Thus my education proceeded easily and comfortably for me,
but not for Harris. Three courses of a table d'ho^te
dinner were enough for me, but Harris preferred thirteen.
Even after I had acquired full confidence, and no longer needed
the agent's help, I sometimes encountered difficulties.
Once at Baden-Baden I nearly lost a train because I could
not be sure that three young ladies opposite me at table
were Germans, since I had not heard them speak; they might
be American, they might be English, it was not safe to venture
a bow; but just as I had got that far with my thought,
one of them began a German remark, to my great relief
and gratitude; and before she got out her third word,
our bows had been delivered and graciously returned,
and we were off.
There is a friendly something about the German character
which is very winning. When Harris and I were making
a pedestrian tour through the Black Forest, we stopped at
a little country inn for dinner one day; two young ladies
and a young gentleman entered and sat down opposite us.
They were pedestrians, too. Our knapsacks were strapped
upon our backs, but they had a sturdy youth along to carry
theirs for them. All parties were hungry, so there was
no talking. By and by the usual bows were exchanged,
and we separated.
As we sat at a late breakfast in the hotel at Allerheiligen,
next morning, these young people and took places
near us without observing us; but presently they saw
us and at once bowed and smiled; not ceremoniously,
but with the gratified look of people who have found
acquaintances where they were expecting strangers.
Then they spoke of the weather and the roads. We also
spoke of the weather and the roads. Next, they said they
had had an enjoyable walk, notwithstanding the weather.
We said that that had been our case, too. Then they said
they had walked thirty English miles the day before,
and asked how many we had walked. I could not lie, so I
told Harris to do it. Harris told them we had made thirty
English miles, too. That was true; we had "made" them,
though we had had a little assistance here and there.
After breakfast they found us trying to blast some
information out of the dumb hotel clerk about routes,
and observing that we were not succeeding pretty well,
they went and got their maps and things, and pointed
out and explained our course so clearly that even a New
York detective could have followed it. And when we
started they spoke out a hearty good-by and wished us
a pleasant journey. Perhaps they were more generous
with us than they might have been with native wayfarers
because we were a forlorn lot and in a strange land;
I don't know; I only know it was lovely to be treated so.
Very well, I took an American young lady to one of the fine
balls in Baden-Baden, one night, and at the entrance-door
upstairs we were halted by an official - something about Miss
Jones's dress was not according to rule; I don't remember
what it was, now; something was wanting - her back hair,
or a shawl, or a fan, or a shovel, or something.
The official was ever so polite, and every so sorry,
but the rule was strict, and he could not let us in.
It was very embarrassing, for many eyes were on us.
But now a richly dressed girl stepped out of the ballroom,
inquired into the trouble, and said she could fix it in
a moment. She took Miss Jones to the robing-room, and soon
brought her back in regulation trim, and then we entered
the ballroom with this benefactress unchallenged.
Being safe, now, I began to puzzle through my sincere
but ungrammatical thanks, when there was a sudden mutual
recognition - the benefactress and I had met at Allerheiligen.
Two weeks had not altered her good face, and plainly
her heart was in the right place yet, but there was such
a difference between these clothes and the clothes I
had seen her in before, when she was walking thirty miles
a day in the Black Forest, that it was quite natural
that I had failed to recognize her sooner. I had on MY
other suit, too, but my German would betray me to a person
who had heard it once, anyway. She brought her brother
and sister, and they made our way smooth for that evening.
Well - months afterward, I was driving through the streets
of Munich in a cab with a German lady, one day, when she
said:
"There, that is Prince Ludwig and his wife, walking along there."
Everybody was bowing to them - cabmen, little children,
and everybody else - and they were returning all the bows
and overlooking nobody, when a young lady met them and made
a deep courtesy.
"That is probably one of the ladies of the court,"
said my German friend.
I said:
"She is an honor to it, then. I know her. I don't know
her name, but I know HER. I have known her at Allerheiligen
and Baden-Baden. She ought to be an Empress, but she
may be only a Duchess; it is the way things go in this way."
If one asks a German a civil question, he will be quite
sure to get a civil answer.
