The Young Ladies, And Other People,
Crowded Around And Showed A Great Deal Of Sympathy,
But That Did Not Help Matters; For My Friends Said They
Did Not Want Sympathy, They Wanted A Back Alley And Solitude.
CHAPTER XX
[My Precious, Priceless Tear-Jug]
Next morning brought good news - our trunks had arrived
from Hamburg at last. Let this be a warning to the reader.
The Germans are very conscientious, and this trait makes
them very particular. Therefore if you tell a German you
want a thing done immediately, he takes you at your word;
he thinks you mean what you say; so he does that thing
immediately - according to his idea of immediately
- which is about a week; that is, it is a week if it refers
to the building of a garment, or it is an hour and a half
if it refers to the cooking of a trout. Very well; if you
tell a German to send your trunk to you by "slow freight,"
he takes you at your word; he sends it by "slow freight,"
and you cannot imagine how long you will go on enlarging
your admiration of the expressiveness of that phrase
in the German tongue, before you get that trunk.
The hair on my trunk was soft and thick and youthful,
when I got it ready for shipment in Hamburg; it was baldheaded
when it reached Heidelberg. However, it was still sound,
that was a comfort, it was not battered in the least;
the baggagemen seemed to be conscientiously careful,
in Germany, of the baggage entrusted to their hands.
There was nothing now in the way of our departure, therefore we
set about our preparations.
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