Julia Ward Howe - Richards Laura E. (бесплатная регистрация книга TXT) 📗
Still, the travellers arrived looking as proud as they could, wearing their best frocks and bonnets. They travelled with the Englishwoman's outfit. "Three suits. Hightum, tightum, and scrub." "Hightum" was for any chance festivity, "tightum" for the table d'hote, "scrub" for everyday travelling. The question of the three degrees was anxiously discussed on this occasion; it was finally decided that only "hightum" would come up to the Von Rabe standard.
"August 4. Arrived at Czerwinsk, where sister L. and Baron von Rabe met us. He kissed my hand in a courtly manner. My sister looks well, but has had a hard time. We drove to Lesnian where Annie von R. and her mother-in-law made us welcome."
"August 9, Lesnian. A quiet day at home, writing and some work. Tea with Sister L. in the open air. Then went with Baron von Rabe to visit his farm buildings, which are very extensive; not so nicely finished as would be the case in America. We got many fleas in our clothes.... In the evening the Baron began to dispute with me concerning the French and the use and excellence of war, etc...."
"August 12. Up early—to Czerwinsk and thence by Dirschau to Marienburg to see the famous Ritterschloss of the Teutonic Knights.... Marien-Kirch.... Angel Michael weighing the souls, a triptych—the good in right wing received by St. Peter and clothed by angels, the wicked in the other wing going down. The beautiful sheen of the Archangel—like peacock brightness—a devil with butterfly wings."
"August 14. In the church yesterday we were shown five holes in a flat tombstone. They say that a parricide was buried beneath this stone, and the fingers of his hand forced themselves through these holes. They showed us this hand, dried, and hung up in a chapel. Here also we saw a piece of embroidery in fine pearls, formerly belonging to the Catholic service, and worth thousands of dollars. Some very ancient priests' garments, with Arabic designs, were said to have been brought from the East by the Crusaders. An astronomic clock is shown in the church. The man who made it set about making another, but was made blind lest he should do so. By and by, pretending that he must repair or regulate something in the clock, he so puts it out of order that it never goes again.
"The amber-merchant—the felt shoes—views of America—the lecture—the Baltic."
She was enchanted with Dantzig. The ancient Polish Jews in their long cloth gabardines, with their hair dressed in two curls worn in front of the ear and hanging down on either side of the face, showed her how Shylock must have looked. She was far more interested in the relics of the old Polish civilization than in the crude, brand-new Prussian regime which was replacing it; but this did not suit her hosts. The peasants who worked on the estate were all Poles; the relations between them and their employer smacked strongly of serfdom. One very intelligent man, who often drove her, was called Zalinski. It struck her that this man might be related to her friend Lieutenant Zalinski, of the United States Army. She asked him if he had any relatives in America. He replied that a brother of his had gone to America many years before. He seemed deeply interested in the conversation and tried once or twice to renew it. One of the family, who was driving with our mother at the time, managed to prevent any more talk about the American Zalinski, and when the drive was over she was seriously called to account.
"Can you not see that it would be extremely unfortunate if one of our servants should learn that any relative of his could possibly be a friend of one of our guests?"
She was never allowed to see Zalinski again; on inquiring for him, she learned that he had been sent to a fair with horses to sell. He did not return to Lesnian during the remainder of her stay.
One of the picturesque features of the visit was the celebration of Baron Eric's birthday. It was a general holiday, and no work was done on the estate. After breakfast family and guests assembled in front of the old chateau; the baron, a fine, soldierly-looking man, his wife, the most graceful of women, and the only daughter, a lovely little girl with the well-chiselled Crawford features. The peasants, dressed in their best, assembled in procession in the driveway; one by one, in order of their age or position, they came up the steps, presented the Baroness with a bouquet, bent the knee and kissed the hand of Baron and Baroness. To most of the guests the picture was full of Old-World romance and charm. To one it was an offence. That the granddaughter of her father, the child of her adored sister, should have been placed by fate in this feudal relationship to the men and women by whose labor she lived outraged her democratic soul.
The Journal thus describes the days at Lesnian:—
"The Baron talked much last evening, first about his crops, then about other matters. He believes duelling to be the most efficient agency in promoting a polite state of society. Would kill any one whom he suspected of great wrong much sooner than bring him to justice. The law, he says, is slow and uncertain—the decision of the sword much more effectual. The present Government favors duelling. If he should kill some one in a duel, he would have two months of imprisonment only. He despises the English as a nation of merchants. The old German knights seem to be his models. With these barbarous opinions, he seems to be personally an amiable and estimable man. Despises University education, in whose course he might have come in contact with the son of a carpenter, or small shopkeeper—he himself went to a Gymnase, with sons of gentlemen...."
"Everything in the Junkerschaft[80] bristles for another war. Oscar von Rabe's room, in which I now write, contains only books of military drill.
"This day we visited the schoolhouse—session over, air of the room perfectly fetid. Schoolmaster, whom we did not see, a Pole—his sister could speak no German. Tattered primers in German. Visited the Jew, who keeps the only shop in Lesnian. Found a regular country assortment. He very civil. Gasthaus opposite, a shanty, with a beer-glass, coffee-cup and saucer rudely painted on its whitewashed boards. Shoemaker in a damp hovel, with mahogany furniture, quite handsome. He made me a salaam with both hands raised to his head."
"We went to call upon Herr von Rohr, at Schenskowkhan—an extensive estate. I had put on my Cheney silk and my bonnet as a great parade. Our host showed us his house, his books and engravings—he has several etchings by Rembrandt. Herr von Mechlenberg, public librarian of Konigsberg, a learned little old man, trotted round with us. We had coffee and waffles. Mechlenberg considers the German tongue a very ancient one, an original language, not patched up like French and English, of native dialects mingled with Latin."
In one of her letters to the Chicago "Tribune" is a significant passage written from Lesnian:—
"Having seen in one of the Dantzig papers the announcement that a certain Professor Blank would soon deliver a lecture upon America, showing the folly of headlong emigration thither and the ill fortune which many have wrought for themselves thereby, one of us remarked to a Dantziger that in such a lecture many untruths would probably be uttered. Our friend replied, with a self-gratulatory laugh, 'Ah, Madame! We Germans know all about the women of America. A German woman is devoted to her household, its care and management; but the American women all force their husbands to live in hotels in order that they may have no trouble in housekeeping.'"
She was as sensitive to criticism of her country as some people are to criticism of their friends. Throughout her stay in Germany she suffered from the captious and provoking tone of the Prussian press about things American.
