Once a Week (magazine)/Series 1/Volume 9/A "first-class" story; or, The perils of travelling alone - Part 1
A “FIRST-CLASS” STORY; OR, THE PERILS OF TRAVELLING ALONE.
CHAPTER I. IN WHICH THE TRAVELLER CONSULTS HER FRIENDS.
The table d’hôte at the “Halbe Mond” (Half Moon) Hotel in the little town of Eisenach, which, though no bigger than Hampstead, is one of the principal “Residenz” cities belonging to the Grand Duke of Saxe-Weimar, and famous for the neighbouring Castle of the Wartburg, where Martin Luther wrote his translation of the Bible, while secreted within its walls under the disguise of “Younker George,”—the table d’hôte, we say, at the best hotel of this tiny Saxon capital is an agreeable scene at all times of the year. It is agreeable enough in the season when visitors swarm thither like swallows from other climes; some to gape at the frescoes on the walls of the “Singers’ Hall” at the Wartburg, while others make a special trip to the town on purpose to feast their eyes with the sight of the quaint little “Luther chamber” in the old cottage-like “Knight’s-house” adjoining the castle. Others, again, are there, not to see merely the artificial “lions” of the place, but to enjoy the natural beauty of the exquisite mountain and forest scenery in the neighbourhood. Indeed all manner of tourist folk are here to be met with in the tour-making season, and a more motley cosmopolitan group can hardly be seen even at the great fair of Leipzig. There are Jews and Gentiles, Poles, Russians, dark Italians, and fair-haired Swedes, dandy Frenchmen and burly Netherlanders, long-haired artists on a sketching tour, and bright-coloured “muffin-capped” students making a walking “partie” through the Thuringian forest, sedate untidy-looking professors, and expensively “got-up” Berlin tailors; be-ringed, be-chained, and be-studded commercial travellers, who have left their little square parcel of samples in the lobby; and stolid, untalkative Englishmen, costumed for the tour in suits of raspberry-cream-coloured tweed, and who saunter into the dining-hall with their opera-glass slung in a patent leather pouch at their side.
Such is the curious ethnological assembly at the “Halbe Mond” dinner, at the primitive hour of one, in the holiday aeason of the year; and, though, in the winter time, when the villages in the neighbourhood of the town are many of them snowed up, so that the provisions of the peasantry have to be hoisted in at the dormer-windows in the roofs, and when the starved and frozen-out deer come down to the cities to be fed, and the market-carts are all taken off their wheels, and the vegetables, butter, and cheese have to be brought to the “Stadt” upon sledges—though, at such a time, but few travellers can naturally be expected to dine there, nevertheless there is always a goodly muster of townsfolk who make a practice of taking their “mid-day meal” at the hotel; for when the coat of regaling oneself with some dozen courses and a dessert is but eightpence a head to regular subscribers (for it is the custom with residents to take a given number of “billets,” as if one was contracting for so many dips at the sea-side, instead of so many tickets for soup, poultry, meat, fish, pastry, or d’œuvres, entremets, dessert, and heaven knows how many other dishes besides), and when we add that the cooking moreover is by no means unpalatable, the London epicure upon a moderate income will readily understand that the attractions are sufficient to draw “good houses,” the entertainment being generally excellent, the performers mostly respectable, and the prices extremely moderate.
True, the lover of English fare will be occasionally offended with the sight of such dishes as boiled beef and cherries, roast pork and preserved oranges, stewed mutton and pickled “sticklebacks,” carp and horse-radish sauce, fieldfares and juniper-berries, and raw herrings served with cream, raw onions, capers, and sliced apples. True, again, the meat, owing to its having been all boiled for soup before being baked to do duty as a roast joint, has no more flavour left in it than in a mouthful of papermaker’s pulp, so that one really has to inquire whether it be stag or roebuck, or goose, pork, beef, or veal that we are eating; nevertheless, the sauces with which they are smothered are sufficiently savoury to make them toothsome, so that for a month or two the mere novelty of the fare is enough to give it a zest to the hungry and smoke-dried traveller.
At this hotel, in the winter time, the company, if not numerous, is, at least, select. At the head of the table is invariably to be seen the little round figure of Professor M., the teacher of painting at the principal public school of the town, who has eaten his twelve courses there day after day for seven and thirty years, and whose bulky little body and fat round checks are glowing results at once of the excellence and nutritive qualities of the food,—for, good cheery little soul, his face is as pleasant and as ruddy as the sun in the winter time,—and who, though numbering nearly sixty years, is as full of hope as a young poet, for it was only last year that he was busy covering an acre of canvas that he had to mount a ladder to paint, for his 999th grand tableau of “Christ and his Apostles.” Then there is the young and sharp-witted Professor H., whose features remind one somewhat of Louis Napoleon, and who, like the French Emperor, has been the architect of his own fortunes, for, though not a man of the schools, he has taught himself to make what he delights to call the finest microscopes in Europe, and is famed all over Germany for his splendid illustrations of the polarisation of light by means of the oxyhydrogen apparatus. Besides these is a group of Saxon officers, good-humoured jolly fellows, who every year believe that there is a chance of war breaking out with France, and are longing for another brush with the imperial army, or else as anxiously awaiting the festivities of the next ball at the Klemda, or arranging the details of their next grand sledging party with the band of music to Ruhla. Moreover, here may be found the polite silver-headed old courtier, the Baron von H., who is the head forester of the Duchy, and is ever pleased to point out to strangers where the choicest beauties of the forest scenery lie. Again, the lively and kindly-natured commandant of the Wartburg, the Major von A., occasionally forms one of the party: and then how merrily the time passes, and how the glasses are sure to clink! For he is “the best of all good company,” and has always a good tale to tell, either of the ghosts he has himself seen up at the Wartburg, or else some pretty Thuringian legend to narrate, or one of his last clever little sketches to show; for the Major paints as tastily as he sings, and his old Thuringian songs, when accompanied by himself on the “zitter,” the national instrument of the country, are things quite unique, as well for the gracefulness of the execution as for the quaintness of the simple ditties. Nor are ladies, at such a time, entirely absent from the company; for here dines daily the Fraulein K., who was formerly the head governess to the young princesses of Saxe Weimar, but who is now the principal teacher at what is termed the “higher daughters’ school” in the town, and who still delights in all the manners of the Court, and sits at home apparelled in black velvet, waiting to receive her friends on the nights of her receptions. How fluently she passes from one language to another! Now she is speaking French, and excellent French, too, with the accomplished Commandant; now she is talking English with the two worthy Scotch ladies next her, and now she converses in German with the Baron von H. concerning the studies and quickness of his little grandchildren. There is also a slight sprinkling of English ladies at the table, for, though the British inhabitants in the town hardly exceed half a dozen, the greater part of these meet regularly at the table d’hôte. It would be unfair, however, to speak more particularly of them in a paper intended for English eyes; suffice it, the two Scotch ladies, above alluded to, were a couple of the best and most graceful-minded women it has ever been the writer’s lot to meet with—the one as wise as she was pleasant, and as pleasant as she was kindly; and the other, clever in all things, clever in painting, clever in music, aye, and we have a shrewd suspicion, clever at writing too.
Of the other Englanderinns (as the Germans call our countrywomen), as they are to constitute the principal characters in the narrative which is to follow, we shall leave the ladies to speak for themselves. They were two cousins, originally of Irish extraction, and the one many years older than the other. The elder lady had been married to a Bremen merchant, who had died young and left her with a small independence, which she had come to eke out by a residence in the town of Eisenach, where, owing to the cheapness of provisions and rent, her income was sufficient to keep her in the state of comfort to which she had been accustomed. She could hardly be called a young widow, though on the other hand she was many years below the middle age of life, and there was a kind of statuesque character about her features which, though it had grown into somewhat of a masculine style as she had advanced in years, was still sufficient to assure the beholder that she must have possessed no slight beauty when the face was rounder and the cheeks plumper and rosier with the charms of youth. You had but to meet her and converse with her occasionally to find out ere long that the peculiar characteristic of her mind was worldly prudence; and one could soon see that she was distinguished by all that scrupulous care of young women which is so marked an attribute of the Irish character, and which makes the chastity of the females of that nation famous over all the world. The younger cousin was so unlike the elder one, that it was difficult to imagine any tie of kindred to exist between them. Her features, indeed, were far from regular, and her face more square than oval. But though she was neither handsome nor pretty, she was what was more striking, perhaps: she was interesting. It was impossible to look at her once and then turn away with absolute indifference. The reason of this was that the girl had a pair of most remarkable full black eyes—too lustrous and large indeed for anything like regular beauty, but still so full of fire and so penetrating, that they were as fascinating as those of the rattle-snake are said to be; so that a stranger, however well-bred, could hardly help staring at her. Moreover, there was a fawn-like tenderness in their expression that told the quick-sighted that though the girl was a person of violent emotions, she was at the same time a creature of such high nervous susceptibility, that it was impossible to say whether in the hour of danger she would display the highest heroism or be overcome, even to stupor, by the fright.
The elder lady we shall call Madame Steindorf (for as the circumstances we are about to relate are founded in truth, it is superfluous to say that the name must necessarily be a fictitious one), and the younger one Miss Boyne. At the time of the opening of our story, Madame Steindorf had succeeded in obtaining for her cousin a situation as companion to the wife of a rich Hamburg merchant; for owing to her crippled means since the death of her husband, she was unable to keep the young lady with her any longer, and the main object of her visit to the Halbe Mond that day was to consult the gentlemen whose acquaintance she had made at the table d’hôte, as to the most prudent and safe mode of getting a young lady, unprotected as she was, to her destination, especially as she herself could not afford the expense of accompanying her.
When the almonds and raisins, the “sand-cake,” the meringues, had been handed round, and the other ladies had taken their bonnets and cloaks from the hat-stand and had slipped on their felt over-shoes to guard against falling in the snow, previous to making their bow before leaving the company at the table, Madame Steindorf drew her chair towards the gentlemen at the upper end of the room, and said, in German, as the waiter deposited the silver spirit-lamp on the table for the smokers to light their cigars.
“I beg, gentlemen, that you will not let our presence interfere with your enjoyment, for I wish to consult you upon a point that you, as natives of the country, must be better acquainted with than I possibly can.”
“Was the Fraulein out skating to-day on the Orleans pond?” said one of the officers to Miss Boyne, as he leant behind Madame Steindorf’s chair to address the black-eyed young lady, who merely shook her head and whispered “Nein” in reply.
“Now, do I beg, light your cigars, gentlemen,” continued Madame S, as the waiter made his appearance with the cups of “black coffee” that had already been ordered for the German post-prandial entertainment.
Hereupon Lieutenant Von T rose from his chair, and raising his hand to his ear by way of military salute, bowed slightly as he said:
“If you ladies will be good enough to give us your permission,”—to which Madame Steindorf answered jocularly,
“We will not only give you our permission, but a light also,” and so saying she drew the sponge from the centre of the stand, and applying it to the flame below handed it burning blue to the officer.
“Oh, I beg—I beg, Madame,” cried some half-dozen simultaneously.
The ice of foreign ceremony being thus pleasantly broken, the elder lady immediately returned to the subject she had just touched upon.
“I want to learn from you gentlemen which class you consider the safest for a young lady to travel by in Germany when journeying alone by rail. Some tell me,” she added, “that in the third class a young lady is less liable to meet with insult, because the carriages there are undivided into compartments, and some one is certain to be present to protect her.”
“For myself,” said Professor H, “I travel some thousands of miles by rail regularly every year, and I never knew an instance of any female having been rudely treated, but then I always take a second-class ticket; and you know, Madame Steindorf, our second-class carriages are as good as your first, and the company one meets in them quite as respectable.”
“Oh, yes!” chimed in the officers, “we all travel second-class.”
“Besides,” added the Baron von H, “I believe I may say without offence to so clever a lady of the world as yourself, Madame Steindorf, that our people are more polite than yours,” and the couple bowed to one another with extreme deference.
“I don’t know that,” cried Professor M, from the top of the table, as he looked up from the large china bowl in which he was busily engaged in brewing “May drink”; now emptying bottle after bottle of “Forster Traminer” into the vessel, then throwing in handsful of sugar, and lastly sprig after sprig of dried “woodruff,” with a tiny green orange or two to give it an extra flavour. “I don’t know that,” he repeated. “The English people are not so ceremonious as ours, but when I went over to the Manchester Exhibition of Art, I found them quite as civil to me. Besides, look at their public gardens; there the people are requested not to pluck the flowers, and here we say it is forbidden by fine to do so. Which is the politer of the two?”
“Ah! but you artists, Herr Professor,” urged one of the scientific teachers at the principal Eisenach school, “always delight in foreign works, but I have a theory that owing to the great prevalence of fogs in England—and I have seen a statement by Professor Faraday in our papers, that there are no less than 250 odd fogs in London every year,”—and the learned gentleman looked round to mark the astonishment produced upon those present: “I have a theory, I repeat, that such a climate, where a bit of blue sky is almost as great a rarity as a water-spout here, the people cannot possibly be as vivacious and affable as ours. You see the sulphurous acid present in the London atmosphere prevents the oxygen or vital gas,”—and the Professor crossed the tips of his two fore-fingers as he was about to enter into the chemico-physiological details of the subject, when fortunately for the company, the courteous Baron von H interposed by saying,
“But, Herr Professor, we are forgetting the ladies, and they didn’t come here to listen to one of your extremely clever scientific lectures, but to have a simple answer to a simple question—at least, so it strikes me, though I may be mistaken, Herr Professor,” and the Baron bowed his white head to the learned gentleman across the table.
“But who travel in the first-class carriages?” enquired Madame Steindorf, after a slight pause.
“We have a saying here,” said the good-tempered maker of the best microscopes in Europe, “that our first-class is kept only for Englishmen and madmen,” and he laughed as he said the words, but immediately added, “though you know, Madame, we all look upon you here as a German lady.
“Badinage apart, however, Herr Professor, do you really mean to say that you never saw any but English in them?” asked the elder lady.
“Well, I travel more than most people,” returned the gentleman, and I generally find them filled with gentlemen with whiskers as long as a fox brush, and each with the invariable red book in their hands. Once to be sure I did see a German, but he had the gout, and he had gone there to prevent the possibility of any person entering the carriage and treading on his toes.”
“And I,” said the Lieutenant von T, “once knew a real German who always travelled by rail that way.”
“It cannot be!” cried the others, laughing. “Was he a hermit or a hyphocondriac?” asked one of the party in a bantering tone.
“Neither,” answered the officer, “but I found out at last that he was one of the principal tragic actors at the Dresden Theatre, and always chose that class when travelling, so as to be able to rehearse his part in private on the way.”
“Very good,” cried the others, “if he had gone into the woods he couldn’t have had greater solitude.”
The information was enough for Madame Steindorf, so thanking the gentlemen for what she had learnt from them, the ladies rose from table, whereupon all the gentlemen present stood up and bowed to them as they curtseyed before leaving the room; while the young lieutenant flew to the door, and throwing it open, held it back as he said,
“A pleasant journey to you, Fraulein. Adieu, ladies, I bow to you.”
As soon as the couple had reached the gate-way of the hotel, Madame Steindorf said to her cousin,
“I have made up my mind, Helen, you shall travel first-class, and then no harm can befall you.”