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THE BIG 
 
 AMERICAN CARAVAN 
 
 IN 
 
 EUROPE. 
 
 ) I 
 
 Being Letters descriptive of the Movement: 
 
 on the Continent of Europe of the Largest 
 
 Party of Tourists who ever made the 
 
 Rounds in a Body under one 
 
 Management. 
 
 By BURR H. POLK. 
 
 EVANSV1LE: 
 Journal Co., St«am Printers, Binders and Stationers. 
 1879. 
 
^ 
 
 12 
 
 ,9 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The following letters were written while making a tour en 
 the Continent of Europe. There was no idea, at the time, of 
 their publication. No pains was taken with them, and they 
 were often hurriedly written under the most unfavorable circum- 
 stances. Our itinerary aimed to consume all our time, and 
 frequently we were at a loss for rest. But for this reason they 
 may be all the more acceptable, as they convey the impressions 
 that were fresh upon me, and are honest impressions with re- 
 gard to things as I saw them. A desire on the part of those 
 who made this tour to have the letters, led to their publication, 
 and they may not fail to entertain others. The putting through 
 s/ this large party in the very height of the tourist season, was cer , 
 tainly a mammoth undertaking, and shows to what perfection 
 this business has attained. In Switzerland especially, where it 
 has been estimated over a million tourists visited during the 
 summer, it was a wonder that we experienced no inconvenience 
 from delays or over crowding. The weather, for the most part, 
 was very propitious and our chances for sight seeing were per- 
 haps rarely excelled. 
 
 THE AUTHOR. 
 
LETTER I. 
 
 The Tourgee Party— Crossing the Ocean— Sea sickness— Fogs and Fog horns— Life 
 aboard the Ship— Fourth of July celebrated— Shivering in Mid. summer— 
 Almost a collision. 
 
 On Board Ship, July 22, 1879. 
 
 In the uncertain stale of my stomach, with the minor 
 hindrance of a little disturbance in the shape of church services 
 going" on around and above me, I doubt if I can do justice to 
 my friends in the way of a letter. But as a slight calm has 
 come over me, I thought best to seize the opportunity and 
 make what progress I can while there is allowed to me the 
 happy privilege of holding up my head and knowing my name 
 and residence. 
 
 This excursion, of which I am now a member, was gotten up 
 by Dr. Eben Tourjee, of Boston. He took over a party last * 
 Summer, the success of which induced him to take over another 
 this year. There are 186 of the party on board this vessel, the ,*. 
 Anchoria, while 127 have already gone ahead and are now prob- 
 ably out of their misery enjoying a little tour through parts of Ire. 
 land. On our arrival at Glasgow the entire band will meet and 
 there be divided up into four sections, all to travel over the 
 same route but in different order, so as not to have the caravan 
 so cumbersome. Twenty-one States are represented by those 
 aboard this ship — as far East as Maine, down to Florida on the 
 South, and as far West as Kansas and Minnesota. Massachu- 
 setts leads with 98, Boston contributing 38 of these, Ohio being 
 the State sending the delegation second in size. The "little 
 
6 . THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN' S 
 
 one," my daughter, and I are the only ones from Mississippi. 
 Only two Southern States are represented, there being two 
 ladies from Nashville, Tennessee, and one gentleman from Flor- 
 ida. Of the 1 86 here. 108 are ladies, showing quite a prepon- 
 derance of the fair sex. And thus you have an analysis of the 
 handsome little pamphlet liberally distributed to the passengers 
 and their friends before the departure of the ship. I may add, 
 as an item of interest to bachelors, that much over one-half of 
 the ladies are single. 
 
 By a previous arrangement most of the party met at the St. 
 Nicholas hotel in New York prior to sailing. On Saturday 
 morning early the hotel coach began the no small task of carry- 
 ing down passengers and baggage. I went down with the last 
 load and found the ship crowded with people and everything in 
 a jam and confusion. Hundreds had come on board to bid 
 friends and acquaintances good-bye, and groups were standing 
 about here and there in earnest converse. It never occurred 
 that any familiar face would meet us, but we had that pleasure, 
 nevertheless, for nearly an hour before starting we were joined 
 by that most genial gentleman, John Bell, of Commodore Pari- 
 sot's fleet; and when, an hour later, all visitors had gone upon 
 the pier and our vessel was pushing out for the sea, the last we 
 saw of his pleasant face was while he was waving his handker- 
 chief, with hundreds of others, and bidding us God speed and 
 a pleasant voyage. He is the only home friend we have seen 
 since leaving Cincinnati. We were to have been accompanied 
 by a charming young lady of Vicksburg, but the trivial circum- 
 stance of contemplated matrimony prevented her coming, and 
 we have been out of humor with Cupid ever since. 
 
 As we steamed out of the bay at noon, in comparatively smooth 
 water, the passengers loitered about the decks and cheerfully 
 contemplated the scene, but after we got "outside" and fell in 
 with a pretty stiff breeze and rough water, the numerous reclin- 
 ing chairs were soon filled and looked like so many occupied 
 cots in an army hospital. Those who had not providid them- 
 selves with these chairs' generally disappeared and perhaps were 
 not seen on deck any more that day. As for myself, I braved 
 it out on deck as loiw as I could, When I went on board, the 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 7 
 
 sensitiveness of my nasal organ over the unpleasant smells (and 
 there are very, very many unpleasant smells about a ship) was 
 an unfavorable omen. Still, as I saw victim after victim on this 
 hand and that, I hoped, in a feeble way, that the little cruise I 
 took two years ago among the islands in the Gulf of Mexico, 
 would be of service to me here. But such hope proved a de- 
 lusion and a fraud. It was not long before I joined the throng 
 at the railing, and began a series of pilgrimages between that 
 and my chair until four o'clock in the afternoon, when I grew 
 so terribly sick and drunk and worthless, that I fled to my close 
 and stifling room below. How I writhed down there in the 
 arms of this awful monster of the sea, I think I will never be 
 able to describe. Later, asleep, I forgot the billows, but the 
 moment I awoke I became conscious of the rolling and pitch- 
 ing of the vessel. The room was away forward, and contained 
 four berths, two running lengthwise and two at right angles with 
 the ship. I occupied the lower one of the latter two. The 
 wind was quartering with our course, and as the ship mounted 
 a wave she twisted awfully to one side, and as she plunged 
 down into the trough of the sea she swung up and twisted the 
 other way, thus giving to one's person a species of rotary mo- 
 tion that made his stomach feel as though it contained a rest- 
 less, uneasy lump as big as a foot ball, The greater number 
 of passengers were sick, but most of them for a short time only, 
 while others were pitiable invalids for so long a time as to wish 
 themselves comfortably at home and Tourjee's excursion in Pat- 
 agonia. I may safely be classed with the latter. I fasted 
 literally from Saturday morning till Sunday morning, when I 
 ventured down to the table. I looked with an air of deter- 
 mination on my countenance, and attempted to walk bravely 
 up one of the aisles, but had scarcely reached the farther end 
 where there was a vacant seat, when I turned sadly about and 
 rushed up stairs and out on deck to contribute, for the forty- 
 ninth time, my share of food to the active little gulls that 
 were continually skimming the foaming billows behind us, I 
 count — we have now been four days out and I think, so far as 
 • the records show, I have been the very sickest man in the 
 party, and am utterly disgusted with my stomach. I can ap- 
 
X THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 preciate and measurably forgive the insufferable and provoking 
 vanity of a man whose stomach behaves itself while those 
 around him are continually casting up their Jonahs. 
 
 At the very moment I penned the memorandum upon which 
 the above painful remarks were based, a joyous party came out 
 from the dining-table and regaled me with a description of the 
 choice and bounteous dinner just served down stairs. Of 
 course, as I lay prone upon my reclining chair, awaiting a call 
 to the railing, I enjoyed this timely kindness in the fullest sense 
 But let me pass from this subject. It is harrowing to my feel- 
 ings. I feel that when I reach Europe much of my enjoyment 
 there will be marred by the contemplation of a repetition of this 
 thing on my return home. I have heard two or three declare 
 with the most powerful emphasis, that no excursion, after they 
 reach home, will ever tempt thim across the ocean again; and 
 so far as I am personally concerned, if I retain my senses and 
 my memory, I think the scenery of America will suit me to a 
 dot. But those who do not suffer materially — and they consti- 
 tute a very large majority — find much to enjoy in a voyage of 
 this kind, and will always be ready to repeat it when occasion 
 offers. 
 
 I have been astonished at the cool winds we have encountered 
 off the coast of Maine, and that now blow as we plow through 
 the pale blue waters on the banks of Newfoundland. Every 
 book we read and every person we consulted on the subject, 
 warned us to bring our heaviest wraps, but there are some 
 things hard to realize, just as hard as it was for my friends to 
 understand, while I was in the mountains of Colorado writing 
 of snows and ice in July and they sweltering in the hot sun of 
 the South, that the truth was in me. I could not get it into my 
 head that there was any sense in bringing an immense overcoat 
 and a horse blanket to swathe my person in during a passage 
 across the ocean in July; but I now know the necessity for it, 
 and would say to those likely ever to make the trip, to bringall 
 their own wraps and to pilfer all they can from their neighbors. 
 On one or two occasions the wind whistled through my thick 
 overcoat, apparently with as much ease as it would through a 
 seive. Those ladies who are the most outlandishlv "bundled 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 9 
 
 up" and look most like animated mummies, are the most com- 
 fortable. Many of these have been enabled to occupy their re- 
 clining chairs night and day on deck and thus avoid the close and 
 ill-smelling rooms below. 
 
 It has been very foggy much of the journey so far, and the 
 fog whistle has been going at intervals throughout the entire 
 journey. Here on the banks of Newfoundland the water is of a 
 much paler blue than any we had heretofore encountered, and 
 the fog has been so dense at times we could not see a ship two 
 lengths of our own vessel. At noon to-day, just four days out, 
 the log indicated that we had made 1226 miles, which is re- 
 garded as above the average speed. At that rate we will reach 
 Scotland one day or more in advance of our time. If we should 
 sight the Irish coast to-morrow, there is one excursionist, at 
 least, who would rejoice. 
 
 Afternoon of the second day out, they cleared a space on the 
 after hurricane deck and played a game called pitch; with no 
 pitch in it, a species of old fashioned hop-skotch in which blocks 
 are shoved at the marked field with a long stick. At night 
 there was a concert in the cabin, which was pronounced good ; 
 and later there was quite a blow, great phosphorescent lights 
 around and in the wake of the ship, and a rainbow by moon- 
 light, none of which I saw. But as I lay in my berth, down in 
 the tomb-like room, I could hear the roaring and thundering of 
 the sea as the billows dashed against the sides of the ship, but 
 if she had stood upon her head and wallowed over and over in 
 the raging sea, I don't think my poor excuse of a stomach 
 would have acted more disgustingly. Last Sunday we had an 
 appropriate and entertaining sermon under the awning, and it 
 being the day after departure and the temporary pulpit erected 
 amid the array of invalids, the learned pastor had a^large con- 
 gregation if he did not have an attentive one. This morning 
 we had short Episcopal Church services ; this afternoon we had 
 chorus singing, and now, as I write, I hear the strains of the 
 organ at one end of the gallery over the cabin, and the piano 
 at the other. To-night we are to have our third series of enter- 
 tainments in the way of readings, recitations, music and the 
 like. I heard one last night and was very much entertained 
 indeed. 
 
 2 
 
IO THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 There is almost a total absence of the signs of fish up here off 
 Newfoundland. We have seen only two small schools of por- 
 poises and nothir g else. Were we sailing in the Gulf of Mexi- 
 co we would rarely be out of sight of the denizens of the deep, 
 but constantly be in sight of great schools of fish and my old 
 friends, the sharks. It may be that when we cross the Gulf 
 stream we will fall in with some of these. I hope so, at least- 
 I am tired seeing this vast waste of water with nothing to break 
 the monotony. An iceberg would not go amiss, especially a 
 large one, and Ave should pass it at a safe distance. But I 
 would like above all things, to see this dense fog clear away 
 and the bright sunshine to thaw out and enable me to realize 
 that this" was July instead of midwinter. I am absolutely shiv- 
 ering with cold, here in the parlor, with all the thick clothes I 
 have on my back, and my undergarments doubled. You may 
 understand this when I tell you it is just 43 degrees colder than 
 on the day I left home. 
 
 Night, July 5. — I add a few words, to say, among other things, 
 that we had an intolerable fog for seven blessed days and nights 
 — a most outlandish, cold, penetrating fog which has prevented 
 enjoyment on deck. Yesterday being the 4th, we got up a little 
 
 f celebration on our own account and kicked up auite a smoke. 
 There was a big procession around and about the ship, of men 
 with horns.'pans, trumpets, tin cans and the like; hoisting and 
 cheering the flags ; firing of crackers ; speeches, toasts, songs 
 and such, during the day. The Captain of the ship was called 
 out and gave us a nice little talk, and upon the whole we had 
 a jolly time. At night, there were more speeches, recitations 
 and instrumental and vocal music in the cabin. A large part of 
 to-day has been devoted to the selection of sections to be taken 
 by the party, and there has been a perfect Babel. The matter 
 has now'been pretty generally and satisfactorily arranged. 
 
 We ;"came near 'having a collision this morning. Before 
 
 breakfast, and as a few of the early risers were on deck astern, 
 
 , and the fog so dense one could not see more than the length of 
 
 our ship, the whistle blew two shriil blasts, and in an instant a 
 
 full rigged sailing vessel, with all its canvass spread, suddenly 
 
 « 
 
 emerged from the fog like some phantom bearing down upon 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 1 
 
 us. She came quartering, and in less than thirty seconds would 
 have struck us amidships, but when the whistle blew she luffed 
 up and gave us her side, but as she passed us and drifted astern 
 she came so near rubbing us we could plainly see the faces of 
 the few men astir upon her. In less than one minute from the 
 time she came in ^view, amid the cheers of the startled little 
 band watching her, she had disappeared in the fog behind us. 
 It was too close a graze to leave a favorable impression, and I 
 notice the fog-whistle has since been blown with greater 
 regularity. 
 
12 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN*? 
 
 LETTER II. 
 
 First sight of land on the Irish Coast — Among the Canny Scots — A trip up the 
 Clyde — Its Scenery — Glasgow— Hotel— Magnificent accommodations— A stroll 
 over the City and an incident of Scotch life— Cathedrals and Castles to the 
 front — The Big Caravan looking like animated bundles of wraps— Jammed 
 by the crowd of People. 
 
 Glasgow, Scotland, July 8th, 1870. 
 
 On Monday afternoon as the first table were at dinner, and 
 making a fearful hole in the stores, there rang out the joyous 
 cry of "land !" In an instant all was confusion and a stampede 
 to the port-holes, and out upon the deck to witness the spec- 
 tacle. Sure enough, away off through the mist where ail seem- 
 ed dark, there stood out a darker and irregular outline of the 
 high bluffs on the northern coast of Ireland. It was not a very 
 satisfactory view of land, still, the land was there, and it did our 
 hearts so much good to have ocular demonstration of the fact. 
 We ran along the coast for an hour or more, coming closer un- 
 til the cheerful green of the hills came plain' -. Then 
 we skirted by some rocky islands against which the angry Avatfes 
 lashed themselves into foam as the spray was thrown high into 
 the air; then by a light house ; then by some residences on the 
 checkered slope that ran down to the sea; then by a station 
 where a boat came out with a pilot ; then between an island, 
 with high and rugged bluffs, and the main land to Movilie where 
 a tug came out in answer to sky rockets and calcium lights, and 
 brought a great batch of morning papers from Londonderry, 
 
TOUR THUOUGH EUROPE. 1 3 
 
 and took off a large numberfof our steerage passengers. It was 
 raining and cold, and the disembarkation of these returning em- 
 igrants appeared a gloomy J one as they went off our big ship 
 down into the tug, lighted by the sickly glare of the lanterns as 
 they struggled with the fog. But all our people were happy, 
 and very few stayed on deck to witness the departure of our 
 fellow voyagers. 
 
 At just nine o'clock, before reaching Movih , the heavens 
 cleared up some and the mists drifted away '" >m the shore, 
 giving us one grand view. Cheer after cheer rang out from 
 that ship, and the people felt good for the rest of the night. 
 
 Here the agent of Gaze & Son came on board, and at once 
 began the task of arranging the little parties in the different sec _ 
 tions who were to room together on the two months journey 
 ahead of us. It was one o'clock at night when he got through, 
 and the steward had driven us all out of the cabin by turning 
 down the lights. 1 his morning, or, going on deck, I found we 
 were steaming up t. -: channel towards Greenoch. The 
 
 day was dark and tkrc - , but the shores were beautifully 
 
 green, laid off in little pal \i :s separated by hedges, and 
 terminating in. hills against the horizon. There did not appear 
 to be a foot of available land not utilized. Ev rybitof it seem- 
 ed to be in cultivation where there was any soil, and the foliage 
 $Mi a variety of shades about, it that rendered the view very 
 pleasant indeed. I would like to describe my feelings for this 
 da}/. I can not do it. The scene was so new to me, the land- 
 scape so cheerful, arid the houses, and Jthe way of cutting the 
 the land up ii%L<> wee bits of patches, so edd, that my interest in 
 the picture amounted almost to excrement. Persons who have 
 come over here for the first time*, after dreaming year after 
 year of the trip, and having undergone the miseries of a voy- 
 age dot often encountered, may be able to appreciate the feel- 
 ings of our party as the country lay spread out, for the first 
 time before them. No others could, even though the picture 
 should be drawn by the most graphic pen. 
 
 At 7 o'clock we anchored off Greenoch and a large, side- 
 wheel tug came out to carry away the baggage. It took two of 
 them to do it. A. "little, dirty urchin,' with a timid voice, as 
 
T4 'THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 though he was frightened by the pilgrims, made his appear- 
 ance in the cabin with the Glasgow morning papers. He didn't 
 sing out strong and recklessly, like an American newsboy would 
 have done. It had been the intention to go ashore at Green- 
 och and take cars for this city, but by a vote last night it was 
 decided that we should take one of the swift steamers that ply 
 between the two great places and run up the Clyde. As we lay 
 there having the necessary chalk marks put upon our trunks by 
 the Custom-house officer (which was a mere formal matter, in 
 our case, though requiring two hours — for they had never had 
 as big a batch before, ) we could see Roseleith Castle, the prop 
 erty of the Duke of Argyle, and where our neighbor, the Mar- 
 quis of Lome, spent his honeymoon. I speak of it specially 
 because it was the first live castle I had ever seen and I wanted 
 to make a sort of landmark of the fact. I don't want to go into 
 the castle business too strongly, but hope to fill up my letters 
 with a recital of minor details which, though I have almost al- 
 ways found entertaining to me, most writers have omitted. 
 Nearly all of the guide books can give you a history of these 
 castles and a list of the nabobs who have held them, but they 
 rarely ever tell you if they give you hash at this hotel or pea 
 soup at that. Of course I will have to own I have seen a castle 
 now and then, and perhaps when I am short of material may 
 throw in a descriptive paragraph or so. 
 
 I was glad of the change to a steamer for a run up the Clyde. 
 It was a most enchanting trip till we neared this city, and it 
 was entertainining all the way. Beside, I didn't like the looks 
 of the dumpy cars I saw as we steamed by the station at Green. 
 och. I don't think I will ever overcome my preconceived ideas 
 of and prejudices against them. But let me hurry on here. 
 Directly after leaving Greenoch we passed Dunbarton Castle, a 
 very ordinary sort of stone house stuck at the base of and 
 against a huge solid stone mound that would have been all the 
 more attractive without the Castle. On the left of us the rocky 
 promontories reached nearly to the proportions of mountains, but 
 always covered with trees or grass or grain where there was any 
 soil. On the right, the country sloped gradually from the river 
 and was often cultivated to the very edge of the quay. Houses 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. . I $ 
 
 were nestled about everywhere. The entire distance appeared 
 like a continuous village, blooming out, every three or four 
 miles, into quite a town, where we made landings, as quick as 
 you could say Jack Robinson, to put off and take on passengers. 
 We passed another castle, (confound them, I fear they will be in 
 my way) old, tumbled down and ivy-grown, when every one 
 said "how beautiful!" and indeed it was so. It enabled me to 
 see how ivy can ornament and render attractive decaying and 
 unsightly ruins. The buo3^s and light-houses and other devices 
 to mark the channel, were very numerous and varied in their 
 character and construction. The river is so narrow a little be- 
 low the city any Scottish lad ten years old can cast a pebble 
 across it. In some places the banks are literally lined with 
 ship yards, where great iron vessels are under process of con- 
 struction — and the scene is a busy one. As we met the thirty 
 or forty steamers similar to our own, going down the river, the 
 passengers would look with a species of awe upon our hooded 
 and cloaked and bundled up crowd. There was a strong, coo^ 
 breeze blowing, with spits of rain every once in a while, and I 
 think I never saw a more ungraceful looking set in my life than 
 our party appeared just then. When we reached the station, 
 in the city, where we went ashore, an immense crowd soon col- 
 lected, and while we were filing off the wharf to the line of ve- 
 hicles in waiting for us, it took half a score of policemen to pre. 
 vent our being jammed. Some of our vehicles were double- 
 decked omnibusses, with a stairway astern leading to the top, 
 and held thirty or forty passengers. They were drawn by three *> 
 horses abreast, the middle animal between shafts, which gave 
 the appearance of two poles instead of one. I climbed upon 
 top, the better to see. The remarks of the throng around us 
 were humorous. They spoke of us as "sight-seers," " Ameri- ^ 
 cans," etc. All except section one were driven to the Grand 
 Hotel — that section went to Cockburn's. At the Hotel we ■;& 
 found our rooms already assigned, and, upon registering, were 
 handed a slip of paper with the number upon it which enabled 
 us to reach it with the aid of one or more of the two dozen or so f 
 of female servants eager to get her clasp upon our hand parcels. 
 The Hotel is a new one, large and handsomely furnished, 
 
1 6 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 and resembles an American hotel only so far as it has gas 
 throughout and soap at the wash stands. Everything has an 
 odd look, but a substantial one. The rooms are furnished in 
 wood resembling dark cherry, a drugget or carpet covering 
 about four-fifths of the floor, the bare part being highly polished 
 and waxed. The bedsteads are metal throughout, the head 
 and foot being of brass, in which you could make your toilet in 
 the absence of a looking glass, and the balance is of bronzed 
 iron. I have critically examined one, and I think the concep- 
 tion must have been that of a sensitive traveler who had often 
 been burdened with too many voracious bed-fellows, The 
 dining-room, I think, is the handsomest I ever saw ; not gor- 
 geous in gewgaws and gingerbread work, but solid, clean, airy 
 and quiet. It seemed even to have a soothing effect upon our 
 boisterous caravan, for they toned down here and submitted to 
 the tedious dinner courses in which they had as little voice in 
 selecting as the man in the moon, with such grace as to give 
 assurance that they did not intend to kick against the customs 
 of the country. There was one apparently solid and unbroken 
 table running the entire length of three.sides of the room, a sort 
 of family concern, where your destinies are placed in the hands 
 of the very few dandy waiters who officiated. 
 
 On arrival, we lunched at I o'clock, a special arrangement. 
 There was not much of it, but what there was was nice and well 
 cooked, all cold except the potatoes, and on your own plate 
 when you sat down. At lunch there were the tiniest little bits 
 of butter at great distances apart, ,fJ and at dinner, eaten by us as 
 early as seven, there was no visible trace of this article of food, 
 I had noticed the same trouble aboard the ship. At that rate 
 of consumption I wonder what becomes of the tons of it which 
 every ship coming from our own country brings here, Perhaps 
 it is manufactured into pomatums or worked up into machine 
 grease. I can't think the natives consume no more of it than is 
 fed to Americans that it gets away as an article of food. The 
 hotel is exclusively in charge of ladies. One £or two porters to 
 wrestle with the heavy baggage, and the waiters who keep con- 
 stantly dressed, ^though ready to rush off to the next dress 
 ball, and the fellow who shines the boots, are the only males 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1/ 
 
 on duty here. No supercilious, high-flown, shallow-brained 
 popinjay behind the counter to freeze you with his loftiness and 
 his idiotic stare, but neatly dressed ladies within the office that 
 is encased with glass, to politely and quietly see to your wishes. 
 
 After lunch, having some necessary purchases to make, the 
 "little one" and I took an aimless stroll about the city and 
 among the stores, leisurely sauntering by the windows and ci- 
 phering out the value of the articles on exhibition from the 
 prices, in shillings and pence, that in most cases were marked 
 upon them. Some of them appeared cheap, while others did 
 not. We had been told prices were generally high here. But 
 we bought a few things, however, including some trinkets, and 
 fell into such confusion over our first endeavor to become ac- 
 customed to the coin of the realm, that before I knew it my 
 pockets were so full of silver and their ugly copper pennies and 
 half pennies that my suspenders would hardly bear the great 
 weight. The stores are very small and the doors are nearly all 
 closed as though it were Winter. We did not intend to go to 
 the Cathedral with the party, but in our tramp got into that 
 neighborhood and went there. It is an old place and seems to 
 be suffering for want of air. The lower part, down where the dead 
 are buried, is dark and damp and not calculated to be beneficial 
 to rheumatic people. There are two great organs whose largest 
 pipes seemed to me as though they might be as big as the chim- 
 neys of a Sunflower river steamer. The windows were the chief 
 attraction. But if there had been other things they could not 
 have been seen that dark afternoon. So our stay here was brief. 
 
 Near this Cathedral was the Necropolis, the burying ground 
 of this city. It has many imposing monuments, plainly visible 
 a square or so away, but as it was growing late we did not walk 
 through it, On our return we passed the prison. We had 
 noted the shabby appearance of the neighborhood of the Cathe- 
 dral, and as we retraced our steps we saw an excited assembly 
 of dirty looking men, women and children, and soon heard the 
 cry of "police! police!" and on the instant a woman rushed in 
 our direction, with hair streaming in the wind and terror in her 
 face, followed by a drunken man bent on destruction. Unfor- 
 fortunately the woman caromed on me, and as she aid so grab- 
 3 
 
1 8 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 bed me and made a species of breastworks of my person, while 
 her pursuer chased her around and about, and made several 
 efforts to strike her over my shoulders, till I feared I would be 
 the only victim in the case. Directly, however, a burly team- 
 ster came up, took in the situation, and taking hold of the irate 
 man, gave him a good shaking and gave me freedom. Three 
 noble-looking policemen passed by just then, casually glanced 
 at the melee, smiled feebly, and went on. Perhaps they had 
 not formally gone on duty for that day. 
 
 We passed St. George's Square, where there are several mon- 
 uments, and around which are located the Post-office and most 
 of the principal hotels of the city, and went home in a rain. Not 
 an hour before I had bought an umbrella and cut a figure by 
 having it sent to the hotel. A programme for the morrow, 
 posted up in the dining room, announced that we would break- 
 fast at six and leave the hotel at seven in the morning, for a 
 tour, by rail and coach, to Loch Lomond, through the Tros- 
 sachs, to Loch Katrine, Dunbarton, CaJlender and Stirling, to 
 Edinburg, at which place we will be due at half past seven in the 
 afternoon. So, as the day is to be an unusually big one, and it 
 is now past one at night, I will pass Glassgow for the present 
 and go to a bed that has appeared very inviting for hours. 
 There is much more to be said, and many of my memorandums 
 have not been checked off, but I must sleep and rest, and trust 
 to the future to touch up the more important points not yet 
 mentioned. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE, 1 9 
 
 LETTER III. 
 
 Leaving Edihburg— Early breakfast— Division of the Caravan— Ballock and Loch 
 Lomoad-On the Lake— Duke of Montrose's deer park— Scottish cattle and 
 sheep— Ben Lomond, the highest mountain in Scotland— American Flag-- 
 Trip to Loch Katrine -The kind of coaches— Scenery— Walk up the hill- 
 Stone houses— Many historic places— Stacks of peet— Scarcity of fuel— Callan- 
 der—Stirling— More about castles— Greyfriar's Church— The Royal Hotel— 
 The Scott Monument— Museum, &c. 
 
 Edinburg, Scotland, July 10. 
 
 After writing the above date and address I sat for some time 
 trying to decide what character I would give my letter. I am 
 still undecided, I don't just see how to get the doings of the 
 day in one letter, and yet I feel that I can't bear to abbreviate. 
 As indicated by the programme posted the day before, we yes- 
 day took breakfast at 6 o'clock and entered the cars ai/. One 
 section came direct to this place and arrived early in the fore- 
 noon. The other section for Balloch, the southern extremity 
 of Loch Lomond, the scene of Scott's Lady of the Lake, where 
 they were transferred to a steamer which carried them to Invers- 
 naid, a distance of twenty-three miles, crossing the lake five 
 times in the journey, and landing at Balmada, Luss, Rowarden- 
 nan and Tarbet. Directly after leaving, we passed Inch Mur- 
 rin, the Duke of Montrose's deer park. This Scottish gentle- 
 tleman owns a matter of twenty-five miles square of the historic 
 highlands, and his sheep and cattle clip the grass and chew the 
 cud of contentment upon the territory made famous by history 
 
20 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 and song. I fancied these animals felt their importance, for 
 there was an air of contentment about them, and they seemed 
 utterly unmoved, in any way, by the vast cavalcade invading 
 their domains. I may say that the cattle were few, but that 
 sheep were about in ail directions as far as the eye could see or 
 the country be brought within range of a field-glass. And they 
 were splendid fellows, their long wool often hanging nearly to 
 the ground. 
 
 In this little run we passed the gate of the Highlands, the 
 Isle of Woman and Drunkard's Island, a place once used for 
 curing men of drunkenness — the mountains called The Cobbler 
 and his Wife, Ben Lomond, and a great number of others that 
 have their history and legends but which I have forgotten now. 
 But Lomond is the tallest mountain in Great Britain, being 
 3,-170 feet high. We arrived at Inversnaid at half-past ten. 
 The American flag was flapping in the breeze in front of the 
 hotel here, and of course we had to cheer it. I presume if the 
 time had been given us we would have felt in duty bound to go 
 in and eat a high-priced lunch through sheer gratitude for this 
 show of American patriotism on the part of the proprietors. 
 But we hadn't time for this as the coaches were in waiting to 
 carry us over to Loch Katarine, a distance of five or six miles. 
 These coaches are made especially for tourists. There is a low, 
 box-like, covered body into which whatever baggage there may 
 be is carried, and across the top of this are four seats, including 
 that of the driver, each capable of comfortably seating four per- 
 sons, three seats facing to the front, that behind the driver 
 facing to the rear. They are very strong and are drawn by 
 splendid horses, generally four to each, between the two lakes, 
 though the one I got upon had only two, which gave the gen- 
 tlemen in the party the privilege of walking to the summit of 
 the mountain. I di<~l not regret it. My Colorado experience 
 made it light work, albeit I wore my overcoat, the pockets of 
 which were stuffed with something less than a ton of guide 
 books, rubber shoes belonging to the ladies ot the party and 
 other trinkets too tedious to mention. 
 
 The scene was very beautiful to me, and wonderously so to 
 those who had not seen a Mountainous country before. The 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 21 
 
 Highlands resemble, in a great measure, some of the districts 
 down in Southwestern Colorado, and though not so grand and 
 awe-inspiring, have the advantage of being, in most cases, 
 clothed in verdure of various shades to their summits. Now 
 and then I heard the roar of the little waterfalls, and away be- 
 low, on the right, ran quite a stream towards Loch Lomond. 
 As I walked up, I several times, inadvertently, went to the 
 edge of the cliffs and looked down to see if there were any signs 
 of trout. I had no doubt they were there in abundance, but as 
 I neither had the time nor a permit from the Duke to angle in 
 the water of his domains, I passed on to the summit and climb- 
 ed upon the coach when it came up. In this ride several noted 
 places were pointed out to us, among which were an old fort 
 near the road, erected in 1 7 1 3 to overawe Rob Roy (alias Rob- 
 ert Macgregor Campbell) and the hut in which Helen, his wife, 
 was born. On looking at the hut there was no wonder at Helen 
 being the woman she was. In an hour from starting we reach- 
 ed Stronachlachler, at the western end of Loch Katrine, where 
 we spent the time rowing upon the lake, gathering flowers, and 
 climbing the adjoining mountain. The only buildings here are 
 the handsome hotel and outhouses, all of stone. And it may 
 be just as well to say now, that I have not seen a brick or frame 
 house, so far, in Scotland. The last one of them is stone, which 
 gives to them an air of permanence truly pleasing. The resi- 
 dences are superb, and . the public buildings are royal. One 
 don't feel afraid of storms, nor very much of fire. What a 
 contrast, in this respect, between this and our own country! 
 
 At half past 1 2 the Rob Roy steamed up from the other end 
 of the lake, put off a party of tourists, took ours aboard and 
 steamed back to the other end, where we took another set of 
 coaches for Callander. Loch Katerine, the guide books tell us, 
 is the grandest lake in Scotland. I am willing to believe it. In 
 this run we passed many noted places, among which were the 
 peaks of Ben An and Ben Venu, and Ellen's Isle. On taking 
 the coaches again, we soon entered the territory called the 
 Trossachs, the foot hills or lower ranges of the Highlands, and 
 after a two mile drive, stopped for lunch at the elegant hotel 
 which stands above the road side. I don't just understand 
 
22 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 how the lordly Duke of Montrose was induced to allow these 
 hotels to be erected on his premises for fear of some one scar- 
 ing his sheep. He certainly is apprehensive about his sheep, 
 for a little further on, where the road passes at the foot of Ben 
 Lodi, there are two sign boards a quarter of a mile apart, re- 
 questing tourists who visit the mountain, not to stray upon the 
 moor for fear of upsetting the sheep. I looked for a path to 
 the mountain, but there was none, and consequently the sign 
 was unintelligible to me. 
 
 After lunch we proceeded to Callander, which we reached at 
 four o'clock, passing en route, Loch Achray, the glen, Loch 
 Vennachar, the water works of Glasgow, over forty miles dis- 
 tant, the bridge of Tark, and Colantogle Ford, where Fitz 
 James fought with Roderick Dhu. At Callander a special train 
 was waiting to carry us to Sterling. The road we drove over 
 was a magnificent one, in perfect order, while the foliage, on 
 either hand, was generally in full bloom, and kept the ladies in 
 a continual state of excitement. Most of the soil is wet and 
 boggy, even far up the mountain sides, and is fit only for graz- 
 ing purposes. In many places we saw where they had dug and 
 stacked up peet to dry for use as fuel. Timber is quite scarce 
 in most places, and I guess the Duke don't allow the few tenants 
 he has in that region to burn any of it. 
 
 We sped through the country and towns along the road to 
 Stirling without stopping, and reached there in half an hour. 
 Leaving our hand baggage we tumbled out and proceeded di- 
 rectly to the Castle. There it goes again. I can't help it. The 
 country is full of them. As I sit here in the hotel I look out 
 my window and see an immense one frowning down upon the 
 city from a great bluff in the heart of Edinburg. The whole 
 history of the country and people are connected and interwoven 
 with castles. Their kings and queens lived within their un- 
 sightly walls and reared and educated their children within 
 them. I would rather it would have been them than myself. 
 They generally had a good view of the country, of course, and 
 had the satisfaction, often, of seeing their enemies march up 
 and squat around and starve them out, but I fancy their home 
 comforts were few and their list of luxuries shorter than my 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 23 
 
 little finger, unless written in a very bold and scattering hand. 
 I saw a chair of James the VI, and one of James II, and the 
 "little one" sat down in them, and I will take my affidavit that 
 almost any ordinary, old, straight-backed wooden chair in a dar- 
 kle cabin, in the South, would sit as easy. So you must ex- 
 cuse me if I find it impossible to keep out of the castle business, 
 as I had intended. 
 
 In many respects Stirling is one of the 'most historic places 
 in Scotland. The things enacted there and in view of the 
 castle furnished much material for Scottish history and song. 
 The castle seems to have been erected in detachments at dif- 
 ferent dates, and with little apparent order. The people of 
 those times had a queer conception of architecture — at least in 
 this part of the hemisphere. The statistics of the castle in 
 question go back as far as Alexander I, who died in it in 1124. 
 Mary, Queen of Scots, was crowned here, and some miserable 
 old scoundrel got Douglas in, and had him pitched out one of 
 the windows, after having him stabbed, and broke his neck. 
 The present Queen has put in a memorial glass in the window 
 through which Douglas was thrown. The guide books are 
 full of this castle, and the guide who conducted the squad I was 
 with, had committed the entire batch to memory, and practiced 
 it daily in his garret when he had no tourist to bore with his 
 twaddle. The distance from the walls to the valley, through 
 which winds the Forth, is 340 feet, and the view of the surround- 
 ing country is said to be unequalled anywhere in Great Britain. 
 It is very easy to take this as a fact. I think I never saw a 
 more magnificent sight, leaving entirely out of question ail feel- 
 ings brought up by a knowledge of the events which occurred 
 upon the the territory covered by the vision. 
 
 The town itself is the oddest looking place. The narrow 
 street that leads up the hill to the castle is more crooked than a 
 dog's hind leg, and literally jammed with funny houses. For 
 the first time I disregarded my temperance principles in the 
 Old World, and dropped into one of those houses and took a 
 glass of wine. Upon asking the price the vendor replied, as it 
 sounded to me, "tup punce, hay penny" — inflection on the 
 word "hay," He was too much for me, but pulling out a hand- 
 
24 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 full of miserable coppers and holding them towards him, he took 
 out two pennies and one half penny— in other words, my glass 
 of wine reduced my finances in the neighborhood of five cents 
 in civilized coin. 
 
 Adjoining the castle is the Greyfriar's Church, founded in 
 1594, and in it John Knox preached a sermon at the coronation, 
 there, of James the VI. It was the church of the martyr Guth- 
 rie and of Ebenezer Erskine, one of the founders of the United 
 Presbyterian Church. I did not go to it. The day's work had 
 floored the "little one" and myself, and we sauntered back to 
 the depot. I presume we did not miss much. A lady of the 
 party told me she had gone there, and as she was strolling 
 through the aisles of the building she remarked to a lady near 
 her, it seemed strange that she should be in the very Church 
 whose pews had been occupied by renowned persons hundreds 
 of years ago, and that in reply the lady, with a shrug of the 
 shoulder, said it looked like a mighty old-fashioned thing to her, 
 and she couldn't see what there was in it for people to come 
 trotting so far to see. I expect the place had a mouldy smell 
 to her, and she had left her ammonia in her satchel in the car. 
 
 When we reached the depot we learned that our train would 
 back up on the track on the farther side, so that to reach it we 
 would have to cross over. Well, sir, they made us go up a 
 flight of stairs, cross the road through a covered bridge, and 
 come down on the other side, when there was not a train or a 
 single car in sight, our train being somewhere out of town. 
 One or two stragglers coming up and seeing the party across on 
 the opposite side of the depot, started across the tracks as 
 though they were at home, but a guard stopped them and sent 
 them overland. They have some regard for life in this country. 
 
 To the minute our train ran up, was soon filled, the doors 
 locked and the train speeding away for this city, which we 
 reached at half-past seven. The whole party — all sections — 
 were quartered at the Royal Hotel where we found the rooms 
 already assigned and the baggage in them and unstrapped. 
 Dinner began at a quarter after eight and finished in one hour 
 — too late for the theater. The hotel is a fine one and the 
 view irom its Iront windows is one which, it seems to me, would 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. ?5 
 
 never become commonplace or irksome. The rooms are hand- 
 some and the beds are as inviting as it is possible for them to be, 
 the sheets and pillow-slips being the nicest linen. 
 
 This morning I took another stroll about the city and was 
 continually running against monuments and buildings of inter- 
 est, including the Albert Memorial, that cost $40,000, the Scott 
 Monument, in front of our hotel, that cost $75,000, and many 
 other handsome and imposing ones. I went a part of the way 
 up the Scott Monument but gave out upon reaching the mu- 
 seum, which I entered and saw the few relics there. Among 
 them was an autograph note written in 1832 by Walter Scott, 
 inviting some one to attend the funeral of his father, and a pro- 
 gramme of the Royal Theater of the same date, announcing the 
 play of Rob Roy Macgregor, and closing with the information 
 that the next week would open with Othello, with Mr. Keene 
 in the role of that name. 
 
 Some seventy went to Roslin Castle, others went to Abbots- 
 ford and Melrose Abbey, while some went to all these, and 
 others drove about over the city. I purchased stereoscopic views 
 of the first two places, and after nocn laid up to work on this 
 letter and get a rest. Since I began the letter, parties have 
 been returning and regaling me with high wrought descriptions 
 of what they have seen, until I have been so worked up I think 
 I will never squander any hours in doors another day. It is 
 the first day that has been without more or less rain for weeks, 
 and the streets were thronged with people. In my rambles I 
 came across a Punch and Judy show which I witnessed with a 
 great crowd and no little satisfaction. 
 
 The programme for to-morrow is to take in the lions of the 
 city, including two more castles, and at nine o'clock at night 
 leave by rail for London, stopping at Kenilworth and Warwick 
 on Saturday long enough to see the things there and frighten 
 the people, To-day being a day extra in this place on account 
 of the arr'val of the ship one day ahead of time, the action of 
 each was independent and at his own expense, but to-morrow 
 will be under the printed programme, which covers the entire 
 tour, in charge of our own conductors. I will go to bed and 
 prepare for it by taking a rest. The first and fifth sections are 
 4 
 
26 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 to breakfast at five in the morning, and travel over our route of 
 yesterday, though in reversed order, and return here in time 
 to join us before leaving for London. They have a big day 
 before them, and while they will be about crazy over the things 
 they will see on the trip, they will be very tired on returning 
 here to take the night ride in a train without sleepers. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 2J 
 
 LETTER IV. 
 
 A second letter from Edinburg— A drive about the city— The attention we attracted 
 —John Knox's house— The. way the streets are named— Craigmillar ( astle— 
 Edinboro Castle— Parliament Buildings— Queen Mary's bed room— Dudding- 
 ton's Church— Holyrood Palace— Portraits of Scotland's Kings — Visit to a 
 Scottish Court -Curled and powdered wigs— Prepare to leave Scotland. 
 
 Edinburg, Scotland, July n, 1879. 
 
 I did not think I would write another letter about this place. 
 Two can only give a skimming of what is to be seen here. In 
 order to do justice to Scotland, one ought to spend a month 
 within its territory. On coming over here I think but very few 
 of the party anticipated much pleasure from that part of the 
 tour which led through Scotland, but rather looked beyond it 
 for that which was to please. The visit has been an agreeable 
 surprise to most of them, and as for myself, I don't think it pos- 
 sible for me to derive more pleasure from anything that is ahead 
 of us. One thing I regret, and that is, that I was not better 
 posted in the history of the country before I left home. Still," I 
 can now read it with an interest that I could not have had be- 
 fore. 
 
 Our party left the hotel at nine o'clock, in open vehicles, one 
 half going one way and the Other another. Either was a big 
 caravan, and attracted much attention, even in this place, where 
 gangs of tourists, at this season of the year, are numerous and 
 often very large. In one narrow street, called Canongate, that 
 passes by the old Tolbooth of that name, and is a continuation 
 of Netherbow, upon which is located John Knox's house, the 
 crowd was immense, and the shouting of the urchins and girls 
 was almost deafening. This, of course, brought the inmates of 
 
28 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 houses to the doors and windows, so that we had about as much 
 attention paid us as is usually accorded to a circus pageant on 
 show day. Our course lay out the Dalkeith road, the old stage * 
 route towards the south, and gave us a fine view of the country. 
 As we drove through the city, before reaching the suburbs, we 
 found that the street, though a continuous one, changed its 
 name just seven times. We had experienced something of the 
 kind in our stroll about Glasgow, but in a different way. To 
 reach a certain place good for shopping, we were to follow one 
 street so far, and in our efforts to do so, after inquiring of two 
 hundred and one people, we found that the erratic thing twisted 
 around corners, whether at right angles or in a curve, in such 
 utter disregard to all former experience of city thoroughfares, 
 that we have not yet recovered from the effects of the discovery. 
 Yesterday I chased a street entirely around a square in search 
 of a gunmaker whose name had been given to me by a member 
 of the Marooner Club at home. 
 
 Three miles out we came to the ruins of Craigmillar Castle 
 and dismounted to invade it. The old wooden door which 
 closes the entrance was shut and locked, and some one appropri- 
 ately suggested it was closed for repairs. I have a view of this 
 castle, and if any one wants to see it when I get home I will ex- 
 hibit it to him and act the guide by chattering from the local 
 guide-book. As we stood there awaiting the arrival of the 
 keeper, one lady looked listlessly about and then asked of some 
 
 1 one near her, "what is peculiar about this place that we should 
 be brought here?" We have an intelligent party but there are 
 some odd persons connected with it, and I find their ideas and 
 
 tf> talk often quite amusing. This morning a prominent lady de- 
 clared her intention to spend the day at the hotel, but the con- 
 ductor urged her to go with the party, telling her we should 
 visit Edinboro Castle, Holyrood Palace, Parliament buildings, 
 etc. She innocently remarked that she did not know there was 
 
 ^ anything at those places to see. But she went, and after we got 
 
 • out upon the road she said to the conductor, "You see what an 
 influence you had with me." History had none. Is there any 
 use of such a person travelling in a country whose interest lies 
 largely in the records of its past? 
 
TOUR THUOUGH EUROPE. 20. 
 
 Craigmillar Castle, though most of the upper portion has 
 tumbled in and the ivy has crept about it and hides many of the 
 signs of decay, was more striking in its arrangement and the 
 intricacies of its numerous passages, dungeons, stairways and 
 the like, than any we had before seen. All that portion which 
 lies under ground was as dark as night, yet by the aid of matches 
 and holding on to each other's hands we explored perhaps the 
 most of it, and I think I caught a cold in doing so, as I did an 
 awful amount of sneezing at the dinner table. We could, with- 
 out the aid of a guide, distinguish the banquet hall and the 
 kitchen adjoining, with its great fire place eleven feet wide, all 
 perfectly intact. With these in view, it was not hard to im- 
 agine the roaring fires kept up here to roast the animals and con- 
 sume the wood, which, perhaps, had sometingto do with cre- 
 ating a fuel famine in this country. We went through what is 
 shown as Queen Mary's bed-room — a little cuddy hole, seven by 
 five ieet, especially short on light and ventilation. So, you 
 see, the Queens in those days did not have very sumptuous 
 apartments. If the Queen was a goodly sized lady and had 
 much of a bed, I can't imagine what disposition she made of 
 herself when not reclining. There was neither mantle or win- 
 dow sill to sit upon, and no hooks in the wall from which to 
 swing herself. I leave you to solve the difficulty. 
 
 We returned by way of Duddingston and saw Duddingston 
 Church, where the Scottish Chiefs were wont to go on Sunday. 
 The stone tile upon which the lassies dismounted and mounted, 
 was pointed out; and near the gate leading through the wall to 
 the building, was the iron stock or collar, attached to the wall 
 by a chain nearly eaten up with rust, where men who had of- 
 fended were collared and kept there for a season while those 
 entering at the gate were privileged to spit in the criminal's 
 face, with no restriction as to chewers of tobacco. Jeanie 
 Dean's cottage was pointed out to us, and very many other ob- 
 jects of interest in this drive. 
 
 At length we reached Holyrood Palace, the chief object of 
 our drive, and here spent an hour or more in looking the build- 
 ing over and taking an inventory of what is in sight. The 
 original part of the palace is in ruins, but the more modern part 
 
3<J THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 is in good repair, and the greater part of it furnished for the use 
 of the Queen of England, when she may choose to come over. 
 That part was not open to visitors. We could not get even a 
 peep through an opening in one of the blinds to see if modern 
 Queen's live more luxuriously than those who passed off the 
 stage before them. 
 
 We were turned loose in one room 123 feet long by 46 wide, 
 where hang the portraits of all the Queens and Kings of Scot- 
 land. The guide mentioned their great value, when a lady 
 present remarked they certainly could not be valued highly on 
 account of their beauty. The most of them are very coarse 
 looking fellows, and some of them look like a set of bloody 
 butchers. Whether that be the fault of the painter or the 
 physiognomy of the subjects, history does not record. We 
 were shown some of the rough stone coffins in which notable 
 personages had been buried, and they did not speak very highly 
 of the skill of the workmen in stone of the day in which they 
 were dug out. Then we went through Lord Darnley's rooms 
 and saw his furniture and the tapestry, that if new would be a 
 credit for this day and generation. The chairs in these rooms 
 had two silken cords running from the back of the chair to the 
 front part of the seat and crossing in the center. This was a 
 modern arrangement, and was done to prevent pilgrims from 
 dabbing down ir.to them and wearing them out. Our party 
 never pass a noted chair but that we must sit in it and twist 
 about a while and look foolish ; and I expect the parties having 
 charge of this place had heard of our landing upon the shores of 
 Scotland, and had been making preparations for us. I noticed 
 many of the old articles of furniture had been chipped by relic 
 hunters, and if not better protected, will be literally carried 
 away. So far our own party has not been very bad in this re- 
 spect. Dr. Tourjee caught one of them breaking a piece of 
 stone at the Queen's lookout, in Stirling Castle, and gave him a 
 lecturing over it, saying such things would compromise our 
 entire party. 
 
 We next went into Queen Mary's audience-room, her bed- 
 chamber, and the dining-room. In the first was the bed, made 
 up and all complete, used by royalty as far back as the 16th 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 3£ 
 
 • 
 
 century, and it did have an old look about it and no mistake. In 
 the Queen's chamber was her own bed and much of the tapes- 
 try of the room. Rizzio was killed in the dining-room, dragged 
 out through her chamber to the farther side of the audience 
 room and left there till the floor was stained with his blood. 
 To shut it out the Queen engaged a carpenter and had him 
 build a partition between the spots and the main part of the 
 room. The guides tried to show us the spots, and we jammed 
 each other about mightily to make room for the few straggling 
 rays of light coming in there, but I don't believe I am fully sat- 
 isfied I clearly saw any signs of blood. The guide was joked a 
 good deol about it — was asked how often the spot was renewed, 
 etc. . but he took it all in good part and was equal to the emer- 
 gency. He was a very clever old fellow, and I think believed 
 all that he said. In front of this old palace is the handsomest 
 fountain in Scotland. 
 
 From here we went to the house of John Knox and paraded 
 and crowded about in the little box of a concern. A lady coming 
 out was asked what was in there. She replied, ' 'nothing much 
 but a musty smell." I am afraid the olfactories of some of our 
 people are too good. Thence to the Parliament where Lords 
 Currie, Hill and Churchill were holding Court in their respective 
 rooms, and four distinguished looking fellows were sitting in a 
 larger room as a Court of Appeals. Of course we went in. 
 We go in every where they will let us and the dog don't look 
 too vicious. I saw, for the first time, the gowns and curled and 
 powdered wigs worn by all lawyers in attendance upon Courts 
 in this country. I knew of this dress and had often seen pic- 
 tures of it, but to see live men going about in such toggery ap- 
 peared queer. 
 
 From here we filed off and went to St. Giles Church, near by, 
 whore Knox held forth in the 16th century. I forget the name 
 of the present pastor. This, place had a more mouldy smell 
 than any I had been in before. I presume the pastor dampens 
 his handkerchief with cologne before going in to preach. We 
 wound up the day with a visit to Edinboro Castle. I shall pass 
 it briefly. It is in a good state of preservation, the decayed 
 portions having been restored. A regiment of soldiers is sta- 
 
32 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 tioned within it and two or three batteries of very old guns 
 overlook its ramparts. One of these guns is fired by electricity 
 at noon every day, Greenwich time. Here is a cannon made 
 in i486, and bursted in 1680. Around it lie some of its old 
 stone bullets. Its calibre is about fifteen inches or more. If it 
 bursted in 1680 I imagine it was the first and only time it was 
 ever fired. 1'he degree of its strength was amazingly low. The 
 old crown jewels of Scotland are kept here in a large glass case, 
 and that protected by a strong iron cage. Close by sits the 
 chest in which they were discovered after being missing so long. 
 From this castle one has a most splendid view of Edinburg and 
 its environs. I forgot to mention that we were shown, also, 
 the Heart of Mid Lothian. It is near St. Giles Church, Parlia- 
 ment Buildings, and the Tolbooth ; and the spot is marked by 
 granite stones of different hues set into the pavement in the 
 form of a heart. 
 
 To-night, at 9, we are to take our departure from Scotland. 
 I can not close without saying again how delightful our stay here 
 has been. So much has been crowded into so short a space I 
 find it impossible to realize that it has been less than four days 
 t since we landed from the ship. I like these Scottish people 
 and I have no doubt they like to have us among them. They 
 are always polite and cheerfully give you all the information 
 they can. I don't think they appreciate their poets as much as 
 American's do. One morning two of us were hunting the 
 house in which Waiter Scott had lived. In the neighborhood 
 of the place we were directed to go, we asked an intelligent and 
 well dressed man if Scott ever lived there. He seemed puz- 
 zled ; said he didn't know, then studied a moment as though 
 communing with himself, and asked: ''Who did you say, sir?" 
 Upon our again mentioning the name of Scott, he looked at us 
 inquiringly, and then said: "Oh, Scott, I thought you said 
 Lord Brougham's; yes, sir, perhaps that is the house, " and 
 then walked on. The vendors ot wares in the basement could 
 not even tell us where the house was, and I doubt if they knew. 
 The memory of the great poet don't keep them awake of nights. 
 But we found the house. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 33 
 
 LETTER V. 
 
 Edinburg to London— Twilight in Scotland— Kenilworth Castle— Breakfast under a 
 Shed — Visit to the home of Shakspeare — Lunch at the Old Red Horse— The 
 ravages of Relic Hunters — At Inns of Court Hotel, London---Sabbath in the 
 great City — Spurgeon.- 
 
 London, England, July 13, 1879, 
 
 On Friday night, at 9 o'clock, we left Edinburg by special 
 train, the entire party being together and filling just twenty 
 'cars drawn by two locomotives. At the hotel, as we began to $ 
 file out and enter the long line of vehicles in waiting to carry us 
 to the depot, the citizens began to gather to see the large array 
 of Americans, until the throng became so immense in the 
 broad street that it required great activity on the part of the * 
 policemen to keep the walks clear for pedestrians, and to allow 
 us to get away. And as our train whirled through the country 
 with the placards "engaged" posted on the car windows, people 
 would look in wonder until we had gone out of sight. You 
 may be troubling your minds as to how the placards could be 
 read at that time at night. At first this was something I could not at 
 once get used to, but on the brighter days in Scotland it did not 
 get what we called dark at home till after 1 1 o'clock, and at no 
 time during the night so dark as it does in America. The eve- 
 ning we left Edinburg I read a newspaper in the cars by the 
 light of the heavens after ten o'clock, and was able to resume 
 
 the next morning, without the aid of other light, as early as 
 5 
 
34 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 three o'clock ; and my organs of vision are not first class at that. 
 We ran all night and were tolerably comfortable in the first 
 class carriages where four rode together. The train reached 
 Kenilworth at six o'clock in the morning and remained till 9:50. 
 From the depot we walked or rode, as we chose, to Kelinworth 
 Castle, distant about a mile, over a pleasant drive, and took 
 breakfast at a hotel near by, where the most excellent, nicely 
 cooked beef and mutton, and other good things, were served 
 in bounteous quantities under a long shed arranged for the spe- 
 cial occasion. After breakfast we "did" the Castle, but I will 
 attempt no description of it, as I have been into that line so 
 much already since coming here, I am inclined to let them alone. 
 Nearly all of this Castle is in ruins, only that part being pre- 
 served where two or three rooms are filled with relics, all of 
 which are duly inventoried and entered into more than a hun- 
 dred note books. I generally buy a guide book of these noted 
 places, check off the articles as I see them, and stuff the book in 
 my pocket. What I am to do with this accumulation of bag- 
 gage is beginning to be a serious question with me. Besides 
 their cost, which is the smaller item, they are likely to overload 
 my trunk, Kelinworth Castle is made famous by Scott's novel 
 of that name, and during the season of tourists, thousands flock 
 there. No castle, so far, has interested me as much as Craig- 
 millar, near Edinburg. I may say, however, that of all the 
 castles I have seen Kelinworth was the only one in which Queen 
 Mary had not had an abode at some time or another. That 
 Queen Mary, if you take for true all that is said as to where she 
 kept herself, had rather a roving disposition there can scarcely be 
 a doubt. And when I think again of the cramped-up room at 
 Craigmillar used by her as bed chamber, I fancy she must have 
 made her stay short there. 
 
 From Kelinworth we proceeded to Stratford-on-Avon, our 
 train having to go upon two other roads for the trip. Here we 
 stayed from 11:50 a. m. to 3 p. m. lunching under the auspices 
 of the Old Red Horse Inn, but in a Bowling Alley about a 
 square behind the Inn and back of the court through which we 
 passed to reach it. The people at this Inn attach much import- 
 ance to the visit there of Washington Irving, and the room he 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 35 
 
 occupied during his stay, now used as a reception room, con- 
 tains his picture, copies of some of his works, the chair he sat 
 in and other mementoes of the man. Shakspeare doubtless had 
 many a spree in this old tavern. 
 
 Of all the funny loking places we had seen, Stratford-on-Avon 
 beat the list. Aside from the fact that it was the home of 
 Shakspeare, it is well worth a visit by those who happen in this 
 part of the country. I saw an old thatched building called the 
 i "Thatch Inn," that struck me as so very peculiar I hunted all 
 over the place for a picture of it, without success. I believe I 
 would rather have had it than one of the poet's house. But 
 the inside of the poet's old home is more fantastic than the out- 
 side appearance, though most of the rooms are much larger 
 than those of other dwelling houses of that time. 
 
 Again I saw evidences of the vandals who had been here be- 
 fore us. Much of the woodwork had been chipped by the 
 knives of relic-hunters. I despise them, and I think I would 
 stay over a day to testify against one if there was a law for pun- g 
 ishing them. I honestly believe, if unmolested, they would car- 
 ry away the Savior's tomb if He was corporeal and His body 
 rested beneath. In the room called the museum are very many 
 of the relics of Shakspeare ; articles of furniture, drinking ves- 
 sels, manuscripts and originals of the first printed editions of 
 some of his plays, covering quite a variety. The original of a 
 portrait taken of him at 35, and said to be the best one ever paint- 
 ed, occupies a fire-proof safe, high up at one end of the room, 
 which at first look appears set in the wall. This safe is closed 
 and locked every night. In many places the falling timbers of 
 this house, which has an interest to people over so large a part 
 of the world, is strengthened by the addition of iron in such a 
 manner as not to change at all the original appearance. I ex- 
 pect one of these days they will have to surround the entire 
 building with a strong case, then put a regiment of honest sol- 
 diers to guard it. I think relic hunters could get away with it 
 more quickly than it would go through natural decay. 
 
 After leaving Stratford-on-Avon our train brought us directly 
 here, flying through the country, and by elegant stations on the 
 way with the highest speed, stopping at only two or three sta- 
 
36 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 tions en route, and arriving at the London station at 6:50 p. m., 
 after a most enjoyable day for us. A few miles back we drop- 
 ped the four cars containing section IV, that they might come 
 in on another track and stop at a different hotel. Vehicles were 
 in waiting to carry us to Inns of Court Hotel, where again we 
 found our rooms already assigned, and our luggage (they don't 
 call it baggage here) in them and unstrapped. We have had a 
 very easy time about our luggage and all kinds of transportation. 
 I must write one letter about it. I think that would interest as 
 much as anything else. We began dinner at 8:30 p. m. and got 
 away from the table at 9:30. I would have been in bed before 
 that hour at home. 
 
 To-day, after breakfasting at 9, most of the party attended 
 some church. I went to the tabernacle where Spurgeon holds 
 forth, and on reaching there found a stream pouring into it. 
 Every one except members and Americans were then being re- 
 fused tickets. "American" was our password and it passed us 
 in. The building very much resembles a theater with three 
 tiers, except that the upper two run all the way around the 
 house, while at the lower one, where a stage would be, runs out 
 a platform for the choir, and above this, not extending so far 
 out, is another platform which serves as a pulpit. A plain rail- 
 ing runs around both of these, the pulpit being a plain table be- 
 hind which sat a sofa, and to the right of the speaker a chair, 
 constituting all the furniture in sight. There is no ornamenta- 
 tion about the building. Its seating capacity is near 7,000. I 
 was fearful the great man was not to preach that day as he has 
 been sick lately and has failed two or three times to put in an 
 appearance. On entering I asked a member about it, and was 
 told I would hear Spurgeon. Well, I did hear him, and I would 
 not have missed doing so for a great deal. He read a long les- 
 son, and made such extended remarks upon it that when he 
 went to give out the second hymn, which was sung, and prayed 
 his second time, I felt sorry he was through. But just then he 
 announced his text, mentioned his sub-divisions and launched 
 out, no doubt to the delight of every man, woman and child in 
 the congregation. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 37 
 
 I gathered that the Archbishop of Canterbury had requested 
 that to-day be set apart as a day of prayer for the cessation of 
 the long" and damaging spell of wet weather they have been ex- 
 periencing in the country. The Rev. gentleman spoke of the 
 hardness of the times, and charged it upon the Government. 
 He criticised their action in unmeasured terms, and especially 
 that part which brought so many wars upon their hands. He 
 asserted that they invaded domains they had no right to, and 
 that Great Britain, in that respect, was no better than a thief or 
 a robber, using those very words. He believed in prayer, but 
 thought this would not result in good because the Nation would 
 not acknowledge their errors. After excoriation upon excoria- 
 tion he wound up that, head of his subject by saying in sub- 
 stance : "I have expressed my belief upon this matter and you 
 can make the most of it, It was on my conscience and I was 
 compelled to get rid of it. " Alluding once to America he spoke of 
 her people as being leaders in enlightenment and religion. The 
 two members whose pew two of us occupied seemed anxious to 
 know how we liked their minister, and were delighted when 
 told that Mr. Spurgeon had thousands of admirers in America. * 
 
 A big programme is out for us to-morrow, and I will close and 
 take a rest for it. 
 
38 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 LETTER VI. 
 
 A day in London— Drive through the great city and the sights we saw— House ol' 
 Lords and House of Commons— A British Court— Impressious— Leaving Lon- 
 don Crossing the North Seas-Arrival at Rotterdam — Best breakfast we met 
 in Europe— Cart loads of strawberries devoured for breakfast — Description ol 
 the boats, warehouses, rnilkwagons, women and dogs— The primitive ways— 
 i ileanliness of the Hollanders— Peculiar customs— A tour about the city- 
 Trip to The Hague -The Hotel— Glad to get out of Holland. 
 
 Rotterdam, Holland, July 15, 1879. 
 
 My last letter was written at London, on Sunday night. 
 The next morning at nine we took vehicles and drove through 
 parts of the city. It was a little foggy — they have fogs in Lon- 
 don now and then — and we had one or two showers, but the 
 things to be seen were of such unbroken interest to us that we 
 did not mind these much. Most of the party, ladies and gen- 
 tlemen, are provided with rubber cloaks and hoods, and with 
 these not much attention is paid to rain. As we are to return 
 to this immense city at the close of our tour and stay three days, 
 I will merely mention an outline of the drive. We passed 
 Lincoln's Inn Hall and Library, the Law Courts, Temple Bar, 
 office of the New York Herald, Cook's Tourists offices, Ludgate 
 Circus and Hill, St. Paul's, telegraph office, postoffice, Peel's 
 statue, through Newgate, past the statue of Prince Consort, up 
 Holborn and High Hill, via Holborn Bars, by the British Mu- 
 seum, through Oxford street, which is lined with retail stores, 
 Regent street, where many fashionable residences are, along 
 Haymarket and by the theatre of that name, to the National 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 39 
 
 Gallery, along Pall Mall (Pell Mell they pronounce it,) past the 
 War Buildings, and the magnificent Club Houses, Prince of 
 Wales' house, through St. James street and by the Parks, past 
 Buckingham Palace, stables and garden, out Grosvenor street 
 and along Rotten Row, the new Museum of Natural History, 
 and that of South Kensington, by the Albert Memorial, the 
 Home and Foreign offices, through Stand Street to Westmin- 
 ster Abbey and Westminster Hall. 
 
 We went hurriedly through the Museums and were dazed 
 with the vast array of relics and curiosities there. We saw the 
 pictures in the National Gallery something like one sees a 
 country as he speeds through it in a railroad car, save that once, 
 in a while, when we saw something particularly attractive, we 
 could check up and give it a moment's more time. I would 
 take it that either the British Museum or South Kensington (the 
 latter of which I liked best) would afford a person of even or- 
 dinary capacity for appreciating such things, pleasure for a week 
 or more. At St. Paul's and Westminster we groped about 
 among the lower passages and over the tombs and by the Crypts 
 of many a person famous in this and our own country. The 
 Poet's Corner, in Westminster, seemed to possess more attrac- 
 tion for us than the more gaudy and elaborate tombs in honor 
 of the royalty and nobility. I am sure I was far more interest- 
 ed in the simple tablet covering the remains of Dickens, than 
 I was in that of any King or Queen whose life was commemora- 
 ted by a monument there. Of course we jammed into the 
 House of Lords and the House of Commons, in the former of 
 which the Court of Lords was in session and the trial of a case 
 was in progress. I must confess that I was not struck dumb 
 with the appearance of the eight or ten men I saw here; and 
 the noble Lord who had the floor while we were in, impressed 
 me as very tiresome. If it had been at night I should have be- 
 gun to yawn and gape at once. At the South Kensington Mu- 
 seum, they register visitors as was done at our Centennial. In 
 1862 the number of visitors was 1,241,369, the next highest 
 being in 1S76, when it reached 1,173,350. 
 
 We returned to the hotel at 4:30 and took an early dinner. 
 At 8 the second section numbering seventy-four, including the 
 
40 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 two conductors, left the hotel and taking the cars reached Har- 
 wich, the end of British territory, at 10 o'clock that night, where 
 we were transferred to a brand new steamer, comfortably stowed 
 away, even though as many as six were put in one room — the 
 rooms containing that many berths — and transported across the 
 North Sea to this place, reaching the wharf at 9:30 A. m. Here 
 we fell in with new scenery and certainly a very different kind 
 of people. I presume all of Holland is flat and much of it 
 "made" land. They have a time of it keeping the channel 
 open through the river Maas, which leads to the sea, as that 
 stream is lined with dredging machines busy at work filling with 
 mud the barges which lie alongside of them. The shores are 
 fiat and in most cases covered with a species of flag which is 
 used for thatching houses, and which was being cut and tied 
 in bundles and loaded into the small sailing vessels in various 
 places. 
 
 As far as the eye could reach, on either hand, we could see 
 the great clumsy windmills as their arms lazily revolved against 
 the horizon. This was a clear day — the first we had seen since 
 leaving New York — and we could see a long distance. The 
 examination of our baggage was very hasty and formal, many 
 of the smaller packages not being opened at all. They do not 
 suspect tourists of coming here as a matter of speculation. The 
 vessels of these Hollanders are very heavy, unshapely things — 
 a sort of enlargement of their ungraceful wooden shoes. Their 
 yawls or skiffs are worse, even, than their sailers, and they sit 
 right near the bow and row with a pair of oars which very much 
 resemble a big fence rail, straightened and flattened a bit at the 
 end which dips heavily into the water. These skiffs, I would 
 guess, propel about as easily as a water-soaked log. On arrival 
 at the wharf we were driven to the Victoria Hotel, where we 
 found the best breakfast awaiting us we have had in Europe, 
 making due allowance for sharpened appetites by fasting since 
 the evening before. Napkins were on the table large enough 
 for two of them to make a sheet for a narrow bed, and they and 
 the table cloths were of such spotless whiteness that we all felt 
 sorry we could not stop here long enough to have some wash- 
 ing done. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 4 1 
 
 Just about the time we were through with our meal, some 
 one came in with a little stone jar, resembling a small flower 
 pot, filled with the biggest and most luscious strawberries I 
 ever saw in any country, and upon announcing that there was a 
 cart at the door loaded with them, and for sale at only two cents 
 a pot full, there was a stampede out there. The supply was not 
 exhausted, for before one cart could be emptied another would 
 heave in sight, until we could eat no more. I never saw and 
 never expect to see again so large a quantity of this delicious 
 berry disappear in so short a time. Directly after this, on 
 starting out to take a stroll, three women signaled me to buy 
 some berries. Placing my hand in the region of my stomach 
 I moved it up to my throat and made a mark there, indicating 
 how full I was, at which the women laughed heartily. 
 
 Things are primitive here in many respects. The larger busi- 
 ness houses, fronting on the numerous canals, lower their freight 
 from the upper stories by a single rope running over a pulley 
 from above and around a check-post to regulate the speed of 
 descent. I saw no block and tackle, and presume they hoist by 
 main strength and awkwardness. The women wash the clothes 
 on the sidewalk, and use a species of pestle like an old-fashion- 
 ed "hominy beater," and scrub the pieces with the wash brush 
 that we use for cleaning wood-work, by laying the article 
 against the inside of the tub. They pound away with little re- 
 gard to passers-by, who, if they don't want a little soap suds fly 
 upon them, must take the middle of the street. 
 
 All transportation, or nearly all, of goods, wares and merch- 
 andise, except the heavy articles, is done on long trucks with a 
 pair of wheels near the centre ; on wheelbarrows, and the shoul- 
 ders of women by means of the neck yoke resting on the back 
 and shoulders, and into a depression of which fits the neck. 
 The trucks are propelled by men, women or dogs, and now and 
 then by all three combined. It was the first time in my life I 
 had seen dogs used in this way except for the amusement of 
 children in harnessing them up to little wagons. I saw one 
 heavily loaded truck with a woman in front pulling, a boy and 
 girl behind pushing, and two dogs harnessed and hitched in 
 underneath, one of which was setting to with all his might, while 
 6 
 
42 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 the other was shirking, just as other people do on rare occa- 
 sions. The milk wagon is nothing more or less than a woman 
 with one of these yokes with a keg attached to each end, having 
 a sliding cover which is removed when they deliver milk. I saw 
 several of these and was trying to guess what they were. At 
 last one put down her load in front of a residence, rang the door 
 bell, and waited for the opening of the door, while I leaned 
 against a tree near the canal to witness the result. The measure 
 hung inside the keg, while two earthen pitchers were attached 
 to each, outside. What these were for I have not yet found 
 out. I may do so before leaving Holland. The sidewalks are 
 narrow, and as these women go swinging along with baskets or 
 kegs, one has to keep a good look out or he stands a chance of 
 getting his shins rubbed. 
 
 I never saw a more cleanly people than these Hollanders 
 here in Rotterdam. The children, especially, looked as 
 though it were Sunday and they had just been tumbled out of a 
 band-box. Even the workmen and lower classes were all clean. 
 I think I didn't see a dirty man, woman or child about the city 
 except, perhaps, a few on board some of the lubberly 
 vessls at the wharf. The women are generally good looking, 
 not handsome, and every one seemed cheerful. I saw very 
 few unattractive faces amongst them, and not a single beggar. 
 After parading about the city independently for an hour in 
 squads of two, three or a dozen, we were placed in fifteen car- 
 riages, similar to your nicer two horse hacks, and had a two or 
 three hour's drive over the city. I guess tourists don't come to 
 Rotterdam much, for even in our little walk we were known as 
 foreigners and gazed at, but as our caravan went whirling 
 through the streets we kicked up a racket the like of which I 
 never saw where only common people were riding through a 
 town. Men, women and children flocked to the doors and 
 windows to look at us, and pedestrians would stop and watch 
 us till we were out of sight. In passing an intersecting street 
 our line of carriages would block it up, and before the rear had 
 passed, we had a crowd of curious spectators on either side 
 reaching often a square away. The better to see I sat on the 
 roof of the carriage behind the driver, and in my efforts to re- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 43 
 
 tain my seat, see all the sights, and enter a memorandum once 
 in a while, I had a busy time of it. We hauled up once and 
 dismounted at a church, when the crowd became immense. 
 Just before resuming the march, the women got so thick and 
 pressed so closely around a carriage occupied by four young 
 ladies that they were compelled to close the window. At this 
 carriage one woman looked admiringly at its occupants and said, 
 "Oh how beautiful you all are." Two of the ladies understood 
 her. I hadn't thought before that we were burdened with 
 beauty and I am skeptical on that point yet. But tastes will 
 differ. 
 
 There is one thing here which I think would take an Ameri- 
 can a long time to get used to, and that is the use, in very pub- 
 lic places, of the entirely exposed urinals. They have them for 
 men in nearly every nook and corner outside of the church 
 where we stopped, right upon the narrow side walk, and ap- 
 proach them in about the same spirit, but with somewhat less 
 concern than one of our ladies would stop to adjust a disarranged 
 shoe. At the depot women had charge of these places, and one 
 stood at the door directing our gentlemen who couldn't deci- 
 pher the Holland lingo, the way to go. 
 
 At 3 o'clock we wound up our ride at the magnificent depot 
 just at the edge of the city, where we took the cars for the 
 Hague, arriving there in half an hour and passing the town of 
 Scheidam on the way, a name familiar to Americans from the 
 few bottles of Schnapps drank in that country. We have seen 
 no fences in Holland, and are told we will see none. The little 
 narrow fields away back from the railroad remind one some of 
 the plantations on the sugar coast in Louisiana, with the excep- 
 tion that they are much smaller and are separated by small 
 canals or ditches apparently about four feet wide. At crossings 
 there are bridges and gates. I presume they don't do it, but it 
 looks to me as if the stock could easily jump these ditches. 
 
 No hotel at The Hague could bed away all of our party, so 
 the ladies and married couples quartered at the Hotel Belle 
 Vue, and the others came over here. I don't know the name 
 of the hotel, but it's all right. We are experiencing much 
 trouble and deriving a great deal of amusement over our inabil- 
 
44 
 
 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 ity to speak the language, while the money confuses us beyond 
 calculation. In my stroll around the city this afternoon, I made 
 a purchase and handed the woman a sixpence left over from the 
 English supply. She looked at it inquiringly and muttered 
 something that was all Hottentot to me, but did not take the 
 
 t hing. Drawing out my entire stock in trade, including both 
 English and American pieces of silver and copper and one 
 small coin of her own outlandish stuff, worth about fcur cents, 
 
 h er face brightened up and she. took the little fellow and gave 
 me back four pieces of copper. I am glad I am going to get 
 out of Holland soon. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 45 
 
 LETTER VII. 
 
 Talk about The Hague— A woman pulling a Uanalboat — The stores— The Picture 
 Galleries — Departure for Haarlem to attend a Concert — A Dutch Wedding- 
 Arrival at Amsterdam and the doings there— Trouble over Table de Hole— 
 Holland an entertaining place to visit. 
 
 Amsterdam, Holland, July 16, 1879. 
 
 In Glasgow, Scotland, I saw a man working in the shafts of a 
 cart well laden with coal, while a woman was pushing, but it was 
 reserved for us to see, at The Hague, the seat of the Govern- 
 ment and the home of royalty, a woman acting horse and pull- 
 ing a good sized canal boat, while a man sat lazily in the stern 
 of the vessel steering. This sight rather shocked the feelings 
 of our party. Some one, in mitigation of this apparent injus- 
 tice, suggested that perhaps the man and woman took turn 
 about, and ail of us felt sorry it happened to be the woman's 
 watch just at that time. All the other boats we had seen were 
 towed by men who got down and "scratched gravel" like any 
 other horse. Horse flesh must be scarce or human flesh super- 
 abundant in Holland, 
 
 I got up early this morning and sauntered through the streets 
 of the Hague. People don't seem to be early risers there 
 Very few pedestrians were astir, not even the tipler out for his 
 early horn. I saw a few men around trucks laden with peat, 
 and now and then a. servant girl who had been over to a neigh- 
 bor to borrow some matches to start the breakfast fire. The city 
 
46 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 was very quiet. It is well that so much of the transportation is 
 done by other mofles than on wagons. The noise would be 
 deafening. I now understand why so many of the doors to 
 stores are kept closed in Glasgow and Edinburg. If they did 
 not do it they would have to keep a supply of speaking trump- 
 ets and ear trumpets, too, in order to carry on necessary con- 
 versation. Here, in the smaller stores, the. entrance is by one 
 small door into a hall and then into the shop. Often both of 
 these are closed and the only evidence there is that articles are 
 for sale within is that given by the little show window attached 
 to the front of the house. Sometimes one has to look around 
 and take the bearings a good while before he is sure of the right 
 door, and when he finds it, has to ring the owner up from an un- 
 known quarter of the house. 
 
 In front of very many of the windows, and especially the front 
 ones of residences, are two looking glasses fastened by iron 
 arms holding frames at an angle so that one within may sit back 
 and see those moving along the street, while in others are wire- 
 netting, enabling the occupants of the room to stand at the 
 window and see out and not be recognized. While meander- 
 ing about this morning I saw a rnilk-maid milking one of the 
 little asses of this country, three others standing patiently by 
 having already been milked or waiting their turn. A moment 
 or two later I saw the driver taking some away that had been 
 milked. At breakfast one of our boys said there were four 
 kinds of milk in Holland; cow's milk, ass's milk, goat's milk 
 and sour milk, and that he had tried them all but the latter. 
 That young man has an inquiring turn of mind. He and I had 
 some letters to mail, and it would have done you good to see us 
 wrestling with the landlord for stamps and settling with him 
 after we got them. The efforts of some of our folks to talk the 
 language of these people causes both amusement and conster- 
 ration.. I never attempt it. There are many who can read the 
 language, but I find them but little better off than those who 
 know nothing about it. 
 
 After an early breakfast we did the city in a body, on foot, 
 passing the Government buildings and going through the two 
 picture galleries of the place, in which we saw many pictures, 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 47 
 
 the work of artists famous in this and our own country. There 
 was one large painting that particularly attracted our attention. 
 We had heard of it before reaching here, but it required no 
 eulogies to arouse our admiration. It had been spoken of as 
 "Potter's Bull," and was painted by Julius Potter in 1649, w h° 
 died at the age of 29. Though known as the "Bull" there are 
 four other prominent characters in the foreground, a cow and 
 her calf, a sheep, and a man who stands leaning against a tree, 
 under which they are resting, with an air of satisfaction on his 
 face. One could almost imagine he saw these animals breathe ; 
 and it would have hardly surprised any one if the frog near by 
 had hopped off the canvas into the middle of the room. This 
 young genius painted another picture — representing a pack of 
 dogs in conflict with a bear, the hunter witnessing the struggle ; 
 and the thing appeared so terribly real that it was impossible 
 not to have a feeling of pity for the poor dogs that were being 
 lascerated and killed by the infuriated beast that fought for life. 
 It is impossible to tell what round of fame that mere youth 
 would have reached if he had lived to the age of fifty or more. 
 
 I am sorry for the credit of my associates in this tour to say 
 that they often turn from the paintings of such masters as Ru- 
 bens, Rembrandt and others, and gaze with a species of rever- 
 ential awe upon the works of some obscure fellow unknown to 
 fame. As for myself, I must confess, early, an ignorance as to 
 what fine paintings are. Every once in a while some member 
 of the party will come up and say, "Oh, have you seen that fine 
 painting in 'the other room by Mr. so and so?" naming some 
 noted painter, and upon my replying in the negative, dragging 
 me off to see a work I had already passed without being attract- 
 ed, and which, at last, only became a matter of interest because 
 it was the product of so and so. Great men differ, as a matter 
 of course, but my judgment of a picture is based upon the effect 
 it has upon me before the painter is known. I can't admire all 
 the works of these great men, though I have marched about 
 them, taken sundry positions before them for the best light and 
 shade, and kept my mind on the dead author all the time. I 
 am afraid the "little one" is worse than I am, and I have ap- 
 prehensions that she, even, has grown too old to learn to go 
 
48 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 into ecstacies over all the paintings of the old authors. Some 
 of our people, I suspect, never commit themselves with refer- 
 ence to a picture till they delve out the name of the painter, and 
 then, if he be a big bug, cry out, "how beautiful, " "such life- 
 like expressions," "how delicate its shading;" and so on. For 
 my own part, I never carry a catalogue into a picture gallery. 
 I do not care for pictures which of themselves do not fix my 
 attention without the influence of some great name ; and when 
 I do find one which does — and so far they have been pretty nu- 
 merous — there are always those around me ready to give the 
 information, as many of them spend half their time in a gallery 
 reading their catalogues. But there is danger, anyway, of this 
 picture business becoming a greater nuisance than that of the 
 castles, and the time may come, before the journey is over, that 
 I will lag behind the doors of their galleries. I would vastly 
 rather see their people and their ways and their shops and the 
 things they contain, than a big gallery it would take a week to 
 see satisfactorily. 
 
 We passed the open square where some tall gun was exe- 
 cuted, and on being shown the spot about where the deed was 
 done, some sentimental chap feelingly remarked that perhaps 
 his spirit now howered over the place. "Let it hover," was 
 answed by one not so deeply impressed. The fact is some of 
 us are crude material, and don't work up just as kindly as we 
 ought. 
 
 At 10:50 we took the train for this place, and on arrival at 
 Haarlem our cars were run upon a side track, and we were allowed 
 to march up town, astonish the Dutch, and attend a special con- 
 cert given in the Cathedral, on "the world-lamous organ which 
 enjoys the proud distinction of having been played by Han- 
 del, and by Mozart, when he was only ten years old." That is 
 a quotation from our own little guide book. I am sorry to say 
 I had not heard of the organ before starting on this trip. Be- 
 fore leaving the cars, programmes of the pieces to be played 
 were distributed by the conductor, but on reaching the Cathe- 
 dral we found a marriage ceremony just beginning and we had 
 to remain as spectators. The ceremony was a long one, in 
 Dutch, and unimpressive, and the groom didn't seem to care a 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 49 
 
 row of pins whether school kept or not. Both he and the bride 
 mustered out of the building just as man and wife might at the 
 close of a sermon. Some of our ladies who are good at nosing 
 out things, ascertained that the groom was a widower with two 
 children and that the bride had been a servant in his family. 
 That being the case the Americans were satisfied. On account 
 of the delay caused by the wedding, the grand old organ, con- 
 structed by Muller, over a hundred years ago, omitted two of 
 the eight pieces. The music was charming. 1 heard two pieces 
 and then slipped out and crept about over the town till time to 
 return to the depot and meet the party coming just as our cars 
 were being run in to hook on the regular train for this place, 
 which was reached at two o'clock, our gang stopping at the 
 Hotel des Pays Bas, a house so odd in the arrangement and 
 construction of its rooms that nearly half an hour was spent in 
 visiting each other's quarters to see how all were located. Ev- 
 ery one was pleased. 
 
 Having gotten through with this we went in a body to the 
 Royal Museum, the finest picture gallery in Holland, and there 
 stayed till we saw it out. For once we took our time, having 
 nothing else to do before dinner, which had been announced 
 for six o'clock. At dinner every one was hungry, there having 
 been no opportunity for lunch. Americans who have not been 
 over here will never understand till they experience it how te- 
 dious one of their dinners here is to a real hungry man. I will 
 give the experience to-day. Down we sit on each side of a great 
 long table, and wait till all hands are adjusted and the four feet 
 square napkins are satisfactorily arranged. Then the soup is 
 served. That being done, all around the soup dishes are re 
 moved and plates given you instead ; then come along big dishes 
 of fish and potatoes from which you help yourself, after eating 
 which all plates are again changed. The bill of fare being in 
 Holland lingo, our chief difficulty lay in our not knowing what 
 would follow, and consequently in being unable to gauge our- 
 selves properly for it. The danger on one hand was that if we 
 did not partake pretty freely of the courses as they came along, 
 others might not succeed them, and we would come out short ; 
 while on the other hand, we ran the risk of filling up before 
 7 
 
50 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 reaching the end and getting among the goodies. To-dav there 
 were just eight courses, the plates being removed each time, 
 and as the table was unusually full and waiters few, the process 
 was very slow. Bread and butter were alwa3's in reach, and 
 the temptation to nibble at these was too great to be resisted. 
 The upshot of it was that I fell at the fifth course, after a seige 
 of over an hour, with oceans of the most luscious cherries and 
 strawberries in the back-ground. I think another day I will get 
 in with the steward and borrow a bill of fare and cipher it out 
 before dinner comes on. But it is well these dinners are long, 
 as it is the only time during the day we get a genuine good 
 rest. It is a splendid place to rest when we are not hungry, 
 but rather annoying when our appetites are sharp. Whenever 
 a member refuses an article constituting one course he has to 
 sit it out and wait till that one is disposed of by all, and the next 
 one comes around. Often I use this time by writing up my 
 notes or continuing my letters, which are generally written in 
 detachments. 
 
 Amsterdam contains near 300,000 inhabitants, and is said to 
 be built entirely upon piles. One would not guess the character 
 of the foundation from any evidences he sees; still, in some of 
 the streets, I saw houses very much out of plumb, and leaning 
 out into the street as if endeavoring to kiss their neighbors 
 across the way. All of Holland is twenty-four to thirty feet be- 
 low the level of the sea, and on that account I suspect they 
 don't dig their cellars very deep. There is a way of cleaning 
 out the numerous canals which one is liable to tumble into any 
 moment if he don't keep his eyes open, and I understand it is 
 done once a year, but I have avoided undertaking to become ac- 
 quainted with the process for fear the effort and the information 
 combined would incapacitate me from pursuing the tour. In 
 some parts of the city the streets and sidewalks are so narrow- 
 that we could touch the houses with our umbrellas from the 
 tops of the omnibusses as we drove from the depot to the hotel. 
 
 In the morning we are to make an early visit to the Palace 
 and one or two old churches, and leave for Cologne at 10:40, 
 which will give us the longest ride we have had in the cars since 
 leaving Edinburg. We have been carried away with Holland, 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 5 I 
 
 and have been nearly as great a show to the people as they 
 have been to us. It seems to me that those* who omit this 
 quaint land in a tour in Europe make a mistake. No one could 
 possibly regret a visit here. He will probably not see a beggar 
 in all Holland, or a single person whose appearance would in- 
 dicate they stood in need of alms. I have seen none and I 
 have tried hard to see all there is to be seen. 
 
 To day has been a cloudy and a very cool day. and my room- 
 mate has gone to bed clear under all the cover with his heavy 
 overcoat across the lower part of his body. So we have not 
 suffered with heat in Holland. 
 
 <£&§&- 
 
 
 u ;. J - >-- 
 
 yy; - 
 
5 2 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 LETTER VIII. 
 
 The King's Palace at Amsterdam— Scenery on the German Border— Dutch "Dams" 
 —Clean Cities— Cologne and its Cathedral ; a Costly 8hrine ; Big Bells— The 
 Church of St. Ursula -Ancient Relics, and sacred Bones— "Over the Rhine"— 
 The River of Magnificent Scenery— Bingen— Fran kfort-on-the-Main— AViesba- 
 den and its Sycamore Avenues. 
 
 Heidelberg, Germany, July 19, 1879. 
 
 On the morning of the 17th, we visited the Palace, in Am- 
 sterdam, where the King spends eight days in the year, and had 
 our first glimpse of the inside of the dwelling of live royalty. 
 Over in Scotland we were looking up the abodes of dead Kings 
 and Queens, the small remnants of whose furniture were in such 
 dilapidation it was difficult for us to determine its original com- 
 position. Here, everything was new and in order as you would 
 find it in a well kept house. We were first shown the small 
 dining room, and wondered what must be the dimensions of the 
 big one. I don't know how long we were marching around in 
 that place, gaping at the finery, but it appeared to me even 
 the King of this small territory did not suffer for the want of 
 elbow room. Most of the rooms, walls and all, are solid, high- 
 ly polished marble, and where not were of silk tapestry of the 
 most taking patterns. The ball-room is a very gorgeous room, 
 and the old Dutch guide, who was dressed as if a ball were 
 soon to come off and he to be one of the Queen's partners, de- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 53 
 
 clared it to be the finest in Europe. It is 120 feet long, 
 60 feet wide, 100 feet high, solid marble, and not a column any- 
 where to be seen. Of course dancers would not likely bump 
 their heads against the rafters should they jump ever so high. 
 After this we went to the church and the Exchange, when we 
 were driven through a maze of streets and canals, to the depot, 
 where, at 10:40 a. in. , we took the train for Cologne. The day 
 was clear and warm, and we had pecks of dirt flying in at our 
 car windows. Directly after leaving we ran into the grain pro- 
 ducing lands, the fertility of which apparently increased till we 
 reached the Rhine, at Cologne. 
 
 There was abundant evidence of the spirit of war in the forts 
 we passed on the border and the numerous soldiers seen every- 
 where. Among other places we passed through Zevenaar, 
 Gelden, Kempen, Utrecht, Arnheim, Crefeld, Oppum and Ne- 
 uss. Just alter leaving Zevenaar we came to the station on the 
 border where our baggage went through the mill again. It was 
 hastily done. They caught my roommate on a box of cigars, 
 partly full, and made him pay 12 cents duty only. In Germany, 
 after crossing a branch of the Rhine, which we did in boats pro- 
 pelled along by wire ropes stretched across the stream, the 
 scenery became absolutely enchanting and was sufficient to keep 
 awake and interest our worn out and sleepy crowd. I saw no 
 stock or fruit, but as far as the eye could reach the landscape 
 was covered with luxuriant grain, relieved by the variation in 
 colors and the magnificent roads which run through avenues of 
 trees that had an inviting look to us. The lands must be very 
 rich in the first part of Germany. In a few of the fields where 
 the wheat had just been cut and bound, it looked as if the 
 bundles nearly covered the ground. There was no waste ter- 
 ritory, and not a poor spot to be seen. 
 
 We saw so many dams in Holland that I fear some of our 
 party contracted bad habits in the use of language. The word 
 "dam" seemed to work itself into everything about the place, 
 and especially on the street cars. Nearly every one was re- 
 minded of a story. Very often people who do not swear like 
 to repeat a story having a few cuss words in it. It is a species 
 of forbidden fruit that tastes sweet to them. In this connection 
 
54 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 Rotterdam was illustrated. A girl had eaten the little boy's 
 candy up, and upon his paternal ancestor telling him it was no 
 harm to repeat the name of the city mentioned, he remarked 
 he hoped it would "Rotterdam teeth out." And in this way 
 he flanked all responsibility for profanity. They have the most 
 awful names; or a combination of names in Holland. The signs 
 were a continual puzzle to us. It is probable that many of the 
 names on the signs were composed of two or three words, but 
 the latters of the same size and shape on each were strung to- 
 gether and appeared as one, Here is one of the easiest and 
 shortest taken at Haarlem with forty urchins watching me as I 
 spelled it off and wrote it down in my note book — Steenkolen- 
 veringing. I was afraid to tackle those having three vowels in 
 succession, sometimes twice in the same word. I wonder the 
 jaws of the Hollanders are not twisted out of all shape. 
 
 In Amsterdam the chimes of a church near our hotel gave us 
 the section of a tune every quarter of an hour, and at the end 
 of the hour turned out a long song — not loud and harsh but soft 
 and agreeable to the ear. The garbage of that city is gathered 
 up at 8 o'clock in the morning. The driver stops his big box 
 of a wagon and goes along the street, whirling a watchman's 
 rattle about the size of a small cupboard, and at the same time 
 giving a pull to every bell he passes. After going some dis- 
 tance he returns to his wagon and empties, as he drives through 
 the street he has just gone over, the vessels that have been hur- 
 riedly set out on the pavement. The cities of Rotterdam 
 and Amsterdam are as cleanly as their people, and even with 
 the hundreds of canals running though them I was surprised to 
 detect no disagreeable odor. But in one place, at The Hague, 
 in crossing a large canal, if my eyes had been shut, I would 
 have thought I was down in the bowels of the ill-smelling ship 
 which brought us over. 
 
 We arrived at Cologne at 4:40 p. m., and putting our hand 
 baggage in vehicles for the hotel,, walked to the cathedral and 
 took it. We left the spire, which is the tallest in the world, not 
 even excepting those in the deserts of Egypt. We had learn- 
 ed this in the British Museum, where there was one great wall 
 upon which we grouped the designs of all the principal spires, 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 55 
 
 domes and monuments on the globe, the one on Trinity Church, 
 New York, being rather an insignificant one in the group. 
 After promenading about the aisles of the great church, see- 
 ing this altar and that, and getting lost every ten minutes, we 
 were divided into squads and taken under proper guard down 
 into the treasure rooms. And here began our joy over true 
 relics, relics that are worth talking about. We were first 
 mrached around the shrine containing the remains of the three 
 wise men. I wish I could describe it in a way lo make you 
 realize its magnificence. But that could not be done except 
 through the instrumentality of your own sight. Let me say 
 that it is about as large as a good sized chicken coop, solid gold, 
 with the figures of the twelve Apostles in niches on either side, 
 and angels, cherubs and seraphims at every nook and corner, 
 while it is ornamented with 1440 precious stones of almost every 
 known variety, from the pearl of the size of a pea to a topaz as 
 large as a goose egg. At one end are placed the three skulls 
 in recesses behind little windows, and these ghastly evidences 
 of death stare at you with their heads encircled by wreaths of 
 diamonds, and their jaws swathed in cloths literally covered 
 with precious stones that sparkled in the gas light as we looked 
 in wonder upon the display. The custodian told us this was 
 the finest shrine in the world, and all the guide books say the 
 same. So you see we have fallen early among the superlatives. 
 I can not recount the riches here, but next in order to this 
 shrine containing these ancient bones, was the one which held 
 those of the architect of the building. Few artists find a home, 
 at last, among such splendor. But that which touched us most 
 were two links from the identical chain with which St. Peter 
 was chained when in prison. We expect to find the other links 
 and have the story complete after a while. In one corner of 
 one of the transepts is the reclining monument of some great 
 Pope or Cardinal, and the relic hunters knocked off the ear of 
 one of the dogs the feet of the figure rested upon ; then the big 
 toe of the figure itself, and finally the nose, when the custodians, 
 fearing it might get disfigured, had it encased in a strong cage 
 of iron. The lost portions are replaced by plaster of Paris. I 
 quote a description of the church : 
 
56 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 ' ' The Cathedral is a crucifixion structure, the nave being 
 flanked with double, and the transept with single aisles. Total 
 length 444 feet, breadth 201 feet, length of transepts 292 feet, 
 height of walls 150 feet, height of roof 201 feet, height of cen- 
 tral tower 375 feet. This enormous mass of masonry is enliven- 
 ed by a profusion of flying buttresses, turrets, gurgoyles, galler- 
 ies, cornices, foliage, etc. The largest of the bells, cast in 1874, 
 from the metal of French guns, weighs twenty-five tons. There 
 are two others, cast in 1447 and 1448, and weigh respectively 
 six and eleven tons." 
 
 There are three hundred workmen engaged upon the building 
 renovating it and restoring the decayed portions. The new 
 work is marvelously handsome. 
 
 From this cathedral some of us proceeded, on foot, to the 
 church of St. Ursula while the larger number, who were worn 
 out by the fatigues of the day, took carriages and were driven 
 to the Grand Hotel Victoria. This church was erected in com- 
 memoration of St. Ursula, who is reported to have headed a 
 little party of 11,000 virgins in a tour to Rome, all of whom 
 were slain by the Huns while en route, whether going or re- 
 turning there seems to be some conflict in the authorities. Rut 
 there is no conflict about the bones of St Ursula herself, (many 
 of which are exhibited separately in the most costly trappings) 
 being her own bones instead of those of some" other lady who 
 accompanied the expedition. In the church they have the 
 skulls and bones of these unfortunate tourists, the former in a 
 kind of honey-combed cases, covered with glass, all about over 
 the wails, while the other bones are corded up in vaults on the 
 floor, and can be seen through glass windows. It seems that 
 recently some malicious individual has circulated the rumor 
 that a few careless persons, not very well posted in anatomy, 
 who were entrusted with the work of gathering up these bones, 
 made a mistake and got a few sheep's bones. I don't believe 
 it. I can't see how such an error could have been committed. 
 It is wrong to credit the rumor. 
 
 In the treasure room the upper part of the four walls, reach- 
 ing fifty feet or more high, are ornamented with these bones, 
 worked into wreaths ; figures and letters forming Latin inscrip- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 57 
 
 tions. It was a bony diet as one of our party remarked, The 
 skulls of the more "toney" fellows were encased in vessels of 
 different kinds and duly labelled in Latin. The right hand of 
 St. Ursula, her left foot, her right eye tooth and many other 
 separate bones of the skeleton were, each in turn, exhibited and 
 descanted upon. And so with others. Some of our people 
 were silly enough to ask how it was possible to identify these 
 bones after a lapse of a thousand years, but the custodian as- 
 sured them there was no trouble about it. It seems to me some 
 people will never cease asking foolish questions. Here, also, 
 was one of the stone vessels used by Christ at the miracle of 
 converting water into wine, and in a hermetrically sealed glass 
 vessel, to prevent decay or destruction by wood borers, sur- 
 mounted by rare stones, were two of the thorns of the crown in 
 a perfect state of preservation. We were all glad to see that 
 so much pains had been taken to hand down to succeding gen- 
 erations these valuable relics in good order. We have depu- 
 tized Henry, a bright young fellow, resident of Honolulu, but 
 just now from Oberlin College, and spending his vacation on 
 this tour, to keep an inventory of the thorns on the way to see 
 if none have been lost. His score now stands two. 
 
 From the church we went to the hotel, and after washing off 
 some of the Holland and German dirt, sat down with all the 
 party and began our dinner, which was concluded, in seven 
 courses, at ten o'clock. I went through all for the first time, 
 but about one o'clock frightened my roommates with one of the 
 most terrible cases of nightmare on record. Some of the party, 
 after dinner, went over the Rhine on the pontoon bridge, and 
 knocked about among the nice gardens over there and heard 
 the music served free to visitors. I can now understand why 
 the phrase "over the Rhine" has grown so popular. The peo- 
 ple of Cologne could find no more pleasant place to while away 
 a summer evening. The very best of them go there, and the 
 places are as orderly as a church during a sermon. After dis- 
 appointing the boys who climbed up to the windows to see us 
 dining, by closing the shutters, and having a nice night's rest 
 in Cologne, where all the sweet smells ere bottled for export 
 and all the bad ones left in their own streets, we took passage 
 8 
 
58 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 on an elegant steamer, at 9 o'clock a. m., and steamed away up 
 the Rhine. 
 
 We had a lovely day in all respects, and saw the beautiful 
 scenery which has a reputation the world over. It must be 
 seen to be appreciated. Neither pen nor picture can convey an 
 idea of its beauties. The entire journey from Cologne to Bie- 
 brich, where we disembarked to take carriages for this place, is 
 one of unbroken interest. There is not a moment that you feel 
 you can spare to go into the cabin for fear you will lose some 
 entertaining part of the scene. The stream is much larger than 
 I expected to. find it, and its current, I would judge, as rapid 
 as the lower Mississippi, if not more so. The hills on either 
 side are in the very highest state of cultivation, and the old 
 castles, residences, towns and little fields, looking like a patch- 
 work quilt composed alone of green pieces of varied shades 
 and the brown of ripening grain, constitute, doubtless, a pic- 
 ture unequalled in the world. I had left home with the deter- 
 mination to believe the scenery on the Hudson was superior, 
 but having seen the Rhine, and passing through its loveliness as 
 I write these lines, I couldn't keep my resolution. I lay aside 
 my national prejudices and give it up to the Rhine. Ruins and 
 old castles are continually in sight, and beautiful pictures suc- 
 ceed each other in such rapid succession that the interest never 
 flags throughout the day, but exclamations of surprise and de- 
 light are continually heard on every hand. Just as the sun is 
 dropping behind the high hills we come to Bingen, where in 
 song, at least, lived the "Soldier of the Legion," who "lay dy- 
 ing in Algiers," and who sent the feeling messages to his broth- 
 ers and comrades; his mother, his sister, and that other not a 
 sister, but dearer than them all. I was sorry that they pro- 
 nounce it Bingen. But here the highlands ceased, the river 
 spread out among some little islands, and we soon go down to 
 dinner. At Bingen quite a number of tourists, mostly English, 
 and some Americans, got off for the night. Later, we reached 
 Biebrich, where we took carriages and had a lovely drive of 
 three miles to Weisbaden, and went at once to bed. 
 
 Getting up early this morning, many of us went to the famous 
 springs, drank some of the hot and nasty water, and saw the 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 59 
 
 famous gambling places, now closed. After breakfast we ran 
 over to Frankfort-on-the-Main, where we drove about the city 
 and spent four hours seeing the sights there, among them the 
 old Jewish quarter, Rothschild's old house, his present banking 
 house, the house from which Martin Luther preached, Guten- 
 berg's monument, the picture and art galleries, and many other 
 places. As our long line of carriages strung about through the 
 city, I fancied the people looked at us as though we were a set 
 of gumps. It was at this place we were shown through a gal- 
 lery of statuary which seems to have been selected on account 
 of its "loud" character. It was an early, unexpected and 
 rather an amusing dose to the seventy-four. 
 
 We arrived at this place at 5 p. m., and after dinner went to 
 see the "boss" castle of Europe, which overlooks this city of 
 students and cheap pipes, and after gazing upon the ruins and 
 groping about in the subterranean passages, one of which leads 
 over three miles, some of us had a long drive, by moonlight, 
 upon the hill-tops, and had a nice view of the city by gas-light. 
 We rest here to-morrow, it being Sunday, and leave about noon 
 Monday for Stuttgart. Having missed an entire day without 
 seeing a castle or cathedral we will be hungry for them. It is 
 getting so now that if we do not see one or the other of these 
 every hour we are complaining about it. 
 
 I can not close the letter without returning to Weisbaden to 
 say that it is a very attractive place, with wide, clean streets, 
 and with such royal avenues of stately and wide spreading trees 
 as to make it charming to promenaders. Its parks are exten- 
 sive and handsome and are kept in perfect order, the lakes in 
 them being covered with water fowls, even wild and untamed 
 ones, and full of fish. The drive from Bierbrich was through 
 an unbroken avenue of immense sycamores, reaching nearly 
 across the broad street, and through which it seemed impossible 
 for even one stray ray of the sun to penetrate. 
 
6o THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 LETTER IX. 
 
 Heidelberg again— The Carriage Ride up the Neckar— Germany nearly everywhere 
 a Garden— The fighting Students— Too much Carving— Our first Washing- 
 Arrival at Stuttgart, and the Great Picture Galleries there— Treatment of 
 Relics by Tourists — Heavy financial transactions— A stop of two hours at 
 Ulin — A cheap lunch and low priced Fruit — Arrival at Munich— The Abstin- 
 ence members taking to wine on account of bad reputation of water— Mr 
 Potter, Consul at Stuttgart, gives a party and pays a compliment. 
 
 Munich, Bavaria, July 23, 1S79. 
 
 We fared sumptuously at the Hotel Schreider in Heidelberg, 
 and bankrupted ourselves in the purchase of pipes and ivory 
 ornaments. On Sunday morning many of the party went up to 
 the castle again, some in carriages and some on foot, returning 
 in time for services in the English church there. At one 
 o'clock the cavalcade were placed in open carriages and had a 
 ten miles ride into the country. Nearly every one had on his 
 or her store clothes, and it was the first time on the Continent 
 of Europe that we looked like a civilized people. For once I 
 felt proud of my countrymen. Heretofore, when not on the 
 move, it was either raining or threatening to do so ; and the 
 manner in which we have been dressed, and especially the 
 ladies, made us look more like a body of restless and noisy 
 mummies, swathed to the chin and hooded to the eyes, than a 
 party of sight-seers from enlightened America. I have been 
 glad that we have so often been taken for Englishmen. 
 
 Our drive was out the long street through the old gateway 
 and up the south bank of the Neckar, over a road that was as 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 6 1 
 
 smooth, as a floor. To the right of us was the railroad, running, 
 for the most part, on a terrace supported by a wall composed 
 of red sand-stone and dressed as nicely as if in a costly dwell- 
 ing. Back of this lay the high range of hills, reaching to the 
 proportions of small mountains, and where not covered with 
 trees, cultivated in little patches set as closely together as the 
 stones in a piece of Mosaic work. Below and to the left, lay 
 the swift running Neckar, beyond which rose another imposing 
 range of hills, with such varied changes, as we drove along, in 
 their height and formation, that they could not grow monoton- 
 ous. At their base wound a broad white pike, similar to the 
 one on which we were driving. On either side of the road were 
 rows of trees, all of the fruit or nut bearing species, many of 
 them laden with their fruit and almost within reach as I sat in 
 the high seat by the driver. Often there would be rows of 
 hedges nicely pruned, and so thick where the trees grew up 
 through them as to appear a part of the trees themselves. In 
 some places, where the bank was at all abrupt between the road 
 and the river, there ran a row of large sandstone posts about a 
 foot square and six feet apart, dressed as if to ornament a gate- 
 way leading to some rich man's residence. The fruit and nut 
 bearing trees were all tastefully pruned, and every foot of ground 
 not used for foot-paths was covered with some kind of vegeta- 
 tion except weeds. Grass grew up to the very edges of the 
 road, the stone wall holding the terrace upon which ran the rail- 
 road even being sodded on top and covered with grass. There 
 was no rubbish anywhere. Every stick or limb or chip had 
 been gathered, and the little pastures and tiny fields were as 
 tidy as any lawn. Bare ground, except in the roads, upon per- 
 pendicular cliffs where vegetation can not grow, and in small 
 patches where the soil has just been turned over for another 
 crop, is never seen. So far, Germany has been one vast park 
 where careful men have kept all things in pleasing order. 
 
 In our drive we passed through two little towns and ended 
 the drive within the third. Queer looking places to raw Amer- 
 icans are these little towns. The streets are narrow and being 
 made to conform to the sinuosities of the hills upon which they 
 are built, appear, from a distance, like so many mud-daubers' 
 
62 THE BIG AMERICAN' CARAVAN'S 
 
 nests stuck against the cornices of a big, old house. Here we 
 had a long walk — to see some castles of course. It was feared 
 we could not pass an entire day without seeing a castle and re- 
 tain our health. So we climbed up and up, gathered bouquets, 
 stuffed our hats full of leaves, admired the long stretch of beau- 
 tiful landscape that lay spread out before us, returned to the 
 carriages with red cheeks and good appetites, and drove home 
 to a bounteous 6 o'clock dinner. 
 
 It rained hard during the night, but the next morning was 
 bright and cool, with a stiff breeze blowing through the streets. 
 We were to leave Heidelberg at 10 a. m., but the departure 
 was postponed to I p. m . , and we spent the time shopping and 
 paying about a price and a half more than the citizens, and 
 still getting things at prices that seemed cheap to us. 
 
 Our people were all the time on the lookout for students 
 with faces disfigured by scars obtained in their numerous duels 
 with swords ; and they not only saw an abundance of these, 
 but every now and then one would come along having his face 
 plastered and bandaged up to hide and cure the results of more 
 recent chopping. My guess is that one-third of the students 
 of Heidelberg carry away some kind of scar on leaving Heidel- 
 berg. I have no high admiration of the schools of this part of 
 the country. I am aware that it is popular for students from 
 our own land to come here, but very many of them go to the bad. 
 The morals of those they fall in with are not of a high order, 
 and there is no restraint upon their conduct. A false sentiment 
 with reference to sword exercise between members of different 
 societies overshadows everything else, and education is a sec- 
 ondary consideration. The popular student is one who has 
 been successful in the greater number of combats. The duel- 
 ists do not engage to satisfy wounded honor, but often are total 
 strangers, being selected by their respective societies to repre- 
 sent them. I would never send a boy of mine, alone, to the 
 institutions of Germany to obtain an education. 
 
 Our party were affected by this vitiated air, and felt like 
 doing some carving on their own account. Perhaps it would 
 have been more justifiable in our case. Our soiled linen had 
 accumulated on us, and some were running their duds through 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 63 
 
 the second time. We were told Saturday evening washing 
 would be done and returned to us at 7 o'clock Monday morning. 
 Well, you ought to have seen that washing going out, some of 
 the ladies having something less, and not many less, than one 
 hundred pieces each. And you ought to have seen it coming 
 back in big baskets full clear up to noon, and Tom, Dick and 
 Harry charging round over the hotel excited, saying ugly words 
 and jabbering to waiters, who, with consternation in their faces, 
 understood nothing that was said except there were a lot of 
 Americans terribly mad. The washing was not done in the 
 hotel, but farmed out to washerwomen in various parts of the 
 city, and every time one would come in with a batch of clothes, 
 about forty of us would bear down upon her and capture her big 
 basket and dive into it like so many pigs into a swill tub just in 
 receipt of a fresh invoice of slops. Of course things got mixed, 
 but suspicion has grown up that some of the more energetic 
 ones laid in a good supply. This is the first real disadvantage 
 we have experienced from our party being so large. 
 
 At 4 p. m. Monday the seventy-four dropped in upon the 
 people of Stuttgart like a Summer shower, overflowing one ho- 
 tel and partially inundating another. I say seventy- four — we 
 lost one of our number at a station on the way where she slipped 
 by the guard, and while out gazing around, the train sped away 
 and left her. But she came in on the next train. As soon as 
 we could shake ourselves we marched about in column over the 
 place, saw the lovely gardens and parks, and the various monu- 
 ments, and moped about through the great picturt galleries in 
 the Museum. Here we fell in with such men as Reubens, 
 Rembrandt, Van Dyck, Leonardo de Vinci, Murrillo and Ra- 
 fael. But for all that I don' think some of our folks were as 
 enthused as they should have been. I saw two or three 
 leaning against some of the larger gilt frames to rest themselves, 
 while others would place their hands on the mountings and 
 stand talking to other members of the party so like a street 
 corner loafer leaning against a friendly column for support. I 
 expect one of these days to see a big picture of Reubens — say 
 something like the Transfiguration — taken bodily from the wall 
 and made a bed of for some weary member of the party. Amer- 
 
64 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 icans, as a general thing, are very careless, to put it mildly, as 
 to their treatment of relics. They are not allowed to carry 
 their canes or umbrellas into museums and art galleries to 
 punch out the eyes and otherwise disfigure the articles on exhi- 
 bition, but I have seen some of our very nicest people walk 
 deliberately up to a rare painting and designate some particular 
 spot by stuffing their dirty fingers against it. Many of the 
 pictures are hundreds of years old, and held as almost sacred 
 by the corporations and Governments to which they belong, 
 and if one thoughtless person in every thousand who visit them 
 should touch one picture, in any part, it would, in time, be 
 utterly ruined. I do not wonder that a tremor disturbs the 
 body of the custodian of relics when his precinct is invaded by a 
 pack of Americans. Experience has taught that they are to be 
 dreaded. Very many of the average ones have about as much 
 conception of the value of a fine painting and the care that 
 should be taken of it as a pig has of holidays. This is the plain 
 unvarnished truth about it. 
 
 Corning up the Rhine we had the scare in the matter of 
 finances experienced by Mark Twain and his friends the time 
 one of his party treated to a breakfast. It being a long time 
 between our breakfast and dinner we ordered a lunch for six of 
 us, served under the awning of the steamer, and on eating it up, 
 we found we had consumed sixteen sandwiches at forty pfen- 
 nigs each, nine cups of coffee at thirty each, and one dish of 
 strawberries at seventy, total 980 pfennigs. It was an awful 
 bill but we had consumed the provender and had to pay for it, 
 I thought it would have taught us a lesson to inquire another 
 time the price of things before buying, but the very next day 
 two of us joined in and went to the extravagance of a bottle of 
 wine at a cost of 1 10 pfennigs. At Heidelberg the "little one" 
 bought some carved ivory traps and when through was con- 
 fronted with a collossal bill aggregating 6,690 pfennigs. You 
 ought to have seen her face. Visions of the silk dress and the 
 kid gloves she contemplated buying at Naples vanished like a 
 dream. I can see her face at this moment with the shade of 
 surprise and mortification passing over it. But she has recov- 
 ered, and I think may still be able to make her purchases in 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 6$ 
 
 Naples if they give us time there. To sum it up the lunch 
 cost, all told, about $2 45 ; the bottle of wine 27 cents, and the 
 ivory ornaments $16 75. They designate all smaller values by 
 marks, about twenty-four cents, and it takes one hundred pfen- 
 nigs to make a mark. 
 
 Leaving Stuttgart at 9 o'clock the morning after arrival, we 
 landed in Ulm in an hour or so, and leaving our luggage in the 
 cars, which were detached from the main train to await our re- 
 turn, we proceeded to capture the quiet place, which was done 
 without the loss of a man. We promenaded the city, and vis- 
 ited the cathedral, which is over five hundred feet in length, and 
 in that respect has the advantage of the one in Cologne, but 
 falling short in the matter of its tower. Some of us were green 
 enough to climb the 352 steps leading to the highest parapet, 
 and came twisting down the spiral staircase, feeling that we 
 needed the services of a surgeon to put splints upon our legs, 
 and hardly knowing the position of our bodies with reference to 
 other terrestrial objects. This cathedral contained no bones or 
 other relics and consequently had but little interest to us. Af- 
 ter getting outside I lost trryself in a search for views, and in 
 passing an old fruit woman I gave her four cents worth of her 
 cheap money, and by signs demanded their equivalent in cher. 
 ries — nice ones. After fishing about behind her stand a mo- 
 ment she brought out a big paper sack and filled the thing so full 
 I had to carry it in my arms like a boy would an arm full of 
 chips. Presently I fell in with a party at the Roaring Lion 
 Tavern. I presume that was the name, as a very wide-mouth- 
 ed, gilt lion stood on a projection over the door — and they were 
 as busy as bees devouring an eight cent lunch. Every one 
 warns us against drinking water in this country, and I have been 
 taking the warnirg. So I ordered a glass of wine, holding up 
 my glass and yelling out "vine." Of course we all have to 
 talk to these foreigners in a tone totally unknown, and in a pitch 
 of voice that would shock a deaf person. The fellow looked at 
 me with an air of astonishment, and then fetched a small bottle- 
 full, which I dispatched on the spot, and handed over another 
 eight cents to liquidate the bill. I mention these things to 
 show how cheap some things are over here. 
 9 
 
66 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN 's 
 
 We landed at this city at half-past seven, and were again 
 quartered at two hotels. We spent the day busily seeing the 
 museums and picture galleries, which are probably as fine as we 
 shall see on our tour This is a nice city, and full of splendid 
 looking soldiers in bright new uniforms. The stores are quite 
 gaudy, and prices apparently low. Good water is said to be out 
 of the question, and some of our temperance people are talking 
 about taking to wine. They do not think they should risk their 
 lives in adherance to a principle. Of course not. I saw one 
 sip down a glass-full yesterday, and after smacking her lips 
 rather approvingly, she declared she could see nothing intoxi- 
 cating in that. To be sure. 
 
 At Stuttgart some twenty-five of the party were invited to 
 call and see Mr. Potter, the resident Consul there, and who is 
 from Boston. We found him a jovial fellow and he fed and 
 wined us on the best of the land. There were toasts and 
 speeches, and the eagle did an awful amount of flapping. Mr. 
 Potter said that Americans rarely called upon him except to get 
 his aid in rescuing them from trouble, and that we were the 
 only party who brought him all sunshine and no trouble. Take 
 that as an offset to our faults. 
 
 We will spend another day in Munich, wear ourselves out in 
 trotting around, visit the International Exhibition of Paintings 
 now in progress, and then strike out through Austria for Italy. 
 Since last Saturday the weather has been very cool and our 
 thickest garments are comfortable. To-day has been cloud)/, 
 with occasional light showers. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 6j 
 
 LETTER X. 
 
 Magnificent Munich— The great Museum and Picture Galleries— The King's Chapel 
 —Ancient feats— Cheap Beer and Wine— A Railroad ride across the Alps- 
 Imposing scenery— Crazy Tourists — Arrival at the old City of Verona— Aston- 
 ished Citizens— Interesting localities— Tears over Juliet's tomb— Beggars of 
 Verona— Arrival at Venice and a Gondola ride to the Hotel -The shinplasters 
 of Italy. 
 
 Venice, Italy, July 26, 1879. 
 
 Until 3 o'clock of our second day in Munich we spent the 
 time in a body, going first to the National Museum and gallop- 
 ing through it. It would justify a stay of a day or more among 
 its rich and entertaining relics if one could spare that much 
 time Its rare and handsome tapestry, its ornaments of ivory, 
 and its long list of furniture, inlaid with pearl, ivory and pre- 
 cious stones, alone make one feel like loitering and losing other 
 sights in the city, but our conductor hurries us along, so we may 
 not miss any places in the programme. The next visit was to 
 the picture gallery containing the modern paintings, which 
 pleased my eyes. After this we were placed in carriages and 
 driven through the city, around the principal monuments and 
 public buildings, and out into the vast park in the suburb. 
 We entered the town hall (rathhaus) and saw the big picture 
 there painted by Piloty in five years and finished two months 
 ago, being an alegorical history of Bavaria, and representing art- 
 
6S THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 ists, bishops, sculptors, composers and those belonging to 
 other different arts and sciences. It is sixty feet in length and 
 eighteen feet high, and contains 230 figures, most of them life 
 size an^l full length, and each one a study within itself. They 
 do such things up royally in this country. 
 
 The nex,t place we got out of our carriages to enter was the 
 King's chapel. I regret my inability to put in language a 
 description of this place so as to convey to you a proper idea of 
 its magnificence. It is all bright and new, and every part of the 
 vast structure visible is of the most handsome colored and 
 variegated marble, and polished till it reflects surrounding ob- 
 jects. The columns charm the eye, and as you look, you won- 
 der and wonder again why this splendor in a house of worship ? 
 The King's seat is in an alcove of the gallery and could not be 
 seen from the ground floor, and we were not permitted to go up 
 there. I presume we would have gone any how if the door had 
 not been locked and barred, for when some of our people start- 
 ed up the steps leading to the platform in front of the altar, and 
 a big fat woman threw up her hands in holy horror, and tried to 
 bar the way, we paid about as much attention to her as though 
 she had been a shadow. When our brigade bear down upon a 
 remonstrating custodian we crush him on the spot. 
 
 There were many other places we visited, but I can not stop 
 to name them. At one of the courts of the King's old palace 
 there were three spikes driven high up in the wall at different 
 distances from the ground, with an inscription that three certain 
 celebrities had jumped as high as the points designated by the 
 spikes; and near by lay a stone weighing 350 pounds which 
 had been thrown by one of these men half way across the large 
 court-yard. It was fastened to the pavement by heavy iron 
 bolts and bars. Our conductor got upon the stone and said it 
 had been heaved at a man for asking too many questions, and 
 that it had been named "Questioners, Beware." 
 
 From here we drove to the hotels and took dinner, after 
 which each acted upon his own hook, the greater number spend- 
 ing the time rubbing their noses against shop windows. We 
 all like Munich ever so much. It is a place worth any one's 
 while to see ; and to devotees of art it offers unusual attractions 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 69 
 
 Temperance people can't live here, of course, if what we hear 
 is true, for water is at a discount and is only taken inwardly 
 in its natural state by the reckless. But substitutes being very 
 cheap the unscrupulous can get along pretty well. Beer costs 
 a fraction over two and a half cents for about a quart, and the 
 cheaper wines can be bought for ten to fifteen cents per bottle. 
 With such prices as these, Maine principles have a hard time of 
 it. I don't know where they get decent water to make their 
 excellent beer, for the Iser goes dashing by the city like a mill 
 race and about the color of dirty milk; and the "blue Danube," 
 which we crossed at Ulm, Avas about the color of the lower 
 Mississippi. At what season of the year it becomes "blue" I 
 have not been able to ascertain. 
 
 The above was written at Munich. We left there at 9 o'clock 
 day before yesterday morning by rail, and in less than an hour 
 the cry of "the Alps, the Alps," was heard from the car win- 
 dows. We were traveling up the river Inn, the mountains ap- 
 pearing first on our right. It was not long, however, till they 
 also appeared upon our left, and very soon we were passing 
 up the beautiful valley with the peaks on either side frowning 
 down upon us. Not long afterwards snow began to appear in 
 patches, till in some places, nearer the summit, the higher 
 peaks would be nearly covered. The valley was in the highest 
 state of cultivation, and sometimes houses would be perched so 
 far up the mountain sides that they looked like the abodes of 
 a^igmy people. Castles were without number, and crucifixes 
 stood here and there till they early ceased to be even a subject 
 of comment. Churches — nearly all tower with little dabs of 
 buildings stuck to them — were continually in view, very many 
 of them located in odd-looking places, and often on such high 
 and craggy eminences that the wonder is how woi shippers ap- 
 proach them. The little grape patches on the mountain sides 
 were made and held in place by great stone walls, and the 
 thousands and thousands of these terraces gave evidence of the 
 scarcity of tillable soil in this country and the labor required to 
 keep it in order. 
 
 After creeping about half way to the summit of the pass, we 
 took up the river Sill and followed that to the divide, the n 
 
/O THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 taking down the Eisack and Adige till we fell into the plain, 
 after dark, in Italy. The road-bed upon which our train ran is 
 a rare and massive work, and it is hard even to guess what 
 great labor and money were spent in its construction. Nearly 
 all the little streams and rivulets which cross it are paved and 
 walled like gutters as far as the eye can reach, while in many 
 places acres of the mountain sides, above the road, are paved 
 like a great city wharf to prevent slides. Then come bridges, 
 diches, drains and culverts of massive proportions, while the 
 road itself — double track in greater part — runs upon a ponder- 
 ous stone wall. The ascent was slow and labored, giving ample 
 time for a good view of the scenery upon either band. The 
 descent was more rapid, but not frightfully so, though the iron 
 rubbers attached to the brakes grew hot and smoked till it ap- 
 peared as though every car was on fire underneath. Many of 
 us became frightened and jumped about and sputtered at the 
 guards to indicate the danger, but we might as well have en- 
 deavored to discuss the subject with the] man in the moon. 
 They were so calm and unmoved amid the smoke and stench 
 of burning grease that we were, in time, assured of our safety. 
 
 At the Austrian frontier our baggage was overhauled, and 
 again when we entered Italy, where cigars suffered ; and some 
 of our party got fighting mad and jabbered at the officers in an 
 amusing way. One young gent who had fired his pistol off 
 going through the tunnel, was reported ahead by telegraph, 
 and on the arrival of the train at the Italian station that imple- 
 ment of destruction was taken away from him. 1 am sorrry to 
 say many of our party are carrying around young blunderbusses 
 with them in these foreign lands. The revenue officials seem 
 only to be after cigars and tobacco, and I guess they chew and 
 smoke all they confiscate. 
 
 This journey occupied the entire day, and when the moon— 
 which looks for all the world like the one we left at home— ap- 
 peared over the mountain tops to the west of us, we were still 
 speeding down the steep decline. It was a beautiful day, and 
 for the entire distance the scenery was most magnificent. Our. 
 people were wild with excitement, which found no abatement 
 till night shut out the scene. We were continually bouncing 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. J I 
 
 up and running from one window to the other and thrusting out 
 our heads to get a better view. "Look here!" "Oh, come 
 here!" "Just see this!" "Oh, see, see!" were the exclama- 
 tions continually heard ; and we acted so like a set of wild peo- 
 ple I suspect the thousands of citizens we passed on the way 
 imagined our train was conveying the inmates of a lunatic asy- 
 lum from one country to another. Well, it was enough to run 
 one crazy to be in three Empires in one day and see such grand- 
 eur in nature. In a lake lying below us, almost at the summit 
 of the pass, we saw trout striking at insects, and as we passed 
 we could plainly see the beauties sporting in the water. We 
 went through some thirty tunnels but none of them of any great 
 length. 
 
 We reached Verona just before midnight, after the longest 
 unbroken ride we have had since leaving London, and as our 
 long line of omnibusses went thundering through the narrow- 
 streets, the clocks were ringing out the hour of twelve. We 
 were driven into an open court around which was the hotel, 
 with just one row of rooms in each story, opening upon galleries 
 running around the inside. The rooms upon the ground floor 
 opened upon the paved court, where stood the omnibusses. 
 The house had the appearance of having escaped the flood, and 
 the lower rooms smelled like a charnel house. They were 
 frescoed in the most gaudy colors, and the beds were white and 
 clean, but the bright sunshine had not been in those rooms 
 within the last hundred years. The rooms higher up were dry 
 and airy. 
 
 The next morning we entered the church near by, and then 
 marched through the town for an hour or so in column, and cre- 
 ated a consternation we had not witnessed before. As we 
 would pass the stores and shops the inmates would gaze at the 
 first few with an air of curiosity a moment, then a look of won- 
 derment crept over their faces, succeeded by a rush to the doors 
 with whatever their hands held at the time. The smith's lifted 
 hammer stopped poised in the air, the shoemaker got no far- 
 ther than to run his awl into the leather, while those walking 
 along the street halted and gazed at the cavalcade, and those 
 near by, in intersecting streets, hurried up to see the show. 
 People at doors would dash into the house to tell the other in- 
 
"J2 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 mates, and windows were filled with staring eyes. They would 
 look at the head and then at the rear of the straggling column, 
 and end by throwing up their hands in utter astonishment. Of 
 course they talked to one another. I never heard the like of it. 
 But about all we could catch was the word "Americano." 
 At one court yard they collected and rather crowded us, having 
 a look in their faces as though wondering what in the name of 
 heavens all these folks meant by being so far away from home 
 staring at these old buildings. 
 
 The morning was excessively warm, and sunny Italy was 
 with us in dead earnest. The streets were mostly narrow and 
 had a combination of smells which gave an unpleasant twist to 
 our noses, which I am apprehensive may become permanent. 
 Getting into carriages, finally, we had a lorig drive and saw all 
 the churches, the tomb of Juliet, the house of the Capulets, but 
 no trace of the love sick Romeo — Poor fellow ! How sad it is he 
 depends upon the immortal Shakspeare for the perpetuation of 
 his own memory. We went through quite a pantomime of grief 
 over the coffin of Juliet, and I imagine the few citizens who 
 witnessed it took us to be a very silly, tender hearted set. 
 
 We saw the great amphitheater, second only to the one at 
 Rome, in a better state of preservation and capable of seating 
 35,000 spectators or furnishing standing room for 70,000. Its 
 interior is nearly perfect and the dens where the prisoners and 
 wild beasts were kept have not been destroyed. And the en- 
 trances for these into the arena are all there as they were in 
 the days when the inhuman butcheries were witnessed by thous- 
 ands of miserable, garlic-eating, dirty, applauding, heartless 
 spectators. Some of our folks thought the citizens stared at 
 us. I am waiting till we reach the place where the residents 
 can stare harder and longer than we can. Why, at one of the 
 churches that we entered there was quite a congregation inside, 
 and services were being conducted; yet we paraded, about the 
 aisles, talked, pointed at this thing and that, and one half of 
 us actually strolled up and filed along near the altar and be- 
 tween the officiating priest and the worshipping congregation. 
 Suppose a pack of foreigners were to do that in our country. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 73 
 
 It was here we met our first annoyance in the shape of beg- 
 gars. At Amsterdam one rather bright little fellow stuck out 
 his hat, but upon our looking at him rather curiously he seem- 
 ed to become ashamed of himself, and put it back upon his 
 head. At Heidelberg, when we drove out and walked up to a 
 far off castle, we passed three beggars, neatly dressed Germans, 
 who sought alms. Some of us took off our hats and bowed to 
 them as though they were Princes, but if we attempt to 
 keep that up our necks are gone, and no mistake. These 
 were the only beggars we had seen until we fell on Verona ; 
 and these were mostly boys and girls who laid in wait for us 
 at every turn and corner, following us into churches and other 
 places, and making miserable nuisances of themselves. My 
 guess, on the threshold of Italy, is that about the first thing 
 many of her children learn is the art of begging. 
 
 We left Verona at 1 1 a. m., and had a hot and dusty ride of 
 five hours At Padua we met the fifth, or Irish, section on 
 their way from Venice to Florence. And such a hand shaking 
 and jabbering I never saw. This section is composed of those 
 who came over a week earlier than we did. But the noise and 
 confusion did not last long, as each train soon moved on. At 
 four o'clock p. m. our train landed us on one of the canals of 
 Venice, and we were taken to our hotels in gondolas. I think 
 I shall never abuse American hackmen again for their persis- 
 tency in seeking passengers after seeing these legions of vil- 
 lainous looking gondoliers trying to snatch people bald-headed 
 into their black crafts. As to gondoliers — but let me reserve 
 them and Venice for another letter. I have just been looking 
 at the miserable, dirty shinplasters we have had thrust at us as 
 a circulating medium, and I am mad. I'll go out and look at 
 the moon shining over the Adriatic and the Grand Canal and I 
 may feel better. 
 
 10 
 
74 THE BIG AMERICAN CAKAVAN S 
 
 LETTER XL 
 
 Venice — The Gondolier— No Horses or Vehicles in this City of the Sea — Visit to 
 the Palace of the Doges, and other interesting places — cheap living — The 
 Water supply — Ice a beverage— Comparison between American and English 
 Growlers. 
 
 Venice, Italy, July 28, 1879. 
 
 I do not know how to write you a letter about Venice. It is 
 such an odd place and has been the subject of so many correspond- 
 ents that I could hardly expect to produce something new. I 
 had read a great deal about it myself, at home, and upon arrival 
 was carried away as much as I have been with other places on 
 the journey, but I find what is the experience of most of our 
 party, that the more we see of it and drift lazily in our gondolas 
 over its canals and through its narrow and awfully crooked 
 streets, the interest in the place grows upon me, and I feel that 
 I shall regret it when the hour for our departure comes. It is 
 certainly a place where locomotion is not tiresome and where 
 no great amount of dust can be raised by charging through the 
 streets. 
 
 There is not a horse in the city of Venice, and I have not 
 seen a single vehicle on wheels, though there is much of the 
 city which may be traversed on dry land. What streets there 
 are are verv narrow and seem to have been constructed with a 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE, 75 
 
 special view to run any single one towards every point of the 
 compass and take in also every degree of the circle. I can ac- 
 count for the many and sharp turns in the canals that had to 
 conform to the little islands upon which the city was built, but 
 I can not comprehend why the streets were built so unless it was 
 upon the principle that the builders thought they could obtain 
 more street front by that species of engineering. Nearly all 
 species of transportation are done by gondolas and other water 
 craft. The gondolier is a fraud and a humbug, except in so far 
 as he is able to manage his long, narrow, black craft with con- 
 summate skill. Mark Twain tells in graphic language how 
 these fellows whip around corners and dodge each other in the 
 most miraculous manner, but no one will ever be able to realize 
 the truth about it till they come here and see it done, and per- 
 haps even then, those unaccustomed to managing water-craft 
 will fail to appreciate the difficulties to be encountered. Yes- 
 terday, when in the Grand Canal following up a floating band of 
 music that was out in a shower of flags and gaudy trappings to 
 serenade the town, some of our adventurous gentlemen tried 
 their hand at the oar, and always ended by giving the inmates 
 of the boat a splashing, and coming near turning a summersault 
 into the water. This morning my finances having reached a 
 low ebb and all the members of the party having hesitated 
 about adding to my obligations, I had to interview a banker of 
 Venice named in my letter of credit. I couldn't go overland 
 and hired one of the six or ten thousand pirates to transport me 
 there in his floating coffin. We took short cuts and found a 
 large number of very crooked and narrow streets. Gondolas 
 were as thick as beggars in Verona — some tied close to the 
 walls by means of rings therein, others going our way, some 
 faster and some slower, and many meeting us, but never a single 
 collision. All at once a dark prow would shoot around the corner 
 looking for all the world as though it was going to give us a jolt 
 amidships, but a "hi" from our gondolier and a "ho" from 
 the other, either suddenly checked the speed and changed the 
 course so unexpectedly and so happily as to allow the vessels 
 to glide by each other in the most marvelous and harmless way. 
 I can't admire the gondolier with his dark visage, his unkempt 
 
j6 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 hair andfhis unshaven face, his dirty shirt that fills with wind 
 and looks like an inflated bladder around his body; I can't ad- 
 mire him for his disposition to be boisterous, and to hold noisy 
 converse with every chap within hearing ; nor can I feel kindly 
 towards him when, after paying him the fee-allowed by law, he 
 puts his hand to his mouth and goes through a dumb show of 
 drinking to indicate that ; he would be pleased if you would fur- 
 ther contribute to his happiness by throwing in a few centesnm 
 with which to buy Winslow's soothing syrup, but I do admire 
 the rascal for the dexterity he displays in the management of 
 his boat, and the power he can put to his single oar without 
 starting one drop of sweat at noon day in this warm Italian 
 clime. I have purchased just five of these boats and an armful 
 of pictures of them, and if the revenue man at New York don't 
 confiscate the lot I will 'be able to show my friends just how 
 they look. They are not very rapid when propelled by one 
 man, and if I was in a big hurry to catch the train, I would pre- 
 fer a hack. Their^ length is about thirty-five feet, with five, or 
 five and a half feet width, and any quantity of rake. 
 
 Half of yesterday and all of to-day have been devoted to 
 sight-seeing and a long gondola ride in battalion. Yesterday 
 afternoon six of us switched off from the main party and did the 
 Palace of the Doges on our own hook. If we had seen no other 
 evidence of the former grandeur of Venice, this Palace would 
 have convinced us of it without the aid of history. Royal old 
 butchers must have been those Doges whose villainous visages 
 adorn the wall of this building, and who, in some cases, have 
 been painted by the great masters in company with the Deity, 
 and playing no second part at that. Covering one and of a 
 large room is a painting, by Tintoretto, I believe — no by some 
 other fellow — representing Christ, the Holy Virgin, two Saints 
 in the back ground, and two of these old cut-throat Doges. 
 There are no other figures in the picture, and those of the Doges 
 stand out prominently as though all the others were adjuncts in 
 the scene. I presume the painter executed the work as a mat- 
 ter of compulsion, and that if he had not done so his head 
 would have been chopped off in a twinkling. I hope he did, and 
 that he had a wife and children depending on him for their 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. J J 
 
 food from day to day. He could be excused for this prostitu- 
 tion of his talents on no other grounds, and barely upon these. 
 We passed through all the various rooms, including those of 
 the Council of Three Hundred, the Council of Ten, and the Coun- 
 cil of Three, who, with a cool villainy almost without a parallel, 
 sent so^many a^poor devil in haste to his final account. We saw 
 the hole through which were slipped the anonymous complaints 
 that sealed the doom of the unsuspecting ; we passed over the 
 Bridge of Sighs leading from the Palace to the dungeons across 
 the canal, and were shown the passages to the right and to the 
 left for the'two grades of prisoners, and the little door in the 
 wall just at the water line, out of which came the bodies of those 
 who died within. We went down into the dungeons, and with 
 torches in our hands, groped about from room to room of this 
 most gloomy place, and while doing so it was not hard to peo- 
 ple, in imagination, the dark and noisome cells with wan and 
 haggard prisoners, without light and hope, daily receiving their 
 scant supply of rough food and worse water through the small 
 holes cut in the stone walls, and courting death in preference to 
 such a life as theirs. The guide also pointed out the head 
 block where the heads of the condemned were hacked off; and 
 nearby, the hole in the stone floor through which the blood 
 might flow into the sea below. It is useless to state that these 
 sights lascerated our feelings, and there is no question but that 
 it was well for those old scoundrels that they were dead and 
 buried some time ago. We even felt like hunting up their 
 graves and rattling up their bones, and I suspect we would 
 have done "it had we not feared falling into the same, error that 
 was committed in the case of >the bones of the 11,000 virgins 
 deposited in the Cathedral at Cologne — that of mixing in a few 
 bones belonging to some other animals not in the big excursion. 
 None of us were up in our anatomy, and the mistake might 
 easily have occurred. We didn't want to put ourselves into a 
 perspiratioivover the bones of some dead and forgotten sheep. 
 But, all iokes aside, if any one can go down into the dungeons 
 under the Palace of the Doges and see the evidences of cruelty 
 which can not be mistaken, even without the aid of the gar- 
 rulous guide, without being moved, my opinion is that he had 
 
7<S THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 better remain at home and go to bed and stay there. One oi 
 our ladies, who went down later with the others, was overcome 
 by the contemplation of the situation, and had to be taken 
 above and out into the light of day. Our little squad got dis- 
 gusted, gave up sight-seeing for the day, and went to the hotel 
 and looked daggers even at these modern Italians as though 
 they could be held responsible for the conduct of their ancestors. 
 
 If I had not already worn you out with letters I would de- 
 vote a very long one to Venice, and if I had not written to you 
 at all I think I would make it the subject of two or three and 
 let other places go by, but as it is and has been I will tell 
 you that we have taken in nearly all that is novel to be seen ; 
 have gone through the churches, picture galleries, the arsenal, 
 the establishment where the mosaic and glass work are manu- 
 factured, the markets and principal streets ; have loitered about 
 the the square of St. Mark, seen the pigeons fed, and fed them 
 ourselves, and sipoed our harmless drinks, and minced our 
 ice cream in front of some of the numerous cafes there ; have 
 seen the giants hammer out the hour on the great clock there, 
 and gone up into the tall campanile and gazed over this city of 
 the sea ; have crowded in front and darkened every one of the 
 beautifully arranged shop windows around this square, and 
 have bought and been cheated inside ; have jostled the priests 
 in their own churches, taken their vacated seat in the confes- 
 sional and been ejected by them ; have bumped up against sol- 
 diers in the streets, run over priests and been run over by them, 
 and have stared at the citizens and talked about them in a 
 tons ue it is.perhaps well they do not understand ; and some of 
 us have gotten homesick and stood upon the bridges in the soft 
 moonlight and gazed across the Grand Canal out toward the 
 Adriatic, while the gondoliers were passing to and fro through 
 the shimmer and the sheen of the sparkling waves, their out- 
 lines standing clear out against a horizon flecked with downy 
 clouds, and some of us have nearly "bohooed" because we could 
 not, at once, transport ourselves and this pleasannt scene to our 
 own homes across the continent and the deep blue sea. 
 
 Our hotels are rather comfortable — one ol them being quite 
 fine — and well aired. Upon the theory that higher rooms are 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. Jg 
 
 the better ones in Italy, the ladies are well up towards the roof, 
 and have been complaining that they have to climb over one 
 hundred steps when they come down, and remember they have 
 forgotten something they left behind. We all complain at 
 something. If we are not too high we are too low, and the 
 happy medium is rarely ever found. I think it one of the won- 
 ders our conductors have not gone stark mad, although we are 
 having a nice time of it, traveling first class and nearly always 
 stopping at the best hotels in the places visited. If Italy fur- 
 nishes bad water, the conductors catch it ; if one hotel in a 
 place won't hold us all, some of us think we have been 
 selected to occupy the second rate one, and we give it to them ; 
 if it rains, they are remiss in their duty ; if it is too warm, they 
 are to blame ; if the customs of the country keep us waiting at 
 the dinner table till every tardy member sits down before the 
 soup is started around, and is then allowed to proceed no faster 
 than the toothless ones, but required to sit there between 
 courses while the pangs of hunger are gnawing our very vitals, 
 we feel like converting them into food and dispatching them on 
 the spot. And thus, through all the long list, we manage to 
 rake up and growl about something. Still, the patient conduct- 
 ors do not fall out with us, but say that we are models as com- 
 pared to the same number of Englishmen ; even further, that 
 they would hear ten growls from them where they hear one 
 from us. Then I do leel sorry for those who have the manage- 
 ment of English parties. 
 
 It is thought that the average citizen of Venice can live at a 
 cost of from two to five cents per day. Their chief luxuries are 
 gondolas, moonshine and bilge water. I don't tmnk an am- 
 bitious person would want to stay a thousand years in the 
 place, and, especially if, at the close of his earthly career, he 
 expected to have his bones deposited anywhere in the neigh- 
 borhood of those of the bloodthirsty Doges who have gone be- 
 fore him. The gondoliers are allowed twenty cents for one to 
 four persons for the first hour, and ten cents for each succeeding 
 hour for the entrie party. His horse don't eat, or die on his 
 hands, and as his vehicle probably lasts for years, I guess if one 
 of them gets "a load" once or twice a week he is happy, A 
 
80 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 very active and intelligent salesman in a large umbrella store, 
 who had been to America and spoke English quite well, told me 
 he got $14 per month for his services, and that was much above 
 the average wages. 
 
 Cistern water is used, and when the supply is exhausted — as 
 it is most of the time — it is brought into the city from some 
 point outside, in the hulls of boats, and turned into large public- 
 cisterns, from whence it is taken for consumption, in copper 
 buckets, one swung on either end of a pole, and carried on the 
 shoulder by men and women. There is no pump x>r other con- 
 venience for drawing the water from the cisterns, but every one 
 carries his or her own rope and plunges their bucket down into 
 the water. I did not learn if there is any law requiring them 
 to keep their buckets clean, but if there is such a law and my 
 eyes did not deceive me, I fancy it is not being very rigidly en- 
 forced. I made an effort one morning before breakfast to go 
 up an alley out of which scores of water carriers were coming 
 into St. Mark's square, to see where they got their supply, but 
 a policeman or officer of some kind barred the way and refused 
 to let me go in there. 
 
 Ice throughout Italy is a luxury not given you except as an 
 extra, to be paid for the same as your washing, yet^the way in 
 which these Americans pile it into their glasses makes the wait- 
 ers stare. I see the citizens sipping it in front of the cafes as a 
 Dutchman does his lager beer. I have not been able to learn 
 where it is procured. I find much difficulty in picking up little 
 bits of information I would like to have on account of not being 
 up in the Italian language. 
 
 To-morrmv, at one o'clock, we will leave for Florence, and 
 there have a big dose of churches and picture galleries. I 
 think I will worry the shop keepers. They have cheated me 
 so far and I want to get even with them. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 8 1 
 
 LETTER XII. 
 
 A good-bye to Venice— A member of the party captured by a Countess— The 
 Journey to Florence— Sights in that City— Beautiful Mosaics— A queer Hotel 
 —Michael Angelo's house and relics— Scarcity of water — Railroad dining 
 rooms— America ahead— Arrival at Rome— Superb Hotel Costanzi— Talk about 
 victualing. 
 
 Rome, Italy, July 31, 1879. 
 
 I must return to Venice to say good-bye to that delightful 
 place. It is only since we left there that I learned fully how 
 happy our party were while there and the amount of real enjoy- 
 ment they experienced, especially in the moonlight rides up 
 and down the Grand Canal. A fair was in progress at the only 
 garden facing this canal, which had a rare look of enchantment 
 about it. The booths are tastefully arranged and the place was 
 ablaze with lights, bright-colored flags and brighter-eyed Italian 
 women. Many of our young men spent their evenings in the 
 place and courted and flirted with the vendors of wares. We 
 fear some of them left their hearts in Venice. We were told 
 the citizens in charge of the fair all belonged to the nobility, 
 and every lady who sold you trinkets for four times their value, 
 as they often do at home, was a Countess or a Princess. Two 
 of our best looking boys, the very next day after our arrival, 
 visited the Palace of a couple of these fair ones and are punish- 
 ing us with details of their experience. One of them has gone 
 1 1 
 
&2 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 clean daft, and when he draws out a cabinet sized picture of 
 Countess So-and-So, and looks at it and smiles his sickly smile 
 upon it, we all feel sorry for him and hope he may soon recover. 
 We try to destroy the effect of his romantic visions by declaring 
 we saw T the girl's mother selling garlic at the corner of the 
 Doge's Palace in St. Mark Square, while she, herself, was going 
 about, barefooted and bareheaded, carrying water for the day's 
 consumption at home. Oh, moon-light and love in Venice ! 
 
 The gondolas having taken the seventy-four and our pile of 
 baggage to the depot, we left Venice at I p. m. Tuesday, for 
 Florence, at which place we arrived at 1 1 o'clock, in time to 
 wind up a dinner as the bells were striking the hour of mid- 
 night. So you see we dine at fashionable hours, now and then, 
 on the continent. The day was warm, the road dusty, and if 
 the monotony had not been relieved by the towns and cities on 
 the way, and a run through the cool air, and grand scenery of 
 the Appenines to close the day, the ride would have been a 
 hard one. They put us in a large hotel, named after the father 
 of our own country, on the broad street facing the Arno, and 
 we were stowed away and rooms to spare. I never saw so 
 many crooked and intricate passages in a house in my life. At 
 first it seemed as though I would want a pilot and two guides 
 to conduct me to and from my room, but I made a plan of my 
 route, with all the crooks and turns and distances from point to 
 point, and by studying it carefully, was able to make the trip 
 after the tenth attempt. No one but a porter who had served 
 an apprenticeship of a life time would be able to find all the 
 rooms before getting lost himself. The dining room is on the 
 second floor, and the bed rooms are numbered from the one 
 above to the top. I was put on the second floor, or, in other 
 words, in the fourth story. 
 
 Notwithstanding the lateness of the hour at which we dined, 
 we could not resist the temptation to stroll out in front of our 
 hotel, seat ourselves on the stone wall separating the street from 
 the river, smoke our cigars, gossip and gaze at the moonlight 
 sparkling and dancing on the quiet surface of the Arno. The 
 ladies came to their windows to enjoy the scene, and as they 
 stood there chatting to us many a poetical fellow was reminded 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 83 
 
 of the balcony scene in Romeo and Juliet, and had to give us a 
 dramatic touch of it. The day after our arrival in Florence we 
 spent in driving round to see the sights, winding up at three 
 o'clock with the famous Ufizzi and Pitti galleries, and having seen 
 the great Cathedal whose dome is higher than that of St. Paul's 
 or St. Peter's, and gone through the residence of Michael An- 
 gelo where we were shown a large number of things connected 
 with that gentleman of whom we have heard so much since our 
 arrival in Europe, including many of his original plans and 
 specifications of the buildings claimed to have been designed 
 by him. He seems to have been a departure from the common 
 saying "Jack of all trades and good at none," for we can bare- 
 ly escape the belief that he was good in painting, sculpture and 
 architecture. 
 
 But after all, the big things to see in Florence and the acres 
 of paintings in the galleries, and the fields of costly tapestry 
 that have dilated the eyes of so many pilgrims, I think that 
 which most captivated the ladies were the lovely displays of 
 Florentine mosaics in the shop windows. How much of this 
 jewelry our party carried away I am not able to guess. I 
 think this is the only thing that made them forget the snubbing 
 they got at Venice, where, after having been shown the house 
 in which Ftyron lived on the Grand Canal, we were taken to a 
 Monastery on one of the outlying islands where he studied the 
 Armenian language, and the ladies refused admission while the 
 gentlemen were allowed to enter and see his room and all the 
 relics connected with the talented poet. The day may come 
 when a better reason for this discrimination against the fair sex 
 may be developed, but my belief now is that if some of our 
 ladies could have got hold of the meek looking monk who bow- 
 ed them to the left, they would have made him think there were 
 six earthquakes in full progress in the immediate vicinity. 
 
 We left Florence and her elegantly paved streets at half past 
 eight o'clock in the morning, and were whirled through an un- 
 inviting country till near five o'clock that afternoon. The rail- 
 road runs for a long distance along the river Tiber after leaving 
 the Arno, but the valleys are quite poor, and the parched and 
 clayey hill-sides give but little sign of vegetation. The entire 
 
84 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 ride to Rome is without interest, and in our case was burden- 
 some, for we suffered from dust and heat to an extent not ex- 
 perienced heretofore. We were in such dire distress from 
 these that even the idea we were nearing the Eternal City 
 could not inspire us with enthusiasm ; and when, at last, the 
 locomotive blew a long blast with its peculiar sharp whistle, 
 and we looked out of the windows and saw the church spires, 
 and finally the great wall surrounding the place, we heard no 
 shout go up from the parched and jaded pilgrims in our van. 
 But when we were driven into the court-yard of the superb 
 Hotel Costanzi — second to only one or to others in all Europe — 
 and were conducted to the pleasant rooms already assigned to 
 us, there was a grateful sigh of relief it would not, probably, 
 have been well for the landlord to see as he may have felt 
 authorized to remit some item from his ordinary bill of fare. 
 We partook of a good and early dinner at 6 o'clock, after which 
 we assembled in the parlor and were met by Mr. Russell 
 Forbes, a historian of Rome, who is to take charge of and con- 
 duct us while here. He gave us a very pleasant talk of half an 
 hour in regard to what we would see and how we must act 
 during our stay, and read the programme for to-morrow, which 
 seems to be an extensive one. We are quartered now for four 
 days, and the indications are that we will be given a good op- 
 portunity to see, hurriedly though it may be, the principal 
 novel and attractive features of Rome. Some few went out for 
 an evening drive, but the greater number sought rest and 
 slumber at an early hour. 
 
 There is one thing always scarce and hard to find in traveling 
 by rail on the Continent, and that is water The railroads 
 make no provision for it whatever, either on the cars or at the 
 stations, and we Americans, who almost always seem to be 
 thirsty, have hard work in getting water. This may arise from 
 inability to make ourselves understood, but it seems to me this 
 is one of the chief defects of the railroad system in this country. 
 Now and then, at the stations, some enterprising chap will be 
 on hand with a waiter and a few glasses of water containing 
 homoeopathic doses of ice, and these he disposes of in a twink- 
 ling at a compensation of two 01 four cents per glass. In this 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 85 
 
 respect we are far ahead of the Europeans. We excel them 
 also in the matter of our railroad dining rooms and lunch 
 counters. Neither in G.reat Britain, Germany or Italy do they 
 have much in the way of refreshments at stations, and I have 
 yet to see the place where one is given time to eat a square 
 meal, even if he were fortunate enough to have it placed before 
 him. Mark Twain says (and I quote him so often because I 
 think his Innocents Abroad the finest book of humor, and 
 travel, too, for that matter, in the English language) that in 
 France they have oceans of time in which to dine at railroad 
 eatinghouses ; and he has two pictures showing the superiority 
 of the French, in that respect, over Americans. I presume, 
 of course, he meant his comparison to extend no farther than 
 France, and not yet having been there can't take issue with him. 
 But so far as the countries which I have already gone through are 
 concerned, our own country beats them all hollow. Why, I 
 have gone into their dining-rooms marked first-class, and 
 danced, and gestured, and sputtered about, and got into a 
 sweat and at last come out without getting a bite to eat. When 
 you enter, your vision falls upon a table covered with empty 
 dishes and a side table with a few joints — they persist in calling- 
 all cold meats "joints" — and a few round rolls that are so tough 
 that by the time you could get a bite out of one, masticate -and 
 swallow it, their confounded old dinner bell would summon you 
 to take your seat in the cars. 
 
 And while on this subject I might as well add that the hotels 
 of Europe can not, in the matter of their .table, at all compare 
 to ours. They give you a deuce of a big dose of plates, and 
 waiters with broad-cloth and swallow-tail coats, who are eter- 
 nally sticking the high-priced wine list under your nose, but 
 after an hour's eating, and gettting hungry between courses, 
 you get up longing for one good, honest, satisfactory dinner 
 such as you could get in any first-class hotel in the United 
 States. They have no water-coolers or other vessels where 
 water is kept to quench the thirst of their guests, except in bot- 
 tles on the wash-stands in the bed-rooms, and you have no rea- 
 son to think that has not been there for weeks. If you ring 
 and order fresh water and some ice to make the stuff tolerable 
 
86 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN 's 
 
 it comes after you have given it up in despair and made your 
 will; and when you settle, it is in big figures in the bill. In 
 Venice they favored us with ice in our water at dinner, and 
 when we were getting ready to put foot in the gondolas for our 
 departure they presented a miserable account of 75 centimes 
 each for the privilege of cooling our stomachs. They have so 
 little to do with ice they rarely learn the English pronunciation 
 of it; and when at Venice we ordered a bowl-full and some 
 sugar to compound a lemonade, the dunderhead of a waiter 
 brought up two big sheets of blotting paper Here in this fine 
 hotel which I have already told you is second to only one or 
 two in all Eprope, they try many of their articles in tallow 
 instead of lard, and yesterday in endeavoring to make a feast off 
 some cakes and crackers we had purchased in Florence, we 
 found them so impregnated with tallow that we laid most of 
 them aside for the next beggar we should see. In Great Brit- 
 ain, Holland and Germany we had good meats, but never a 
 great variety, and everywhere the coffee has been tip-top. 
 Butter is never seen at dinner, coffee and tea are extra, and, if 
 ordered, are charged to your room, while vegetables are poor 
 in variety and worse in quality. The bed-rooms are nearly 
 always comfortable and the beds clean. 
 
 Ir t Germany they tried to prop us up in bed with an im- 
 mense wedge-shaped bolster and a colossal pillow, and to cover 
 us with a juvenile feather bed, that if laid in the centre would 
 leave both ends sticking out, but we generally piled all these on 
 the floor, which gave the room the appearance of initiatory steps 
 towards a family moving. I presume that on account of the 
 great size of our party, we meet difficulties, and especielly at 
 railroad stations, not experienced by the single traveler, but I 
 think I may safely say that one can travel much more comfort- 
 ably and luxuriously on the main thoroughfares of the United 
 States than he can in Europe, taking the part I have seen as a 
 sample of the whole. Possibly, if I were alone, or with only 
 three or four others, and understood and could speak the lan- 
 guage of the countries through which 1 passed, I might give a 
 different verdict. Still I hardly think I would. But hotel fare 
 is much cheaper in Europe than it is in America, their system 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 
 
 87 
 
 of serving guests being much more economical. But to-mor- 
 row morning the carriages will drive into the court to take us on 
 a tour through the city, and I must bid you good-bye for the 
 present. I fear I shall not be able to say much about Rome. 
 The theme is too big a one, even if it had not already been 
 exhausted. 
 
THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 LETTER XIII. 
 
 Ronie — The Author floored— Fonner impre^ - —Inability to 
 
 the ".Jreai City in one or two letters — A diary of one 'lay's doings— - 
 Roman and the Old Masters - The tomb of the wife of Crosus— A visit to tb»- 
 Cataeombs. St. Peters, the Vatican and other notable plae*-s-»arryi- ^ 
 Corpses o: ess usehold. 
 
 Rome. Italy. August 5, 187 
 
 The last letter I wrote you brought our trip up to this place, 
 and I think it would be just as well, perhaps, if I would 
 pass on to the next city and say nothing of this. I find some 
 difficulty in writing a letter about Rome. There would be no 
 difficulty in writing a dozen, but it is no easy task to write one. 
 Still, every one who reads at all has heard of the great church 
 
 St Peter s, the Vatican, the Roman Forum, the Colosseum. 
 the Catacombs, the Appian Way. the Pantheon, the Acqueduct. 
 and the hundred and one other objects of interest clustered in 
 and about the Eternal City, and no letter about them could go 
 over untrodden ground. But I find that all reading about 
 these have beer, of small service in conveying a proper concep- 
 tion of them to the mind. I think a person might read even- 
 letter and every book ever written about Rome and its won 
 and still have an indefinite, or erroneous, idea of them as they 
 actually exist. I had read and read again of the immensity and 
 magnificence of St. Peter s, and had seen the figures designating 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 89 
 
 its size, and thought I was fully prepared to look upon it, but 
 when I entered its great door, and walked halfway up its main 
 aisle, I stopped and stood speechless with amazement, fully 
 realizing, at once, the poverty of human language to impress 
 what was before and around me upon those far away. 
 
 It is an easy matter to tell that the little cherubs we see 
 sculptured low down on the columns of handsome marble, make 
 dwarfs of tail men who walk and stand beside them; that the 
 tiny doves just above them and which look smaller than your 
 hand, are over two feet in length ; that the pen in the hand of a 
 Saint over one of the altars, and which appears to be only an 
 ordinary goose quill, is actually seven feet long ; that the top 
 of the cross surmounting the elaborate tomb of St. Peter, in 
 the centre of the Church and just under the dome, and which 
 looks but little taller than the ceiling in an ordinary American 
 church, is actually so high that it would take a shot-gun of 
 good capacity to knock a tough squirrel from it; I say it is easy 
 to tell these things and it is easy to read about them, but form- 
 ing a proper idea of them without the aid of one's own vision 
 is another matter entirely. It requires no great amount of 
 talent to go into St. Paul's — decidedly the finest church, inside, 
 about the city — and see the immense altars there, composed, in 
 large part, of malachite, lapis luzuli, jasper and amethyst, or to 
 gaze upon the rows of portraits of all the Popes, from the found- 
 ation of the Church, in mosaic, and each of which required the 
 labor of a skillful artist a whole year to execute; and it is only a 
 little tiresome walk over acres of many colored and beautiful 
 marble slabs that compose the floor of this gorgeous church, 
 and to look up and around the vast columns of solid and un- 
 broken marble from almost every rich quarry on the globe, 
 while the diamonds in many of the eyes of the portraits high up 
 on the walls are sparkling down upon you ; it does not now 
 throw one into a perspiration to write about going down into 
 the catacombs and telling of a tramp through half a mile or so 
 of the fifty or more miles of damp and tortuous passages be- 
 tween the tiers of tombs of Romans, who died some hundreds 
 of years ago, or to recount what a feeling of awe takes posses- 
 sion of one as he elbows and edges about in the subterranean 
 12 
 
gO THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 aisles and grottoes, and gropes his way around sharp corners 
 and over the uneven floors of these honey-combed charnel 
 houses in mortal fear that he may stray away from the guides 
 and be forever lost to the world and home ; it is no burden to 
 talk of the Colosseum, and to say, in cold figures, how large it 
 is and how many people it would seat ; and it is easier to grow 
 mad over the contemplation of the scenes once enacted within 
 the arena before the 90,000 blood-thirsty spectators, and to feel 
 like going out and chopping off the head of some villainous look- 
 ing modern Roman. I say, again, it is easy to do these things, 
 but it is not possible to bring home to those who have not 
 themselves been here, a realization of the grandeur of that which 
 is to be seen in and about Rome, or the feelings which take 
 possession of one as he passes about among the monuments of 
 a once mighty empire. He can see the Roman Forum and 
 have pointed out to him the place where Caesar fell, but he can 
 not describe the effect these have upon him. And it is for 
 these reasons I shall devote but one letter to Rome. 
 
 The first day after our arrival we spent sight seeing, using 
 carriages to transport us from point to point. The day was 
 warm and reminded me of the climate at Vicksburg. We cross- 
 ed the Tiber by the bridge of St. Angelo, having first driven to 
 an eminence overlooking and giving us a good panoramic view 
 of the city. This bridge, they tell us, is the finest in the city, 
 and was built by Hadrian about A. D 130. Near by is Castle 
 St. Angelo, originally Hadrian's tomb, but converted into a 
 fortress twelve hundred years ago. What in the name of com- 
 mon sense they wanted to box up old Hadrian in such a big 
 pile of stone and mortar as this is I can't conceive. Why, it is 
 big enough for the remains of thousands of dead men. The 
 bones of the 11,000 virgins in the Cathedral at Cologne would 
 not make a respectable pile in one corner of it. 
 
 Inside of St.' Peter's we gawked about dumbfounded, heard 
 the exquisite singing of the choir and the seventy odd priests 
 within the railing near the center of the church, and wondered 
 to find no other seats or places of worship for the people. The 
 place seems to be taken entirely by fat, sleek, rather good look- 
 ing priests, and the impious are impressed with the idea that 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 9 1 
 
 this magnificent structure is more for the adoration of the 
 Popes than to the glorification of the Creator. Pope this and 
 Saint that crop into prominence all over the church, and a vis- 
 itor can not avoid the suspicion they are the objects of worship. 
 From St. Peter's we passed into the Vatican, and went hur- 
 riedly through some of the galleries and museums, seeing, of 
 course, the works of the old masters, but being too much of 
 savages to appreciate them as good judges of art might. I have 
 so often in this trip regretted that I am not intelligent enough 
 to take a fancy to the great works which are being continually 
 trotted out for us to see. There is no subterfuge that I can 
 resort to that enables me to escape the infliction of being bored 
 over a work of some of the old masters, unless, indeed, I feign 
 sickness and stay at home. I despise their daubs, with a few 
 exceptions. The truth of the whole matter is, they selected 
 impossible subjects, in the first place, and perhaps had worse 
 living ones for their models. I know it is wicked for me to har- 
 bor the idea that probably the old Roman matron was not a 
 noble looking woman, but, on the contrary, was as homely as 
 the present dwellers in Rome, but I can't help it. I think it 
 not at all beyond the possibilities that the works of our own 
 Fennimore Cooper and that other prolific writer of thrilling In- 
 dian novels, whose cognomen does not drop from my pen just at 
 the present moment, may escape fire and flood and be handed 
 down to far off generations and read as the chronicles of the 
 present time. If they should be, then what of the beautiful In- 
 dian maiden I have sought among so many tribes of the far 
 West to see without being rewarded for my labor ? Why, she 
 Avill be regarded as a beauty who bewitched and ran men crazy 
 with her loveliness. 
 
 But I am stragglirrg. At the Vatican we passed into one 
 room and, as if by concert, there arose the exclamation of "how 
 beautiful !" as the bright, life-like pictures greeted our eyes. A 
 shade of disgust passed over the face of our conductor. He 
 hurried us out of the room with the remark that these pictures 
 all represented some dogma of the Church, and as modern pic- 
 tures, were very good, but of not sufficient interest to justify any 
 loss of time over them. Mr. Forbes is an intelligent gentle- 
 
92 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 man, who has lived in Rome several years, and made its an- 
 tiquities his study, and who has aided in the recent discoveries 
 of several catacombs, and translated and written a great deal, 
 but I fear that he sees beauties in things more from the fact that 
 they look old and rusty than because they are actually hand- 
 some. And I suspect he would sooner go into raptures over 
 the proboscis of some idol made just after Adam's time, and 
 baked and dried in the burning sun of Egypt, than he would 
 over the most symmetrical nose of any handsome lady in our 
 entire party. Now that's art, and the common herd don't pos- 
 sess it — at least all Americans who have independence enough 
 to be their own judges are devoid of it. 
 
 We took lunch between noon and I o'clock and rested till 3 
 o'clock. To give you an idea of the amount of labor we per- 
 form, I will quote from the diary of my room-mate, covering 
 the rounds for the balance of the day : 
 
 "Left the hotel again at three o'clock, passing through the 
 Corso, by the new Postoffice, to the Theater of Marcellus, the 
 second stone theater in Rome, built by Augustus, son of Julius 
 Caesar, and finished by Augustus' son, Marcellus, in the first 
 century. It is in the shape of the letter D, and accommodated 
 40,000 people. Thence to the Temple of Vesta, or Hercules, 
 a circular building supported by twenty Corinthian columns, 
 thirty two feet in height and built in the time of Vespasian. 
 Next, to the pyramid of Caius Cestius, containing his remains. 
 It is 116 feet high by 98 feet square at the base, built of brick 
 by Pontius Mila and the freedman Polhus. Thence we drove 
 quite a distance outside the city walls to St. Paul's, which was 
 burned in 1823, and restored in the most expensive manner by 
 Pope Pius IX. It contains a few fine paintings and mosaics, 
 and the pictures of all the Popes in circular frames five feet in 
 diameter. These pictures are all mosaic, and a number of them 
 have diamond eyes. There are eighty massive Corinthian col- 
 umns which form the nave, all of solid marble. The whole 
 church is of the most expensive marble, polished so highly as 
 to reflect like a mirror. The painted glass windows are the 
 finest I ever saw. The principal entrance, toward the Tiber, is 
 unfinished. On that end, outside, is an immense mosaic pic- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 93 
 
 ture made by the Vatican man u factors, and which consumed 
 fifteen years in making. St. Paul's remains are in a tomb in the 
 transept. This is far the finest church of its size in the world. 
 Thence through the Porto St. Paolo to the house of Rienzi, 
 passing the Hill of Remeli and the Temple of Patrician on the 
 site of the Forum of cattle dealers, and walking up to the 
 stone bridge across the Tiber, built 150 B. C, and the 
 first stone bridge in Rome. Below we saw the mouth of the 
 great drain of Rome and the remains of the wooden bridge, and 
 above the Sacred Island of the Tiber, and connected to the 
 main land by two bridges built 100 years B. C. Thence through 
 the Jew's quarter to the "hired house" of St. Paul, where that 
 Apostle lived ; to the Pantheon, or Temple of All Gods, a large 
 circular edifice, formerly used as a bath or sweating chamber. 
 A circular, open space, 27 feet in diameter, in the center of the 
 roof is the only opening for light in this large building. The 
 tombs of Raphael and Victor Emanuel are in this building. 
 Thence to the hotel, passing the King's Palace." 
 
 My young friend, who keeps a full record of all the statistics 
 of this trip, after dinner (and that means in this country, to us, 
 anywhere between six o'clock and midnight) went out with 
 some ladies to see the Colosseum by moonlight, drove home by 
 the Corso, stopping at a cafe on the way to take "some ices," 
 as he has it in his notes. And in this way I show you how busy 
 we are. 
 
 You have often heard of Croesus. You, perhaps, never saw 
 that wealthy gentleman, and, perhaps never will, but you can 
 see the tomb of his wife outside the citv on the Appian way. 
 They called her Cecilia Metella, and encased her in this immense 
 tower about 100 B. C. The thing is large enough to hold the 
 remains of a regiment. Out on this famous highway we also 
 saw the buildings, dug deep down into the earth and walled up 
 like a cellar, and reaching a roof twenty feet above ground with- 
 out any intervening floor, where, in niches in the wall, were 
 placed the urns containing the ashes of the members of Caesar's 
 numerous household. There are three of these buildings, and 
 the one we went down into, by means of stone steps, was capable 
 of accommodating eight hundred urns without crowding. Two 
 
94 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 of these urns contained some ashes, said to be of those cremated 
 bodies, and our party carried most of them off. It was a con- 
 venient way of transporting corpses. 
 
 But I must bid Rome good-bye for the present. To-morrow 
 night or the next morning, we go down to Naples, Vesuvius 
 and Pompeii. I want to visit Pompeii and see the home of 
 Glaucus and the house of Diomed, and perhaps the ground over 
 which Bulwer made the blind girl, Nydia, lead Glaucus and the 
 queenly lone through darkness, fire and raining ashes to safety, 
 on the seashore and love and happiness beyond. And I want 
 to look over the water into which that faithful, but heart-broken 
 little guide sought oblivion from the pangs of unrequited love 
 by casting herself beneath the sea. Having done this, I think I 
 will be enabled to endure the fleas of Rome, and tramp through 
 her narrow, dirty, crooked streets with greater composure. 
 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 95 
 
 LETTER XIV. 
 
 More of Rome and its big sights— Trying to have pictures taken in the Roman 
 Forum— Our Guide in the Eternal City— Run to Naples— First view of Vesu- 
 vius—Naples not a clean city — The beautiful Bay— Cheapness of everything 
 —Noisy place -Odd vehicles— Mosquitoes and Smudges — Preparing for a 
 midnight tramp to the summit of Vesuvius. 
 
 Naples, Italy, August 7th, 1879. 
 
 The day subsequent to the date of my last letter from Rome, 
 we spent in that interesting city seeing all the sights we could 
 in that time. The sun shone pretty warm, and we suffered from 
 heat, especially while hanging about the Roman Forum, look- 
 ing at the remains of noted temples and other buildings cluster- 
 ed thickly about it, and listening to our conductor air his knowl- 
 edge of these places. And we absolutely boiled while about 
 one half the party stood for their picture in a group in the 
 parching rays of the sun. I presume when we get home and 
 our friends see our blurred faces with the remaining columns of 
 the Temple of Castor and Pollux in the back ground, they will 
 feel we have done something wonderful indeed. If they don't 
 feel so, we will never be repaid for our being cooked alive. 
 
 We did not see where Caesar fell — for he did not fall in the 
 Roman Forum, but at another fellow's house, a mile away, and 
 
g6 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 was brought and laid out here — but we saw the spot where his 
 dead body lay when Mark Antony made the speech mentioned 
 by many ancient historians and put in words by Mr. Shaks- 
 peare. From the Roman Forum we went to the Palatine Hill, 
 and did up the ancient edifices there, including the Palace of 
 the Caesars, Farnese Gardens, Baths of Livia, Palaces of Caligu- 
 la, Tiberius and Flaii, and divers other points made famous by 
 history. Of course we saw the room set apart as the one in 
 which Caligula stabled his famous horse and fed him on oats 
 gilded in gold, but Mr. Forbes wouldn't swear to it. But we 
 find Mr. Forbes a very poor guide in one or two respects. For 
 one thing, he has small faith, and he even turns up his nose at 
 many favorite traditions. He don't believe in the twenty kegs 
 of nails from the true cross, or that Saint So and So is buried in 
 three or four different places. He will deliberately show us the 
 foot prints of some noted chap or the dent of his head where it 
 was bumped against some stone, and then in cold blood show 
 us that, for mam' reasons, it is all a hoax — such as that the fel- 
 low was never in those parts and consequently he couldn't have 
 imprinted any stones in that locality. This is not exactly right. 
 We want to be astounded, and when this delver after hidden 
 lore trots in his unromantic notions and brushes away so many 
 pet theories, we feel that we ought to have a guide not so well 
 down to hard fact. It must be understood that Mr. Forbes 
 only conducts the sections in Rome. While he is a very clever 
 gentleman and very thorough in his knowledge of the city and 
 its surroundings, he will not dose us with miracles or allow oth- 
 ers to do so without his protest. 
 
 It having been left discretionary whether we should travel by 
 night or by day from R.ome to this place, about twenty of us took 
 the cars at 1 1 o'clock p. M. and ran through that night, thus 
 avoiding the heat and dust of the day. Just as the sun was 
 peeping over the mountains and glinting the low range to the 
 right of us, we looked out the car window and, for the first time, 
 saw the small column of smoke issuing from the top of Vesuvius 
 and drifting lazily before a gentle breeze out to sea. It did not 
 strike us as a grand sight and yet it impressed us as an interesting 
 one, The column was never broken, but steady and regular as 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. g? 
 
 though the fireman below did his work without any fitful inter- 
 ludes of rest or slumber. So near did the mountain appear to 
 us that we felt it necessary to adjust our baggage and our hair 
 so we might be ready to get out in order at the depot, and for 
 this purpose aroused two or three sleepers for whom the cry of 
 "Vesuvius" had no electric effect, but it was full two hours 
 when we came fully abreast of the mountain and passed into the 
 city. 
 
 As our tired pprty sat in and on top of the omnibusses wait- 
 ing the slow action of the railroad men in delivering the few 
 trunks brought along, we were discovered by some boys who 
 were out early, and who gathered around us, and good-humor- 
 edly sought alms, indicating by various signs that they were in 
 want of a breakfast. We did not dare to pitch them a copper, 
 for had we done so, our peace would have been gone for all of 
 our stay in Naples. Some one tried that when passing through 
 the Jews' quarter in Rome, and a pack of boys and girls chased 
 us for half a mile, and would bounce out after us whenever they 
 caught sight of us afterwards. I said we waited for the bag- 
 gage at the depot. That usually goes ahead of us, and is in 
 charge of our sub-conductor, but being ahead of the programme, 
 and for the first time under the baggage man, we had to wait 
 for all baggage we had brought down for the entire section. 
 Most of it we left at Rome to await our return. 
 
 If we had seen no more, the ride from the depot to the hotel 
 was sufficient to convince us that Naples is not a clean city. I 
 don't think, now that I have been here two days, that I have 
 seen a more dirty one. That street which runs the whole 
 length of the half circle or more in front of the bay for a dist- 
 ance of over ten miles, is especially unclean, and some of the 
 narrow alleys leading into it, and which seem to be absolutely 
 swarming with human beings, are filthy in a superlative degree. 
 In the afternoon when the sun has passed behind the houses 
 and tall bluffs fronting the bay, the place becomes crowded with 
 dirty women and children, who seek light and air by teeming 
 out of their dirty and filthy dens into the open street. Many 
 of the children are half naked, and some of them quite so, thus 
 making them no cheerful sight to see. And I have never 
 
 13 
 
9§ THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 heard so much noise as I have heard in Naples. It seems that 
 some one is yelling all the time. Midnight brings no relief 
 from this nuisance. Sometimes some vendor of fruit passing 
 under my window screams out in such an unearthly manner that 
 I fancy, on the spur of the moment, some one is murdering 
 him, and on going to the window I am sorry it is only a fancy. 
 The organ grinders have besieged our hotel and, at meal times 
 especially, have nearly ground us into fits. The first time they did 
 this we unfortunately sent out a deputation to buy them off and 
 send them away. Now they suddenly start up at every corner 
 of the hotel and have become too much for us. We may have 
 to kill one before we get any peace. Yesterday we were all 
 badly shocked by a pack of boys with no other garments than 
 shirts on, turning handsprings and standing on their heads in 
 front of our hotel. What other indignity we may expect be- 
 fore we leave I can not tell. 
 
 We find most things very cheap in Naples. A short cab 
 drive in the city costs ten cents for two — street car fare two 
 cents a bare seat, and three cents for one with cushions. Coral 
 jewelry and shell cameos are in great abundance and low in 
 price. Bath houses in the bay furnish you with a bathing gar- 
 ment very short at both ends, two towels as large as a sheet for 
 a single bed, and a room in which to disrobe, all for the modest 
 sum of ten cents. One can get a first class shine to his boots 
 for the insignificant price or two cents, and he can buy fruit 
 enough to gorge three persons for ten or fifteen cen^ts. 
 
 They have mosquitoes here, and they have them in abund- 
 ance ; yet the hotels make no provision in the way of bars to 
 keep them from feasting off Americans. Last night they came 
 near finishing me. The chambermaid gave me two saucers con- 
 taining a vile compound to burn as a ''smudge," and with which 
 I nearly suffocated myself trying to rid the room of pests, but 
 I think if old Vesuvius herself had been vomiting her sulphur- 
 ous smoke right in at my window, I would have furnished steak 
 for hungry mosquitoes all the same. When I look at these 
 brown, dirty, sour, thick-skinned Italians, whom we meet upon 
 the streets, I do not wonder that a mosquito should risk his 
 life and wade through fire and smoke to get a nibble at an 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 99 
 
 American. Thinking that perhaps our hotel was peculiar in 
 the matter of this great deficiency for the comfort of guests, we 
 made diligent inquiries and found they were all alike. One 
 can not buy a mosquito bar in Naples. 
 
 I wish I could describe some of the outlanaish vehicles they 
 use here in Italy, especially the carts upon which nearly every- 
 thing is transported. It would be better than anything else, 
 perhaps, to illustrate what miserable, ignorant human beings 
 these people are, and how small progress in some things they 
 have made since the flood. But I shall not attempt to do it. 
 I have nearly run my legs off in search of photographs of them 
 without success. I can always, everywhere, find pictures of 
 castles, palaces, parks, big churches and stunning places, but 
 when I look for those which will illustrate the character of their 
 odd streets, their fantastic surroundings and such things as 
 would somewhat show their mode of living and doing business, 
 I can not find them. I would give more for a view looking up 
 one of the dark, dirty, narrow streets intersecting the broad 
 one facing the bay, or for the clumsy and murderous cart drawn 
 by three small, patient, ill-used donkeys, than I would for the 
 entire catalogue of those of the bay, or of Vesuvius sending up 
 fire and smoke in the distance. 
 
 If one had not been in Naples and seen the poverty and dirt 
 of her half million of people, or smeiled the awful smells which 
 run riot on the streets facing the bay, and which are open to air 
 and sunshine ; and had not heard the yells and noise and 
 screeches that have no cessation, morning, noon or night, and 
 which would make Bedlam appear a quiet place ; or had not 
 seen the inhuman drivers of vehicles pounding their faithful and 
 tractable ponies and donkies over the head, or trying to crack 
 their eyes out with clumsy whips, I think a sight of the Bay of 
 Naples would strike him as being as lovely a sight as he has 
 ever seen, I can understand the gorgeous descriptions of those 
 who approach the city from the sea, and who write under the 
 inspiration of such a view, unaffected by the scenes which meet 
 them on putting their feet upon its wharf. But if any one 
 should enter Naples'and see what I have 1 recounted and then 
 go into gush about the city, I should set him down on the spot 
 
IOO THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 as a hopeless idiot. Some fellow once wrote "see Naples and 
 die." My honest conviction is that if he be an ordinary tidy 
 person, with his senses of sight and smell and hearing in good 
 order, and sees Naples in August thoroughly, he will obey the 
 injunction in less than two weeks, and be as hopeless a corpse as 
 though he had jumped into the crater at Vesuvius. But a sea- 
 sick person, gliding into the quiet, blue waters of the bay as it 
 was sparkling and quivering in the moonlight, and seeing the 
 long crescent of houses and lights before him, as his own stom- 
 ach was clearing up from the effects of a long voyage in a stink- 
 ing ship, would be justified in an attack of enthusiasm, and my 
 advice to him would be to cast anchor and never enter the city 
 at all. Then he could return to his native land with pleasant 
 recollections of it. 
 
 It is now midnight. The noise in the streets below is greater, 
 if possible, than ever. I occupy a corner room, each of the 
 two sides facing other hotels across the way. Both of them are 
 ablaze with light. In the parlor of one six ladies and gentle- 
 men are at a game of cards, while a big mouthed Italian, with 
 strong lungs and great endurance, is singing at the top of his 
 voice and pounding away at an ancient piano. In the corner 
 room of the other hotel, and on a level with mine, by the win- 
 dow, sits a middle aged lady with no greater amount of attire 
 than the urchins who stood upon their heads in front of out- 
 hotel, fanning herself and enjoying the smells and melodies that 
 are stealing upon the night air. The streets are narrow, and 
 yet this Italian lady seems to have no concern that she is being 
 gazed upon by a gentleman from America. The mosquitoes 
 have come in and gathered upon the walls or are innocently 
 humming about the room waiting for me to blow out the lights 
 and go to bed. But I am going to disappoint them to-night 
 Most of our party are going to Vesuvius, and I hear the car- 
 riages driving up to the door. I look out my window and just 
 where the moon came up over the mountair s three hours ago, 
 I see a red beacon in the heavens with its light dim, and brighter 
 by turns, and I know that is uneasy Vesuvius, the cinders and 
 ashes from whose troubled stomach buried Pompeii and several 
 adjoining towns just eighteen hundred years ago. I am very 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. IOI 
 
 tired and more sleepy, and they tell me it is an awful pull, but I 
 want to go there, and I hope I won't fall by the wayside as 
 many have done before. Yet two nights without slumber in this 
 hot clime, hard work during the day, winding up with an ex- 
 hausting climb up Vesuvius, may be more than I can endure, 
 and I will not predict the result. There is a loud call upon 
 stragglers from our conductor from below, so I bid you good- 
 night. 
 
 
102 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 LETTER XV. 
 
 Night ride to Vesuvius— The carriages- -Strange night scenes— Guides and Ponies 
 —The Hermitage -Bedlam broke loose— Climbing to the summit— Some of 
 the party brean down and are boosted up the ascent by the rabble guides- 
 Down into the bowl of the crater, and lighted our cigars at the brimstone 
 tires-Return to the hotel well tagged out— Rest two hours and start lor 
 Pompeii— The Exhumed City and what we s,rv there— The buildings that are 
 being uncovered— The paintings a/id now they hold their colors -Licentious- 
 ness of these ancients— Their valgar pictures closed against lady visitors- 
 Shameful symbols on the houses— The house of Glaucus— Rude mills, ovens, 
 bread, etc.- Excursion to the island of Capri, Sorrenti, and the Blue Grotto- 
 Return to Rome— Seethe tiueen but miss the Pope— More of Rome hereafter. 
 
 Rome, Italy, August 9, 1879. 
 
 I closed my' last letter to you at Naples, a little after mid- 
 night, to take a seat with the driver of one of the twelve car- 
 riages that were to convey the greater number of our party to 
 the hermitage about half way, in elevation, up Vesuvius. 
 These carriages were all with folding tops, holding five persons, 
 one with the driver and four inside, and drawn by three horses 
 abreast, the third one being only for this drive and hitched by a 
 movable arrangement alongside the near horse. This drive 
 lasted three hours and a half, being about equally divided be- 
 tween the journey through the long city of Naples and the as- 
 cent of the mountain. The ascent begins near the eastern ter- 
 minus of the city and before you pass out of it. The moon was 
 a little past the full, and the sky was unbroken even by a cloud 
 as big as your hand. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. IO3 
 
 About a half a mile or more before leaving the city we came 
 to the headquarters for guides and ponies, and here experienced 
 a siege I had never seen before or ever want to see again. 
 It beggars description. Almost in a twinkling the streets 
 swarmed with the most ill-favored and piratical looking scoun- 
 drels, some with donkeys, some with staffs, some with nothing 
 but their bad faces, and all noisily crowding about the carriages 
 seeking to be employed. They led their animals up to the car- 
 riage doors, piled their walking sticks into the vehicles, held 
 out their straps for us to touch that they might then claim that 
 we had engaged their services, and were persistent to a 
 degree that was both laughable and annoying. Our con- 
 ductor brought partial order out of the chaos by ascertaining 
 who wanted animals and who wanted chairs in which to be car- 
 ried up, and then engaged these, but forty others took 
 after us and the whole swarm of them went whooping and yell- 
 ing up the road with us, some walking, some riding, while 
 others held to the tails of the animals and pounded them with 
 sticks to increase their speed. To say that they kicked up a 
 dust that nearly suffocated us expresses it mildly. 
 
 The day was fairly dawning when we reached the hermitage. 
 Here the carriages stop for the present, but the Government is 
 at work on a road that will enable vehicles to reach the base of 
 the cone. About thirty of us in all concluded to undertake the 
 ascent. And here again Bedlam broke loose and continued 
 until the riders were mounted, some ladies in chairs, and the 
 doleful looking caravan under way. If I did Vesuvius I wanted 
 to do it myself, so I was one of a very few who started out on 
 foot and continued unassisted till I stood upon the summit look- 
 ing down into the bowl-like conformation, and the two unequal 
 peaks therein sending up their fire and smoke, and now and 
 then spitting out a bushel or so of red hot lava. It was a very 
 exhaustive trip of two hours duration, and very many of the 
 dirty vagabonds who had stuck to us, were rewarded by being 
 employed to pull and push at members of our party who had 
 lost their wind and their spirits at the same time. These fel- 
 lows know pretty well the capacity of the average American, 
 and his readiness to call for assistance in trying times even if it 
 
104 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 is expensive, and when one of them swears up and down at the 
 outfitting" station that he will foot it up Vesuvius or die in the at- 
 tempt, they do not become discouraged, but follow on clear up 
 to the crater, rarely ever reaching it without being sought to 
 lend a helping hand, either to push or pull some one, to car- 
 ry his surplus garments, or, perchance, make a perambulating 
 wineshop of himself by carrying the numerous bottles that have 
 been brought along for the stomach's sake. 
 
 Well, every one who undertook the trip made it; went down 
 into the bowl, crossed the fissures around its edge that were 
 sending out their heat and sulphurous smoke, walked over the 
 field of lava that had been made only eight days ago, and was 
 still hot, climbed the main crater and perspired within the very 
 heat of its gentle vomitings, lit our cigars, and burned the 
 corners of letters at the fissures, and dug moulten lava from the 
 sides of the baby crater to mould around our copper pieces, or 
 to let cool for specimens to bring home. We did all these 
 things and got our lungs full of vile air, and came down by a short 
 and steep cut on the jump — some of us tumbling heels over 
 head and nearly burying ourselves in the fine lava — and at last 
 reaching our hotels near noon, so nearly worn out as to feel it 
 were an accident if our bodies hung together. And yet in less 
 than two hours we started for Pompeii, taking carriages to the 
 depot, a long way from our hotel, and then the cars for the ex- 
 humed city. 
 
 What shall I say of Pompeii ? I am sure I do not know, I 
 can state with all my reading on the subject I found the houses 
 which have been uncovered in a much better state of preserva- 
 tion than I had expected, and was enabled to form a clearer 
 idea of the habits of its former inhabitants than I supposed 
 would be possible. There are no evidences that any of these 
 people lived luxuriantly, but on the contrary their rooms were 
 small, poorly lighted, worse ventilated, and devoid of comfort. 
 Some writers speak of them as having lived in splendor. I 
 can not believe it from the well preserved things to be seen 
 there. They had some bronze ornaments and marble statuary, 
 but they had poor bread. Their walls were frescoed but the 
 rooms were small and without windows. Their houses were 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. I05 
 
 one story high, jammed together, with very narrow streets, 
 with certainly no front yards and no indications of back ones. 
 What they luxuriated in can not be seen among the relics left 
 to this generation. It is true they had their public baths, and 
 perhaps their private ones, and it is not a wide stretch to 
 imagine they needed them. 
 
 It is estimated that about one-third of the city has been un- 
 covered, and yet only one small window of glass about sixteen 
 inches in length and three in width has, so far, been discovered. 
 The Government has a force at work excavating right along 
 towards the mountain, and we were taken to that point and saw 
 the buildings being brought to the light after a burial of just 
 eighteen hundred years. It was almost startling to see how 
 clear and bright they looked after this long slumber under 
 ground Those old fellows had fast colors in those days, for 
 many of the fresco paintings on the walls look almost as bright 
 as if put on but a week ago, and after being exposed to the hot 
 sun of Italy for months, and even years, retain their color in a 
 remarkable degree. We had seen an evidence of this in Rome, 
 in the house of Germanicus, on the Palatine Hill, adjoining the 
 Palace of the Caesars, which has recently been exhumed after 
 being buried twelve hundred years, the paintings upon whose 
 walls were quite good and strikingly fresh and clear. And 
 there was another thing those ancients understood, and that 
 was the art of making mortar that would stand for ages as firm 
 and strong as when first dried from the trowel of the mason. 
 
 Still, having seen the homes of these people, their clumsy 
 manner of doing things, and the many witnesses of their licen- 
 tious lives, I can't admire them even though they are credited 
 with intelligence and were the possessors of some arts that 
 have been lost to us. Why, in Pompeii, there are houses con- 
 taining so many evidences of vulgarity that even these Italians 
 of the present day, who are by no means fastidious on such sub- 
 jects, deem it necessary to keep closed and shut out from the 
 view of ladies; and in the museum at Naples there is a room 
 filled with such questionable works of art that have been found 
 during excavations of this renowned city of the past, no female 
 is ever permitted to enter its doors. I speak of this thing be- 
 14 
 
I06 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 cause it is not often alluded to by writers, and because it is the 
 most striking feature of the history of Pompeii handed down by 
 art in paintings and bronze and sculpture, so far unearthed. 
 Houses, the character of which can barely be hinted at in print, 
 were designated by the most shameful symbols, prominent from 
 the street, and in enduring marble that marks the tread of cen- 
 turies— symbols that stand as monuments to disgust a civilized 
 people. I presume writers seldom mention these things be- 
 cause it would detract from the poetry of the place ; but the 
 things I speak of stand out boldly in Pompeii, and one must 
 pass through its streets, deserted now by aught else save liz- 
 zards, with closed eyes if he does not see them. As we stood 
 there, with Vesuvius frowning down upon us from the distance, 
 it was an easy matter to entertain the conviction that Pompeii 
 existed long enough, and that the Almighty smote it none too 
 soon. 
 
 We were shown the houses of Glaucus — they call him the 
 "Tragic Poet" — of Salust, of Diomede, and other prominent 
 characters in Bulwer's novels, but there was no monument to 
 that loving blind girl, who rescued lone and Glaucus and the 
 miserable priest from the clutches of the wily Arbaces, and at 
 last led Glaucus and lone through the horrors of a ghastly day to 
 the seashore. I thought of that faithful little woman often in 
 my ramble through Pompeii, and when I stood in Glaucus' 
 house where the flowers must have grown and blossomed under 
 her gentle care, I forgot that she was an ideal character, and 
 imagined where she stood and how she looked as she prepared 
 the bouquet for the kindly master whom she loved so well. 
 
 We saw the rude, clumsy mills upon which the Pompeiians 
 ground their grain, standing just as they stood eighteen hundred 
 years ago ; we looked into the oven which baked their bread 
 and from which eighty loaves were taken cooked too brown for 
 the use of those who found them so long after baking ; we saw 
 their amphitheatre — a child as compared with the one at. Vero- 
 na, and a mere baby by the side of the full grcwn one at Rome. 
 We saw their public and private baths, their forums and temples 
 of justice, their churches, and the immense well, the caving in 
 of which opened a hole to light above, and led to the discovery 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. IOJ 
 
 of the buried city. We walked over the tiled floors that are as 
 smooth and bright as though cemented yesterday, and we tried 
 to steal mementoes of the place, but the Italian guards were so 
 thick and watched us so closely we could only carry away a few 
 yards of the floor from the house of Salust. We tried to get 
 away with one of the bodies which lie in state in the Museum, 
 2nd which gave forth no odor after so long a burial, but it was 
 too heavy for us. So we passed out the city under the archway 
 that formerly led to the sea, now far away, as a grateful breeze 
 came to us across the lovely expanse, of water, and took the cars 
 for Naples. 
 
 The next day a steamer was chartered, and an excursion made 
 to the island of Capri, to Sorrento and the famous Blue Grotto, 
 but I was too much fatigued to accompany it, and so stayed in 
 Naples loafing around upon my own hook. Last night at 8 
 o'clock, we left the hoteL and driving for a mile or more through 
 the swarms of people on the broad street along the bay, amid 
 myriads of lights and the busiest scene we have witnessed in 
 Europe, we struck out through the narrow streets, and at last 
 reached the depot in time for the nine o'clock train, and to bid 
 Naples good-bye, Vesuvius keeping her red eye upon us till we 
 were far upon our journey. Our train was an immense one, 
 carrying quite a number of soldiers, and we did not reach our 
 hotel in Rome till 8 o'clock this morning, after a very tiresome 
 ride that would be made in America in less than half the time 
 it takes these slow-going people to make it. We found the. 
 fourth section here, having "done up" the city and ready to 
 start for Naples in two hours. When we came here before we 
 met the third section returning from Naples, and we have been 
 with the first section both here and at Naples, and will remain 
 with it over Sunday, when we part and none of us meet till we 
 reach London on our return home. Thus we have met all of 
 the three hundred Americans on this excursion except the fifth 
 section, which only made a short tour no farther South than 
 Switzerland. On Monday we start northward, and in three days 
 will be out of Italy and in cooler quarters, passing first through 
 Pisa, "Genoa and Milan. The fourth section, who have just 
 come down from Switzerland, give us such glowing accounts of 
 
Io8 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 their enjoyment in that country, and the fun they had snow- 
 balling in the Simplon pass, that we are anxious to be on that 
 territory. 
 
 We had arranged to see the Pope to-day, but it is a disap- 
 pointment to learn he is indisposed and can see no one. But 
 we have seen the Queen and waded through the Palace, and 
 that is some compensation. Yet nearly all of us were anxious 
 to see the Pope. He is the only dignitary we have had any 
 anxiety to look upon. Our lovely hotel here and the good fare 
 have put us all in a good humor, and we will no doubt leave 
 Rome with kindlier feelings towards it than we entertain for 
 Naples, even with her charming bay. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE, 
 
 IO9 
 
 LETTER XVI. 
 
 More about Rome— The Baths of Caracalla— High Mass at St. Peter's— The Capuc- 
 cini I Church and description of the Graveyard for barefooted Monks— De- 
 parture from Rome— Journey to Genoa— Stay at Pisa, to see the Baptistery, 
 Cathedra!, Campo Santo 4 and the Leaning Tower— Discourse upon Fleas- 
 Scenery upon "the Mediterranean '[.Coast. 
 
 Genoa, Italy, August 12, 1879. 
 
 I fear there was an apparent contradiction in the two letters 
 I wrote from Rome. Before starting for Naples I may have- 
 spoken sneeringly of the Eternal City, and made some unjust 
 remark about its fleas, and on retnrning I think I expressed de- 
 light at getting back. Not having been to Naples when I wrote 
 the first letter, and having been there when I -wrote the second, 
 must account for this. After having gone to Naples and en- 
 dured its stench and noise and unpleasant sights, and left there 
 with our bodies all frescoed by hungry fleas, our faces set in 
 Mosaic by v'ler mosquitoes, our stomachs full of tough and sour 
 bread and questionable water, and made a long run, at night, 
 in a train "with a regiment of soldiers whose vocation seemed to 
 be to screech and yell, I think one might be pardoned for 
 even liking Rome, especially if quartered in an elegant hotel. 
 I doubt if we find a place during our whole tour which will 
 please us less or disgust us more than did our visit to Naples, 
 where so many dirty people nearly live in the streets. In our 
 
I IO THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 ride to Vesuvius from the hotel the pavements were lined in 
 some places with slumberers like so many pigs, and as we re- 
 turned we saw the inhabitants pursuing all sorts of avocations 
 in narrow streets, such as washing, shoemaking, boiling roast- 
 ing ears, drying maccaroni on poles, searching the heads of 
 young ones for vermin, making up their black bread and leaving 
 it to sour in the sunshine, and preparing their vegetables for 
 cooking and leaving the parings and dirt in the street, while 
 half-grown children, begrimed as though they had been drag- 
 ged a day through the lava on the sides of Vesuvius, sported 
 about as naked as when they unluckily came into the world. 
 
 We spent the first day of our return to Rome in cleaning our- 
 selves, and getting a rest so greatly needed by all. The next 
 day, Sunday, a large party "did up" the baths of Caracalla, the 
 two museums, and other places they had omitted, while many 
 went to high mass and afternoon services at St. Peter's. A few 
 returned to the Colosseum to gaze again upon and wonder at 
 the stupendous structure, while still two or three lingered about 
 the baths I have mentioned, that were once under a roof, the 
 outer walls of which were just a mile in length. These baths 
 are a greater curiosity to me than the Colosseum, and aside 
 from any history connected with them, are far more impressive. 
 They have in large part been destroyed by various Popes, who 
 robbed them of their marble and statues to build and adorn 
 churches that few enter except priests, pilgrims and beggars. 
 We are told they actually burned the marble statues to make 
 lime. And yet these people make costly pictures, in Mosaic, 
 of those old vandals, and stick them up in prominent places for 
 future generations to see. If the Baths of Caracalla had been 
 left as they were when first discovered and cleared of the rub- 
 bish caused by the crushing in of the acres of garden upon their 
 roof, they would to-day be a far grander sight to see than St. 
 Peters, with all her pomp and riches stolen from other inter- 
 esting monuments in and about Rome. 
 
 In the afternoon some of us went to the Capuccini Church, the 
 lower portion of which is a graveyard for the barefooted monks. 
 There are five rooms, or large alcoves, made entirely of the 
 bones of these old fellows, and the fat chap who accompanied 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. I I 1 
 
 us, said 7,000 monks had been buried and disjointed and strung 
 up there in the four hundred years since the place was opened 
 for the reception of them. The ground on the small floors is 
 composed of dirt from Jerusalem, and every monk who dies de- 
 sires to take his turn in it ; so when a new corpse is brought in 
 they take up the one who has enjoyed the Jerusalem dirt the 
 longest, and replace him with the new one, putting the disin- 
 terred fellow in a niche till he is thoroughly cured, when they 
 disjoint him, label his skull and pile his bones in the heaps 
 which form the walls, ceilings and columns of these fantastic 
 rooms. 
 
 There was no unpleasant odor whatever in the place, albeit 
 some of the ghastly monks who sat upright or reclined in the 
 drying-out niches were still uncured, with the skin drawn un- 
 pleasantly tight over their shrivelled faces, and tufts of hair, 
 here and there, sticking to their head and jaws. Many of the 
 jaws are nearly toothless through the ravages of relic hunters, 
 and I confess to a slight feeling of guilt as I write with the tooth 
 of a fourteen-hundred-and-niner in my pocket, given me by a 
 dentist of our party after coming out. How that old fellow 
 will find his tooth when Gabriel blows his horn and causes a 
 rattling of dry bones in this bony place is not for me to say. I 
 regard the stereoscopic view I have of one of these alcoves as 
 the most valuable in my collection, because it will illustrate bet- 
 ter than the words of any pen, the appearance of this wierd and 
 awful place. 
 
 Taking lunch at Rome with a good supply of maccaroni after- 
 putting every one at the hotel on his oath that it was not made 
 at Naples, we entered the cars and bade a last good-bye to that 
 famed city and our nice hotel; and turning our faces northward, 
 whirled away through the heat and dust that have all the time 
 been our companions during our jaunt in Italy. As far as 
 Spezia the scenery on the way is uninviting, the land poor, the 
 fields and gardens parched by the heat of the sun, or actually 
 burned by the fires that have swept over them, and the scenery 
 tame. In passing through it one can not resist wishing it were 
 night to shut out the view and the heat of the sun at the same 
 time. At Spezia, however, a happy change takes place, and 
 
112 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 from that point till you have driven through the long tunnel at 
 Genoa, and the guard opens the door there and politely calls 
 out "Genova," there is ample in the picture laid out before you 
 to reward 3/011 for remaining awake and looking upon it, Here 
 you have come upon the seashore, and to your right lies the 
 clear, blue waters, flecked, as far as the eye can reach, with 
 sailing vessels, while upon the left lie the mountains inhabited 
 and cultivated to their very summits, and often running down 
 to the sea in such bald and rugged spurs of solid rock that our 
 train can not turn their points, but must dart through the tun- 
 nels which pierce them so frequently and at such short inter- 
 vals, in some parts of the journey, that one has not time to look 
 at the time of day by his watch in the flashes of day-light that 
 are allotted to him. There are between fifty and a hundred of 
 these tunnels — I should judge nearer the latter number — some 
 of them so long that you lose your patience waiting for the 
 sunshine to greet you at their termini. The coast is very rug- 
 ged, and no doubt a view from a ship at sea, looking inland, is 
 a very fine one. 
 
 I never saw so many houses stuck about so thickly in appa- 
 rently inaccessible and impossible places as may be seen on the 
 mountain sides in this ride. It is a constant matter of specula- 
 tion how the inhabitants all subsist. For miles and miles the 
 only thing which seems to be cultivated are the tens of thous- 
 ands of olive trees that appear like forests as we speed by them. 
 Nearing Genoa, we find every inch of the little valleys cultivated 
 in gardens, and all these irrigated by water drawn from wells 
 that exist by hundreds. Indeed, there are no crops in Italy 
 which seem to thrive at all where not irrigated. 
 
 I have just become conscious that I have jumped Pisa at a 
 bound. Still, so far as the mention of the country is concerned, 
 it makes no difference. We reached Pisa near 1 1 o'clock at 
 night the day alter leaving Rome, and, late as it was, took a 
 good tea at the excellent Hotel Minerva, near the depot, and 
 went to bed in airy rooms, and surrounding ourselves with 
 mosquito bars dreamed of home. The next morning taking 
 carriages, we drove through the town, crossed the Arno and saw 
 the objects of interest clustered together at the outskirts of 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 113 
 
 the place — the Cathedral, Baptistery, Campo Santo and the 
 Leaning Tower, all of which entertained us. The Cathedral 
 has large bronze doors, is very fine inside and out, and contains, 
 as you have no doubt heard, the lamp, the swinging of which, 
 suggested to Galileo the idea of a pendulum. The Baptistery 
 is a circular building shaped like a Humpy sugar loaf, culminating 
 in a dome near 200 feet high, containing a renowned pulpit 
 which I forgot to look at, and having the ability to furnish an 
 echo that is its chiel wonder. The Campo Santo is the burial 
 ground, where fifty ship loads of dirt brought from Jerusalem, 
 constitute the earth which receives the bodies of those buried 
 there. This place is surrounded by a high wall, and a wide 
 covered portico where are many curious relics. The walls are 
 covered with a dauby and faded fresco painting, representing vari- 
 ous subjects that can hardly be guessed at after the conductor 
 has told us what they are. 
 
 Of course we made ourselves drunk and brought the sweat 
 streaming down our backs climbing to the top of the Leaning 
 Tower, and we fairly made the custodians dance by ringing the 
 big bells up there, out of hours. All these buildings are from 
 six hundred to eight hundred years old. I might tell by refer- 
 ence to some one's guide book but I would rather not. When 
 I got to London I buried all the guide books I had in the trunk 
 I left there, and have not felt disposed to be burdened with one 
 since. So, if any statistics should now and then prove a little 
 faulty, you can understand the reason. 
 
 The water or the atmosphere, or something else must be very 
 bad on eyesight about Pisa. There are so many blind people at 
 that place lying in wait for you. They barred every door of 
 these old buildings we entered, and many urchins led them 
 about and skilfully blockaded our way at every turn until they 
 annoyed us so much we almost wished their bones were lying- 
 in the Campo Santo. How very natural it is for people to beg 
 in Italy, and oh, how often do the calls of hunger and wan 
 prompt the act. 
 
 In the journey from Rome to Pisa we passed through two 
 rather important places, Leghorn and Civita Veccliea, but did 
 not make more than a halt there and a slight exchange of fleas. 
 15 
 
114 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 I tell you this flea business is a terrible annoyance, and scratch- 
 ing is one of our chief entertainments. When we first went to 
 Rome and took on the old Roman flea, many seekers after relics 
 from this part of the world were rather proud of the acquisition, 
 and hoped to take some home ; but after we went down to 
 Naples and got multiplied, and then came back and picked up 
 another Roman invoice, with additions at several minor places, 
 till our bodies became a battle ground for these hungry and in- 
 dustrious vermin, and we could no longer identify our cherished 
 Roman flea from the ignoble herd around him, we began to feel 
 that we would like to shake the entire companv and bid them 
 good bye forever. But they won't shake worth a cent, and I 
 suppose we must still count our hunts after them in the privacy 
 of our chambers, by the uncertain light of a sickly European 
 candle, as one of our chief sources of delight. 
 
 We left Pisa at noon and reached our hotel here at eight 
 o'clock to-night. Our stay here will be short, as we leave at 
 noon to-morrow. We have seen the monument of Columbus 
 and went to see his autograph letter. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 15 
 
 LETTER XVII. 
 
 From Genoa, Italy, to Brieg, Switzerland— The Party losing interest -Hot and dusty 
 Italy Genoa — Trying to talk Italian — Country Improving— Arrival at Milan 
 Tlie Grand ' athedral and Magnificent Arcade — The Picture of the Last Sup- 
 per and comments thereon — Lake San Maggoire and the Barromean Islands 
 Crossing the Alps in diligences by day and hy night- Unequalled scenery- 
 Arrival at Brieg— Stop for the night. 
 
 Brieg, Switzerland, August 16, 1879. 
 
 I believe I closed my last letter at Genoa. I am not certain 
 of it. We have been on the pad so continually that I have 
 about lost my identity as well as my bearings. I am almost 
 beginning to think we are getting too large a dose of this tour. 
 The way we rush around and keep in a perpetual stew has been 
 telling on some members of our party. They begin to lose in- 
 terest in the journey, and it is hard to arouse their enthusiasm. 
 Many of them persist in sleeping in the cars while we are bowl- 
 ing through a country they will know as little about as if they 
 had remained in America. This has only been the case since 
 we left Naples. We will date many of our miseries from our 
 visit to Naples. I honestly believe some of us have not yet 
 been able to digest the bread we ate there. But this is no easy 
 trip, especially that part lying in Italy, and unless we get rested, 
 now that we are out of the heat and dust and noises and 
 
Il6 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 stenches of that priest-ridden land, we may begin to long for 
 the end of it, and for the time that will find us aboard of our 
 vessel homeward bound. 
 
 We did not like our hotel in Genoa. The building was good 
 enough and the rooms up to the average, but there were so 
 many extras at the table, and such a disposition to force these 
 upon us to the neglect of those things which belong to the reg- 
 ular bill of fare, that we felt more than ever before a disposition 
 to rend somebody and compose our minds. 
 
 We spent the day of our arrival up to noon in hurrying about 
 seeing the principal objects of interest and admiring the rather 
 good looking women we met in large numbers in the streets. 
 The chief things we did not see were the manuscript letters of 
 Columbus and Paganini's old fiddle. We were willing to take 
 these at second hand, but we had to drive around Columbus' 
 monument and feel grateful that he had discovered a country 
 and a home for us. Even if he were not able to write a good 
 fist, as Mark Twain unkindly intimated, we feel kindly towards 
 Columbus. 
 
 Our drive led through the handsome park of the city, and we 
 all regretted our arrival so late in the evening previous. We were 
 not favored with a look at the throngs of big bugs who congre- 
 gate and air themselves there in the breezy afternoons. We 
 drove through one long street upon which nearly every build- 
 ing we passed was a palace, and we kept our driver on the rack 
 trying to make us understand their names. One of the party 
 in the carriage in which I rode was ever so busy endeavoring 
 to talk to this fellow; and the manner in which he mixed 
 French, Dutch and Italian, with an occasional dab of English 
 into one heterogeneous mass, was beyond comprehension. It 
 absolutely confounded the driver, and now and then he would 
 rein up his horse and sit in speechless amazement till, by yells 
 and cries from the sane ones of the party, he would recover his 
 senses and drive on. If we could have read their language and 
 could have seen the morning paper the next day, we would no 
 doubt have seen a notice of the death of this man from exhaus- 
 tion in endeavoring to comprehend the gabbling of an Ameri- 
 can Tourist. The truth of the matter is, some of us make woful 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 11/ 
 
 asses of ourselves, and will have forgotten our mother tongue 
 if we do not soon quit this country. We often lunge away into 
 an abyss of incomprehensible jargon, trying to give some order 
 at the table, and have grown so hopelessly foolish that we 
 barely recover our senses when the waiter, with a look of dis- 
 gust on his face, asks us, in good English, what we want. We 
 have now left Italy and are among a French speaking people, 
 soon again to pass into England, and I apprehend all the lan- 
 guages will mix and run together in such a confused way that 
 the tongue we shall speak aboard our ship will create greater 
 confusion than was known to Babel, for not even two will be 
 able to speak the some dialect. 
 
 We left Genoa at noon very much pleased with our short stay 
 there, and regretting we could not see more of the city. As we 
 sped northward the country improved very greatly in appear- 
 ance, and gave evidence of better soil and higher cultivation. 
 The view upon either hand was pleasing to the eye, and even 
 our wearied sight-seers enjoyed it. We arrived at Milan near 
 ten that night, drove through its elegant streets, by the mag- 
 nificent Arcade and the renowned Cathedral, and into the court 
 yard at our hotel, to finish a hearty dinner at half-past eleven 
 that threw the greater number of us into the nightmare before 
 the dawn of day. The next morning we went first to the Ca- 
 thedral that has already cost its one hundred and ten million 
 dollars, climbed to the top of its tallest spire, gazed upon acres of 
 marble roof, its hundreds of spires and its four thousand costly 
 marble statues, and going down into its basement, saw the treas- 
 ures which have caused so many to stare; then went back to our 
 hotel and wanted to see no more Cathedrals. Here was the 
 queen of them all in her loveliness and grandeur, and a sight of 
 her made all other churches appear tame. A few drove 
 out to the old convent and took a squint at the old daub out 
 there so famous throughout the civilized world as the picture of 
 The Last Supper, and which, but for its great age and continuous 
 laudations of those whose admiration flows at second hand, would 
 hardly now, whatever its merit may once have been, create any 
 great amount of furore. If a man with a taste for art can dis- 
 cover a beauty in this frescoe painting through the dirt and 
 
Il8 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 smoke that cover it as with a pall, then I do not envy him the 
 acuteness of his vision. If an ordinary mortal did not have 
 the aid of copies he would hardly guess at the subject from a 
 look at the original, even after its having been touched up by 
 modern artists of good ability It seems that in the time when 
 probably it was new and bright, the monks in the convent 
 had no appreciation of it, for they cut a door right through the 
 walls upon which it was painted, and through the painting itself, 
 and it was disfigured in this way for very many years until 
 some relic hunters discovered it was a work of one of the old 
 masters. 
 
 There are eighty churches all told in Milan, but after^having 
 seen the big one we wanted to see no more. But we saw 
 hundreds of fat well dressed priests, and oceans of beggars in 
 the streets. With the state upon one hand, with its legions of 
 soldiers to be equipped and fed, and the church upon the other 
 hand, with its nearly as numerous clergy to be supported in 
 worse than idleness, and churches as thick as hailstones and too 
 costly to describe, there is no wonder at the extreme poverty 
 and great want of the people of Italy. The countenance of a 
 priest will light up as he sees the shade of wonder passing over the 
 face of a visitor to the relics of a church, but the sight of the 
 hideous beggars who block the way and whine for alms does not 
 excite his pity in the least. On the contrary, I suspect he 
 would rather have them so than otherwise. I am not writing 
 against Catholicism or against Catholics — for I have many- 
 friends in that faith — but I write of what I see here and the 
 effect of what I see upon the people. - I have seen no such 
 shadow of poverty and ignorance combined in any other part 
 of Europe as I have seen all over Italy. 
 
 Leaving Milan at noon and putting ^behind us, perhaps for- 
 ever, her quarter of a million of people, and her handsome, 
 well-paved streets and elegant business houses, we run out by 
 cars to Arona, on Lake San Maggoire, where we took steamer for 
 Stresa, which place we reached at 4 o'clock. Here we took 
 dinner and rested till 1 1 o'clock that night. The scenery is 
 very beautiful on this lake, and "especially in view of Stresa ; 
 and had we made the ride earl}- in our tour we would have gone 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. MO. 
 
 into raptures over it, but we have seen so much of the same 
 thing, it is growing threadbare, and I actually saw some of our 
 people asleep on the boat as we steamed along. 
 
 Lying in front of our hotel were the Barromean Islands and 
 from which the house derived its name: "Hotel des lies Bar- 
 romeo." I believe a fellow by the name of Barromeo once 
 owned this part of Italy. It was he who contributed from his 
 inexhaustible quarries a large portion of the marble for the 
 building of the church at Milan, and whose corpse now lies in 
 such splendor in one of the crypts of that Church. He may 
 have been a good looking chap in his clay, but the sight of him 
 now, at a cost of five francs, is very discouraging indeed. One 
 of the islands is the home of a very wealthy Italian nobleman, 
 and is adorned with a stately residence, and gardens containing 
 trees, plants and shrubs from every part of the globe. Two 
 dozen or more rowed over there from the hotel and came back 
 distracted, from which I imagine the place to be unusually at- 
 tractive. 
 
 At 1 1 o'clock that night we took diligences and struck out 
 for the Alps. A diligence is a good enough thing in its way, 
 but when loaded to its capacity, especially with, six persons in 
 the centre compartment, may prove uncomfortable. Our squad 
 generally overflows everything, and did so effectually in this 
 instance, so that at the start we were crowded, but a little 
 after daylight when we changed horses and fairly began the 
 ascent, as many as could, including ladies, climbed upon the 
 top and found seats there. Early in the morning we took 
 breakfast in the court yard of a hotel, in open air, and I gutss 
 if the landlord had made any reduction on account of wholesale, 
 he lost money by the contract to feed us. It is impossible to 
 keep within the bounds of reason and tell the actual quantity 
 of provender we consumed. The air among the Alps seemed 
 to be better than wine of. iron or any other appetizer druggist 
 ever prepared. At two o'clock that day we stopped a while 
 for lunch, and literally ate up every article of food we could lay 
 our hands on, and then left hungry. At four in the afternoon 
 we reached the summit and sped down the mountain, reaching 
 Brieg at seven. The programme was to take the cars at once 
 
120 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 and continuue our journey four hours longer to Vernayaz, but 
 we were much too late for the regular train, and not being wil- 
 ling to wait the hours it would require to move the extra one in 
 waiting for us, we were sped about over the picturesque moun- 
 tain town and quartered in its various hotels and restaurants for 
 the night, ever so glad to get a rest after our long and exciting 
 ride over the Alps. 
 
 It would be foolish for me to attempt a description of the 
 scenery that greeted us among the crags and glaciers and gorges 
 and torrents and cascades of these snow-capped mountains of 
 Europe ; nor, could I convey to you any part, even, of the de- 
 light experienced by our travel- worn party, especially those who 
 had never witnessed mountain scenery before. The great 
 peaks which pierced the clouds, and hid their summits beyond ; 
 immense walls of rock that rose perpendicularly for a thousand 
 feet or more, and often overhung our very heads ; the roaring 
 cataracts that leaped from bluffs away up the mountain sides 
 and dashed themselves into foam and spray hundreds of teet 
 below ; the tiny streams from the melting snows coursing their 
 way to the valley and looking so like silver ribbons laid crook- 
 edly upon the uneven surface of the mountains; the very clouds 
 around us and the banks of snow within reach, and from which 
 we grabbed handsful to munch upon the way ; the broad, solid, 
 magnificent pike that has no equal upon the globe, winding its 
 tortuous way around peaks and under crags and through tunnels 
 and over bridges that cross great chasms that make one dizzy 
 to see, and threads around solid stony promontories which we 
 fancy have neither base or summit as we sit atop the diligences 
 involuntarily clinging to anything within reach of our hands for 
 fear of going over and being dashed to atoms a thousand feet 
 below; the Swiss chalets perched almost among the clouds, with 
 little patches of tilable soil around them that must be irrigated 
 by the melting snows; the bright children running alongside our 
 diligences holding up bright and delicate mountain flowers to 
 exchange with us for pennies; the constant and varied change 
 of scenery from grand to grander still, and the concluding ride 
 down the mountain, combined to give us such a day of enjoy- 
 ment as we have not had since leaving home. Our weariness 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 121 
 
 and hunger were forgotten, and sick people who insisted upon 
 being propped up inside the diligences took on enthusiasm be- 
 fore the sun put its rays about us, and climbed on top to whoop 
 and shout with the more robust. It was indeed a grand ride 
 over Napoleon's wonderful road, and throughout its entire 
 length we had to admire the genius and energy of the man 
 whose brain conceived it, and at whose will it was constructed. 
 This letter was written in detachments, and is finished in 
 Brieg, as I wait for a breakfast I shall certainly enjoy. We 
 leave between ten and eleven o'clock, and during the day will 
 have six hours more riding in diligences in the mountains. 
 
 16 
 
j22 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 LETTER XVIIL 
 
 From Brieg to Vernayaz— A Charming Hotel and a glorious rest— The Gorges of 
 the Trent— A thunder storm on the mountains— A day's carriage ride over 
 the Tete Noir Pass— First view of Mont Blanc and some tamous Glaciers- 
 Cold winds in August— An excursion to the Mer de Glace Glacier on mules 
 ana afoot— The ambitious toilers up Mont Blanc— Losing the biggest thing 
 of the tour. 
 
 Chamounix, France, Augustus, 1879. 
 
 I suspect it would be regarded by you as inexcusable if I 
 failed to write you a letter from this place. I begin it sitting 
 by my window in the hotel Palais de distal, and through 
 which I look out at Mont Blanc, which overshadows this little 
 town. I closed my last letter at Brieg, in Switzerland, when 
 • about worn out with constant travel. That day we had only a 
 short run in the cars to Vernayaz, where we stopped at a most 
 delightful hotel in view of impressive scenery, and got a glorious 
 rest. The day was cloudy and rain fell copiously during the 
 two hours ride, so that instead of finding the valley of the 
 Rhone, down which the road runs, a hot one, the air was so 
 cool the more tender ones insisted upon closing the car win- 
 dows, and when at rest in the hotel we easily imagined a fire 
 would be comfortable. At night, when we retired, we nestled 
 away down under the cover, dragging the^pillows of down with 
 us, and would not have fallen into a perspiration had the quan- 
 tity of cover been doubled. We had been warned that we 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE, I 23 
 
 should find it hot at Brieg and Vernayaz, and felt grateful that 
 the clouds and rain had so timely favored us. 
 
 During" the afternoon we spent the time in exclamations of 
 delight at the surroundings, in visiting the Gorges of the Trent, 
 and the ambitious cascade whose name it would not be polite 
 to put in print, and promenading around and around the hotel 
 we so much admired. The gorge, while is does not at all com- 
 pare in extent and depth with the great Arkansas canyon, in 
 Colorado, is nevertheless quite imposing, and the foot bridge 
 which runs along its sides for a half a mile or more, upon spikes 
 driven into the solid rock wails, crossing and recrossing the 
 river at intervals, gives the tourist an opportunity to witness it 
 which is not obtained at any gorge within our own country. 
 And I may here say, that is one of the features of this country. 
 Wherever there is any object at all striking in nature, the peo- 
 ple, where it is at all possible, have devised means for reaching 
 and seeing it to the best advantage. Aside from the bridge I 
 have mentioned along the Gorge of Trent, from which you can 
 not look out upon the sky above, owing to the overhanging 
 cliffs which almost shut out the light of day, there is a substan- 
 tial trail, well walled up, to the top of the mountain, so that a 
 climb up there to gaze a thousand feet down into this chasm, 
 cut through solid stone, is not an irksome one. At night, as we 
 sat in our rooms writing to friends at home, there was a thun- 
 der storm on the mountain above us, and it was pleasant to hear 
 the peals reverberating through the valley, and to have the 
 lightning playing upon us through the windows. It was all 
 the more enjoyable from the fact that we had not seen a cloud 
 scarcely in parched and dusty Italy, and barely a drop of rain 
 before that day since leaving drowned out England. 
 
 We were due here night before last, and for yesterday, (Sun- 
 day,) our programme has it "a day of rest among some of the 
 most sublime mountain scenery in Europe," but the general 
 sentiment was to come on here and have Monday for the sights 
 mapped out for us. So, early in the morning, we climbed into 
 nineteen of the peculiarly constructed carriages of this region, 
 and retracing our steps along the Rhone as far as Martigney, 
 plunged into the mountains a n d did some honest work durin 
 
124 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 the day. We were to cross the range again, this time by the 
 Tete Noir Pass, and had proceeded but a very short distance 
 when the drivers very politely indicated that we must try Walk- 
 er's line for a while, which all, except the few sick, the aged 
 and the lazy ones of the party, very cheerfully did. The day 
 was again cool, and the road free from dust, with an abundance 
 of shade for the first two or three miles. As our caravan of 
 vehicles and footmen strung out for miles along the winding 
 road, and scattered about over the mountain side, taking by- 
 paths and short-cuts up the gradual ascent, we met many of the 
 Swiss cottagers going to church in the valley, which lay stretch- 
 ed out in a lovely panorama below. Chalets were dotted 
 thickly along the less precipitous mountain sides, and the pleas- 
 ant women and children swarmed the wayside, offering us 
 tempting cherries, apricots, raspberries, strawberries, and goat's 
 milk at moderate prices. By the aid of some of these the "lit- 
 tle one" footed it nearly to the summit, after a trudge of six 
 miles or more, and Miss Josie, with her fifteen summers and 
 her lithe Yankee limbs, never rested till she was seated in the 
 hotel at the summit devouring a saucer of strawberries and 
 cream. We all like Josie, and hope she will survive the constant 
 supervision she claims it is necessary to exercise over her ex- 
 cellent and devoted mother. 
 
 From Forclaz, upon the summit, until we reached the river 
 Trent below, the descent was frightfully steep, passing now and 
 then on the very brink of precipices that nearly took our breath 
 to see, and once cutting a tunnel through the solid rock where 
 a road bed could be obtained in no other way. At about three 
 o'clock we took lunch at a hotel stuck into the cliffs, paying 
 two francs for a very enjoyable meal of meat, milk, eggs and 
 strawberries. From this point, continuing our journey down- 
 ward, we finally left one stream, started up another, passed into 
 France, swung around in a circle, climbed the summit of anbther 
 range, and from that point could see the immense one of which 
 Mont Blanc is a small part. Ahead of us lay peak after peak, 
 mantled around their summits in unbroken sheets of snow, and 
 as the winds came wafting from them, we did a little mantling 
 ourselves in the way of getting inside of all the wraps we could 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 25 
 
 lay our hands upon. After we had passed down into the valley 
 and were traveling down the river, we came alongside the 
 Mont Blanc range and saw a few of the big glaciers of the Alps, 
 two of which had crawled down to the very banks of the stream, 
 carrying along their millions of tons of earth and snow. We 
 had hoped to have a good view of the peaks of this range, but 
 when fairly opposite them masses of miserable dark clouds drag- 
 ged themselves across its face and shut out the view. We were 
 particularly anxious to see Mont Blanc, and this accident great- 
 ly discouraged us, but all at once, and for a moment only, there 
 came a great rift in the clouds, and there stood out grandly be- 
 fore us and high above us the Monarch of the Alps, its snow- 
 white head illuminated by the sun, which had sunk, to us, be- 
 hind the mountains on the right. 
 
 Arriving at this place and finding the hotels pretty well filled 
 with tourists, we were again quartered about over the place, 
 but all of us snugly located and pleased, except a very few 
 chronic growlers whose chief aim seems to be to render them- 
 selves miserable and everybody else uncomfortable. This is a 
 town made up of hotels, variety stores, the homes of guides, 
 washer-women and owners of mules. I am afraid to state how 
 many hotels the little place has, but I am sure I have seen near- 
 ly a dozen myself, and I have been around very little at that. 
 The country is literally alive with tourists, and you see them 
 everywhere, riding or trudging up and down the roads with al- 
 penstocks in their hands, They are nearly as great a study as 
 the country itself. I have no doubt that while the citizens are 
 glad of an opportunity to make money out of them, they regard 
 them as average idiots who ought to be caged at home. And 
 in this category 1 can not think the Americans take a back seat. 
 
 This morning about half our party started on an excursion 
 up the mountain called Mer de Glace, leaving the hotel on 
 mules. Each was accompanied with an attendant, and as the 
 odd-looking cortege filed through the streets I expressed a 
 hearty wish that they could be seen in that rig by friends at 
 home. It beat anything I have so far seen. It was better than 
 a view of the Bay of Naples, or a sight of the scantily dressed 
 Neapolitan urchins standing on their heads in front of our hotel 
 
126 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 down there. I am sorry no lightning photographer was on 
 hand to catch the picture and transfer it to card. It absolutely 
 "beat bobtail." When the "little one" mounted the biggest 
 mule in the lot — and they are all large — that animal jerked the 
 skin on its back as though trying to rid itself of a pestiferous 
 horsefly. During the journey, which will consume the day, 
 there will be a two hour's climb over some glaciers, when all 
 hands will have an opportunity of getting a real taste of the Al- 
 pine snows. As for myself, I concluded to "pass," and take 
 the trip ''second hand." 
 
 Two days ago three men started for the summit of Mont 
 Blanc, having now spent two nights upon the mountain. This 
 morning, by the aid of the immense telescope rigged in the yard 
 of our hotel, we could see the flag flying at the upper station to 
 indicate they had passed that point. At 8 o'clock the men 
 themselves passed from behind a tall glacier, slowly toiling their 
 way up, and apparently miles from the summit. One of them 
 seemed to be exhausted, and was down very often. Later, 
 they huddled together for a while, and then turned their steps 
 down the mountain, evidently having abandoned the weary, 
 weary tramp. I have been watching the mountain ever since, 
 when not obscured by drifting clouds, and between running to 
 the telescope, writing this letter and watching for clear intervals, 
 I have had a mixed time of it. I think the letter would have 
 gone to the bad entirely had not a cloud of hopeless blackness 
 settled over Mont Blanc and shut out the view for the day. 
 The last look I- had showed me only two men working their 
 way down, and five others, who started out yesterday, going up 
 with miles of snow and hundreds of fissures before them. They 
 tell me here that the summit is ten to twelve miles away in a 
 direct line, and over thirty to the ambitious chap who goes up 
 there. The ascent was once regarded as a remarkable feat, but 
 now a great many perform it annually. For my own part I 
 would rather sit here and gaze upon it while the river Arve goes 
 dashing by under the balcony of my window. There is as 
 much poetry and less toil and danger in "thus doing" Mont 
 Blanc. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE, 12/ 
 
 Since the above was written, the wanderers to the Mer de 
 Glace (Sea of Ice) have returned, and have been putting me on 
 the rack by assuring me I have lost the biggest thing of the 
 tour. I am forever missing the biggest thing. I suppose they 
 grow in size as we advance, and if we were to tramp around the 
 globe and I should house up on the last day before making the 
 circuit, I would then miss the very biggest thing. I am begin- 
 ning to feel it is cruel to tantalize me in this way. The first 
 thing they know I may rush wildly out and climb Mont Blanc. 
 No, I won't either, for as I cast my eye upwards (I have been 
 seated facing the old fellow that the slumbering poetical feelings 
 may be aroused within me) I see a storm in progress towards 
 the summit, and I know that the adventurous men already up 
 there wish themselves safe down here in the valley. 
 
 To-morrow we leave early in a species of two story diligences, 
 for Geneva, where we will spend two nights and a full day. We 
 are getting ravenously hungry to see some more churches, and 
 expect to appease the appetite at that city. I am going out 
 now to hunt some more wraps and a hot brick for my cold feet. 
 We warmed our hands on the hot plates at dinner time, and 
 now I want to apply some caloric to my feet and back. If it 
 keeps this cold much longer the ducks will begin to fly south- 
 ward. 
 
128 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 LETTER XIX. 
 
 A ride in two story diligences ironi Chamounix to Geneva — The splendid road 
 along the river Arve— Small apples and William Tell— Eating in general — 
 How American tourists clear the platter — Horse flies — Americans thick as 
 bees in Geneva — Concert on the Grand Organ— Shopping — The result of the 
 the mule rides at Chamounix — Cafes and drinking— A sample of hotel keeping 
 —A sick tourist— Charming Geneva. 
 
 Geneva, Switzerland, August 20, 1879. 
 
 On Tuesday morning the seventy-four (we have not yet lost a 
 man] climbed by ladder into the lumbering two-story diligences 
 and started over a pike one could not desire to better, for Gen- 
 eva. The air was cool and bracing, and, as the horses struck 
 off down the road, jingling the necklace of sleighbells around 
 their necks, we wrapped our shawls and coats snugly around us 
 to keep our bodies warm, forgetting that it was August, even 
 though it were but a few days since leaving Italy. The road 
 for the entire distance of fifty-four miles lies along the river 
 Arve, and in many places the descent ^s quite rapid, which will 
 give some idea of the difference in elevation between Chamou- 
 nix and Geneva. The scenery along the route while not so 
 grand, perhaps, as that through which we had bgen passing, 
 and which lay around Chamounix, was still very beautiful in its 
 more subdued character, and we had as much enjoyment from 
 the ride as from any other since the one taken upon Nopoleon's 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 20. 
 
 road over the Simplon Pass. This road is as near perfect, I 
 would imagine, as it can be, and it only wanted the wilder 
 mountain scenery, and the more difficult region of the other to 
 create the same amount of admiration for it. It is a Govern- 
 ment road, and the mails, the express, the telegraph and the 
 diligences which pass over it are all in charge of and conducted, 
 like clock-work, by the Government. As I understand it, these 
 are not separate bureaus, but all combined, the "Poste" carry- 
 ing you, or your letters, or your trunk, or Sending your tele- 
 gram at moderate rates, and with careful and certain dispatch. 
 
 After traveling some ten miles, the valley widens out, and the 
 mountain slopes become more gentle, so they are tillable to a 
 great height, thus giving a breadth of territory, in a high state 
 of cultivation, from two to five miles in width. The road is stud- 
 ded with the brown Swiss cottages of every variety in construc- 
 tion, and lined with fruit trees so closely overhanging the 
 road that you can pluck the fruit sitting in your seat in the 
 dilligence as it goes whirling by. The fruit is of an indiffer- 
 ent character, the pears being small and the apples both small 
 and imperfectly formed. Since seeing the apples of Switzerland 
 I entertain a greater respect for the marksmanship of Tell than 
 I ever did, even when a boy, as I gazed in breathless wonder 
 upon the picture of his son calmly standing with an apple upon 
 his head as big as a two pound turnip. If the apples of to-day 
 are a fair sample of those of Tell's time, I don't see how he 
 could have sent an ordinary sized arrow through one on his 
 boy's head without lifting a little of the scalp. 
 
 The plumbs were so sour they doubled us up like a rainbow 
 when we were foolish enough to eat them, but the cherries and 
 raspberries we found delicious. Being on matters of diet, I 
 would say that the milk and honey of Switzerland are what cap- 
 ture the hungry tourist, and I have seen members of our party 
 almost throw waiters into spasms by the way they have scooped 
 into the dishes of honey. But we have some awful eaters in 
 the crowd, and the rapidity with which a big cake of pudding 
 or a pyramid of ice cream will disappear, after being started 
 along the line, is one of the sights of the town. Each waiter 
 has his own territory at the table marked out upon the floor, 
 17 
 
130 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 and as they begin at the end, I have watched the countenances 
 of those sitting well down the line and noted the look of anxiety 
 as the big eaters plunged into the coming dish, and finally the 
 one of despair when the contents of the dish entirely disappear- 
 ed long before it reached them. At Chamounix as we were 
 closing dinner, a large dish of pudding started down the line 
 towards me, there being a lady on my right, and myself within 
 the bounds of that bailiwick. The pudding got along very well 
 and was only half consumed when it reached the two ladies on 
 my left, when, with a full scoop from each they cleaned the 
 platter. It was such a case of gluttony that even the polite 
 and well drilled waiter could not suppress his laughter, but went 
 off in a painful quiver to hunt some more pudding with which 
 to serve me and my unfortunate neighbor, At Vernayaz a dish 
 of fishes was started along by a waiter without the precaution of 
 cutting them into respectable pieces. The two first chaps who 
 had a pull at the dish, each took out a whole fish large enough 
 to pull an ordinary man off a mill dam, if alive and hooked to 
 his line, when the waiter deliberately sat the dish down, and 
 then and there cut up what remained. It may be that our 
 party are an exception to the average American tourist abroad, 
 and that few such gourmands could be found in an equal num- 
 ber, but I fear not. The piggishness of Americans is a subject 
 of just criticism on the part of Europeans. I often look at some 
 of our party eating, and wonder where in the deuce they stow 
 away the piles of provender they heap upon their plates. From 
 what I have seen over here I am convinced that Americans eat 
 at least double the quantity that is eaten by the residents of 
 this country, not even excepting England. 
 
 The chief discomfort of the ride to Geneva were clouds of 
 horse flies that swarmed around our horses and gathered in 
 banks upon their necks and bodies. It annoyed both the pas- 
 sengers and the horses. Some of the ladies felt so sorry for 
 the animals they insisted every now and then upon the driver 
 stopping the diligence and brushing the flies, which, of course, 
 he declined doing. The passengers, in the diligence which fell 
 to my lot, were afflicted through the efforts of a famous singer 
 of the party — a very large old bachelor, from Maine, inexhausti- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 131 
 
 ble in wind and limb — who pinioned us on the rack and kept us 
 suffering there through half of the ride. He fancies he is well 
 up in the peculiar trill of the Swiss mountaineers, and the doses 
 that he poured into our ears, interlarded with ancient home 
 songs such as "Uncle Ned," "Ole Virginny," and the like, 
 came near being the end of some of us. I am real sorry there 
 was not a phonographer along that we might have preserved and 
 brought home these charming efforts amidst this Alpine 
 scenery. 
 
 We passed from France into Switzerland a few miles before 
 the end of our journey, and drove up to our hotel in handsome 
 Geneva at four o'clock in the afternoon, with Mont Blanc still 
 in plain view, forty miles away, to remind us of the misguided 
 Bostonian who fell down into the icy gorge not long since, and 
 whose body now lies frozen and stiff beyond the reach of human 
 hands. 
 
 A fete which began yesterday was in progress and the city 
 was in gay attire, decorated with imposing arches of flowers 
 and evergreens, and bright colored flags and banners. But it 
 does not take these to render Geneva attractive. At night, 
 with its myriads of lights on the quay and on the bridges cross- 
 ing the clear, blue river, which cuts it in two, the lovely scene 
 is sure to win you from the hotel for a stroll over the city. And 
 if you suffer yourself to go into the alluring shops, you are pret- 
 ty sure to come out with your ready cash greatly diminished. 
 We find Americans here as thick as bees, and. at almost any 
 reasonable hour of the clay they may be seen crowding about 
 shop windows and discussing what they will buy. It is truly- 
 wonderful how many things Americans purchase while in Eu- 
 rope. Some of them spend one half of their time in prowling 
 around and into shops. It is no doubt a pleasant way of spend- 
 ing their spare time. I do considerable of it myself, and I must 
 confess it is by no means an unpleasant thing to do. 
 
 A concert on the grand organ in the Cathedral of St. Peter's 
 was given to-day to the members of our section, which perhaps 
 two-thirds of them attended and enjoyed, going thence to the 
 museum, but I preferred striking out on my own hook, stroll- 
 ing over the city, standing on the bridges looking down into 
 
132 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 the lovely water to see the trout dashing by, watching the rows 
 of washer-women in the small houses out in the stream washing 
 clothes in water which is always clean, and taking my turn 
 worrying the shop keepers. 
 
 Coming back to the hotel at 3 o'clock I find myself very tired, 
 but not quite so badly used up as were many of the ladies, who 
 had the fun of riding mules up and down the mountain at Cha- 
 mounix. "Oh my poor back !" is a common expression just 
 now, and I don't have near so many tantalizing me for staying 
 at home that day. The "pharmacie" stores have done a lively 
 little trade in plasters and salves since our arrival here, and I am 
 real sorry to hear more than one Mer de Glace excursionist at- 
 tributing their ills to the hard seats in the dilligences yesterday. 
 I think I never saw 2 party who had such a quiet, subdued way 
 of sitting' down, even upon the most unexceptionable sofa. But 
 to see big sights, such as the Mer de Glace glaciers, one must 
 suffer in the flesh now and then. So it is what I have heard 
 and seen this day which makes me no longer regret that I lost 
 the biggest thing of the tour when I stayed in my room at Cha- 
 mounix, watching the adventurous men toiling up and down 
 Mont Blanc. 
 
 The country is full of cafes, and Geneva comes in for a full 
 share. Their patrons mostly sit on the pavement in front of 
 them, and often in such crowds that passing pedestrians must 
 leave the side-waik and take the middle of the street. Last 
 night a party of us had to flank them so often in a street facing 
 the river that we moved into a street further back to avoid the 
 maneuver. Next to Venice, Geneva stands ahead in this re- 
 spect. In St. Mark's Square, in Venice, there were places 
 where one can barely pass at all between the hours of 8 and 10 
 p. m. But the drinks are mild ones and not indulged in to ex- 
 cess. 1 have seen but one intoxicated person since the jostling 
 I got in the street at Glasgow. Some one said that one of the 
 drivers coming over the Simplon Pass had too much, but I am 
 assured it was forced upon him by persons in the diligence 
 anxious to accelerate the speed of the horses. I believe they 
 regretted the experiment, as a driver over that route should be 
 wide awake and in the full possession of his senses. Our own 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 33 
 
 people, if they were so disposed, could learn a useful lesson in 
 the matter of dram drinking" from the people on the continent 
 of Europe. 
 
 Last night we had a sample of hotel keeping in Europe. 
 About three o'clock, the three in our room were aroused by a 
 member of the party, who had been violently taken ill, in search 
 of medicine to give him some relief. He had played a horn- 
 pipe on the electric bell for half an hour, and getting no answer, 
 and fearing he would die alone in his room, began groping 
 about over the house seeking midicine from his fellow voyagers. 
 In this way he fell upon our room. We then took a little dance 
 on our bell, in the vain hope that we might produce a different 
 sound, and awake a porter or a chambermaid somewhere ; but 
 for all the good we accomplished we had as well blown a whistle 
 into the ears of a dead man. One of my room mates remem- 
 bering that his mother had the very specific needed, took a 
 candle (they even turn off the gas in the halls at 12) and sough 
 her room. In doing so he was hailed by a lady boarder, who 
 had also been practicing upon the bell to see if she could not 
 obtain a nurse for her child, who had a broken nose and who 
 had fretted so long the anxious mother was nearly worn out. 
 But half an hour later I dropped to sleep, with the faint sound 
 of the persevering woman's bell jingling in my ears from the 
 depths below. My room mate industriously sought to find 
 some one connected .with the house, but was unsuccessful. 
 What would be thought of a first-class American hotel in which 
 such a thing could occur ? But one of these days I want to 
 write a little paragraph on European hotels, not all bad, and 
 I'll reserve further comments .for that occasion. 
 
 The attempt to take our picture in the Roman Forum resulted 
 in an utter failure. The combined scenery was too much for the 
 man's instrument and so strained it that all of us resembled a gang 
 of twisted-mouthed monkeys squinting at the sun. But he fixed 
 us under the Porter's gallery in the court-yard of the Hotel Cos- 
 tanzi, and the result has just reached us here in the shape of 
 very questionable photographs of a jumbled up set of tourists. 
 
134 
 
 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 To-morrow we leave early by the steamer on Lake Geneva for 
 Chillon and sundry other places too tedious to mention. If I 
 could only stop long enough to take a good fish and had per- 
 mission to hook a few trout I would be satisfied. But I guess 
 I will have to wait till I come home and try my hand in the 
 waters of the State of Mississippi. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 35 
 
 LETTER XX. 
 
 Fire at Geneva and primitive flre engines —Crowds of tourists— Leaving Geneva 
 by steamer for Chillon — The dead prisoner Bonivard and the famous Castle 
 —Handsome Lake Geneva and picturesque surroundings— Blunted enthusi- 
 asm—An anecdote of a Montana friend— Arrival at Fribourg and stay there 
 for the night— Concert— The famous tree— On the Thun— On the Interlaken— 
 A lovely place— Excursions to Lauterbrunnen and Grindelwald— The first 
 Alpine Horn -Saw mills— Wrestling Tournament — Music and flowers every- 
 where. 
 
 Interlaken, Switzerland, August 24, 1879. 
 
 They had a fire at Geneva the last evening of our stay there. 
 Being near the hotel some of us went to see it, and witnessed 
 about as primitive an arrangement for subduing the raging ele- 
 ment as it has ever been our fortune to see. The engines 
 looked as though the pattern had been gotten out when the 
 Alps had been created, and were capable of throwing a stream 
 large enough to supply one thirsty ox till his thirst was 
 quenched. The fire was raising a little racket near the roof of 
 the building, and a fellow ran through the house and lowered a 
 rope out of the window by which to haul up the hose. After 
 some industrious pumping they finally got the water to flow up 
 there about the time the fire had been extinguished by the aid 
 of a few buckets and a little stamping round. But there is not 
 much necessity for a fire department in any part of Europe that 
 
I36 THE BTG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 I have seen. There is so little wood about the buildings it 
 would even be difficult to set them on fire. One sees very few 
 evidences in all his travels anywhere of the ravages of an ele- 
 ment which is a source of such constant anxiety and loss to the 
 people in our own country. 
 
 We could not buy out Geneva or even kick up a stir there. 
 The supply of music boxes, watches, jewelry, carved woodwork, 
 and the like is inexhaustible, apparently, and there are so many 
 English and American tourists crowding about its streets that 
 the sight of a few extra ones does not strike the citizens as any- 
 thing unusual. In nearly every shop there is some one who 
 can speak a spattering of English sufficiently to make shopping 
 less difficult. We have always found, in every place, our efforts 
 to get something off the marked price the hardest thing for them to 
 comprehend. In Italy this was a matter of some importance as 
 there they generally ask at least half as much more than they 
 expect to get for an article, but in Switzerland they charge only 
 a little more in the first place than they are willing to take. So 
 we left Geneva between six and seven o'clock in the morning by 
 one of the swift little steamers which ply between the cosy 
 towns that lie nestled along the banks of Lake Geneva, and 
 sped away to Chillon, making landings to put off and take on 
 passengers with the speed of a railroad train, and to the very 
 minute as fixed by the time table. Each landing was announced 
 before reaching it by hanging up a large sign with the name of 
 the place upon it. The towns are very thick and consequently 
 the landings were numerous. 
 
 At • Nyon there is a castle, built in the twelfth century, and 
 noted more for its connection with the Bonaparte family than 
 for its imposing appearance or anything very striking in its his- 
 tory. We could not learn that any one had been starved to 
 death in its dungeons (if it has any), or that any one's head had 
 been chopped off with a dull cleaver within its walls, so we had 
 no disposition to disembark and go through it. But we took to 
 the shore it Chillon, leaving our luggage at the boat, which 
 went to the end of the lake a few miles further on, and walked 
 three quarters of a mile to the castle, which would be known 
 to but few only for Byron's poem touching the prisoner who 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 137 
 
 was confined there, and who spent six years of his life chained 
 to one of the pillars of the dungeon — -a man by the name ot 
 Bonivard — dead now — whose ambitious maneuvers did not 
 please the cruel Duke of Savoy. Why the Duke did not whack 
 off his head and be done with it, even tradition does not tell. 
 We were shown all over the extensive place, and saw where 
 Bonivard wore the stone pavement in his long tramp around 
 the pillars ; the place where obstreperous prisoners were stretch- 
 ed up and their feet toasted to keep them warm in the cold, 
 damp cells ; the room with the inclined platform covered with 
 knives, and upon which culprits were dropped through a trap 
 door and made into sausage meat before rolling off into the 
 lake in convenient bits of food for fishes ; and the large rooms, 
 with their immense fire places, for the revellers, and the apart- 
 ments of the ladies, who were attached to these lordly cut- 
 throats, overlooking the lake and the Alps beyond. We saw 
 the name of Byron, Eugene Sue, Victor Hugo, and others, 
 carved on the dungeon pillars, and inspected the curious chapel 
 in which the villainous Dukes played the hypocrite by making 
 a show of religion. Returning to the town, we awaited the ar- 
 rival of the boat, and then returned to Lausanne, where we took 
 cars for Fribourg. 
 
 If there is a more handsome lake in the world than Lake 
 Geneva I want to go and see it, and see no more lakes. I re- 
 gard it as absolutely enchanting, its entire length, the more 
 abrupt mountains upon one side, with occasional glimpses of 
 Mont Blanc, and the gradual slopes upon the other, covered 
 with fields of green and ripening grain, and thousands of vine- 
 yards with their numerous cottages and neat villages, with 
 many large hotels and handsome residences, their picturesque 
 yards running down to the beach, constitute a picture rare to 
 see. Still, some of our people dozed and slept on the way.' 
 We have become surfeited with beautiful scenery, and while we 
 went into ecstacies over our ride upon the lakes in the Scottish 
 Highlands, and exhausted the adjectives in our letters home 
 describing what we saw, we now often look languidly at what is 
 around us and feel no enthusiasm when we write about it. I 
 remember during the Centennial year traveling the Hudson 
 18 
 
I38 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN^ 
 
 with two batchelor friends, one of whom had come in from the 
 mountains of Montana after a residence of ten years amid its 
 superb scenery, and who sat upon his stool on the steamer and 
 slept two-thirds of the way from New York to Albany. The 
 thing made me so mad I could hardly enjoy the trip. I shook 
 the fellow up several times and told him he had better go home 
 and go to bed ; that it looked ridiculous that he should stage it 
 over 500 miles to a railroad and then travel 2,000 miles to sleep 
 in an uncomfortable position going up the Hudson. Every 
 time I did so he would gaze up and around him in a sleepy way, 
 and with a contemptuous twitch of his face and a provoking 
 shrug of the shoulders, drop back into his doze, muttering com- 
 plaints at my disturbing him. The tame mountains of the 
 Hudson could not arouse his interest so soon after leaving the 
 imposing Rockies. 
 
 We reached Fribourg at 8 o'clock. As we drove up to the 
 hotel we were greeted by the strains from a big band of about 
 forty pieces, playing to a large crowd under the trees in the 
 open square, and we had this music floating in at the windows 
 as we partook of our late and acceptable dinner. The next 
 morning a concert was given for our benefit on Switzerland's 
 best organ. When we went into the Cathedral high mass was 
 in progress for some departed member of the church. This 
 being over the people took their departure and the organist at 
 once opened out upon his programme of six pieces. I mark- 
 ed my comments on each piece as it was played, and opposite 
 the first I have written the word "buster," a slangy phrase, but 
 fully expressing the character of the music. I was fearful 
 atone time, it would lift off the roof of the church. A thunder 
 storm in progress, with three hundred empty wagons dashing 
 down a stony street, and a few healthy avalanches crashing 
 down the mountain sides, would convey an idea of the roar of 
 the organ in that selection. The third and a portion of the last 
 were in the same order, and it evidently took so much wind to 
 get up this breeze, I would not have been surprised to find the 
 citizens short of air and gasping for breath had I gone out into 
 the street. But the other selections were mild and gentle, and 
 were played with a skill that pleased the ears of all and won the 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 130 
 
 admiration of the musicians of the party. After the concert we 
 went to see the two suspension bridges of the place, not re- 
 markable in comparison with our bridges at home, except that 
 one of them is very high, and is attached to the mountains it 
 connects without piers. Fribourg has a population about equal- 
 ly divided between French and German, who live in different 
 parts of the place. 
 
 Every visitor to Fribourg is taken to see a famous tree they 
 have there. The story is that two hundred years, or more, 
 ago, at a time a big battle was in progress, a wounded soldier 
 came reding up to the commander of one of the opposing 
 armies and brought the news of a victory. As soon as he had 
 conveyed the joyful intelligence he fell and expired at the foot 
 of a small tree. Since then this tree has been held in the highest 
 veneration. It is very decrepid and is supported in many 
 places by marble columns and props. Just now a vigorous 
 young shoot has come up through the hollow trunk of the old 
 tree, and the citizens are rejoiced at the idea that they will not 
 lose the great memento. 
 
 At noon we took the train for Thun, on the small lake of 
 that name, and were transferred to a steamer which carried us 
 to the other extremity. Here we climbed into double-decked 
 cars and were brought to this place at five o'clock. Lake Thun 
 is more beautiful, if possible, than Lake Geneva, and Interlaken 
 is charming. It is one mass of elegant hotels and attract- 
 ive shops. The yards in front of the hotels are ablaze with rare 
 and beautiful flowers, enlivened by fountains that are fed by 
 the melting snows upon the mountains overlooking the town. 
 There are swarms of tourists here. The big hotels are reaping 
 a rich harvest. The Kursaal, not inferior perhaps to that at 
 Weisbaden in its palmiest days, is crowded at night with people 
 who sit listening to the music of the band, second only to one or 
 two others in Europe, and enjoying their ices and harmless 
 drinks. There is music almost everwhere. All sorts of bands 
 visit the hotels and play in the parlors, depending upon the lib- 
 erality of guests for compensation. On the night of our arri- 
 val, the tedium of a hungry caravan waiting for a late dinner 
 was relieved by the appearance in the big parlor of three Ty- 
 
I4O THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 rolean warblers, two men and one handsome girl, dressed in 
 their gaudy costume, who treated us with some exquisite music. 
 Their music took . the house by storm. And last night while 
 passing, I saw a juvenile band, composed of boys and girls, in 
 full blast at one of the hotels. The little leader, with his fiddle, 
 was standing upon a chair and burlesquing an excitable con- 
 ductor. He was vociferously applauded by his spectators. 
 
 Yesterday morning the party made an excursion in carriages 
 to Lauterbrunnen and afterwards to Grindelwald, which occu- 
 pied the day till five o'clock. In each case the road lay up a 
 narrow valley between abrupt mountains covered with snow, 
 and the scenery was equal to any we have seen in Switzerland. 
 At the former place we visited the Staubach Falls and saw them 
 take their seven hundred feet leap from an overhanging ledge 
 away up the mountain side, and at the latter many of us climb- 
 ed the glacier and got up an appetite that was hard to appease. 
 
 During this trip we saw and beard our first Alpine horn. 
 Going up a steep ascent, where many of us got out to walk, 
 we heard ahead of us an occasional toot that resounded and re- 
 verberated through the valley, and at last, at a sharp turn in 
 the road, came upon the source of the fuss in the shape of an 
 infamous wooden trumpet about ten feet long, slightly curled up 
 at the large end similar to the bowl of a pipe standing say at an 
 angle of forty-five degrees from the stem. It was about three 
 inches in diameter at the small end and eight at the other, and 
 bound together after the fashion of a wine cask. When we 
 reached this delectable instrument one end of it was resting on 
 a stone by the roadside and the other was placed to the mouth 
 of a harmless looking idiot, who with distended eyes and 
 cheeks, and veins in face and neck that looked as though they 
 would burst with an additional pound of pressure, was endan- 
 gering his life by trying to torture us out of a few centissimi. I 
 have often heard of a person's eyes "bugging" out, but I never 
 fully realized the meaning of it till I saw this Swiss chap strain- 
 ing to get music out of an Alpine horn. Farther along we 
 came to a little fellow worrying with one, and the effort struck 
 us as so hazardous to the life and happiness of the boy that he 
 reaped no mean harvest of coppers thai day. The effort to 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. I4I 
 
 hold up the cumbersome instrument, and get a noise out of it, 
 struck us as calculate^ to cripple him for life, and we felt it 
 well to begin an endowment fund for his benefit. If a power- 
 ful air machine had been at work pumping wind into his cheeks 
 they could not have puffed out worse than they did as he stood 
 there by the roadside heaving away, with his protruding eyes 
 painfully cast towards the carriages in mute appeals for succor. 
 But we got plenty of this thing during the day, the performer 
 being located, sometimes, where the echo and re-echo were 
 quite effective. I would guess that some of these ponderous 
 things, when moved, are put upon wheels, and that they are 
 carted from point to point, including the long, funnel shaped 
 box into which the large ends of some of them are inserted to 
 increase the volume of their noise. 
 
 The roadside was lined -with girls knittng lace, sitting bare- 
 headed in the sun, and who offered the product of their labors 
 at low prices, and the occupants of the carriages were besieged 
 by the women and little girls who held up milk, cherries and 
 flowers for sale. At one place where there were two miles of 
 steep ascent ahead of us, a whole gang of boys rushed out, 
 each with a brush of green bushes in one hand and a three- 
 sided block of wood in the other. The block they hung on one 
 side of the carriage to be used as a "chock" when we stopped 
 to let the horses "blow," and then began killing flies upon the 
 horses. In this manner they went a long way up the hill 
 with us, when they stopped and held out their hats for pay, 
 backed up by the impertinent demand of the drivers in their 
 behalf. And this is one of the thousand and one devices to ex- 
 tort money from tourists. 
 
 We passed many saw-mills on the way. The water power is 
 excellent, but the mills are of primitive design and construc- 
 tion. I would guess that in summer time, when the days are 
 at the longest, they might saw up one log a day if all the power 
 was turned on and the mill put to its full capacity. The sawyer 
 can very easily wait upon the mill and work in his crop at the 
 same time, the former making calls upon him just about often 
 enough to rest him by varying the labor. I presume when he 
 has no work to do in the fields he can set the saw and go home 
 
14"? THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 and split the kindling, or help his wife peel the potatoes, while 
 it is slowly hunting the other end of the log. 
 
 I had gotten just this far when I was called to the front win- 
 dow by blasts from a band of music, and on looking out saw a 
 procession from one canton marching by on its way to the 
 ground where they have their wrestling matches. In front 
 were the straggling boys, then the band ; next, three men 
 dressed in acrobatic costumes, carrying ancient war maces ; a 
 man attired as a bear ; seven sheep ornamented with wreaths of 
 evergreens, led by boys ; a straggling body of countrymen ; 
 and, bringing up the rear, a dozen or more athletes in proper 
 attire for the coming contest. Sunday as it was, the sight 
 was too much for me, and I rushed out to go and see 
 the thing done, but a game foot prevented my walking, and I 
 gave it up. I understand that often as many as four hundred 
 men from various cantons collect here and engage in these 
 wrestling contests, nearly every one and his family going to 
 witness them. 
 
 The season for tourists in Switzerland is fast drawing to a 
 close, and a week from now they will begin to turn their faces 
 homeward. To give you an idea of the great number now here, 
 I will state that during our drive yesterday, we .met and passed 
 one hundred and eleven vehicles containing visitors, with an 
 average of four persons to each, and this did not include our 
 own caravan. This afternoon we leave this place, after a de- 
 lightful sojourn, for another portion of the mountains — all of 
 us except one young man taken sick at Geneva, and who must 
 be left here to recover, renewed in health and spirits. We 
 have almost forgotten the heat and dust and fleas of Italy and 
 Naples, and hope to entirely forget them before we sail for 
 home. 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 143 
 
 LETTER XXL 
 
 Return to Berne and the Bear Pits- Departure for Interlaken— On Lake Brienze — 
 Geisstoach Falls an I the magnificent hotel there— Illumination of the Falls 
 at night— Sunday night concert — Across Lake Brienze and a carriage ride 
 over Brunig Pass— A comparison of the four Passes— Lake Lucerne— A night 
 upon the Alps— Dizzy ride up there— Sunrise on the Alps— Trouble over the 
 Alpine horn— Righi Kulm Tour of the Lake and a visit to the spot where 
 Tell sent the arrow through the small apple— Why we like Switzerland—Loss 
 of life among the glaciers. 
 
 Lucerne, Switzerland, August 26, 1879. 
 
 The "little one" wrote a part of a letter to her mother the 
 other clay — she is not guilty of writing a full letter often — and 
 in describing our journey from Pisa to Milan left out Genoa en- 
 tirely, not even mentioning the Campo Santo there, where may 
 be seen, in my humble estimation, the finest statuary, by very 
 great odds, in all Europe. Well, I think I did the same thing 
 to you in my letter from Interlaken, when I jumped from Fri- 
 bourg to that place, and omitted to say one word about Berne, 
 the Capital of Switzerland. I merely go back and refer to it 
 now to show we did not neglect it, but that we stopped there 
 three quarters of an hour, and saw the big clock perform, and 
 went out to the bear pits and got gloriously taken in by three 
 old spavined and dilapidated bears, with barely enough energy 
 in them to eat a square meal if they had a chance. 
 
144 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 Leaving Interlaken Sunday afternoon by cars, we soon 
 reached Lake Brienze, where a steamer was in waiting to carry 
 us to Geissbach Falls, at which place we spent the night. 
 From the landing the greater number of our party were carried 
 up to the hotel in the cars on the inclined plane, which has 
 been erected at much cost within the last year, while some of 
 them exercised their limbs by walking, and a couple got lost. 
 The hotel at Geissbach is perhaps to finest one in Switzerland. 
 Its location would seem to justify the greater outlay of money 
 in its erection. The view it commands is, in many respects, 
 the most attractive Ave have seen in this country where tame 
 views are the exception. Below lies the beautiful lake, walled 
 in by mountains, stretching back upon one side to Interlaken 
 and nearly meeting the one beyond, and on the Other turni g 
 gently to the right until it seems to end in the very midst of 
 imposing peaks. Above comes dashing down the falls in a suc- 
 cession of startling leaps, as though the waters would dash into 
 the very windows of the house, and with a roar that becomes 
 agreeable after a while and lulls you to sleep when you retire 
 for the night. 
 
 The hotel was crowded, and three of us occupied a large 
 room twenty-four steps above all the other floors in the centre 
 dome of the building, the English-speaking chambermaid assur- 
 ing us that we might consider ourselves lucky in getting No. 
 218, as it afforded the best view, while many of the guests oc- 
 cupied cots in obscure rooms, and the servants were sleeping 
 about on the floor. But at dinner that night and breakfast the 
 next morning, we were expeditiously served by pretty Swiss 
 girls, all neatly dressed in the fancy costume of the country. I 
 don't know that the viands were any better than we have beer* 
 indulging in along the route, but our people seemed to enjoy 
 them to a greater extent. Here we met, for the first time, a 
 set of people who could do more staring than we have been 
 guilty of, and the thing becomes so marked and ill-bred that a 
 few of us met it by borrowing all the eye glasses within reach, 
 and deliberately rising in our seats at the table and grotesquely 
 squinting at the more obnoxious ones at the other tables. That 
 proceeding about squelched them. If it had not we would 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 45 
 
 probably have resorted to some other device more effective. 
 At half-past 9 that night, upon the ringing of the bell, we as- 
 sembled on the piazzas and the amphitheater to witness the illu- 
 mination of the falls. Two rockets were sent up the mountain, 
 which spent their force and exploded far short of the upper cas- 
 cade, when there burst upon our vision a most bewitching scene 
 as, one after another, all the cascades flashed into a blaze of 
 red, green and blue, and came down the mountain as if so much 
 colored liquid fire. Seen in places through the pines which par- 
 tially obscured the falls, and which took on the colors thrown 
 upon the water, the effect was pleasing in the extreme. Many 
 tourists ran over to Geissbach from Interlaken and the villages 
 along- the banks, to witness the illumination and return after it is 
 over. Later, there was a concert in the reception room, and 
 some of those who can't hold a foot still when music is going, 
 were about to 'go upon the floor and pitch into a waltz, when 
 they were reminded it was still the Sabbath day, even though 
 in Switzerland, where that day does not worry them more than 
 any other. 
 
 The next morning, after breakfast and a ride down the dizzy 
 incline, we took a steamer and crossed the lake to Brienz, where 
 we were loaded into carriages and driven over the Brunig Pass, 
 which our own unpretentious itinerary tells us is, in some re- 
 spects, ahead of the others we had seen. Perhaps had we crossed 
 it first we would have thought so ourselves, but, as it is, we call 
 in question the authority quoted. But, crossing the Alps four 
 times in about that many weeks, is calculated to deaden our 
 appreciation for the scenery they present, and I am not pre- 
 pared to question that, had we seen the Brunig Pass first, we 
 may have accorded it the palm. My conviction is that the 
 Simplon beats them all, though the Tete Noir is not far behind. 
 We saw each end of the road leading over the St. Bernard 
 Pass, and at Grindelwald I put my arms around the neck of the 
 famous mammoth St. Bernard dog that made a stir at Paris and 
 was laden with premiums there, but we gave the pass the go-by, 
 and will re-read Bulwer when v/e go home. 
 
 Reaching Lake Lucerne, or "Lake of the Four Cantons," as 
 they call it here, we again took steamer for Lucerne, having 
 19 
 
I46 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 passed, during our carriage drive, two small lakes nestling among 
 the mountains, and whose waters gave out an emerald green 
 in the noon day sunshine- On reaching Lucerne we were de- 
 layed nearly an hour, waiting for a steamer to carry us to Vitz- 
 nau, the one that was to have taken us having already gone. 
 It was but three-quarters of an hour's run over there, but the 
 ' sun's rays were only seen on the tallest peaks when we reached 
 Vitznau and took the cars up the frightful ascent which leads to 
 the summit of Righi Kulm. It had been planned that we should 
 get there in time to see the sun set, but, as that luminary did 
 not behave excellently well in its concluding performances, and, 
 as night shut out the frightful views in our first ride up towards 
 the moon, it was well enough the delay occurred. We could 
 hardly have gone up there in broad daylight except under a 
 tremor of agitation from the beginning to the end. As we 
 ascended the atmosphere gradually grew colder, and when, at 
 last, after an hour and a half of honest shivering, we stepped 
 out of the cars into a cold, dense cloud, we felt that winter was 
 fast approaching, and would not have been surprised on seeing 
 ice in our rooms. We went in to dinner at nine* and finished at 
 ten, went to bed in the monster hotel, crowded with people, 
 dreading the sounds of the Alpine horn that was to awake us 
 on the morrow to see the sun rise over the Alps. 
 
 I go fishing occasionally when at home, and that I may 
 awake early for a good start, I set the alarm of the clock upon 
 the hour I want to get out of bed. The next morning I gener- 
 ally catch myself awake, listening for the thing to go off. So 
 it was with that awful Alpine horn. I awoke before its misera- 
 ble tooting resounded through the corridors of the hotel. I 
 guess the late dinner — and I may add the hearty one — had given 
 me the night mare, for I had kicked off the stubby feather bed 
 they use in this country for covering, and was about half frozen. 
 Getting up to re-adjust my chunk of feathers, I looked out the 
 window, and the clouds around looked so unpropitious I hoped 
 the ceremony of arousing the guests would be omitted, and 
 that I might fallinto a more peaceful slumber. I had some 
 difficulty making up my mind how to utilize the feathers. I 
 put the package across my lower extremities, and that left my 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 147 
 
 body exposed. I then brought it up to my neck, and my legs 
 felt the night breeze. I put it across the centre of my body, 
 and consequently took a chill at both ends. Finally I compro- 
 mised the matter by curling up like a grub worm and getting 
 entirely under the thing, Ihad barely accomplished the feat when 
 I heard the faint sounds of the horn in the adjoining hotel, and 
 in less than five minutes thereafter it burst loose in the halls 
 around us, and aroused the soundest sleeper of them all. To 
 add to the noise many of us jumped out of bed, and, opening 
 our doors, yelled to the top of our voices. Not even one of 
 the Seven Sleepers could have slumbered in that fuss. It was 
 very different from the scene I had read an entertaining account 
 of in the London Telegraph a few days before. The able 
 writer was talking about Englishmen, I presume, for he spoke 
 of this uncomfortable morning proceeding as being a quiet and 
 sombre one. There was nothing quiet about our party from 
 first to last, for we got out upon the highest point of Righi 
 Kulm in all sorts of garbs, and. toilets in every stage of com- 
 pletion compatible with respectability and the Norwegian blasts 
 that whistled about us, We astonished the two or three hundred 
 other tourists around us with our clatter. 
 
 When we first came out the sky was overcast with dark look- 
 ing clouds, and the prospect was discouraging, but as the hour 
 for sunrise approached the clouds immediately overhead dis- 
 solved into thin mist and gradually floated away, while a long 
 line opened just above the horizon on the east, through which 
 old Sol cast his rays upon the fleecy billows in the west and gave 
 us the first promise of a glorious feast. Gradually he painted and 
 tinted cloud after cloud, illuminated the entire heavens in gor- 
 geous hues of mellow and ever changing colors. Then, 
 with a gentle brush, he touched up the snow-capped peaks of 
 the Burnese Alps, moving slowly down their sides and lighting 
 up the deep valleys and dark gorges in his progress till there 
 lay out before us a picture the memory of which we will carry 
 to the grave. I have seen more sublime illumination of the 
 heavens from my own gallery in Vicksburg, looking westward, 
 in the afternoon after a summer shower, by far, than I have seen 
 in this brief tour in Europe, and I apprehend it would be the 
 
I48 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 same if I lived even in " sunny Italy " tc the end of my days; 
 but here, on Righi Kulm, where the effect is aided by a pano- 
 rama of a thousand peaks, lying within a circle of three hun • 
 dred miles, and where the beauties are outlined to a greater 
 extent upon the mountains than upon the sky, it is merely true 
 to say that I have seen nothing in all my life to compare to it, 
 Once, standing in a pass over one of the tall ranges in South- 
 western Colorado, looking towards the Rockies in Utah, I was 
 nearly dazed with the grandeur of the view, but in that case 
 the sky was clear and the scene was unaided by pictures in the 
 heavens, as the sun sank to rest for the day. So we were fortu- 
 nate in our visit to Righi Kulm, as we have been fortunate in 
 all our trip through Switzerland. Perhaps no one has had 
 greater luck in this respect than have we. 
 
 After an early breakfast we came down the mountain and 
 nearly held our breath as we crossed the deep gorges or ran near 
 the edge of a precipice. A few of us took a steamer and came 
 back direct to this place, the others making a circular tour of 
 the lake and returning here in the afternoon. They passed 
 by spots pointed out as places where Gessler and Tell figured, 
 and landing once walked two miles to the ground where Tell 
 stood when he knocked the pigmy Swiss apple off the head of 
 the faithful boy — a boy who should be awarded the larger share 
 of the honor. I said if there was a more handsome lake than 
 Lake Geneva I wanted to see it and quit. Well, I have seen 
 Lake Lucerne and close the chapter. I do not see how its su- 
 perior in loveliness can exist. 
 
 To-night we attend another concert, and to-morrow start for 
 Paris, stopping a few hours at Bale to see some more churches 
 to mix with the mountains and the lakes. I shall depart from 
 enchanting Switzerland with feelings of great regret. Our stay 
 has been one continual pleasure feast. We like Switzerland 
 ever so much. We like her for her pure mountain air ; her 
 exquisite scenery and ruddy-cheeked, brown-armed women ; 
 the honest-looking, cheerful faces we see; the politeness and 
 kindness we meet on every hand; her lovely lakes mirroring 
 back the mountain and the clouds above them, and her clear, 
 pure water that comes dashing down into the green and fertile 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 149 
 
 valleys from the eternal snows of the Alps. All these give a 
 charm to Switzerland, and under it no wonder that her frugal 
 people can find no other home which pleases them so well. 
 
 I was mistaken about the young Bostonian having lost his life 
 on Mont Blanc a few days prior to our visit to Chamounix. It 
 was on the Matterhorn where he fell a victim to his adventurous 
 spirit. And on the same day a guide, who could not resist the 
 big fee, and who attempted to conduct a party when he was 
 ailing, died alone and unattended at the rude station on the 
 same mountain. Since leaving Chamounix, however, a tourist 
 fell down one of the glaciers near where our party ascended, 
 and his body was recovered the next day hundreds of feet below, 
 bruised and lacerated in the most shocking manner. I would 
 much rather take a comfortable position and admire from afar the 
 glaciers of Mont Blanc, the Matterhorn, the Wetterhorn, Mer de 
 Glace, and the hundreds of others we have seen, than to go 
 climbing, and scratching, and digging my way up their treacher- 
 ous snows and icy sides, liable at any moment to slip, only to 
 find a stopping place, a shapeless mass, a thousand feet down 
 some frightful chasm that never sees the light of day. The 
 more modest tramps satisfy my ambition, with much less prob- 
 ability that an untimely death in Switzerland will require an 
 early settlement of my estate. 
 
I =>0 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 LETTER XXII. 
 
 Leaving Luzerne— Good-bye Switzerland— The last look at the .Alps— Halt at Bale 
 —Protestant Church there and its curious clock faces— Buying Ribbons— A 
 pleasant all night ride in the cars— Arrival in Paris— What we saw there 
 and the many places of note we visited— The French we learned in the 
 Ornni busses — Leaving Europe with many longings, and yearnings to come 
 again— Some of our party left behind. 
 
 Paris, September i, 1879. 
 
 As I wrote you we would do, we left Lucerne Wednesday 
 morning and soon put the beautiful lakes and mountains of 
 Switzerland behind us. Now and then as we sped on our journey, 
 peaks that had been familiar to us in our short stay among 
 them would come into view for a moment or so, and it was so 
 natural to wave our hands towards them as though bidding 
 farewell to cherished friends who stood watching our departure. 
 Still, we could not see a single change in the cold face of the 
 immovable Jungfrau as we looked upon her in the distance for 
 the last time before darting into a long tunnel that led tc a val- 
 ley from which we saw the mountains no more. It is well these 
 mountains can not have feelings like human beings, for in the 
 event they could have they would be continually in painful 
 sympathy with loving friends taking their eternal leave. I am 
 glad it is all the same to Jungfrau whether we laugh or whether 
 we cry under the shadow of her snow-capped head, and I love 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 5' I 
 
 her just as though I could see the cold tears streaming down 
 her face because I have turned my back upon her and my face 
 towards the sea. 
 
 We changed cars at Bale, and staid there four hours before 
 we took the express train for an all night's ride to Paris. Of 
 course we went to see the Protestant Church there. It does 
 not come up to many of the Cathedrals we have visited, but it 
 is put down in the guide books of our party as the finest Protes- 
 tant Church in existence, and the museum connected with it has 
 many rare and curious relics, some of them very old. Among 
 them is the face of an ancient clock tower once overlooking the 
 town across the river Rhine, and put up there to make faces at 
 the people over the way, with whom the Bale 'folks had had a 
 little falling out and for whom they desired to express their 
 contempt in this way. The indignant dwellers over the Rhine 
 got up a counter mouth maker, and thus the people were happy 
 in being able to make ugly faces at their neighbors by proxy. 
 They differed from many folks of the present time in that they 
 did not make faces behind each other's backs, but stood out 
 fairly and squarely and did their grinning openly and above 
 board. Only one of those curious pieces of mechanism has 
 been preserved. That one will run out its long, red tongue, 
 and roll its eyes at you as you go looking at the other curi- 
 osities in the room in which it hung. Well, -it was a harmless 
 way of venting spleen, and it is a pity more persons in those 
 days did not resort to it. 
 
 The organ was the handsomest one we had seen, and we had 
 a desire to hear it play, but the organist had the key in his 
 pocket and he could not be found. The city was very clean, 
 reminding us of some of the towns in Holland, and the streets 
 appeared almost deserted. Ribbons constitute one of the chief 
 products of the place, and are cheap there. It would have 
 amused you to see the "little one," and another lady with a 
 weakness for bright neckties, going hurriedly through two 
 large basketsful of remnants in search of the pretty patterns, 
 while in motal fear the train would go off and leave them a mile 
 away. If you have ever seen an active old hen with one chicken 
 in a pile of loose straw, scratching vigorously for a runaway bug, 
 
152 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 you may form a mild conception of the manner in which they 
 made the pieces fly. The girl who waited on them spoke Hot- 
 tentot to us, and we jabbered Potawotamie to her, and in our 
 efforts to make each other understand, increased the chances of 
 being left behind. After buying a few pieces which proved to 
 be not near so pretty as many that were cast aside, we darted 
 out of the shop and fairly ran to the hotel to find on gettiug 
 there that we had a full half hour to spare. 
 
 And this was our last transaction in Switzerland, for in less 
 than two hours we had crossed into France and were huddled 
 up in the depot on the border with our hand luggage waiting 
 for the revenue officers to see if we intended smuggling a ton or 
 so of cigars into the French Republic. The examination, as 
 all others in our case have been, was a mere formal affair, and 
 the talismanic chalk mark was placed upon many of our 
 packages without any inspection whatever. The fact that we 
 are a party of American tourists may do away with any sus- 
 picion that we might be lugging around contraband goods as a 
 matter of speculation. Our night ride was not uncomfortable. 
 The conductor had succeeded in getting permission for only 
 four to ride in a section, instead of eight, which they comfortably 
 hold, and this arrangement permitted us to lie down on the 
 seats and sleep comfortably well, so that on arriving here we 
 were not worn out and sleepy, but in fair trim for a good break- 
 fast and the succeeding eight hours ride over the city, which 
 followed. 
 
 I am worse put to it in the matter of writing a letter about 
 Paris than I was about Rome. It is apparently so near home 
 and the ground has been so thoroughly plowed that I feel I 
 could not get up a letter in hurriedly passing through it, that 
 would be news to you. In the belief that you may become 
 somewhat interested in the movements of our party, through 
 my hastily written letters, I will say that on arriving here we 
 found the hotel named in our itinerary so nearly full that about 
 one-half of the number had to be sent to another. I fell in with 
 the latter party and we went to the Hotel d' Albe, on the 
 Champs Elysees, not far from the Arch of Triumph. In less 
 than two hours after our arrival Ave were in the big carriages 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 153 
 
 which they use here for hauling around tourists, driving through 
 the streets of Paris, seeing the sights that were deemed most 
 likely to entertain us — getting out and going through those 
 buildings whose interior we desired and > had time to see. To 
 give you an idea of that one day's work, I will tell you we 
 visited and passed through the churches ot St. Vincent de Paul 
 and Notre Dame, Chaumont Park, Piere la Chaise Cemetery, 
 Botanical and Zoological Gardens, the Morgue, and the Luxem- 
 bourg galleries and gardens. We drove through miles of 
 boulevards and streets, and among the long list of objects of 
 interest, and passed the bastile column which marks the site 
 of the famous prison of that name, Palace of Justice, Chamber 
 of Commerce, Grand Hotel, the Obelisk, brought from Egypt, 
 the horse butcheries, Pantheon, the Louvre, the church con- 
 taining the bell which rang out the signal for the massacre of 
 St. Bartholomew, ruins of the Tuileries, the handsome shops 
 along the Rue de Rivoli, and then through the Communists' 
 quarters, and up the Champs Elysees home to a six o'clock 
 dinner. Thus you see we did a big day's work and saw perhaps 
 much more than we would have seen in a whole week unaided 
 by a conductor, the junior Mr. Gaze himself, who is on the go 
 every day of the tourist season. 
 
 During our walk over the 112 acres, and among the 16,000 
 tombs of the Chaumont Cemetery, we were permitted to see the 
 resting places of many famous men, among them quite a num- 
 ber who figured conspicuously with, and in the time of, the 
 first Napoleon. At a point called Napoleon's corner there is a 
 cluster of some of his leading generals and statesmen. The tomb of 
 Thiers, was pointed out, and we were told of the 50,000 people 
 who followed his remains, and that the largest wreath among the 
 symbols of mourning was the contribution of Americans resi- 
 dent here. Of course-, we saw the tomb of Heloise and Abe- 
 lard, and had the history of their devotion, their secret marriage, 
 their separation, their hopeless constancy and their final death 
 and burial here, detailed to us. . But if those people looked 
 anything like the two figures lying on top of the tomb, and 
 which, no doubt, were intended to represent this most unfor- 
 tunate pair ot lovers, then I am unable to account for the at- 
 
 20 
 
1 54 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVANS 
 
 tachment on an)- other ground than that it was Hobson's choice 
 with them. Still the sculptor may have done his work awk- 
 wardly, and in view of the probability that he did so, many 
 touching things have been written about this loving pair, and 
 to which I refer you for further particulars. 
 
 On the top of this cemetery we had our first panoramic view 
 of the city — we have had many since — and had pointed out to us 
 places of interest, especially those associated with the taking of 
 the city by the Prussians and the subsequent, action of the Com- 
 munists. Aside from the history of the men entombed there, 
 and the fact that the Communists more than once sought refuge 
 there and invited the shots which mark many of the tombs, this 
 cemetery is not at all impressive. The monuments are, for 
 the most part, plain and unobtrusive, and hung about with a 
 profusion of wreaths and immortelles similar to the decorations 
 in the cemeteries in New Orleans. 
 
 We have been to the Grand Opera House and taken a sweat 
 bath in that oven, while trying to stay out the first act of Faust, 
 equal to the one we took around the crater of Vesuvius. And 
 we were inveigled into the Jardin Mabille, and while there saw 
 a little of the extravagant dance which has never flourished in 
 our own country except in the lower dens, but which is the 
 leading feature ol this famous garden on the Avenue Montague, 
 near the Champs Elysees. The place was not crowded the 
 night w T e were there, and people were quietly strolling about 
 the lovely grounds or seated at the tables taking refreshments, 
 Directly after our entrance the band struck up with a very lively 
 quadrille, when two couples took position on a part of the 
 floored space around the music stand, and a big ring of specta- 
 tors gathering around them, the fun began. It was but a minute 
 or two before one of the female dancers, while spinning around 
 near the surrounding circle, kicked the hat off the tallest man 
 within reach, and then deliberately put her foot upon the shoul- 
 der of another, while the other female dancer took her right 
 foot in her hand, (I am certain as to the foot for I was there 
 and saw it), and holding it up before her face leisurely inspected 
 the nicely fitting shoe which encased it. And yet when the 
 jiiusic ceased and the crowd, temporarily assembled around the 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 155 
 
 dancers, had scattered about over the garden, there could be 
 seen nothing to indicate that the Jardin Mabille might not be 
 visited by the most fastidious person. 
 
 We have been to the great Hippodrome and the panorama of. 
 the Siege of Paris, a most life-like and impressive scene, worth 
 much trouble and money to see. The imitations of it, exhibited 
 in America, barely give one an idea of the magnificence of this. 
 We have been out to Versailles and seen the gardens and gjo- 
 rious avenues, ,and fed the fish in the basins; have gone through 
 the palace and seen the rich trappings of royalty, the rooms 
 they occupied, the beds they stretched their legs upon, and in 
 which they slept the sleep which brought but little refreshment ; 
 the balcony upon which Maria Antoinette appeared with her 
 first infant child in the vain hope of appeasing the mob who had 
 come to carry her to the guillotine ; the room where she was 
 finally captured and from which she was taken to her doom ; 
 the room prepared for the reception of Queen Victoria on the 
 occasion of her visit to France, and the gorgeous bed on which 
 that lady declined to sleep on account of some scandal connect- 
 ed with it, or because it was once occupied by the excellent and 
 ill-used Josephine, and the conscientious Queen desired to ex- 
 press her disapproval of the whole matter by declining the prof- 
 fered luxury, and going off to St. Cloud and spending the nights 
 with the Empress Eugenie. 
 
 We have seen the places where stood the guillotines and fell 
 the heads during the revolutions which have fallen upon the 
 excitable people of France, and where, in all probability, the 
 same scenes will be re-enacted. We have been to the Louvre, 
 and tried hard to see the seven miles of pictures, the acres of 
 statuary and the tens of thousands of rare curiosities in that 
 world-renowned building, but we could not do it, even in weeks, 
 with perfect satisfaction. We have seen Paris, in balmy 
 weather, by gas light, and will never cease wondering where -all 
 the people come from who throng its brilliant streets and crowd 
 about the cafes that, wherever you may be, are before you, 
 behind, and upon either side, ablaze with gas when night i s 
 upon the city. We have gazed down the street* leading up to 
 the Grand Opera, and have been nearly dazed by the electric 
 
1$6 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'? 
 
 lights which absolutely turn night into day. We have been to 
 the great stores of the Palais Royal, the Louvre and the Bon 
 Marsche, and have seen the army of employes within them, 
 bus)', as though their very lives depended upon rapid action. 
 
 But there is one place we have never seen, and that is Com 
 plet. We have not seen it, because every time we hailed an 
 omnibus having that name upon it the driver sitting perched 
 upon top with his legs encased in a leather house, looked at us 
 contemptuously and drove on. This is not original. I give it 
 as told by a New Englander, who, returning to h'"s native land 
 and naming the places he had seen, gave this as a place he had 
 not seen. Every one who visits Paris soon learns that Complet 
 means that the vehicle has its complement of passengers inside 
 and. out, and that when the word appears over the door he will 
 not be allowed to even put his foot on the platform for love or 
 money. There is no chance of getting squeezed in an omnibus 
 in Paris. Just so many are allowed on top, so many on the in- 
 side, and four on the rear platform. On the inside you pay six 
 cents, and half that for a seat on top. If the inside and top are- 
 full you must stand on the platform, if that has not four, and 
 you pay six cents for that position. But if a passenger vacates a 
 seat, either above or below, by getting off, you may take it. I 
 have been in an omnibus but once, and I give you what I then 
 learned, but I hailed half a dozen with the word "complet" 
 upon them, before I found out why the plaguey things wouldn't 
 stop for me. So there is one land under the sun where omni- 
 busses may get full. It never occurs in our own glorious cli- 
 mate, America. 
 
 We learn that since our departure from Naples, Vesuvius has 
 been in active eruption. The sight of it to one who had never 
 witnessed it, I have no doubt, would be a grand one ; still, I 
 doubt, as such action would prevent our closely approaching the 
 crater, whether *it would impress us more than we were im- 
 pressed at the time of our visit. If it could have been quiet 
 till we went up there and fearlessly dallied with her fires, and 
 then raised Cain for our special benefit, we would have been 
 doubly favored. The inhabitants were looking for some demon- 
 strations of the restless mountain when we were there, and pre- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE.. ?57 
 
 dieted a display within ten days. Upon what basis they made 
 their calculations I am not able to state. 
 
 Those of us who are to take the Glasgow steamer on the 4th, 
 will leave here to-night and be back in London by noon to mor- 
 row. Perhaps the chief source of regret will be the short time 
 allowed by the tour to that city. London is not a pretty place, 
 but there are very many places within it one would like to see. 
 Large numbers of our party will remain behind, some to follow 
 us by the next steamer, others later, while a few will remain 
 in Europe for months or more and leisurely see what is on their 
 individual programmes. Those of us who were so miserably 
 sick on coming over already begin to feel an uncomfortable sens- 
 ation in the stomach, and will be fully prepared on getting out 
 to sea to throw up a world of Jonahs. I hope to have lucid 
 intervals often enough and of sufficient duration to close this 
 chapter of travels while aboard the ship, and in that hope I may 
 make this my last letter bearing date in Europe. If I did not 
 leave here in the belief that I would come back some day, I 
 should quit very reluctantly indeed, for there is much in this 
 country to see, and the many pleasant recollections of the jour- 
 ney will tend greatly towards mitigating the terrors- of the sea, 
 if they do not entirely cause me to forget the heavings of my 
 stomach. I have changed my mind as to not braving the sea 
 again to look at Europe. Sea sickness is a bitter dose but I 
 would endure it a^ain to sjet back here. 
 
• 58 THE BIG AMERICAS' CARAVAN'S 
 
 LETTER XXIII. 
 
 Paris to London— Smooth channel and no sea sickness Two days in London- 
 Comparison between that city and Paris— Both behind our country in Fine 
 Stores- On to Glasgow — A. day of shopping there — Down to the Steamer and 
 out to sea — Description of the passage — Some tumbling upon the briny deep 
 — The arrival at home and the passage Lhi'ough the quarantine and Custom 
 House — The meeting of friends. 
 
 New York, September 14, 1879. 
 
 The good ship Circassia lies quiet at anchor at the quarantine 
 station in New York Harbor. The great engines which have 
 been thundering away at the immense screw that sped us home- 
 ward, without rest or cessation for ten days and nights, have 
 ceased at last, and the repose which seems to have'come to our 
 ship is grateful to us all. So accustomed had we become to the 
 never ceasing jar of the power around us that when, at dinner, 
 the steam was shut off, and the wheel ceased to revolve, many 
 jumped to their feet with a look of surprise, and sometimes fear 
 * in their faces, exclaiming, "the engines have stopped !" as 
 though some calamity had befallen us. We have signalled for the 
 health officer, and while we gently rock upon the kindly swells 
 of the ocean here in the harbor, we await the coming of this 
 officer. We have been upon deck all day when the rain did not 
 compel us to seek cover below, descanting upon the land dimly 
 seen through the mist here and there, and admiring the great 
 concourse of vessels going out and coming in from sea. Those 
 of us who are not still busy with trunks and valises, trying to 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 159 
 
 bury dutiable articles beyond the keen eyes of the revenue officer, 
 are all huddled about over the commodious decks, taking our 
 last chat together, and feeling some pain in view of the approach- 
 ing separation, after so long and entertaining a journey together. 
 Our associations have, in the main, been pleasant, and we have 
 made acquaintances and formed attachments it will cause a pang- 
 to interrupt by separation. In some cases the attachment has 
 been of such a character that will result in binding the parties 
 together for life, and if, in their cases, the journey henceforth 
 be a smooth one, they will have additional reason to be thank- 
 ful Providence directed them on this tour. 
 
 The Government boat lies alongside, and the doctor has 
 climbed up the side of our big ship, accompanied by his assist- 
 ants, bringing along the vessels and apparatus with which to 
 fumigate the hold when his inspection is over. He h?s shaken 
 hands familiarly with our odd-looking, but pleasant, doctor, and 
 now stands carefully scrutinizing the faces of the three hundred 
 men, women and children from the steerage as they marched 
 before him. But we have a clean bill of health, and he can find 
 no pestilence or contagious malady in the appearance of any of 
 them. The hatches are now shut down and the process of fumi- 
 gation begun. We hear a rattle and a gurgling sound below 
 as the mess fumes and stews in that pent up place. Directly 
 the doctor and his assistants go briskly down the steps to their 
 own wee steamer, which soon darts away to a French sailing 
 ship, just in, and also awaiting his inspection. Our engines re- 
 sume their labor, and we move slowly towards the city. As 
 we near the Anchor Line's pier we see it crowded with people, 
 and the waving of handkerchiefs soon begins. Friends begin 
 to recognize each other, and at last, when we have come along- 
 side the pier, and tied up our floating home, and run out the 
 gangway, there is a rush in the meeting of loving ones that is 
 touching even to those of us whose friends are a thousand miles 
 or more away. But in the throng I do not see the sad face of 
 the widowed woman, whose genial and excellent husband laid 
 away his life in Germany. How our hearts go out to her in her 
 sorrow, that of all our party he can not return for the happy 
 greeting which is in store ior us, 
 
l6o THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 \ 
 
 Our great quantity of baggage has gone out upon the dock, 
 and, as the night comes on, it has been inspected, sometimes 
 with feeble rigor, and, at others, with a haste and a suspicious 
 indifference as to the contents of the packages that smack loudly 
 of the influence that a little grease has been used upon the ma- 
 chine, and the proper revenues upon our stuff diverted into an- 
 other channel. In truth and in fact, a body of blind and deaf 
 passengers could hardly go through the New York Custom 
 House, on a Sunday afternoon, without becoming aware of the 
 ease with which returning voyagers can pass through it, if they 
 are inclined to swear to a lie, and are then thoughtful enough 
 to put a little money where it will do the most good. And it is 
 wonderful how many of us were inclined to put the most favor- 
 able construction for ourselves upon the oath to construe mer- 
 chandise into wearing apparel, and to forget that we ever had 
 bought a present for a friend. The desire to cheat the Govern- 
 ment out of its legal revenue seems to afflict the majority of Amer- 
 icans, and there are very few who come from Europe who do 
 not, in some way, try to evade the payment of duties fixed by 
 law. I feel that a wolul source of sin will be obliterated if it 
 should ever come to pass that our country will luxuriate in free 
 trade. There were a few Romans in our party who conscien- 
 tiously reported everything they had bought. Among these 
 was a minister who even declined to swear to his list because he 
 had forgotten all his trivial purchases, or what they cost, but, 
 upon opening his trunk, took out every article and carried them 
 all to the chief officer. for inspection and valuation, who, to his 
 credit, be it said, returned them without assessment. The gen- 
 tle minister could lie down that night with a clear conscience, 
 which, I fear, not man}' of his companions could have. I shall 
 remember his quiet, beautiful face to the last of my life. And 
 there is perhaps not one of our large party who will not always 
 bear pleasing recollections of this worthy man and his modest, 
 devoted and winning wife. 
 
 I closed my last letter to you at Paris. A day or two there- 
 after we took the night train for London, which place we reached 
 near noon the next day, after so remarkable a thing as to cross 
 the channel without rough weather, and consequently no incon- 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. l6l 
 
 venience from sea-sickness. The rains had ceased about three 
 days before in England, and we had clear and cheerful weather 
 while in London. It was so rare to those people that you could 
 not enter a store and buy the most trivial article and hurry out 
 without some allusion being made to the happy change. We 
 staid in this city until the night of the second day, and then took 
 the express train for Glasgow. Upon the whole, our party 
 liked London better than Paris. It is almost a waste of Ian- ^ 
 guage to say it is a wonderful city. I would hazard the guess that 
 it does more business in one day than Paris does in a week, and 
 for the chance purchaser at retail, its stocks are more ample and 
 prices lower. There are enchanting streets, beautiful drives, 
 and lovely parks in Paris, with ever so many nice fountains ; and 
 at night the city is ablaze with gas, while the seekers of pleas- 
 ure swarm the streets and cafes till the wonder seems to be how 
 these myriads can afford the time and the money thus thrown 
 away. But when you are in London there is an appearance of 
 solidity around you, and an attention to the more serious con- 
 cerns of life which are not visible in Paris. Both are interesting 
 cities, but if a person could see one and not the other I feel that 
 he would make a mistake if he should select Paris over London. £ 
 I may add here that I was in all the noted retail establishments 
 in both places, but I saw nothing equaling those of Stewart in 
 New York; Field, Lciter & Co., Chicago ; and Shillito, in Cin- 
 cinnati. Indeed, I saw many things in Europe inferior to like 
 things in our own country. I am aware it is not the usual style 
 to make such an assertion, still I can not avoid it and approxi- 
 mate the truth. 
 
 We spent nearly the entire day in Glasgow. One would have 
 supposed that in our long round, all purchases would have al- 
 ready been made, but if you could have seen the bundles piling 
 into the hotel from io to 3 o'clock, your guess would have been 
 that shopping had been postponed for this last place. As we 
 left for the cars to carry us to our ship at Greenoch, nearly every 
 member of the party looked like a delivery messenger loaded 
 down to the guards with packages. 
 
 As we tumbled out of the cars on the wharf at Greenoch, 
 there lay our ship at anchor in the harbor, and alongside the 
 21 
 
l62 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 dock, close by, bobbed up and down the little steamer that was 
 to carry us out to the big one. It was the first time we fully 
 realized that we were quitting Europe and starting on our jour- 
 ney homeward. In a few minutes we were transferred to the 
 vessel, and at once began searching for our respective rooms. 
 The Circassia is a much larger ship, being nearly 450 feet long, 
 and newer and a great deal cleaner than the Anchoria, which 
 took us over, and the rooms gave general satisfaction. I had 
 the same three room-mates returning I had going over, two of 
 whom had been in my section, and with whom I had roomed 
 at the hotels on the tour, and, of course, we harmonized. There 
 were about two hundred and twenty cabin passengers, all of 
 whom but about twenty belonged to our band, being composed 
 of members from all five of the sections. The Swiss section and 
 the third, which started out from London a week before we did, 
 had mostly gone home in preceding ships, but some of them 
 had loitered behind to accompany us. We left many in Europe 
 to straggle along home at odd times during the next twelve 
 months, as inclination and circumstances dictate. 
 
 The weather was delightful when the bow was pointed sea- 
 ward, and we sped through the placid waters that lie between 
 the highlands at Greeficch and for many miles towards Moville, 
 and there were no sea-sick persons that night, albeit, at one 
 time, just before the dawn of day, we passed through some 
 rough water, and the ship did some uncomfortable rolling. At 
 
 %> Moville, next morning, we took on many of our three hundred 
 steerage* passengers, and further out many of our own party, 
 who had taken a run through Ireland, ar.d joined us at a place 
 I do not now remember. This second day the weather was 
 kind to us, but about 12 o'clock that night there came up a 
 blow, which made things lively for us. The ship was lightly 
 
 -laden with iron and sugar, which, lying at the very bottom, al-' 
 lowed the vessel to wallow about in a fearful manner. I was 
 aroused with a crashing of things about over the ship, which 
 appeared as though everything was loose and being banged to 
 pieces. Most of the trunks and valises had been brought down 
 and set in the passages, or in the large spaces used for dining 
 rooms for second class passengers, and these made pilgrimages, 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. v6% 
 
 with every roll of the ship, through all the space allotted to 
 them, and came up on the other side with a bang, as though 
 they were aiming to drive through the sides of the ship. Glass- 
 ware was rattling in every direction, and every article not pro- 
 perly moored perambulated about in the most reckless way. 
 Our clothing hanging over the iron rod running; through our „ 
 room, vibrating back and forth like the pendulum of a clock 
 with a long swing, while those of us lying in the berths parallel 
 with the vessel, rolled from side to side like a baby rigid with 
 anger, in a rocking cradle, and those lying at right angles with 
 the vessel had honest work to perform to prevent their skulls 
 getting cracked, as the down grade was in that direction, or to 
 avoid being doubled up like a jack knife, if it was in the other, 
 With my pillow upon one side and my big overcoat on the 
 other, I wedged myself in and let her roll. Added to these 9 
 little discomforts, we hear the billows thundering against our 
 iron shell, and every now and then come crashing over the 
 decks above us, as though we stood in danger of being literally 
 crushed to the bottom of the sea. 
 
 It seemed a long time till day. With daylight came men and 
 nailed strips of wood around the baggage, and that trouble 
 ended. The wind moderated and the rolling decreased. One 
 of our party, who had retired in his clothes, got up and tried 
 to wash his face. In a twinkling he shot out the door and 
 tumbled up in a lump among the baggage. Hastily coming 
 back with set features and a blanched face that are never mis- 
 taken, he snatched' up his hat and darted up the passage of the 
 saloon evidently hunting for a nice place on deck in which to 
 cast up 'accounts. We heard from him afterwards that the set- 
 tlement had been complete. Then another got up, the heavy 
 young Boston journalist, who bunked above me. I think he 
 got on both socks and one shoe, when he got white in the face 
 and settled. Then he put on the other shoe, and tried to wash ^? 
 with one hand, while he hung on with the other. Another 
 settlement. He got his face dampened, and was trying to dry 
 it with a towel, when, being for a third time required to settle, 
 he gave it up as a bad job, and crawled back in his berth, which to 
 his fat body filled, and he lay there comfortably. # In the mean- 
 
164 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 time I had gotten sick at this fellow calling- on Europe, and my 
 head had been hanging ever the side of the berth, as though 
 my neck was devoid of vertebra?. It was a funny time. Not 
 long after this the other man, a Boston artist, declared he could 
 do it. He had not been sick a moment in going over, and he 
 simply had been lying there because it was not his getting up 
 time. Well, he sat down on the floor and after skating two or 
 three times across the room in an ungraceful and still more 
 unpleasant way, in that position, managed to get on his socks; 
 then looking up towards us, with mingled looks of appeals and 
 apologies, said, hopelessly, "Oh, I can't stand this!" and 
 dragged his limp body back into the berth. And thus lay this 
 trio till noon. We were not alone. We could hear the sounds 
 of distress all around us — a most woful distress, but which 
 aroused scant sympathy. 
 
 At noon, somehow, we got up and got out upon deck. I 
 was awfully sick, but went on the upper deck, over the 
 ladies' cabin, and laid down up there, overlooking the deck 
 below, where were huddled quite a lot of ladies in their sea 
 chairs, trying to get some comfort from the sea air. The waves 
 had quit breaking over the ship, but we were rolling fearfully 
 from side to side. At one time the indicator attached to the 
 compass marked the deck as standing at an angle of forty de- 
 crees, which gave us a swing from the lowest point upon one 
 side to the lowest upon the other of eighty degrees ! Of course, 
 walking about, except to experienced seamen, was no easy mat- 
 ter, and it bothered even them. Every now and then the ladies 
 below me would break from their moorings, and, sweeping across 
 to the opposite side of the passway, would pile up in a confused 
 mass, from which it took some time to extricate themselves. 
 M"any who undertook to walk across the wet decks often wound 
 up their efforts by hastily sitting down and mopping up the floor 
 as they bowled away to the first permanent obstruction. One 
 bio-, fine looking Scotchman, who hated to give in, sailed away 
 on his back twice across the after deck, the last time shooting 
 his legs through the iron railing, and wedging himself in so 
 tightly it took two men to pull him out and put him on his feet 
 ao-ain. Two ladies were quite badly hurt by being thrown 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 65 
 
 down, but, upon the whole, it was quite a laughable affair. It 
 cured me. After that we had no more rough sea. The weather 
 was lovely and the trip a charming one. We had two most 
 magnificent sunsets — the only ones we had seen since leaving 
 home, and all of us forgot our sea-sickness, except to laugh 
 over it. It is awful funny at all times, except when you have a 
 case of it on hand. 
 
1 66 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN b 
 
 LETTER XXIV 
 
 A letter from home, the last of the series — Explanations of matters overlooked in 
 former letters— Comparison of European and American railroads, mode of 
 travel and living— Cost of oar round trip — Useful hints to tourists — The 
 care for our lives— The polite guards at the railroad stations— Our attentive 
 guides, Henry Gaze & Son — A general review of the entire trip, with its in- 
 cidents and pleasures — Happy return to our own fast and free counlry. 
 
 Vicksburg, Mississippi, November 17, 1879. 
 
 Since my return home I have been asked many questions 
 about the Tourjee Excursion in Europe, which suggests the 
 propriety of one more letter. These questions mainly touched 
 the subject of hotels, railroads and the propriety of traveling in 
 tourists' parties. I will try and briefly meet them here. 
 
 The hotels on the Continent which are termed first-cass are, 
 as a general rule, good. They are not as gaudily furnished as 
 American hotels, but I think they are quite as comfortable — 
 perhaps more quiet and home-like — and are nearly always 
 pleasingly clean. In the matter of beds I think they excel our 
 hotels, both in comfort and cleanliness. The section to which 
 I belonged occupied, first and last, nearly fifty hotels, and I 
 feel sure there was no ground for complaints, in this respect, 
 except, perhaps, with one or two we were quartered in at 
 Paris. Even in Naples, where we found so much to grow! 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 67 
 
 about, we had comfortable rooms and no dirt. It was read at 
 one of the entertainments on board our ship coming home that 
 a young lady of another section found a bed bug down there 
 and she exclaimed, "Why, I declare! this is the first bed bug 
 I have seen since I left-home !" 
 
 The hotels are wonderfully quiet at night. You hear no 
 thumping or thundering about below, or in the halls after eight ' 
 or nine o'clock. Guests, if they come and go after that hour, 
 have respect for those who may have retired, and who desire 
 repose. Our own party could kick up a racket — and often did 
 it — equal to that of a dozen houses full of native boarders. Bell 
 calls are answered by chambermaids stationed on the various 
 floors, and, as a rule, without vexatious delays. Now and then, 
 as at Venice, the waiter did not dislocate his neck (they had 
 male servants there)~in rushing upon you to reply; but we had 
 little fault to find on this score —very much less than we would 
 have in an equal number of average hotels in our own country. 
 In the matter of quiet, I was reminded of the great contrast be- 
 tween the two countries by spending a night at a hotel in Cairo, 
 as I came South from Indiana, where the noise was so great it 
 was almost impossible to drop off to sleep with the door and 
 transom both tightly closed. But after midnight all employes 
 at the hotels over there go to bed and stay there till time to get 
 up". That's my belief. 
 
 My guess is that thefts are not frequent in the hotels of Eu- 
 rope. The difficulty of making proper disposition of the key, 
 between my two room-mates and myself, induced us, from the 
 beginning to the end, to leave our door unlocked, and very often 
 wide open, with our trunks all open, and half the time our traps 
 strewn everywhere ; and yet we never lost an article. Many 
 others were just as careless as we were. Still, we heard of no 
 one who suffered any loss from theft. It gives me pleasure to 
 say this, because it is a pleasing phase of hotel life in Europe. 
 
 Of course we did not like their mode of feeding us. Their 
 table a" hote does not suit Americans. It is too tedious and 
 consumes too much time. There is not enough freedom about 
 it. They stuff you with the things contained in their limited 
 bill of fare. It is that or nothing, There is no choice in the 
 
l68 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 matter. If you don't like the viands or the manner of their 
 cooking, you can "lump" it. If the soup don't suit you you 
 can "pass" and wait till those who do take soup have all sipped 
 what they want, the dishes removed, plates put before each 
 guest, and the next course brought along. The meat or its 
 cooking may not come up to your ideas. Well, you can "pass" 
 that, and sit there and wait and gnash your teeth till all the 
 others are through, plates again removed and clean ones brought 
 on, and the third dish moves round. And, so, clear through 
 the whole category of the eight or nine tedious courses. 
 
 It is true one may merely hire a room and take his meals in 
 restaurant style, either in the hotel where he stops, or elsewhere, 
 if he chooses. F^ut even then, he will not be able to get so 
 gorgeous a meal as will be served up to him in a first class hotel 
 here at home. It may be all the better for his stomach that he 
 can't do so. Some of our party showed our conductors a bill of 
 fare they had of hotels here, and they could hardly be made to 
 believe it possible a hotel would give its guests so large a range 
 in the matter of articles from which to select a dinner. It ap- 
 peared almost incredible that they would be allowed to order 
 the whole catalogue at one fell swoop. 
 
 The table a hote style is certainly very economical. There is 
 no waste, especially if the waiter who carries around the dish 
 serves the plates instead of the guests forking it out themselves. 
 There are no scraps to amount to a big sum. Our party, I can 
 testify, generally cleared the platter. In this way European 
 hotels can avoid big prices. If they were to feed as our hotels 
 do the expenses of traveling would necessarily be beyond the 
 ability of the average tourist. Much of the meat and butter 
 consumed in many parts of the Continent are imported from 
 America, and, consequently costs the landlord there more 
 money than it costs him here. The cooking is generally satis- 
 factory, except, in some places, where they use tallow instead 
 of lard in which to fry things. One might even get to admire 
 that in time. But we always found elegant coffee. I think 
 there was not a single exception to this during our entire jour- 
 ney. In this respect they are far ahead of our palatial hotels. 
 ^ But never a water cooler did we see in any hotel, anywhere, 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 69 
 
 and never did we see a native take a drink of this beverage. 
 This was one of the greatest annoyances we had to encounter, 
 and we often suffered in consequence of it. 
 
 I had expected to find the people over here big eaters, and 
 especially the English. I was disappointed. I am thoroughly 
 satisfied Americans eat nearly double the quantity consumed $& 
 by the average European. Both, 1 imagine, eat more than 
 their systems absolutely require. The surplus is a burden, and 
 in proportion to the excess brings bn disease. And for this * 
 reason the Continental table d hote is more conducive of health 
 if not so palatable. The articles served up are healthy, and 
 ample time is given in which to eat. You can't rush through a 
 meal as though you were going to the races, or were belated 
 and anxious to leave town on the next train. If in all your 
 travels you should see a piece of pie or corn bread it would be 
 a sio-ht that never greeted us while in Europe. Nor would you 
 ever be able to enjoy the luxury of burning your mouth on a 
 hot biscuit. You would now and then, no doubt, have the 
 amusement of witnessing one of the genteel and highly starched 
 waiters lose his balance on the highly polished and waxed floors, 
 and come sprawling down with whatever his hands contained at 
 the time, but you would not, probably, find an impudent one } 
 or very many both blind and deaf to your wants. Nearly all of 
 them on the lines of travel understand English sufficiently well 
 to comprehend your orders, while the "portier," or manager, 
 generally speaks that language fluently. 
 
 I shall speak briefly of railroads. The compartment system 
 in the passenger cars doubtless had its origin in the exclusive- 
 ness of the citizens. The different classes, of course, followed. 
 Even to Americans it is real pleasant for a party of friends to 
 get together and be shut off from strangers, or obnoxious pas- 
 sengers in a compartment to themselves. I think both first and 
 second class carriages are more comfortable than the average 
 passenger cars on the roads here at home. They are never 
 crowded beyond their seating capacity, and are more comfort- 
 able to sit in. Very few travelers in Europe ride in the first-class 
 carriages. Americans nearly all do, I fancy they are fearfu \ Q 
 if they do not it w,ill be inferred they have not the money to 
 22 
 
X70 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S 
 
 afford the luxury. The chief difference between first and 
 second class compartments is. in their upholstering inside. The 
 fare by first class is about fifty per cent greater than by the 
 second, and second is' about as much greater than the third. 
 Traveling by third class cars is not pleasant. 
 
 In all the descriptions I had read of the cars in Europe I had 
 not formed a correct idea of them. They are shorter than 
 ours, and are divided into three compartments by petitions run- 
 ning across the cars from top to bottom. Each contains two 
 seats, one facing to the rear and the other to the front, just like 
 a two seated carriage here at home. Two doors enter each 
 compartment, one on either side.. The seats are divided off by 
 cushioned arms, similar to the arms of an old fashioned chair, 
 so arranged that they may be turned back, leaving the seat un- 
 obstructed from one end to the other. The backs are up- 
 holstered clear to the top of the car, and in this respect are de- 
 cidedly more comfortable than ours. Over each seat is a long, 
 net rack, for hand baggage, besides plenty of room under the 
 seats. Facilities for light and ventilation are very good. Each 
 compartment is furnished with a lantern at night, inserted from 
 the roof. Guards or conductors never enter the cars during 
 their occupancy by passengers. A step runs the entire length 
 of each car on the outside, similar to the open street cars in 
 some cities where the seats run from side to side of the car. 
 Guards communicate with passengers through the doors, stand- 
 ing on this step. The complement in first-class compartments 
 is eight people, four on each seat, and those on one seat facing 
 those on another. 
 
 The road beds, the depots, the paraphernalia, and the man- 
 agement of roads in Europe are nearly always superb. Great 
 attention is paid to the preservation of life. If death occurs 
 over there from carelesseness I presume some one has to suffer 
 for it. In very few places in England, Scotland- and France 
 do railroads cross each other on the same level. One shoots 
 over the other on a bridge. Nearly all pikes in those countries, 
 also, cross railroads on bridges. In the countries where this is 
 not done a watchman is stationed at each crossing, however in- 
 significant, to bar the way with a long sweep or pole on the 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 7 '* 
 
 approach of trains, of which they are usually notified by an 
 electric alarm. No one, not even a man on foot, is allowed to 
 cross the track after the sweep comes down, although no cars 
 are in sight. 
 
 Much care is exercised by guards, at the depots, to see that 
 passengers do not take the wrong train, and to prevent their 
 getting off and on when the cars are in motion. Our party 
 often came near throwing these careful men into spasms by our 
 utter disregard of the rules of the road, and our apparent indif- 
 ference to our' own personal safety. When we wanted to go 
 anywhere we generally went, notwithstanding the vehement 
 protests of the guards. Two or three oi us might be collared 
 and held in some 'sort of subjection, but the others would take 
 advantage of the situation and skip around. The principal 
 source of annoyance to the guards was our habit of standing 
 outside the cars, at the stations, - holding the doors open ready 
 to jump in when the train got in motion. This was contrary to 
 rules, and the polite and considerate guards would dance up 
 and down the train, gently pushing us inside, so that they 
 might close the doors and blow their old dinner horn as a signal 
 for the engineer to turn on steam. We never once heard the 
 cry of "all aboard." In England and Scotland a bell was rung 
 a few minutes before starting time and we were told in our ver- 
 nacular, "take your seats. " Elsewhere they likewise rang the 
 bell and used some kind of lin^o, but we never knew what it 
 was though we guessed it meant "get in." 
 
 There is no system of "through" tickets in Europe, and one 
 can not check his baggage, both of which are a nuisance. One 
 can only buy a ticket to the end of the road over which he starts 
 on his journey, and if he has a trunk he must be at the depot 
 quite a while before train time in order to get it aboard. At 
 the end of that road he must claim it, and if he continues his 
 journey he must go through all this routine^again. He has not 
 the happy privilege of handing his check to a baggage man and 
 whirling away to the hotel for his baggage to follow him. And 
 they look out for extra baggage, allowing but 56 pounds, in 
 some countries, and charging heavily for all over that weight. 
 Hand baggage is not counted, and it was, doubtless, for that 
 
17.2. TRK BIG AMERICAS! CARAVANS 
 
 reason we saw native travelers often lugging two great big 
 valises into the carriages with them. 
 
 And the cars have no saloons for .ladies, or gentlemen either, 
 which Americans regard as a woful want. One can hardly 
 imagine the discomforts that arise from this omission. It seems 
 that an enlightened people would have long ago corrected the 
 error. Nor is there any provision for water, as I wrote in a pre- 
 vious letter. Our skirmishes after this article were frequently 
 a laughable part of our junketings. I don't think any of us saw 
 a water cooler in all Europe. I suspect if one was set up, even 
 in a hotel in Paris or London, the citizens would not divine its 
 use. They wash clothes with water, and doubtless cook with it, 
 and, perhaps, now and then, give it to their stock, but precious 
 little do the people drink themselves 
 
 As a matter of some interest it may not be amiss to give you 
 a better idea of our mode of travel than could be gathered from 
 my previous letters. As I wrote you from London, our party 
 for the greater part of the time we were in Scotland numbered 
 about 220 persons. The baggage was then all intact, and its 
 quantity was simply enormous. On the steamer, while cross- 
 ing the ocean, three of the sections intending to make the long 
 tour, were organized by the members of the party making their 
 own selections, the result being generally satisfactory. Then 
 there was the short section, composed of those going no further 
 than Switzerland. One section had already gotten under way 
 for Italy! Before entering the Firth of Clyde a boat brought 
 out a pilot, and with it came an agent of Henry Gaze & Son, 
 Tourist Contractors, of London, who at once organized the 
 members of each section into parties of one, two and three each, 
 who desired to room together during the journey on land, 
 stating that the larger rooms, containing as many as three beds, 
 would be found the most desirable. He even went so far as to 
 state that he would try and have any two squads put in adjoining 
 rooms where they so desired it. I will illustrate : 
 
 A lady from Boston, another from Pennsylvania and the "lit- 
 tle one " wanted to room together, while another lady and her 
 daughter wanted an adjoining room. These names were entered 
 in the agent's list in the order I have mentioned them ; then 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1/3 
 
 brackets thrown around the first three names and the last two 
 respectively, and another bracket around them all to indicate 
 the wants of these people. , This enabled them to enter into a 
 species of co-partnership in the matter of soap, brushes, combs, 
 trunks and the like that proved a matter of convenience in many 
 ways ; but principally in the reduction of baggage to the mini- 
 mum, thus making the daily " packing up " a less serious mat- 
 ter. My guess is that every trunk and valise in the party 
 had some article of furniture belonging to the others, all of 
 which was straightened up in the grand . clearing house — the 
 Inns of Court Hotel, on our return to London. 
 
 Then came the arrangement for the baggage. The roaming 
 squads of each section were numbered, and different colors 
 adopted to represent the section. Blue fell to our section. 
 The numbers given these squads were written opposite the 
 respective names on the list, and then a number of the lists 
 were printed, and a copy sent ahead to each hotel where we 
 were to stop, on a day already fixed. Then upon the baggage, 
 not carried in the hand, were pasted the numbers corresponding 
 with those given each squad, so that rooms at hotels might be 
 assigned and the baggage deposited in them by the numbers, 
 and not by the names of the owners. In addition to this, linen 
 tags were distributed for the proper dddress of the owners, and 
 to be attached to every piece, whether satchel, shawl, valise or 
 trunk. On the reverse side of these tags instructions in Ger- 
 man, French and English were printed for the disposition of the 
 article to which it was attached, in case it went astray — that 
 was to express it to Henry Gaze & Son, London, at their ex- 
 pense. In such event they would be able, at once, to forward 
 it to the owners. 
 
 Upon arriving at London from Scotland all the trunks not 
 required for the tour were taken by these gentlemen to their 
 own warehouse, and those pieces not carried in the hand, but 
 which had to go in the baggage car, were numbered in white 
 paint, with the section and squad, to avoid erasure. During 
 the entire trip, as has been seen from previous letters, we were 
 actively on the move nearly all the time, and yet there was but 
 one detention in all that time, which, in that instance, was 
 
1 74 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN S 
 
 caused by a blunder in a railroad. On the contrary, we gener- 
 ally found, on reaching the hotels, our rooms already assigned, 
 and the trunks in them, unstrapped, ready for opening. A 
 young Englishman by the name of T. G Mill had charge of 
 the baggage, in addition to other minor details, and to his 
 energy and continued watchfulness we were indebted to the 
 great relief experienced by freedom from all care, with refer- 
 ence to a matter which, at all times, and in all lands, has been 
 a source of so much care and anxiety to independent travelers. 
 The only attention we bestowed upon our trunks was to pack 
 and fasten them in our rooms, and leave them there. 
 
 Mr. E. McQueen Gray was our chief conductor, interpreter, 
 guide, cashier and companion. In all he was royal. I doubt 
 if a better man could have been selected. He was a Scotchman 
 by birth, but had been a resident of London during the last few 
 years, and for a greater part of the time in the employ of 
 Henry Gaze & Son. I do-not know how many languages he 
 spoke, but he seemed at home wherever he went. He was 
 remarkably patient with our troublesome party, and was never 
 discovered out of humor at things, which, it seemed to me, would 
 have annoyed a saint. In a nice little speech, made to us by Mr. . 
 Gaze, as we sat at the table in our hotel in London, he spoke 
 of Mr. Gray as one of the best men. to be found in all England 
 for the position. It was he who had come aboard our ship, and 
 who had conducted us through Scotland- and his native High- 
 lands, and it did not require this eulogy from his employer to 
 make us appreciate the man. He was a person of rare infor- 
 mation, and there was a fund of wit and good humor about him 
 that even quieted, in a great measure, the grumblers of our party. 
 He planned our campaigns ahead, and, at the dinner table in 
 the evening, announced the programme for the morrow, the 
 time for getting up, the hours for meals, the time for leaving 
 the hotels, and whether we would need lunch between meals, 
 and when and where we would get it. He paid our bills and 
 kept an account against each, thus saving ' us the annoyance 
 caused by the constant change from the use of one kind of 
 money to another, and did many other useful things for us that 
 would have caused an independent tourist much lossof time and 
 
TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 1 75 
 
 anxiety to have looked after himself. If, hereafter, I should 
 hear of any of my friends making a tour • of that country, I 
 would he very glad to learn they had fallen under the conduc- 
 torship of Mr. Gray. And I say these things of him the more 
 cheerfully, because he so well deserves them, and because, at 
 one time on the tour, I got cross towards him, and said ugly 
 things about him. I guess my digestive organs were out of re- 
 pair, for, sitting here in my home, and looking back at the 
 wirey, patient, hard -worked and always willing conductor, I see 
 how greatly our section were favored by having him to look 
 after us. I feel sure if he were to come over here we would all 
 be disposed to give him a very hearty greeting. 
 
 I like the manner in which we traveled. There were a few 
 minor disadvantages connected with it, but I think those were 
 largely overbalanced by the absolute advantages. Porters and 
 servants did not bother us; hackmen did not fleece us; there 
 were no hotel extras, except such as we knowingly and pur- 
 posely made; our local guides were all provided when necessary, 
 and fees for admission to sights all paid ; the best things to be 
 seen were culled from the long list, and no time lost in hunting 
 them up ; and such careful provision was made for all our move- 
 ments that we could give ourselves over to the full enjoyment 
 of the novelties surrounding us. Besides, we had lots of fun 
 among ourselves. In the long trip together we got to be some- ^ 
 what like a big family, and were good company for each other 
 when surfeited with sight seeing. 
 
 I speak now of people who desire to see as much of Europe 
 as possible for the least money, people who are not able to af- „ 
 ford an expensive trip. Many of those with us were teachers 
 and scholars and had to make this tour during their vacation. * 
 The cost of the tour from New York and back was $500, and it 
 was not absolutely necessary for any member to spend $50 
 over that sum, though most of them did it. Washing was the 
 only absolute extra, boots, even, being blacked, without charge, @ 
 at the hotels. I think an independent tourist could not go over 
 the same ground we did and see what we saw for less than 
 $1,000, and short of a month or two greater length of time. Of 
 course, if one has plenty of money, and time is no considera* 
 
1^6 THE BIG AMERICAN CARAVAN'S TOUR THROUGH EUROPE. 
 
 tion, and he had just as soon be alone as in company, he would 
 certainly go alone and take it leisurely. But, for my own part, 
 I would not give five cents to go trudging over Europe, or any 
 other country, among a people whose language I; could not 
 understand, and having no one along to help me admire the 
 sights. I can not even enjoy fishing or huntiug, my chief hob- 
 bies, when by myself. 
 
 And thus I close my last letter.