"It must do, since we can do no better; but he has his trunk curled up

and tucked into his mouth. That is unfortunate, and is calculated to

mislead, for of course he does not usually have it in that position."

He touched his bell.

"Alaric, have fifty thousand copies of this photograph made the first

thing in the morning, and mail them with the descriptive circulars."

Alaric retired to execute his orders. The inspector said:

"It will be necessary to offer a reward, of course. Now as to the

amount?"

"What sum would you suggest?"

"To begin with, I should say--well, twenty-five thousand dollars. It is

an intricate and difficult business; there are a thousand avenues of

escape and opportunities of concealment. These thieves have friends and

pals everywhere--"

"Bless me, do you know who they are?"

The wary face, practised in concealing the thoughts and feelings within,

gave me no token, nor yet the replying words, so quietly uttered:

"Never mind about that. I may, and I may not. We generally gather a

pretty shrewd inkling of who our man is by the manner of his work and the

size of the game he goes after. We are not dealing with a pickpocket or

a hall thief now, make up your mind to that. This property was not

'lifted' by a novice. But, as I was saying, considering the amount of

travel which will have to be done, and the diligence with which the

thieves will cover up their traces as they move along, twenty-five

thousand may be too small a sum to offer, yet I think it worth while to

start with that."

So we determined upon that figure as a beginning. Then this man, whom

nothing escaped which could by any possibility be made to serve as a

clue, said:

"There are cases in detective history to show that criminals have been

detected through peculiarities, in their appetites. Now, what does this

elephant eat, and how much?"

"Well, as to what he eats--he will eat anything. He will eat a man, he

will eat a Bible--he will eat anything between a man and a Bible."

"Good very good, indeed, but too general. Details are necessary--details

are the only valuable things in our trade. Very well--as to men. At one

meal--or, if you prefer, during one day--how man men will he eat, if

fresh?"

"He would not care whether they were fresh or not; at a single meal he

would eat five ordinary men.

"Very good; five men; we will put that down. What nationalities would he

prefer?"

"He is indifferent about nationalities. He prefers acquaintances, but is

not prejudiced against strangers."

"Very good. Now, as to Bibles. How many Bibles would he eat at a meal?"

"He would eat an entire edition."

"It is hardly succinct enough. Do you mean the ordinary octavo, or the

family illustrated?"

"I think he would be indifferent to illustrations that is, I think he

would not value illustrations above simple letterpress."

"No, you do not get my idea. I refer to bulk. The ordinary octavo Bible

weighs about two pound; and a half, while the great quarto with the

illustrations weighs ten or twelve. How many Dore Bibles would he eat at

a meal?"

"If you knew this elephant, you could not ask. He would take what they

had."

"Well, put it in dollars and cents, then. We must get at it somehow.

The Dore costs a hundred dollars a copy, Russia leather, beveled."

"He would require about fifty thousand dollars worth--say an edition of

five hundred copies."

"Now that is more exact. I will put that down. Very well; he likes men

and Bibles; so far, so good. What else will he eat? I want

particulars."

"He will leave Bibles to eat bricks, he will leave bricks to eat bottles,

he will leave bottles to eat clothing, he will leave clothing to eat

cats, he will leave cats to eat oysters, he will leave oysters to eat

ham, he will leave ham to eat sugar, he will leave sugar to eat pie, he

will leave pie to eat potatoes, he will leave potatoes to eat bran; he

will leave bran to eat hay, he will leave hay to eat oats, he will leave

oats to eat rice, for he was mainly raised on it. There is nothing

whatever that he will not eat but European butter, and he would eat that

if he could taste it."

"Very good. General quantity at a meal--say about--"

"Well, anywhere from a quarter to half a ton."

"And he drinks--"

"Everything that is fluid. Milk, water, whisky, molasses, castor oil,

camphene, carbolic acid--it is no use to go into particulars; whatever

fluid occurs to you set it down. He will drink anything that is fluid,

except European coffee."

"Very good. As to quantity?"

"Put it down five to fifteen barrels--his thirst varies; his other

appetites do not."

"These things are unusual. They ought to furnish quite good clues toward

tracing him."

He touched the bell.

"Alaric; summon Captain Burns."

Burns appeared. Inspector Blunt unfolded the whole matter to him, detail

by detail. Then he said in the clear, decisive tones of a man whose

plans are clearly defined in his head and who is accustomed to command:

"Captain Burns, detail Detectives Jones, Davis, Halsey, Bates, and

Hackett to shadow the elephant."

"Yes, sir."

"Detail Detectives Moses, Dakin, Murphy, Rogers, Tupper, Higgins, and

Bartholomew to shadow the thieves."

"Yes, sir."

"Place a strong guard--A guard of thirty picked men, with a relief of

thirty--over the place from whence the elephant was stolen, to keep

strict watch there night and day, and allow none to approach--except

reporters--without written authority from me."

"Yes, sir."

"Place detectives in plain clothes in the railway; steamship, and ferry

depots, and upon all roadways leading out of Jersey City, with orders to

search all suspicious persons."

"Yes, sir."

"Furnish all these men with photograph and accompanying description of

the elephant, and instruct them to search all trains and outgoing

ferryboats and other vessels."

"Yes, sir."

"If the elephant should be found, let him be seized, and the information

forwarded to me by telegraph."

"Yes, sir."

"Let me be informed at once if any clues should be found footprints of

the animal, or anything of that kind."

"Yes, sir."

"Get an order commanding the harbor police to patrol the frontages

vigilantly."

"Yes, sir."

"Despatch detectives in plain clothes over all the railways, north as far

as Canada, west as far as Ohio, south as far as Washington."

"Yes, sir."

"Place experts in all the telegraph offices to listen in to all messages;

and let them require that all cipher despatches be interpreted to them."

"Yes, sir."

"Let all these things be done with the utmost's secrecy--mind, the most

impenetrable secrecy."

"Yes, sir."

"Report to me promptly at the usual hour."

"Yes, Sir."

"Go!"

"Yes, sir."

He was gone.

Inspector Blunt was silent and thoughtful a moment, while the fire in his

eye cooled down and faded out. Then he turned to me and said in a placid

voice:

"I am not given to boasting, it is not my habit; but--we shall find the

elephant."

I shook him warmly by the hand and thanked him; and I felt my thanks,

too. The more I had seen of the man the more I liked him and the more I

admired him and marveled over the mysterious wonders of his profession.

Then we parted for the night, and I went home with a far happier heart

than I had carried with me to his office.

II

Next morning it was all in the newspapers, in the minutest detail. It

even had additions--consisting of Detective This, Detective That, and

Detective The Other's "Theory" as to how the robbery was done, who the

robbers were, and whither they had flown with their booty. There were

eleven of these theories, and they covered all the possibilities; and

this single fact shows what independent thinkers detectives are. No two

theories were alike, or even much resembled each other, save in one

striking particular, and in that one all the other eleven theories were

absolutely agreed. That was, that although the rear of my building was

torn out and the only door remained locked, the elephant had not been

removed through the rent, but by some other (undiscovered) outlet.

All agreed that the robbers had made that rent only to mislead the

detectives. That never would have occurred to me or to any other layman,

perhaps, but it had not deceived the detectives for a moment. Thus, what

I had supposed was the only thing that had no mystery about it was in

fact the very thing I had gone furthest astray in. The eleven theories

all named the supposed robbers, but no two named the same robbers; the

total number of suspected persons was thirty-seven. The various

newspaper accounts all closed with the most important opinion of all

--that of Chief Inspector Blunt. A portion of this statement read as

follows:

The chief knows who the two principals are, namely, "Brick" Daffy

and "Red" McFadden. Ten days before the robbery was achieved he was

already aware that it was to be attempted, and had quietly proceeded

to shadow these two noted villains; but unfortunately on the night

in question their track was lost, and before it could be found again

the bird was flown--that is, the elephant.

Daffy and McFadden are the boldest scoundrels in the profession; the

chief has reasons for believing that they are the men who stole the

stove out of the detective headquarters on a bitter night last

winter--in consequence of which the chief and every detective

present were in the hands of the physicians before morning, some

with frozen feet, others with frozen fingers, ears, and other

members.

When I read the first half of that I was more astonished than ever at the

wonderful sagacity of this strange man. He not only saw everything in

the present with a clear eye, but even the future could not be hidden

from him. I was soon at his office, and said I could not help wishing he

had had those men arrested, and so prevented the trouble and loss; but

his reply was simple and unanswerable:

"It is not our province to prevent crime, but to punish it. We cannot

punish it until it is committed."

I remarked that the secrecy with which we had begun had been marred by

the newspapers; not only all our facts but all our plans and purposes had

been revealed; even all the suspected persons had been named; these would

doubtless disguise themselves now, or go into hiding.

"Let them. They will find that when I am ready for them my hand will

descend upon them, in their secret places, as unerringly as the hand of

fate. As to the newspapers, we must keep in with them. Fame,

reputation, constant public mention--these are the detective's bread and

butter. He must publish his facts, else he will be supposed to have

none; he must publish his theory, for nothing is so strange or striking

as a detective's theory, or brings him so much wonderful respect; we must

publish our plans, for these the journals insist upon having, and we

could not deny them without offending. We must constantly show the

public what we are doing, or they will believe we are doing nothing.

It is much pleasanter to have a newspaper say, 'Inspector Blunt's

ingenious and extraordinary theory is as follows,' than to have it say

some harsh thing, or, worse still, some sarcastic one."

"I see the force of what you say. But I noticed that in one part of your

remarks in the papers this morning you refused to reveal your opinion

upon a certain minor point."

"Yes, we always do that; it has a good effect. Besides, I had not formed

any opinion on that point, anyway."

I deposited a considerable sum of money with the inspector, to meet

current expenses, and sat down to wait for news. We were expecting the

telegrams to begin to arrive at any moment now. Meantime I reread the

newspapers and also our descriptive circular, and observed that our

twenty-five thousand dollars reward seemed to be offered only to

detectives. I said I thought it ought to be offered to anybody who would

catch the elephant. The inspector said:

"It is the detectives who will find the elephant; hence the reward will

go to the right place. If other people found the animal, it would only

be by watching the detectives and taking advantage of clues and

indications stolen from them, and that would entitle the detectives to

the reward, after all. The proper office of a reward is to stimulate the

men who deliver up their time and their trained sagacities to this sort

of work, and not to confer benefits upon chance citizens who stumble upon

a capture without having earned the benefits by their own merits and

labors."

This was reasonable enough, certainly. Now the telegraphic machine in

the corner began to click, and the following despatch was the result:

FLOWER STATION, N. Y., 7.30 A.M.

Have got a clue. Found a succession of deep tracks across a farm

near here. Followed them two miles east without result; think

elephant went west. Shall now shadow him in that direction.

DARLEY, Detective.

"Darley's one of the best men on the force," said the inspector. "We

shall hear from him again before long."

Telegram No. 2 came:

BARKER'S, N. J., 7.40 A.M.

Just arrived. Glass factory broken open here during night, and

eight hundred bottles taken. Only water in large quantity near here

is five miles distant. Shall strike for there. Elephant will be

thirsty. Bottles were empty.

DARLEY, Detective.

"That promises well, too," said the inspector.

"I told you the creature's appetites would not be bad clues."

Telegram No. 3:

TAYLORVILLE, L. I. 8.15 A.M.

A haystack near here disappeared during night. Probably eaten.

Have got a clue, and am off.

HUBBARD, Detective.

"How he does move around!" said the inspector "I knew we had a difficult

job on hand, but we shall catch him yet."

FLOWER STATION, N. Y., 9 A.M.

Shadowed the tracks three miles westward. Large, deep, and ragged.

Have just met a farmer who says they are not elephant-tracks. Says

they are holes where he dug up saplings for shade-trees when ground

was frozen last winter. Give me orders how to proceed.

DARLEY, Detective.

"Aha! a confederate of the thieves! The thing, grows warm," said the

inspector.

He dictated the following telegram to Darley:

Arrest the man and force him to name his pals. Continue to follow

the tracks to the Pacific, if necessary.

Chief BLUNT.

Next telegram:

CONEY POINT, PA., 8.45 A.M.

Gas office broken open here during night and three month; unpaid gas

bills taken. Have got a clue and am away.

MURPHY, Detective.

"Heavens!" said the inspector; "would he eat gas bills?"

"Through ignorance--yes; but they cannot support life. At least,

unassisted."

Now came this exciting telegram:

IRONVILLE, N. Y., 9.30 A.M.

Just arrived. This village in consternation. Elephant passed

through here at five this morning. Some say he went east some say

west, some north, some south--but all say they did not wait to

notice, particularly. He killed a horse; have secure a piece of it

for a clue. Killed it with his trunk; from style of blow, think he

struck it left-handed. From position in which horse lies, think

elephant traveled northward along line Berkley Railway. Has four

and a half hours' start, but I move on his track at once.

HAWES, Detective

I uttered exclamations of joy. The inspector was as self-contained as a

graven image. He calmly touched his bell.

"Alaric, send Captain Burns here."

Burns appeared.

"How many men are ready for instant orders?"

"Ninety-six, sir."

"Send them north at once. Let them concentrate along the line of the

Berkley road north of Ironville."

"Yes, sir."

"Let them conduct their movements with the utmost secrecy. As fast as

others are at liberty, hold them for orders."

"Yes, sir."

"Go!"

"Yes, sir."

Presently came another telegram:

SAGE CORNERS, N. Y., 10.30.

Just arrived. Elephant passed through here at 8.15. All escaped

from the town but a policeman. Apparently elephant did not strike

at policeman, but at the lamp-post. Got both. I have secured a

portion of the policeman as clue.

STUMM, Detective.

"So the elephant has turned westward," said the inspector. "However, he

will not escape, for my men are scattered all over that region."

The next telegram said:

GLOVER'S, 11.15

Just arrived. Village deserted, except sick and aged. Elephant passed

through three-quarters of an hour ago. The anti-temperance mass-meeting

was in session; he put his trunk in at a window and washed it out with

water from cistern. Some swallowed it--since dead; several drowned.

Detectives Cross and O'Shaughnessy were passing through town, but going

south--so missed elephant. Whole region for many miles around in terror

--people flying from their homes. Wherever they turn they meet elephant,

and many are killed.

BRANT, Detective.

I could have shed tears, this havoc so distressed me. But the inspector

only said:

"You see--we are closing in on him. He feels our presence; he has turned

eastward again."

Yet further troublous news was in store for us. The telegraph brought

this:

HOGANSPORT, 12.19.

Just arrived. Elephant passed through half an hour ago, creating

wildest fright and excitement. Elephant raged around streets; two

plumbers going by, killed one--other escaped. Regret general.

O'FLAHERTY, Detective.

"Now he is right in the midst of my men," said the inspector. "Nothing

can save him."

A succession of telegrams came from detectives who were scattered through

New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and who were following clues consisting of

ravaged barns, factories, and Sunday-school libraries, with high

hopes-hopes amounting to certainties, indeed. The inspector said:

"I wish I could communicate with them and order them north, but that is

impossible. A detective only visits a telegraph office to send his

report; then he is off again, and you don't know where to put your hand

on him."

Now came this despatch:

BRIDGEPORT, CT., 12.15.

Barnum offers rate of $4,000 a year for exclusive privilege of using

elephant as traveling advertising medium from now till detectives

find him. Wants to paste circus-posters on him. Desires immediate

answer.

BOGGS, Detective.

"That is perfectly absurd!" I exclaimed.

"Of course it is," said the inspector. "Evidently Mr. Barnum, who thinks

he is so sharp, does not know me--but I know him."

Then he dictated this answer to the despatch:

Mr. Barnum's offer declined. Make it $7,000 or nothing.

Chief BLUNT.

"There. We shall not have to wait long for an answer. Mr. Barnum is

not at home; he is in the telegraph office--it is his way when he has

business on hand. Inside of three--"

Done.--P. T. BARNUM.

So interrupted the clicking telegraphic instrument. Before I could make

a comment upon this extraordinary episode, the following despatch carried

my thoughts into another and very distressing channel:

BOLIVIA, N. Y., 12.50.

Elephant arrived here from the south and passed through toward the

forest at 11.50, dispersing a funeral on the way, and diminishing

the mourners by two. Citizens fired some small cannon-balls into

him, and they fled. Detective Burke and I arrived ten minutes

later, from the north, but mistook some excavations for footprints,

and so lost a good deal of time; but at last we struck the right

trail and followed it to the woods. We then got down on our hands

and knees and continued to keep a sharp eye on the track, and so

shadowed it into the brush. Burke was in advance. Unfortunately

the animal had stopped to rest; therefore, Burke having his head

down, intent upon the track, butted up against the elephant's hind

legs before he was aware of his vicinity. Burke instantly arose to

his feet, seized the tail, and exclaimed joyfully, "I claim the

re--" but got no further, for a single blow of the huge trunk laid

the brave fellow's fragments low in death. I fled rearward, and the

elephant turned and shadowed me to the edge of the wood, making

tremendous speed, and I should inevitably have been lost, but that

the remains of the funeral providentially intervened again and

diverted his attention. I have just learned that nothing of that

funeral is now left; but this is no loss, for there is abundance of

material for another. Meantime, the elephant has disappeared again.

MULROONEY, Detective.

We heard no news except from the diligent and confident detectives

scattered about New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Virginia--who

were all following fresh and encouraging clues--until shortly after

2 P.M., when this telegram came:

BAXTER CENTER, 2.15.

Elephant been here, plastered over with circus-bills, any broke up a

revival, striking down and damaging many who were on the point of

entering upon a better life. Citizens penned him up and established

a guard. When Detective Brown and I arrived, some time after, we

entered inclosure and proceeded to identify elephant by photograph

and description. All masks tallied exactly except one, which we

could not see--the boil-scar under armpit. To make sure, Brown

crept under to look, and was immediately brained--that is, head

crushed and destroyed, though nothing issued from debris. All fled

so did elephant, striking right and left with much effect. He

escaped, but left bold blood-track from cannon-wounds. Rediscovery

certain. He broke southward, through a dense forest.

BRENT, Detective.

That was the last telegram. At nightfall a fog shut down which was so

dense that objects but three feet away could not be discerned. This

lasted all night. The ferry-boats and even the omnibuses had to stop

running.

III

Next morning the papers were as full of detective theories as before;

they had all our tragic facts in detail also, and a great many more which

they had received from their telegraphic correspondents. Column after

column was occupied, a third of its way down, with glaring head-lines,

which it made my heart sick to read. Their general tone was like this:

THE WHITE ELEPHANT AT LARGE! HE MOVES UPON HIS FATAL MARCH WHOLE

VILLAGES DESERTED BY THEIR FRIGHT-STRICKEN OCCUPANTS! PALE TERROR

GOES BEFORE HIM, DEATH AND DEVASTATION FOLLOW AFTER! AFTER THESE,

THE DETECTIVES! BARNS DESTROYED, FACTORIES GUTTED, HARVESTS

DEVOURED, PUBLIC ASSEMBLAGES DISPERSED, ACCOMPANIED BY SCENES OF

CARNAGE IMPOSSIBLE TO DESCRIBE! THEORIES OF THIRTY-FOUR OF THE MOST

DISTINGUISHED DETECTIVES ON THE FORCES! THEORY OF CHIEF BLUNT!

"There!" said Inspector Blunt, almost betrayed into excitement, "this is

magnificent! This is the greatest windfall that any detective

organization ever had. The fame of it will travel to the ends of the

earth, and endure to the end of time, and my name with it."

But there was no joy for me. I felt as if I had committed all those red

crimes, and that the elephant was only my irresponsible agent. And how

the list had grown! In one place he had "interfered with an election and

killed five repeaters." He had followed this act with the destruction of

two pool fellows, named O'Donohue and McFlannigan, who had "found a

refuge in the home of the oppressed of all lands only the day before, and

were in the act of exercising for the first time the noble right of

American citizens at the polls, when stricken down by the relentless

hand of the Scourge of Siam." In another, he had "found a crazy

sensation-preacher preparing his next season's heroic attacks on the

dance, the theater, and other things which can't strike back, and had

stepped on him." And in still another place he had "killed a

lightning-rod agent." And so the list went on, growing redder and redder,

and more and more heartbreaking. Sixty persons had been killed, and two

hundred and forty wounded. All the accounts bore just testimony to the

activity and devotion of the detectives, and all closed with the remark

that "three hundred thousand citizen; and four detectives saw the dread

creature, and two of the latter he destroyed."

I dreaded to hear the telegraphic instrument begin to click again.

By and by the messages began to pour in, but I was happily disappointed

in they nature. It was soon apparent that all trace of the elephant was

lost. The fog had enabled him to search out a good hiding-place

unobserved. Telegrams from the most absurdly distant points reported

that a dim vast mass had been glimpsed there through the fog at such and

such an hour, and was "undoubtedly the elephant." This dim vast mass had

been glimpsed in New Haven, in New Jersey, in Pennsylvania, in interior

New York, in Brooklyn, and even in the city of New York itself! But in

all cases the dim vast mass had vanished quickly and left no trace.

Every detective of the large force scattered over this huge extent of

country sent his hourly report, and each and every one of them had a

clue, and was shadowing something, and was hot upon the heels of it.

But the day passed without other result.

The next day the same.

The next just the same.

The newspaper reports began to grow monotonous with facts that amounted

to nothing, clues which led to nothing, and theories which had nearly

exhausted the elements which surprise and delight and dazzle.

By advice of the inspector I doubled the reward.

Four more dull days followed. Then came a bitter blow to the poor,

hard-working detectives--the journalists declined to print their

theories, and coldly said, "Give us a rest."

Two weeks after the elephant's disappearance I raised the reward to

seventy-five thousand dollars by the inspector's advice. It was a great

sum, but I felt that I would rather sacrifice my whole private fortune

than lose my credit with my government. Now that the detectives were in

adversity, the newspapers turned upon them, and began to fling the most

stinging sarcasms at them. This gave the minstrels an idea, and they

dressed themselves as detectives and hunted the elephant on the stage in

the most extravagant way. The caricaturists made pictures of detectives

scanning the country with spy-glasses, while the elephant, at their

backs, stole apples out of their pockets. And they made all sorts of

ridiculous pictures of the detective badge--you have seen that badge

printed in gold on the back of detective novels, no doubt it is a

wide-staring eye, with the legend, "WE NEVER SLEEP." When detectives

called for a drink, the would-be facetious barkeeper resurrected an

obsolete form of expression and said, "Will you have an eye-opener?"

All the air was thick with sarcasms.

But there was one man who moved calm, untouched, unaffected, through it

all. It was that heart of oak, the chief inspector. His brave eye never

drooped, his serene confidence never wavered. He always said:

"Let them rail on; he laughs best who laughs last."

My admiration for the man grew into a species of worship. I was at his

side always. His office had become an unpleasant place to me, and now

became daily more and more so. Yet if he could endure it I meant to do

so also--at least, as long as I could. So I came regularly, and stayed

--the only outsider who seemed to be capable of it. Everybody wondered

how I could; and often it seemed to me that I must desert, but at such

times I looked into that calm and apparently unconscious face, and held

my ground.

About three weeks after the elephant's disappearance I was about to say,

one morning, that I should have to strike my colors and retire, when the

great detective arrested the thought by proposing one more superb and

masterly move.

This was to compromise with the robbers. The fertility of this man's

invention exceeded anything I have ever seen, and I have had a wide

intercourse with the world's finest minds. He said he was confident he

could compromise for one hundred thousand dollars and recover the

elephant. I said I believed I could scrape the amount together, but what

would become of the poor detectives who had worked so faithfully? He

said:

"In compromises they always get half."

This removed my only objection. So the inspector wrote two notes, in

this form:

DEAR MADAM,--Your husband can make a large sum of money (and be

entirely protected from the law) by making an immediate, appointment

with me. Chief BLUNT.

He sent one of these by his confidential messenger to the "reputed wife"

of Brick Duffy, and the other to the reputed wife of Red McFadden.

Within the hour these offensive answers came:

YE OWLD FOOL: brick Duffys bin ded 2 yere.

BRIDGET MAHONEY.

CHIEF BAT,--Red McFadden is hung and in heving 18 month. Any Ass

but a detective know that.

MARY O'HOOLIGAN.

"I had long suspected these facts," said the inspector; "this testimony

proves the unerring accuracy of my instinct."

The moment one resource failed him he was ready with another. He

immediately wrote an advertisement for the morning papers, and I kept a

copy of it:

A.--xWhlv. 242 ht. Tjnd--fz328wmlg. Ozpo,--2 m! 2m!. M! ogw.

He said that if the thief was alive this would bring him to the usual

rendezvous. He further explained that the usual rendezvous was a glare

where all business affairs between detectives and criminals were

conducted. This meeting would take place at twelve the next night.

We could do nothing till then, and I lost no time in getting out of the

office, and was grateful indeed for the privilege.

At eleven the next night I brought one hundred thousand dollars in

bank-notes and put them into the chief's hands, and shortly afterward he

took his leave, with the brave old undimmed confidence in his eye.

An almost intolerable hour dragged to a close; then I heard his welcome

tread, and rose gasping and tottered to meet him. How his fine eyes

flamed with triumph! He said:

"We've compromised! The jokers will sing a different tune to-morrow!

Follow me!"

He took a lighted candle and strode down into the vast vaulted basement

where sixty detectives always slept, and where a score were now playing

cards to while the time. I followed close after him. He walked swiftly

down to the dim and remote end of the place, and just as I succumbed to

the pangs of suffocation and was swooning away he stumbled and fell over

the outlying members of a mighty object, and I heard him exclaim as he

went down:

"Our noble profession is vindicated. Here is your elephant!"

I was carried to the office above and restored with carbolic acid. The

whole detective force swarmed in, and such another season of triumphant

rejoicing ensued as I had never witnessed before. The reporters were

called, baskets of champagne were opened, toasts were drunk, the

handshakings and congratulations were continuous and enthusiastic.

Naturally the chief was the hero of the hour, and his happiness was so

complete and had been so patiently and worthily and bravely won that it

made me happy to see it, though I stood there a homeless beggar, my

priceless charge dead, and my position in my country's service lost to me

through what would always seem my fatally careless execution of a great

trust. Many an eloquent eye testified its deep admiration for the chief,

and many a detective's voice murmured, "Look at him--just the king of the

profession; only give him a clue, it's all he wants, and there ain't

anything hid that he can't find." The dividing of the fifty thousand

dollars made great pleasure; when it was finished the chief made a little

speech while he put his share in his pocket, in which he said, "Enjoy it,

boys, for you've earned it; and, more than that, you've earned for the

detective profession undying fame."

A telegram arrived, which read:

MONROE, MICH., 10 P.M.

First time I've struck a telegraph office in over three weeks. Have

followed those footprints, horseback, through the woods, a thousand miles

to here, and they get stronger and bigger and fresher every day. Don't

worry-inside of another week I'll have the elephant. This is dead sure.

DARLEY, Detective.

The chief ordered three cheers for "Darley, one of the finest minds on

the force," and then commanded that he be telegraphed to come home and

receive his share of the reward.

So ended that marvelous episode of the stolen elephant. The newspapers

were pleasant with praises once more, the next day, with one contemptible

exception. This sheet said, "Great is the detective! He may be a little

slow in finding a little thing like a mislaid elephant he may hunt him

all day and sleep with his rotting carcass all night for three weeks, but

he will find him at last if he can get the man who mislaid him to show

him the place!"

Poor Hassan was lost to me forever. The cannonshots had wounded him

fatally, he had crept to that unfriendly place in the fog, and there,

surrounded by his enemies and in constant danger of detection, he had

wasted away with hunger and suffering till death gave him peace.

The compromise cost me one hundred thousand dollars; my detective

expenses were forty-two thousand dollars more; I never applied for a

place again under my government; I am a ruined man and a wanderer on the

earth but my admiration for that man, whom I believe to be the greatest

detective the world has ever produced, remains undimmed to this day, and

will so remain unto the end.

E-----------------------------------------------------------------------

A TRAMP ABROAD

By Mark Twain

(Samuel L. Clemens)

First published in 1880

* * * * * *

CHAPTER I

[The Knighted Knave of Bergen]

One day it occurred to me that it had been many years

since the world had been afforded the spectacle of a man

adventurous enough to undertake a journey through Europe

on foot. After much thought, I decided that I was

a person fitted to furnish to mankind this spectacle.

So I determined to do it. This was in March, 1878.

I looked about me for the right sort of person to

accompany me in the capacity of agent, and finally

hired a Mr. Harris for this service.

It was also my purpose to study art while in Europe.

Mr. Harris was in sympathy with me in this. He was as much

of an enthusiast in art as I was, and not less anxious

to learn to paint. I desired to learn the German language;

so did Harris.

Toward the middle of April we sailed in the HOLSATIA,

Captain Brandt, and had a very peasant trip, indeed.

After a brief rest at Hamburg, we made preparations for

a long pedestrian trip southward in the soft spring weather,

but at the last moment we changed the program,

for private reasons, and took the express-train.

We made a short halt at Frankfort-on-the-Main, and found

it an interesting city. I would have liked to visit

the birthplace of Gutenburg, but it could not be done,

as no memorandum of the site of the house has been kept.

So we spent an hour in the Goethe mansion instead.

The city permits this house to belong to private parties,

instead of gracing and dignifying herself with the honor

of possessing and protecting it.

Frankfort is one of the sixteen cities which have

the distinction of being the place where the following

incident occurred. Charlemagne, while chasing the Saxons

(as HE said), or being chased by them (as THEY said),

arrived at the bank of the river at dawn, in a fog.

The enemy were either before him or behind him;

but in any case he wanted to get across, very badly.

He would have given anything for a guide, but none was to

be had. Presently he saw a deer, followed by her young,

approach the water. He watched her, judging that she

would seek a ford, and he was right. She waded over,

and the army followed. So a great Frankish victory or

defeat was gained or avoided; and in order to commemorate

the episode, Charlemagne commanded a city to be built there,

which he named Frankfort--the ford of the Franks.

None of the other cities where this event happened were

named for it. This is good evidence that Frankfort was

the first place it occurred at.

Frankfort has another distinction--it is the birthplace

of the German alphabet; or at least of the German word

for alphabet --BUCHSTABEN. They say that the first movable

types were made on birch sticks--BUCHSTABE--hence the name.

I was taught a lesson in political economy in Frankfort.

I had brought from home a box containing a thousand

very cheap cigars. By way of experiment, I stepped

into a little shop in a queer old back street, took four

gaily decorated boxes of wax matches and three cigars,

and laid down a silver piece worth 48 cents. The man gave

me 43 cents change.

In Frankfort everybody wears clean clothes, and I think we

noticed that this strange thing was the case in Hamburg, too,

and in the villages along the road. Even in the narrowest

and poorest and most ancient quarters of Frankfort neat

and clean clothes were the rule. The little children

of both sexes were nearly always nice enough to take into

a body's lap. And as for the uniforms of the soldiers,

they were newness and brightness carried to perfection.

One could never detect a smirch or a grain of dust

upon them. The street-car conductors and drivers wore

pretty uniforms which seemed to be just out of the bandbox,

and their manners were as fine as their clothes.

In one of the shops I had the luck to stumble upon a book

which has charmed me nearly to death. It is entitled

THE LEGENDS OF THE RHINE FROM BASLE TO ROTTERDAM,

by F. J. Kiefer; translated by L. W. Garnham, B.A.

All tourists MENTION the Rhine legends--in that sort of way

which quietly pretends that the mentioner has been familiar

with them all his life, and that the reader cannot possibly

be ignorant of them--but no tourist ever TELLS them.

So this little book fed me in a very hungry place; and I,

in my turn, intend to feed my reader, with one or two

little lunches from the same larder. I shall not mar

Garnharn's translation by meddling with its English;

for the most toothsome thing about it is its quaint

fashion of building English sentences on the German plan

--and punctuating them accordingly to no plan at all.

In the chapter devoted to "Legends of Frankfort,"

I find the following:

"THE KNAVE OF BERGEN"

"In Frankfort at the Romer was a great mask-ball, at

the coronation festival, and in the illuminated saloon,

the clanging music invited to dance, and splendidly

appeared the rich toilets and charms of the ladies,

and the festively costumed Princes and Knights.

All seemed pleasure, joy, and roguish gaiety, only one of the

numerous guests had a gloomy exterior; but exactly the black

armor in which he walked about excited general attention,

and his tall figure, as well as the noble propriety of

his movements, attracted especially the regards of the ladies.

Who the Knight was? Nobody could guess, for his Vizier

was well closed, and nothing made him recognizable.

Proud and yet modest he advanced to the Empress; bowed on

one knee before her seat, and begged for the favor of a

waltz with the Queen of the festival. And she allowed

his request. With light and graceful steps he danced

through the long saloon, with the sovereign who thought

never to have found a more dexterous and excellent dancer.

But also by the grace of his manner, and fine conversation

he knew to win the Queen, and she graciously accorded him

a second dance for which he begged, a third, and a fourth,

as well as others were not refused him. How all regarded

the happy dancer, how many envied him the high favor;

how increased curiosity, who the masked knight could be.

"Also the Emperor became more and more excited with curiosity,

and with great suspense one awaited the hour, when according

to mask-law, each masked guest must make himself known.

This moment came, but although all other unmasked;

the secret knight still refused to allow his features

to be seen, till at last the Queen driven by curiosity,

and vexed at the obstinate refusal; commanded him to open

his Vizier. He opened it, and none of the high ladies

and knights knew him. But from the crowded spectators,

2 officials advanced, who recognized the black dancer,

and horror and terror spread in the saloon, as they said who

the supposed knight was. It was the executioner of Bergen.

But glowing with rage, the King commanded to seize the

criminal and lead him to death, who had ventured to dance,

with the queen; so disgraced the Empress, and insulted

the crown. The culpable threw himself at the Emperor,

and said--

"'Indeed I have heavily sinned against all noble guests

assembled here, but most heavily against you my sovereign

and my queen. The Queen is insulted by my haughtiness

equal to treason, but no punishment even blood, will not

be able to wash out the disgrace, which you have suffered

by me. Therefore oh King! allow me to propose a remedy,

to efface the shame, and to render it as if not done.

Draw your sword and knight me, then I will throw down

my gauntlet, to everyone who dares to speak disrespectfully

of my king.'

"The Emperor was surprised at this bold proposal,

however it appeared the wisest to him; 'You are a knave

he replied after a moment's consideration, however your

advice is good, and displays prudence, as your offense

shows adventurous courage. Well then, and gave him the

knight-stroke so I raise you to nobility, who begged for

grace for your offense now kneels before me, rise as knight;

knavish you have acted, and Knave of Bergen shall you

be called henceforth, and gladly the Black knight rose;

three cheers were given in honor of the Emperor,

and loud cries of joy testified the approbation with

which the Queen danced still once with the Knave of Bergen."

CHAPTER II

Heidelberg

[Landing a Monarch at Heidelberg]

We stopped at a hotel by the railway-station. Next morning,

as we sat in my room waiting for breakfast to come up,

we got a good deal interested in something which was

going on over the way, in front of another hotel.

First, the personage who is called the PORTIER (who is

not the PORTER, but is a sort of first-mate of a hotel)

[1. See Appendix A] appeared at the door in a spick-and-span

new blue cloth uniform, decorated with shining brass buttons,

and with bands of gold lace around his cap and wristbands;

and he wore white gloves, too. He shed an official glance

upon the situation, and then began to give orders.

Two women-servants came out with pails and brooms

and brushes, and gave the sidewalk a thorough scrubbing;

meanwhile two others scrubbed the four marble steps

which led up to the door; beyond these we could see some

men-servants taking up the carpet of the grand staircase.

This carpet was carried away and the last grain of dust

beaten and banged and swept out of it; then brought back

and put down again. The brass stair-rods received an

exhaustive polishing and were returned to their places.

Now a troop of servants brought pots and tubs

of blooming plants and formed them into a beautiful

jungle about the door and the base of the staircase.

Other servants adorned all the balconies of the various

stories with flowers and banners; others ascended

to the roof and hoisted a great flag on a staff there.

Now came some more chamber-maids and retouched the sidewalk,

and afterward wiped the marble steps with damp cloths

and finished by dusting them off with feather brushes.

Now a broad black carpet was brought out and laid down the

marble steps and out across the sidewalk to the curbstone.

The PORTIER cast his eye along it, and found it was not

absolutely straight; he commanded it to be straightened;

the servants made the effort--made several efforts,

in fact--but the PORTIER was not satisfied. He finally

had it taken up, and then he put it down himself and got

it right.

At this stage of the proceedings, a narrow bright

red carpet was unrolled and stretched from the top

of the marble steps to the curbstone, along the center

of the black carpet. This red path cost the PORTIER

more trouble than even the black one had done. But he

patiently fixed and refixed it until it was exactly right

and lay precisely in the middle of the black carpet.

In New York these performances would have gathered a mighty

crowd of curious and intensely interested spectators;

but here it only captured an audience of half a dozen

little boys who stood in a row across the pavement,

some with their school-knapsacks on their backs and their

hands in their pockets, others with arms full of bundles,

and all absorbed in the show. Occasionally one of them

skipped irreverently over the carpet and took up a position

on the other side. This always visibly annoyed the PORTIER.

Now came a waiting interval. The landlord, in plain clothes,

and bareheaded, placed himself on the bottom marble step,

abreast the PORTIER, who stood on the other end of the

same steps; six or eight waiters, gloved, bareheaded,

and wearing their whitest linen, their whitest cravats,

and their finest swallow-tails, grouped themselves

about these chiefs, but leaving the carpetway clear.

Nobody moved or spoke any more but only waited.

In a short time the shrill piping of a coming train was heard,

and immediately groups of people began to gather in the street.

Two or three open carriages arrived, and deposited some

maids of honor and some male officials at the hotel.

Presently another open carriage brought the Grand Duke

of Baden, a stately man in uniform, who wore the handsome

brass-mounted, steel-spiked helmet of the army on his head.

Last came the Empress of Germany and the Grand Duchess

of Baden in a closed carriage; these passed through the

low-bowing groups of servants and disappeared in the hotel,

exhibiting to us only the backs of their heads, and then

the show was over.

It appears to be as difficult to land a monarch as it

is to launch a ship.

But as to Heidelberg. The weather was growing pretty warm,

--very warm, in fact. So we left the valley and took

quarters at the Schloss Hotel, on the hill, above the Castle.

Heidelberg lies at the mouth of a narrow gorge--a gorge

the shape of a shepherd's crook; if one looks up it he

perceives that it is about straight, for a mile and a half,

then makes a sharp curve to the right and disappears.

This gorge--along whose bottom pours the swift Neckar

--is confined between (or cloven through) a couple of long,

steep ridges, a thousand feet high and densely wooded

clear to their summits, with the exception of one section

which has been shaved and put under cultivation.

These ridges are chopped off at the mouth of the gorge

and form two bold and conspicuous headlands, with Heidelberg

nestling between them; from their bases spreads away

the vast dim expanse of the Rhine valley, and into this

expanse the Neckar goes wandering in shining curves and is

presently lost to view.

Now if one turns and looks up the gorge once more, he will

see the Schloss Hotel on the right perched on a precipice

overlooking the Neckar--a precipice which is so sumptuously

cushioned and draped with foliage that no glimpse of the

rock appears. The building seems very airily situated.

It has the appearance of being on a shelf half-way up

the wooded mountainside; and as it is remote and isolated,

and very white, it makes a strong mark against the lofty

leafy rampart at its back.

This hotel had a feature which was a decided novelty,

and one which might be adopted with advantage by any house

which is perched in a commanding situation. This feature

may be described as a series of glass-enclosed parlors

CLINGING TO THE OUTSIDE OF THE HOUSE, one against each

and every bed-chamber and drawing-room. They are like long,

narrow, high-ceiled bird-cages hung against the building.

My room was a corner room, and had two of these things,

a north one and a west one.

From the north cage one looks up the Neckar gorge;

from the west one he looks down it. This last affords

the most extensive view, and it is one of the loveliest

that can be imagined, too. Out of a billowy upheaval of

vivid green foliage, a rifle-shot removed, rises the huge

ruin of Heidelberg Castle, [2. See Appendix B] with empty window

arches,

ivy-mailed battlements, moldering towers--the Lear of

inanimate nature--deserted, discrowned, beaten by the storms,

but royal still, and beautiful. It is a fine sight to see

the evening sunlight suddenly strike the leafy declivity

at the Castle's base and dash up it and drench it as with

a luminous spray, while the adjacent groves are in deep shadow.

Behind the Castle swells a great dome-shaped hill,

forest-clad, and beyond that a nobler and loftier one.

The Castle looks down upon the compact brown-roofed town;

and from the town two picturesque old bridges span

the river. Now the view broadens; through the gateway

of the sentinel headlands you gaze out over the wide

Rhine plain, which stretches away, softly and richly tinted,

grows gradually and dreamily indistinct, and finally melts

imperceptibly into the remote horizon.

I have never enjoyed a view which had such a serene

and satisfying charm about it as this one gives.

The first night we were there, we went to bed and to

sleep early; but I awoke at the end of two or three hours,

and lay a comfortable while listening to the soothing

patter of the rain against the balcony windows.

I took it to be rain, but it turned out to be only the

murmur of the restless Neckar, tumbling over her dikes

and dams far below, in the gorge. I got up and went

into the west balcony and saw a wonderful sight.

Away down on the level under the black mass of the Castle,

the town lay, stretched along the river, its intricate

cobweb of streets jeweled with twinkling lights;

there were rows of lights on the bridges; these flung

lances of light upon the water, in the black shadows

of the arches; and away at the extremity of all this

fairy spectacle blinked and glowed a massed multitude

of gas-jets which seemed to cover acres of ground;

it was as if all the diamonds in the world had been spread

out there. I did not know before, that a half-mile

of sextuple railway-tracks could be made such an adornment.

One thinks Heidelberg by day--with its surroundings

--is the last possibility of the beautiful; but when he

sees Heidelberg by night, a fallen Milky Way, with that

glittering railway constellation pinned to the border,

he requires time to consider upon the verdict.

One never tires of poking about in the dense woods that

clothe all these lofty Neckar hills to their beguiling

and impressive charm in any country; but German legends

and fairy tales have given these an added charm.

They have peopled all that region with gnomes, and dwarfs,

and all sorts of mysterious and uncanny creatures.

At the time I am writing of, I had been reading so much

of this literature that sometimes I was not sure but I

was beginning to believe in the gnomes and fairies

as realities.

One afternoon I got lost in the woods about a mile from

the hotel, and presently fell into a train of dreamy thought

about animals which talk, and kobolds, and enchanted folk,

and the rest of the pleasant legendary stuff; and so,

by stimulating my fancy, I finally got to imagining I

glimpsed small flitting shapes here and there down the

columned aisles of the forest. It was a place which was

peculiarly meet for the occasion. It was a pine wood,

with so thick and soft a carpet of brown needles that one's

footfall made no more sound than if he were treading

on wool; the tree-trunks were as round and straight

and smooth as pillars, and stood close together;

they were bare of branches to a point about twenty-five

feet above-ground, and from there upward so thick with

boughs that not a ray of sunlight could pierce through.

The world was bright with sunshine outside, but a deep

and mellow twilight reigned in there, and also a deep

silence so profound that I seemed to hear my own breathings.

When I had stood ten minutes, thinking and imagining,

and getting my spirit in tune with the place, and in the

right mood to enjoy the supernatural, a raven suddenly

uttered a horse croak over my head. It made me start;

and then I was angry because I started. I looked up,

and the creature was sitting on a limb right over me,

looking down at me. I felt something of the same sense

of humiliation and injury which one feels when he finds

that a human stranger has been clandestinely inspecting

him in his privacy and mentally commenting upon him.

I eyed the raven, and the raven eyed me. Nothing was said

during some seconds. Then the bird stepped a little way

along his limb to get a better point of observation,

lifted his wings, stuck his head far down below his

shoulders toward me and croaked again--a croak with a

distinctly insulting expression about it. If he had

spoken in English he could not have said any more plainly

that he did say in raven, "Well, what do YOU want here?"

I felt as foolish as if I had been caught in some mean act

by a responsible being, and reproved for it. However, I

made no reply; I would not bandy words with a raven.

The adversary waited a while, with his shoulders still lifted,

his head thrust down between them, and his keen bright eye

fixed on me; then he threw out two or three more insults,

which I could not understand, further than that I

knew a portion of them consisted of language not used

in church.

I still made no reply. Now the adversary raised his head

and called. There was an answering croak from a little

distance in the wood--evidently a croak of inquiry.

The adversary explained with enthusiasm, and the other raven

dropped everything and came. The two sat side by side

on the limb and discussed me as freely and offensively

as two great naturalists might discuss a new kind of bug.

The thing became more and more embarrassing. They called

in another friend. This was too much. I saw that they

had the advantage of me, and so I concluded to get out

of the scrape by walking out of it. They enjoyed my

defeat as much as any low white people could have done.

They craned their necks and laughed at me (for a raven

CAN laugh, just like a man), they squalled insulting remarks

after me as long as they could see me. They were nothing

but ravens--I knew that--what they thought of me could

be a matter of no consequence--and yet when even a raven

shouts after you, "What a hat!" "Oh, pull down your vest!"

and that sort of thing, it hurts you and humiliates you,

and there is no getting around it with fine reasoning and

pretty arguments.

Animals talk to each other, of course. There can be no

question about that; but I suppose there are very few

people who can understand them. I never knew but one man

who could. I knew he could, however, because he told

me so himself. He was a middle-aged, simple-hearted

miner who had lived in a lonely corner of California,

among the woods and mountains, a good many years,

and had studied the ways of his only neighbors, the beasts

and the birds, until he believed he could accurately

translate any remark which they made. This was Jim Baker.

According to Jim Baker, some animals have only a

limited education, and some use only simple words,

and scarcely ever a comparison or a flowery figure;

whereas, certain other animals have a large vocabulary,

a fine command of language and a ready and fluent delivery;

consequently these latter talk a great deal; they like it;

they are so conscious of their talent, and they enjoy

"showing off." Baker said, that after long and careful

observation, he had come to the conclusion that the bluejays

were the best talkers he had found among birds and beasts. Said

he:

"There's more TO a bluejay than any other creature.

He has got more moods, and more different kinds

of feelings than other creatures; and, mind you,

whatever a bluejay feels, he can put into language.

And no mere commonplace language, either, but rattling,

out-and-out book-talk--and bristling with metaphor,

too--just bristling! And as for command of language--why

YOU never see a bluejay get stuck for a word. No man

ever did. They just boil out of him! And another thing:

I've noticed a good deal, and there's no bird, or cow,

or anything that uses as good grammar as a bluejay.

You may say a cat uses good grammar. Well, a cat

does--but you let a cat get excited once; you let a cat

get to pulling fur with another cat on a shed, nights,

and you'll hear grammar that will give you the lockjaw.

Ignorant people think it's the NOISE which fighting

cats make that is so aggravating, but it ain't so;

it's the sickening grammar they use. Now I've never heard

a jay use bad grammar but very seldom; and when they do,

they are as ashamed as a human; they shut right down

and leave.

"You may call a jay a bird. Well, so he is, in a measure

--but he's got feathers on him, and don't belong to no church,

perhaps; but otherwise he is just as much human as you be.

And I'll tell you for why. A jay's gifts, and instincts,

and feelings, and interests, cover the whole ground.

A jay hasn't got any more principle than a Congressman.

A jay will lie, a jay will steal, a jay will deceive,

a jay will betray; and four times out of five, a jay

will go back on his solemnest promise. The sacredness

of an obligation is such a thing which you can't cram

into no bluejay's head. Now, on top of all this,

there's another thing; a jay can out-swear any gentleman

in the mines. You think a cat can swear. Well, a cat can;

but you give a bluejay a subject that calls for his

reserve-powers, and where is your cat? Don't talk to ME--I

know too much about this thing; in the one little particular

of scolding--just good, clean, out-and-out scolding

--a bluejay can lay over anything, human or divine.

Yes, sir, a jay is everything that a man is. A jay can cry,

a jay can laugh, a jay can feel shame, a jay can reason

and plan and discuss, a jay likes gossip and scandal,

a jay has got a sense of humor, a jay knows when he is

an ass just as well as you do--maybe better. If a jay

ain't human, he better take in his sign, that's all.

Now I'm going to tell you a perfectly true fact about

some bluejays."

CHAPTER III

Baker's Bluejay Yarn

[What Stumped the Blue Jays]

"When I first begun to understand jay language correctly,

there was a little incident happened here. Seven years ago,

the last man in this region but me moved away. There stands

his house--been empty ever since; a log house, with a plank

roof--just one big room, and no more; no ceiling--nothing

between the rafters and the floor. Well, one Sunday

morning I was sitting out here in front of my cabin,

with my cat, taking the sun, and looking at the blue hills,

and listening to the leaves rustling so lonely in the trees,

and thinking of the home away yonder in the states,

that I hadn't heard from in thirteen years, when a bluejay

lit on that house, with an acorn in his mouth, and says,

'Hello, I reckon I've struck something.' When he spoke,

the acorn dropped out of his mouth and rolled down the roof,

of course, but he didn't care; his mind was all on the

thing he had struck. It was a knot-hole in the roof.

He cocked his head to one side, shut one eye and put the

other one to the hole, like a possum looking down a jug;

then he glanced up with his bright eyes, gave a wink

or two with his wings--which signifies gratification,

you understand--and says, 'It looks like a hole,

it's located like a hole--blamed if I don't believe it IS

a hole!'

"Then he cocked his head down and took another look;

he glances up perfectly joyful, this time; winks his wings

and his tail both, and says, 'Oh, no, this ain't no fat thing,

I reckon! If I ain't in luck! --Why it's a perfectly

elegant hole!' So he flew down and got that acorn,

and fetched it up and dropped it in, and was just tilting

his head back, with the heavenliest smile on his face,

when all of a sudden he was paralyzed into a listening

attitude and that smile faded gradually out of his

countenance like breath off'n a razor, and the queerest

look of surprise took its place. Then he says, 'Why, I

didn't hear it fall!' He cocked his eye at the hole again,

and took a long look; raised up and shook his head;

stepped around to the other side of the hole and took

another look from that side; shook his head again.

He studied a while, then he just went into the Details

--walked round and round the hole and spied into it from every

point of the compass. No use. Now he took a thinking

attitude on the comb of the roof and scratched the back

of his head with his right foot a minute, and finally says,

'Well, it's too many for ME, that's certain; must be

a mighty long hole; however, I ain't got no time to fool

around here, I got to "tend to business"; I reckon it's

all right--chance it, anyway.'

"So he flew off and fetched another acorn and dropped

it in, and tried to flirt his eye to the hole quick

enough to see what become of it, but he was too late.

He held his eye there as much as a minute; then he raised

up and sighed, and says, 'Confound it, I don't seem

to understand this thing, no way; however, I'll tackle

her again.' He fetched another acorn, and done his level

best to see what become of it, but he couldn't. He says,

'Well, I never struck no such a hole as this before;

I'm of the opinion it's a totally new kind of a hole.'

Then he begun to get mad. He held in for a spell,

walking up and down the comb of the roof and shaking

his head and muttering to himself; but his feelings got

the upper hand of him, presently, and he broke loose

and cussed himself black in the face. I never see a bird

take on so about a little thing. When he got through he

walks to the hole and looks in again for half a minute;

then he says, 'Well, you're a long hole, and a deep hole,

and a mighty singular hole altogether--but I've started

in to fill you, and I'm damned if I DON'T fill you, if it

takes a hundred years!'

"And with that, away he went. You never see a bird work

so since you was born. He laid into his work like a nigger,

and the way he hove acorns into that hole for about

two hours and a half was one of the most exciting and

astonishing spectacles I ever struck. He never stopped

to take a look anymore--he just hove 'em in and went

for more. Well, at last he could hardly flop his wings,

he was so tuckered out. He comes a-dropping down, once more,

sweating like an ice-pitcher, dropped his acorn in and says,

'NOW I guess I've got the bulge on you by this time!'

So he bent down for a look. If you'll believe me,

when his head come up again he was just pale with rage.

He says, 'I've shoveled acorns enough in there to keep

the family thirty years, and if I can see a sign of one

of 'em I wish I may land in a museum with a belly full

of sawdust in two minutes!'

"He just had strength enough to crawl up on to the

comb and lean his back agin the chimbly, and then he

collected his impressions and begun to free his mind.

I see in a second that what I had mistook for profanity

in the mines was only just the rudiments, as you may say.

"Another jay was going by, and heard him doing his devotions,

and stops to inquire what was up. The sufferer told him

the whole circumstance, and says, 'Now yonder's the hole,

and if you don't believe me, go and look for yourself.'

So this fellow went and looked, and comes back and says,

'How many did you say you put in there?' 'Not any less

than two tons,' says the sufferer. The other jay went

and looked again. He couldn't seem to make it out, so he

raised a yell, and three more jays come. They all examined

the hole, they all made the sufferer tell it over again,

then they all discussed it, and got off as many leather-headed

opinions about it as an average crowd of humans could

have done.

"They called in more jays; then more and more, till pretty

soon this whole region 'peared to have a blue flush about it.

There must have been five thousand of them; and such

another jawing and disputing and ripping and cussing,

you never heard. Every jay in the whole lot put his

eye to the hole and delivered a more chuckle-headed

opinion about the mystery than the jay that went there

before him. They examined the house all over, too.

The door was standing half open, and at last one old jay

happened to go and light on it and look in. Of course,

that knocked the mystery galley-west in a second.

There lay the acorns, scattered all over the floor..

He flopped his wings and raised a whoop. 'Come here!'

he says, 'Come here, everybody; hang'd if this fool hasn't

been trying to fill up a house with acorns!' They all came

a-swooping down like a blue cloud, and as each fellow

lit on the door and took a glance, the whole absurdity

of the contract that that first jay had tackled hit him

home and he fell over backward suffocating with laughter,

and the next jay took his place and done the same.

"Well, sir, they roosted around here on the housetop

and the trees for an hour, and guffawed over that thing

like human beings. It ain't any use to tell me a bluejay

hasn't got a sense of humor, because I know better.

And memory, too. They brought jays here from all over

the United States to look down that hole, every summer

for three years. Other birds, too. And they could all

see the point except an owl that come from Nova Scotia

to visit the Yo Semite, and he took this thing in on

his way back. He said he couldn't see anything funny

in it. But then he was a good deal disappointed about

Yo Semite, too."

CHAPTER IV

Student Life

[The Laborious Beer King]

The summer semester was in full tide; consequently the

most frequent figure in and about Heidelberg was

the student. Most of the students were Germans,

of course, but the representatives of foreign lands

were very numerous. They hailed from every corner

of the globe--for instruction is cheap in Heidelberg,

and so is living, too. The Anglo-American Club,

composed of British and American students, had twenty-five

members, and there was still much material left to draw from.

Nine-tenths of the Heidelberg students wore no badge

or uniform; the other tenth wore caps of various colors,

and belonged to social organizations called "corps." There

were five corps, each with a color of its own; there were

white caps, blue caps, and red, yellow, and green ones.

The famous duel-fighting is confined to the "corps" boys.

The "KNEIP" seems to be a specialty of theirs, too.

Kneips are held, now and then, to celebrate great occasions,

like the election of a beer king, for instance.

The solemnity is simple; the five corps assemble at night,

and at a signal they all fall loading themselves with beer,

out of pint-mugs, as fast as possible, and each man keeps

his own count--usually by laying aside a lucifer match

for each mud he empties. The election is soon decided.

When the candidates can hold no more, a count is instituted

and the one who has drank the greatest number of pints is

proclaimed king. I was told that the last beer king elected

by the corps--or by his own capabilities--emptied his mug

seventy-five times. No stomach could hold all that quantity

at one time, of course--but there are ways of frequently

creating a vacuum, which those who have been much at sea

will understand.

One sees so many students abroad at all hours, that he

presently begins to wonder if they ever have any

working-hours. Some of them have, some of them haven't.

Each can choose for himself whether he will work or play;

for German university life is a very free life;

it seems to have no restraints. The student does not live

in the college buildings, but hires his own lodgings,

in any locality he prefers, and he takes his meals when

and where he pleases. He goes to bed when it suits him,

and does not get up at all unless he wants to.

He is not entered at the university for any particular

length of time; so he is likely to change about.

He passes no examinations upon entering college.

He merely pays a trifling fee of five or ten dollars,

receives a card entitling him to the privileges of

the university, and that is the end of it. He is now ready

for business--or play, as he shall prefer. If he elects

to work, he finds a large list of lectures to choose from.

He selects the subjects which he will study, and enters

his name for these studies; but he can skip attendance.

The result of this system is, that lecture-courses upon

specialties of an unusual nature are often delivered

to very slim audiences, while those upon more practical

and every-day matters of education are delivered to very

large ones. I heard of one case where, day after day,

the lecturer's audience consisted of three students--and always

the same three. But one day two of them remained away.

The lecturer began as usual--

"Gentlemen," --then, without a smile, he corrected himself,

saying--

"Sir," --and went on with his discourse.

It is said that the vast majority of the Heidelberg students

are hard workers, and make the most of their opportunities;

that they have no surplus means to spend in dissipation,

and no time to spare for frolicking. One lecture follows

right on the heels of another, with very little time

for the student to get out of one hall and into the next;

but the industrious ones manage it by going on a trot.

The professors assist them in the saving of their time

by being promptly in their little boxed-up pulpits when the

hours strike, and as promptly out again when the hour finishes.

I entered an empty lecture-room one day just before the

clock struck. The place had simple, unpainted pine desks

and benches for about two hundred persons.

About a minute before the clock struck, a hundred

and fifty students swarmed in, rushed to their seats,

immediately spread open their notebooks and dipped their

pens in ink. When the clock began to strike, a burly

professor entered, was received with a round of applause,

moved swiftly down the center aisle, said "Gentlemen,"

and began to talk as he climbed his pulpit steps; and by

the time he had arrived in his box and faced his audience,

his lecture was well under way and all the pens were going.

He had no notes, he talked with prodigious rapidity and

energy for an hour--then the students began to remind

him in certain well-understood ways that his time was up;

he seized his hat, still talking, proceeded swiftly down

his pulpit steps, got out the last word of his discourse

as he struck the floor; everybody rose respectfully,

and he swept rapidly down the aisle and disappeared.

An instant rush for some other lecture-room followed,

and in a minute I was alone with the empty benches

once more.

Yes, without doubt, idle students are not the rule.

Out of eight hundred in the town, I knew the faces of only

about fifty; but these I saw everywhere, and daily.

They walked about the streets and the wooded hills,

they drove in cabs, they boated on the river, they sipped

beer and coffee, afternoons, in the Schloss gardens.

A good many of them wore colored caps of the corps.

They were finely and fashionably dressed, their manners

were quite superb, and they led an easy, careless,

comfortable life. If a dozen of them sat together and a lady

or a gentleman passed whom one of them knew and saluted,

they all rose to their feet and took off their caps.

The members of a corps always received a fellow-member

in this way, too; but they paid no attention to members

of other corps; they did not seem to see them. This was not

a discourtesy; it was only a part of the elaborate and rigid

corps etiquette.

There seems to be no chilly distance existing between the

German students and the professor; but, on the contrary,

a companionable intercourse, the opposite of chilliness

and reserve. When the professor enters a beer-hall

in the evening where students are gathered together,

these rise up and take off their caps, and invite the old

gentleman to sit with them and partake. He accepts,

and the pleasant talk and the beer flow for an hour or two,

and by and by the professor, properly charged and comfortable,

gives a cordial good night, while the students stand

bowing and uncovered; and then he moves on his happy

way homeward with all his vast cargo of learning afloat

in his hold. Nobody finds fault or feels outraged;

no harm has been done.

It seemed to be a part of corps etiquette to keep a dog

or so, too. I mean a corps dog--the common property of

the organization, like the corps steward or head servant;

then there are other dogs, owned by individuals.

On a summer afternoon in the Castle gardens, I have

seen six students march solemnly into the grounds,

in single file, each carrying a bright Chinese parasol

and leading a prodigious dog by a string. It was a very

imposing spectacle. Sometimes there would be as many

dogs around the pavilion as students; and of all breeds

and of all degrees of beauty and ugliness. These dogs

had a rather dry time of it; for they were tied to the

benches and had no amusement for an hour or two at a time

except what they could get out of pawing at the gnats,

or trying to sleep and not succeeding. However, they got

a lump of sugar occasionally--they were fond of that.

It seemed right and proper that students should indulge in dogs;

but everybody else had them, too--old men and young ones,

old women and nice young ladies. If there is one spectacle

that is unpleasanter than another, it is that of an

elegantly dressed young lady towing a dog by a string.

It is said to be the sign and symbol of blighted love.

It seems to me that some other way of advertising it might

be devised, which would be just as conspicuous and yet

not so trying to the proprieties.

It would be a mistake to suppose that the easy-going

pleasure-seeking student carries an empty head.

Just the contrary. He has spent nine years in the gymnasium,

under a system which allowed him no freedom, but vigorously

compelled him to work like a slave. Consequently, he has

left the gymnasium with an education which is so extensive

and complete, that the most a university can do for it

is to perfect some of its profounder specialties.

It is said that when a pupil leaves the gymnasium, he not

only has a comprehensive education, but he KNOWS what he

knows--it is not befogged with uncertainty, it is burnt

into him so that it will stay. For instance, he does not

merely read and write Greek, but speaks it; the same with

the Latin. Foreign youth steer clear of the gymnasium;

its rules are too severe. They go to the university

to put a mansard roof on their whole general education;

but the German student already has his mansard roof, so he

goes there to add a steeple in the nature of some specialty,

such as a particular branch of law, or diseases of the eye,

or special study of the ancient Gothic tongues.

So this German attends only the lectures which belong

to the chosen branch, and drinks his beer and tows his dog

around and has a general good time the rest of the day.

He has been in rigid bondage so long that the large liberty

of the university life is just what he needs and likes

and thoroughly appreciates; and as it cannot last forever,

he makes the most of it while it does last, and so lays

up a good rest against the day that must see him put on

the chains once more and enter the slavery of official

or professional life.

CHAPTER V

At the Students' Dueling-Ground

[Dueling by Wholesale]

One day in the interest of science my agent obtained

permission to bring me to the students' dueling-place. We

crossed the river and drove up the bank a few hundred yards,

then turned to the left, entered a narrow alley, followed it

a hundred yards and arrived at a two-story public house;

we were acquainted with its outside aspect, for it was

visible from the hotel. We went upstairs and passed into

a large whitewashed apartment which was perhaps fifty feet

long by thirty feet wide and twenty or twenty-five high.

It was a well-lighted place. There was no carpet.

Across one end and down both sides of the room extended a row

of tables, and at these tables some fifty or seventy-five

students [1. See Appendix C] were sitting.

Some of them were sipping wine, others were playing cards,

others chess, other groups were chatting together,

and many were smoking cigarettes while they waited for

the coming duels. Nearly all of them wore colored caps;

there were white caps, green caps, blue caps, red caps,

and bright-yellow ones; so, all the five corps were

present in strong force. In the windows at the vacant

end of the room stood six or eight, narrow-bladed swords

with large protecting guards for the hand, and outside

was a man at work sharpening others on a grindstone.

He understood his business; for when a sword left his hand

one could shave himself with it.

It was observable that the young gentlemen neither bowed

to nor spoke with students whose caps differed in color

from their own. This did not mean hostility, but only an

armed neutrality. It was considered that a person could

strike harder in the duel, and with a more earnest interest,

if he had never been in a condition of comradeship with

his antagonist; therefore, comradeship between the corps

was not permitted. At intervals the presidents of the five

corps have a cold official intercourse with each other,

but nothing further. For example, when the regular

dueling-day of one of the corps approaches, its president

calls for volunteers from among the membership to

offer battle; three or more respond--but there must not

be less than three; the president lays their names before

the other presidents, with the request that they furnish

antagonists for these challengers from among their corps.

This is promptly done. It chanced that the present

occasion was the battle-day of the Red Cap Corps.

They were the challengers, and certain caps of other colors

had volunteered to meet them. The students fight duels

in the room which I have described, TWO DAYS IN EVERY WEEK

DURING SEVEN AND A HALF OR EIGHT MONTHS IN EVERY YEAR.

This custom had continued in Germany two hundred and fifty years.

To return to my narrative. A student in a white cap

met us and introduced us to six or eight friends of his

who also wore white caps, and while we stood conversing,

two strange-looking figures were led in from another room.

They were students panoplied for the duel. They were bareheaded;

their eyes were protected by iron goggles which projected

an inch or more, the leather straps of which bound

their ears flat against their heads were wound around

and around with thick wrappings which a sword could not

cut through; from chin to ankle they were padded thoroughly

against injury; their arms were bandaged and rebandaged,

layer upon layer, until they looked like solid black logs.

These weird apparitions had been handsome youths,

clad in fashionable attire, fifteen minutes before,

but now they did not resemble any beings one ever sees

unless in nightmares. They strode along, with their arms

projecting straight out from their bodies; they did

not hold them out themselves, but fellow-students walked

beside them and gave the needed support.

There was a rush for the vacant end of the room, now,

and we followed and got good places. The combatants were

placed face to face, each with several members of his own

corps about him to assist; two seconds, well padded,

and with swords in their hands, took their stations;

a student belonging to neither of the opposing corps

placed himself in a good position to umpire the combat;

another student stood by with a watch and a memorandum-book

to keep record of the time and the number and nature of

the wounds; a gray-haired surgeon was present with his lint,

his bandages, and his instruments. After a moment's pause

the duelists saluted the umpire respectfully, then one

after another the several officials stepped forward,

gracefully removed their caps and saluted him also,

and returned to their places. Everything was ready now;

students stood crowded together in the foreground,

and others stood behind them on chairs and tables.

Every face was turned toward the center of attraction.

The combatants were watching each other with alert eyes;

a perfect stillness, a breathless interest reigned.

I felt that I was going to see some wary work. But not so.

The instant the word was given, the two apparitions

sprang forward and began to rain blows down upon each

other with such lightning rapidity that I could not quite

tell whether I saw the swords or only flashes they made

in the air; the rattling din of these blows as they struck

steel or paddings was something wonderfully stirring,

and they were struck with such terrific force that I could

not understand why the opposing sword was not beaten

down under the assault. Presently, in the midst of the

sword-flashes, I saw a handful of hair skip into the air

as if it had lain loose on the victim's head and a breath

of wind had puffed it suddenly away.

The seconds cried "Halt!" and knocked up the combatants'

swords with their own. The duelists sat down; a student

official stepped forward, examined the wounded head

and touched the place with a sponge once or twice;

the surgeon came and turned back the hair from the wound

--and revealed a crimson gash two or three inches long,

and proceeded to bind an oval piece of leather and a bunch

of lint over it; the tally-keeper stepped up and tallied

one for the opposition in his book.

Then the duelists took position again; a small stream of

blood was flowing down the side of the injured man's head,

and over his shoulder and down his body to the floor,

but he did not seem to mind this. The word was given,

and they plunged at each other as fiercely as before;

once more the blows rained and rattled and flashed;

every few moments the quick-eyed seconds would notice

that a sword was bent--then they called "Halt!" struck up

the contending weapons, and an assisting student straightened

the bent one.

The wonderful turmoil went on--presently a bright spark

sprung from a blade, and that blade broken in several pieces,

sent one of its fragments flying to the ceiling.

A new sword was provided and the fight proceeded.

The exercise was tremendous, of course, and in time

the fighters began to show great fatigue. They were

allowed to rest a moment, every little while; they got

other rests by wounding each other, for then they could

sit down while the doctor applied the lint and bandages.

The laws is that the battle must continue fifteen minutes

if the men can hold out; and as the pauses do not count,

this duel was protracted to twenty or thirty minutes,

I judged. At last it was decided that the men were too much

wearied to do battle longer. They were led away drenched

with crimson from head to foot. That was a good fight,

but it could not count, partly because it did not last

the lawful fifteen minutes (of actual fighting), and

partly because neither man was disabled by his wound.

It was a drawn battle, and corps law requires that drawn

battles shall be refought as soon as the adversaries are

well of their hurts.

During the conflict, I had talked a little, now and then,

with a young gentleman of the White Cap Corps, and he

had mentioned that he was to fight next--and had also

pointed out his challenger, a young gentleman who was

leaning against the opposite wall smoking a cigarette

and restfully observing the duel then in progress.

My acquaintanceship with a party to the coming contest

had the effect of giving me a kind of personal interest

in it; I naturally wished he might win, and it was

the reverse of pleasant to learn that he probably

would not, because, although he was a notable swordsman,

the challenger was held to be his superior.

The duel presently began and in the same furious way

which had marked the previous one. I stood close by,

but could not tell which blows told and which did not,

they fell and vanished so like flashes of light. They all

seemed to tell; the swords always bent over the opponents'

heads, from the forehead back over the crown, and seemed

to touch, all the way; but it was not so--a protecting

blade, invisible to me, was always interposed between.

At the end of ten seconds each man had struck twelve

or fifteen blows, and warded off twelve or fifteen,

and no harm done; then a sword became disabled, and a short

rest followed whilst a new one was brought. Early in the

next round the White Corps student got an ugly wound on

the side of his head and gave his opponent one like it.

In the third round the latter received another bad wound

in the head, and the former had his under-lip divided.

After that, the White Corps student gave many severe wounds,

but got none of the consequence in return. At the end

of five minutes from the beginning of the duel the surgeon

stopped it; the challenging party had suffered such

injuries that any addition to them might be dangerous.

These injuries were a fearful spectacle, but are better

left undescribed. So, against expectation, my acquaintance

was the victor.

CHAPTER VI

[A Sport that Sometimes Kills]

The third duel was brief and bloody. The surgeon stopped

it when he saw that one of the men had received such bad

wounds that he could not fight longer without endangering

his life.

The fourth duel was a tremendous encounter; but at the end

of five or six minutes the surgeon interfered once more:

another man so severely hurt as to render it unsafe to add

to his harms. I watched this engagement as I watched

the others--with rapt interest and strong excitement,

and with a shrink and a shudder for every blow that laid

open a cheek or a forehead; and a conscious paling of my

face when I occasionally saw a wound of a yet more shocking

nature inflicted. My eyes were upon the loser of this

duel when he got his last and vanquishing wound--it

was in his face and it carried away his--but no matter,

I must not enter into details. I had but a glance, and then

turned quickly, but I would not have been looking at all if I

had known what was coming. No, that is probably not true;

one thinks he would not look if he knew what was coming,

but the interest and the excitement are so powerful that

they would doubtless conquer all other feelings; and so,

under the fierce exhilaration of the clashing steel,

he would yield and look after all. Sometimes spectators

of these duels faint--and it does seem a very reasonable

thing to do, too.

Both parties to this fourth duel were badly hurt so much

that the surgeon was at work upon them nearly or quite an

hour--a fact which is suggestive. But this waiting interval

was not wasted in idleness by the assembled students.

It was past noon, therefore they ordered their landlord,

downstairs, to send up hot beefsteaks, chickens, and such things,

and these they ate, sitting comfortable at the several tables,

whilst they chatted, disputed and laughed. The door to

the surgeon's room stood open, meantime, but the cutting,

sewing, splicing, and bandaging going on in there in

plain view did not seem to disturb anyone's appetite.

I went in and saw the surgeon labor awhile, but could

not enjoy; it was much less trying to see the wounds

given and received than to see them mended; the stir

and turmoil, and the music of the steel, were wanting

here--one's nerves were wrung by this grisly spectacle,

whilst the duel's compensating pleasurable thrill was lacking.

Finally the doctor finished, and the men who were to fight

the closing battle of the day came forth. A good many

dinners were not completed, yet, but no matter, they could

be eaten cold, after the battle; therefore everybody

crowded forth to see. This was not a love duel, but a

"satisfaction" affair. These two students had quarreled,

and were here to settle it. They did not belong to any of

the corps, but they were furnished with weapons and armor,

and permitted to fight here by the five corps as a courtesy.

Evidently these two young men were unfamiliar with the

dueling ceremonies, though they were not unfamiliar with

the sword. When they were placed in position they thought

it was time to begin--and then did begin, too, and with

a most impetuous energy, without waiting for anybody

to give the word. This vastly amused the spectators,

and even broke down their studied and courtly gravity

and surprised them into laughter. Of course the seconds

struck up the swords and started the duel over again.

At the word, the deluge of blows began, but before long

the surgeon once more interfered--for the only reason

which ever permits him to interfere--and the day's

war was over. It was now two in the afternoon, and I

had been present since half past nine in the morning.

The field of battle was indeed a red one by this time;

but some sawdust soon righted that. There had been one

duel before I arrived. In it one of the men received

many injuries, while the other one escaped without

a scratch.

I had seen the heads and faces of ten youths gashed

in every direction by the keen two-edged blades, and yet

had not seen a victim wince, nor heard a moan, or detected

any fleeting expression which confessed the sharp pain

the hurts were inflicting. This was good fortitude,

indeed. Such endurance is to be expected in savages

and prize-fighters, for they are born and educated to it;

but to find it in such perfection in these gently bred

and kindly natured young fellows is matter for surprise.

It was not merely under the excitement of the sword-play

that this fortitude was shown; it was shown in the surgeon's

room where an uninspiring quiet reigned, and where there

was no audience. The doctor's manipulations brought

out neither grimaces nor moans. And in the fights

it was observable that these lads hacked and slashed

with the same tremendous spirit, after they were covered

with streaming wounds, which they had shown in the beginning.

The world in general looks upon the college duels as very

farcical affairs: true, but considering that the college

duel is fought by boys; that the swords are real swords;

and that the head and face are exposed, it seems to me

that it is a farce which had quite a grave side to it.

People laugh at it mainly because they think the student

is so covered up with armor that he cannot be hurt.

But it is not so; his eyes are ears are protected,

but the rest of his face and head are bare. He can not only

be badly wounded, but his life is in danger; and he would

sometimes lose it but for the interference of the surgeon.

It is not intended that his life shall be endangered.

Fatal accidents are possible, however. For instance,

the student's sword may break, and the end of it fly

up behind his antagonist's ear and cut an artery which

could not be reached if the sword remained whole.

This has happened, sometimes, and death has resulted

on the spot. Formerly the student's armpits were not

protected--and at that time the swords were pointed,

whereas they are blunt, now; so an artery in the armpit

was sometimes cut, and death followed. Then in the days

of sharp-pointed swords, a spectator was an occasional

victim--the end of a broken sword flew five or ten

feet and buried itself in his neck or his heart,

and death ensued instantly. The student duels in Germany

occasion two or three deaths every year, now, but this

arises only from the carelessness of the wounded men;

they eat or drink imprudently, or commit excesses in the

way of overexertion; inflammation sets in and gets such

a headway that it cannot be arrested. Indeed, there is

blood and pain and danger enough about the college duel

to entitle it to a considerable degree of respect.

All the customs, all the laws, all the details,

pertaining to the student duel are quaint and naive.

The grave, precise, and courtly ceremony with which the

thing is conducted, invests it with a sort of antique charm.

This dignity and these knightly graces suggest the tournament,

not the prize-fight. The laws are as curious as they

are strict. For instance, the duelist may step forward

from the line he is placed upon, if he chooses, but never

back of it. If he steps back of it, or even leans back,

it is considered that he did it to avoid a blow or contrive

an advantage; so he is dismissed from his corps in disgrace.

It would seem natural to step from under a descending

sword unconsciously, and against one's will and intent--yet

this unconsciousness is not allowed. Again: if under the

sudden anguish of a wound the receiver of it makes a grimace,

he falls some degrees in the estimation of his fellows;

his corps are ashamed of him: they call him "hare foot,"

which is the German equivalent for chicken-hearted.

CHAPTER VII

[How Bismark Fought]

In addition to the corps laws, there are some corps

usages which have the force of laws.

Perhaps the president of a corps notices that one of the

membership who is no longer an exempt--that is a freshman

--has remained a sophomore some little time without volunteering

to fight; some day, the president, instead of calling

for volunteers, will APPOINT this sophomore to measure

swords with a student of another corps; he is free

to decline--everybody says so--there is no compulsion.

This is all true--but I have not heard of any student

who DID decline; to decline and still remain in the corps

would make him unpleasantly conspicuous, and properly so,

since he knew, when he joined, that his main business,

as a member, would be to fight. No, there is no law

against declining--except the law of custom, which is

confessedly stronger than written law, everywhere.

The ten men whose duels I had witnessed did not go away

when their hurts were dressed, as I had supposed they would,

but came back, one after another, as soon as they were free

of the surgeon, and mingled with the assemblage in the

dueling-room. The white-cap student who won the second

fight witnessed the remaining three, and talked with us

during the intermissions. He could not talk very well,

because his opponent's sword had cut his under-lip in two,

and then the surgeon had sewed it together and overlaid it

with a profusion of white plaster patches; neither could

he eat easily, still he contrived to accomplish a slow

and troublesome luncheon while the last duel was preparing.

The man who was the worst hurt of all played chess

while waiting to see this engagement. A good part of

his face was covered with patches and bandages, and all

the rest of his head was covered and concealed by them.

It is said that the student likes to appear on the street

and in other public places in this kind of array,

and that this predilection often keeps him out when

exposure to rain or sun is a positive danger for him.

Newly bandaged students are a very common spectacle

in the public gardens of Heidelberg. It is also said

that the student is glad to get wounds in the face,

because the scars they leave will show so well there;

and it is also said that these face wounds are so prized

that youths have even been known to pull them apart

from time to time and put red wine in them to make

them heal badly and leave as ugly a scar as possible.

It does not look reasonable, but it is roundly asserted

and maintained, nevertheless; I am sure of one thing--scars

are plenty enough in Germany, among the young men;

and very grim ones they are, too. They crisscross the face

in angry red welts, and are permanent and ineffaceable.

Some of these scars are of a very strange and dreadful aspect;

and the effect is striking when several such accent

the milder ones, which form a city map on a man's face;

they suggest the "burned district" then. We had often

noticed that many of the students wore a colored silk

band or ribbon diagonally across their breasts.

It transpired that this signifies that the wearer has

fought three duels in which a decision was reached--duels

in which he either whipped or was whipped--for drawn

battles do not count. [1] After a student has received

his ribbon, he is "free"; he can cease from fighting,

without reproach--except some one insult him; his president

cannot appoint him to fight; he can volunteer if he

wants to, or remain quiescent if he prefers to do so.

Statistics show that he does NOT prefer to remain quiescent.

They show that the duel has a singular fascination about

it somewhere, for these free men, so far from resting upon

the privilege of the badge, are always volunteering.

A corps student told me it was of record that Prince

Bismarck fought thirty-two of these duels in a single summer

term when he was in college. So he fought twenty-nine

after his badge had given him the right to retire from

the field.

1. FROM MY DIARY.--Dined in a hotel a few miles up the Neckar,

in a room whose walls were hung all over with framed

portrait-groups of the Five Corps; some were recent,

but many antedated photography, and were pictured in

lithography--the dates ranged back to forty or fifty

years ago. Nearly every individual wore the ribbon across

his breast. In one portrait-group representing (as each

of these pictures did) an entire Corps, I took pains

to count the ribbons: there were twenty-seven members,

and twenty-one of them wore that significant badge.

The statistics may be found to possess interest in

several particulars. Two days in every week are devoted

to dueling. The rule is rigid that there must be three

duels on each of these days; there are generally more,

but there cannot be fewer. There were six the day

I was present; sometimes there are seven or eight.

It is insisted that eight duels a week--four for each

of the two days--is too low an average to draw a

calculation from, but I will reckon from that basis,

preferring an understatement to an overstatement of the case.

This requires about four hundred and eighty or five hundred

duelists a year--for in summer the college term is about

three and a half months, and in winter it is four months

and sometimes longer. Of the seven hundred and fifty

students in the university at the time I am writing of,

only eighty belonged to the five corps, and it is only

these corps that do the dueling; occasionally other

students borrow the arms and battleground of the five corps

in order to settle a quarrel, but this does not happen

every dueling-day. [2] Consequently eighty youths furnish

the material for some two hundred and fifty duels a year.

This average gives six fights a year to each of the eighty.

This large work could not be accomplished if the badge-holders

stood upon their privilege and ceased to volunteer.

2. They have to borrow the arms because they could not

get them elsewhere or otherwise. As I understand it,

the public authorities, all over Germany, allow the five

Corps to keep swords, but DO NOT ALLOW THEM TO USE THEM.

This is law is rigid; it is only the execution of it that

is lax.

Of course, where there is so much fighting, the students

make it a point to keep themselves in constant practice

with the foil. One often sees them, at the tables in the

Castle grounds, using their whips or canes to illustrate

some new sword trick which they have heard about;

and between the duels, on the day whose history I

have been writing, the swords were not always idle;

every now and then we heard a succession of the keen

hissing sounds which the sword makes when it is being

put through its paces in the air, and this informed us

that a student was practicing. Necessarily, this unceasing

attention to the art develops an expert occasionally.

He becomes famous in his own university, his renown spreads

to other universities. He is invited to Goettingen,

to fight with a Goettingen expert; if he is victorious,

he will be invited to other colleges, or those colleges will

send their experts to him. Americans and Englishmen often

join one or another of the five corps. A year or two ago,

the principal Heidelberg expert was a big Kentuckian;

he was invited to the various universities and left

a wake of victory behind him all about Germany;

but at last a little student in Strasburg defeated him.

There was formerly a student in Heidelberg who had picked

up somewhere and mastered a peculiar trick of cutting up

under instead of cleaving down from above. While the trick

lasted he won in sixteen successive duels in his university;

but by that time observers had discovered what his charm was,

and how to break it, therefore his championship ceased.

A rule which forbids social intercourse between members

of different corps is strict. In the dueling-house, in

the parks, on the street, and anywhere and everywhere that

the students go, caps of a color group themselves together.

If all the tables in a public garden were crowded

but one, and that one had two red-cap students at it

and ten vacant places, the yellow-caps, the blue-caps,

the white caps, and the green caps, seeking seats,

would go by that table and not seem to see it, nor seem

to be aware that there was such a table in the grounds.

The student by whose courtesy we had been enabled to visit

the dueling-place, wore the white cap--Prussian Corps.

He introduced us to many white caps, but to none of

another color. The corps etiquette extended even to us,

who were strangers, and required us to group with the white

corps only, and speak only with the white corps, while we

were their guests, and keep aloof from the caps of the

other colors. Once I wished to examine some of the swords,

but an American student said, "It would not be quite polite;

these now in the windows all have red hilts or blue;

they will bring in some with white hilts presently,

and those you can handle freely. "When a sword was broken

in the first duel, I wanted a piece of it; but its hilt

was the wrong color, so it was considered best and politest

to await a properer season. It was brought to me after

the room was cleared, and I will now make a "life-size"

sketch of it by tracing a line around it with my pen,

to show the width of the weapon. [Figure 1] The length of

these swords is about three feet, and they are quite heavy.

One's disposition to cheer, during the course of the

duels or at their close, was naturally strong, but corps

etiquette forbade any demonstrations of this sort.

However brilliant a contest or a victory might be,

no sign or sound betrayed that any one was moved.

A dignified gravity and repression were maintained at

all times.

When the dueling was finished and we were ready to go,

the gentlemen of the Prussian Corps to whom we had been

introduced took off their caps in the courteous German way,

and also shook hands; their brethren of the same order

took off their caps and bowed, but without shaking hands;

the gentlemen of the other corps treated us just as

they would have treated white caps--they fell apart,

apparently unconsciously, and left us an unobstructed pathway,

but did not seem to see us or know we were there.

If we had gone thither the following week as guests of

another corps, the white caps, without meaning any offense,

would have observed the etiquette of their order and ignored

our presence.

[How strangely are comedy and tragedy blended in this life!

I had not been home a full half-hour, after witnessing

those playful sham-duels, when circumstances made it

necessary for me to get ready immediately to assist

personally at a real one--a duel with no effeminate

limitation in the matter of results, but a battle

to the death. An account of it, in the next chapter,

will show the reader that duels between boys, for fun,

and duels between men in earnest, are very different affairs.]

CHAPTER VIII

The Great French Duel

[I Second Gambetta in a Terrific Duel]

Much as the modern French duel is ridiculed by certain

smart people, it is in reality one of the most dangerous

institutions of our day. Since it is always fought in the

open air, the combatants are nearly sure to catch cold.

M. Paul de Cassagnac, the most inveterate of the French

duelists, had suffered so often in this way that he is at

last a confirmed invalid; and the best physician in Paris

has expressed the opinion that if he goes on dueling for

fifteen or twenty years more--unless he forms the habit

of fighting in a comfortable room where damps and draughts

cannot intrude--he will eventually endanger his life.

This ought to moderate the talk of those people who are

so stubborn in maintaining that the French duel is the

most health-giving of recreations because of the open-air

exercise it affords. And it ought also to moderate that

foolish talk about French duelists and socialist-hated

monarchs being the only people who are immoral.

But it is time to get at my subject. As soon as I heard

of the late fiery outbreak between M. Gambetta and M. Fourtou

in the French Assembly, I knew that trouble must follow.

I knew it because a long personal friendship with

M. Gambetta revealed to me the desperate and implacable

nature of the man. Vast as are his physical proportions,

I knew that the thirst for revenge would penetrate

to the remotest frontiers of his person.

I did not wait for him to call on me, but went at once

to him. As I had expected, I found the brave fellow

steeped in a profound French calm. I say French calm,

because French calmness and English calmness have points

of difference. He was moving swiftly back and forth

among the debris of his furniture, now and then staving

chance fragments of it across the room with his foot;

grinding a constant grist of curses through his set teeth;

and halting every little while to deposit another handful

of his hair on the pile which he had been building of it on

the table.

He threw his arms around my neck, bent me over his stomach

to his breast, kissed me on both cheeks, hugged me four

or five times, and then placed me in his own arm-chair.

As soon as I had got well again, we began business at once.

I said I supposed he would wish me to act as his second,

and he said, "Of course." I said I must be allowed

to act under a French name, so that I might be shielded

from obloquy in my country, in case of fatal results.

He winced here, probably at the suggestion that dueling was

not regarded with respect in America. However, he agreed

to my requirement. This accounts for the fact that in all

the newspaper reports M. Gambetta's second was apparently

a Frenchman.

First, we drew up my principal's will. I insisted upon this,

and stuck to my point. I said I had never heard of a man

in his right mind going out to fight a duel without

first making his will. He said he had never heard

of a man in his right mind doing anything of the kind.

When he had finished the will, he wished to proceed

to a choice of his "last words." He wanted to know

how the following words, as a dying exclamation, struck me:

"I die for my God, for my country, for freedom of speech,

for progress, and the universal brotherhood of man!"

I objected that this would require too lingering a death;

it was a good speech for a consumptive, but not suited

to the exigencies of the field of honor. We wrangled

over a good many ante-mortem outbursts, but I finally got

him to cut his obituary down to this, which he copied

into his memorandum-book, purposing to get it by heart:

"I DIE THAT FRANCE MIGHT LIVE."

I said that this remark seemed to lack relevancy; but he

said relevancy was a matter of no consequence in last words,

what you wanted was thrill.

The next thing in order was the choice of weapons.

My principal said he was not feeling well, and would leave

that and the other details of the proposed meeting to me.

Therefore I wrote the following note and carried it to

M. Fourtou's friend:

Sir: M. Gambetta accepts M. Fourtou's challenge,

and authorizes me to propose Plessis-Piquet as the place

of meeting; tomorrow morning at daybreak as the time;

and axes as the weapons.

I am, sir, with great respect,

Mark Twain.

M. Fourtou's friend read this note, and shuddered.

Then he turned to me, and said, with a suggestion of

severity in his tone:

"Have you considered, sir, what would be the inevitable

result of such a meeting as this?"

"Well, for instance, what WOULD it be?"

"Bloodshed!"

"That's about the size of it," I said. "Now, if it is

a fair question, what was your side proposing to shed?"

I had him there. He saw he had made a blunder, so he hastened

to explain it away. He said he had spoken jestingly.

Then he added that he and his principal would enjoy axes,

and indeed prefer them, but such weapons were barred

by the French code, and so I must change my proposal.

I walked the floor, turning the thing over in my mind,

and finally it occurred to me that Gatling-guns at fifteen

paces would be a likely way to get a verdict on the field

of honor. So I framed this idea into a proposition.

But it was not accepted. The code was in the way again.

I proposed rifles; then double-barreled shotguns;

then Colt's navy revolvers. These being all rejected,

I reflected awhile, and sarcastically suggested brickbats

at three-quarters of a mile. I always hate to fool away

a humorous thing on a person who has no perception of humor;

and it filled me with bitterness when this man went soberly

away to submit the last proposition to his principal.

He came back presently and said his principal was charmed

with the idea of brickbats at three-quarters of a mile,

but must decline on account of the danger to disinterested

parties passing between them. Then I said:

"Well, I am at the end of my string, now. Perhaps YOU

would be good enough to suggest a weapon? Perhaps you

have even had one in your mind all the time?"

His countenance brightened, and he said with alacrity:

"Oh, without doubt, monsieur!"

So he fell to hunting in his pockets--pocket after pocket,

and he had plenty of them--muttering all the while,

"Now, what could I have done with them?"

At last he was successful. He fished out of his vest pocket

a couple of little things which I carried to the light

and ascertained to be pistols. They were single-barreled

and silver-mounted, and very dainty and pretty.

I was not able to speak for emotion. I silently hung

one of them on my watch-chain, and returned the other.

My companion in crime now unrolled a postage-stamp

containing several cartridges, and gave me one of them.

I asked if he meant to signify by this that our men were

to be allowed but one shot apiece. He replied that the

French code permitted no more. I then begged him to go

and suggest a distance, for my mind was growing weak

and confused under the strain which had been put upon it.

He named sixty-five yards. I nearly lost my patience.

I said:

"Sixty-five yards, with these instruments? Squirt-guns

would be deadlier at fifty. Consider, my friend,

you and I are banded together to destroy life, not make

it eternal."

But with all my persuasions, all my arguments, I was only

able to get him to reduce the distance to thirty-five yards;

and even this concession he made with reluctance,

and said with a sigh, "I wash my hands of this slaughter;

on your head be it."

There was nothing for me but to go home to my old

lion-heart and tell my humiliating story. When I entered,

M. Gambetta was laying his last lock of hair upon the altar.

He sprang toward me, exclaiming:

"You have made the fatal arrangements--I see it in your eye!"

"I have."

His face paled a trifle, and he leaned upon the table

for support. He breathed thick and heavily for a moment

or two, so tumultuous were his feelings; then he hoarsely

whispered:

"The weapon, the weapon! Quick! what is the weapon?"

"This!" and I displayed that silver-mounted thing.

He cast but one glance at it, then swooned ponderously

to the floor.

When he came to, he said mournfully:

"The unnatural calm to which I have subjected myself

has told upon my nerves. But away with weakness!

I will confront my fate like a man and a Frenchman."

He rose to his feet, and assumed an attitude which

for sublimity has never been approached by man,

and has seldom been surpassed by statues. Then he said,

in his deep bass tones:

"Behold, I am calm, I am ready; reveal to me the distance."

"Thirty-five yards." ...

I could not lift him up, of course; but I rolled him over,

and poured water down his back. He presently came to,

and said:

"Thirty-five yards--without a rest? But why ask? Since

murder was that man's intention, why should he palter

with small details? But mark you one thing: in my fall

the world shall see how the chivalry of France meets death."

After a long silence he asked:

"Was nothing said about that man's family standing

up with him, as an offset to my bulk? But no matter;

I would not stoop to make such a suggestion; if he is

not noble enough to suggest it himself, he is welcome

to this advantage, which no honorable man would take."

He now sank into a sort of stupor of reflection,

which lasted some minutes; after which he broke silence with:

"The hour--what is the hour fixed for the collision?"

"Dawn, tomorrow."

He seemed greatly surprised, and immediately said:

"Insanity! I never heard of such a thing. Nobody is

abroad at such an hour."