Around the World with Josiah Allen's Wife by Marietta Holley (ebook reader android txt) đ
- Author: Marietta Holley
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Josiah acted huffy, and I drawed his attention off onto the corners of base relief and the white statters ornamentinâ the ruff.
To our great sorrow, we found that Emperor William wuznât to home. I spoze it will be a great disappointment to him when he hears onât that Josiah and I had really been there right to his home and he shouldnât be there. I well know how bad I should feel if Potentates come to Jonesville and I happened to be off on a tower. And then I honored Emperor William for his kind heart and kind actions and his good sense, and felt bad enough to think I wuznât goinâ to see him.
But owinâ to Robert Strongâs gittinâ a letter from somebody to somebody, we went through the palace just as I would want William to go through our house in Jonesville and the carriage-house and barn, if we happened to be away a visitinâ when he come our way.
And oh, what a sight that palace wuz on the inside when we come to go through it, and the outside too looked 430 well, very strong and massive and handsum and big, enormous big.
Why, it contains six hundred rooms. And Miss Cornelius Bobbett thought she had reached the very hite of grandeur when she moved into their new house that had six big rooms beside the bedrooms. And it did go fur ahead of the average Jonesville housen. But when I stood in Williamâs white saloon and our party wuz givinâ utterance to different ejaculations of surprise and admiration I only sez instinctively:
âOh, if Sister Cornelius Bobbett only could see this room! what would she say? How her pride would be lowered down.â
For it did seem to me the most beautiful room I ever beheld. It was more than a hundred feet long, and about half that in width, and the crystal glitter overhead reflected in the shininâ floor below wuz ahead of anything I had ever seen, as brilliant as a hull forest of ice-sickles mingled in with statutes and columns and angels and everything else beautiful.
Here in this room Sessions of Parliament are opened. And I thought the laws ort to be grand and noble indeed to make âem worthy of the place they was made in.
But, immense as this room wuz, the picture gallery is most as big agin and full of beauty and inspiration from wall to wall and from floor to ceilinâ. The palace chapel is kinder round in shape, and has all sorts of soft and rich-colored marbles in the floor and wall. The altar wuz made of Egyptian marble, a kind of buff color, and the pulpit wuz made of Carrera marble. I spoze powerful sermons have been preached from that pulpit.
In Berlin the most beautiful pictures are to be seen on every side on palace walls and in picture galleries, Dorothy and Robert just doted on âem and so did I. But Josiah always complained of his corns whilst walkinâ through âem. A picture gallery just started them corns to achinâ the worst kind from his tell.
Samantha points out the beauties of the White Saloon.ââPage 430.
The Bourse is sunthinâ like our stock exchange, but big enough to accommodate thousands of money-seekers. I spoze they have lively times here anon or oftenerââthe river Spree runs right in front onât (though I donât think that makes a mite of difference).
More than fifty bridges cross this river and it divides out into canals and little streams, all of which comes together agin and flows away into the sea.
The Alson bridge is one of the most beautiful bridges I ever sot my eyes on, and not fur off is the Alson Platz, a very charming public garden. Shady paths, trees, flowers, sculpture, all make this garden very attractive.
Not fur off is the Konigs Platz, one of the most imposing parts of the city. In the centre of this square stands the grand monument to Victory, it is high and lofty as a monument to Victory ort to be, solid and massive at the base (for in order to be successful you have got to have a good underpinninâ of principle and gumption) and crowned with a noble-lookinâ figger, standinâ amidst a flock of eagles.
The Royal Theatre is a handsome building and looks some in front like our own Capitol in Washington, D. C. It stands between two meetinâ-houses, as if it laid out to set back and enjoy its neighborhood and be real respectable.
In front of it stands a fine monument to the German poet, Schiller. I sot store by him. Thomas J. used to read his books to his Pa and me a good deal when he wuz tendinâ the Cademy to Jonesville, his dramas and his poems, so Josiah and I felt quite well acquainted with him, and when we see his name here amidst foreign seens it give us quite agreeable emotions, some as if we wuz a travellinâ in Africa and should see a obelisk riz up with Deacon Henzyâs name on it. Also I wuz interested in looking at the beautiful equestrian statute of Frederic William the illustrious elector, who did so much to make his country great.
432It stands on a bridge, as if dominating sea and land, as he did a good deal whilst he wuz alive. He looks calm and powerful, and has a look on his face as if he could do most anything he sot out to do. And the four slaves grouped round the base of the statute seem to look up to him as if they trusted him implicitly.
His clothes wuznât exactly what I would want Josiah sculped in if he wuz to be rared up in marble, and it seems as if so many skirts and such a long cloak floatinâ out must be in a manâs way if he wuz in a hurry. But where is there anything perfect here below? It wuz remarkably handsome, take it as a hull.
Dorothy and Robert said they wanted to see the statute of Gerty.
And Josiah whispered to me and sez, âGerty who? I didnât know as they knew any Gertrude that wuz buried here.â
And I whispered back, âThey mean Goethe, Josiah. You know Thomas J. has read us quite a lot of his writings.â Sez I, âDonât you remember about little Mignon, who wuz so home-sick for her own land, and would keep askinâ:
âKnowest thou the land where citron apples bloom,
And oranges like gold amidst the leafy gloom?â
âYou remember it, Josiah. Iâve seen you shed tears when he wuz readinâ about her.â
And Josiah whispered back in a loud shrill whisper that I know they hearn: âIf they wanted to see Go-ethe, why didnât they say Go-ethe?â (He always would pronounce his name to rhyme with sheath.)
I felt mortified, nothinâ seems worse when youâre tryinâ to quell a pardner down than to have him whisper back so loud. Why, I have had Josiah right to my own table when Iâve had company and he wuz makinâ onlucky remarks, Iâve known him to ask me right out what I wuz steppinâ on his 433 toe for, and I wuz worse off than as if I hadnât tried to curb him in. But then he has a host of good qualities, and pardners are dretful handy lots of times. But life is a kind of a warfare to the best and happiest on us.
Well we all went to see the statute to Goethe; it stands in a pleasant spot in the Thiergarten surrounded by shrubs and trees. The face of the great poet is full of the sadness and glory of them that see visions and dream dreams. Grouped about him are the sculptured forms of Tragedy, Lyrical Poetry, and Research. It wuz a impressive monument and rousted up more emotions in me than any that I see in Berlin.
Well, we didnât stay long in Prussia, for the cords that wuz drawinâ us home tightened from day to day, the children and Philury drawinâ them cords closter ever and anon with long and loving letters, and we hastened on to Hamburg. It wuz a lovely day when we sot out on our journey and we wuz all feelinâ well, specially Josiah and I, for every revolution of the wheels brought us nigher to our beloved Jonesville and every toot of the engine seemed to shout afresh the joyful tidinâs to us that we had sot our faces towards the bright hearth stun of home.
We had no eventful experiences on the journey to relate, unless it wuz a interview we had with a young man, a Freshman I believe he wuz from some college, travellinâ with his tutor, and he seemed real fresh, he seemed to have plenty of money but a scarcity of brains, or mebby he had enough brains, but they seemed to be in a sort of a soft state, and I guess theyâll harden up some when he gits older if he has good luck with them.
I wuz most a good mind to advise him to set in the sun bareheaded all he could, thinkinâ mebby it might harden âem some, but didnât know how it would be took.
He thought he knew a sight, but the shadder he really cast on worldly affairs wuz exceedingly small, he could step over it the hull time, but he felt that it reached the horizon. 434 Robert talked quite a good deal with him, to pass away the time I spoze, but there wuz a queer smile in his eyes and kinder patient and long sufferinâ as if to say:
âYouâll know more in the future than you do now and Iâll bear with you.â
The young man thought he wuz patronizinâ Robert, I knew from his liniment. He wuz a infidel, and seemed to think it made him very smart. You know some folks do think it is real genteel to doubt and a mark of a deep thinker.
I hearn him go on for quite a spell, for Robert wouldnât argy with him, thinkinâ I spoze it might strain his arm to hit at vacancy. But at last I seemed to have to speak up to Miss Meechim and say:
âHow strange it is that some folks think the less they believe the bigger it makes âem, but good land! it donât take much intellect to believe in nothinâ, it donât strain the mind any if it is ever so weak.â
I guess he hearn me, for he kinder changed his talk and went to patronizinâ the seenery. Well, it wuz beautiful a good deal of the way, though at the last of our journey it broke out rainy all of a sudden right whilst Josiah wuz all engaged in admirinâ a particular view, and it grew cold and disagreeable. And he beinâ tired out, worried a sight about the rain and the suddenness onât and how it stopped his sight-seeinâ and brung on his rumatiz, and he complained of his corns and his tight boots, and said that I had ort to seen that he wuz dressed thicker, and fretted and acted. And I sez:
âYouâve got to take things as they come, Josiah. I couldnât send anybody out this morninâ to bring in a pail of weather to see if it wuz goinâ to rain. Youâve got to take it as it comes, and when it comes, and make the best onât.â
But he still acted restless and oneasy, and most cried, he felt so bad. And I went on and dilated on the merits of calmness and serenity and how beautiful traits they wuz and how much to be desired.
435And he snapped me up enough to take my head off, and said that he âcouldnât always be calm and wuznât goinâ to try to be.â
âNo,â sez I reasonable, âyouâve got to be megum in that, or in eatinâ bread and milk; of course, you could kill yourself on that, though it seems innocent and harmless; you can carry everything too fur.â
And seeinâ that his liniment still bore the marks of restless oneasiness and onhappiness, I eppisoded a little on his side of the question, for what will not a woman do to ease a pardnerâs mind and comfort him?
âYes, Josiah, Cousin Joel Smithâs life used to be so serene and so deadly calm on all occasions that she used to mad Uncle Joel, who wuz of a lively and active temperament, like the most of the Smiths.
âI asked Joel once on a visit there, when she had been so collected together and monotonous in aspect, and talked with such oneven and sweetness of tone that I got dead tired onât myself, and felt that I had been lookinâ on a sunbaked prairie for months,
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