that part of the river which is called the scenic or “the castled
Rhine,” the part of which poets have sung and around which history and
fiction have woven stories and legends in every language. But the Rhine
is not only useful for the poet and the historian; it is also a plain
business proposition. I am told and I believe that the Rhine carries
more traffic than any other river in the world. It flows through a rich
agricultural country, is lined with important cities, and especially
with manufacturing places. Freight rates on the water are cheap.
Products of the farm or vineyard, the shop or mill, placed on the
boats, are carried with only one transfer to all the great markets of
the world.
[Illustration]
And now imagine the beautiful Rhine gliding among high hills, with
every few miles a handsome castle or the picturesque ruins of one, with
a busy railroad running on each bank, passenger and freight trains as
frequent as suburban trains near Chicago, and two endless processions
of steamboats, tugs and barges, one going up and one going down. That
is the Rhine of to-day. The hills and castles reminiscent of the past,
the black smoke of the furnaces and the shrill whistle of the engine
the reminders of the present. You have to shut your eyes to see either
the historic or the beautiful and keep them from “telescoping” into the
practical present. And I will admit that the boats and the boatmen,
the passengers and the freight interested me more than the dead-walls
and the ivy-covered towers. If you think it over you will realize how
castles and ruins pall upon your taste. When we began the trip we
would rush from one side of the boat to the other to see a castle and
hardly went below for lunch for fear we might miss a lofty summit or
a breasted fortress. At the close of the trip a broken-down abbey or
a roofless castle had no charms that would compare with a comfortable
seat and a cigar. I remember well one of the last and largest castles
we passed, one I had read of and looked forward to seeing. A friend
enthusiastically exclaimed: “There is the Drachenfels on the other
side!” And my coarse nature revolted, and I murmured that if the
Drachenfels wanted me to see it, the Drachenfels would have to come
around to my side of the boat. My neck was tired.
[Illustration]
Really a homeopathic dose of Rhine castles would be very interesting. A
thousand years ago some baron would build a big stone fortress high up
on a hill overlooking the Rhine, and up to the discovery of gunpowder
it was practically impregnable. The baron and his followers, according
to the rules of the game, would divide their time between rescuing
lovely maidens from giants and robbing the merchants and traders who
passed by. I never heard of a knight or baron who worked for a living.
History is filled with tales of deeds the old knights did for religion
or for some fair lady, but it is silent or passes over lightly the
fact that they made their money by robbery and murder, disguised under
the name of expeditions, crusades, knight-errantry, and war. But when
the inventive genius of man made a gun that would shoot through armor
and discovered that gunpowder could knock down forts, the days of
chivalry and highway robbery on the Rhine were over. The merchants and
artisans no longer had to hire armies to protect their property and
their families, and the rule of force was followed by the rule of
shrewdness, a change which may not have brought perfection, but has
resulted in a show of decency, fairness and honesty.
[Illustration]
A few old castles transported from the Rhine to Cow creek or the Kaw
would be helpful to the landscape of Kansas. But there would be no use
of stringing them out for a hundred miles. A castle a thousand years
old is interesting, always provided your imagination is good. The best
way to enjoy castles is to believe everything the books and guides
tell you. I am getting fascinated with the legends, although I think
I can unfasten. Now here is a choice legend of the castles of the Two
Brothers, which stand on neighboring hills and which I saw early:
THE TWO BROTHERS.
Once upon a time there were two brothers, both as valiant and noble
knights as ever wore armor or robbed a traveler. Unfortunately they
fell in love with the same girl, and as she couldn’t accept both and
had to say she would “always be a sister” to the other, the tension in
the family circle got very tight. Finally the elder brother saw that
the maiden loved the younger best, so he put his broken heart in his
pocket, gave the pair his blessing and lit out for the crusades. In
those days whenever a man lost out in love or was in danger of being
hung for crime, he went to the crusades. The younger brother was very
happy for a while, but he happened to visit another country and there
he fell in love with another girl, just as much and as eternally in
love with her as with the first one. The second girl was wise or else
she had been warned of the young man’s record, for she announced the
engagement and the marriage followed soon. Girl No. 1 went to a convent
with an aching heart, everybody settled down, and even the neighbors
quit talking. Just at that time the elder brother returned from the
crusades, and when he heard what had happened he thought it was awful.
He went to his brother’s castle and challenged him to fight a duel.
The younger brother was worked up over the interference of the family
in his private affairs and was anxious to fight. The two knights met
in a plum-patch back of the convent and prepared to settle which was
right. Just as they drew their swords the original girl, who had been
informed of what was going on by some busybody, rushed out of the gate,
threw herself between the brothers and begged them not to fight for her
sake. She made such a good talk that they shook hands and took a drink
together as a sign that it was all over. The elder brother offered to
marry the girl in the convent, but she refused. The wife of the younger
brother ran off with another chivalrous knight and the two brothers
were left alone in the world. They built the two castles side by side,
and spent all their days together hunting deer and wealthy travelers,
and died without ever flirting with another woman (so the legend says).
The ruins of the two castles side by side are evidence of the truth of
the story.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: THE LEGEND OF COW CREEK.]
“Fair Bingen on the Rhine” was somewhat of a disappointment. Thousands
and tens of thousands of American girls and boys have stood up in
front of the school on Friday afternoons, scared stiff with the awful
prospect of forgetting the next word, and told their school-mates:
“A soldier of the legion lay dying in Algiers,
There was lack of woman’s nursing,
There was dearth of woman’s tears.”
And when the same moon shone there that shone on fair Bingen on the
Rhine, those countless American youths have breathed a sigh for the
soldier and several sighs over getting through. Bingen is a good sort
of manufacturing town, and the fact that the poet selected the name
because of its rhythm and not because it fitted the situation accounts
for the success of the poem. After some reflection on the subject among
the storied regions of Europe I have come to the conclusion that it is
the romancer and the singer who make a country great and interesting,
and not any special merit of the place itself. If Cow creek had a few
legend-writers in a few years it would rank with the Rhine, the Black
Forest, and even the fields of old England. How would this do for a Cow
creek legend, _a la_ Europe?
LEGEND OF COW CREEK.
Once upon a time there lived on the creek a wealthy old farmer who
had a beautiful daughter. The fame of her beauty spread all the way
to Sterling and down to Pretty Prairie, and many young men aspired to
the honor of her hand in marriage. Among those who loved her was a
neighbor boy who had nothing to his credit but a good name and a rare
ability to make speeches before the literary society which met every
other Friday night at the school-house. As the good name was no good
on a check, he knew the old farmer would not listen to his suit but
would likely kick him into the middle of next week if he asked him for
his daughter. So all the poor young man could do was to see her home
occasionally after church and talk about the soulfulness of love and
the communion of congenial souls. The young lady really preferred the
aforesaid young man, but as she did not want to undertake the job of
making a living for two or more, and she knew her father would never
consent to taking him to board, she could only sigh and pine and sit in
the shade of a cottonwood tree and dream of love. At last the father
told his beautiful daughter that he had selected a husband for her, a
man from Nickerson, a man who owned two sections of land and a lot of
oil stock, but who could not tell the difference between true love and
a pain in his side. That night the two young people met down by the
creek bank and she told him of the fate in store for her unless he got
a move on himself. Their plan was formed. That night the lover braced
himself with a good “bracer” and met the maiden behind the barn. Away
they went toward the county seat with high hopes and enough cash to
purchase a marriage license. Suddenly they heard the gentle murmur of
the father, who had discovered the elopers and was telling the people
for miles around what he would do to the son of a gun who was running
off with his daughter. It was a race for love and for life, but the old
man was getting the best of it and the lovers could hear him as he was
overtaking them. They came to the creek, which was on its annual flood,
and then they gave themselves up for lost. But the young man happened
to look around and saw an old cow. An idea came into his head. He drove
the cow into the creek and each of them grabbed her tail. She swam
straight to the other side while the old man stood on the bank cursing
a blue streak. Away they went to town and were married by the probate
judge before the flood went down and the old man could get across.
There was nothing for the father to do but to give them his blessing
and eighty acres of sand-hill land, on which they lived happily ever
afterward. The stream which thus saved the lives and loves of those two
young people has been called Cow creek ever since.
[Illustration]
If the people of Kansas will take a few stories like the above, have
them trimmed up and embellished, tell them to visitors and charge
admission to see the relics, they will have as good a collection of
legends as ever grew on the Rhine.
COLOGNE WATER AND OTHERS.
COLOGNE, GERMANY, July 29, 1905.
This is the place the eau de cologne habit started. There are over
forty manufacturers who advertise themselves as “the original house”
that first made this perfumed water. A few miles below here on the
Rhine is the Apollinaris spring. I always supposed Apollinaris water
came from the drug store, but there really is an original spring. It
got its name from St. Apollinaris, who was a prominent church-worker a
thousand years ago, and had his head chopped off by the heathen. The
head is still preserved in a church and his name goes marching on with
a label on the bottle. The highest cathedral I have seen in Europe is
at Cologne, the top of the spire being 510 feet above the ground. It is
a beautiful cathedral of Gothic architecture. The plans were made and a
good part of the structure completed about eight hundred years before
it was finished, the latter part of the job being done only a few years
ago. The legend of the beginning of the cathedral is very authentic.
The architect had spent several years on the drawings, but was not able
to finish them satisfactorily to himself or the building committee.
One night he had a dream, and in the vision saw just what had been
lacking. But when he awoke he could not remember the design, and as is
usual in such cases he said he would give anything to have it. The
Devil promptly showed up and offered to reveal the wonderful plan if
the architect would sign a contract to give in payment his own soul and
also the soul of the first who should enter the church after it was
completed. The architect tried to beat the Devil down on the price,
but could not, and finally signed. The Devil lived up to his part
of the contract, and the completed plans were so beautiful that the
church authorities and the emperor and the city council were unanimous
in declaring the architect the greatest man in his profession. As
the church neared completion the architect began to worry. He took
to drink, and went around carousing so that his friends thought he
was crazy. Finally he confessed to the archbishop and it got into the
newspapers, so the community was stirred up. No one was willing to be
the first to go into the church, and yet if the great cathedral was to
amount to anything, somebody must enter it. Finally a bad woman who was
confined in jail sent word to the church board that she would be the
victim. After due deliberation, and believing that she would go to the
Devil anyhow, they accepted her offer. The day of dedication came. The
people gathered from far and near. A carriage drove from the police
station and backed up to the church door. Out of the wagon and into the
building dashed a female form and the Devil in great glee grabbed, and
broke its neck. But it was only a pig which the smart bad woman had
fixed up in her clothes. So the Devil was cheated, the cathedral was
dedicated, and all went right except for the architect, who was found
with a broken neck and smelling of sulphur, for the Devil in his rage
didn’t do a thing to him.
[Illustration]
Cologne has over 300,000 inhabitants and is a very busy city. This
morning we went to the market. The grocery stores in Cologne and in
all the German cities I have visited practically never keep green
groceries. Everything of that kind is bought at the public market,
which is a very interesting sight. From all the country around come
the farmers and the farmers’ wives with the produce of the garden, and
from all over the city come the housewives or the maids, each with
a big basket. The trading is brisk, and as it is nearly all done by
women on both sides, there is some talk and the shopping habit is seen
in all its glory. Then there is the fish market, the flower market,
the poultry market, and even the old-clothes market. I am sure that
in the big market-house and on the streets and the square in Cologne
this morning there were two thousand vendors of goods, from potatoes to
second-hand hats and from luscious fruit to old candle-sticks,—nearly
everything conceivable that could be brought to the open-air market and
sold. The market is still retained in a few old American towns, but to
me it is a novelty with a never-fading charm, and in nearly every city
where I have stopped the market has been a sight that I did not miss.
[Illustration]
Next to the market the restaurant or beer- and wine-garden is the place
to see the people. The Germans eat breakfast, dinner at noon, supper
at 6 o’clock, and once more about 10 o’clock. From 7 o’clock to 10
o’clock the whole family sits in the public garden drinking beer or
wine (not much, but long), listening to the music and getting hungry
for the fourth meal of the day. There are restaurants everywhere—in
the public buildings, the art galleries, the churches, on the
sidewalks, and in the parks. I have not been to a German cemetery, but
I would confidently expect to find there a garden with tables where one
could get something to eat and drink.
[Illustration]
The valley of the Rhine for more than a hundred miles is one vast
vineyard, and the word valley includes the hillsides. The hills are
high. The vines begin close to the water’s edge, the vineyards being
sometimes terraced and sometimes on a slope so steep that the men and
women who cultivate them must wear climbers like telegraph linemen.
It is a beautiful sight at this season of the year with the lofty
heights clothed in green and pointing up into the blue sky, with brown
old ruined taverns and castles and white châteaus and villas here and
there among the green. One would wonder what could be done with all
the grapes that must come from such a great vineyard if he did not
look around him and see everybody drinking the juice and evidently
endeavoring to keep pace with the production. At Coblentz the Moselle
river joins the Rhine, and it is another charming valley full of
history, poetry and grapes. Coblentz is old and quaint, with narrow
streets, old-fashioned people, and the appearance of ancient days.
On this trip I have seen a good deal of the German people. The class
distinctions are about all that make them different from Americans. The
poor folks always expect to be poor and do not move around with the
aggressive action that ours do. I suppose I talked with a hundred, and
every one of them wanted to come to America. Mechanics and artisans,
very skillful, are not altogether satisfied with conditions, and they,
too, talk America. But the great middle class of farmers and merchants
are as full of patriotism and conceit as are true American citizens.
They think Germany is the greatest nation on earth, and that all the
countries will eventually admit the fact and take subordinate places.
They don’t like America or England, and they expect sometime to have
war with us unless we give up easier than they anticipate. The typical
German is not slow or easy-going, as he is often painted, but is
energetic, pushing and “chesty.” He thinks Germany can lick the United
States with one hand tied behind, and is ready to have the work begin
any time. In fact, Germans are just as offensively and ignorantly
patriotic as are Americans, which is saying a good deal, for Americans
in Europe nearly always go around with a chip on either shoulder,
daring somebody to knock it off.
[Illustration]
But the Germans are gentlemen. For the first time since I left Paris
I saw men in the street cars give their seats to ladies. In Italy the
rule is for the man to have first consideration. It makes American
women furious when they meet Italian men on the narrow sidewalks to
have to get off into the streets and let the gentlemen pass by. But
they must do it or the men will simply walk over them. In Germany the
women in the country work in the fields and in the cities they are in
the shops and offices more than in the United States, but they are
treated decently and politely. The German is in fact more polite than
the Frenchman. He even tips his hat to his man friends. If I go into
a store to buy a cigar the proprietor or clerk who waits on me will
say “good-morning” and “good-by.” They do this with one another, and
do not keep their company manners for strangers. German hotels are the
best in Europe, and one of the customs is during the meal at hotel or
restaurant for the proprietor to walk around and pleasantly greet his
patrons, whether he knows them or not, on the comfortable theory that
they are his guests. Germans are always willing to guide and advise
strangers and they don’t take “tips,” at least not any more than in
America. Germany is wealthy and prosperous as a nation and the Germans
one meets when traveling are about the best folks you find in Europe.
[Illustration]
In Germany a landlord advertises his hotel as “first-class” or
“second-class.” The second-class hotels are clean and good, but they
have some mighty funny names. I had learned in England not to get
worried over the signs of “The Red Lion,” “The White Bull,” etc. But
German hotel-keepers go still further. They name their places after
animals of all kinds and colors, and often saints and imaginary
creatures. The Golden Calf, The Winged Lion, The House of the Weaned
Calf, The Wild Man, were some of the names, but at Heidelberg one
extreme was reached by the “Hotel Jesus,” and at Worms the other
extreme by the “Hotel of the Two Pairs of Drawers.” I suppose every
name has a story or a legend behind it and the name is a valuable asset
of the property. Speaking of names reminds me that here in Cologne the
street that leads to the market-place is called “Kingdom of Heaven
street,” and not far away is the “Grace of God street.” I can see how
these names might be properly used in Kansas, but they are out of place
in Cologne.
HOLLAND AND BELGIUM.
IN DUTCH LAND.
AMSTERDAM, HOLLAND, July 31, 1905.
The kingdom of Holland is a little bit of a country, but it has exerted
a great influence in history. In size it is 12,650 square miles, not
as large as the Seventh congressional district of Kansas, but it has
over 5,000,000 inhabitants and is busy from one end to the other. The
greater part lies below the level of the sea, which borders it on the
west and has been literally reclaimed from the water by the energy
and work of the people. The Hollanders are the Dutch, and they have a
saying: “God made the sea, but we made the land.” The water is held
back by immense dikes, and here in Amsterdam I look toward the sea and
the great lot of shipping along the quay is higher than the tops of
many of the houses; that is, the water is higher than the roofs in the
town. The industry which has thus driven back and held back the sea has
made little Holland a wealthy nation and Dutch capital has not only
built up business at home, but it has gone into the farthermost parts
of the earth, even to Missouri and Arkansas, constructed railroads,
started factories and earned dividends or gone into the hands of
receivers in large amounts. The country is covered with canals about as
Kansas is with section-line roads. These canals are used for commerce,
carrying freight cheaply, and for drainage, irrigation, and in place
of fences. Every farm has its little canal leading to a main canal
as a farmer’s road in Kansas goes out to the main traveled road. The
farmer brings his stuff to town in a canal-boat, and a farm-wagon
is almost as rare a sight in Holland as a canal-boat is in Kansas.
In wet seasons the canals are used as drains and in dry seasons as
irrigating-ditches. Canals are built above the level of the land, so
that irrigation is easy, and for drainage the water is collected in
ditches and pumped up into the canals. All of these facts I had read
about, as has everyone else, but to actually see such a country was
like a dream come true.
[Illustration]
There is more sky in Holland than anywhere else. The land is flatter
than a Kansas prairie. The scenery would be absolutely nothing if it
were not for the works of man upon the surface. There are no hills in
Holland, no rushing streams, no picturesque bits of nature. Some of
the land looks lower than the rest, but none looks higher, and the
water from the big rivers that enter Holland on the east simply oozes
through the soil and canals, without a perceptible current and really
without river-beds or water-courses. The Rhine spreads out until it is
fifty miles wide, but it is no longer a river,—merely a network of
canals which it supplies with water, and its old channels are now made
by dikes and drainage into farms and town-sites. The landscape thus
becomes a flat, fertile country, mostly farmed in grass and pastured
with cattle and sheep, a lace-work of canals in shiny streaks running
in every direction, narrow red brick houses with white trimmings,
and windmills which tower above everything else and stand like giant
sentinels over the low and level country. These windmills are big,
fifty to a hundred feet high, the lower part usually used as dwellings,
constructed as strongly and stoutly as government buildings, and
with four immense arms or sails which convert the Dutch zephyrs into
horsepower. The windmills are used for grinding grain, sawing lumber
and in all kinds of manufacturing, as well as to pump water from the
low ground to the canals and into the sea. A Kansas windmill compared
to a Dutch windmill would be like a straw beside an oak tree.
Very often in Europe I have been compelled to draw on my imagination to
make the actual facts come within speaking distance of what had been
written or promised about a country. Not so in Holland. Everything I
have ever read about dikes, canals and windmills is true, and nothing
you have been able to imagine is beyond the real existing condition and
appearance.
[Illustration]