  Snapping and Tipping THE poor man never knows the cares and responsibilities that beset the man of wealth, and the man without a kodak does not know how keen is the disappointment of a picture missed—be the cause what it may. Heretofore I have traveled care free for two reasons: one was I never had any money to speak of, and the other was I never carried a camera. I looked at the superb view, or the picturesque street group, solely for its passing interest, with never a thought of locking it up in a black box for the future delectation of my friends, and to bore transient visitors who, as I have noticed, always begin to look up their time tables when the snapshot But this year some one with the glib tongue of a salesman persuaded me of the delights that were consequent on the pressing of a button, and I purchased a camera of the sort that makes its owner a marked man. The first two or three days I was as conscious as a man who has just shaved his mustache on a dare, and who expects his wife home from the country any minute. I fancied that every one knew I was a novice, although even I hadn't seen any of my pictures as yet. I snapped a number of friends on the steamer, and even had the audacity to make the captain look pleasant—but in his case it came natural, and really, when it was printed, even strangers could hear his hearty laugh whenever they looked at the picture, so true to life was it. Of course it was beginner's luck, but as I went on snapping and getting the Say, have you ever had hen fever? Has your pulse ever quickened at sight of an egg you could call your own? Have you ever breathed hard, when the old hen led forth thirteen fluffy chickens and you reflected that thirteen chickens would reach the egg-laying stage in seven months, and that if each of them hatched out thirteen you would have one hundred and sixty-nine inside of a year—and then have you gone out and bought twenty old hens, so as to have wholesale success—with deplorable results? If you have done all these things you know what a man does whose first snapshots are successful. I laid in supplies of films till my pockets bulged and my purse looked lean. And the first time the sun shone after landing at 'Derry, I went out to see the Giant's Causeway—and left my camera behind me. Then I experienced for the first time the sensation as of personal loss, when the views that might have been mine were left where they grew. On my way back I came on a hardened old sinner of sixty odd years teaching a little kiddie of four to smoke a cigarette. If I had had my camera I could have batted the old man over the head with it. But it was in the hotel. When I show my views to visitors they will say, "And didn't you go to the Giant's Causeway?" nor will they accept my reason for the lack of a view. And I feel that the set is incomplete. As time went on I noticed several things that are probably obvious to every amateur. One was that on the days on which I remembered to take my camera I saw very commonplace subjects and only snapped because I had the habit. Another was that no matter how fine the weather was when I set out with my camera, it was sure to cloud up, just as we reached the castle or met the pretty peasant girl, who was only too willing to be taken. On the Road to Lismore, in a Rain Storm One day I was walking from Cappoquin to Lismore, all unconscious of what lay before me, and just for wantonness I took trees and pictures that might have been in any country. At last I had but two films left, and then the meeting of several droves of cattle coming from Lismore told me that it must be Fair Day there. Just then lovely, noble, glorious Lismore castle burst on my view and I had to take it. And then I came on the fair and saw pictures at every turn. Funny little donkeys with heads quite buried in burlap bags the while they sought for oats, gay-petticoated and pretty-faced women in groups, grizzled farmers that looked the part, waterbutts on wheels in Rembrandtesque passageways, leading to sunlit courtyards beyond—regular prize winners if one had any sort of luck.
And then a man with an ingratiating brogue asked me to take him and his cart and almost before I knew it I had taken a sow that weighed all of five hundred pounds, and my snapshooting was over for the day. You may be sure that next day I went well prepared, but Fair Day is only once a month, and fair days are not much more plentiful, and it rained all day, and the only thing I saw worth taking was a sort of Don Quixote windmill that had been run by a horse probably years before the expression "the curse o' Crummel" (Cromwell) came to be used, and I was in a swiftly moving train and there was a woman in the way—oh! there's no doubt that camerading is fascinating, but it is also vexatious. Still, my advice to those about to travel is—take a camera. If it's a very rainy Sunday you may want them to leave on an early train. Tipping is a subject that is always Tipping in Ireland is a very mild thing compared to continental tipping. I'll never forget my first experience in Amsterdam. I have spent many agreeable and useful years since then, and the world has been better for my presence, for eighty-four months at least, since that day, but the comic opera features of that first wholesale tipping stand out as if I heard the whole thing last night at some Broadway theater. There were two of us, and we had spent two delightful days in Amsterdam, doing the picture galleries and confirming Baedeker as hard as we could, and now we must give up the two huge rooms on the first floor that we occupied at the Grand Hotel (to give it a name) and make our way to other Dutch hostelries. I said to Massenger, "How about tipping? Does it obtain in Holland?" "Oh, yes," said Massenger, with a gleam in his eye. "It obtains all right. You leave it to them." "How much shall I leave to them?" said I, looking at the small coins I had withdrawn from my pocket. "Well, we have been royally treated, and there are a good many waiters and chambermaids and 'portiers,' and a proprietor or two, and the equivalent for boots, and the 'bus driver." "But how are we to get them all?" "Just pay your bill and you'll get them all right," said Massenger. (I should explain that whoever travels with me is called Massenger. It saves trouble.) I did not quite understand, but I signified my intention of paying my bill, and the proprietor or his steward was all bows and smiles, and handed it to me, at the same time ringing a bell. Then the chorus began to assemble. After they had ranged themselves picturesquely the boots began to arrive. Some from neighboring hotels who had heard the bell came running in, and grouped themselves behind the maids. Then a head waiter who looked like a tenor came seriously in and I expected that in a moment I would hear: "'Tis the very first of May, Though we've not a thing to say, We will stand here, anyway Stand awhile and sing." I looked at Massenger and asked him what it all meant. "It's in our honor," said he. "We've got to shell out." And sure enough it was. We had to disgorge pro rata to all the assembled ones, and Massenger said afterward that he thought one or two of the guests came in for certain of our gratuities. When we stepped into the 'bus, quite innocent of coins of any sort, I listened, expecting to hear: "Now, in spite of rainy day, We have gone and made our hay. And I don't care what you say, When the Yankees come this way We get what they bring." They got it all right, but I was quite unnerved for some time. The attack had been so sudden. In Ireland there is nothing to equal this for system, and a copper does make a man feel grateful—or at least it does make him express gratitude. I have yet to hear curses in Ireland. But when you visit private houses you don't know what to do. Tips are expected there—not by everybody, but by maid and coachman, anyhow, and you wonder what is the right thing to do. To be sure you have caused trouble. You have placed your boots outside your door, just as you have latterly learned to do at home, and it was a maid who gave them that dull polish that wears out in a half hour. Leave polish behind when you leave America—that seems, by the way, to be the motto of a good many traveling Americans, but I referred to the kind that you can see your face in when imparted by an Italian. Milk Wagon, Mallow I had an experience when on my way to visit Lady ——, in County Monaghan, in the central part of Ireland. Just how much to tip a coachman of a "Lady" I did not know. A shilling did not seem enough, and two shillings seemed a good deal, and the fellow did not have the arrogance of an English coachman. He was simple and kindly, and was willing to talk to me, although he never ventured a word unless I spoke to him. When I had alighted at Ballybully station a ragged man had seized my valise, and on ascertaining my destination So to contint meself I gave him sixpence, just what I had paid for having my trunk carried one hundred and eighty miles, and climbed to the car. On the way to the estate of Lady Clancarty (to give her a name also) I figured on what I'd better give. To give too much would be as bad as to give too little. Still, if it cost a sixpence for my suit case to go a hundred yards, a three-mile drive should be worth a half pound at least. At last, just as we were driving in at the lodge gates, I foresaw that I must make haste—as it would never do to hand out my tip in the presence of my hostess—so I reached over the "well" and handed two shillings to the driver. He seemed surprised and pulled a bit I was conscience-stricken, but said not a word for a minute. Then the driver said, "I've been driving for twinty-three years and niver had an accident before." He had jumped out and thrown the step into the "well" between us. I had visions of the sacking of the old family driver, and all because I had not known how much of a gratuity to give him. But when I offered to make up the damage he said, "Indeed an' I'll be able to fix it myself." And fix it he did, so that no one was the wiser. But the pain of those few moments when I expected to be driven into the presence of my hostess with the car a wreck will not soon fade. As a matter of fact, it was a good half mile to the house after we left the lodge, and when we arrived I jumped from |
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