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DEDICATION.iii 
 
 CONTENTS.v 
 
 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.vii 
 
 INTRODUCTION. .... 9 
 
 THE CHURCH OF SAN PABLO, SEVILLE.11 
 
 EL PUERTA DEL VINO. ALHAMBRA (GRANADA).13 
 
 A GYPSY DANCE NEAR GRANADA.17 
 
 UNDER ARREST IN CORDOVA.23 
 
 A VERANDA IN THE ALCAZARIA.27 
 
 IN AND OUT OF A CAB IN AMSTERDAM. 31 
 
 A WATER-LOGGED TOWN IN HOLLAND.37 
 
 Under a Balcony.38 
 
 A Day with the Professor.41 
 
 A Visit from the Doctor.43 
 
 ON THE RIVA, VENICE.46 
 
 A SUMMER’S DAY IN VENICE.52 
 
 THE TOP OF A GONDOLA ..56 
 
 BEHIND THE RIALTO.61 
 
 UP A BELFRY IN BAVARIA. . 65 
 
PHOTOTYPE PLATES 
 
 TITLE PAGE 
 
 THE HEERENGRAACHT, AMSTERDAM. Frontispiece, 
 
 INTERIOR OF SAN PABLO, SEVILLE.10 
 
 EL PUERTA DEL VINO, ALHAMBRA.12 
 
 A SPANISH POSADA.16 
 
 THE ALTO ARCHO.22 
 
 THE ALCAZARIA, SEVILLE. 26 
 
 ON THE WAGENSLUIS, DORDRECHT.36 
 
 BEHIND THE GROOTE KERK.38 
 
 AMONG THE MARKET BOATS.40 
 
 THE POTATO MARKET.42 
 
 ALONG THE RIVA, VENICE.46 
 
 THE WINE SHOP ON THE GRAND CANAL.52 
 
 LIGHTERS OFF THE DOGANA, VENICE.56 
 
 A VENETIAN POTTERY SHOP.60 
 
 NEAR NEIGHBORS IN A BAVARIAN TOWN.64 
 
 THE OLD TOWN OF “-”.66 
 
 ILLUSTRATIONS IN THE TEXT 
 
 HEAD-PIECE. 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 SPANISH ALTAR LAMP. 
 
 WOODEN FIGURE OF THE VIRGIN. 
 
 COURT OF MYRTLES, ALHAMBRA. 
 
 A CORNER OF THE ALHAMBRA. 
 
 THE GARDEN OF THE ALHAMBRA. 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 THE GATE OF JUSTICE, ALHAMBRA. 
 
 ENTRANCE OF A POSADA, GRANADA. 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 AN OLD MOORISH GATE. 
 
 9 
 
 10 
 
 11 
 
 12 
 
 13 
 
 14 
 
 15 
 
 16 
 17 
 19 
 22 
 23 
 
ILL ULTRA TIONS 
 
 viii 
 
 A TARTANA 
 A MOORISH KNOCKER, SEVILLE . 
 INTERIOR OF A SPANISH CHURCH . 
 STREET OF THE ALCAZARIA .... 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 HEAD-PIECE. 
 
 A CANAL IN AMSTERDAM .... 
 DUTCH LUGGERS, AMSTERDAM 
 A MARKET LANDING, AMSTERDAM . 
 
 THE STATION-HOUSE LAMP .... 
 
 HOLLAND MILK JAR. 
 
 HEAD-PIECE. 
 
 THE BALCONY. 
 
 SUNSET, DORDRECHT. 
 
 HEAD-PIECE. 
 
 AN OLD WIND-MILL, PAPENDRECHT . 
 
 HEAD-PIECE. 
 
 FERRY LANDING, DORDRECHT 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 FRUIT MARKET, VENICE. 
 
 GRAND CANAL, VENICE .... 
 
 FISHING BOATS, VENICE. 
 
 OFF THE SANTA MARIA DELLA PIET A . 
 
 GONDOLAS WAITING. 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 THE SALUTE FROM THE GRAND CANAL . 
 CHIOGGIA FISHING BOATS .... 
 
 A FLASK OF CHIANTI. 
 
 LIGHTER BOATS AT ANCHOR . 
 
 THE SALUTE . 
 
 THE GRAND CANAL . 
 
 A FELSE. 
 
 UP A CROOKED CANAL .... 
 
 WAITING FOR THE TIDE. 
 
 TAIL-PIECE. 
 
 THE BELFRY IN BAVARIA .... 
 ENTRANCE TO THE MONASTERY 
 THE VAULTED ROOM OF THE MONASTERY 
 THE EMPTY CENSER. 
 
 26 
 
 27 
 
 28 
 
 29 
 
 30 
 
 31 
 
 32 
 
 33 
 
 35 
 
 36 
 
 37 
 
 38 
 
 39 
 
 40 
 
 41 
 
 42 
 
 43 
 
 44 
 
 45 
 
 46 
 
 47 
 
 48 
 
 49 
 
 50 
 
 51 
 
 52 
 
 53 
 
 55 
 
 56 
 
 57 
 
 59 
 
 60 
 
 61 
 
 63 
 
 64 
 
 65 
 
 67 
 
 68 
 
 69 
 
INTRODUCTION 
 
 'HESE brush and pen sketches are the record of some idle days spent in ram- 
 
 bling about odd places, and into quaint nooks, and along well-worn roads of 
 travel. They contain no information of any value to anybody. They are abso¬ 
 lutely bare of statistics, are entirely useless as a guide to travelers, and can be 
 of no possible benefit to a student desirous of increasing his knowledge either 
 of foreign architecture, mediaeval art, politics, or any kindred subject. 
 
 They are not arranged in any order, have no specific bearing one upon the 
 other, and are, in short, the merest outline of what one may see and hear who 
 keeps both his eyes and his ears wide open. 
 
 The brush sketches were made on the spot and in the open air. The pen 
 sketches were written some months after, when the discomforts and annoyances 
 of travel had passed out of mind, and only the memory remained of the many 
 happy hours spent under cool archways, and along canals, and up curious, 
 twisted streets, and into dark, old, smoked churches. They, however, possess 
 one quality, and that is truth. The pictures are portraits, and the incidents 
 actually occurred. 
 
 A painter has peculiar advantages over other less fortunate people. His 
 sketch-book is a passport and his white umbrella a flag of truce in all lands 
 under the sun, be it savage or civilized ; an u open sesame,” bringing good 
 cheer and hospitality, and entitling the possessor to all the benefits of liberty, 
 equality, and fraternity. 
 
 I have been picked up on a roadside in Cuba by a Spanish grandee, who 
 has driven me home in his volante to breakfast. I have been left in charge of 
 the priceless relics and treasures of old Spanish churches hours at a time and 
 alone. I have had my beer mug filled to the brim by mountaineers in the 
 
10 IN TROD UCTION 
 
 Tyrolean Alps, and had a chair placed for me at the table of a Dutchman liv¬ 
 ing near the Zuider Zee. All these courtesies and civilities being the result of 
 only ten minutes’ previous acquaintance, and only because I was a painter. 
 
 Truly “one touch of nature [with the brush] makes the whole world kin.” 
 
 If, therefore, by reason of my craft and its advantages, I can show you some 
 thing’s you may perhaps have overlooked in your own wanderings, I shall be 
 more than satisfied. So, if you will draw another easy-chair up to my studio 
 fire, I will bring you out my portfolio and hand you the sketches. They will 
 be shown you haphazard, and while you criticise their shortcomings I will tell 
 you as simply as I can under what circumstances and conditions they were 
 painted, narrowing my descriptions to the groups who looked over my shoulder 
 while I worked, and who daily formed my circle of acquaintance; merely hint¬ 
 ing to you as delicately as possible that a traveler, even with an ordinary pair 
 of eyes and ears, can get much nearer to the heart of a people in their cafes, 
 streets, and markets than in their museums, galleries, and palaces, and remind¬ 
 ing you at the same time of the old adage which claims that “a live gamin 
 is better than a dead king,” for all the practical purposes of life. 
 
 F. H. S. 
 
 New York, September, 1886. 
 
 

 THE CHURCH OF SAN PABLO, SEVILLE 
 
 1 had a queer adventure in this old Spanish church. I was a 
 voluntary prisoner within its quiet walls for half a day. The in¬ 
 tense heat of the morning had driven me out of the small plaza 
 near the fruit market, and into a narrow, crooked street which led 
 to the open church door. The interior was filled with the fragrant 
 incense of the mass, just closed, and the cool air and silence of the 
 place were so grateful that I laid my “ trap ” softly down near a group 
 of pillars, uncovered my head, and watched the kneeling figures pray¬ 
 ing at the feet of the Virgin. Two altar boys entered from a side 
 door, snuffed out the long candles, and covered the altar with white 
 $ cloths. One by one the kneeling penitents rose, bowed reverently, 
 drew their mantillas closer, and glided out into the sunlight, boon 
 the sacristan appeared, closed the great swinging-doors behind the 
 last worshiper, and discovered me with my easel up. I had already 
 blocked in one end of the confessional, over which hung poised in 
 air a huge angel, holding a swinging-lamp. 
 
 “ Seilor, it is not permitted to remain longer. It is eleven o’clock. 
 At four you can return again.” 
 
 Two pesetas performed a miracle. The sacristan was soon in the hot street 
 with the money and the keys in his pocket, and I was locked up alone in the 
 cool church with my easel and sketch. I continued painting. The hours wore 
 on slowly. The light streamed in through the high windows, patterned the 
 floor, crept up the altar steps, and illumined the head of the huge angel with 
 a crown of prismatic color. 
 
 The silence became intense, and was broken only by the muffled sound of a 
 door closing in the cloister beyond. Suddenly a panel opened in the solid Avail 
 to my left, and a figure closely veiled and shrouded in black tottered in, sup¬ 
 ported by her duenna and an elderly woman. She staggered to the altar steps, 
 and threw back her mantilla. She was richly dressed, deathly pale, and her eyes 
 red with weeping. With a cry of agony she lifted up her hands, and fell half 
 swooning at the feet of the figure of the Virgin. 
 
 “Mi adorada amiga! ” she sobbed, “they have taken you away. Mother of 
 God, have mercy! ” The duenna raised her head and laid it in her lap. The 
 mother sat silently by, smoothing her temples and fanning softly. Again she 
 raised herself, and, winding her white arms around the Virgin, while her black 
 hair streamed over her tear-stained face, she poured out her grief, until she sank 
 
12 
 
 THE CHURCH OF SAN PABLO , SEVILLE 
 
 back exhausted and motionless. This continued nearly an hour, — the senorita 
 sobbing- convulsively, and the two women kneeling beside her, waiting for the 
 paroxysms to pass, until, utterly worn out, she was lifted and half carried across 
 the aisle and through the open door. It closed gently and left no trace. 
 
 I emerged from my shelter, gathered up my brushes, and continued work. 
 The confessional box took definite shape, and the angel was kept in his proper 
 place by many pats of color bestowed on the background around him. A few 
 touches brought out the swinging-lamp and the organ-pipes against the light 
 high up in the nave. But I could not paint. I pushed back my easel and 
 began wandering about. I sat down by the altar steps, near where the seno¬ 
 rita had thrown herself, and examined carefully the poor cracked image of the 
 Virgin, with the paint scaling off and crumbling under my touch, to which she 
 had clung so desperately. I went on tiptoe to the altar. The old Spanish 
 chairs on either side were covered with soiled linen covers ; underneath, huge 
 brass nails of a Moorish pattern, and scarlet velvet, threadbare. The vessels, 
 quaint in design, silvered on copper. The cloths, superb with delicate Sala¬ 
 manca embroidery in pale yellow and white. The lamp which hung in front, 
 suspended from a chain lost in the gloom of the 
 roof, burned a ruby light. Behind the altar, broken 
 saints of wood and plaster, bits of candles, tapers, 
 and the ashes of many censers. Behind this, a cir¬ 
 cular stairway leading to the organ loft. Up this 
 stairway, dust, and a lumber-room containing old 
 chant-books bound in vellum, yellow and worm-eaten, 
 with bronze corners and heavy bindings torn and de¬ 
 faced. Farther on, a small door, and then the or¬ 
 gan. The floor was strewn with broken keys, twisted 
 pipes and wire, and the great tubes were smashed in 
 as if with the butt of a musket. I again closed the 
 small door, and descended the stairway. A key 
 grated in a lock, the great door swung open, and 
 let in the sunlight, the hot air, and the sacristan. 
 
 Had I been disturbed? Yes, the senorita. He 
 looked startled. 
 
 Through which door ? Ah ! yes ; from the Arch¬ 
 bishop’s. He had heard about it. It was very sad- 
 Tlie poor senorita, and she so beautiful! 
 
 “ But is there no hope ? ” 
 
 “ No, mi amigo ; he was shot at daylight.” 
 

EL PUERTA DEL VINO. ALHAMBRA (GRANADA) 
 
 The legends say that the Moorish kings stored their choicest wine in the 
 cellars beneath this curious old archway. It was blazing away this morning at 
 a white heat under a Spanish sun and against a china-blue sky, and it shel¬ 
 tered not the juice of the grape, but an aguadero and two donkeys. All three 
 were asleep, — the water-carrier on his back, and the patient, tired little beasts 
 propped up against each other. 
 
 They had climbed the long hill of the Alhambra very many times since sun¬ 
 rise, and the water-jars had been often filled that day, and as often emptied into 
 thirsty villagers in the plain below. They had refreshed everybody but them¬ 
 selves, and it now seemed to be their turn. So they dozed away, and I con¬ 
 tinued painting. 
 
 If their green jars had contained wine I should have had no use for it. No 
 water-color painter does. But water, pure water, began to be valuable; my 
 bottle was empty, and the well some distance off. It was cruel to disturb them, 
 but after all I am only human. “ Agua ? Si, senor.” The aguadero sprang 
 to his feet, the donkeys lazily opened their eyes, a simultaneous convulsive move¬ 
 ment of long ears and short tails, and the procession moved down out into the 
 glare, and halted outside of my umbrella. 
 
 A glass wet and held high, glistening in the sunlight, a shower of diamond 
 drops thrown in a circle, a gurgling sound from a cool jar, and, with the bow 
 of an Hidalgo, the aguadero handed me that most blessed of all drinks, — cool 
 water in a hot land. I dropped a copper into his outstretched hand, and looked 
 up. He was a tall, straight young fellow, swarthy, with high cheek-bones, and 
 black, bead-like eyes; a red silk handkerchief bound his head, and a broad sash 
 encircled his waist. 
 
14 
 
 EL PUERTA DEL VINO 
 
 “You are not a Spaniard?” I asked. 
 
 His face flushed, and a smile of supreme contempt crept over it. 
 
 “ A Spaniard ? Caramba ! No, senor ! I am a gypsy ! Come.” 
 
 He caught me by the arm, and half dragged me to the low wall which over¬ 
 hangs the plain. Below was the valley of the Vega and the city of Granada 
 swimming in a gray dust. He pointed to a narrow road far down the slope, 
 skirted by the river Darro. 
 
 «See you those dark holes in the hillside ? That is my home.” I made him 
 a low bow. I had not only caught a gypsy, but a cave-dweller. 
 
 I remembered instantly that this man’s ancestors lived in these holes in the 
 ground before Ibun-I-Ahmar began to build the Alhambra. I also remembered 
 that the Moors had “ met with some reverses; ” but here was this sunburnt 
 
 gypsy living in a house eight hundred years old, and the house still in posses¬ 
 sion of his family ! I handed him a cigarette, and made room for him under 
 my umbrella. 
 
EL PUERTA DEL VINO 
 
 15 
 
 His story was very simple. He had been a water-carrier for several years. 
 In the summer time he earned two pesetas (about forty cents). The donkeys 
 belonged to his father, who had half of his earnings. That left one peseta for 
 himself and Pepita. 
 
 Was Pepita his wife? No, not yet, because her mother had been a long time 
 sick; but soon — perhaps by next Holy Week. 
 
 He wished I knew Pepita. “ Her waist was so ” (making a circle of his two 
 thumbs and his two forefingers), “ her ankle was so ” (one thumb and one fore- 
 fin ger), “ and her foot so ” (holding up his little finger). 
 
 Pepita was as good as she was pretty. Perhaps she would come up to the 
 well to-day, for she was at mass when he left that morning. He would go to 
 the well and look for her. 
 
 He was gone a long time, and but for the dozing donkeys broiling in the 
 sun I should have given him up. 
 
 Suddenly four long ears pointed forward, and two stumpy tails veered like 
 weather-vanes. Through the archway came my aguadero and the daintiest of 
 little gypsy maidens. She wore a white kerchief tied under her chin, great 
 hoops of gold in her ears, strings of blue heads around her neck and wrists, 
 over her shoulders a yellow scarf, and on her feet tiny black slippers with red 
 heels. Shading her eyes with her fan she gave me a timid courtesy, and stood 
 at one side resting her hand on her lover’s shoulder. She watched every move¬ 
 ment of my brush, and laughed heartily when a few strokes indicated the don¬ 
 keys. 
 
 But it was growing late. Would the most illustrious painter have any more 
 water? Would he share the grapes Pepita had brought? Yes, with pleasure; 
 but Pepita should have five pesetas. 
 
 Shall I tell you what happened as I placed the coins in her hands? 
 
 “Ah, senor! Bueno! bueno! Mateo, see!” she said, holding up the money 
 and seizing my hand, her eyes filling with tears. Before I was aware she had 
 kissed it. 
 
 The aguadero leaned forward and whispered, “ You know her mother is very 
 sick.” 
 
16 EL PUERTA DEL VINO 
 
 Then he fumbled about between the donkeys, and piled both panniers and 
 all the jars on top of the uglier and sleepier of the two, and the dainty little 
 sweetheart was lifted on the other 1 . Then I watched them through the archway 
 and down the steep hill, until they were lost amid the pomegranates. 
 
 I held up the back of my hand. Yes, there was no mistake; she had kissed 
 it. It was a pity that she — but then, of course, I was only a stray painter. 
 I was not an aguadero, descendant of a family eight hundred years old, a landed 
 proprietor, with a cash capital of five pesetas, and a half interest in a water- 
 route and two donkeys ! 
 
 After all, are the good things of this world so unequally divided ? 
 
 Quien sabe ? 
 
A GYPSY DANCE NEAR 
 GRANADA 
 
 Mateo, the aguadero, and I became 
 great friends. His cheery, bright face, 
 and his welcome “ buenos dias, senor,” 
 were very grateful to me so many miles 
 away from home. He and the donkeys 
 stumbled in upon me at all hours, and 
 in all parts of the Alhambra grounds; 
 and if he did not quickly catch sight 
 of my white umbrella, he would leave 
 his little beasts in the road and go 
 in search of me. 
 
 This afternoon I heard his voice far 
 down the hill, and in a few moments 
 more he came singing through the small entrance gate, and, burst¬ 
 ing into a laugh, began to tell me the latest news in the city 
 below. 
 
 He was especially delighted over the padre who sold the chairs 
 out of the sacristy to the Englishman, and who did not give all 
 the money to the bishop. This I knew to be true, for I had a 
 hand in a similar transaction myself, — the chair I write in being part of the 
 villainy. 
 
 He had a sad story to tell about Santiago, who lived at the Great Gate, and 
 whose brother, the matador, had been hurt in the bull-tight. 
 
 Then he told me about the actor from Madrid, who lived in one of the old 
 red towers of the Alhambra, and came every summer with a new wife; about 
 the mass on Sunday last, the procession of Holy W eek; and the great Spaniard 
 who lived in Paris, and who visited his olive farm only once in five years, and 
 who arrived yesterday. Then, finally, about Pepita. I began to notice that all 
 these talks ended in Pepita. To-day he was in fine spirits. He had already 
 earned three pesetas, and it was not yet sundown. 
 
 It was a “ Fiesta day,” and the churches and streets were full, and the peo¬ 
 ple very thirsty. To-night he and Pepita would go to the dance. 
 
 Up to this time I listened to his talk without ever looking up from my work. 
 I was struggling with the Moorish arch over the entrance of the Hall of the 
 Ambassadors, and had my hands full, but here I laid down my palette. 
 
 “ What dance, Mateo ? ” 
 
 «The dance of the gypsies, senor, at the Posada del Albaycin. La Tonta 
 
18 
 
 A GYPSY DANCE NEAR GRANADA 
 
 would dance, and the king of the gypsies would bring his great guitar. Would 
 the illustrious painter accompany them ? ” 
 
 That being the one particular thing the illustrious painter most desired to 
 see in all Granada, I at once accepted, hurried up my work, and arranged to 
 meet them both at the Great Gate of Charles Y. Accordingly about an horn* 
 after sundown I gave my watch and wallet to the landlord, took my umbrella- 
 staff, and strolled down the hill. 
 
 Mateo awaited me in the shadow of the arch of the gate, carrying a lantern. 
 Pepita joined us farther down in the city; she had stopped on her way tip to 
 re-string her guitar. In a few moments more we all halted at the door of a 
 wine shop in the rear of the church. This was the Posada del Albaycin. A 
 dim lamp fastened against the wall revealed a crowd of aguaderos, fruit-sellers, 
 and garlic-venders, together with a motley crew of Spaniards and gypsies of both 
 sexes crowding about the entrance. 
 
 As I passed in, I heard overhead the click of the castanets and the low 
 thrumming of the guitars. Ascending the steps, I found myself in a long room 
 on the second floor, simply furnished with a row of chairs on either side, and 
 lighted by a number of lamps suspended on brackets fastened to the wall. At 
 one end was a raised platform covered with a carpet. Seated upon this plat¬ 
 form was a man of middle age, very tall and broadly built, with the features 
 and expression of an American Indian. Compared in size to the gypsies about 
 him, he was a giant. He was tuning an enormous guitar, — a very grandfather 
 of guitars, — having all the strings which ordinary instruments of its class pos¬ 
 sess, and an extra string fastened on an outrigger. The back of this curious 
 instrument was covered with sheet-brass. 
 
 As we entered he left his chair, placed the guitar against the wall, greeted 
 Mateo and Pepita, and, having spoken in an undertone to the aguadero, raised 
 his wide Spanish hat and saluted me gracefully. 
 
 Pepita occupied one of the vacant seats on the platform, and rested her in¬ 
 strument gently against her knee, while her lover and I watched the groups as 
 they crowded up the narrow stairway and filled the floor space. 
 
 He pointed out all the celebrities. The tall man with the overgrown guitar 
 
 was known as the king of the gypsies. The dance to-night was for his ben¬ 
 efit. La Tonta was his daughter, and the best dancer in Spain. She did not 
 dance often. He was sure I would not be disappointed. But the dance was 
 about to begin, and we must keep silence. 
 
 The king bowed to the audience, struck his guitar with the flat of his hand, 
 swept all the strings simultaneously, twirled it in the air, kissed it, and then, 
 taking his seat with a great flourish, began the melody. Immediately, at the 
 
 far end of the room, a young gypsy arose, tightened his belt, clapped his hands, 
 
 and began a slow movement with his feet, the dancers and audience keeping- 
 time with their castanets and the palms of their hands. 
 
 Then a gypsy girl took the floor and danced a “ Bolero.” Then came more 
 gypsies in tight trousers and loose jackets, until the hour arrived for the sensa¬ 
 tion of the evening. 
 
A GYPSY DANCE NEAR GRANADA 
 
 19 
 
 A great clapping announced La Tonta as she entered quickly from a side 
 door, and stood facing the mirror. To my surprise she was a tall, thin, un¬ 
 graceful, badly-formed, and slattern-looking gypsy woman, by no means young. 
 She was attired in a long yellow calico gown hanging loosely about her, much 
 the worse for wear and not overclean. She wore black kid slippers and white 
 cotton stockings. Her skin was dark like all women of her race, and her eyes 
 large and luminous. Her mass of jet-black hair was caught in a twist behind, 
 the whole decorated with blossoms of the tuberose. Taken as a whole, she 
 
 was the last woman in all Spain you would have picked out as a star dan- 
 seuse. 
 
 I looked at Mateo in surprise, but his expression was too earnest and his ad¬ 
 miration too sincere. He evidently did not agree with me in my estimate of 
 La Tonta. He laid his hand upon my knee, and said, “ Wait! ” 
 
 At this instant a stout gypsy in his shirt sleeves, who had been beating time 
 with his cane, and who appeared to be master of ceremonies, cleared the floor, 
 pressing everybody back against the wall. 
 
 La Tonta stood surveying herself in the mirror which hung over the mantel. 
 
20 
 
 A GYPSY DANCE NEAR GRANADA 
 
 She nodded to Mateo, and began rolling up her soiled calico sleeves quite to 
 her shoulders, revealing a thin, although well-proportioned and not altogether 
 unattractive pair of arms. She then stripped the cheap tinsel bracelets from 
 her wrists, and put them in her bosom. 
 
 As the music increased in volume, she shut her eyes and stretched out her 
 long arms as a panther sometimes does; then lifted them above her head, and 
 instantly they fell into the rhythm of the music. Her feet now began to move, 
 and a peculiar swaying motion started as if from her heels, ran up through 
 her limbs, back, and neck, undulated through her long arms, and lost itself in 
 her finger-tips. 
 
 This was repeated again and again, each movement increasing in intensity; 
 her eyes flashing with a light rare even in a Spanish gypsy. She stamped her 
 feet, swayed her body backwards and forwards, almost touched the floor with 
 her hair, and then suddenly rushed forward, appealing to you with her out¬ 
 stretched arms. 
 
 The music seemed to possess her like a spell. She became grace itself, her 
 movements sylph-like —- and if you will believe it, she was positively beautiful. 
 As the music quickened, her gestures became more violent; as it died away, you 
 could hardly believe she moved — and she did not, except the slight shuffling 
 of her feet, which kept up the spell within her. 
 
 The effect on the audience was startling. Men rose to their feet, bending 
 forward and watching her every motion. The women clapped their hands, and 
 encouraging her with cries of “ Olle ! olle ! Bravo, La Tonta ! ” 
 
 Suddenly the music ceased, and La Tonta stood perfectly still. Her eyes 
 opened, her arms fell limp beside her, her back straightened, and she awoke as 
 if from a trance. Giving a quick glance around, she gathered her skirts in her 
 hand and limped rather than walked through the hall and out into the side 
 room, if anything more awkward than when she had entered. 
 
 The applause was long-continued and genuine. I certainly did my share of 
 it. The look of supreme satisfaction which came over the face of my aguadero 
 as he watched my admiration was not the least part of my enjoyment. 
 
 But the dance was over, and we all crowded to the street. Mateo had greet¬ 
 ings for his friends, and Pepita was surrounded by half a dozen girls of her 
 own age, who had kind things to say about her part of the performance. In 
 a moment I was singled out and besieged by a bevy of dark-eyed gypsies, who 
 had heard, no doubt, of Pepita’s good fortune, and who, if they did not have 
 sick mothers at home, had many other interests equally pressing. 
 
 “ Una peseta, sehor,” called out half a dozen at once. I had a few small 
 coins left in my sketching-coat, but they were soon distributed. “ Por me, 
 senor,” said a wicked-looking gypsy girl. My money being all gone, and the 
 bulk of my property being at that moment in the hands of my landlord, I did 
 the next best thing possible. I gave her a red rose from my buttonhole with 
 my best bow. Just here my trouble began. She received it with a cold smile, 
 and turned on her heel. In less time thereafter than I can tell it, a young- 
 fellow broke through the group and confronted me, held the rose in his hand, 
 poured out a torrent of abuse, and ground it into the earth with his heel. 
 
4 GYPSY DANCE NEAP GRANADA 
 
 21 
 
 Mateo sprang forward and caught him by the throat, and for a moment it 
 looked as if there was going to he as lively a scene as I had ever experi¬ 
 enced. But at this instant the powerful form of the king appeared in the door¬ 
 way, and, after mutual explanations on all sides, the young fellow seemed satis¬ 
 fied that no indignity had been offered his sweetheart, and that the illustrious 
 painter had only intended a compliment especially prized by the senoritas in his 
 own country. 
 
 With this we separated, Mateo and Pepita going with me as far as the Great 
 Gate, the groups scattering down the crooked streets, and I to wander about 
 the groves of the Alhambra before going to bed. 
 
 It was a lovely night, and I wanted once more to see the Garden of Linda- 
 raxa with its deep shadows. A few quick steps brought me beyond the arch¬ 
 way of the Gate of Justice, and near the fountains of the Court of Lions. 
 
 It was nearly midnight. The Moorish arches, supported on their slender mar¬ 
 ble columns, wore the color of a tea-rose, as they stood bathed in the moon¬ 
 light. There was no sound but the gurgling of the water running through the 
 channels in the marble at my feet, and the regular plash of the fountain. 
 
 I began thinking about these gypsies, — then history, the peculiarities of 
 their race, the stories of their villainy and treachery, of their vindictiveness, of 
 their curious homes, and then of this girl whom the music had transformed into 
 a goddess. 
 
 My reverie was broken by the sound of a footstep, and rising from my seat 
 I looked behind me into the mass of shadow. It ceased, and I again took my 
 seat. Some visitor, I thought, who would also see the Alhambra by moonlight. 
 But I felt uncomfortable. The incident of the rose was, to say the least, un¬ 
 pleasant. I began realizing the lateness of the hour, and turned my steps back 
 to my lodgings. 
 
 On the way home, finding the bucket of the well of the Moors at the top 
 and full, I had a cool drink. Then I passed down through the trees and into 
 the narrow ravine which leads through the gate, and so on under the archway 
 and out into the moonlight beyond its black shadow. 
 
 At that instant I became conscious that some one was following me. I could 
 hear the rapid footfall timed to keep pace with my own. I grasped my um¬ 
 brella-staff, and slid it along my hand until I could feel the iron spike. As I 
 reached the last outer step of the gate, a man wearing a gypsy’s cloak ran rap¬ 
 idly through the shadow behind and towards me. I turned quickly, and recog¬ 
 nized the young gypsy who had so pointedly destroyed my rose under his boot 
 heel. 
 
 At the same instant another figure stepped from the doorway to my side, and 
 said in a low voice, “Never fear, caballero; it is Mateo.- I am watching the 
 cut-throat.” 
 
 The gypsy started back, sprang over the low wall, and disappeared in the 
 darkness. If I had ever been glad to see Mateo it was at that moment. He 
 was out of breath — and temper. For an instant he was undecided whether he 
 would go home with me or go after the gentleman with the destructive heel. 
 
22 
 
 A GYPSY DANCE NEAR GRANADA 
 
 I finally persuaded him that he possibly might do both, but he should leave 
 me at my lodgings first. 
 
 On our way down the hill Mateo told me his end of the story. After leaving 
 Pepita for the night, and crossing the street which leads to the Great Gate, he 
 had noticed this fellow skulking along, and watched him turn into the Alham¬ 
 bra grounds. Knowing that the gypsy could not reach his home by that route, 
 and remembering our recent difficulty, he had dogged his footsteps into and 
 through the Alhambra, and had caught up with him as I was drinking at the 
 well. Believing that I would go out by the Gate of Justice, he had taken the 
 short cut down the hill, and waited for me under the archway, and I knew 
 the rest. 
 
 I reached my lodgings and rapped up the sleepy porter, and bade good¬ 
 night to my friend the aguadero. I hope my additions to Pepita’s dowry cured 
 the mother and hastened the wedding. 
 
.... 
 
fee - 
 ■Miif 
 
 UNDER ARREST 
 IN 
 
 CORDOVA 
 
 In Spain evolution has produced 
 the tartana from the old - fashioned 
 charcoal cart. During the process 
 the cart lost two of its wheels and 
 the tartana gained two long seats, 
 both chintz covered and made com- 
 , fortable with pew cushions, two pairs of lace curtains looped back fore 
 and aft, and a brief flight of steps farthest from the mule serving as 
 a sort of Jacob’s ladder for ascending and descending senoritas. 
 
 I was standing in the shadow of one of the gates of the great 
 Mosque at Cordova when I saw for the first time a tartana. 
 
 It took possession of me, and in five minutes I had returned the 
 compliment. 
 
 It came around the corner with a rush, smothered in a cloud of white 
 dust, in the centre of which I could see the red tassels of the mule 
 and the outstretched arm of the driver seated on the shaft and wield¬ 
 ing a whip of convincing length. Then it whirled around before me, 
 backed to the sidewalk, and unloaded half a dozen pairs of black eyes, 
 some mantillas, fans, and red-heelecl slippers. 
 
 As the fair senoritas were going to mass and I sketching, we sep¬ 
 arated at once. 
 
 A crack of the whip, a plunge from the convinced mule, a dash along a hot, 
 dusty road, bounded by a hedge of prickly pears, and we all stopped at an old 
 Moorish arch, now, as in olden times, one of the city’s gates. 
 
 I stopped for two reasons. First, because the custom-house officer insisted upon 
 it; and second, because the gate loomed up in such majestic symmetry against 
 the deep blue sky that I determined to paint it at once, and so ordered the 
 driver to unlimber, and prepared for action. 
 
 This meant that the mule was unharnessed and tethered in a shady spot, and 
 that I was anchored out by myself in the tartana in the middle of the road, and 
 in the immediate centre of all the traffic of the city’s gate. 
 
 Any other position, however, would have been useless, for it was the only spot 
 from which I could see through the arch and into the city’s streets beyond. 
 
 Considering that I and my tartana were public nuisances, the good nature and 
 forbearance of the populace were remarkable. Every now and then a great string 
 
24 
 
 UNDER ARREST IN CORDOVA 
 
 of mules would come to a standstill off my weather bow, the muleteer would slide 
 down from his perch, step forward, peer into my shaded retreat, catch sight of 
 the easel, apologize for disturbing the painter, and then proceed to disentangle 
 his string of quadrupeds as if it was a matter of course and part of his daily 
 routine. 
 
 Even the custom - house officers exacting tithes from the hucksters bringing 
 their produce to the city’s market, and who at first regarded me with suspicion, 
 became courteous and lent a helping hand in straightening out the continuous 
 procession of donkeys, market carts, wagons, and teams crossing the cool shadow 
 of the arch. 
 
 The crowd about my muleless tartana were equally considerate. They stood 
 for hours patient and silent, filled my water-bottle, brought me coffee, and one 
 old Sancho Panza of a farmer even handed me up a great bunch of white grapes. 
 All they wanted in return was a view of the sketch. This I paid, holding it up 
 regularly for their inspection every half hour. 
 
 While this busy scene occupied the roadway under the gate, another of quite 
 a different character was taking place in the grated rooms above it. 
 
 I had noticed on my arrival a thinly constructed military gentleman all sword 
 and moustache, who watched me from a -window, and who seemed to take an 
 especial interest in my movements. I now caught sight of him at an upper win¬ 
 dow gesticulating wildly and surrounded by a group of other military gentlemen, 
 all apparently absorbed in me, my tartana, and my circle of art students. Then 
 they disappeared, and I gave the incident no further thought. 
 
 Half an hour later the vista of the street seen through the gate, and conse¬ 
 quently the central point of my sketch, was obstructed by a mass of people crowd¬ 
 ing about the great swinging doors, and from it marched a file of soldiers under 
 command of an officer who began a series of military movements of great sim¬ 
 plicity. 
 
 First, they marched up the road and left two men. Then they marched back 
 and left two more. Then they deployed in front and stationed one at each wheel 
 of my tartana, and finally the officer stepped forward, drew his sword, and, look¬ 
 ing me searchingly in the face, made this startling announcement: -— 
 
 “ Senor, the general in command has ordered your instant arrest. You will 
 accompany me to the prison.” 
 
 As soon as I recovered my breath I came down Jacob’s ladder and asked po¬ 
 litely for an explanation. 
 
 The only reply was a crisp order closing the files, followed by a forward march 
 which swept me down the dusty road under the gate, through an iron-barred door, 
 up a broad flight of stone steps leading up one side of the gate-way, and into a 
 room on the second floor dimly lighted by small grated windows. 
 
 As soon as my eyes, dazzled by the glare of the sunlight, became accustomed 
 to the semi-darkness, I discovered an officer with snow-white hair and moustache, 
 seated at a desk and poring over a mass of papers. He was in full uniform, 
 was half covered with medals, and attended by a secretary. 
 
UNDER ARREST IN CORDOVA 
 
 25 
 
 He arose, perforated me with his eye, listened to the officer’s statement, and de¬ 
 manded my age, name, and occupation. To these questions I gave civil answers, 
 which the secretary recorded. 
 
 Then he faced me sternly and said, “ What are you doing in Cordova ? ” 
 
 “ A little of everything, your excellency. I prowl about the streets, lounge 
 in the cafes, go to mass, make love to the senoritas, attend the bull-fight, and ” — 
 
 “ And make drawings ? ” 
 
 “ I admit it, your excellency.” 
 
 “ What do you do with these drawings, Senor Pintor ? ” 
 
 “ Sell them, your excellency — when I can.” 
 
 “You are a Frenchman?” 
 
 “No, I am an American.” 
 
 “Your passport.” 
 
 “ I have none.” 
 
 That settled it. Seizing a pen, he indorsed a paper handed him by his sec¬ 
 retary, passed it to the officer, and said, in a gruff voice, “ Conduct this man to 
 the Governor.” 
 
 More closing in of files, more drawn sword, more forward march, and down 
 the stone stairs we all tramped out into the glare of the sunlight, through the 
 excited, sympathetic, and curious mob, and then up on the other side of the gate, 
 and up a precisely similar staircase, and into a precisely similar semi-dark room. 
 More desk, more secretary, — two this time, — and more excellency, but here the 
 similarity ends. 
 
 At a square table covered with books and papers was seated a young officer, 
 scarcely twenty years of age, also in full uniform, but without the numismatic 
 collection decorating his chest. He was occupied in rolling a cigarette. 
 
 The only sign he gave of our presence was a glance at the squad and a slight 
 nod to the officer, who saluted him with marked deference. As for myself, I 
 do not think I came within his range. 
 
 The cigarette complete, he struck a light, blew a cloud of smoke from his 
 nostrils, read the much - indorsed paper, reached for a pen, and was about to 
 countersign it when I stepped forward. 
 
 “ Will your highness inform me why I am under arrest ? ” 
 
 “ Certainly; you have been detected in making plans of this prison, which is 
 a military post of Spain. In time of war this is punished with death; in time 
 of peace, by imprisonment.” 
 
 All this, you know, with as much ease and grace of manner as if he had in¬ 
 vited me to luncheon, and was merely giving directions about the temperature 
 of the burgundy! 
 
 “But I am not a spy. I am simply an American painter traveling through 
 Spain, sketching as I go, and painting whatever pleases my fancy. Last week 
 it was the awnings over the street of the Sierpes in Seville, yesterday the donkeys 
 dosino- in the sun at the gate of the Mosque, and to-day this old Moorish arch, 
 so typical of Spain’s great history.” 
 
26 
 
 UNDER ARREST IN CORDOVA 
 
 He threw away his cigarette, lost his languid air, took up the paper, re-read 
 it carefully to the end, and said : — 
 
 “ But you have no passport.” 
 
 “You are mistaken.” 
 
 “ Produce it.” 
 
 I ran my hand into my blouse and handed him my pocket sketch-book. 
 
 He opened it, stopped at the first page, turned the others slowly, backed un¬ 
 consciously into his chair, sat down, cracked his face with a smile, and then 
 broke it in pieces with a laugh, ordered the officer to follow him, and disappeared 
 through a door. 
 
 I occupied myself examining the brass numbers on the cartridge-boxes of the 
 squad, and wondering what size handcuffs I wore. Before I had settled it, the 
 officer returned, saluted me, escorted me through the door, leaving the squad 
 behind, and led me into a small room luxuriously furnished. The young Gov¬ 
 ernor came forward and held out his hand. 
 
 “ Senor, you are free. I have seen your picture. It is admirable. I regret 
 the mistake. The officer will conduct you to your tartana and detail a file of 
 men who will prevent your being disturbed until you finish. Adios.” 
 
 It was a noble and goodly sight to see that awkward squad moimt guard in 
 the dust and heat! It was so frightfully hot out there in the road, and so de¬ 
 lightfully cool inside the tartana. It was another exhilarating exhibition to watch 
 the crowd and see them tortured by hopeless curiosity to understand the situa¬ 
 tion. It was still an additional delightful spectacle to contemplate the driver, 
 who had shrunk into a mere ghost of himself when the arrest was made, and 
 who was now swelling with the importance of the result. 
 
 An hour later the sketch was finished, the squad dismissed, the officer, who 
 turned out to be a charming fellow, was seated beside me; the mule, the driver, 
 and the tartana became once more a compact organization, and we rattled back 
 through the blinding dust, and stopped at a caf6 of the officer’s choosing. 
 
 Over the cognac I mustered up courage to ask him this question: — 
 
 “ If you will permit me, senor capitan, who is the young Governor ? ” 
 
 “ Do you not know ? ” 
 
 I expressed my ignorance. 
 
 “ The Governor, caballero, is the cousin of the King.” 
 
A VERANDA IN THE ALCAZARIA 
 
 To really understand and appreciate Spanish life you must 
 live in the streets. Not lounge through them, hut sit down 
 somewhere and keep still long enough for the ants to crawl 
 over you, and so contemplate the people at your leisure. If 
 you are a painter you will have every facility given you. The 
 balconies over your head will be full of senoritas fanning lazily 
 and peering at you through the iron gratings ; the barber 
 across the way will lay aside his half-moon basin and cross 
 over to your side of the street and chat with you about the bull-fight of yester¬ 
 day and the fiesta to-morrow, and give you all the scandal of the neighborhood 
 before noon. The sombrerero, whose awnings are hung with great strings of 
 black hats of all shapes and sizes, will leave his shop and watch you by the hour; 
 and the fat, good-natured priest will stand quietly at your elbow and encourage you 
 with such appreciative criticisms as“Muy bien. Bonita, seiior. Bonisima.” 
 
 If you keep your eyes about you, you will catch Figaro casting furtive glances 
 at a shaded window above you, and later on a scrap of paper will come flutter¬ 
 ing down at your feet, which the quick-witted barber covers with his foot, slyly 
 picks up, and afterwards reads and kisses behind the half-closed curtains of his 
 shop. So much of this sort of thing will go on during the day that you won¬ 
 der what the night might bring forth. 
 
 The Alcazaria in Seville, upon the broad flags of which I spent the greater 
 part of three days, is just such a street. It is a narrow, winding, crooked thor¬ 
 oughfare, shaded by great awnings stretched between the overhanging roofs, and 
 filled with balconies holding great tropical plants, strings of black hats, festoons 
 of gay colored stuffs, sly peeping senoritas, fruit sellers, aguaderos, donkeys, 
 beggars, and the thousand and one things that make up Spanish life. 
 
 Before I finished my picture I had become quite an old settler, and knew 
 what time the doctor came in, and who was sick over the way, and the name 
 of the boy with the crutch, and the picador who lived in the rear and who 
 strutted about on the flagging in his buckskin leggings, padded with steel 
 springs, on the day of the bull-fight, and the story about the sad-faced girl in 
 the window over the wine shop, whose lover was in prison. 
 
 But of course one cannot know a street at one sitting. The Alcazaria, on 
 the morning of the first day, was to me only a Spanish street; on the morning 
 of the second day I began to realize that it contained a window over my shoul¬ 
 der opening on a small veranda half hidden in flowers and palms ; and on the 
 morning of the third day I knew just the hour at which its occupant returned 
 
28 
 
 A VERANDA IN THE ALCAZARIA 
 
 from mass, tire shape of her head and mantilla, and could recognize her duenna 
 at sight. 
 
 This char ming Spanish beauty greatly interested me. If I accidentally caught 
 her eye through the leaves and flowers, she would drop her lashes so quickly, 
 and with such a half frightened, timid look, that I immediately looked the other 
 way for full five minutes in lieu of an apology ; and I must confess that after 
 studying her movements for three days I should as soon have thought of kissing 
 my hand to the Mother Superior of the convent as to this modest little maiden. 
 I must also confess that no other senorita led me to any such conclusion in any 
 of the other balconies above me. 
 
 On the afternoon of the third 
 day I began final preparations 
 for my departure, and as every¬ 
 body wanted to see the picture, 
 it was displayed in the shop of 
 the barber because he had a 
 good light. Then I sent his 
 small boy for my big umbrella 
 and for a large, unused canvas 
 which I had stored in the wine 
 shop at the corner, and which, 
 with my smaller traps, he agreed 
 to take to my lodgings; and 
 then there was a general hand¬ 
 shaking and some slight waving 
 of white hands and handker¬ 
 chiefs from the balconies over 
 the way, in which my timid 
 senorita did not join ; and so, lighting my cigarette, I made my adios and strolled 
 down the street to the church. 
 
 It was the hour for vespers, and the streets were filling rapidly with penitents 
 on their way to prayers. With no definite object in view except to see the peo¬ 
 ple and watch their movements, and with that sense of relief which comes over 
 one after his day’s work is done, I mingled in the throng and passed between 
 the great swinging doors and into the wide incense-laden interior, and sat down 
 near the door to watch the service. The dim light sifted in through the stained- 
 glass windows and rested on the clouds of incense swung from the censers. 
 Every now and then I heard the tinkling of the altar-bell, and the deep tones 
 of the organ. Around me were the bowed heads of the penitents, silently telling 
 their heads, and next me the upturned face and streaming eyes of a grief-stricken 
 woman, whispering her sorrow to the Virgin. To the left of where I kneeled 
 was a small chapel, and, dividing me from this, an iron grating of delicate work¬ 
 manship, behind which were grouped a number of people praying before a pic¬ 
 ture of the Christ. Suddenly another figure came in, kneeled, and prayed 
 
A VERANDA IN THE ALGAZARIA 
 
 29 
 
 silently. It was my timid senorita, and before I was through wondering’ how she 
 could come so quickly, a young priest entered and knelt immediately behind her. 
 He was the same I had seen in the Alcazaria glancing at her window as he 
 passed. 
 
 Fearing that I should frighten her, as I had often done before, I moved a few 
 steps away; but she was so lovely and Madonna-like with her mantilla shad¬ 
 ing her eyes and her fan fluttering slowly like a butterfly, — now poising, now 
 balancing, then waving and settling, — that I instinctively sought for my 
 sketch-book to catch an outline of her pose, feeling assured that I should not 
 be discovered. Before I had half finished she arose, slowly passed the priest, 
 half covered him with her mantilla, and quick as thought slipped a white en¬ 
 velope under his prayer-book ! 
 
 It was done so neatly and quickly and with such self-possession that it was some 
 time before I recovered my equilibrium. Had I made any mistake ? Could it 
 possibly be the same demure, modest, shy senorita of the veranda, or was it not 
 some one resembling her ? All these Spanish beauties have black eyes, I thought, 
 carry the colors of their favorite matador on their fans, and look alike. Per¬ 
 haps, after all, I was mistaken. 
 
 I determined to find out. 
 
 Before she had reached the outer step of the church I had overtaken her, 
 but her mantilla was too closely drawn for me to see her face. The duenna, 
 
 however, was unmistakable, for she wore great silver hoops in her ears and an 
 enormously high comb, and once seen was not easily forgotten ; but to be sure, 
 I followed along until she entered the Alcazaria, and so on to the step of her 
 house. If she touched the old Moorish knocker and rapped, it would end it. 
 
 She lingered for a few minutes at the iron gate, chatted with her duenna, 
 watched me cross the street, kept her eyes upon me with her old saintly look, 
 patted her attendant on the back, gently closed the gate upon her, completely 
 shutting her in, bent her pretty head, pushed back her mantilla, showing her white 
 
30 
 
 A VERANDA IN TIIE ALCAZARIA 
 
 
 
 throat, and flashing upon me from the corner of her eye the most coquettish, dar¬ 
 ing, and mischievous of glances, touched her finger-tips to her lips, and vanished ! 
 
 I had made no mistake except in human nature. Surely Murillo must have 
 gone to Italy for his Madonnas. They were not in Seville, if the times have 
 not changed. 
 
 I crossed over and had a parting chat with the barber. What about the 
 seuorita opposite who had just entered her gate ? “ Ah, Senor! She is most 
 lovely. She is called The Pious ; but you need not look that way. She is the 
 betrothed of the olive merchant who lives at San Juan, and who visits her every 
 Sunday. The wedding takes place next month.” 
 
 Figaro believed it. I could see it in his face. So, perhaps, did the olive 
 merchant. 
 
 I did not. 
 
IN AND OUT OF A CAB 
 
 IN AMSTERDAM 
 
 It is raining this morning in Amsterdam. It is a 
 way it has in Holland. The old settlers do not seem 
 to mind it, hut I am only a few days from the land 
 of the orange and the olive, and, although these wet, 
 silvery grays and fresh greens are full of u quality,” I 
 long for the deep blue skies and clear-cut shadows of 
 
 sunny Spain. On this particular morning I am in a cab and in search of a 
 certain fish-market, and cabby is following the directions given him by a very 
 round porter with a very flat cap and a deep bass voice. 
 
 There is nothing so comfortable as a cab to paint in if you only know how 
 to utilize its resources. For me, long practice has brought it to a fine art. 
 First, I have cabby take out the horse. This prevents his shaking me when 
 he changes his tired leg. He is generally a spiral-spring-fed beast, and enjoys the 
 relief. Then I take out the cushions. This keeps them dry. Then I close the 
 back and off-side curtains, so as to concentrate the light, prop my easel up 
 against the front seat, spread my palette and brushes on the bare wooden one, 
 hang my rubber water-bottle up to the arm rest, and begin work. (I have even 
 discovered in the bottom of certain cabs such luxuries as knot or auger holes 
 through which to pour my waste water.) I then pass the umbrella-staff to 
 cabby, calling particular attention to the iron spike, and explain how useful it 
 may become in removing the inquisitive small boy from the hind wheel. One 
 lesson and two boys makes a cabby an expert. 
 
 This is why I am in a cab and am driving down the Keizersgraacht on this 
 very wet morning in Amsterdam. Before the fat porter’s directions could be 
 fully carried out, however, T caught sight of an old bridge spanning a canal 
 which pleased me greatly, and before my friend on the box could realize the 
 consequences I had his horse out and tied to a wharf post, and the interior of 
 his cab transformed into a studio. In five minutes I discovered that a cabless 
 horse and a horseless cab presided over by a cabby armed with an umbrella-staff 
 was not an every-day sight in Amsterdam. 
 
 I had camped on the stone quay some distance from the street and out of 
 everybody’s way. I congratulated myself on my location, and felt sure I would 
 not be disturbed. On my left was the canal crowded with market-boats laden 
 with garden-truck; on my right, the narrow street choked with the traffic of the 
 city. 
 
32 
 
 IN AND OUT OF A CAB IN AMSTERDAM 
 
 Suddenly the business of Amsterdam ceased. Everybody on the large boats 
 scrambled into smaller ones and sculled for shore. Everybody in the street 
 simultaneously jumped from cart, wagon, and doorstep, and in twenty seconds I 
 was overwhelmed by a surging throng, who swarmed about my four-wheeler and 
 blocked up my only window with anxious, inquiring faces. 
 
 I had been in a crowd like this before, and knew exactly what to do. Spliynx- 
 like silence and immobility of face are imperative. If you neither speak nor smile, 
 the mob imbibes a kind of respect for you amounting almost to awe. Those 
 nearest you, who can see a little and want to see more, unconsciously become 
 your champions, and expostulate with those who cannot see anything, cautioning 
 them against shaking the painter and obstructing his view. 
 
 This crowd was no exception to the general rule. I noticed, however, one 
 peculiarity. As each Amsterdammer reached my window he would gaze silently 
 at my canvas and then say, “ Ah, teekenmeester.” Soon the word went around 
 and reached the belated citizens rushing up, who stopped and appeared satisfied, 
 as they all exclaimed, “ Ah, teekenmeester.” 
 
 At last commerce resumed her sway. The street disentangled itself. The 
 market in cabbages again became active, and I was left comparatively alone, 
 always excepting the small boy. The variety here was singularly irritating. 
 They mounted the roof, blocked up the windows, clambered up on the front 
 seat, until cabby became sufficiently conversant with the use of the business end 
 of my umbrella-staff, after which they kept themselves at a respectful distance. 
 
 Finally a calm settled down over everything. The rain fell gently and con¬ 
 tinuously. The spiral-spring beast rested himself on alternate legs, and the boys 
 contemplated me from a distance. Cabby leaned in the off window and became 
 useful as a cup holder, and I was rapidly finishing my first sketch in Holland 
 when the light was shut out, and looking up I saw the head of an officer of 
 
IJST AND OUT OF A CAB IN AMSTERDAM 
 
 33 
 
 police. He surveyed me keenly, — my sketch and my interior arrangements, 
 and then in a gruff voice gave me an order in low Dutch. I pointed to 
 my staff holder, and continued painting. In a moment the officer thrust his 
 head through the off window and repeated his order in high Dutch. I waved 
 him away firmly, and again referred him to cabby. 
 
 Then a war began on the outside in which everybody took a hand, and in 
 half a minute the population of Amsterdam had blocked up the wharf. 
 
 I preserved my Egyptian exterior, and proceeded unconcernedly to lay a fresh 
 wash over my sky. While thus occupied, I became conscious that the spiral¬ 
 spring was being united once more to the cab. This fact became positive when 
 cabby delivered up the umbrella-staff and opened the door. 
 
 I got out. 
 
 The gentleman in gilt buttons was at a white heat. The mass-meeting were 
 indulging in a running fire of criticism, punctuated by loose cabbage leaves and 
 rejected vegetables, which sailed, bomb-like, through the air, and the upshot of 
 the whole matter was that the officer ordered me away from the quay and 
 into a side street. 
 
 But why ? The streets of Amsterdam were free. I was out of everybody’s 
 way, was breaking no law, and creating no disturbance. 
 
 At this instant half of a yesterday’s cabbage came sailing through the atmos¬ 
 phere from a spot in the direction of a group of wharf-rats, struck the officer’s 
 helmet, and rolled it into the canal. A yell went up from the crowd, cabby 
 went down to the water for the headgear, and the owner drew his short sword 
 and charged on the wharf-rats, who suddenly disappeared. 
 
 I reentered my studio, shut the door, and continued work. I concluded that 
 it was not my funeral. 
 
 I remember distinctly the situation at this moment. I had my water-bottle 
 in my hand re-filling the cups, mouth full of brushes, palette on my lap, and 
 easel steadied by one foot. Suddenly a face surmounted by a wet helmet, and 
 
IN AND OUT OF A CAB IN AMSTERDAM 
 
 34 
 
 livid with rage, was thrust into mine, and a three-cornered variety of dialect 
 that would produce a sore throat in any one except a Dutchman was hurled at 
 me, accompanied by the usual well-known “ move on ” gesture. 
 
 Remembering the soothing influence exerted on the former mob, I touched 
 my hat to his excellency, and said, “ Teekenmeester.’ The head disappeared like 
 a shot, and in an instant I was flat on my back in the bottom of the cab, 
 bespattered with water, smeared with paint, and half smothered under a debris 
 of cushions, water-cups, wet paper, and loose sketches, and in that position was 
 unceremoniously jolted over the stones. 
 
 The majesty of the law had asserted itself! I was backed up in a side street! 
 I broke open the door and crawled out in the rain. His excellency was stand¬ 
 ing at the head of the spiral-spring, with a sardonic grin on his countenance. 
 The mob greeted my appearance with a shout of derision. 
 
 I mounted the driver’s seat and harangued them. I asked in a voice which 
 might have been heard in Rotterdam if anybody about me understood English. 
 A shabbily-dressed, threadbare young fellow elbowed his way towards me and 
 said he did. I helped him up beside me on the box and addressed the multi¬ 
 tude, my seedy friend interpreting. 
 
 I reviewed the history of old Amsterdam and its traditions; its reputation 
 for hospitality; its powerful colonies scattered over the world ; its love for art 
 and artists. Then I passed to the greatest of all its possessions, — the New 
 Amsterdam of the New World, my own city, — and asked them as Amsterdam¬ 
 mers, or the reverse, whether they considered I had been fairly treated in the 
 city of my great-grandfathers — I, a painter and a New \ orker ! 
 
 I had come three thousand miles to carry home to their children in the New 
 World some sketches of the grand old city they loved so well, and in return I 
 had been insulted, abused, jumped over the stones, and made a laughing stock of. 
 
 I would appeal to them as brothers to decide whether these streets of Am¬ 
 sterdam were not always open to her descendants, and whether X was not enti¬ 
 tled to use them at all times by virtue of my very birthright. (Another shout 
 went up, but this time a friendly one.) This being the case, I proposed to 
 reoccupy my position and finish my sketch. If I had violated any law it was the 
 duty of the officer to put me under arrest. If not, then I was free to do as I 
 pleased; and if the highly honorable group of influential citizens about me 
 would open their ranks, I would drive the cab back myself to the spot from 
 which I had been so cruelly torn. 
 
 Another prolonged shout followed the interpretation, an opening was quickly 
 made, and I had begun to chafe the spiral-spring with my shabby friend s um¬ 
 brella, when cabby rushed forward, pale and trembling, seized the bridle, and 
 begged me piteously to desist. My friend then explained that cabby would 
 probably lose his license if I persisted, although I might carry my point and 
 his cab back to the quay. 
 
 This argument being unanswerable, a council of war was held, to which a 
 number of citizens who were leaning over the front wheels were invited, and it 
 
IN AND OUT OF A CAB IN AMSTERDAM 
 
 35 
 
 was decided to drive at once to the nearest police station and submit the whole 
 outrage to the chief. 
 
 In two minutes we halted under the traditional green glass lamp so familiar 
 to all frequenters of such places. We saluted the sergeant, and were shown up 
 a winding iron staircase into a small room and up to a long green table, behind 
 which sat a baldheaded old fellow in undress uniform, smoking a short pipe. 
 
 My threadbare friend explained the cause of our visit. The old fellow looked 
 surprised, and touched a bell which brought in another smoker in full dress, 
 whose right ear served as a rack for a quill pen, and who used it (the pen not 
 the ear) to take down our statement. Then the chief turned to me and asked 
 my name. I gave it. This he repeated to the secretary. Occupation ? Painter. 
 “ Teekenmeester,” said he to the secretary. 
 
 Magic word ! I have you at last. Teekenmeester is Dutch for painter. 
 
 The chief read the secretary’s notes, signed them, and said I should call 
 again in ten days, and he would submit a report. 
 
 “ Report! What do I want with a report, your imperial highness ? It is 
 now four o’clock, and I have but two hours of daylight to finish this sketch. I 
 don’t want a report. I want an order compelling the pirate who presides over 
 the cabbage market district to respect the rights of a descendant of Amsterdam 
 who is peacefully pursuing his avocation.” Certainly, he so intended. I was 
 at liberty to replace my cab and finish my sketch. The officer exceeded his 
 instructions. 
 
 But how? I did not want either to provoke a riot or get my cabby into 
 trouble. Ah, he understood. Another bell brought an orderly, who conducted 
 
36 IN AND OUT OF A CAB IN AMSTERDAM 
 
 us down - stairs, opened a side door, called two officers, placed one outside with 
 cabby and the other inside with me and Threadbare, and we drove straight 
 back to the quay and were welcomed by a shout from my constituents com¬ 
 pared to which all former cheering was a dead silence. I looked around for his 
 excellency, but he was nowhere to be seen. 
 
 Verily, the majesty of the law had asserted itself! 
 
 I do not think I made much of an impression as a painter in Amsterdam, 
 but I have always had an idea that I could be elected alderman in the cab¬ 
 bage market district. 
 
A WATER-LOGGED TOWN 
 
 IN HOLLAND 
 
 Having shaken the water of Amster¬ 
 dam from off my feet, dust being’ out of 
 the question in this moist climate, I have 
 gC settled myself for a month in this sleepy 
 old town of Dordrecht on the Maas. 
 
 It is a fair sample of all Holland, — 
 flat, wet, and quaint; full of canals, mar¬ 
 ket boats, red-tiled roofs, rosy-cheeked girls, brass milk cans, wooden shoes, 
 and fish. Every inch of it is as clean as hare arms, scrubbing brushes, and 
 plenty of water can make it. The town possesses an old gate built in fifteen 
 hundred and something, a Groote Kerk built before America was discovered, 
 and several old houses constructed immediately thereafter, together with the 
 usual assortment of bridges, dikes, market-places, and windmills. 
 
 I lodge in two rooms at the top of a crooked staircase, and as three sides 
 of my apartments overlook the Maas I see a constant procession of Dutch lug¬ 
 gers, Rhine steamers, and fishing smacks. When it rains I paint from one of 
 my windows. When it shines I am along the canals or drifting over to Papen- 
 drecht, or at work under the trees which fringe every street. 
 
 My fellow lodgers afford me infinite enjoyment. There is a doctor who does 
 not practice, a merchant who does no business, and mine host who is every¬ 
 body’s friend, and who attends to everything in his own section of the town, in¬ 
 cluding his inn. 
 
 Then there is Johan. He is porter, interpreter, guide, boots, railway agent, 
 postal official, head waiter, and cook. He assumes and sustains all these 
 various personages simply by the changes possible with a white apron, a rail¬ 
 way badge, and two kinds of caps, — one flat and the other round-topped. 
 
 For instance, when you arrive at the brisk little station of Dort, kept perma¬ 
 nently awake by the noise of constantly passing trains, Johan is waiting for 
 you, wearing his flat-topped cap and porter’s badge, and has your luggage on 
 his hand-cart before you know it. 
 
 Or perhaps at dinner you ask the demure old butler for more boiled fish, and 
 on looking closely and trying to recall his face, you are startled to recognize 
 your friend at the station who handled your trunk. Johan enjoys your puzzled 
 
38 A WATER-LOGGED TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 look. He knows it is simply a question of a slightly bald head and white apron 
 in exchange for a flat cap and a badge. 
 
 Later on yon ask for a guide who speaks your own language, whatever that 
 may be. A jaunty fellow presents himself holding his round-topped cap in his 
 hand, and is prepared to show you the universe. It is Johan. 
 
 Besides this he speaks the fag ends of six languages, all with a strong Dutch 
 accent. He says to me, “It will some rain more as yesterday, — don’t it?” 
 This is why I know he is a linguist. 
 
 Last of all there is Sophy, who is maid of all work. She it is who cares 
 for my rooms, sews on my buttons, wakes me in the morning, and washes my 
 brushes. She is a rosy-cheeked girl of twenty, wears a snow white cap (screwed 
 to her head with two gold spirals), short skirts, blue yarn stockings, and white 
 wooden shoes; and is never still one minute that she is awake. 
 
 Moreover, she has a pair of arms as red as apples and about the size of a 
 blacksmith’s, which she uses with a flail-like movement that makes her dangerous. 
 Every paving-stone, door-step, window-sill, and pane of glass within the posses¬ 
 sion of mine host knows all about this pair of arms, for Sophy first souses them 
 with great pails of water, which she herself dips from the canal, and then pol¬ 
 ishes them with a coarse towel until they shine all over. She has a mortal 
 antipathy to dirt and a high regard for Johan, whom she looks upon as a su¬ 
 perior being. 
 
 These are my simple surroundings in this water-logged town. I have only 
 one drawback. I do not speak its liquid dialect. 
 
 UNDER A BALCONY 
 
 Behind the Groote 
 Kerk is a moss-grown 
 landing-place, shaded by 
 a row of trees, the trunks 
 of which serve as moor¬ 
 ings for some broad 
 Dutch luggers floating 
 idly in the sluggish ca¬ 
 nal. Away up among 
 the branches are their topmasts half hidden amidst the leaves. Across this nar¬ 
 row strip of water is thrown a slender foot bridge to a row of reddish brown 
 houses running Venetian-like sheer into the canal, with their overhanging bal¬ 
 conies and windows filled with gay flowers in bright China pots. 
 
 I have already become quite intimate with the domestic affairs of some of the 
 inmates of these houses. 
 
 One three-windowed balcony especially interests me. I have never seen flowers 
 require so much water. Every time I look up from my easel she drops her eyes 
 
A WATER-LOGGED TO WN IN HOLLAND 
 
 39 
 
 and pours oil another pitcher. And then the pruning and trimming is some¬ 
 thing marvelous ! She is a bright little body with big blue eyes, and the tangled 
 vines and flowers climbing over the quaint wooden window make a charming 
 frame for her pretty face. 
 
 It is difficult to paint under such circumstances, and if I have over-elaborated 
 the details of this balcony in my sketch, I frankly say I could not help it. 
 
 Suddenly she disappears, and in her place stands a pleasant-faced young Hol¬ 
 lander, having the air of a student, who makes me a slight bow which I gladly 
 return, for I am anxious to prove to him how honorable have been my inten¬ 
 tions. 
 
 In a few moments my fair win¬ 
 dow-gardener comes tripping over 
 the bridge bearing a small tray, 
 which, to my great astonishment, 
 she lays at my feet on the clean 
 flagging. 
 
 She makes no reply to my thanks 
 except with her eyes, and, before 
 I am half through with my little 
 speech, is over the bridge and out 
 of sight. 
 
 The tray contains some thin 
 slices of cheese, a few biscuits, and 
 a pot of milk. This is almost im¬ 
 mediately followed by the student 
 himself, who holds out his hand 
 heartily, which I grasp, and who 
 addresses me in Dutch, accompa¬ 
 nied by those peculiar nods and 
 frowns common to all of us when 
 we are sure we are not understood. 
 I sadly shake my head. 
 
 Then he tries Italian. I shrug 
 my shoulders in a hopeless way. 
 “Perhaps, sir, then, it maybe that you speak some English?” I wanted to 
 fall upon his neck. 
 
 “ Speak English, my dear sir ? It is my favorite language. Let us converse 
 in English, by all means. But where did you learn it ? ” 
 
 “ Here in Dordrecht. Where did you ? ” 
 
 “I? Oh, in America. My mother spoke it perfectly.” 
 
 “ How interesting! I was not aware you Spaniards spoke it with so little 
 accent. I do not speak Spanish myself, for which I am truly sorry. It is so 
 musical.” 
 
 Now that was very kind of him. I knew that I had absorbed during my 
 
40 
 
 A WATER-LOGGED TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 two months’ residence in Spain something of the air of a hidalgo, but I was 
 not prepared for this ! 
 
 He was glad to make the acquaintance of a Spanish painter. He so much 
 admired our school. He had been in his study and had watched me all the 
 morning, and finding me still at work at lunch hour had taken the liberty of 
 sending his sister with the tray. It was a leisure month with him, the college 
 being closed. He would like to watch me paint, especially now that he knew 
 his own windows formed part of the picture. 
 
 An hour later the pretty sister is filling his pipe and my empty cup in a cosy 
 little room with windows filled with flowers, through which I can see my sketch¬ 
 ing ground of the morning. 
 
 She has donned another cap more bewitching than the first and is busying 
 herself about the room. It is a cosy little den, and rests you to sit in it. 
 The walls are lined with shelves, laden with books. The tables are covered with 
 French, English, and German magazines, pamphlets, and papers. A student’s 
 lamp, a few rare etchings, some choice bits of porcelain, and three or four easy 
 chairs complete the interior. 
 
 While we smoke my host begs me tell liim something of Spain and my 
 people, and when I undeceive him as to my nationality he laughs heartily, and 
 is doubly glad to make the discovery, for now that he knows I hail from one 
 of the colonies I am of course a kinsman of his. He explains that he had 
 mistaken me for a Spaniard because as he watched me from his study window 
 he noticed that I smoked cigarettes and twisted my moustache! 
 
 Late in the afternoon when I knock the ashes from my third pipe he insists 
 on accompanying me to my boat, and before we part we exchange cards and 
 arrange for a little dinner at my rooms the next day for three. 
 
 Verily a white umbrella is better than a Letter of Credit! 
 
 As soon as I reached my lodgings I sent for Johan and handed him my host’s 
 card. “ Who is that gentleman ? ” His eyes opened very wide. “ Dot yentle- 
 man ? Dot yentleman, Mynheer, is the professor of English at the university.” 
 
A WATER-LOGGED TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 41 
 
 A DAY WITH THE PROFESSOR 
 
 I tell tlie professor lie is a godsend to me, for while I 
 am all ears and eyes and have something of a nose for 
 poking into odd places, he supplies me with a tongue, 
 which completes my equipment. 
 
 He returns the compliment hy saying I am the only 
 gentleman speaking English he has ever met, and that 
 his pronunciation is improving daily. 
 
 I remark to him that either Englishmen or politeness have been very scarce 
 in Dordrecht heretofore, at which he laughs and says he shall never overcome 
 all the peculiarities of my language. 
 
 Under his guidance I have ransacked every crook, cranny, and sluiceway in 
 this curious old town. This morning being Friday, we go to the market. It 
 is a small open square on one side of the V oorstraat. It is really the floor 
 of a great stone bridge, for the canal runs beneath it. 
 
 In every town in Holland on market day you will find two stalls which may 
 interest you, — one is the junkman’s, who sells old iron, hinges, locks, and broken 
 kitchen ware, and sometimes rusty swords, fragments of armor, and rare old brass 
 and copper utensils, battered and bruised. The other contains old hooks, engrav¬ 
 ings, and prints. 
 
 Successive Friday mornings have added to my own stock of bric-a-brac, but 
 this morning it is the professor who hugs all the way back to my improvised 
 studio three great Dutch books for which he says he has looked for months. 
 
 He wondered yesterday why I stopped the milkmaid on the street and bought 
 her heirloom of a milk-can covered with scars and patches and shining like gold, 
 but to-day he is even more astonished at the miscellaneous assortment of rusty 
 iron hinges, locks, and handles I have picked out, and which with the assistance 
 of an aged locksmith and his wife will soon be restored to their pristine polish. 
 
 But I have an old Dutch cabinet at home which has waited for these irons 
 for years, and the milk-can exactly fits the shelf on the top. 
 
 He raves, however, about these old books; tells me that Mynheer somebody or 
 other, whose name is full of o’s and fs, wrote this treatise in the last century, 
 and that there has been a great dispute about it; that a spurious edition was 
 published which at one time was accepted; that he had looked for the original 
 for many months. Then he removes his pipe, blows the blue smoke out of my 
 window, and fondly pats the cover. , 
 
 I think to myself as I look at him with his high forehead, deep, keen eyes, and 
 thoughtful look, what a thorough Bohemian he would have made if he had only 
 taken to paint and bric-a-brac instead of languages and literature. 
 
 The clack of Sophy’s wooden shoes hurrying up-stairs announces breakfast, 
 which Johan serves with more than usual solemnity owing to the professor’s 
 presence, and also to the fact that for three days no one has arrived at our 
 
42 
 
 A WATER-LOGGED TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 inn, and consequently his attention lias not been diverted from his table to the 
 duties of either porter, railway official, or guide. 
 
 This over, Sophy clatters across the clean cobbles to the stone quay, and bales 
 the rain of last night from my boat, and the professor and I drift down the 
 Wagensluis to where some overhanging balconies shelter from the sun and rain 
 an old barge, the bow of which serves as a foreground for a sketch I am finishing 
 of the canal with the Groote Kerk in the distance. While I paint he smokes 
 and reads, and nods to the passing boats, and tells me stories of the people 
 about us and the current gossip of the town, and so the hours slip by. 
 
 Then, as the shadows lengthen and my work is over, we row back and out 
 on the broad Maas, and watch the sun set behind the big windmill at Papendrecht, 
 and the Dutch luggers anchored in pairs in midstream waiting for a change in 
 the tide to float them to Rotterdam and a market. 
 
 When the sun goes down and it becomes quite dark we drift back, picking 
 our way among the market boats moored for the night along the quays, and up 
 to a flight of wooden steps slippery with ooze and slime and well known to both 
 of us. It is the nearest landing to a small beer house which we frequent. 
 
 The landlord greets us heartily, and takes down two pewter-topped mugs from 
 a row against the wall, and spreads a clean cloth over one of the tables over¬ 
 looking the dark canal with its flickering mast-head lights and deep shadows. 
 
 Before we can blow the froth from our mugs the landlord returns with a dish 
 of cold boiled potatoes, some leaves of lettuce, and the castors, and the professor 
 proceeds with great gravity to peel and slice, pour on the oil and vinegar, adding 
 a pinch of salt, and finishing the whole with crisp sprigs of lettuce, which he 
 plants here and there on the top. 
 
 A cup of coffee, cigarettes, and pipes, a few strokes of the oars, and I bid 
 the professor good-night at the landing nearest his house, and so on to mine. 
 
 Johan thrusts his head from the side window at my third ring, unlocks the 
 door, and lights for me a slender candle. As I climb the crooked staircase, I 
 overhear him yawning and muttering to himself, “ Dot veller von America slileep 
 notting.” 
 
A WATER-LOGGEl) TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 43 
 
 A VISIT FROM THE DOCTOR 
 
 From the windows of my rooms I can see the 
 only busy spot in all Dordrecht. It is the wharf 
 immediately beneath me, where all the Rhine steam¬ 
 ers land, and which is crowded all day long with 
 groups of people either going to or coming from 
 the different small towns and villages up and down 
 this outlet to the sea. 
 
 On rainy days I draw the curtains wide apart, 
 fasten back the shutters, set up my easel, and pick 
 out a subject from the moving panorama below. 
 The wharf is piled high with garden truck in huge 
 wicker baskets, boxes of fish, rows of brass milk 
 cans reflecting their polished sides in the wet pave¬ 
 ments, furniture, crates of crockery, and the usual 
 assortment of small merchandise. On its wet planks 
 the leave-takings and welcomings occur every half 
 hour; that is, upon the arrival and departure of 
 each boat, and during the whole day it seems as if 
 all the vitality and energy of Dordrecht had con¬ 
 centrated itself under my window. Elsewhere the 
 town is fast asleep. 
 
 Out on the Maas the lazy luggers with their red and white sails float by, the 
 skipper’s wife usually holding the tiller. Across the marshes the sails of the 
 windmills turn lazily as if it were an exertion for them to move, and over all falls 
 the gentle rain. 
 
 On these days I have many knocks at my door announcing various visitors. 
 The doctor generally drops in early. He is a cheery old soul, and although he 
 speaks very little English, I have picked up enough broken Dutch to piece out 
 with, and so we get on very well. His picturesque faded green coat, yellow 
 nankeen waistcoat, and red necktie make him very valuable around a studio. 
 
 Then he is never in the way. He raps, opens the door, sees me, shuts it, 
 raps again gently, and then comes in with an air of surprise mingled with gen¬ 
 uine delight at finding me, fills his pipe from my tobacco-box, spreads himself on 
 my lounge, and smokes away quietly. 
 
 I would love him for this quality alone, even if he had no other, — for it is 
 a rare kind of a man who can come noiselessly into your studio when you are 
 at work, dispense with more than a nod of greeting, slide into a seat, help him¬ 
 self to a pipe, and so unconsciously become one of your surroundings. 
 
 Besides, the doctor is especially interested in the small collection of old brass, 
 hammered iron, and bric-a-brac I have made since my sojourn with them all at 
 the inn, and which is scattered about my room, and he takes the greatest delight 
 in examining each new addition that I make. 
 
44 
 
 A WATER-LOGGEl) TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 To-day he is brimful. He lias heard of a man who lives on the quay near 
 the potato market, just returned from Friesland, who has enough old Dutch 
 leather to cover the walls of my two rooms, and all perfect and of one pat¬ 
 tern, and very cheap! 
 
 1 look incredulous, and hint that so much leather of one pattern did not 
 exist in all Holland outside of a museum, and perhaps not in one. But he will 
 not listen. He insists that the man bought the whole house, and then pulled 
 it to pieces for the leather which lined the walls of one room. The potato 
 market was close by, the rain was nearly over, and I must go with him at once. 
 I knew the potato market and the quay, for I had painted them the week before 
 
 with a pretty milk girl carrying her cans across the foreground of my picture. 
 So to oblige him I take down my storm coat from its peg and we tramp through 
 the wet streets to the market and up to a small house, the front of which is 
 built on an angle, so that the third story windows lean over the sidewalk. This 
 enables the occupants to see who conies in the front door without going down¬ 
 stairs, not an unusual style of house, by the way, in Holland. 
 
 “ Would Mynheer show the painter from America the leather he had in the 
 garret ? ” 
 
 Mynheer at first did not have any leather at all in the garret; then he had 
 only a few pieces, but they were not there; then he could get some more if we 
 would call the next day. 
 
 But this did not suit the doctor. He knew all about it. He had a friend 
 who had seen it. Mynheer need not expect to keep the leather for the rich 
 Englishman. The American painter would pay more. 
 
 At this the old Shylock led the way up an almost perpendicular staircase. 
 The doctor was right. There lay the leather in flat sheets and of a quality and 
 quantity that proved the truth of the whole story, but the price demanded 
 would have ruined the American painter. 
 
A WATER-LOGGED TOWN IN HOLLAND 
 
 45 
 
 On the way home the old fellow built up and destroyed a dozen schemes by 
 which I was to get the leather at half its value or my own price, none of 
 which would have been possible without the permission of the police. 
 
 The next morning a much softer knock than usual announces the good doc¬ 
 tor, wearing so sad a face that I fear some calamity has overtaken him. He 
 only shakes his head and puffs away. Then it leaks out that on his way to 
 the post he had seen Shylock packing on the sidewalk a long, wide, flat box, 
 marked London. The Englishman had bought the leather. 
 
 Since then the doctor often starts up from my lounge after a long reverie, 
 knocks the ashes from his pipe, lays his hand upon my shoulder, looks at me 
 sadly, and says, “ Dot Englishman! ” And then goes out shaking his head om¬ 
 inously. Incidents like these in my quiet life at this charming old inn make 
 even rainy days pleasant in Dordrecht. 
 
ON THE RIVA, VENICE 
 
 My gondolier, Ingenio, is a wrinkled old sea-dog, with gray hair and 
 stooping shoulders, who has the air of a retired buccaneer and the voice 
 of a girl. His gondola has been my home during the daytime for a 
 month past, and he has been my constant companion. As he speaks noth¬ 
 ing but Italian and I nothing resembling it, we have adopted a sign language 
 which answers perfectly. This morning he comes through the garden where I 
 am taking my coffee, points to his gondola floating at the foot of the marble 
 steps leading to the Grand Canal, touches his forehead, then his pocket, holds 
 up two fingers, and motions as if to sit down. I understand at once that he has 
 thought of a new shop where for a few francs we can buy two antique chairs, 
 of a pattern especially desired by me. 
 
 These chairs have greatly bothered Ingenio. Under the plea of searching for 
 them, I have ransacked half the old palaces in Venice, and have discovered most 
 marvelous rooms, with ceilings of carved beams edged with gilt, with faded 
 frescoes, exquisite marble staircases leading thereto, and often quaint and pictur¬ 
 esque interiors inhabited by the present generation. 
 
 I have, of course, found every variety of chair, old and new, but the search 
 has been so delightful, and the discoveries have partaken so much of the un¬ 
 expected, that I refuse to be satisfied with any of them, and so continue my 
 explorations; Ingenio poking the nose of his gondola into every crooked canal 
 m Venice, and I my own up one half of her equally crooked staircases and 
 across many an old courtyard and damp, mould-covered garden. 
 
 But this morning I shook my head, which was full of another and a more 
 brilliant idea, — an idea which I conveyed to Ingenio by pointing down the canal 
 with my umbrella staff, putting up my hands like a little praying Samuel, and 
 sketching an imaginary bridge on the tablecloth with my coffee spoon. 
 
ON THE RIVA 
 
 47 
 
 Ingenio understood at once. He knew that I wanted to paint the bridge near 
 the old church on the Riva degli Schiavoni. 
 
 In five minutes we were floating past the Piazza and San Marco, and in as 
 many more had reached the quay near the Church of the Santa Maria della 
 Pieta. 
 
 I had seen a group of fishing boats moored here as I drifted past the after¬ 
 noon before, and I reasoned that, as the tide did not change until noon, there 
 was, perhaps, time to catch them before they spread their gorgeous wings of 
 red and gold and flew away to their homes in Chioggia. 
 
 W e landed at the small piazza which formed the quay, at the end of which 
 ran a flight of marble steps up and over the bridge. To the left of this were 
 moored the boats with all sails set, hanging listless in the still air. In front 
 was the white marble pavement baking in the sun. I soon found the open door 
 of the Santa Maria was my only shelter from the blinding heat. By hugging 
 one side of the porch, and resting one leg of my easel against the lower hinge, 
 
 I was sheltered in the shadow, and could still see the subject of my picture 
 entire. 
 
 So without more ado, I opened my folding seat and unlimbered my trap, 
 while Ingenio filled the water bottles. 
 
 There are so many white umbrellas and floating studios in Venice that an 
 artist at work excites very little curiosity. The novelty of my position would 
 occasionally tempt some penitent to glance over my shoulder, as she entered the 
 church, making room lest she disturb me, but with this exception I worked on 
 without interruption. 
 
 As the heat increased, the worshipers grew less numerous and the quay 
 became nearly deserted. Ingenio, who had gone to sleep in the shadow, was 
 now broiling in the sun, and my left or palette hand felt scorching hot. 
 
 But these are trifles when you have two fishing boats half finished, the tide 
 to turn in two hours, and you begin to note that already the crew are moving 
 about and restlessly handling the ropes. You grow nervous every time a man 
 goes ashore, lest he shall cast off the moorings, and so wreck your morning’s 
 work. 
 
 Suddenly a sunbeam shot across the upper corner of my canvas. I looked 
 
48 
 
 ON THE RXVA 
 
 around and up. The sun was slanting over and down the cornice of the church, 
 and with such intensity that I felt an immediate change of base imperative. 
 You cannot see color by the side of a sunbeam. 
 
 In Venice, when your best friends fail and life begins to be a burden, you 
 have one resource, —- you call for your gondolier. So I awoke Ingenio. He 
 appreciated the situation at once. He ran to the gondola, brought back my large 
 umbrella, and wasted ten minutes of my precious time in attempting to drive its 
 spiked staff into a flight of polished marble steps. The only result was the 
 loss of the spike and the little that remained of my good temper. 
 
 After this failure I decided that heroic treatment was all that was left. I first 
 pointed to my half-finished sails, seized the ropes in an imaginary sort of way 
 as if lowering them, and then lifted my hands in despair. Then I gave him 
 two francs, and followed him with my eyes as he disappeared from the bridge 
 and reappeared on the deck of one of the boats. 
 
 A row of grinning faces all looked my way, and in a moment more Ingenio 
 returned without the money and with one of the fishermen. The latter gazed 
 silently at my sketch and said, “Buono.” I was reassured. The sails were safe, 
 at all events. But the heat continued to be frightful. 
 
 looked somewhat alarmed. Five francs more, and a pleasanter expression asserted 
 itself in the latter’s face. Then they both measured the distance between the 
 
ON THE RIVA 
 
 49 
 
 two doors, found a hook high up on the mouldings over the arch, returned to 
 the boats, and in five minutes I had rigged an orange-colored jib sail across the 
 entrance of the church, and had crawled in underneath, out of the sun, into its 
 grateful shadow. 
 
 I do not offer any apology for this. I distinctly vow that I intended no dis¬ 
 respect to the most holy Maria della Pieta. I was simply backed up into a 
 church door on the sunny side of a quay, with the thermometer in the nineties, 
 an unfinished sketch before me, a marble wall behind me, and but two hours 
 of tide remaining. The effect of a jib sail on Venetian church architecture was 
 not under consideration by me. The possible loss of one in my picture was at 
 the moment of greater importance. 
 
 At that instant the horror-stricken and very oily face of a well-fed priest 
 peered into my improvised tent, and from it followed a torrent of Italian. I 
 raised my hat meekly, bowed reverently, and pointed to Ingenio. While the dis¬ 
 cussion lasted, I managed to finish the rigging, the awning on deck, and the 
 gondola alongside, but the crisis had arrived. I must either take in the jib or 
 go with the priest. This sentiment seemed also to be shared by the crowd. I 
 preferred the latter, and detailing the fisherman to stand by and “ repel board¬ 
 ers,” I called Ingenio, and followed his oiliness through the cool church, down a 
 long passage and up to a dark green door heavily hinged and locked. 
 
 r 
 
 The priest touched a bell, footsteps were heard, and a sliding panel revealed 
 the sad face of a nun. A word of explanation followed, the bolts were shot 
 hack, and I found myself in a small vestibule leading into a low room, white, 
 bare, and scrupulously clean. In a moment more the nun returned, bringing the 
 Mother Superior. I saluted her as if she had been the Queen of Sheba. She 
 listened incredulously to the voluble priest as he elaborated the outrage, and 
 then indignantly turned to Ingenio, who hung his held and chewed the rim 
 
50 
 
 ON THE HIV A 
 
 of his hat. Then she raised both hands as if in amazement, looked me straight 
 in the face, and slowly shook her head. The sad-faced nun waited, and heard 
 me expostulate in my choicest English that I had the greatest reverence for 
 every church in Italy and for every Lady Superior. I only objected to the 
 climate, and to the fact that this particular church was not on the shady side 
 of the quay. 
 
 Then the nun slipped away, and presently returned with a sister in gray, who 
 had the face of a Madonna and the voice of an angel, and an English angel at 
 that. She questioned the priest, then Ingenio, then the sad-faced nun, and then 
 turned to me. 
 
 Did the painter speak Italian? Not a word. Furthermore, he was a stranger 
 in a foreign land, away from the home of his childhood, without friends except 
 this poor gondolier, his only possession being a half-finished sketch and a jib 
 sail, for both of which he pleaded. 
 
 She listened, half smiling, and said the priest need not remain, and perhaps 
 the gondolier had best return and watch my easel; the good mother need not 
 
 
 be alarmed. There was some mistake. She would return to the church with 
 the painter and verify the good priest’s story. 
 
 I stopped for a moment as she made her devotions at the altar. As we reached 
 the outer door she caught sight of the jib, and stood still as if shocked. My 
 yellow rag was waving in the sunlight as defiant as a matador’s cloak ! 
 
 She stooped under the improvised awning and closely examined the sketch. 
 How long would it take to finish it ? Half an hour. Be quick about it, then. 
 If I did not mind, she would watch me paint. She stood for a long time with¬ 
 out speaking, and then said, u Would not a touch of rose madder help that 
 shadow?” “You paint, then?” I asked, following her suggestion. “I did 
 
OJST THE HIV A 51 
 
 once, she replied, and turned her head sadly and looked out over the blue 
 lagoon towards San Giorgio. 
 
 An hour later she watched Ingenio and the fisherman take down the jib and 
 return it to the boats, but she would not receive my thanks. All artists were 
 her friends. The sail made no difference, the sun was too hot to work without 
 it, and she understood it all when she first saw the sketch. She would close 
 the church door. I need not wait. I drifted slowly out into the lagoon and 
 looked back. She was still standing' in the archway, shading her eyes with her 
 hand, and watching us. 
 
 Then the fishing boats spread their sails, drifted past, and shut her from my 
 sight. Ingenio’s cry of warning as he rounded a turn in the canal awoke me 
 from my reverie. I picked up my sketch and stepped ashore. I will give it to 
 any one who will tell me the history of that good gray nun. 
 
of Italians, who have one object in life which they never lose 
 sight of, — never to do to-clay what they can possibly do to-morrow or the 
 next week. If time is money, the average Venetian is a millionaire. He has 
 stored up for present and future use such a vast amount of leisure that it 
 makes a busy man envious to contemplate him. 
 
 If you leave your gondola and cross the sun-baked quay to this shelter, 
 these aristocrats will make room for you at their table and hand you a flagon 
 of tepid water and a saucer containing two lumps of sugar; or perhaps the 
 landlord will bring you a bottle of Cerise (cherry juice) and a thin cigar about 
 the size and length of a shoestring. The cigar has a movable backbone of a 
 single broom straw. 
 
 Inside of this retreat are small tables, around which are seated other nabobs 
 drinking coffee and playing dominoes. Occasionally one will rise from his seat, 
 approach a high table at one end of the room,- select a small bit of dried fish 
 from a pewter platter, and gravely resume his chair with the air of a man who 
 really owned the whole fish, but allowed the landlord to keep it on his side¬ 
 board merely as a mark of the high esteem in which he held him. 
 
 Should you land immediately opposite the awning and the open door, so as 
 to be quite within sight from the inside, one of these princes will slide from his 
 seat very much as a turtle does from his log and hold your boat steady with 
 his staff until you step ashore. For this service you give him one penny, and 
 quite a small penny at that. 
 
 i 
 

 
A SUMMERS DAY IN VENICE 53 
 
 A turn of Ingenio’s wrist whirled the sharp blade of my gondola close to 
 this quay one lovely morning in August with results to me exactly similar to 
 what I have described, and in a moment more I was dropping my second lump 
 into the clumsy little cup which the landlord filled from the common pot. 
 
 What to paint to-day was the question that bothered me. Should I go hack 
 to the Rialto and try the flight of steps up from the canal with the gondolas 
 and boats in the foreground, or the view from the Piazzetta across the small 
 fruit-market with the Great Bridge in the distance, or should I keep on to tlie 
 Public Gardens and catch the fishing boats as they came across from the 
 Lido ? 
 
 Ingenio stood by hat in hand trying to read my thoughts. It is delightful 
 to watch him. He starts off with a great show of enthusiasm, points up the 
 canal, seizes a cup, turns it upside down, plants a fork beside it, and by this 
 pantomime seeks to recall to me a spot in yesterday’s excursion where I halted 
 long enough to make some memoranda of a cluster of mooring piles with the 
 round dome of the Salute in the distance. 
 
 “ No ? Bah ! Certainly not; how stupid of me ! ” (All this in his face, for 
 his native tongue is still unintelligible to me.) “That would be impossible. 
 Then how about this ? ” And then follows another arrangement of saucers for 
 sails, lumps of sugar for steps, and other breakfast accessories illustrating minor 
 details which make it very plain to me that the spot in his mind now is lower 
 down the Riva where the fishermen tie their boats to the staircase. This, after 
 all, is really the only spot in Venice w r orthy the consideration of a great painter 
 on so charming a morning as this. 
 
 But I did not want the staircase, and Ingenio saw it. I did, however, want 
 another cup of coffee, and this he brought me. 
 
 But where to go, and what to paint! I have learned never to attempt to 
 solve this or any other difficulties in Venice. I fall back on my gondolier. 
 
 A section of the Venetian Committee of Finance followed me to my gondola, 
 and a modern Dives added one half of one penny to his worldly store steady- 
 
54 
 
 A SUMMERS DAY IN VENICE 
 
 ing my boat. Ingenio bent to bis oar, we glided along the edge of the quay, 
 and I looked back. My gondolier had solved the problem. I would paint the 
 wine shop. My eye had caught the flat quay protected by the marble rai l i n g, 
 the glare of the white wall against the deep blue sky, the arching stairway, the 
 soft, filmy outline of the Salute in the distance, and, centering the whole com¬ 
 position, the brilliant-colored awning casting its rich shadow, in which were dotted 
 the groups of wealthy capitalists with the unlimitable bank account of intermi¬ 
 nable leisure. 
 
 An obliging row of houses served as an umbrella and cast a grateful shadow, 
 upon the edge of which I planted my easel. In five minutes more I was work¬ 
 ing away with as much gusto as if I had planned to paint this identical wine 
 shop weeks before. 
 
 The usual Venetian crowd collected and looked over my shoulder. The 
 woman carrying her two copper water-pails slung to a light yoke, and which 
 she had filled at the fountain in the Piazzetta adjoining; the girls stringing 
 beads; the fishermen carrying their nets to the boats moored below; another 
 painter with his trap — etiquette forbids him the privilege of the masses, but 
 all the same I am conscious that he slackens his pace and edges as near as he 
 can, and tiptoes himself for a glance. The tangle-haired children with abbrevi¬ 
 ated clothing and faces like Raphael’s cherubs; the old hags shuffling along in 
 their heelless shoes ; the fat priest in his sandals, and the pretty flower-girl in 
 a costume not her own, — all these types are well known to the painter in 
 V enice. 
 
 Out on the canal I hear the shouts of the gondoliers and boatmen. My lim¬ 
 ited knowledge of their language prevents my understanding what the contro¬ 
 versy is all about, but all the boatmen on both sides of the water have a voice 
 in it, and I am convinced from the way in which they emphasize some of their 
 expressions that their dialect is punctuated by a very choice variety of pro¬ 
 fanity. 
 
 In the midst of this Babel, which is suddenly increased by the arrival of a 
 number of fruit and fish venders, I hear a strain of- music, sung with such a 
 full, free, whole-souled sort of a voice that it drowns all other sounds and in¬ 
 stantly catches my ear : — 
 
 “ Jammo jammo neoppa jammo ja.” 
 
 It is a Neapolitan song very popular in Venice this summer. 
 
 Over the bridge it comes, and in a moment more I catch sight of the singer 
 as he mounts the steps. First his red cap perched on the back of his head, 
 crowning a mass of jet-black hair; then his sunburned face, blue shirt open 
 from the throat to the waist, red sash, and white trousers; and then, as he de¬ 
 scends on my side of the bridge, I notice that he is barefooted. A roar of 
 laughter greets him as he halts at the wine shop, and follows him as he makes 
 his way towards the crowd around my easel. Before he reaches me he breaks 
 out again: — 
 
 “ Jammo jammo neoppa jammo ja. 
 
 Funiculi Funiculk Funiculi Funicula.” 
 
A SUMMERS DAY IN VENICE 55 
 
 Everybody about me welcomes him. The flower-girl gives him a rose, and 
 one of the girls stringing beads a kiss; the old woman a scolding, at which he 
 laughs and makes a grimace, which instantly puts her in a good humor again. 
 As he nears my easel he picks up a child, pinches it, and, when it cries, kisses 
 it and puts it down. Then he plants himself immediately in front of me, com¬ 
 pletely hiding my view, and cranes his neck trying to see my sketch upside 
 down. He is not impertinent, or rude, or aggressive; he only wants to see 
 what is going on. 
 
 I mildly expostulate, and the crowd break out against him in a chorus; and 
 when he cannot be made to understand that he is very much in my way and 
 very much out of his, Ingenio turns up and leads him gently to the rear. 
 Then he sees it all, laughs until the quay rings, pats me on the back, and 
 apologizes like a gentleman. 
 
 Before I can reply he dodges into a hallway opposite, hauls out a great seine, 
 spreads it on the marble flagging of the Piazzetta, and falls to mending it with 
 a will, singing at the top of his voice, and stopping every few moments to 
 argue with the girl who is making lace behind her pot of flowers in the balcony 
 over the way, or chaff some gondolier landing at the quay on his left, or send 
 some witticism flying after a passer-by, to the intense delight of the whole com¬ 
 munity. 
 
 This went on for hours, I painting quietly, and this breezy, happy-hearted, bare¬ 
 footed, sunburned, rosy-cheeked fisherman keeping the whole place alive and 
 awake. Finally, he gathered up the net just as I finished washing my brushes, 
 stowed it away in his boat near by, waved his hand to me, returned to his 
 house and brought out a table, two chairs, and a bottle of Chianti wine, and, 
 without a moment’s hesitation, crossed to where I was packing my sketch-trap, 
 strapped it himself, locked his arm through mine, and led me to his table, his 
 honest, handsome face saying as plain as could be told, “ Come, comrade, we 
 have had a hard day’s work; now let 
 us have a bottle together.” And we 
 did. 
 
 I never see a bottle of Chianti but 
 I think of this sunny fisherman, and 
 I never drink one but I pledge him a 
 bumper. I send him my greeting over 
 the sea, and long life to him, and a 
 wife to love him, and plenty of fish, 
 and plenty of Chianti, and one bottle 
 always for me! I owe him my thanks 
 for his hearty laugh, and his song, 
 and his courtesy, and for his share in 
 making this summer’s day the pleas¬ 
 antest I spent in Venice. 
 
THE TOP OF A GONDOLA 
 
 While I am at breakfast tbis morning a fleet of lighter boats sweep slowly 
 past my garden and moor to a cluster of piles off the Dogana. 
 
 I have been on the lookout for this picturesque flotilla for some time, and 
 Ingenio knows it. Before I have half finished my omelette he arrives off the 
 marble steps, and rounds in his gondola, steadying her against the incoming 
 tide with one hand and waving his congratulations with the other. 
 
 One peculiarity of this gentle, loyal soul is the intense personal interest he 
 takes in my affairs. When I am satisfied with my day’s work Ingenio is bub¬ 
 bling over with happiness, and hums to himself as he rows an old song, or 
 rather one line of it. When my sky becomes muddy, or my shadows opaque, 
 and I irritable and disgusted (what painter is not so sometimes?), poor Ingenio 
 pulls away mute and sad, and comes forward every now and then with an anx¬ 
 ious expression upon his face and watches the sketch as if it was a sick child 
 and I the physician upon whom its life depended. 
 
 This morning he is as happy over the arrival of these golden - winged boats 
 from beyond the Lido as if he was my man Friday crying a sail! and I his 
 shipwrecked master. 
 
 In five minutes we are off, and running under the shadow of the Salute. As 
 it is too hot to work in the sun, moored to a spile on the Canal, I direct In¬ 
 genio to the broad landing of the church, hoping to find some spot where I 
 
THE TOP OF A GONDOLA 
 
 57 
 
 can put up my easel and umbrella and paint the group of lighters in comfort 
 and at my leisure. 
 
 I convey this information with my umbrella-staff very much as a Londoner 
 directs and stops a hansom cab with his walking-stick. IngCnio sees the point 
 (of the staff, of course) over the edge of my gondola’s awning, darts in among 
 a number of’ fishing boats, and immediately begins a search in the pavement of 
 the Piazzetta for a crack wide and deep enough in which to anchor my um¬ 
 brella and still keep sight of the lighters. 
 
 This combination proved difficult. There were cracks enough, and views 
 enough ; the problem was to utilize them together. 
 
 It is true, there was also a long, cool shadow slanting across the marble pave¬ 
 ment which would serve as an umbrella, and which for a time was tempting, but 
 sober second thought convinced me that it could not be depended on. It was 
 not the shadow of the great dome of the Salute, but of one of its small towers; 
 and old Sol, in his mad climb to the zenith, was fast melting it up. 
 
 But if the shadow failed me Ingenio did not, who at that instant returned 
 from a search after narrow cracks with news of some wide openings. These 
 proved to be half a dozen or more felsi laid up for the summer on the far 
 side of the landing, under which I could crawl and so escape the heat. 
 
 The discovery so pleased my faithful gondolier that, without waiting for any 
 instructions from me, he picked up the traps and deposited them in front of a 
 row of great black beetles sprawled out on the pavement, apparently sunning 
 themselves. On closer inspection they proved to be the tops of gondolas used 
 in wet and wintry weather, whose owners, having no immediate use for them, 
 had laid them by for a rainy day like their extra pennies. 
 
58 
 
 THE TOP OF A GONDOLA 
 
 I inspected each one. in turn, found one larger than the others commanding 
 a capital view of the boats, and moved in at once. 
 
 It made a delightful studio, was just high enough and wide enough, and had 
 two windows on each side, with sliding shutters and sash like a cab’s, which 
 proved admirable in managing the light on my canvas. 
 
 The result was that I spent the whole day under its shelter, and finally com¬ 
 pleted my picture, Ingenio bringing me, from one of the fishing boats, some 
 broiled fish and a pot of coffee for luncheon, which I shared with him, he oc¬ 
 cupying the adjoining felse, and pushing his cup under mine for me to fill. 
 
 When the sun went down and I began packing up my traps, a number of 
 gondoliers arrived, one of whom, a forbidding-looking fellow with a shock of 
 red hair, informed Ingenio that the fels£ belonged to his gondola, and that he 
 demanded eight lira for the use of it. On my replying that he could only 
 earn one quarter of that amount with his whole gondola, and that one lira, 
 which I handed him, would be more than a reasonable rent for his stationary 
 sunshade, at best but half of it, he flew into a great rage, and tossed the lira 
 back to Ingenio. Then finding that I paid no further attention to him and 
 moved off, he collected a crowd of gondoliers, who, uniting their cries to his, 
 jumped into their gondolas, and followed my own to the water stairs of my 
 lodgings, the whole mob shouting and gesticulating wildly. 
 
 There we were met by the porter. He is rather a thin gentleman with a 
 high forehead, and is proverbial for his politeness. As his entire life is spent 
 on the front steps helping people in and out of their gondolas, it is deserved. 
 He performed that service for me, and then turned upon the howling mob. 
 
 It was simply delightful to see the way he handled them. They evidently 
 knew him, and respected either his authority or patronage, — the latter probably. 
 
 During the discussion I sought the quiet of the garden, followed by Ingenio, 
 who vented his indignation upon the whole crew, being especially severe upon 
 the gentleman with the auburn locks, whom he described by gestures of infinite 
 disgust. 
 
 Before long the porter sought me out, and explained that these gondoliers 
 were a rough set, and that if I valued my peace of mind while in Venice I 
 ought to make some settlement of the affair, and either pay the amount de¬ 
 manded or explain the circumstances to the other gondoliers. 
 
 At this juncture an idea occurred to me which I proceeded to put into 
 practice. 
 
 I would invite the plaintiff and half a dozen of his confreres into the gar¬ 
 den, install the porter as chief justice, and argue the case before him. 
 
 This programme was immediately carried out, — the porter acting in the 
 double capacity of interpreter and judge. 
 
 The gondolier opened the case. He stated that he had been at work all day, 
 and being too poor to pay some one to watch his felse had left it unguarded. 
 On his return, in the evening, he had surprised this rich painter as he was 
 leaving it, and who, after occupying it all day, had refused to pay for the 
 
THE TOP OF A GONDOLA 
 
 59 
 
 privilege, except in a coin of so little value that it was almost an insult to the 
 profession to offer it. 
 
 On the cross-examination it was shown that at this season of the year there 
 were several hundred felsi decorating the vacant quays, landings, and piazzas 
 of Venice (there being no back yards in which to store them); that a gondola 
 had a summer and a winter top, consequently only one was or could be used 
 at the same time; and that now, in summer time, the felse I occupied was about 
 of as much use to the plaintiff as two umbrellas on a rainy day. 
 
 It was also shown that the gross earnings of a gondolier and gondola com¬ 
 plete averaged less than three lira a day, and that there was no instance on 
 record in Venice or elsewhere in which any gondolier had ever collected any 
 large or small amount of money for the use of a felse for any period of time, 
 long or short. 
 
 On the re-direct, the plaintiff wanted the judge and jury to remember that 
 no bargain had been made for the use of the felse; that accordingly he had a 
 right to charge what he considered would compensate him, especially since there 
 existed no tariff for laid-by felsi; and that, in defiance of his rights of own¬ 
 ership, I had forcibly entered and taken possession. 
 
 The effect of this last shot on the jury was very pronounced. They looked 
 at each other wisely, and nodded concurrence. 
 
 It was now my turn, and as I was conducting my own case I summed up 
 for the defense. 
 
 I asked the jury whether Italy was not now free, and whether Venice was 
 not a city free to her citizens and to the strangers within her gates. I re¬ 
 minded them that the days of Austrian tyranny were days of the past, and 
 that any Italian who would wish to renew them would be a traitor to his 
 country. 
 
60 
 
 THE TOP OF A GONDOLA 
 
 In those days a tax was placed upon the people of Venice so severe that the 
 privations it caused were still fresh in their memories. 
 
 Now, thanks to a humane government under a wise king, all such onerous 
 burdens had been lifted from the people. Venice had a free harbor, free 
 canals, free churches, piazzas, and landings. 
 
 How came it, then, that this plaintiff, representing so loyal a body of hard¬ 
 working citizens as the gondoliers, should seek to bring back the days of tyr¬ 
 anny and wrong ? 
 
 The king had said these piazzas were free, and under this ruling I, a stranger, 
 in the peaceful pursuit of my profession, had taken up my position in one of 
 them. I had really occupied the pavement, not the felse [sensation] ; and if its 
 top happened to be over me and so shaded me from the heat of the sun, that 
 circumstance gave the plaintiff no more ground for charging me eight lira for 
 its use than it did the owner of a palace, who happened to own the shady side 
 of the street, and so charged passers-by for the relief it afforded them. 
 
 This settled it. The judge decided in favor of the defendant, maintaining 
 that felsi and Venice were free, and that the only charge which could reason¬ 
 ably be made would be against the gondolier for obstructing the painter and 
 annoying him while engaged in the peaceful pursuit of his profession. 
 
 Ingenio afterwards reported that the verdict was entirely satisfactory to the 
 jury, and also to the gondolier, who had not seen it in that light before. 
 
 When I saw him the next day and handed him again the one lira, he touched 
 his hat and said, “ Gracias, signor.” 
 
 Since this little incident I have been more than ever impressed with the 
 majesty of the law, which somehow or other always seems to protect me in these 
 my wanderings! 
 

I am at work painting an old bridge spanning a narrow canal 
 which flows behind the Rialto. It is the sole dependence of a 
 crooked crevice of a street running over and across the sluggish water 
 way and into the small open square facing a church. This bridge also 
 provides shop space for a vender of cheap pottery, whose wares of 
 green and red glisten in the sun, supplying a spot of brilliant color to 
 my composition. I know this church and its quaint interior, and I 
 also know the cafe next to it, for here Ingenio and I often breakfast. It is an 
 unpretentious place, but the coffee is always good, and sometimes the landlord 
 serves a cutlet sliced quite thin and smothered in an inviting sauce. 
 
 This morning I prefer breakfasting in my gondola, and so send Ingenio for 
 coffee and whatever else he can bring me from a larder rarely overstocked. 
 
 If you have never breakfasted in a gondola moored under the windows of an 
 old palace, on its cool side, with your curtains drawn back, the water gurgling 
 about you and reflecting the thousand tints of marble walls, white sails, and 
 blue skies, I commend it to you as an experience which, once enjoyed, you will 
 never forget. 
 
 When Ingenio returns with the coffee he brings me a message from the land¬ 
 lord ‘that he is cooking a cutlet, and will send it to the bridge.’ Later on, in 
 looking from between my curtains, I see a pale-faced child, scarce ten years of 
 a°-e, carrying between her outstretched hands a covered dish. I notice, also, that 
 Ingenio helps her carefully down the slippery steps of the landing, relieves her 
 of the cutlet, and when she hesitates and is timid about returning, picks her up 
 gently in his arms, and places her safely on the quay at the entrance of the 
 crevice of a street, through which she disappears waving her hand. 
 
 In my experience gondoliers are not in the habit of exhibiting such watchful 
 
 BEHIND THE IlIALTO 
 
62 
 
 BEHIND THE IUALTO 
 
 care over the youth of Venice, and so I ask Ingenio, in our sign language, now 
 quite well understood between us, if the child belongs to him. 
 
 The old man smiles sadly, and a far - away look comes into his eyes; then he 
 shakes his head. 
 
 The cutlet and sketch finished, the gondola is headed up the canal, and 
 Ingenio and I begin our daily search for good bric-a-brac at poor prices. To¬ 
 day I want a staff, or boat-hook, similar to one I saw yesterday in the hands 
 of a Venetian gentleman of unlimited leisure, who used it in steadying the 
 gondola of an Englishman of unlimited means, who upon alighting immediately 
 purchased it. It was studded all over with copper coins of various dates and 
 diameters nailed to the wood, a kind of portable savings bank, and was alto¬ 
 gether a very curious and interesting exhibit of Venetian life. 
 
 Ing ;enio thinks he knows a gondolier who may still own one. He is to be 
 found at the right-hand landing of the Rialto. So we twist our way in and 
 out of the narrow water ways, and under many bridges, and then through the 
 broad water of the Grand Canal, spanned by the famous arch. But Ingenio’s 
 friend could not be found at the landing, or anywhere else in the vicinity, so 
 we try another bridge lower down, and not finding him there, give up the 
 search in this direction. A shop near the fish-market, another in one of the 
 streets near the Piazzetta, and a fisherman’s house above it, were next visited 
 without success. Then Ingenio tells me he thinks he can find a staff near his 
 own home, but a short distance away. Might he turn the gondola into the 
 canal to our left? 
 
 He had often before asked me to visit his home. At one time, it was be¬ 
 cause of a cafe opposite his house where they made an excellent omelette; 
 again, it was a cabinet-maker, who had his shop near where he lived, and 
 who had some old engravings in black frames. To-day, it is this much sought 
 for staff. 
 
 Until now either want of time or some more interesting excursion had al- 
 ways prevented my consenting, and, when I again refuse, the same sad expres¬ 
 sion I often see passes over his face, and so, to please him, I nod my head. 
 A few quick strokes bring us to an angle in the canal running behind the 
 Rialto, and quite near where I had breakfasted in the morning. 
 
 A pleasant-faced woman, prematurely old, comes down a flight of steps built 
 under a culvert-shaped arch, and holds the boat to the lower step. It is Inge¬ 
 nio s wife. I follow her under the arch, up a tottering flight of steps, and into 
 a small, scrupulously clean room with high ceiling. It is their living room, and, 
 like all Venetian kitchens, has its fire-place built out from the wall, while on 
 either side of the raised hearth, two small windows, about one foot square, 
 look out on the canal. The shelf over the hearth, and the wall above it, shine 
 with well-polished brass and copper pans. White curtains soften the glare of 
 the sunlight. Some pictures of the Holy Mother, a cheap crucifix, and a few 
 articles of furniture complete the interior. Ingenio enters, having moored the 
 gondola, gives me the best chair, draws the curtains that I may see the view of 
 
BEHIND TIIE RIALTO 
 
 63 
 
 the Grand Canal and the Rialto, officiates as sign-interpreter between me and 
 his wife, and then disappears into an adjoining room, leaving the door ajar. 
 The good wife rises quickly and closes it behind him. As she regains her 
 seat she says something to me in Italian which I do not understand. 
 
 In a moment more the door reopens and Ingenio enters, carrying in his arms 
 a pale, hollow-cheeked child, about ten years of age, who looks at me wonder- 
 
 ingly with her great round eyes. One hand is wound around her father’s neck, 
 her thin fingers lost in his bushy gray beard. The other holds a short crutch. 
 I shall never forget the tender way with which the old man placed her on a 
 low stool at his side, caressing her hair, holding fast her hand, and talking to 
 her in a low undertone in his soft Italian; nor the tremor in his voice when he 
 leaned over to me and said, pointing to his crippled daughter: — 
 
 “ This one belongs to me.” 
 
 It was all the child he had, poor fellow. She filled his heart full with her 
 bright face and loving ways, and although she was his greatest sorrow, he was 
 proud of her, and proud that I had seen her. Several years ago she had fallen 
 from one of the bridges, struck a passing boat, and broken her thigh. Since 
 then she had lived in these two rooms. 
 
 I understood now why he lifted ashore so tenderly my little waitress with the 
 cutlet. 
 
 When I regained my gondola I reminded Ingenio of the object of our 
 search. Was the man at home? Had he seen the staff? Would he bring it 
 
64 BEHIND THE RIALTO 
 
 Then it all came out. There was no man with a gondola staff. There had 
 been no cabinet-maker next door, with rare old engraving's in black frames, nor 
 any cafes with toothsome omelettes. 
 
 It was Giulietta he wanted me to see. 
 
 Patient, loyal, gentle, old gondolier! With me you will forever be a part of 
 sunny skies, old palaces, and the silver shimmer of the Lido, the bright sails 
 of red and gold, the cool of dim, incense-laden churches, and crooked canals 
 under quaint bridges. 
 
 Even now I hear your warning cry as you round the sharp corners of the 
 canals. But I love best to remember you with that pale-faced child in your 
 
 arms. 
 
UP A BELFRY 
 
 IN BAY ARIA 
 
 I am aware that this is rather 
 an indefinite belfry, for Bavaria 
 covers a wide territory, and bel¬ 
 fries are by no means rare; but, 
 nevertheless, this is as near as any 
 one will ever get to the exact lo¬ 
 cality of this particular belfry from 
 any information which 1 will fur¬ 
 nish, and there are good reasons 
 for my reticence. 
 
 This belfry caps the quaint tower 
 of a curious old Franciscan mon¬ 
 astery. It is built of red sand¬ 
 stone, seamed and scarred by the 
 weathers of many centuries, and 
 barnacled all over with gray lichen 
 and green moss. It carries within 
 its open arches the remnant of a 
 chime of bells which are never 
 rung, and overlooks a clock which ran down some hundred years ago, and 
 has never been wound up since. Backed up against the wall of this monastery 
 is a small church or chapel. Adjoining the church is a cloister, surrounded by 
 a high wall, on one side of which is an open gate or archway, the whole sur¬ 
 mounted by a high peaked roof. 
 
 I had walked up from the lower part of the town, where some quaint houses 
 leaning over a narrow canal, reminding one of two old crones gossiping across 
 a street, had tempted me to paint them, and catching sight of this gate, I loi¬ 
 tered in aimlessly. Under the groined arches of the cloister were sheltered idle 
 carts and wagons. From the sculptured tombs in the pavement many restless 
 feet had wellnigh effaced all traces of the graven names of the holy saints who 
 lay buried beneath. It was easy to see that modern Protestantism had no re¬ 
 spect for the traditions of the Holy Church. 
 
 Crossing the cloister with its vistas of open squares and small culvert-shaped 
 arches running under rickety houses, I passed a group of heavy columns sup¬ 
 porting a low roof, the whole forming a vaulted room. A grated window at 
 one end cast a dim light over an old woman washing. She gazed at me sol¬ 
 emnly, and pointed to a door in the wall. Thinking that this was another way 
 
 
 
66 
 
 UP A BELFRY IN BA VARIA 
 
 out, I turned the knob, and found myself in the refectory of the monastery 
 and confronted by a kindly-faced old friar and a strong smell of cookery. It 
 was some time before I could make him understand how I came there and by 
 what mistake, for my knowledge of German is only that of a traveler. My 
 sketch-book, however, settled it. He turned over the leaves slowly, recognized a 
 pencil memorandum of the gate, took my hat from my hand, hung it on one of 
 a row of wooden pegs, and motioning me to a seat, dipped a long perforated 
 iron ladle into a steaming cauldron, dished out some boiled potatoes and shreds 
 of meat, and placed them on a plate before me. I thanked him and ate my 
 rations like a friar. 
 
 Then I followed him through the wide, bare, whitewashed-rooms of the ground 
 floor, and into the small church, and such a shabby old church, too! Cheap 
 silvered candlesticks, cheaper cotton lace on the altar-cloth, paper flowers in china 
 vases, ugly modern lamps, German lithographs edged with gilt paper supplying 
 the places of Raphaels and Correggios, and offering candles, none of which were 
 burning, fastened to iron spikes, from which flowed streams of tallow telling of 
 former prayers. All indicated bitter poverty. 
 
 Even the wrinkled old friar seemed a part of the place, — sad, hollow - eyed, 
 and barefooted, his waist bound with a cord from which hung a wooden cross, 
 and he himself as much a tear-stained relic of the past as the walls over which 
 the damp of ages had trickled. Poor old fellow! I can see him now looking 
 at me wistfully and standing patiently as I examined all he showed me. 
 
 Finally he said to me, “ English ? ” “ No,” I replied, “ American.” He 
 
 dropped the iron hoop which held his keys, and the tears started to his eyes. 
 “American, my son?” Then he took my hand and by many signs and ges¬ 
 tures made me understand that my country was the future home of his church; 
 that Bavaria in the dim past had seen the grandeur and splendor of the mon¬ 
 astery, which had once been heaped full of riches, and had once been proud of 
 its power and prestige, but now she had turned her back upon it and had left 
 it to decay. As he spoke he picked up a small copper censer, poured the ashes 
 out in the palm of his hand, and sifted them slowly on the floor. 
 
 I encouraged him to talk, and examined with him the altar-screen faced with 
 a square of some cheap modern fabric, and asked him what it was like in the 
 olden times ? “V elvet and satin, my son, and embroidery of gold and silver; 
 and the lamps all solid gold; the walls were covered with paintings, the steps 
 of the altar with fine carpets ; and the Archbishop, to whom the king kneeled, 
 was clothed in lace and scarlet.” 
 
 By this time we had circled the small church and reached the door, but I 
 was not satisfied. I led him back to the altar and pointed out the different 
 objects. Where now was the old lace? Was it stored away somewhere and 
 only shown to travelers? He shook his head and spread his fingers as if it 
 had slipped through them years before. Candlesticks? Lamps? Censers? Still 
 the same mournful shake. All gone. About the silks and velvets and embroid¬ 
 eries that covered the face of the altar; where now were they ? He simply cast 
 
UP A BELFRY IN BA VARIA 
 
 67 
 
 his eyes upward. But this was a new piece but a few years old; what was 
 done with the old one ? A gleam of intelligence shot across his wrinkled old 
 face, and one long, thin finger rested on his forehead. He looked at me search- 
 ingly from under his bushy gray eyebrows, tapped me on the shoulder, and 
 led the way back through the bare wide rooms and into the seething refectory, 
 and up to a row of hooks from which hung keys of all shapes and sizes. He 
 looked them over carefully, and took down a great hoop linking three keys to¬ 
 gether, lighted a lantern, and I followed him into the vault-shaped room, past 
 the old woman, who bowed and crossed herself, through an open court, from 
 which I saw the belfry with the silent chimes, and up to a door in its tower 
 heavily grated with iron. 
 
 The first key started its rusty holts, and we groped our way up a mouldy 
 stone staircase, the friar going ahead feeling his way and holding the lantern 
 for me until we reached the landing of the first story, which I noticed was level 
 with the roof of the monastery. The daylight struggling in through diamond¬ 
 shaped panes of glass begrimed with dirt and cobwebs revealed another door. 
 I looked through its gratings and could see nothing but an empty room. The 
 
68 
 
 UP A B ELF BY IN BAVABIA 
 
 old friar pressed his shrunken cheek against the bars, gave a pleased chuckle, 
 unlocked them, and pointed to a pile of six wooden altar screens leaning against 
 the wall and half buried in dust. My heart sank within me. 
 
 Not seeing my chagrin he stooped over and threw down the first screen. A 
 cloud of dust arose nearly suffocating me. It proved to be a worm-eaten frame 
 covered with mouldy canvas. The second the same; the third, mere shreds of 
 worsted, with patches of tinsel lace bearing the figure of the cross embroidered 
 
 in faded green. The fourth of silk, threadbare and stained with the droppings 
 of many candles. As the dust cleared away from each screen the old fellow 
 would look anxiously in my face for approval. The fifth—to tell you the truth, 
 the fifth took my breath away. It was an old gold-colored corded silk as heavy 
 as canvas, and covered with an exquisite embroidery in silk and silver without a 
 break or flaw. The canvas backing had protected it from the damp, and the 
 sixth screen against the wall had saved it in a measure from the grime of 
 years. 
 
 I broke all the blades of my knife cutting this precious relic of the seven¬ 
 teenth century from its frame, the good friar on his knees meanwhile holding 
 one end taut so that I could run my knife close to the rusted tacks. 
 
 His enthusiasm was delightful as he read my face, for the discovery was evi¬ 
 dently as much of a surprise to him as to me. “ Now I would believe the truth 
 of all the stories of the magnificence of the olden times.” And then he lifted 
 it tenderly and carried it as carefully down the treacherous staircase as if it had 
 been blessed by the Pope, and spread it on the grass in the sunlight. 
 
 I sat down on the tomb of an old saint and feasted my eyes. 
 
 It was Italian, without doubt, worked in twisted silk and silver in a design of 
 leaves and flowers, the whole in delicate tones of pale yellows, pinks, and tur¬ 
 quoise blue. Soiled and stained, of course, but that did not trouble me. I 
 knew a little Frenchwoman near St. Cloud who could take half a loaf of fresh 
 bread and with it work a charm upon its old gold background. 
 
 Then I tried a charm of my own with some new gold upon the palm of my 
 
UP A B ELF BY IN BAVARIA 
 
 69 
 
 old friar. To my surprise lie refused it. “ No, take it to America. They would 
 appreciate it there. It was nothing' here, — all dead, all ashes, all forgotten.” 
 Well, then, for the poor? Yes, he would take it for the poor. There were 
 plenty of them always. He would give the money to the bishop for the poor. 
 
 As he pressed my hand at the gate his eyes filled, and pointing to the mon¬ 
 astery he said slowly, “ Never here, my son. In America.” 
 
 It was not until I reached my lodgings with my prize that I thought of the 
 sixth screen, which in my great joy I had neglected to turn down. What could 
 that have been ? 
 
 This question I am not yet able to answer, and until I am I shall not tell 
 anybody where in Bavaria is my belfry.