Sunny Memories Of Foreign Lands Volume Ii Part 34

Some, surrounded by their growing families, though they abhor the tyranny of the government, acquiesce wearily, and even dread change lest something worse should arise.

We know not in America how many atrocities and cruelties that attended the _coup d'etat_ have been buried in the grave which intombed the liberty of the press. I have talked with eye witnesses of those scenes, men who have been in the prisons, and heard the work of butchery going on in the prison yards in the night. While we have been here, a gentleman to whom I had been introduced was arrested, taken from bed by the police, and carried off, without knowing of what he was accused. His friends were denied access to him, and on making application to the authorities, the invariable reply was, "Be very quiet about it. If you make a commotion his doom is sealed." When his wife was begging permission for a short interview, the jailer, wearied with her importunities, at last exclaimed unguardedly, "Madam, there are two hundred here in the same position; what would you have me do?"

[Footnote: That man has remained in prison to this day.]

At that very time an American traveller, calling on us, expatiated at length on the peaceful state of things in Paris--on the evident tranquillity and satisfaction universally manifest.

JOURNAL--(Continued.)

Sat.u.r.day, August 27. Left Paris with H., the rest of our party having been detained. Reached Boulogne in safety, and in high spirits made our way on board the steamer, deposited our traps below, came on deck, and prepared for the ordeal. A high north-wester had been blowing all day, and as we ran along behind the breakwater, I could see over it the white and green waves fiendishly running, and showing their malign eyes sparkling with hungry expectation. "Come out, come out!" they seemed to say; "come out, you little black imp of a steamer; don't be hiding behind there like a coward. We dare you to come out here and give us a chance at you--we will eat you up, as so many bears would eat a lamb."

And sure enough, the moment her bows pa.s.sed beyond the pier, the sea struck her, and tossed her like an eggsh.e.l.l, and the deck, from stem to stern, was drenched in a moment, and running with floods as if she had been under water. For a few moments H. and I both enjoyed the motion. We stood amids.h.i.+ps, she in her shawl, I in a great tarpauling which I had borrowed of Jack, and every pitch sent the spray over us.

We exulted that we were not going to be sick. Suddenly, however, so suddenly that it was quite mysterious, conscience smote me. A profound, a deep-seated remorse developed itself just exactly in the deepest centre of the pit of my stomach.

"H.," said I, with a decided, grave air, "I'm going to be seasick."

"So am I," said she, as if struck by the same convictions that had been impressed on me. We turned, and made our way along the leeward quarter, to a seat by the bulwarks. I stood holding on by the railrope, and every now and then addressing a few incoherent and rather guttural, not to say pectoral, remarks to the green and gloomy sea, as I leaned over the rail. After every paroxysm of communicativeness, (for in seasickness the organ of secretiveness gives way,) I regained my perpendicular, and faced the foe, with a determination that I would stand it through--that the grinning, howling brine should get no more secrets out of me. And, in fact, it did not.

Meanwhile, what horrors--what complicated horrors--did not that crowded deck present! Did the priestly miscreants of the middle ages ever represent among the torments of purgatory the deck of a channel steamer? If not, then they forgot the "lower deep," that Satan doubtless thought about, according to Milton.

There were men and women of every age and complexion, with faces of every possible shade of expression. Defiance, resolute and stern, desperate resolves never to give in, and that very same defiant determination sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought. A deep abyss of abdominal discontent, revealing afar the shadow, the penumbra, of the approaching retch. And there were _boulevers.e.m.e.nts,_ and hoa.r.s.e confidences to the sea of every degree of misery. The wind was really risen quite to a gale, and the sea ran with fearful power. Two sailors, standing near, said, "I wouldn't say it only to you, Jack, but in all the time I've crossed this here channel, I've seen nothin' like this."

"Nor I neither," was the reply.

About mid channel a wave struck the windward quarter, just behind the wheel, with a stroke like a rock from a ballista, smashed in the bulwarks, stove the boat, which fell and hung in the water by one end, and sent the ladies, who were sitting there with boxes, baskets, shawls, hats, spectacles, umbrellas, cloaks, down to leeward, in a pond of water. One girl I saw with a bruise on her forehead as large as an egg, and the blood streaming from her nostrils. Shrieks resounded, and for a few moments, we had quite a tragic time.

About this time H. gave in, and descended to Tartarus, where the floor was compactly, densely stowed with one ma.s.s of heaving wretches, with nothing but washbowls to relieve the sombre mosaic. How H. fared there she may tell; I cannot. I stood by the bulwark with my boots full of water, my eyes full of salt spray, and my heart full of the most poignant regret that ever I was born. Alas! was that channel a channel at all? Had it two sh.o.r.es? Was England over there, where I saw nothing but monstrous, leaping, maddening billows, saying, "We are glad of it; we want you; come on here; we are waiting for you; we will serve you up"?

At last I seriously began to think of Tartarus myself, and of a calm repose flat on my back, such as H. told of in his memorable pa.s.sage.

But just then, dim and faint on the horizon, I thought I discerned the long line of a bank of land. It was. This was a channel; that was the sh.o.r.e. England had not sunk. I stood my ground; and in an hour we came running, bounding, and rolling towards the narrow mouth of the Folkstone pier heads.

LETTER XLIX

LONDON.

MY DEAR:--

Our last letters from home changed all our plans. We concluded to hurry away by the next steamer, if at that late hour we could get pa.s.sage. We were all in a bustle. The last shoppings for aunts, cousins, and little folks were to be done by us all. The Palais Royal was to be rummaged; bronzes, vases, statuettes, bonbons, playthings--all that the endless fertility of France could show--was to be looked over for the "folks at home."

You ought to have seen our rooms at night, the last evening we spent in Paris. When the whole gleanings of a continental tour were brought forth for packing, and compared with the dimensions of original trunks--ah, what an hour was that! Who should reconcile these incongruous elements--bronzes, bonnets, ribbons and flowers, plaster casts, books, muslins and laces--elements as irreconcilable as fate and freedom; who should harmonize them? And I so tired!

"Ah," said Jladame B., "it is all quite easy; you must have a packer."

"A packer?"

"Yes. He will come, look at your things, provide whatever may be necessary, and pack them all."

So said, so done. The man came, saw, conquered; he brought a trunk, twine, tacks, wrapping paper, and I stood by in admiration while he folded dresses, arranged bonnets, caressingly enveloped flowers in silk paper, fastened refractory bronzes, and m.u.f.fled my plaster animals with reference to the critical points of ears and noses,--in short, reduced the whole heterogeneous a.s.sortment to place and proportion, shut, locked, corded, labelled, handed me the keys, and it was done. The charge for all this was quite moderate.

How we sped across the channel C. relates. We are spending a few very pleasant days with our kind friends, the L.'s, in London.

ON BOARD THE ARCTIC, Wednesday, September 7.

On Thursday, September 1, we reached York, and visited the beautiful ruins of St. Mary's Abbey, and the magnificent cathedral. How individual is every cathedral! York is not like Westminster, nor like Strasbourg, nor Cologne, any more than Shakspeare is like Milton, or Milton like Homer. In London I attended morning service in Westminster, and explored its labyrinths of historic memories. The reading of the Scriptures in the English tongue, and the sound of the chant, affected me deeply, in contrast with the pictorial and dramatic effects of Romanism in continental churches.

As a simple matter of taste, Protestantism has made these buildings more impressive by reducing them to a stricter unity. The mult.i.tude of shrines, candlesticks, pictures, statues, and votive offerings, which make the continental churches resemble museums, are constantly at variance with the majestic grandeur of the general impression. Therein they typify the church to which they belong, which has indeed the grand historic basis and framework of Christianity, though overlaid with extraneous and irrelevant additions.

This Cathedral of York has a severe grandeur peculiar to itself. I saw it with a deep undertone of feeling; for it was the last I should behold.

No one who has appreciated the wonders of a new world of art and a.s.sociation can see, without emotion, the door closing upon it, perhaps forever. I lingered long here, and often turned to gaze again; and after going out, went back, once more, to fill my soul with a last, long look, in which I bade adieu to all the historic memories of the old world. I thought of the words, "We have a building of G.o.d, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens."

These glorious arches, this sublime mystery of human power and skill, is only a shadow of some eternal substance, which, in the ages to come, G.o.d will yet reveal to us.

It rained with inflexible pertinacity during all the time we were at York; and the next day it rained still, when we took the cars for Castle Howard station.

In riding through the park from the station, we admired an avenue composed of groups of magnificent beeches, sixteen or eighteen in a group, disposed at intervals on either hand.

The castle, a building in the Italian style, rose majestically on a slight eminence in the centre of a green lawn. We alighted in the crisis of one of the most driving gusts of wind and rain, so that we really seemed to be fleeing for shelter. But within all was bright and warm.

Lady Carlisle welcomed us most affectionately, and we learned that, had we not been so reserved at the York station, in concealing our names, we should have received a note from her. However, as we were safely arrived, it was of no consequence.

Several of the family were there, among the rest Lady Dover and Mr.

and Mrs. E. Howard. They urged us to remain over night; but as we had written to Leeds that we should be there in the evening train, we were obliged to decline. We were shown over the castle, which is rich in works of art. There was a gallery of antiques, and a collection of paintings from old masters. In one room I saw tapestry exactly like that which so much interested us in Windsor, representing scenes from the Book of Esther. It seemed to be of a much more ancient date. I was also interested in a portrait of an ancestor of the family, the identical "Belted Will" who figures in Scott's Lay.

"Belted Will Howard shall come with speed, And William of Deloraine, good at need."

In one of the long corridors we were traversing, we heard the voice of merriment, and found a gay party of young people and children amusing themselves at games. I thought what a grand hide-and-go-seek place the castle must be--whole companies might lose themselves among the rooms. The central hall of the building goes up to the roof, and is surmounted by a dome. The architecture is in the Italian style, which I think much more suited to the purposes of ordinary life than for strictly religious uses. I never saw a church in that style that produced a very deep impression on me. This hall was gorgeously frescoed by Italian masters. The door commands the view of a magnificent sweep of green lawn, embellished by an artificial lake. It is singular in how fine and subtle a way different nationalities express themselves in landscape gardening, while employing the same materials. I have seen no grounds on the continent that express the particular shade of ideas which characterize the English. There is an air of grave majesty about the wide sweep of their outlines--a quality suggestive of ideas of strength and endurance which is appropriate to their nationality.

[Ill.u.s.tration: _of Castle Howard, with the artificial lake in the foreground._]

In Lord Carlisle's own room we saw pictures of Sumner, Prescott, and others of his American friends. This custom of showing houses, which prevails over Europe, is, I think, a thing which must conduce greatly to national improvement. A plea for the beautiful is constantly put in by them--a model held up before the community, whose influence cannot be too highly estimated. Before one of the choicest paintings stood the easel of some neighboring artist, who was making a copy. He was quite unknown to the family, but comes and goes at his pleasure, the picture being as freely at his service as if it were an outside landscape.

After finis.h.i.+ng our survey, I went with Lady Carlisle into her own _boudoir_. There I saw a cabinet full-length picture of her mother, the d.u.c.h.ess of Devons.h.i.+re. She is represented with light hair, and seemed to have been one whose beauty was less that of regular cla.s.sic model, than the fascination of a brilliant and buoyant spirit inspiring a graceful form. Lady Carlisle showed me an alb.u.m, containing a kind of poetical record made by her during a pa.s.sage through the Alps, which she crossed on horseback, in days when such an exploit was more difficult and dangerous than at present. I particularly appreciated some lines in closing, addressed to her children, expressing the eagerness with which she turned from all that nature and art could offer, in prospect of meeting them once more.

Lord Carlisle is still in Turkey, and will, probably, spend the winter in Greece. His mother had just received a letter from him, and he thinks that war is inevitable.

In one of the rooms that we traversed I saw an immense vase of bog oak and gold, which was presented to Lord Carlisle by those who favored his election on the occasion of his defeat on the corn-law question.

The sentiment expressed by the givers was, that a defeat in a n.o.ble undertaking was worthy of more honor than a victory in an ign.o.ble one.

After lunch, having waited in vain for the rain to cease, and give us a sunny interval in which to visit the grounds, we sallied out hooded and cloaked, to get at some of the most accessible points of view. The wind was unkindly and discourteous enough, and seemed bent on baffling the hospitable intentions of our friends. If the beauties of an English landscape were set off by our clear sky and sun, then patriotism, I fancy, would run into extravagance. I could see that even one gracious sunset smile might produce in these lawns and groves an effect of enchantment.

I was pleased with what is called the "kitchen garden," which I expected to find a mere collection of vegetables, but found to be a genuine old-fas.h.i.+oned garden, which, like Eden, brought forth all that was pleasant to the eye and good for food.

There were wide walks bordered with flowers, enclosing portions devoted to fruit and vegetables, and, best of all this windy day, the whole enclosed by a high, solid stone wall, which bade defiance to the storm, and made this the most agreeable portion of our walk.