WELL, here I am at last in Paradise! I was a long time on the way, but I would not have back one moment. To paraphrase dear, simple-hearted, child-like Hans Christian Anderson, “My journey has been a lovely dream, happy, and full of incident.”

I left Munich two weeks ago alone, for a twenty-four hours’ railway trip, in a mixture of foreign countries and a medley of foreign languages that would have swallowed me up in inextricable confusion, but for the wise precautions I had taken to fend it off. I made requisitions in every direction and on every available person on almost as extensive a scale as the Kaiser might if he were going in for a big war; the American consul and all my other acquaintances—their name was not “legion”—all being called upon. I had a royal escort to the station—three ladies and Mr. S—— placed me in the care of the “guard” (conductor), who spoke French and German. His fluency in both I’ll own was a trifle aggravating. My friends had put me in my “carriage” (sleeper), which was elegant and commodious, such as only princes and princesses and the like are in the habit of using. I had it all to myself. How I wish that Tower of Babel incident had happened on some other planet. Then they all smothered me with kisses, and the dear, young frÄuleins with tears. The warning shriek sent them tumbling over each other to get off the train. Handkerchiefs were waved from the platform, and oh! in a flash I was out in the universe of moonlight and solitude, cut off from all I know. But, having obeyed the instructions of my special advisers, the American consul and others, not to have a courier, I felt no anxiety. Said the A. C., “Tip the guard.” Ditto, said Mr. S——, “Tip the guard,” and “Tip the guard,” chimed in No. 3. And on my order to that effect, said Mr. S——, young America, Harvard graduate! “I’ve made it bully with the guard.” So that guard didn’t mean to bear the weight on his conscience without rendering a fair equivalent of service. In he came popping every few minutes to say something in that dreadfully fluent German. If he thought I was not understanding fast enough, resorting to French (and this is a most mortifying admission); when both seemed failing, he tripped into the most ludicrously despairing pantomime! At bedtime he put a crimson shade over my lamp and bade me “good-night” with that exquisite French politeness that has not its match in the world, charging me to call him if I needed anything. But—the chilly little bed he had made for me—Ugh! It made me shiver just to look at it. Think of it, linen sheets and one spread after my German nest of down—a bed of it under and another over me.

Fortunately, I think the earth never saw a lovelier night, a full moon and that clear, keen air that tells “Jack Frost” is busy; and the pretty country slipping past so fast in the dazzling white light. I sat up, of course. Towards morning it grew “cold, very cold.” It was ruthless in me, but I stripped that bed of its one cover to wrap up in. When we ran into Strassburg at five and got out for breakfast, I just roasted myself by the great, generous fire. My waiter spoke English. I crossed his hand with that douceur, “a silver shilling,” in England, mark, in Germany. Believe me, the sweetest sounds ever syllabled by human tongue are those of one’s own vernacular. On the frontier, we changed from German to French cars, from the luxurious warmth of the former to the comfortless cold of the latter; the one heated by invisible registers, the other by a tube of hot water laid on the floor—merely a poor foot-warmer. I was never more tired of a journey, all because of the cold; therefore never so glad to see the end.

When I jumped out of the carriage at the Gare de L’Est, you need not be told how glad I was to find a relative awaiting me. He took me to the Grand Hotel, the largest and most fashionable in Paris, and after I was rested, out on the balcony attached to show me the Rue des Capucins by gas-light, lamp-light, moon-light, and star-light. I was overwhelmed with the sight, speechless at such a brilliant spectacle—millions, it seemed, of lights in every possible arrangement. This winter has been so rainy, I am glad I came no sooner. I shall be away by the middle of the month to Italy, and return again to Paris later.

The view from my private balcony (at a pension kept by a French lady, to which I have changed from the hotel) is charming, and the Arc de Triomphe de l’Étoile is not a stone’s throw distant. I also see the great palace of Mrs. Mackey from my balcony; it is nearer than the Arc. It has a little square all to itself. She is now at Nice, and it is closed. I heard that Mr. Mackey is worth two hundred millions! Grace Greenwood is in Paris. Her daughter is pronounced by everyone to be “exquisitely beautiful.”

I have seen the Hotel des Invalides, Champs de Mars, Trocadero, Passy, the loveliest suburb of homes; the Bois de Boulogne, that you know by heart, but oh! what an enchantment to know by sight; the Champs ElysÉes; the Place de la Concorde; the garden of the Luxembourg; the Palace de l’Étoile with the grand Arc de Triomphe, the largest, they say, in the world; the Madeleine; Chapelle Expiatoire; and the afternoon at the Gobelins, looking at those wonders of wool, silk, gold and silver, wrought in such patience “by the most practiced eye” by men’s fingers never allowed to demean themselves by other work of whatever kind; and the Champs ElysÉes on Sunday afternoon! This last is the great moving human spectacle. I have seen nothing like it but Hyde Park on that gala-day of “The meet of the four-in-hands.” Such countless lines of carriages in the street! Looking ahead I could not see how we were ever going to get through the approaching host, apparently as compact and impregnable as one’s idea of the advancing columns of an army. I tell you it filled me with awe. In the street I could not detect space enough for even one more carriage. One must see to comprehend how grand and imposing such a vast concourse of seething humanity is.

The weather is like our last of April. The grass is thick and green, and from three to five inches high. The flower-beds in the squares are full of flowers. As one walks or drives, whiffs of sweet violets are constantly blown to you. At least one great flower-shop greets the delighted eye every half-square. The sunshine is a dazzle most of the time. I must stop, but will write more at an early date.

L. G. C.

Paris, February 4, 1883.