From Naples we went to Athens, Dorothy wantin’ to see Greece while she was so nigh to it, and Robert Strong wantin’ just what she did every time. And Miss Meechim sayin’ that it would be a pity to go home and not be able to say that we had been to what wuz once the most learned and genteel place in the hull world.

“Yes,” sez Josiah, “I’d love to tell Elder Minkley and the brethern I’d been there.”

And Miss Meechim went on to say that she wanted to see the Acropolis and the Hall of the Nymphs and the Muses.

And Josiah told me that “they wuz nobody he had ever neighbored with and didn’t know as he wanted to.”

I guess Miss Meechim didn’t hear him for she went on and said, “Athens wuz named from Athena, the goddess Minerva.”

And Josiah whispered to me “to know if it wuz Minerva Slimpsey, Simon’s oldest sister.”

And I sez, “No, this Minerva, from what I’ve hearn of her, knew more than the hull Slimpsey family,” sez I. “She wuz noted for her wisdom and knowledge, and I spoze,” sez I, “that she wuz the daughter of Jupiter.”

Josiah said Jupiter wuz nobody he ever see, though he wuz familiar with his name. And I’d hearn on him too when Josiah smashed his finger or slipped up on the ice or anything, not that I wanted to in that tone. Arvilly thought mebby she could canvass the royal family or some on ’em, and Tommy wuz willin’ to go to any new place, and I spoze Carabi wuz too. And I said I wanted to stand on Mars’ Hill, where Paul preached to the people about idolatry and 386 their worship of the Unknown God. As we sailed along the shores Dorothy spoke of Sapho. Poor creeter! I wuz always sorry for her. You know she wuz disappointed, and bein’ love-sick and discouraged she writ some poetry and drownded herself some time ago.

And Robert Strong talked a good deal to Dorothy about Plato and Homer and Xenophon and Euripides, Sophocles, Phidias, and Socrates––and lots more of them old worthies; folks, Josiah remarked to me, that had never lived anywhere round Jonesville way, he knew by the names. And Dorothy quoted some poetry beginning:

And Robert quoted some poetry. I know two lines of it run:

But his eyes wuzn’t on Athens at all. They wuz on Dorothy, and her face flushed up as rosy a pink as ever Miss Sapho’s did when she wuz keepin’ company.

After we left the boat we rode over a level plain with green trees by the wayside till we reached Athens and put up at a good tarven. Athens, “The eye of Greece,” mother of arts and eloquence, wuz built in the first place round the Acropolis, a hill about three hundred feet high, and is a place that has seen twice as many ups and downs as Jonesville. But then it’s older, three or four thousand years older, I spoze, and has had a dretful time on’t since Mr. Theseus’s day, take it with its archons or rulers, kings and generals, and Turks, Goths and Franks, etc.

But it become the fountainhead of learning and civilization, culture and education of the mind and the body. In that age of health and beauty, study and exercise, the wimmen didn’t wear any cossets, consequently they could breathe 387 deep breaths and enjoy good health, and had healthy little babies that they brought up first-rate as fur as the enjoyment of good health goes, and Arvilly said she knew they didn’t drink to excess from the looks of their statutes.

Athens also claims to be one of the birthplaces of Homer, that good old blind poet. Robert Strong talked quite a good deal about his poems, the Iliad and the Odyssy or the return of Ulysses Odysses to his native land.

Josiah paid great attention to it, and afterwards he confided to me that he thought of writin’ a Jodyssy or the return of Josiah to Jonesville. He said when he recounted all his wanderin’s and tribulations on the road and at tarvens with starvation and tight clothes and all the other various hampers he’d been hampered with he said that it would beat that old Odyssy to nothin’ and nobody would ever look at it agin. “Why,” sez he, “jest think how old that is, most a thousand years B. C. It is time another wuz writ, and I’m the one to write it.”

But I shall try to talk him out of it. He said he shouldn’t begin it till our return to Jonesville, so Ury could help him in measurin’ the lines with a stick. And when I am once mistress of my own cook-stove and buttery I have one of the most powerful weepons in the world to control my pardner with.

I hain’t no great case to carry round relics, but I told Josiah that I would give a dollar bill quick if I could git holt of that old lantern that Diogenes used to carry round here in the streets in broad daylight to find Truth with. How I’d love to seen Mr. Diogenes and asked him if he ever found her.

Josiah said he would ruther own his wash-tub that he used to travel round in. And which he wuz settin’ in when Alexander the Great asked him what costly gift he could bestow on him. And all that contented, independent creeter asked for wuz to have the king not git between him and the sun.

He snubbed Plato, too; didn’t want anything, only his 388 tub and his lantern and hunt round for a honest man, though I don’t see how he got round in it. But Josiah sez the tub wuz on castors, and he had a idee of havin’ our old washtub fixed up and go to Washington, D. C., in it with our old tin lantern, jest to be uneek and hunt round there for an honest man.

Sez I middlin’ dry, “You may have to go further, Josiah.” But I shan’t encourage him in it. And our wash-tub wouldn’t hold him up anyway; the hoops had sprung loose before I left home.

At the southwest of Athens is the Mount Hymettus. I’d hearn a sight about its honey. Josiah thought he would love to buy a swarm of bees there, but I asked him how could he carry ’em to Jonesville. He said that if he could learn ’em to fly ahead on us he could do it. But he can’t.

The road west wuz Eulusas, the Sacred Way. And to the north wuz the Academy of Plato, and that of Aristotle wuz not fur away. One day I see there on an old altar, “Sacred to either a god or goddess.” They believed in the rights of wimmen, them old Pagans did, which shows there is good in everything.

And how smart Socrates wuz; I always sot store by him, he wuz a good talker and likely in a good many ways, though I spoze he and his wife didn’t live agreeable, and there might have been blame on both sides and probable wuz. How calm he wuz when on trial for his life, and when he had drunk the hemlock, sayin’ to his accusers:

“I go to death and you to life; but which of the twain is better is known only to Divinity.”

And Mr. Plato; don’t it seem as if that old Pagan’s words wuz prophetic of Christ when he spoke of an inspired teacher:

“This just person must be poor, void of all qualifications save virtue. A wicked world will not bear his instructions and reproofs. And therefore within three or four 389 years after he begun to preach he should be persecuted, imprisoned, scourged, and at last put to death.”

Hundreds of years after, Paul preaching the religion of Christ Jesus, met the Epicurians and Stoics representing Pleasure and Pride. Strong foes that religion has to contend with now. Then he addressed the multitude from the Areopagus, Mars’ Hill.

What feelin’s I felt; how real and nigh to my heart his incomparable sermon that he preached in that place seemed to be as I stood there. I thought of how the cultured, beauty-loving nature of Paul must have been affected by his surroundings as he stood there in the midst of statutes and altars to Apollo, Venus, Bacchus. The colossial golden figure of Minerva, holdin’ in her outstretched right hand a statute of victory, four cubits high. So big and glorious-lookin’ Minerva wuz that her glitterin’ helmet and shield could be seen fur out to sea. The statute of Neptune on horseback hurling his tridant; the temple to Ceres and all the gods and goddesses they knew on and to the Unknown God. Here Paul stood surrounded by all these temples so magnificent that jest the gateway to ’em cost what would be ten million dollars in our money.

Here in the face of all this glory he stood up and declared that the true God, “Lord of heaven and earth dwelt not in temples made with hands.” And he went on to preach the truth in Christ Jesus: repentance, remission of sin, the resurrection of the dead. Some mocked and some put him off by saying they would hear him again of this matter. They felt so proud, their glory and magnificence seemed so sure and enduring, their learning, art and accomplishments seemed so fur above this obscure teacher of a new religion.

But there I stood on the crumbling ruins of all this grandeur and art. And the God of Paul that they had scorned to “feel after if haply they might find him,” wuz dominating the hull world, bringing it to the knowledge of Christ Jesus: “The gold and silver and stone wrought by many hands” 390 had crumbled away while the invisible wuz the real, the truth wuz sure and would abide forever. How real it all seemed to me as I stood there and my soul listened and believed like Dionysos and Damarus!

The market place wuz just below Mars’ Hill, and I spoze the people talked it over whilst they wuz buyin’ and sellin’ there, about a strange man who had come preachin’ a new doctrine and who had asked to speak to the people. It sez, “His heart was stirred within him and he taught them about the true God” in the synagogue and market-place. As we stood there in that hallowed spot, Miss Meechim said:

“Oh, that I had been there at that time and hearn that convincin’ sermon, how glad would I have left all and followed Him, like Dionysos and Damarus.”

“Well, I d’no,” sez Arvilly, “as folks are any more willin’ now to let their old idols of Selfishness and Mammon go and renounce the faults and worship the truth than they wuz then.”

Miss Meechim scorfed at the idee, but I pondered it in my own mind and wondered how many there really wuz from Jonesville to Chicago, from Maine to Florida, ready to believe in Him and work for the Millenium.

But to resoom. The Patessia is a beautiful avenoo, the royal family drive there every day and the nobility and fashionable people. The Greek ladies wear very bright clothing in driving or walking. The road looks sometimes like a bed of moving blossoms.

As in most every place where we travelled, Robert Strong met someone he knew. Here wuz a gentleman he had entertained in California, and he gave a barbecue or picnic for us at Phalareum. A special train took the guests to it. There wuz about thirty guests from Athens. The table wuz laid in a pavilion clost to the sea shore covered with vines, evergreens and flowers. Four lambs wuz roasted hull and coffee wuz made in a boiler, choice fruits and foods were served and wines for them that wanted ’em. It is needless 391 to say that I didn’t partake on’t, and Josiah, I’m proud to say, under my watchful eyes, refused to look on it when it wuz red, and Arvilly and Robert Strong and Dorothy turned down their glasses on the servant’s approach bearin’ the bottles.

Everything wuz put on the table to once and a large piece of bread to each plate. No knives or forks are used at a barbecue. We had sweetmeats, rose leaf glyco, oranges and all kinds of fruit. The way they roast a lamb at a barbecue––two large lambs are placed about four feet apart, the lamb pierced lengthwise by a long pointed stick is hung over the bed of live coals. They turn and baste it with olive oil and salt and it is truly delicious.

One pleasant day we visited the King’s country place. The dining room wuz a pavilion in a shady spot under orange trees full of fruit and blossoms surrounded with a dense hedge of evergreens, vines and blossoms. There wuz walks in every direction bordered with lovely flowers. The Queen’s private settin’ room is a pretty room, the furniture covered with pink and white cretonne, no better than my lounge is covered with to home in the spare room. And in a little corner, hid by a screen of photographs wuz her books and writing desk. The maids of honor had rooms in a little vine covered cottage near by.

We of course went to see the ruins of the Parthenium, built by Pericles and ornamented with the marbles of Phidias. It wuz finished about four hundred and thirty years B.C. and cost about four millions of our money. A great Bishop once said:

“This was the finest edifice on the finest site in the world, hallowed by the noblest recollections that can stimulate the human heart.”

It stands on the highest point of the Acropolis and wuz decorated by the greatest sculptor the world ever saw. It stands on the site of an older temple to Minerva. They thought a sight of that woman. It made me feel well to see 392 one of my sect so highly thought on though I did not approve of their worshippin’ her and I would never give my consent to be worshipped on a monument, not for the world I wouldn’t––no, indeed!

Robert Strong wanted to go to see the ruins of the enormous temple of Jupiter where chariot races were run and the Olympic games wuz fought that Paul speaks of so many times in his letters to the churches.

But time wuz passin’ fast away and we thought best to not linger there any longer and we went directly from there to Vienna, a longer journey than we had took lately, but Robert thought we had better not stop on the way.

Vienna is a beautiful city. I d’no as I would go so fur as the Viennesse myself and say it is the most beautiful in the world, but it stands up high amongst ’em.

The beautiful blue Danube makes a curve round it as if it wuz real choice of it and loved to hold it in its arms. I say blue Danube, but its waters are no more blue than our Jonesville creek is pink. But mebby if I wuz goin’ to sing about the creek I might call it blue or pink for poetical purposes.

We had rooms nigh to the river, the banks of which wuz terraced down to the water, and laid out in little parks, public gardens full of flowers and trees and flowering shrubs.

There are two massive stun bridges in this part of the city, and very handsome dwellin’ houses, churches, and the Swartzenburg palace. The buildings are very handsome here, more lofty and grand looking even than they are in Paris, and you know you would imagine that wuz the flower of the universe, and I needn’t mention the fact that I had to gin into it that it goes fur beyend Jonesville.

The street called the Ring Strasse, I spoze because it curves round some like a ring, is three milds long, and most two hundred feet wide. And along this broad beautiful avenue there are six rows of large chestnut trees. A track for 393 horseback riders on one side, a broad carriage driveway, two fine promenades, besides the walk.

Splendid buildin’s rise up on each side of this grand street, and parks and gardens abound. At intervals there are large roomy lawns, covered with velvety grass, where easy seats under the trees invite you to rest and admire the beauty around you, and the happy, gayly-dressed throng passing and repassing in carriages, on horseback or walkin’ afoot, thousands and thousands on ’em, and everyone, I spoze, a pursuin’ their own goles, whatever they may be.

The first place we went to see wuz St. Stephen’s Church. This is on a street much narrower than the Ring Strasse. The sidewalks wuz very narrer here, so when you met folks you had to squeeze up pretty nigh the curbstun or step out into the carriage way; but no matter how close the quarters wuz you would meet with no rough talk or impoliteness. They wuz as polite as the Japans, with more intelligence added.

St. Stephen’s Cathedral is a magnificent Gothic structure, three hundred and fifty-four feet long and two hundred and thirty broad, and is full of magnificent monuments, altars, statutes, carving, etc., etc. The monument to the Emperor Frederic III. has over two hundred figures on it.

Here is the tomb of the King of Rome, Napoleon’s only son, and his ma, Maria Louise. I had queer feelin’s as I stood by them tombs and meditated how much ambition and heart burnin’ wuz buried here in the tomb of that young King of Rome. I thought of how his pa divorced the woman he loved, breakin’ her heart, and his own mebby, for the ambitious desire to have a son connected with the royalty of Europe, to carry on his power and glory, and make it more permanent. And how the new wife turned away from him in his trouble, and the boy died, and he carried his broken heart into exile. And the descendant of the constant-hearted woman he put away, set down on the throne of France, and then he, too, and his boy, had to pass 394 away like leaves whirled about in the devastatin’ wind of war and change. What ups and downs! I had a variety of emotions as I stood there, and I guess Josiah did, though I don’t know. But I judged from his liniment; he looked real demute.

The catacombs under this meetin’-house are a sight to see I spoze, but we didn’t pay a visit to ’em. Josiah had a idee that they wuz built to bury cats in, and he said he didn’t want to go to any cat buryin’-ground. He said there wuzn’t a cat in Europe so likely as ourn, but he wouldn’t think of givin’ it funeral honors.

But he didn’t git it right. It wuz a place where they buried human bein’s, but I didn’t care anything about seein’ it.

Robert got a big carriage, and we all driv over to the Prater, a most beautiful park on an island in the Danube. The broad, flower-bordered avenues wuz crowded with elegant carriages and beautiful forms and faces wuz constantly passing hither and yon, to and fro, and the scene all round us wuz enchantin’ly beautiful. We had a delightful drive, and when we got back to the tarven we found quite a lot of letters that had been forwarded here. Josiah and I had letters from Jonesville, welcome as the voice of the first bird in spring, all well and hopeful of our speedy meetin’; but Miss Meechim had one tellin’ of dretful doin’s in her old home.

We’d heard that there had been a great labor strike out in California, but little did we know how severe it had struck. Rev. Mr. Weakdew had writ to Miss Meechim how some of the rebellious workmen had riz up against his son in his absence. He told how wickedly they wuz actin’ and how impossible it wuz in his opinion to make them act genteel, but he said in his letter that his son had been telegrafted to to come home at once. He said Mudd-Weakdew always had been successful in quelling these rebellious workmen 395 down, and making them keep their place, and he thought he would now as soon as he arrived there.

I know Arvilly and Miss Meechim had words about it when she read the letter. Miss Meechim deplored the state of affairs, and resented Arvilly’s talk; she said it was so wicked to help array one class aginst another.

“They be arrayed now,” sez Arvilly. “Selfishness and Greed are arrayed aginst Justice and Humanity, and the baby Peace is bein’ trompled on and run over, and haggard Want and Famine prowl on the bare fields of Poverty, waitin’ for victims, and the cries of the perishin’ fill the air.”

Arvilly turned real eloquent. I mistrusted mebby she’d catched it from me, but Miss Meechim turned up her nose and acted dretful high-headed and said there was nothing genteel in such actions and she wouldn’t gin in a mite till that day in Vienna she had a letter that brought her nose down where it belonged, and she acted different after readin’ it and didn’t talk any more about gentility or the onbroken prosperity of the Mudd-Weakdews, and I wuz shocked myself to hear what wuz writ.

As I say, Miss Meechim read it and grew pale, the letter dropped in her lap and she trembled like a popple leaf, for it told of a dretful tragedy. It wuz writ by a friend in Sacramento and the tragedy wuz concernin’ the Mudd-Weakdews. On hearin’ of the strike, the Mudd-Weakdews had hurried home from their trip abroad and he had tried to quell the strike, but found it wouldn’t quell. He had been shot at but not killed; the shot went through his eyes, and he would be blind for life. A deadly fever had broke out in the tenements on the street back of his palace, caused, the doctors said, by the terrible onsanitary surroundings, and helped on by want and starvation. The families of his workmen had died off like dead leaves fallin’ from rotten trees in the fall. The tenements wuz not fur from the Mudd-Weakdew garden where Dorris loved to stay, who had stayed at home with a governess and a genteel relative during her parents’ 396 absence. The garden wuz full of trees, blossoms and flowering shrubs, a fountain dashed up its clear water into the air and tall white statutes stood guard over Dorris in her happy play. But some deadly germ wuz wafted from that filthy, ghastly place, over the roses and lilies and pure waters, and sweet Dorris wuz the victim.

The clear waters and fresh green lawns and fragrant posies didn’t extend fur enough back; if they had her life might have been saved, but they only went as fur as the sharp wall her pa had riz up and thought safely warded his own child from all the evils of the lower classes.

No, it didn’t go fur enough back, and sweet Dorris had to pay the penalty of her pa’s blindness and selfishness. For what duz the Book say? “The innocent shall suffer for the guilty.”

Her broken-hearted mother followed her to the grave, and it wuz on that very day, Mudd-Weakdew bein’ shut up with doctors, that the little boy wuz stolen. The discharged workman, whose little boy had died of starvation, disappeared too. He wuz said to be half-crazy and had threatened vengeance on his old employer. There wuz a story that he had been seen with a child richly dressed, and afterwards with a child dressed in the coarse clothing of the poor, embarking on a foreign ship, but the clue wuz lost, so the living trouble wuz worse to bear than the dead one.

The strike wuz ended, Capital coming out ahead; the workmen had lost, and the Mudd-Weakdews had a chance to coin more money than ever out of the half-paid labor and wretched lives of their men. They could still be exclusive and foller the star of gentility till it stood over the cold marble palace of disdainful nobility. But the wall of separation he had built up between wealth and poverty had not stood the strain; Deadly Pestilence, Triumphant Hatred and sharp-toothed Revenge had clumb over and attacked him with their sharp fangs, him and his wife, and they had to bear it.

I knowed it, I knowed that no walls can ever be built high enough to separate the sordid, neglected, wretched lives of the poor and the luxurious, pleasure-filled lives of the rich. Between the ignorant criminal classes and the educated and innocent. You may make ’em strong as the Pyramaids and high as the tower of Babel, but the passions and weaknesses of humanity will scale ’em and find a way through.

The vile air of the low lands will float over into and contaminate the pure air of the guarded pleasure gardens, and the evil germs will carry disease, crime and death, no matter how many fountains and white statutes and posies you may set up between. Envy, Discontent and Revenge will break through the walls and meet Oppression, Insolence and Injustice, and they will tear and rend each other. They always have and always will. Robert Strong, instead of buildin’ up that wall, spends his strength in tearin’ it down and settin’ on its crumblin’ ruins the white flowers of Love and Peace.

Holdin’ Oppression and Injustice back with a hard bit and makin’ ’em behave, makin’ Envy and Hatred sheath their claws some as a cat will when it is warm and happy. He tears down mouldy walls and lets the sunshine in. Pullin’ up what bad-smellin’ weeds he can in the gardens of the poor, and transplantin’ some of the overcrowded posy beds of the rich into the bare sile, makin’ ’em both look better and do better. I set store by him. But to resoom:

CHAPTER XXXII

Amongst my letters wuz one from Evangeline Noble tellin’ of her safe arrival in Africa and of the beginning of her work there, some like strikin’ a match to light a lamp in a dark suller, but different from that because the light she lit wuz liable to light other lamps, and so on and on and on till no tellin’ what a glorious brilliance would shine from the one little rushlight she wuz kindlin’. She felt it, she wuz happy with that best kind of happiness, doin’ good. She spoke of Cousin John Richard, too; he wuz not in the same place she wuz, but she hearn of him often, for his life wuz like a vase filled with the precious ointment broke at the feet of Jesus. Broken in a earthly sense, but the rich aroma sweetened the whole air about and ascended to the very heavens.

A missionary she knew had seen him just before she wrote me. He wuz working, giving his life and finding it again, useful, happy, beloved. Not a success in a worldly way; Mudd-Weakdew would have called it a dead failure. In place of a palace, Cousin John Richard could not call even the poor ruff that sheltered him his own. Instead of a retinue of servants, Cousin John Richard worked diligently with his hands to earn his daily bread; instead of stocks and bonds bringing him rich revenues, he had only the title deeds of the house of many mansions, and Mudd-Weakdew would not have accepted any deeds unless signed before a notary and sealed with our govermunt stamp. No wealth, no luxuries, not hardly the necessities of life had Cousin John Richard, whilst Mudd-Weakdew wuz steeped in the atmosphere of wealth and grandeur for which he had lived and toiled, yet Cousin John Richard wuz blissfully happy and 399 content, Mudd-Weakdew unspeakably and hopelessly wretched. Both had follored their goles and wuz settin’ on ’em, but, oh! how different they wuz––how different to themselves and them about ’em. Inspiration and help flowed from Cousin John Richard’s personality like the warm sunshine of a clear June day, or the perfume from a rare lily, brightening, sweetening and uplifting all about him, whilst from Mudd-Weakdew fell a dark shadder made up of gloom, discontent, envy, hatred. How different they wuz, how different they wuz! And Robert Strong’s gole, how different his wuz from Mudd-Weakdew’s. I methought of what Miss Meechim had said to me deplorin’ly, how different Robert Strong wuz. Yes, indeed! both on ’em had had fur different goles and pursued ’em. The onselfish road Robert Strong trod wuz leadin’ him to the house of happiness––Mudd-Weakdew’s to the house of pain and despair.

I dare presoom to say I eppisoded more’n a hour to myself about it and to Josiah, ’tennyrate Josiah got real huffy and acted, and sez in a pitiful axent:

“Samantha, I’m willin’ to hear preachin’ twice a week and can set under it like a man, but it comes kinder tough to have moralizin’ and preachin’ brung into the bosom of the family and liable to be drizzled out onto me week days, and any time, night or day.”

His axent wuz extremely hopeless and pitiful. He felt a good deal as I did in the matter, but it is a man’s nater to be more impatient and not bear the yoke so well as wimmen do. Wimmen are more used to galdin’ things than men be; I don’t blame Josiah.

I wuz glad enough to see in Vienna the stately monument to Maria Theresa, Empress of Austria Hungary. To see all about her and below her the noble forms of Wisdom, Strength, Justice and Religion. And men a-hoss back and sages and soldiers and to see her a-settin’ so calm and benine on top of the hull caboodle, it gin me proud sensations and made me glad I wuz a woman, but not haughty.

Maria Theresa wuz a likely woman; I wish she could have lived to have me encourage her by tellin’ her what I thought on her. I would said to her:

“Marie,” sez I, “you did well with what you had to do with, your pardner left a sight for you to tend to, as pardners will if they see their consort is willing to bear the brunt. You went through no end of trials and tribulations, wars and revolutions, but come off victorious. You helped the poor a sight, abolished torture, sot up schoolhouses, fenced in the roarin’ Papal bulls so they couldn’t break out and rare round so much, you helped on the industries of your country, looked out for the best interests of your husband and son, as pardners and mothers will and looked and acted like a perfect lady through it all in war and peace.”

It would done Marie sights of good to hearn my talk, but it wuzn’t to be. But this high, noble monument wuz some consolation to her if she could look down and see it, as I spoze she can and duz. And partly on her ma’s account I visited the tomb of her girl, Marie Christina. It wuz designed by Canova and wuz the most beautiful tomb I ever see. Nine beautiful figgers with heads bowed down in grief wuz bearin’ garlands of flowers to strew above the beloved head, Youth, Middle Age and Old Age all bearin’ their different garlands and seemin’ to feel real bad, even the mighty angel who guarded the open door of the tomb had his head bowed in sorrow. Way up above wuz the face of the beautiful Arch Duchess carved in marble, with angels and cherubs surroundin’ her. Josiah said if he wuz able he would love to rare such a one up for Tirzah Ann. Sez he, “She could enjoy it durin’ her life and if she should pass away before us it would come handy.” He thought the features of the Arch Duchess favored Tirzah Ann, but I couldn’t see it.

Albert Fountain is a noble-lookin’ structure rared up by Francis Joseph in 1869. We also visited the Academy of Fine Arts, the conservatory of music, Museums of Arts 401 and Industries, the new Parliament and University buildings. The University building has one hundred and sixty thousand volumes and engravings and drawing enough to fill up an ordinary building, the collection of manuscripts is called the richest in the world.

The teachers in the University of Vienna number two hundred and ten, good land! enough to make a good school in themselves if anybody knowed enough to teach ’em. In the Chamber of Treasures in the Imperial Palace we see the largest emerald known to the world and the Florentine Diamond, 133 karats big, though Josiah said when I told him on’t that wuz nothin’ to carrots he’d raised in his garden, but I sot him right. There wuz more than one hundred and forty thousand coins and all sorts of minerals and a great quantity of bronzes, gems and cameos.

I hated to give in, but I had to. I see cameos there that went fur beyend mine. We visited gymnasiums, public schools, institutes, colleges and more noble and interestin’ edifices than I could tell you jest the names on unless I took loads of time.

The principal articles of manufacture in Vienna are jewelry, clocks, kid gloves, musical instruments, shawls, silks and velvets. It is supplied with water that comes forty milds in an aqueduct and gits there as fresh and sparklin’ as if it hadn’t travelled a mild.

I felt that I ort to go and see the Emperor, Francis Joseph, while I wuz in Vienna. I knowed that if my Josiah had been took from my heart and presence as his Elizabeth had been and he’d come to Jonesville to see the sights and look round some as I wuz doin’ and hadn’t come to condole with me I should feel dretful hurt.

Just to think on’t, the sweet, beautiful woman that he had loved ever sence she wuz a little girl in short dresses and would marry in spite of all opposition, and who had been his confidant and closest earthly friend for so many long years a settin’ up there by his side on that hard peak with 402 the kodaks of the world aimed at ’em, and rejoiced in his joy and sympathized in his sorrow, to have her struck down so sudden and to once by the hand of a assassin. Why, if it had been my Josiah I couldn’t have bore up as Fritz had; it seems to me as if I never could have held my head up at all after it.

But Fritz had bore up under his sorrow all these years and carryin’ it along he bore also the load of his people’s cares and perplexities and tried to do the best he could with what he had to do with, which is a golden rule to frame and hang up over our soul’s mantletry piece and study from day to day and which is the very best a human creeter can do in Jonesville or Austria.

I sot store by him. One thing specially I always liked in him wuz his humility and reverence, as showed by the foot-washing in the palace. I’d hearn about that, and wanted to see it myself, like a dog, but it wuz too late, for that takes place in April. But Robert Strong wuz here once in April, and witnessed that ceremony.

It is a old custom, comin’ from so fur back that nobody knows what monarch it wuz and whose feet they wuz, and whether they needed washin’ or not. But I presoom they wuz middlin’ clean; they be now anyway, and the Emperor doesn’t do it for bathin’ purposes or to help corns, but it is a religious custom. Robert explained it all out to me so plain that I almost seemed to see it myself.

Robert said that the day he wuz here there wuz twelve old men, some on ’em ninety years old, seated at a table set out handsome with good dishes, napkins, etc., and the table all covered with rose leaves, and under it brown linen cushions for the old feet to rest on.

The old men had on black clothes, short breeches, black silk stockings, and wide white turned-down collars. They wuz seated by grand court officials, the oldest man seated at the head of the table. Anon the Emperor come in in full uniform, with a train of nobility and big court officers with 403 him, all in gorgeous attire, and the Emperor took his place at the head of the table as a waiter to wait on the oldest old man. And then follered twelve palace officials, each bearin’ a black tray that had four dishes of good food on it, and they took their places opposite the old men who set on one side of the table, some as they do in pictures of the Last Supper or some as we have some times in cleanin’ house and things tore up and we all set on one side of the table.

Then all bein’ ready, the Emperor took the food off the tray opposite the oldest man, and waited on him jest as polite as Philury waits on me when we have company. The Crown Prince waited on the one next in age, and each of the old men wuz waited on by some grand duke or other member of the Austrian nobility.

After the trays wuz emptied, the palace guard, in full uniform, come in with twelve more trays, and so on till four courses wuz served, the last consistin’ of a sweet dish, fruit, cheese, almonds, etc. After this, and it wuz done quite quick, for not a mouthful wuz eaten, a large, gold tray wuz brought in with a gold pitcher on it and a large napkin, and the Emperor knelt and poured a little water on the old man’s foot, and wiped it on the napkin. It wuzn’t very dirty, I spoze; his folks had tended to that, and got off the worst of it. But he had had his foot washed by a Emperor, and I spoze he felt his oats more or less, as the sayin’ is in rural districts, though he orten’t to, seein’ it wuz a religious ceremony to inculcate humility, and the old man ort to felt it too, as well as the Emperor. But howsumever, the hull twelve on ’em had their feet washed and wiped by nobility. And that bein’ done, the Emperor, Crown Prince, and all the arch dukes, etc., havin’ riz up from their knees, the Grand Chamberlain poured some water on the Emperor’s hands, who dried ’em on a napkin, and all the rest of the nobility done the same.

Then a court officer come in bringin’ twelve black bags of money containing each thirty silver florins. They had long black cords attached, and the Emperor fastened the 404 bags around the necks of each of the old men by putting the cords round their necks. Then the Emperor and nobility left the hall.

All durin’ this ceremony a priest and twenty assistants read and intoned beautiful extracts from the Gospel, showin’ how the Lord washed the disciples’ feet. Then all the food and plates and foot cushions wuz packed into baskets and sent to the houses of these old men, and I wuz glad to hear that, for I thought how they must have felt to have such tasty food put before ’em and took away agin for good and all.

When the Empress wuz alive she did the same to twelve old wimmen––good creetur! Wuzn’t it discouragin’ to wash the feet of the poorer classes every year of her life, and then be shot down by one on ’em? How Fritz must have felt a-thinkin’ on’t! If he’d been revengeful, I felt that he might have gin their feet a real vicious rub––kinder dug into ’em real savage; but he didn’t; he washed and wiped ’em honorable, from what I’ve hearn.

I always thought that that wuz a noble thing for the Emperor to do. I d’no as our presidents would be willin’ to do it, and I d’no as they wouldn’t. I don’t believe the question has ever been put to ’em. I guess Washington and Lincoln would anyway, and I don’t believe that they would have shrunk back if the feet wuz real dirty; they went through worse things than that.

But to resoom: Robert Strong’s description of this seen made me set more store by Fritz Joseph than I had sot. And I wanted dretfully to meet him and condole with him and congratulate him, but didn’t know as I should have a chance. But to my great satisfaction we wuz all invited to the palace to a big informal reception. I wuz tickled enough.

I spoze it wuz on Robert Strong’s account that we wuz invited to the Emperor’s palace, though Josiah thought it wuz on his account. Sez he:

“Fritz is a educated man and reads about foreign affairs; 405 of course, he has hearn of Jonesville and knows that I am one of its leadin’ men, and wield a powerful influence in political and religious circles, and wants to honor me and on my account and to please me, and for various diplomatic reasons he is willin’ to receive my pardner.”

But it wuzn’t so, no such thing; it wuz on Robert’s account; Robert had been invited there for lunch when he wuz there before, for Miss Meechim had told me on’t over and over. When the evening of the reception come, Miss Meechim wuz in high feather every way. She wore one in her hair that stood up higher than old Hail The Day’s tail feathers, and then her sperits wuz all feathered out, too.

Dorothy looked sweet as a rose just blowed out. She had on a gown of pale-green satin and shiffon, which looked some the color of fresh, delicate leaves, and her sweet face riz up from it and bloomed out like a flower. It wuz a little low in the neck, which wuz white as snow, and so wuz her round arms. A necklace of big pearls wuz round her neck, not much whiter than the warm, soft flesh they rested on, and she carried a big bunch of white orchids. She looked good enough to frame in gold and hang up in anybody’s best parlor, and Robert Strong felt just as I did I knew by his liniment. On such a occasion, I felt my best black silk none too good, and at Dorothy’s request I turned down the neck a little in front, mebby a half a finger or so, and wore a piece of lace she gin me over it that come down to my belt. It looked like a cob-web that had ketched in its transparent meshes some voylets and snowdrops. And at her request I did not wear the cameo pin, but a little bunch of posies she fixed for me, fine white posies with a few pale lavender ones. I spoze Dorothy, though she didn’t tell me so, for fear it would make me oneasy and nervious, but I spoze she wuz afraid that some bold thief might rob me of that valuable jewel; she knowed that cameo pin fell onto me from Mother Smith and fell onto her from her ma. This rim of memory sot it round and rendered it valuable aside from its intrinsic 406 worth, which wuz great. Why, I hearn that Grandmother Smith paid as high as seven dollars for it, gin five bushels of dried apples and the rest in money. Tommy stayed to home with Martha.

The guests wuz ushered into a spacious and magnificent room. Innumerable lights flashed from its lofty ceilings and music and flowers brightened the seen. The rich costooms of the ladies and the gorgeous uniforms of the men, representatives of the different countries, richly embroidered in gold and silver, added to the beauty of the panorama. Jewels wuz sparklin’ everywhere, and I thought to myself I d’no but Dorothy wuz more fraid than she need be, I d’no; but I might have resked the cameo pin there. For it didn’t seem as if anybody there, man or woman, stood in need of any more ornaments, and if they took it, I should always thought they done it out of pure meanness. For such a profusion of jewelled ornaments I never see, and such dresses, oh, my! I thought even before I met the royal party what would I give if Almina Hagadone could be sot down there with liberty to bring a lot of old newspapers, the Jonesville “Augurses” and “Gimlets” and take patterns. Oh, my! wuzn’t they grand, though our good Methodist sisters wouldn’t dream of havin’ their calico and woosted dresses with such long trains draggin’ behind ’em or havin’ ’em low-necked and short sleeves. I could hardly imagine how Sister Gowdey and Sister Henzy would look with their chocolate-colored calicos made without sleeves and dekolitay, as Miss Meechim called it; they would blush to entertain the thought, and so would their pardners.

Francis Joseph, or as I called him in my mind, the good crisp name of Fritz, I found wuz good lookin’ and good actin’. Of course, like myself and Josiah, he’s gittin’ some along in years. And like us, too, he won’t most probable ever be hung for his beauty. But what of that? Like others lately mentioned, his liniment shows just what kind of a person he has been and is. Honest, honorable, hard-workin’, 407 gittin’ up at five o’clock in the mornin’, doin’ a good day’s work before lots of folks rises up from their goose-feather pillers. Fillin’ up the day with duties performed to the best of his ability. Good, solid-lookin’ and good-actin’ the most of the time, though I spoze that like every human bein’, he has had spells of bein’ contrary and actin’, but on the whole a good man, and a well-wisher to his race.

And now in this dretful epock of time, when everything seemed upside down, thrones tottlin’ and foundations warpin’, and the roar of battle comin’ nigher and nigher on every side, I felt that it wuz a great thing for him that he had the chance to hear some words of encouragement and advice. Yes, I knowed that if ever the Powers wuz in a tight place they wuz now.

I wuz the last one in the line, and so had a chance at him; I shouldn’t have had if Miss Meechim and Arvilly had been follerin’ close to my heels. I had said in days gone by that if I ever got holt of one of them Powers I would give ’em a piece of my mind that they could patch onto their daily experience, and tremble and wonder at it for the rest of their days. I had been riled up by these Powers a number of times, real provoked and out of patience with ’em. But now when I stood in the presence of one of ’em I felt different from what I thought I should feel; I pitied ’em like a dog. And I showed it. I mistrust my liniment looked pale and excited, though not havin’ a lookin’ glass present I couldn’t tell for certain, but I know my voice trembled with emotion, for I hearn it myself.

I sez to him how proud and happy I wuz to see him lookin’ so well and holdin’ his age to such a remarkable degree, and after a few such preliminary politenesses had been tended to, I branched out and told him with my liniment lookin’ good and earnest I know, and tears almost standin’ in my eyes, I told him the feelin’s I felt for the Powers, how mad I’d been at ’em in the past, and how them feelin’s had turned into pity, for I knowed just what a ticklish place they 408 wuz in and how necessary it wuz for ’em to keep a cool head and a wise, religious heart, and then, sez I, “I d’no as that will save you. You Powers have got so hard a job to tackle that it don’t seem to me you’ll ever git out of it with hull skins if you don’t use all the caution a elephant duz in crossin’ a bridge. Go cautious and carefull and reach out and try every plank before you step on’t.”

He felt it, I could see he did, he knowed how the ground wuz quakin’ under him and the rest of the Powerses. “And don’t,” sez I, “don’t for mercy’s sake! you Powers git to squabblin’ amongst yourselves, for if you do you might just as well give up first as last, for you are all lost as sure as fate. Keep your temper above all things,” sez I. “You’ve got age and experience as well as I have, and it takes such experienced wise heads to manage such a state of affairs, and I d’no even then as we can git along without an awful fuss, things are so muddled up. Mebby you’re the very one to go on and try to straighten out the snarls in the skein of the nation’s trials and perplexities, and I’ll do all I can to help you,” sez I.

He wuz dretful impressed by my eloquence; he acted for all the world just as Mr. Astofeller did. He looked at his watch just as if he wuz anxious to know just the time I said such remarkable things, and I continued on, “Sister Henzy,” sez I, “thinks that the millenium is comin’.”

“Sister Henzy?” sez he inquirin’ly.

“Yes,” sez I, “Sister Mehala Henzy, sister in the M. E. meetin’-house at Jonesville. She sez that this is the great universal war that is to usher in the thousand years of peace and the comin’ of our Lord. She reads Skripter a sight and has explained it out to me and I must say it does look like it. And oh how I do want to be here to see it, but don’t spoze Josiah and I can live a thousand years, no matter how much patent medicine we take, specially as we both have the rumatiz bad, but oh how I would love to.

“Brother Meesick thinks this is goin’ to be a war of the 409 yellow races agin the whites. And though it would come tough on Josiah and me to be driv out of house and home and scalped and made slaves on, yet right whilst them yeller races wuz engaged in it if I could think at all––and of course I don’t know how much the seat of thought is situated in the crown of the head and hair and whether the entire citadel would go with the scalp, but if I could think and keep my conscientiousness as I spoze I should, I should have to give in right then and there that it wuz only justice fur the white races to submit to the revenge of the darker complected, thinkin’ what we’d done to them.

“Josiah bein’ so bald they would probable have to take his head right off, not havin’ anything to hang onto while they scalped him, and I should probably foller him soon, as I couldn’t imagine a life Josiahless. But whilst I lived, and even if I wuz sold into captivity, and see Thomas J. and the rest of the children sold into distant countries, and I chained to widder Henzy, drove off west to be slaves to Hole In The Day or Big Thunder, I should have to say amidst my heart breakin’ groans and sithes, it is just, it is just, we white folks richly deserve it for our treatment to the darker races.”

The Emperor felt my talk deeply, I knew by his looks; he looked completely wore out; it wuz from admiration I knowed.

Sez I: “It is a dretful thing to have all the beasts of the world git mixed up and a-fightin’ and chankin’ each other up, as they have seemed to, whilst the Powers have sot and looked on. Jest now it looks to me as if the Russian Bear is gittin’ the worst on’t and the dragon a-comin’ out on top, and the Eagle has done noble work a-shriekin’ and fightin’ and protectin’ her young.

“It seemed to me and Josiah that the Powers have took things pretty easy and loitered along when their ministers and missionaries wuz chased into a corner and the Boxers ready to take their heads off. It makes a sight of difference in such things whose heads are in danger. If it wuz the 410 Powers’ own heads, for instance, there would probable been more hustlin’ round.

“But things are in a dretful state in Russia and Japan and China. It is a great pity I hadn’t knowed what wuz comin’ when I wuz there; I could probable done lots of good advisin’ the Empress and tryin’ to make her do as she ort to, though my pardner thinks the blame hain’t all on China. He argys wrong, but is sot on it. He sez spozen he wuz slow with his spring’s work and didn’t keep his fences up, or hustle round so and mebby didn’t pay Ury so big wages as the Loontowners did in their factory, and wuzn’t what they called sound on the doctrines. You know they are seven-day Baptisses over in Loontown and Shackville; but Josiah sez if them two Powers got together and tried to force Loonton and Shackville civilization and ways onto Jonesville, which is a older place and glad to be kinder settled down and mind its own bizness; and if they should try to build roads through Jonesville medders and berry lots and set up their tabernacles and manufacturys there and steal right and left and divide Jonesville into pieces and divide the pieces amongst ’em, why, sez he, ‘I would arm myself and Ury and fight to the bitter hind end.’

“Sez Josiah: ‘Why do we want our pleasant woods and fields turned into noisy bedlams by the whirrin’ of wheels, creakin’ of engines and the roar and smoke and dust of traffick? Spozein’ we should make more money and dress better and own more books; money hain’t everything in life, nor hustlin’ in bizness; peace and comfort and mindin’ your own bizness is sunthin’.’

“‘And wheresoever them noisy manufactories go, there goes whiskey,’ sez Arvilly. A neighborin’ woman who wuz by and jined in: ‘What good duz it do to try to settle which is the right Sunday if at the same time them proselyters brings pizen that crazes their converts so they can’t tell Sunday mornin’ from Friday midnight, bring the preachin’ of 411 love and peace and the practice of hatred and ruin, the creeds and catechism packed on with opium and whiskey.’

“‘Yes,’ sez Josiah, ‘let me catch the Loontown and Shackville Powers tryin’ to divide Jonesville into pieces and grabbin’ the pieces and dividin’ ’em up amongst ’em and turnin’ us out of house and hum, I guess them powers would find they had got hold of a Boxer when they come to cut up my paster and divide it and the medder back of the house where grandfather Allen’s grandpa and great-grandma lays with a white railin’ round ’em, kep’ up by the Allens two hundred years. I guess they’d think they had got holt of a Boxer––yes indeed! and Josiah Allen breathed hard and looked warlike.

“‘But,’ I sez, ‘Josiah, you hain’t got it right; there is more to it.’

“And he sez fiery red in the face and sithin’ hard, ‘There is generally more to everything.’ And I sez, ‘So there is, Josiah.’”

I see the Emperor lookin’ round anxiously and he seemed to be on the very pint of startin’ away. I mistrusted he wanted to go and git more folks to hear my wonderful eloquence, but I couldn’t wait and I sez, “Time and Josiah are passin’ away and I mustn’t detain you; you Powers will have to do the best you can with what you’ve got to do with. Wisdom is needed here, and goodness, piles and piles of goodness and patience and above all prayer to the God of love and justice for help. He is the only Power that can bring light into the dark problem confrontin’ the nations. He can settle the question and will, if you Powers trust Him and try to toiler his teachin’s.”

“The only receipt I can give you is what I told you. Seekin’ earnestly for patience and wisdom from on high, payin’ no attention to the blue light that rises from the low grounds lit by Greed, Ambition and Revenge, follerin’ from day to day the light that filters down from heaven through the winders of the mind and soul, and keepin’ them winders 412 as clean as possible so the light can shine through. Brushin’ away, as fur as your powers can, the black cob-webs from your own civilizations whilst you are tacklin’ the scrubbin’ brush to cleanse older and dirtier ones, and don’t for mercy sake in the name of freedom take away freedom from any race or nation. I d’no what else you can do.”

Agin he looked anxiously round as much as to say, oh why, why don’t somebody else come to hear this remarkable talk?

And sez I, “I will say in conclusion for your encouragement, fur off over the hills and dells of the world and Jonesville there will be one follerin’ you with earnest good wishes and prayers and will help you Powers all she can and may God help you and the other Powerses and farewell.”

He looked dretful relieved as he shook my hand and I passed on. I guess he had worried for fear it would be out of sight, out of mind with me, and I rejoined my pardner. The rest of our party had passed on into another gorgeous apartment, but my faithful pardner had waited for me. He wuz rejoiced to see me I knowed, though his words wuz:

“What under the sun wuz you hangin’ round and preachin’ to a Emperor for? I believe you would dast anything.”

“I hope I would,” sez I, calmly, “upheld by Duty’s apron strings.” I wouldn’t have it knowed in Jonesville for a dollar bill that right there in the Emperor’s palace Josiah demeaned himself so, but he did say:

“I don’t want to hear any more about them infarnal strings.”

And a gorgeous official looked round at him in surprise and rebuke. Well, we didn’t stay a great while after that. We walked round a little longer through the magnificent rooms, and anon we met Arvilly. She wuz lookin’ through a carved archway at the distant form of the Emperor and unfastenin’ the puckerin’ strings of her work-bag, but I laid holt of her arm and sez:

“Arvilly, for pity sake help me find Robert and Dorothy.” She turned with me, and my soul soared up considerable to think I had already begun to help the powers and lighten their burdens. And pretty soon the rest of our party jined us, and we returned home to our tarven.