This is a reproduction of a library book that was digitized by Google as part of an ongoing effort to preserve the information in books and make it universally accessible. https://books.google.com University ot Virginia libraries FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE. A Pla1n Record of a Pleasant Journey. by JULIA WARD HOWE. BOSTON: LEE AND SHEPARD. 1868. AlD D WIS Entered, according to Act of Congreu, In the year 1868, by JULIA WABD HOWI, In the Clerk'i Office of the District Court of the District of Maaaacbnsetti TO S. G. H., THE STRENUOUS CHAMPION OF GREEK LIBERTY AND OF HUMAN SIGHTS, IS OFFERED SUCH SMALL HOMAGE AS THE DEDICATION OF THIS VOLUME OAK OOBFEB. CONTENTS. prel1m1nar1es 1 Thb Voyagk 3 liverpool. 9 Chester — L1chfield 1 1 London 17 St. Paul's— The Japanese 23 Socekty 28 The Channel 36 Par1s and Thence 37 Marse1lles 42 Rome 45 St. Peter's 30 Supper of the P1lgr1ms 55 Easter 58 Works of Art. 60 P1azza Navona— The Tombola 65 Sundays in Rome 70 Catacombs 74 V1a Afp1a and the Columbar1a 81 Naples — The Journey 88 The Museum 92 (▼> VI CONTENTS. MM Naples — Excurs1ons 9^ The Capuch1n. 103 Baja I°6 Capr1. «» Sorrento "9 Florence. 1aa Palazzo P1tt1 I34 Ven1ce *33 Greece and the Voyage th1ther. -153 Syra 16+ Pdlakus — Athens 169 Exped1t1ons— Naupl1a. 17S Argos 183 Eg1na 196 Days 1n Athens 198 Excurs1ons 305 Hymrttus * • 214 Items 331 The Palace 333 The Cathedral 337 The Missionar1es 331 The P1azza 334 Departure 337 Return Voyage 339 Farther. 349 Fragments 353 Fly1ng Footsteps 370 Mun1ch 375 Sw1tzerland 384 The Great Expos1t1on. 390 P1ctures in Antwerp 399 FEOM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE. Prel1m1nar1es. Not being, at this moment, in the pay of any press, whether foreign or domestic, I will not, at this my third landing in English country, be in haste to accom plish the correspondent's office of extroversion, and to expose all the inner processes of thought and of nature to the gaze of an imaginary public, often, alas ! a delu sory one, and difficult to be met with. No individual editor, nor joint stock company, bespoke my emotions before my departure. I am, therefore, under no obliga tion to furnish for the market, with the elements of time and of postage unhandsomely curtailed. Instead, then, of that breathless steeple chase after the butterfly of the moment, with whose risks and hurry I am inti mately acquainted, I feel myself enabled to look around me at every step which I shall take on paper, and to represent, in my small literary operations, the three dimensions of time, instead of the flat disc of the present. And first as to my pronoun. The augmentative We (l) 3 FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE. is essential for newspaper writing, because people are liable to be horsewhipped for what they put in the ■acred columns of a daily journal. We may represent a vague number of individuals, less inviting to, and safer from, the cowhide, than the provoking egomet ipse. Or perhaps the We derives from the New Testa ment incorporation of devils, whose name was legion, for we are many. In the Fichtean philosophy, also, there are three pronouns comprised in the personal unity whose corporeal effort applies this pen to this paper, to wit, the I absolute, the I limited, and the / resulting from the union of these two. So that a phi losopher may say we as well as a monarch or a penny- a-liner. Yet I, at the present moment, incline to fall back upon my record of baptism, and to confront the white sheet, whose blankness I trust ,to overborne, in the character of an agent one and indivisible. Nor let it be supposed that these preliminary remarks undervalue the merits and dignity of those who write for ready money, whose meals and travels are at the expense of mysterious corporations, the very cocktail which fringes their daily experience being thrown in as a brightener of their wits and fancies. Thus would I, too, have written, had anybody ordered me to do so. I can hurry up my hot cakes like another, when there is any one to pay for them. But, leisure being accord ed me, I shall stand with my tablets in the market place, hoping in the end to receive my penny, upon a footing of equality with those who have borne the bur den and heat of the day. THE VOYAGE. 3 With the rights of translation, however, already arranged for in the Russian, Sclavonian, Hindustanee, and Fijian dialects, I reserve to myself the right to con vert my pronoun, and to write a chapter in toe when ever the individual / shall seem to be insufficient. With these little points agreed upon beforehand, to prevent mistakes, — since a book always represents a bargain, — I will enter, without further delay, upon what I intend as a very brief but cogent chronicle of a third visit to Europe, the first two having attained no personal record. The Voyage. The steamer voyage is now become a fact so trite and familiar as to call for no special illustration at these or any other hands. Yet voyages and lives resemble each other in many particulars, and differ in as many others. Ours proves almost unprecedented for smooth ness, as well as for safety. We start on the fatal Wednesday, as twice before, expecting the fatal pang. Our last vicarious purchase on shore was a box of that energetic mustard, so useful as a counter-irritant in cases of internal commotion. The bitter partings are over, the dear ones heartily commended to Heaven, we see, as in a dream, the figure of command mount ed upon the paddle-box. We cling to a camp stool near the red smoke-stack, and cruelly murmur to the two rosy neophytes who are our companions, "In five minutes you will be more unhappy than you ever were or ever dreamed of being." They reply with 4 FROM THB OAK TO THE OLIVE. sweet, unconscious looks of wonder, that ignorance of danger which the recruit carries into his first battle, or which carries him into it. But five minutes pass, and twelve times five, and the moment for going below does not come. In the expected shape, in fact, it does not arrive at all. We do not resolve upon locomotion, nor venture into the dining saloon ; but leaning back upon a borrowed chaise longue, we receive hurried and fragmentary instalments of victuals, and discuss with an improvised acquaintance the aspects of for eign and domestic travel. The plunge into the state room at bedtime, and the crawl into the narrow .berth, are not without their direr features, which the sea- smells and confined air aggravate. We hear bad accounts of A, B, and C, but our neophytes patrol the deck to the last moment, and rise from their dive, on the second morning, fresher than ever. Our steamer is an old one, but a favorite, and as steady as a Massachusetts matron of forty. Our captain is a kindly old sea-dog, who understands his business, and does not mind much else. To the innocent flat teries of the neophytes he opposes a resolute front. They will forget him, he says, as soon as they touch land. They protest that they will not, and assure him that he shall breakfast, dine, and sup with them in Boston, six months hence, and that he shall always remain their sole, single, and ideal captain; at all of which he laughs as grimly as Jove is said to do at lovers' per juries. Our company is a small one, after the debarkation THE VOYAGE. 5 at Halifax, where sixty-five passengers leave us, — among whom are some of the most strenuous euchre ists. The remaining thirty-six are composed partly of our own country people, — of whom praise or blame would be impertinent in this connection, — partly of the Anglo-Saxon of the day, in the pre-puritan variety. Of the latter, as of the former, we will waive all dis criminating mention, having porrigated to them the dexter of good-will, with no hint of aboriginal toma hawks to be exhumed hereafter. Some traits, however, of the Anglais de voyage^ as seen on his return from an American trip, may be vaguely given, without per sonality or fear of offence. The higher in grade the culture of the European traveller in America, the more reverently does he speak of what he has seen and learned. To the gentle- hearted, childhood and its defects are no less sacred than age and its decrepitude ; withaj, much dearer, because full of hope and of promise. The French bar ber sneezes out " Paris " at every step taken on the new land. That is the utmost his ratiocination can do ; he can perceive that Boston, Washington, Chicago, are not Paris. The French exquisite flirts, flatters the indi vidual, and depreciates the commonwealth. The Eng lish bagman hazards the glibbest sentences as to th falsity of the whole American foundation. Not much behind him lags the fox-hunting squire. The folly and uselessness of our late war supply the theme of dia tribes as eloquent as twentyyfo* letters can make them. Obliging aperfus of the degradation and misery in 6 FROM THE OAK TO THE OLIVE. store for us are vouchsafed at every opportunity. But it is when primogeniture is touched upon, or the neu trality of England in the late war criticised, that the bellowing of the sacred bulls becomes a brazen thunder.