in front of the chalet, a circumstance which we almost
immediately noticed, because a procession of tourists was
filing along it pretty much all the time. [1] The chaleteer’s
business consisted in furnishing refreshments to tourists.
My blast had interrupted this trade for a few minutes,
by breaking all the bottles on the place; but I gave
the man a lot of whiskey to sell for Alpine champagne,
and a lot of vinegar which would answer for Rhine wine,
consequently trade was soon as brisk as ever.
1. “Pretty much” may not be elegant English, but it is
high time it was. There is no elegant word or phrase
which means just what it means.–M.T.
Leaving the Expedition outside to rest, I quartered myself
in the chalet, with Harris, proposing to correct my journals
and scientific observations before continuing the ascent.
I had hardly begun my work when a tall, slender, vigorous
American youth of about twenty-three, who was on his
way down the mountain, entered and came toward me with
that breeze self-complacency which is the adolescent’s
idea of the well-bred ease of the man of the world.
His hair was short and parted accurately in the middle,
and he had all the look of an American person who would
be likely to begin his signature with an initial,
and spell his middle name out. He introduced himself,
smiling a smirky smile borrowed from the courtiers
of the stage, extended a fair-skinned talon, and while
he gripped my hand in it he bent his body forward
three times at the hips, as the stage courtier does,
and said in the airiest and most condescending
and patronizing way–I quite remember his exact language:
“Very glad to make your acquaintance, ‘m sure; very glad indeed,
assure you. I’ve read all your little efforts and greatly
admired them, and when I heard you were here, I …”
I indicated a chair, and he sat down. This grandee was
the grandson of an American of considerable note in his day,
and not wholly forgotten yet–a man who came so near
being a great man that he was quite generally accounted
one while he lived.
I slowly paced the floor, pondering scientific problems,
and heard this conversation:
GRANDSON. First visit to Europe?
HARRIS. Mine? Yes.
G.S. (With a soft reminiscent sigh suggestive of bygone
joys that may be tasted in their freshness but once.)
Ah, I know what it is to you. A first visit!–ah,
the romance of it! I wish I could feel it again.
H. Yes, I find it exceeds all my dreams. It is enchantment.
I go…
G.S. (With a dainty gesture of the hand signifying “Spare
me your callow enthusiasms, good friend.”) Yes, _I_ know,
I know; you go to cathedrals, and exclaim; and you drag
through league-long picture-galleries and exclaim; and you
stand here, and there, and yonder, upon historic ground,
and continue to exclaim; and you are permeated with
your first crude conceptions of Art, and are proud
and happy. Ah, yes, proud and happy–that expresses it.
Yes-yes, enjoy it–it is right–it is an innocent revel.
H. And you? Don’t you do these things now?
G.S. I! Oh, that is VERY good! My dear sir, when you
are as old a traveler as I am, you will not ask such
a question as that. _I_ visit the regulation gallery,
moon around the regulation cathedral, do the worn round
of the regulation sights, YET?–Excuse me!
H. Well, what DO you do, then?
G.S. Do? I flit–and flit–for I am ever on the wing–but I
avoid the herd. Today I am in Paris, tomorrow in Berlin,
anon in Rome; but you would look for me in vain in the
galleries of the Louvre or the common resorts of the
gazers in those other capitals. If you would find me,
you must look in the unvisited nooks and corners where
others never think of going. One day you will find me
making myself at home in some obscure peasant’s cabin,
another day you will find me in some forgotten castle
worshiping some little gem or art which the careless eye
has overlooked and which the unexperienced would despise;
again you will find me as guest in the inner sanctuaries