HIBPtARY OF CONGRESS, i ^!L.i/ .....v\....4..9.. I \ UNITED STATES OP AMERICA, ^i THE ECOiNOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. FOR $430, INCLUDING IRELAND — CORK, blarney castle, killarney lakes, Dublin, Belfast, and giant's causeway; SCOTLAND — Glasgow, Edinburgh, roma.n walls, etc.; ENGLAND— INCLUDING ten days in London; isle of wight; FRANCE — SIX days in PARIS, VERSAILLES, AND THE PALACES; SOUTH FRANCE; SWITZERLAND — geneva and the lake, mont blanc, mont CENIS tunnel, and THE ALPS; ITALY— INCLUDING TURIN, PALACES, ETC., FLORENCE (LA BELLA), ROME FIVE DAYS, NAPLES, MOUNT VESUVIUS, POMPEII AND HERCULA- NEUM, PISA, VENICE; AUSTRIA — THE CAVES, TRIESTE, AND THE ADRIATIC; VIENNA; PRUSSIA — INCLUDING PRAGUE, DRESDEN, BERLIN, POTSDAM, HAMBURGH, THE GERMAN OCEAN ; LONDON AGAIN, LIVERPOOL, MANCHESTER, AND HOME AGAIN. .i^LL IN A MANNER OF ORDINARY AMERICAN STYLE J\ND COMFORT. FIRST-CLASS OCEAN FARE BOTH WAYS. Inchiding, also, an Account in Detail of the Daily Dishcrsements, Hotel Bills, Railroad Fare, Cabs, Sight-seeing, etc., shozving what was Enjoyed and what it Costs. With many New Hints on Foreign Travel, and Contrasts and Comparisons BETWEEN America and Europe. y" By WILLIAM HEMSTREET. — - — ichM^y New- York : S. W. GREEN, PRINTER, Nos. i6 & i8 JACOB STREET. 1875. $ i- THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS WASHINGTON Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1875, by WILLIAM HEMSTREET, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. CONTENTS. CHAPTER I. The Necessity of Travel— The Outset— The Outfit— Recapitu- lation CHAPTER n. The Refreshment of the Ocean— The Ship— How to Make a Trip Comfortable — The Company— A Burial— Sea-Sick- ness — Land — Fourth of July i8 CHAPTER HI. Ireland — Guide-books — Traveling Light — Queen stown — An Esthetic Breakfast — Blarney — The River Lee — Cork — Blarney Castle — A Future Congressman — Killarney: its Lakes, Castles, and Abbeys — South Ireland 24 CHAPTER IV. Dublin — Its Arts and Refinements — Soldiers — Belfast — Poli- tics — Rome Religion — Home Rule — Scenery 41 CHAPTER V. North Ireland— The Channel— The Clyde— Ship-building— Paisley— The Roman Wall— Broad Scotch— Edinburgh.. 54 IV CONTENTS. CHAPTER VI. European Railroads — Vexatious Experience — Absurd Man- agement 66 CHAPTER VH. Great Britain's Climate — America's Need — En Route to Lon- don — Underground Railroads — City Travel — How Lon- don is Fed — Municipal Government — The Unctuous Shil- ling — Fee to see the British Lion — Restaurants and Hotels — Varieties So CHAPTER VHL The Sights of London— Westminster Abbey— The Tower— St. Paul's — Cost of Living. 99 CHAPTER IX. The Isle of Wight— Royalty and Loyalty io6 CHAPTER X. European Eating: the English and Continental Styles 113 CHAPTER XL To France — The Channel — Crucifixes, Soldiers, and Priests — Beautiful Paris— -Palaces in general — The French As- sembly — Gambetta— The Army — The Grand Opera-House — French Fussiness 117 CHAPTER XII. The European Language — Across France to Geneva — The Beautiful River Rhone — By Diligence to Mont Blanc — The Savoyards— The Glaciers— Scenery 137 CONTENTS. V CHAPTER XIII. Mont Cenis Tunnel — Italy — Turin — Florence — Art 150 CHAPTER XIV. Rome, Ancient and Modern — Ruins 161 CHAPTER XV. Naples — Mount Vesuvius — How to go up it — What it is — The Bay of Naples 179 CHAPTER XVI. Venice — Faded Glory — Clean and'Quiet Streets — Adelsburg Grotto — Vienna 189 CHAPTER XVII. Austria and Germany — Berlin — Hamburg — The German Ocean — The Liverpool Docks — Manchester — " No Admit- tance" — Domiciles in general igS CHAPTER XVIII. Final Comparisons and Contrasts — Foreign Prejudice con- cerning America — America has Nothing but Liberty — A Wholesome Resentment — More American Patriotism necessary 212 CHAPTER I. THE ECONOMY OF IT. A TRIP to Europe! Its anticipations were not to me more inspiriting than their realization now is. To know Europe through one's own senses is the indulgent life-long dream of many Americans. I had always held a doctrine that to give an American balance, he should have a trip through the mother-world — although experiment proves even that is not always effectual. The transat- lantic world is to us the mother-world in every phase of human life — of art and thought — except as to our peculiar American freedom ; and as to that, nowhere on the round earth do men walk so erectly and easily as here. Many times as the writer went through Europe, he thought, '" Ah ! we have nothing in America but freedom ;" but more of this in the sequel. Extensive travel on our own continent, a tho- rough consultation of European guide-books,maps, and lists of prices, and some training as a journalist to quick ancf critical observation and prompt 2 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. record, led the writer to believe that the reputed expense of European tours is a humbug, and that he might become, in some wise, a pioneer to others in economical European touring, while resting, instructing, and improving himself. Europe is the biggest show I ever went to. All Americans who have resources above the necessities of life, and are willing to pay money for substantial education, should go to it. [It is funny how many of the Americans whom I met abroad asked me if I had never before heard of them. I had to blush in every instance to say I had not. This is a diversion to gain the attention of the desultory reader ; now to business.] To show the benefit of care and method in preparation for an European tour, I will here say that I started with $506 in gold, and only a hand-valise for baggage, on a three months' trip through Ireland, Scotland, England, France, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, and Germany, and disbursed only $433 for essentials, devoting the remainder of the $506 to art purchases, clothing, etc., and arrived home on the day and dollar intended, chock-full of satisfaction, having ac- complished my journey in the uttermost detail. There will not be any attempt here to develop any new thing in European attractiveness, nor to write better than has been done of any old thing ; ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 3 the only object is to show, in a brief and cheap form, to Americans of limited means or plain habits, the facilities for European touring that really await them. Each day's actual expenses, as we proceed, is faithfully given, showing what was enjoyed, what it cost, the general style of the trip, and what each reader may do if he chooses, varying his route to his own taste ; for the whole civilized world furnishes facilities at every rod, and more conveniently and methodically in Europe than in America. Here follows a recapitulation ; but the daily items will be given as we proceed. Of course such a trip can be only a skimming- over of Europe and as to its scenic aspects ; there can be no more than a superficial observa- tion of society, which, much more than American society, has the fashion of being ''out of town" in the summer. Of course, one can not attempt to describe any of the ten thousand interesting objects he meets, and which the guide-books and encyclopedias do well ; but general allusion will be made, to make interesting the practical re- quirements of the travel. RECAPITULATION OF EXPENSES. OCEAN TRIP, IRELAND, SCOTLAND, AND ENGLAND, FIVE WEEKS, $182.29. June 27 to July 9, Ocean, $84 48 July 9, Queenstown, 4 00 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. July lo, Cork, etc., " II, Killarney, " 12, Dublin, etc., . " 13, Dublin, " 14, Belfast, " 15, Giant's Causeway, " 16, Glasgow, " 17, At Friend's, " 18, " " 19, " " (gifts), " 20, Edinburgh, • " 21, " 22, To London, " 23, York, etc., . " 24, London, . " 25, 26, 27, 28. 29, 31, Isle of Wight August 2, " 3, Lodgings and room 9 days back, EXPENSES IN FRANCE, $« 71 5 54 2 40 5 97 5 92 4 34 3 50 5 00 338 3 08 9 66 3 17 3 39 2 89 70 383 2 72 I 48 I 82 4 59 I 38 3 34 7 GO $182 29 INCLUDING GENEVA AND MONT BLANC TO MONT CENIS TUNNEL, EMBRACING TWO WEEKS, $51.48. August 4, Fare to Paris, $7 35 5, At Paris, 3 66 6, Paris, . . . . . . . 4 09 " 7, " ........ 2 73 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. August 8, Paris, 9» ' . . 10, " 11, " ....... 12, Fare to Geneva and Mont Cenis, second class, 13, E7t route, ' 14, Geneva, 15, Mont Blanc, 16, Geneva, . . . . 17, En route, . . . . EXPENSES IN ITALY, EMBRACING ELEVEN DAYS, $90.33. Fare to Naples and back to Venice, second class, August 18, Turin, 19, Florence, " 20, Rome, 21, " ....... " 22, " • . " 23, En route, ...... " 24, Naples, ...... " 25, Pompeii and Vesuvius, " 26, Rome again, ..,',. "27,. " ^. 28, En route, " 29, Venice, " 3o> " AUSTRIA AND PRUSSIA, EMBRACING NINE DAYS, $47. lO. August 31, To Austrian frontier, second class, . Sept. I, To Vienna, second class, $480 2 26 4 40 4 40 d 9 00 80 2 14 2 15 I 30 I 40 $51 48 %M 05 4 95 4 15 4 20 4 20 3 20 \ 20 3 70 4 50 2 80 2 00 I 15 3 20 4 03 $90 33 $6 80 II 70 I lO 360 5 40 6 70 5 40 5 80 6 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. [Sept. 1, En route, . . / . , . . $0 60 3, Vienna, 4, " 5, To Prussian frontier, third class, 6, To Berlin, third class, .... 7, At Berlin, 8, To Hamburg, U7 10 FROM HAMBURG, THROUGH ENGLAND, HOME AGAIN, $110.54. Sept. 9 and 10, To London, by steamer, second class, $6 00 " 10, London, 3 44 " II, To Liverpool, third class, . i2^and 13, at a friend's (gifts), " 14, Manchester, " 15, Liverpool. " 16, Passage home, En route to New-York, waiters, i $110 54 Landed Sept. 23 ; total expenses, three months, in United States currency, $481 74 Gold, about, 433 00 The tourist should exercise everywhere and at every hour the same self-reliance, positive- ness, and intelligence he does about home and at business — not surrendering himself supinely to the swarms of importunate servitors, whose only patrimony is the traveling public. For example, what event is more romantic than first standing before majestic Mont Bla7tc, with his mighty 5 60 3 00 2 50 88 00 2 GO ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 7 masses of volcanic rock pushed up into heaven, his glaciers, and banks of whitest snow ; or at what moment is a man more likely to lose his practical senses ? And yet, while all other tour- ists were negotiating for guides, mules, Alpine staves, charts, etc., the writer started ahead alone, without companions or guide, with his umbrella for a staff, and, following the path, spent five hours on the mountain, crossing the wonderful Mer de Glace, without its costing a cent. An American lady, Mrs. M , of Joliet, afterward performed the same economical (and what is, to a woman, a hazardous) feat. Again: as soon as I arrived at the hotel at Rome, I made the acquaintance of three other English-speaking people — a Scotchman, a Ken- tuckian, and a lady of Glenn's Falls — and we joined in obtaining facilities for our Roman tour, getting an elegant two-horse carriage, an accomplished guide — Signor Noci, of the Hotel Allemagne — all fees, lunches, beggars' pence, etc., paid, eight hours each day, for ten francs each — two dollars, gold! Again: arriving at Naples at six o'clock in the morning, we saw there to the left, in easy sight, Mount Vesuvius, smoking. Instead of going a mile to the right to the hotel, to commence the day's expenses and be overwhelmed by the offers of ''guides," we remained at the depot during the 8 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. cool of the morning, obtaining a refreshing toilet and a lunch for thirty cents each person, and then, for sixty cents each, obtained a railroad ticket by way of Vesuvius to Pompeii, and return. The expenses of the day until our return were $1.20 each. Detailed instructions need not be given. Much must be left to the common-sense and composure of the tourist as he arrives on the ground. A few moments' reflection, without haste, saves much time and money. Study the guide-book and map beforehand or on the hour of arrival, and then do as you would here. The writer practiced a method in visiting for- eign cities as he advised the young English doc- tor, on the return trip, to do in New-York. He was a comely, virtuous young person — the doc- tor, not the writer — as every young person ought to be while visiting Europe, and advice was given him accordingly. He had taken the post of surgeon of the ship for one trip to see " Nee- ah-gah-rah" Falls and to do " New-Yahk." Bar- ring the advice some gave him ^' not to go far out Broadway without stout boots, on account of the rattlesnakes," and if he went "to Yonkers where that fellow (designating one of the com- pany) lived, to have a good pair of revolvers, on accormt of the Indians," and ''to telegraph a registry of himself and his personal description ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 9 to the Commissioners of Police, on his arrival," I will pass to my own sober counsels. He allowed ten pounds for " Neeahgahrah" and ten pounds for a week in " New-Yahk" and en- virons. I told him he could do it all for six pounds, if he could live gn the ship for nothing, as he said he could. And this was the plan I mapped out for him : NIAGARA. Return ticket to Suspension Bridge, . . $16 00 Cross the bridge on foot, . . . . .12 Walli from bridge to Falls, ..... One night's lodging (first-class), ... i 00 Six meals (two days at Falls and e^i route), . . 3 00 Total for the Falls (four pounds), . . . $20 12 FOR NEW-YORK. Six days and six lunches in New- York (liberal), $3 00 Fare by West-street cars to Central Park, . . 05 Public carriage through the Park, . . . aq Fare back, q^ First-class theatre (once), i cq Fare by Harlem River to High Bridge, ... 20 Return by horse-cars, 12 Fare to Greenwood and ferriage, .... 07 Return, q- Fare to Prospect Park and return, . . . . 14 Ferriage to Beecher's, ...... 04 Three omnibus trips the length of Broadway and re- turn, . . - 60 Extra car-fare and omnibuses, . . . . i 00 Total for New-York (i pound 12), . . . $7 24 lO ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. But one who could not board on his ship could take a genteel boarding-house for $12 per week, there seeing common society, relishing the enjoy- ments of the average American sociabilit}^, and obtaining practical information, a like experience being unattainable in London. On the contrary, some Westchester annexa- tion nabobs advised our friend to stop at the Fifth-avenue Hotel, travel by hack at ten dollars per day, lunch at Delmonico's, and take the In- ternational Hotel at Niagara. Now, all these things are very comfortable, ex- peditious, and nice ; but, in the inscrutable de- crees of Providence, some of us have not been endowed with the faculty of money-making, and yet are afflicted with ambition and intellectual desire. The above is a general illustration of going through Europe with surprising economy, a con- dition that I found many Americans had the wish but not the tact to attain. Many, for want of practical judgment or determination, and too much small pride, spend their tours in continu- ous fidgets, gloom, or anger, at the entire ele- ment of extortion in which they have to travel. Upon the fool who goes to Europe to avail its vices, no advice can be thrown away. The writer was, throughout, habitually in his own room at dusk and in his own bed at nine, gaining. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. II in a long rest, strength for the observations of the day, dawn finding him among the markets, news-venders, or taking extended views of city and suburb before the accumulating smoke. RECAPITULATION OF PASSAGE-MONEY. From New-York to Queenstown, first cabin, ; " Queenstown to Cork, ..... " Cork to Blarney Castle, and return, " Killarney, third class, . Jaunting-car and boat, From Killarney to Dublin, third class, " Dublin, third class, to Belfast, " Belfast to Giant's Causeway, and return second class " Belfast to Glasgow, first class, " Glasgow to Castlecary, first class, " Castlecary to Edinburgh, third class, . " Edinburgh to London, third class. To Windsor Castle, and return, third class, . From London to Isle of Wight, and return, third class, *' London to Paris, second class. From Paris, by Cook's tourist-ticket, to Geneva, Mont Blanc, Mont Cenis, Turin Florence, Rome, Naples, Pisa, Ancona, Venice, to Genoa, second class, (That portion from Venice across to Genoa was sacrificed.) From Venice to Vienna, Austria, second class, " Vienna to Berlin, third class, " Berlin to Hamburg, third class 60 GO 28 1 70 2 80 2 80 4 14 2 80 2 66 3 50 I 50 70 9 24 70 3 02 7 35 56 05 18 50 12 10 5 40 12 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. From Hamburg to London, by steamer, second class, , . $6 oo " London to Liverpool, third class, . . 5 60 " Liverpool to New-York, first class, . . 88 00 Total fares, $313 54 Fares by steamboat, rail, and diligence, $313.54, United States currency ; $33 off for gold leaves $280.54 — about, in gold. This deducted from the total expenses of $433, leaves $153 for expenses of subsisting and lodging for sixty-eight days (de- ducting twenty-tv^o days from the three months for ocean passage), which leaves $2.25 gold, per day, or about $2.50 United States currency. One can readily see what he can save here on that for omnibus fare, cab fare, and admissions to places of interest. There were many days en route wherein subsistence cost but little — less than a dollar. There were fourteen days, as will be seen by the table, where the expenses were about $1.50 per day, and about fourteen days or nights €71 route, when much less was spent per diem. This accounts for the table showing so many days up to three and four dollars, and sometimes five. There was no pinching economy; I ate and drank all I had a taste for, and lived, when halt- ing, at respectable places. I had more money, and knew well when I departed from essentials to luxuries. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 3 OBJECTS OF INTEREST VISITED. Having given the expenses of a three-months' trip abroad, it might be well to indicate, in gene- ral, the objects of interest visited. But this can not be done in detail. When we reflect that most of the cities and towns we visited were older than America now is when America was discovered, and that, on an average of a thousand years each, they have been accumulating art and historic interest ; when Ave speak of their old so- cieties for the diffusion of knowledge, for the pro- motion of science, and the preservation of archaso- logical matters, we can only say, " Go and see Europe." The writer has before him some three dozen guide-books of places of local importance, each having its long catalogue. Many of these places of attraction are free ; but those requiring a fee range about twenty-five cents, United States money, throughout Europe. Cab fare is about twenty-five cents per mile, and omnibus or horse-car fare about two cents per mile. So, from this, it may be seen what immense stores of intellectual and sentimental gratification exist each day for the visitor in those European cities, among its libraries, museums, gardens, and galle- ries, at a very little cost. The folloAving were visited in person by the writer: 14 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. IRELAND. Queenstown and forts, River Lee, Black Rock Castle, Carrigrohane Castle ; Cork, Cathedral, public buildings ; Blarney Castle, Water-cure establishment, Killarney Lakes, Round Towers, Muckross Abbey, Danish Bridge, Ross Castle, Peat-Beds. Dublin. — The Nelson, O'Connell, and Welling- ton monuments. Trinity College, Bank of Ireland, Old Parliament Rooms, Dublin Castle, Christ Church, and St. Patrick's Cathedral, ancient monuments. Bones of Strongbow, Royal Dublin Society Rooms and scientific collections, National Art Gallery, exceeding any art gallery in Ameri- ca, Crystal Palace, Custom-House, the Four Courts, Phoenix Park. This town is coeval with the Roman empire. Belfast. — Linen factories and docks. Giant's Causeway. SCOTLAND. Glasgow and the Clyde — ship-building. Ca- thedral and Necropolis — over a thousand years old — architecture massive and imposing^ Castle- cary and Roman walls. Edinburgh. — Castle, crown jewels and regalia, Room of Queen Mary, Mons Meg, Calton Hill, ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I 5 Holyrood Palace, and Queen Mary's apartments and furniture, room of the assassination, Scott Monument, Royal Institution, Antiquarian Mu- seum, National Gallery, Nelson's Monument, John Knox's residence, Walter Scott's residence. Paisley shawl factories. High School, Arthur's Seat, Museum of Science and Art. ENGLAND. York. — Coal mines and foundries. Cathedral, monastery, scene of Jew massacre, ancient walls. London. — Crystal Palace, Windsor Castle, royal apartments and Throne-room, London Tower, the Crown " of ^ England and crown jewels, also military weapons and armor, room of Raleigh, Anne Boleyn — beheading-block and axe — Norman Chapel, the Bloody •Tower,^Queen Elizabeth's prison, and numerous objects of in- terest. Catalogue in a large book. The Fire Monument, Thames Tunnel, Parlia- ment, Westminster Abbey, Royal Academy, British Museum, St. Paul's Church, Nelson's and Wellington's coffins. Bank of England, Times Buildings, Thames and bridges, docks, suburbs, Horse Guards, parks, Zoological Gardens, Bo- tanic Gardens, etc., etc. Isle of Wight. — Ryde, Osborne, Queen's Villa, Portsmouth Navy-yard. 1 6 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. FRANCE. Dieppe, Paris. — Bois de Boulogne, Tuileries, Palaces of the Louvre, St. Cloud, Versailles, Tria- non, Royal apartments. Throne-rooms, Arc de Triomphe, tour around the wall enceinte, monu- ments, house of Abelard and Heloise, Jardm des Plantes, Hotel des Invalides, and coffin of Napoleon, Military Museum, Catacombs, carriages of State, French Assembly, Champs Elys^es, Notre Dame, Palace de P Industrie, Place de la Revolution, de la Concorde, de la Bastille, Museums, Tomb of Richelieu, scenes of the late war, etc. Southern France — Macon wine districts ; and Geneva— Mont Blanc,^ Mer de Glace, Savoyard peasants and scenery, the Alps and Mont Cenis Tunnel. ITALY. Turin (Turino, two thousand years old). — Hall of Deputies, Palace of Victor Emmanuel, Galleries, Palazzo Madama, Palazzo Reale, Palace of Science and Antiquities, Arsenal, churches (very grand) : through the various ancient towns and capitals by day. Florence (Firenze). — Piazza della Signoria, Palazzo Vecchio, Galleria degli Uffizi (the centre of art for the world), Cathedral, // Duoino, Cam- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1/ panile, National Museum, Dante's Monument, house of Michael Angelo, churches, etc. Rome. — St. Peter's, Catacombs, Tombs of the Scipios, Roman Forum, Trajan Forum, Colos- seum, ancient palaces, baths, tombs, walls, and sewers, Roman highways, aqueducts, arches, gates, and ruins generally. Naples. — Museums, Virgil's tomb, Grotto of Pausilippo, the Bay, Vesuvius, Pompeii. Rome and Florence again. Venice. — Gondola rides. Doge's palace. Bridge of Sighs, the Rialto and Grand Canal, Church of St. Mark, palaces, etc. AUSTRIA. The Grotto of Adelsberg, Vienna royal palaces, the Prater and Exhibition Palace, public garden. Through Austria by day to GERMANY. Berlin.— Public buildings, Monument of Vic- tory, public gardens and monuments. Potsdam and old palaces. Hamburg. — Home again by way of the Ger- man Ocean, London, Liverpool, and Manchester, with their wonderful docks and factories. CHAPTER 11. THE OBJECTS — THE PASSAGE. With the writer, the main consideration in taking this tour was change, diversion, rest — as it is with very many. The battle of bread in the metropolis is a sore one ; that and the heat and dust put most of us at our wit's end to get a fresh breath and repose. An ocean trip gives all. From the centre of the hot, dusty, wearying city, to the clean deck of the quiet, orderly steamer, moving calmly off into the cool, fresh, pure breezes of the ocean, all within an hour, is a re- lief — sudden, perfect : behind is care laid upon the shelf; before are only bright visions ; and then, at an early hour, one sinks to the first comfortable sleep for past months. Then come ten days' quiet, and three thousand miles of fresh winds over thousands of miles' expanse of sea-water, to strengthen the brain and invigorate soul and body. The toiling of the city makes life stale, and one craves an exchange of worlds. This ocean voyage is an effectual change, the great ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I9 distance from continent to continent having- a peculiar fitness in the programme of novelties and benefits. A shorter distance and a quicker passage might land one in Europe as jaded in body and mind as when he left America ; but so much time on the ocean, with no books nor busi- ness, and a good captain, good company, and a good table, relax the strained nerves, refresh the brain, relight the eye, send new vitality through the veins, dispel the clouds of melancholia, re- store the joyous, unbroken spirits of boyhood, and prepare one to step ashore amid the grandeurs of Europe with a degree of exultation. THE GANG-PLANK. It is a glorious thing to start for Europe, but even that has its cloud ; there is the heart-tremor in looking a farewell upon those faces that have never looked but kindness and peace on us. That is one of the times in life when we feel that there must be a place "Where all parting pain and care And death and time shall disappear." Among other preparations, it is necessary that the tourist should select well in advance a repu- table ship, likely to have good company ; and if he be of a susceptible naturCj should have a care in the selection of his state-room companions. 20 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. By deferring this matter, many have to take ''Hobson's choice." So far as the ship is con- cerned, the writer suffered no grievous omission, except as to a Hght felt hat, a deck blanket, and a deck chair. All voyages — even those in mid- summer — are cold, and the air below decks being always bad, healthful rest must be taken upon deck, and the cap, blanket, and private chair are essential articles. They may appear to be indifferent matters, and the ''greenhorn" will likely omit them. The pleasures of the trip will be enhanced in proportion as one cultivates from the start agree- able relations with his fellow-passengers ; for all who go to Europe are likely to have some " point" in their history or purposes ; and I think the ex- perience of others will show that there is less ob- jectionable personal character in a cabin of ocean passengers than in the same number of people anywhere else. On the score of economy, I had been counseled that a steerage passage might do, if I were willing to " rough it." I took pains to investigate the nature of the steerage passage, and the result of my observation is to advise no- body to take it who can possibl}^ raise money for a cabin passage. There are no social lines in America over which one may not easily step ; but on the deck of a steamer there is an invisible line, terrible and depressing to the steerage or inter- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 21 mediate passenger, across which he may look but dare not pass to more congenial and refined associations. But it is not proposed here to make much of the ocean passage ; it is a worn-out subject. I have no opportunity to describe the sublimity of a storm, for our passages, going and coming, were disgustingly calm. We saw no " waves mountain high," no "wales," no "sherk," no "phosphores- cent ripples," no "icebergs." But one can hardly repress a remark of wonder and admiration at the precision and simplicity of navigating the great ship by star, and sun, and wheel, and compass, and log. Going out on the steamer Italy, of the National line, June 27th, 1874, we had a good specimen of the English officer — Captain Thompson, a quiet, strong man, who commanded his ship without a word ; and returning, September 23d, 1874, on the steamship Idaho, of the Guion line, we had a good specimen of the Scotch officer — Captain Forsyth, who knows his business. All honor to them both ! As to SEA-SICKNESS, it is not proposed to say much. It has one wise purpose in it, if no other, and that is, to teach a man how little he can be — how near zero his gauge runs. However, it may be resisted by the 22 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. will, by conforming the volitions to the motion of the ship. The cause of sea-sickness is in emo- tional surprise or disappointment, and begins in the brain. The writer acted upon this theory, and did not miss a meal on either passage, although he was subjected to a dull, heady feeling, which was, perhaps, nearly as bad as the usual climac- teric of the trouble. . A BURIAL. A babe in the steerage died. A few gathered at the gangway. The little corpse was wrapped in canvas ; two sailors laid it upon a rug, and, with ropes, awaited the ceremony of the minister. Ladies from the cabin attended amid the squalor of the steerage ; the spray covered us all ; the Union Jack was curtained before the little body, which was dropped into the angry waters, to be nosed by the monsters of the deep, while the mother tottered away to her cold hemlock bunk, and a bejeweled mother gathered the rich em- broidered skirt, and went back to the cabin to laugh and flirt. FOURTH OF JULY was celebrated, at longitude 37.9 and latitude 45-33? by a clean, trim deck, the stars and stripes at the mast-heads, and appropriate cabin cere- monies, in which people of many nations joined. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 23 After no 071 of tJie tzvelfth day. — We are in sight of Ireland. The sky is cloudless ; the sea is calm. The eager steeragers, with leaping hearts, crowd the bow and sides of the ship, blessing Ireland ; some are in tears. I now know^what is meant by "• Isle of the Sea" andj'' Emerald Isle." The sea is blue and pure ; there is the green ; it is like a great emerald in a sea of sapphire. The colors are bright, distinct, beautiful. The lines of the land are bold, prominent, striking. Martello sig- nal towers and one ruined castle stand lonely, suggesting the past. As we skirt the coast, the study with our glasses is CORK HARBOR. We arrived at the mouth of the harbor at 1 1 at night ; the tug is two hours reaching us, and we have taken off sixty passengers and baggage by one small oil-lantern. EXPENSES. (All enumerations of expenses are reduced to U. S. currency, and will be given daily.) Cabin passage, $80 00 " Boots " (twice), 28 Brandy (lOom-porter drank it), . . . . i 40 Subscription to Fourth of July display, . . 2 80 $84 48 CHAPTER III. SOUTH IRELAND. There will be no attempt in this little volume to equal or imitate in any degree the many excel- lent guide-books that may be had almost any- where, and all of which are of good practical ser- vice. Every city, country, or lesser object of in- terest has a local guide-book ; a thorough consul- tation of them will save the tourist time and money. Self-reliance and the business sharpness- practiced at home, a bearing without flurry or loss of ^elf-possession, will carry a tourist in Eu- rope as economically as here. Care should be taken, in the selection of a guide-book, to get the latest issue, as dealers are accustomed to " palm off" old trash. Intending to make this little work very limited, there will be an endeavor to put into it only such novel observations and compari^ sons as can not be found elsewhere. Immediately on landing at Queenstown, I found that my foresight had made a '' decided hit" in ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 2$ selecting for my luggage only a hand-valise ; for I distanced my companions and secured comfort- able quarters in the middle of the night, while they were yet perplexed and delayed by the cus- toms officers and the swarms of Irish porters, who were worse than gnats. My luggage consisted of six shirts and collat- erals, a tooth-brush, a hair-brush. Harper's Guide- book, an opera-glass, and note-books — that is all. QUEENSTOWN. The first touch of Ireland, though at midnight, showed us ^' strong government." The docks of hewn stone, the military police, and the neat and substantial appearance of things, were discovered in the night. The carrier of baggage overcharged, and asked, in addition, a drink of whisky. At the Queen's Hotel, very bad air in the corridors. Aroused the porter, who jabbered so we could not understand more than as if French, until two or three repeatings. Fifteen cents per drink. Shown rooms at 2 a.m. ; furniture all foreign, old, and substantial; royal arms and insignia on every thing. Got into bed, and thought it was dawn; looked at watch, and saw by twilight it was half-past two ! What 26 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST A DELICIOUS BREAKFAST ! What fine cooking and flavor, and what decent waiting ! Strawberries that looked like wax- work, and scented the whole room ; chops like quail ; salmon, tender and sweet ; butter and bread pure as snow, and coffee like wine ! There is a cosi- ness about an Irish breakfast-room that is in- describable — almost aesthetic. No wonder they are plump people, and we are lean. We hurry out to " do" Queenstown, amphitheatred in cres- cent form around her beautiful bay. With her three strong forts, her vessels-of-war, and com- mercial shipping, the town looks like the circular shelves of a greenhouse of flowers — flowers, ivy, and trees everywhere. The poor and middle class cultivate them. We are struck at first view favorably. There is careful, laborious taste dis- played by the rich, and much imitation of the cas- tellated and feudal style. Troops of chubby chil- dren are going up the hill. I see a sign, "NATIONAL SCHOOL." Knowing this to be secular, sustained by public money, I go in ; am politely and sweetly wel- comed by nuns. The walls are hung with maps and charts, and the shelves are laden with books of every form of instruction. It is a regulation of the National School that no religious precepts ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST, 2/ be taught nor the Bible read, where the sects are mixed, but separate moments for religious in- struction are had where either sect desires — the other fleeing away. WOMEN PEDDLERS are, of all nuisances, here the worst ; they are more persistent than a swarm of blue-tail flies, and stick closer than sheep-ticks. They infest the doors of every hotel, and the proprietors per- mit it. Two or three followed each of us for several blocks. They blarneyed and pleaded ; one told me I was a " lady-killer." They have discovered the trick of repeating the attack until they wear people out. When they get hold of a tough customer, they become impertinent. They are dishonest, and seldom give back change, pleading short a few pennies. At ten o'clock, we take the boat up the RIVER LEE, renowned in Irish poetry. And it is justly re- nowned. Here we first penetrate Ireland. All are on deck with field-glasses ; some in expressed raptures, others quiet and searching, but with no less profound emotion. What of villa and ivy- clambered wall and tree ! What of sylvan nook and grotto, of field, lawn, and flower-beds ! And 28 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. the River Lee is busy, too. It is full of craft. We pass old Black Rock Castle, renovated ; and after a sail of eleven miles, passing shaded prome- nades, for stretches of miles, and elegant lines of bathing-houses, we reach CORK, and, sure enough, hear the chimes of old Shan- don : " Oh ! the bells of Shandon, That sound so grand on The pleasant waters Of the River Lee !" This city is a thousand years old ; eighty thou- sand people — solid, rich, and mixed with poverty. Thackeray says the people of Cork have always been distinguished for their artistic and literary tastes. They have furnished eminent men in those departments — Sheridan Knowles, William Penn, Hogan, the sculptor. Father Prout, Ma- guire, Barry, Maginn, etc., etc. Cromwell paid especial attention to it, and Marlborough cap- tured it. The city is a combination of cathedrals, convents, exchanges, banks, solid residences, and concrete hovels. All is stone or brick— no wood anywhere. Stone and mortar seem to have been plenty, and labor cheap, all through South Ire- land. All habitations are made of it, and even ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 29 the cattle-guards at the depots, and pig-pens. The country is swept of timber, giving the eye a stretch over fields for twenty to thirty miles, with occasionally shade-trees and clumps, or a new growth of timber, planted by the wealthy land monopolists for hunting-grounds. The road- sides, through town and country, are fenced with high stone walls, old and ivy-covered. Along these are hedge-growth and tall shade-trees. Cork is venerable for centuries of active history and sanguinary struggles. As soon as we are in THE STREETS '^ ■ of Cork, we see new street scenes. There are gooseberries, rich and yellow as mandrakes, for a cent a pint ; small donkeys drawing market- carts ; JAUNTING-CARS, waiting like our cabs. We secure rooms at the Victoria. I go for a straw hat ; an old hatter and his daughters poultice me with their blarney until I buy one three times the cost I intended to. He said, " You Amerikins are the fellers to thravel and spind money, an' yez have the wit to make it." Why I am spotted everywhere, by childhood and age, as an American, I can not tell. At i o'clock we all take jaunting-cars, and are off, pell- 30 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. mell, through the streets of Cork, for a trip, six miles distant, to BLARNEY CASTLE. As we proceed through a very romantic coun- try, what emotions fill one on nearing one of the famed spots of earth and history ! All the coun- try has the mellowness of age. One is conscious of its all being the ground of -stirring events for ages and centuries. The castle is venerable for its antiquity, its size, and power, as well as for the chief who built it. When its gray walls and bat- tlements were first pointed out through the elms and foliage near there, I felt a little romantic. I knew that over those hills, down through those dells and by yon lake, scouted and reveled Crom- well's troopers. We alight at the stone and iron gate, and are admitted by a peasant woman, who asks if we will remember her when we return. We walk on fast, eager, and with strange antici- pations, toward the venerable pile. Pages of detail could be made interesting, but here is no room. It is partly secluded by foliage, and the spirit of romance and ruin broods over and around. There it is in solitude, deep into a pastoral coun- try, far from the -jar of modern life. Heaps of wall and carved turrets were down, having fallen over a hundred feet. Ivy had grown, season over ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 3 1 season, for years and ages, until it had spent its natural life, and become matted ten or fifteen feet thick, and then, by accumulated weight of centu- ries, perhaps, fallen down. The castle is known to have been built nearly five hundred years ago. Its style is rude, rough, massive. It is a concrete of mortar and stones of all sizes — the windows, embrasures, balconies, hanging buttresses, and turrets being chiseled granite. The circular stair- way up through the tower is granite ; the centre edge of the stone steps, as they wind up for seven landings, 120 feet, corresponding to a stairway newel, has become polished and rounded from the gliding of hands in descending. At the base, the embrasures show the walls to be twelve feet thick. There is a jutting for the beams of each story, the wall thus narrowing to the top, which is covered with earth and grass, and is about eight feet wide. 1 am detailed in this description, because we have no ruins in America. The overrunning of Ireland, in religious wars, by soldiers of Elizabeth and James and Cromwell, left many of these ruins of castles, monasteries, and abbeys. They all, to-day, present a similar appearance. The roof and all the floors have disappeared. Nothing but rude stone and the evidences of rude builders remain. The dark, eccentric passages, the cells, nooks, niches, crannies, alcoves, rooms, banquet-halls. 32 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. are too intricate for description. Tall trees grow up inside. THE BLARNEY-STONE. Tradition does not reveal why or when a cer- tain stone there was connected with the national character of volubility. But there it is, and its blarney has distinguished itself around the earth. And to know what real blarney is, come to this country. One has to arouse a new faculty to guard successfully against it. The rivers run with it ; the birds sing it ; it is in the dew, in the milk, in the sunshine ; the winds hum it. If there is any virtue in that stone, it must have kissed the people. Let the Irish place the term upon their national escutcheon, for it illustrates their vivaci- ty and ingenuousness. It is said that this Latin inscription is upon it, " Cormach MacCarty fortis me fieri fecit y The stone was pointed out, away up, over loo feet high ; it is a lower one on the projecting battle- ment, held up by iron clasps, running ten or twelve feet to the top and over the battlement. By the aid of a glass, from the ground, I could not discover an inscription; but there is a stone for the pil- grims of all the world. It is said that the way to kiss it is to be lowered down from the top on the outside of the wall, but the battlement, projecting three feet out, and being machicolated, and rickety ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 33 with age, no one will attempt it ; but the stone is wide, and reaches to the inner face of the wall, where it can be kissed over an open space two feet wide and three feet long-, if some companion will hold on to the adventurer's heels, and he will pro- ject his body with 100 feet, clear, under him. It is a difficult and dangerous feat. One is on top of a narrow parapet or wall, 100 feet high, with no protection inside, and only a seeming frail one outside. The legend runs : " There is a stone there, That, whoever kisses. Oh ! he never misses To grow eloquent. 'Tis he may clamber, To a lady's chamber, Or become a member Of Parliament." TIM BUCKLEY. Descending the long, rude, spiral^ stone stair- way, and each paying a shilling to the woman be- longing there, we were then met by an interesting character — a ragged, sharp : lad of seven, with the above name. He commenced volubly his legends and history. " Come wid me ; I'll shoa you where Cramwell hanged the Irishman — yis, Cramwell, the r-r-ogue." Said I, "Why, the Irish hanged Cromwell." Tim replied, '' Noa, they murthered 34 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. him wi' cannon, the r-r-ogue." He showed us caves, and pointed to natural rock-loops, where the prisoners are said to have been chained. Tim threatened to come to the United States as soon as he could raise money enough. I expect him to turn up here soon as alderman, or judge, or M. C. for us. EXPENSES JULY 9, QUEENSTOWN AND CORK. Lodging, $0 84 Treated to breakfast, Trip to Cork, , 28 Dinner, i 12 Jaunting-car to Blarney Castle, . . . . . i 40 Fees at the Castle, 56 Lodging at Cork, 70 Boots and attendance, 28 Breakfast, . . . 70 $5 88 THE LAKES OF KILLARNEY. Nothing can be added to the literature of Killarney beauties. But aside from the general beauty of the surroundings, some new facts may be given to American readers. Lord Kenmare owns all one side for twenty square miles or more, and Sir William Herbert owns all the other side. These great demesnes are held in affluent rest, bearing old, sacred ruins of castle and abbey near the banks of the lakes. Some ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 35 of the wild and wooded parts are hunting- grounds for the nobility. There are blue moun- tain-peaks all around ; the valleys and plains are alluvial, and have the culture of centuries. The country roads are equal in smoothness and clean- ness to your asphalt pavement. Ivy-covered stone walls stretch along, and over all are arched vistas of elm. Huge gates of stone and iron, with foliage covering, indicate retired and sequestered manorial and mediaeval residences. ^ » MUCKROSS ABBEY I had not heard of, and was not prepared to meet so interesting a place in Ireland. This, too, is a thousand years old ; roof, floors, win- dows, and doors gone ; nothing but the stone- work left. All around are awe-inspiring tombs, in silence, gloom, ruin. The carvings on many of the tablets are effaced by the corrosion of time. Some are entirely concealed by accu- mulations of moss. Within the walls are old tombs and entablatures. Many of the old Irish kings repose there. I stood upon the tomb of MacCarty More, the tomb of O 'Sullivan, and the tomb of O'Donohue. There is a square courtyard and cloisters all around on the four sides. There appear all the rooms necessary to a monastery. There has been a place of worship on this ground since 1192. In 1440, the Francis- 36 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. can monks built the present walls. In 1626, it was renovated. There are two or three hundred tombs in and about the abbey, all of seeming importance at one time. A large yew-tree, two feet in diameter, has grown up among the clois- ters. This abbey is called '' The Melrose of Ire- land." We now row across the lake, and are landed at the rear of ROSS CASTLE, behind which General Ludlow, under Cromwell, came up with his flat-boats, with cannon [upon them. In front of the castle is the row of old iron six-pounders, eaten and furrowed by rust, thrown down just where Ludlow left them. They commanded the approach over the neck of the peninsula. I noticed on one of the cannon, " 1592." This castle is dilapidated like the above-men- tioned one. It was the last that surrendered in the work of the subjugation of the Irish chiefs. Our jaunting-car is waiting at the castle, and we are hurried back rapidly. Overcoats are on — July loth — and the pleasure and the fresh air of the day have given us a good appetite for the rich salmon of the pure, cool, clear lake. We can not stop for a description of the various points of interest pointed out by the rowmen, nor the silly legends told by them in connection. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 37 THE VILLAGE OF KILLARNEY is poor enough. No trade, no factories ; the county is a grazing county ; and yet the Cathe- dral, the Monastery (modern), the Priory, the Bishop's Palace, the Lunatic Asylum, and Jail, would buy out all the public buildings of any of our affluent American cities or counties. Every- where the churches and public buildings are worth every thing else. I am told that the arrivals of visitors for 125 days average 100 a day — i2,5oo^and that they leave, on an average, $10 per day, being $125,000 the season. Here, too, are men proffering ser- vice, and women proffering trinkets, following and persisting and teasing until they become an intolerable nuisance. No local authority or in- fluence attempts to discourage it. Americans, by -their indiscriminate bestowal of pence, six- pence, and shilling, and sometimes a fellow with more money than brains bestowing a gold piece, have encouraged a swarm of the most despica- ble things that ever outraged the human form. There is not enough manhood or womanhood in an acre of them to fill a baby. I noticed a Pres- byterian church in the village. The Catholics and Protestants get along well together ; preju- dice, some say, is dying out. 38 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. FROM KILLARNEY TO DUBLIN is a beautiful country. It is more beautiful than useful — large grazing tracts, and no small thrifty farmers. Either a peasant's shanty or a large mansion makes up the buildings. The country has a deserted look. No ownership in the land is Ireland's curse. THE SOUTH OF IRELAND I proclaim to be all-beautiful — much beyond the general conception of Americans. From Queens- town dock to Dublin, the mind has been almost bewildered by the panoramic move of naught but beautiful landscapes — yes, and thrift ! This is not said from a superficial looking, but from critical observation and inquiry. I say thrift in general, and on the surface aspect of things; there is misery and destitution, but it is the. ex- ception, and is no more than I have been accus- tomed to see. But we will have facts and inci- dents now, and sociology by and by. Irishmen may be proud of their country. It is a beautiful land, with refreshing atmosphere, sweet, pure water, a climate conducive to strength, and a sturdy soil. Such children ! plump, and tough as car-bumpers — and many of them as dirty. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. EXPENSES, JULY lo. Fare to Killarney Lakes, third class (60 m.), . $2 80 Jaunting-car and boat for 24 miles, . . . . 2 80 Fees at Ross Castle, 28 Guide at Muckross Abbey, 14 Lunch, . . • 59 Dinner, 70 Lodging, 42 Breakfast', . . 42 Boots and attendance, 28 Guide to Cathedral, 28 $8 71 THE ROUTE TO DUBLIN. Here I took third-class passage. The style of cars is the same as all over the Continent, cross compartments and side entrances. I can look back now, after the completion of the trip, and say that throughout Ireland the railroad officials are less fussy than anywhere else in Europe. In England, the railroad servants are pompous and arrogant, with a haughty polite- ness ; on the Continent, they are always in a state of agitation. The conductor, on learning my nationality, was very polite to me, and even urged me to go into a first-class compartment, which I did, in order to make the acquaintance of Mr. Butt, the member of Parliament and home-rule agitator, 40 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. with whom I had a free conversation on the sub- ject of Ireland's government. The farm country all the way is flourishing, so much as can be said of a country without small farmers or owners in the fee. In Ireland, as all through Europe, there is the notable ab- sence of the frequent thrifty villages and ele- gant isolated farm-houses that are so general in America. The country is without forests, and riding along on the cars, the American looks in vain for a sight of an untamed patch of woods, a rail-fence, or a slab shanty. The only wooden structure I saw in all Europe was about five rods of slab fence in Austria. EXPENSES, JULY II. Fare to Dublin, third class, .... $4 14 Lunch, 28 Concert, 56 Two cab fares, 56 $5 54 CHAPTER IV. DUBLIN — ART— POLITICS. I ONCE asked a new-found friend in America if he was an Irishman. He replied, '' No, I'm a Dublin mon." Dublin is metropolitan ; there is nothing want- ing to make it a great capital but Irish indepen- dence. Three hundred and eighteen thousand inhabitants, of a highly intellectual and aesthetic ambition, immense public institutions, a classic history, and the centre of a fertile island — why is it not one of the'most brilliant capitals of the earth ? " Poor Ireland !" the Irish of America have always cried, until the average impression among Americans who have not been through Ireland is, that it is one entire place of gloom and misery. But I aver there is more art in that " Poor Ire- land" than in all America — that is, leaving out the Capitol at Washington and the new Post- Office at New- York. Of Dublin, it may be said, as of all Ireland and Europeancountries, that the 42 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. public buildings and works generally are of a costly and extensive character. For instance, Trinity College, in architecture,' bronze statues, apparatus, library, and museum, is worth as much as half the college buildings of the United States. The public monument to a single man — Welling- ton — is as large as, and cost more than. Bunker Hill Monument. The monument to Nelson, right in the principal street*, cost more than all thus far paid on the Washington Monument, and is more massive than all our public monuments put toge- ther. The monument to O'Connell is 165 feet high. The American is always impressed, in every European capital, with the richness of all public works, public buildings, squares, or plazas, sta- tues,Tountains, docks,'etc. ; there is always some- thing new to the traveler as he progresses, some peculiarity of each city ; and this rather enlarges his capacity for imposing or accepting taxation for public improvements when he returns home. In one of the public squares of Berlin is a red marble basin of one solid piece of stone, turned and polished as perfectly as a dish, on which two hundred men might stand, it being about twenty feet in diameter. The quarrying, transporting, and turning of this article was a titanic work, not, I think, generally known. The rich palaces and gardens of Versailles, France, or of Potsdam, ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 43 Prussia, mig-ht afford some Americans romantic dreams for a lifetime. About all these palaces there is the mellowness of great age and aristo- cratic history ; the erections are begrimed by time, and hovering over all are the tall trees in igrand rows, giving evidence of culture and training ages ago. There has been more spent on granite docks in Dublin than in all New- York, Boston, and Phila- delphia. The city has a substantial look; its houses are all brick or stone, and the streets splendidly paved and free from garbage, although they are not without a clayey mud or dust. If the people would improve the faces of the houses, it would be a brilliant city ; but the houses are built of rough brick or stone, which allow a catch or 'deposit of dust and soot, giving the older and central portion of the city a dinginess. The out- ward portion and the suburbs are refined, affluent, lovely, and possess the feudal appearance in the high walls and strong gates before alluded to in reference to other parts of the country. The shops are as brilliant, gay, and filled with fashion and rarities as in any metropolis. A RUN AROUND. Jaunting-cars are here as well as throughout Ireland, answering for the cabs in the cities of other countries. Depositing my carpet-bag in a 44 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. good lodging-house, where I obtain a good room for 70 cents per day, I sally out for" impressions." The trim uniforms of the British soldiery are seen everywhere, the soldiers walking about on leave from the barracks, singly, or in pairs or squads. In addition to them are the constabulary, or po- lice in semi-military uniform, in every city, vil- lage, and country road, so that the power of the government is seen and felt everywhere. The appearance of the British soldiery puts the American army to shame. The former, with their jaunty " forage" caps, the trim, well-fitting scarlet coat, the well-fitting trowsers, and the waist-belt and the well-burnished spur, and the erect, brisk gait, all contrast unfavorably to our army, with their Dutchy cap and the slouchy, ill- fitting, shoddy uniform, that looks as if the quar- termaster had thrown the clothing at the men without regard to adaptation. This affects the esprit de corps. While the British soldiers feel and look like soldiers, our men both look, and doubt- less feel, like dunces rigged out for ridicule. The way Uncle Sam, with all his " resources," allows his men to appear on the streets, is grotesque, ridiculous, and shameful, and, perhaps, explains the desertions. Perhaps it is not good policy to increase the American army, but what we have of it should be second to none on earth for ap- pearance. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 45 THE SHOPS open later in the morning", and close at tea-time in the evening. The one-price system is not prac- ticed. This produces a general want of faith, and a habit of higgling in all common trade relations. The city is largely Roman Catholic in religion ; and in politics is Home Rule, or disloyal (called ''Liberal"). BELFAST would do credit to Boston, or any other Ameri- can city, for the neatness of its streets, the face of its buildings, and its bustling, thrifty appearance. Seven or eight lines of steamers ply daily between it and the English and Scotch ports. It has about 175,000 inhabitants. Its public build- ings are costly and stylish. Its character is Pro- testant and Conservative, preferring the English government to independence or to an Irish Par- liament, with a majority in it of Catholics. THE LINEN FACTORIES we could not visit, because they were stopped by strikes. They are many and stupendous in Bel- fast. THE POLITICAL CONDITION OF IRELAND is a mystery to Americans, and a problem for the whole world. The incessant complaints of Irish- 46 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. men in America have not impressed us with the true condition of affairs. When I left America, one said, " See if you can find out what's the matter with the Irish." Another said, " You can see as soon as you set foot ashore." Another said, " If you do, you'll be smarter than any body else." Well, these topics were prominent ones on the ship. I determined that while going through Ireland, I would ask of all classes and sects these four questions; "Is any thing the matter with Ireland ? If there is, what is it ? What are the causes? And what is the remedy ?" In reply to these questions, various statements were made, differing in character, but not incon- sistent with each other. EXPENSES, JULY 12, AT DUBLIN. Lodging, $0 56 Breakfast, ....... 56 Dinner, . . 70 Horse-cars, ....... 28 Supper . . 40 $2 50 RELIGIOUS TROUBLES. The Protestants — even the most intelligent of them — ascribe the evils of Ireland to " PoperyV' but they did this with an apparent animus and bigotry that, to me, somewhat weakened their ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 47 testimony. The Roman Catholics ascribed op- pressive legislation by the Parliament as the cause ; almost all parties agreed that the land tenures were wrong — many mentioned '^ absen- teeism" as the mischief. Catholic farmers said the rents were too high, and tenures too uncer- tain. Protestant farmers of North Ireland said the Catholic farmers of South Ireland were lazy ; that they gave too much money to the priests, and that they wasted too much time in observing religious holidays. Scotch people in Ireland said they could get along well enough at any business, and that the laws are all right ; the English peo- ple insisted that there is a *' screw loose in the Irish head." Take it all in all, the question of Irish discontent is a very mixed and profound one ; but from observation, and a patient and un- prejudiced inquiry, I think I can see, as clearly as I ever saw anything, the causes ; but the remedy is be3^ond mortal vision. THREE R'S will embrace Ireland's troubles — religion, rum, and runaway. Its people are divided by the worst of all prejudices — religious prejudice. The old Celtic and Catholic Irishmen remember, and they view the English power all about them with sullen hate. Their best scholars and historians 48 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. insist that even the vote for the Union in 1800 was not popular nor fair ; that the old IRISH PARLIAMENT was never a Parliament of Irish, but rather made up of Scotch and English, and many Irishmen who were renegades. However, it is an admitted fact that Ireland is from two thirds to three fourths Roman Catholic, and that most of this sect are of the old Celtic origin ; that they have got it into their heads that they have more rights of self-government, and that there is a mutual hos- tility between the English people or Parliament and the Irish people. Added to this, masses of the Irish people behold the lands that should have descended to them from their forefathers now in the possession of the descendants of in- vaders, only by the right of conquest, and which lands are now rented out with an extortionate spirit, while the proprietors spend, in gay living, in the capitals of Europe, the patrimony wrung from the tillers of the soil. These considera- tions, whether real or fancied, produce a CHRONIC DISCONTENT among the people of the South and mid die of Ireland. When it is mentioned to these people that the land tenures and proprietary interests are legally ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 49 the same in England and Scotland and the North of Ireland, they reply that the people of those sections of the Realm are better allied, socially and religiously, and that a better spirit among the landlords and law-judges has established customs favorable to those people. I conversed with the editor of the Irish News, at Belfast, who is a born Irishman and a Protestant, who admitted, in terms, that " custom had done more in favor of the Northern tenant than the Southern tenant ;" but still he insisted that the Southern Irish farm tenant was *' lazy and priest-ridden ;" he insisted the laws of England were good enough, and he hoped he would never see the day when England would consent to Irish HOME RULE, or withdraw her authority sufficiently to permit the Catholic majority to rule Ireland. I asked Hon. Pope Hennessy to cite to me THE LAWS he deemed unfair and oppressive toward Ireland, as compared with Scotland. He replied that, there being no legislative functions in Ireland above that of Town Council, and even that con- strained to what is permitted by act of Parlia- ment, the Irish felt no freedom, and were governed with the greatest rigor in matters too numerous 50 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. and small to mention. He cited, however, the Fire-arms Act, by which the Lord Lieutenant could proclaim any county where no man could own a fire-arm, except by special license and heavy tax. As a consequence of that law, I my- self observed that the whole country is SHADOWED WITH CROWS, as thick and familiar as our doves and pigeons. Any Yankee farmer knows how this pest scratches up the seed, and yet that the crows are so afraid of a gun that they would keep out'of its range. I have heard from Scotch farmers that in Scotland, where all the farmers have guns, they can not get within range of a crow. Calling the attention of the Hon. Mr. Butt, M.P., to this matter, while riding in the cars from Kilkenny to Dublin, he said that out of the thirty-two counties in Ireland, thirty-one had been proscribed by the Lord Lieu- tenant. I casually remarked that if the American government attempted to prevent a farmer from shooting a crow, the farmer would SHOOT THE GOVERNMENT. That evening, before a meeting of two thousand persons of the Home-Rule League, he mentioned that opinion. WHAT ARE IRISH PROMISES? With Stephen J. Meaney, with Pope Hennessy ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 5 I and Mr. Butt, I conversed upon the subject of England's alleged misrule, and received promises from them to send me indices of the oppressive or unjust acts of Parliament. Neither one of them has been heard from. RUM. The gin palaces of Dublin exceed in style and number even our famed New- York ones, and the retail places in every town are as numerous. Considering the admitted sanguinity of the Celtic race, the fiery fluid has no right in their veins and brains. THE RUNAWAYS come next in curses. The Irish landlords unpa- triotically spend much of their time abroad, taking their money and their living from the Irish mar- kets, and the influence of their presence from Irish society. This is a general and crying evil ; but the state of society is a partial excuse for this kind of absenteeism. There is another kind of absenteeism, however, that is reprehensible unless the absentees can make less fuss about " poor Ireland " wherever they go — they are the tenant and mechanic absentees. If the Irish emigrants take so much doleful interest in their "unhappy countr}?-," and if they " mean business" when they talk about their patriotism, they might 52 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. make her happier by staying home and patiently helping her out of her trouble. Their love for the soil is not as sturdy as the American. All O'Connell waited for was an increase to eight millions, when he said her fight would begin. The English encourage the emigration of the Irish to America, and, in fact, of all people that will relieve the land, and give more SPORTING GROUND for the aristocracy, and more pasturage for the mighty maw of London. It is a fact that vast stretches of Irish country look deserted. There are evidences everywhere of a once hive of in- dustry and toil, where now the scene is pastoral and quiet. Macadamized roads and curbed side- walks, running through and through every county, hedges everywhere, and labored stone walls, all show how ever37^ foot of ground has been worked over ; but those hoary, gray, moss and ivy-co- vered walls, that once divided small tenants, are now useless as objects across vast consolidated grazing-tracts or hunting-grounds. What will be the end, no one here can answer. England will not relax her firm hand until she thinks the Irish can govern themselves ; and when they can, popular opinion says she will. Whether these vast landed proprietaries shall be reduced and divided up, is hard to tell ; but, other things ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. $3 being favorable, public opinion will force an im- provement of land tenures equal, practically, to the American system of small fee-ownerships. EXPENSES, JULY I3. Guide-book of Dublin, . . . . $0 56 Breakfast, 40 Horse-cars, 28 Trinity College porter, .... 28 Bank of Ireland porter, .... 23 Dublin Castle, ...... 28 Dublin Cathedral, , , , , . 28 Dinner, ...,,., 56 Passage to Belfast, 2 80 $5 67 CHAPTER V. NORTH IRELAND. Our trip here was confined to the route from Dublin to Belfast and Giant's Causeway. The country presents the same cleared aspect. The farmer tenements are slightly more frequent, and better. The single town of Belfast is enough to redeem all Ireland and the Irish from the false, character given to them by the Irish abroad, and by bigotry and uncharity of the world. Giant's Causeway is wild-looking, but will pay only those having plenty of leisure. The fresh, pure air of that region is bracing in July. One can look off on the Northern Ocean, and read by twilight un- til half-past ten at night. This trip was on the TWELFTH OF JULY, and the people were celebrating the Orange fes- tivities and the Protestant victory of the Battle of the Boyne. Although the population is over- whelmingly Protestant, the government does not ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 55 allow Orange parades within the villages or cities — at least with the Orange flags unfolded. They were kept furled, and the regalia covered accord- ing to law, until arriving outside the corporate limits. A gathering was had on a plain south of Belfast, of about one hundred thousand people. Here the national police were gathered to pre- serve order. This system of police, or constabu- lary, is one organization throughout the island. There are also eighteen thousand regular troops quartered on the island. Both in the troops and the police, Catholic and Protestant members are found. The trains were, of course, filled with these celebrants. Some potheen had been drank, and there was some fighting between brother Orange- men ; but although they filled the third-class car where I was, I found their company tolerable and humorous. I read the Catholic and Protestant papers next day, and they were both criminative and intolerant. The Catholic-Irish editors and reporters magnified every little personal rencoun- ter to a "brutal riot ;" and the Protestant-Irish editors and reporters insisted the celebrations Vv^ere " orderly, dignified, and respectable — be- coming Christian people under the better influ- ence of Protestantism." No people are more hotly inimical to each other than the Irish as divided by religious im- pulse. 56 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST, EXPENSES, JULY 14. Guide-book, ...... $o 74 Lodging and breakfast, .... 70 Horse-cars to linen factories, ... 14 Fare to Giant's Causeway and return, 3d class, 2 66 Supper, lodging, breakfast at Causeway, . i 68 $5 92 From the railroad-station to the Causeway is five miles. This was traveled on foot as an even- ing preparation for sleep, and the scenic wonders were done without guide next morning. Going *' across lots" five or six miles from the railroad to Giant's Causeway, where not a shrub was to be seen within the horizon — the hills bald — I stopped in a shanty on the bluff of the Irish sea-coast, to witness the use of peat as fuel. An old woman who had never lived in any other house, and an old man, affectionately entertained me, longing to know if I knew their son in " the Ohio district." A SUMMER RESORT. For nerve-rest and renovation, let Ireland be commended. Quit you of prejudice, and then fancy only her rarities and realities of freshest air and green fields; her universality of flowers, hedges, and improved landscape ; her limpid streams, cool lakes, and paradisal twilights; ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 57 her plain people, whose hearts only leap with nature's impulses, and are not ossified with the coldness and treachery of Continental etiquette ; and her bounteous supply of all that can sate the appetite and enrich the vitality of man, appreci- ated in a refinement of rational cookery that is unequaled elsewhere in Europe. Nowhere else does an American find a meal that ''goes to the spot." Nowhere else may his hours and weeks sing- themselves happily along, with the uninterrupted respect of the people, and without the annoyance of the Continental fussiness, pomposity, and American detraction. Ireland is the only friend America has in Europe. Two hundred dollars will give a first-class passage to and fro, a quittance of the heated term here, a peaceful and health-giving sojourn there, and an increase of valuable information. Go. CHAPTER VI. THE PORT OF BELFAST. Five lines of staunch and splendid steamers ply between this active port and the English and Scottish ports. Not only do the wharves display commercial activity, extensive importations and exportations, and a good deal of shipping, bnt I noticed some very extensive ship-building, and the launching of one of the very largest ocean steam- ers, and also another very large iron ocean steam- er on the stocks. EXPENSES, JULY I 5 — BELFAST.' ; Lunch, . $0 28 Horse-cars, 5^ '^ Steamer to Glasgow, first-class, . . • 3 50 $4 34 A trip during the night across the Irish Chan- nel, and I am awakened in the morning by the unpleasant odor of the ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 59 RIVER CLYDE. Knowing that we were due in the Clyde by day- light, I hastily dressed, and was on deck, as the renowned ship-building of the Clyde had been an interesting anticipation. There . were bold head- lands, rocks, and castles on the north bank, and fair plains and a splendidly cultivated country on the south bank. Every thing was lovely but the water — or rather slush — through which the pad- dle-wheels stirred up noxious gases, which made a position aft the wheels unbearable. The cap- tain told me that this dirty condition of the Clyde was caused by its being made the main sewer of Glasgow, and that the city had for a long time agitated the discharge of the sewage by means of an artificial sewer, and by pumping into the ocean, as in the case of London. This is about the only- fault to be found with Glasgow, and she owes it to herself to purify that river, which, though the busiest river in the world for its size, is certainly the filthiest. THE SHIP-BUILDING begins principally about six miles below that hive of industry, Glasgow. The ships are all iron, and the sound of tens of thousands of riveting-ham- mers is like the roar of musketry in a general battle. 6o ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. As we get up near the Broomielaw Bridge, the river is barely wide enough for the steamer to turn around. The vessels lie from one to three deep on each side. It is ^' Glasgow Fair Week," and several low, black, narrow, sharp steamers are each swarmed with people on a holiday ex- cursion. All the steamers are painted black, ob- viously to prevent the bespattering effects of that nasty river. GLASGOW has about six hundred thousand inhabitants, and I suppose, from its general appearance, as well as statistics, it has more people of thrift, and fewer of wretchedness, than any city in Europe. The neatness of its streets, and the bright and rich ap- pearance of its stores and shops, will attract par- ticular notice. There are many interesting scenes, buildings, and monuments in this city, among which are the Cathedral and Necropolis, began in the twelfth century, the Glasgow University, the Royal Exchange, the parks, and the statues. PAISLEY SHAWLS. A sixpence took me down to Paisley, one of the suburbs of Glasgow, the place of the manufacture of the celebrated Paisley shawls. There appeared to be about a dozen of these manufactories. This name is not unfamiliar to any family man. I vis- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 6 1 ited some of the factories, and saw in the weaving of these shawls additional evidence of man's im- mortality — the Jacquard loom. Messrs. J. Clarke & Co. were very courteous in showing us about. They informed us that none of the trade at Pais- ley ever exported to New-York a shawl worth more than $25 or $30! What the French do in that line, the ladies may answer to their savage lords. EXPENSES, JULY 16 — GLASGOW. Board and lodging by a friend ; gifts, . $2 00 Fare to Castlecary, first-class, . . i 50 $3 50 THE ROMAN WALL. My excuse for not devoting more time to the interesting country, Scotland, is because I was more in search of Art than of Nature ; and as to human nature, it may be said that the Scotch are so honest, plain, and direct, that it takes but little time to know or describe them. Leaving out the wild and healthful, as well as beautiful, scenery of the Highlands, one may get a fair idea of Scotland and her people, and also visit her most renowned localities, by a trip across that narrow portion from Glasgow and the Clyde to Edinburgh and the Forth. The farming is careful, and every foot of soil is brought into use, as in all old countries ; but to 62 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. me the most interesting feature was — what I had never heard of before — the old Roman wall, which to-day illustrates the power of ancient Rome and the character of the Scots. Subse- quent to this visit, the writer visited Rome in company with a Scotchman. He was a man of extensive information, precise in the use of it, and a gentleman in deportment. When our Italian guide was boasting over ''ze leetel ceetee of Rome, vich gongkered all ze vorld," the Scotch- man turned round impulsively in his seat, and, shaking his fist at the guide on the driver's seat, said, ''Ay; but they neve-r-r conquer-r-r-ed Scotland." And, sure enough, here was this Roman wall, or the remains of it, stretching entirely across the island, now distinctly visible, and proclaiming with eternal voice where the proud waves of Rome were staid. The invasion of Caledonia, under the Emperor Antoninus, in the second cen- tury, extended northward only as far as this line. The unconquered Scots retreated to the north of it, and the Romans threw up this wall, camped there, and garrisoned it four centuries. I be- lieve no stones are now visible in connection with the wall, but the site of it is visible in many places across the island. It was only an earthen wall and outer ditch. The demolitions, natural causes, and husbandry of sixteen centuries have left only ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 63 a slight elevation where the wall was, and a de- pression where the outside ditch was ; but even where now are the furrows of the plow, and waving- grain, or grazing cattle, this imposing effect of mighty hands still lasts, stretching over hill and dale and across plain. It can be seen anywhere at a glance how it ran, according to good military judgment, along the bluff or crown of the slope that faces northward, giving a view of the valley and of the rising slope on the other side, thus affording a look-out line as against invaders. I had the pleasure of stopping among the farm- ers around Castlecary, Avhich, in the time of the Romans, was one of Agricola's chain of forts. At this time, about that portion of the country may be seen, placed in the walls of fences and houses, stones of quaint and unexplained carving, that have been found there, supposed to be of Ro- man origin. There also may be traced the Roman road, or highway, of that system of roads through- out the Roman empire that cost more than the city ; and also may be traced the remains of rude structures by the mediaeval Scots, at every mile of the traveler's progress, awakening his- toric and romantic interest, as all old countries do to Americans. It was along here, too, that I got a taste of the inherent and conservative religious character of 64 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. the Scots. I was dragged off to church three times a day, because it was the '' rule of the house." They did not see where courtesy to American habits, or to the ''stranger within thy gates, came in as against the ^' command of God." There is nothing elsewhere in human nature so odd — sometimes amusing, and always interesting — as the Scotch frankness and directness of expression. They seem to have no art of plausibility or sua- vity ; politeness, as a study, is not in their curri- culum. They are the antipodes of the French in this respect, and are, on that account, much easier got along with by any sensible foreigner. It is a wonder how two such opposite races have been put upon the same planet, or how they can go to the same heaven. An old lady, eighty years of age, escorted me about her farm, to see some strange monuments ; we met a neighbor- woman with two milk-pails, and the following colloquy ensued : " Here's an American janetleman, wha wants to see the onteekweeties o' the place." " Hach, ha ! Will he no bide lang?" ''Na, na; he's gae'n awa shin." " Hach, ha !" (reproachfully.) " Will he no bide the Sawbaith-day ? Eh, mon!" This was Saturday evening, and I immediately signified my intent to continue on in search of ''onteekweeties." I went to church three times next day, and saw ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 65 the deacon do as all the Scotch deacons do — take the Bible into the pulpit, and then escort the minister into the pulpit; and saw all the '^big bugs*' sit in the gallery, while all the people of converse grade sat below\ And while speaking of PECULIARITIES, I might note here that all pedestrians, vehicles, and car-trains pass each other to the left, in Ireland, Scotland, and England (as well as in Canada) ; while in France, pedestrians pass to the right and vehicles to the left. The paviors in the cities of Ireland, Scotland, and England kneel upon one knee while at work ; in France they "squat," and in Italy they sit oh a little bench. At the depots, and other scenes of meeting or parting of friends, I noticed, in Scotland, no **kessen ;" in France, men or women kiss on each cheek alternately. In Germany and Austria, the men alone do the kissing, while the women look on. In England, Ireland, and Scotland, heavy, square-toed shoes are universal, and are always well blackened — probably because the women do it every morning as a part of their household duties, like making the morning fire or cooking the breakfast. Shoe-blackening is a British trait. But of local and national peculiarities, we will take more particular notice as we proceed. CHAPTER VI. RAILROADING. There is not a feature of peculiarity in all Eu- rope more striking to the American than the rail- road system. All the railroads are better built, swifter, smoother, more carefully managed, and cost more to travel on than the American roads. But all this is for the benefit of the stockhold- ers. In the matter of comfort to the average passenger, the roads are positively ridiculous. It would seem curious that a people of admitted civilization should maintain the obnoxious and '' strait-jacket " compartment cars, until we un- derstand that that people are WEIGHED DOWN BY CONSERVATISM. What with the really arrogant but superficially polite manners of the English railroad servants, their '' cast-iron " rules as to passengers, their compartment cars and barred and bolted stations, the passenger has an irksome journey, and rail- roading is looked upon by all people as is night- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. (ij mare. The long and short of it is that this rail- road management and style is a sort of cousin to other aristocratic institutions. The nobility are largely interested in railroads ; the government it- self meddles largely with their management, and the untitled wealthy, naturally imitating their bet- ters, are aristocratic in their tendencies. This compartment plan of the cars — first, second, and third class — is a fair illustration of social divisions in Europe, the people being cribbed, confined, and divided everywhere, and in every thing else, as they are while traveling. The American there finds his wonted free, easy, and roaming style suddenly and annoying- ly checked. In America, he may buy a ticket and roam freely where he will, on a long train of cars, with every appurtenance of convenience, selecting or shunning company according to his tastes, or indulging in variety, picking up infor- mation here and there, meeting old acquaintances and forming new ones, and stopping on the jour- ney wherever he pleases, his ticket being " good until used " — as held by the American courts. But all these advantages are lost in the European management, more particularly in the English management, which partakes of the English block- headed conservatism and native arrogance. Often the writer wished to wield a fist like the kick of a cart-horse. You enter a station where 68 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. you must be confined in the room containing the ticket-office of the *' class " to which you belongs according to your pay. There is not a map nor a chart hanging anywhere, nor any geo- graphical information to be found on any ticket or time-table or prospectus. To the inquiries of the stranger, the ticket-clerk — called a " booking agent " — is rather too curt for decency. Going to the train, you are bundled peremptorily into a compartment which is something like an ordinary omnibus set crosswise upon a platform-car. You are then locked in, and you have no means of exit but at the same side ; and there being no provision in the car for the evacuative func- tions, should the passenger find conveniences provided at the next station, they might be on the opposite side to his door of exirt, and thus necessitate his passing around the end of a long train. Should nature demand this hazardous undertaking, and the passenger miss the train thereby, he would have to pay for another ticket for the universal rule is that a ticket is only '' good for this train." Children in these com- partments make some very startling and persistent requests in the presence of ladies and gentlemen, and the stamp of suffering upon the faces of adults may often be seen. There is no provision of drinking-water on these cars ; and if any of your fellow-passengers ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 69 are obnoxious, there is no remedy to that. I was confined once in a '^ first-class " compart- ment, my only companion being a young English- man, who was an entire polecat. Where a com- partment is fiiU, only the two passengers sitting next the window really have fresh air, and they usually take entire control of it to the discomfiture of those in the interior. Sometimes, on a hot summer day, one broad-shouldered fellow will fill up each window to enjoy the scenery and the fresh air, occasionally drawing in his head to spit on the floor. No matter what occurs within these compartments — sickness, death, in- sult, assault, accident, fire, murder, rape — it is shut out from the world, and there is no suc- cor. A half century of inconvenience has final- ly punched through John Bull's resistive skull that there can be some change in these matters without danger to the English constitution ; and they have done what they consider a smart thing in connecting a rope along the outside t)f the train whereof a printed notice is posted in each com- partment, stating that it may be pulled when any thing obnoxious occurs, but in which event not one in ten of the real sufferers could avail them- selves. The wags have called this the '' murder- rope ;" a pleasantry which shows there is more perception in England than progress. In winter, these compartments are warmed by 70 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. station-agents thrusting into the cars upon the floors warming-pans containing hot water, but which are too seldom renewed. Each compart- ment has a voluminous display of Parliamentary statutes relative to the privileges of railroad com- panies, and the duties of the public, the most con- spicuous of which are how much a passenger may be fined if he does this or that, or omits to do this or that. The people are attended and hedged about like children, perhaps because Parliament has experienced that the people don't know enough to take care of themselves. This is espe- cially European. CARE FOR THE PEOPLE. The fire-tower of London, 150 feet high, erect- ed at the spot of the origin of the great fire, at an enormous expense, to commemorate that cala- mity, has its top balcony covered with wire bas- ket-work, on account of the frequent suicidal leaps from that place. At Pisa the keepers of the leaning tower will not permit a smaller party than three to ascend the tower, because, if one takes a freak to jump off, the two others would restrain him more certainly than one. All these oddities of railroad management re- quire about twice the number of servants which the American railroads do, and they really tend to discourage railroad traveling. If European people ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. /I could adopt the American system, in its freedom, ease, and generosity, intercommunication and en- terprise would be promoted among the people, which would serve to knock away many social bars and absurdities, and augment railroad profits. As it is, people there travel only upon infinite- ly greater necessity [than in America ; and the general knowledge among the people of the geography of their own country is surprisingly limited. I did not see but one map in all Europe outside of a bookstore ; in America, they are abundant — in every office, hallway, domicile, and railroad-station, besides the railroad-maps, pros- pectuses, tickets, and other means, which are as '* thick as leaves in Vallambrosa," and seem to spring both from the insatiate impulse of Ameri- cans for keeping on the move, and the sharp en- terprise and liberal management of railroad com- panies. I can practically illustrate some of the foregoing criticisms by some of my own annoying experience. At Edinburgh, I went to the station early, so as to find the ticket-agent disengaged (who, by the way, was a consciously smart lad, of from twenty to twenty -five years of age), and not seeing any map at the station of that large city, and being unacquainted with the portions of the country through which the road extended, I made upon the clerk an inquiry which I supposed Avould be J2 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. regarded as a reasonable one the Avorld over, and was entitled to a human answer. He very pro- perly regarded me for just what I was — an unti- tled, unimposing Yankee, and treated me accord- ingly. " I wish to go through the pleasantest route to London, and stop over at two or three interesting places." *' By what route T " I didn't know the names of your routes." (Pause and no answer.) " Can't you tell me the pleasantest route ?" ''That's ho wing to yer fancy." " Can you show me a map or something?" " We cahn't provide hevery body with maps." '' Well, I'm a stranger traveling, and, blast your eyes ! if you knew how to run a railroad here, you would have a map, so that people would know where they are." By this time, others were pressing for their turn at the ticket-window, and I stepped aside. After taking a few moments to reduce my pulse, I ven- tured back again to the young "lion" at the ticket- window, and told him to give me a ticket for the most direct route to London, and with per- mit to stop over at two or three of the most in- teresting towns en route. " Ha ! that depends hevery think, hagain, on yer fancy, ye see." ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 73 This evidently was enjoyed by his brother clerks, who felt that he was too much for " Bro- ther Jonathan." He shoved me a ticket with per- mit to stop over at York, and took my money as though he had done me a gratuity. On the way down {"uj?," as they say) to Lon- don, I saw at a country-station an important agri- cultural fair. Knowing another train was to pass two hours later, and desiring to see the English people at one of their agricultural fairs, I inno- cently stepped from the train, and was about to pass out of the station, on my way toward the vil- lage, when I was stopped by a boy of about fifteen years of age, in uniform, who told me I could not "pahshout" on that ticket. I at first regarded that as an illegal arrest. I said to myself, " Sup- pose I had a dying friend without, or were myself in need of medical attendance." However, I found the station-master, who told me I would have to purchase a new ticket for London, and that I must in no event get on the next train without it. I staid there, imprisoned on the platform for two hours, and when the train arrived, I took it among the crowd, took from my valise another hat, but- toned up my coat, with a white handkerchief around my neck (as it was raining), and proceeded on unmolested ; but the official at the London end of the route mounted to a state of " 'igh hindig- 74 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. nation " at discovering that a blarsted Yankee had come through on a wrong train ! EXPENSES, JULY 1 7, l8, AND I9. Glasgow, entertained by friends. Again, passing from London to Liverpool, through the usual swindling process of the res- taurant-keepers at the different stations,! was com- pelled to return to the train, leaving my fourteen- cent cup of slop-tea untasted, just as the train had begun to move. Several voices called out to me, " You cahn't get on now, sir, while the train is in motion ;" but the restaurant-keeper having per- mitted me, in his own hearing, to be misinformed about the time of the train's tarrying, and I being unwilling to pay for another ticket, or to miss the steamer at Liverpool,dived like a frog through one of the open windows into a compartment, nearly leaving my boot in the station-master's hands. At the next station, a guard came to the window with a telegram, and asked for my name and ad- dress. When I answered him, I was an Ameri- can, going home, he said : " Ha ! that halters the case ; but, sir, you have violated the law." I told him I might wait in Liverpool a few days for his summons, if it would accommodate him ; and asked him, if I received the summons in America, and should fail to appear, whether ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 75 or not it would be " contempt of court." I had only a third-class ticket, but had dived through the window into a first-class compartment, where I had an agreeable and instructive conversation with a young English real gentleman ; and as I went to a seat in my own proper place, I had the satisfaction of hearing some one good-hu- moredly say, " A jolly Yankee beggah, that." In concluding this subject, we might note that the third-class cars, in Europe correspond to our smoking-cars in construction, although many re- fined people travel in them, and the behavior of all classes in them is very proper. The average business men use them. Smoking is prohibited, if any one objects, and I have seen American clergy- men with their families travel on them. In hot weather, I found them preferable to second-class, being more roomy and airy. The fare is about three cents per mile. The second-class car cor- responds to our common coach, and the fare is about four and a half cents per mile. The first- class car corresponds only in cushions to our palace-car, but has none of its conveniences ; is dis- tinguished particularly by the refined people who occupy them, and by the polite attentions their occupants receive from the flunkeys of the rail- roads. The fare is about six cents a mile. Daniel Webster once said, at Rochester, " No people ever lost their liberties who had a wa- terfall sixty feet high." It is doubtful that a 76 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. people will ever obtain liberty that permits compartment-cars. EDINBURGH. It would be presumptuous for me to attempt to describe worthily this modern Athens. The city gives an ennobling impression. I don't like to use the term " romantic," but that term has a catholic import. What was once a wild, deep gorge, with sides embracing rock, and precipice, and slope, and hill, and mountain, is now trimmed by centuries of art into terrace, and wall, and castle, and monument, and amphitheatres of cost- ly buildings, piled with enchanting altitude, va- riety, and magnificence. Entering the city by the railway, along the bottom of this gulf, and stopping at the Waverley Bridge, an immense structure, which gives a level viaduct between the south and the north sides of the town, at a giddy height over this gulf we see stupendous and striking objects on all sides. To the east and on the right is a loft}^ peak called ''Arthur's Seat," and on the left is Calton Hill, surmounted by Nelson's Monument ; and near it, clear cut against the sky, the unfinished columns of the modern Parthenon and Professor Playfair's Ob- servatory ; just at the left of the depot, over two or three well grassed and flowered terraces, stands the national monument to Walter Scott ; ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. // to the right is the ancient Abbey and palace of Holyrood, which have been occupied by Mary Queen of Scots, by James VIL, by Prince Charles Edward, by Louis XVIII. and Charles X. of France, by Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. JULY 20, EXPENSES. Fare to Edinburgh, third class, from Castle- cary, $0 70 Dinner, 48 Supper, 42 Holyrood Castle, fees, .... 5 Burns's Monument, 5 Lodging, Imperial Hotel, .... 70 Attendance, 42 One whisky-punch in room (caught cold), 56 L S3 38 MUNICIPAL. I must pass notice of the monuments, univer- sities, art galleries, museums, etc., and will con- clude by a notice of the universally clean streets. Every alley and lane and by-way is as clean of garbage and mud as the aristocratic streets. The city is economically governed ; the Common Council derive no salary ; nobody grumbles. I asked the City Clerk what was the secret of clean streets and good government. He said, '^ Public conscientiousness among the people, mon." The people on the streets are bright, intelligent, 78 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. active, well-dressed. A noticeable feature is the frequency of old men, well-preserved, active, gen- teel, and learned-looking. Eatables about the same price here as in Ameri- can cities ; wages about 25 per cent less. The side- walks are on a level with the carriage-way, making promenading easy at the crossings — a sensible fea- ture of the European cities, superior to ours. The Scotch are smoking themselves to death — high and low, rich and poor, learned and un- learned. Good tobacco or cigars are hard to get throughout Europe. Beer, Avine, and whisky drinking is duly observed. The women have their share. It is a common thing for a well- dressed lady to step in off the street to a bar — and the bars are genteel, respectable, and for the accommodation of ladies, just the same as ladies' and gentlemen's restaurants in our country. There seems to be a general idea of the ludicrous in al- lowing the element to pass the lips that is used for ablutions and navigation. THE LAW COURTS were visited. The judges, the clerks, and law- yers all bewigged and begowned. SaAV a young lawyer opening a case to the jury ; he had an august iron-gray wig. Dundreary whiskers, black mustache ; and the wig being cocked up behind, revealed his back hair parted in the middle, and ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 79 over which hung the queue of the wig. I thought it was about as clownish a make-up as I had ever seen. The beauty of Edinburgh, like Glasgow, seems destined to be forever shrouded by the smoke of their universal bituminous coal. JULY 21, EXPENSES, Breakfast, $0 84 Lodging. 70 Attendance, 42 Supper, 84 Edinburgh Castle, fees, ..... 28 $3 08 CHAPTER VII. GREAT BRITAIN'S CLIMATE. A CONDITION readily noticed and continuously enjoyed by an American in the British Isles, is the moist, cool, and refreshing climate. It is con- ducive to more physical hardihood than the Ame- rican climate. While our summers are hot and dry, theirs are comparatively humid and cool. Our climate makes active nerves, and a restless, eager, ambitious disposition ; and we work harder, and study more and longer hours, and exhaust by activity. The British people, as an average, have less eager and continuous industry ; have more quiet nerves, stronger bodies, and a more leisurely enjoyment of life in all things. As a general thing, they rise later in the morning, and close business earlier in the evening than Americans. The superior physique of man, woman, and child in the cities of England is readity noticeable. Ame- ricans can only compensate the exhausting influ- ences of their climate by working less and playing more. Spending the last half of July ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 8 1 and the first part of August in England, we noticed there was no night wherein a Spring overcoat or bed-covers were not comfortable, even in London. Beard and hair that are hard and dr}^ in America are soft in the British Islands ; and pictures, statuary, and architec- ture fade, corrode, or disintegrate on account of this humidity. I have pinched pieces off St. Paul's church and Westminster Abbey with my thumb and finger in some out-of-the-way, dilapi- dated place which already needed repairing. Then, also, in connection with this ph}- sical har- dihood, might be mentioned another matter con- ducive to it : the people eat much offish and drink little of water, and not at all of ice-water. Ice is very little consumed ; and even in the meat and fish markets of London, in July, I saw no ice. Ice is seldom found in liquor-stores or restaurants^ and a bar-tender will assure you that his soda- water is " cold," because in a cool place " under the counter." In America, two glasses of beer Avill produce a headache, where one's fill of it will not in England, or on the Continent. I at first thought this difference of effect was caused by a difference in the quality of the beer, but was told that the climate was the cause. Pro- bably the truth is in both causes. S2 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. YORK. Many impressive scenes in this trip must be omitted, and we will only briefly allude to the fact of visiting York, once the seat of the English Gov- ernment, and containing a castle and the York Minster church, eight hundred years old, and of very imposing dimensions and architecture, with many tombs of distinguished historical per- sons. An old Englishman visiting there told me he could spend two weeks inspecting that church. EXPENSES, JULY 22. Fare from Edinburgh to London, third class, $9 24 Lunch en route, ...... 42 $9 dd Riding swiftly by the iron mills by night, and getting, amid the surrounding darkness, only instantaneous glimpses of the workers illumined by their fiery occupation, was like a magic glimpse of the infernal regions. We shoot by the villages of uniform houses clustered around the mouths of coal-pits. Over Newcastle we go, which, with its expanse of red tiles, resembles the angry ocean illumined by a red light. Verily, England is a hive. All along the route could be seen troops of women tilling the fields. Hundreds come over from Ireland every harvest, and work for fifty-six cents per day, boarding ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 83 themselves. On the farms in Scotland, there were hundreds of ^' Scotch lassies," bareheaded and barefooted, with legs like Indiana prize beets. EXPENSES, JULY 23— YORK, ENGLAND. Lodging, $0 42 Attendance, 14 Candle, 7 Breakfast, 42 Guide-book, ....... 28 Cathedral fees, 14 Sandwich (size of visiting-card), . . . 5 London Underground Railroad, . . 7 Dinner, 56 Lodging, 84 Attendance, 14 Candle, 7 LONDON. I came up out of the ground suddenly into sun- light, into the heart of London — the centre of Great Britain's glory — Trafalgar Square. A swift ride from Edinburgh, through southern Scotland and northern England, to a suburban station at London, then down a series of day- lighted granite stairways to an underground railroad, where another train and locomotive sped us like lightning past other long, brilliantly lighted trains, filled with gay people under the world's metropolis, with its civilization and wealth, and all its network of subterranean im- 84 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. provements still above us, and here I am in the centre of London, without passing through that slow filtering process and the disenchanting and unfavorable suburban scenes so common to an introduction to our own cities. The rapidity with which the Londoners dart about their city underground is a demonstration of the need, in this respect, of our metropolis. Riding on the underground railway reveals an outlay of capital that can not be realized until the results are looked upon. The equipments, iron, gauge, locomotives, etc., are all as solid, broad, and heavy as our Erie's. The depots, many of them, are as exteijsive as some of our through- line depots — say Rochester, Cleveland, Boston, etc. THE PRICE OF LIVING in the cities of England, I find, on inquiry, is about as dear to a family as in the American cities, or New-York and Brooklyn. In the rural districts, it is higher than in the American rural districts. But wages are from a third to a half lower. Farm laborers get from 75 cents to $1 a day, in harvest; paviors in London, $1.50 to $1.75 per day ; and laborers, $1 a day. A walk through the vast meat and vegetable markets was delightfully cool. No ice is used on the meat or fish, as a general thing. In the gene- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 85 ral market, if the meat is not sold, they keep it until the next day without ice. Every thing- was neat and pure; no confusion or disagreeable scenes. With the thirty-five thousand beeves used daily here, and other things in proportion, the mind would naturally anticipate disorder. But, on the contrary, there is as much system in this vast ramification of supply as in this civil government. Much of the garden-truck is raised within thirty miles of the city. All the railroads are given up at night to this, and to milk which may come from two hundred to three hundred miles north. But here you find fresh fruits, and even flowers and fern-leaves, every morning — Ire- land, Scotland, France, Spain, Portugal, Holland, and the United States and Canada contributing the fruit. CITY TRAVEL. The omnibuses ply generally through the centre of the city, and connect with the horse cars ("tramways") that commence at the su burbs, or, rather, remote from the centre. The underground routes are for longer distances through and through the city, and have stations not closer than half a mile. They are capacious, vast, costly, and open to the light of day. The elevated routes are those from the country. Probably the most general impression that 86 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. strikes the mind, on approaching London, is the mysterious and troubled thought how that com- pact mass of three millions of people are daily fed. It will take but twenty-four hours to an- swer the conjecture, if one will visit the va- rious markets and milk-stations. The fact will be readily observed that the faces and move- ments of the entire people indicate ease, con- tentment, and plenty. The influences of stern and well-defined laws, and of their ministers and executors, permeate everywhere ; law and order universally prevail; and, by the conser- vative character of the English people, all the channels, great and small, of supply are steadily preserved, having passed from father to son, and grown and become as fixed as the arteries and veins of the human body, or as the rivulets and rivers that contribute to the sea. The London- ers feel as secure and are as happy as the in- habitants of an American village. The great markets, nightly supplied with fruit from Spain and France, or with vegetables from France and Germany, or with beeves, mutton, and milk from England and Scotland, or with pigs and potatoes from Ireland, are conducted with the quiet system of any village market. There are three or four grand markets, in the first instance, supplied by sailing-craft from the sea, and wagons from the country, infinitely cleaner and more ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 8/ orderly than the New- York markets, and they supply the retail grocers and meat-market men throughout the city. For about thirty miles about London, the soil is largely devoted to gar- dening ; but most of the land of Great Britain is used for grazing, to furnish London with its roast beef and mutton-chops ; thus compelling London and England to depend upon other parts of the world for their cereals. It is understood that England is not directly self-supporting, except in the way of exchange; and that if an embargo were to be suddenly laid on the food of other countries, it Avould, for a time, produce frightful disturbance in England. But, in answer to this, when a foreigner sees the vast manufac- tories throughout the country, and the stupen- dous docks and the system of shipping, his commiseration, he finds, has been ludicrously mis- placed. EXPENSES, JULY 24. Breakfast, $0 49 Omnibuses, 24 ' Dinner, 49 Supper, -40 House of Commons, fees to — no matter, . 42 American Reading-Rooms, . . . i 12 Thames Tunnel and return, . . . . 5 Fire-tower book, ..... 9 Boot-blacking twice, 9 $3 39 88 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. POLITICALLY, London is a mere congeries of many separate municipalities — about seventy ancient townships that have grown into a confluent mass, and have an independent political existence still, their bound- aries invisible to the general observer, as those of the separate wards in one of our cities. London proper, as a municipality, bears about the same relation to the metropolis known throughout the world as London, as any one central ward does to the whole of any large American city. Each of these many parishes has an independent con- trol in local government, such as lamp-lighting, policing, street-sweeping, etc. ; but Parliament, in order to give a uniformity throughout the metro- polis in public improvements and good order, has organized whatas known as the Metropolitan Board of Works, who have charge of water- supply, the sewage, and the grading and paving. There is no such body as a Board of Aldermen for the general city of London, and the " Lord Mayor" has only to do with a very small patch within the metropolis. The people are busy at their private vocations, knowing and caring but little about the adminis- tration of civil government, paying their taxes without a murmur, feeling ^'God save the Queen," and respecting and standing by their ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 89 nobility and Parliament. Above all elements, there will be noticed, throughout the streets and at public gatherings, that all-pervading feeling of good-humor and waggery, good eating and drinking and contentment, more comfortable to behold than the aspect of hurry, agitation, and gloom that make up the faces of the people in our American cities. Right in the heart of the metropolis — London — may be seen, any day, processions of Sabbath-school children, on picnic and social excursions to the country, on trains and on the boats on the Thames". Of course, we can not attempt a description of the various objects* of interest ; but we may enu- merate them, and state the various facilities for seeing them. The expenses of sight-seeing are by the shilling an item. The shillings fly easily, and the English can poultice them out of the visitor about as well as any people in the world. About every place of public interest costs a shilling, and the cab-fares are about a shilling a mile (about twenty-eight cents United States currency). The omnibuses and horse-cars are about a penny a mile, with which and the Hansom cabs, the underground railroads, and the Thames boats, the visitor is enabled to get very rapidly to the various places of interest. To see the surface of London and its life does not require man;^ days, if one will use the ordinary sharp- go ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. ness, self-reliance, enterprise, and vigor that he does at home. EXPENSES, JULY 25. Breakfast, $0 22 Newspapers, 12 Westminster Abbey guide-book, . . . 28 London Tower fee, 28 London Tower guide-book, .... 14 Dinner, ^ . . 28 Omnibuses, 22 Fruit, . 9 Stationery, . . . . . . . 56 Walking-stick, 28 Supper, 42 $2 89 LODGINGS. The writer, on landing from Edinburgh, took the underground cars for threepence halfpenny (seven cents) to the Strand — the centre or Broad- way of London — and there, with his little black valise, he walked only one block, to Craven street, commonly patronized by Americans, before he dis- covered a nice hall bedroom in a private family for ten shillings a week (two dollars and eighty cents), including lights, boots, and attendance. He then obtained a map of London, to tho- roughly study during the evening, had a comfort- able night's rest, and the next day — -the second one in London — rode all over the city on the om- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 9I nibuses, tramways, and boats, familiarizing him- self with its general features, paying only about half a dollar for fares, and then was ready to take matters up by detail. And now we come to the interesting subject of THE UNCTUOUS SHILLING and the restaurants. I ate wherever I found my- self hungry, always ''fetching up " at my lodgings in good season at night, thoroughly tired, and ready for a good sleep, after enlarging, systema- tizing, and filing away my notes of the day. The visitor will have many an extortionate fee to pay, and many an insinuation or importunity for a shilling. He had better pay pleasantly, for he gets his money's worth everywhere. The English have started upon Americans the well-known satire, " The almighty dollar," but they ought to be silenced with, '^ The unctuous shilling," for it will go farther and belittle more manhood in England than a dollar will in Ameri- ca. I have asked a laborer, apparently in employ- ment, the direction to a boat, and after informing me, he has followed me for the " price of a pint of beer " as a compensation. But I will dismiss this part of that subject by boldly asserting that, regardless of ministers plenipotentiary, rules, guards and police, one can hear even the British lion roar in Parliament for two and sixpence a 92 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. night. This I did three nights in the House of Commons, and one in the House of Lords. EXPENSES, JULY 26— SUNDAY. Newspapers $0 14 Breakfast, . . . . . . . , 42 Omnibuses, 14 $0 70 Desiring very much to visit Parliament, I in- quired of Mr. Bowles, the proprietor of the American Reading-room, as to the means. He said Americans generally applied to the United States Minister, but that was a slow and uncertain means, and that if I would '' tip '' one of the at- tendants two and sixpence, it would be the rea- diest way of effecting an entrance. Having made the acquaintance of the Hon. Mr. Butt, of Ireland, and having his autograph on one of my cards, I went to the Commons, and with it passed one after another of the police to the corridor next the chamber. Mr. B. not being in the house that evening, my long delay and disappointment at- tracted the notice of one of the officials in atten- dance, who, by his conversation with and manner toward me, impressed me as an uncommonly congenial fellow. In a very kind and sympathiz- ing way, he said that he had a member's pass for some other visitor who, likely, would not be ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 93 present, and that it was at my disposal. I thanked him, and told him it was no more than right that these little courtesies should be reciprocated, but that I had no change less than a sovereign except one shilling and eightpence, and that I would be mortified to offer him that small amount. He said, " Don't mention it ;" but I found his a ready palm ; and, telling him that if I came again I would do better by him, I received the pass ; but having been seen loitering about there nearly two hours, I had to be disposed of in a round- about way, and accordingly Avas taken to the outer corridor, and winked over to another offi- cial, who had in charge the next squad of visitors in waiting. Having once got into the gallery, which, by the way, is a small perch at one end of the chamber, another very " congenial " person in attendance made my acquaintance. I was in- formed by him also that he had a member's pass for some visitor who would not likely avail him self of it. I told him that I had nothing short of a sovereign, and I was too poor to give that. He, too, said, " Oh! don't mention it;" but before we finished conversation, ke offered to go and get my sovereign changed. I was thus admitted the next and the third night under the same bargain, and might have continued on indefinitely. I supposed that the House of Lords would be hedged in with more dignity ; but, on telling an 94 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. American resident of my success in entering the Commons, he replied that I could safely try the same thing on with the Lords. I went there, how- ever, with our Minister's ticket. I there found another very ''congenial" attendant, who soon made my acquaintance. He was venerable enough for a grandfather, august enough for a lord, and had a four-inch star on his coat. He asked me to tarry a moment after the other visitors had left. He produced a page or two of auto- graphs, which he said he had collected for a countryman of mine who had not called for them, and that he would not mind turning them over to me " for a trifle." I became assured that ''for a trifle," I could have the assistance of this kind and hospitable gentleman in visiting the Lords ; which, however, I failed to do, having more in- teresting objects. EXPENSES, JULY 2J. Breakfast, $o 42 St. Paul's Cathedral, crypt, ball, and catafalques, 84 Dinner, 40 Pint Champagne (felt bad), ... 84 Waiter, ....... 7 Omnibuses, ....... 14 Paper collars, 28 Paper cuffs, 28 House Commons, fees to, ... 56 $3 83 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 95 At Westminster Abbey, while Avandering in that sacred spot, the Poets' Corner, an attendant, in a long black surplice, thrust upon me a ticket for a privileged seat in the ensuing Sunday even- ing's service. Not knowing that I could use it, as I desired to hear Spurgeon, and as my shillings had been melting away like snow-flakes, I did not offer him a shilling ; but every time I visited the Abbey, he turned up before me as suddenly, unexpectedly, and silently as Banquo's ghost. After a while, I dispatched him with a shilling. Now that I have returned and am earning shil- lings as before, I feel very mean at not having given this man one at first, as he was so " congenial." Now, as to the RESTAURANTS. As an economical tourist, the reader will have a curiosity to know how the writer lived. The diary of expenses will show. The English and all Europe are as far behind Americans in the restaurant and hotel business as they are in run- ning railroads. The meals are not as cheap nor as ready as in America. The call for a cup of tea generally brings a pot large enough for a family, for which you have to pay ; and, in the country inns and restaurants, and in many city ones, a demand for potatoes at breakfast is looked upon as '' houtrageous." 96 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. THE HOTELS have not that open, public place at the entrance which is common to the offices of the American hotels, making the lower part really a public ex- change, where men meet in business and social intercourse. An English hotel or inn, however large, has a little lodge in the hallway, generally at- tended by a female, and there is no place to loiter or rest, or to study the character of the house or its inmates before engaging a lodgment ; there is generally no table d'hote or regular hour of eating, and the matter of engaging board is almost as laborious as hiring a house and initiating house- keeping. If the house is full of guests, they are secluded in their rooms, and there is no place of general assembly. EXPENSES, JULY 28. House of Commons(fees,as before, irregular), % 70 Breakfast, 46 Catalogue National Gallery, ... 28 Kensington Gardens, 28 Zoological Gardens, 28 Dinner, 44 Omnibuses and underground, ... 28 %2 72 VARIETIES. One visiting London should never get more than ten minutes' distance from his umbrella. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 97 The small boys, before their teens, wear '^ plug " hats. The horses have no heel nor toe corks on their shoes. Horse-cars are called " tramways," and they and the omnibuses are limited as to the number of occupants. There are no news-cries on the streets ; and the boot-blacks are limited by law to a penny a shine. The outside walls of most of the buildings are dingy and sooty, caused by the damp weather upon the smoke of the bituminous coal ; but the interior of the shops is brilliant and richly stocked. There are no coffin-shops essaying an inviting display of their wares, as in America. The street-sweeping machines are • at work during the entire day ; and boys, with dust-pans and brushes, gather horse-manure constantly, the parishes being paid for the privilege of taking the manure. I found the notorious fish-women of Billings- gate all to be fish-men. Private funerals are excessively lugubrious ; horses and hearses nod with sable plumes, and artistic mourners are hired, trapped with super- fluous black. All through Europe, this imposing character of private funerals is characteristic ; 98 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. they do not trot to their funerals, nor toll the knells by machinery, as we do. In Versailles, in France, I saw a corpse displayed in its coffin all day in front of the residence. The priest, bare- headed, heads the procession on its way to the church, and the bystanders, as the funeral passes, are accustomed to raise their hats. POSTAL TELEGRAPH. A most convenient thing in England, which our country ought to imitate, is the postal telegraph. You may convey twenty words to the most dis- tant part of England, Ireland, or Scotland for a shilling. CHAPTER VIII. Many of the things mentioned below are main attractions, each worth a trip across the Atlantic. There is the Tower, once the residence of the sovereigns, and the scene of many a state tragedy. There are beheading axes and blocks, and the suits of armor worn by all its kings, one hun- dred and seventy-five thousand stand of new arms ready for immediate use, and all of England's war panoply for ages ; all forming a wonderful and impressive museum wherein days may be spent with interest. The British Museum, the Royal Academy of Painting, the Sydenham Crystal Palace, Windsor Castle — some miles out of the city — the Fire Tower, the Thames Tunnel, the Live-Meat Market, the Thames bridges, are all im- posing objects^of visit. The parks and gardens, in finish and refinement, do not equal Central Park, New- York, nor Prospect Park, Brooklyn ; but they bear indications of what is a great deal better — a thoroughly democratic use of them by the people. In St. James's Park, not far from 100 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Buckingham Palace, and within forty steps of St. Janies's Palace, 1 saw eight or ten cows tied to trees on the public mall, to supply warm milk for the many children who are driven about in baby- wagons — and this right in the heart of the metro- polis. This characteristic is general to the public parks throughout Europe, and even to the gar- dens of the royal palaces. The people have more free and indulgent use of them than of the Ameri- can parks ; having more seats, more shade, and more grass-lounging. The Zoological Gardens in these parks are infinitely superior to any thing of the kind in America. EXPENSES, JULY 29. Breakfast, . . ' $o 56 Catalogue British Museum, .... 9 Fare to Woolwich Academy, . . . 28 Dinner (mean one), 40 Supper, ....... 40 Met Americans, 84 $2 57 Ten cents gave me a ride down the Thames to Woolwich. After repeated attempts with our Minister Plenipotentiary, I failed to get admis- sion to Woolwich Arsenal, which is kept secluded from all the world ; but I visited the Academy and grounds where England's boys are trained for officers, and where there is a vast and won- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. lOI derful museum of ordnance. There are captured cannon from Turkey and China a hundred and fifty years old, and some of them twenty feet long; there are captured ordnance of all sizes, ages, and from all countries, from the rudest construc- tion to the modern steel rifled-cannon ; and there are steel plates a foot thick which have been per- forated like paper by steel shot. TRAFALGAR SQUARE is the centre of interest. Standing on the steps of the National Gallery, there is a broad, open plaza of two or three acres, with basin and foun- tain, and bronze equestrian statues. In the cen- tre, one hundred and fifty feet high, is the monu- ment to England's historic idol. Admiral Nelson, around which are four bronze lions couchant, each twenty feet .long, that seem to typify the power of England, and ready to roar so as to shake the earth. Just to the left is old Northumber- land House, the seat of the Percys ; to the right is St. James's Park and Buckingham Palace ; farther down Parliament street are the Horse Guards — the beau-ideal of the dragoon, and always on duty ; next are seen the new government offices, and, lastly, the Parliament buildings, the Palmer- ston Monument, and Westminster Abbey. All this is within the space of a few blocks. 102 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. WESTMINSTER ABBEY. This contains the tombs of about one thou- sand celebrities — military, literary, scientific, and princely. Here we read upon tablets, beautiful verse or prose, composed in sacred regard for the scenes around ; and yet here, too, we see corrod- ing away the tombs of the very authors of those tablets. I stood over the bosom of Charles Dick- ens before I was aware of it, the spot of his burial being marked by a carving in the slab in the floor of the transept in the Poets* Corner. At the feet of Dickens are the remains of Garrick and his Avife ; by their side, Samuel Johnson ; by his side, Sheridan ; by the side of Dickens, Macaulay ; and at the head of Macaulay, Handel. I sat near the ashes of Handel on Sunday evening while the choir and organ of the abbey performed his Hal- lelujah Chorus in a manner I never heard equaled in America. There is the old oak chair in which have been crowned all the sovereigns of England, from William the Norman and Victoria, inclusive. EXPENSES, JULY 30. Breakfast, $0 56 Boots and papers, ...... 9 Fare to Windsor Castle, .... 70 Guide-book for same, 28 Lunch, 19 |i 82 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 103 While in Holyrood Palace, Edinburgh, we saw the room of Mary Queen of Scots as she left it, and the private supper-room where Rizzio was assassinated in her presence, tv/o or three months before James I. was born. We also saw the room in Edinburgh Castle where he was born, and the window from which he was lowered as an infant prince in a basket. Here, in Westminster Abbey, side by side, repose Queen Mary, Queen Bess (who beheaded her), and James I.,the son of Queen Mary, who reigned over England for forty years, and had his mother's body deposited in this place. PRICES OF LIVING. We often hear it said by Englishmen in Ameri- ca, that they can get along as well over there as here. From a comparison of the prices which I ascertained there,I can not believe that statement. I inquired of housekeepers, grocery and meat- market men for the different prices, and here copy them from my diary : Porterhouse steak, 14 pence, . . 32 cents. Butter, in July, 18 pence, ... 42 " Potatoes, for 14 lbs., .... 75 " Bread, for 4-lb. loaf, . . . . 8 " Flour, per lb., 7i " Milk, per quart, 11 " Railroad laborers, per day, 3^-. 6d. . 98 '• Paviors, per day, 2s. 6d to 3^-. 6d. — 70 to 98 " Masons, " 4^. to 55-. 6^, — $1.12 to $1.54 ; 104 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I found, on inquiring, that the prices of produce in the country were nearer to city prices than in America. It will be seen by the above facts that while the cost of subsistence to the poor man is as high as here, the wages are only one half, but there the price of clothing, the equipments of life, and rental are much cheaper than here. EXPENSES, JULY 3I. Breakfast, $0 40 Fare to Isle of Wight and return, third-class, 3 02 Dinner, 61 Lodging, 56 U 59 ST. PAUL'S CATHEDRAL. ^ Placarded all about is the following: "Visitors to the Cathedral are requested not to put on their hats in any part of the sacred building, and not to talk on subjects or in a tone of voice inconsis- tent with the respect which is due to the house of God." And yet two thirds of the mortuary honors within the building are in commemora- tion of butchers of their race — military and naval heroes, who have the best places and costliest monuments. The sarcophagi of Wellington and Nelson are in the crypt, and are an imposing sight. The Thames, up as far as London Bridge, which is at about the centre of the city, admits of the ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. ' I05 largest vessels. It is under this part that the tunnel is ; above London Bridge there are many other bridges, all of heaviest masonry and iron. The tide is always coming in or going out very swiftly, because it rises twenty-one feet. Of course, this leaves a wide beach on each side of the river, leaving the store-houses high and dry at ebb-tide. Hence the large vessels are usually anchored out in the stream, and lighters convey the freight to the store-houses, except such as have locks, where the tide at its flood is shut in, thus in many places floating the largest vessels twenty-one feet above the other vessels at anchor in the river. This lock-dockage in London is immense. The river steamers are low and black ; the pilot is at the stern, and the look-out at the bow tells him and the engineer what to do, thus employing an extra man more than on American boats, when a bell would answer. But we must consume no more time about London, and leave a thousand interesting things undescribed. EXPENSES, AUGUST I. Breakfast, $0 42 Dinner, 56 Lunch, 28 Treated Queen's baker at Osborne to hear him blow, ....... 12 $1 38 CHAPTER IX. THE ISLE OF WIGHT AND THE QUEEN. EXPENSES, AUGUST 2. Lodging, . . . . . . . $0 56 Breakfast, 40 Cab, . 56 Hair-dressing, 14 Dinner, 56 Ferry from Isle of Wight, ... 22 Car to station, 6 Cab in London, 84 $3 34 Three dollars and two cents, by third-class car, and with very acceptable company, takes us from London to the Isle of Wight and return. This beautiful island at the south of England, washed on all sides by the purest waves of the ocean, and continually fanned in the summer by refreshing breezes, contains diversified scenery, and is altogether a lovely spot worthy as a retreat for rest arid summer refreshment. From England's earliest history, it has been a favorite place of re- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. lO/ sort for its monarchs and nobility. The Queen thinks the sea-water here is more refreshing for bathing than elsewhere, and has it transported in casks to London, and even hundreds of miles north — asfaras Balmoral, Scotland. The American who escapes the hot and cry climate of his own coun- try, would find at the Isle of Wight the most in- vigorating and bracing change. Aside from the inspiriting influences of the scenery and the cli- mate, the cool, sweet breezes, the pure fresh and salt waters, and the clean, gravelly beaches, soci- ety has an air of respectable ease, content, and retirement, away from the bustle and drive of business life. And yet the shopkeepers and boarding-house and hotel keepers have an eye to the main chance during the visiting season ; but the character of comparative ease in the island may be inferred from the fact that there is no business interest of a general nature, such as man- ufacturing or commerce. ROYALTY. When the writer was at Ryde, in the early part of August, the island was honored with the presence of the Queen of England, the Prince and Princess of Wales, the Crown Prince and Princess of Prus- sia, and the Empress of Austria. Queen Victoria has a farm there, established by Prince Albert, but the visit of the Crown Prince of Prus- I08 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. sia was, to the native islanders, a novelty. Near the landing at Ryde, the people had erected a tem- porary arch of wood, painted in imitation of stone, and covered with evergreens, and on a scroll over the top the words, '^ Gott mit uns." There were placards about the town, by the Mayor, exhorting the people to good behavior during the presence of the royal visitors, prescribing their mode of con- duct, and enjoining them not to ''stare at, or other- wise make disagreeable the visit of, their royal guests." I thought if it had been a Yankee mayor who had assumed to thus instruct his con- stituents in manners, he would be ridiculed into his grave. How much of presumption those people over there can take from their governors remains to be fathomed. The tall, blonde-whiskered Prussian Prince, Frederick William, so familiar in the war pictures of the Emperor William's staff, I had the good for- tune to see. At the long and beautiful pier lay the Queen's yacht — a large and magnificent steamboat, manned with the best seamen, in neat sailor uni- forms, and officers in chapeaux, epaulettes, swords, etc. It was rumored that at 10.20 the Crown Prince and Princess of Prussia would embark. About a hundred ladies and gentlemen were on the pier surrounding the ropes. Presently the ''tram" (horse-car) came down — no carriages being admit- ted on the pier — and two middle-aged gentlemen. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. IO9 in plain business clothing,alighted, and walked in a business-like way toward the gang-plank; they were followed by a ta.ll, pleasant-looking man, in brown cheviot, carrying a small bandbox, and on his arm a plain-looking and plainly-dressed Eng- lish girl with rather rough skin. These were the Prince of Prussia and his wife. Queen Victoria's eldest daughter. She hung upon his arm as though she liked him. I was won by their simplicity and graceful and easy ways. The prince is a splendid- looking man ; his pictures do him injustice. He is tall, powerful, well-formed, quick, easy and dignified in carriage ; and lifted his hat, with a graceful air and pleasant smile, to those Avho sa- luted him as he walked quickly to the gang-plank, upon which he handed the princess. The )^acht contained no other passengers, and started off, in about the time it takes to read this, for the train, wherefor the regular boat with the subject pas- sengers was ready and followed. EXPENSES, AUGUST 3., Breakfast, $0 42 Dinner '82 Crystal Palace at Sydenham, fare, admission, and return, first class, .... 82 Supper, 28 Lodging, boots, and light, back from July 24 to date, inclusive, in London, . . 7 28 $9 62 no ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. THE EMPRESS OF AUSTRIA AND SUITE arrived at the pier at 5 o'clock in the morning, and before the city (Ryde) was awake, her Highness was in her villa. THE queen's villa. On this island, on the northern slope, Prince Albert bought an immense tract, embracing sev- eral small farms. A line from the beach around the Queen's farm two miles inland and to the beach again, would be about six miles in length. It is a high and lovely portion of the island ; the sea-water is pure and limpid ; fresh streams and springs abound. The mansion is sequestered from the thoroughfares in the interior by hedges and a mass of woods consisting of oak, elm, haw- thorn, etc., with every mile or so a " lodge," or entrance of high-arched stone and iron, and a porter's residence. On the gate is the monogram " V. A." Within this demesne is the Queen's residence, with her royal household and suite ; throughout the grounds are dispersed quiet policemen, effective but unobtrusive, and un- seen by the royal eyes. The extreme menials, such as the outriders, the ostlers, the baker, the packer, porters, etc., reside entirely outside, generally boarding with the villagers or farmers. Here the Queen secludes herself from a people who support her so extravagantly, occasionally ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Ill taking a rapid drive around outside, with an ad- vanced outrider ready to clear away obstructions. The Queen "runs" this farm of hundreds of acres, SELLS THE PRODUCE, and pockets the money. The royal family have a bathing-house on the beach, but " 'er Majesty has the wawtah brought to the aouse in cahsks, and halso sent to Windsor, Buckingham, and Balmoral in cahsks." Being accidentall}^ in Ryde for the Sabbath, I concluded to make the most of the time by going out to OSBORNE, where it was said " 'er Majesty" would attend church. Distance, seven miles ; carriage fee, $3.30. Whether I should pay this for a sight of royalty, I doubted ; but I bethought me of an ex- cellent resource — my foot-carriage — and had a very pleasant stroll and a sound sleep at night. Being told by a ''yeoman," with a tired look, and a hoe on his shoulder, that " 'er Majesty was hout a driving, and would pahs in at this lodge," I sat down and waited until dark — she having "pahsed" in at another lodge a few rods distant. A NIGHT OPPOSITE the Queen's place was not without much amuse- ment and instruction. The " Prince oi Wales 112 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Hotel," a lone tavern on the other side of the road, into which the Prince of Wales never en- tered (he has a cottage a few rods off), furnishes refreshment for man and beast — the " beasts" predominating ; for the ostler, and the Queen's baker, and one or two more of '' 'er people," were there in their mugs. Two portly dames waited upon them at the bar, and bandied jests with them. One of them discoursed to me the following : '' The Royal Princess is a fine lady ; no more pride habout Vr nor there his habout you, not *alf so much as about some of them 'alf-bred ones. She came hout to where I was a cleanin' the carriage, and says she, ' Wair is Judkins ?' Says I, ' He's gone, your Roil Tness. Wat is it hi can do, your ^Roil Tness?' Says she, 'Oh! nuthin', only I've left my handkerchief in the coach.' Says I, ' I'll get it, yer Roil 'Iness.' Says she, ' Thank you, thank you very much.' S/ies a lady. She ain't no pride in 'er." With whom the coachman contrasted her so favorably, I did not inquire. Walking back to Ryde with two clerks, who earn fifteen dollars per week, conversation with them showed the conservatism and loyalty of the lower half of the people. They believed in the Queen and her expense, and ridiculed America. CHAPTER X, EATING. Many Americans remark, upon their return, that they had not had a good " square" meal while in Europe. Making allowances for the difference in taste between Europeans and Americans, and admitting that the Europeans are old enough and know enough to please themselves in their habits of dietetics, yet I think they would hke the Ame- rican system of setting a table, if it were once in- troduced. In Continental Europe, particularly, there is an avoidance of vegetables for the hotel- tables ; the markets in Italy, France, and Austria are as laden with fruits and vegetables, and are as cheap, as in America ; but we were starved for want of them in hotels. Then they carry their " course" system to an absurd degree. In Ame- rica, the whole table is generally laden at once with every thing that is to be had, so that a per- son may partake according to his taste, time, and other personal circumstances, and we have great- 114 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN. TOURIST. er varieties of veg^etables and more cookery b}^ boiling-. In Europe, the universal custom at table dlidte (taabledote) is to give each article of meat a separate course. A description of one will suf- fice for the general way Americans go over the Continent in discomfort as to meals. As a guest at a hotel, you are expected to breakfast at any time between eight and twelve. To the indus- trious and early-rising American, the loss of four hours' daylight is not relishable. It was my custom to wander about and waste two hours in discomfiture before I could get any breakfast. Repairing to the breakfast-hall at the very mo- ment of eight o'clock, I would be regarded by steward, waiters, and landlord with curiosity. I would take a seat alone at a cold, blank table, instead of seeing a table laden with a tempting breakfast and surrounded with cheerful company, as here at home. Nothing would be ready, and, after giving the order to a waiter with a black dress-coat and pants, white necktie, and perhaps white gloves, I would have to wait fifteen minutes or half an hour for it. But justice should add that when it does arrive, the cooking and flavor are rather better than averaged in America. Dinner will not be had until six o'clock, and in the interim I have to take a lunch at my own ex- pense somewhere outside, although having en- gaged full board at the hotel. And at the restau- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. II 5 rants, one can never calculate in advance the ex- pense of a meaL Dinner-hour arriving, the guests all seem to be a leisurely class who don't care whether they eat or not, and appear to enjoy each other's society more than their food. While the guests are desultorily getting their seats, you have an opportunity to select and order your wine. The water in all Europe is bad, and if you are at a hotel that is stylish enough for ice, you will have a vessel of it set before you, for which you will have to pay. The first course is a very small dish of soup. The soup-plates being cleared, there is another mysterious signal, and you are permitted to have a small plate of fish. Now we brightly anticipate we shall see the dinner come on ; but a very small piece of beef a la mode is brought, and the waiter passes on ; there is not a sign of a vegetable nor a relish on the table, and your bread having gone with your soup, you are left, like a carnivorous animal, with your one piece of meat, which, being devoured, is followed by another clean plate, and then another small piece of highly seasoned meat of some other kind ; perhaps with this will be brought along some curiously fixed-up pommes de terre (pum de tehr — potatoes) ; your plate again being removed, you will have a selection of some curiously fixed- up fowl, and nothing else ; and thus after from six Il6 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. to eight courses, you have nibbled through a dinner unsatisfactorily. Sometimes, Americans will get together and exercise their imaginations over the details of a boiled dinner. One would say, " What would you give to see a table with green corn, cucumbers, and tomatoes, boiled tur- nips, carrots, onions, and celery, and chow-chow, and fresh bread and butter, and pitchers of pure water?" — all of which picture would be totally strange to a European table. With the English, a meal seems to be a private and exclusive affair, like family worship. The family hide themselves while at it. At a small country inn, or at lodgings in the city, the guest never gets sight of the family. They will partake of their meal in the garret or cellar rather than be seen by outward people. Generally speaking, the matter of meals is not ready, convenient, free, public, and accessible as in America. RECAPITULATION OF EXPENSE. It will be seen how we have come across the ocean by cabin fare, and enjoyed Ireland, Scotland, and England, during a period of thirty-seven days, for one hundred and eighty-one dollars, currency. CHAPTER XT. TO FRANCE. EXPENSES, AUGUST 4. Fare from London to Paris, second-class, $6 75 Cab in Paris, 40 Lunch, i . 20 $7 35 Iris the wonder of every American who crosses the English Channel to the Continent, that where there is so much important travel there is so little convenience of transportation. The vessels are small and dash about like a chip ; the channel is always very rough ; confinement in the cabin is very nauseating, as every body is sea-sick ; and to be on deck requires a firm grip and an oil-cloth over-suit. I was thrilled with the first sight of France, with its centuries of stirring history and romance. The first definite object of interest that we could dis- tinguish, approaching the harbor of Dieppe (Dee- yep), was a colossal representation of the Cruci- Il8 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. fixion, standing out upon a bold bluff, as though proclaiming the first thing to all comers, " I AM THE way!" From this point, for over a thousand miles through France, Italy, and Austria, I never got out of sight of crucifixions and Virgin Marys. To me, the people seemed, in their religion, to have forgotten the spirit and adopted the letter of the law, to have made up their religious devotions in symbols and unspiritual idolatry. Besides the superfluity of crucifixions. Virgin Marys and saints, in both statues and pictures, in the churches, schools, and private houses, they were about as superfluous in all public places out of doors. We met them at the cross-roads, in niches in the rocks by the road-side ; we see them on hill-tops and mountain-peaks ; on prominent bluffs and projecting rocks, that are attractive for their picturesqueness ; we see them in the centre of agricultural fields, and even over barn-doors, superstitiously utilized as Yankee farmers do horseshoes — for good luck. In Rome, I saw the stubs of marble feet that had been kissed nearly away ; and in one case, the'statue of the Saviour, a brass foot was substituted for the marble one that had been kissed away. Let me indorse myself by reaffirming this as a literal fact. I have seen a woman kiss a wall at a point where I could notice ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. IIQ nothing by its structure to mark it as peculiar, and go into a rapturous repetition of kisses of the spot. Those polished marble floors in the Roman churches, looking too dainty almost for us to tread upon, even with our guide in advance, would be dotted with the most ragged and filthy Italian lazzaroni, in attitudes of idolatry (some of them taking advantage of the cool shade and quiet to obtain a comfortable " snooze"), whom we would not like, unprotected, to meet at night. On the side of the marble wall of one of the churches is a horizontal groove painted red, and over it the words — " At this point the waters of the Tiber arose, where they were stopped by the intercessions of the Blessed Virgin, but for which they would have inundated the city." The Presbyterian Scotchman who was in the car- riage with us, and alluded to the cowled, gir- dled, and sandaled Benedictine monks we met as '* heedjeous monster-r-r-rs," scouted this presumed intercession of the Virgin Mary, but at the same time acknowledged that he and his neighbors in Scotland had just been, during a long drouth, praying for rain. It is a historical fact that this month, the whole Church of England prayed for rain. But let us return to France. On landing, the first very noticeable thing was the French soldiers, with their narrow waists and red, baggy 120 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. trowsers, and the black-gowned priests. Of France and Italy, the most prominent things now in the eye of recollection are soldiers, priests, sabres, and crucifixes ; and where on the round earth does public indecency or private ex- tortion go further ? EXPENSES, AUGUST 5. Lodging (HoterAthende), . . . $i oo Candle, 30 c. ; soap, 20 c. ; attendance, 20 c, 70 Boots, 10 c. ; guide-book, 20 c, . . • 3<^ Beefsteak and potatoes, 30c.; bread, 5 c.,. 35 Butter, 2|- c; napkin, 2^ c; table-cloth, 5 c, . 10 Tea, 10 c. ; fare to Versailles and return, first-class, 53 ; glass of wine, 5c., . . 68 Supper, 53 $3 66 The scenery from Dieppe toward Paris we find to be the same as we found in the British realm as to careful cultivation and good roads and hedges, but here is a little more shrubbery, and the trees are taller. The country has the same aspect of being cleared of forests, and of the hud- dling of population about centres. We find the same style of cars — the compartment system — as in England. Arriving at PARIS in the night, we at once notice the strong hand and vigilant eye of government in the gendarmes ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 121 (zhondarm) at the station and on the streets. A little cab-man, with a red pug-nose and a glazed stiff hat, offered to cab two of us to the Hotel Athenee for two francs ; arriving there, he de- manded two francs and a half. My companion very foolishly expostulated in bad French, when the French eloquence demonstrated itself in a whole hose-full of p's and r's, ending with the shake of a card and the only intelligible word " taree/y Even by night we knew we were in la belle cite (ceetay). I see by the style of Le Grand Hotel Athenee that it is very " grand ;" but it is late, and I prudently inquire the price of the lodging. The answer is, cinq francs (sank frank) — five francs. But how does it turn out in the morning ? My bill stands thus : Lodging, five francs ; candle, one and a half francs ; soap, one franc ; attendance, one franc ; boots, a half franc ; matches, ten centimes, making in all one dollar and eighty-two cents in gold for one night's lodg- ing. Well, the smaller hotels and restaurants throughout the Continent imitate this. EXPENSES, AUGUST 6. Church of Madeleine, . . . . lo 20 Guide de Paris, i 60 Omnibuses, ...... 12 Arc de Triomphe, 10 Fruit, 05 Board per day, 2 20 $4 27 122 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. You are charged extra for the butter on your bread, for the use of the table-cloth, for a napkin, for ice to your wine or water ; and if you do not wish to be regarded with expressive disgust by monkeys and laughed at by jackasses — an extreme depth of degradation for one to fall into — you must pay the waiter from two sous up. I was told by one American that a landlord charged him for receiving and delivering his mail ! One never knows only approximately what his bills are to be. But as irritating as this may be to the American traveler, and as toadying as it makes the people about him, still a more absurd and even disgusting thing is for this American traveler to become annoyed by or to resist these petty extortions. The French have what they call the golden rule of travel, which we would do well to understand ; it is, " Conform cheerfully to the usages of the country you are in." EXPENSES, AUGUST 7. H6tel des Invalides, . . . . $0 08 Panorama, [40 Programme, 05 Soup, . 20 Board, 2 20 $2 93 With dawn appears before us beautiful Paris ! We can not, in a book like this, give the details ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 23 of Parisian attractions. It will suffice for me to give a short general impression, and my diary of each day's expenses.' THE RECONSTRUCTION OF PARIS is almost complete. No one could detect in the present beauty of the city and gayety of life, promenades, open-air concerts, and theatres, any results or evidences of the past war, or the havoc of the Commune, except the ruins of the Tuileries and Hotel de Ville. On that palace of kings and emperors are still the words, placed there long ago, ^' The Republic of France : Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity." The black and red tongues of petroleum flame partly licked out and obliterat- ed ^' FraUrniU/' that no potentate ever dared to remove, and showed the intensity of republi- can feeling. It is evident everywhere, in the spirit of the people, that they are not "fit " for a monarchy ; and the very wildness of the legisla- ture comes from their freedom of spirit. The old aristocracy, of course, stick to their birthrights of fancied elevation, but the French are in no mood to squander more millions upon royalty. They now see millions upon millions of dollars' worth of royal trappings thrown off, now being honored only for museums. A French soldier told me that the army is entirely republican. Under three years of republican or legislative 124 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. rule, Paris has been restored, the private build- ings made good at public expense, business is brisk, and the people are as contented and happy as other people. The distinguishing feature of Paris is the light- colored character of its buildings. The Boule- vards are long, straight, and broad, and the light- colored houses give them a gay appearance ; but there is no street in Europe where the amount of business is done which is done in Broadway, New- York, while that street looks less imposing than some of the Parisian streets because of the heterogeneous character of its buildings in their age, color, and composition. Of the Champs Elysees and the Bois de Boulogne, we need not say much ; those subjects are familiar. The artis- tic displays in Paris are abundant, brilliant, and beyond conception until seen. There is where we first see that Continental, out-door sociability. All the salons or cafes have seats and tables along the sidewalks, at which customers sip their wine, coffee, or chocolate, or smoke cigars, at their lei- sure. (r<^//-lounging in city and in country towns is another prominent reminiscence one has of Europe. Neither in Great Britain nor Continen- tal Europe is there that universality of personal industry found in America. All Europeans en- joy life and take it more leisurely than we do. To draw a contrast in brief, human rest is com- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 25 monly observed there, while human rest is hardly known here. Even our assumed pleasures here are painful in their intense excitement ; there, a leisurely mood pervades business and pleasure. We will briefly notice the palaces of the Louvre and Versailles, and then quit France. For eight hundred years the site of the Louvre has been the residence of kings, and so has the Palace of Ver- sailles for two hundred years. No kings or courts are in either now ; but they are main- tained in all their magnificent garnishment as Avhen they were the abodes of royalty ; and the pictures in these palaces may be counted by miles of distance and millions of money. But while on this subject of PALACES, we might note the general system throughout Europe, all of which, except those of St. Pe- tersburg, I had the good luck to visit. EXPENSES, AUGUST 8. Cook's diligence, tour to St. Cloud, Bois de Boulogne, Palaces of Versailles, Palace de Trianon, and Sevres Porcelain Works, $2 00 Fee to the royal carriages, ... 20 Dinner, . . 40 Medicine, 20 Board, 2 20 SS 00 126 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST., You would be surprised to find what a similar- ity they have — as though one had been built in im- posing grandeur and taste, and all the rest, with royal emulation, successfully patterned after it. They are generally composed of a square, with a court-yard inside, and around this square is a continuous passage by halls and suites of rooms — the wealth being principally displayed in pictures, statuary, vases, etc. The furniture is generally no more costly or unique than that of some wealthy private subject. The floors are generally inlaid oak, waxed ; and the walls are always covered with tapestry, painting, or fresco. Paper, how- ever rich, would be the depth of vulgarity. Ex- tensiveness is the peculiarity of all princely pal- aces, as well as of the grounds — a feature which the American mind can hardly realize. Each sovereign has from two to half a dozen palaces — all but one maintained vacant at the expense of the people. The peculiar palatial features that have just been mentioned are the same in the English and French, the Italian, the Austrian, and the Prus- sian palaces. Each has a throne-room, and the throne consists generally of a not very imposing dais and chair — a mere locality for the sovereign during receptions. So it appears the throne of a state is not an identical reality so much as it is an imaginative seat of the sovereign. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 12/ EXPENSES, AUGUST 9 — SUNDAY. Omnibuses, $0 06 Board, 2 20 $2 26 In all this vast and complicated government of Paris and of France, the respective bureaus and records have been preserved intact, and run right on, without any interregnums, through all the tumbling of the revolutions. The heads of departments have been changed, but the clerical force has remained mainly the same. Talk about the Commune ! Nobody laments the killing of the thirty thousand of them by battle and by exe- cution ; but there is another commune of intrigu- ing, snob monarchists, who ought to come second in reprobation — people who care nothing about government, peace, or any thing else, but to give themselves caste, exclusiveness, and income from the pockets of their countrymen, without working for their money as honest people do. THE ASSEMBLY. This absolute body is an object of interest to all the world. A seat in the diplomatic gallery a whole afternoon, tendered me by Mr. Hoffman, of our legation, gave me a leisurely opportunity to study them. They occupy the parquette of the private theatre in the old palace of Versailles. 128 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. The President occupies a high seat ; he is in plain dress like our own speakers. Below and in front of him is a sort of pulpit — the tribune — from which only can the House be addressed. This shuts off the facilities for " long-windedness," so easy in our own legislatures, offered by the members being permitted to bob up from their seats with ha- rangues. The French Assembly is very disorderly^ the whole membership expressing assent or dis- sent verbally at almost every sentence, or moving about and having loud conversation. The orators have to be pointed, terse, clear, and vigorous, like one addressing an out-door mob — not calling the Assembly a mob — but the manner of the speakers is often necessarily like addressing a mob. Pass through the French Assembly, and it may be remarked that if our House of Representatives is a^' bear-garden," theirs is a '^ monkey-cage"; but they are thoroughly democratic ; and while the American Senate is the most dignified in appear- ance of any legislative body in the world, yet the English Lords and Commons have a character of ease, affluence, learning, and respectability per- haps unequaled in the world. Oratory, in the English Parliament, is unknown, the speeches being mere colloquial statements, and very similar in style. If an English member should make a ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 29 sweeping gesture with his arm, it would fairly be presumed he was out of taste. GAMBETTA converses and moves about a good deal, restless, not content, but not troubled, good-natured, and influential. He never will set the world on fire — he is too fat and inclined to the pleasures of sense. He is good for forty years yet ; is of medium height, is full chested and shouldered, has fat legs, a rather waddling walk, and not a direct, positive, or forcible gait, a pulpy hand, and is a good liver. His hair is black, tinged with gray, thrown back, beard full and cropped, face flushed, hand about his face and across his mouth a good deal as he leans on the back of his seat. It was a lucky thought that prompted me to attempt to enter THE NEW OPERA-HOUSE just on the eve of my leaving. I have been in the best palaces and throne-rooms of England and France, but this is far above any of them. It is more than a palace ; it is a very temple in the highest idea of massiveness, richness, and beauty. It is said to be far grander than any thing of an- cient or modern times. It is to cost six millions of dollars — this for a compact theatre. It will 130 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. not be finished in two years. The auditorium is large, of course, but it is not as large as the stage ; it is not as large as the grand entrance and stair- way ; it is not as large as the other saloon-rooms, nor is it as large as the portion devoted to dress- ing-rooms, which would do credit to any grand hotel. There are long corridors with dressing- rooms, richly furnished, with large panel plate- glass mirrors. Back of the stage is a rehearsing theatre, the embellishment of which, in allegorical statues in gilt and in fresco, must have cost many thousand dollars. Every thing away from the auditorium, connected with the performers, seems calculated to inspire them. The grand stairway has many pillars, huge monoliths of the costliest polished marble, in all colors. The grand recep- tion-room exceeds the famous Salle du Glace of the Versailles palace. It is loo feet long, 40 feet high, and 40 feet wide. I was favored with see- ing the Italian artists putting on the stucco alle- gories, and the representation of exotic plants and fruits, the natural models of which were present, growing in pots and tubs, for the artists to imitate in color and form. Bronze and marble, and gold and beautiful colors are lavishly dis- played, and under the feet are the finest Mosaic floors, composed of pieces no larger than half an inch square, but worked into patterns of great breadth and variety. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 131 EXPENSES, AUGUST lO. Palace of Industry, $0 20 Cab, 80 Theatre, 60 Pantheon, 20 Postage and stationer}'-, 40 Board, 2 20 $4 40 THE ARMY of France is mainly an army of boys, but is surprisingly intelligent. I have conversed with many private soldiers in English, and find that they possess general intelligence, and some of them good knowledge of the science of govern- ment, and the political attitude of France and other countries. I understand the schools to be rather more free to the poor here than in Eng- land. In the latter country, although tuition is legally free, yet such a searching inquiry is made into the circumstances of those applying for free schooling that it hurts their pride, and I was told by a prominent principal teacher that it was con- sidered to be charity. PUNCTUALITY has not impressed me as a French quality. " Toute suite" (immediately) is a universal fib. With Americans, minutes are golden grains ; here, half an hour is the smallest fraction of time a 132 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Frenchman can measure, in the ordinary courses of business or life. THE WEATHER is delightfully cool here in Southern France. Summer overcoats are worn in the cars in the mornings. I have not felt the warmth yet in Europe. In England, it was said to be uncom- monly warm, and in France it is called a cool summer. SOUTH-EAST FRANCE. The traveler should approach Geneva by day- light. Leaving the Marseilles train at Lyons to go eastward, we dash immediately into a most rugged and mountainous district, giving us as it were a foretaste of Swiss scenery. For fifty miles there is , not a level acre. The road runs through a deep, wide gorge, and, towering above, from a thousand feet to a quarter of a mile, are rocks and cliffs. Peasants' cots dot the sides wherever there is a small patch of soil. The val- ley is in garden cultivation, and industry hums over the mountain-torrents. Factories, houses, and little churches are jumbled up the mountain- sides in fantastic confusion. Cool, bracing moun- tain air rushes through the valley. The great, thick strata of rock are bent and twisted like pa- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 33 per. There are too many curious and interesting freaks of geology to enumerate. The scenery shows me where we have obtained our subjects for theatre drop-curtains. EXPENSES, AUGUST II. Chambermaid, $0 20 Boots (her husband), 40 Washing, . . . . . . i 00 Watchman at New Opera-House, . . 20 Cab, 40 Board, ' . . . 2 20 $4 40 I entered France with sentiments entirely in favor of the country and its people, having been soaked, when a lad, by Abbott's History of Napo- leon 1. ; but I never was so glad to get off a terri- tory or away from a people as I was on leaving the frontiers of France for the more calm, free, and happy Swiss. The change of manner is instantly noticed at the line in the difference of the train-hands and railroad officials. In France, all officials are '' fussy ;" in England, they are pompous ; in Italy, Austria, and Germany, they are midway between those characteristics. In France, from one end to the other, everywhere and at all times, it is fuss, fuss, fuss: you are fussed at in the hotels and restaurants, fussed at by every porter and guide and concierge (consarge) 134 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. who has any thing to do with you ; you are scold- ed at by the train-conductors and ticket-agents ; entering your hotel and leaving it, you have to walk the gauntlet of obsequious bows as though 3^ou were a prince; you can meet with a super- fluity of politeness, but can attain no beneficial in- timacy. The politeness of continental Europe is only face-deep. EXPENSES, AUGUST 12. Cook's Italian tour, second-class fare from Paris to Geneva, Mont Blanc, Turin, Florence, Rome, Naples, Pompeii, Pisa, Venice, Milan, Genoa, . . . $55 45 En route to Macon, lunch, ... 20 Dinner, . 40 $56 05 Paris is so gay, that it is a saying that all good Americans go there when they die — or that it is a sort of Paradise for Americans. I notice that all bad Americans want to go there before they die. The American lady who is willing to live in Paris, and for a time desert her pure, temperate, native land, ought to be scolded. In Paris, wine takes the place of water, and the public sugges- tions to sexual sensuousness go almost to the verge of barbarism ; and in private vice, practi- cal men and philosophers know that analogy points to a depth that the American mind re- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 35 fuses to look at. Some European writers have said that the blushing of American females, young and old, at the displays of nude human figures on canvas and in marble, in anatomical detail, is from affected prudery and conscious passion, and that the reason European females don't blush is from purity. I am loth to believe this latter proposition where the theatres of the capitals are mostly filled with both sexes and all ages and conditions of life, and the pieces are gagged with " smut ;" where there are such in- stitutions as the Dance Mabille, the Students' Ball, and even the open-air concerts of the Champs Ely- s^e (shanz eleeze), patronized by thousands. Any Frenchman would be going a good way to say that the French baby inherits natural purity above the American baby. And if it does not, what is likely to be the result upon the imagi- nation or animal nature of a young girl as she goes out upon the streets and meets every temp- tation and suggestion, from the uncovered public urinals to the less gross influences of the shop- windows and theatres, statuary and open-air con- certs ? The American man who goes to Paris is lost before he gets there, and the American lady who goes there needs to have a care and to be cared for more than she who goes to our Capital, Washington. The writer sent some letters on this subject 136 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. from Paris to an American newspaper, which, al- though registered in the post-office, never reached their destination. I should not omit mention of the railroad that encircles Paris just inside the wall or enceinte. The passenger may ride on the top of the cars, with sheltered seats, entirely around the city, Avitnessing its beautiful suburbs and points of his- torical interest, also the artistic gardening, for about sixty cents. An American going through Europe will for the first time^ really understand hoAV American girls are willing to marry titled Europeans and forsake the stars and stripes to live in Europe, to turn from the old home and friends, and com- mence the world again amid all that is strange. The reason is that the aristocratic and royalist manners of Europe have centred in the capitals and large towns, making life there alluring. In Europe, we are in the world ; in America, we are out of it. EXPENSES, AUGUST I3. Supper, lodging, and breakfast, . . $0 60 Boots and chambermaid, .... 20 (Stopped over at Macon.) $0 80 CHAPTER XII. SPEAKING THE LANGUAGES. Half of the pleasure and benefit of a European trip will be lost unless the tourist has a " smatter- ing" at least of French. Where English is not spoken at a hotel, railroad-station, or shop in Europe, French is likely to be ; and the tourist needs but a few elementary phrases in French, a general knowledge of its peculiar rules of pro- nunciation, and an ordinary school French Gram- mar, to get along very well. The tourist is par- ticularly recommended to always take and keep with him the French Grammar and Reader com- bined, with exercises in sentences. From that, he may quickly select phrases adapted to all the cir- cumstances of his tour. Of course, the more one is acquainted with the language of the country he is in, the more will be his instruction and plea- sure, because there is so much inquiry to be made, and so much reply to be given everywhere. 138 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Without a knowledge of the language, one goes through the country as unsatisfactorily as a deaf mute would. Morford's guide-book gives useful French phrases and their pronunciation, with all other necessary information, and is generally preferred by Americans. GENEVA AND MONT BLANC. I would not wonder if this Switzerland should turn out to be the paradise to which we are, contingently, destined. Abundance of pure air and pure, cold water ; a republican government ; political peace, and a spirit and practice of econo- my, with no complications nor enemies to require a regular professional standing army ; compulsory education, and the spirit of William Tell and of Calvin working throughout the people — all these are substantial blessings. It may be said that practically they have never had a war ; they have no debt, and local self-government is here in- violable. GENEVA, the princess of cities, is, in her physical aspect, worthy the name she bears in art, invention, and moral reform. The pulpit of Calvin is here. There are two drawbacks to universal happiness, but they will dissolve in the progress of time. One is the chagrin of the old regime of aristocracy for lost prestige, and the other is religious intolerance. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 39 Here the Protestants are the aggressors, being stronger in numbers.than the Papists. The federal constitution of 1848 is in many respects identical with ours ; but in their budget they provide for the support of all the churches — Protestant and Catho- lic. But Geneva, independently of all this, is the sweetest spot for one who loves a plain, honest, quiet life. If there be natural surroundings that clear the mind of its dross and elevate the spirits, they are here. Mr. Upton, our consul, and a most genial and fit representative of us, thinks this the prettiest city in Europe. EXPENSES, AUGUST I4. Geneva, dinner, $0 60 Pourboire driver to Mont Blanc, . . 30 Supper, 25 Lodging, I 00 $2 15 THE RHONE. The beautiful, the clear, pure, cold, blue river Rhone floods on, swift and deep, through the middle of the city, without traffic or despoil- ment, a perpetual and sweet fountain of refresh- ment and health. It is the outlet of Lake Geneva, whose waters in the summer are from the snow and ice of the Alps. The Rhone is beautifully walled all along with the granite and marble cop- I40 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. ings of private villa grounds ; shade-trees, seats, parks, statues, music-stands, elegant hotels, and handsome streets border it, and upon its limpid bosom float graceful yachts and skiffs. Oh ! how I wanted to lave in it on that day of August ! It is even poetically pure. Where the streets of the city stop, the suburban villas begin, and their plots of grass, their graveled walks and flower- beds extend to the water's edge, which is defined by neat coping ; there is no tide, no-mud, no strand. Up to the coping of these villa grounds, arbored and ornamented with trees and summer-houses, extends the fresh, soft, cold water, the highest in hottest summer. The best sites for villas are on the west and north side, having the shade in the afternoon, and a view of the Alps and Mont Blanc to the south. The lake-shore has its slopes in view. The city is quiet, respectable, and in- dustrious. There is no '' loaferism," squalor, nor mendicancy. What the winters are I can not say, but the summers are delightful. Through the hotels during all the night and day float breezes from the snow-peaks in sight. But the diligence (dillezhonce) is ready for Mont Blanc. There can be no more inspiriting sounds than the crack of the driver's whip and voices of a good company as we set out in anticipation for this romantic ride and sublime object. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 141 THE ROUTE from Geneva to Mont Blanc is fifty miles, over a splendid road, macadamized and graded, so that we go on a trot all the way, arriving at night at the foot of the mountain by an easy and beautiful drive of about ten hours. There are every day from twenty-five to one hundred tourists leaving Geneva for the mountain, and, with them, all is usually merry. Soon after leaving, we enter among the mountains, and as we drive along a verdant valley dotted with the small cottages of the Savoyards, we approach scenes increasing in weirdness and novelty. We drive between ranges of mountains, their far-upreaching peaks making familiar with heaven itself. Cascades melting from snow and ice appear on all sides, leaping and dashing down hundreds of feet in snowy spray, their rifts seeming to float slowly downward like the wafting of bridal vails. With these cloud- piercing, shaggy mountain-rocks, snow-covered, we see verdure and bloom below. EXPENSES, AUGUST 1 5. Lodging and breakfast at Mont Blanc, . $1 25 Dinner, 60 Chambermaid, 10 Stationery, .20 (No expenses up the glacier.) $2 15 142 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. THE SAVOYARDS climb and plant wherever the chamois can go. Their cottages dot the steep slope far up, and serve well to aid our eyes in calculating the im- mensity of the height above. The slope is so steep that they crib and terrace their soil to prevent its being washed below. We see houses away up, as- cended by the angle of forty-five degrees, and we wonder what can the family want to go up there for ; but being up there, we wonder again what on earth can they ever want to come down for. Oc- casionally we get a glimpse of the white, clear-cut, jagged forms of Mont Blanc's peaks, apparently five or six miles away; but after riding twelve and then twenty miles, they appear no nearer. It seems as though we were climbing the stair- case of natural wonders. We are coming among still higher mountains, and more jagged and bald and HEAVEN-PIERCING PEAKS. No snow nor ice yet visible from the road. How can Mont Blanc be higher than these ? , The road is dusty, and, there being no wind, the summer's sun — August 14th — blazes upon our heads as un- comfortably as on Broadway, New- York. Here are gardens, vineyards, and orchards. In five minutes more, and there in the distance is Mont ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 143 Blanc in his white majesty, his immense fields of whitest, purest snow clearly defined against the blue sky, part of his form masked by the spur of a verdant mountain nearer us with vineyards and fields, and the highest of his peaks caressed and vailed in mystery by clouds. At first, we are sur- prised to see that he monopolizes all the snow, the other mountains and ridges around, apparently as high, having none ; but there he stands, like the huge frosted BRIDAL CAKE OF EARTH, presented to heaven. There, within cannon-ball reach, is eternal snow, and here the verdure of summer. There, perchance, are adventurers freezing to death ; here we are sheltering our- selves with parasols from the summer sun. But we ride on and on for miles ; the gorge becomes narrower, the dashing river Arve nearer ; we begin the ascent toward Chamounix valley, along the side of one of these cliffs, on a macadamized road, walled on the precipice side, and built under the direction of NAPOLEON III. In some places, he had to slice a cliff down one hundred and fifty feet, to get a horizontal ledge wide enough for two vehicles. Now the wind 144 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. begins to feel snowy, and we want blankets and overcoats. Suddenly the guide points out to us the first glacier — De Bosson. What, may it not be imagined, are the feelings now of an American tourist who has read of these same glaciers from the geography at the school-desk, away back in childhood ? The glacier is a mass of purest ice and whitest snow, crowded down the ravines by the weight of the greater masses away up among the clouds, further than we can see. Along up the mountain, past the lower end of this mass of ice, still appear verdant, cultivated fields and pastures. This ice and snow, in its slow downward course, has plowed the ravine out deeper, and pushed a huge hill of gravel and rock and trees down before it, as an eel would nose his way into mud. The lower end keeps melting away by the heat of the valley, and the mountain-top keeps on forming more and pushing it down. As I am writing now in the H6tel des Alpes, I can hear the roar of many torrents and cascades of this pure cold water from the melting snows. We are now at the foot of Mont Blanc, in the VILLAGE OF CHAMOUNIX, in a little valley entirely surrounded by these cloud-wreathed walls. To-morrow, we will go over some of the glaciers — not ascend Mont Blanc, ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 45 for that is a two days' labor, and costs fifty dol- lars for the necessary guides and appliances. That feat is rarely performed, and Avhen done is record- ed and heralded the world over. In this little village of Chamounix (Shamoonee) are a half dozen STYLISH HOTELS, and I, in passing around to all of them, in search of a young Englishman with whom a mutual promise had been made in Geneva to share guide and mule across to the head of Lake Geneva, have looked into a half dozen first- class dining-halls, brilliantly lighted with gas, and seen each of them full of superior company from all parts of the world, with wines and deli- cacies of first-class hotels, and all chattering hap- pily in anticipation of the scenes of the morrow, or of feats performed the day past. J suppose three hundred guests are in the village to-night. I might as well note that the Alps here and Mont Blanc are not in Switzerland, but in France. Geneva stands like a speck almost alone, and sur- rounded in French territory, at the foot of the lake, something like a knob on the end of a " crit- ter's " horn. There are a few AMERICAN LADIES here, alone and in pairs. They ought to " pair " another way. They are too shy. They ought to 146 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. know there are many lone American and English gentlemen who would be only too glad of their company, who would give them the benefit of their practical advice, protect them from extor- tion, and lend occasionally a strong arm. THE MER DE GLACE. The tour up Mont Blanc, across the great gla- cier of this name, and down along the other side of the glacier to the road in the valley, took just five hours. I did it without guide, v/ithout company, and without a staff other than an umbrella. A mule and guide cost about four dollars. Men don't need mules, and one guide will do for a large party. The track all the way is well worn and can be easily followed. I should think the zigzag track up the mountain to the point avail- able for crossing the glacier is about four miles long. It is above the pines and beyond vegeta- tion, where the cones of the mountain are wholly rock. This glacier is about eight or ten miles long, and averages about a quarter of a mile wide and one hundred feet deep of solid ice. It has plowed a mighty furrow from one to two hun- dred feet deep, and has rolled the debris of the furrow over from fifty to one hundred feet up on each side, carrying immense bowlders and broken pieces of granite that Aveigh thousands of tons. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I47 No soil or earth appears ; all is broken quartz or granite. The sides of this gulf, or huge furrow, are a mass of bowlders tumbled in wild confusion. Some of them have rolled back down upon the surface of the glacier, and are borne slowly along on its bosom, and in years hence will be finally pitched over at the bottom end, where huge hills of them now are, the ice that bore them thither, for ages, having melted. THE MOVING THEORY of the glacier is proved by these results. In its course doAvn, it is over an uneven bed, and hence breaks up crosswise into combs or sections, leav- ing deep fissures or ice-cracks tapering down wedge-like. One can see down some of them fifty feet. If a man should fall into one, he would wedge in so tightly that no forceps could pull him out. In this weather, the ice is melting and soft on the surface ; but one sees bowlders of hun- dreds of tons on the ice, and thus knows that by care and by examining the route there is no danger ; for in these fissures the clear, SOLID GREEN WALLS can be seen. I was enabled to find my way across by the dirt and gravel left on the surface from the feet of voyagers, and occasionally by ice-steps 148 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. that are daily cut by the system of public guides whom the hotels employ. Under this great gla- cier, and from its melting, the river Arve takes its source, and breaks out suddenly from a grotto at its foot. The descent down the bank of this great furrow, between the bowlders and up the opposite bank, is really more dangerous than cross- ing the ice, as there is constant change and roll and tumble ; and this seems likely to occur at any time, and while people are upon it. . In such a case, only a miracle could save one. Ladies crossed to-day, and they seemed to do it with more facility and courage than the men. Crossing this glacier with care, there is little or no hazard ; but climb- ing the sides of the gulf, no foresight can prevent the danger of this indescribable mass of loose rocks from moving. Old Blanc mostly keeps his head vailed in cloud, as though too majestic for familiar gaze ; and when he is for a moment revealed, his fea- tures, with the sunlight upon them, seem almost to smile. I must be pardoned for repeating an expression, because it is the only one that imparts the appearance of this sublime peak — it is heaven- piercing. At just sunset, while the guests, a hun- dred of them, were at dinner, the heavens cleared at once, and the line of ridge stood out gilded in the halo of setting sun-rays. The day had been cloudy, and many of the guests were disappointed. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I49 I fortunately discovered the momentary scene, and told the landlord it was too bad for them to miss this opportunity. He announced it, and the tables were nearly thrown over in the pell-mell rush of a hundred people out upon the balconies and terraces, all enraptured, as evinced by their expressions. First, we see a mountain of green, above that a mountain of pure crusted white, and above that the deep blue vault of heaven, the stars just twinkling over the ridge like diamond- settings in this crown of earth. On returning, all pronounce this the grandest sight of a lifetime. But w^hile inanimate nature here is grand, the human nature is made up of ex- tortionate, begging peasantry, with more hideous deformities of body and weakness of mind than in the same number of people elsewhere. EXPENSES, AUGUST 16. Lodging and breakfast, . . . . $0 80 Supper at Geneva, 50 $1 30 5 CHAPTER XIII. MONT CENIS TUNNEL. Back to Geneva, around through French ter- ritory again, we approach another important object of visit — Mont Cenis (Cen^^) Tunnel, cut seven miles through the solid rock, from the French side through the Alps to the Italian side. The grade approaching the tunnel is not very steep, and there is nothing about the approach to or mouth of the tunnel to indicate its impor- tance as a great piece of engineering. For four or five miles, we can look through the tunnel to- ward the Italian entrance, which, while we are riding in pitch darkness, looks at first like the white flame of a lamp, and gradually enlarges as we approach. Coming from Switzerland into France, and from France into Italy, all the pas- sengers get out of the train and file through the passport and customs departments. I hand my passport ; it is simply looked at, and the single remark is made, ''Americainf '' Out/' and to my valise, '^ Cigars ? " '^ Non.'" ^^ Passe,':;, monsieur.'' FXONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 151 EXPENSES, AUGUST 1 7. Lodging, .... ... $0 80 Breakfast, 40 Soup €71 route through Mont Cenis Tunnel to Turin, . . . . <, . 20 %i 40 RECAPITULATION. It has been seen that France, includmg Geneva and Mont Blanc, has been enjoyed, embracing twa weeks, for $48.49 currency, including fare from London to Geneva. ITALY. And now we get into Italian scenery. I do not concur with Byron's poetic description of Italy, where he uses the words, "Thou art the garden of the world, the home Of all Art yields and Nature can decree ; Even in thy desert, what is like to thee ? Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste More rich than other climes' fertility." Italy looks old, ragged, dried-up, and poor. Her towns average about two thousand years of age, and most of them cluster where- they were started, upon some cliff or the spur of a mountain, orfginally selected for defense. This is not true of the large cities. Entering them, the American 152 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. feels really that he is in the land of art. The railroad depots are like palaces in exterior ap- pearance, with imposing colonnades, arches, reception-rooms, and gardens. Every thing- is strange and unique. Art and luxury appear everywhere, yet without any great exhibition of wealth. Ease, leisure, and pleasure are the bent of the people ; and there is an absence of the appear- ance of what is generally called '^business" in thrifty cities of England and America. There is a sprightly elegance tripping along the street, and the gay and well-dressed of both sexes are moving along the same as in Broadway ; but also may be seen idle, sun-tanned, half-clothed lazza- roni, resembling our organ-grinders, lying upon the sidewalks, basking in the sun ; and the scene of small carts full of garden-truck drawn by small asses, is a familiar one in all the Italian cities. These general remarks apply to Turin, Florence, Rome, and Naples, which we visited. In each of these cities, there are, of course, won- derful galleries of pictures and statuary — the accumulation of many centuries ; and the ar- chitecture is all fanc}^ Every thing is stone, marble, and concrete — the floors of the hotel bedrooms in every story are polished concrete and mosaic. Throughout 'Italy there are no evi- dences of manufacturing industry, and very little ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 53 of commerce. Agriculture is very untoward, sufficing only for the wants of the people, which are few ; the laborers lie about the fields, and almost all Italy seems to be taking a recumbent position, and giving a national adoption to the dolce far niente. Victor Emmanuel's officers swarm in every city with their bright sabres and neat uniforms. EXPENSES, AUGUST 1 8. Baedeker's Italian guide-books, . . $1 60 Keeper House of Deputies, .... 20 Fruit, 5 c. ; omnibus, 5 c. ; bath, 60 C;, . 70 Board and lodging, one day, . . . 2 20 Ice at dinner, 5 Omnibuses, ....... 20 $4 95 TURIN, revealed by daylight, awakens one to an ii^medi- ate realization that he is in Italy. In our break- fast-hall, stucco, fresco, painting, gilding, and upholstering — all in a florid and abundant style — the fountain in the court-yard, the arrangement of the black lace vail over the black hair and down the neck and shoulders of the dark-eyed fruit-girl, the view of high buildings, with spa- cious and arched promenades, carried even over the street-crossings, and sheltering from sunburn or storm — all indicate that the Italian mind loves 154 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. beauty ; and although we are in this frontier and inland town, one can see that Italy has been the school of art for the world. THE STREET SCENES are interesting. There is a beauty of form and feature everywhere, and the carriage of the wo- men is grand and graceful. The young men are fashionable, bright, and intelligent, and in respect to the persomtel of the streets, it looks to me very American-like. I looked into the old Hall of De- puties, a small amphitheatre, now unused. The guide showed me Count Cavour's seat, at the top row next an aisle, and how Cavour used to stand impatiently in the aisle, lean his left arm on the back of his seat, and impatiently shake his watch-chain with his right hand during the de- bate. He also showed his chair as premier at the secretary's table, where he used to sit, cross-leg- ged, shaking his watch-chain. The guide seem- ed to feel the place was sacred, for he bade me sit there, and cross my legs and lay my arm where the count did. I was shown the rooms of Victor Emmanuel's mother. They are all gold, plate mirrors in the panels, and the ceilings artistically pictured. The new Hall of the Deputies, now abandoned for the seat of government at Rome, is of remarkable richness and height. It must" ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I 55 have been a difficult hall for speaking, as a sharp clap of the hands would echo or reverberate for a minute and a half, making about 150 distinct repetitions in a beautiful and wonderful diminu- endo. A HANDY MOTIVE-POWER. In Turin, I saw a wood-sawj-er stop at a hydrant, attach a small machine, and by the force of the hydrant- water, saw a pile of wood. No fire-engines are needed there. The thought occurred. Why would not this be economy in all cities ? Where there is an expensive water department, why not have sufficient ''head" on, by a water-tower, to give each house its fire-plug, the same as it now has its street-washer ? EXPENSES, AUGUST I9, Florence — Cathedral and tower, . . . $0 20 Pitti Palace, 20 • Board and lodging, one day, . . , 2 00 Cab, 40 c. ; lunch, 30 c. ; medicine, 20 c, . 90 Laundry, 80 Extra lunch, 45 ^4-55 THE STREET CICERONES are a plague, and should be suppressed by police surveillance. They know a stranger immediately, obtrude upon him with their services, dog him to his extreme annoyance for blocks, and meet 156 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. him a second and third time. The employ- ment of them is seldom needed, and when used they are an unfailing swindle and disgust. FLORENCE. The night of August i8th, 1874, was so cold eri 7'oute from Turin to Florence that the car-windows were closed and overcoats necessary. Straight to the New- York Hotel, a brush-up and a wash-up — for railroading in Italy is very dusty — and some rest and refreshment, then look- ing over the guide-book and a map of the city, and one is ready to do Florence — justly entitled ''la bellay For brevity, let us quote the terse opening of Baedeker's Italy" on the article '' Flo- rence :" '' Formerly the capital of the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, and from 1864 to 1870 the capital of Italy, it ranks with Rome, Naples, and Venice as one of the most attractive towns in Italy. While in ancient times, Rome was the great centre of Italian development, Florence has, since the mid- dle ages, superseded it as the focus of intellectual life. The modern Italian language and literature have emanated chiefly from Florence, and the fine arts also attained the zenith of their glory here. An amazing profusion of treasures of art, such as no other locality possesses within so narrow FXONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I 57 limits, reminiscences of a history that has influ- enced the whole of Europe, perpetuated by nu- merous and imposing monuments, and, finally, the delightful environs of the city, combine to render Florence one of the most attractive places in the world." NOW the city is beautiful in its situation, its pavement, and architecture. Through the streets coursed a delightful breeze to-day, and on the shady side I found the walk as comfortable as anywhere else, on the same date, as regards climate. I lost no time in following the direction of my guide-book, without a personal guide or cicerone^ to the various places of interest, and have to-day visited the Piazza delta Signoria^ the Palazzo Vecchio — and all the palaces of art in its vicinity — also the Cathe- dral Duomo, the National Museum, and Palazzo Pitti. In these places are the artistic works of every school, every age, and every master, and thousands of originals, some of which have been copied indefinitely, and thus represented all round the world. The town is old, and seems to run to art. Art is everywhere ; the common buildings are erected with unique design ; nothing that man can lay his hand to has he done as it is done in America and England ; stores and shops of jewel- ry, pictures, and statuary outnumber all other 158 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. trades, so that the wonder' is where all their cus- tomers are. Surely to maintain or encourage this immense trade in these articles, all the world must come here, and yet the hotels in this month are as deserted as the palaces. Onl}^ seven per- sons assembled at the table (TJiote of the " New- York" to-day, a hotel that accommodates, sump- tuously, 300. Fruit is abundant and twice as cheap as in America. I am agreeably disappoint- ed in the Italians, thus far, as to the one-price charge, and fair charges ; also with the general spirit of the people. They are not so fuss}^ as the French, nor have I seen or been annoyed by their beggars, so much spoken of. In fact, the cicerones and cabmen and hotel drummers are less persis- tent in Florence than anywhere I have been. THE PIAZZA BELLA SIGNORIA is a small open space in the heart of the city — a piazza — paved all over, which has been for hun- dreds of 3^ears the place of the most momentous incidents in Italian history. Here, Savonarola was burned at the stake nearly 300 years ago. All around it are public edifices as old as 700 years, and there are at least 40 statues in view. Here is the great Galleria degli Uffizzi, embracing so many treasures of art. Here, copying is carried on to a great extent by artists from all parts of the ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I 59 world. Here are originals by Michael Angelo, Vacca, Cellini, Bologna, and, in fact, all leading artists. Here are grouped the distinct schools, such as the Flemish, Tuscan, Venetian, Dutch, German, and French. But it would be idle to at- tempt description of these numerous galleries. THE PALAZZO PITTI is a rough structure outside, but royal within. It is richer than the English or French royal palaces. When Victor Emmanuel is in Florence, he lodges in this palace. Every thing is in royal readiness. There is furniture of inlaid wood or mineral, form- ing fine and minute faces or landscapes, the natu- ral color of the wood or mineral giving the shad- ings. Some of the spacious floors are one vast sheet of polished concrete. Back of the palace is an ancient out-door amphitheatre of granite, ca- pable of seating 2000 persons, made 200 years ago for the Court. It is moss and ivy covered now. Rising above that is a delightful grove and garden. This palace, costing millions, is also un- used. I suppose there are thirty palaces in Eu- rope, costing over two hundred millions of dol- lars, with garnishment, unused except for the people to marvel at, and to show them how grand it is to support royalty, any one of the many thou- sand articles in each of w^hich — door, mirror, l6o ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. chair, table, vase, picture, chandelier, etc. — would buy a homestead. EXPENSES, AUGUST 20. Rome — One fourth expense of guide and carriage, in a party of four (having visited Roman Forum, Colosseum, Trajan Forum and Column, Prison St. Paul, baths of Titus, Caracalla, and Vespasian, ancient sewers, Catacombs, tombs of the Scipios, Campagna and . . Aqueduct, Churches, and Quirinal Palace), ... . . $2 oo Board, 2 20 $4. 20 CHAPTER XIV. ROME. Long before we arrived here, we saw from the passes of the Apennines the towering dome of St. Peter's. We entered the Eternal City just at dusk, and had a foretaste of the ruins of ancient Rome. But, alas! classic sentiments are dis- pelled by brick-yards, railroad-switches, clothes- lines, tan-yards, hacks and hack-drivers, modern brick tenements, and Victor Emmanuel's sol- diers, all mixed up with the ruins of the great baths of Diocletian, the Temple of Minerva, the wall of Servius Tullius, and a fragment of the Etruscan walls. Being left at the hotel on Via Condotti, we hastily wash and brush up, en- gage our guide and carriage for the next day, and walk out to the famous main street of Rome — the Corso. This is a narrow, paved street, and the mass of the people saunter along from curb to curb — the sidewalk being only three feet wide. In the morning, our party of four, with guide and driver, go rapidly around visiting the various l62 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. ruins. We ride out on the Appian Way, see the ancient Aqueduct, go into the Colosseum, inspect the process of excavation, descend into the Cata- combs and the tombs of the Scipios — where we see the results of the cremation of the human body in the cinders of each member of the family, in urns deposited in niches in the solid rock — descend also into the ancient Trajan Forum, stand upon the pavement trod by the Caesars, and see all round the evidences of Vandal-like de- struction of the Imperial City. We also visit many of the churches, ancient and mediaeval, there being scarcely any modern ones. Aside from the ruins of ancient Rome and the mediaeval churches, there is nothing in or about it of an in- teresting nature in architecture or scenery. There are about four hundred and eighty churches in the city, and upon every one of them, even the least in significance, is lavished all the cumulative art that zeal and wealth can afford. These churches would require a whole chapter to give only a general description of them. Our guide, who was a thorough artist, and was enthusiastic and un- flagging in his interest v/hile with us, often passed his hand up and down pillars and paneling and niches and casings and statuary and paintings and mosaic, saying, ''All reech — no sham." There was St. Paul's Church, which seemed to be out- side of the city limits, and said to be on the site ECONO^IICAT. EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 63 of the martyrdom, too magnificent for me to de- scribe. It is constantly open, yet seldom used on account of its inaccessibility. There is one church, the Maria in Trastevere, no two of the pil- lars of which surrounding the nave are alike, having been exhumed from ruins unknown. There is one granite monolith in that row of pillars, hard as flint and polished like glass, eight feet in diameter and ninety-nine feet tall. The base of it is run into the ground because it is longer than the other pillars, and a false base and pedestal is forrried at the floor. There is no knowledge of the structure to which this pillar belonged, nor of the machinery or immense labor it took to make it. I believe it is the largest monolith in the world ever turned out by the hand of man. The next day is devoted entirely to St. Peter's, and this, like our Niagara Falls, can only be re- alized by a metrical knowledge of its proportions, for the eye can not take in its size. First, there are two vast semicircular colonnades, each of four rows of monstrous pillars five feet in diameter, making about four hundred pillars in all, and em- bracing many acres. Then there is the body of the church. While there, in writing to my friends, I made the following comparisons, believing them to be exaggerations, but only to bring their minds up to a comparative idea of its vastness. I said that " I had now climbed a stairway of artistic 164 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. and architectural wonders ; that our Trinity Church, Brooklyn, would stand inside of St. Paul's, London ; and that St. Paul's dome, ball, and cross would stand inside the dome of St. Peter's." When I returned to Brooklyn, and the old dimi- nution of soul returned to me again, I was a little ashamed at the lie I had told, and I compared the figures ; but I found that not only would our Trinity Church stand inside of St. Paul's, and St. Paul's inside of St. Peter's, but our post-office building might still be placed on top of both of them, and then all three stand inside of St. Peter's. These proportions seem incredible, but they are true, as can be shown by these figures : Trinity Church is 275 feet high to top of cross. St. Paul's, from floor to top ofdome inside, is 271 feet 6 inches, being 4^ feet less than Trinity ; but by taking out the floor of the lantern on top of the dome, the height would equal Trinity. St. Paul's outside to top of cross is 360 feet 4 inches. Our post-office building is about 70 feet high, which, put on top of St. Paul's, would just make the height of St. Peter's dome. inside — ^429 feet. Inside of St. Peter's there is no painting, the pictures are in mosaic that will never fade or be destroyed, except by fire. Within this dome are pictures of the evangelists, and so great are the dimensions that the pen held by St. Mark appears to be about 13 inches long, as generally estimated by visitors, while in reality it ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 65 is 7 feet long. This mosaic-picturing illustrates the richness of these churches. Our guide intro- duced us to the studio of his brother, who was a mosaic artist. Mosaic is glass fused with metal to obtain the various colors, and drawn out into splinters or spindles of every variety of tint, like crochet material. These bits are broken off and inserted into a bed of cement as the shading is re- quired by the pattern. It will be seen from this that time has no effect upon the brightness of the coloring. The pictures, statuary, and ornamenta- tion in St. Peter's, the Vatican, and the Quirinal can not, of course, be here described ; and as to the ruins, the Archaeological Commissions are prosecuting their exhumations and preserving what they find. EXPENSES, AUGUST 21. One fourth expense of guide, carriage, and admission fees (visiting St. Peter's, Vatican, and churches), . . . $2 20 Board, 2 20 U 40 We visited Palatine Hill, containing the ruins of the palaces of the Csesars and Nero, and the baths of Caracalla and Vespasian. Their splendor and magnificence as now indicated by their im- mense walls, broad mosaic floors, and the mosaic bottoms of the bathinsr-basins, wherein fifteen hun- l66 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. dred people could bathe, is not easily within our conception ; but the most striking- point to me Avas the vindictiveness with which those Vandals, in their various sackings of Rome, had carried on the work of destruction. Not only did they cast down, but they broke and mashed every thing of a fine na- ture, such as the statuary and the polished marble facings of walls. Ancient Rome had tens of thou- sands of its citizens illustrated in marble and bronze, and these are now exhumed in all their variety of feature and character, broken and earth-stained. But we must quit Rome and hurry on. We were there five days, and we saw Americans who had been residents for two years, and who said their astonishment was increasing day by day. We were told not to go to Rome during the hot weather, but we found blankets comfortable every night, and, with care, that the health and spirits were as good as anywhere. We kept in-doors at night, and when in the hot days we descended into cool crypts, catacombs, or tombs, we were prepared Avith shawls and stimuli. EXPENSES, AUGUST 22. Private galleries and studios, one-fourth expense of guide, . , . . $i oo Board, 2 20 $3 20 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 6/ But Space limits us. Here is Murray's guide- book of the city, 480 pages octavo, only historical and statistical, and in most compressed style. As a modern cit}^, Rome would not be noticed ; but mingled with the modern life here are the impos- ing ruins of ancient Rome that can not be buried nor forgotten ; and also here are the towering monuments of the mediaeval ages. Thus the mingling of contrasts is almost ridiculous. For the ancient Roman, you see the dandies and organ-grinders ; for Csesar, you have Victor Em- manuel, who knows and cares for nothing (as his people sslj) but his pleasures ; for the Colos- seum, the palaces of Titus, of Vespasian, and the baths of Caracalla, we have an uncomfortably close, blocky, bare style of houses. Externally, there is nothing attractive about Rome ; rather, it is repulsive. Its streets are narrow, and there is no redeeming domiciliary architecture, from centre to circumference, until the distant villas are reached. No flowers, grass, nor grounds exist about any house. Take away the structures of the mighty Roman Catholic Church and the ruins, of the past, and Rome is left a third-rate city. Take away the patronage of the outside world in art-buying and wonder-seeking, and the people would be in a strait to get their bread and wine. Rome has l68 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. NO BRANCH OF INDUSTRY for the supply of the rest of the world, nor of its own country, except in the arts. It is the centre of nothing but of an ecclesiastical society. Here is nothing that is new, to indicate a vigorous peo- ple or a powerful State. Here are no glories but of the past. To be sure, it should be said'that a few modern houses of beauty and comfortable style, with open spaces surrounding, are now in course of erection ; and this evidence of life has sprung up since the advent of the Italian govern- ment. " See Naples and die" — see the ruins of Rome and depart. And yet, how can an impression of them be brought to the mind of one who has not beheld them ? Remember, Rome was once imperial ; that imperial Rome is still imperial in its ruins. What breadth and strength of genius to conceive, and what energy and facilities to execute ! The broken arches are many, vast, towering; the walls, thick and strong, broken and ivy-cover- ed, line away to grand extents, inclosing piles of destruction whose now unearthed fragments in- dicate their splendors. Huge monoliths are thrown down and broken as though by man's rage, but no one can trace the different epochs of spoliation in the results now laid bare. Myriads of statues, tablets of laws and personal records, ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 69 and articles of public and private taste are ex- humed, earth-stained, that show a vigor of char- acter and of resources not displayed in any age since. None of the architectural or artistic works of any country can now be pointed out that can not here find their equal. Such is a superficial impression. Our little party undertook to have A MOONLIGHT VIEW of the Colosseum, and were so favored. In this way, the impression is much grander. In the day-time, the vision contracts the dimensions of all large objects as an opera-glass makes distances shorter. In the night-time, that effect did not seem to exist to such a degree. All was solitude about ; the moonlight streamed through the vast arches and windows, lighting the inside partly, and leav- ing other parts dark and gloomy. There was nothing to hinder, and we walked right in to the arena. Two Italian sentries were there, smoking their pipes, but said nothing to us. The lines of the structure stood out boldly against the blue sky. We sat upon a broken pillar and reflected. From there it was but a few steps to the Forum. In the same silence, and none to disturb, we de- scended to the ancient pavement, where had thronged the busy Romans and spoken the mighti- est of voices. There lay the fragments in abundance I/O ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. of what nearly two thousand years ago adorned the heart of the Roman empire. There we stood at the rostrum, and under the pillars of the temple of Saturn. When and why and how this mass of earth was sloped over this place to the depth, on an average, of twenty-five feet over its fallen pil- lars, but leaving parts of temples there protrud- ing, and how they all should be forgotten in a city of continuous history, is not clear ; but there was the grand fact before our eyes. EXPENSES, AUGUST 23. Lunch, $1 00 Omnibus, . 20 $1 20 THE EXCAVATIONS are continued by the private Archaeological Com- mission. Their labors are protected by the State, and at night sentried by government soldiers. Every scrap discovered is carefully preserved, placed, and recorded. The greater the mind and the more the learn- ing, the more will Rome be appreciated. Although it concentrates more modern art than any city in the world, j^et that bears slight proportion to the wonders of the past that tower up there with the hoary character of more than two thousand years, or that are exhumed day after day. A great mind is staggered and overwhelmed as he ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I /I moves about Rome and sees these majestic out- croppings ; and the mind that is not great becomes fascinated and lost in study and contemplation as the subjects about him grow and grow and grow upon him. Standing by a bronzed and dirty Italian laborer of to-day, in a pit thirty feet below the level of the modern street, and seeing him clear- ing away the gravel and clay from some magni- ficent broken pillar, now dragging up some fragment of statuary, such as a beautiful female hand in marble, now some fragment in marble of the more muscular anatomy of man, and then some beautiful design of architectural decoration, the mind then totters and flits with puny realiza- tion back twenty centuries, and asks. What were the last human influences, before this, at this spot ? We look around us through the city and at the various fora, temples, churches, palaces, and streets being excavated. We see, even in mounds and by cart-loads, fragments of ancient statuary, whole statues by thousands, marble busts of Ro- man citizens by thousands, single monoliths pur- porting to be of some immense structure whose whereabout is not even conjectured ; then frown- ing everywhere — decaying grandeur mixed with the insignificant appearances of modern life — are basilicas, triumphal arches, military walls, col- umns, imperial palaces, public baths and foun- tains, and the Colosseum. 172 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Modern Rome is but the rubbish of mighty imperial Rome of the past. But we Avill recur to the question, and try to answer it, How imperial Rome came to be cov- ered up and forgotten? History records no earthquake swallowing up, and no flood nor con- tinuous submerging that would carry a deposit thither ; and the present witness of these excava- tions will see that they are cut right down through sand, gravel, clay, and bowlders from the surface of the present paved streets. Probably the explanation is that the forgetful- ness of these ancient objects is akin to the rage that destroyed them. Ancient combatants and icon- oclasts, foreign and internecine, threw them down, and mediaeval and modern people have covered them over. To express it in a simple way, anti- quities and ruins had become a drug in the Ro- man market. Even emperors and popes have regarded the great Colosseum and palaces as quarries from which to build private palaces. But within the past age, steam travel has brought all the world in adoration to the feet of her ancient mistress, and Roman respect for the sentiment of the world, as well as its profits, has arrested despoilment, and begun exhumation and preservation. In the time of the Emperor Vespasian, a.d. 69, the inhabitants numbered about two millions ; ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 73 there were 19 public forums, each adorned by wealth and taste, 37 public gates, 19 aqueducts, 1790 superior palaces, 7 public baths, 423 temples, 36 triumphal arches, 10 basilicas, and 1352 foun- tains, great and small. No wonder, then, that dig- ging in the earth develops myriads of these proofs of the grandeur of the past, and that there is more under the present surface of Rome than there is over it. For a thousand years, Rome was sub- jected to the rage of war from without and with- in. In the first century, the city was burned under Nero. In 390, the Gauls took, sacked, and entirely destroyed the city, and this was after the most brilliant ages of Rome, including the Augustan and Aurelian. The Goths, in 410, de- stroyed most of the city ; and the Vandals in 455. Marble statues were then in the fights hurled upon the heads of the advancing Goths. In the eighth century, the ravages of the Saracens were destructive of much of its wealth. In suc- ceeding centuries, the city was repeatedly , cap- tured by the German armies, and then succeeded civic feuds, when the city was divided into sev- eral distinct fortified quarters, afterward de- stroyed. Thus Rome, being the subject of con- tests and misfortunes for a thousand years, was, in the fourteenth century, reduced to 20,000 peo- ple and the removal of the pontifical government. The modern visitor, on inspecting these ruins, at 174 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. once gets the impression that not only did many of these besiegers cast down temples and statu- ary, but with rage and the spirit of extinction, they mashed and scattered every thing they could lay their hands upon ; the marble veneering or facing of the walls in palaces was obviously hammered, and almost pulverized ; and pieces of statuary are found, the complement or bodies of v/hich are untraceable. What wonder, then, that in temporary periods of discouragement, expediency, and indifference, these ruins were covered up to grade streets and form building-sites by later builders and munici- pal authorities. THE EXPENSES IN ROME have been $14.40. For this moderate sum, embracing all disbursements whatsoever, in- cluding hotel bills for nearly four days, have been brought to the writer's realization the principal objects of Rome, and as many of them as the time would permit of viewing, in- cluding its most imposing churches and chapels ; the Colosseum and excavations ; the Roman and Trajan forums, their excavations and fragments of art exhumed ; the ancient sewers; the ruins of the ancient imperial palaces of Palatine Hill ; the Catacombs, with their miles of labyrinths, their ECONO^IICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 75 niches for the bones of the Christians ; the tombs of the Scipios in solid rock under the ground, with their mortuary cinerary urns, their little niches in the rock, a foot cube, containing- all that remains physically of a king or a princess ; the church of St. Peter's ; the Vatican and its galleries and library ; the Roman ancient roads ; the aque- ducts ; the ruins of ancient basilicas, temples, and arches, calling forth a veneration for their silent, hoary majesties ; the museums, containing trea- sures of ancient, medieval, and modern art; the modern villas, and many soul-absorbing wonders, too wearying in their multitude to enumerate, without describing them. One night's ride over the Cam.pagna, along the dark arches of the aqueduct, through the camp- fires of regimental bivouac, brings us to Naples. All along the base of Mount Vesuvius, and by the road that circles around the bay, approaching Pompeii, the houses are one story, of concrete^ stone, or brick, not excepting the rOofs. The un- covered city of Pompeii lies on rising ground, a few minutes' walk from the railroad-station. We ap- proached the entrance through a government house, and were admitted by paying one franc each to the government official, and were fur- nished for that a guide. The walls of the houses and the streets are as open to the air and light of day as any village. There is nothing subterra- 176 ECONOMICAT- EUROPEAN TOURIST. nean nor damp. The old, well-worn pavements are swept clean, and not even any debris remains. Nothing of the houses remains but the first-story Avails. Where are the domestic utensils and furniture of a population? The museums at Pompeii and Naples do not contain a thousandth part of what was needed. Where are the bodies of those over- taken by the eruption ? Only eighty have been discovered, three or four of which are on exhibi- tion, the crust of scoriae scraped down sufficient to indicate the personal form and character of the bod}^ Most interesting of these are two figures, obviously a mother and young daughter, who had perished — suffocated — within each other's grasp. A ring on one of the fingers of the younger fe- male was visible through the thin crust of earthy material, and afcAV white finger-bones protruded, perhaps broken by the pick of the exhumers. There they lie upon a table for the nineteenth century to view and silently wonder what graphic and thrilling scenes they could portray of the first century, could they now resurrect. After a day spent in deepest interest in this " dead city," we return to Naples, view its evening pastimes, ride rpon the bay to the song of the Neapolitan oars- man, and the next morning go over, hard by, to Mount Vesuvius. Though Pompeii is stripped of almost every ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 7/ thing but pavements and the bare walls of the first stories,! discovered onethingthat brought vividly home to the mind the realization of past life there. It was plumbing, connected with the fountain (now dry) in the courtyard of the house of Sallust. In the centre of the marble mosaic courtyard is the fountain and its basin. The fountain is a minia- ture stairway of marble, about three feet high and ten inches broad. At the top stands a marble child with a pitcher, from which poured the water down over the stairway, making miniature cas- cades. Through the broken floor, I traced a few feet of lead pipe an inch and a half in diameter, and a cock exactly similar to those at present in use. The seam of the pipe wa.s clamped as our stove-pipes, instead of being made solid. There, in the solitude of that August af- ternoon, in the light and sky of the nineteenth century, panting for a refreshing bath, for a draught of pure, cool water, or to hear its flow, the mind traversed back eighteen hundred years to this spot, inquiring what workmen were here, what jokes or business intercourse passed, what personages of affluence or enlightenment reposed or rested here by this sparkling fountain, perhaps in intercourse with life in the adjacent alcoves and rooms that were open to the cool breezes of the Mediterranean, whose waves around the crescent bay could be heard there ; and then the 1/8 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. mind realized the continuous spirit occupation of earth, and that eternity is to the All-seeing Eye but one instant. EXPENSES, AUGUST 24. (Naples) Museum, $0 20 Cab, 20 cr ; fare to Pompeii and return, 60 c, 80 Boating on the bay, 20 One half of cab, . .... 10 Entrance to Pompeii, with guide, . . 40 Board at Naples, . .... 2 20 $3 90 CHAPTER XV. MOUNT VESUVIUS. The old saying* of the Italians, " See Naples and die," was of course, like all old sayings, well founded. The surrounding of the Bay of Naples is an amphitheatre of beauties in nature and art. From the centre of the city, you face, westward, the blue bay, with its islands, castles, and forts ; to the left and south, near by, is Mount Vesuvius, always with its phenomenon of volcanic smoke ; to the right and north, you see villas, grottoes, vine- yards, and Virgil's tomb ; and back of the city, to the east, and above it on high crags, are castles, forts, and monasteries. The city itself, of white stone houses, its clean streets, its fountains and bright shops, is pleasant to look through. THE MOUNTAIN. Yesterday, there was an unusual amount of smoke from the crater. Vesuvius had been marked as the end of my journey, and I found it l8o ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST to be also the climax of natural and imposing wonders. On the 15th of August, I ate ice, crystal in purity and hardness, off the Mont Blanc glaciers, and ten days after — here on Mount Vesuvius — I have had my dinner cooked by the internal fires of the earth. The ascent was full of interest. I will give it in plain, brief detail. A young American lady, a Scotchman from Edinburgh, a Kentuckian, and myself formed a party for the ascent. To avoid the pestering offers of guides and drivers, with their tales of difficulty and danger, and their high prices, we arose in the morning at five, hired a cab for 20 cents to reach the railroad, and from there, for 30 cents each, and in half an hour reached Portrici, the station nearest the main ascending-place. Here, an early bird of a guide caught the worm. We had determined to ascend alone, without guide or horses. This guide followed us persistently but respectfully through the village, until oppo- site a small, dirty '' agency for mules and guides," where we were assured it was '' imposseeb" for the lady to ascend on foot. For four francs there was provided for her what she persistently called her " mule," but what was a much more gene- ric animal, very shabbily caparisoned. Now, these animals need much more positive stimu- lus to duty than that of a fragile young lady ; so a guide was hired for six francs ($1.20) to ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. l8l help animal and lady. And the guide earned his mone}^, for it was punch and '' ean " all the way up, and a sturdy hold upon the '' animal's" tail ail the way down. The guide was, however, in a copartnership of the supply business, for we had three lunches on the mountain at '' siege prices." Eggs cooked in the crater were half a franc each. He accused us three of drinking four bottles of wine and two of water ! That's what we paid for.- EXPENSES, AUGUST 25. Trip to Vesuvius, $0 30 One third expenses of the guide, . . 40 One third expenses of boy to carry lunch, 20 Breakfast at Hermitage, .... 40 Lunch at the crater, .... 60 One third of carriage back to Naples, . 20 Two extra eggs baked in the crater, . 20 Board at Naples, 2 20 $4 50 THE ASCENT is commonly made by three halts or divisions of the route. Carriages to the Hermitage, then on the back of an animal to the base of the cone, then up the cone, forty-five degrees steep, on foot. We walked it, staff in hand, from the station to the lips of the crater, but we lost more than the price of animals in our shoe-leather. This 1 82 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. crumbled scoria rasps like a steel file. On this first section we passed vineyards and the crop- pings of ancient lava streams, and then along and over the bare lava-floods of 1858 and 1872. Here, having toiled above the villages and shore of the Mediterranean, and above Naples, we turn around and find a grand view. All is desolate near us. The lava, having spread out, forms vast fields of black, bald sterility a hun- dred feet deep, as hard and heavy as cast-iron, and wrinkled and swirled and congealed into an infinitude of weird, fantastic shapes, nearest re- sembling fragments of the human form. Where this has been blasted for a roadway, or has been cracked as it passed over a bowlder, the bottom shows compact, dense granite, and on the top a blacker and quite as hard scum or scoria, show- ing that the lava was molten rock. There are square miles of this congealed flood, extending, but narrowing, right up to the lower side of the crater. Above the first third of the base there is no vegetation ; the mountain is but a mass of this lava in sheets, broken sections, and lumps, or it is pulverized into gravel. At the Hermitage, an unventilated, narrow-windowed, dirty stone house, we get a dose of a breakfast. The coffee, like picra, and without milk, was all that hero- ism could endure. Seeing some small, plum-like tomatoes in the garden, I called for them ; then ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 83 called for vinegar — when the young lady told me to crumb the bread on the tomatoes in lieu of vinegar. Considering the number of visitors to Vesuvius, it is strange there are no facilities for rest and refreshment beyond the simplest and most nauseating kind. THE CONE. This is, geometrically, a perfect cone. The pulverized scorias and ashes falling from the spurt right back upon and around the aperture, have raised, to an immense height, a soft, loose, crumbling mass, the outside of which takes the natural angle of forty-five degrees, while the base or framework of the cone and the crater are large masses of scoriae and lava. The material of the surface resembles gravel in size of particles, but it is flinty scoriae. Under the tread this grinds and gives way, making the progress up- ward very toilsome. A steep ascent, which seemed three miles long, brings us to the edge or lips of the crater. The outward view here, of the Mediterranean and of Italy, is alone worth the toilsome, hot ascent. But all consi- derations are forgotten in the anticipation of looking down the crater. As we approach the top, we find a few inches under the surface to be much hotter than the surface itself. We rest a moment, and, while taking a drink of cool wine and water, 1 84 FXONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. brought in a basket of leaves by the guide's " friend," we look at the great view around and below us, for we anticipate more engrossing won- ders at the top. We see a circuit of two hundred miles of sea and land. Cities and villages look like small patches of white cloth upon a green carpet. Pompeii could not be discovered from there without the aid of the guide. It seems that only a comparatively small rift of ashes was necessary to be carried thither by the wind to cover it, it being a mere speck in the landscape. As we stood there, the mind went back eighteen centuries, and asked, " Did God especially send that shower from this awful jet away where that little speck of Pompeii is ?" We knew from the frescoes now existing there — the eternal brand of her disgrace — that she deserved it. The lips of the crater were sharp and the throat was precipitous — a very chimney or funnel. Across the top, we judged the distance was a quarter of a mile, and we could see down, we supposed, three fourths of a mile, the throat narrowing downward, andjagged protuberances and convolutions cover- ing deeper distances, from below which sulphurous smoke was constantly rolling up. All around the inside of this throat, the material is in combus- tion, smoking and crackling, detaching and falling down. There is a constant sound like a sputtering and blubbering of molten metal, which seems ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 85 distant and subterranean ; but after careful lis- tening and comparing-, we concluded the sound might be that of the cracking, by heat, of soft stone on the sides which we could see tumble smoking down. Perhaps there is no spot on earth where the curiosity and venturesomeness of man are so excited. The desire is to get into a position to see the volcanic fire in the interior of the earth. This is not permitted mortals. If the crumbling and insecure walls of the crater could be descended, the sulphurous smoke would de- stroy life. Over the lips,. we look down into the awfully deep, narrowing funnel, up which rolls sulphurous smoke that fills it entirely, except when the wind swirls in there and clears some of it away. It seems that our sight penetrates lower than the base of the mountain, down into the earth. It looks and smells and sounds, with its sputtering and gurgling, like the very throat of hell, which, like the throat of Vesuvius, no one can see — in this life. Sulphurous whiffs torment our lungs and drive us away. This would be a good place for some roaring Methodist to take a man by the nape of the neck and point him to. The whole inside of the crater is yellow with sulphur. The entire cone itself to the top is in a state of combustion. Smoke issues from every crevice. Eight feet from us, on the outside of the crater, 1 80 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. our eggs were baked hard ; inside the crater, we thrust our staves, and they were charred like coal in one minute. We kept our feet from burning by moving, the winds from the Mediterranean keep- ing the surface cooled or reduced in heat. Miss Wing, of Glenn's Falls, a lithe young girl, who made the ascent on foot, occasionally assisted by the hand of the guide (a feat of courage, ambi- tion, and endurance that not one woman in a hundred accomplishes who undertakes it), had her linen dress scorched. We interest-ourselves in detaching fragments, and seeing them bound down, leap after leap, down, down, down, down, taking so long that it proves the distance is greater than the eye realizes. THE DESCENT down outside the cone is easier, and of some amusement. We take a direct route down the loose, soft gravel, sinking in half-way to the knees at each hop, and descending as harmlessly as though upon a heap of grain. Heated — almost in- flamed — dirty, and tired, we take a carriage to Naples, and see in the suburbs and narrow streets the characteristic scenes of women doing their work on the sidewalks, of cheap fruit and vege- table stalls, and of macaroni-making. We see every kind of fruit and vegetable known to Ame- rica, and yet almost none of it is on the hotel- ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 18/ tables, that make us sick with their eternal spiced meats, and with wine and concentrated pastry. Here, one of the ancient Roman emperors lost a son, who, among other boys, was practicing throw- ing plums into the air and catching them with the teeth, but missing one it lodged in his throat and choked him. We saw lads practicing the amusement part. VIRGIL'S TOMB. Next morning, we ride through the grotto of Posilippo, cut a mile through the hills. The en- trance is a narrow street of traffic. We pass a blacksmith-shop and a cooper-shop, with litter all about ; a rickety door is opened by a half- naked Italian ; there are stone steps, rock, and vines, and we clamber up toward the tomb of Virgil. Up around the rocks we continue, through a small vineyard, through dust, dirt, and brambles, around down again to a nook on the face of the rock, a hundred feet above the street, where we find a little, rough, stone shelter, itself obscured EXPENSES, AUGUST 26 AND 27. Return to Rome — Board (26th and part of 27th) $3 40 Palace of the Cassars, cab and guide, , 40 Carpet-bag for guide-books and souve- nirs, I 60 Postage and stationery, . . . . . 40 $5 80 1 88 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. by untrained vines, bushes, and many weeds. There is no door ; the floor is littered ; goats make it a place of shelter. At one end is a small, thin marble slab with the words, "VIRGILIO MARONI," " Mantua me genuit, Calabri rapuere, tenet nunc Parthenope, cecini pascua, rura, duces " And (in French), " Consecrated to the prince of Latin poets by EighhofF, Librarian to the Queen of the French." I thought that here, in sight of beautiful Naples, should be a suitable monument or tomb to Virgil — a worthy object of art and literary commemora- tion ; and that it was an opportunity for a college or alumni of America to do a handsome thing before the world and posterity, in obtaining per- mission to erect a structure worthy his fame. We each took a simple flower, and pressed it in our guide-books, as a relic or souvenir for our American friends. EXPENSES, AUGUST 28. (Florence) breakfast, . . . . . $0 60 Cab, . . 25 Lunch, 20 Gondola-omnibus at Venice, . . . 20 $1 25 CHAPTER XVL VENICE. Glad have I been to be hauled, as swiftly as the iron horse could go, from sterile Southern and Central Italy to the more agricultural Northern Italy. Approaching Venice, the eye is relieved and the mind refreshed by a more level, grassy, woody, and cultivated country, where the popu- lation is more disseminated over the soil, and less huddled upon bald hills, or perched and crouched upon craggy, forbidding peaks, as though eternal- ly watching somebody, than the people of Central and Southern Italy are. By dozens and dozens EXPENSES, AUGUST 29. Gondola, . $o 30 Shoe-mending, 70 Board, 2 20 $3 20 of tunnels^ long and short, hither and thither, we finally burrow through and clear the Apennines I go ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. and arrive at the north-eastern slope, where, for fifty miles from Venice, is a flat with many arms of the sea winding through it. Careful are we, on arriving at Venice in the night, in getting out of the cars, for fear of stepping into the water. The '' omnibus" at the marble steps of the depot is a gondola. Silently and pleasantly, as though in spirit-land, 'mid spectral palaces, we glide to the marble steps leading from the v/ater to a hall of pillars and a mosaic floor, where we are received into our hotel. The morning show^s that Venice is a scene of faded glory. In the days of her doges and new palaces, when her maritime character was greatest before the world, her fantastic architecture and fairy- like location on the sea gave her an unique splen- dor, the literature whereof is old and familiar to all. But Venice is now only a thing of the past, or, at most, a toy. It is the most trinkety place in the world. To appreciate her, she must be seen in the moonshine. From her gondolas to her coral shops, from her private palaces to her doges' palace, all seem toy-like. There is not a horse nor wheeled vehicle in the city, and one can imagine the lazy-going and quiet nature of affairs that are subject to the slow motion of the pedestrian and of the singing gondolier. Venice has good docks and good anchorage, and I see ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 19I some of the largest steam and sailing vessels floating here in the canal Guidecca ; she has a good railroad across her swampy lagunes into the rest of the world ; but what can be said as to the thrift of a place steadily decreasing in population ? EXPENSES, AUGUST 30. Gondola and guide, . . ... . $1 20 Board, 2 20 $3 40 Twelve hundred years ago, here was a cluster of mud islands in the sea. We know not what im- mediate necessities first impelled man to build upon them, but they found a firm hard-pan, and ever since have, by sufficient necessity and in- ducement, continued to drive spiles and erect upon them stone houses, marble palaces, and towers. These islands, now compactly built upon, have narrow streets, about the width of a common hallway, through which throng the people in leisure, business, and fashion ; between and around these islands are canals of swift-running tide — pure, clear sea-water. These are the thorough- fares. As a consequence, Venice is pure, cool, fresh, and healthy. This kind of pavement (canals) is of course noiseless and free from dust. It costs nothing to sewer here. Fresh water is brought down from the rivers of the country in flatboats, filling the boat as a tub, 192 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. and dipped by ragged, dirty fellows, immersed barefooted into it, into the private cisterns. Ven- ice is the place to rest and play. I have heard rtiore pianos here than in all Italy. St. Mark's Piazza is a square, surrounded by ancient public buildings, the doge's palace, St. Mark's Church, the senators' houses, etc., and shops of surprising brilliancy, but small. On this square, ten thousand people gather in evenings to quaff wine or coffee, smoke tobacco, and listen to some military band. The doge's palace and the Church of St. Mark, once wonderfully brilliant, are now corroded and blackened by time, so that their rich carving and outside fresco can hardly be defined. We wan- dered through the cells and torture-rooms of the palace, and over the bridge of sighs,, and looked through the grated iron of the window where the prisoners were permitted to take their last view at out-door nature. One interesting spectacle all strangers go to visit at eleven o'clock each day at the great piazza (square or place) of St. Mark. Here at that hour, the air is almost darkened with pigeons who come to be fed, and they will familiarize themselves with any body who will permit. I saw them alight upon the outstretched hands of ladies to eat therefrom. This custom arises from a legend of the Avars in connection with carrier- pigeons. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 93 The private palaces are all that can be ex- pected of domiciles arising from canals. Some of them were pretty in interior arrangement and garniture, but not large nor stately. All of them are settled unevenly. All I can say for Venice at this writing in August is, I would like to plunge out of my window into the canal and swim, ride a month in her gondolas, and then hurry to the country where I could see a tree and a horse, and stretch my legsi Leaving Italy, a final word should be said about THE WEATHER. The sun's rays during mid-day have been in- tensely hot, but, walking on the shady side of the streets, and always keeping a sun-umbrella over our heads when subjected to the sun, Ave have kept busy throughout the day. Every night, in all Italy, through this month of August, has been cool. It is said to have been a cool summer in England and America. RECAPITULATION. Italy has occupied thirteen days, and cost ninety dollars currency, embracing all her principal cities from Turin to Naples, and back to Venice, omit- ting the trip from Venice across to Genoa, which was paid for in the ninety dollars. 194 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. EXPENSES, AUGUST 3 1. Board, $2 20 Gondola 20 Fare to Austrian frontier, second-class, . 4 40 $6 80 AUSTRIA. From the instant of striking the boundary of Aus- tria, en route from Italy, it has seemed as though we were re-entering our native land, America. The country and the farm cultivation seem Ame- rican. Here, for the first time in Europe, have I seen cars like ours ; and the railroad manage- ment is less pompous and excitable than elsewhere. Let me say now that I have been through most of Austria, and two days in her capital, and every thing is more American, in general scene, and in detail of social habits and manners, than any other European country. Americans should make more of the Austrians. All my companions of the voyage concur in these sentiments. Austria seems to be a thrifty and contented coun- try. Here are not such monuments of art and ar- chitecture as elsewhere, but, like our own beloved land, she makes up for that in her generah beauty and disseminated wealth. Here is a singular proof of her good spirit — I have bought over one hundred and fifty views, in other countries, of remarkable scenes of art, but not one view of ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I95 Austria, and yet I admire Austria most for her natural simplicity and happiness. Her railroads are magnificent. I rode over twenty-five miles that cost seven millions of dollars — $280,000 per mile ! EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER I. Barber, $0 30 Adelsburg grotto, . . . . . i 40 Dinner, ........ 60 Porter, 20 Fare to Vienna, second-class, . . . 9 20 $11 70 ADELSBURG GROTTO. En route from Venice, we had the lucky thought to visit this cave. One of the princes with his suite happened there that day, for whom the caverns were lighted up with two thousand lights ; and, as we wandered through its halls, galleries, and tunnels, over its bridges, up its hills, and down into its dark valleys — all an under- ground world — and into its immense stalactite chambers, the height or circumference of which the eye could not see, the rich, powerful melody of a magnificent military band sounded the Austrian hymn as the prince approached. We wandered two miles in this cavern, where, in the dim light, seemed to be displayed the natural antitypes of ail the architecture, sculpture, and 196 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. ornament that we had just left in the temples, the palaces, and ruins of Rome and other cities. The illumination of the cave usually costs twenty dollars, but we saw it on the visit of the prince for a dollar each. EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 2. En roiite^ lunch, . . . . . . $0 20 VIENNxV is brilliant, and growing with amazing rapidity. Whole streets of magnificent stone or brick edi- fices are now in process of erection. At the Volks Garten, near the palace, last evening, the scene was quite Parisian, and infinitely more decent ; in fact, it would do Austrian society an injustice to make a comparison of morals with the French, so far as public appearances go. The place of the Exposition is now for public resort, its fountains and trees being delightful. It is a broad place, a mile square, called '' The Prater." The rotunda of the Exposition build- ing is as far across as one of our long blocks — 400 feet. We saw a signboard there, a relic of the Exposition — '' American coak-t2ii\s.** The palace of the Kaiser we visited to-day. The grounds are majestic and extensive, and the people are admitted freely to them. The palace, ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. I97 however — exterior and interior — has not the rich gaudiness of other European palaces, but is more chaste and economical, quite in keeping with the ideas I have formed of Austrian good sense. The people here |^are' easy-going and enjoy life. While in every other Continental city the public urinals have a barbarously free exposure, in Vienna they are concealed. In other Continental cities, art runs to nude forms ; here there is no more of it than in an American city. EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 3. Lunch (Vienna), $0 40 Cab, 40 Omnibuses, ....... 30 $1 10 CHAPTER XVII. TEUTONIC FEATURES. In Austria and Germany, as in all European countries, well-uniformed soldiers swarm every- where, in the cities, in every little village, at every station. The writer observed one day, from the car-windows commanding" a view over the country for man}^ miles, bodies of troops, infantry, artillery, and cavalry, moving as though to repel an invasion on the frontier, while inter- spersed through the fields were women farm- hands. All the railroads are of great magnifi- cence and costliness ; their management is syste- matic and with military rigor; their fares are high, and traveling for the passenger exacting and uncomfortable. The absurdity of an absence of maps is general, as in Great Britain. No depot has a map. Vienna was the first place Avhere I found a hotel with one. I took a ticket from Vienna for Berlin, and there was nothing on it to indicate a change of cars. Soon after, I found myself seventy miles out of my route. One, locked in a compartment with two or three (other) blockheads, is not likely to see or learn much about where he is passing, although visited ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 1 99 every hour by a chatterbox of a conductor, clam- bering along outside of the train. The railroads are owned by the princes and the aristocracy generally, and their rules, as well as the laws of the state, are not favorable to the people. If they would have aisle cars, make their depots more free, and a ticket " good until used," as in America, and have a more enlightened system of maps everywhere, with less importance on the part of railway officials, travel and intercourse among the people would be promoted, and their intelligence quickened out of its present stupi- dity, which can not now originate an idea, or perceive or suggest a traveler's meaning, even in their own language, unless words as definite as brickbats are thrown at their heads. In Ame- rica, if a traveler on a train should point to a sta- tion and sa}^ with interrogative _accent, "New- York ?" he would be answered Yes or No, as the fact might be ; but one can get every thing in the world out of the average Continental Euro- pean except Yes or No. EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 4. Cab (Vienna), . . . . . . $q 60 Cab, 40 Board, ....... 2 20 Lunch, extra, . . . ^ . . . 40 $3 60 200 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. Austrian scenery is more diversified than the Prussian. Austria has more mountains and hills. From Vienna northward, through the centre of Prussia, through Berlin to Hamburg, the country is level, somewhat sandy, the soil, having the appearance of being overwrought, and the forests have been swept away. In both countries, the females are in the majority in the fields, and the males are lounging or strutting in military uniforms. Women carry the hod, pump water into the street-sprinklers, sweep streets, and saw wood as vocations. THE RELIGION of Austria is Roman Catholic. And yet, meet- ing the assertion, often too dogmatically and un- charitably made by Protestants, that " all Catho- lic countries are; degraded," I say, as a matter of superficial observation, that I see nothing but thrift, neatness, comfort, and internal peace in Austria. Our republican simplicity was much pleased with the comparative economy and plain- ness of Francis Joseph's palace. Immediately on crossing the border from Aus- tria to Germany, the crucifixes and Virgin Marys disappear entirely ; and yet I can not note any particular difference in the material and social ECONOMICAL' EUROPEAN TOURIST. 201 aspect of the two peoples. The customs and language, country for country and city for city, are similar. Government is majestic ; all authority, military and civil, is vigorous, dignified, and som.ewhat overbearing. Victory has almost turned every German's head. In every tov/n there is a great deal of military strut. It has been the making of the people. Politeness is very superficial. Men are regarded as superior to. women. Men do all the kissing of each other on the streets and at leave-takings. Women do not. Men are cringingly polite to each other ; frigidly so to wom'en. The women are good creatures here. They meet gentlemen half-way, and are grateful for attentions to them. In Germany and Austria, there is more decency and modesty of men on the streets than iii France and Italy, where, in some functions, they are semi-barbarians. Here, the people are social out of doors ; in American cities, the social life is within doors and exclu- sive. In every village and city, over half of the population are every summer's evening at the cafi tables, in the gardens, and along the quays and all cool places, enjoying convivial refresh- ment and conversation. In short, the ways of social enjoyment in Europe are so developed that I don't see how a European can content himself in America. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. BEER. The water all over Europe is execrable — limy and brackish, from the absence of forests. All drink beer there, even young ladies and children. The men drink from mugs as big as the half sec- tion of a stove-pipe. It is refreshing and harm- less. In America, one glass makes my head ache ; here my head is as sound as a nut from it. " Scoot- ing" all over the Continent, with my eyes always on the alert, I have not seen one case of intoxi- cation. Our laws ought to cudgel out the rum- traffic, and establish and protect honest beer. The Prussian people do not deserve to main- tain their liberties unless they can establish a better ■ MONEY CURRENCY. Of all the confused and complicated subjects, this beats all. Their divisions of coin are infinite in denomination and in composition of metal. Half of it has nothing on it to indicate its value, and the people know it only as one knows the faces of his acquaintances. Strangers don't pre- tend to know it, and in paying bills, pass it out by the handful, like dirt, telling the claimant to help himself. The people know this perplexity of foreigners, and sometimes " help themselves" too liberally. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST ■ EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 5. Board, part of day (Vienna), . $1 CD Cab, 20 Fare to Prussian line, .... 4 20 • ^5 40 BERLIN 203 is an imperial city. The monument of Victory is the costHest monument in the world. The busts of Wilhelm, Bismarck, and Moltke are crowned with wreaths everywhere. This city, like all other European cities, is growing. A modern spirit seems to have suddenly and simultaneously taken hold of all of them. Potsdam, the country resi- dence of the Prussian kings, has an old-fashioned grandeur. There the natural forests are left as gardens, and costly graveled walks, bordered with statuary, are run through them. Every turn reveals] additional wonders of secluded art in statues, fountains, basins, causeways, bridges, lodges, etc. It is easy to mark princely grounds and palaces. They are scopy, grand, extensive. All private palaces, however rich, are small in comparison. From Berlin north to the German Ocean, the country is flat. HAMBURG is a busy city. The old part is cramped and quaint, but the new part is open, free, and stately. 204 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. She has 300,000 population. Her bourse, or ex- change, was as enterprising a scene, with its one thousand merchants, as the Stock Exchange or Gold Board of New- York. EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 6. (At Prague) meals and lodging, . . $i 50 Postage, . . . . . . . . 20 Fare to Berlin, 4 00 Lodgings at Berlin, . . . . . 80 Breakfast, ^ . 20 %6 70 One afternoon, I heard a tremendous chatter of tongues and jaws, s^w a street jammed full of people, and safe spectators filling the windows. I anticipated a riot, or, perhaps, a revolution. From a door-step, I could see the dispute was between two passing truckmen. Not a blow was struck ; the angry storm spent itself in thunders and wind, and the crowd melted awa}^ Not a policeman was in sight. For obvious reasons, police there are not needed. These scolders were the swarms who, with needle-guns and princes and aristocrac}^ to drive them, overwhelmed the French. RECAPITULATION. A general run through Austria and Germany, spending two or three days at each capital, and embracing nine days in all, has cost only $61. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST, 205 FROM LONDON TO LIVERPOOL, the country will almost do for a park. At Liver- pool, the tide ebbing and flowing twenty-one feet, keeping the Mersey mostly shooting, one way or the other, as swift as an arrow, are necessi- tated great granite locks or basins on both sides of the river to keep the water in and the vessels afloat. All the shipping of the world can float in them twenty-one feet above the sea at low tide. Here is the gate whence England sends out to the world the results of her humming indus- try, and here is the gate where she receives back the world's food and gold. EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 7. (Bsriin) Fare to Potsdam, Kaiser's palace, and return, $0 40 Cab and guide, i 00 Two days' board, '4 00 $5 40 From Liverpool to Manchester, forty miles, one can not get out of the view of manufactories. England is covered with factory-smoke. Liver- pool is a rousing place — plain, unpretentious, sociable, joyous. Rural Manchester is a vast city, looking much as if built to resist earth- quakes. Although the factories are many, yet they are so scatteredthat they are hard to find, 206 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. and when found, are harder to obtain admission into. In England, as in all'Europe, the intent is that people shall know nothing but their own business, and the intent has ^obtained a marked success. In Manchester, the people have a local habit, when answering a stranger's inquiries, of pointing one direction and describing by words an opposite direction. To keep a clean collar, one must change three times a day. The people have some local freaks and vagaries, as most people have, not based upon reason. Their omni- buses are driven at a walk until a load is picked up, and then at a trot. The Corporation spends much money sprinkling grit upon level streets. Almost all the population wear clogs — shoes with thick wooden soles — although the pavement is smooth and dry. Childhood is cramped and kept from active play by them, and they totter along like weak-backed monkeys ; the graceful form of woman is hideously tortured by them, and men are made prematurely old by them. No parliament is fit to govern which permits the people to wear EXPENSES, SEPTEMBER 8, 9, AND lO. Fare to Hamburg, third-class, . . $3 80 Board at Hamburg, one day, . . . 2 00 Fare to London (second-class, by steamer), occupying September 8, 9, and 10, . .6 00 $11 80 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 20/ clog's. If the people claim for them economy, it may be answered that they waste time by retard- ing- locomotion. Some say they are not cheaper than leather, but they keep the feet from damp. To that may be replied, the refined people never wear them, while machinists and mechanics, who are confined, wear them home beside the little barefoot girl who carries the dinner-pail. No people can maintain their liberties who wear clogs. Liverpool is a very cheap place for purchases. All returning tourists should reserve a fund for a private stock to smuggle home. LAST EXPENSES. September lo — London horse-cars, . $d 14 Board and lodging, i day, $2 ; laundry, $1.28, 3 28 September 11 — Fare to Liverpool, Hbird- class, 4 76 Cab, 56 c, ; lunch, 28 c, ... 84 September 12 and 13 — With a friend. Septe?7tber 14 — Return ticket for Manches- ter, I 50 Lodging and breakfast, . . . i 00 September 15 — Gifts, . . . . . 3 00 Septe7)iber 16 — Passage to America, . 88 00 Stewards on ship, . . . . . 2 00 $104 52 208 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. RECAPITULATION. From Hamburg back through England, Lon- don, Liverpool, Manchester, and first class for home, embracing twenty days, was $i lo currency. DOMICILES. If the compartment cars of Europe are an index of the undemocratic condition of society, with much more clearness does the arrangement, location, and style of domiciles in America indi- cate the personal independence, ambition, and thrift of our people. The different compartments in all public vehicles for different classes — which, however, are free to all for choice, if paid for — are a constant reminder to the people of Europe that there are grades to which they must not aspire, and that class-lines must be revered. A prominent aspect of difference between America and Europe is in the location of dwellings. In America, the disposition of the people is to segre- gate and separate ; in Europe, the disposition is to congregate — to huddle together. In America, there are more villages and small cities than in Europe ; and here, dotting the land everywhere, never anywhere out of sight, are elegant and well-garnished homesteads. In Europe, the tra- veler is surprised at not observing these iso- lated homesteads as he rides across the long ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 209 Spaces from city to cit}'. The domiciles of the farmers are generally characteristic of those of the inferior peasantry ; in America, they are comparatively manorial and stylish. In the vil- lages of America, the houses are separated and surrounded with grounds, every family seeming to desire plenty of room and out-of-door seclu- sion on their own domain. In Continental Europe, particularly, the houses in the small vil- lages are compacted as though the people possess no land to spare, or are afraid of it. Of course, this is not absolutely true in every place, but such are the differences in a general way. In Europe, the cities are more the centres of every thing than they are in America. While for Americans at large, the cities have almost no attraction as a place of residence, in Europe all life gravitates toward the cities as moths do toward a light. In America, the brisk, proud., fashionable villages, with their public libraries, free schools, lyceums, telegraphic and railroad connections, that are each of them the centre of an independent, thrifty, farming population, that are the homes of representatives, judges, gover- nors, senators, and presidents, and that consti- tute the real political power and social worth of the country, are characteristics not applicable to Europe. That peculiarly robust, active, and enterprising character of the millions of Ameri- 210 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. - can farmers who have their horses and carriages, and indulge in their use daily, who count as no trouble a twelve-mile journey to a wedding, a church, a paring-bee, a husking or raising, a party or a dance, and which migratory character is a great feature of American strength and material resources, is utterly strange to Continental Europe, where the common people have not so much the use of horses, and where social circles have nar- rower territorial limits. The 'American abroad can see that the great domain of his own country will alwaj^s be filled with a free, happy, and' strong people, owing to the distribution of acres^among them wherefrom nature stretches out her own lavish hands, full of bounties, to be merely received without effort. The pride and dignity of our population away from the cities is our American characteristic. The increase and dignifying of our cities will be our weakness. In the old world, all eyes are turned to the metropolises. France lavished mil- lions upon the new opera-house in Paris. Our rural population would not be likely to build an opera-house in a city. The American abroad can see that there can be no real happiness in Europe until the whole system of land-tenure is changed, which, however, is not likely to be done but by an agrarian revolution, an event that will as certainly occur as the world rolls on ; and ' ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 211 when, through the education of the lower orders, the spark shall be struck in any state, it will leap to other states like electric flame. CHAPTER XVIl. CONCLUSIONS. It is common for Americans returning from Europe to express themselves as more than ever gratified with their own country, countrymen, and institutions ; but with this general expression, they seldom detail their reasons why. In Europe generally, the average sentiment re- garding America is disrespect, or, at least, indif- ference. In England, every thing concerning us t) is regarded with almost contempt ; but as to all American sojourners in England, that sentiment is promptly and fully reciprocated. Individually, our •people are respected abroad for their personal bearing and their lavish outlay of money, the avidious acceptance of which is general with the entire Eastern^Hemisphere. Our prodigality is the only element that redeems us, in their ridiculous ignorance and prejudice. From the hour of leav- ing our shores, the ears of Americans in England are continually scorched with the misrepresenta- tions of their countrv, and these remarks here ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 213 will be indulged in with a view of gratifying a wholesome resentment, and of correcting some of the English criticisms. • Ship-captains, whose liv- ing is in our trade, join in this abuse ; the foreign- ers who have gained affluence ^here, and are re- turning " home" to display it, join in it ; copper- head Americans join in it, and, arriving in Eu- rope, we find but little interest taken in our coun- try but to criticise and censure. There is much more PREJUDICE IN ENGLAND regarding America than there is in America re- garding England. Americans who have had the good fortune to meet only the more educated and liberal English are deceived in this respect. The average Englishman is a companionable fellow everywhere and on every subject except the rela- tive merits of the two countries, and in that he is a clear-cut and well-defined ass. This anti-Ameri- can feeling is coextensive with the middle class of English, and to a higher degree ; and more par- ticularly are they intolerant, absurd, and bigoted who have raised themselves just above want. It is the middle class of England Avho are conserva- tive, who throw up their hats in favor of an annu- ity to the latest prince, and who unfeelingly cry down the strikes and unions whereby their less fortunate countrymen are struggling to ameliorate their condition. The small merchants, the well- 214 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. to-do mechanics, the obscure professional men, and the clerks are the most Englishy. They think the earth rolls over only for England. They read to a very limited degree, and reason less. Debar- red by law and custom from high social position, they devote their surplus energy and leisure to the pleasures rather of sense and of the time-be- ing than to high-toned aspiration. They assume to judge of America by the sporadic spleen of transient writers ; every American political "sore- head," and every rebel or '^copperhead" who tra- duces the institutions or people of his country, is gluttonously imbibed by them. Mark Twain's play, '' The Gilded Age," an idle amusement for Americans as an hyperbole of our exceptional ec- centricities, would be accepted throughout Eng- land as a fair illustration of our average life. He should take it thither : " There's millions in it." The incautious grumblings of Americans abroad, the " Yankee" lampoonings, and the exaggera- tions indulged in by the European press of our exceptional incidents of civil maladministration and our social unfinish, have set republicanism back in Europe fifty years. THE BRITISH PRESS in these matters is noticeably jealous and menda- cious. It systematically publishes of us only our ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 2X5 foibles. If the press know America, they have not succeeded in instructing their people of her. The people have heard of H. W. Beecher and the Danbury News man, and suppose those worthies '' reside in the York district." No one has any conception of our confederated character as a nation, and they do not understand American empire. They say our '' war was unholy, and every secessionist j killed was a murder." The British press is to-day lying to restrain the un- due emigration of labor, and to keep down its price ; and, to this end, they are now publishing letters purporting to come from disappointed emi- grants to America, made up of absurd stories, and savoring strongly of sancUivt invention ; and yet they say nothing about the millions of money sent by emigrants back from America to Europe to help over their friends who, by their own exer- tions, could never pay their steerage passage. The writer was present in the House of Com- mons when Mr. Butt objected to the annuity asked in behalf of Prince Leopold, and saw, when a member read from the Richmond Whig an opinion that '' Queen Victoria's government was ten times cheaper than Grant's, with its peculations," the foolish libel received by members and spectators with evident glee, and it was made the most of by the Times. The 2l6 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. COMMON ENGLISH IDEA of American society is, that it is a sort of reckless, unconscionable, English-speaking people, not in a high state of civilization, where the law is a dead letter, where public vice is rife, and where gov- ernment is a farce. They regard our few clerical scandals as an evidence of the general character of our clergy. They have heard about Jim Fisk and the Erie Railroad. They think the road is the spine of the country, and that, it being rotten, all the railroad system of the country, and the people too, have the meningitis. The captain of a coal-mine called our Northern and Southern armies mobs. He said he had his own brother for authority, who was in our war, for the statement that the two armies at first fought with pitchforks, axes, shovels, and brickbats. To say that the AVERAGE MANHOOD of the United States is above that of Europe, and that man and woman here enjoy comparative emancipation alone in the world, will suffice for this part of the subject. But English unsympathy, ignorance, prejudice, and misrepresentation re- garding us and our institutions, which all our tra- velers notice, merit more especial attention. • While Americans see much to admire and re- ECONOMICxVL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 217 vere in England, while they are amazed at Euro- pean art, the completeness and power of European governments, state and municipal, over their subjects, the resources of taxation, the perfection of public works, the material displays of power, and the national patriotism of the peoples, yet they see clearly through it all why Jefferson said the Avorld was governed too much, and that what Europeans term our " weak government " is but the STRENGTH OF OUR PEOPLE. The American government is unobtrusive and unimposing, but, under the intelligence and patri- otism of the people, is as powerful within itself as heaven. In Europe, the government is impres- sive everywhere, and monopolizes respectability. In America, government is unseen and unfelt, and its glory is disseminated, as its wealth and power are, to the people individually. Our gov- ernment officials — state and municipal — may be lax, and our corporations " soulless," v/hich give us a bad name as a people ; but comparison has shown me that here the average dignity, tone, and hon- esty of private character is above other peoples'. Private suspicion and distrust is nowhere ranker than in England. Bolts and bars belong to every do- micile, even in country shanties, which are through- out the warm summer nights tight as a jail, while 2l8 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. here they are open as an Arab's tent. Said a restaurant-keeper in Manchester to me : '' The al- mighty dollar is here as powerful as in America — it's every man for himself." Said my landlady — a widow — in London : " Keeping lodgings is bad business ; we lose a good deal by cheats. An English officer on half pay has just cheated me out of four months. ^ We landladies consider we are all right if we get hold of an American." England spends untold moneys and labor to transport huge captured cannon thousands of miles to the public squares of interior towns in order to impress the people with their prowess, while their starving laborers demonstrate their RESTLESSNESS AND DESPAIR in that species of malicious mischief known in Great Britain only ; and while their poor-laws and paupers are becoming a ''dismal problem," the people are still hero-worshipful — an element peculiar to barbarism ; they have monuments enough erected to great men to buy every pau- per Englishman a homestead, while the principal cause of lunacy in their asylums is poverty. All this wasted money and labor would be dissemi- nated in America, in substantial benefits to the people. But the idolatry of the English for their monarchy makes their burdens acceptable. ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 219 An American there, fresh in the field of compari- son, sees the direct connection between caste and the incumbrances it weaves about the people. All of our self-made presidents have been lam- pooned by English sentiment. But the QUEEN AND HER FAMILY, petted above all domain of human utilities, are not beyond criticism. In practical philan- thropy and social utility, the Queen has done less, in proportion to her opportunities, than any other woman in ten thousand ; and prac- tical sympathy with her own people has never reached the name of gratitude. This belief is crystallizing rapidly with the English people. The personal expenses of herself and progeny are accepted by her as a matter of course. Her main quality of mind is a natural relish for that govern- mental fiction — her sovereignty — v/hich her house has enjoyed at the expense of a people who, not- withstanding their varied claims to good sense, are subject to the ridicule of all the world, for their worship of a princehood that for a century has been far inferior to the average of its subjects in morality and intellect. Fifty thousand of the Queen's sisters, lost to shame, are within a walk of her palace, but she has never gone down among them with her sceptre to counsel or command, nor even blessed them wdth her scorn. The expenses of 220 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. her coronation, her mcome and the mcomes of her children, the costly trappings of court paid for out of the national exchequer, royal presents, the public conveyance of distinguished personages, princely baptisms, royal funerals, the fidgety constant journeyings of the Queen and family, the main- tenance of five royal palaces and four royal yachts, court ceremonies, allowances to trumpeters, wa- termen, marshals, and chamberlains — all tell di- rectly upon the suffering lower class, who have to pay as much for a pound of meat or a potato as the nobility do. But this burden, extra to that of a republic, bears little proportion to the in- fluence of the public debt, which removes its owners from the spheres of productive industry, and bears little proportion to the monopoly and idleness of the soil, or to the^immense army (besides the national police), the half-pay and pension list, the frequent demand for monuments, public cele- brations and receptions, household troops, sham fights, and foreign wars of conquest, or of redress of the questionable grievances of private in- dividuals who, unlike Yankees, have not the shrewdness to keep themselves out of mischief while sojourning in a foreign country. England maintains one soldier to every one hundred and fifty-eight of her inhabitants, besides maintaining the navy ; the United States have only one soldier for ever}^ fourteen hundred inhabitants. EC6N0MICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 221 All these expenses are uncommon to America, and in England the}^ ROB THE HOUSEHOLDS of their security, ease, and garnishment. There are a dozen monuments to individuals in Great Britain, each of which would buy all the public monuments in the United States. Nelson has three and Wellington two, each costing as much as Bunker Hill. It is one of the glories of America that the Washington national monument has not been completed. Washington's monument is in the hearts of his countrymen, and his history in the books of the free schools. AN ENGLISHMAN can not see an idea unless it is allegorized in gran- ite, nor recognize ability or authority unless it is behind a star or scarf. A client can not believe in his young lawyer's ability unless there be over his waxed mustache a grizzly wig, while in court ; nor can learning or dignity be seen in a judge unless he is bewigged and begowned. One flunky correspondent likened General McClellan in ability to an English head-quarters' orderly, because McClellan wore a slouched hat and citi- zen's dress. For us to claim generalship for Grant or Sherman meets with only their mute 222 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. contempt ; but they accord genius to Lee. They know all about Stonewall Jackson, but don't know Howard nor Thomas. Their sympathies were, and still are, with our secessionists ; they can not recognize any body's right to empire but that of the English. It is said there is more liberty in England than in America. A Brooklyn clergyman, recently, has said he failed to see where there was less freedom in England than in America. Had he attempted to walk erect, like a man, into grades there corresponding to those here, into which he freely enters, he would have learned through his dullest senses what his perceptions could not discover. Dickens could " not go as a man whither he Avas invited as an actor." The peo- ple have the " liberty'' of knowing there are offices and social positions to which they can never aspire ; they have the " liberty" to pay their taxes and be led by their aristocracy without question ; they have the " liberty" of prisoners in jail, the " liberty" of a car on its track, the " liber- ty" of tadpoles in a mud-puddle ; but they have not the high sense of liberty in full, free, dignified, emancipated, equal manhood. The American sti- mulus to young men's good behavior afforded in political preferment is wanting in England. An Englishman's house is called his castle, where he may terrorize over his children, and kick his ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 223 wife to death with his clogs. They have " liber- ty" to support the established church, and to pay the expenses of government without ques- tioning. They have *' liberty" to vote for mem- bers of the House of Commons only, who are and must be conservative, essentially, and who can not criticise the expenses of the sovereign without being charged with treason. The country is weighted down with conservatism ; it is thick as the London fog, and is a pack upon every poor Englishman's back. Liberty ! the compartment cars are a symbol of their political and social liberty, and of the cribbed and confined move- ments of men. All the laws of the state, the rules of society, the practices of corporations and business establishments, proclaim, " Confine your- self to your own sphere;" '' Mind your own busi- ness;" "Beware of the dog;" " No admittance ;" *' Trespassers punished." The people know noth- ing except in their own business and their own sphere, and, accident throwing them out of their single vocation, they are helpless; suspicion and uncharity brood everywhere. In America, inter- course between man and man is open, welcoming^ unsuspecting ; in all Europe, it is distrustful. Here hospitality is easy, and the house-door is open ; there, if the door of the private house be not shut tight as a clam, such hospitality as you find is over- strained and affected with dignity. English domi- 224 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. ciliary exclusiveness even reaches so far as to ex- clude sunlight and fresh air. There are few uni- versal ideas; there is but little intercommunica- tion, and public opinion is not as developed as in America. An indication of the^difference in the degrees of self-government between Americans and other peoples will be seen in the difference of know- ledge of civil government. It is only with the utmost difficulty that an American traveler can, upon inquiry of an English subject, Frenchman, Italian, Austrian, or German, obtain any informa- tion a-bout the workings of their governments, either state or municipal. The merchant, the school-teacher, the farmer, the mechanic, and also the lawyer, are ignorant of the duties of civil administration. The method of taxation, direct and indirect, the maintenance of public improvements, and the red tape of office are left by the people to a class, while any average American can fill any office. The English speak of our LAXITY OF PUBLIC MORALS. Their laxity oi private morals furnishes examples of nameless crimes and obscene literature and traditions for all the world. Their inferior courts are charnel-houses of beastliness, as ours are when the foreign element among us predominates. Real ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 225 Americanism in America, though born in the slums by accident, will aspire with a bound into decency and refinement. It does not beat women, invent malicious and dirty mischief, nor murder non- union men. We have been charged with YANKEE TRICKS, but adulteration of food has become so frightful in England as to require the interference of Parlia- ment ; and Carlyle has recently said, '' All Eng- land has decided that the most profitable way is to do its work ill, swiftly, slimly, and mendacious- ly." They praise the STABILITY OF THEIR GOVERNMENT, while Trafalgar square often resounds with ora- tors predicting a republic, and denouncing princely annuities. They boast of official purity while as large a percentage of their people are in the peni- tentiary as that of any other country. But should their civil administrators steal, the people, in their ignorance of civil government, could never detect it; and if they could detect it, they could not remedy it, having no elections for those offices. The grand jury they have, but that is not so ser- viceable for reforms as public opinion, which in 226 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. America is more spontaneous and operative than anywhere else in the world. AGRARIAN IDEAS are arising that are only the natural sequence of a barbaric policy in land ownerships that could not exist in the twentieth century. England is not now self-supporting. The London markets have grain, fruit, and vegetables from all parts of the world. England's land is used for parks and as grazing pastures for London's mutton-chops- Let America lay an embargo on grain, France on vegetables, and Spain on fruit, then all the world would pity England. An American returns to his native land con- tent, with the exception of his impatience to cul- tivate in his countrymen more national pride. He sees his countrymen proud in an average manhood above that of any other in the world. Here the lower orders are low only a generation, and do not entail their condition upon their descendants. He sees his people are less affected by baubles, are cool, plain, direct, practical, proud, self-sustaining, self-controlling, of more work and less talk, men of more fighting and less scolding and that they have a private honor, a social faith, a democratic respect of each other, and freedom of spirit not realized elsewhere. But let not our ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 22/ metropolis be taken as a criterion, where foreign influences have assimilated ; nor our seaports, the dumping-grounds of the Old World's social slough, and where, widely, American society itself is degenerated by the infection of foreign fraud, vice, cowardice, disloyalty ; nor the ex- ceptional specimens of degenerated Americans who only disgust the superior foreigner. The writer frequently observes "bands" of exclusive Americans, whose shriveled characters, moral and physical, provoke only his mortification. For twenty years, the writer has been a traveler and observer throughout the length and breadth of our land, and now speaks in comparison with the length and breadth of other lands. There is no prejudice in the foregoing compari- sons of peoples ; they are the involuntary impres- sions received by Americans generally while abroad. The upper half of all peoples can, in education, refinement, and common decency of intercourse, assimilate with each other; but the lower half of all foreign peoples will not find in America, away from the seaports, their counter- part in the elements of stupidity, jealousy, preju- dice, bigotry, cowardice, puerility, and whatever bemeans humanity. Our millions of rosy, bold boys and girls who walk miles over the crusted snow to the free schools ; the robust, roaming, rural population, trained from childhood with ax 228 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. and gun, and rod and saddle, in vast spaces of fresh air, with the stimulus of inviting and unfor- bidden domains, conscious of free ballot, free press, and free religion, who inherit no masters and know not vassalage — this character has no coun- terpart in Europe. As the government in Europe robs the individual of identity, and assumes to it- self power, dignity, and majesty, so it goes further and monopolizes all the integrity. I will not quarrel with any body who says the governments of Europe are more respectable than ours ; but private honesty and honor in America are, to my eyes, above that of all the world. From Europe, an American can look to his own land, and there see, not monuments nor arts, but principles governing society as distinct from those of Europe as the mountain-peaks of the Alps, such as national temperance, national Sabbath- keeping, national honor to women, free education, cheap government, strict decency, and mutual faith between the classes. Hail ! then, American flag ! Hail ! bright, free, aspiring, abundant, generous America ! Our com- patriots always meet each other in Europe with more mutual regard, and a degree of congratula- tion upon the institutions of their own country and the character of their countrymen. Wherever they have moved in strange lands, it has been among people who know not the word " equality ;" FXONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. 229 they see nobilit}^ on the one hand and degrada- tion on the other, the arrogance and contempt of the former and servility of the latter, and the two classes meeting only in mutual distrust ; and then the Americans recur to their own native country to exclaim, '' Land of the noble, free!" The temples and palaces they meet ma}^ for for an hour, bewilder them with their dimensions and their art, but to the drones about them, and w^ho fill them, they have not seemed to impart any extra superiority ; and they look back to America, where the free spirits of men have strengthened 'mid its " rocks and rills," its '^ woods and templed hills." They also see everywhere abroad the power and conservative imposition of the state -church, and yet widespread vice and dishonesty among the people ; and then they sigh of the land of the Pil- grims, " Our fathers God, to thee. Author of liberty." They see all peoples on bended knee to their monarchs, and they repeat of the land of Washing- ton, ''Protect us by thy might, great God, our King!" And often in heartfelt emotion iVmeri- cans abroad join in Holmes' hymn "America," which may here be quoted as a fit 2^0 ECONOMICAL EUROPEAN TOURIST. CONCLUSION. ' My native country ! thee, Land of the ttoble, free, Thy name I love. I love thy rocks and rills. Thy woods" •a.ndi templed hills; My heart with rapture thrills Like that above. Onr fathers' God, to thee, J Author of liberty, To thee we sing ! Long may our land be bright With freedom's holy light ; Protect us by thy might, Great God, oi^r King !" APPENDIX. The following fares are given to show generally the expense of European car-fare. Making Lon- don the starting-point, and then fixing the fares to certain principal points, the reader can approxi- mate his fare for any trip he may select, and allow- ing about as much for lodging and eating as he would in America per diem, can approximate, to within a few dollars, his entire expenses : ; Time. ist Class. 2d Class. 3d Class. From Liverpool to London, 6 hours $12 50 $8 00 $5 50 From London to Berlin, . From London to Geneva, via Paris, .... From London to Naples, via Trieste, Venice, Flor- ence, Rome, and back to Geneva, .... From London to Madrid, via Paris, From London to St. Peters- burg, via Berlin, From London to Paris, Cook & Co. have arranged to furnish return or circidar tours, with stop-over permits, at much lower figures, and their offices may be found in New-York and all the principal cities of Europe. 36 hours 33 39 28 00 22 00 34 hours 33 00 24 38 19 00 7 days -]-] 00 64 00 49 00 2 days 61 00 49 00 40 00 4 days ^72 00 61 00 52 00 10 hours 16 00 II 00 7 00