TRAVELLING SKETCHES.
BY
ANTHONY TROLLOPE.
[REPRINTED FROM THE "PALL MALL GAZETTE."]
LONDON:
CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY.
1866.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
THE FAMILY THAT GOES ABROAD BECAUSE IT'S THE
THING TO DO 1
THE MAN WHO TRAVELS ALONE 15
THE UNPROTECTED FEMALE TOURIST 29
THE UNITED ENGLISHMEN WHO TRAVEL FOR FUN 43
THE ART TOURIST 57
THE TOURIST IN SEARCH OF KNOWLEDGE 71
THE ALPINE CLUB MAN 84
TOURISTS WHO DON'T LIKE THEIR TRAVELS 98
TRAVELLING SKETCHES.
THE FAMILY THAT GOES ABROAD BECAUSE IT'S THE THING TO DO.
That men and women should leave their homes at the end of summer and go
somewhere,--though it be only to Margate,--has become a thing so fixed
that incomes the most limited are made to stretch themselves to fit the
rule, and habits the most domestic allow themselves to be interrupted
and set at naught. That we gain much in health there can be no doubt.
Our ancestors, with their wives and children, could do without their
autumn tour; but our ancestors did not work so hard as we work. And we
gain much also in general knowledge, though such knowledge is for the
most part superficial, and our mode of acquiring it too often absurd.
But the English world is the better for the practice. "Home-staying
youths have ever homely wits," and we may fairly suppose that our
youths are less homely in this particular after they have been a day
or two in Paris, and a week or two in Switzerland, and up and down the
Rhine, than they would have been had they remained in their London
lodgings through that month of September,--so weary to those who are
still unable to fly away during that most rural of months.
Upon the whole we are proud of our travelling; but yet we must own
that, as a nation of travellers, we have much to learn; and it always
seems that the travelling English family which goes abroad because it's
the thing to do, with no clearly defined object as to the pleasure to
be obtained or the delights to be expected,--with hardly a defined
idea of the place to be visited, has, as a class, more to learn than
any other class of tourists.
In such family arrangements daughters of course predominate. Sons can
travel alone or with their own friends. This arrangement they generally
prefer, and for it they are always able to give substantial reasons,
in which their mammas may, or may not, put implicit confidence.
Daughters can travel alone too occasionally, as I hope to be able to
show by-and-by in a sketch of that much abused but invaluable English
lady, the Unprotected Female Tourist. But such feminine independence
is an exception to the rule, and daughters are generally willing to
submit themselves to that paternal and maternal guidance from which
the adult male tourist so stoutly revolts. Paterfamilias of course is
there, paying the bills, strapping up the cloaks, scolding the waiters,
obeying, but not placidly obeying, the female behests to which he is
subject, and too frequently fretting uncomfortably beneath the burden
of the day, the heat and the dust, the absence of his slippers, and
the gross weight of his too-matured proportions. And he has, too, other
inward grievances of which he can say nothing to any ear. Something of
the salt of youth is left to him,--something of the spirit, though but
little of the muscle,--and he thinks of his boys who are far afield,
curtailed in their exploits by no petticoats, abridged by no stiff
proprieties; and he wishes that he was with them, feeling that his
trammels are heavy. The mother, of course, is there, kind to all her
party, but too often stiff and hard to all beyond it, anxious that papa
should have his comforts, anxious that her girls should see everything,
but afraid to let them see too much, sometimes a little cross when the
work becomes too hard or the pace of the pony is too rough, somewhat
dowdy in her cotton dress, and ill-suited to the hat which she wears.
She possesses every virtue under the sun. Of human beings she is the
least selfish. Her heart is full of love, and all who know her dote
upon her. At home she is charming, at home she is graceful and sweet
to be seen. But on her travels things do not go easily with her, and
her temper will sometimes become ruffled. The daughters are determined
to do the thing well, to see everything, to be stopped by no English
prejudices, to be at their ease, or at any rate look as though they
were; to talk French boldly in spite of their little slips; to wear
their dresses jauntily, and make the best of themselves; to have all
their eyes open, and carry home with them something from every day's
work. Who will say that they are wrong? Nay, who will not declare that
they are right in all this? But they overdo the thing in their intense
desire to utilize every moment; they are, alas, sometimes a little
ashamed of papa and mamma; and as they return down the Rhine, having
begun in Switzerland, and done Baden Baden, Frankfort, and Homburg on
their way, their dresses are not quite so jaunty, nor their gloves so
neat, nor their hats in such perfect trim, as when those articles were
inspected on the evening before they left home. That resolve to make
the best of themselves has been somewhat forgotten during the stern
realities of their journeys. A French girl will remember her crinoline
and her ribbons throughout every moment of her long day's work,--will
think of them through it all, preserving herself that she may preserve
them, if they were worth a thought at the beginning. If she is minded
to end dowdily, she will begin dowdily. But the trouble of such
continued care is too much for an English girl. She lapses first into
indifference, and from indifference to aversion; till at last she takes
an absolute pride in the absence of those little prettinesses which
she had at first been determined to maintain so stoutly. Who has not
seen her at the Dover railway station on her return home, as she stands
there grasping with one hand an Alpine stock and an umbrella, while she
leans listlessly on the other, regardless of the torn extremities of
her gloves and the battered form of her hat?
Such is the family that goes abroad because it is the thing to do.
The spirit that instigates them to roam afield is no hankering after
fashion. The father and mother, and daughters also, of the family of
which I speak, are well aware that such tourings are too common to
confer fashion or distinction. The days in which we heard that--
Mrs. Grill is very ill,
And nothing will improve her,
Unless she sees the Tuileries,
And waddles down the Louvre,--
are well nigh over, and are certainly over for such sensible people as
I am describing. It is not fashion that they seek, nor is it chiefly
amusement. Paterfamilias, when he starts, knows that he will not be
amused, and already wishes that the journey was over, and that he
could be back at his club. Mamma dreads it somewhat, and has more of
misgiving than of pleasant anticipation. She has not much of happiness
when papa is cross, and he is usually cross when he is uncomfortable.
And then the people at the inns are so often uncivil; and she fears the
beds! And the girls look for no unalloyed satisfaction. They know that
they have hard work before them, and the dread of those slips in their
French is not pleasant to them. But it is the thing to do. Not to have
seen Florence, Rome, Munich, and Dresden, not to be at home as regards
the Rhine, not to have ridden over the Gemmi or to have talked to
Alpine climbers at Zermatt, is to be behind the world. And then there
is so much to be done in Europe! Ars longa, vita brevis. Last year papa
wouldn't move,--that is, he wouldn't move beyond Cromer. Carry is,
alas! twenty-nine; Fanny is twenty-seven; even Sophie,--the childish
Sophie,--is twenty-four. Under such circumstances, who can dare to
think of ease, or even of pleasure? Years are flowing by, and the
realities of life,--still doubtful realities, but with so much of pain
in the doubt!--are coming on. Who can say how soon the income arising
from paternal energy may be at an end, and that the modest means of
pensioned age may render all such work impracticable? It is imperative
that the places be seen, that the lions be killed and ticked off as
difficulties done with and overcome. What may be the exact balance
of advantage to any of them when the tour is over, neither Carry nor
Fanny stops to inquire; but they put their heads together and determine
that the thing must be arranged. They feel that they are right. "It is
education," says Fanny, with her eyes glittering. "Home-staying youths
have ever homely wits," says Sophie, thinking perhaps too much of her
own advantage in point of years. "I will talk to papa in earnest,"
says Carry, with resolute mildness. She does talk to papa in earnest,
conscious that she is thereby doing her duty; and thus the family goes
abroad, because it is the thing to do.
In the old days,--days, let us say, that are now some hundred and fifty
years old,--young Englishmen used to travel for their education; but
it entered into the minds of those who sent them that they should see
something of the society of the countries which they visited. And in
such travelling time was given for such intercourse. But with the
ordinary English tourist, and especially with the ordinary English
tourist family, there is no such attempt now, no hope of any such good
fortune. Carry and Fanny mean to talk French boldly, but they intend
to do so in railway carriages, at hotel dinners, and to the guides and
waiters. No preparation is made for any attempt at social intercourse.
Letters of introduction are not obtained, nor is there time allowed
for any sojourn which would make an entrance into society possible.
That does not come even into Fanny's programme, though Fanny is
enthusiastic. Scenery, pictures, architecture, and a limited but minute
geographical inquiry, are the points to which it is intended that
attention shall be given. And of these much is learned. A true love of
scenery is common to almost all who will take the trouble to seek it. I
think that it is, at any rate, common to all English men and women. Of
pictures the knowledge acquired is most frequently what may be called
dead knowledge. Carry soon learns to know a Rubens from a Raphael,
and almost learns to know a Titian from a Tintoretto. She stores her
memory with facts as to individual pictures, remembers dates, and
can tell you who was the teacher of whom. She is sometimes a little
restless and mildly impatient during her labours in the galleries, and
rejoices often when the hard day's work is done and the custodian bids
her depart. But her toils have not been barren, and she enjoys after a
fashion what she has learned. Architecture comes easier, as the time
given to it is necessarily less, and the attention may be more vaguely
applied. But, on that account, less is carried away, and the memories
of the cathedral have dwindled to nothing, while the positions of the
world-famous pictures are still remembered. As to the geography,
it comes unsought, and remains unappreciated; but it is not on that
account the less valuable. How few of our young ladies can define the
position of Warsaw; while so many know accurately that of Wiesbaden!
Many accusations have been made against travelling English families,
touching that peculiarity of theirs in going hither and thither without
an attempt to see and know the people of the countries they visit; and
it is alleged, and truly alleged, that Frenchmen and Germans coming
here do make efforts to come among us and see us, and learn of what
like we are. But I think that we can defend ourselves on that score. We
travel among Frenchmen and Germans in bulk, while they come among us by
twos and threes. Our twos and our threes see as much of them as they
see of us. With them families do not go abroad because it is the thing
to do. How many an Englishman stays in Paris two days to see the city;
whereas no Frenchman comes to London for such a flying visit, unless he
be a _commis voyageur_, or has some business in hand.
The family that travels because it is the thing to do, is, I am sure,
in the right. Fanny understood her point when she said that it was
education. It is education; but if one can judge from the faces,
voices, and manners of the persons undergoing it, it is not often
pleasure. The work has been too hard, the toil too unremitting, the
endeavour to make the most of the short six weeks too unrelenting, to
allow of much of the softness of summer enjoyment. The stern Fanny,
who, as she has gone on her way, has made the foreign Bradshaw all
her own, has allowed no rest to her weary father, no ease to her
over-driven mother. "If we don't do Munich now, we shall never do it,"
she has said with energy. And thus the sullen father and the despairing
mother have been dragged along further dusty railroads, to another hot
city of pictures, in which Paterfamilias found nothing to comfort him
but the beer, and mamma no alleviation but the excessive punctuality
and neatness of the washerwoman.
But, at last, they are at home,--the penance is over, and the true
pleasure begins. They have done the work and have garnered the wages.
Papa is sufficiently happy in feeling that he cannot be again taken
away from his dressing-room and cellar, at any rate, for ten months;
and mamma, as she once more creeps into her own bed, thanks God that
she has been enabled to go through her duty. Carry and Fanny hide their
travelling gear with some little feeling of shame, and, as they toil
at their journals for the first week of their return, take pride in
thinking that they have seen at any rate as much as their neighbours.
THE MAN WHO TRAVELS ALONE.
Men who travel alone may be divided into two classes. There is the man
who cannot get a companion, and the man who does not want one. There is
also, between these two solitary men, an intermediate solitary man, who
travels alone because he cannot find the companion that would exactly
suit him. But, whatever may be the cause of his solitude, the man who
travels alone is not, I think, to be envied.
If he be a studious, thoughtful man, taking delight in museums and
houses of assembly, given to chemistry and the variations of European
politics, fond of statistics and well-instructed in stuffed vermin, he
may be as happy travelling alone as he would be alone in his library;
but such a man is exceptional, and I am not now speaking of him. He is
a student and not a tourist. He is going to school and not out for a
holiday. The man who travels alone, with whom we have to do, is one who
goes abroad for a little health, for a good deal of recreation if he
can find it, and for the pleasure of looking about him and seeing the
world. The improvement in health he may find; but the recreation will
be doubtful, unless he be one by nature averse to gregarious habits.
When we see such a one,--and such a one is often seen straying along
the Rhine or wandering listlessly among the mountains,--we always
suppose him to be alone because he cannot help it. We are never kind
enough to give him credit for a choice for solitude; and we avoid him
sedulously because we have it in our power to give him that one thing
that he wants. Such is the human nature of tourists, which in this
respect is very like to the human nature of people who stay at home. We
like to have at our houses those whom it is difficult to obtain, and do
not care to entertain those who are always ready to come to us.
It must be admitted that the ill-nature of tourist parties in this
respect is justified to a great degree by the experienced results of
any exceptional good-nature into which soft-hearted persons may be
occasionally betrayed. Who among us that has been thus soft-hearted
on an occasion has not repented in sackcloth and ashes? The solitary
tourist when once taken up can hardly be dropped; he appears, and
reappears, and comes up again till the original friends of the original
good-natured sinner become gloomy and sullen and talk of strong
measures. Whispers of an enforced separation are murmured about,
and Jones, who has picked the man up, and who "found that there was
something in him" as they sat next each other in a railway carriage, is
made to understand by Smith and Walker, that unless he can contrive
to drop Mr. Robinson, he must be dropped himself. It is not so easy to
drop Mr. Robinson. The paths of Switzerland, and the roads into Italy,
are open to all the world.
Poor Robinson! we will cling to him for a while, and endeavour to show
the nature of the misery which he suffers. At home he is an honest
fellow, and those who know him best say that he is a gentleman. He is
quite equal to the men whom he meets on his tour, and who look down
upon him because of his solitude. The time will probably come when he
will be no longer alone, when he will have a wife and children, and a
house into which Jones would think it a blessing to be admitted.
But at present Robinson is alone, and has known himself to be thrown
aside by the men whose society he coveted. He had come out on his tour
with much compunction, dreading his solitude, believing in his heart
of hearts that it would be better for him to go with his sisters
to Broadstairs. But he had accused himself of being unmanly, he had
buckled on his armour in the shape of a Murray's guide, a vocabulary,
and a Bradshaw, and had started by the Ostend boat, assuring himself
that many others had done the same before him, and had returned home
proudly to tell the tale of their wanderings. On the railway to Cologne
he had picked up with Jones, and for twenty-four hours the prospects of
a blessed union had cheered him. He had followed the friends to their
hotel with some half-word of excuse. He had sat by Smith at the first
dinner, dividing Smith from a pretty young countrywoman, and had found
Smith to be somewhat unpleasant. Had he understood his game he would
have taken himself to the other side of Smith. Wanting to gain much, he
should have surrendered something. In the evening he had smoked with
Jones, whose good-nature had not as yet been outraged. Then had Walker
and Smith roundly brought their friend to task, and Jones having asked
the poor fellow which way he meant to travel on the morrow, had plainly
told him that he and his party intended to take another route.
Some chance reader of these words may, perhaps, one day have felt such
rebuke, and be able to understand its harshness. "Ah, yes! very well,"
said Robinson. "Then I dare say we shall not meet again. I couldn't
very well alter my plan now." There was a dash of manliness about him,
and he could show some gallantry before the traitor friend who had
become his foe. But when he went up to his room, the tears were almost
in his eyes, and as he turned into bed, he resolved that on the morrow
he would betake himself home.
But on the morrow his heart was higher, and he persevered. He saw the
three odious men as they started from the inn door, and was able to
perceive that they were not gentlemen. Smith he thought he had seen
behind a counter. As for Walker, he had caught Walker tripping with his
_h_s, and was glad to be rid of him. Before his breakfast was over he
had taught himself almost to believe that he had dropped the equivocal
party, and had told himself that he should be very careful how he
selected his acquaintance.
But not the less was he very melancholy, and at the end of the second
day from that morning had fallen into a dreary state of misanthropy.
Ideas had begun to float through his brain which he believed to be
philosophical, but which all tended to the no-good-in-anything school
of thought. He had assumed a constrained look of contempt, and would
hardly notice the waiter, as he declined one after another the dishes
brought to him at dinner. In the evening he roamed about moodily in the
twilight, asking himself psychological questions about suicide; not,
indeed, intending to kill himself, but having a fancy for the subject
as one of great interest. He thought that he might, perhaps, have
killed himself had he not felt that his doing so would be deleterious
to his sisters. As for Jones, or Smith, or Walker, in his present
mood he would not have spoken to them. He was in love with solitude,
and would have been severe to any Jones or any Walker who might have
intruded upon him.
But on the next day he makes another effort, having encountered our
friend Paterfamilias, with his wife and three daughters, upon a Rhine
steamboat. Like a prudent young man in such circumstances, he first
speaks a word to the father, and the father admits the word graciously.
Fathers so situated are always oblivious of their daughters, and never
remember that they, when young men, used to make similar attempts.
But mothers never forget, and with accurate measures of mental yard
and foot, take inventory of all comers, weighing every gesture, and
knowing the value of every stitch in the man's garment, and of every
tone in the man's voice. The stitches and tones belonging to Robinson
were not much in his favour. When a man is at discount with himself he
is usually below par with all the world beside. When in the course
of a couple of hours Robinson had remarked to Sophie,--the youthful
Sophie,--that the Rhine was the monarch of rivers, the mother speaks a
cautious word to Carry, the eldest daughter, and just as misanthropy
was giving place to a genial love for all his kind under a pleasant
smile on Sophie's mouth, the whole family whisk themselves away, and
our friend is again alone.
He has Childe Harold in his pocket, and the labour of learning a stanza
or two by heart carries him on into Switzerland. In ascending the
Rigi he again comes across Jones and Walker. Alas for human nature,
he is only too happy to be recognized by those whom he had assured
himself that he despised! A civil word half spoken by a panting voice,
a nod of recognition which could hardly not have been given, draws
him once more into their social circle, and he forgets the counter,
and the doubtful _h_s, and the bearishness of the obdurate Smith. If
they will only open their arms to him, and let him be one of them! A
fear comes upon him that they may suspect him to be impecunious, and
he adapts his conversation to the idea, striving to make it apparent,
by words carefully turned for the purpose, that he is quite another
sort of person than that. Walker sees the attempt, and measures the
man accordingly,--but measures him wrongly. Poor Robinson has been
mean,--is mean; he has sunk beneath the weight of his solitude to a
lowness that is not natural to him; but he has not the meanness of
which they suspect him. "If you let that man hang on to you any longer,
he'll be borrowing money of you," says Smith. Jones remarks that it
takes two men to play at that game; but on the following morning the
three friends, having necessarily been domiciled with Robinson on
the top of the mountain that night, are careful to descend without
him, and the poor wretch knows that he has again been dropped. The
trio, as they descend the hill, are very merry withal respecting the
Robinson difficulty, indulging that joy of ascendancy which naturally
belongs to us when we have discovered anyone low enough to require our
assistance.
Along the lakes and over the mountains goes the wretched man, still in
solitude. He tells himself in moments of sober earnest that he has made
a mistake, and has subjected himself to great misery in attempting to
obtain alone delights which by their very nature require companionship.
Robinson is not a student. He cares nothing for minerals, and knows
nothing of botany. Neither the social manners of the people among whom
he is wandering, nor the formation of the earth's crust in those parts,
are able to give him that excitement which he requires. The verdure
of the Alps, the peaks of the mountains, the sun rising through the
mists, would give him pleasure if he had with him another soul to
whom he could exclaim in the loving intimacy of free intercourse, "By
George, Tom, that is jolly! It's all very well talking of Cumberland,
but one must come to Switzerland to see that." Every man cannot be
a Childe Harold; and even to be a Childe Harold one must begin by a
stout determination to be unhappy, and to put up with it. In his own
lodgings in London Robinson has lived a good deal alone, and, though he
has not liked it, he has put up with it. It has been the business of
his life. But he has it not in him to travel alone and to enjoy it. If,
indeed, the Foreign Office in Whitehall had entrusted him with a letter
or even a teapot, to carry to the Foreign Office at Vienna, he would
have executed his mission with manly fidelity, and would have suffered
nothing on the journey. The fact that he had a teapot to convey would
have been enough for his support. But then work is always so much
easier than play.
But he goes on wearily, and still makes an effort or two. As he falls
down into Italy, looking with listless, unseeing eyes at all the
prettinesses of the Ticino, he comes upon another Robinson, and there
is a chance for him. But he has unconsciously learned and despised
his own littleness, and in that other lonely one he fears to find
one as small, or it may be smaller than himself. He gathers his toga
round him, in the shape of knapsack and walking-stick, with somewhat
of dignity, and looks at his brother with suspicious eye. His brother
makes some faint effort at fraternization, such as he had made before,
and then Robinson,--our Robinson,--is off. He wants a companion
sorely, but he does not want one who shall be so low in the world's
reckoning as to want him. So he passes on, and having at last tramped
out with weary feet his six weeks of wretched vacation, he returns
home rejoicing to think that on the morrow he shall be back amidst the
comforts of his desk and stool, and the society of his fellow-labourers.
Most of us are Robinsons. We are so far lucky indeed, the greater
number of us, that we need not be solitary Robinsons. We have our
friends, and are better advised than to attempt the enjoyment of our
tours alone. But as to our capacity for doing so, or our conduct if we
should attempt it, I doubt whether many of us would be much stronger
than he was.
THE UNPROTECTED FEMALE TOURIST.
The unprotected female tourist is generally a much stronger-minded
individual than the solitary male traveller, and has a higher purpose,
a better courage, and a greater capacity for meeting and conquering
the difficulties of the road. The poor fellow, indeed, whose solitary
journey we described the other day, had no purpose, unless a vague idea
of going where amusement would come to him, rather than of seeking it
by any effort of his own, may be called a purpose; but the unprotected
female knows what she is about; she has something to do and she
does it; she has a defined plan from which nothing moves her; the
discomfort of a day will not turn her aside; nor will she admit of any
social overtures till she has formed a judgment of their value, and has
fair reason to believe that she will receive at any rate as much as
she gives. The unprotected female, as she knows and uses the strength
of her weakness, so does she perceive and measure the weakness of her
strength. She cannot be impetuous, and impulsive, and kitten-like, as
may girls who can retreat at once behind their mother's crinoline or
under their father's umbrella, should a cloud be seen in the distance
or the need for shelter be felt.
How or under what influences the unprotected female commences her
tour, who can tell? It will usually be found, if inquiry be made as
to her family, that she has a brother, or a father, or a mother; that
she need not be an unprotected female tourist, had she not elected
that line as the best for her pleasure or her profit. She is seldom
very young;--but neither is she very old. The lady whose age would
admit of her travelling alone without remark rarely chooses to do
so; and when she does, she is not the lady whom we all know as the
unprotected female. The unprotected female must be pretty, or must
at least possess feminine graces which stand in lieu of prettiness,
and which can put forward a just and admitted claim for personal
admiration. She is not rich, and travels generally with economy; but
she is rarely brought to a shift for money, and her economies conceal
themselves gracefully and successfully. She learns the value of every
franc, of every thaler, of every zwansiger as she progresses, and gets
more change out of her sovereigns than any Englishman will do. She
allows herself but few self-indulgences, and controls her appetites.
She can enjoy a good dinner as well as her brother could do; but she
can go without her dinner with a courageous persistence of which her
brother knows nothing. She never pays through the nose in order that
people indifferent to her may think her great or generous, though she
pays always sufficient to escape unsatisfactory noises and to prevent
unpleasant demands. Her dress is quiet and yet attractive; her clothes
fit her well; and if, as one is prone to suspect, they are in great
part the work of her own hand, she must be an industrious woman, able
to go to her needle at night after the heat and dust of the day are
over. Her gloves are never worn at the finger-ends; her hat is never
shapeless, nor are her ribbons ever soiled; the folds of her not too
redundant drapery are never misarranged, confused, or angular. She
never indulges in bright colours, and is always the same, and always
neat; and they who know her best believe that if she were called out of
her room by fire in the middle of the night, she would come forth calm,
in becoming apparel, and ready to take an active part in the emergency
without any infringement on feminine propriety. She is never forward,
nor is she ever bashful. A bashful woman could not play her game,
and a forward woman immediately encounters sorrow when she attempts
to play it. She can decline all overtures of acquaintanceship without
giving offence, and she can glide into intimacies without any apparent
effort. She can speak French with fluency and with much more than
average accuracy, and probably knows something of German and Italian.
Without such accomplishments as these let no woman undertake the part
of an unprotected female tourist. She can converse on almost any
subject; and, if called on to do so, can converse without any subject.
As she becomes experienced in her vocation she learns and remembers
all the routes of travelling. She is acquainted with and can explain
all galleries, cathedrals, and palaces. She knows the genealogies of
the reigning kings, and hardly loses herself among German dukes. She
understands politics, and has her opinion about the Emperor, the King
of Prussia, and the Pope. And she can live with people who know much
more than herself, or much less, without betraying the difference
between herself and them. She can be gay with the gay, and enjoy that;
or dull with the dull, and seem to enjoy that. What man as he travels
learns so much, works so hard, uses so much mental power, takes so
much trouble in all things, as she does? She is never impatient, never
exacting, never cross, never conquered, never triumphant, never humble,
never boastful, never ill, never in want of assistance. If she fall
into difficulties she escapes from them without a complaint. If she be
ill-used she bears it without a murmur; if disappointed,--as must so
often be the case with her,--she endures her cross and begins again
with admirable assiduity. Yet she is only an unprotected female, and
they who meet her on her travels are too apt to declare that she is an
old soldier.
Unprotected female tourists, such as I have described, are not very
numerous; but there are enough of them to form a class by themselves.
From year to year, as we make our autumn excursions, we see perhaps
one of them, and perhaps a second. We meet the same lady two or three
times, making with her a pleasant acquaintance, and then passing on.
The farther we go afield the more likely we are to encounter her.
She is always to be met with on the Nile; she is quite at home at
Constantinople; she goes frequently to Spain; you will probably find
her in Central America; but her head-quarters are perhaps at Jerusalem.
She prefers the saddle to any other mode of travelling, and can sit
on horseback for any number of hours without flinching. For myself,
I have always liked the company of the unprotected female, and have
generally felt something like the disruption of a tender friendship
when circumstances have torn me from her.
But why is she what she is? As to the people that one ordinarily meets
when travelling, no one stops to inquire why they are what they are.
Mr. and Mrs. Thompson have come together, naturally enough; and,
naturally enough, there are three or four Miss Thompsons. And when
young Mr. Thompson turns up alone, no one thinks very much about him.
But one is driven to think why Miss Thompson is there at Cairo all
by herself. You go to the Pyramids with her, and you find her to be
very pleasant. She sits upon her donkey as though she had been born
sitting on a donkey; and through dust and heat and fleas and Arabs
she makes herself agreeable as though nothing were amiss with her.
You find yourself talking to her of your mother, your sister, or your
friend,--but not of your wife or sweetheart. But of herself, excepting
as regards her life at Cairo, she says nothing to you. You ask yourself
many questions about her.
Who was her father? who was her mother?
Had she a sister? had she a brother?
Or was there a dearer one still, and a nearer one
Yet than all other?
Why is she alone? and how is it possible that a girl whose dress fits
her so nicely should not have "a nearer one and dearer one yet than all
other?"
But you may take it for granted that she has not; or if she has, that
he is no better than he should be;--that his nature is such as to
have driven her to think solitude better than his company. Love of
independence has probably made the unprotected female tourist what she
is;--that and the early acquired knowledge that such independence in a
woman requires very special training. She has probably said to herself
that she would rise above the weakness of her sex,--driven, perhaps, to
that resolve by some special grief which, as a woman, she has incurred.
She is something of a Bohemian, but a Bohemian with a regret that
Bohemianism should be necessary to her. She will not be hindered by
her petticoats from seeing what men see, and from enjoying that which
Nature seems to bring within a man's reach so easily, but which is so
difficult to a woman. That there might be something more blessed than
that independence she is ready enough to admit to herself. Where is
the woman that does not admit it? But she will not admit that a woman
should live for that hope alone; and therefore she is riding with you
to the Pyramids,--others of course accompanying you,--and talking to
you with that studied ease which is intended to show that, though she
is an unprotected female, she knows what she is about, and can enjoy
herself without any fear of you, or of Mrs. Grundy. You find her to be
very clever, and then think her to be very pretty; and if,--which may
probably be the case,--you are in such matters a fool, you say a word
or two more than you ought to do, and the unprotected female shows you
that she can protect herself.
But Miss Thompson is wrong for all this, and I think it will be
admitted that I have made the best of Miss Thompson's case. The line
which she has taken up is one which it is impossible that a woman
should follow with ultimate satisfaction. She cannot unsex herself
or rid herself of the feeling that admiration is accorded to her as
a pretty woman. She has probably intended,--honestly intended,--to
be quit of that feeling, and to move about the world as though, for
her, men and women were all the same, as though no more flirting were
possible, and love-making were a thing simply good to be read of in
novels. But if so, why has she been so careful with her gloves, and her
hat, and all her little feminine belongings? It has been impossible to
her not to be a woman. The idea and remembrance of her womanly charms
have always been there, always present to her mind. Unmarried men
are to her possible lovers and possible husbands,--as she is also a
possible wife to any unmarried man,--and also a possible love. Though
she may have devoted herself to celibacy with her hand on the altar,
she cannot banish from her bosom the idea which, despite herself,
almost forms itself into a hope. We will not ask as to her past life;
but for the future she will be what she is,--only till the chance
comes to her of being something better. It is that free life which she
leads,--which she leads in all innocency,--which makes it impossible
for her to be true to the resolution she has made for herself. Such
a woman cannot talk to men without a consciousness that intimacy may
lead to love, or the pretence of love, or the dangers of love. Nor, it
may be said, can any unmarried woman do so. And therefore it is that
they do not go about the world unprotected, either at home or abroad.
Therefore it is that the retreat behind mamma's ample folds or beneath
papa's umbrella is considered to be so salutary.
You, my friend, with your quick, impulsive, and, allow me to say,
meaningless expression of admiration, received simply the rebuke
which you deserved. Then there was an end of that, and Miss Thompson,
being somewhat used to such misadventures, thought but little of it
afterwards. She has to do those things when the necessity comes upon
her. But it does happen, sometimes, that the unprotected female,--who
has a heart, though other women will say that she has none,--is
touched, and listens, and hopes, and at last almost thinks that she has
found out her mistake. The cold exterior glaze of the woman is pricked
through, and there comes a scratch upon the stuff beneath. A tone in
her voice will quaver as though everything were not easy with her. She
will forget for the moment her prudence, and the usual precautions
of her life, and will dream of retiring within the ordinary pale of
womanhood. She will think that to cease to be an unprotected female may
be sweet, and for a while she will be soft, and weak, and wavering. But
with unprotected females such ideas have to pass away very fleetly.
I am afraid it must be said that let a woman once be an unprotected
female, so she must remain to the end. Who knows the man that has taken
an unprotected female to his bosom and made her the mistress of his
home, and the chief priestess of his household gods? And if any man
have done so, what have his friends said of him and his adventure?
And so the unprotected female goes on wandering still farther afield,
increasing in cleverness every year, and ever acquiring new knowledge;
but increasing also in hardness, and in that glaze of which I have
spoken, till at last one is almost driven to confess, when one's wife
and daughters declare her to be an old soldier, that one's wife and
daughters are not in justice liable to contradiction.
THE UNITED ENGLISHMEN WHO TRAVEL FOR FUN.
The United Englishmen who travel for fun are great nuisances to other
tourists, are great nuisances to the towns they visit and the scenes
they disturb, are often nuisances in a small way to the police, are
nuisances to people saying their prayers in churches, are nuisances
to visitors in picture galleries, are nuisances to the ordinary
travellers of the day, and are nuisances to the world at large--except
the innkeepers and the railway companies; but they generally achieve
their own object, and have what the Americans call a good time of it.
A United Englishman travelling for fun should not be over twenty-five
years of age, but up to that age what he does, though he be a nuisance,
should be forgiven him. Though we ourselves may be annoyed by the
freaks of such travellers, shocked by their utter disregard of apparel,
stunned by their noises, and ashamed of them as our countrymen, yet
we are well pleased that our sons should be among their number, and
are conscious that amidst all that energetic buffoonery and wild
effrontery, education is going on, and that much is being learned,
though the recipient of the learning would himself be ashamed to own
any such fact to himself.
The men of whom I am now speaking are generally gentlemen by
birth,--who have been educated or missed being educated, as education
is obtained or missed by the sons of English gentlemen,--are pleasant
fellows who have learned to love each other at school or college,
and have nothing about them that is mean or in itself ignoble; but
they are young of their age, men for whom nature has hitherto done
more than art, who have hardly as yet learned to think, and are still
enjoying all the irresponsible delights of boyhood at a time of life
at which others less fortunate are already immersed in the grievous
cares of earning their bread. I do not know that any country except
England produces such a crop. We see United Frenchmen on their travels;
but they are discreet, well dressed, anticipating the life of middle
age rather than adhering to the manners of boyhood,--much given to
little attentions to women, and very decorous in their language. And
young German tourists are encountered everywhere, though more often
alone than in union; but the German tourist is almost always a German
student. Life is a serious thing to him, and he is resolved that he
will not lose this most precious period of it. United Germans, rough
in their pleasures, and noisy in their demonstrations, may no doubt
be found; but they are to be found in their own cities, at their
universities, among their own people. It does not come in their way
to go forth and exhibit their rowdiness among strangers. And as to
Americans, who has ever seen a young American? An American who travels
at eighteen, travels because he is blasé with the world at home, tired
of democratic politics, and anxious to see whether anything may still
be gleaned from European manners to improve the not yet perfected
institutions of his own country. Among tourists of the order of United
Englishmen an American young man is altogether out of his element. He
will attempt sometimes to live as they live, but will soon retire,
disgusted partly by them and partly by his own incompetence. I have
known an American who could be loud, and jolly, and frolicsome, and yet
carry himself like a gentleman through it all; but I have never known a
young American who could do so.
Englishmen of the class in question are boys for a more protracted
period of their life, and remain longer in a state of hobbledehoyhood,
than the youths probably of any other nation. They are nurtured on the
cold side of the wall, and come slowly to maturity; but the fruit,
which is only half ripe at the end of summer, is the fruit that we keep
for our winter use. I do not know that much has been lost in life by
him who, having been a boy at twenty, is still a young man at forty.
But even in England we are changing all this now-a-days, and by a
liberal use of the hot-water pipes of competition are in a way to force
our fruit into the market as early as any other people. Let us hope
that what we gain in time may not be lost in flavour.
But we have not yet advanced so far as to put down the bands of United
Englishmen who travel for fun. Who does not know the look of the band,
and cannot at a glance swear to their vocation? The smallest number
of such a party is three, and it does not often exceed five. They
are dressed very much alike. The hat, whatever be its exact shape, is
chosen with the purpose of setting all propriety instantly at defiance.
No other description can be given of it. To say that it is a slouch
hat, or a felt hat, or a Tom-and-Jerry hat, conveys no idea of the hat
in question. The most discreet Low Church parson may wear a slouch
hat, and may look in it as discreet and as Low Church as he does in
his economically preserved chimney-pot at home. But the United English
tourist batters his hat, and twists it, and sits on it, and rumples and
crumples it, till it is manifestly and undeniably indicative of its
owner. And having so completed its manufacture he obtrudes it upon the
world with a remarkable ingenuity. In a picture gallery he will put it
on the head of a bust of Apollo; in a church he will lay it down on
the railing of the altar, or he will carry it on high on the top of
his stick, so that all men may see it and know its owner by the sign.
Sitting in public places he will chuck it up and catch it, and at
German beer-gardens he will spread it carefully in the middle of the
little table intended for the glasses. He never keeps it on his head
when he should take it off,--because he is a gentleman; but he rarely
keeps it on his head when that is the proper place for it,--because he
is a United Englishman who travels for fun. He wears a suit of grey
clothes, the coat being a shooting coat, and the trousers, if he be
loud in his vocation, being exchanged for knickerbockers. And it is
remarkable that the suit in which you will see him will always strike
you as that which he had procured for last year's tour, and that he is
economically wearing it to shreds on the present occasion. But this
is not so. The clothes were new when he left London; but he has been
assiduous with his rumpling and crumpling here as he has been with his
hat, and at the expiration of his first week out he is able to boast
to himself that he has, at any rate, got rid of the gloss. He wears
flannel shirts, and in warm weather goes about without a cravat. He
carries in his portmanteau a dress-coat, waistcoat, and trousers,
which are of no use to him, as who would think of asking such a man to
dinner? But, as he abhors the extra package which a decent hat would
make needful, he is to be seen in Paris, Vienna, or Florence with that
easily-recognized covering for his head which I have above described.
He has a bludgeon usually in his hand, and often a pipe in his mouth.
He knows nothing of gloves, but is very particular as to the breadth
and strength of his shoes. He often looks to be very dirty; but his
morning tub is a religious ceremony, and, besides that, he bathes
whenever he comes across a spot which, from its peculiar difficulties,
is more than ordinarily inappropriate for the exercise.
These tourists for fun are known well by all that large class of men
who are engaged in supplying the wants of summer travellers. No one
ever doubts their solvency; no innkeeper ever refuses them admittance;
no station-master or captain of a steamboat ever takes them for other
than they are. They are not suspected, but known; and therefore a
certain tether is allowed to them which is not to be exceeded. They
are looked after good-humouredly, and are so restrained that they
shall not be made to feel the restraint if the feeling can be spared
them. "Three mad Englishmen! They're all right. I've got my eye on
them. They won't do any harm?" That seems to be the ordinary language
which is held about them by those to whom falls the duty of watching
them and supplying their wants. The waiters were very good-natured to
them, patting them, as it were on the back, and treating them much
as though they were children. But it is understood that they must
have wherewithal to eat and to drink well, and that their bells must
be answered if any quiet is to be preserved in the houses. Sometimes
there will be a row, and the English pride will flare up and conceive
itself to have been insulted. The United Englishman who travels for
fun has a great idea of his country's power, and resents violently any
uncourteous interference with his vagaries. But it is so generally
known that the "mad Englishman" is all right, and that he won't do
any real harm if an eye be kept on him, that such rows seldom end
disastrously.