If I didn't pat the old farmer on the back, for the common sense of that remark, it was not because I didn't fully indorse it; nor did I fail to sympathize with his chagrin afterwards, when he remarked with a sigh, as he looked out of the car window, "it is such a pity my farm aint down this way. I might make my independent fortin now, selling small notions; for instance, look at them flowers in that gardin—it is astonishing how much money can be made now-a-days, just selling bokys." Our farmer was very human, too, for, just then, as we stopped for a minute, a young girl rushed up to the car-window to say a hurried "how d'ye do," to an old man. "That's a very nice gal, only to get a shake of the paw" said he, compassionately. Well, we worried through that long day as best we might, the poor children in the company half beside themselves with fatigue and hunger; and the men talking loudly about "swindling railroad companies," and threatening "to make a noise about it," when they reached their native Frog-town. After stopping about dark at a miserable place to get a miserable supper, we proceeded on the few remaining miles to Pittsburg. The glowing red lights of the great smelting furnaces, across the river, as we approached the city, looked very cheerful, through the fog, and gave promise of the warm reception of which we stood so greatly in need. Our troubles were over, as soon as we landed at the principal hotel, where solid, substantial comfort as well as luxury awaited us; in the shape of immense beds, with pillows whose sides did not cling together for want of feathers, as is too often the case in very pretentious hotels; in plenty of towels, in plenty of bed-clothes, and in a lookout from the window on the "levee" and across the river, upon the heights of Mount Washington, which we sleepily remarked we should be sure to explore the next morning. Fortified by a splendid night's rest, and a luxurious breakfast we did do it, spite of fog and threatening clouds. Up—up—up—till it seemed as if, like aerial voyagers, we were leaving the world behind us. But what a sight when we reached the summit! How like little birds' nests looked the houses dangerously nested beneath those rocky, perpendicular cliffs! Nor was "the solitary horseman" wanting, "winding round the brow of the hill," for there were houses and farms, and overhanging fruit-trees, and above all, a placard on a fence, with the announcement that the hours for this school for the young were from nine till twelve in the morning, and from two till four in the afternoon. Thank heaven! said I, that there is one place where health is considered of some importance in education. Seeing a coal mine near, my companion proposed we should penetrate a little way into its dark depths. A lad with a donkey-cart had just preceded us, with a small lamp fastened to his cap in front. He looked doubtfully at my feet, and mentioned the bugbear word "dirt." I replied by gathering my skirts in my hand, and following the donkey cart. Smutty enough we found the reeking pit, as we inhaled the stifling, close atmosphere. Its black sides seemed closing round me like a tomb, and when the last ray of daylight from the entrance had quite disappeared, and only the rumbling of the cart-wheels could be heard, like the roar of some wild beast, and only the glimmer of the miner's lamp could be seen, like the glare of its wild eyeball, all the woman came over me, and I begged humbly "to be taken out!" With what satisfaction I emerged into the daylight, and greeted the bright sun which just then shone out, and plucked from the overhanging mouth of the dark pit, which compassionate nature had draped fantastically with a wild vine, a pretty blossom, which looked so strangely beautiful there, some of my readers can imagine. With what zest I tried my limbs, scaled precipices, and jumped from cliff to cliff, to make sure of, and assert my vitality, both present and to come, in this breathing, living, sunshiny, above-ground world of flowers and fruits and blue sky, my astonished fellow traveller, who for the moment doubted my sanity, will bear witness.
And now, as to Pittsburgh itself, apart from its romantic bluffs and their surroundings, and out of its principal hotel, which is decidedly one of the best I ever entered, it is the dismalest, sootiest, forlornest of cities that I ever stumbled into. Let me do justice to the enormous peaches and very fine fruits found in its market-place. Let me do justice to the independence of a female we saw wending her way there, on horseback, with a basket on each side of the saddle, beside another on her arm, not to mention a big cotton umbrella and a horsewhip. We were to rise again, wretched fate! in the middle of that night, to proceed to Philadelphia, on our way home. On reaching my room, and glancing into my looking-glass, I perceived the necessity for the unusual outlay of towels in our bed-room; for what with the visit to the coal-pit, and general atmospheric sootiness of Pittsburgh, my most intimate friends would scarcely have recognized me through the black mask of my complexion. Let me, however, do Pittsburgh this justice: it is a most picturesque and interesting town, and well worth the intelligent, or even the curious, traveller's visit.
Oh, the unutterable dreariness of an hotel parlor at two o'clock in the morning, as you sleepily tumble down stairs at the call of the inexorable "waitah" to take the midnight train of cars. How your footsteps echo through the long, wide, empty halls, you thought so pleasant the evening previous, with their bright lights and flitting forms—tenanted now only by spectral rows of boots and shoes before the doors of still happy sleepers, or by the outline form of the swaggering Hercules who bears your trunk. Shiveringly you draw your blanket-shawl about your shoulders, and sink down on the drawing-room sofa, deferring till the last possible moment your egress into the foggy, out-door air. Julius Cæsar Agrippa enters the drawing room, and placing upon the cold silver salver a cold silver pitcher of ice-water, politely offers you a glass. Good heavens! your hair stands on end at the thought of it. "If it were hot coffee, now!" you faintly mutter at him, from beneath the folds of your woollen shawl. His repentant "Yes, ma'am, wish I had it for you," rouses you from the contemplation of your own pitiable situation, to ask the poor wretch (confidentially) if he has to stand there on one leg every midnight, in that way, contemplating cross travellers like yourself. Whereupon he tells you, with a furtive glance over his shoulder, that "it is every third night;" and just then you notice that a gentleman in the hall, with a valise attached, has just slipped something into Julius Cæsar's hand; and pretty soon you see another gentleman go and do likewise, and so, gradually, it gets through your curls that it mayn't be so bad after all, for this perquisited Julius Cæsar "to sit up every third night:" and humiliated at having been caught the forty-hundredth time throwing away your sympathy, you sheepishly obey the summons to "come," and forthwith pitch into the "Black Maria" that is waiting at the door to jolt your shivering bones to the depot. Everybody in it looks sullen, and everybody's shoulders seem to be buttoned on to their ears. Not even a grunt can be extorted from a mother's son of them, by the roughest pavement. Silent, stoical endurance is written on every Spartan! And so you are all emptied at last, pell-mell into the cars, after kicking at offered peanuts and cold, slimy oranges, and one by one, ties himself (you notice I use the masculine gender) into double knots on his respective seat.
Daylight creeps gradually on, after weary hours of twisting and turning. Your strange male vis-á-vis has overslept himself, and you have been, meanwhile, maliciously watching to enjoy his discomfited waking from that awkward posture, knowing, as you well do, that vanity has no sex. He starts, and takes a look at you; then he rubs his eyes—combs out the pet lock of hair on his forehead with his fingers, gives his disarranged moustache a scientific twist, straightens out a wrinkle on his coat, turns down the collar, which has all night harbored his nose, gets up and gently stamps his pants down over his boots, settles his hat at the accustomed knowing angle, draws on his gloves and looks at you, as if to say, Come now, you see I am not such a bad looking fellow, after all! Of course you don't notice the varlet; you are very busy just then with the "prospect."
Between our midnight leave of Pittsburg and daylight, I was conscious, as we darted through the fog, how much we were losing in the way of scenery. Oh, those sublime Alleghany Mountains, and that lovely Juniata winding round and through them. I have no words to express my sense of their beauty, and my unalloyed delight. I trust the coroner's inquest will be deferred on me till I drink that draught of pleasure again. Of course, through the narrow limits of the car window, and where one can only see one side of the way at a time, too, my tantalization was next door to lunacy. In vain I twisted my neck, and bobbed my bonnet, and, in child fashion grabbed at so much that I nearly lost all. Not all! for enough is left to dream over with closed eyes, when the dreary winter snows shall drive against the windows. Had I not been strictly enjoined by Mr. Fern never to jump a judgment, of a town, from a bird's-eye view out of a car window, I should quarrel with Harrisburg, situated in that gem of a valley, for resting so satisfied with nature's work, as to ignore any adornment of art, as well as with some other places near, and for the same reason. Come to think of it, I will assert my feminine right to declare that it is a shabby little town, and a disgrace to those kingly mountains, and Mr. Fern may like or dislike it.
Profiting by our experience of a day's compulsory fast from Cleveland to Pittsburg, we bargained with the head-waiter at the latter place, to fit us out with a lunch-basket, thus rendering us independent of the way-stations, where half the time is spent in fumbling out your money, and the rest in making change, the whistle sounding just as you get possession of your knife and fork. As hot tea and coffee are now sold on the platform, quite independent of the general scrambling feeding-room, if your luncheon-basket is furnished with a cup or mug to put it in, you may of course snap your fingers at fate. Railroad people and way station providers have jointly themselves to thank for being outwitted by the well-provided "luncheon-basket;" the convenience of which, especially where there are children in the party, and about one waiter in the feeding hall to two dozen people, and ten minutes to fight for food is plainly manifest; not to speak of the economy as it regards temper and digestion. Let me do justice, however, to one obscure way-station, where a friend and myself were the fortunate discoverers of a squirrel-pie, with which, alas! we had all too brief an acquaintance. A certain "Oliver Twist" near us, scenting the secret, called for "more;" whereupon the buxom young woman in attendance replied, "that she was sorry, but the squirl-pie was all out." It struck me that the word in would have been more significant, but I didn't mention it.
I don't think my worst enemy can say that I am often betrayed in showing politeness to females. I trust I know my own sex too well, so miserably to waste my time. Once, on my journey, I waived this well known article in my creed, in favor of an unprotected one who was seated next me at table. Every woman but herself, had one of the male species to stand between her and the—"how not to do it"—landlord and his satellites;—to have been more truthful I should have put this last word in the singular number. There was nothing preposessing about the woman; she was wiry and angular, and had a horrible trick of snuffing; perhaps it was all these that made me insane enough to pity her, as she sat there gazing into her empty plate, with a sort of dumb despair. What goodness may be enshrined in that repulsive face and form, I said to myself; how tenderly she may, in happier days, when younger and more attractive, have been watched and cared for; and how wretched to have only the memory of such things in this solitary place; so I just snatched some eggs that after unheard efforts to obtain, Mr. Fern had fondly hoped to regale himself upon, and offered them to her. Did that female thank me by a word, or even a glance? Ye gods? Didn't she take those eggs as if she had laid them herself? "Good enough for you Fanny," muttered I; "one would think you were old enough by this time, to know better." I didn't say any wicked words; it is not my way. Shortly after, the damsel who waited on us, and who employed the intervals when dishes were preparing in running up stairs to attend to her toilet:—First course being, no hoop, and bread-and-butter. Second course, crinoline and poached eggs. Third course, ear-rings and mutton-chop. Fourth course, ringlets and apple-pie;—this girl, I say, sat before me, at my own private, personal request, a plate of tea-biscuit. The unprotected female looked at them—so did I. Presently she poked me in the ribs and imperatively requested "them biscuit." Shade of Lindley Murray! you should have seen how civilly I informed her that they were destined for my luncheon-basket, but that doubtless the damsel in waiting would attend to any of her orders for food, as she had to mine. You should have seen the "unprotected female" at that moment. She was a panting, panther-like, gasping monument of philanthropy ill-directed.—Peace to her irate bones.
The butter, cheese, and other dairy (I wonder if the type-setters will print this daily) delicacies of Philadelphia, are no longer a matter of marvel to me, after travelling through Pennsylvania, and viewing its admirable farms, unencumbered by a weed or stone or thistle, and as far as foliage and fruit gave evidence, by any noxious vegetable insect; and enclosed by fences in perfect order and repair. Not an unsightly object about barn, house or garden; the very genius of thrift and neatness seemed pervading and presiding over all. It was indeed a delight to see them, although I was not unaware of the years of patient, careful tillage which had brought them to such a point of perfection. True—there might have been more flowers and vines, about their very neat dwellings, without endangering the Quaker's title to a seat among the blessed in a future state; for I never will believe that if He who made this bright world, approved of universal drab, he would have tinted the rose such a beautiful pink, or the morning-glory such a heavenly blue, or the grass such a cool, eye-satisfying-green; but for all that, were I queen of the country, the Quakers should believe and wear what they pleased, as I would myself.