LITTLE IDYLS J 
 
 B!GWORL:D M5CRACKANI 

 
 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE 
 BIG WORLD
 
 . /
 
 UMf. er 
 
 CALIF. UBBARTi. W>S \»0»**
 
 THE CAMl'At'.NA — ROME.
 
 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE 
 BIG WORLD 
 
 BY 
 
 W. D. McCRACKAN, M. A. 
 
 AUTHOR OF "the RISE OF THE SWISS REPUBLIC" 
 
 "romance and teutonic SWITZERLAND" 
 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 BOSTON 
 
 JOSEPH KNIGHT COMPANY 
 
 1895
 
 Copyright, 1895, 
 By Joseph Knight Company. 
 
 Printed by C. H. Simonds & Co. 
 Boston, U. S. A,
 
 BEING A FEW WORLD PROBLEMS: 
 STATED, BUT NOT SOLVED; SOME 
 HUMAN DOCUMENTS UNROLLED; 
 AND SOME SIGHTS THAT SUGGEST. 
 
 2131445
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 I. PONTIFEX MaXIMUS 
 
 II. That Little Neapolitan Lie 
 
 III. A Riot in Rome . 
 
 IV. The Angels of the Baptistery 
 V. A Woman of Paris 
 
 VI. On the French Frontier . 
 
 VII. Jeanne d'Arc's Land . 
 
 VIII. The Germania 
 
 IX. A Sunday in Vienna . 
 
 X. The Sultan's Prayer . 
 
 XI. Dancing Dervishes 
 
 XII. From Smyrna to Ephesus . 
 
 XIII. Ali, the Brigand 
 
 XIV. A Train of Camels 
 
 XV. The Goatherd of Priene . 
 
 XVI. HiERAPOLis, the Holy 
 
 XVII. Their Golden Wedding 
 
 XVIII. At the Manoeuvres 
 
 XIX. Self-Government 
 
 XX. Hoeing Potatoes . 
 
 Page. 
 
 I 
 
 9 
 
 17 
 
 27 
 
 32 
 
 42 
 
 61 
 
 70 
 
 83 
 
 95 
 
 100 
 
 107 
 
 117 
 
 125 
 
 131 
 138 
 155 
 159 
 165 
 
 ^73
 
 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE 
 BIG WORLD. 
 
 I. 
 
 PONTIFEX MAXIMUS. 
 
 A RUMOR had gone abroad that the 
 Pope was to officiate in St. Peter's at 
 the mass for the dead on All Saints' Day. 
 The spectacle was sufficiently rare to send 
 all Rome pouring over the bridge of St. 
 Angelo to see Leo XIII. break through 
 that thin crust of fiction which makes him 
 a prisoner in the Vatican. 
 
 There was unwonted animation on the 
 piazza. Bernini's curving colonnades, usu- 
 ally deserted, were thronged with sight- 
 seers. The two fountains were playing, 
 and with every puff of wind sprinkled an 
 eager crowd that filed in thin lines towards 
 the steps. Cabs rattled across the paved
 
 2 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 piazza to leave their occupants under the 
 fa9ade. The ugly accumulation of build- 
 ings which constitute the Vatican, that non- 
 descript growth of many centuries, loomed 
 into a sky of tender blue. But the mon- 
 ster dome dominated everything, placid 
 and full-fed, like a gilded idol, sitting se- 
 renely upon its massive substructure. 
 
 As the faithful mounted the steps in the 
 light of the sun, and entered within, they 
 seemed to disappear into a dark, insatiable 
 maw, from which there could be no return. 
 
 Behind the leather curtains of St. Peter's 
 there is a climate which knows neither 
 winter nor summer. Its atmosphere is as 
 unvarying as that of some island on a 
 southern sea, — soothing, full of genial 
 caress. Its day is toned to twilight, and 
 its night holy with unquenched candles. 
 
 As I entered, the place was full of small 
 echoes that came from the moving of 
 chairs, the footfalls of men in cassocks, or 
 the occasional closing of a chapel door. 
 There were murmurs of distant prayers, of
 
 PONTIFEX MAXIMUS. 3 
 
 sudden " Aniens ! " on the organ, or chants 
 in monotone. The sibilants, which are al- 
 ways heard in churches, struck upon the ear 
 from all sides, and the very whisperings of 
 the confessional seemed hovering in the air. 
 All these sounds were caught up by the 
 dome, and thence re-echoed, tempered into 
 a musing harmony. Ah, the immensity 
 which was suggested by this strange mu- 
 sical quality ! It was more convincing 
 than all the statistics of measurement. 
 
 Cherubs sported on the pillars, or grouped 
 themselves into medallions, — delicious cre- 
 ations full of joy and mischief, who alone 
 served to mitigate the essential vulgarity 
 of the prevailing decoration. For what 
 could exceed the burlesque of the statues, 
 betraying the decay of art ? Heroic proph- 
 ets, standing in theatrical attitudes, their 
 garments hanging in unnatural folds, or on 
 the tombs the voluptuous figures of women, 
 grinning skulls, and popes, knowing-look- 
 ing and wordly-wise. Bernini's baldachino 
 rose in costly vandalism above the main
 
 4 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 altar, and at the extremity of the chapel 
 there was a grotesque glory of gilded 
 plaster. But even this plaid of mosaic de- 
 tail could not rob St. Peter's of its magnifi- 
 cent lines, which, in the aggregate, produce 
 an impression of vastness, at first unsus- 
 pected, but gradually creeping into the 
 soul, never to depart. 
 
 While I waited in the church, the Vati- 
 can was swarming like a hive. 
 
 All grades of the Roman hierarchy had 
 sent representatives ; all the orders, in 
 their multi-colored cowls, were there ; emis- 
 saries from the ends of the earth, to wait 
 upon the holy father ; country clergymen, 
 coming like Luther, all reverence, into the 
 realms of intrigue ; glib 771011 sig?2 ore, who 
 proselyte among the visiting nobility, and 
 haunt the hotels for converts ; monks 
 sworn to poverty, bronzed and bearded ; 
 priests with the stamp of holy living on 
 their faces ; secret spies, money lenders, 
 and political advisers ; missionaries and
 
 PONTIP^EX MAXIiMUS. 5 
 
 chaplains ; men fresh from the benedic- 
 tions of their parishes, or debauched b)' 
 crimes begun at the confessional or in the 
 flattery of the drawing-room. Pages, clad 
 in scarlet, hurried through the passages in 
 the service of the cardinals. 
 
 In the cells of that mighty hive there 
 was feasting and praying, fasting and 
 blaspheming ; for aspirations and infamies, 
 which were to affect the world, were being 
 concocted, and the representative of the 
 Nazarene Carpenter was crying aloud for 
 kingly power. 
 
 And all the time the Swiss guard watched 
 by the portals. They looked theatrical, 
 and just a little foolish, in the costume of 
 red, black and yellow designed by Mich- 
 ael Angelo. The deliberate guttural of 
 their speech contrasted strangely with the 
 soft Italian of their environment ; and, in- 
 deed, they stood there somewhat shame- 
 faced, as the only survivors of that mer- 
 cenary system which, in the Middle Ages, 
 sapped the national life of Switzerland,
 
 6 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 and made her the prey of bribing ambass- 
 adors. 
 
 But the time had come. An impatient 
 crowd awaited the entry of the Pontiff into 
 St. Peter's, with apprehension growing, 
 lest they be cheated of the promised spec- 
 tacle. 
 
 There was heard a loud clanging, as 
 the iron gate of a chapel was thrown 
 open, and a train of vested ecclesiastics 
 issued into the church, and moved towards 
 the main altar. But their magnificence 
 was as nothing to what followed, for 
 suddenly there came a hoarse command, 
 and the papal guard presented arms to 
 the divinity of the place. He came, borne 
 upon the shoulders of the faithful in his 
 sedia, covered with a silken canopy. 
 
 Hail, Pontifex Maximus ! Ruler of the 
 world ! 
 
 The triple mitre was on his head, from 
 which some of the greatest jewels of the 
 ages sparkled loftily ; his vestments glit- 
 tered beside his pallid, old man's skin.
 
 PONTIFEX MAXIMUS. 7 
 
 He raised his jewelled hand in blessing, 
 bending now to one side, now to the 
 other over the serried ranks, and thus 
 passed on. 
 
 And his face ? It was keen and in- 
 tellectual, even to shrewdness, ever watch- 
 ful and nervous, yet restrained, — a face 
 fit for a scholar, a diplomat, and a fox; 
 at once harrowed and self-contained, anx- 
 ious and full of resources, cast in a 
 conservative mould, and yet liberal beyond 
 his environment. 
 
 The magnificence of this ceremony 
 appalled. Its audacity made one afraid, 
 and yet it fascinated with a savage splen- 
 dor. 
 
 An Anglican clergyman w^ho had been 
 watching with wrapt countenance, now 
 fell upon his knees, for the mark of his 
 future apostasy was already upon him. 
 
 Then the sombre music of the mass 
 for the dead stole through the church, 
 from where the incense and the candles 
 burned, and after a while I heard the
 
 8 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 thin, small voice of an old man in faint 
 recitation. It sounded attenuated by the 
 immensity of the church, as though it 
 had passed through many atmospheres, or 
 pierced the walls of a tomb. The quaver- 
 ing monotone ceased amid a profound, 
 prayerful hush. 
 
 God rest their souls ! 
 
 When the procession returned from the 
 altar to the chapel door along the marble 
 pavement, I could see the Pope far down 
 the cheering throng, swaying slightly upon 
 his lofty sedia, blessing as he passed, 
 smiling with polite serenity, gratified by 
 the enthusiasm, but weary with old age. 
 
 Outside, the sun beat joyously upon 
 the piazza from a luminous sky, the 
 fountains prattled to the bathing pigeons, 
 the air came spring-like to the nostrils ; 
 there was the rumble of Rome in the dis- 
 tance, and all the joys of daily life came 
 back again.
 
 II. 
 
 THAT LITTLE NEAPOLITAN LIE. 
 
 THE porter of the small Albergo 
 Buona Mano liked to put advent- 
 ure into his work. He would rather any 
 day make a soldo by various shifts than 
 a lira by direct business methods. 
 
 It was in his blood. 
 
 Not many foreigners came his way. 
 Occasionally he caught a German artist, 
 bound for Capri; once he had lured a 
 couple of British old maids from the 
 beaten track of star-marked Baedecker 
 hotels ; but, for the most part, he had 
 to exercise his talents upon Italian com- 
 mercial travellers, who were often more 
 than his peers. 
 
 As Guiseppe drove to the station one 
 afternoon on the step of the omnibus, 
 his mind was full of delightful criminal- 
 ities. By the time the driver had drawn 
 
 9
 
 lO LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 up in line with the other omnibuses of 
 Naples, the porter had secured, in imagi- 
 nation, a family of very rich Americans, 
 who feed him every time they passed in 
 or out the hotel door; a dashing prima 
 donna, who made eyes at him and showed 
 her teeth with a rich smile ; an aged 
 count, a diplomat, on his way to the 
 east, who ordered many carriages ; and 
 a party of English who used him as a 
 courier, and took him shopping for bar- 
 gains. He was very glad to go with 
 them, and always got his twenty-five per 
 cent, of the purchases from the shop- 
 keepers. 
 
 The whistle of the train, arriving from 
 Rome, woke our friend from his day- 
 dreams, just as he had persuaded the 
 King of Italy and the Star of Savoy 
 herself to take lodgings in the Albergo 
 Buona Mano. 
 
 But his watchful eye soon after fell 
 upon some American tourists, who were 
 standing disconsolate and distracted be-
 
 THAT LITTLE NEAPOLITAN LIE. I I 
 
 fore the line of omnibuses. Evidently 
 kind Providence had sent an answer to 
 his hopes. It would be wrong to neglect 
 so fertile a field, especially as these tour- 
 ists, for some reason or other, refused the 
 overtures of one porter after another. 
 
 " No," said the man among them who 
 had travelled before ; " I won't take the 
 first that offers. Last time I was here 
 I stayed at a certain Hotel Diana, over- 
 looking the Chiaia. I don't see the om- 
 nibus, though." 
 
 " Ask, why don't you ? " came from a 
 weary woman's voice. 
 
 "Ask ? My dear, you must never ask ques- 
 tions in Naples. They make you pay for 
 everything here, even when they lie to you." 
 
 Guiseppe had a master's eye for effects. 
 He chose his moments for action with the 
 skill of a great general. It was in his 
 blood. 
 
 " Vant 'otel Diane ? Verra veil ; I do ze 
 zervice 'otel Diane. Si, si I omnibus, — 
 to lite de suite '^
 
 12 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 The tourists looked at each other. 
 
 " I don't understand," objected the man- 
 who-had-travelled-before, " how he can do 
 the service for Hotel Diana, when the sign 
 on his omnibus says ' Albergo Buona 
 Mano.' " 
 
 A female voice : " I am beginning to 
 hate Naples ! Let 's have the baggage put 
 on and get away." 
 
 " Si, si ! I do ze zervice 'otel Diane," 
 came from Guiseppe, at regular intervals. 
 
 The party clambered into the little omni- 
 bus, much relieved ; but a cloud of distrust 
 still rested upon the brow of the man-who- 
 had-travelled-before. 
 
 As the omnibus rattled over the streets 
 of Naples, Guiseppe swung up and down 
 on the step, smiling innocently upon his 
 victims within. It had been almost too 
 easy, this capture. He heard the-man-who- 
 had-travelled-before describe the atrocities 
 committed by the cab-drivers of Naples, 
 the piracies of the men who rowed passen- 
 gers over to the Capri boat. Guiseppe felt
 
 THAT LITTLE NEAPOLITAN LIE. 1 3 
 
 as though he were playing the part of vil- 
 lain in some dear old melodrama. He 
 hugged this theatrical thought to his heart. 
 He felt it course through his veins. It 
 was in his blood. 
 
 Instead of driving to the Chiaia, the om- 
 nibus plunged into a labyrinth of narrow 
 streets. 
 
 The man - who - had - travelled - before 
 seemed to grow restless. 
 
 " I can't see why we should go through 
 the back streets. Hotel Diana is by the 
 water." 
 
 Guiseppe looked carefully away, fearing 
 to betray his joy, and presently the omni- 
 bus drew up before the Albergo Buona 
 Mano, a sad and sombre-looking inn, full 
 of dread possibilities. Guiseppe opened 
 the door with a wide swing of welcome, 
 and proceeded to take out whatever bags 
 and bundles were nearest. 
 
 " Heh there ! " shouted the-man-who-had- 
 travelled-before. " What 's all this ? Drop 
 those bags ! Drive on. This is n't Hotel
 
 14 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 Diana ; this is your miserable Albergo 
 Buona Mano ! " 
 
 With a look of gentle commiseration, 
 Guiseppe shrugged his shoulders. 
 
 " Scuse mea, Votel Diane n^existe plus. 
 Voila ! I t'ink you lika dis place." 
 
 " N^existe phis ? There is n't any Hotel 
 Diana any longer ? But you said you 'd — 
 So you lied when you said you 'd take 
 us to Hotel Diana ? I '11 break every 
 bone in your body ! (Let me alone, girls ; 
 we 've got to show them we won't stand 
 it !) I '11 teach you to lie to an American ! " 
 
 Before Guiseppe could dodge, the man- 
 who-had-travelled-before had seized him by 
 the coat-collar, and was shaking him to 
 a running accompaniment of keen com- 
 ments upon the character of Italians in 
 general and porters in particular. 
 
 At the first sound the proprietor came 
 rushing out, with hands upraised, beseech- 
 ing the kind forcstiere to have patience. 
 It was a misunderstanding. 
 
 " I want you to know that I am con-
 
 THAT LITTLE NEAPOLITAN LIE. I 5 
 
 nected with the press. A word from me, 
 and your hotel will go higher than a kite." 
 
 The proprietor hoped the party would be 
 comfortable at the Albergo. 
 
 " No, sir ! I would n't stay here now for 
 a farm. Climb out, girls. We '11 take a 
 cab, and drive to the swellest hotel in 
 town." 
 
 By this time all the servants of the inn 
 were in the street, every window of the 
 neighborhood was full of delighted spec- 
 tators. 
 
 Guiseppe stood there, dazed by his 
 shaking. His jaw fell helplessly. As 
 the cab drove off with his victims, he 
 had one moment of supreme satisfaction. 
 He saw them suddenly duck their heads 
 together, pull their coat-collars and shawls 
 over their ears, and take out their hand- 
 kerchiefs. Some good soul had thrown 
 a lot of water upon them from a lofty 
 window. 
 
 Then Guiseppe finally broke into a long, 
 stage laugh. He felt like an artist, foiled,
 
 l6 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 but Still devoted to his art. It was in his 
 blood, 
 
 Guiseppe laughed on, until the proprietor 
 of the inn came to tell him that he was 
 discharged.
 
 III. 
 
 A RIOT IN ROME. 
 
 MY little apartment was perched high 
 in air on the via Quattro Fon- 
 tane. The sun poured into it for half 
 the day, and for the other half the vary- 
 ing winds of a Roman winter crept through 
 the ill-fitting windows and chilled the stone 
 floor. 
 
 In February there came a dull day, — 
 moist, unwholesome, and threatening rain. 
 I was reading the Tribuna after lunch, 
 when something made me start to my 
 feet and step out upon the miniature 
 balcony that overlooked the street. There 
 was a sound in the direction of the Corso 
 I had never heard before, — a distant, ill- 
 defined, elemental murmur : as of the 
 sea, and yet not so common a sound; 
 without apparent pulsations, but rising 
 on a cumulative crescendo that betrayed
 
 1 8 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 no gradations of increase ; a smooth, com- 
 pressed roar, heart-sickening, and not de- 
 void of a certain grewsome harmony. 
 
 Pigeons darted and flapped, as usual, 
 over the house-tops, or strutted on the 
 roofs ; a gray sky lowered upon the 
 sunless city; the stone-cutters, at work 
 on the Canadian convent opposite, chipped 
 noisily from their Travertine stone, — but 
 in the street there seemed to have arisen 
 a vague alarm. 
 
 It communicated itself with mysterious 
 rapidity to the people on the pavement, to 
 the drivers of cabs and carts in the middle 
 of the street, and finally to the shopkeepers. 
 People were seen to stop suddenly, and 
 then hurry off in new directions. Car- 
 riages, coming from the Via Nazionale 
 and going toward the Venti Settembre, 
 pulled up and started back on a gallop. 
 The owner of the pizzicheria^ on the 
 corner, came out in his white apron, to 
 put up his iron shutters, rattling them 
 violently, in trembling haste.
 
 A RIOT IN ROME. 1 9 
 
 The Stone - cutters and masons at 
 the Canadian convent stole cautiously 
 from their work, pale with apprehension 
 and uncertainty, and peered up and down, 
 irresolute. 
 
 As the sound approached, it lost its 
 harmonious character. It could now be 
 differentiated into its component parts. 
 
 There was the steady fundamental note, 
 made by the rumble of the city, but the 
 superimposed noises of panic could be 
 distinguished from one another. Doors 
 slammed, bolts were pushed forward, 
 men ran through the emptying streets, 
 shouting incoherent warnings, a runaway 
 horse trailed his torn harness behind him. 
 The shopkeepers watched before their 
 doors with ashy-gray countenances. 
 
 Then came a crashing sound, which 
 dominated all other notes, — inexplicable, 
 ominous, full of nameless terrors, — and 
 after that the rioters themselves appeared 
 over the brow of the hill. 
 
 They were mostly young fellows, some
 
 2 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 mere boys, clad in the canvas and cor- 
 duroy of the Italian workmen. 
 
 They carried shovels and picks, and 
 dashed them, as they ran, against the 
 unprotected shop windows. It was this 
 constant crashing of breaking glass which 
 had given warning of their coming. A 
 spirit of exaltation seemed upon them. 
 Some overmastering force was directing 
 their actions, and had stamped a look 
 of purpose upon their faces, which ex- 
 cluded all fear for the future. Undersized 
 and ill-fed, as they doubtless were, they 
 ran with a toss of the dark hair which 
 was truly magnificent, — these votaries of 
 a goddess whose name was Revolution. 
 
 There was a driver from the country 
 who had left his cart standing full of 
 firewood, cut, Italian fashion, into long 
 sticks. The rioters quickly overturned this 
 cart, and discarding their heavy tools, 
 armed themselves with the handier sticks. 
 They did not stop to steal or even scatter 
 the contents of the shop windows, but
 
 A RIOT IN ROME. 2 1 
 
 hurried on, in the service of their implac- 
 able goddess, to do their utmost, before, 
 exhausted by their mad exertions, they 
 should fall an easy prey to the police, 
 who now began to show themselves. 
 
 One fellow struck the photographer's 
 showcase, on the ground floor, a resound- 
 ing blow, shattering the glass into a 
 thousand splinters. 
 
 Over at the convent the vacillation of 
 the employed, in the face of the excesses 
 of the unemployed, was a study in itself. 
 It was evident that the stone-cutters and 
 masons felt the contagion of the moment, 
 for at sight of the rioting, they rushed 
 hither and thither witlessly, uncertain 
 whether to make enemies of their em- 
 ployers, or of their poorer brothers. I 
 cannot tell, to this day, whether or not I 
 was disappointed when they decided to 
 return to their work, casting furtive glances 
 about, to see if their momentary sympathy 
 with the elements of disorder had been 
 observed.
 
 2 2 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 Just beyond the Via Nazionale a really 
 charming scene was enacted. A young 
 lieutenant had stationed himself in the 
 middle of the street, in front of the glass- 
 covered Galleria Marguerita, to bar the 
 way of the stragglers. He stood with his 
 sword drawn, his army mantle hanging 
 from his shoulder like a Roman toga, — 
 posed as for a painter. The whole had 
 just that theatrical touch which appeals to 
 the Italian character, and made him next 
 day the talk of the cafis. 
 
 And the causes of this sudden outbreak, 
 — what were they ? 
 
 When Rome became the capital of Italy, 
 in 1870, its grass-grown streets and de- 
 serted piazzas took on another aspect. A 
 real-estate boom was started, as pronounced 
 as that of any prairie town in America. 
 
 It attracted laborers from the provinces 
 in unheard-of numbers. A great rejuvena- 
 tion was begun in the ancient quarters ; 
 the hitherto unprotected marvels of an-
 
 A RIOT IN ROME. 23 
 
 tiquity were set apart for public edification ; 
 vast sums were expended on improvements 
 of all sorts. 
 
 Then came a reaction. During the en- 
 suing period of stagnation men were ap- 
 palled at the debts they had contracted, at 
 the boodle the politicians had appropriated 
 under cover of popular services; but, 
 worse than all, the unemployed workmen 
 haunted the traftorie, to talk over their 
 grievances. They had brought their fami- 
 lies with them from the country districts, 
 and now found themselves stranded, with 
 the margin of starvation slowly receding. 
 
 To add to the general misery of the situ- 
 ation, Italy had joined the triple alliance. 
 
 The army and the navy must be inor- 
 dinately increased to satisfy the demands of 
 the allies. The Budget, which had for some 
 years been coaxed into an annual surplus, 
 showed a deficit. Increased taxation fol- 
 lowed. The necessaries of life rose steadily 
 in price, as high tariffs on imports were 
 decreed ; for in Italy, as elsewhere, war, or
 
 2 4 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 the fear of war, goes hand in hand with 
 so-called protection of native industries. 
 
 While King Humbert was feasting Em- 
 peror William, and showing him his soldiers 
 and sailors, there was a fermentation in the 
 rookeries of the Roman poor. 
 
 The unemployed finally met in open 
 assemblies to take counsel, usually on the 
 drill-ground, which lies between the 
 churches of St. John Lateran and of the 
 Holy Cross of Jerusalem. 
 
 They still bore their ills with that mar- 
 vellous patience of the Italian people, pre- 
 ferring to endure for a time, if, perchance, 
 work might be given. A committee was 
 finally sent to beg the Syndic of Rome for 
 relief works. But how was it possible to 
 involve the municipal finances, already on 
 the verge of bankruptcy, in further out- 
 lays ? Besides, confidence was shaken, 
 credit poor ; and so the committee returned 
 empty handed. 
 
 Several days passed, several more meet- 
 ings were held, growing noisier as they pro-
 
 A RIOT IN ROME. 25 
 
 gressed. Further refusals of help were 
 reported, until one day violent counsels 
 prevailed over the . customary advices of 
 prudence. 
 
 A few Socialists and Anarchists by pro- 
 fession spoke of the great revolution which 
 must come some day ; they urged concerted 
 action against capital. Then some fellow 
 exclaimed that the time for talking had 
 passed ; the moment for action was at 
 hand. Shouts rose from the ranks. A 
 moderate orator tried to make himself 
 heard above the hoarse din; but when 
 some one took a stone from a pile which 
 lay there for building purposes, and hurled 
 it at a passing carriage, the long-pent-up, 
 savage hatred of those thousands had burst 
 its bonds. 
 
 They issued from the square a cursing, 
 howling mob, to overrun Rome until the 
 evening. 
 
 That night the stars looked down upon a 
 great ufiinhabited waste, lying all around 
 the Eternal City.
 
 26 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 It was the Campagna, breeding malaria 
 for want of tillage. 
 
 A few noble families, sprung from papal 
 orgies, alone have the right to graze their 
 sheep and horses upon it. 
 
 Ever and anon a buffalo strode through 
 the moonlight, sniffing the night air with 
 outstretched head, its black sides glistening 
 in the light. The ruined aqueducts seemed 
 always on the march across the plain from 
 Tivoli, or from the silver-blue Alban Hills. 
 St. Peter reared its dome silhouette, and 
 the broken tombs watched wearily beside 
 the Appian Way. 
 
 But in Rome itself the prisons were full 
 of starving wretches. 
 
 For that same human greed which had 
 reserved the Campagna for the cattle, had 
 also robbed them of their heritage.
 
 THE ANGELS OF THE BAPTISTERY 
 
 A BLIND beggar was plying his trade 
 one December day in the cathedral 
 enclosure of Pisa. 
 
 He was not as blind as he seemed, for 
 he watched visitors warily with open eyes, 
 until they neared, and then stood blinking, 
 with suffering mien and extended hand, 
 ready to curse if they passed on unheed- 
 ing. 
 
 The great bell in the Leaning Tower 
 rang out the noon hour with terrific rever- 
 berations, threatening to destroy the whole 
 structure in a cataclysm of battling vibra- 
 tions. 
 
 Soon after, an Englishman arrived in a 
 carriage, and proceeded to see the sights. 
 He was of the usual w^ell-dressed, well- 
 groomed, man-of-the-world type. His face 
 was without expression.
 
 28 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 After a stolid visit to the Tower, he en- 
 tered the cathedral, which had weathered 
 yellow-brown, and looked painted in vari- 
 ous shades of sepia. 
 
 The blind beggar waited outside. 
 
 A quiet magnificence made itself felt 
 within the cathedral, from the bronzed 
 doors to the chastely-carved altars, de- 
 signed by Michael Angelo, and the profuse 
 ornaments in costly lapis lazuli. Andrea 
 del Sarto's picture of St. Agnes hung 
 from a column, showing the holy maid 
 gazing heavenward, the orange-yellow of 
 her garments crossed by shadows of lovely 
 purple. In the transept Galileo's pendu- 
 lum-lamp was suspended, resting now, after 
 having taught mankind a new set of laws. 
 
 But the Englishman came out unmoved, 
 and the blind beggar cursed him quietly 
 for his indifference. 
 
 A strong light poured into the galleries 
 of the Campo Santo, flecking the worn 
 pavements. On the eastern side white 
 modern statues were thrown into refulgent
 
 THE ANGELS OF THE BAPTISTERY. 29 
 
 relief against a background of fading 
 frescoes. Pathetically crude, these latter, 
 full of the grotesque images of the feudal 
 mind, figures jumbled together haphazard 
 and with only a primitive sense of color 
 and perspective. An old-time solemnity 
 haunted this resting-place, but it did not 
 impress the Englishman. He strode by, 
 without noticing the hand of the blind 
 beggar. The latter cursed him a second 
 time, more roundly. 
 
 And, last of all, there w^as the Baptistery, 
 set on the ground like a monster papal 
 tiara, bristling with ornaments, and rounded 
 at the top like a dome. It has a rich and 
 reverent interior. Half-lights steal in 
 through small, sparkling windows. There 
 is a font of marvellous inlaid marbles, 
 and then the famous pulpit of Niccola 
 Pisano, wdth its strong reliefs and polished 
 pillars borne upon archaic lions. 
 
 The Englishman was about to return 
 to his carriage when the blind beggar, 
 standing just within the door, touched his 
 arm and motioned him to listen.
 
 30 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 He sang the four notes of a chord in 
 slow succession up into the vault, by no 
 means well or sweetly, but as anyone 
 might do. 
 
 Then, in truth, a great marvel was 
 performed ; for the dome gathered the 
 isolated notes into its ample arms, breathed 
 its own spirit into them, and thus rained 
 them down again, welded into a single 
 chord, — refined, apparently rarified, and 
 ringing, through a celestial diminuendo, to 
 utter silence. 
 
 Now it seemed like the angelic arpeg- 
 gios of many harps, luxurious and speaking 
 of a golden rest; now enthralling, ecstatic, 
 reaching to one's inmost fibres, and prick- 
 ing the imagination to supernatural enter- 
 prise. In such a moment the very 
 mysteries of life are touched, deeply felt, 
 but dimly known. The soul communes 
 with the unseen, the world apart, in 
 whispers fine. 
 
 It was like the eternal harmonies of 
 many whirling worlds, — a concord deep
 
 THE ANGELS OF THE BAPTISTERY. 3 1 
 
 and wide. It opened the vast expanse 
 of space, and gave one for an instant 
 a short-lived glimpse of what we call 
 Infinity. 
 
 The blind beggar saw tears coursing 
 down the cheeks of the man of the 
 world, and soon after felt a good-sized 
 silver piece in his palm.
 
 V. 
 A WOMAN OF PARIS. 
 
 COUNT De B , first lieutenant in 
 the artillery, is sitting in uniform 
 before the Cafe Americain, surveying the 
 strollers of the Boulevard. 
 
 It is eight o'clock. He has just dined, 
 and the waiter is bringing him his cup 
 of coffee and liqueur. He leans back, 
 with his sword on his knees, a cigarette 
 between his lips, the vizor of his cap 
 tilted up, just a little. His uniform of 
 blue-black, with rich red stripes, is the 
 handsomest in the French army, and the 
 women give him little glances as they 
 pass; he ought to be happy. 
 
 But there is a puzzled look in the 
 lieutenant's eyes. It was only day before 
 yesterday that he landed in Toulon, on 
 his return from the ill-fated expedition 
 to Tonquin, and Paris is a little discon-
 
 A WOiMAN OF PARIS. 33 
 
 certing to a man who has been camping 
 in a wilderness of jungle and swamp for 
 two years, fighting a hidden foe, dying 
 and recovering from cholera, or starving 
 on a little rice. 
 
 Over a lighted match he kindles a little 
 conversation with his neighbor, an Amer- 
 ican traveller. 
 
 " Per7nettez — thank you." 
 
 " I 'm glad to find you speak English, 
 so few French people do." 
 
 "My mother, the comtesse, is American. 
 You likes Paris ? Gai^ c'est vrai. Plenty 
 pretty women. Ah^ les femmes I I prom- 
 ise myself much amusement when I return 
 from Tonquin. But I find no longer the 
 same thing. It is w^ell the cholera which 
 change me." 
 
 " The cholera ! " 
 
 " Yes, I had a poste^ — three guns, twenty- 
 one men ; about thirty kilometres from 
 the ca77ip du centre. After some time 
 communication was cut away; no provi- 
 sions made cholera, so my men all had
 
 34 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 it. Ma foil many die, black, degoutafits. 
 At last my sergeant, Vigoroux, and I catch 
 the sickness, and no help yet which come. 
 One day Vigoroux drag himself to my 
 tent, — I see him try to do Jixe and 
 salute, — ' Mo?i lieutenant, ily a une bouteille 
 de Champagne we save for the fete. Mon 
 lieutenant, you take that, and I, too, a little. 
 Perhaps it will do us some good.' Voyez 
 vous le pauvre, brave man ? Eh, Men i 
 we drink and get more strong, till reen- 
 forcements come and take us to the 
 'ospital." 
 
 " That was a tough experience ! Did 
 you have any more of that kind ? " 
 
 " Once I find a letter stick with a 
 knife on my table, and written in Ton- 
 quinois ' Death ' in big letters. So when 
 I ride to the guns on inspection, I take 
 a guard of ten men with me. The Ton- 
 quinois attack, but we beat them away." 
 
 '' I should think you must feel quite 
 dazed to be plunged so suddenly from 
 that barbaric life into this Paris, where
 
 A WOMAN OF PARIS. 35 
 
 the Utmost ingenuity of refinement reigns 
 supreme." 
 
 " Yes, ebloui, — like from death into a 
 bright light. 'Ave one sherry cobbler 
 with me, eh t This place is good for 
 that, — Cafd Americain, you see ; but one 
 does not eat well here. Yes t Ganofi I 
 deux, avec de la glace, vous savez ? " 
 
 " But you were speaking just now of 
 the cholera having changed your liking 
 for Paris." 
 
 " I, which was Boulevardier to the ends, 
 not 'appy away from here; know every 
 caf^, theatre, and all the best women. 
 C^a in^efmuie maintenant." 
 
 The stream of the Boulevard sweeps 
 by them, down the brilliant lines of 
 shops, hotels and kiosques, gaudy with 
 posters. It is a stream that carries many 
 a steady man off his feet, and engulfs 
 many a dainty morsel of a woman. Cabs 
 roll in procession up and down the middle, 
 the drivers lolling on their boxes in im- 
 pudent recklessness. At the curbstone
 
 36 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 camelots are hawking their nauseous 
 wares: comic papers, gallant adventures, 
 toys, songs. The pavement is alive with 
 a multitude, putting its best foot forward 
 to please, to stare, to make an impression, 
 and to be stared at. Stumpy little soldiers 
 in ungainly uniforms salute the lieutenant 
 incessantly. 
 
 "When I was getting well in the 'os- 
 pital, I think a good deal about women." 
 
 "That was right." The American 
 laughs. 
 
 ^^ C^ est -a- dire, these women of Paris. 
 Why are they so bad? I say, and remem- 
 ber my women I could not trust. La 
 femfne de Paris, you cannot see her round 
 the corner. What you think ? " 
 
 " No ; you 're right. I understand what 
 you mean. There is something about 
 your French women that defies analysis. 
 They swim in oceans of tact. There is 
 always just the right touch. They put 
 you at your ease with a turn of the 
 shoulder, or inflame you with the low-
 
 A WOMAN OF PARIS. 37 
 
 ering of the eyes. Delicate masks and 
 lady-like disguises ! And back of it one 
 is continually suspecting some piece of 
 treachery. This sympathy, is it not per- 
 haps diluted selfishness .'' These tears and 
 friendly taps, — are they not works of art ? 
 This pretty manner doubtless hides some 
 incredible past." 
 
 " You speak like a connoisseur." 
 
 "Well, I have lived. We Americans 
 do not profess to understand our own 
 women, but yours are like sealed editions 
 de luxe with gold clasps, to us. If I may 
 exaggerate to make my meaning clear, 
 your Frenchwoman seems careless about 
 'crimes, but punctilious about convention- 
 alities. Yet, through it all she never 
 forgets her bread and butter." 
 
 " Ah, very good ! I cannot express 
 myself like that in English." 
 
 The lieutenant turns his eyes for a 
 moment down the street to avoid the 
 salute of a group of soldiers he sees 
 coming. As he does so, a girl passes.
 
 ^S LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 looking into men's eyes without seeming 
 to, — an art. So, too, is her gait, not 
 exactly a stroll, but a walk that suggests; 
 yet daintily, mind you, very c/iic, as a 
 special favor, because monsieur is so tres 
 bien. The lieutenant hears a caressing 
 note, " Tiens^ de retour, mon cher? Viens me 
 voir.'" Yes, it is Josephine, — the same, 
 wearing her adventures unchanged. And 
 she is not a bad girl, either, — one of those 
 big Alsatians, that are as fatal as Helen, 
 when they have learned the arts of Paris. 
 
 The American looks after her in amaze- 
 ment. " And a woman like that, too ! " 
 
 As the night advances, the electric 
 lights seem to glare more pitilessly than 
 ever on the dusty leaves of the trees and 
 the powdered faces in the parade. Dis- 
 charged servants and shop-girls are exert- 
 ing their most graceful and determined 
 wiles. Mon dieu, il faut vivre ! At other 
 cafes isolated women sit, en grande toilette, 
 who live by changing their addresses, — 
 not too often. Poseurs in dress suits and
 
 A WOMAN OF PARIS. 39 
 
 vacant smiles, or foreigners with money, 
 are the fish most sought after by these 
 anglers. 
 
 The lieutenant shrugs his shoulders. 
 
 ^'' La femme serieuse^ what has she ? Low 
 wages, long hours, poor quarters. What 
 you think .'* " 
 
 " True ; and the woman of Paris is not 
 burdened with a Puritan conscience. She 
 does not suffer long in silence. She al- 
 ways looks well, because she knows no re- 
 morse. There is nothing that robs people 
 of their good looks so quickly as continual 
 self-suppression." 
 
 The American speaks bitterly. 
 
 Paris is beginning to disgorge vast 
 crowds from its theatres and halls. The 
 air throbs with the exaltation of a million 
 people bent on amusement, — a frivolous, 
 kindly air, that stimulates and whispers, 
 " Please yourself first, and others, too, if 
 you can." In the scraps of conversation, 
 in the significant gestures, in the very 
 toilettes, there is a sensual sparkle that
 
 40 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 none of us can resist. It lures, it mocks 
 the conscience with a jest. Worse than 
 all, that smell of Paris rises to the nostrils, 
 the smell of scented women, like the fumes 
 of alcohol to the drunkard. 
 
 Josephine comes drifting back on the 
 tide to the Cafe Americain, looking a shade 
 less fresh. This time the lieutenant says, 
 '•^ Assieds tot, ma petite.'' 
 
 While they talk in rapid, low tones, the 
 American sits smoking in embarrassment, 
 and presently excuses himself. As he 
 saunters away, he smiles contemptuously. 
 " Ah, these French people ! " 
 
 But he does the lieutenant an injustice, 
 for the latter sits till far into the night at 
 the cafe, talking seriously to Josephine. 
 The waiter passes to and fro, nervously at 
 first, then with decided irritation. He ends 
 by piling the chairs upon the tables. 
 
 Then the couple rise very gravely, and 
 go out into the warm night, where a soft, 
 sticky mist is beginning to hover about the 
 trees.
 
 A WOMAN OF PARIS. 4 1 
 
 " Th promefs^ tu vas chcz toi, demaifi, en 
 Alsace, chcz tcs parens V^ A billet de banque 
 of a hundred francs changes hands, the 
 lieutenant salutes, and walks hastily 
 towards his hotel, clinking his sword. 
 
 Next day he starts for Chalons, to join 
 his regiment at artillery practice. 
 
 But Josephine buys a new dress at the 
 Magazin du Louvre with her hundred 
 francs, and goes to the races as usual.
 
 VI. 
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 
 
 A ROW of garrisoned cities and 
 entrenched camps crouch like watch- 
 dogs over against Germany: Besan^on, 
 Epinal, Nancy, Toul, and many another. 
 
 Railroads, serving as strategic lines, 
 skirt the whole French frontier. At every 
 station the signs of military preparation 
 abound. There are extra tracks and plat- 
 forms for embarking troops and loading 
 cannon, powder-magazines, and vast store- 
 houses for ammunition and fodder, — all 
 deteriorating for want of use, and needing 
 constant renewal. Almost every hill is 
 crowned with a low fort of the most ap- 
 proved pattern, which is at once a post of 
 observation, a signalling and spying station, 
 and a centre of destruction. 
 
 Besan9on, the headquarters of the 
 Seventh Army Corps, lies close-packed 
 
 43
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 43 
 
 upon a loop of the River Doubs. An old- 
 fashioned citadel rises from the neck of 
 the peninsula, and on either hand two 
 strong forts, — Bregille and Chaudanne. 
 All other approaches are guarded by a 
 multitude of walls and bastions ; the very 
 bridges and gates seem full-fledged for- 
 tresses, being the work of Vauban, that 
 famous builder of Louis XIV. But a 
 new zone of defence covers the surround- 
 ing hills for many miles around, hiding 
 itself from the uninitiated. There are 
 three principal heights, — Chailluz, Mont 
 Faucon and Planoise, encircled by lesser 
 forts, and connected by graded, macadam- 
 ized roads and telegraph lines. In one in- 
 stant their guns can concentrate fire upon 
 a given spot in the plain with horrible pre- 
 cision. Besancon is without doubt a place 
 forte. 
 
 Nancy, the ancient capital of Lorraine, 
 swarms with soldiers. It is a city, flat and 
 whitewashed, that has been beautified in 
 places by the munificence of King Stan-
 
 44 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 islas of Bohemia, who once made it his 
 home. The Place ' Stanislas survives to 
 perpetuate his memory. This place is 
 adorned with a Town Hall, a Municipal 
 Theatre, an Episcopal Palace, and gilded 
 gates of wonderful renaissance workman- 
 ship. 
 
 But near by there is another square, the 
 Place de I'Alliance, flanked by plain, old- 
 fashioned houses. A grotesque rococco 
 fountain mutters in the centre. Here 
 the survivors of an old generation live 
 apart, ruined by the late war, and nursing 
 their pride in solitude. But their door- 
 plates are kept brightly burnished, so that 
 one may read the names of those who 
 mourn within, waiting for the revanche. 
 
 An hour by train from Nancy, and 
 farther from the frontier, lies the en- 
 trenched town of Toul. It is surrounded 
 by formidable hill forts of the latest 
 design, all connected with the town by 
 an ingenious narrow-gauge railroad, which 
 is constructed to climb steep grades, so
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 45 
 
 as to transport the heaviest ordnance to 
 the surrounding heights. Two regular 
 trips are made every day to victual the 
 forts and carry soldiers up and down. 
 
 The town itself is uninteresting, in spite 
 of a fine old church and neglected 
 cloisters. As a matter of fact the pop- 
 ulation and the garrison number about 
 the same, so that the former merely 
 ministers to the latter. The military 
 spirit really dominates every thing. 
 
 MORNING. 
 
 A light came up over the farther hills 
 of Franche Comte and Lorraine. 
 
 It wavered for awhile like faint summer 
 lightning. Then the birds twittered to 
 it from the edge of the woods, and 
 soared to it from the fields. There came 
 a breath that brushed the plumes of the 
 poplars along many a roadside, and swept 
 the scent of clover into the red-roofed 
 towns and grim fortresses of the frontier.
 
 46 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 The sentinels on the ramparts sniffed 
 the air eagerly, watching the brazen sky 
 turn blue, and so a June day dawned in 
 eastern France. 
 
 After the ?'evei//e had sounded in Be- 
 sangon, an officer could be seen riding 
 slowly up to Fort Bregille for his daily 
 inspection. The red of his uniform was 
 thrown into brilliant relief by the green 
 of the roadside, or the foliage of the 
 trees he passed. Presently a little file of 
 green and gray-blue sharpshooters crossed 
 the bridge of St. Pierre to manoeuvre 
 among the lanes of the countryside. In 
 another direction a train of artillery rattled 
 on the highway, the men riding in linen 
 jackets and shapeless blue-black trousers, 
 striped with red. A discordant medley of 
 trumpets, practising the calls, came from 
 somewhere in the barracks. 
 
 A hundred miles farther north, at 
 Epinal, enormous white barracks glistened 
 ominously among pine forests. Red- 
 legged soldiers swarmed in and out the
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 47 
 
 doors, or marched in steady lines up the 
 roads. 
 
 In Nancy, another fifty miles farther, 
 there was similar activity. 
 
 It was before the sun had fairly 
 risen that a detachment of infantry swept 
 through the Place Stanislas, outward bound. 
 There was first a gentle breath of music 
 far away by the barracks. It rose to a 
 stimulating and triumphant march as it 
 approached. The ground throbbed with 
 the steady tread of the soldiers, — cheery 
 little fellows, burned brown by exposure, 
 loosely and comfortably set up. A minute 
 passed, the band was clamorous with 
 rhythmic bursts; three minutes, and the 
 musicians were already far up the street, 
 only the heavy tramp remained. At last 
 there was the shuffling of the rear guard, 
 a little out of step ; and all was still 
 again. 
 
 In another direction, just out of town, 
 the artillery barracks were astir. 
 
 On the road thither one met untidy
 
 48 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 soldiers in foraging suits, carting fodder 
 and manure in four-horse military wagons. 
 But within the large enclosure squads of 
 fine, tall artillery men in rich, sober uniform, 
 were being put through the infantry drill, 
 for theirs is a complicated branch of the 
 service, involving a knowledge of many 
 tactics. Under a long shed stood a row 
 of field-guns, carefully guarded by a sen- 
 tinel, who had orders not to allow any 
 one to approach, except the officer of 
 the day, for the mechanism of these 
 melinite guns is still a war secret. In 
 the riding-school new horses were being 
 trained for the saddle. At first the men 
 rode with their sabres under the left leg, 
 that the clattering might not frighten their 
 mounts, but the animals soon became 
 accustomed to, and actually enjoyed, the 
 noise. 
 
 After awhile an officer passed through 
 the long dormitories on inspection. Over 
 each rough but clean cot was written a 
 soldier's name. In the kitchen there
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 49 
 
 Stood an enormous coffee machine, while 
 an appetizing French soup simmered 
 slowly on the range. As the officer 
 entered one room after another, the men 
 in charge cried, ^^ Fixe !'^ and stood, set up 
 in their ungainly linen suits. The stables, 
 too, were kept in scrupulous order, where 
 horses munched and rattled their chain 
 halters comfortably, — great strong animals 
 for drawing guns, and lighter ones as 
 mounts. 
 
 On the drill-ground of the infantry bar- 
 racks in Toul squads of recruits were 
 practising gymnastics, bending to right, 
 to left, backward and forward. Others 
 jumped on tan bark, or climbed poles and 
 ladders. The best of feeling seemed to 
 pervade the ranks : men and officers min- 
 gled freely, displaying neither brutal arro- 
 gance nor abject servility. 
 
 As a rule the soldiers looked bronzed, 
 good-natured, ugly little fellows, and were 
 allowed to chatter a good deal while wait- 
 ing for their turn.
 
 50 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 A Prussian drill-master would have de- 
 spaired of them at once. 
 
 NOON. 
 
 As the brilliant day progressed on the 
 frontier, violet shadows were thrown upon 
 the saffron ground of the vineyards. The 
 wet meadows by the rivers and canals were 
 full of glistening light ; waves of heat 
 trembled incessantly above the railroad 
 tracks. A few white clouds coursed on 
 high, trailing their shadows over the hills 
 of Franche Comtd and the plains of 
 Lorraine. 
 
 Throughout the morning men and 
 women hoed, somewhat hopelessly, in the 
 vineyards, bent to their tasks in dogged in- 
 dustry. It appears that the vines are 
 dying pretty generally in the east of 
 France. Some say the climate is chang- 
 ing ; others shake their heads, perplexed ; 
 but all agree that taxes are rising to sup- 
 port the army. Still, the children did not
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 5 1 
 
 seem to care, as they clambered about the 
 cherry-trees, picking a little fruit for their 
 baskets and a great deal for their mouths. 
 
 The haymakers worked with a better 
 will, so that carts now drove on to many of 
 the fields, where the hay lay crisp in pale 
 olive-green mounds. It would often be a 
 woman who clambered in to adjust the 
 armfuls which men in blue blouses handed 
 up to her upon their pitchforks. As the 
 pile grew, she floundered about, knee-deep, 
 tramping to and fro, and trimming the load 
 high in the air. 
 
 Beyond the suburbs of many a town, 
 laborers were planting and watering- 
 stretches of market-gardens, where long 
 lines of vegetables grew in mathematical 
 order from end to end, infinitely neat and 
 appetizing. 
 
 Just at noon a deep sense of peace 
 seemed to fall upon the land. The sweat- 
 ing peasants sat under their trees, on field 
 and countryside of the frontier, eating 
 their morsel in silence, looking out over
 
 52 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 the shimmering landscape as they munched. 
 The crickets churred in the tall grass. A 
 wave of warm air passed by, laden with 
 the fragrance of hay and flowers. Here 
 sat a woman, her back against the trunk of 
 a tree, her eyes growing dreamy and stupid 
 in the sleepy atmosphere. There, a man 
 rolled over and stretched himself, with his 
 nose to the ground ; or another lay flat on 
 his back, his hat tilted over his eyes. 
 Even the birds sang no more from the 
 branches of the cherry-trees. 
 
 At this very time in Nancy, at the Grand- 
 Hotel on the Place Stanislas, there was a 
 continual going and coming of officers in 
 te)iue, the reason being that an inspector- 
 general on a tour was receiving reports and 
 giving orders there. The vestibules were 
 gay with uniforms of all arms, and the 
 steps loud with clinking swords. It was 
 like the wings of a theatre on a spectac- 
 ular night. 
 
 Infantry officers, in vivid brick-red 
 trousers and caps, dark tunics and brown
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 53 
 
 gloves ; light cavalry in sky-blue, with ma- 
 genta stripes, and white frogs across the 
 breast; the gendarmerie^ in handsome 
 blue, with black stripes and white decora- 
 tions; cuirassiers, engineers and commis- 
 sariat officers, .vieing with each other for 
 gaudiness, — nothing could be more brill- 
 iant, more like opera bouffe for unaccus- 
 tomed eyes. The sober uniform of the 
 artillery came as a real relief. A detail of 
 dragoons waited at the entrance to escort 
 the general and his suite upon their rounds, 
 after the grand banquet with regimental 
 music, which was just going on, should be 
 over. 
 
 NIGHT. 
 
 The afternoon waned at Besan^on. 
 There was a decorous gathering of citizens 
 and officers in the Promenade Micaud by 
 the Doubs ; the river-bath was crowded 
 with a noisy troop of boys; washerwomen 
 knelt on the banks, scrubbing and pound- 
 ing their linen ; a dusty battalion returned
 
 54 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 from rifle practice with a burst of music ; 
 disbanded soldiers leaned on the parapets, 
 smoking at their ease, alternately saluting 
 officers or teasing the country-girls, home- 
 ward bound. 
 
 Later on, perhaps, a band will play in 
 the charming little garden of Granvelle, 
 where the same citizens will probably re- 
 appear with their wives and daughters. Of- 
 ficers of all arms are going to sit over 
 their absinthe and dominos at the Cercle 
 Militaire ; civilian sportsmen will do the 
 same at the Cercle Nautique. There is 
 sure to be everywhere a great deal of civil- 
 ity and good manners, but not much 
 hilarity, unless it be shown by a few sol- 
 diers, returning arm in arm to their bar- 
 racks, singing out of tune. 
 
 In the evening a wedding party drove up 
 before a country inn, within a mile or two 
 of Besan^on, to drink and dance till late 
 at night. Old and young sat at table in 
 noisy confusion. Some wavering horns 
 played for the dancers. At intervals
 
 ON THt: P^RENCH FRONTIER. 55 
 
 heated couples rushed out into the garden 
 or up the road, with their arms about each 
 other, — flushed, laughing, pushing and 
 caressing each other in awkward abandon. 
 But, curiously enough, a great powder- 
 vault had been placed around the corner 
 from the inn, a mass of masonry, with iron 
 gates leading into the hill-side, kept ready 
 for war, for that great catastrophe w^hich 
 oppresses so cruelly, even by anticipation. 
 
 It was a sort of memento mori to the lov- 
 ers that strolled along the road. 
 
 So, too, in Nancy, when the day's work 
 was done, good fellowship reigned at the 
 Cercle Militaire, which was lodged over the 
 Municipal Theatre. 
 
 The officers, on entering, hung their 
 cloaks and caps in long rows up the wind- 
 ing stairs, then passed into the assembly 
 room to play backgammon and cards, and 
 sip liqueurs. New-comers were greeted 
 with frank courtesy, and in a spirit of 
 genial wit. The prevailing amusements 
 seemed almost childish, but not silly, for in
 
 56 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 France fun never degenerates into buffoon- 
 ery, but always preserves a certain some- 
 thing of delightful formality. Moreover, 
 there was none of the toilet and painful 
 stiffness of the German officers. Indeed, 
 a certain indifference to dress seemed quite 
 the thing. These men were not tall, on an 
 average, wore the regulation moustache 
 and under-lip goatee, and their heads were 
 close-cropped. 
 
 When it grew dark, some of them went 
 over to the gilded cafe^ to smoke and see 
 the papers. Several mounted into a room 
 upstairs, of which the windows were care- 
 fully screened, and passed the night at the 
 gaming tables. 
 
 A few of the handsome women of the 
 town dropped in from time to time, to 
 stake their earnings or lure the winners. 
 Good manners, however, were strictly main- 
 tained, except that for a moment a dispute 
 arose over a doubtful stake, because a 
 woman had advanced her money hesitat- 
 ingly. It was a question whether the gold
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 57 
 
 lay fairly on the table before the trick was 
 called. The dealer, meanwhile, smoked 
 cigarettes without ceasing, his hat tilted 
 on the back of his head, never losing his 
 phenomenal quickness in making change 
 for winners and losers. 
 
 At one o'clock the lights were put out, 
 and many of the players drilled their men 
 a few hours later at rkveille. 
 
 But the frontier never sleeps. No 
 sooner are the lights put out in one place 
 than they blaze up again farther north or 
 south. And so that night, Nancy had 
 barely sunk to rest before the call to arms 
 rang through the town of Toul, setting in 
 motion a whole regiment, to manoeuvre on 
 the plain of the Meuse. 
 
 It was two o'clock in the morning. The 
 soldiers of one division wore white bands 
 on their kepis^ to mark them as the enemy. 
 The infantry marched and countermarched 
 through the summer darkness ; the artillery 
 stood in hiding on the hill-sides ; the en- 
 gineers dug trenches in the plowed fields,
 
 58 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 ran for positions, or lay, cramped and wet, 
 waiting for orders. As day dawned, the 
 whole action could be beautifully watched 
 from a captive balloon that swung high in 
 the air above a neighboring hill, like a soap- 
 bubble. 
 
 Later in the day the regiment returned 
 to Toul, but with music, and flags flying, 
 as though from victory. Men and horses 
 were, of course, muddy and tired, hungry 
 and thirsty. More than that, the soldiers 
 were loaded for war, carrying a complete 
 outfit of ammunition, clothing and pro- 
 visions. Even tiny fagots of wood, for 
 kindling fires, lay on the top of their knap- 
 sacks. They trudged bravely by in their 
 barbaric uniforms of crude reds, yellows 
 and blues. Their baggy trousers, soiled 
 gaiters and boots, heavy with mire, gave 
 them a certain grotesque appearance ; but 
 they looked willing, cheery and intelligent 
 in all their fatigue. 
 
 And, when the time comes, these fine
 
 ON THE FRENCH FRONTIER. 59 
 
 fellows will glow with a sullen frenzy of 
 revenge. 
 
 Two hours after the declaration of war, 
 every French soldier on the frontier will 
 be in his place, to start on the campaign. 
 Nancy lies only four hours' trot from 
 German soil ; Pont-a-Mousson only two. 
 Before the signal has fairly resounded in 
 Europe, the cavalry and artillery of the 
 two armies will be galloping towards each 
 other, and manoeuvring for positions, long 
 since established by the general staffs of 
 both armies. 
 
 Beyond that imaginary line, over in Ger- 
 many, another set of peasants have been 
 dressed up in a different uniform. They 
 wear helmets instead of kepis ; they call 
 their smokeless magazine rifle by another 
 name ; they use different oaths upon their 
 officers w^hen the latter's backs are turned. 
 But, as for the rest, the peasants on both 
 sides plow within sight of each other ; 
 they meet at market, and sometimes drink 
 to each other on the sly.
 
 6o LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 It seems to them a waste of time to 
 spend three and four years of their lives 
 learning to kill each other. 
 
 The same clouds float over them, the 
 same winds sweep their fields, and the 
 same rivers wind through their plains. 
 The birds make their nests impartially 
 on either side, the flowers grow as gayly, 
 and the rows of poplars pass from one 
 country to the other, — without a break.
 
 JEANNE D'aRC. — HASTIEN l.K I'AGE.
 
 VII. 
 
 JEANNE D'ARC'S LAND. 
 
 ON a day when the meadows of 
 Lorraine were fairly throbbing with 
 the flutter and trills of the larks, I trudged 
 from the railroad station of Domremy- 
 Maxey to the hamlet of Domremy-la- 
 Pucelle, the birthplace of Jeanne d'Arc. 
 
 I found the place to be a cluster of 
 poor mortar houses, sheltering not quite 
 three hundred souls. It nestled against a 
 low ridge, covered partly with vineyards, 
 partly with woods. 
 
 Following a road that mounted gently 
 from behind the hamlet among the 
 vines, I came to the Bois Chenu, the 
 holy of holies, where Jeanne had her 
 visions. From the steps of a commem- 
 orative basilica, recently built, my eye 
 ranged over the broad valley of the 
 Meuse. The land was sown in long
 
 62 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 Strips of many colors, like variegated rib- 
 bons; a train of cars rumbled afar off, 
 as it turned a sharp curve; straight, 
 white highways crossed from one village 
 to another, between rows of rigid poplars 
 that rustled their silver leaves in the 
 breeze. Two mounted gendarmes rode 
 slowly along, side by side, saying nothing. 
 Women in large sunbonnets were bending 
 to their work in the fields. At intervals 
 long streamers of sunlight broke through 
 the clouds and passed rapidly across coun- 
 try, like the rays of an electric search-light. 
 Here it was that Jeanne, between the 
 ages of twelve and eighteen, received the 
 visitations of those mysterious voices 
 which urged her to go forth, exhort the 
 king and save France from the English 
 invaders. 
 
 The home of Jeanne d'Arc is in 
 reality an old-fashioned farm-house, some 
 what embellished in the style of the 
 fifteenth century. It has the sloping.
 
 JEANNE d'aRC's LAND. 63 
 
 one-sided roof, characteristic of French 
 farm-houses. The old tiles, once red, 
 are now a russet-brown. The windows 
 are framed in stone. The narrow door- 
 way is carried up into a richly -carved 
 Gothic point, which contains the fleur- 
 de-lis of France and the coats of arms 
 of the allied families of Thiesselin and 
 d'Arc. Above is the strangely modern- 
 sounding motto ^^Vive Labeur, 1481," and 
 below " Vive le Roi Louisa 
 
 A niche over the door-way contains a 
 statue of Jeanne d'Arc, kneeling, bare- 
 headed, with folded hands, and clad in 
 a complete suit of armor, — greaves, breast- 
 plate and all. A sword hangs by her 
 side. Her hair falls down her back in 
 long waves, and her woman's form shows 
 plainly in the cut of her knightly accou- 
 trements. The steel-clad maid does not 
 lose by her mannish attire, like the 
 modern woman who, undeterred by out- 
 ward, conventional considerations, changes 
 her very dress to suit new conditions, if
 
 64 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 need be, at the same time retaining the 
 eternally feminine throughout her contact 
 with the world of work. 
 
 Think of a girl in 1431 daring to say, 
 "As for the works of women, there are 
 plenty of other women to do them." 
 
 The first room you enter is the kitchen, 
 and general living-room of the family. 
 Here Jeanne probably spent many a 
 winter evening, sewing by the firelight 
 and listening to tales of English in- 
 vasion, brought by wandering pilgrims. 
 Jeanne's bedroom is bare and badly 
 lighted by a tiny square window. A 
 third room was used as a cellar, and a 
 fourth by Jeanne's brothers. 
 
 The general impression is that of a 
 damp and dingy house, long uninhabited. 
 But, in reality, Jeanne's father was a well- 
 to-do yeoman and a local magistrate ; his 
 house is even now one of the best in 
 the village. 
 
 Jeanne worshipped oftenest in the par- 
 ish church. Indeed, she was by nature
 
 JEANNE d'aRC'S LAND. 65 
 
 intensely religious. The keynote of her 
 life was devotion, — to God, to the saints, 
 to the king. The call of duty, as she 
 conceived it, was supreme for her over 
 every other consideration. 
 
 " If I had had a hundred fathers and 
 a hundred mothers," she once exclaimed, 
 *' if I had been a king's daughter, still 
 would I have gone forth." 
 
 Whatever may be the explanation of 
 the voice that haunted Jeanne, she herself 
 had no doubts about its origin. 
 
 " I firmly believe, as firmly as I believe 
 in the Christian faith, and that God has 
 redeemed us from the pains of hell, that 
 this voice is from God." 
 
 She resisted the subtle interpretation of 
 the questioner at her trial, who suggested 
 that she imagined voices, as one sometimes 
 thinks to hear and understand certain 
 words amid the sound of bells ringing. 
 The voice was too real ; its prophecies 
 too true for her. 
 
 The judge, probing for some pretext 
 to condemn, asked :
 
 66 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 "What were you doing yesterday morn- 
 ing when the voice came to you ? " 
 
 "I was sleeping; it woke me." 
 
 " By touching your arm .'' " 
 
 " It woke me without touching." 
 
 " And what said the voice ? " 
 
 " It told me to answer boldly, and that 
 God would help me." 
 
 The good old-fashioned word inspiration 
 no longer satisfies us. Was Jeanne a 
 psychic medium, or a victim of auto- 
 suggestion ? 
 
 When you have read the mystic words 
 of this peasant woman, and puzzled over 
 the nature of her visions, go to Nancy, 
 the capital of this same land, Lorraine. 
 Perhaps there you may find a strangely 
 modern answer to your mediaeval puzzle 
 in the hospital now become famous the 
 world over for the experiments in hypno- 
 tism which have been conducted there. 
 
 A young girl lies in the hospital ward, 
 with body relaxed, hearing everything, but 
 subject to the will of the doctor.
 
 JEANNE d'aRC'S LAND. 67 
 
 " Look at me, and think only of sleep. 
 Your eyelids will close ; you cannot raise 
 them." 
 
 She has become inert, plastic and obe- 
 dient. The doctor proceeds to fill her 
 mind with hallucinations. 
 
 She sees an imaginary rose. She 
 touches it, smells it, describes it, turns it 
 about, admires it. Then it disappears 
 and the girl looks disappointed. 
 
 He makes her play with an imaginary 
 ring on her finger, a bracelet on her arm, 
 or a fan in her hand. Suddenly she 
 takes hold of the sheet of her bed. She 
 goes through all the motions of washing 
 and ironing it, omitting no detail, even 
 putting in a few stitches where she fancies 
 it needs mending. Once she raises her 
 finger hastily to her mouth : she imagines 
 she has pricked herself with the needle. 
 
 The doctor now causes the patient to 
 enact a little play. 
 
 First, she hears military music in the 
 courtyard of the hospital. The brisk
 
 68 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 measure and full, joyous tones make 
 her smile with pleasure. But the next 
 instant a look of surprise comes over her 
 face : the soldiers are tramping up the 
 stairs, two by two, drawing nearer every 
 instant. She starts in dismay and pulls 
 the bedclothes about her, for the soldiers 
 have opened the door and now fill the 
 room. Worse than that, the girl shrinks 
 all at once with fright close up to the 
 wall, and screams: a drunken officer has 
 tried to throw his arms around her. In 
 another moment she is seen to give some- 
 body a box on the ear, while she calls 
 lustily for the nurse. 
 
 Yes ; and these hallucinations can be- 
 come self-made after awhile, in certain 
 cases. By means of auto-suggestion, 
 doubtless an unconscious process, many 
 men and perhaps more women have fitted 
 themselves for great missions on this 
 earth. 
 
 Contrast the mediasval maid in the Bois 
 Chenu, and the modern maid in the
 
 JEANNE d'ARC'S LAND. 69 
 
 hospital of Nancy. Is not the world 
 walking the brink of great discoveries, 
 which may some day explain many mys- 
 teries of our present life, and strip not 
 a few masks from history.
 
 VIII. 
 THE GERMANIA. 
 
 ONCE a year, when the spring is 
 young and the nightingales caress 
 the air of dusk, the huge bronze Ger- 
 mania relaxes from her triumphant pose 
 and becomes a woman again. 
 
 She lowers the imperial crown of Ger- 
 many, which she has held aloft for a 
 whole year; she lays aside the two-edged 
 sword she has grasped so firmly, — and 
 turns to see how her clothes set at the 
 back. 
 
 Last year I was hiding under the trees 
 of the Niederwald, near by, when the 
 Germania woke from her trance. 
 
 She looked down the vine-clad slope 
 on which she stood, across the Rhine to 
 Bingen, and beyond to Alsace and France. 
 She sighed, as though she would like to 
 step down from her great stone pedestal. 
 70
 
 THE GERMANIA. 7 1 
 
 It was hard work posing as a martial 
 goddess, when her soul yearned for peace 
 and love. But she dared not leave her 
 post — she, " Die Wacht am Rhehi " — as 
 long as old William I. sat quietly on horse- 
 back in the bronze frieze on her pedestal, 
 surrounded by the great men who labored 
 for the unification of Germany, — Unser 
 Fdtz, Bismarck, Moltke, Ludwig of Ba- 
 varia, and others. 
 
 The Germania stood for a long time 
 listening to the nightingales. Occasionally 
 the sound of a dog barking came up from 
 Bingen, or some one hammered among the 
 shipping on the Rhine. The moon finally 
 rose. A damp, delicious woodland smell 
 came to her nostrils. She felt the balmy 
 night air strike upon her shoulders and 
 bare arms, and a thrill seemed to run 
 through her from head to foot. 
 
 After that I saw her lean forward in the 
 moonlight, with set eyes, and make strange, 
 slow passes in the air, like a magician. 
 Before long her face looked less severe,
 
 72 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 she smiled, and then laughed softly to 
 herself. No wonder she laughed, for she 
 had waked from their trance all the figures 
 on her monument. 
 
 Old William I. shifted his position 
 slightly in the saddle, Unser Fritz tried to 
 get at his cigar-case, Bismarck, Moltke 
 and Ludwig of Bavaria exchanged sur- 
 prised glances. Even the symbolical statues 
 of War and Victory moved a little, while 
 recumbent Father Rhine turned over, and 
 the fierce Reichsadler rustled its feathers. 
 
 The aged emperor turned to the only 
 man among his attendants who was still 
 really alive. 
 
 " Chancellor," he said, " how are the af- 
 fairs of our realm this year ? " 
 
 Bismarck bit his lip. Then, with that 
 tone of filial reverence, which he was in 
 the habit of using towards his dear master, 
 he answered, simply, — 
 
 "Your majesty has not yet heard that 
 your grandson dismissed me from office 
 soon after he came to the throne."
 
 THE GERMANIA. 73 
 
 These words created a great stir among 
 the figures on the monument. A veritable 
 buzz of conversation arose. Unser P'ritz 
 alone said nothing, but puffed contentedly 
 at his cigar. 
 
 William I. drew Bismarck affectionately 
 to his side, and leaned down to speak in 
 confidence. 
 
 " Tell me, how did it happen ? " 
 
 The two old friends were seen to remain 
 a few moments in whispered conversation. 
 After that Bismarck said, aloud, — 
 
 " But he has since heaped me with 
 honors ; and the fatherland keeps my birth- 
 days like national holidays. I do not 
 complain. I have retired to Frieder- 
 ichsruh to rest." 
 
 Moltke stroked his smooth-shaven chin, 
 meditatively. 
 
 " But tell us, my friend, even if you are 
 no longer in office, what is your opinion of 
 the state of the country ? " 
 
 " For the present, the great German 
 Empire w^e labored to unite seems secure,
 
 74 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 without and within. The triple alliance 
 holds, and the Socialists, though active, do 
 not resort to violence." 
 
 "A powerful Germany in the centre of 
 Europe," spoke William I., sententiously, 
 " is the best guarantee of peace." 
 
 "True!" broke in Moltke. "A State 
 must first protect itself externally. Dis- 
 armament would mean national ruin. 
 After all, scientific war is a civilizing agent ; 
 it proves beneficial in the long run." 
 
 Unser Fritz fidgeted a little, but said 
 nothing. 
 
 "And art?" asked Ludwig of Bavaria, 
 with a lofty raising of the brows. " What 
 place do you assign to her amid the influ- 
 ences that make the nation ? " 
 
 Nobody answered. The mad king, 
 drawing himself to his full height, looked 
 about him with glowing eyes. 
 
 " Our Germany is sunk in a military 
 materialism, before which everything is 
 sacrificed. I have tried to counteract 
 the tendency by building my palaces.
 
 THE GERMANIA. 75 
 
 But take this very monument of which 
 we form a part. It bristles with heavy 
 defiance. Our figures betray the can- 
 nons out of which they are moulded. 
 That statue of Germania above us, which 
 ought to represent the culmination of 
 German art, is nothing but an overgrown, 
 clumsy war goddess." 
 
 Everybody looked up. The Germania 
 who had been leaning forward and lis- 
 tening with considerable interest to the 
 conversation, now drew back resentfully. 
 
 " It seems to me, King Ludwig," she 
 blurted out quickly, " you had better pay 
 for your palaces before you talk of raising 
 the tone of the German nation with 
 them." 
 
 Bismarck nudged Moltke and chuckled 
 with delight. Old William looked puzzled 
 and a little shocked. 
 
 Unser Fritz drew his cigar from his 
 mouth for a moment, while he said, — 
 
 " She is the new woman." 
 
 As this was the first time he had
 
 76 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 spoken, his companions glanced at him, 
 expecting an explanation. But he volun- 
 teered none. His handsome, manly face 
 merely smiled at them pleasantly. 
 
 Fortunately King Ludwig did not hear 
 what the Germania was saying. His eyes 
 roamed tragically up and down the Rhine, 
 now bathed in moonlight. For an instant 
 it seemed as though he was about to 
 disengage himself from the frieze, and 
 plunge down the slope into the swift- 
 flowing gold of the river. But the 
 suicidal mood passed as suddenly as it 
 came. 
 
 " Do you think there is anything in 
 the Russian and French entente V^ now 
 asked William I. of Bismarck. "You 
 know my parting words to my grandson : 
 ' Keep friends with Russia.' " 
 
 " Well, sire, I do not believe there is 
 any alliance in the real sense of the 
 word. A vast autocratic empire, con- 
 trolled absolutely from headquarters, can- 
 not afford to tie itself to a republic, whose
 
 THE GERMANIA. 77 
 
 policy is subject to popular approval. 
 But the threat of this alliance is very 
 useful in the Reichstag, when the military 
 credits are to be voted." 
 
 Moltke looked interested. " I trust we 
 shall not carry out the theory of a weak 
 attacking force and a strong defensive 
 one. We do not want to reduce our 
 army to a militia force, like the Swiss." 
 
 " No," continued Bismarck ; " we Ger- 
 mans fear no one but God ; at the same 
 time we like to keep our powder dry. 
 Perhaps some day the nations will no 
 longer need to apply the better part of 
 their revenues to armaments." 
 
 Unser Fritz threw away the stump of 
 his cigar. 
 
 " Is there not a very easy way of 
 hastening that happy day even now ? " 
 he said, suddenly. 
 
 William I. smiled indulgently. The 
 Prince had always been a good deal of 
 a crank. 
 
 " Declare free trade with the world,"
 
 78 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 the Prince cried, enthusiastically, " and you 
 will have peace. Protective tariffs, so- 
 called, destroy the natural brotherhood of 
 nations. They bring estrangements, jeal- 
 ousies, imputations of evil motives and 
 misunderstandings without end." 
 
 " But, Prince, we have our commercial 
 treaties," retorted Bismarck. 
 
 " It is true, they are a step in the 
 right direction. But, after all, artificial 
 reciprocity is based on the silly assump- 
 tion, that people do not know what goods 
 they want to exchange, and must be 
 guided in their selection." 
 
 "We need the revenue from indirect 
 taxation." 
 
 " You think you do, because you have 
 neglected the principal source of direct 
 taxation, namely, land values." 
 
 Bismarck's moustache began to bristle 
 visibly. 
 
 " Prince, you were ever hard on our land- 
 owners. What would you do without the 
 Yunker ? Where would you get your offi-
 
 THE GERMANIA. 79 
 
 cers lor the army, if you destroyed the 
 landed aristocracy ? " 
 
 " I would not care what became of the 
 army, as long as justice prevailed. The 
 army might even be abolished." 
 
 A horrified murmur ran through the 
 frieze. Old William tried ineffectually to 
 turn the conversation upon less sensa- 
 tional topics. The Germania, who had 
 been looking wearily away to the horizon 
 during this discussion, now clapped her 
 hands gleefully. This was the first radical 
 utterance she had ever heard from the 
 frieze. 
 
 The two men faced each other with 
 determination. 
 
 " The army is an internal means of edu- 
 cation," began Bismarck, trying to speak 
 calmly. " It trains the nation physically 
 and morally." 
 
 Unser Fritz squared his stately figure. 
 His bearded face did not lose its complete 
 composure. 
 
 " True ; but is it necessary to take men
 
 8o LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 from their life-work during their most im- 
 portant years, and then teach them the 
 science of killing their fellow-men in order 
 to impart this training? Chancellor, you 
 know me for a soldier. We have fought 
 side by side, but let me tell you that I 
 loathe this profession. It is a survival 
 from a savage past, when men fought for 
 a foothold on this earth." 
 
 " You speak like a Socialist, Prince." 
 
 " Call me what you will, but you shall 
 hear me. If I had had more than my 
 ninety days of reign, the world would have 
 known me for what I am." 
 
 Unser Fritz turned his eyes over the 
 moonlit land, and continued : 
 
 " This earth belongs equally to all men. 
 None of us can add or subtract an atom 
 from its bulk; none of us can, therefore, 
 own it, though all are entitled to use it. 
 
 " Now taxation can regulate this usufruct 
 to the earth's surface in an equitable man- 
 ner. Take for public purposes what be- 
 long to the public, by faxing land according
 
 THE GERMANIA. 8 I 
 
 to its value, but leave to individuals all that 
 they produce." 
 
 A perfect uproar now ensued, which 
 even the presence of the venerable em- 
 peror was unable to check. Not only did 
 Bismarck, Moltke and Ludwig of Bavaria 
 all try to talk at once, but the symbolical 
 figure of War brandished a sword ex- 
 citedly, while Victory blew loudly on a 
 horn. The recumbent Father Rhine rolled 
 over and over, and the Reichsadler 
 screeched dismally. 
 
 The Germania could hardly contain 
 herself for joy. She danced upon her 
 pedestal with the absolute abandon of the 
 new woman, until suddenly she saw the 
 moon set behind the trees of the Nieder- 
 wald, and she realized that the day would 
 soon dawn, bringing the usual crowd of 
 sight-seers to the monument. 
 
 With a mighty effort she pulled herself 
 together. A last glance down upon the 
 frieze showed her that the unifiers of Ger- 
 many might come to blows any moment.
 
 82 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 She leaned forward, with outstretched 
 arms. " Hush, the dawn ! " she whispered. 
 Her eyes once more grew fixed. She made 
 her mysterious passes. The noise ceased. 
 One by one the figures on the monument 
 relapsed into their habitual positions, each 
 trying in vain to say a last word. 
 
 When all was still, the Germania took 
 a final look across the Rhine towards 
 France. She shook out her flowing gown 
 with a backward kick of her foot, grasped 
 her two-edged sword firmly, and raised the 
 imperial crown of Germany on high. 
 Within her the soul of a woman turned 
 to bronze. 
 
 Soon after the nightingales sang to the 
 dawn.
 
 IX. 
 
 A SUNDAY IN VIENNA. 
 
 THERE is no New England Sabbath 
 in Vienna. Whatever may be the 
 opinion of the city in regard to a goody- 
 goody heaven and a brimstone hell in the 
 morning, in the afternoon everybody 
 believes that the better the day, the better 
 the deed. 
 
 That is why on a Sunday two great 
 streams of pleasure-seekers flow in op- 
 posite directions, out to the gardens 
 of Schloss Schonbrunn, or the beloved 
 Prater. Those who ride in carriages, 
 those who take the trains, and those who 
 walk, together form a vast population that 
 moves forward with irresistible momentum. 
 
 When one of these streams has passed 
 the last rows of new city houses, it is 
 confronted by a long cream-colored build- 
 ing, — the Imperial Palace of Schonbrunn. 
 83
 
 84 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 This place is sufficiently plain in itself to 
 act as an admirable foil to the glorious 
 gardens at the back. 
 
 There, indeed, Art has triumphed over 
 Nature. 
 
 A superb stretch of rising ground 
 sweeps from the palace up to an elaborate 
 colonnaded gloriette, or belvedere, built 
 in rococco, on the crest. The intervening 
 ground is laid out in large flower-beds, 
 wide gravelled walks and strips of lawn. 
 At intervals statues gleam from the shrub- 
 bery. There is room for a multitude to 
 saunter without jostling. About midway 
 to the top a fountain, benymphed and be- 
 neptuned, full of marble dolphins and live 
 goldfish, sprays the holiday air with con- 
 scious pride, for the whole place is named 
 after it, — Schonbrunn. 
 
 But most wonderful of all are the 
 forests that flank this brilliant slope. 
 They are pierced by avenues, radiating in 
 straight lines from the palace to the re- 
 motest corners of the grounds. Their
 
 A SUNDAY IN VIENNA. 85 
 
 lofty trees are clipped with absolute preci- 
 sion, like the boxwood hedges of an old- 
 fashioned garden. So great is the dis- 
 tance, that these avenues fairly lose 
 themselves in dim vistas, where, at the end, 
 their green sides seem to meet, and earth 
 and sky come to a point. You feel your- 
 self caught in one of those tantalizing 
 dreams which lure you on and on towards 
 an ever-receding goal. 
 
 Artificial ? Yes ; but the scale is hercu- 
 lean. The gardeners of Schonbrunn appar- 
 ently believed that they could improve 
 upon nature ; and what is, perhaps, more 
 wonderful still, they have almost persuaded 
 us that they were right. We can readily 
 believe that they protested against droop- 
 ing and arching branches as decidely bad 
 form ; that they would like to have painted 
 the sky some permanent shade to match 
 their flower-beds ; to change the scents 
 of certain blossoms ; to temper the breeze 
 and regulate the rainfall according to 
 some etiquette, prescribed at court.
 
 86 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 The city crowd wanders at will through 
 these hiarvellous gardens. We imagine 
 the avenues once peopled by simpering 
 shepherdesses in Watteau gowns, tripping 
 on over-high heels, handling crooks tied 
 with ribbons ; at their sides, lovers all 
 lace and ruffles, making well-worn compli- 
 ments. On the benches we are ready to 
 see dainty coquettes, planning intrigues 
 under their enormous coiffures, that are 
 no more real than they. Throw in a 
 wicked dowager or two, some snuff-taking 
 diplomats, a soldier with conquering air; 
 besprinkle everybody with much paint and 
 powder and not a few familiar perfumes. 
 Then tie the whole with ribbons, pink and 
 blue, — that may have been Schonbrunn 
 in the age of rococco. 
 
 Nowadays the grounds are open to all. 
 There is even a little menagerie for " the 
 people," to use this term in its feudal 
 sense. And, indeed, queer specimens 
 from the utmost ends of that strange poly- 
 glot Austrian Empire find their way to
 
 A SUNDAY IN VIENNA. 87 
 
 Schonbrunn. I remember two long-haired, 
 long-coated, unwashed Polish Jews, veri- 
 table Svengalis in their hirsute blackness, 
 who questioned me eagerly about the 
 animals. They had never seen a bear ; 
 they stood in amazement before the enor- 
 mous cat, which was a lioness ; they pulled 
 my sleeve excitedly, and pointed with 
 greasy fingers at a huge hen with storks 
 legs, the pet ostrich of the place. These 
 grimy brothers must have issued from 
 some dank city slums, forever cut off from 
 the world. 
 
 But the women of Vienna saunter about, 
 altogether at their ease. Can they do 
 other^vise, these leisurely, well-dressed 
 creatures, whose glances contain endless 
 possibilities ? Even the frequently recur- 
 ring Slav type is fascinating, with its 
 ugly little eyes and flat nose. 
 
 And so Sunday will pass at Schon- 
 brunn in the midst of decorous sight- 
 seeing, and not a little flirtation in the 
 forest glades, where the trees are not
 
 88 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 clipped, but coquettish little twigs are 
 allowed to make advances to each other 
 across the paths, and even to throw out 
 sheltering branches in order to shield those 
 lovers who desire nothing so much as to 
 be left alone, and not noticed. 
 
 It is true, however, that most of the 
 open-air love-making of Vienna is done 
 in the Prater. 
 
 At all hours of the day tram-cars and 
 omnibuses bring loads upon loads of 
 people to the circular space at the en- 
 trance to the park, called the Praterstern. 
 From there they distribute themselves 
 according to their tastes and stations in 
 life. Habit seems to have regulated the 
 pace and demeanor of the Prater crowd. 
 There is no hurrying, and yet every face 
 shows anticipation of amusement. 
 
 It may be taken for granted that " the 
 people " will stop in the Wurstel Prater, 
 the Clown Prater, which is a veritable 
 village of booths with painted monstros- 
 ities, tents and even theatres ; a permanent
 
 A SUNDAY IN VIENNA. 89 
 
 fair of merry-go-rounds and beer gardens, 
 — a standing joke. The Viennese smile 
 easily; they are good-tempered; they like 
 old friends ; they never tire of the Wurstel 
 Prater. 
 
 Nowhere can one be made to realize 
 better the mixture of nationalities Austria 
 possesses. Tyrolese, clad in gray and 
 green, with bare knees, wide leather belts, 
 and black cock-feathers in their felt hats ; 
 Hungarian nurses in short skirts and top 
 boots ; Polish Jews, with cork-screw curls ; 
 peasant women, wearing dresses stiffly 
 starched that reach only to the knee, and 
 stand out besides like the frills of ballet 
 dancers, — imagine all these types, and 
 add an occasional heavily -embroidered 
 Dalmatian, a Greek in divided skirt, or a 
 soldier of the Bosnian contingent. 
 
 A certain avenue, the Haupt-Allee, is 
 given over to carriage-folk by tradition, 
 though the Prater is everywhere open to 
 everybody. There never was a more un- 
 fenced show-place in the world, but by
 
 go LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 common consent " the classes " do not 
 interfere with each other, and, in point 
 of fact, really enjoy having each other 
 somewhere near. Of course this can 
 only happen in a country where there 
 is next to no chance for self-made 
 men. In America we are far too much 
 afraid of one another to let down the 
 barriers of exclusiveness, except for very 
 decided considerations. 
 
 One must see a Papier- Schnitzel evening 
 in the exhibition grounds to feel the com- 
 plete charm of the Viennese character. 
 The Austrians love this word Schnitzel 
 above every thing, and so they have lately 
 invented a carnival game which gives them 
 a chance to use it in a new way. Every- 
 body is armed with a bag full of thin 
 paper strips, brightly colored and crinkly. 
 As they stroll up and down the prom- 
 enade, these delightful children throw 
 handfuls of the light fluffy stuff at each 
 other. It decorates their bonnets, it hangs 
 from their beards ; it clings to the cor-
 
 A SUNDAY IN VIENNA. 9 1 
 
 sage or the folds of a dress; it perches 
 on top of a silk hat ; sometimes it nestles 
 on a dear little neck, where the love- 
 curls catch it, or it twists about a wee 
 shell of an ear that immediately looks 
 rakish. Very often some gallant seizes a 
 bunch of Papier Schnitzel^ kisses it, puts it 
 in his left-hand vest-pocket, as a souvenir. 
 Another hopes to see a certain fair one 
 again ; she picked him out with an arch 
 eye, she threw very hard, and missed him. 
 He would like to have her try again, this 
 time to strike him with her hand, if need 
 be, as long as she but touch him. 
 
 A Hungarian band plays in the open 
 air naively savage music, fiddling estab- 
 lished rules to the winds. We have over- 
 done Hungarian bands by this time at 
 home, but to hear their music for the first 
 time, alternately rent by spasmodic storms, 
 and then lapsing into inexpressible ten- 
 derness, is to enjoy, in truth, a never- 
 recurring musical moment. 
 
 First comes an exquisite little theme in
 
 92 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 waltz time, the unpremeditated expression 
 of a people to whom dancing is like daily 
 bread. It swings and whirls its way 
 through several bars, but after that a 
 change comes upon the musicians, like the 
 ruffling of the sea by a squall. Without 
 obvious rhyme or reason each instrument 
 seems possessed by some ungovernable 
 impulse, seeking to express independently 
 an overmastering desire. They go every 
 which-way, freely, into ecstasies of passion, 
 wild laments or incomprehensible vagaries. 
 The whole forms an incoherent, insane, 
 cumulative cry, like the uncontrolled howl 
 of a mob, which yet emits a certain un- 
 mistakable harmony. 
 
 When it seems as though the musicians 
 could rise to no greater heights of folly, 
 they are brought to reason by some sud- 
 den, superb chord, trailing itself out like a 
 sigh of relief. The chaos of a moment 
 ago is instantly reduced to perfect order. 
 The musicians dwell upon these calm notes 
 with an air of satisfaction, clinging to
 
 A SUNDAY IN VIENNA. 93 
 
 them for safety from further spasms of 
 emotion. The waltz theme once more 
 weaves its sinuous swing into their meas- 
 ures, and the piece comes to an end unex- 
 pectedly, as though the motive power of 
 their inspiration had given out. 
 
 Was it truth or fancy that the whole life 
 of the still half-developed Slav race was 
 pictured in that music, — in its barbaric, 
 unrestrained bursts, and its melting moods, 
 contrasting with each other ? Certainly 
 the element of melancholy asserted itself 
 throughout, for this is the music of a race 
 of dreamers, full of magnificent possibili- 
 ties. 
 
 At nightfall most of the family groups 
 that have picknicked in the Prater will 
 saunter cityward. The carriages of the 
 aristocracy have driven by some time ago. 
 At the swell cafes, numbered i, 2 and 3, 
 on the Haupt-Allee, rows of lamps glimmer 
 through the branches, as though the rich 
 who are not noble, intend to keep on enjoy- 
 ing themselves.
 
 94 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 But the principal gayety still centres in 
 the Wurstel Prater. Every beer garden 
 which hopes to live in the hearts of the 
 Viennese now piles up its white-painted 
 chairs, and makes way for the dancers. 
 The poorer the people the more they will 
 dance, for it costs nothing extra, and yet is 
 food and drink to them.
 
 X. 
 
 THE SULTAN'S PRAYER. 
 
 CONSTANTINOPLE looked like a 
 vast encampment. It seemed the 
 temporary resting-place of some nomadic 
 tribe, and not the permanent home of that 
 poor Turkish race which, day by day, 
 withers like a weed in the chink of the 
 pavement. 
 
 As the crowds passed through the streets 
 to see the Sultan pay his weekly visit to 
 the mosque, jackal-dogs slunk about, ferret- 
 ing out all manner of foulness in dark 
 corners, or slept undisturbed in the open 
 spaces. Money-changers sat at their stalls, 
 haggling. Some hamals (porters) were 
 climbing the steep cross-streets, stooping 
 under incredible loads. A flock of pigeons 
 strutted with prinked feathers in the mire, 
 and an old woman held out a piteous, 
 trembling hand for alms. 
 95
 
 96 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 The carriages swept by Dolmabatchke, 
 the winter palace on the Bosphorus, and 
 climbed the elevation to the Yildiz Kiosk, 
 where Abdul Hamid was then residing. 
 A small mosque rose near by. 
 
 The kiosk and mosque were already 
 surrounded by troops, about three thousand 
 strong, principally infantry of the line and 
 cavalry in Circassian costume. A Nubian 
 regiment of coal-black negroes in green 
 uniforms was stationed at the post of 
 honor. Around this cordon of soldiery 
 there was a fringe of motley sight-seers, the 
 flower and weed of Constantinople. Some 
 smart carriages were drawn up, with ladies 
 of rank and fashion leaning back in a 
 wealth of gay colors, provokingly hand- 
 some in their silk mantles of sky-blue, 
 yellow or crimson, their faces thinly veiled 
 with transparent jashrnaks. A mendicant 
 fakeer strode solemnly through the crowd. 
 He had thrown a goatskin over his 
 shoulder, a spear was in his hand, and a 
 begging-cup hung by his side. There were
 
 THE SULTAN S PRAYER. 97 
 
 venders of water, for which you paid by 
 the glassful, and of strange sweetmeats, 
 made with oil and honey. 
 
 A sudden silence fell on the multitude, 
 broken only by the clink of the sabres as 
 the cavalry quickly perfected their align- 
 ment. Then Abdul Hamid, ruler of the 
 Ottoman Empire, mighty and supreme, was 
 seen riding slowly from his palace on a 
 white Arabian. He alone was on horse- 
 back, for the members of his suite who 
 surrounded him, were on foot, and, indeed, 
 had difficulty in keeping pace with his 
 magnificent stallion. Osman Pasha walked 
 on the right, the erect and sturdy defender 
 of Plevna, and the hero of the army. 
 Some of the Sultanas followed in 
 broughams attended by eunuchs. 
 
 As for the Sultan, he is a pale-faced, 
 black-bearded Oriental, wdth flabby, dis- 
 passionate features, and shoulders slightly 
 stooping, — a man who is said to be in 
 constant fear of assassination, perhaps on 
 account of his predecessor's mysterious
 
 98 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 death. For the rest, a diplomat of some 
 pretensions, who has not been altogether 
 without success in playing off the great 
 powers against each other. 
 
 At all events the soldiery cheered bravely 
 as he passed, and a group of Pashas and 
 notables stood in the court of the mosque 
 to salaam to his majesty as he disappeared 
 within the portals. 
 
 While he worshipped, grooms brought a 
 victoria to the door, with other carriages, 
 from which he could select one for his re- 
 turn. Also four superb Arabians, ready- 
 saddled, with golden cloths and silver bits, 
 prancing with arched necks, and looking 
 out of great eyes, full of spirit and gentle- 
 ness. 
 
 When the Sultan reappeared in half an 
 hour, he chose the victoria, and drove 
 rapidly back to the palace. A woman in 
 front of the crowd held up a framed in- 
 scription, crying out something at the same 
 time. It might have been a petition, or 
 perhaps a votive verse, to be blessed by the
 
 THE SULTAN S PRAYER. 99 
 
 Sultan, for he is also titular head of all 
 Mohammedans. 
 
 At this moment a few drops of rain were 
 beginning to fall. The troops defiled, with 
 flags flying and bands playing. The car- 
 riages, full of tourists, turned back to the 
 city, along with the street hawkers, who 
 had momentarily deserted their regular 
 rounds. Soon the kiosk and mosque stood 
 there alone, save that a few of the strag- 
 gling poor hung about, unable to tear them- 
 selves from the lingering aroma of departed 
 majesty. 
 
 Who of us Occidentals can ever hope, in 
 our waking moments, to understand that 
 listless, loitering life of Asia? — Arid, yet 
 warm ; phlegmatic, yet full of passion.
 
 XI. 
 
 DANCING DERVISHES. 
 
 THE psychic spirit of the East brooded 
 over the city. 
 The housetops of Stamboul rose, amphi- 
 theatre-like, tier on tier, above the waters 
 of the Golden Horn. On the sky-line the 
 mosques and minarets seemed bleached 
 into supernatural whiteness by the vivid 
 sun. Near them clumps of cypresses 
 pointed black fingers from the cemeteries. 
 A clatter of many crafts, the hum of 
 many languages spanned the air, as with 
 a pulsating web of sound, and a sparkling 
 breeze swept through the shipping of 
 the harbor, past the dingy wharves and 
 warehouses, and up to the stone and 
 stucco palaces beyond. 
 
 In the afternoon the Dancing Dervishes 
 performed their ceremonies in an octag-
 
 DANCING DERVISHES. lOI 
 
 onal wooden building, that had a smooth, 
 polished floor. A part of this was railed 
 off for spectators, and there was a gallery 
 on one side for a miniature orchestra. 
 
 About twenty Dervishes were sitting 
 cross-legged around the hall, each upon 
 his sheepskin, seemingly absorbed in mys- 
 tic meditation. They were mostly young 
 fellows, and were engaged in reciting 
 inaudibly the name of Allah in endless 
 repetition. The air was thick with an 
 Oriental foulness, an unwashed, unventi- 
 lated closeness. A half-light converted the 
 crude dinginess of the hall into mystery, 
 and something like spiritual abstraction 
 rested upon the crouching devotees. 
 
 Soon the thin, small tones of a reed- 
 flute came from the gallery, playing an 
 uncertain, halting theme, meandering up 
 and down the scale in meaningless va- 
 garies, that usually began in haphazard 
 trills and died away in a long-drawn, 
 dismal w^ail, truly Oriental. The irregular 
 tom-tom of a drum, primitive and savage
 
 I02 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 in quality, completed this morose and 
 wayward music. 
 
 As the drum gave a louder beat, the 
 Elder rose from his place, the Dervishes 
 fell on their faces, and then sprang to 
 their feet. The ceremony had began. 
 
 The Elder, or Sheikh, lifted his hands 
 in silent prayer for the founder of the 
 order, bowed toward Mecca, and, wheel- 
 ing round, bowed again to his vacant 
 seat. He then began to march slowly 
 around the hall. Each Dervish in suc- 
 cession performed the same outward rite 
 at the Sheikh's vacant seat, and passed 
 on around the hall. There was not a 
 little grace in their deliberate movements, 
 but their faces were set in sallow, im- 
 perturbable lines, and the purposeless, 
 incomplete music sounded inharmoniously 
 from the gallery. 
 
 A single Dervish detached himself from 
 the rest and took up a position in the 
 middle of the hall, to act as director of 
 the dancing.
 
 DANCING DERVISHES. I 03 
 
 Having made the round of the hall 
 three times, the Dervishes, one by one, 
 as they reached the Sheikh's seat, quietly 
 began to revolve into the middle of the 
 hall, turning on the left foot and pushing 
 with the right. They wore tall conical 
 caps, called kichi/i, like sugar -loaves in 
 shape, white or yellowish, and skirts 
 reaching to their ankles, caught in at 
 the waist by narrow cloth girdles. Short 
 jackets completed a somewhat shabby 
 and shoddy-looking costume. 
 
 As they whirled, the arms gradually 
 rose to a horizontal position, the left 
 hand being turned down and the right 
 palm upwards. They leaned their heads 
 over the right shoulder. Their eyes were 
 either closed or fixed, expressionless, as 
 in a trance. 
 
 If they approached too near to one 
 another, the director stamped his foot as 
 a warning signal. Their skirts rose and 
 stood out, when the pace increased, form- 
 ing inflated cones whose apex was at the
 
 104 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 waist. Their legs showed beneath, clad 
 in untidy hosiery. 
 
 And still that harrowing accompaniment 
 inflamed them with its perverse and ram- 
 bling trills. 
 
 A species of mute exaltation was upon 
 them. One looked to see some fall for 
 dizziness, but they kept revolting in mystic 
 circles, repeating inaudibly an invocation to 
 Allah, like so many Ave Marias. It was a 
 marvel that they never jostled each other, 
 blindly turning, circle within circle, each in 
 his mad orbit, round the hall. 
 
 The Dervishes claim that their move- 
 ment pictures the harmony of the many- 
 whirling worlds. In fact, the central idea 
 of the MevJevee Order is the divine love of 
 God, all-embracing, all-pervading. They 
 represent a sort of esoteric pantheism. 
 Occupying very much the same position 
 in the Mohammedan religion that the 
 monastic orders do in the Christian, the 
 various bodies of Dervishes have a philos- 
 ophy of their own, called Soofooism. For
 
 DANCING DERVISHES. 105 
 
 this reason they are not on the best of 
 terms with the idemas and imams of the 
 orthodox priesthood. 
 
 But now the whirling began to hurt one's 
 eyes, the subtle reiteration of the music to 
 tell upon the nerves. The accidental, 
 naive discords of the flute and drum irri- 
 tated beyond measure. They were like the 
 fiddler's notes that set the bridge a-sway- 
 ing, or the organ that makes the church 
 windows rattle. They became truly dis- 
 tressing and painful. Some of the insane 
 folly, which was whirling the Dervishes in 
 their uncanny rite, seemed to enter into 
 one's soul. It opened vistas into a remote, 
 savage ancestry ; its barbaric persistency 
 was excruciating to the senses of a civil- 
 ized nature. There was torture and frenzy 
 in its culminating wail. Its spontaneous 
 sombreness pictured vast Asiatic desola- 
 tions, and its stubborn shrillness all 
 manner of abominations, — maddening, 
 disgusting, infuriating, driving one into 
 a dismal world of nightmare fancies.
 
 Io6 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 At length the Dervishes stopped dan- 
 cing. It had lasted perhaps ten minutes, 
 this insensate ceremony, but it seemed a 
 whole seon of sensation. They crouched 
 upon their sheepskins once more, appar- 
 ently free from dizziness, and relapsed into 
 a state of abstraction, calling on Allah in 
 silent and mystic repetition. 
 
 Ah ! it was well to breathe the air of the 
 street once more, even if the dogs and dirt 
 were there, for at all events the minarets 
 pointed to an unsullied sky, and a breeze, 
 that blew fresh from the Black Sea, had 
 set the caiques dancing on the Golden 
 Horn.
 
 XII. 
 FROM SMYRNA TO EPHESUS. 
 
 THERE is a land, but little known to 
 modern men, which is destined some 
 day to rival Egypt as the haunt of the 
 winter tourist. 
 
 Asia Minor has given the world Homer, 
 the father of poetry ; Herodotus, the father 
 of history ; ^sop of fables, and Pythagoras 
 of philosophy. It furnished three of the 
 seven wise men of the Greeks, — Thales, 
 Bias, and Pittacus, — and built three of the 
 seven wonders of the ancient world, — the 
 Temple of Diana at Ephesus, the Mauso- 
 leum in Caria, and the Colossus of Rhodes. 
 It has contributed at least four words to 
 the every-day speech of mankind : its river, 
 Maeander, has given us our expression for 
 leisurely and tortuous progress ; one of its 
 cities. Magnesia, the word magnetism, be- 
 cause magnetic iron was first discovered on 
 107
 
 Io8 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 a hill near by; the Colossus of Rhodes our 
 epithet colossal ; and the tomb of Mau- 
 solus has named for all time every monu- 
 mental sepulchre. 
 
 To-day Asia Minor supplies the world 
 only with carpets, figs and licorice. 
 
 My friend had urged that if I was going 
 as far East as Constantinople, I might as 
 well extend my trip to Smyrna, and pay 
 him a visit at his home in the valley of the 
 Maeander. It was this invitation which 
 tempted me upon a March day to succumb 
 to the spell of the magnificent desolation of 
 Asia Minor. 
 
 It actually snowed a little the day I 
 landed in Smyrna, on the 12 th of March. 
 A wintry blast had swept down upon the 
 city from the Black Sea or the Phrygian 
 Highlands, and given the shivering, bare- 
 legged population the rare spectacle of a 
 snow-flurry. But the sky soon cleared, 
 a cold wind rufifled the bay into brilliant 
 blue, and gulls fluttered, screaming, over the 
 floating refuse of the harbor.
 
 FROM SMYRNA TO EPHESUS. 1 09 
 
 A young man had been sent to make me 
 welcome, and see me through the organ- 
 ized brigandage of the custom-house. My 
 passport, also, was sent to receive the 
 official vise, before I could make my way to 
 the hotel, awed and bewildered amid the 
 sights of the Smyrna streets. 
 
 The spell of the East was already upon 
 me. 
 
 There seemed to be dangers lurking in 
 every corner, and plots of robbery hatching 
 amongst those armed men, loitering about 
 in outlandish dress and with imperturbable 
 faces. 
 
 Before the cafes petty merchants, from 
 all the country districts and neighboring 
 islands, lounged, haggling vociferously, 
 while the cafeji unconcernedly filled their 
 pipes. A troop of women passed to em- 
 bark on one of the steamers, — the harem 
 of some rich official, perhaps, — skurrying 
 along like a flock of frightened partridges. 
 They shuffled awkwardly in outdoor shoes, 
 but their costumes were surpassingly bril-
 
 no LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 liant, from their silken trousers to their 
 multicolored cloaks, — sky - blue, yellow 
 and white, magenta or pale purple. 
 Albanian adventurers were smoking by the 
 house doors, clad in white, with pistols in 
 their belts and daggers everywhere, like 
 Scotch Highlanders. Sallow-faced Arme- 
 nians, looking askance, went by upon their 
 business, a race full of high aspirations, 
 but become warped and tricky by tyranny. 
 Greek islanders in brown homespun waited 
 for saiUng orders. A negress in a bright 
 yellow jashmak strolled leisurely, or a 
 Tartar groom led his horse by the bridle. 
 
 The quay looked modern enough, with 
 its line of horse-cars. Behind it there 
 were storehouses for figs, cotton, raisins, 
 tobacco, and licorice, and beyond them 
 began a network of alleys, leading no- 
 where, at cross-purposes, and without plan, 
 into which I dared not enter far. Some- 
 times a string of camels blocked the way. 
 At such times it was necessary to raise 
 the loop of the rope which bound them
 
 FROM SMYRNA TO EPHESUS. Ill 
 
 together, in order to pass. Greek women 
 went about unveiled, their raven black 
 hair coiled upon their heads in oily tresses, 
 or hanging down their backs in braids. 
 There was the pleasant droning burr of 
 Turkish, and the clatter of a multitude of 
 languages. Stale smells came from the 
 cellars, but tobacco smoke and steaming 
 coffee mitigated the evil. A vender of 
 halva?' sweetmeats called to his customers, 
 and a mangy dog slept curled up in the 
 gutter. 
 
 Next day I visited some friends in 
 Burnabat, a straggling suburb, distant a 
 few minutes by train, reposing amid cy- 
 presses and gardens of untold loveliness. 
 
 After dinner a party of us walked out to 
 gather anemones on the hill-sides. The 
 flowers were at their best, covering the 
 stony soil in motley profusion, and nodding 
 gayly to the afternoon breeze. 
 
 A camel train went by with a measured 
 tinkling of bells. I watched the animals as 
 they wound over the hills, unable to rouse
 
 112 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 myself from the contemplation of their 
 mysterious progress. " Where are they 
 going ? " I asked, at last. 
 
 " Oh ! into the interior, to Aidin, per- 
 haps, to Isparta, or even Konieh, — far off, 
 weeks and months of travelHng." 
 
 A nameless desire seized me to follow 
 them into that unknown East, — and so 
 next day I took the train for the valley 
 of the Maeander, to make my promised 
 visit there. 
 
 The Smyrna and Aidin Railroad is an 
 English-built affair ; track and rolling-stock 
 are typically British. It is designed pri- 
 marily to tap the great fig-growing district 
 of the Masander Valley. 
 
 At first the train steamed through a 
 land of vineyards, orange trees, and fig and 
 olive orchards, past the Caravan Bridge, 
 and Sedikoi. Hovels of sun-dried brick 
 showed here and there through the foliage. 
 
 Later came a prairie-like expanse under 
 scanty cultivation, where an occasional
 
 FROM SMYRNA TO EPHESUS. II3 
 
 peasant could be seen laboring in a primi- 
 tive fashion ; and after Devlikoi, there were 
 alternating stretches of swamp and pasture 
 land. Herons stood fishing amongst the 
 reeds ; on the dry ground, sheep with long 
 flat tails nibbled contentedly, while their 
 shepherds watched them with staff and 
 dog, huddled under stiff felt cloaks, with- 
 out sleeves or collars, which serve also as 
 shelter for the night. Camels browsed 
 beside their young, herds of mares and 
 colts galloped off at our approach, and on 
 the rocks of the limestone mountains near 
 Tourbali goats were clambering in search 
 of food. Here, on the right, loomed Mount 
 Galesion, sheer and precipitous, crowned 
 with ruined fortifications, called by the 
 Turks the Goat Fort. 
 
 Then the country became more barren 
 still, the train crossed a brook, the Cayster, 
 and finally drew up at Ayasaluk, the mod- 
 ern name of Ephesus. Herein is a record 
 of St. John's presence, for Ayasaluk is 
 nothing but a corruption and contraction of 
 Hagios Theologos, St. John's title.
 
 114 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 A Greek keeps an inn near the station, a 
 man of unblushing overcharges, who sup- 
 pUes horses and mules for the tour of the 
 ruins. Ayasaluk itself is an ill-favored 
 group of a few dozen hovels, patched to- 
 gether from fragments of ancient Ephesus. 
 
 Travellers are generally disappointed with 
 their visit to the ruins, because the latter 
 are not grouped effectively, but spread over 
 a wide area, which cannot be easily appre- 
 ciated as a whole, but must, perforce, be 
 examined in detail. 
 
 Ephesus is not well posed for a painter. 
 
 A lonely reach of marsh and rank vege- 
 tation stretches to the sea, enclosed by 
 many miles of circling hills. On the right 
 a battlemented castle, perched on an eleva- 
 tion ; in the level, the mosque of Sultan 
 Selim, roofless and abandoned. Beyond, 
 and to the left, covering Mount Prion, 
 which projects into the plain, are the prin- 
 cipal ruins of the ancient city in the midst 
 of infinite desolation. 
 
 The site of the famous Temple of Diana,
 
 FROM SMYRNA TO EPHESUS. 115 
 
 for a long time sought in vain by explorers, 
 was discovered in 1869 by Mr. J. T. Wood, 
 once an engineer connected with the rail- 
 road. It has been carefully excavated, and 
 the results of his labors are to be seen in 
 the British Museum, where a special room 
 has been assigned to them. There is now 
 nothing but a hole in the ground to mark 
 one of the wonders of the ancient world. 
 The best portions of the temple were first 
 carried off by Justinian to beautify St. 
 Sophia in Constantinople ; then came the 
 destroying Goths, the hosts of Islam, the 
 warring Crusaders, and, last of all, the 
 archaeologists. 
 
 A profound melancholy brooded over 
 the street of tombs, as I passed, and a 
 nameless piteousness was in the Thermae, 
 the Odeum, the Gymnasium, the enormous 
 theatre, and the port, overgrown with tall 
 reeds, whence a canal led straight to the 
 sea. 
 
 And so, who shall say that aught en-
 
 Il6 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 dures? Ephesus, founded before men 
 could even write her records; placed to 
 command commerce ; housing her many- 
 breasted goddess in a marble shrine that 
 was sculptured by Phidias and painted by 
 Apelles ; well-beloved of Alexander the 
 Great ; visited by St. Paul ; her church 
 nurtured by St. John, — how comes she to 
 be buried in the mud of the Cayster } 
 
 Asia Minor is a carpet, worn in spots to 
 threadbare tatters. The Lydian Croesus 
 spread his wealth upon the middle ; the 
 Greeks displayed their arts along the 
 edges; Cyrus, the Persian, and Alexander, 
 the Macedonian, marched and counter- 
 marched their armies across its length and 
 breadth; Roman legions, Byzantines, Sara- 
 cens and Crusaders trampled its choicest 
 patterns ; and, finally, the Turks rode rough- 
 shod over the whole, wearing away its last 
 vestiges of decoration, tearing ruthlessly 
 its fabric, spurning everything, — and never 
 mending anything.
 
 XIII. 
 
 « 
 
 ALI, THE BRIGAND. 
 
 I CAN see him now, riding ahead on 
 his white stallion, a rifle across his 
 knees, pistols in his belt, and his saddle- 
 bags full of provender. 
 
 He carefully picked out the best trail, and 
 turned from time to time to see how I fared, 
 for there were often muddy pools to ford 
 and steep places for the horses to clamber 
 over. 
 
 They had given me a horse from the 
 Khan, a sorry-looking, ill-used animal, that 
 stood with hanging head to await my 
 pleasure. But it was surprising how that 
 faint trace of the Desert Arabian, which 
 lurked somewhere in its veins, stood it in 
 good stead, when it felt the pressure of a 
 rider. 
 
 After I had bathed in the pool of Hierap- 
 olis, Ali told me his story through an 
 
 "7
 
 Il8 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 interpreter. I was lying in the shade, 
 enjoying the after-effects of my swim, 
 Ali knelt by my side, rolling cigarettes for 
 me, as gentle a servant as ever a prince 
 could desire. 
 
 But his story sounded like a feudal 
 tale. 
 
 It appears that Ali was a man of good 
 family, as we say, without knowing very 
 well what that may mean. The patrimony 
 he inherited made him a sort of indepen- 
 dent land-owner. One day, returning home 
 from hunting, he found his slave loitering 
 at the door. He ordered him to perform 
 some service. But the latter was reluc- 
 tant or impudent, and Ali, who was not a 
 man of many words, shot him on the spot, 
 just as one of our Teutonic ancestors 
 might have cut down a disobedient bond- 
 man. 
 
 In Turkey, justice is bought and sold, as 
 a matter of course. Unfortunately it took 
 practically the whole of All's estate to 
 clear him from his crime.
 
 ALI, THE BRIGAND. II9 
 
 And this made me think of the Teutonic 
 wehrgeld, that old-fashioned fine for murder. 
 In the feudal age, if you killed a nobleman, 
 you had to pay a sum of about four thou- 
 sand five hundred dollars in modern money 
 to his kinsmen. A bondman costs some 
 two hundred and eighty dollars. 
 
 After Ali had paid his money to the kins- 
 men of his victim he was a pauper ; and so 
 he turned brigand, much as one of our 
 ancestors might have turned knight-errant 
 or highwayman. 
 
 The Turkish Government has so much 
 trouble with brigands that it has resorted 
 to an ingenious method of getting rid of 
 them. At intervals an official announce- 
 ment is made, that if the brigands of a 
 certain district will present themselves in 
 some particular village, at a stated time, and 
 promise to do so no more, they will be for- 
 given. Our friend Ali seized one of these 
 opportunities to return to the open arms of 
 forgiveness. Strangely enough, a business 
 firm, which was thoroughly familiar with
 
 I20 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 his career, immediately engaged him as a 
 cavass^ or armed guard. 
 
 His employers had not been mistaken 
 in his character. Although Ali had already 
 been in their service several years when I 
 met him, he had proved himself the soul of 
 honor. His life was nothing to him in the 
 discharge of his duty. His watchword was 
 loyalty. 
 
 I looked at him as he rose from my side, 
 and liked him, even if we could not talk 
 to each other directly. He was a thorough 
 gentleman. 
 
 His face was imperturbable, truly oriental. 
 The hair of his head was shaved part way 
 back to the rim of his small fez, which had 
 around it a piece of ancient muslin. He 
 wore a handsome dark-blue jacket, em- 
 broidered with braid, and his Turkish 
 trousers hung awkwardly about his legs, 
 like a divided skirt. 
 
 Ali was not a man of many accomplish- 
 ments. It is true he could ride anything 
 on four legs, and could roll a cigarette the
 
 ALI, THE BRIGAND. 121 
 
 while with one hand. He was also first- 
 class at rifle practice ; nothing pleased him 
 so much as to pick ofi^, in the ruins we 
 visited, an ornament on a capital, carved 
 two thousand years ago. 
 
 But, like most inland Turks, Ali could 
 not swim. 
 
 They told me an amusing story, to illus- 
 trate at once his helplessness in the water 
 and his absolute obedience. 
 
 Some of his employers one day rode out 
 to bathe in the pool of Hierapolis. They 
 stripped and dived in, while Ali watched 
 helplessly from the bank. After awhile 
 they called to him to follow, knowing that 
 he could not swim. Ali explained gravely 
 that he had never learned, but that if they 
 insisted, of course he must obey. The 
 employers insisted. Ali did not expostu- 
 late, but when he was on the brink, ready 
 to throw himself in, he begged them to 
 take care of his wife and children. They 
 promised, and before he could realize what 
 they were doing, they seized him, one by
 
 122 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 each arm, and swam across the pool with 
 him safely to the opposite bank. Ali 
 crawled out, dripping, dried and dressed 
 himself without a word. Then he was 
 ready for any further test of his loyalty 
 his masters might devise. 
 
 No people in the world are more mis- 
 understood than the Turks. 
 
 There is, of course, nothing to say in 
 if avor of the official Turk, — he is the un- 
 speakable Turk we hear about, and is 
 very often a Greek or an Armenian convert 
 to the Mohammedan faith. The Govern- 
 ment is organized brigandage, from top to 
 bottom. 
 
 But the rural Turk, the man of the soil, 
 the husband of one wife, who worships 
 daily in the village mosque, and is getting 
 ready for his particular paradise, — he is 
 quite a different sort of person. You may 
 put him down as a thoroughly good fellow 
 within his limitations. 
 
 He is first of all hospitable. You may 
 knock about the country and put up at
 
 ALI, THE HRIGAND. 1 23 
 
 the first house you reach, with the certainty 
 of courteous welcome. The Turk is made 
 temperate by his reHgious principles, and 
 he is honest by instinct. 
 
 His kindness to animals is illustrated 
 in a curious manner by the behavior of 
 the storks, which are very numerous in 
 Asia Minor during the winter. 
 
 Almost every town has its Turkish, 
 Greek and Armenian quarter. The Turk- 
 ish quarter, however, may be instantly 
 recognized by the presence of storks' nests 
 on the roofs of the houses. The Greeks 
 and Armenians drive the birds away with 
 sticks and stones, so that their roofs are 
 free. 
 
 It is an amusing sight to see a stork 
 walking solemnly behind some Turkish 
 ploughman, picking up grubs in the fur- 
 rows. There seems to be a sort of 
 comradeship between man and bird. 
 
 But the Turks are not modern ; they 
 do not fit into the present industrial 
 system ; they have no commercial instinct,
 
 124 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 and are still in the feudal age, full of 
 old-fashioned virtues and vices. They 
 are decreasing in numbers, and are grow- 
 ing poorer ; they know too little arithmetic. 
 When the time came for me to part 
 from Ali, I felt that I was losing a friend. 
 With much hesitation I slipped a Turkish 
 dollar into his hand. You ought to have 
 seen that ex-brigand, who had killed his 
 man more than once, blush up to the 
 rim of his fez.
 
 XIV. 
 A TRAIN OF CAMELS. 
 
 IT was a March morning in the valley 
 of the Maeander. A group of camels 
 waited patiently for the rising sun, crouch- 
 ing on the gravel bed of the brook which 
 bisects the little town of Sochia. 
 
 Their mouths worked slowly, in a sen- 
 sitive sort of way ; their great fringed eyes 
 seemed to plead ; the inverted arch of 
 the neck appeared at moments magnifi- 
 cent, then again only comical. Uncouth, 
 perplexing animals ! Those callous spots, 
 on their knees, suggested abject submis- 
 sion, and even the humps on their backs, 
 that were overborne to one side by their 
 own weight, looked pathetic. 
 
 With the first ray of sunlight a driver 
 
 went among them and prodded them to 
 
 their feet. Then he took the end of the 
 
 rope which bound the animals together, 
 
 125
 
 126 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 and rode ahead on a donkey down the 
 valley of the Maeander to the sea. 
 
 The camels strode forward unerringly 
 and stealthily on their padded feet, ad- 
 vancing with a seesaw motion of marvel- 
 lous regularity, their loads of licorice root 
 creaking in unison. First there was the 
 invariable forward reach of the neck, — 
 something between a lurch and a swing, 
 — and then the tremendous gathering up 
 of the long, attenuated hindquarters, which 
 looked so weak but were immensely 
 strong. Ever and anon one of the camels 
 would turn its head a little, with slow, 
 affected grace, but for the rest there was 
 no variation in the march. 
 
 As the train passed through the narrow, 
 haphazard by-ways of the town, storks 
 were nesting on the Turkish houses, 
 smacking their bills in connubial bliss. 
 Scavenger dogs prowled and barked 
 about the alleys, or snarled at each other 
 over the refuse of the streets. 
 
 Beyond Sochia the hill-sides glowed with
 
 A TRAIN OF CAMELS. 1 27 
 
 color. It was the anemones showing 
 through the grass on every hand, — of all 
 hues, from scarlet, through changing blues, 
 to pale saffron, the whole forming a vast 
 primeval Smyrna rug. Sparrow - haw^ks 
 fluttered over the reeds; ground -larks 
 scurried away; hounds rushed fiercely 
 from peasant hovels to gnash at the 
 camels' heels. 
 
 There lay the valley of the Maeander, 
 unreclaimed from the ravages of annual 
 floods and breeding malaria ! Its coloring 
 resembled that of the Roman Campagna 
 in winter, — vague, subdued and rich. 
 There were the same yellows of dead 
 grass upon an undertone of dark sod, 
 the same living brilliancy around the 
 pools, and the same gray blight cast 
 upon the expanse. A marvellous harmony 
 haunted the region in a minor key, — 
 piteous, magnificently oriental, never-to- 
 be-forgotten. 
 
 At Samsun the train of camels stopped 
 a while for the driver to drink a cup of
 
 128 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 coffee and smoke a cigarette in the midst of 
 a motley group of travellers, all fully armed, 
 freebooting-looking, speaking a dozen dif- 
 ferent languages, their horses gayly capari- 
 soned. 
 
 In the evening the sea sparkled its wel- 
 come, and the isles of Greece leaned upon 
 the horizon, — Patmos, Samos and many 
 others. But the camels cared not for that. 
 They kneeled, their loads were taken off, 
 and they munched their feed. Poor ani- 
 mals ! full of ugly graces, apologetic in 
 their bearing, and yet gifted with uncon- 
 scious strength, like browbeaten, uncom- 
 plaining and unlovely women. 
 
 Next morning the loads were delivered 
 to a schooner sailing for America. The 
 camels kneeled again. New bales were 
 strapped to their humps, and the return 
 journey to Sochia began rather late. 
 
 The sun was high and warm ; a damp, 
 earthy smell rose from the Maeander Valley, 
 a desolate languor lowered upon the ex- 
 panse. At rare intervals men and women
 
 A TRAIN OF CAxMELS. 1 29 
 
 were passed, digging for licorice root, or 
 driving laden donkeys before them. A 
 yoke of buffaloes, with black, glistening 
 sides, drew a rough cart; a trader sat 
 perched high on his saddle-bags ; a woman 
 in bright red drew on her veil, and some 
 little children had woven anemones of 
 many colors into their hair. 
 
 Night fell before the train of camels had 
 reached Sochia. 
 
 One by one the stars appeared. The 
 mist settled upon the river. Only the 
 tinkling of the bell on the foremost camel 
 could be heard, or an occasional expostu- 
 lating moan from the great, stupid, patient 
 beasts of burden. 
 
 It was a night of the East. 
 
 One star especially seemed to change 
 from green to red, and back again, — 
 surely a double star, discernible in the 
 clearness of that Asiatic sky ! 
 
 But where was it this same scene had 
 been enacted once before ? Yes, truly : 
 there was once a Star of the East, and the
 
 130 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 wise men travelled until they came to the 
 spot where it shone, and there were camels, 
 too, laden with precious gifts for a little 
 Child. 
 
 In Sochia the men were gathered in 
 polyglot confusion before the inns, smoking 
 chibouks and drinking innumerable cups of 
 coffee. Attendants went about replenish- 
 ing the pipes, or supplying them with live 
 coals. A ragged, vermin-infested dervish 
 howled dismally for alms, staff in hand. 
 The dogs skulked in search of offal. A 
 peasant homeward bound sang from the 
 countryside. It was one of those dirges 
 which, in the East, passed for popular 
 songs, but sound to the Western ear like 
 the wail of a dying race. 
 
 And then the camels kneeled once 
 more ; their loads were taken off ; they 
 munched their feed, and after awhile they 
 were allowed to sleep.
 
 XV. 
 
 THE GOATHERD OF PRIENE. 
 
 EVER since he could remember, Usuf 
 had driven his goats to the plateau 
 of crumbling limestone, where the ruins of 
 ancient Priene are perched in brilliant 
 wreckage above the plain of the Maeander. 
 He was now a shy old man, and had 
 grown almost speechless from his long 
 solitude. 
 
 His garments were made of long-haired 
 skins ; coarse sandals protected his feet, 
 and leather thongs were wound about his 
 legs. In his hand he carried a strange old 
 staff, and a flat felt hat sat upon his 
 matted gray hair. 
 
 He had no idea what the ruins meant ; 
 but he liked to go there, because the Turks 
 avoided them, and left him in peace. He 
 did not even know that he belonged to a 
 primitive race, which had lived thereabouts 
 131
 
 132 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 from time immemorial, long before the 
 Turks were ever heard of. 
 
 Once inside the broken walls of Priene, 
 the goats wandered at will, feeding on the 
 grass-grown streets and the shrubbery of 
 the wayside. Great blocks of marble, 
 trunks of columns, fragments of capitals, 
 and everywhere massive foundations, told 
 of the classic age. Especially fine were 
 the remains of a temple, whose columns of 
 white marble lay prone as they fell, split 
 into their original sections by the force of 
 their fall. 
 
 Behind the town proper rose an acropolis, 
 — a treeless mountain, three or four hun- 
 dred feet high, crowned with ancient forti- 
 fications. There were steps leading up, 
 cut into the bare face of the precipice ; but 
 they were difficult of access, and in places 
 almost obliterated by the action of the cen- 
 turies. It was many years since Usuf had 
 attempted to climb them. 
 
 The old goatherd sat on a step of the 
 temple, his back against a fallen capital,
 
 THE GOATHERD OF PRIENE. 1 33 
 
 and looked lazily out over the plain of the 
 Mobander to the sea. His dog barked now 
 and again through the ruins. A mother in 
 the flock ninnied to her young, or a vulture 
 alighted on the city wall, with a clumsy 
 folding of its wings. There was a warm 
 reflection from the sun shining on the 
 shadeless rocks. 
 
 The eyes of Usuf fell to the ground, and 
 then grew dim. He was asleep. 
 
 With that Priene passed away. Only the 
 bare limestone remained. 
 
 But Usuf, looking out to sea with a new 
 pair of eyes, seemed to behold several 
 barks, heading for the mouth of the Mae- 
 ander. Each was manned by many oars- 
 men, and had a huge square sail in the 
 centre. Some colonists in rough tunics, 
 rudely armed, unloaded their vessels, then 
 climbed the rocky elevation, and camped 
 upon the site of Priene. They were 
 lonians. 
 
 Many centuries passed unheeded. 
 
 Then Usuf, with a new pair of ears,
 
 134 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 heard the sound of flutes and lyres, inton- 
 ing a paean of victory. A procession of 
 priests and citizens filed through the city 
 gate, and marched towards the headland 
 of Micale, where stood the shrine of the 
 twelve Ionian cities, the sacred Panionium. 
 The tunics of the people were no longer 
 coarse and cheap, they glittered with em- 
 broidery, some were even dyed with purple, 
 for Priene had prospered as a seaport and 
 grown rich. 
 
 So rich, in fact, that Alyattes, father of 
 Croesus, laid siege to Priene. 
 
 Usuf, with a new power of thought, im- 
 agined himself climbing up the steps, then 
 newly-made, of the acropolis. From on 
 high he saw the Lydian army encamped 
 below, a numerous host, but not a brave 
 one. The city, well-provisioned and well- 
 armed, offered a stout resistance. But 
 exhaustion threatened to come at length, 
 so a certain citizen. Bias by name, one of 
 the seven wise men of antiquity, bethought 
 him of a trick.
 
 THE GOATHERD OF PRIENE. 135 
 
 He fattened two mules with great diffi- 
 culty, and drove them down the incline 
 into the camp of the enemy. Now, Aly- 
 attes, seeing the splendid condition the ani- 
 mals were in, was astonished. He did not 
 suppose the besieged could have spared 
 the food. Therefore he desired to make 
 peace with Priene, and so sent an ambas- 
 sador. 
 
 At other times Usuf heard this same 
 Bias — worldly-wise philosopher — say many 
 a true word ; for instance : 
 
 " It is more agreeable to decide between 
 enemies than between friends ; for of 
 friends, one is sure to become an enemy to 
 you ; but of enemies, one is sure to become 
 a friend." 
 
 Usuf also saw the aged sage die quietly 
 at his profession. Having pleaded a cause 
 for some one, when he was exceedingly old, 
 after he had finished speaking, he leaned 
 back with his head on the bosom of his 
 daughter's son ; and after the judges had 
 given their decision in favor of Bias's
 
 136 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 client, when the court broke up, he was 
 found dead on his grandson's bosom. 
 
 Again many centuries passed unheeded. 
 
 Finally, one day, Usuf heard stone-cut- 
 ters at work upon a glorious temple of 
 white marble. Many sculptors adorned it 
 with statues, and painters decorated the 
 cella with color. When all was ready, be- 
 hold ! Alexander the Great marched through 
 this region, after the battle of Granicus, 
 proclaiming freedom from the Persian 
 yoke. Amid popular rejoicings, the little 
 man with aquiline nose and curly hair 
 dedicated the temple to Athene Polias. 
 Usuf even saw an inscription, recording 
 this fact, carved upon the wall. 
 
 More than two thousand years passed 
 over Usuf in his sleep. 
 
 Priene was now in ruins, as Usuf had 
 always known it, except that many columns 
 of the temple still stood upright. But even 
 while Usuf wondered, some modern-looking 
 men came prying about the city. One 
 among them, who was master, ordered the
 
 THE GOATHERD OF PRIENE. 137 
 
 Others to overturn a column. They did so, 
 and found a gold coin of great rarity be- 
 neath the drum. Thereafter peasants came 
 from all the countryside, hearing there was 
 gold under the columns of Priene. They 
 overturned everything, but no more coins 
 were found. Some of the fluted sections, 
 however, were taken away, to be used as 
 grinding-stones in the licorice factory. 
 
 Usuf raised his eyes. He found himself 
 looking out over the plain of the Maeander 
 to the sea. He heard his dog bark at the 
 flock. He smelt the thyme in the grass at 
 his side. Vultures circled, swayed, and 
 swung in mid-air to emphasize the im- 
 mense, impenetrable desolation. The tor- 
 tuous track of the Maeander glistened 
 below, and beyond a range of pale purple 
 spoke unutterable mysteries. 
 
 The old man turned to look over the 
 ruins of Priene. He had no idea what they 
 meant now ; but once, yes, a moment ago, 
 he had known, for a brief instant.
 
 XVI. 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 
 
 THERE can be nothing on this every- 
 day earth more fantastic, incompre- 
 hensible and altogether alluring, than that 
 first sight of Hierapolis in Phrygia, as you 
 approach it over the sterile, volcanic plain 
 of the Lycus. 
 
 I rode out from Seraikioi, at that time 
 the terminus of the Smyrna and Aidin 
 Railroad. It was the morning of the 22nd 
 of March, a day full of sunny exhilaration. 
 Three cavasses led the way with much 
 show of arms and oriental trappings. 
 
 Beyond the village, buffaloes grazed, 
 heavy-footed, in the rough pastures, or 
 wallowed through the mire of the swamps ; 
 and at the licorice stations, where an occa- 
 sional halt was made to take breath, there 
 were herds of mares and foals in paddocks. 
 As one advanced, the wayside folk seemed 
 138
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 1 39 
 
 more untamed and unkempt, the children 
 freer, lovelier ; while the women, their hair 
 dyed a dull brick-red with henna, not only 
 shyly veiled themselves as we rode up, but 
 also turned their backs until we had passed. 
 The hovels of sun-dried mud and rushes 
 were pitiably primitive. 
 
 In one hamlet a poor little mosque 
 leaned against a tall tree, which, for want 
 of anything better, served as a minaret. 
 
 After three hours of riding, Hierapolis 
 loomed in sight. 
 
 At first one can only discern a white 
 effulgence on the hill-side, like a monster 
 snow-drift, dazzling and glinting in the 
 sunlight. Above it the ruins of the city 
 show vaguely, as though enthroned on a 
 marble pedestal. The Turks call the place 
 Pambouk Kalessi, or Cotton Fort, but 
 nearer by the mass of white looks more 
 like a frozen cataract, tumbling in great 
 bounds from a terrace, where Hierapolis 
 lies forlorn and forgotten, a sanctuary once, 
 but now shunned by the natives.
 
 I40 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 At this moment Ali, the head cavass on 
 the white stallion, fired into the air. The 
 horses knew their cue ; rearing, leaping, 
 and racing, as though the evil spirits of 
 Gadara had entered into them, they tore 
 across the plain, — and so we arrived at 
 the foot of the plateau on which Hierapolis 
 stands. 
 
 The terrace, or shelf, is between two and 
 three hundred feet high and several miles 
 long. It has been created by the deposits 
 of a hot spring, which rises amongst the 
 ruins, and overflowing in little streams, 
 runs down the incline, incrusting the 
 ground with a snow-white sediment. 
 
 While fresh, this substance looks like 
 pure lime, but it weathers hard and turns 
 into a porous gray-brown rock, resembling 
 Roman travertine. The water is full of 
 carbonic acid gas, and probably, also, con- 
 tains a good deal of silica in solution, for 
 the grasses and shrubs, that have found a 
 foothold in the crevices, are silently turned 
 to stone, silicified by the impregnated water
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 14I 
 
 and steam. There were leaves and stems 
 still green and barely touched, others al- 
 ready thoroughly incrusted, while some 
 were transformed into white, fragile forms, 
 from which all vegetable matter had long 
 since vanished. 
 
 The face of the cliff is a marble-like 
 Niagara. 
 
 As the little rills trickle down over the 
 edge, there is a constant banking up of the 
 soft sediment, a busy building of pools, 
 where the shifting light creates colors of 
 enchantment : iridescent, pale blue, yellow 
 and joyous pink. There is the whispered 
 dripping of steaming rivulets, leaping from 
 shelf to shelf, from basin to basin, consort- 
 ing strangely in murmured companionship. 
 In these water-pockets forsaken Hierapolis 
 now alone can store her wealth. 
 
 There is such daintiness and gayety in 
 the descent of these waters into the plain, 
 that one is not prepared for the gray deso- 
 lation above. 
 
 We clambered up the incline, as best
 
 142 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 we might, while the horses were led round 
 to mount into the city by the ancient road. 
 On top there was an arid expanse, covered 
 with enormous ruins. 
 
 No trace of human life, and a silent 
 blight dominating everything. 
 
 Near the edge of the cliff were massive, 
 broken walls ; beyond, a group of vast, 
 vaulted buildings, which have been identi- 
 fied by archaeologists as the thermos and 
 palcBstria of Hierapolis, the baths and the 
 gymnasium. Here and there great rents 
 crossed the masonry, the result of earth- 
 quakes, for which this region has always 
 been noted. Narrow passage-ways pierced 
 the walls. 
 
 When we had climbed to the top of one 
 of the archways, and seen the extraordi- 
 nary size of the stones which composed it, 
 our astonishment was indeed great. No 
 mortar was used ; the blocks held together 
 by their great weight and strength; but it 
 seemed a marvel how the ancients could 
 have hoisted them to such an elevation, or
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 1 43 
 
 what sort of a scaffolding they could have 
 used. 
 
 Leaving the cavasses and horses com- 
 fortably placed in the great hall of the 
 thermce. I first passed through an open 
 space surrounded by remnants of columns, 
 perhaps an agora, or market-place and 
 then climbed the hill to the theatre, which 
 is reckoned one of the best preserved to 
 be found anywhere. 
 
 The scena or stage was wonderfully intact, 
 but what might be termed the fa9ade, over 
 the main entrance, lay headlong, a tumbled 
 mass of sculpture. I noticed especially a 
 part of the fallen frieze, which represented 
 a hunting scene. The workmanship was 
 exquisite. After vainly endeavoring to de- 
 cipher an inscription, we entered the or- 
 chestra and walked to the topmost tier of 
 seats, still for the most part in their places. 
 
 Archaeologists give the diameter of the 
 theatre as three hundred and forty-six feet, 
 with forty-five tiers of seats in sight, and 
 others, perhaps, buried under the debris.
 
 144 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 Was it accident or design that placed so 
 many Greek theatres in positions with 
 wide outlooks ? 
 
 The plain of the Lycus rolled sea-like to 
 the west. Opposite, Baba Dagh — Father 
 Mountain — surged into the sky, the Mount 
 Cadmus of the ancients, and the highest 
 peak in this part of Asia Minor. It was 
 still covered with snow, like a bit of the 
 Alps in the tropics. At its foot lay the 
 ruins of Laodicea and Colossae, but be- 
 hind, in sombre rows, the mountains of 
 Caria rose and fell, bleak and gray against 
 an unclouded sky. No sound broke 
 through the sunlit air. A dry smell 
 came from the heated rocks, where devas- 
 tation reigned supreme. A musing lan- 
 guor spoke in the dying breeze. 
 
 Once there must have been the utmost 
 refinement of pleasure in sitting there, dur- 
 ing the days of the city's full tide of 
 prosperity. 
 
 Not that Hierapolis ever played a great 
 part in the world's history. A fashionable
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 1 45 
 
 shrine, perhaps, a resort for the sick, like 
 some modern Spa or Saratoga, but for the 
 rest, apparently, a quiet provincial town. 
 The peculiar properties of the water gave 
 value to her dyes and woollen manufac- 
 tures, Strabo says. St. Paul speaks of a 
 Christian church there in his time, and 
 there were bishops until A. D. 1066. 
 Probably the Latin Crusaders, in their 
 many marches through this region, sup- 
 pressed the Greek ritual ; then came the 
 destroying fury of the Moslem, and the 
 earthquakes did the rest. 
 
 If Hierapolis can claim any distinction 
 at all in history, it is for having given 
 birth to Epictetus, the slave-philosopher, 
 the pure-souled Stoic. 
 
 By some mocking irony he had become 
 in early youth the slave of that profli- 
 gate freedman, Epaphroditus, who helped 
 Nero put an end to his life. About 
 89, A. D., however, Epictetus was enabled 
 to open a school of philosophy at Nicop-
 
 146 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 olis, in Epirus. It was a magnificently 
 modern saying of his, " Never, in reply to 
 the question to what country you belong, 
 say that you are an Athenian or a Corin- 
 thian, but that you are a citizen of the 
 world." 
 
 Epictetus . was always insisting upon 
 man's divine nature : " Wretch, you are 
 carrying about a god with you, and you 
 know it not." Of the human being he once 
 exclaimed in a supreme moment : " What, 
 and immortal, too, exempt from old age 
 and from sickness ? No ; but dying as 
 becomes a god, sickening as becomes a 
 god." A sublime paradox indeed. 
 
 But his conversation with his pupils 
 seems to have been filled also with homely, 
 telling phrases : " It is not easy to exhort 
 weak young men ; for neither is it easy to 
 hold soft cheese with a hook." " The con- 
 test is unequal between a charming young 
 girl and a beginner in philosophy." 
 
 He once stated the position of the Stoic 
 by referring to himself as an illustration :
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 1 47 
 
 " Look at me, who am without a city, with- 
 out a house, without possessions, with- 
 out a slave ; I sleep on the ground ; I 
 have no wife, no children, no praetorium, 
 but only the earth and heavens, and one 
 poor cloak. And what do I want ? Am I 
 not without sorrow ? Am I not without 
 fear ? Am I not free ? " 
 
 I descended from the theatre, past a 
 well-preserved reservoir with earthen pipes, 
 and came to the famous pool of Hierapolis. 
 
 This sheet of warm water is of irregular 
 shape, perhaps forty feet by twenty; the 
 depth varies considerably, for in places 
 the marble pavement, which once covered 
 the bottom, shows plainly through the 
 water, upheaved and broken, apparently 
 by the action of earthquakes. In one 
 spot, however, there is a deep rift, from 
 which the water rises dark and in smooth 
 coils. Fragments of white columns lie 
 prostrate in the water, heaped in superb 
 confusion, the remnants, probably, of a
 
 148 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 colonnade which circled the pool. The 
 water is of an iridescent blue, something 
 like that in the famous grotto at Capri; 
 silver bubbles rise incessantly to the sur- 
 face, and steam fills the air on ordinary 
 days, for the temperature is about 90° 
 Fahrenheit. 
 
 I stripped and dived in headlong. 
 
 It was the strangest bath I have ever 
 taken. Swimming over columns and blocks 
 of pavement, resting for a moment on a 
 chiselled capital, my body gleaming, as 
 though with some strange phosphores- 
 cence, floating with eyes upturned to the 
 sky, or looking round upon the infinite 
 sadness of the city, — where shall a modern 
 man find so ancient and classic a bath 
 in our day? 
 
 The ever-attentive cavass spread out 
 luncheon near the ther7?ics, then rolled 
 cigarettes for us, and left us dozing 
 comfortably on a blanket, sheltered from 
 the breeze. The effect of the bath was 
 inexpressibly soothing.
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 1 49 
 
 Various travellers, beginning with 
 Strabo, have described the exhalations 
 from the pool as dangerous. One of the 
 most recent visitors to Hierapolis, the Rev. 
 E. J. Davis, in his book, " Anatolica," 
 writes that villagers told him of several 
 persons who had been drowned, while 
 bathing in • the pool, either overpowered 
 by the supposed noxious gases, or, as the 
 villagers thought more probable, dragged 
 down by some evil spirit. He mentions 
 seeing two sparrows, just dead, which had 
 alighted to drink, and been stifled. 
 
 For myself, I can only say that I 
 experienced no bad effects, but, on the 
 contrary, found the bath most refreshing; 
 while a friend of mine assures me, that 
 it has become quite a custom for himself 
 and family to spend several weeks at a 
 time in an improvised tent near Hierapolis, 
 in order to enjoy the bathing. 
 
 Other travellers, both ancient and mod- 
 ern, also speak of a mephytic cavern, the 
 so-called Plutonium. Whether the aper-
 
 150 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 ture has become blocked up, or the 
 exhalations have been diverted to other 
 openings, certain it is, that neither Mr. 
 Davis nor I saw anything which corre- 
 sponds to the description given by these 
 visitors. There is indeed a large ruin, 
 rising upon the supposed site, but no 
 aperture is visible. 
 
 The cavasses amused themselves with 
 a little rifle practice, and then we mounted 
 and rode through the deserted city. 
 
 There is a main street, lined with a 
 multitude of ruins. One of these had 
 evidently been a Christian church, for a 
 cross was carved upon the keystone of 
 the arch. 
 
 At this point a goatherd started sud- 
 denly from behind some stones, and came 
 forward with a few coins for sale which 
 he had found thereabouts. He was glad 
 of the metallics I gave him, in exchange 
 for a Byzantine copper coin, of Leo, the 
 Isaurian. 
 
 Beyond, there was a gateway and wall.
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 151 
 
 then another gateway; a prostrate colon- 
 nade, a triumphal archway, another Chris- 
 tian church, and after that, for about half 
 a mile, we rode along a street of tombs, 
 stretching wearily on either hand, beside 
 the rough-paved way. They consisted of 
 a sarcophagus and lid, each hewn from 
 a solid piece, and the whole perched on 
 a square of masonry. Some bore in- 
 scriptions, some were tilted and broken, 
 and all had been rifled of their contents 
 at some time. 
 
 Among them, but standing somewhat 
 apart, was the one known as the tomb 
 of Epictetus, how justly I do not know. 
 
 From the end of the street a last look 
 at Hierapolis showed the city lying, 
 yellow-brown, in the afternoon sun. The 
 parched ground looked sear against some 
 sparsely-wooded hills at the back. An 
 abandoned, hopeless aspect pervaded 
 everything, inexpressibly pathetic to any- 
 one coming from the centres of civilization. 
 It seemed as though the mute city were
 
 152 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 Struggling to cry out against hapless fate, 
 to reproach a pitiless heaven. The very 
 white that gleamed so joyously at our 
 approach now looked more like a shroud. 
 
 As the horses turned their heads tow- 
 ards Seraikioi, a vulture squawked in the 
 ruins ; but in the plain the grass was gayly 
 green, camels and horses grazed content- 
 edly over wide pasture lands, a peace almost 
 Arcadian rested on the peasant huts. 
 
 It was decided to return to the village 
 by another way. All went well for awhile. 
 By degrees, however, the sod became 
 softer, the grass juicier, the horses' hoofs 
 sank awkwardly into the ground, and then 
 we knew that we had ventured into a bog, 
 dry and passable in the summer, but diffi- 
 cult in March. 
 
 We dismounted and led the plunging 
 animals gently from one hummock to 
 another. Sometimes they sank to their 
 haunches, struggling with a human fright 
 in their eyes, which was pitiable. But 
 when we reached firm footing once more,
 
 HIERAPOLIS, THE HOLY. 1 53 
 
 they fell into their rapid, rachvan gait, 
 apparently as fresh as ever. 
 
 The afternoon waned. A traveller knelt 
 by the wayside on his carpet, praying 
 towards the east, the villagers were return- 
 ing to their homes after the field-work of 
 the day. 
 
 In Seraikioi motley groups, poverty- 
 stricken, but in gay colors and outlandish 
 dress, stood in the little squares, and all 
 the men were gathered in front of the 
 mosque, to await the evening call to prayer. 
 
 Then a figure stepped out upon the 
 gallery of the minaret, and, with uplifted 
 hands, wailed forth a sombre dirge to the 
 night wind. 
 
 The sound descended in broken pulsa- 
 tions upon the listening town. 
 
 It was lugubrious, charged with sorrow, 
 and burdened with an unspeakable dejec- 
 tion. It rose and fell, from sad sighings 
 and murmurs full of evil prophecies, 
 through dismal howls and blood-curdling 
 execrations, to hoarse shrieks of unbridled
 
 154 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 madness. It chilled, and yet inflamed. 
 At the end there came a piteous, nasal 
 note, almost a whine, upon which the 
 priest dwelt with lingering pathos. 
 
 " God is great ! God is almighty ! God 
 is merciful ! I testify there is no God but 
 one God. I testify that Mohammed is the 
 prophet of God. Ye faithful, come now 
 to prayers. God is great ! God is al- 
 mighty ! God is merciful ! There is no 
 God but one God ! " 
 
 And then the men entered the mosque 
 to worship, leaving their shoes on the 
 threshold in long lines, two and two.
 
 THKIK C.ULDKN' \VEDlJlN(i.
 
 XVII. 
 THEIR GOLDEN WEDDING. 
 
 OLD Reiser had been a fisherman all 
 his life on the lake of Thun, and he 
 was now over seventy. Just because to- 
 day happened to be the fiftieth anniver- 
 sary of his wedding was no reason for 
 stopping work. Besides, lake trout were 
 scarce and in demand, and his fishing per- 
 mit came high. So he had spent the day, 
 as usual, with his nets off the reeds, where 
 the Aar rushes into the lake. 
 
 In the late afternoon Reiser rowed home, 
 obliquely across, to the hamlet of Sund- 
 lauenen. It was only a handful of dingy 
 chalets, built on the rubble which the 
 Suldbach had brought down through the 
 ages, and inhabited by a wretched, primi- 
 tive population. As he neared, he turned 
 his boat, — they always do in the Ober- 
 155
 
 156 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 land, — and rode stern foremost under the 
 rustic roof of his boat-house. 
 
 His wife, who was watching, came to 
 meet him from their cottage. 
 
 She wore the old-fashioned bodice of 
 the Bernese costume and the wide sleeves. 
 Her face was puckered into weather-beaten 
 wrinkles, her hands hard and callous, her 
 gait stooping and slouchy, peasant-like. 
 As she laid her hand on his arm and 
 pushed him affectionately, her little old 
 eyes were moist with happiness. She had 
 said all along, she knew they would never 
 live to celebrate their golden wedding. It 
 was an intuition, she insisted, but now, 
 after all, it was such a relief to know that 
 she was wrong. 
 
 Some young ladies from the pension at 
 the end of the lake, who were fond of 
 picknicking here, on the grass by the 
 water, nicknamed the old couple the Duke 
 and Duchess, — probably because their 
 manners were so much finer than those of 
 real dukes and duchesses. That morning
 
 THEIR GOLDEN WEDDING. 1 57 
 
 those dear young ladies had brought their 
 wedding gift, she told him. Four pounds 
 of sugar, two of coffee (for them both, you 
 see), some cotton thread and a paper of 
 pins for her. They had asked about 
 tobacco for old Reiser, but she told them 
 proudly that he never smoked. 
 
 Reiser's wife had never been farther 
 from home than Bern, some twenty-five 
 miles away, and that was in her youth. 
 They had never had any children. He 
 had fished ; she had worked in their vege- 
 table patch, and woven the hemps for his 
 nets, or helped him mend them. It was 
 always a struggle to make both ends meet, 
 but they had been really happy through it 
 all. 
 
 '' And to think," she repeated, as they 
 came out after supper, " that I felt so sure 
 we would never live to see this day." 
 
 They sat on the bench at the side of the 
 cottage, where the nets hang to dry. There 
 was such a calm on the lake, they could 
 hear people talking on the other shore.
 
 158 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 From the fringe of the woods came the 
 smell of cyclamen. A quiet light glowed 
 behind the Stockhorn, but the Niesen had 
 already become a purple pyramid, turn- 
 ing black. An electric light was turned on 
 at the Darlingen steamboat landing, and, 
 soon after, a star appeared over the shoul- 
 der of the range opposite. 
 
 Old Reiser and his wife sat hand in 
 hand, like lovers. She had brought out 
 the Bible, as though it were Sunday. 
 
 At intervals she still persisted that she 
 had always felt they would never live to 
 see this day. 
 
 Just then a fish rose. The ripples 
 parted slowly in a circle across the calm, 
 line after line, without pause, infinite, — a 
 symbol of immortality. 
 
 " But now I don't care what happens," 
 said the old woman. And they went in.
 
 XVIII. 
 AT THE MANCEUVRES. 
 
 THAT autumn the manoeuvres of the 
 Swiss army were held in the upland 
 district of the Canton of Vaud, back of 
 the Lake of Geneva, in a delightful region, 
 lying between Romont and Chatel St. 
 Denis, which is practically unknown to 
 tourists. 
 
 There were as many as twenty-five 
 thousand men in the field, encamped in 
 two great divisions, so as to form an in- 
 vading and a defending corps, equipped 
 for war in every particular. 
 
 A general scheme of operations had 
 been drawn up beforehand, and even pub- 
 lished in the newspapers. Fortunately it 
 was so simple that even an unmilitary mind 
 could master it at once, with the aid of an 
 ordinary map : 
 
 IS9
 
 l6o LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 A hostile army from the south has pene- 
 trated into the Valais with the intention of 
 forcing a passage upon Bern, the capital, 
 while a native army is gathered in the 
 region of Bern to defend that city. The 
 enemy's plan of attack consists in sending 
 detachments to try and cross the passes 
 which lead from the Valais into the 
 Bernese Oberland, such familiar passes as 
 the Grimsel, the Gemmi, the Rawyl, and 
 others. For purposes of simplification, 
 however, these detachments are supposed 
 to be held in check by native troops, col- 
 lected for the defence of the passes, so that 
 their operations remain purely imaginary, 
 and play no part in the manoeuvres. On 
 the other hand, a large force of the enemy, 
 the left wing, advances from Vevey upon 
 Fribourg, in order to reach Bern from this 
 side, and a corresponding force of native 
 troops is sent forward to meet the invaders, 
 and throw them back upon Vevey and into 
 the Valais again. The two armies are sup- 
 posed to meet finally near Romont, but the
 
 AT THE MANOEUVRES. l6l 
 
 various details of the conflict are to be left 
 entirely to the commanders, and to fortune, 
 as in real war. 
 
 On the morning of the tenth of Septem- 
 ber a decisive battle was fought on the out- 
 skirts of Romont. 
 
 The defending force was strongly posted 
 upon a commanding hill. Great masses of 
 infantry were waiting in the woods ; 
 Krupp cannon were stationed in trenches, 
 hidden behind hedges, artificially made of 
 cut branches ; and the sharp-shooters were 
 thrown well forward in all directions. 
 
 Presently, scouts came riding furiously to 
 announce that the enemy had been sighted. 
 A few alterations were quickly made in the 
 position of the artillery, to correspond with 
 the most recent information received, and 
 finally small detachments of the enemy 
 were perceived in the distance, advancing 
 under cover of all possible natural shelter. 
 
 It was half-past nine. 
 
 The native artillery promptly opened fire 
 upon the exposed enemy. The hostile
 
 1 62 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 artillery responded, and the battle had 
 begun. 
 
 Presently the sharp-shooters found them- 
 selves within range of each other, and a 
 murderous fire ensued, which steadily in- 
 creased in volume, until all the hills around 
 resounded with the crack of musketry and 
 the booming of cannon. It took the two 
 armies about an hour and a half to come 
 to close quarters. Then the native army 
 brought forward its reserves, hitherto hid- 
 den in the woods behind. Dark lines of 
 infantry advanced in quickstep and poured 
 fusillades into the enemy, posted on the 
 outskirts of a dense forest, whose trees re- 
 echoed the sound of shooting with a ter- 
 rible, hollow shriek. 
 
 Line after line of reserves came pouring 
 out, running every moment faster, with 
 drums beating, bands playing and flags 
 flying. It was now half-past eleven o'clock. 
 
 The umpires ordered the retreat to be 
 blown, for victory remained with the de- 
 fenders. Twenty-five thousand men had
 
 AT THE MANOEUVRES. 1 63 
 
 fought each other with grim determination, 
 but there were neither dead nor wounded 
 to deplore, — the surgeons alone had been 
 inactive. 
 
 Next" day the army, which had been 
 called into existence for the manoeuvres, 
 was reviewed by the commanding officers, 
 and was then disbanded to return to civil 
 life. Within twenty-four hours there was 
 not a soldier to be seen in all that country 
 round about. 
 
 Of course the appearance of the troops 
 and the conduct of operations were by no 
 means faultless. 
 
 An English captain on leave w^as very 
 severe upon the tefiuc of the men, which 
 is unquestionably slovenly, according to 
 English or German ideas of military smart- 
 ness. He also thought the lower officers a 
 very uninstructed set of men, and espe- 
 cially criticised the close order in which the 
 lines were brought under fire at the close, — 
 an operation which, he said, would have ex- 
 posed them to annihilation in real warfare.
 
 164 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 At the same time the captain was loud in 
 his praises of the artillery, and was pleased 
 with the enthusiasm and morale of the men. 
 
 A retired Prussian cavalry officer, al- 
 though admitting the lack of neatness in the 
 appearance of the men and the amateurish- 
 ness of the younger officers, was of opinion 
 that the close order of lines at the last was 
 the right thing, because the supreme 
 moment of the battle had come : it was 
 good military science to mass the troops 
 for a last rush. 
 
 One of the three French officers, who 
 had been sent to report, was heard to 
 characterize the morning's work as a "nice 
 little manoeuvre," — a remark sufficiently 
 non-committal to suit his official position. 
 
 But the supreme virtue these critics 
 failed to understand, — the Swiss army is 
 democratic to the core. There are no 
 drill-master tyrannies, but only that obedi- 
 ence is demanded which comes to men 
 naturally in the fulfilment of a patriotic 
 duty.
 
 XIX. 
 
 SELF-GOVERNMENT. 
 
 EARLY in the morning crowds of wor- 
 shippers repaired to the parish church 
 at Altdorf, and after service dispersed in 
 groups about the village, to await the time 
 when the procession should start for the 
 famous meadow. At last, at about eleven 
 o'clock, there was a roll of drums, a burst 
 of music, and a train of persons issued from 
 the little market-place in front of the town 
 hall. 
 
 First marched two men, clad in mediaeval 
 costumes of orange and black, the cantonal 
 colors, each bearing upon his shoulders the 
 great horn of a bull. These individuals are 
 called Tells, in memory of the traditional 
 hero, and the horns are those which the 
 ancient warriors of Uri carried with them 
 to battle. Then followed drums and music 
 and a detachment of soldiers, over whom 
 165
 
 1 66 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 waved the ancient banner, in the centre of 
 which was embroidered a bull's head, the 
 cantonal coat of arms, and in one corner a 
 miniature representation of the crucifixion. 
 For Church and State, religion and warfare, 
 have always gone hand in hand in the prim- 
 itive Swiss cantons. 
 
 Behind this guard of honor came the 
 magistrates and their seven beadles in car- 
 riages, the latter made imposing by cocked 
 hats and long cloaks, also of orange and 
 black. In the carriages were the three 
 symbols of state : the mace, a wooden staff 
 studded with brass nails, and surmounted 
 by a ball representing an apple pierced by 
 an arrow (evidently another reference to 
 William Tell) ; the sword of state, a long, 
 two-edged weapon ; and a bag containing 
 the cantonal seals. 
 
 The procession was closed by an irreg- 
 ular following of all the men, women 
 and children who could conveniently 
 leave their homes in various parts of the 
 canton.
 
 SELF-GOVERNMENT. 1 67 
 
 Arrived at the meadow, the voters, esti- 
 mated at two thousand by the weekly paper 
 of Uri, the Ur?ier Wochenblatt, ranged them- 
 selves upon a wooden stand, built for the 
 occasion, in the shape of an amphitheatre ; 
 the chief magistrate, the Landammann, and 
 the Landesstatthalter, took positions at a 
 table in the centre, where the symbols of 
 state were displayed, with the horns, drums, 
 and banner, while the seven beadles occu- 
 pied raised seats at one side of the ring. 
 The women, children and visitors, on their 
 part, withdrew to the unoccupied portions 
 of the meadow, or to an adjacent hillock, 
 from which the proceedings could be more 
 conveniently watched. Amongst the spec- 
 tators were also some visitors from neigh- 
 boring cantons, a member or two of the 
 federal Legislatures at Bern, and a few 
 foreigners. 
 
 It is customary for the Landammann to 
 open the Assembly with a speech, in which 
 he rehearses the affairs of the canton, of 
 Switzerland, and even the most important
 
 1 68 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 events in foreign countries, which have 
 occurred during the past year. 
 
 While this was in progress, one could look 
 more closely at the men who composed the 
 Assembly, and see how truly democratic a 
 gathering they made. All manner of men 
 were there, side by side ; all kinds of trades 
 and occupations were represented, — the 
 cowherd, the artisan, and the shopkeeper ; 
 the professional man, the parish priest, the 
 monk, and the soldier ; all on an equal po- 
 litical footing, deliberating together for the 
 common good. They paid the closest 
 attention to the speech of the Landam- 
 mann, who, as he advanced and warmed 
 up to his theme, departed more and more 
 from pure German, and lapsed into the 
 familiar dialect, which was used by every 
 subsequent speaker. 
 
 As soon as this speech had been brought 
 to a close, a ceremony of the utmost solem- 
 nity took place. 
 
 The whole Assembly rose, and stood, 
 bareheaded, for some moments in silent
 
 SELF-GOVERNMENT. 1 69 
 
 prayer, — an impressive incident, never to 
 be forgotten : the sudden silence of the 
 multitude, the heads bared to the sky, and 
 the deeply religious aspect of the whole 
 thing. After this the business of the meet- 
 ing began. 
 
 Every one knew that a measure of great 
 importance would be presented to the 
 Assembly that day ; in fact, nothing less 
 than the adoption of a new constitution. 
 
 The old one had been found to be both 
 cumbersome and antiquated, and the new 
 one had been framed with a view toward 
 simplification, so that it might correspond 
 more closely to those of the other cantons. 
 As the project had been before the people 
 for some time, ample opportunity had been 
 given them to make themselves thoroughly 
 acquainted with its provisions, and the As- 
 sembly was, therefore, prepared to discuss 
 the proposed changes intelligently. 
 
 A strong minority from the Valley of 
 Urseren, where lies the popular summer 
 resort of Andermatt, opposed the new con-
 
 170 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 stitution, especially on account of certain 
 clauses, referring to the management of 
 roads. These views were represented by 
 five speakers, whereas the majority put for- 
 ward nine. After an animated debate, 
 lasting for two hours and a half, a vote 
 was taken upon the question of adopting 
 a new constitution, pure and simple, adop- 
 tion being carried by the bare majority of 
 three-fifths to two-fifths of the votes. An- 
 other vote was taken, this time upon the 
 adoption of the new constitution as it stood 
 or as amended by the minority, and resulted 
 in the almost unanimous adoption of the 
 constitution as it stood. 
 
 The voting was done by a show of 
 hands, according to the old Teutonic 
 custom, so familiar to us; but it was 
 accompanied by a curious sound, which 
 seemed in imitation of the bellowing of 
 a bull, the inevitable bull of Uri. An 
 appeal in writing against the new con- 
 stitution was then handed to the Land- 
 esstatthalter, based upon the forty-third 
 
 i
 
 SELF-GOVERNMENT. 171 
 
 article of the federal constitution, and the 
 Assembly proceeded to the next order of 
 business, the election of officers. 
 
 First came the seven Regicrimgsrdthe ; 
 literally, " councillors of the Government," 
 forming a sort of executive board. In 
 only two cases was there any serious 
 opposition to the candidate nominated; 
 for it seems to be customary in this 
 conservative little democracy to reelect 
 officers who have done their work sat- 
 isfactorily, rather than experiment with 
 untried ones. The result of every elec- 
 tion was announced by the head beadle, 
 or crier {Landesweibel), who raised his 
 cocked hat, and repeated a set formula, 
 wishing the successful candidate " joy and 
 health" {Gliick imd Heit). 
 
 At this juncture the Assembly was asked 
 to choose the Landammann and the Land- 
 esstatthalter from the number of the 
 Regierungsrathe. Immediately the actual 
 Landammann rose and resigned his office 
 in a speech in which he declared that he
 
 172 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 had served four years as magistrate, and 
 therefore declined reelection. At the 
 same time he proposed the actual Land- 
 esstatthalter as his successor, and with 
 this took his seat amongst the people. 
 The Assembly followed his suggestion as to 
 his successor, and afterwards returned the 
 Landammann himself to the office of Land- 
 esstatthalter ; so that the two highest officers 
 had in the end only exchanged places. 
 
 After the oath had been administered 
 to them, the necessary representatives to 
 the federal Legislature in Bern were 
 elected, and then a number of minor 
 officers of the canton. As a last piece 
 of legislation, the rights of citizenship 
 {Biirgerrechi) were granted to a family 
 which had lately immigrated from the 
 canton of Unterwalden. 
 
 With this the order of business Avas com- 
 plete, and the Assembly adjourned. The 
 session had lasted four hours and a half, 
 when the procession marched back to Alt- 
 dorf in the same order in which it had 
 arrived.
 
 XX. 
 
 HOEING POTATOES. 
 
 ALL the valleys hushed, the lakes 
 black. A mist in the hollows, 
 smelling moist and tasting smoky. 
 
 Then, on the top of the Jungfrau, a 
 sudden gleam alighted. The sun crept 
 down the great aretes, — those arms of 
 the goddess, draped in muslin. It bur- 
 nished the rounded snow slopes into rich 
 saffron, and cast mauve shadows into the 
 seracs and crevasses. The light chased 
 the gloom from the abyss, where the 
 avalanches fall, — that lap of the goddess. 
 It stripped the darkness from her sheer 
 sides. 
 
 With this, the virgin seemed to wake, 
 and stretch, and smile. 
 
 She saw two women with a child, hoeing 
 potatoes on the Almend of Unterseen. 
 They were dressed partly in brown home- 
 173
 
 174 LITTLE IDYLS OF THE BIG WORLD. 
 
 spun, partly in nondescript calicoes. Their 
 feet stood in great ungainly shoes, with 
 wooden soles. The grandmother still 
 wore her hair twined with white braid, 
 Oberland fashion, but the young woman 
 tried to be modern. As for the child, it 
 played in the dirt. 
 
 And so the women toiled, unmindful of 
 the magnificence of their surroundings. 
 
 The Jungfrau saw the turquoise of the 
 lake of Thun, the glowing slopes of 
 St. Beatenberg, the green-black firs on 
 the Harder. She heard a man sharp- 
 ening his scythe among the field-flowers, 
 a boy yodeling to his goats in the shrubs, 
 a herd of cows jingling their bells on the 
 summer pasture. She smelt the mown 
 grass, the briar hedges nipped by the 
 goats, the flowers trodden by the cattle. 
 
 But the women neither saw, nor heard, 
 nor smelt. 
 
 At noon the Jungfrau looked again. 
 The grandmother was leaning for a mo- 
 ment on her hoe, the young woman worked
 
 HOEING POTATOES. I 75 
 
 in a crude red petticoat, blown by the 
 wind, the child still played in the dirt. 
 They all looked sordid, sullen, stupid. 
 
 Then the pitying Virgin turned to 
 Mount Blanc, full eighty miles away. 
 How long must these wrongs be ^ But 
 before the answer came, the day was 
 over, and the women shuffled sadly home- 
 ward, drawing their cart after them, 
 wherein the little girl sat, holding tight 
 to the sides. 
 
 And for the millionth time the Jungfrau 
 blushed, and then turned gray and slept. 
 
 THE END.
 
 B 000 002 826 6