Since my return home, I have, out of curiosity, obtained three or
four "English-German Dialogues" and "Conversation Books," intended
to assist the English traveller in his efforts to make himself
understood by the German people, and I have come to the conclusion
that the work I took out with me was the most sensible and practical
of the lot.
Finding it utterly hopeless to explain ourselves to the waiter, we
let the thing go, and trusted to Providence; and in about ten
minutes the man brought us a steaming omelette, with about a pound
of strawberry jam inside, and powdered sugar all over the outside.
We put a deal of pepper and salt on it to try and counteract the
flavour of the sweets, but we did not really enjoy it even then.
After breakfast we got a time-table, and looked out for a train to
Ober-Ammergau. I found one which started at 3.10. It seemed a very
nice train indeed; it did not stop anywhere. The railway
authorities themselves were evidently very proud of it, and had
printed particulars of it in extra thick type. We decided to
patronise it.
To pass away the time, we strolled about the city. Munich is a
fine, handsome, open town, full of noble streets and splendid
buildings; but in spite of this and of its hundred and seventy
thousand inhabitants, an atmosphere of quiet and provincialism
hovers over it. There is but little traffic on ordinary occasions
along its broad ways, and customers in its well-stocked shops are
few and far between. This day being Sunday, it was busier than
usual, and its promenades were thronged with citizens and country
folk in holiday attire, among whom the Southern peasants, wearing
their quaint, centuries-old costume, stood out in picturesque
relief. Fashion, in its world-wide crusade against variety and its
bitter contest with form and colour, has recoiled, defeated for the
present from the mountain fastnesses of Bavaria. Still, as Sunday
or gala-day comes round, the broad-shouldered, sunburnt shepherd of
the Oberland dons his gay green-embroidered jacket over his snowy
shirt, fastens his short knee-breeches with a girdle round his
waist, claps his high, feather-crowned hat upon his waving curls,
and with bare legs, shod in mighty boots, strides over the hill-
sides to his Gretchen's door.
She is waiting for him, you may be sure, ready dressed; and a very
sweet, old-world picture she makes, standing beneath the great
overhanging gables of the wooden chalet. She, too, favours the
national green; but, as relief, there is no lack of bonny red
ribbons, to flutter in the wind, and, underneath the ornamented
skirt, peeps out a bright-hued petticoat. Around her ample breast
she wears a dark tight-fitting bodice, laced down the front. (I
think this garment is called a stomacher, but I am not sure, as I
have never liked to ask.) Her square shoulders are covered with the
whitest of white linen. Her sleeves are also white; and being very
full, and of some soft lawnlike material, suggest the idea of folded
wings. Upon her flaxen hair is perched a saucy round green hat.
The buckles of her dainty shoes, the big eyes in her pretty face,
are all four very bright. One feels one would like much to change
places for the day with Hans.
Arm-in-arm, looking like some china, but exceedingly substantial
china, shepherd and shepherdess, they descend upon the town. One
rubs one's eyes and stares after them as they pass. They seem to
have stepped from the pictured pages of one of those old story-books
that we learnt to love, sitting beside the high brass guard that
kept ourselves and the nursery-fire from doing each other any
serious injury, in the days when the world was much bigger than it
is now, and much more real and interesting.
Munich and the country round about it make a great exchange of
peoples every Sunday. In the morning, trainload after trainload of
villagers and mountaineers pour into the town, and trainload after
trainload of good and other citizens steam out to spend the day in
wood and valley, and upon lake and mountain-side.
We went into one or two of the beer-halls - not into the swell cafes,
crowded with tourists and Munich masherdom, but into the low-
ceilinged, smoke-grimed cellars where the life of the people is to
be seen.
The ungenteel people in a country are so much more interesting than
the gentlefolks. One lady or gentleman is painfully like every
other lady or gentleman. There is so little individuality, so
little character, among the upper circles of the world. They talk
like each other, they think and act like each other, they dress like
each other, and look very much like each other. We gentlefolks only
play at living. We have our rules and regulations for the game,
which must not be infringed. Our unwritten guide-books direct us
what to do and what to say at each turn of the meaningless sport.
To those at the bottom of the social pyramid, however, who stand
with their feet upon the earth, Nature is not a curious phenomenon
to be looked down at and studied, but a living force to be obeyed.
They front grim, naked Life, face to face, and wrestle with it
through the darkness; and, as did the angel that strove with Jacob,
it leaves its stamp upon them.
There is only one type of a gentleman. There are five hundred types
of men and women.
