yards. Every luxury in the worldCarlsbad provides for its visitors, with the one exception of pepper.That you cannot get within five miles of the town for money; what you canget there for love is not worth taking away. Pepper, to the liverbrigade that forms four-fifths of Carlsbad's customers, is poison; and,prevention being better than cure, it is carefully kept out of theneighbourhood. "Pepper parties" are formed in Carlsbad to journey tosome place without the boundary, and there indulge in pepper orgies.
Nuremberg, if one expects a town of mediaeval appearance, disappoints.Quaint corners, picturesque glimpses, there are in plenty; but everywherethey are surrounded and intruded upon by the modern, and even what isancient is not nearly so ancient as one thought it was. After all, atown, like a woman, is only as old as it looks; and Nuremberg is still acomfortable-looking dame, its age somewhat difficult to conceive underits fresh paint and stucco in the blaze of the gas and the electriclight. Still, looking closely, you may see its wrinkled walls and greytowers.
Three Men on the Bummel Page 9