Father Rhine
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P R E F AC E TH E fo llo wing pages are intended to s ho w how much can be done and seen in three weeks for twelve pounds . We started o n n o f A from London the ight ugust I , and were due back in England o n the morning o fthe 2 0 th 5 but within this short Space we were able to get to the very o f th e R source hine and back , mostly by o u r boat and bicycle . Nor did economy as s u compel us , a pessimistic friend g o n gested , to live sausage and sauerkraut , and sleepo ne night at the Hotel Norfolk Howard , and the next at the Grosser ” a vo n Floh or the B cillus Deutschland . Our quarters , however modest , were always o ur clean , and generally very roomy food was plentiful and good . Here and there I have altered names and ’ incidents for discretion s sake , and here and ’ there the reader s own judgment m ay s u g gest a pinch o fsalt ; but I have kept faith fully all through to my main purpose o f giving a j u st immes sion ofa Bohemian tour o n R - a the hine its charms and v ried chances , of and the beauty the river , the good nature vii P REFAC E o fthe people . I have passed quickly over such well- known places as Cologne and Heidelberg , to describe more fully other spots which are still less know n than they deserve . There will be found in the Appendix a fairly complete list of distances a nd ex h fo r penses , with a few ot er practical hints the journey . F ATH ER R H IN E C H APTER I Nil raetu lerim u c u ndo s anu s a ego p j mico . — C HORA E . O N A 1 8 8 the night of the I st of ugust 9 , two cloaked horsemen might h ave been seen o n the platform o f the Parkeston n Quay Station , speaki g in commanding tones to the knaves and varlets who pressed obsequiously round them , and a exhorting these rapsc llions , under peril o f their ears , to see the iron steeds safe fo r R on board the boat otterdam . The o f t taller the two , who twis s half a dozen links from the heavy gold chain round his neck , and casts them among the rabble d a forgive me , dear rea er ; this str in is above me : I too k them o u t of my right c0 er s hand pocket , and they were only pp ; a but the porters , if not sl vishly deferential , o u r were at least civil and handy , and on machines were soon board . Let me introd uce you now to my travelling com panion and old college friend . A 2 F ATH ER RH I N E Henry Schultz has nothing German about him but his name (and on this A I . n occasion , must add , his straw hat) accomplished mathematician , he is also familiar with the noblest poets , orators , and m historians of antiquity , and ore especially with such portions of them as are commonly s et fo r a Pass Degree at F either university . rench he will talk you a no t classic lly , if fluently ; but he never could bend his tongue to the rough Teutonic idiom , any more than Mrs Battle could condescend to the ignoble phraseology of A o f was not I cribbage . cricketer fame ( myself present some ten years ago , when a public- school boy at the Cologne table ’ d hote asked him whether he was tbe Schultz , and quite forgot the rest of his ice pudding o n receiving an affirmative a golfer of almost equal pro fi cienc a y ; a p infully energetic cyclist , as in — due time you shall s ee these are but a fe w fo r of his superficial accomplishments , I make no attempt here to catalogue his Yo u genuine virtues . will understand now why I chose this motto for my first chap fo r ter ; you doubtless remember , dear reader , that it is with reference to his own little tour with Virgil and Mzec enas that Horace tells us he knows nothing like an — old friend a sentiment which will be heartily echoed by all who have tried FATH E R RH I N E 3 travelling in the same way—uncondition and ally by the single , by the married with all proper m arital reservations . Our plan this time is ambitious— no less than to trace and retrace the whole course of the Rhi ne within the only eighteen clear a at a days we h ve our dispos l . We knew a it must needs be great rush , but the idea had fasci nated us ; we felt that even this dizzy succession o fch anging scenes would o w n have a charm of its , and that thus , in a of some ways , we should le rn more the characteristics and co ntrasts of land and people by a plan which e nabled u s to see it all , as it were , at one sweeping glance . Nearly all of the route we had already seen in detail at other times the rest we k new by books ; and in these eigh teen days we hoped rapidly to skim the cream of it all . That in this we succeeded to our own a complete s tisfaction , is my best excuse for publishing an account of our tour as a guide for future tourists . We o u rselves o f s o far spent eighteen days bliss , only alloyed as to give it the necessary human ’ consistency . Yet , a mo n g one s later r a a memo ies of even the h ppiest holid y , few things stand out in brighter colours than those first moments of a nticipation ; and few men ever started with more con fident n hopes of e joyment than we , as the ship ploughed her way through the tran 4 F ATH E R RH IN E quil starlit s ea ; and we sat recalling memories o fformer holidays until prudence warned us to go below and snatch that some what unquiet sleep , which is the most that o n mortals dare hope for , even the most unruffled passage . CHAPTER II h all u s N ow t e world is before . Au . 2 1 8 8. g , 9 ’ TH E Hook of Holland : s ix o clock on a brilliant morning : a calm passage behind u s ! , and the whole Continent before us Not even twenty years ago , when we first travelled together in our undergraduate days , did the world seem fresher to us , o r fuller of pleasant surprises . Here is - the well ordered little station , with every as thing as trim and as Dutch can be , built and arranged for o u r exclusive use who have come over in the Great Eastern boat : here are the two trains snorting with im u s off patience , ready to hurry to Hanover o r n at o u r — Colog e choice nay , even to l wa Switzer and , if we care to make our y into the through carriage for Bale : but we ’ ” don t care , for we are going to do the R a . fo r hine by bo t However , the moment we must desert the river , for our time is and a limited , this morning we must c tch the Netherlands Steamship Co . boat which R 0 starts from otterdam at seven . 8 we creep rather reluctantly into the train ; and n I , for my part , ca not help looking wist 6 F ATH E R RH IN E fully at the broad waters th at come down R a from otterd m , and thinking of the lazy voyages I have made on their bosom in all days gone by , after the perils of the An deep . d I see again that first cross a o — ing , nineteen years g how we passed a S teamer th at had been cast on the stone and bank , how the big waves raced along d and and her si es , swept her deck , lifted her and banged her down again on the stones ; and how our own c apt ai n hove- to b ar a outside the , and for ten mort l minutes a deb ted whether he dare risk to cross it , or whether we must put back again and pitch for a few hours more on the pitiless s ea that had tossed our souls o u t all that a and night ; and how at l st he risked it , a a we were soon in c lm water, and gradu lly the souls came back to o u r bodies ; and presently three p ale and h aggard brothers a a and st ggered shore upon a heaving quay , - - a crept wide legged , sailor fashion , long the n a n a and heavi g p veme t of the Hoogstra t , t at even par ook with some appetite , the o H tel St Lucas , of veal chops which bobbed up and dow n s o erratically b e fore our eyes that it seemed almost a miracle when we picked a bit up on our . H o w forks often since , in peril of the d a I a eep , h ve thought of th t first crossing “ 1 8 a 0 in 79 , and s id to myself, passi gr av io ra F ATH E R RH I N E 7 ’ And of then the last all , on New Year s 1 8 1 morning , 9 , when the whole broad river was f a s u n a mass of lo ting ice , and the rose like blood through hard lines of mist that a n looked like a prison gr ti g , until he gradually burst the bars and flamed up s k n over the whole y , and the thi threads of clear water made a wonderful arabesque of crimson and orange in and o u t of the - A d colder grey o fthe great ice Hoes .