I any revolver or gun, all of which, especially the blanket, I sadly missed ere I returned. I got, before I left, a full white flannel or fine white cloth suit, which was then a startling novelty, and wore it to the Falls of the Mississippi. Little did I foresee that ere it gave out I should also have it on at the Cataracts of the Nile!
So we started and after a few hours’ travel, stopped at Altona. There I was very much amused by an old darkey at the railway-station hotel, who had, as he declared, “specially the kyar of de ladies an’ quality.” He had been a slave till the war broke out, and had been wondrously favoured by visions and revelations which guided him to freedom. “De Lawd he ’pear to me in a dream, an’ I hyar a vi’ce which cry, ‘Simon, arise an’ git out of dis, an’ put fo’ de Norf as fass as you kin travel, fo’ de day of de ’pressor is at an end, an’ you is to be free.’ So I rosed an’ fled, hardly a-waitin’ to stuff my bag wid some corn-dodgers an’ bacon, an’ foller de Norf Star till I git confused an’ went to sleep agin, wen, lo, an angel expostulated hisself befo’ my eyes in a wision, an’ say, ‘Simon, beholdes’ dou dat paff by de riber? Dat’s de one fo’ you to foller, ole son!’ So I follers it till I git on de right trail. Den I met anoder nigger a-’scapin’ from the bon’s of captivity, an’ carryin’ a cold ham, an’ I jined in wid him—you bet—an’ so we come to de Lawd’s country.”
And so gaily on to Chicago. We went directly to the first hotel, and as soon as I had toiletted and gone below, I saw on the opposite building a sign with the words Chicago Tribune. This was an exchange of ours, so I crossed over, and meeting the editor by chance in the doorway, was welcomed and introduced to Governor Desbrosses, who stood by. Then I went to a telegraph office and sent a despatch to the Press. The man wanted me to pay. I told him to C. O. D., “collect on delivery.” He declined. I said, “Your principal office is in Philadelphia, is it not?—Third and Chestnut Streets. Just send a telegram and ask the name of your landlord. It’s Leland, and I’m the man. If you make me
pay, I’ll raise your rent.” He laughed heartily and let me off, but not without a parting shot: “You see, Mr. Leland, there are so many scallawags [349] from the East come here, that we are obliged to be a little particular.”
I returned to the hotel, and was immediately introduced to some one having authority. I narrated my late experience. He looked at me and said, “How long have you been in Chicago?” I replied, “About thirty minutes.” He answered gravely, “I think you’d better stay here. You’ll suit the place.” I was beginning to feel the moral influence of the genial air of the West. Chicago is emphatically what is termed “a place,” and a certain amount of calm confidence in one’s self is not in that city to any one’s discredit. Once there was an old lady of a “hard” type in the witness-box in an American city. She glared round at the judge, the jury, and the spectators, and then burst out with, “You needn’t all be staring at me in that way. I don’t keer a --- for you all. I’ve lived eleven years in Chicago, and ain’t affeard of the devil.” Chicago is said in Indian to mean the place of skunks, but calling a rose a skunk-cabbage don’t make it one.
Walking on the edge of the lake near the city, the waters cast up a good-sized living specimen of that extraordinary fish-lizard, the great menobranchus, popularly known as the hell-bender from its extreme ugliness. Owing to the immense size of its spermatozoa, it has rendered great aid to embryology, a science which, when understood au fond, will bring about great changes in the human race. We were taken out in a steamboat to the end of the great aqueduct, which was, when built, pronounced, I think by the London Times, to be the greatest engineering work of modern times.
In due time we came to St. Paul, Minnesota. We went to a very fair hotel and had a very good dinner. In the West it is very common among the commonalty to drink coffee and milk through dinner, and indeed with all meals,
instead of wine or ale, but the custom is considered as vulgar by swells. Having finished dessert, I asked the Irish waiter to bring me a small cup of black coffee and brandy. Drawing himself up stiffly, Pat replied, “We don’t serve caafy at dinner in this hotel.” There was a grand roar of laughter which the waiter evidently thought was at my expense, as he retreated smiling.
We were kindly received in St. Paul by everybody. There is this immense advantage of English or American hospitality over that of all other countries, that it introduces us to the home, and makes us forget that we are strangers. When we were at the end of the fearfully wearisome great moral circus known as the Oriental Congress, held all over Scandinavia in 1890, there came to me one evening in the station a great Norseman with his friends. With much would-be, ox-like dignity he began, “You ha-ave now experienced de glorious haspitality off our country. You will go oom and say—”
“Stop a minute there!” I exclaimed, for I was bored to death with a show which had been engineered to tatters, and to half defeating all the work of the Congress, in order to glorify the King and Count Landberg. “I have been here in your country six weeks, and I had letters of introduction, and have made no end of acquaintances. I have been shown thousands of fireworks, which blind me, and offered dozens of champagne, which I never touch, and public dinners, which I did not attend. But during the whole time I have never once seen the inside of a Swedish or Norwegian house.” Which was perfectly true, nor have I ever seen one to this day. There is a kind of “hospitality” which consists of giving yourself a grand treat at a tavern or café, and inviting your strangers to it to help you to be glorified. But to very domestic people and utter Philistines, domestic life lacks the charm of a brass band, and the mirrors and gilding of a restaurant or hotel; therefore, what they themselves enjoy most, they, with best intent, but most unwisely, inflict on