A DAY AT LA 
 GUERRE SAND 
 OTHER DPK5 
 BEING NINE 
 SKETCHES BY 
 F.HOPKINS ON SMITH 
 
 IC-NRLF 
 
 MDCCCLXXXXH 
 
GIFT OF 
 HGMA? O BACO 
 
Other books by the same Author are : Old 
 Lines in New Black and White, $12.00 ; 
 Large-Paper Edition, $23.00; Well-Worn 
 Roads of Spain, Holland, and Italy, $13.00 ; 
 Popular Edition, $1.23; A Book of the Tile 
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 $1.30 ; Colonel Carter of Carter sville, $1.23. 
 
A DAY AT LAGUERRE S 
 AND OTHER DAYS 
 
A DAY AT 
 LAGUERRE S 
 AND OTHER 
 DAYS BEING 
 SKETCHES BY 
 
 F.HOPKINSONSM1 
 
 BOSTON AND NEW YORK 
 HOUGHTON MIFFLIN AND COM 
 PANY THE RIVERSIDE PRESS 
 CAMBRIDGE MDCCCXCII 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1892, BY 
 F. HOPKINSON SMITH 
 AI.L RIGHTS RESERVED 
 
TO MY OUT-DOOR FRIENDS 
 EVERYWHERE : MY GOOD 
 ESPERO, WHOM I LOVE; 
 MANUEL AND HIS SWEET 
 HEART ; LITTLE LUCETTE 
 WITH THE VELVET EYES ; BIG- 
 HEARTED CAPTAIN JOE, AND EVEN 
 ISAACS 
 
 ISAAC ISAACS, 
 
 THE UNFAITHFUL, WHO IS WATCH 
 ING TO FLEECE ME AGAIN WHEN 
 NEXT I VISIT CONSTANTINOPLE 
 
 292001 
 
THE INTRODUCTION TO 
 THE READER 
 
 [ESE slight sketches are 
 the records of some more 
 idle days, stolen, I must 
 confess, from a busy and 
 far more practical life. 
 I have committed these 
 depredations upon myself for years, and 
 have then run off to the far corners 
 of the earth and sat down in some for 
 gotten nook to enjoy my plunder. 
 
 The villainy, strange to say, has only 
 served to open my eyes the wider 
 and my heart too for that matter and 
 to bring me closer to many fellow 
 tramps who have delighted my soul, and 
 still do. 
 
 Idle tramps if you will, who love the 
 sunlight and simple fare and simple 
 ways ; ne er-do-wells, who haunt the 
 cafe s and breakfast at twelve ; vagrants 
 made millionaires by a melon and a ci 
 garette ; mendicants who own a donkey 
 and a pair of panniers, have three feast 
 days a week, earn but half a handful of 
 copper coin, and sing all day for the 
 very joy of living. 
 
The Intro- if you too can unhook your neck 
 rom t k e new car O f Juggernaut 
 American Progress which is crushing 
 out the sweetness of an old-timed, 
 simpler life, and would gain a little free 
 dom, turn bandit yourself. If you have 
 the pluck to take a long rest, the sun is 
 still blazing along the Grand Canal in 
 dear old Venice. If you can only mus 
 ter up courage for a short breathing 
 spell, even a day, there is still a 
 chop to be served under the vines over 
 hanging the Bronx. 
 
 The stories are all true. Many of 
 the names are genuine, and everybody 
 is still alive. Most of them will be wait 
 ing for me when I run off again. 
 
 F. H. S. 
 
 New York, March, 1892. 
 
A TABLE OF THE CON 
 TENTS OF THIS BOOK 
 
 ?|? I. A Day at Laguerre s, i ; II. 
 Espero Gorgoni, Gondolier, 23 ; III. 
 Under the Minarets, 47 ; IV. An 
 Escapade in Cordova, 75 ; V. La 
 Canal de la Viga, 95 ; VI. A Bulga 
 rian Opera Bouffe, 102 ; VII. Cap 
 tain Joe, 141 ; VIII. Hutchins, 162 ; 
 IX. Six Hours in Squantico, 169 
 
I. A DAY AT LAGUERRE S 
 
 is the most delightful 
 of French inns, in the 
 quaintest of French 
 settlements. As you 
 rush by in one of 
 the innumerable trains 
 that pass it daily, you 
 may catch glimpses of tall trees trail 
 ing their branches in the still stream, 
 hardly a dozen yards wide, of flocks 
 of white ducks paddling together, and of 
 queer punts drawn up on the shelving 
 shore or tied to soggy, patched-up land 
 ing-stairs. 
 
 If the sun shines, you can see, now 
 and then, between the trees, a figure 
 kneeling at the water s edge, bending 
 over a pile of clothes, washing, her 
 head bound with a red handkerchief. 
 
 If you are quick, the miniature river 
 will open just before you round the 
 curve, disclosing in the distance groups 
 of willows, and a rickety foot-bridge 
 perched up on poles to keep it dry. All 
 this you see in a flash. 
 
^ But you .must stop at the old-fash- 
 res ioned station, within ten minutes of the 
 Harlem River, cross the road, skirt 
 an old garden bound with a fence and 
 bursting with flowers, and so pass on 
 through a bare field to the water s edge, 
 before you catch sight of the cosy little 
 houses lining the banks, with garden 
 fences cutting into the water, the ar 
 bors covered with tangled vines, and the 
 boats crossing back and forth. 
 
 I have a love for the out-of-the-way 
 places of the earth when they bristle all 
 over with the quaint and the old and 
 the odd, and are mouldy with the pictur 
 esque. But here is an in-the-way place, 
 all sunshine and shimmer, with never a 
 fringe of mould upon it, and yet you lose 
 your heart at a glance. It is as charm 
 ing in its boat life as an old Holland 
 canal; it is as delightful in its shore life 
 as the Seine; and it is as picturesque 
 and entrancing in its sylvan beauty as 
 the most exquisite of English streams. 
 
 The thousands of workaday souls who 
 pass this spot daily in their whirl out 
 and in the great city may catch all these 
 glimpses of shade and sunlight over the 
 edges of their journals, and any one of 
 them living near the city s centre, with 
 a stout pair of legs in his knickerbockers 
 and the breath of the morning in his 
 
 2 
 
heart, can reach it afoot any day before A Day at 
 breakfast ; and yet not one in a hundred La & ierre >s 
 knows that this ideal nook exists. 
 
 Even this small percentage would be 
 apt to tell of the delights of Devonshire 
 and of the charm of the upper Thames, 
 with its tall rushes and low-thatched 
 houses and quaint bridges, as if the 
 picturesque ended there ; forgetting that 
 right here at home there wanders many 
 a stream with its breast all silver that 
 the trees courtesy to as it sings through 
 meadows waist-high in lush grass, as 
 exquisite a picture as can be found this 
 beautiful land over. 
 
 So, this being an old tramping-ground 
 of mine, I have left the station with its 
 noise and dust behind me this lovely 
 morning in June, have stopped long 
 enough to twist a bunch of sweet peas 
 through the garden fence, and am stand 
 ing on the bank waiting for some sign 
 of life at Madame Laguerre s. I dis 
 cover that there is no boat on my side 
 of the stream. But that is of no mo 
 ment. On the other side, within a bis 
 cuit s toss, so narrow is it, there are 
 two boats ; and on the landing-wharf, 
 which is only a few planks wide, sup 
 porting a tumbledown flight of steps 
 leading to a vine-covered terrace above, 
 rest the oars. 
 3 
 
A Day / j j a y m y traps down on the bank and . 
 s begin at the top of my voice : 
 
 " Madame Laguerre ! Madame La- 
 guerre ! Send Lucette with the boat." 
 
 For a long time there is no response. 
 A young girl drawing water a short dis 
 tance below, hearing my cries, says she 
 will come ; and some children above, 
 who know me, begin paddling over. I 
 decline them all. Experience tells me 
 it is better to wait for madame. 
 
 In a few minutes she pushes aside the 
 leaves, peers through, and calls out : 
 
 " Ah ! it is that horrible painter. Go 
 away! I have nothing for you. You 
 are hungry again that you come ? " 
 
 " Very, madame. Where is Lu 
 cette ? " 
 
 " Lucette ! Lucette ! It is always 
 Lucette. Luc-e-t-t-e ! " This in a shrill 
 key. " It is the painter. Come quick." 
 
 I have known Lucette for years, even 
 when she was a barefooted little tangle- 
 hair, peeping at me with her great brown 
 eyes from beneath her ragged straw hat. 
 She wears highheeled slippers now, and 
 sometimes on Sundays dainty silk stock 
 ings, and her hair is braided down her 
 back, little French Marguerite that she 
 is, and her hat is never ragged any more, 
 nor her hair tangled. Her eyes, though, 
 are still the same velvety, half -drooping 
 
 4 
 
eyes, always opening and shutting and A Day at 
 never still. Lag**** 
 
 As she springs into the boat and pulls 
 towards me I note how round and trim 
 she is, and before we have landed at 
 Madame Laguerre s feet I have counted 
 up Lucette s birthdays, those that I 
 know myself, and find to my surprise 
 that she must be eighteen. We have 
 always been the best of friends, Lucette 
 and I, ever since she looked over my 
 shoulder years ago and watched me dot 
 in the outlines of her boat, with her dog 
 Mustif sitting demurely in the bow. 
 
 Madame, her mother, begins again: 
 
 "Do you know that it is Saturday 
 that you come again to bother ? Now 
 it will be a filet, of course, with mush 
 rooms and tomato salad ; and there are 
 no mushrooms, and no tomatoes, and no 
 thing. You are horrible. Then, when 
 I get it ready, you say you will come 
 at three. Yes, madame ; at three, 
 mimicking me, sure, very sure. 
 But it is four, five, o clock and then 
 everything is burned up waiting. Ah ! 
 I know you." 
 
 This goes on always, and has for 
 years. Presently she softens, for she 
 is the most tender-hearted of women, 
 and would do anything in the world to 
 please me. 
 5 
 
A Day <*/ But, then, you will be tired, and of 
 course y OU mus t have something. I re 
 member now there is a chicken. How 
 will the chicken do ? Oh, the chicken 
 it is lovely, charmant. And some pease 
 fresh. Monsieur picked them himself 
 this morning. And some Roquefort, 
 with an olive. Ah ! You leave it to 
 me ; but at three no later not one 
 minute. Sacrt ! Vous ties le diable ! 
 
 As we walk under the arbor and by 
 the great trees, towards the cottage, 
 Lucette following with the oars, I in 
 quire after monsieur, and find that he is 
 in the city, and very well and very busy, 
 and will return at sundown. He has a 
 shop of his own in the upper part where 
 he makes passe-partouts. Here, at his 
 home, madame maintains a simple res 
 taurant for tramps like me. 
 
 These delightful people are old friends 
 of mine, Francois Laguerre and his wife 
 and their only child Lucette. They 
 have lived here for nearly a quarter of a 
 century. He is a straight, silver-haired 
 old Frenchman of sixty, who left Paris, 
 between two suns, nearly forty years 
 ago, with a gendarme close at his heels, 
 a red cockade under his coat, and an 
 intense hatred in his heart for that " lit 
 tle nobody," Napoleon III. 
 
 If you met him on the boulevard you 
 
 6 
 
would look for the decoration on his A Day at 
 lapel, remarking to yourself, " Some re- 
 tired officer on half pay." If you met 
 him at the railway station opposite you 
 would say, " A French professor return 
 ing to his school." Both of these sur 
 mises are partly wrong, and both partly 
 right. Monsieur Laguerre has had a 
 history. One can see by the deep lines 
 in his forehead and by the firm set of 
 his eyes and mouth that it has been an 
 eventful one. 
 
 His wife is a few years his junior, 
 short and stout, and thoroughly French 
 down to the very toes of her felt slip 
 pers. She is devoted to Frangois and 
 Lucette, the best of cooks, and, in spite 
 of her scoldings, good -nature itself. 
 As soon as she hears me calling there 
 arise before her the visions of many 
 delightful dinners prepared for me by 
 her own hand and ready to the minute 
 all spoiled by my belated sketches. 
 So she begins to scold before I am out 
 of the boat or in it, for that matter. 
 
 Across the fence next to Laguerre s 
 lives a confrere, a brother exile, Monsieur 
 Marmosette, who also has a shop in the 
 city, where he carves fine ivories. Mon 
 sieur Marmosette has only one son. He 
 too is named Francois, after his father s 
 old friend. Farther down on both sides 
 
A Day / of the narrow stream front the cottages 
 of other f r i en( j s> a ll Frenchmen; and 
 near the propped-up bridge an Italian 
 who knew Garibaldi burrows in a low, 
 slanting cabin, which is covered with 
 vines. I remember a dish of spaghetti 
 under those vines, and a flask of Chianti 
 from its cellar, all cobwebs and plaited 
 straw, that left a taste of Venice in my 
 mouth for days. 
 
 As there is only the great bridge 
 above, which helps the country road 
 across the little stream, and the little 
 foot-bridge below, and as there is no 
 path or road, all the houses fronting 
 the water, the Bronx here is really 
 the only highway, and so everybody must 
 needs keep a boat. This is why the 
 stream is crowded in the warm after 
 noons with all sorts of water crafts 
 loaded with whole families, even to the 
 babies, taking the air, or crossing from 
 bank to bank in their daily pursuits. 
 
 There is a quality which one never 
 sees in nature until she has been rough- 
 handled by man and has outlived the 
 usage. It is the picturesque. In the 
 deep recesses of the primeval forest, 
 along the mountain-slope, and away up 
 the tumbling brook, nature may be ma 
 jestic, beautiful, and even sublime ; but 
 she is never picturesque. This quality 
 
 8 
 
comes only after the axe and the saw A Da y at 
 have let the sunlight into the dense ***** 
 tangle and have scattered the falling 
 timber, or the round of the water-wheel 
 has divided the rush of the brook. It is 
 so here. Some hundred years ago, along 
 this quiet, silvery stream were encamped 
 the troops of the struggling colonies, 
 and, later, the great estates of the sur 
 vivors stretched on each side for miles. 
 The willows that now fringe these 
 banks were saplings then ; and they and 
 the great butternuts were only spared 
 because their arching limbs shaded the 
 cattle knee -deep along the shelving 
 banks. 
 
 Then came the long interval that 
 succeeds that deadly conversion of the 
 once sweet farming lands, redolent with 
 clover, into that barren waste subur 
 ban property. The conflict that had 
 lasted since the days when the pioneer s 
 axe first rang through the stillness of the 
 forest was nearly over ; nature saw her 
 chance, took courage, and began that 
 regeneration which is exclusively her 
 own. The weeds ran riot ; tall grasses 
 shot up into the sunlight, concealing 
 the once well-trimmed banks ; and great 
 tangles of underbrush and alders made 
 lusty efforts to hide the traces of man s 
 unceasing cruelty. Lastly came this lit- 
 9 
 
A Day <nf tie group of poor people from the Seine 
 s and the M arne an d lent a helping hand, 
 bringing with them something of their 
 old life at home, their boats, rude 
 landings, patched-up water-stairs, fences, 
 arbors, and vine-covered cottages, un 
 consciously completing the picture and 
 adding the one thing needful a human 
 touch. So nature, having outlived the 
 wrongs of a hundred years, has here 
 with busy fingers so woven a web of 
 weed, moss, trailing vine, and low-branch 
 ing tree that there is seen a newer and 
 more entrancing quality in her beauty, 
 which, for want of a better term, we call 
 the picturesque. 
 
 But madame is calling that the big 
 boat must be bailed out ; that if I am 
 ever coming back to dinner it is abso 
 lutely necessary that I should go away. 
 This boat is not of extraordinary size. 
 It is called the big boat from the fact 
 that it has one more seat than the one 
 in which Lucette rowed me over ; and 
 not being much in use except on Sun 
 day, is generally half full of water. Lu 
 cette insists on doing the bailing. She 
 has very often performed this service, 
 and I have always considered it as in 
 cluded in the curious scrawl of a bill 
 which madame gravely presents at the 
 end of each of my days here, beginning 
 
 10 
 
in small printed type with " Francois A Day at 
 Laguerre, Restaurant Frangais," and **&*"** 
 ending with " Coffee 10 cents." 
 
 But this time I resist, remarking that 
 she will hurt her hands and soil her 
 shoes, and that it is all right as it is. 
 
 To this Frangois the younger, who is 
 leaning over the fence, agrees, telling 
 Lucette to wait until he gets a pail. 
 
 Lucette catches his eye, colors a little, 
 and says she will fetch it. 
 
 There is a break in the palings through 
 which they both disappear, but I am half 
 way out on the stream, with my traps 
 and umbrella on the seat in front and 
 my coat and waistcoat tucked under the 
 bow, before they return. 
 
 For half a mile down-stream there is 
 barely a current. Then comes a break 
 of a dozen yards just below the perched- 
 up bridge, and the stream divides, one 
 part rushing like a mill-race, and the 
 other spreading itself softly around the 
 roots of leaning willows, oozing through 
 beds of water-plants, and creeping under 
 masses of wild grapes and underbrush. 
 Below this is a broad pasture fringed 
 with another and larger growth of wil 
 lows. Here the weeds are breast-high, 
 and in early autumn they burst into pur 
 ple asters, and white immortelles, and 
 goldenrod, and flaming sumac. 
 ii 
 
A Day a/ if a painter had a lifetime to spare, 
 and i oved th j s sort O f material, the 
 willows, hillsides, and winding stream, 
 he would grow old and weary before 
 he could paint it all ; and yet no two of 
 his compositions need be alike. I have 
 tied my boat under these same willows 
 for ten years back, and I have not yet 
 exhausted one corner of this neglected 
 pasture. 
 
 There may be those who go a-fishing 
 and enjoy it. The arranging and select 
 ing of flies, the joining of rods, the pro 
 spective comfort in high water-boots, 
 the creel with the leather strap, every 
 crease in it a reminder of some day with 
 out care or fret, all this may bring 
 the flush to the cheek and the eager 
 kindling of the eye, and a certain sort 
 of rest and happiness may come with it ; 
 but they have never gone a-sketch- 
 ing ! Hauled up on the wet bank in the 
 long grass is your boat, with the frayed 
 end of the painter tied around some wil 
 low that offers a helping root. Within 
 a stone s throw, under a great branch 
 ing of gnarled trees, is a nook where the 
 curious sun, peeping at you through the 
 interlaced leaves, will stencil Japanese 
 shadows on your white umbrella. Then 
 the trap is unstrapped, the stool opened, 
 the easel put up, and you set your pa- 
 
 12 
 
lette. The critical eye with which you A Da y ^ 
 look over your brush-case and the care 
 
 with which you try each feather point 
 upon your thumb-nail are but an index 
 of your enjoyment. 
 
 Now you are ready. You loosen your 
 cravat, hang your coat to some rustic 
 peg in the creviced bark of the tree be 
 hind you, seize a bit of charcoal from 
 your bag, sweep your eye around, and 
 dash in a few guiding strokes. Above 
 is a turquoise sky filled with soft white 
 clouds ; behind you the great trunks of 
 the many-branched willows ; and away 
 off, under the hot sun, the yellow-green 
 of the wasted pasture, dotted with 
 patches of rock and weeds, and hemmed 
 in by the low hills that slope to the 
 curving stream. 
 
 It is high noon. There is a stillness 
 in the air that impresses you, broken 
 only by the low murmur of the brook 
 behind and the ceaseless song of the 
 grasshopper among the weeds in front. 
 A tired bumblebee hums past, rolls 
 lazily over a clover blossom at your 
 feet, and has his midday luncheon. Un 
 der the maples near the river s bend 
 stands a group of horses, their heads 
 touching. In the brook below are the 
 patient cattle, with patches of sunlight 
 gilding and bronzing their backs and 
 13 
 
A Day a/ sides. Every now and then a breath of 
 
 guerre s COQ J ^ starts out from some shaded 
 
 retreat, plays around your forehead, and 
 
 passes on. All nature rests. It is her 
 
 noontime. 
 
 But you work on : an enthusiasm has 
 taken possession of you ; the paints mix 
 too slowly ; you use your thumb, smear 
 ing and blending with a bit of rag 
 anything for the effect. One moment 
 you are glued to your seat, your eye 
 riveted on your canvas, the next, you 
 are up and backing away, taking it in 
 as a whole, then pouncing down upon it 
 quickly, belaboring it with your brush. 
 Soon the trees take shape ; the sky 
 forms become definite ; the meadow lies 
 flat and loses itself in the fringe of wil 
 lows. 
 
 When all of this begins to grow upon 
 your once blank canvas, and some lucky 
 pat matches the exact tone of blue-gray 
 haze or shimmer of leaf, or some ac 
 cidental blending of color delights you 
 with its truth, a tingling goes down your 
 backbone, and a rush surges through 
 your veins that stirs you as nothing else 
 in your whole life will ever do. The re 
 action comes the next day when, in the 
 cold light of your studio, you see how 
 far short you have come and how crude 
 and false is your best touch compared 
 
with the glory of the landscape in your A Day at 
 mind and heart. But the thrill that it 
 gave you will linger forever. 
 
 But I hear a voice behind me calling 
 out : 
 
 " Monsieur, mamma says that dinner 
 will be ready in half an hour. Please 
 do not be late." 
 
 It is Lucette. She and Francois have 
 come down in the other boat the one 
 with the little seat. They have moved 
 so noiselessly that I have not even 
 heard them. The sketch is nearly fin 
 ished ; and so, remembering the good 
 madame, and the Roquefort, and the 
 olives, and the many times I have kept 
 her waiting, I wash my brushes at once, 
 throw my traps into the boat, and pull 
 back through the winding turn, Frangois 
 taking the mill-race, and in the swiftest 
 part springing to the bank and towing 
 Lucette, who sits in the stern, her white 
 skirts tucked around her dainty feet. 
 
 " Sacrt ! He is here. Cest merveil- 
 leux ! Why did you come ? " 
 
 " Because you sent for me, madame, 
 and I am hungry." 
 
 " Mon Dieu ! He is hungry, and no 
 chicken ! " 
 
 It is true. The chicken was served 
 that morning to another tramp for break 
 fast, and madame had forgotten all about 
 
A Day <*/ ft, and had ransacked the settlement for 
 5 its mate. She was too honest a cook to 
 chase another into the frying-pan. 
 
 But there was a filet with mushrooms, 
 and a most surprising salad of chicory 
 fresh from the garden, and the pease 
 were certain, and the Roquefort and the 
 olives beyond question. All this she 
 tells me as I walk past the table cov 
 ered with a snow-white cloth and spread 
 under the grape-vines overlooking the 
 stream, with the trees standing against 
 the sky, their long shadows wrinkling 
 down into the water. 
 
 I enter the summer kitchen built out 
 into the garden, which also covers the 
 old well, let down the bucket, and then, 
 taking the clean crash towel from its 
 hook, place the basin on the bench in 
 the sunlight, and plunge my head into 
 the cool water. Madame regards me 
 curiously, her arms akimbo, re-hangs the 
 towel, and asks : 
 
 " Well, what about the wine ? The 
 same ? " 
 
 "Yes ; but I will get it myself." 
 
 The cellar is underneath the larger 
 house. Outside is an old-fashioned, slop 
 ing double door. These doors are al 
 ways open, and a cool smell of damp 
 straw flavored with vinegar from a leaky 
 keg greets you as you descend into its 
 
 16 
 
recesses. On the hard earthen floor rest A Da y ^ 
 eight or ten great casks. The walls are La &" rris 
 lined with bottles large and small, load 
 ed on shelves to which little white cards 
 are tacked giving the vintage and brand. 
 In one corner, under the small window, 
 you will find dozens of boxes of French 
 delicacies truffles, pease, mushrooms, 
 pate" de foie gras, mustard, and the like, 
 and behind them rows of olive oil and 
 olives. I carefully draw out a bottle 
 from the row on the last shelf nearest 
 the corner, mount the steps, and place 
 it on the table. Madame examines the 
 cork, and puts down the bottle, remark 
 ing sententiously : 
 
 " Chateau Lamonte, 62 ! Monsieur 
 has told you." 
 
 There may be ways of dining more 
 delicious than out in the open air under 
 the vines in the cool of the afternoon, 
 with Lucette, in her whitest of aprons, 
 flitting about, and madame garnishing 
 the dishes each in turn, and there may 
 be better bottles of honest red wine to 
 be found up and down this world of care 
 than " Chateau Lamonte, 62," but I 
 have not yet discovered them. 
 
 Lucette serves the coffee in a little 
 cup, and leaves the Roquefort and the 
 cigarettes on the table just as the sun 
 is sinking behind the hill skirting the 
 17 
 
A Day a/ railroad. While I am blowing rings 
 Laguerres through the grape leaves over my head 
 a quick noise is heard across the stream. 
 Lucette runs past me through the gar 
 den, picking up her oars as she goes. 
 
 " Oui, mon ph e. I am coming." 
 
 It is monsieur from his day s work in 
 the city. 
 
 " Who is here ? " I hear him say as 
 he mounts the terrace steps. " Oh, the 
 painter good ! " 
 
 " Ah, mon ami. So you must see the 
 willows once more. Have you not tired 
 of them yet ? " Then, seating himself, 
 " I hope madame has taken good care of 
 you. What, the 62 ? Ah, I remember 
 I told you." 
 
 When it is quite dark he joins me un 
 der the leaves, bringing a second bottle 
 a little better corked he thinks, and the 
 talk drifts into his early life. 
 
 " What year was that, monsieur ? " 
 I asked. 
 
 " In 1849. I was a young fellow just 
 grown. I had learned my trade in 
 Rheims, and I had come down to Paris 
 to make my bread. Two years later 
 came the little affair of December 2. 
 That nobody, Louis, had dissolved the 
 National Assembly and the Council of 
 State, and had issued his address to the 
 army. Paris was in a ferment. By the 
 
 18 
 
help of his soldiers and police he had A Day */ 
 silenced every voice in Paris except his La ? u * rre s 
 own. He had suppressed all the jour 
 nals, and locked up everybody who had 
 opposed him. Victor Hugo was in exile, 
 Louis Blanc in London, Changarnier 
 and Cavaignac in prison. At the mo 
 ment I was working in a little shop near 
 the Porte St. Martin decorating lacquer- 
 work. We workmen all belonged to a 
 secret society which met nightly in a 
 back room over a wine-shop near the 
 Rue Royale. We had but one thought 
 how to upset the little devil at the 
 lyse"e. Among my comrades was a big 
 fellow from my own city, one Cambier. 
 He was the leader. On the ground 
 floor of the shop was built a huge oven 
 where the lacquer was baked. At night 
 this was made hot with charcoal and 
 allowed to cool off in the morning ready 
 for the finished work of the previous day. 
 It was Cambier s duty to attend to this 
 oven. 
 
 " One night just after all but he and 
 two others had left the shop a strange 
 man was discovered in a closet where the 
 men kept their working clothes. He 
 was seized, brought to the light, and in 
 stantly recognized as a member of the 
 secret police. 
 
 " At daylight the next morning I was 
 
 19 
 
A Day / aroused f rom my bed, and, looking up, 
 saw chapQ^ an inspector of police, stand 
 ing over me. He had known me from a 
 boy, and was a friend of my father s. 
 
 " Frangois, there is trouble at the 
 shop. A police agent has been mur 
 dered. His body was found in the oven. 
 Cambier is under arrest. I know what 
 }tau have been doing, but I also know 
 that in this you have had no hand. 
 Here are one hundred francs. Leave 
 Paris in an hour. 
 
 " I put the money in my pocket, tied 
 my clothes in a bundle, and that night 
 was on my way to Havre, and the next 
 week set sail for here." 
 
 "And what became of Cambier?" I 
 asked. 
 
 " I have never heard from that day to 
 this, so I think they must have snuffed 
 him out." 
 
 Then he drifted into his early life 
 here the weary tramping of the streets 
 day after day, the half - starving result, 
 the language and people unknown. 
 Suddenly, somewhere in the lower part 
 of the city, he espied a card tacked out 
 side of a window bearing this inscription, 
 "Decorator wanted." A man inside 
 was painting one of the old-fashioned 
 iron tea-trays common in those days. 
 Monsieur took off his hat, pointed to the 
 
 20 
 
card, then to himself, seized the brush, A Day a/ 
 and before the man could protest had 
 covered the bottom with morning-glories 
 so pink and fresh that his troubles ended 
 on the spot. The first week he earned 
 six dollars ; but then this was to be paid 
 at the end of it. For these six days he 
 subsisted on one meal a day. This he ate 
 at a restaurant where at night he washed 
 dishes and blacked the head waiter s 
 boots. When Saturday came, and the 
 money was counted out in his hand, he 
 thrust it into his pocket, left the shop, 
 and sat down on a doorstep outside to 
 think. 
 
 " And, mon ami, what did I do first ? " 
 
 " Got something to eat ? " 
 
 " Never. I paid for a bath, had my 
 hair cut and my face shaved, bought a 
 shirt and collar, and then went back to 
 the restaurant where I had washed dishes 
 the night before, and the head waiter 
 served me. After that it was easy ; the 
 next week it was ten dollars ; then in a 
 few years I had a place of my own ; then 
 came madame and Lucette and here 
 
 we are." 
 
 The twilight had faded into a velvet 
 blue, sprinkled with stars. The lantern 
 which madame had hung against the 
 arbor shed a yellow light, throwing into 
 clear relief the sharply cut features of 
 
 21 
 
A Day a/ monsieur. Up and down the silent 
 Lagturrft stream drifted here and there a phan 
 tom boat, the gleam of its light following 
 like a firefly. From some came no sound 
 but the muffled plash of the oars. From 
 others floated stray bits of song and 
 laughter. Far up the stream I heard 
 the distant whistle of the down train. 
 
 " It is mine, monsieur. Will you cross 
 with me, and bring back the boat ? " 
 
 Monsieur unhooked the lantern, and 
 I followed through the garden and down 
 the terrace steps. 
 
 At the water s edge was a bench hold 
 ing two figures. 
 
 Monsieur turned his lantern, and the 
 light fell upon the face of young Fran- 
 gois. 
 
 When the bow grated on the opposite 
 bank I shook his hand, and said, in part 
 ing, pointing to the lovers, 
 
 " The same old story, monsieur ? " 
 
 " Yes ; and always new. You must 
 come to the church." 
 
II. ESPERO GORGONI, GON 
 DOLIER 
 
 |OOR old Ingenio my 
 gondolier of five years be 
 fore dear old Ingenio, 
 with his white hair and 
 gentle voice ; Ingenio with 
 the little, crippled daugh 
 ter and the sad-faced wife, who lived 
 near the church behind the Rialto, had 
 made his last crossing. At least the 
 sacristan shook his head and pointed up 
 ward when I sought tidings of him ; and 
 the old, familiar door with the queer 
 gratings was locked, and the windows 
 cobwebbed and dust-begrimed. 
 
 None of the gondoliers at the Rialto 
 landing knew, nor did any of the old 
 men at the water-steps the men with 
 the hooked staffs who steady your boat 
 while you alight. Five years was so 
 very long ago, they said, and then there 
 had been the plague. 
 
 So I looked up wistfully at the win 
 dows of the old palace where I had 
 called to him so often I can see him 
 now, with little Giulie"tta in his arms, 
 peering at me through the gay, climb- 
 23 
 
j n g flowers which she watered so care- 
 (ZS&r fully looked long and wistfully, as if 
 he must surely answer back, " Si, signore, 
 immediatamente" and turned sadly away. 
 But then there was the same old gon 
 dola-landing, blue poles, bridge, and all, 
 with its flock of gondolas hovering 
 around, and a dozen lusty fellows ready 
 to spring to their oars and serve me 
 night and day for a pittance that else 
 where a man would starve on. My lucky 
 star once sent me Ingenio, who floating 
 past caught my signal ; why not another? 
 This is why I am on the quay near 
 the Rialto this lovely morning, in Ven 
 ice, overlooking the gondolas curving in 
 and out, and watching the faces of the 
 gondoliers as with uplifted hands, like a 
 row of whips, they call out their respec 
 tive numbers and qualifications. 
 
 In my experience there is nothing 
 like a gondola to paint from, especially 
 in the summer and it is the summer 
 time. Then all these Venetian cabs are 
 gay in their sunshiny attire, and have 
 laid aside their dark, hooded cloaks, 
 their rainy - day mackintoshes their 
 felsi and have pulled over their shoul 
 ders a frail awning of creamy white, 
 with snowy draperies at sides and back, 
 under which you paint in state or lounge 
 
 24 
 
luxuriously, drinking in the beauty 
 
 about you. . 
 
 I have in my wanderings tried all 
 sorts of moving studios : tartanas in 
 Spain, volantes in Cuba, broad-sailed lug 
 gers in Holland, mules in Mexico, and 
 cabs everywhere. One I remember with 
 delight an old night-hawk in Amster 
 dam that offered me not only its front 
 seat for my easel, its arm-rest for my 
 water-bottle, and a pocket in the door 
 flap for brushes (I am likely to expect 
 all these conveniences in even the most 
 disreputable of cabs), but insisted on 
 giving me the additional luxury of a 
 knot-hole in its floor for waste water. 
 
 But with all this a cab is not a gon 
 dola. 
 
 In a gondola you are never shaken by 
 the tired beast resting his other leg, nor 
 by the small boy who looks in at the 
 window, nor by the cabby, who falls 
 asleep on the box and awakes periodi 
 cally with a start that repeats a shiver 
 through your brush hand, and a corre 
 sponding wave-line across your sky. 
 
 In place of this there is only a cosy 
 curtain-closed nest a little boudoir 
 with down cushions and silk fringes and 
 soft morocco coverings ; kept afloat by 
 a long, lithe, swan -like, moving boat, 
 black as an Inquisitor s gown save for 
 25 
 
Espero the dainty awning. A something bear- 
 * n S i tse lf proudly with head high in air, 
 alive or still, alert or restful, and 
 obedient to your lightest touch, half 
 sea-gull reveling in the sunlight, half 
 dolphin cutting the dark water. 
 
 If you are hurried, and the plash of 
 the oar comes quick and strong, in an 
 instant your gondola quivers with the 
 excitement of the chase. You feel the 
 thrill through its entire length as it 
 strains every nerve; the touch of the 
 oar, like the touch of the spur, urging 
 it to its best. If you would rest, and 
 so slip into some dark waterway under 
 the shadow of overhanging balcony or 
 mouldy palace wall, your water-swallow 
 becomes a very lasagnone, and will go 
 sound asleep, and for hours, or loll la 
 zily, the little waves lapping about its 
 bow. 
 
 In Venice my gondola is always my 
 home, and my gondolier always my best 
 friend ; and so when my search for In- 
 genio ended only in a cobwebbed door 
 and an abandoned balcony, and that 
 mournful shake of the sacristan s head, 
 and I stood scanning anxiously the up 
 turned faces below me, it was some min 
 utes before I selected his successor and 
 returned Espero s signal. 
 
 I cannot say why I singled him out 
 
 26 
 
except, perhaps, that he did not press 
 forward with the rest, rushing his bow 
 ahead ; but rather held back, giving his 
 place to a gray-headed old gondolier, 
 who in his haste had muffed his oar 
 awkwardly, at which the others laughed. 
 
 Perhaps, too, it might have been his 
 frank, handsome, young face, with its 
 merry, black eyes ; or the inviting look 
 of the cushions beneath the white awn 
 ing, with the bit of a rug on the floor ; 
 or the picturesque effect of the whole ; 
 or all of them together, that caught my 
 eye. Or it might have been the per 
 fect welding together of man and boat. 
 For, as he stood erect in the sunlight, 
 twisting the gondola with his oar, his 
 loose shirt, with throat and chest bare in 
 highest light against the dark water, his 
 head bound with a red kerchief, his well- 
 knit, graceful figure swaying in the 
 movement of the whole, blending with 
 and yet controlling it, both man and 
 boat seemed but parts of one organism, 
 a sort of marine Centaur, as free and 
 fearless as that wonderful myth of the 
 olden time. Whatever it was, my lucky 
 star peeped out at the opportune mo 
 ment, and the next instant my sketch- 
 traps were tumbled in. 
 
 "To the Salute!" 
 
 The gondolier threw himself on his 
 27 
 
Espero O ar, the sensitive craft quivered at the 
 Gondolier touch, and we glided out upon the broad 
 waters of the Grand Canal. 
 
 Nowhere else in the wide world is 
 there such a sight. A double row of 
 creamy white palaces tiled in red and 
 topped with quaint chimneys. Over 
 hanging balconies of marble, fringed with 
 flowers, with gay awnings above and 
 streaming shadows below. Two lines of 
 narrow quays crowded with people flash 
 ing bright bits of color in the blazing 
 sun. Swarms of gondolas, barcos, and 
 lesser water-spiders darting in and out. 
 Lazy red - sailed luggers, melon - loaded, 
 with crinkled green shadows crawling be 
 neath their bows ; while at the far end 
 over the glistening highway, beaded with 
 people, curves the beautiful bridge an 
 ivory arch against a turquoise sky. 
 
 Espero ran the gauntlet of the skim 
 ming boats, dodging the little steamers 
 puffing away all out of breath with their 
 run from the Lido, shot his boat into a 
 narrow canal, and out again upon the 
 broad water, until the edge of her steel 
 blade touched the water-stairs of the Sa 
 lute. 
 
 This beautiful church is always my 
 rendezvous. It is half-way to every 
 thing : to the Public Garden ; across 
 the Giudecca ; away over to the Lagoon 
 
 28 
 
where the fishermen live ; to the Rialto 
 and beyond. 
 
 In the freshness of the morning, when 
 its lovely dome throws a cool shadow 
 across its piazza, there is no better place 
 for a painter to make up his mind as to 
 where he would work. Mine required 
 but a few minutes ; I would paint near 
 the Fondimenta della Pallada ; a narrow, 
 short canal where the fishermen moor 
 their boats. 
 
 " What is your name, gondolier ? " 
 
 " Espero Gorgoni." 
 
 The voice was sweet and musical, and 
 the answer was given with a turn of the 
 head as graceful as it was free. 
 
 " Do you know the Pallada ? " 
 
 " Perfectly." 
 
 " Stop, then, where the crab baskets 
 are moored to the poles." 
 
 A turn of the wrist, a long, bending 
 sweep of the oar across the Giudecca, 
 and we enter a waterway leading to the 
 Lagoon. Here live the fishermen, in 
 great, rambling houses three and four 
 stories high, warehouses probably in 
 the old days, running sheer into the 
 water. Outside of the lower windows 
 lie their boats, with gay-colored sails, and 
 next to these stand a row of poles anchor 
 ing the huge wicker crab and fish baskets 
 filled with their early morning catch. 
 29 
 
Espero ran the gondola behind a pro- 
 
 tectm g sa ^> an ^ m ^ ve HlinutCS I was at 
 
 work. 
 
 The experience was not new to him. 
 I saw that from the way he opened the 
 awning on the proper side, unstrapped 
 my easel, and spread out the contents of 
 my trap on the cushions, which he re 
 versed to protect from waste water ; and 
 from the way he stepped ashore, so that 
 my gondola should lie perfectly still, 
 joining later a group of children who 
 were watching me from the doorway 
 above. (Half an hour after they were 
 laughing at his stories, the two young 
 est in his lap.) A considerate, good-na 
 tured fellow, I thought, this gondolier 
 of mine, and fond of children ; and I 
 kept at work. 
 
 When the fisherman awoke and came 
 down to make ready his boat for the 
 morning, and I began the customary 
 protest about the lowering of the sail, 
 thus spoiling my sketch, Espero sprang 
 up, locked his arm through that of the 
 intruder, and led him gently back into 
 the house, calling to me, five minutes 
 thereafter, from across the canal, to keep 
 at work and not to hurry, as the fisher 
 man and he would have a mouthful of 
 wine together. And a man of tact, 
 too ! Really, if my gondolier develops 
 
 30 
 
like this, I shall not miss Ingenio so 
 much. 
 
 The next day we were across the La 
 goon, and the day following up the Giu- 
 decca, by the storehouses where the 
 lighters unload, and before the week was 
 out I had fallen into my old habits and 
 was sharing my breakfast and my ciga 
 rette-case with my gondolier, who, day by 
 day, won his way by some new trait of 
 usefulness or some new charm of man 
 ner. 
 
 Oh, these breakfasts in the gondola 
 in the early morning ; the soft, fresh air 
 of the sea in your face, the cool plash of 
 the water in your ears ! On the floor of 
 the boat, smoking hot, rests the little 
 copper coffee-pot ; above in the wooden 
 side - pockets, your store of fruit and 
 rolls. With what a waste and reckless 
 ness is the melon split and quartered, 
 and the half -eaten crescents thrown over 
 board ! What savory fish ! What deli 
 cious bread ! What luscious figs ! And 
 yet Espero had gathered them all up at 
 a caffe, a fruit-stand, and a baker s ; and 
 a bit of silver no larger than my thumb 
 nail had paid for it all. 
 
 When the wind freshens and the boats 
 from Chioggia begin spreading their 
 sails, Espero turns his prow toward the 
 
Public Garden, their mooring-ground, 
 
 and we f llow them out over thc 
 
 broad water until my sketch-book is rilled 
 with their varying forms and colors. 
 On our way back we board the wood 
 boats, drifting in with the tide, or land 
 under the old garden -walls, which Es 
 pero scales, regaining the gondola loaded 
 with flowers, which he festoons over the 
 awning, trailing the blossoming vines in 
 the water behind. Or we circle about 
 the Salute, composing it now on the 
 right, with some lighter boats in the 
 distance ; now on the left, with the Do- 
 gana and the stretch of palaces beyond. 
 Or we haunt the churches, listening to 
 the music, or follow with our eyes the 
 slender, graceful Venetians who come 
 and go. 
 
 In all these rambles there was one 
 little, crooked canal near the Salute 
 that, whatever our course, Espero al 
 ways dodged into. Long way around or 
 short way over, it was always the same. 
 Somehow Espero must get into this 
 waterway to get out somewhere else. 
 At last I caught him. She wore a yel 
 low silk handkerchief tied under her 
 pretty chin and was waving her hand 
 from a balcony filled with oleanders high 
 up on the wall of a crumbling old pal 
 ace. These were our days ! 
 
 32 
 
Then came the twilights, with palace, Espero 
 tower, and dome purple in the fading 5*555$ 
 
 1.1,1 i 11 i 1 i .LI Gondolier 
 
 light, the canal all molten gold, the gon 
 dolas, with lamps alight, gliding like 
 fireflies. 
 
 On one of these purple-laden twilights 
 we had floated over to San Giorgio, 
 moored the gondola to a great iron ring 
 in the water-soaked steps that might 
 once have held a slave-laden galley, and 
 had sat down to watch the darkness 
 as it slowly settled over the dreaming 
 city. Away off to the right stood the 
 Campanile, its cone-shaped top pink and 
 gold, while behind, against the deepen 
 ing blue, rose its twin tower. 
 
 The scene awoke all the old memories, 
 and I began talking to Espero, who was 
 stretched out on the marble steps below 
 me, of the olden times when this same 
 harbor was full of ships of every clime, 
 with sails of gold and cargoes of spice, 
 and of the great regattas, and the two- 
 decked war barges, with slaves double- 
 banked rowing beneath ; and from this 
 to the wonderful Bucentaur, the Doge s 
 barge, encrusted with gold, rowed by the 
 members of the Arsenalotti a sort of 
 guild or corporation formed of the work 
 men at the Arsenal. How, every year, 
 occurred the ceremony of the Espousal 
 of the Adriatic, and how, when the Bu- 
 33 
 
Espero centaur returned, there was a grand ban- 
 
 G G^ndoiier q uet at which the Arsenalotti dined at 
 
 the public expense, with the privilege of 
 
 carrying off everything on the table 
 
 even the linen, vessels, and glass. 
 
 Espero s attitude and face, as he lis 
 tened, led me on. He had an odd way 
 of lifting his eyebrows quickly when I 
 told him something that interested him, 
 a questioning, yet deferential expres 
 sion, which I generally accepted as a 
 tribute to my superior intelligence. 
 He never formulated it in words. It 
 was only one of the many flashes that 
 swept over his face, but it was always a 
 grateful encouragement. 
 
 And so, with the glamour of the scene 
 about me, and with Espero s eyes fas 
 tened on mine, his well-shaped head clear 
 cut against the fading sky, I rambled 
 on, telling him of those things I thought 
 would please him the most. Of how 
 these Arsenalotti became gondoliers, 
 joining the Castellani, the gondoliers 
 at that time being divided into two par 
 ties, the Castellani, who wore red hoods, 
 and the Nicolletti, who wore black hoods. 
 Of how these Castellani were aristocrats 
 and had portioned out to them the east 
 ern part of the city where the Doge 
 lived, his residence being in the Piazza 
 of San Marco ; while the Nicolletti were 
 
 34 
 
only publicans. That, besides attending Espero 
 to the Doge in public, many of these 
 Castellani had served him in private, 
 thus being of great service to the state. 
 
 Espero listened to every word, raising 
 his head and looking at me curiously 
 when I mentioned the Castellani, and 
 laughing outright at my description of 
 the banquet tables in the hands of the 
 Arsenalotti. Nothing else dropped from 
 his lips except the grim remark that if 
 he had lived in those days he would, 
 perhaps, have owned his own gondola, 
 and not have had to use his grand 
 father s, who was now too old to row. 
 I remembered afterward that a certain 
 thoughtful expression overspread his 
 face, as if my talk had awakened some 
 memory of his own. 
 
 A passing music boat cut short my 
 dissertation, and in a moment more we 
 were following in its wake, threading 
 our way in and out of the tangle of gon 
 dolas massed about it. Then a twist of 
 the oar, and Espero glided alongside 
 the lantern-hung barge and leaned over 
 to speak to the leader. The musicians 
 were going to the Piazza, would I care 
 to hear them sing under the Bridge of 
 Sighs ? 
 
 In five minutes we had picked our 
 way through the labyrinth of surround- 
 
 35 
 
J n g gondolas, and in five more had en- 
 r tere ^ tne close, narrow canal, where the 
 beautiful bridge, buttressed by two great 
 masses of gloom, the palace and the 
 prison, overhung the sluggish, sullen 
 water. 
 
 There is never a lantern now along 
 this weird and grewsome waterway. 
 One only sees the twinkling lamps of 
 the gondolas, like will-o -the-wisps, drift 
 past, the boats themselves lost in the 
 blackness of the shadows, the glim 
 mer of the pale light of some slow-mov 
 ing barge, or the reflection of the stars 
 above. All else is dark and ghostly. 
 
 The music boat drifted sideways, and 
 the bass viol, who was standing, twisted 
 a light cord through an iron ring in 
 the slimy, ooze-colored palace. Espero 
 drifted against the opposite wall the 
 prison. 
 
 " What shall they sing, signor ? " 
 
 "As you please, Espero." 
 
 I have heard the Miserere chanted at 
 dead of night in the streets of an old 
 Italian town, the flare of the torches 
 lighting the upturned face of the ghastly 
 dead ; my eyes have filled when, with 
 knee to marble floor, I have listened 
 to the pathos of its harmonies sighing 
 through the many-pillared mosque of 
 Cordova ; I have drunk in its cadences 
 
 36 
 
in curtained alcoves with the breath of Espero 
 waving fans and flash of gems about 
 me ; but never has its grandeur and 
 majesty so stirred my imagination and 
 entranced my soul as on this night in 
 Venice, under the deep blue of the soft 
 Italian sky, the frowning, blood-stained 
 palace above, the treacherous silent wa 
 ter beneath. 
 
 I could stretch out my hand and touch 
 the very stones that had coffined the liv 
 ing dead. I could look down into the 
 same depths along the edge of the water- 
 soaked marble where had lain the head 
 less body, with sack and cord, awaiting 
 the sure current of the changing tide ; 
 and from my cushions in the listening 
 gondola I could see, high up against the 
 blue in the starlight, the same narrow 
 window in the fatal arch, through which 
 the hopeless had caught a last glimpse 
 of light and life. 
 
 When the last low strains had died 
 away, Espero raised himself erect, 
 walked slowly the length of the gon 
 dola, and, bending down, said in a voice 
 tremulous with emotion, " Signor, did 
 you hear the tramp of the poor fellows 
 over the bridge, and the moans of the 
 men dying under the wall ? Holy God ! 
 Was it not terrible ? " 
 
 At that instant the barge floated past. 
 37 
 
Espero \ looked at him in wonder Espero s 
 eyes were full of tears! 
 
 This man began to interest me intense 
 ly. Only an every -day, plain, Venetian 
 gondolier, in a blue shirt, and patched 
 at that, with hardly a franc he could 
 call his own, and yet there was some 
 thing about him that made his presence 
 a delight. It was not the graceful swing 
 of his beautiful body, nor his musical 
 laugh, nor his honest kindness to every 
 human being. It was rather an unde 
 fined, courteous, well-bred independ 
 ence. 
 
 When it came to rowing a gondola, it 
 never seemed to me that he rowed be 
 cause it was his duty and his livelihood. 
 He rowed because he loved it, and be 
 cause he loved the sunshine across his 
 face and the flash of the water on his 
 oar-blade the swing and freedom of it 
 all. My happening to be a passenger 
 was but one of those necessary evils at 
 tending the earning and payment of five 
 francs a day. And yet, not altogether 
 an evil ; for he loved me, too, as he did 
 everything else that brought him com 
 panionship and air and light and life. 
 Nothing seemed to tire him. Day or 
 
 38 
 
night, or all night, if I wished it for 
 often we were whole nights together in 
 the soft summer air, floating back to 
 the sleeping city in the gray dawn, stop 
 ping to listen to early mass at the Pieta, 
 or following the fruit boats or fishermen 
 in from the Lido. 
 
 And thus it was that we ransacked 
 Venice from San Giorgio to Murano ; 
 and thus it was that every day I caught 
 some fresh glimpse of the sweetness of 
 his inner nature, and every day loved 
 him the better. Nobody could have 
 helped it. There was that touch about 
 him one could not resist. Once on the 
 Giudecca, when the sea was polished 
 steel and the tide turning ebb, Espero 
 ran the gondola up under the lee of a 
 melon boat, its sail limp and useless in 
 the breathless air, sprang over her rail, 
 caught the oar from the captain, fagged 
 out with the long pull from the Lido, 
 and threw his weight against the droop 
 ing blade. And all this with a laugh 
 and a twist of his foot in pirouette, as if 
 it was the merriest fun in the world to 
 save a tide and a market for a man he 
 had never seen in his life before. 
 
 On another morning he was just in 
 time to save Beppo from a plunge over 
 board old Beppo who for centuries 
 (nobody knows how old Beppo is) has 
 39 
 
hooked his staff into myriads of gondo- 
 GnMitr las landing at the Salute steps. It had 
 happened that some other mediaeval 
 ruin, a few years Beppo s junior, had 
 crowded the old man from his place, and 
 Espero s righteous wrath was not ap 
 peased until he had driven the usurper 
 from the piazza of the church, with the 
 parting reminder that he would break 
 every bone in his withered old skin if 
 he ever caught him there again. 
 
 And yet, with all my opportunities 
 for intimacy, I really got no nearer to 
 the inner side of Espero than the day I 
 hired him. To him I was still only the 
 painter from over the sea, his patron, to 
 whom he was loyal, good-natured, hap 
 py-hearted, and obliging ; but nothing 
 more. Nothing more was for sale for 
 five francs a day. What his home or 
 life might be outside the hours I called 
 my own, I knew no more than of the 
 hundred other gondoliers who filled the 
 canal with their cries and their laughter. 
 The one sole connecting link was the 
 pretty Venetian of the little, crooked 
 canal, who waved her hand whenever 
 we passed, and who once tossed down a 
 spray of oleander which fell at his feet ; 
 and yet I could not even have found 
 her doorway, much less have told her 
 name. 
 
 40 
 
One beautiful, bright Sunday morn- Espero 
 ing, perplexed at this unequal exchange 
 of confidences, this idea took possession 
 of me. Espero and I would breakfast 
 together blue shirt, patch, and all ! 
 Not as we had often breakfasted before, 
 in the gondola under the shadow of a 
 palace, or down by the stalls of the fruit 
 market ; but at the great Gaffe Florian, 
 in the Piazza of San Marco, at twelve 
 o clock, high noon, in the midst of gold 
 embroidered officers with clanking 
 swords and waxed mustaches, and ladies 
 of high degree in dainty gowns and veils. 
 
 " Leave the gondola, Espero, in charge 
 of somebody, and come with me ! " 
 
 We twisted our way through the nar 
 row slits of streets, choked with awnings 
 shading groups of Venetians sipping 
 their coffee, dodged under an archway, 
 across a narrow bridge, and so out upon 
 the blinding, baking Piazza, dotted here 
 and there with hurrying figures, dogged 
 by ink-spilled shadows. 
 
 " Breakfast for two ! " I said to the 
 startled waiter. " Take the seat by the 
 window, Espero ! " 
 
 His face lighted up, and an expres 
 sion of the greatest happiness and good- 
 humor overspread it. But that was all. 
 There was no sign of humility ; nothing 
 indicating that I had done him a kind- 
 
Espero ness, or had conferred upon him any 
 s P eci al favor. He merely pointed to 
 himself, and then to the seat, as if mak 
 ing quite sure, saying, " Me, signor ? " 
 and then sat himself down, spreading 
 his napkin, and all with the air of a man 
 accustomed to that sort of thing every 
 day of his life. 
 
 I ordered nearly everything on the 
 bill of fare. Fish, eggs, salad, broiled 
 cutlet, fruit, even a bottle of Chianti, 
 with silk tassels on its neck. Espero 
 took each in its course with the easy 
 grace of a Chesterfield, and the quiet 
 refinement of a man of the world. 
 
 The only person who put his astonish 
 ment into words was the head waiter, 
 who caught his breath when I lighted 
 Espero s cigarette myself, recounting to 
 his assistant, and adding, " Ma foi y what 
 funny people these painters ! " 
 
 An hour later we were again afloat, 
 embarking at the water -steps of the 
 Piazza. 
 
 Just here, and for the first time in all 
 our intercourse, I noticed a change in 
 Espero s bearing. The touch of humil 
 ity it had been only a trace, and, as I 
 always knew, only assumed that I might 
 see he recognized the obligation of five 
 francs even that slight touch was gone. 
 
 The change was not one that beto- 
 
 4? 
 
kened presuming familiarity, as if all so- 
 cial barriers having now been swept 
 away he would insist upon sharing with 
 me everything I owned. It was more 
 the manner of a man clothed with the 
 responsibilities of a host ; a welcoming, 
 generous, appropriating manner. Here 
 tofore, when I had stepped into the gon 
 dola, Espero invariably offered me his 
 bent elbow to steady myself; but now 
 he gave me his hand. 
 
 Furthermore, he did not wait for in 
 structions as to where the prow of the 
 gondola should be pointed. He said, 
 instead: 
 
 " There is a famous old Cortile that I 
 must show you. All the artists paint it. 
 We will go now ! " 
 
 With this he shot past our customary 
 landing-place, entered the little, crooked 
 canal, and rounded the gondola in front 
 of an old marble archway curiously 
 carved. 
 
 I began to wonder at the change that 
 had come over him. What was there 
 about this Cortile? If everybody had 
 painted it, why should he have kept it 
 hidden all summer from me ? 
 
 Espero s manner at this landing was, 
 if anything, more expressive than at the 
 last ; for, after securing the gondola, he 
 waved his hand graciously and led me 
 43 
 
Espero along a damp, tunnel-like passage, un- 
 G Gondoiier tn * we stepped into an abandoned clois 
 ter, once the most beautiful Cortile in 
 Venice. 
 
 When we entered the sun was blazing 
 against the opposite wall, the nearer 
 columns standing out strong and dark. 
 In the square, bounded by the low wall 
 supporting the pillars, which in turn sup 
 ported the living rooms above, climb 
 ing vines and grasses ran riot, while in 
 the centre of the tangled mass of weeds 
 stood an old covered well, at which a 
 girl was filling her copper water-pail. 
 
 Espero watched my delight at its 
 picturesqueness, laughing outright at 
 my determination to begin work at once, 
 and then, with great deference, led me 
 to a doorway level with the flagging of 
 the mouldy pavement. Here he rang 
 a bell hung on the outside. The next 
 instant a shutter opened above and a 
 pair of black eyes peered out from be 
 tween some pots of oleanders. It was 
 the same face I had seen so often smil 
 ing at Espero from an upper balcony ! 
 The cloister evidently abutted on the 
 little, crooked canal. This, then, was 
 what he was hiding ! But surely he 
 could not have thought that I would 
 have stolen his sweetheart ! 
 
 Another moment and the door was 
 
 44 
 
opened by the same pretty Venetian, 
 who ushered us into a square hall having 
 a broad staircase which led to the floor 
 above. Here, on the wainscoted walls, 
 half way to the ceiling, hung a collec 
 tion of old portraits, each one a delight 
 to the eye of a painter. They were of 
 men, costumed in the time of the 
 later Doges one in scarlet and black, 
 another in a robe of deep blue, while a 
 third wore a semi-military uniform and 
 carried a short sword. 
 
 They all had one distinguishing fea 
 ture : each head was covered by a bright 
 red hood. 
 
 Espero never took his eyes from my 
 face as I looked about me in astonish 
 ment, not even long enough to salute 
 the pretty Venetian who stood smiling 
 at his side. 
 
 " Who lives here, Espero ? " 
 
 " My grandfather, signor, who is very 
 old, lives on this floor. My little wife, 
 Mariana," turning to the pretty Vene 
 tian, " and I live on the floor above ; " 
 and he kissed the girl on the forehead 
 and laid her hand in mine. 
 
 " And these portraits " 
 
 " Are some of the famous gondoliers 
 of old. This one was chief of the Ar- 
 senalotti, and an intimate friend of the 
 Doge." 
 45 
 
Espero " And the others ? " 
 
 Espero s eyes twinkled, and a quizzi 
 cal, half -triumphant smile broke over 
 his face. 
 
 " These are all my ancestors, signer. 
 We have been gondoliers for two hun 
 dred years. I am a Castellani ! " 
 
III. UNDER THE MINARETS 
 
 was a small, not over- 
 clean, and much-crumpled 
 card. 
 
 It was held very near 
 my nose, and above the 
 heads of a struggling, 
 snarling pack of Turks, Armenians, 
 Greeks, and Jews, all yelling at the tops 
 of their voices, and all held at bay by a 
 protecting rail in the station and two 
 befezzed officers attached to the custom 
 house of his Serene Highness. It bore 
 this inscription : 
 
 Isaac Isaacs, 
 
 Dragoman and Interpreter, 
 
 Constantinople. 
 
 Beyond this seething mass of Orien 
 tals was seen an open door, and through 
 this only the sunlight, a patch of green 
 grass, and the glimpse of a minaret 
 against the blue. 
 
 Yes ; one thing more the card. 
 47 
 
Under the The owner carried it aloft, like a flag 
 of truce. He had escaped the tax-gath 
 ering section of the Sublime Porte by 
 dodging under the guarded rail, and 
 with fez to earth was now pressing its 
 oblong proportions within an inch of 
 my eyeglasses. 
 
 " Do you speak English ? " 
 
 "Ev ting: Yerman, Tranche, Grek, 
 Tearkish all!" 
 
 " Take this sketch-trap, and get me a 
 carriage." 
 
 The fez righted itself, and I looked into 
 the face of a swarthy, dark-bearded mon 
 grel, with a tobacco-colored complexion 
 and a watery eye. He was gasping for 
 breath and reeking with perspiration, 
 the back of his hand serving as sponge. 
 
 I handed him my check, through 
 baggage Orient Express, two days from 
 Vienna, stepped into the half-parched 
 garden, and drank in my first full breath 
 of Eastern air. 
 
 Within the garden an oasis, barely 
 kept alive by periodical sprinkling 
 lounged a few railroad officials hugging 
 scant shadows, and one lone Turk dis- 
 pensing cooling drinks beneath a huge 
 umbrella. 
 
 Outside the garden s protecting fence 
 wandered half the lost tribes of the 
 earth. Some staggered under huge 
 
 48 
 
casks of wine swung on poles ; some Under the 
 bent under cases as large as pianos ; ******** 
 some were hawking bread, Turkish 
 sweets, grapes, and sugared figs ; some 
 were peddling clothes, some sandals, 
 some water-jars : each splitting the air 
 with a combination of shouts and cries 
 that would have done justice to a travel 
 ing menagerie two hours late for break 
 fast. In and out this motley mob 
 slouched the dogs in the middle of the 
 street, under the benches, in everybody s 
 way and under everybody s feet : every 
 where dogs, dogs, dogs ! 
 
 Beyond this babel straggled a low 
 building attached to the station. Above 
 rose a ragged hill crowned by a shim 
 mering wall of dazzling white, topped 
 with rounded dome and slender minarets. 
 Over all was the beautiful sky of the 
 East, the joy and despair of every brush 
 from the earliest times down to my own. 
 
 Ever since the days of the Arabian 
 Nights my days the days of Ha- 
 roun al Raschid, of the big jars with the 
 forty scalded thieves and the beautiful 
 Fatima with the almond-shaped eyes, I 
 have dreamed of the Orient and its 
 palaces of marble. And so, when Baron 
 
 49 
 
Under the de Hirsch had brought the home of the 
 Minarets c a ijp ns within two days journey of the 
 domes of San Marco, I threw some extra 
 canvases into a trunk, tucked a passport 
 into my inside pocket, shouldered my 
 sketch-trap, and bought a second-class 
 ticket for Constantinople. 
 
 I had only one object to paint. 
 
 My comrades at Florian s that most 
 delightful of caffes on the Piazza 
 when they heard that I was about to ex 
 change the cool canals of my beloved 
 Venice for the dusty highways of the 
 unspeakable Turk, condemned my de 
 parture as quixotic. The fleas would 
 devour me ; the beggars (all bandits) 
 steal my last franc ; and the govern 
 ment lock me up the very first moment I 
 loosened my sketch-trap. 
 
 But Isaac Isaacs, the dragoman, is 
 standing obsequiously with fez in hand, 
 two little rivulets of well-earned sweat 
 coursing down each cheek. 
 
 "Ze baggages ees complet, effendi." 
 
 Isaac crawled upon the box, the driver, 
 a barelegged Turk with fez and stomach 
 sash, drove his heel into the haunches 
 of the near horse, once, no doubt, the 
 pride of the desert, and we whirled away 
 in a cloud of dust. 
 
 " I don t see my trunk, Isaac." 
 
 "Not presently, effendi. It now ar- 
 
 50 
 
rives immediatamente at the dogane. Under th* 
 Trust me ! " 
 
 Five minutes more, and we alighted 
 at the custom-house. 
 
 "This way, effendi." 
 
 For the benefit of those unfamiliar 
 with the liquid language of the Orient, 
 I will say that effendi means master, and 
 that it is never applied except to some 
 distinguished person one who has, or 
 is expected to have, the sum of half a 
 piastre about his person. 
 
 Isaac presented the check a scrap 
 of paper to another befezzed official, 
 and the next moment ushered me into a 
 small room on the ground-floor, furnished 
 with a divan, a tray with coffee and ciga 
 rettes, and an overfed, cross-legged Turk. 
 There was also a secretary, curled up 
 somewhere in a corner, scratching away 
 with a pen. 
 
 I salaamed to the Turk, detailed into 
 the secretary s ear an account of my 
 birth and ancestry, my several occupa 
 tions and ambitions, my early life at 
 home, my past life in Venice, and my 
 present intentions in Constantinople. I 
 then opened my passport, sketch-book, 
 and trap, and delivered up the key of 
 my trunk. 
 
 The secretary undid his legs, stamped 
 upon my official passport a monogram 
 51 
 
Under the o f authority looking more like the image 
 * refs of a fish-worm petrified in the last ago 
 nies of death than any written sign with 
 which I was familiar, and clapped his 
 hands in a perfectly natural Aladdin 
 sort of way. A genie in the shape of 
 a Nubian, immeasurably black, moved 
 from behind a curtain, and in five min 
 utes my trunk holding the extra can 
 vases, with a great white cross of peace 
 chalked upon its face, was strapped to 
 the carriage, and we on our way to the 
 Royal. 
 
 As I said before, I had come to Con 
 stantinople to paint. Not to study its 
 exquisite palaces and mosques ; its mar 
 velous stuffs ; its romantic history ; its 
 religion, the most profound and impres 
 sive ; its commerce, industries, and cus 
 toms ; but simply to paint. To revel in 
 color ; to sit for hours following with 
 reverent pencil the details of an archi 
 tecture unrivaled on the globe ; to 
 watch the sun scale the hills of Scutari, 
 and shatter its lances against the fairy 
 minarets of Stamboul ; to catch the 
 swing and plash of the rowers rounding 
 their caYques by the bridge of Galata ; to 
 wander through bazaar, plaza, and mar 
 ket, dotting down splashes of robe, tur 
 ban, and sash ; to rest for hours in cool 
 tiled mosques, with the silence of the 
 
 52 
 
infinite about me ; to steep my soul in a Under th 
 splendor which in its very decay is sub- m 
 lime ; and to study a people whose rags 
 are symphonies of color, whose tradi 
 tions and records the sweetest poems of 
 modern times. If you are content with 
 only this, then come with me to the pa 
 tio of the Mosque Bayazid the Pigeon 
 Mosque. 
 
 Isaac Isaacs, dragoman, stands at its 
 door, with one hand over his heart, the 
 other raised aloft, invoking the condem 
 nation of the gods if he lies. In his 
 earnestness he is pushing back his fez, 
 disclosing an ugly old scar in his wrin 
 kled, leathery forehead a sabre cut, he 
 tells me, in a burst of confidence, won 
 in the last row with Russia. His black 
 beard is shaking like a goat s, while his 
 hands, with upturned palms and thumbs, 
 touch his shoulders with the old wavy 
 motion common to his race. Standing 
 now in the shadow of the archway, he 
 insists that no unbeliever is ever per 
 mitted to make pictures in the patio, 
 where flows the sacred fountain, and 
 where the priests and faithful wash 
 their feet before entering the holy tem 
 ple. 
 
 I had heard something like this before. 
 The idlers at Florian s had all said so ; 
 an intelligent Greek merchant whom I 
 53 
 
Under the m et on the train had been sure of it ; 
 
 Minarets ^ eyen the clerk Q the R()yal shrugged 
 
 his shoulders and thought I had better 
 not. 
 
 All this time Isaac still invoking 
 new gods I was gazing into the most 
 beautiful patio along the Golden Horn, 
 feasting my eyes on columns of verd- 
 antique supporting arches light as rain 
 bows. 
 
 Crossing the threshold, I dropped my 
 trap behind a protecting column, and 
 ran my eye around the Moorish square. 
 The sun blazed down on glistening mar 
 bles ; gnarled old cedars twisted them 
 selves upward against the sky ; flocks 
 of pigeons whirled and swooped and fell 
 in showers on cornice, roof, and dome ; 
 and tall minarets, like shafts of light, 
 shot up into the blue. Scattered over 
 the uneven pavement, patched with 
 strips and squares of shadows, lounged 
 groups of priests in bewildering robes 
 of mauve, corn-yellow, white and sea- 
 green, while back beneath the cool arches 
 bunches of natives listlessly pursued 
 their several avocations. 
 
 It was a sight that brought the blood 
 with a rush to my cheek. Here at last 
 was the East, the land of my dreams ! 
 That swarthy Mussulman at his little 
 square table mending seals ; that fellow 
 
 54 
 
next him selling herbs, sprawled out on Under the 
 the marble floor, too lazy to crawl away Minarets 
 from the slant of the sunshine slipping 
 through the ragged awning ; and that 
 young Turk in frayed and soiled em 
 broidered jacket, holding up strings of 
 beads to the priests passing in and out, 
 had I not seen them over and over 
 again ? 
 
 And the old public scribe with the 
 gray beard and white turban writing let 
 ters, the motionless veiled figures squat 
 ting around him, was he not Baba 
 Mustapha, and the soft-eyed girl whis 
 pering into his ear none other than Mor- 
 giana, " fair as the meridian sun " ? 
 
 Was I to devour all this with my eyes, 
 and fill my soul with its beauty, and 
 take nothing away ? My mind was 
 made up the moment I looked into the 
 old scribe s face. Once get the confi 
 dence of this secret repository of half 
 the love-making and intrigue in Stam- 
 boul, and I was safe. 
 
 " Isaac ! " 
 
 "Yes, effendi." 
 
 " Do you know the scribe ? " 
 
 Isaac advanced a step, scrutinized the 
 old patriarch for a moment, and re 
 plied, 
 
 " Effendi, pardonnez, he the one only 
 man in Stamboul I not know." 
 55 
 
Under the This time, I noticed, he omitted the 
 
 Minarets invocation to the go d s . 
 
 " Then I 11 present you." 
 
 I waited until the scribe looked up 
 and caught my eye. Then I bowed my 
 head reverently, and gave him the Turk 
 ish salute. It is a most respectful salu 
 tation. You stoop to the ground, pick 
 up an imaginary handful of dust, press 
 it to your heart, lips, and forehead in 
 token of your sincerity and esteem, and 
 then scatter it to the four winds of hea 
 ven. Rapidly done, it looks like brush 
 ing off a fly. 
 
 The old scribe arose with the dignity 
 of King Solomon I am quite sure he 
 looked like him and offered me his 
 own straw-thatched stool. I accepted it 
 gravely, and opened my cigarette case. 
 
 He unseated a client, dismissed his 
 business for the day, and sat down beside 
 me. Then, Isaac interpreting, I turned 
 my sketch-book leaf by leaf, showing 
 him bits of Venice, and in the back of 
 the book some tall minarets of an old 
 mosque caught on my way through 
 Bulgaria. 
 
 It was curious to watch his face as 
 the dragoman located for him the several 
 scraps and blots, and explained their 
 meaning. He evidently had never seen 
 their like before. When he came to the 
 
 56 
 
minaret, his eye brightened, and point- u*?*r the 
 ing upward to the one above our heads, 
 he drew an imaginary outline with his 
 hand, and pointed to me. I nodded my 
 head. At this he looked grave, and I 
 forthwith sent Isaac for coffee, and 
 lighted another cigarette. Before the 
 cups were emptied I had formally and 
 with great ceremony asked and received 
 permission to paint the most sacred 
 patio, Isaac protesting all the time in 
 high dudgeon as he unbuckled my trap, 
 that the scribe was a common pauper, 
 earning but a spoonful of copper coin 
 in a day, with no more right to grant 
 me a permit than the flea-bitten beg 
 gar at the gate. It was evident that 
 Isaac had not come to Constantinople 
 to paint. 
 
 Half an hour later, the arches were 
 sketched in, the pillars and roof line 
 complete, and I rapidly nearing that 
 part in my work in which the pencil is 
 exchanged for my palette, when the 
 shrill voice of the muezzin calling the 
 faithful to prayer sounded above my 
 head. I could see his little white dot 
 of a turban bobbing away high above 
 me on the minaret, his blue robe wav 
 ing in the soft air. 
 
 In an instant priests, seal-maker, herb- 
 doctor, and peddler crowded about the 
 57 
 
Under tht fountain, washed their faces and feet, 
 Minarets an( j moved s ii en tly and reverently into 
 the mosque. Soon the patio was deserted 
 by all except Isaac, the pigeons, and the 
 scribe, the kindly old scribe, who 
 remained glued to his seat, lost in 
 wonder. 
 
 Another hour, and the worshipers 
 came straggling back, resuming their 
 several avocations. Last of all came 
 the priests, in groups of eight or ten, 
 flashing masses of color as they stepped 
 out of the cool arches into the blinding 
 sunlight. They approached my easel 
 with that easy rhythmic movement, so 
 gracefully accentuated by their flowing 
 robes, stopped short, and silently 
 grouped themselves about me. I had 
 now the creamy white of the minaret 
 sharp against the blue, and the entrance 
 of the mosque in clear relief. 
 
 For an instant there was a hurried 
 consultation. Then a beardless young 
 priest courteously but firmly expounded 
 to Isaac some of the fundamental doc 
 trines of the Mohammedan faith, 
 this one in particular, " Thou shalt not 
 paint." 
 
 Before I could call to Isaac, I felt a 
 hand caress my shoulder, and raised my 
 head. The scribe, with faded robe gath 
 ered about him, stood gazing into the 
 
 58 
 
face of the speaker. I held my breath, Under the 
 wondering whether, after all, I had left Minarets 
 San Marco in vain. Isaac remained 
 mute, a half-triumphant " I told you so" 
 expression lighting up his face. 
 
 Then the old scribe waved Isaac 
 aside, and, drawing himself to his full 
 height, his long beard blending with his 
 white robe, answered in his stead. "I 
 have given my word to the Frank. He 
 is not a giaour, but a true Moslem, a 
 holy man, who loves our temple. I have 
 broken bread with him. He is my friend, 
 bone of my bone, blood of my blood. 
 You cannot drive him away." 
 
 After that, painting about Constanti 
 nople became quite easy. Perhaps the 
 priests told it to their fellow-priests, 
 who spread it abroad among the faith 
 ful in the mosques ; perhaps the gossips 
 around the patio took it up, or the good 
 scribe whispered it into the veiled ear 
 of his next fair client, and so gave it 
 wings. How it happened, I know not ; 
 but from that day my white umbrella 
 became a banner of peace, and my open 
 sketch-book a passport to everybody s 
 courtesy and everybody s good will. 
 
 59 
 
Under the L e t me remind those who may have 
 forgotten it that there is really no such 
 place as Constantinople. There is, of 
 course, the old Turkish city of Stam- 
 boul, with all the great mosques : the 
 mosque of the Six Minarets; the Sul 
 tana Valede; Soliman, and some hun 
 dred others and where, moreover, one 
 finds the great bazaar twelve miles of 
 arcaded streets in a tangle the caffes, 
 drug -markets, fish -markets, spice -mar 
 kets, vile-smelling, dirt-choked alleys and 
 baths. 
 
 Then there is the European city of 
 Pera, up a hill, a long way up, with 
 its modern tramway below, and the an 
 cient tower of the Genoise crowning the 
 top. Pera, rebuilt since the fire, with its 
 new hotels and foreign embassies, its 
 modern shops filled with machine-made 
 Oriental embroideries, and its more 
 modern streets flanked by the everlast 
 ing four-story house with the flat roof 
 and balcony, and the same old cast-iron 
 railings and half -dead potted plants. 
 Pera, the commonplace, except, perhaps, 
 for one delightfully picturesque old cem 
 etery with its curious headstones and 
 dismal cypresses which could not be 
 
 60 
 
burned, and so could not be rebuilt and Under the 
 ruined. Minarets 
 
 And last, across the Bosphorus, is 
 Scutari, only ten minutes by ferry-boat. 
 Scutari-in-Asia, with mosques, archways, 
 palaces, seraglios, fruit-markets, Arab 
 horses, priests, eunuchs with bevies of 
 houris out for an airing, gay awnings, 
 silks in festoons from shop doors, streets 
 crowded with carnival-like people wear 
 ing every color under the sun, Bedouins 
 on horseback riding rapidly through nar 
 row streets, tons and tons of grapes 
 piled up in baskets, soldiers in fez and 
 brown linen suits : everything that is 
 foreign and un-European, and out of the 
 common world. A bewildering, over 
 whelming, intoxicating sight to a man 
 who has traveled one half the world 
 over to find the picturesque, and who 
 suddenly comes upon all there is in the 
 other half crammed into one compact 
 mass a mile square. 
 
 Isaac never quite understands why I 
 go about absorbed in these things, and 
 why I ignore the regulation sights the 
 mosque with the Persian tiles, three 
 miles away and a carriage ; the treas 
 ury at Seraglio Point, opened only by 
 permit from the Grand Vizier (price 
 2) ; the dancing dervishes at Pera ; the 
 howling dervishes at Scutari ; and the 
 61 
 
Under the identical spot where Leander plunged 
 
 Minarets into the sea. 
 
 I finally compromised with Isaac on 
 the dervishes. We had spent the morn 
 ing at Scutari, where I had been paint 
 ing an old mosque. It was howling- 
 dervish day, it comes but once a week, 
 the howl beginning at three p. M. pre 
 cisely, and to satisfy Isaac I had left 
 the sunshine for an hour to watch their 
 curious service. 
 
 I had, it is proper to state, wrung a 
 confession that morning from Isaac 
 which had so humiliated him that he had 
 suggested the dervishes to divert my 
 attention. A dragoman of the opposi 
 tion, a veritable son of Abraham, had be 
 trayed him. He had bitten his thumb 
 at him, not literally but figuratively, and 
 this in very decent English no, the 
 reverse. He had charged him with 
 fraud. He had said that his name was 
 not Isaac Isaacs, but Yapouly Dreco 
 Yapouly ; that he was not an honest 
 Jew, but a dog of a Turk, who had stolen 
 honest Isaac s name when he died. Yes, 
 robbed him, ghoul, grave-digger, beast ! 
 He with a scar on his forehead, where 
 he had been branded for theft ! And 
 here the opposition dragoman snatched 
 Isaac s fez from his head, and ground 
 it into the dirt with his heel. 
 
 62 
 
After a gendarme had taken this very Under the 
 disagreeable opposition dragoman away, Minarets 
 Isaac had confessed. So many English 
 men, Frenchmen, Americans, he said, 
 had wanted Mr. Isaacs that he had con 
 cluded that it was cruel not to accom 
 modate them. Of what use, estimable 
 effendi, was a dead Jew? How infi 
 nitely better a live Turk ! So one day, 
 when hanging over the rail at the station, 
 an Englishman had arrived holding the 
 deceased Isaac s card in his hand, and 
 since that time Yapouly had been Isaac 
 Isaacs to the stranger and the wayfaring 
 man. " See, effendi, here the Angleesh- 
 man card." 
 
 It was the same the rascal had pressed 
 into my own face ! 
 
 Thus it was that Dreco Yapouly 
 Isaacs I will no longer lend myself to 
 his villainous deception preceded me 
 this day up a steep hill paved with boul 
 ders, entered the low door of the tekke 
 (house) of the dervishes, and motioned 
 me to a seat in a small open court shel 
 tered by an arbor covered with vines. 
 
 In the centre was a well flagged by a 
 great stone, and on this rested a high 
 narrow-necked silver pitcher of perfect 
 Oriental shape used by the priests in 
 their ablutions. At the door of the 
 sacred room stood a stalwart Nubian 
 63 
 
Under the dressed in pure white ten times as 
 
 Minarets y^ by CQntrast 
 
 Five francs, and we passed the hang 
 ing curtain covering the entrance, and 
 stepped inside a square, low-ceiled room 
 hung with tambourines, cymbals, arms, 
 and banners, and surrounded on three 
 sides by an aisle. 
 
 The howlers there were at least a 
 dozen were standing in a straight row 
 on the floor, like a class at school, fa 
 cing their master, an old, long-bearded 
 priest squatting on a mat before the 
 altar. 
 
 As we entered, they were wagging 
 their heads in unison, keeping time to 
 a chant monotoned by the old priest. 
 They were of all ages ; fat and lean, 
 smooth-shaven and bearded; some in 
 rich garments, others in more sombre 
 and cheaper stuffs. 
 
 One face cut itself into my memory, 
 that of a handsome, clear - skinned 
 young man, with deep, intense eyes 
 and a sinewy, graceful body. On one 
 of his delicate, lady-white hands was a 
 large turquoise ring. Yapouly whis 
 pered to me that he was the son of the 
 high priest, and would succeed his father 
 when the old man died. 
 
 The chant continued, rising in volume 
 and intensity, and a Nubian in white 
 
 64 
 
handed each man a black skull-cap. Under the 
 These they drew tightly over their per- A 
 spiring heads. 
 
 The movement, which had begun with 
 the slow rolling of their heads, now ex 
 tended to their bodies. They writhed 
 and twisted as if in agony, a row of 
 black-capped felons suspended from un 
 seen ropes. 
 
 Suddenly there darted out upon the 
 mats a boy scarce ten years of age, spin 
 ning like a top, his skirts level with his 
 hands. 
 
 The chant broke into a wail, the audi 
 ence joining in. The howls were deafen 
 ing. The priest rose from the mats by 
 the altar, slowly waved his hands, and 
 began moving around the room, the 
 worshipers reaching forward and kissing 
 the hem of his robe. As he passed, each 
 dervish stepped one pace forward, and 
 handed his outer robe to the Nubian, 
 who piled them on the floor in front of 
 the altar. 
 
 The twelve were now rocking their 
 heads in a wild frenzy, groaning in long, 
 subdued moans, ending in a peculiar 
 "hough," like the sound of a dozen dis 
 tant locomotives tugging up a steep 
 grade. 
 
 " Allah, hou ! Allah, hou ! Allah, hou ! " 
 the last word expelled with a jerk. 
 
 65 
 
Under the Their eyes were starting from their 
 heads, their parched tongues hanging 
 out, the sweat pouring from their faces. 
 The young priest was livid, with eyes 
 closed, his body swaying uneasily. 
 
 A dozen little children were here 
 handed over the rail to the Nubian, who 
 took them in his arms and laid them in 
 a row, with their faces flattened to the 
 mats. The old priest advanced within a 
 step of the first child, his lips moving 
 in prayer, and stretched his arms above 
 the motionless line of fat, chubby little 
 bodies. 
 
 Yapouly Isaac leaned over and whis 
 pered, " See, now he bless them." 
 
 I raised myself on my feet, to see the 
 better. The Nubian held out his hand 
 to the old priest, who balanced himself 
 for a moment, stepped firmly upon the 
 first child, his bare feet sinking into its 
 soft, yielding flesh, and then walked de 
 liberately across the row of prostrate 
 children. As he passed, each little tot 
 raised its head, watched until the last 
 child had been trampled upon, then 
 sprang up, kissed the old priest s robe, 
 and ran laughing from the room. 
 
 The sight now was sickening ; the 
 dervishes were in the last stages of ex 
 hausted frenzy. The once handsome 
 young priest was ghastly, frothing at 
 
 66 
 
the mouth, only the white of his eyes Under the 
 visible, his voice was thick, his breath Minarets 
 almost gone. The others were droop 
 ing, with knees bent, hardly able to 
 stand. 
 
 Suddenly the priest turned his back, 
 prostrated himself before the altar, and 
 prayed silently. The whirling child 
 sank to the ground. The line of der 
 vishes grew still, tottered along the 
 floor, clutched at the hanging curtain, 
 and staggered into the sunlight. 
 
 I forced my way along the closely 
 packed aisle, and rushed into the open 
 air. The sight that met my eye stunned 
 me ; my breath stopped short. In the 
 midst of the court stood the Nubian 
 serving coffee, the howlers crowding 
 about him, clamoring for cups, and 
 panting for breath like a team of ath 
 letes in from a foot-race. I looked for 
 my young priest with the turquoise 
 ring. He was sitting on a bench, roll 
 ing a cigarette, his face wreathed with 
 smiles ! 
 
 And yet the Mohammedan priest, 
 despite his fanaticism, is really a most 
 delightful companion. His tastes are 
 refined, his garments spotless, his man- 
 
Under the ne rs easy and graceful, and his whole 
 Minarets b earm g distinguished by a repose that 
 is superb, the repose of unlimited 
 idleness dignified by unquestioned re 
 ligious authority. 
 
 I remember one in particular who 
 spent a morning with me, a noble old 
 patriarch, dressed in a delicate egg 
 shell-colored robe that floated about his 
 feet as he walked, an under-garment of 
 mauve, with waist sash of pale blue, and 
 a snow-drift of silk on his head. For 
 four broiling hours, with only such 
 shade as a half-withered plane-tree could 
 afford, did this majestic old fellow, with 
 slippers tucked under him, sit and drink 
 in every movement of my brush. When 
 I had finished, he arose, saluted me after 
 the manner of his race, and pointing 
 first to the sketch, and then to the glis 
 tening mosque, said, in the softest of 
 voices : 
 
 " Good dragoman, tell your master I 
 have for him a very great respect. He 
 has opened my eyes to many beautiful 
 things. I am sure he is a most learned 
 man," and passed on with the dignity 
 and composure of a Doge. 
 
 Everywhere else did I find this same 
 spontaneous, generous courtesy and 
 kindly good-humor. Only once was I 
 rebuffed. It was in the open plaza of 
 
 68 
 
the Valede". I had been watching the Under the 
 shifting scene, following eagerly the Mtn( 
 little dabs of color hurrying over the 
 heated pavement, when my eye fell 
 upon a cobbler but a few yards off, peg 
 ging away at an upturned shoe. When 
 my restless pencil had fastened his fez 
 upon his head, and linked his body to 
 his three-legged stool, a laugh broke 
 out among the bystanders crowded 
 about me, one jovial old Turk calling out 
 to the unconscious model. In a mo 
 ment he was on his feet, forcing his 
 way through the throng behind me. 
 Then a hand clutched my shoulder, and 
 the next instant a wet leather sole was 
 thrust forward and ground into my pa 
 per, spoiling the sketch. 
 
 It took five minutes of my most 
 subtle Oriental diplomacy, sweetened 
 with several cups of the choicest Turk 
 ish coffee, to convince this indignant 
 shoemaker that I meant no offense. 
 When I had succeeded, he was so pro 
 fuse in his apologies that I had to 
 smoke a chibouque with him, at his ex 
 pense, to restore his equanimity. 
 
 And yet, under all the courtesy and 
 good-nature I found everywhere, I could 
 not help noticing that a certain disquiet 
 and nervous fear permeated all classes, 
 priests and people alike. The gov- 
 69 
 
Under the ernment s extreme poverty and con- 
 Minarets stant watc hf u lness are two things the in 
 habitant never forgets, one concerns 
 his taxes, the other his liberty. This 
 fear is so great that many public topics 
 worn threadbare by most Europeans are 
 never whispered by a Turk to his most 
 intimate friend. Even my dear friend 
 and confidential adviser, Mr. Yapouly, 
 finds now and then a subject upon which 
 he is silent. One day I asked him who 
 had been suspected of murdering the 
 predecessor of the present Sultan, and 
 why it had been thought necessary to re 
 move that luxurious son of the Prophet. 
 It was an idle question on my part, 
 and one I supposed anybody in Con 
 stantinople could answer ; especially so 
 learned and versatile a dragoman as Mr. 
 Yapouly. To my surprise he made no 
 reply : we were in Pera at the time, he 
 preceding me with the trap. When we 
 reached the long cemetery, he stopped, 
 looked carefully over the low wall, as if 
 fearing the very graves, and then said, 
 in his broken conglomerate, too shat 
 tered to reproduce here : 
 
 " Effendi, you must not ask such 
 questions. Everybody is a spy : the 
 man asleep on the sofa in the hotel, the 
 waiter behind your chair, the barber 
 who shaves you. Some night your bed 
 
 70 
 
will be empty. Nobody ever asks such Under the 
 questions in Constantinople." 
 
 Nor is this unrest confined to the 
 people. I noticed the same anxious 
 look on the Sultan s face the day of the 
 salemlik the day he drives publicly to 
 the little mosque to pray, the mosque 
 outside the palace gates. His face was 
 like that of the acrobat riding bareback 
 at the circus hoop glad to be through. 
 
 But I am in Constantinople to paint, 
 not to moralize, and these glimpses of 
 the treacherous, deadly stream that flows 
 beneath Turkish life are not to my lik 
 ing. I want only the gay flowers above 
 its banks and the soft summer air on 
 my cheek, the tall grasses waving in the 
 sunlight, and the glow and radiance of 
 it all. So, if you please, we will go back 
 to my mosque, and my delightful old 
 priests, and the Greek who sells me 
 grapes and weighs them in a pair of tee 
 tering scales, and my cai que with the 
 pew cushion over the bottom, and the 
 big cai kjis, with the chest of a Hercules 
 and the legs of a satyr, who rows my 
 Oriental gondola, and all the beautiful 
 patches of color, fretted arch, and slen 
 der column that make life enchanting in 
 this lotus-eating land ; and even to Mr. 
 Yapouly, Mr. Dreco Yapouly, who tells 
 me he has reformed, and will never lie 
 
Under the more, " so help him," - - Mr. Dreco 
 Isaacs Yapouly, who has lately ceased 
 his unanswered appeals to the gods, and 
 who has left off all his evil ways. 
 
 But then I remember that I cannot 
 go back to my old life now, for the sum 
 mer is ended. Last night there was a 
 great storm of wind and a deluge of rain, 
 the first for four months. All the gold- 
 dust has been washed from the trees 
 and the grasses. The plaza of the Va- 
 lede" is scoured clean. The little waves 
 around the Galata no longer lap their 
 tongues indolently about the soggy, rot 
 ten floats, but snap angrily in the bleak 
 wind. The doors of the mosques are 
 closed, and outside, in the early morn 
 ing, groups of natives are huddled over 
 charcoal pans. The winter is creeping 
 on apace, and I must be gone. Besides, 
 they are waiting for me at Florian s on 
 the Piazza in my beloved Venice ; those 
 scoffers with their cerise and Chianti 
 and grandi of Munich beer. Waiting, 
 not to mock, but to kotow, to bend the 
 ear and genuflect, now that my port 
 folio is bursting, and to say, " Come, let 
 us see your stuff ! " and " How the devil 
 did you get away with so much ? " 
 
 So one morning I tell Isaac to pack 
 my trap, and this time to slip it inside 
 its leather traveling-case, and to get me 
 
 72 
 
a " hamal," a human burro an Arme- Under the 
 nian, perhaps who will toss my trunk, Mmarefs 
 with the extra canvases now all filled, 
 upon his back, and never break trot 
 until he dumps it at the station two 
 miles away. 
 
 I instantly detect, in spite of our 
 close intimacy, an expression of relief 
 wrinkling Mr. Yapouly s tobacco-colored 
 countenance. He sighs his regrets, but 
 with a lightness that shows his heart is 
 not in them. He has been but a "ha 
 mal " himself, he thinks, lugging the trap 
 about in the heat, and sitting for hours 
 doing nothing absolutely nothing. 
 And I have bought so little in the ba 
 zaars, and his commissions are so small. 
 But then, as he reflects, is he not the 
 dragoman of dragomans, and might not 
 future wayfarers be my intimate friends 
 and his special prey? So he becomes 
 doubly solicitous as the time draws near. 
 Would effendi allow him to place a few 
 pounds of grapes in the compartment, 
 the road to Philippopolis is so dusty and 
 the water is so bad ? Had not the um 
 brella better go above, and the rugs on 
 the other seat ? 
 
 Last of all, with a certain tenderness 
 that he knows will appeal to me, where 
 will the most gracious effendi permit 
 him to place the dear old trap, my com- 
 73 
 
Under the panion over so many thousand miles of 
 Minarets travel ? At my feet ? No ; on the cush 
 ion beside me ! 
 
 The guard blows his whistle ; the 
 carriage doors are locked. Yapouly 
 Dreco Yapouly, the reformed leans 
 outside. I move to the window for a 
 parting word. After all, I may have 
 misjudged him. He starts forward, and 
 presses some cards into my hand. 
 
 " For your friends, effendi, when they 
 want good dragoman." 
 
 I turn up their white faces. 
 
 They are clean and newly printed, 
 and bear this inscription : - 
 
 Isaac Isaacs, 
 
 Dragoman and Interpreter, 
 
 Constantinople. 
 
IV. AN ESCAPADE IN COR 
 DOVA 
 
 |HE first day he contented 
 himself with merely glan 
 cing my way as I emerged 
 from the door of my lodg 
 ing, following me with his 
 eyes until I disappeared 
 around the corner of the narrow street 
 that leads to the Moorish mosque. 
 
 Then he took to raising his hat with 
 quite the air of a hidalgo, standing un 
 covered on the narrow sidewalk until I 
 passed, expressing by this simple cour 
 tesy a sort of silent apology for occupy 
 ing my premises. 
 
 I always returned his salute, wishing 
 him "good day" with great gusto, add 
 ing occasionally the desire that the good 
 God would go with him during its sultry 
 hours. Such graceful compliments tend 
 to make life more enjoyable in old 
 Spanish cities. 
 
 But he never addressed a word to me 
 in reply, only bowed the lower, his eyes 
 fixed upon mine, his whole manner 
 suggestive of a wistful desire for closer 
 acquaintanceship. To this was added a 
 75 
 
An Esca- certain fearless independence which 
 banished at once all thought of offering 
 him alms. 
 
 I began to wonder who this very cour 
 teous, very silent, and very friendly 
 young man might be. I began also to 
 count over the various possible and im 
 possible motives which might influence 
 him to become a fixture on the right 
 of my doorstep every morning when I 
 started out with my empty sketch-trap. 
 
 It was plainly evident that he be 
 longed to the better class of Spaniards, 
 and not to " the people." You could 
 see that in his finely chiseled features, 
 and in the way his clothes, though 
 slightly the worse for wear, fitted his 
 graceful, slender figure. You saw it 
 also in his winning mouth, full of white 
 teeth, shaded by a dark mustache with 
 just enough curl to suggest the Don 
 Juan, ready for fan, slipper, or blade. 
 And yet with all this there was a certain 
 air of sadness about him that enlisted 
 your sympathy at sight. 
 
 The swarthy landlady who peered 
 through the lattice-blinds had never 
 seen him before, and expressed, rather 
 pointedly, I thought, the hope that she 
 never would again. The picador who 
 during the bull-fights occupied a room 
 on the floor above mine charged down 
 
 76 
 
upon him very much as he would on a An 
 wounded bull, and returned to me, wait- 
 ing behind the half-open door, with a 
 shrug of his broad shoulders, a lifting of 
 his eyebrows, and the single word, 
 " Nada ! " (" Good-for-nothing "). 
 
 Still the silent young man continued 
 to occupy my sidewalk, to bow with 
 his hat to the ground, and to follow me 
 with his eyes around the corner of the 
 narrow street that led to the Moorish 
 mosque. 
 
 Then a break occurred in the daily 
 programme. I had forgotten my brush- 
 case, and ran back into the house, leav 
 ing my white umbrella and trap on the 
 doorstep. When I emerged again into 
 the blinding sunlight they had disap 
 peared. I instinctively sought out my 
 silent young man. He was standing in 
 his customary place, hat off, my trap in 
 one hand, the umbrella under his 
 arm. 
 
 " My friend, you have my trap." 
 
 "Yes, senor." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " It is too heavy for the painter. Let 
 me carry it." 
 
 His voice was so gentle, his face so 
 honest, his manner so courteous, his de 
 sire to serve me so apparent, that I sur 
 rendered the brush-case at once ; had it 
 77 
 
An Esca- been filled with doubloons I would have 
 done the same. 
 
 " What is your name ? " 
 
 " Manuel." 
 
 " Why are you always here ? " 
 
 "To wait upon you." 
 
 " For what ? " 
 
 " To keep from starving." 
 
 " Have you had any breakfast?" 
 
 " No ; nor supper." 
 
 Below the mosque there runs a 
 crooked street lined with balconies 
 hooded with awnings shading tropical 
 plants, and now and then a pretty se- 
 norita. At the end of this street is 
 an arcade flanking the old bull-ring. 
 Through one of its arches you enter 
 the best cafe" in Cordova. 
 
 To see a hungry man eat has always 
 been to me one of the most delightful 
 of all the expositions of the laws of 
 want and supply ; to assist in equal 
 izing these laws the most exquisite of 
 pleasures. I exhausted all my resources 
 on Manuel. 
 
 He had a cup of coffee as big as a 
 soup-bowl. He had an omelet crammed 
 full of garlic. He had a pile of waffles 
 smothered in sugar. He had chicken 
 livers broiled in peppers and little round 
 radishes, and a yard of bread, and, last 
 of all, a flagon of San Vicente. All 
 
 78 
 
these he ate and drank with the air An 
 and manners of a gentleman, smoking a 
 cigarette, as is the custom, throughout 
 the entire repast, and talking to me of 
 his life, his people at home, his year 
 at the military school at Toledo, of the 
 unfortunate scrape which ended in his 
 dismissal, of the anger of his father, of 
 the beauty and devotion of the girl who 
 caused it all, and of his coming to Cor 
 dova to be near her. Who does not 
 recollect his own shortcomings in the 
 hot, foolish days of his youth ? I could 
 see it all ; hardly twenty, straight as an 
 arrow, lithe as a whip, eyes coals of fire, 
 cheeks like a rose, and his veins packed 
 full of blood at fever-heat. 
 
 He had watched me painting in the 
 plaza, and had followed me to my lodg 
 ings, hoping I would employ him to carry 
 my trap, but had been too timid to ask 
 for it until chance threw it in his way. 
 He would be glad to carry it now all day 
 to pay for his breakfast. 
 
 Manuel was a prize. He would sup 
 ply the only thing I lacked in this most 
 charming of Spanish cities, a boon 
 companion with nothing to do. I made 
 a bargain with him on the spot, so 
 many pesetas per week, with three meals 
 a day, he to occupy the other side of 
 the table. 
 79 
 
Ait Esca- It was delightful to see him when the 
 ^Cordova terms were concluded. His face lighted 
 up, and his big brown eyes danced. 
 Now he could hold up his head. His 
 father perhaps was right, but what 
 could he do ? Florita was so lovely ! 
 Some day I should see her ; but not 
 now ; I would not understand. His fa 
 ther by and by would relent and send 
 for him. Then he would take my hand 
 and place it in his father s and say, 
 "Here is the good painter who saved 
 my life and Florita s." 
 
 We ransacked Cordova from end to 
 end : into the mosque at twilight, sitting 
 in the shadows of the forest of marble 
 columns stretching away on every side ; 
 up into the tower, where the pigeons 
 roost ; across the old Roman bridge ; 
 along the dusty highways on the out 
 skirts of the old city crowded with mar 
 ket people ; through the streets at night, 
 listening to the tinkling of guitars and 
 watching the muffled figures under the 
 balconies, and the half-opened lattices 
 with the little hands waving handker 
 chiefs or dropping roses ; everywhere 
 and anywhere ; in every nook and crack 
 and cranny of this once famous home of 
 the hidalgo, the cavalier, and the ina 
 morata with the eyes of a gazelle and 
 the heart of fire. 
 
 80 
 
Manuel loved it all. He loved, too, 
 strange to say, all things quaint and odd 
 and old, and in his enthusiasm had rum 
 maged every sacristy and priest s house 
 for me in search of such treasures. In 
 deed, there was hardly a purchasable 
 vestment or bit of embroidery in the 
 city that he had not bargained for, and 
 my lodgings gave daily evidence of his 
 success. One morning he came dan 
 cing in, bubbling over with delight, and 
 swinging around his head a piece of bro 
 cade that would have made the mouth 
 of an antiquary water. This he gravely 
 informed me had once belonged to the 
 figure of the good saint, the Santa Te 
 resa, who had worn it for some hundreds 
 of years, and who had parted with it the 
 night before for ten pesetas. The sa 
 cristan who acted as her agent had re 
 placed the exquisite relic with some new, 
 cheap lace, explaining that it was the 
 good saint s feast-day, and he was there 
 fore especially desirous of presenting 
 her properly to her devout admirers. 
 
 One subject, however, by common 
 silent consent was tabooed, the where 
 abouts of the sweetheart who had made 
 him an exile. I knew that she was 
 young, graceful as a doe, seductive as a 
 houri, and beautiful beyond compare. 
 I knew that she loved Manuel wildly, 
 81 
 
AH Esca- that he idolized her, and would starve 
 ratner than desert her. I knew also 
 that she lived within a stone s-throw of 
 the cafe ; for Manuel would leave me at 
 breakfast to kiss her good-morning, and 
 at midday to kiss her again, and at sun 
 down to kiss her once more good-night, 
 and would return each time within ten 
 minutes. I knew also, of course, that 
 her name was Florita. All this the 
 young fellow told me over and over 
 again, with his face flushed and his eyes 
 aflame ; but I knew nothing more. 
 
 One night of each week was always 
 Manuel s. Any part of any other night, 
 or all of it, for that matter, was mine, 
 and he was at my service for sight-see 
 ing or prowling ; but Saturday was 
 Florita s. 
 
 Except on festival nights, Saturday, 
 of all nights in the week, is the gayest 
 in all the Spanish cities. Then the 
 cafe s are in full blast, filled not only 
 with the city people, but with the coun 
 try folk who come to market on that 
 day. These cafe s have raised platforms, 
 are edged by a row of footlights, and 
 hold half a dozen chairs seating as many 
 male and female dancers. Here you 
 see on gala nights the most bewitching 
 of all the sights of Spain, the Spanish 
 dancers. 
 
 82 
 
What music is to the Italian, dancing An Esca- 
 is to the Spaniard. Float along through 
 any of the canals of Venice and listen : 
 everybody is singing. The woman in 
 the window of the wine-shop over the 
 way is humming an air from Trovatore. 
 The idler on the quay joins in the 
 melody, and in five minutes more the 
 whole waterway is ringing with its sub 
 lime harmony. Turn out into the Grand 
 Canal and so on into the Lido. The 
 boats from Chioggia, fish-laden, are drift 
 ing up to the marble front of the Public 
 Garden, and the air is filled with the 
 pathos of some refrain a hundred years 
 old. It is the language of the people ; 
 they think, talk, vibrate in music. 
 
 In Spain the outlet is through the 
 toes, and not only through the toes, but 
 the feet, the ankles, legs, up and through 
 the spinal column, out along the arms 
 to the very finger-tips, every nerve, tis 
 sue, muscle, and drop of blood in their 
 swinging, pulsating bodies tingling to 
 the rhythm of the dance. Under the 
 influence of this magic spell a man with 
 one eye and a crooked leg, head bound 
 with a red handkerchief, jacket and 
 waistcoat off, will transform himself 
 into an embodiment of grace and ex 
 pression. He will give you whole col 
 umns of description with his legs, 
 
 83 
 
An Esca- avenge the forlorn heroine with the 
 
 sma11 of his back > and . deal death . and 
 destruction to the villain with a twist of 
 
 his head. It is the condensation of the 
 opera, the drama, the pantomime, and 
 the story-teller. Pictures, harmonies, 
 books, the platform, and the footlights 
 have their own "well-worn roads to your 
 brain ; this language of the toes ploughs 
 a furrow of its own. 
 
 On this particular Saturday night 
 Manuel had taken himself off as usual, 
 and I was left to follow my own free 
 will alone. So I strolled into the gar 
 den of the mosque, sat me down on one 
 of the stone seats under the orange- 
 trees, and watched the women fill their 
 water-jars at the old Moorish well, lis 
 tening meanwhile to the chatter of their 
 gossip. When it grew quite dark, I 
 passed out through the Puerta del Per- 
 don, turned to the right, and wandered 
 on aimlessly down a narrow street lead 
 ing to the river. Soon I heard the click 
 of castanets and the thrum of guitars. 
 There was a dance somewhere. Push 
 ing aside a swinging door, I entered a 
 small cafe". 
 
 The room was low-ceiled, apparently 
 without windows, and the air stifling. 
 The customary stage occupied one cor 
 ner of the interior, which was crowded 
 
to the very walls with water - carriers, An 
 cargadors, gypsies, hucksters, and the 
 young bloods of the town. They were 
 cheering wildly a black -eyed senorita 
 who had just finished her dance, and 
 who was again at the footlights bowing 
 her acknowledgments. She made a 
 pretty picture in her short yellow skirts 
 trimmed with black, her high comb, and 
 her lace mantilla, her bare arms waving 
 gracefully. I found a seat near the door, 
 called for a bottle of San Vicente, and 
 lighted a cigarette. At the adjoining 
 table sat a group of young fellows drink 
 ing aguardiente. It is a villainous li 
 quor, and more than a thimbleful sets a 
 man s brain on fire. They were measur 
 ing theirs in tumblers. When at a sec 
 ond recall the girl again refused to dance, 
 the manager explaining that she was 
 very tired, the young caballeros began 
 pounding the table with their glasses, 
 shouting out in angry tones, " La senor 
 ita ! la senorita ! " When for the third 
 time the young girl advanced to the plat 
 form s edge and bowed her regrets, one 
 of the group sprang forward, leaped upon 
 a table, and with an oath dashed the con 
 tents of his glass over her bare shoul 
 ders. A frightened shriek cut the air, 
 and the next instant a heavy carafe filled 
 with wine grazed my head, struck the 
 85 
 
AH Esca- ruffian full in the face, and tumbled him 
 headlong to the floor. 
 
 Instantly the place was in an uproar. 
 Half a dozen men, one waving an ugly 
 knife, sprang past me, made a rush for 
 the table in my rear, and threw them 
 selves upon a young fellow who had 
 thrown the carafe, and who stood with his 
 back to me swinging its mate over his 
 head like a flail. Then came a crash, an 
 other Spaniard sprawled on the floor, and 
 a flying figure dashed by and bounded 
 over the footlights. As he plunged 
 through the curtain in the rear I caught 
 sight of his face. It was Manuel ! 
 
 Grasping the situation, I sprang 
 through the door and reached the side 
 walk just as the police forced their way 
 past me into the scattering throng. A 
 few sharp orders, a crash of breaking 
 glass, a rattling of carbines on the floor, 
 and the tumult was over. 
 
 Humiliated at Manuel s deception, 
 and yet anxious for his safety, I hid my 
 self in the shadow near a street lamp, 
 with my eye on the swinging door, and 
 waited. The first man thrust out was 
 the ruffian who had emptied his glass 
 over the dancer. His arms were pin 
 ioned behind his back, his head still 
 bloody from the effects of Manuel s ca 
 rafe. Then came a villainous-looking 
 
 86 
 
cut-throat with a gash across his cheek, An 
 followed by three others, one of whom 
 was the manager. 
 
 The mob surrounded the group, the 
 prisoners in front. I crouched close un 
 til they disappeared in a body up the 
 street, then crossed over, and swung 
 back the door. The place was empty. 
 A man in his shirt-sleeves was putting 
 out the lights. 
 
 " There has been a row ? " I said. 
 
 " Unquestionably." 
 
 " And some arrests ? " 
 
 "Yes, sefior." 
 
 " Did they get them all ? " 
 
 " All but one." 
 
 "Where is he?" 
 
 The man stopped, grinned the width 
 of his face, and, thrusting up his thumb, 
 waved it meaningly over his left shoul 
 der. 
 
 Manuel had escaped ! 
 
 For half the night I brooded over the 
 unfaithfulness of human nature. Here 
 was my hero telling lies to me about his 
 Florita, spending his Saturday nights in 
 a low cafe engaged in vulgar brawls, 
 and all over a dancer. I began to con 
 sider and doubt. Was there any such 
 fair creature at all as Florita ? Was 
 there any implacable father ? Had Man 
 uel ever been a student ? Was it not all 
 
 8; 
 
An Esca- a prearranged scheme to bleed me day 
 bv da y and awaiting a chance, rob me, 
 or worse ? A man who could escape un 
 hurt, surrounded as he had been, was no 
 ordinary man. Perhaps he was simply 
 a decoy for one of the numerous bands 
 of brigands still infesting the moun 
 tains ; and I remembered with a shud 
 der the story about the forefinger of the 
 Englishman forwarded to his friends in 
 a paper box as a sort of sight draft on 
 his entire bank account. I began to 
 bless myself that mere accident had 
 warned me in time. I would pick up 
 no more impecunious tramps, with my 
 heart and pocketbook wide open. 
 
 When the day broke, and the cheery 
 sun that Manuel always loved streamed 
 in my windows, the situation seemed to 
 improve. I thought of his open, honest 
 face, of his extreme kindness and grati 
 tude, of the many delightful hours we 
 had spent together. Perhaps, after all, 
 it was not Manuel. I saw his face only 
 for a moment, and these Spaniards are 
 so much alike, all so dark and swarthy. 
 He would surely come in an hour, and 
 we would have our coffee together. I 
 dragged a chair out on the balcony and 
 sat down, watching anxiously the turn 
 of the street where I had so often 
 caught sight of him waving his hand. 
 
 88 
 
At eight o clock I gave him up. It 
 was true ; the face was Manuel s, and 
 he dared not show himself now for fear 
 of arrest. Then a new thought cheered 
 me. Perhaps he was waiting at the cafe*, 
 or, it being Sunday, was late, and I would 
 meet him on the way. How could I have 
 misjudged him so. Filled with these 
 thoughts I ran downstairs into the sun 
 light and stopped at the corner near the 
 church, scanning the street up and down. 
 There was no one I knew except the old 
 bareheaded beggar with the withered 
 arm. Manuel often gave him alms. He 
 bowed as I passed, stood up, and put on 
 his hat. 
 
 Near the cafe* at the bottom of the 
 hill stands a half-ruined archway. It 
 can be reached by two streets running 
 parallel and within a stone s-throw of 
 each other. As I passed under this 
 arch, the beggar, to my astonishment, 
 started up as if from the ground. He 
 had followed me. 
 
 "You are the painter, seiior ? " 
 
 Yes." 
 
 "And Manuel s friend?" 
 
 " Of course ; where is he ? " 
 
 He glanced cautiously about, drew me 
 under the shadow of the wall, and took 
 a scrap of paper from inside the band of 
 his hat. 
 
An Esca- it bore this inscription : 
 
 " l am in trouble; follow the beg 
 gar." 
 
 The old man looked at me fixedly, 
 turned sharply, and retraced his steps 
 through the arch. My decision was in 
 stantaneous ; I would find Manuel at all 
 hazards. 
 
 The way led across the plaza of the 
 bull-ring, through the fruit -market, up 
 the hill past the little mosque, now the 
 church of Santa Maria, the one with 
 the red marble altar, and so on out 
 into the suburbs of the city, the beggar 
 keeping straight ahead and never look 
 ing behind. At the end of a narrow 
 lane dividing two rows of old Moor 
 ish houses the mendicant tarried long 
 enough for me to come quite near, 
 glanced at me meaningly, and then dis 
 appeared in a crack in the wall. I fol 
 lowed, and found myself in a square patio, 
 overgrown with weeds, half choked by 
 the ruins of a fountain, and surrounded 
 by a balcony supported by marble col 
 umns. This balcony was reached by a 
 stone staircase. The beggar crossed the 
 overgrown tangle, mounted the steps, 
 swung back a heavy green door with 
 Moorish hinges, and waited for me to 
 pass in. 
 
 I drew back. The folly, if not the 
 
 90 
 
danger, of the whole proceeding began 
 to dawn upon me. 
 
 " I will go no farther. Where is the 
 man who sent you ? " 
 
 The beggar placed his ringers to his 
 lips and pointed behind him. 
 
 At the same instant a blind opened 
 cautiously on the floor above, and Man 
 uel s face, pale as a ghost, peered 
 through the slats. The beggar entered, 
 closed the heavy door carefully, felt his 
 way along a dark corridor, and knocked 
 twice. A shriveled old woman with a 
 bent back thrust out her head, mum 
 bled something to the beggar, and led 
 me to an opening in the opposite wall. 
 Manuel sprang out and seized my 
 hand. 
 
 " I knew you would come. Oh, such 
 a scrape ! The police searched for us 
 half the night. But for old Bonta, the 
 beggar here, and his wife we would have 
 been caught. It would kill my father 
 if anything should happen now. See, 
 here is his letter saying we can come 
 home ! Oh, I am so grateful to you ! 
 You see it was this way. It was Flori- 
 ta s night, and I " 
 
 My heart turned sick within me. 
 Florita s night ! If the poor girl only 
 knew ! 
 
 " Don t say another word, Manuel ; 
 
AH Esca- you are in a scrape, and I will help you 
 
 out > but don>t lie about it: to me . f a11 
 men. If you love the dancer, all right. 
 
 Breaking a carafe over a fellow s head 
 in a cafe", and all for a pair of ankles, 
 may be " 
 
 " Lie to you, senor ! " said Manuel, 
 flushing angrily, and with a certain dig 
 nity I had never seen in him before ; " I 
 could never lie to you. You do not 
 know." 
 
 " I do know." 
 
 " Then Bonta has told you ? " and he 
 looked towards the beggar. 
 
 " Bonta has not opened his lips. I 
 saw it all with my own eyes, and you 
 may thank your lucky stars that you 
 were not sliced full of holes. What 
 would Florita say ? " 
 
 " Florita ? Jesu, I see ! " said Manuel, 
 springing forward, pushing open the 
 door, and calling out : 
 
 " Florita ! Are you there ? Come 
 quick ! " 
 
 A hurried step in the adjoining room, 
 and a young girl came running in. 
 
 It was the dancer ! 
 
 "What could I do, sefior? What 
 would you do if your own wife had been 
 so insulted ? See how lovely she is ! " 
 And he kissed her on both cheeks. 
 
 What would I have done ? What 
 
 92 
 
would you have done, my friend, with 
 that startled shriek in your ears, her 
 great eyes wet with tears, her white 
 arms held out to you ? 
 
 My hair is not quite so brown as it 
 was, and the blood no longer surges 
 through my veins. I am cooler and 
 calmer, and even phlegmatic ; and yet 
 had Florita been mine, I would have 
 broken a carafe over every head in Cor 
 dova. 
 
 While he was calming her fears, kiss 
 ing her cheeks, and patting her hands, 
 the whole story came out. Day after 
 day he had hoped that his father would 
 relent. One word from him, and then 
 I need never have known how the dainty 
 feet of his pretty young wife had helped 
 them both to live. 
 
 That night, a painter, with a pretty 
 Spanish cousin, and a servant carrying 
 his coat and trap, occupied a first-class 
 carriage for Toledo. 
 
 The painter left the train at the first 
 station out of Cordova, shouldered his 
 trap and coat himself, and took the 
 night express back to his lonely lodg 
 ings. The servant and the senorita 
 went on alone. 
 
 When the train reached Toledo, an old 
 Spaniard with white head and mustache 
 pushed his way through the crowd, took 
 
 93 
 
An Esca- the servant in his arms, and kissed the 
 P rettv cousin on both cheeks. 
 
 Then a high-springed old coach swal 
 lowed them all up. 
 
V. LA CANAL DE LA VIGA 
 
 begins at the great lakes, 
 away up in the country 
 among the flowers and 
 market gardens, winds in 
 and out of the low hills 
 and hollows, stopping at 
 the various Aztec towns with the un 
 pronounceable names. Then it takes a 
 turn into the little holiday village of 
 Santa Anita where the flower-crowned 
 peons dance feast-days and Sundays, 
 waters the edges of the chinampas, 
 the floating gardens of the ancients over 
 grown with weeds and anchored by neg 
 lect, flows past the almost deserted 
 paseo de la Viga, holding half-way its 
 length the dilapidated bust of Guati- 
 motzin, and so on down to the City of 
 Mexico. 
 
 All kinds of water-craft loaded with 
 all kinds of merchandise float up and 
 down its windings : wood boats ; market 
 boats ; flower boats ; canoes filled with 
 Indians ; flat-bottomed barges roofed 
 over with a rude awning amidships, 
 barbaric gondolas, crowded with merry 
 makers thrumming guitars and clicking 
 95 
 
if Canal castanets, a steady stream of life, with 
 dela Vtga the current towards the city. 
 
 Here it is swallowed up like many an 
 other fresh young life joyous from the 
 green fields. Here the city pounces 
 upon it and defiles it. Here every bit of 
 stray refuse, every scrap of offal, all the 
 filth, all the dirt, all the scrapings and 
 castaways of the great city are thrust 
 into its pure waters. Even the narrow 
 little bridges take a hand in the villainy ; 
 crowding and jostling as if bent on chok 
 ing it up forever. 
 
 Soon it reaches the slums, the very 
 dregs of its pollution ; the stables ; the 
 dyehouses and the sewers ; the slaugh 
 ter-houses, where the brown -backed 
 peons, naked to the waist, lean over 
 rotting logs cleansing the reeking hides 
 fresh from the shambles. Every indig 
 nity is heaped upon it, every touch be 
 fouls it. 
 
 Still it struggles on, cringing like an 
 outcast, slinking under the bridges, 
 crouching through dark waterways, edg 
 ing along rotting embankments, buoyed 
 up and strengthened by the thought of 
 the bright pure waters of Lake Texcoco 
 glistening in the sunlight a few miles 
 away. 
 
 You follow down, in and out, crossing 
 and recrossing the little bridges, hug- 
 
 96 
 
ging the shadows of the tall pink and La Canal 
 yellow washed buildings, their balco- 
 nies trellised with flowers and hooded 
 with awnings, until you come to where 
 the water widens out, washing a broad 
 flight of stone steps that lead up to four 
 great columns supporting the entabla 
 ture and roof of an imposing structure 
 quite classic in its design. This is the 
 Mercaclo del Pulquerria. 
 
 Cross the little bridge above, pick 
 your way through the crowds of venders 
 in the street, push through the babel of 
 buyers and sellers on the floor of the 
 market, and walk out into the blinding 
 sunlight on the very same stone steps 
 you saw from across the canal. A sight 
 greets you that exists only in one spot 
 the world over. 
 
 Beneath, in a solid pack, their sides 
 touching, floats a great fleet of canoes 
 loaded to the water s edge with masses 
 of flowers, heaps of vegetables, piles 
 upon piles of fruit : one solid carpet of 
 blue larkspur, bright marigolds and car 
 nations, poppies, roses, radishes, lettuce, 
 tomatoes, melons, grapes, and figs. 
 
 You forget the ninety and nine smells, 
 the seething, bubbling hides, the ooze 
 and slime of the sodden logs, and revel 
 only in the sunlight, the palms waving 
 over the low walls, the blazing, dazzling 
 97 
 
La Catial white of the great building opposite, the 
 deep blue of the sky over h ea d, and the 
 
 superb carpet of color dotted with fig 
 ures beneath. 
 
 Stand behind one of the great pillars 
 within a few feet of the nearest boat. 
 Its bow is a mass of blue larkspur and 
 ragged sailors. Amidships is a great 
 square of carnations, intermingled with 
 every variety of reds and yellows. In 
 the stern stands a peon girl, her head 
 covered by a wide-peaked sombrero of 
 yellow straw, throwing the richly colored 
 face in shadow. 
 
 The sunlight falls on her bare arms 
 and back, and glistens on the white 
 chemise, half concealing the full outlines 
 of her rounded figure. About her hips 
 is folded a square, blue cotton blanket, 
 girded by a red sash. In her ears are 
 large silver hoops. An armlet of copper 
 binds one arm near the shoulder. 
 
 She stands erect, steadying herself, 
 one hand on the oar, which in turn 
 steadies the boat, the other filled with 
 fruit and flowers. These she lifts up 
 to the clamoring crowd, tossing them 
 now a bunch of radishes, now a cluster of 
 carnations in exchange for their copper 
 coins, which she catches dexterously in 
 mid-air. 
 
 If you think grace died with the 
 
 98 
 
Greeks, watch this girl for a moment. La Canal 
 She is barely sixteen ; her eyes are dark dela 
 and luminous ; her hair a purple black, 
 tied in two great braids down her back ; 
 her teeth white as milk ; her neck, arms, 
 and bust exquisitely modeled ; her fin 
 gers small and tapering, and her feet 
 tiny enough to dance on Persian carpets. 
 She has a skin that is not the red of the 
 Indian, nor brown, nor quadroon ; it is 
 light though transparent copper. 
 
 Every movement is grace itself. That 
 she comes of an indolent race only adds 
 to her beauty. Minutes at a time she 
 keeps perfectly still, even to her eyelids. 
 Then she shifts the oar, throws her 
 weight on the other hip, her beautiful 
 bare arms fall to her side, and she is more 
 entrancing than ever. She is absolutely 
 unconscious of your admiration. She 
 has but one thought in life, to sell her 
 cargo before the hot sun shall shrivel it 
 up. 
 
 Suddenly, above the din of the traffic, 
 you hear a sharp cry. The girl starts 
 forward, drops the oar and falls on her 
 knees in the boat, among the greens and 
 flowers. When she rises she has her 
 little bare, bronze baby in her arms. 
 
 At the same instant, from underneath, 
 there crawls out a shaggy-headed peon 
 rubbing his eyes. He has been sound 
 99 
 
La Canal asleep. Long before the gray dawn, 
 
 is and many weary miles from here, he 
 
 had poled the canoe alone ; past the 
 
 sleeping villages and the chinampas, 
 
 while the mother and child rested. 
 
 The crowd thins out. One by one 
 the boats drop off, and drift up or down. 
 Soon the bronze goddess and her baby 
 and her shaggy-headed husband float by 
 with an empty boat. 
 
 You look after them long and mus 
 ingly, until they are lost in the throng. 
 Then, somehow, you feel a slight pain, 
 as of a personal loss. The place is dif 
 ferent, the charm has fled. 
 
 You begin to note the foul water 
 strewn with waste leaves, decayed fruit, 
 and the offal of the market. You be 
 come aware of the stench and the reek 
 ing filth. The white wall glows like a 
 furnace, the sky is molten brass, the 
 palms hang limp. You turn in disgust 
 and enter the stifling market, where 
 barelegged peons are drenching the foul 
 stone flags with fouler water from the 
 canal, and so on through and out into 
 the narrow street, dodging under the 
 awnings, and skirting close to the strip 
 of a black shadow stenciled on the side 
 walk. 
 
 Soon you reach your garden, and the 
 cool of your quiet siesta. 
 
 100 
 
Over your coffee you have but one La Canal 
 memory, the grand figure of that de la Viga 
 daughter of Montezuma, radiant in the 
 sunlight, her hands filled with flowers. 
 
VI. A BULGARIAN OPERA 
 BOUFFE 
 
 IE was a small waiter with a 
 slightly bald head, and of 
 no very pronounced na 
 tionality, and he spoke the 
 fag-ends of five or six lan 
 guages, one of which, I 
 was delighted to find, was my own. 
 
 These fragments he hurled continu 
 ously at other waiters of more pro 
 nounced nationalities French, Ger 
 man, Hungarian, and the like who 
 were serving little groups of Turks, 
 Russians, and Bulgarians scattered 
 about the coffee-room, 
 
 Directly opposite me hung a half- 
 length portrait of a broad-shouldered 
 young soldier bristling with decorations, 
 his firmly set features surmounted by a 
 military cap. 
 
 " Is that a portrait of the prince ? " I 
 asked. 
 
 The man of many tongues stopped, 
 looked at the chromo for an instant as 
 though trying to remember to which 
 one of the late princes I had referred, 
 and then said blandly : 
 
 1 02 
 
" Yes, monsieur ; the present king ; A 
 Prince Ferdinand." ri 
 
 " Is he now in Sofia ? " 
 
 The slightly bald attendant elevated 
 his eyebrows with a look of profound 
 astonishment. 
 
 " Here ? No, monsieur." 
 
 " He has really run away, then ? " 
 
 The eyebrows fell, and a short, pudgy 
 finger was laid warningly against his 
 lips. 
 
 "Monsieur, nobody runs in Bulgaria. 
 His majesty is believed to be in the 
 monastery at Ryllo." 
 
 " Yes, so they tell me. But will he 
 ever come back here ? " 
 
 The man stopped, gazed about him 
 furtively, refilled my glass, bending so 
 low that his lips almost touched my ear, 
 and then whispered, with a half-laugh : 
 
 " God knows." 
 
 I was not surprised. All Europe at 
 that precise moment was straining its 
 ears to catch a more definite answer. 
 The conundrum was still going the 
 rounds of the diplomats, and the suc 
 cessful guesser was yet to be heard from. 
 
 All that was positively known con 
 cerning his imperial highness was that 
 several weeks prior to the time of this 
 writing he had left his palace at Sofia, 
 the capital of Bulgaria, within mus- 
 103 
 
A Bulga- ket-shot of where I sat, and, attended 
 bv . a f ew personal friends, had taken the 
 midnight express to Vienna. From Vi 
 enna he had gone to Carlsbad, where 
 for several consecutive weeks he had 
 subjected his royal person to as many 
 indoor baths and as much outdoor ex 
 ercise as would entirely eradicate the 
 traces of gout and other princely evils 
 absorbed by his kingship during his few 
 years stay in the capital of the Bulga 
 rians. 
 
 All this time the air had been full of 
 the rumor of his abdication. The Rus 
 sian ambassador at the court of Paris, 
 Baron Mohrenheim, in an interview 
 granted to the Paris correspondent of a 
 St. Petersburg paper, insisted that there 
 was no doubt that Ferdinand had quit 
 ted Bulgaria for good, "his life there 
 being in constant danger." While the 
 Austrian ambassador at Constantinople, 
 Herr von Radowitz, was reported to 
 have advised the Porte to postpone tak 
 ing action on the Bulgarian Note for the 
 present, hinting at the imminent retire 
 ment of the reigning prince, and a con 
 sequent solution of impending difficul 
 ties more in harmony with the purport 
 of the Berlin Treaty. 
 
 These announcements continued, and 
 with such persistency that the Bulgarian 
 
 104 
 
prime minister, M. Stamboloff, deemed 
 it necessary to telegraph to a newspa- 
 per correspondent, " The rumors of the 
 prince s intended abdication are pure 
 fabrications. 
 
 More emphatic still was Ferdinand s 
 own manifesto, issued through the col 
 umns of the Carlsbad " Temps," to the 
 effect that "while there is a great na 
 tional effervescence going on at this 
 moment in Bulgaria, the Bulgarians are, 
 nevertheless, free, and will welcome me 
 back with rejoicings." 
 
 It was while this political " efferves 
 cence," as the prince was pleased to call 
 it, continued that the royal liver grew 
 torpid enough to demand a change of 
 air. This torpidity lasted, in fact, long 
 after the Carlsbad doctors had pro 
 nounced the diseased organ cured. You 
 will remember that Talleyrand tried the 
 same experiment with similar results 
 nearly a century before. 
 
 Then one day the prince turned up 
 serenely on the slopes of the mountains, 
 dismounted like a weary knight, and 
 knocked for admission at the monastery 
 at Ryllo. 
 
 105 
 
A Buigci- Being myself a wanderer in this part 
 
 ra of the world > wit . h an e X e for the unex 
 pected and the picturesque, and anxious 
 
 to learn the exact situation in Bulgaria, 
 I had hurried on from Budapest, and 
 at high noon on a broiling August day 
 had arrived at a way station located in 
 the midst of a vast sandy plain. This 
 station the conductor informed me was 
 Sofia. Following my traps through a 
 narrow door guarded by a couple of sol 
 diers, I delivered up my ticket and pass 
 port, crept under a heap of dust propped 
 up on wheels and drawn by three horses 
 abreast with chair - backs over their 
 names, waited until a Turk, two greasy 
 Roumanians, overcoated in sheep 
 skins wrong side out, and a red-neck- 
 tied priest had squeezed in beside me ; 
 and then started off in a full gallop to 
 a town two miles away. Our sudden 
 exodus obliterated the station in a cloud 
 of dust, through which the Constanti 
 nople express could be seen slowly 
 feeling its way. 
 
 The interview with the waiter occurred 
 within an hour of my arrival. 
 
 The same afternoon I was abroad in 
 the streets of Sofia armed with such in- 
 
 1 06 
 
formation as I had gathered from my A Buiga- 
 obsequious attendant. 
 
 In the king s absence I would call 
 upon the members of the cabinet. 
 
 It did not take me many hours to 
 discover that his Excellency M. Stam- 
 boloff, Minister President, was away on 
 a visit, presumably at Philippopolis ; 
 that the Minister of Justice, M. Sala- 
 bashoff, had resigned a short time be 
 fore ; that Doctor Stransky, Minister of 
 Foreign Affairs, had followed suit, the 
 portfolios of both being still unassigned ; 
 that the Minister of Finance was in 
 Varna, the Minister of War, Colonel 
 Moutkourov, in Vienna. In fact, that 
 not a single member of the Bulgarian 
 government from the king down was 
 to be found at the capital. The Bul 
 garian government had apparently ab 
 sconded. Not a member, not a repre 
 sentative, was to be found, unless a 
 gimlet-eyed man of about forty, with a 
 forbidding countenance, a flat military 
 cap, and a tight-fitting white surtout 
 incrusted with gilt buttons, who an 
 swered as prefect of police, might be so 
 considered. 
 
 I ran up against this gentleman be 
 fore I quitted the palace grounds. He 
 had already run up against me at the 
 station on my arrival, as I afterward 
 107 
 
A Buiga- discovered, and had entered me as a 
 sus P icious character at sight. 
 
 In five minutes he had bored me so 
 full of questions that I became as trans 
 parent as my passport, which he held 
 up to the light in order to read its wa 
 ter-mark. Next he went through my 
 sketch-book page by page, and finally 
 through all my letters until he came to 
 one bearing at its top the image of the 
 American eagle and at its bottom the 
 superscription of one of its secretaries, 
 answering for my sobriety, honesty, and 
 industry ; whereupon he waved me to 
 the door with full permission to roam 
 and sketch at my will. Then he put a 
 special detective on my track, who never 
 took his eyes from me during any one of 
 my waking hours. 
 
 I did not ask this potentate whether 
 the prince was coming back. I did not 
 consider it an opportune moment. 
 
 Neither did I discuss with him the 
 present condition of Bulgaria, there be 
 ing nothing in the cut of his coat nor 
 of his eye, for that matter to indicate 
 his present political views. He might 
 have been an adherent of the prince, or a 
 believer in Panitza, or a minion of Stam- 
 boloff, or he might have been so evenly 
 balanced on the edge of events as to be 
 all three or none. 
 
 1 08 
 
Nor did I explain to him how grieved A 
 I was that his present lords and masters 
 should have seen fit to absent them 
 selves just at the precise moment when 
 their combined presence would have 
 been so agreeable to me. I had really 
 crossed desert wastes to study their com 
 plicated comedy, and now all the princi 
 pal actors were out of town. 
 
 A rehearsal of the preceding acts of 
 this play may possibly lead to a better 
 understanding of the drama as it was 
 then being developed in Bulgaria. It 
 is not heroic; it cannot even be called 
 romantic, this spectacle in which three 
 millions of souls are seen hunting about 
 Europe for a sovereign, a sort of still- 
 hunt resulting in the capture of two 
 kings in four years, with hopes of bag 
 ging a protector or a president before 
 the fifth is out. 
 
 But to the play itself. 
 
 At present in Bulgaria there are, first, 
 the Russophiles, who, as Petko Karave- 
 loff says, " pray for the time when Bul 
 garia shall march into Salonica, while 
 Russia marches into Constantinople," 
 and who believe the Czar to be their 
 natural friend and ally, with the only 
 109 
 
hope of settled peace in his protector- 
 ate - Secondly, the loyal oppositionists, 
 headed by M. Radoslavoff, who would 
 support the prince with certain conces 
 sions, but who detest his advisers. And 
 thirdly, the sympathizers of Major Pa- 
 nitza, the murdered patriot, who was 
 " shot " so ran a proclamation a week 
 old, patches of which were still pointed 
 out to me decorating the walls of the 
 king s palace " by the order of the 
 bloodthirsty Ferdinand, the scoundrel 
 Stamboloff, and the Vaurien Mout- 
 kourov." 
 
 This young officer, Panitza, a de 
 voted adherent of Prince Alexander, 
 had served with distinction in the Ser 
 vian war, having led one of the famous 
 charges at Slivnitza. Believing that the 
 only salvation for his country lay in Rus 
 sian interference, he had joined hands 
 with a Russian spy, Kolobkoff, in fo 
 menting discord in the army. Unluckily, 
 his own letters, carrying unmistakable 
 evidence of the plot, fell into the hands 
 of Stamboloff himself, resulting in his 
 immediate arrest, trial, and condemna 
 tion by court-martial. 
 
 It is greatly to the credit of Prince 
 Ferdinand that he was strongly inclined 
 to spare Panitza. He in fact held out 
 for more than a week against the com- 
 
 110 
 
bined assaults of Stamboloff and his 
 brother-in-law, Moutkourov, then min- 
 ister of war, and it was not until his 
 prime minister threatened the resigna 
 tion of the entire cabinet that he finally 
 yielded. There is even a story current 
 that when this threat failed Stamboloff 
 followed the king to Lorn Palanka with 
 the death-warrant in his hand, and that 
 when he still hesitated that implacable 
 dictator remarked sententiously : 
 
 " Sire, Major Panitza dies on the mor 
 row. If you continue to object, there is 
 one thing we can always do for your 
 majesty, we can always buy you a 
 first-class ticket to Vienna." 
 
 StambolofFs plan for governing had 
 been simple and to the point. It called 
 for five millions of roubles and a king. 
 Who this king might be, or where he 
 should hail from, was a matter of detail. 
 Anybody but a Russian or a Turk 
 would do. And so offers were made in 
 a confidential way to various gentlemen 
 who thought they had an especial, di 
 vine gift for reigning, and who lacked 
 the opportunity only because of the de 
 pleted condition of their bank accounts. 
 At last a fond and ambitious mother 
 and an obliging son with an almost un 
 limited reserve fund unlimited for the 
 ordinary needs of life took the bait. 
 in 
 
A Bulga- It was not, however, a harmonious 
 famil Y arrangement ; for it was well 
 known that the young prince s uncle, 
 the Duke of Saxe-Coburg, did what he 
 could to prevent the final agreement ; 
 he being an older and wiser diplomat, 
 and having had a long and varied expe 
 rience in the ups and downs of several 
 see - saw governments. Among other 
 things, the duke boldly stated that it 
 was only a question of money with the 
 Bulgarian regents, and that Ferdinand 
 would leave the throne when his guldens 
 were gone, as had Alexander, to whom 
 the Bulgarian government then owed 
 three millions of francs. 
 
 The duke was right. When the hour 
 arrived, there were, of course, cogent 
 reasons for heavy drafts on the king s 
 exchequer : the army was to be re 
 armed and clothed, an important rail 
 road built, and a thousand and one im 
 provements made. The money would 
 be returned. 
 
 This schedule has been literally car 
 ried out, except the return item, if 
 not to the benefit of Bulgaria herself, 
 certainly to the depletion of the prince s 
 bank account. 
 
 Among the most seductive of these 
 schemes was the beautifying of the cap 
 ital. Streets were to be opened, and 
 
 112 
 
trees planted, and flowers made to bloom. A . 
 I recall now that vast band of stagnant 3S2f 
 dust leading from the station to the 
 town, separated from its surrounding 
 monotony by sundry depressions and 
 grades indicated along the line by the 
 excavated debris which fringed its 
 edges ; with a double row of infant trees 
 marking its curb -lines, each one of 
 which was shriveled to a crisp by the 
 blistering heat. Added to this mockery, 
 at regular intervals stood flower-beds in 
 ovals, and diamonds, and circles, filled 
 with plants burned to a cinder, their 
 very blossoms, which no man had dared 
 pluck, dead for months, and still stand 
 ing brown and dust-begrimed. 
 
 Such is the great boulevard leading 
 from the railway to the palace ! 
 
 The boulevard, however, is not the 
 only part of Sofia illustrating the pre 
 vailing taste to overturn and recon 
 struct. One sees it in the new part of 
 the town, where government buildings, 
 bare, white, and forbidding, are going 
 up in all directions. One sees it also 
 in the old mosque-and-garden-landmarks 
 left standing high above new streets 
 now being cut to their very edges ; their 
 preservation a tacit acknowledgment 
 of their right to exist, their isolation a 
 forerunner of their death, quite as the 
 
Buiga- old traditions are being undermined by 
 
 ouff? e a the P resent government. 
 
 Many of these streets serve a double 
 purpose. They make a short route to 
 the palace, and they provide right of 
 way for hasty artillery practice. One 
 cannot always tell, in so changeable a 
 climate as that of Bulgaria, when the 
 prevailing political wind may shift. 
 
 The palace itself, a great hospital- 
 looking building surrounded by a gar 
 den, suggests only stately discomfort 
 and emptiness. In walking through its 
 great halls and scantily furnished salons, 
 I could not help pondering upon the 
 peculiarities of human nature, and won 
 dering what could have induced this fine 
 young officer and he is a fine fellow 
 in every sense of the word to give up 
 his brilliant life in Vienna, the most 
 delightful capital in Europe, and to a 
 young man of fortune the most fascinat 
 ing, in order to bury himself in this ugly 
 pile of masonry. But then the market 
 is never overstocked with empty thrones, 
 while would-be kings are a drug. 
 
 The old part of the town, however, is 
 still quaint and Oriental, and has thus 
 far escaped the restless shovel and saw. 
 It lies in the dip of a saucer-shaped val 
 ley, surrounded by bare brown hills. 
 Netted with crooked, dirty streets and 
 
 114 
 
choked with low, shambling houses, A Buiga- 
 with here and there a ruined mosque, it 
 remains a picturesque reminder of the 
 days of Turkish rule, unchanged since 
 the signing of the Berlin Treaty, when 
 in a single year five thousand of Mo 
 hammed s chosen shook the dust of 
 Sofia from their feet and sought refuge 
 under the Sultan. 
 
 The most interesting of these quaint 
 remnants of Oriental architecture found 
 in the old part of the city is the Mosque 
 Bania-bashie, dating back to the year 
 1279. This mosque is still the resort 
 of the devout Mohammedan, who prays 
 therein five times a day with his face 
 towards Mecca, and who, despite the re 
 strictions that vex his race, still pros 
 trates himself on the floor of the mosque 
 below, in obedience to the call of the 
 muezzin from the slender minaret above. 
 
 Here I had my first glimpse of Mo 
 hammedan worship, and to one unac 
 customed to the forms of the Moham 
 medan religion, and especially to one 
 who sees them for the first time, I know 
 of no religious spectacle more impres 
 sive. Before you stands a barefooted 
 Turk erect on his prayer-rug with his 
 face towards Mecca and his eyes look 
 ing straight into the eyes of his God. 
 You see at a glance that it is not a duty 
 "5 
 
A Buiga- w ith him, nor a formality, nor the main 
 ra tenance of a time-honored custom. It 
 is his very life. Watch him as he 
 enters this wretched interior of Bania- 
 bashie, with its scaling and crumbling 
 walls, and its broken windows through 
 which the doves fly in and out. Outside, 
 at the trickling fountain, he has washed 
 his feet and face and hands, bathing his 
 throat and smoothing his beard with his 
 wet fingers. He is a rough, broad- 
 shouldered, poorly clad man in fez and 
 skirt, his waist girt with a wide sash 
 ragged and torn. He is perhaps a " ha- 
 mal," a man who carries great weights 
 on his back, a human beast of burden. 
 His load, whatever it may be, is outside 
 in the court. His hourly task is his 
 daily bread ; but he has heard the shrill 
 cry from the minaret up against the sky, 
 and stops instantly to obey. 
 
 He enters the sacred building with 
 his shoes in his hands. These he 
 leaves at the edge of the mat. Now he 
 is on holy ground. Advancing slowly, 
 he halts half-way across the floor, and 
 stands erect. Before him is a blank 
 wall ; beyond it the tomb of the Pro 
 phet. For a moment he is perfectly still, 
 his eyes closed, his lips motionless. It 
 is as if he stood in the antechamber of 
 Heaven, awaiting recognition. Then 
 
 116 
 
his face lights up. He has been seen ! A Buiga 
 The next instant he is on his knees, 
 and, stretching out his hands, prostrates 
 himself, his forehead pressed to the floor. 
 This solitary service continues for an 
 hour. The man stands erect one mo 
 ment, with a movement as if he said, 
 " Command me ; I am here ; " the next 
 he is prostrate in obedience. Then he 
 backs slowly out, and, noiseless, regains 
 his shoes, bends his back to his burden, 
 and keeps on his way, his face having 
 lost all its tired, hunted look. 
 
 There is no mistaking the impression 
 made upon you. It is not a religious 
 ceremony, nor a form of devotion, nor a 
 prayer. This man has been in the very 
 presence of his God. 
 
 Next to this crumbling mosque stands 
 the Turkish bath, with its round dome 
 pierced with bull s-eyes through which 
 the light falls in slanting parallel bars 
 upon clouds of boiling steam. The wa 
 ter gushes from the ground at a temper 
 ature of 110 Fahrenheit, the pool being 
 shoulder-deep and filling the whole in 
 terior excepting the narrow edge around 
 which cling the half-boiled natives in 
 every variety of undress uniform from 
 the pattern used in the Garden of Eden 
 down to the modern dressing-gown. 
 
 Outside of this circular room are cool- 
 117 
 
ABuiga- i n g apartments smelling of wet towels 
 an d furnished with divans upon which 
 men lounge half -clad, smoking ciga 
 rettes. Now and then from an inside 
 cubbyhole come the whiff of a narghile 
 and that unmistakable aroma, the steam 
 of smoking coffee. 
 
 What a luxury after a four months 
 drought and its consequent accumula 
 tion of Bulgarian dust ! How genuine 
 and unique this volcanic-heated sympo 
 sium compared to all its base imitations 
 palmed off on a suffering public in the 
 several capitals of Europe and America ! 
 For more than six hundred years, and 
 in fact before the mosque was built, 
 has this pool of Siloam comforted the 
 sick and soothed the well and cleansed 
 the soiled. And hot, too, boiling hot 
 out of the ground, running free night 
 and day, and always ready with its ac 
 companiments of Turkish coffee, pipes, 
 and divans. Go to, with your marble 
 slabs, and radiators, and high-pressure 
 boilers under the sidewalk ! 
 
 Beyond this section of narrow streets 
 there runs a broad highway lined with 
 booths attended by all sorts of peoples 
 Gypsies, Turks, Jews, Greeks, and 
 Hungarians, selling every kind of mer 
 chandise entirely worthless to anybody 
 but a native. Here are rings of bread, 
 
 118 
 
squares of leather for sandals, messes A 
 in bowls with indescribable things float- 
 ing about in boiling grease, heaps and 
 lumps of other things served smoking 
 hot in wooden plates, and festoons of 
 candied fruit strung on straws and 
 sugared with dust. Here are piles of 
 melons and baskets on baskets of grapes, 
 these last delicious, it being the sea 
 son, and great strings of onions, pyra 
 mids of tomatoes, and the like. Every 
 where is a mob in rags apparently intent 
 upon cutting one another s throats to 
 save half a piastre. 
 
 Farther on is the Jews quarter, the 
 street Nischkolitza, with its low houses 
 eked out by awnings under which sit 
 groups of people lounging and talking, 
 and behind these, in little square boxes 
 of rooms let into the wall, squat the 
 money-changers, their bank accounts ex 
 posed in a small box with a glass top 
 through which can be seen half the coin 
 age and printage of eastern Europe. 
 
 If the king s continued absence caused 
 any uneasiness among the people crowd 
 ing these streets and bazaars, there was 
 nothing on the surface to indicate it. 
 Many of them looked as if they had 
 very little to lose, and those who had 
 a little more either carried it on their 
 persons in long chains of coins welded 
 119 
 
together, a favorite form of safe-de- 
 P sit with the Bulgarians, or, like the 
 money-changers, hived it in a portable 
 box. 
 
 Nor could I discover that any one 
 realized that he was living over a powder- 
 magazine with a match-factory next door. 
 On the contrary, everybody was good- 
 natured and happy, chaffing one another 
 across the booths of the bazaars, and 
 bursting into roars of laughter when my 
 brush brought out the features of some 
 well-known street-vender. 
 
 The only native who really seemed to 
 possess any positive ideas on the uncer 
 tain condition of public affairs was a Po 
 lish Jew, the keeper of the bath, whom I 
 found berating two soldiers for refusing 
 to pay extra for their narghiles, and who 
 expressed to me his contempt for the 
 ruling powers by sweeping in the air a 
 circle which embraced the palace and 
 the offenders, spitting on the floor, and 
 grinding his heel in the moistened spot. 
 
 Near the bath, and in fact almost con 
 nected with it by a rambling row of 
 houses, is one of the few Oriental cafes 
 left in Sofia, a one-story building with 
 curious sloping roof, its one door open- 
 
 120 
 
ing upon the street corner. It is called A 
 the "Maritza." On both sides of this r n u 2 era 
 entrance are long, low windows shaped 
 like those of an old English inn, and be 
 neath these outside on the sidewalk 
 is a row of benches, upon which 
 lounge idlers sipping coffee and smoking 
 cigarettes. Within are a motley crew 
 of all nationalities liberally sprinkled 
 with Bulgarian soldiers out on a day s 
 leave. 
 
 Coffee is almost the only beverage 
 in these Turkish cafes. It is always 
 handed you scalding hot in little, sau- 
 cerless cups holding hardly a mouthful 
 each. A glass of cold water invariably 
 accompanies each cup. This coffee is 
 generally the finest old Mocha, with an 
 aroma and flavor unapproachable in any 
 brand that I know except perhaps the 
 Uruapam coffee of Mexico. In prepar 
 ing it the roasted bean is ground as fine 
 as flour in a hand-mill ; a teaspoonful of 
 the powder, with half the amount of fine 
 sugar, being put into a brass pot with a 
 long handle. To this is added a table- 
 spoonful of boiling water. The pot is 
 then thrust into the coals of a charcoal 
 fire until the coffee reaches boiling point, 
 when it is caught up by the waiter, who 
 runs to your table and pours the whole 
 into your cup. Although it is dark and 
 121 
 
A Buiga- thick, it is never strong, and there is 
 ra not a wakeful hour in a dozen cups. 
 
 To me there is nothing so interesting 
 as one of these Oriental cafes, and so I 
 turned in from the street, drew a square 
 straw-covered stool up to a low table, 
 and held up one ringer. A fez-covered 
 attendant shuffled over and filled my 
 cup. As I raised it to my lips, my eyes 
 caught the riveted glance of a black- 
 bearded man with a beak-like nose and 
 two ferret eyes watching me intently. 
 He was dressed in a half -cloak orna 
 mented with a dark braid in twists and 
 circles, and wore a slouch hat. 
 
 Being stared at in a cafe" for the first 
 five minutes is so usual an experience 
 for me, in my tramps abroad, that I ac 
 cept it as part of the conditions of travel. 
 But there are, of course, different kinds 
 of stares, all induced and kept up for 
 the most part by idle curiosity, which 
 generally ceases after my dress has been 
 examined, and especially my shoes, and 
 when my voice has been found to be 
 like that of other men. 
 
 This man s stare, however, was devoid 
 of curiosity. His was the face of a fer 
 ret ; a sly, creeping, half-shrinking face, 
 with an eye that pierced you one mo 
 ment and slunk away the next. The 
 thought flashed through my mind a 
 
 122 
 
Spanish Jew who hides his gold in a A 
 hole, and who is here changing money 
 while the " effervescence " lasts. When 
 I looked again a moment later he had 
 disappeared. 
 
 The face haunted me so much that I 
 traced its outlines in my sketch-book, 
 trying to remember where I had seen it. 
 I finally persuaded myself that it only 
 suggested some similar face seen long 
 ago. Finishing my coffee, I lighted a 
 cigarette, picked up a stool, and, plant 
 ing it across the street, began a sketch 
 of the exterior of the cafe. 
 
 The usual crowd gathered, many fol 
 lowing me from the room itself, and soon 
 the throng was so great that I could not 
 see the lower lines of the building. No 
 language that I speak is adapted to Bul 
 garia, and so, rising to my feet, I called 
 out in honest Anglo-Saxon : 
 
 "Get down in front!" This accom 
 panied by a gesture like a policeman s 
 " Move on." 
 
 Nobody got down in front, or behind, 
 for that matter. On the contrary, every 
 body who was down got up, and the 
 sketch was fast becoming hopeless, when 
 four gendarmes arose out of the ground 
 as noiselessly and mysteriously as if 
 they had issued from between the cracks 
 of the paving-stones, formed a hollow 
 123 
 
A Buiga- square, with the caf at one end and me 
 
 a at the other "~ the interv ening space 
 being as clear of bystanders as the back 
 of my hand, and stood like statues 
 until the sketch was finished. When 
 I closed my book half an hour later, a 
 man on the outer edge, wrapped in a 
 cloak, raised his hand. The crowd fell 
 back, a gap was made, and the four 
 gendarmes passed out and were swal 
 lowed up. 
 
 I turned and caught a glimpse of a 
 black hat half concealing a dark, bearded 
 face. It was my friend of the cafe". Not 
 a Spanish Jew at all, I said to myself, but 
 some prominent citizen respected by the 
 police and anxious to be courteous to 
 a stranger. And again I dismissed the 
 face and the incident from my mind. 
 
 Just here another face appeared and 
 another incident occurred, neither of 
 which was so easily forgotten. The 
 face enlivened the well-knit, graceful 
 figure of a young man of thirty dressed 
 in a gray traveling-suit and wearing a 
 derby hat. Every line in his good-na 
 tured countenance expressed that rarest 
 and most delightful of combinations, 
 humor and grit. From this face pro 
 ceeded a voice which sent down my 
 spine that peculiar tingle which one 
 feels when, half-way across the globe, 
 
 124 
 
surrounded by jargon and heathen, he A 
 hears suddenly his own tongue, in his 
 own accent, spoken by a fellow-towns 
 man. 
 
 " I heard your down in front and 
 knew right away where you were from ; 
 but these Bashi-bazouks blocked the 
 way. My name is Burton, correspondent 
 of the Herald/ Been here two months 
 watching this mouse-trap. Come into 
 the cafe", where we can talk. You don t 
 know what a godsend an American is in 
 a hole like this." 
 
 An interchange of cards settled all 
 formalities, and when, half an hour later, 
 numbers of mutual friends were discov 
 ered and inquired after, we grew as con 
 fiding and comfortable as if we had been 
 the best of friends through life. 
 
 Burton was one of those men of whom 
 everybody hears, whom few people see, 
 and not many people know ; one of 
 those men whose homes are fixed by 
 telegrams, whose wits like their pencils 
 are sharpened in emergencies, whose en 
 ergies are untiring and exhaustless, who 
 ransack, permeate, get at the bottom of 
 things, and endure, individual men, 
 sagacious, many-sided, and productive, 
 whose whole identity is mercilessly swal 
 lowed up and lost in that unnoticed head 
 line, " Our Correspondent." 
 125 
 
A Buiga- I had heard of Burton in Paris a few 
 ra weeks before, where his endless re 
 sources in the field and his arctic cool 
 ness in tight places were bywords 
 among his fellow-craftsmen. At the 
 time his friends supposed him to be 
 somewhere between Vienna and Con 
 stantinople, although none of them lo 
 cated him in Bulgaria ; great morning 
 journals being somewhat reticent as to 
 the identity and whereabouts of their 
 staff. 
 
 " Yes," he continued, " life here would 
 reconcile a man to the bottomless pit. 
 I was in London doing some Irish busi 
 ness, rose in your buttonhole at break 
 fast, Hyde Park in the afternoon, and 
 all that sort of thing, when a telegram 
 sent me flying to Paris. Two hours 
 after I was aboard the Orient express, 
 with my shirts half -dried in my bag, and 
 an order in my inside pocket to overhaul 
 Stamboloff and find out whether the 
 prince had left for good, or was waiting 
 until the blow was over before he came 
 back. You see, the Panitza affair came 
 near upsetting things here, and at the 
 time it looked as if the European war 
 circus was about to begin." 
 
 "Did you find Stamboloff?" I asked. 
 
 " Yes. Reached the frontier, learned 
 he had left Sofia, and, after traveling all 
 
 126 
 
night in a cart, got him at Sistova, and A 
 caught our Sunday s edition three hours 
 later. Here I have been ever since, 
 waiting for something to turn up, and 
 spending half my nights trying to get 
 what little does turn up across the fron 
 tier and so on to Paris. And the worst 
 of it is that for four weeks I have n t had 
 a line from headquarters." 
 
 " What ! Leave you here in the 
 lurch ? " 
 
 " No ; certainly not. They write regu 
 larly ; but these devils stop everything 
 at the post-office, open and re-seal all 
 my private letters, and only give me 
 what they think good for me. For two 
 weeks past I have been sending my 
 stuff across the frontier and mailing it 
 in Servia. How the devil did you get 
 permission to sketch around here ? " 
 
 I produced the talismanic scroll with 
 the water-mark and the image and the 
 superscription, and related my experi 
 ence with the prefect. 
 
 " Gave you the freedom of the city, 
 did he ? I wager you he will go through 
 your traps like a custom-house officer 
 when you leave, and seize everything 
 you have. They have been doing their 
 level best to drive me out of here ever 
 since we published that first interview 
 with Stamboloff, and they would if they 
 127 
 
A Bulga- dared. Only, being a correspondent, 
 
 * y u see and this be ; n s a liberal > free 
 
 monarchy, it would n t sound well the 
 next day. 
 
 " Come, finish your coffee, and I 11 
 show you something you can never see 
 outside of Bulgaria." 
 
 We strolled up past the bazaars along 
 the boulevard, stopping for a moment to 
 note the cathedral, with one end perched 
 up in the air, Stamboloff s commis 
 sioners of highways having lowered the 
 street grade at that point some twenty 
 feet below the level of the porch floor. 
 
 Opposite this edifice was the skylight 
 of the local photographer. The old, fa 
 miliar smell of evaporating ether greeted 
 us as we entered his one-story shop, 
 it would be a poetic license to call it a 
 gallery, and the usual wooden balcony, 
 with its painted vase and paper flowers, 
 grinned at us from its customary place 
 behind the iron head-rest. 
 
 Here were portraits of the prince 
 and his mother, Princess Clementine, 
 and of poor Panitza, whom I really 
 could not help liking, traitor as he was 
 to Stamboloff, and the rest of the 
 notables, not forgetting the dethroned 
 prince, Alexander of Battenberg, all of 
 whom had occupied the plush armchair, 
 or had stood behind the Venetian railing 
 
 128 
 
with the Lake of Como and Mont Blanc A 
 in the distance. 
 
 Burton hunted through the collection 
 of portraits scattered about the table, 
 and handed me two photographs, one 
 of a well-built, handsome man with 
 pointed mustache, dressed in the native 
 costume and shackled with heavy chains 
 fastened to his ankles. He was stand 
 ing in a prison-yard guarded by a soldier 
 holding a carbine. 
 
 " Good-looking cut-throat, is n t he ? 
 Might be a diplomat or a night editor ? 
 Too honest, you think? Well, that s 
 Taco Voyvoda, the famous bandit who 
 was caught a few years ago in the act 
 of murdering a detachment, and who 
 was filled full of lead the next day at 
 the government s expense. Now look 
 at this," and he handed me the other 
 photograph. 
 
 I held it to the light, and a shiver ran 
 through me. On a box covered with a 
 piece of canvas rested the head of a 
 man severed from the body. One eye 
 was closed. The other was lost in a 
 ghastly hole, the mark left by a rifle-ball. 
 The mustache was still stiff and pointed, 
 one end drooping a little, and the mouth 
 set firm and determined. The whole 
 face carried an expression as if the death 
 agony had been suddenly frozen into it. 
 129 
 
A Buiga- About the horror were grouped the ban- 
 di * s carbine, holsters, and cartridge-belt 
 bristling with cartridges. The belt hung 
 over the matted hair framing the face. 
 
 Burton watched me curiously. 
 
 " Lovely souvenir, is n t it ? The day 
 after the shooting they cut off poor 
 Taco s head, and our friend here " 
 pointing to the photographer "fixed 
 him up in this fashion to meet the pop 
 ular demand. The sale was enormous. 
 Bah ! let s go to dinner." 
 
 My new-found friend had a better 
 place than the one presided over by my 
 slightly bald waiter with the Tower of 
 Babel education. He would take me to 
 his home. He knew of a garden where 
 a few tables were set, girt about with 
 shrubs and sheltered by overhanging 
 trees that had escaped the drought. At 
 one end was a modest house with a few 
 rooms to let. His gripsack was in one 
 of these. That was why he loved to call 
 it his home. 
 
 Soon a white cloth covered a table for 
 two, and a very comfortable dinner was 
 served in the twilight. With the coffee 
 the talk drifted into the present politi 
 cal outlook, and I put the universal co 
 nundrum : 
 
 " Will the prince return ? " 
 
 "You can t tell," said Burton. "For 
 
 130 
 
myself, I believe he will. He must do A 
 so if he wants to see his money again, 
 and he can do so in safety if Stamboloff 
 succeeds in carrying the elections next 
 month, which I believe he will. If he 
 fails, the nearer they all hug the frontier 
 the better ; for there are hundreds of 
 men right here around us who would 
 serve every one of them as the soldiers 
 did Taco Voyvoda. They know it, too, 
 for they are all off electioneering except 
 the prince, who, I understand, has left 
 Ryllo to-day for Varna. He is hanging 
 on the telegraph now. Not the poles, 
 but the dispatches. 
 
 " The worst feature of the situation 
 is that most of the factions are backed 
 up by Russian and other agents, each in 
 their several interests, ready to lend a 
 hand. To-day it is a game of chess be 
 tween Russia and Turkey ; to-morrow it 
 may involve all Europe. Through it all 
 my sympathies are with the prince. He 
 has been here now nearly three years 
 trying to make something of these bar 
 barians, and so far not a single Euro 
 pean power has recognized him. He 
 will get nothing for his pains, poor fel 
 low. When his money is all gone they 
 will bounce him as they did Battenberg. 
 
 " Certain members of the cabinet are 
 not safe even now," continued Burton. 
 
A Buiga- While I was at Sistova, the other day, 
 ra I had an opportunity of seeing some of 
 the risks that Stamboloff himself runs, 
 and also how carefully he is guarded. 
 He was in a cafe" taking his breakfast. 
 As soon as he entered, a tall sergeant 
 of gendarmes with his sabre half-drawn 
 and his red sash stuck full of pistols 
 and yataghans moved to his right side, 
 while another equally ferocious and as 
 heavily armed guarded his left. Then 
 the doors were blocked by half a dozen 
 other gendarmes, who watched every 
 body s movements. There is really not 
 so much solid fun being prime minister 
 in Bulgaria as one would think." 
 
 While Burton was speaking three offi 
 cers entered the garden where we were 
 dining and took possession of an adjoin 
 ing table. My friend nodded to one of 
 them and kept on talking, lowering his 
 voice a trifle and moving his chair so 
 that his face could not be seen. 
 
 The Bulgarians were in white uni 
 forms and carried their side-arms. 
 
 The next instant a young man entered 
 hurriedly, looked about anxiously, and 
 came straight towards our table. When 
 he caught sight of me he drew back. 
 Burton motioned him to advance, and 
 turned his right ear for a long whispered 
 communication, interrupting him occa- 
 
 132 
 
sionally by such telephone exclamations A 
 as, " Who told you so ? When ? How 
 did he find out ? To-morrow ? What 
 infernal nonsense ! I don t believe a 
 word of it," etc. 
 
 The young man bent still lower, 
 looked furtively at the officers, and in 
 an inaudible whisper poured another 
 message into Burton s ear. 
 
 My host gave a little start and turned 
 a trifle pale. 
 
 " The devil, you say ! Better come to 
 my room, then, to-night at twelve." 
 
 " Anything up?" I asked after the 
 man had gone, noticing the change in 
 Burton s manner. 
 
 "Well, yes. My assistant tells me 
 that my last letter has been overhauled 
 this side of the frontier, and that orders 
 for my arrest will be signed to-morrow. 
 I don t believe it. But you can t tell, 
 these people are fools enough to do any 
 thing. If I knew which of my letters 
 had reached our office I would n t care ; 
 but I have n t seen our paper since my 
 first dispatches appeared, more than a 
 month ago." 
 
 "That needn t worry you. I have 
 every one of them in my bag at the ho 
 tel, and every issue of your paper since 
 you arrived here. I knew I was coming, 
 and I wanted to be posted." 
 133 
 
A Buiga- Burton looked at me in open astonish- 
 
 rian Opera 
 
 " Certainly. Come to my room ; get 
 them in five minutes." 
 
 "Well, that paralyzes me! Here I 
 have been stranded for news and blocked 
 for weeks by these brigands who rob my 
 mail, and here you pick me up in the 
 streets and haul everything I want out 
 of your carpet-bag ! Don t ever put that 
 in a story, for nobody would ever be 
 lieve it. Give me a cigarette. * 
 
 I opened my case, and as I handed 
 him its contents my eyes rested on a 
 man watching us intently. He was sit 
 ting at the officers table. With the flar 
 ing of Burton s match his face came into 
 full relief. 
 
 It was my friend of the morning. 
 
 " There he is again," I blurted out. 
 
 "Who?" said Burton without mov 
 ing. 
 
 "The man in the Turkish cafe, the 
 one who ordered the soldiers around. 
 Who is he ? " 
 
 Burton never moved a muscle of his 
 face except to blow rings over his coffee- 
 cup. 
 
 "A mean-looking hound in a slouch 
 hat, with rat-terrier eyes, bushy beard, 
 and a bad-fitting cloak ? " 
 
 134 
 
" Yes," said I, comparing the descrip- A 
 tion over his shoulder. 
 
 " Why ! that s my shadow, a delicate 
 attention bestowed on me by the prefect. 
 He thinks I don t know him, but I fool 
 him every day. I got two columns out 
 last night from under his very nose, 
 right at this table. The waiter carried 
 them off in a napkin, and my man 
 nabbed them outside." 
 
 " A spy ? " 
 
 " No ; a shadow, a night-hawk. For 
 nearly two months this fellow has never 
 taken his eyes off me, and yet he has 
 never seen me look him in the face. 
 Come, these people are getting too so 
 ciable." 
 
 In an instant we were in the street, 
 and in three minutes had entered my 
 hotel. Leaving Burton in the hall, I 
 mounted the broad staircase, went 
 straight to my room, picked up my 
 pocket sketch-book, and thrust the 
 " clippings " into my inside pocket. 
 
 When I regained the corridor outside 
 my door the man in the slouch hat pre 
 ceded me downstairs ! 
 
 Smothering my astonishment, I had 
 left him sitting in the garden five min 
 utes before, I followed slowly, match 
 ing my steps to his, and turning over in 
 my mind whether it would be best to 
 135 
 
A Bulga- swallow the clippings or drop them over 
 the balusters. 
 
 I could see Burton below, standing 
 near the door absorbed in an Orient ex 
 press time-table tacked to the wall. (I 
 was to leave for Constantinople the next 
 day.) He must have heard our footsteps, 
 but he never turned his head. 
 
 The man reached the hall floor, I 
 was five steps behind, stood within 
 ten feet of Burton, and began striking 
 matches for a cigar which was still burn 
 ing. 
 
 I decided instantly. 
 
 "Oh ! Burton," I called out, " I found 
 the sketch-book. See what I did here 
 yesterday ; " and I ran rapidly over the 
 leaves, noting as I turned, " The Jews 
 Quarter" " Minaret of Bania-bashie " 
 "Ox-Team down by the Bazaar," etc. 
 
 The man lingered, and I could feel 
 him looking over my shoulder. Then 
 the glass door clicked, and he disap 
 peared. 
 
 Burton raised his hand warningly. 
 
 "Where did you pick him up ? " 
 
 " Outside my door." 
 
 " Keyhole business, eh ? Did you get 
 them?" 
 
 I touched my inside pocket. 
 
 "Good." And he slipped the pack 
 age of clippings under his waistcoat. 
 
 136 
 
The next morning I found this note A 
 tucked under my door : - 
 
 " The game is up. Meet me at station 
 at twelve. BURTON." 
 
 Five minutes before the appointed 
 hour my traps were heaped up in one 
 corner of the waiting-room. 
 
 I confess to a certain degree of anxiety 
 as I waited in the station, both on my 
 own account and on his. I was unable 
 to understand how the night-hawk could 
 have reached my chamber door ahead of 
 me unless he had sailed over the roof and 
 dropped down the chimney, and I was 
 equally willing to admit that something 
 besides a desire to see me safely in bed 
 had induced him to keyhole my move 
 ments. Perhaps his sudden disappear 
 ance through the glass door was, after 
 all, only preparatory to including me in 
 the attentions he was reserving for 
 Burton. 
 
 When the exact hour arrived, and the 
 Orient express direct for Philippopolis 
 and Constantinople rolled into the de 
 pot, and still Burton did not appear, I 
 began to realize the absurdity of waiting 
 for a convict at the main entrance. Bur- 
 137 
 
A Buiga- ton of course would be chained to two 
 ra s ldi ers an d placed in a baggage-van, or 
 perhaps be shackled around the ankles 
 like Voyvoda and lifted out of a cart by 
 his waistband. The yard was the place 
 to find him. 
 
 I made my way between the two 
 door-guards, who eyed me in a manner 
 that convinced me that I was under sur 
 veillance and would most likely catch 
 both balls in the vicinity of my collar- 
 button if I attempted to move out of 
 range. 
 
 But there was nothing in the yard ex 
 cept empty cars and a squad of raw re 
 cruits sitting on their bundles awaiting 
 transportation, and so I tried the boule 
 vard side again. 
 
 No Burton. 
 
 Just as I was about to give him up for 
 lost and had begun turning over in my 
 mind what my duty might be as a man 
 and an American, a fresh cloud of dust 
 blew in the open door, and a cab pulled 
 up. From this emerged a pair of leather 
 gaiters followed by two legs in check 
 trousers, a hand with white wristbands 
 and English gloves, and last the cool, 
 unruffled face of Burton himself. 
 
 " Yes, I am late, but I have been up 
 all night dictating. You got my note, I 
 see. I go as far with you as Philippopo- 
 
 138 
 
lis, where I get out to reach the Pomuk A 
 Highlands. You remember I told you 
 about that old brigand chief, Achmet 
 Aga, who rules a province of forty 
 square miles and pays tribute to no one, 
 not even the Sultan. You know he 
 murders everybody who crosses his line 
 without his permission. Well, I am 
 going to interview him." 
 
 This was said in one breath and with 
 as much ease of manner and indifference 
 to surroundings as if the man with a 
 slouch hat had been an idle dream in 
 stead of an active reality. 
 
 " But what about your arrest, Burton ? 
 I expected " 
 
 " Expected what dungeons ? Non 
 sense. I simply went out on my balcony 
 last night before I crawled into bed, 
 sneezed, and called out in French to my 
 man inside to pack my bag for this 
 train. That satisfied my shadow, for all 
 he wants is to get me out of the way. 
 Don t worry ; the dog will be here to 
 see us off." 
 
 Burton was right. That ugly face was 
 the last that peered at us as we rolled 
 out of the station. 
 
 Six hours later I left my new friend 
 at Philippopolis with a regret I cannot 
 explain, but with an exacted promise to 
 meet me in Constantinople a week 
 139 
 
A Buiga- later, where we would enjoy the Turks 
 together. 
 
 The week passed, and another, and 
 then a third, and still no sign of Burton. 
 I had begun to wonder whether, after all, 
 the brigand chief had not served him as 
 he had done his predecessors, when this 
 letter, dated Sofia, reached me : 
 
 "Just returned from the mountains. 
 Spent a most delightful week with Ach- 
 met Aga, who kissed me on both cheeks 
 when I left, and gave me a charm 
 against fire and sword blessed by all the 
 wise women of the clan. Would have 
 joined you before, but had to hurry back 
 here for the opening of the Sobranje. 
 
 " Stamboloffs party carried the day 
 by a small majority, and the town is full 
 of his men, including the prince, who 
 opened parliament here yesterday." 
 
VII. CAPTAIN JOE 
 
 ANTED A submarine 
 engineer, experienced in 
 handling heavy stone un 
 der water. Apply, etc. 
 
 In answer to this adver 
 tisement, a man wearing 
 a rough jacket and looking like a sailor 
 opened my office door. 
 
 " I m Captain Joe Bell, out of a job. 
 Seein your advertisement, I called up. 
 Where is the work, and what is it ? " 
 
 I explained briefly. A lighthouse 
 was to be built in the " Race," off Fish 
 er s Island, the foundation of rough 
 stone protected by granite blocks weigh 
 ing ten tons each. These blocks were 
 to be laid by a diver, as an enrockment, 
 their edges touching. The current in 
 the Race ran six miles an hour. This 
 increased the difficulties of the work. 
 
 While my visitor bent over the plans, 
 tracing each detail with a blunted finger 
 that looked like a worn-out thole-pin, I 
 had time to look him over. He was 
 about fifty years of age, powerfully built, 
 short, and as broad as he was long. 
 The very fit of his clothes indicated his 
 141 
 
Captain enormous strength. His pea-jacket had 
 long since been pulled out of shape in 
 the effort to accommodate itself to the 
 spread of his shoulders. His trousers 
 were corrugated, and half-way up his 
 ankles, in the perpetual struggle to pro 
 tect equally seat and knee, each wrin 
 kle outlining a knotted muscle, twisted 
 up and down a pair of legs short and 
 sturdy as rudder-posts. His brown hair 
 protruded from under a close-fitting cloth 
 cap, and curled over a neck seamed and 
 bronzed, showing bumps where almost 
 every other man had hollows : these 
 short curls were streaked with gray. 
 His face was round, ruddy, and wind- 
 tanned, the chin hidden in a stubby 
 beard, which clung to his lower lip ; the 
 mouth was firm, the teeth a row of corn, 
 the jaws strong and determined. Every 
 thing about him indicated reserve force, 
 endurance, capacity, and push. 
 
 Two things struck me instantly : a 
 voice which was rich and musical, and 
 an eye which looked through me, a 
 clear, laughing, kindling, tender eye, 
 that changed every instant, boring like 
 a gimlet as he pored over the plans, or 
 lighting up with a flash in the sugges 
 tion of ways and means to carry them 
 out. 
 
 As he leaned over the table, I noticed 
 
 142 
 
that his wrist was bandaged, the cotton Captain 
 wrappings showing beneath his coat- ** 
 sleeve, discovering a partly healed scar. 
 
 " Burnt ? " I asked. 
 
 "No, scraped. It don t bother now, 
 but it was pretty bad a month back." 
 
 " How ? " 
 
 " Oh, a-wreckin . I Ve been four 
 years with the Off-Shore Wreckin Com 
 pany. Left yesterday." 
 
 "What for?" 
 
 He looked straight at me, and said, 
 slowly emphasizing each word : 
 
 " Me and the president did n t gee. 
 He had n t no fault to find with me ; 
 but I did n t like his ways, and I quit." 
 
 So transparent was his honesty, self- 
 reliance, and grit that such precaution 
 ary measures as references or inquiries 
 never once entered my mind. Before 
 he left my room the terms were agreed 
 upon. The following week he took 
 charge of the force, and the work be 
 gan. 
 
 As the summer passed away the 
 masses of granite were lowered into po 
 sition, Captain Joe placing each block 
 himself, the steam-lighter holding to her 
 anchors in the rip of the Race. 
 
 When the autumn came a cottage was 
 rented on the shore of the nearest har 
 bor, and the captain s family of six 
 J43 
 
Captain moved in. Later I noticed two new 
 faces in the home circle : a pale, sad 
 woman and a delicate-looking child, both 
 dressed in black. They would some 
 times remain a week, and then disappear 
 only to return again. The mother was 
 introduced by the captain as "Jennie, 
 widow of my old mate Jim." 
 
 "What happened to him, Captain 
 Joe ? " I asked one evening, when she 
 left the room to take the child to bed. 
 He was sitting near the window, from 
 which could be caught a glimpse in 
 the twilight of the tall masts of the 
 schooners, coal-laden, and the jibs of 
 the smacks at anchor near the village 
 wharves. 
 
 " Drownded, sir ; two year ago." And 
 he looked the other way. 
 
 "Washed overboard?" I asked, no 
 ticing his husky voice. 
 
 " No. Smothered in his divin -dress, 
 with a dumb fool at the other end of his 
 life-line. We wuz to work on the Scot 
 land, sunk in six fathoms of water off 
 Sandy Hook. The president sent for 
 me to come to the city, and I left Jim 
 alone. That week we wuz workin in 
 her lower hold, Jim and me, I tendin 
 and Jim divin , and then I goin below 
 and he lookin out after my air hose 
 and line. Me bein away that day, they 
 
 144 
 
put a duffer at the pump. Jim got his Captain 
 hose tangled up in a fluke of the anchor ; J e 
 they misunderstood his signals, and 
 hauled taut when they should have 
 eased away. He made a dash at the 
 hose with his knife, but whether it wuz 
 the brass wire wove in it, or because he 
 wuz beat for breath, we don t know. 
 Anyways he warn t strong enough to 
 cut her through, and when they got him 
 up he wuz done for. That wuz mighty 
 rough on me, bein with Jim mor n ten 
 years, in and out o water. So I look 
 out for Jennie and the young one. No, 
 it ain t nothin strange nor new. While 
 I ve got a roof over me she s welcome. 
 He d done the same for me, and I ve 
 got the best of it, for there s only two of 
 his n, and there s six o mine." 
 
 As the work on the lighthouse pro 
 gressed the force and plant increased. 
 A steam-tug was added, stone-sloops 
 were chartered, and the gradual filling 
 up of the interior of the foundation be 
 gan. 
 
 The owner of one of these sloops was 
 a tall, sunken-cheeked old man named 
 Marrows, who lived near the village on 
 a small stone-incrusted farm. Outside 
 of its scanty crop this vessel and her 
 earnings were his sole resource. 
 
 Late one afternoon his sloop returned 
 
Captain to the harbor with her shrouds loose, 
 her mast started, and her forefoot 
 chewed into splinters. It seemed that 
 her captain, a retired, bony fisherman, 
 named Barrett, had miscalculated the 
 tide, which cut like a mill-tail in the 
 Race. She had misstayed and swirled, 
 bow on, atop of the enrockment of the 
 lighthouse. When she struck, Captain 
 Joe was in his diving dress, his helmet 
 off. In a moment he had loosed his 
 heavy iron shoes, caught up a crowbar, 
 and was bounding over the rugged rocks 
 surrounding the foundation, giving quick, 
 sharp orders to his men, who sprang into 
 a yawl and began paying out a heavy 
 line. 
 
 The next instant he was under the 
 sloop s bowsprit, his broad back braced 
 against her chains, his legs rigid as hy 
 draulic jacks. Every time the vessel 
 surged he straightened out, concentrat 
 ing his enormous strength and assisting 
 the backward movement, so that when 
 she lunged again she came a few inches 
 short of the jagged rocks, the wave hav 
 ing spent its force. There he stood for 
 half an hour, shaking his head free from 
 the great sheets of white foam breaking 
 clear over him, shouting his orders be 
 tween the sousings of the waves, until 
 the men in the yawl had slung a kedge 
 
 146 
 
anchor away out astern of the endan- Captain 
 gered sloop, and she was windlassed 3 e 
 clear of the stone pile and saved. 
 
 Marrows was on the little dock, peer 
 ing through the twilight, when his res 
 cued sloop returned to the village har 
 bor. Captain Joe held the tiller. He 
 began as soon as Marrows s gaunt figure, 
 outlined against the evening sky, caught 
 his eye : 
 
 " I tell you, old man, Captain Barrett 
 ain t fittin to fool round that rock. 
 He ll get hurt. I tell you he ain t 
 fittin ." 
 
 " I believe you, and I ve told him so. 
 Is she sprung, Captain Joe ? " 
 
 " A leetle mite forrard, and her mast 
 a touch to starboard, but nothin to 
 hurt." 
 
 " Will she be any good any more ? " 
 Then, as he came nearer, "Why, you re 
 soaking wet : the boys say you was clear 
 under her." Then, lowering his voice, 
 " You know, Captain Joe, she is a good 
 deal to me." 
 
 The captain laid his great rough hand 
 tenderly on the old man s shoulder. 
 
 " I know it, I know it ; that s why I 
 wuz under her chains." Then, raising 
 his voice, " But Barrett ain t fittin ; 
 mind I tell you he ain t fittin ." 
 
 The next day being stormy, with a 
 147 
 
Captain gale outside and no work possible, Cap 
 tain Joe tightened up the shrouds of 
 the disabled sloop himself, reset the 
 mast, lecturing Barrett all the while, 
 and then sent word to Marrows that she 
 was " tight as a keg, better n ever, and 
 everythin aboard, ceptin the bony fish 
 erman, who was out of a job." 
 
 The winter closed in with the founda 
 tion but partly completed. Before the 
 first December gale broke on the rock 
 the derricks were stripped of their rig 
 ging and left to battle with the winter s 
 storms, the tools were stowed in the 
 shanty, and all work suspended until 
 the spring. During the long winter 
 that followed Captain Joe took to the 
 sea, having transferred his diving-gear 
 to the sloop ; and before April three 
 coal-laden schooners were anchored, or 
 stranded, as befitted their condition, on 
 the shoals in front of his dock in the 
 village harbor. It made no difference 
 to him how severe was the gale, or how 
 badly strained the helpless vessel, he 
 was under her bottom almost as soon as 
 a line could reach her. Then a patch 
 of canvas, or half a cargo of empty oil- 
 barrels, buoyed her up until the tug could 
 tighten a line over her bow, and tow her 
 to an anchorage inside the lighthouse. 
 
 148 
 
It seemed in truth that winter as if each Captain 
 luckless craft, in its journey up the * oe 
 Sound, did its level best to keep its 
 rail above water long enough to sink 
 peacefully and restfully upon some bar 
 or shoal within reach of Captain Joe s 
 diving-tackle. There it died contented, 
 feeling sure of a speedy resurrection. 
 
 If a wrecked schooner, coal-laden, was 
 an unusual sight along the harbor shore, 
 a wrecker distributing her cargo free 
 to his neighbors was a proceeding un 
 known to the oldest inhabitant. And 
 yet this always occurred when a fresh 
 wreck grounded on the flats. 
 
 " That s all right," he would say ; 
 " better take a couple of boat -loads more. 
 Seems to me as if we wuz goin to have 
 a late spring. No, I don t know the 
 price, cause I ain t settled with the un 
 derwriters ; but then she came up mighty 
 easy for me, and a few tons don t make 
 no difference, nohow." 
 
 When the settling day came, and his 
 share as salvage was determined upon, 
 there was of course a heavy shortage. 
 He always laughed heartily. 
 
 " Better put that down to me," he 
 would say to the agent. " Some of the 
 folks along here boated off a little. Guess 
 they wuz careless, and did n t know how 
 much they took." 
 149 
 
Captain Little indiscretions like this soon en 
 deared him to his neighbors. Before 
 long every one up and down the shore 
 knew him, and everybody sent a cheery 
 word flying after him whenever they 
 caught sight of his active, restless figure 
 moving along the vessel s deck, or busy 
 about his dock and wrecking-gear. Even 
 the gruff doctor would crane his head 
 around the edge of his curtained wagon 
 to call out " Good-morning," although 
 he might be clear out of hailing distance. 
 
 So passed the winter. 
 
 When the first breath of spring blew 
 over the marsh the shanty for the men 
 on the rock was rebuilt and the work 
 resumed. 
 
 During all these months the captain 
 never once referred to his early life or 
 associations, or gave me the slightest 
 clue to his antecedents. Now and then 
 he would speak of Jim, his dead mate, 
 as being a "cur us square man," and oc 
 casionally he would refer to the presi 
 dent of the Off-shore Wrecking Com 
 pany, his former employer, as "that 
 skin." Such information as I did gather 
 about his earlier days was fragmentary 
 and disconnected, and generally came 
 from his men, who idolized him, and 
 who had absolute belief in his judgment 
 and the blindest confidence in his cease- 
 
 150 
 
less care for their personal safety. This Captain 
 care was necessary : the swiftness of the -? oe 
 current and sudden changes of wind, 
 bringing in a heavy southeast roll, sub 
 merging the rock at wave intervals, 
 while the slippery, slimy surface and the 
 frequent falling of the heavy derricks 
 made the work extremely dangerous. 
 He deserved their confidence, for 
 through his constant watchfulness but 
 one man was hurt on the work during 
 the six years of its construction, and this 
 occurred during the captain s absence. 
 
 One morning when tacking across the 
 Race in a small boat in a stiff breeze, 
 with only the captain and myself for 
 crew, I tried to make him talk of himself 
 and his earlier life, and so said, suddenly : 
 
 " Oh, Captain Joe ! I met a friend of 
 yours yesterday who wished me to ask 
 you how you stopped the leak in the 
 Hoboken ferry-boat, and why you left 
 the employ of the Off-shore Wrecking- 
 Company." 
 
 He raised his eyes quickly, a smile 
 lighting his weather-beaten face. 
 
 "Who was it the president?" He 
 always spoke of his former employer in 
 that way. 
 
 "Yes, but of one of the big insur 
 ance companies ; not your Wrecking 
 Company." 
 
Captain " No, reck n not. He ought to keep 
 pretty still about it." 
 
 "Tell me about it." 
 
 " Oh, there ain t nothin to tell. She 
 got foul of a tug, and listed some, and 
 I sorter plugged her up till they hauled 
 her into the slip. Been so long ago I 
 most forgot about it." 
 
 But not another word could be coaxed 
 out of him, except that he remembered 
 that the water was "blamed cold," and 
 his arm was " pretty well tore up for a 
 month." 
 
 That night, in the shanty which was 
 built on the completed part of the work, 
 and which sheltered the working force 
 for the three years of this section of the 
 construction, were gathered a crew of a 
 dozen men, many of whom had served 
 with Captain Joe when Jim was alive. 
 While the captain was asleep in the 
 little wooden bunk, boarded off for his 
 especial use, the ceaseless thrash of the 
 sea sounding in our ears, I managed, 
 after much questioning and piecing out 
 of personal reminiscences, to gather 
 these details. 
 
 One morning in January, two years 
 before, when the ice in the Hudson 
 River ran unusually heavy, a Hoboken 
 ferry-boat slowly crunched her way 
 through the floating floes, until the 
 
 152 
 
thickness of the pack choked her pad- Captain 
 dies in mid-river. The weather had ** 
 been bitterly cold for weeks, and the 
 keen northwest wind had blown the 
 great fields of floating ice into a hard 
 pack along the New York shore. It 
 was the early morning trip, and the 
 decks were crowded with laboring men, 
 and the driveways choked with teams ; 
 the women and children standing inside 
 the cabins, a solid mass up to the swing 
 ing doors. While she was gathering 
 strength for a further effort, an ocean 
 tug sheered to avoid her, veered a point, 
 and crashed into her side, cutting her 
 below the water-line in a great V-shaped 
 gash. The next instant a shriek went 
 up from a hundred throats. Women, 
 with blanched faces, caught terror- 
 stricken children in their arms, while 
 men, crazed with fear, scaled the rails 
 and upper decks to escape the plunging 
 of the overthrown horses. The dis 
 abled boat careened from the shock 
 and fell over on her beam helpless. 
 Into the V-shaped gash the water poured 
 a torrent. It seemed but a question of 
 minutes before she would lunge head 
 long below the ice. 
 
 Within two hundred yards of both 
 boats, and free of the heaviest ice, 
 steamed the wrecking tug Reliance of 
 153 
 
Captain the Off-shore Wrecking Company, mak- 
 J 0f ing her way cautiously up the New Jersey 
 
 shore to coal at Weehawken. On her 
 deck forward, sighting the heavy cakes, 
 and calling out cautionary orders to the 
 mate in the pilot-house, stood Captain 
 Joe. When the ocean tug reversed her 
 engines after the collision and backed 
 clear of the shattered wheel-house of the 
 ferry-boat, he sprang forward, stooped 
 down, ran his eye along the water-line, 
 noted in a flash every shattered plank, 
 climbed into the pilot-house of his own 
 boat, spun her wheel hard down, and 
 before the astonished pilot could catch 
 his breath ran the nose of the Reliance 
 along the rail of the ferry-boat and 
 dropped upon the latter s deck like a 
 cat. 
 
 If he had fallen from a passing cloud 
 the effect could not have been more 
 startling. Men crowded about him and 
 caught at his hands. Women sank on 
 their knees, and hugged their children, 
 and a sudden peace and stillness pos 
 sessed every soul on board. Tearing a 
 life-preserver from the man nearest him 
 and throwing it overboard, he backed 
 the coward ahead of him through the 
 swaying mob, ordering the people to 
 stand clear, and forcing the whole mass 
 to the starboard side. The increased 
 
 154 
 
weight gradually righted the stricken Captain 
 boat until she regained a nearly even 3 e 
 keel. 
 
 With a threat to throw overboard any 
 man who stirred, he dropped into the 
 engine-room, met the engineer half-way 
 up the ladder, compelled him to return, 
 dragged the mattresses from the crew s 
 bunks, stripped off blankets, racks of 
 clothes, overalls, cotton waste, and rags 
 of carpet, cramming them into the great 
 rent left by the tug s cutwater, until the 
 space of each broken plank was replaced, 
 except one. Through and over this 
 space the water still combed, deluging 
 the floors and swashing down between 
 the gratings into the hold below. 
 
 " Another mattress, quick ! All gone ? 
 A blanket, then carpet anything 
 five minutes more and she 11 right 
 herself. Quick, for God s sake ! " 
 
 It was useless. Everything, even to 
 the oil-rags, had been used. 
 
 "Your coat, then. Think of the 
 babies, man ; do you hear them ? " 
 
 Coats and vests were off in an instant ; 
 the engineer on his knees bracing the 
 shattered planking, Captain Joe forcing 
 the garments into the splintered open- 
 ings. 
 
 It was useless. Little by little the 
 water gained, bursting out first below, 
 155 
 
Captain then on one side, only to be recaulked, 
 and only to rush in again. 
 
 Captain Joe stood a moment as if un 
 decided, ran his eye search ingly over 
 the engine-room, saw that for his needs 
 it was empty, then deliberately tore 
 down the top wall of caulking he had so 
 carefully built up, and, before the engi 
 neer could protest, had forced his own 
 body into the gap with his arm outside 
 level with the drifting ice. 
 
 An hour later the disabled ferry-boat, 
 with every soul on board, was towed into 
 the Hoboken slip. 
 
 When they lifted him from the wreck 
 he was unconscious and barely alive. 
 The water had frozen his blood, and the 
 floating ice had torn the flesh from his 
 protruding arm, from shoulder to wrist. 
 When the color began to creep back to 
 his cheeks, he opened his eyes, and said 
 to the doctor who was winding the ban 
 dages : 
 
 " Wuz any of them babies hurt ? " 
 
 A month passed before he regained 
 his strength, and another week before 
 the arm had healed so that he could get 
 his coat on. Then he went back to his 
 work on board the Reliance. 
 
 In the mean time the Off-shore Wreck- 
 
ing Company had presented a bill to the Captain 
 ferry company for salvage, claiming that ** 
 the safety of the ferry-boat was due to 
 one of the employees of the Wrecking 
 Company. Payment had been refused, 
 resulting in legal proceedings, which 
 had already begun. The morning fol 
 lowing this action Captain Joe was called 
 into the president s office. 
 
 "Captain," said that official, "we re 
 going to have some trouble getting our 
 pay for that ferry job. Here s an affi 
 davit for you to swear to." 
 
 The captain took the paper to the 
 window and read it through without a 
 comment, then laid it back on the presi 
 dent s desk, picked up his hat, and 
 moved to the door. 
 
 " Did you sign it ? " 
 
 " No ; and I ain t a-goin to." 
 
 "Why?" 
 
 " Cause I ain t so durned mean as 
 you be. Look at this arm. Do you 
 think I d got into that hell-hole if it 
 had n t a been for them women cryin 
 and the babies a-hollerin ? And you 
 want em to pay for it. If your head 
 wuzn t white, I d mash it." 
 
 Then he walked straight to the cash 
 ier, demanded his week s pay, waited un 
 til the money was counted out, slammed 
 the office door behind him, and walked 
 157 
 
Captain out, cursing like a pirate. The next day 
 he answered my advertisement. 
 
 The following year, when the masonry 
 was rapidly nearing the top or coping 
 course, and the five years of labor were 
 bringing forth their fruit, the foundation 
 and the pier being then almost ready for 
 the keeper s house and lantern, its 
 light has flashed a welcome to many a 
 storm-driven coaster ever since, I was 
 sitting one lovely spring morning over 
 looking the sea, the rock with its clus 
 ter of derricks being just visible far out 
 on the water-line. 
 
 Beside me sat a man famous in the 
 literature of our country, one who had 
 embalmed in song and story the heroic 
 deeds of common men, which are now, 
 and will be, household words as long as 
 the language is read. To him I out 
 lined the story, adding: 
 
 " It is but half a mile to the captain s 
 cottage, and, being Sunday morning, 
 we shall find him at home ; let him tell 
 it in his own way." 
 
 We took the broad road skirting the 
 shore, overlooking the harbor with its 
 white yachts glinting against the blue. 
 High up, reveling in the warm sunlight, 
 
the gray gulls poised and curved, while Captain 
 across the yellow marshes the tall tower 3 e 
 of the harbor light was penciled against 
 the morning sky. Over old fences, 
 patched with driftwood and broken oars 
 and festooned with fishermen s nets, 
 stretched the boughs of apple-trees 
 loaded with blossoms, and in scattered 
 sheltered spots the buttercups and dan 
 delions brightened the green grass. A 
 turn in the road, a swinging gate, a 
 flagged path leading to the porch of a 
 low cottage, and a big burly fellow held 
 out both hands. It was Captain Joe. 
 He was in his Sunday best, with white 
 shirt-sleeves, his face clean-shaven to 
 the very edge of the tuft on his chin. 
 
 With a child on each knee, the 
 younger a new-comer since the build 
 ing of the lighthouse, he talked of the 
 "work," his neighbors, the "wrack" 
 the winter before, the one on Fisher s 
 Island, when the captain was drowned, 
 the late spring, the cussed sou east 
 wind that kep a-blowin till you thought 
 it were n t never goin to wollup round 
 to the west ard again ; in short, of every 
 thing but himself. 
 
 My beating the bush with allusions to 
 sinking vessels, collisions at sea, suits 
 for salvage, and the like only flushed up 
 such reminiscences as fall to the lot of 
 159 
 
Captain seafaring men the world over but no 
 thing more. In despair I put the ques 
 tion straight at him. 
 
 " Tell him, Captain Joe, of that morn 
 ing in the ice off Hoboken, when you 
 boarded the ferry-boat." 
 
 He would, but he had most forgot, 
 been so long ago. So many of these 
 things a-comin up when a man s bangin 
 round, it s hard to keep track on em. 
 Remembered there wuz a mess of peo 
 ple aboard, mostly women and babies, 
 and they wuz all a-hollerin to wunst. 
 He wuz workin on the Reliance at the 
 time, captain of her. Come to think 
 of it, he found her log last week in his 
 old sea-chest, when he wuz lookin for 
 some rubber cloth to patch his divin - 
 suit. If his wife would get the book 
 out, he guessed it wuz all there. He 
 wuz always partic ler about keepin log 
 aboard ship. 
 
 When the old well-thumbed book was 
 found, he perched his glasses on his 
 nose, and began turning the leaves with 
 that same old thole-pin of a finger, stop 
 ping at every page to remoisten it, and 
 adding a running commentary of his 
 own over the long-forgotten records. 
 
 " January 23. Yes ! that s when 
 we worked on the Hurricane. She was 
 sunk off Sandy Hook, loaded with su- 
 
 160 
 
gar ; nasty mess that. It was some- Captain 
 where about that time, for I remember Joe 
 the water wuz pretty cold, and the ice 
 a-runnin . Ah ! here it is. Knowed I 
 had n t forgot it. You can read it 
 yourself ; my eyes ain t so good as they 
 wuz" pointing to the entry on the 
 ink-stained page. 
 
 It read as follows : 
 
 " January JO. Left Jersey City 7 
 A. M. Ice running heavy. Captain 
 Joe stopped leak in ferry-boat." 
 
VIII. HUTCHINS 
 
 IUTCHINS lived at the 
 foot of the hill, in a bat 
 tered, patched -up shanty 
 of broken windows and 
 half -hinged doors. The 
 neighbors told queer sto 
 ries about this rookery, and when they 
 could passed by on the other side. 
 Time had stained its unpainted boards 
 a dull gray. Untidy women hung about 
 the porch crowded with wash-tubs, 
 while cooking utensils, broken pots, and 
 fragments of a rusty summer stove lit 
 tered the steps and out-house roof. 
 
 The only spot that defied the filth 
 and squalor was a little patch of a gar 
 den shut in by a broken fence. This 
 held a dozen rows of corn, a stray stalk 
 of morning-glory clinging to a bent 
 and tottering pole, a flaming stand of 
 hollyhock, and a few overgrown sprouts 
 of turnip rioting in the freedom of 
 their neglect. 
 
 Hutchins himself, except at rare in 
 tervals, always leaned lazily in the 
 propped-up doorway, a ragged, dirt-be 
 grimed tramp, biting savagely at the 
 
 162 
 
end of a clay pipe. Besotted, blear- Hutchins 
 eyed and vulgar, with thin, loosely jointed 
 legs and bent shoulders, he looked his 
 reputation, the terror of the neighbor 
 hood. 
 
 Nobody tried to understand the fam 
 ily. The nearest neighbors, generally 
 reliable in such cases, could give no 
 clear description of its members, for 
 they never entered his door. They all 
 agreed, however, upon one fact, that 
 the tall girl who worked in the factory, 
 and who had come home three years be 
 fore to nurse another baby, this time 
 her own, was Hutchins only daugh 
 ter. 
 
 Outside this battered wreck of a home, 
 with its frowzy inmates, Hutchins only 
 possessions were a pair of lean, half-fed 
 oxen who gained a scanty living by nib 
 bling at the patches of grass which grew 
 along the county road. Now and then 
 in the haying season, or when the heavy 
 timber was hauled to the mill, or the 
 road commissioners repaired the high 
 way, their owner would yoke them to a 
 sun-bleached, unpainted cart as shaky 
 as himself. This combination in the 
 twilight, when his day s work was done, 
 made a gruesome picture, as it stum 
 bled down the steep wood road that led 
 by one side of my house, on the way 
 163 
 
Hutchins to his own. He never walked by the 
 head of his oxen, as did most country 
 men, but always propped himself up in 
 his cart, his slouching, swaying figure 
 outlined against the sky, his thin legs 
 hanging below the tailboard. When 
 the children, guessing his condition, - 
 the hire of the cart was always left in 
 the tavern at the fork of the road, 
 called jeeringly at him, he would slide 
 off the board and begin to throw stones. 
 When my dog ran out, he would coax 
 him near and then lash him with his 
 whip. These idiosyncrasies did not 
 endear him to his neighbors. 
 
 I have always had a sympathy for the 
 man who is down, and so, when I met 
 Hutchins I always said " Good-morn 
 ing " as pleasantly as I could. I never 
 remember having said much else, nor 
 that he ever made any other reply than 
 a nod of his head or a short " Mornin " 
 hissed out between his teeth, as if the 
 effort hurt him. 
 
 The road to my work ran by Hutchins 
 gate, and there, one morning, for the 
 first time, I saw the little golden-haired 
 grandchild who had furnished the win 
 ter nights gossip for three years past. 
 
 When this day I stopped and spoke to 
 the child, Hutchins slouched out from 
 his door, called to her mother, and when 
 
 164 
 
the child cried and started towards me, ffutchins 
 caught up a stick angrily. Something 
 in her face, or perhaps mine, stopped 
 him, for when she lifted up her dimpled 
 fingers and ran towards me he softened 
 and walked sullenly away. 
 
 Little by little the child and I became 
 fast friends. She would toddle out to 
 watch for me when I passed by in the 
 morning, her hair flying in the wind. 
 Sometimes, too, she would thrust her 
 chubby sunburned hand through the 
 broken palings and toss out a gay -colored 
 hollyhock that blossomed low enough 
 on its stalk for her to reach. 
 
 As the friendship grew it ripened 
 into an intimacy that finally culminated 
 in her walking with me one day as 
 far as the little bridge over the brook. 
 These confidential relations seemed to 
 impart their flavor to the rest of the 
 family. I noticed that my little friend 
 seemed less untidy, and one morning 
 her outcast of a mother, hearing my 
 voice, put a clean apron over her own 
 head, thus recognizing the unkempt 
 condition of her hair. As for Hutch- 
 ins, although he never offered to speak 
 first, he would somehow manage to have 
 his hat in his hand when I approached, 
 his best attempt at a courtesy. If, 
 however, he held me in any different 
 165 
 
Hutchins esteem from the rest of his neighbors, 
 or rather if he hated me the less, there 
 was nothing in his manner to show it, 
 except the slight evidences I have in 
 dicated. 
 
 When I lost my setter dog, search 
 was made in the village, and up and 
 down the highway as far as the stage 
 went. The farmers, of course, accused 
 Hutchins. Everything from the rob 
 bing of a hen-roost to the big burglary 
 of the county bank was laid at his door. 
 At first I was a little suspicious, and to 
 test his knowledge of my loss offered 
 a reward. A week later I found the 
 dog tied to my door, and the next day 
 learned from my foreman that the poor 
 fellow had followed a gunner, and that 
 Hutchins, hearing of it, had walked 
 twelve miles to the next village to bring 
 him back. When I taxed him with it 
 he made no answer, and when I handed 
 him the reward he dropped the bank 
 note on the ground and lounged off 
 whistling. 
 
 Winter came, and my work was still 
 unfinished. Affairs at Hutchins were 
 unchanged. The house perhaps looked 
 a little more tumbled-down, the ga 
 ble ends, porch, and sloping roof hug 
 ging the big chimney the closer, as if 
 they feared the coming cold. The neigh- 
 
 166 
 
bors still avoided the place, the women Hutckins 
 pretending not to see the daughter when 
 she passed, and the men leering at her 
 when they dared. 
 
 As for the daughter, my acquaintance 
 with her had never extended beyond 
 a word now and then about the child, 
 which was always answered in a half- 
 frightened, shrinking way. 
 
 One blustering night it was the last 
 week in December I was sitting in 
 my room alone studying some plans 
 of a coffer-dam for the better protec 
 tion of a submarine foundation I was 
 building, when there came a sharp 
 knock at the outer door. I expected 
 one of my men, and, catching up the 
 lamp, shot back the bolt and raised the 
 light aloft. A gust of snow chilled my 
 face, nearly extinguishing the flame. 
 Outside the snow lay in drifts, the 
 lower branches of the cedars being half 
 buried, while the stretch to the lower 
 gate was an unbroken sheet of white. 
 Around the corner of the porch my 
 eyes caught the marks of a straggling, 
 uneven footstep ; and beyond, hurrying 
 over the lower fence, I could barely 
 distinguish the outline of a shrunken, 
 shambling figure. It was Hutchins. 
 
 Stooping over to bring in the mat, 
 now wet with snow, my mind filled with 
 167 
 
Hutchins the strange visit and the stranger hur 
 ried disappearance, my hand touched a 
 bundle tied with a cotton cord. It had 
 evidently been laid there but a moment 
 before. It was hard and round and 
 wrapped in a newspaper. 
 
 I brought it to my fire and cut the 
 string. Inside was a huge turnip the 
 size of my two fists ; fastened to it was a 
 sprig of holly. I looked up, and my eye 
 fell on the calendar upon my mantel. 
 
 It was Christmas Eve. 
 
IX. SIX HOURS IN SQUAN- 
 TICO 
 
 QUANTICO was not my 
 destination. 
 
 I confess to hearing 
 from my berth in the 
 Pullman, when the train 
 stopped in the depot, all 
 the customary sounds, the bumpings 
 and couplings of the cars, the relieved 
 "whuff ! " of the locomotive catching its 
 breath after the night s run, the shouts 
 of the hackmen, and the rumbling of 
 the baggage trucks. I remember also 
 the " Dust you off, sir," of the suddenly 
 attentive porter levying blackmail with 
 his brush, the glare of the lanterns, and 
 blinding flash of the head-light. All 
 this came to me as I lay half awake 
 in my section, but it did not suggest 
 Squantico. 
 
 On the contrary, it meant prospective 
 peace and comfort, and another hour s 
 nap, when I would finally be side-tracked 
 outside the station in Washington. So 
 I turned over and enjoyed it. 
 
 Experience teaches me that the going 
 astray of the best laid plans is not con- 
 169 
 
Six Hours fi ne d wholly to men and mice ; it in- 
 eludes Pullmans. 
 
 My first intimation of disaster came 
 from the expectant blackmailer. 
 
 " Eight o clock, sir ; last berth occu 
 pied." 
 
 More positive data proceeded from 
 the conductor, who clicked a punch un 
 der my nose and blurted out, " Tickets ! " 
 
 I fumbled mechanically under my pil 
 low, and, remembering, said sleepily, 
 " Gave them to you last night." 
 
 " Not to me. Want your tickets for 
 Richmond." 
 
 I sat up. Whole rows of people 
 dressed for the day were quietly and con 
 tentedly occupying their seats. All the 
 berths had been swept away. My cur 
 tains alone dangled from the continuous 
 brass rod. Every eye in the car was fas 
 tened on my traveling bedroom. 
 
 " I am not going to Richmond. I get 
 off at Washington." 
 
 " Wrong car, sir. Left Washington 
 two hours ago." 
 
 " Stop at the next station," I gasped, 
 grabbing my coat. 
 
 The conductor peered through the 
 car window, pulled the bell-rope, and 
 shouted, "All out for Squantico !" The 
 next moment I was shivering in a pool 
 of snow and water, my bag bottom side 
 
 170 
 
up, the rear of the retreating train rilling Six Hours 
 a distant cut. /****" 
 
 A man in a fur hat and blue overcoat 
 cast his eye my way, picked up a mail- 
 pouch from a half -melted snow-bank, and 
 preceded me up a muddy road flanked 
 by a worm-fence. I overtook him, and 
 added my bag to his load. 
 
 " When can I get back to Washing 
 ton?" 
 
 " Ten minutes past two." 
 
 I made a hurried calculation. Six 
 hours ! Six hours in a hole like this ! 
 
 It was not a cheery morning for land 
 ing anywhere. January-thaw mornings 
 never are. A drizzling rain saturated 
 everything. A steaming fog hung over 
 the low country, drifted out over the 
 river, and made ghosts of the piles of an 
 unfinished dock. The mud was inches 
 deep under the snow, which lay sprawl 
 ing out in patches, covering the ground 
 like a worn-out coat. A dozen cheaply 
 constructed houses and stores built of 
 wood fronted on one side of a broad 
 road. Opposite the group was a great 
 barn of a building, with its doors and 
 lower windows boarded up. This was 
 the hotel. 
 
 Before I had turned the road I had 
 learned all that could possibly interest 
 me : the hotel was closed ; Colonel Jar- 
 171 
 
Six Hours vis kept a store third house from the 
 inSguan- corner . and Mrs> j arv i s cou id ge t me a 
 
 breakfast. 
 
 The man with the pouch exchanged 
 my bag for a dime, pointed to a collec 
 tion of empty dry-goods boxes ranged 
 along the sidewalk ahead, and disap 
 peared within a door bearing a swing 
 ing tin sign marked " Post-Office." I 
 rounded the largest box, climbed the 
 steps, and entered the typical country 
 store. 
 
 " Is Colonel Jarvis in ? " 
 
 Four men hugging a cast-iron stove 
 pushed back their chairs. One a lank, 
 chin-bearded Virginian straightened 
 himself out and came forward. He wore 
 a black slouch hat, a low-cut velvet vest 
 with glass buttons, all gone but two, 
 a shoestring necktie, and a pair of car 
 pet slippers very much run down at the 
 heel. The only redeeming points about 
 him were his voice, which though clogged 
 with the richest of Virginia dialects was 
 still soft and flexible, and his manners, 
 in which were visible some slight out- 
 croppings of a gentility buried with the 
 preceding generation. Regarded from 
 the point of view of a traveler half awake, 
 hungry, wet, and wholly disgusted, his 
 appearance only helped to intensify the 
 discomforts of the situation. 
 
 172 
 
" I m Kurnal Jarvis, zur. What kin Six Hours 
 I do for you?" % S quan ~ 
 
 " I am adrift here, and cannot return 
 for some hours. The mail man said per 
 haps Mrs. Jarvis would get me a cup of 
 coffee." 
 
 The colonel smiled unctuously ; re 
 plied, with a wave of his hand, that he 
 did not keep a hotel, or in fact a house 
 of entertainment of any kind, but that 
 since the closing he should say the 
 collapse of the Ocomoke Hotel he had 
 prevailed upon Mrs. Jarvis to spread a 
 humble table for the comfort and resto 
 ration of the wayfarer and stranger. If 
 I would do him the honor of preceding 
 him through the folding-doors to the 
 right, he would conduct me to Mrs. Jar- 
 vis, a chop, and a cup of coffee. 
 
 I did him the honor at once, and was 
 the next moment confronted by a little 
 woman in a brown calico dress, who hung 
 my wet coat on a clothes-horse by the 
 fire with so many expressions of sym 
 pathy that my heart was won on the 
 spot. 
 
 The breakfast was fairly good, al 
 though the vivid imagination of the colo 
 nel was not wholly realized, Mrs. Jar- 
 vis substituting hot corn - bread and a 
 sliver of bacon for the chop, and filling 
 my cup with a weak decoction of toasted 
 173 
 
Six Hours sweet-potato skins and chicory in place 
 
 "Squan- Qf the diyine essence Q f old Mocha. 
 
 Comforted by her gentle manner, and 
 glad of any excuse to kill time until the 
 2.10 train should rescue me from what 
 promised to be a most forlorn experi 
 ence, I drew from her, little by little, 
 not only her own history, but that of her 
 unfortunate neighbors. 
 
 It seemed that some years back a cap 
 italist from New York, uniting with 
 other money-bags from Richmond, had 
 fixed upon the town of Squantico as 
 presenting, by reason of its location, ex 
 traordinary advantages for river and rail 
 transportation ; that, in pursuance of 
 this scheme, they had bought up all the 
 land in and around the village, had 
 staked out numerous avenues and town 
 lots, erected an imposing hotel sur 
 mounted by a cupola, and had started 
 an immense pile dock trampling out into 
 the river ; that they had surveyed and 
 partly graded a certain railroad, de 
 scribed as a " sixty-pound steel-rail and 
 iron-bridge road," having one terminus 
 on the wandering dock, and the other in 
 a network of arteries connecting with 
 the " heart of the whole Southern sys 
 tem ; " that, besides these local and con 
 tiguous improvements, such small trifles 
 as a court-house of granite, a public 
 
 174 
 
school of brick with stone trimmings, Six Hours 
 extensive water-works, and ridiculously j quan ~ 
 cheap gas were to be immediately erected 
 and introduced. All these enlargements, 
 improvements, and benefits were duly 
 set forth in a large circular, or hand 
 bill, with head-lines in red ink, a fly- 
 specked copy being still visible tacked 
 up behind the colonel s bar. In addition 
 to these gratuities, large discounts were 
 offered to the earliest settlers purchas 
 ing town lots and erecting structures 
 thereon, the terms being within reach 
 of the poorest, one fourth cash, and 
 the balance in three yearly installments 
 of an equal amount. 
 
 Beguiled by these conditions and pros 
 pects, the colonel had sold her farm 
 on the James River, it was all she had 
 in the world, an inheritance from her 
 father s estate, had moved their house 
 hold effects to Squantico, paid the first 
 installment, and erected the store and 
 dwelling. This had absorbed their 
 means. 
 
 All went well for the first year, or un 
 til the hotel was finished. Then came 
 the collapse. One morning all work 
 ceased on the dock and railroad. An 
 other capitalist, of pointedly opposite 
 views from the original group of projec 
 tors, had gobbled up the road-bed of the 
 175 
 
Hours projected railway, and had carried its 
 terminus far out of reach of Squantico, 
 and miles down the river. This had oc 
 curred some three years back. 
 
 Since that date a complicated melan 
 choly had settled down over Squantico ; 
 the proprietors of the hotel had closed 
 its doors from sheer famine, not so 
 much from want of something to eat as 
 for want of somebody to eat it, the un 
 finished dock had gone to decay, and the 
 town to ruin. Squantico had shriveled 
 up like a gourd in a September frost. 
 
 Nor was this all. Since the collapse 
 no one had been able to meet the second 
 payment on the land ; the original capi 
 talists wanted their pound of flesh ; fore 
 closure proceedings had already been 
 begun, and the act of dispossession was 
 to be taken at the next spring term of 
 the county court. Everybody in the 
 village was in the same plight. " And 
 indeed, sir," she added with a break in 
 her voice, "what is to become of us! It 
 will seem so hard to have no home at 
 all." 
 
 I did what I could to divert her 
 thoughts from her impending misfor 
 tunes by telling her something of my 
 trip the night before, extracting for her 
 benefit what little humor the situation 
 afforded, and then, leaving her to the 
 
 176 
 
care of her dishes, started out into the ? Hours 
 store. ^ f f f$tan 
 
 The colonel widened the circle about 
 the stove, turned to the three other 
 chair holders, and introduced me as " My 
 friend, Major" and paused for my 
 name. As I did not supply it, he 
 glanced toward my bag for relief, caught 
 sight of a baggage label pasted across 
 one end, marked "B., Room , N. Y.," 
 and went straight on, as serene as an 
 auctioneer with a fictitious bid. 
 
 " Broom, Major Broom, gentle 
 men, from New York." 
 
 The occupants stood erect for an in 
 stant, looked at me from under the rims 
 of their hats, and sank into their chairs 
 again. 
 
 If the title was a surprise to me, I 
 being a plain landscape-painter, without 
 capitals of any kind before or after my 
 patronymic, the effrontery of displacing 
 it by an express company s check simply 
 took away my breath. But I did not 
 correct him. It was not worth the while. 
 He thanked me with his eye for my for 
 bearance, and placed a chair at my dis 
 posal. 
 
 This eye of the colonel, by the way, 
 was not the least interesting feature of 
 his face. It was a moist, watery eye, 
 suggestive of a system of accounts kept 
 177 
 
Six Hours mostly in chalk on a set of books cover- 
 i !ico quan in g half the swinging doors in the 
 county. From between these watery 
 spots protruded a sharp, beak-like nose. 
 My host connected these two features 
 by placing his forefinger longitudinally 
 along his nose until the nail closed the 
 right optic, and remarked, in a dry, husky 
 voice, that it was about his time, and 
 would I join him ? Instantly three pairs 
 of legs dropped from the stove rail, an 
 equal number of chairs were emptied, 
 and their occupants filed through a 
 green door with the paint worn off be 
 low the knob. I excused myself on the 
 ground of a late breakfast, and while 
 they were absent made an inspection of 
 the interior. It consisted of one long 
 room, on each side of which ran a pine 
 counter. This was littered up with 
 scraps of wrapping paper, a mouldy 
 cheese covered by a wire fly screen, 
 some cracker boxes, and a case with a 
 glass top containing small piles of plug 
 tobacco and some jars of stick candy. 
 Behind these counters were ranged pine 
 shelves, holding the usual assortment of 
 hardware, dry goods, canned vegetables, 
 and groceries. On the bottom shelf lay 
 a grillage of bar soap, left out to dry. 
 All the top shelves were packed with 
 empty boxes, labels outside, indicat- 
 
ing to the unpracticed eye certain proba- Six Hours 
 ble commercial resources. co qua 
 
 Outside the rain fell in a drizzle, and 
 the fog settled in wavy wreaths. Along 
 the road staggered a single team 
 horse and mule tandem harnessed, or 
 rather tied up, in clothes - lines, and 
 drawing a cart as large as a shoe box, 
 loaded with cord-wood, the whole fol 
 lowed by a negro clothed in cowhide 
 boots, an old army coat, and a straw 
 hat. The movement was slow, but sure 
 enough to convince me that they had 
 not all died in their tracks overnight. 
 
 I followed this team with my eye 
 until the fog swallowed it up ; watched 
 a flock of geese pick their way across 
 the road, the leader s nose high in the 
 air, as if disgusted with the day ; went 
 over in my mind the delay of preparing 
 the breakfast, the time lost in its dis 
 posal, the long talk with Mrs. Jarvis, 
 and my many experiences since, and 
 concluded that it must be high noon. 
 I looked at my watch, and a chill crept 
 down my spine. It was but a quarter 
 past nine ! 
 
 Five hours more ! 
 
 Disheartened but not wholly cast 
 down, I rummaged over a lot of wrap 
 ping paper, borrowed a pencil, and made 
 outline sketches of some pigeons drying 
 179 
 
Six Hours their feathers under the eaves of the 
 l ?ico quan ~ sta ble roof ; interviewed the boy feeding 
 the pigs ; listened enviously to their 
 contented grunts ; and at last, in sheer 
 desperation, returned to the store and 
 sat down. The hours were leaden. 
 Would I never get away ? Soon I 
 began to have murderous intentions 
 toward the porter. I remembered his 
 exact expression when he promised the 
 night before to wake me at eight o clock. 
 I could have sworn, on thinking it over, 
 that he knew I was in the wrong car, 
 and had concealed the fact, tempted by 
 the opulence expressed in my new Lon 
 don bag. I felt that it had all been a 
 devilish scheme to rob me of a double 
 quarter, and throw me out into the mud 
 in this thaw-stricken town. 
 
 In my broodings I began to take in 
 the colonel, following his movements 
 around the store, wondering whether 
 he was not in the conspiracy, and had 
 set the clock back to insure my missing 
 the train. 
 
 A moment s reflection convinced me 
 of the absurdity of all my misgivings, 
 and I resolved to rise to the occasion. 
 Mark Tapley could have made a gala-day 
 of it. I would brace up and study the 
 citizens. 
 
 The colonel was waiting on a customer, 
 
 1 80 
 
the only real one I had seen, a mu- Six 
 latto girl with a jug. &?*"** 
 
 " Misser Jarvis, Miss Manthy sez dat 
 thimble w at you sent her las week wuz 
 ur i on thimble, an she want ur steel 
 one. An she sez ef yer ain t got no 
 steel one she want ur squart o molasses." 
 
 " Where s the thimble?" said the 
 colonel. 
 
 " I drap it in de snow-bank out yer, 
 deed an double I did, an I most froze 
 lookin fur t." 
 
 The colonel sighed. 
 
 While he was filling the jug, an old 
 man in an overcoat made from a gray 
 army blanket, and dragging by the muz 
 zle a long Kentucky rifle, straggled in 
 and asked for a box of percussion caps 
 and half a pound of powder. Then rest 
 ing his shooting-iron against the counter, 
 and pushing his long, skinny, cramped 
 hands through his coat - sleeves, he 
 opened out his thin fingers before the 
 stove and ventured the remark that it 
 was " right smart chilly." 
 
 "Any game, uncle ? " I inquired. 
 
 " Mostly turkeys, zur ; but they s git- 
 tin* miz ble sca ce lately. Fo de wah 
 t warn t nuthin to git a passel of tur 
 keys fore breakfas . But you can t git 
 em now. Dese yer scand 1 us-back 
 ducks is mo plenty than they wuz ; but 
 181 
 
Six Hours ther ain t no gret shucks on em nary 
 ***- way ." 
 
 The colonel handed the old man his 
 ammunition, replaced a cracker box, 
 threw his legs over the counter, and 
 took the chair next me, his heels on the 
 rail. 
 
 " Here on business, major ? " 
 
 " No ; pleasure," I replied wearily. 
 
 " Sorry the weather is so bad, zur ; 
 Squantico is not looking its best. Had 
 you been here some few years ago, 
 it would have looked dif rent to you, 
 zur." 
 
 " You mean before the scheme start 
 ed?" 
 
 " Scheme or swindle, either way, zur. 
 Perhaps you know Mr. Isaac Hoyle ? " 
 
 I expressed my ignorance. 
 
 " Or have heard of the Squantico 
 Land and Improvement Company ? " 
 
 I was equally at fault, except what I 
 had learned through Mrs. Jarvis. 
 
 "Then, zur, you are in no way con 
 nected with the gang of scoundrels who 
 would rob us of our homes ? " 
 
 I assured him that he had hit it ex 
 actly. 
 
 " Allow me to shake you by the han , 
 zur, and offer you an apology. We took 
 you for a lawyer, zur, from New York, 
 come down about these fo closure pro- 
 
 182 
 
ceedin s. Will you join me ? " All Six Hours 
 the legs came down simultaneously with 
 a bang, but my firmness prevailed, and 
 they were slowly elevated once more. 
 
 " What are you going to do about the 
 matter ? " I asked. 
 
 " What can we do, zur ? We are 
 bound hand and foot. We are prostrate, 
 zur, prostrate." 
 
 " Do ? " said I, a ray of hope lighting 
 up my spirits. Perhaps, after all, there 
 were mitigating circumstances about 
 this enforced imprisonment. " Would 
 you have built this house if Hoyle had 
 not agreed to build his railroad ? " 
 
 " Of co se not," said the colonel. 
 
 " Did he build ? " 
 
 " Not a foot." 
 
 " Did you ? " 
 
 " Certainly." 
 
 "Well, then, colonel, sue Hoyle." 
 
 The colonel rose from his chair and 
 fixed upon me his drier eye. The loun 
 gers straightened up and formed a circle. 
 
 "Are there any water-works, granite 
 school-houses, city halls, and other such 
 metropolitan luxuries around ? " I con 
 tinued. 
 
 The colonel shook his head. 
 
 " Had these been erected, and had the 
 programme as marked out in that be 
 spattered circular behind your door been 
 183 
 
Si* Hours carried out, would you be as poor as you 
 5*"" are > or wou ld you not now have a ware 
 house across the road to hold your sur 
 plus stock, and three wagons constantly 
 backed up before your door to serve 
 your customers ? I tell you, sue Isaac 
 Hoyle." 
 
 "Kurnal," said Jarvis, I did not cor 
 rect the promotion, " would you have 
 any objection to elucidate yo views be- 
 fo some of our leadin citizens ? They 
 indicate a grasp of this subject, zur, 
 which is giant-like, yez, zur, giant-like! 
 Jedge Drummond and Gen ral Lownes 
 are at this moment in the post-office, 
 two ve y remarkable men, zur, quite 
 our fo most citizens. Might I send for 
 em?" 
 
 "I would be delighted to meet the 
 gentlemen." It might consume an hour. 
 " Send for them, my dear sir ; nothing 
 would give me greater pleasure." 
 
 " Here, Joe," said the colonel, calling 
 a negro who had lounged in from the 
 road, and was now hovering on the out 
 side of the circle ; "g w up to the post- 
 office, and tell Jedge Drummond and 
 Gen ral Lownes to come yer quick." 
 The boy shuffled out, and Jarvis laid his 
 hand on my shoulder. " It s a pleasure, 
 kurnal, a gen-u-ine pleasure, zur, to meet 
 a man of yo calibre. Allow me to grasp 
 
 184 
 
yo han , and ask you before the arrival Six Hours 
 of my friends to " /^ a *~ 
 
 There was a slight movement toward 
 the green door with the paint worn off, 
 but I checked it before the sentence was 
 complete. 
 
 " No ! Well, zur, we will make it later. 
 By the way, kurnal, before I forget it," 
 the colonel locked his arm through 
 mine and led me aside, " do not offer 
 Mrs. Jarvis any compensation for yo 
 breakfast. She conies of a very high 
 family, zur, and has a very sensitive na 
 ture. Of course, if you insist, I " and 
 my trade dollar dropped without a sound 
 into his desolate pocket. " Here, boy ! 
 Did you fin the gentlemen ?" 
 
 "De gin ral done gone duckin , sah, 
 fore daylight, but the jedge say he is 
 comin right away scat." 
 
 The judge was on the boy s heels. As 
 he entered, his eye wandered restlessly 
 toward the paint-worn door. He had 
 evidently misunderstood the message. 
 I arose to greet him, the ring of listeners 
 widening out to do justice to the im 
 pending ceremony. While the colonel 
 squared himself for the opening address, 
 I took in the general outline of the judge. 
 He was the exact opposite of my host, 
 a short, fat, shad-shaped man of some 
 fifty years or more, whose later life had 
 
 
 
six Hours been spent in a ceaseless effort to keep 
 his clothes up snug around the waist, 
 his failures above being recorded in the 
 wrinkles of his almost buttonless coat, 
 and his successes below in the bagging 
 of his trousers at the knee. He wore 
 low shoes that did not match, and white 
 cotton stockings a week old. A round, 
 good-natured face, ornamented by a mus 
 tache dyed brown and a stump of a cigar, 
 surmounted the whole. 
 
 "Jedge Drummond," began the colo 
 nel, "I sent my servant for you, zur, 
 to introduce you to my ve y particular 
 friend, Gen ral Broom, of the metrop 
 olis, zur, who is visiting the South, and 
 who dropped in upon us this morning to 
 breakfast. Gen ral Broom, zur, is one 
 of the most remark ble men of the day, 
 and, although a soldier like ourselves, 
 has devoted himself since the wah to the 
 practice of the law, and now stands at 
 the zenith, the ve y zenith, zur, of his 
 p ofession." 
 
 The judge expressed himself as over 
 whelmed, extended three fingers, and 
 corrugated his vest pattern into wrinkles 
 in the effort to squeeze himself between 
 the arms of a chair. Jarvis then con 
 tinued : 
 
 " Gen ral Broom is deeply interested 
 in the misfortunes which have overtaken 
 
 1 86 
 
Squantico, and has given expression to Six Hours 
 some ideas lookin to ards our vested i c f* mH ~ 
 rights which are startlin , zur. Gen ral, 
 will you kindly repeat yo views to the 
 jedge?" 
 
 I did so briefly. To my mind it was 
 simply a matter of contract. A grasp 
 ing land company had staked out a com 
 parative wilderness, and as an induce 
 ment to innocent investors and settlers 
 had made certain promises, which, under 
 the circumstances, were binding agree 
 ments. These agreements covered the 
 erection of certain important municipal 
 buildings, public conveniences, and im 
 provements, together with a hotel, a 
 dock, and a railroad. Only a fraction, a 
 very small fraction, of these had been 
 carried out. I would remind them, fur 
 thermore, that these agreements were 
 distributed broadcast, and if not in writ 
 ing, were in print, which in this case was 
 the same thing. Relying on these docu 
 ments, certain capitalists, like my friend 
 Colonel Jarvis, had invested a very large 
 portion of their surplus in erecting 
 structures suitable only for a city of con 
 siderable commercial importance. The 
 result was a matter of history. Squan 
 tico had yielded to a pressure greater 
 than she could bear. 
 
 Judge Drummond closed both eyes as 
 
Six Hours if in deep thought, shifted his cigar, and 
 
 ^ lc f quan remarked that the argument "was a 
 
 sledge-hammer." He was delighted at 
 
 the opportunity of knowing a man with 
 
 so colossal a grasp. 
 
 The store began filling up, the hur 
 ried exit of the boy and the instantane 
 ous return of the judge having had its 
 effect on the several citizens who had 
 witnessed the occurrence. With each 
 new arrival I was obliged to make a 
 fresh statement, the colonel enlarging 
 upon my abilities and rank until I began 
 to shudder lest he should land me either 
 in the White House, or upon the Su 
 preme Bench. 
 
 I was beginning afresh on the last ar 
 rival a weazen-faced old fellow with 
 one tooth when a fog-choked whistle 
 sounded down the river, and every man 
 except Jarvis and the judge filed out, 
 crossed the road, and waited on the end 
 of the unfinished dock until a wheezy 
 side-wheel boat landed a negro woman 
 and a yellow-painted trunk. This ab 
 sorbing ceremony, paralyzing the indus 
 tries of Squantico, I learned, occurred 
 every day. As soon as the excitement 
 calmed down and order had been re 
 stored, Jarvis executed a peculiar sign 
 with his left eye ; three citizens, includ 
 ing the judge, understood it, followed 
 
 1 88 
 
him into a corner, consulted for a mo- Six 
 ment, and returned, the colonel lead- 
 ing. 
 
 " Major-Gen ral Broom," said he, pla 
 cing his hand on his heart, " yo masterly 
 anal sis of our rights in this fo closure 
 matter convinces us that, if we are to 
 be protected at all, we must place our 
 selves in yo han s. We know that yo 
 duties are overwhelmin and yo time pre 
 cious ; but if you would consent to accept 
 a retainer, and appear for these cases at 
 the spring meeting of the county co te 
 in April, we shall consider them settled. 
 What amount would you fix ? " 
 
 The idea appalled me, but I was in 
 for it. " Gentlemen," I said, "your con 
 fidence, stranger as I am to most of you, 
 is embarrassing. As my main purpose 
 would be to wrest from this grasping 
 monopoly property which, if not yours, 
 should be, I would be willing to accept 
 only a small portion of the amount I 
 might recover as my fee " at this 
 point Jarvis had great difficulty in re 
 straining the outburst " together to 
 gether, gentlemen, with a trifling cash 
 payment " the noise moderated 
 " which could be placed in the hands of 
 Colonel Jarvis, to be used for prelimi 
 nary expenses." 
 
 A dead silence ensued. My selection 
 
Six Hours for stake-holder had evidently cast a 
 chill over the room. This hardened into 
 a frigid disapproval when the judge, voi 
 cing the assemblage, remarked that the 
 " colonel would take good care of all the 
 cash he would get." Had not Mrs. Jar- 
 vis announced dinner, the situation 
 would have become oppressive. The 
 colonel punctured the stillness by in 
 stantly subscribing for his proportion, 
 and asked the judge what amount he 
 would contribute. That legal luminary 
 rose slowly, picked up a crumb of cheese 
 that had escaped the fly screen, and re 
 marked that he would look over the list 
 of his real estate and see. An audible 
 smile permeated the crowd, the old 
 sportsman s share widening into a grin, 
 with an aside all to himself : " Real 
 state ? Golly ! Reckon he kearries 
 mos of it on his shoes." 
 
 " My dear," said the colonel, as we 
 followed his wife into the dining-room, 
 " you of co se understan that to-day my 
 old friend the gen ral is our guest." 
 
 That gentle lady, who had borne the 
 heat and burden of my entertainment 
 alone, only replied with her eyes. I 
 dropped another coin of the realm into 
 the colonel s pocket to alleviate the lone 
 liness of my contribution of the morning, 
 lifted my hat to the sad little woman, 
 
 190 
 
who watched us wistfully through the &* Hours 
 
 half-opened door, her apron over her *f fua 
 
 head, and took up my line of march to 
 
 the station with just ten minutes to 
 
 spare, the colonel carrying my bag, and 
 
 about all the male population of Squan- 
 
 tico serving as escort except the judge, 
 
 who excused himself on the ground 
 
 that he had " left his rubbers 
 
 in his office." When I 
 
 go South now, I pass 
 
 Squantico in the 
 
 night. 
 

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