In and Around Berlin

by Minerva Brace Norton

IN AND AROUND BERLIN.

I.[ToC]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS.

t was seven o'clock of a gray November morning when we arrived in Berlin for our first residence abroad. The approach to the city reminded us of the newer parts of New York, and we found that the population was about the same. But here the resemblance ceases. New York is the metropolis of a great nation,—the heart whence arterial supplies go forth, and to which all returning channels converge; the cosmopolitan centre of a New World. Berlin is the increasingly important capital of the German Empire,—growing rapidly, but still the royal impersonation of Prussia and the Hohenzollerns; seated in something of mediæval costume and quiet beside the river Spree; as content to cast a satisfied glance backward to Frederick the Great and the Electors of Brandenburg as to look forward to imperial supremacy among the Great Powers, and the championship of continental Protestant Europe.

There is one continuous thread woven through the old history and the new, and this appeared in the first hour of our stay. Everywhere on the streets the one thing most strange to our American eyes was the number of striking military uniforms mingled with the more sober garb of civilians. Officers of fine form and gentlemanly bearing, in uniforms of dark blue with scarlet trimmings and long, dragging, rattling swords, were commanding the evolutions of infantry in the main streets; while frequent glimpses of gold-laced light blue or scarlet jackets or of plumed and helmeted hussars animated the scene on the crowded sidewalks. Germany is, as it has been from the beginning, a military power.

We drove first to the home of an American friend. We were not prepared for the four long flights of stairs up which we were directed by the porter on the ground floor. "What reverses of fortune have come to A.," thought we, "that she lives in an attic!" The tenement was a good one, to be sure, when we found it,—large and lofty apartments with many windows, commanding a fine view. But to one unused to many stairs, and weakened by continuous illness in a long sea-voyage, the exhaustion of that first ascent was something to be remembered. It was, however, but the precursor of hundreds of similar feats, which our residence involved, as nearly all families live up several flights of stairs. Only once did we see an elevator in Germany. In the elegant hotel known as the Kaiserhof, the sojourning-place of princes, diplomatists, and statesmen, we took our seats in a commodious elevator, rejoiced at the thought of such an American way of getting upstairs. It was fully five minutes before we reached the moderate elevation of the corridor on which our rooms opened; the liveried and intelligent official in charge, evidently a personage of importance, meanwhile replying to our queries and enjoying our evident surprise at the slow motion, until we forgot our annoyance in the interest of the conversation which ensued before we reached our destination. Once I was toiling up the four flights which led to the residence of a cultivated German lady, in company with the hostess. "Oh," I said breathlessly, "would there were elevators in Germany!"

"Yes," courteously responded the lady; adding, with a resigned sigh, the conclusive words which indicated contentment with her lot, "but it is not ze custom."

It was late in the season, and our lodgings were not engaged in advance. Americans in increasing numbers make Berlin a winter residence, and by October the most desirable pensions generally have their rooms engaged. By the kind offices of our friend, our famishing party were provided with the rolls and coffee which compose the continental breakfast, and a fortunate entrance was, after much seeking, obtained for us to a most desirable boarding-house. Our own apartment was a large corner room, with immense windows looking north and east, and, like nearly all rooms in Berlin houses, connected by double doors with the apartments on either side. A fire was built before we took possession, but it was two days before we ceased to shiver. We looked for the stove of which we had heard. More than one of the five senses were called into requisition to determine which article of furniture was entitled to that designation. Across one corner of the room stood a tall white monument composed of glazed tiles laid in mortar, built into the room as a chimney might have been, with a hidden flue in the rear connecting it with the wall. A drab cornice and plaster ornaments of the same color set off the four or five feet above the mantel which surrounded it, and a brass door, about ten inches by twelve, was in the middle front of the part below. On the mantel were disposed sundry ornaments, including vases of dried grasses, and the hand could always be held upon the tiles against which they stood. In a small fireplace within this unique mass of tiles and mortar, the housemaid would place a dozen pieces of coal-cake once or at most twice a day, and after allowing a few minutes for the kindling to set it aglow, would close and lock the triple door, and the fire was made for twenty-four hours. In two or three hours after the lighting of the fire, the temperature of the room, if other conditions were favorable, might be slightly raised. To raise it five to ten degrees would require from six to ten hours.

In response to our request to the landlady for an addition of cold meat or steak to the coffee and rolls of the breakfast, and for more warmth in the room, accompanied by an expression of willingness to make additional payment for the same, the reply, given in a courteous manner, was that Americans lived in rooms much too warm, and ate too much meat, and that it would be for their health in Germany to conform to the German customs. However, some spasmodic efforts were made, for a season, to comply with the requests, which before long were wholly discontinued; and the strangers learned the wisdom of accommodating themselves "in Rome" to the ways of the Romans. This, however, was not accomplished without continued suffering. The meagre "first breakfast," served about half-past eight o'clock, was supplemented by a "second breakfast" of a cup of chocolate or beef tea, at about eleven, to those who were then in the house and made known their desire for it. But the days were short. Berlin is about six hundred miles nearer the north pole than New York, in the latitude of Labrador and the southern part of Hudson's Bay. The climate is milder only because the Gulf Stream kindly sends its warmth over all Europe, which lies in much higher latitudes than we are wont to think. Consequently the days in winter are much shorter than ours, as in summer they are longer. All the mid-winter daylight of Berlin is between the hours of eight A.M. and four P.M. With dinner at two o'clock, from which we rose about three, there was too little light remaining for visits to museums and other places of interest, so that the chief sightseeing of the day must be put into the hours between nine and two o'clock, often far from residence or restaurants; so the work of the day must be done on insufficient food, and the prevailing physical sensation was that of being an animated empty cask. We thus reached a settled conviction that however well the continental breakfast may serve the needs of Germans, with their slow ways of working, and their heavy suppers of sausage, black bread, and beer, late at night, an American home for Americans temporarily in Berlin is a consummation much to be wished.