It is well to have your route laid out beforehand when you start on a pleasure tour, at least in a general way, so that you can approximate the necessary time and money for the journey. To facilitate the traveler's plans a few skeleton routes will be given, together with an estimate of the time necessary for a rapid journey to cover them. It should not be understood that the routes given embrace a tenth or a twentieth of those that exist; any railway or steamship agent can give you dozens or perhaps hundreds of routes of travel, and after you think the subject is exhausted you can easily find a rival agent who can give you a selection from many more. The lines of travel that are here laid out are intended to embrace the chief cities of Europe and America, together with the principal pleasure-resorts. The traveler will pay his money and take his choice, or rather he will take his choice and then pay his money.

The American tours take New York as a starting and also as a returning point, for the obvious reason that it is the largest city of America. For the European tours London or Liverpool will be taken as the terminal points, since nine-tenths of the Americans who visit Europe land at Liverpool and proceed thence to London with more or less directness.

Any one of the American routes can be covered in from one to two months, with a sufficient amount of time for seeing enough to satisfy an ordinary tourist. This does not allow for a stay of a week or more at each of two or three points, but only for a visit of sufficient length for doing the necessary sight-seeing, and a very little more. As there are no antiquities in American cities, and comparatively few stock sights, a tour of a given number of miles or places will take less time than a similar tour in Europe. A few hundred years hence we may be able to point to ancient buildings and ruins around which cluster many historical associations, but at present, to use a Hibernianism, all our antiquities are modern.

Without further preliminary the following routes are presented:—

New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Lynchburg, Charlotte, Atlanta, Montgomery, Mobile, New Orleans. The Mississippi River, passing Baton Rouge, Port Hudson, Natchez, Vicksburg, Memphis, and Cairo to St Louis; rail via Springfield to Chicago and back to New York by Detroit and Niagara Falls.

New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Lynchburg, Danville, Charlotte, Atlanta, Montgomery, Mobile, New Orleans. The Mississippi River, passing Natchez, Vicksburg, Memphis, and Cairo; thence on the Ohio River, passing Evansville and Louisville to Cincinnati, and back to New York, by Pittsburg and Altoona.

New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Norfolk, day steamer on the James River to Richmond, Gordonsville, Goshen (for Natural Bridge), White Sulphur Springs, Kanawha Falls, Huntington, steamer on the Ohio River to Cincinnati, St. Louis, Springfield, Chicago, through the Lakes to Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Toronto, the Thousand Islands and Rapids of the St. Lawrence to Montreal, Lake Champlain, Lake George, Saratoga, Rutland, Boston, Springfield, Hartford, New Haven, and New York.

New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Washington, Cincinnati, St. Louis, Springfield, Chicago, rail or steamer through the Lakes to Buffalo, Niagara Falls, Toronto, the Thousand Islands and Rapids of the St. Lawrence to Montreal, rail or boat to Quebec, Gorham, stage to Glen House, Summit of Mount Washington, Crawford House, Fabyan House, Bethlehem, Profile House, rail to Concord, Nashua, and Boston, and Sound steamboat to New York.

None of the routes thus given will carry the traveler farther west than St. Louis. The tourist who wishes to extend his journey to the Rocky Mountains, to Utah, or to the Pacific Coast will be pretty certain to make either St. Louis or Chicago his point of departure, and therefore we will make up our routes from those cities. From St. Louis we can go as follows:—

St. Louis, Kansas City, Denver, Cheyenne, Ogden, Salt Lake City, Virginia City, Sacramento, and San Francisco, where we pause to consider the sights of California. These include the wonderful Yosemite Valley, the North Pacific Coast Railway through the Redwood forests, the Geysers, and the wine-growing regions of Sonoma, and other valleys north of San Francisco Bay.

From San Francisco we can go to Oregon, either overland or by steamship; in either case we arrive at Portland, whence a journey may be made up the Columbia River and back again. As this book goes to press there is no satisfactory route for reaching the East except by returning to San Francisco, but in a few years it will be possible to ride in railway carriages from the head of navigation on the Columbia to St. Paul, in Minnesota, and thence through the states of the Northwest to Chicago.

Suppose we go back from Oregon to San Francisco and are ready to return to the East. We may go as we came as far as Cheyenne, and thence to Omaha, where we have the choice of four routes to Chicago. Or we may turn to the southward, over the Southern Pacific Railway, which will carry us to Los Angeles, and thence to Yuma, by way of the Desert, where at one point we are 266 feet below the level of the sea. From Yuma the route is eastward over the dry plains of Arizona, and among the mountains to the Rio Grande, and thence through New Mexico and along the valley of the Arkansas to Kansas City. From the latter point there is a bewildering choice of railways to St. Louis or Chicago.

The majority of tourists would doubtless prefer going by one route and returning over the other. In case you take the northern route for the westward journey Chicago would be the best point of departure, while if the southern route is chosen the start should be made from St. Louis. In either instance Denver and the mining and grazing regions of Colorado may be visited by a detour—by the northern route from Cheyenne, and by the southern from Pueblo.

Let us turn now to Europe. The voyage over the Atlantic will occupy about ten days each way, and therefore three weeks should be added to all the estimates of time in the following tours. And as before stated the time allowed for the tour itself is only what would give a hurried view of each place, and the objects of interest along the route. If the tourist wishes to go leisurely he should double the figures, and he will not be far out of the way. Or he may add 50 per cent. with the knowledge that he is just avoiding a "rush" through the country.

A tour of twenty days may be made, embracing the following cities:—

Liverpool, Glasgow or London, Antwerp, Rotterdam, The Hague, Amsterdam, Utrecht, Cologne, The Rhine, Wiesbaden, Brussels, Paris, Rouen, Dieppe, Brighton, London, Glasgow, Liverpool or London.

One of forty days will include most of the foregoing, and also Strasburg, Basle, Luzerne, Brunig Pass, Interlaken, Berne, Lausanne, Villeneuve, Martigny, Chamouny, Geneva, Macon, Dijon, Paris, and back to point of departure in England.

One of sixty-five days, embracing England, France, Italy, Austria, Germany, and Belgium, will include Liverpool, Glasgow or London, Dover, Calais, Paris, Macon, Mt. Cenis Tunnel, Turin, Genoa, Leghorn, Rome, Naples, Florence, Venice, Verona, the Austrian Tyrol, Innspruck, Munich, Salzburg, Vienna, Prague, Dresden, Berlin, Hanover, Cologne, Brussels, Antwerp, London or Liverpool.

One of about the same time, and embracing England, Belgium, the Rhine, Germany, Bavaria, Italy, Switzerland, and France, will take the tourist through Antwerp, Brussels, Cologne, the Rhine, Mayence, Heidelberg, Stuttgart, Munich, Lake Constance, Coire, the Splugen Pass, Colico, Lake Como, Bergamo, Verona, Venice, Florence, Rome, Leghorn, Pisa, Genoa, Turin, Milan, Arona, the Simplon Pass, Brieg, Martigny, Chamouny, Geneva, Lausanne, Berne, Thun, Interlaken, the Brunig Pass, Lucerne, Basle, Paris, and thence to Great Britain for the return to America.

One of sixty days will embrace England, France, Italy, and Switzerland, and will include, London, Paris, Dijon, Macon, the Mt. Cenis Tunnel, Turin, Genoa, Pisa, Rome, Naples, Florence, Venice, Verona, Milan, Como, Lugano, St. Gothard Pass, Andermatt, Lucerne, Interlaken, Berne, Neuchatel, Pontarlier, Paris, London or Liverpool.

Leaving out Italy the tour can be made in thirty days, as follows:—London, Paris, Troyes, Mulhausen, Basle, Lucerne, the Bernese Oberland, Interlaken, Berne, Freiburg, Lausanne, Geneva, Macon, Dijon, Paris, London, Glasgow or Liverpool.

The list may be extended indefinitely; enough has been given to show the possibilities of travel, so as to visit the most of the countries of Central and Southern Europe. For the probable cost the reader is referred to preceding pages of this volume, where the expense of travel is set down as nearly as it can be estimated. But, as before stated, no general rule can be made, and the cost of a journey will depend very largely upon the tastes of the traveler, and his financial ability to gratify them.

The American who visits Europe for the first time is apt to be in a hurry, and to endeavor to see too much. He will very likely return with a confused notion of his experiences, and will be obliged to refer to his note-book to know what he has done. Instances have occurred of tourists who could not tell whether St. Paul's Cathedral was in London or Rome, and who had a vague impression that the tomb of Napoleon was beneath the Arc de Triomphe. They told of the wonderful wood-carving to be seen at Venice, and thought that Michael Angelo, John Titian, and Sir Christopher Wren were among the most famous painters Switzerland had ever produced. They ascended the Volcano of Mount Blanc from Vienna, and had a delightful view of the eternal snows of Vesuvius from their hotel windows at Berlin; where they also visited Trajan's column, and the Falls of Schaffhausen. In short they came back with things decidedly mixed, and all from making their journey too quickly.

Moral—Don't be in a hurry.