I see she had made a blunder and it was my duty to set her right, so says I to her: “I don’t know as it is any more stationery than paper and books commonly is; they are always stationary unless you move ’em round.”
She looked at me sort o’ wonderin’ and then laughed but kep’ her head up as high as ever. It beats all what mistakes some folks will make and not act mortified a mite; but if I should make such blunders I should feel cheap as dirt. Then we took a short tower into Spain, and we found she had trimmed and ornamented herself beautiful. You could stand for hours a lookin’ at the front of this Nation painted to look like colored marble, and all figured off so emblematical and curious. And then we started for Russia, and we see that if any Nation had done well, and put her best foot forred, she had. Such furs as I see there I don’t never expect to see again.
Such awful sights of silks and velvets, and embroideries in gold! There was one man all embroidered in gold that looked splendid, with a crown of the most brilliant jewels on his head, and another shinin’ one on the table by the side of him; and all round in a border was as many as twenty other gold saints; they looked rich. And then there was all sorts of linen and cotton goods and umberells and everything.
And in Austria and Hungary we see beautiful bent wood furniture of all kinds, and the awfulest sight of kid gloves, and chromos, and oil paintins, and musical instruments, and the most beautiful Bohemian glass anybody ever did see. And it was there we see the biggest opal in the world; it is worth 25,000 dollars, and the man told me it weighed six hundred and two carats.
I spoke right up and says I, “They must be awful small carrots then.”
We didn’t argue with him, but we didn’t believe it, Josiah nor I didn’t, for if the carrots was any size at all, six hundred of ’em would have made more’n two bushels. But it was a noble lookin’ stun, and a crowd of wimmen was round it all the while. I declare I admired some of their jewelry fearfully; Josiah see that I did, and with a anxious mean he hurried me off into Germany. And here we see everything, etcetery and so 4th; makin’ one of the nicest displays to the Sentinal—and jewelry, and gold and silver ware, and ivory ware, of all sorts. There was one case containin’ velvet that was made of glass and velvet, the finest case in the hull Main Buildin’.
But now, havin’ gone the rounds of the Nations, and treatin’ ’em all alike, so they couldn’t one of ’em, call me uppish or proud spirited; politeness bein’ attended to and nobody slighted, I told Josiah that I must git out in the open air and rest off the eyes of my spectacles a little, or I didn’t know what the result would be. My head was in a fearful state; I had seen so much, it seemed as if I couldn’t see nothin’, and at the same time I could see everything, right where it wasn’t, or anywhere. Why, when I would look up in my Josiah’s face, it seemed as if I could see right on his forward, dragons, and pulpits, and on that peaceable bald head I could see (as it were) crockydiles, and storks, and handkerchief pins; my mean must have looked bad. So we hurried out through the crowd, and went out under a venerable tree by the side of the path, and sot down; and anon, or about that time, my spectacles begun to be rested off, and I see clearer, and realized things one at a time, more than I had realized ’em. When I come out of that Main Buildin’, everything was mixed up together to a degree that was almost alarmin’.
But the minute Josiah Allen got rested, he was all rousted up with a new idee. He had catched a sight that day of a Photograph Gallery, and nothin’ to do but he must go and have his picture took.
Says he, “I will go and be took Samantha; sunthin’ may happen that we shall have to go home sudden, and I do want to be took before I leave the village, for I shant probable look so dressy, and have so pretty a expression onto me for some time; I shall make a crackin’ good lookin’ picture, Samantha.”
That man is vain! but I didn’t throw it in his face, I only told him almost coldly to be took if he wanted to. And then he beset me to be took too. Says he, “If you will, we will be holt of hands, or lockin’ arms, or any way.”