A Tramp Abroad
satisfied himself that the ancients built it to make German cream in.
He said that the average German cow yielded from one to two and half
teaspoons of milk, when she was not worked in the plow or the hay-wagon
more than eighteen or nineteen hours a day. This milk was very sweet and
good, and a beautiful transparent bluish tint; but in order to get cream
from it in the most economical way, a peculiar process was necessary.
Now he believed that the habit of the ancients was to collect several
milkings in a teacup, pour it into the Great Tun, fill up with water,
and then skim off the cream from time to time as the needs of the German
Empire demanded.
This began to look reasonable. It certainly began to account for the
German cream which I had encountered and marveled over in so many hotels
and restaurants. But a thought struck me--
“Why did not each ancient dairyman take his own teacup of milk and his
own cask of water, and mix them, without making a government matter of
it?'
“Where could he get a cask large enough to contain the right proportion
of water?”
Very true. It was plain that the Englishman had studied the matter from
all sides. Still I thought I might catch him on one point; so I asked
him why the modern empire did not make the nation's cream in the
Heidelberg Tun, instead of leaving it to rot away unused. But he
answered as one prepared--
“A patient and diligent examination of the modern German cream had
satisfied me that they do not use the Great Tun now, because they have
got a BIGGER one hid away somewhere. Either that is the case or they
empty the spring milkings into the mountain torrents and then skim the
Rhine all summer.”
There is a museum of antiquities in the Castle, and among its most
treasured relics are ancient manuscripts connected with German history.
There are hundreds of these, and their dates stretch back through many
centuries. One of them is a decree signed and sealed by the hand of a
successor of Charlemagne, in the year 896. A signature made by a hand
which vanished out of this life near a thousand years ago, is a more
impressive thing than even a ruined castle. Luther's wedding-ring was
shown me; also a fork belonging to a time anterior to our era, and an
early bootjack. And there was a plaster cast of the head of a man who
was assassinated about sixty years ago. The stab-wounds in the face
were duplicated with unpleasant fidelity. One or two real hairs still
remained sticking in the eyebrows of the cast. That trifle seemed to
almost change the counterfeit into a corpse.
There are many aged portraits--some valuable, some worthless; some of
great interest, some of none at all. I bought a couple--one a gorgeous
duke of the olden time, and the other a comely blue-eyed damsel,
a princess, maybe. I bought them to start a portrait-gallery of my
ancestors with. I paid a dollar and a half for the duke and a half for
the princess. One can lay in ancestors at even cheaper rates than these,
in Europe, if he will mouse among old picture shops and look out for
chances.
APPENDIX C.
The College Prison It seems that the student may break a good many of
the public laws without having to answer to the public authorities.
His case must come before the University for trial and punishment. If a
policeman catches him in an unlawful act and proceeds to arrest him,
the offender proclaims that he is a student, and perhaps shows his
matriculation card, whereupon the officer asks for his address, then
goes his way, and reports the matter at headquarters. If the offense is
one over which the city has no jurisdiction, the authorities report
the case officially to the University, and give themselves no further
concern about it. The University court send for the student, listen to
the evidence, and pronounce judgment. The punishment usually inflicted
is imprisonment in the University prison. As I understand it, a
student's case is often tried without his being present at all.
Then something like this happens: A constable in the service of the
University visits the lodgings of the said student, knocks, is invited
to come in, does so, and says politely--
“If you please, I am here to conduct you to prison.”
“Ah,” says the student, “I was not expecting it. What have I been
doing?”
“Two weeks ago the public peace had the honor to be disturbed by you.”
“It is true; I had forgotten it. Very well: I have been complained of,
tried, and found guilty--is that it?”
“Exactly. You are sentenced to two days' solitary confinement in the
College prison, and I am sent to fetch you.”
STUDENT. “O, I can't go today.”
OFFICER. “If you please--why?”
STUDENT. “Because I've got an engagement.”
OFFICER. “Tomorrow, then, perhaps?”
STUDENT. “No, I am going to the opera, tomorrow.”
OFFICER. “Could you come Friday?”
STUDENT. (Reflectively.) “Let me see--Friday--Friday. I don't seem to
have anything on hand Friday.”
OFFICER. “Then, if you please, I will expect you on Friday.”
STUDENT. “All right, I'll come around Friday.”
OFFICER. “Thank you. Good day, sir.”
STUDENT. “Good day.”
So on Friday the student goes to the prison of his own accord, and is
admitted.
It is questionable if the world's criminal history can show a custom
more odd than this. Nobody knows, now, how it originated. There have
always been many noblemen among the students, and it is presumed that
all students are gentlemen; in the old times it was usual to mar the
convenience of such folk as little as possible; perhaps this indulgent
custom owes its origin to this.
One day I was listening to some conversation upon this subject when an
American student said that for some time he had been under sentence
for a slight breach of the peace and had promised the constable that he
would presently find an unoccupied day and betake himself to prison. I
asked the young gentleman to do me the kindness to go to jail as soon
as he conveniently could, so that I might try to get in there and visit
him, and see what college captivity was like. He said he would appoint
the very first day he could spare.
His confinement was to endure twenty-four hours. He shortly chose
his day, and sent me word. I started immediately. When I reached the
University Place, I saw two gentlemen talking together, and, as they
had portfolios under their arms, I judged they were tutors or elderly
students; so I asked them in English to show me the college jail. I
had learned to take it for granted that anybody in Germany who knows
anything, knows English, so I had stopped afflicting people with my
German. These gentlemen seemed a trifle amused--and a trifle confused,
too--but one of them said he would walk around the corner with me and
show me the place. He asked me why I wanted to get in there, and I said
to see a friend--and for curiosity. He doubted if I would be admitted,
but volunteered to put in a word or two for me with the custodian.
He rang the bell, a door opened, and we stepped into a paved way and
then up into a small living-room, where we were received by a hearty
and good-natured German woman of fifty. She threw up her hands with a
surprised “ACH GOTT, HERR PROFESSOR!” and exhibited a mighty deference
for my new acquaintance. By the sparkle in her eye I judged she was a
good deal amused, too. The “Herr Professor” talked to her in German, and
I understood enough of it to know that he was bringing very plausible
reasons to bear for admitting me. They were successful. So the Herr
Professor received my earnest thanks and departed. The old dame got her
keys, took me up two or three flights of stairs, unlocked a door, and
we stood in the presence of the criminal. Then she went into a jolly and
eager description of all that had occurred downstairs, and what the Herr
Professor had said, and so forth and so on. Plainly, she regarded it as
quite a superior joke that I had waylaid a Professor and employed him
in so odd a service. But I wouldn't have done it if I had known he was a
Professor; therefore my conscience was not disturbed.
Now the dame left us to ourselves. The cell was not a roomy one; still
it was a little larger than an ordinary prison cell. It had a window
of good size, iron-grated; a small stove; two wooden chairs; two oaken
tables, very old and most elaborately carved with names, mottoes, faces,
armorial bearings, etc.--the work of several generations of imprisoned
students; and a narrow wooden bedstead with a villainous straw mattress,
but no sheets, pillows, blankets, or coverlets--for these the student
must furnish at his own cost if he wants them. There was no carpet, of
course.
The ceiling was completely covered with names, dates, and monograms,
done with candle-smoke. The walls were thickly covered with pictures and
portraits (in profile), some done with ink, some with soot, some with a
pencil, and some with red, blue, and green chalks; and whenever an inch
or two of space had remained between the pictures, the captives had
written plaintive verses, or names and dates. I do not think I was ever
in a more elaborately frescoed apartment.
Against the wall hung a placard containing the prison laws. I made a
note of one or two of these. For instance: The prisoner must pay, for
the “privilege” of entering, a sum equivalent to 20 cents of our money;
for the privilege of leaving, when his term had expired, 20 cents; for
every day spent in the prison, 12 cents; for fire and light, 12 cents a
day. The jailer furnishes coffee, mornings, for a small sum; dinners and
suppers may be ordered from outside if the prisoner chooses--and he is
allowed to pay for them, too.
Here and there, on the walls, appeared the names of American students,
and in one place the American arms and motto were displayed in colored
chalks.
With the help of my friend I translated many of the inscriptions.
Some of them were cheerful, others the reverse. I will give the reader a
few specimens:
“In my tenth semester (my best one), I am cast here through the
complaints of others. Let those who follow me take warning.”
“III TAGE OHNE GRUND ANGEBLICH AUS NEUGIERDE.” Which is to say, he had a
curiosity to know what prison life was like; so he made a breach in some
law and got three days for it. It is more than likely that he never had
the same curiosity again.
(TRANSLATION.) “E. Glinicke, four days for being too eager a spectator
of a row.”
“F. Graf Bismarck--27-29, II, '74.” Which means that Count Bismarck, son
of the great statesman, was a prisoner two days in 1874.
(TRANSLATION.) “R. Diergandt--for Love--4 days.” Many people in this
world have caught it heavier than for the same indiscretion.
This one is terse. I translate:
“Four weeks for MISINTERPRETED GALLANTRY.” I wish the sufferer had
explained a little more fully. A four-week term is a rather serious
matter.
There were many uncomplimentary references, on the walls, to a certain
unpopular dignitary. One sufferer had got three days for not saluting
him. Another had “here two days slept and three nights lain awake,”
on account of this same “Dr. K.” In one place was a picture of Dr. K.
hanging on a gallows.
Here and there, lonesome prisoners had eased the heavy time by altering
the records left by predecessors. Leaving the name standing, and the
date and length of the captivity, they had erased the description of the
misdemeanor, and written in its place, in staring capitals, “FOR THEFT!”
or “FOR MURDER!” or some other gaudy crime. In one place, all by itself,
stood this blood-curdling word:
“Rache!” [1]
1. “Revenge!”
There was no name signed, and no date. It was an inscription well
calculated to pique curiosity. One would greatly like to know the nature
of the wrong that had been done, and what sort of vengeance was wanted,