CHAPTER XI



Black Forest House: and the sociability therein--Its perfume--
George positively declines to remain in bed after four o'clock in
the morning--The road one cannot miss--My peculiar extra instinct--
An ungrateful party--Harris as a scientist--His cheery confidence--
The village: where it was, and where it ought to have been--
George: his plan--We promenade a la Francais--The German coachman
asleep and awake--The man who spreads the English language abroad.

There was one night when, tired out and far from town or village,
we slept in a Black Forest farmhouse. The great charm about the
Black Forest house is its sociability. The cows are in the next
room, the horses are upstairs, the geese and ducks are in the
kitchen, while the pigs, the children, and the chickens live all
over the place.

You are dressing, when you hear a grunt behind you.

"Good-morning! Don't happen to have any potato peelings in here?
No, I see you haven't; good-bye."

Next there is a cackle, and you see the neck of an old hen
stretched round the corner.

"Fine morning, isn't it? You don't mind my bringing this worm of
mine in here, do you? It is so difficult in this house to find a
room where one can enjoy one's food with any quietness. From a
chicken I have always been a slow eater, and when a dozen--there, I
thought they wouldn't leave me alone. Now they'll all want a bit.
You don't mind my getting on the bed, do you? Perhaps here they
won't notice me."

While you are dressing various shock heads peer in at the door;
they evidently regard the room as a temporary menagerie. You
cannot tell whether the heads belong to boys or girls; you can only
hope they are all male. It is of no use shutting the door, because
there is nothing to fasten it by, and the moment you are gone they
push it open again. You breakfast as the Prodigal Son is generally
represented feeding: a pig or two drop in to keep you company; a
party of elderly geese criticise you from the door; you gather from
their whispers, added to their shocked expression, that they are
talking scandal about you. Maybe a cow will condescend to give a
glance in.

This Noah's Ark arrangement it is, I suppose, that gives to the
Black Forest home its distinctive scent. It is not a scent you can
liken to any one thing. It is as if you took roses and Limburger
cheese and hair oil, some heather and onions, peaches and soapsuds,
together with a dash of sea air and a corpse, and mixed them up
together. You cannot define any particular odour, but you feel
they are all there--all the odours that the world has yet
discovered. People who live in these houses are fond of this
mixture. They do not open the window and lose any of it; they keep
it carefully bottled up. If you want any other scent, you can go
outside and smell the wood violets and the pines; inside there is
the house; and after a while, I am told, you get used to it, so
that you miss it, and are unable to go to sleep in any other
atmosphere.

We had a long walk before us the next day, and it was our desire,
therefore, to get up early, even so early as six o'clock, if that
could be managed without disturbing the whole household. We put it
to our hostess whether she thought this could be done. She said
she thought it could. She might not be about herself at that time;
it was her morning for going into the town, some eight miles off,
and she rarely got back much before seven; but, possibly, her
husband or one of the boys would be returning home to lunch about
that hour. Anyhow, somebody should be sent back to wake us and get
our breakfast.

As it turned out, we did not need any waking. We got up at four,
all by ourselves. We got up at four in order to get away from the
noise and the din that was making our heads ache. What time the
Black Forest peasant rises in the summer time I am unable to say;
to us they appeared to be getting up all night. And the first
thing the Black Forester does when he gets up is to put on a pair
of stout boots with wooden soles, and take a constitutional round
the house. Until he has been three times up and down the stairs,
he does not feel he is up. Once fully awake himself, the next
thing he does is to go upstairs to the stables, and wake up a
horse. (The Black Forest house being built generally on the side
of a steep hill, the ground floor is at the top, and the hay-loft
at the bottom.) Then the horse, it would seem, must also have its
constitutional round the house; and this seen to, the man goes
downstairs into the kitchen and begins to chop wood, and when he
has chopped sufficient wood he feels pleased with himself and
begins to sing. All things considered, we came to the conclusion
we could not do better than follow the excellent example set us.
Even George was quite eager to get up that morning.

We had a frugal breakfast at half-past four, and started away at
five. Our road lay over a mountain, and from enquiries made in the
village it appeared to be one of those roads you cannot possibly
miss. I suppose everybody knows this sort of road. Generally, it
leads you back to where you started from; and when it doesn't, you
wish it did, so that at all events you might know where you were.
I foresaw evil from the very first, and before we had accomplished
a couple of miles we came up with it. The road divided into three.
A worm-eaten sign-post indicated that the path to the left led to a
place that we had never heard of--that was on no map. Its other
arm, pointing out the direction of the middle road, had
disappeared. The road to the right, so we all agreed, clearly led
back again to the village.

"The old man said distinctly," so Harris reminded us, "keep
straight on round the hill."

"Which hill?" George asked, pertinently.

We were confronted by half a dozen, some of them big, some of them
little.

"He told us," continued Harris, "that we should come to a wood."

"I see no reason to doubt him," commented George, "whichever road
we take."

As a matter of fact, a dense wood covered every hill.

"And he said," murmured Harris, "that we should reach the top in
about an hour and a half."

"There it is," said George, "that I begin to disbelieve him."

"Well, what shall we do?" said Harris.

Now I happen to possess the bump of locality. It is not a virtue;
I make no boast of it. It is merely an animal instinct that I
cannot help. That things occasionally get in my way--mountains,
precipices, rivers, and such like obstructions--is no fault of
mine. My instinct is correct enough; it is the earth that is
wrong. I led them by the middle road. That the middle road had
not character enough to continue for any quarter of a mile in the
same direction; that after three miles up and down hill it ended
abruptly in a wasps' nest, was not a thing that should have been
laid to my door. If the middle road had gone in the direction it
ought to have done, it would have taken us to where we wanted to
go, of that I am convinced.

Even as it was, I would have continued to use this gift of mine to
discover a fresh way had a proper spirit been displayed towards me.
But I am not an angel--I admit this frankly,--and I decline to
exert myself for the ungrateful and the ribald. Besides, I doubt
if George and Harris would have followed me further in any event.
Therefore it was that I washed my hands of the whole affair, and
that Harris entered upon the vacancy.

"Well," said Harris. "I suppose you are satisfied with what you
have done?"

"I am quite satisfied," I replied from the heap of stones where I
was sitting. "So far, I have brought you with safety. I would
continue to lead you further, but no artist can work without
encouragement. You appear dissatisfied with me because you do not
know where you are. For all you know, you may be just where you
want to be. But I say nothing as to that; I expect no thanks. Go
your own way; I have done with you both."

I spoke, perhaps, with bitterness, but I could not help it. Not a
word of kindness had I had all the weary way.

"Do not misunderstand us," said Harris; "both George and myself
feel that without your assistance we should never be where we now
are. For that we give you every credit. But instinct is liable to
error. What I propose to do is to substitute for it Science, which
is exact. Now, where's the sun?"

"Don't you think," said George, "that if we made our way back to
the village, and hired a boy for a mark to guide us, it would save
time in the end?"

"It would be wasting hours," said Harris, with decision. "You
leave this to me. I have been reading about this thing, and it has
interested me." He took out his watch, and began turning himself
round and round.

"It's as simple as A B C," he continued. "You point the short hand
at the sun, then you bisect the segment between the short hand and
the twelve, and thus you get the north."

He worried up and down for a while, then he fixed it.

"Now I've got it," he said; "that's the north, where that wasps'
nest is. Now give me the map."

We handed it to him, and seating himself facing the wasps, he
examined it.

"Todtmoos from here," he said, "is south by south-west."

"How do you mean, from here?" asked George.

"Why, from here, where we are," returned Harris.

"But where are we?" said George.

This worried Harris for a time, but at length he cheered up.

"It doesn't matter where we are," he said. "Wherever we are,
Todtmoos is south by south-west. Come on, we are only wasting
time."

"I don't quite see how you make it out," said George, as he rose
and shouldered his knapsack; "but I suppose it doesn't matter. We
are out for our health, and it's all pretty!"

"We shall be all right," said Harris, with cheery confidence. "We
shall be in at Todtmoos before ten, don't you worry. And at
Todtmoos we will have something to eat."

He said that he, himself, fancied a beefsteak, followed by an
omelette. George said that, personally, he intended to keep his
mind off the subject until he saw Todtmoos.

We walked for half an hour, then emerging upon an opening, we saw
below us, about two miles away, the village through which we had
passed that morning. It had a quaint church with an outside
staircase, a somewhat unusual arrangement.

The sight of it made me sad. We had been walking hard for three
hours and a half, and had accomplished, apparently, about four
miles. But Harris was delighted.

"Now, at last," said Harris, "we know where we are."

"I thought you said it didn't matter," George reminded him.

"No more it does, practically," replied Harris, "but it is just as
well to be certain. Now I feel more confidence in myself."

"I'm not so sure about that being an advantage," muttered George.
But I do not think Harris heard him.

"We are now," continued Harris, "east of the sun, and Todtmoos is
south-west of where we are. So that if--"

He broke off. "By-the-by," he said, "do you remember whether I
said the bisecting line of that segment pointed to the north or to
the south?"

"You said it pointed to the north," replied George.

"Are you positive?" persisted Harris.

"Positive," answered George "but don't let that influence your
calculations. In all probability you were wrong."

Harris thought for a while; then his brow cleared.

"That's all right," he said; "of course, it's the north. It must
be the north. How could it be the south? Now we must make for the
west. Come on."

"I am quite willing to make for the west," said George; "any point
of the compass is the same to me. I only wish to remark that, at
the present moment, we are going dead east."

"No we are not," returned Harris; "we are going west."

"We are going east, I tell you," said George.

"I wish you wouldn't keep saying that," said Harris, "you confuse
me."

"I don't mind if I do," returned George; "I would rather do that
than go wrong. I tell you we are going dead east."

"What nonsense!" retorted Harris; "there's the sun."

"I can see the sun," answered George, "quite distinctly. It may be
where it ought to be, according to you and Science, or it may not.
All I know is, that when we were down in the village, that
particular hill with that particular lump of rock upon it was due
north of us. At the present moment we are facing due east."

"You are quite right," said Harris; "I forgot for the moment that
we had turned round."

"I should get into the habit of making a note of it, if I were
you," grumbled George; "it's a manoeuvre that will probably occur
again more than once."

We faced about, and walked in the other direction. At the end of
forty minutes' climbing we again emerged upon an opening, and again
the village lay just under our feet. On this occasion it was south
of us.

"This is very extraordinary," said Harris.

"I see nothing remarkable about it," said George. "If you walk
steadily round a village it is only natural that now and then you
get a glimpse of it. Myself, I am glad to see it. It proves to me
that we are not utterly lost."

"It ought to be the other side of us," said Harris.

"It will be in another hour or so," said George, "if we keep on."

I said little myself; I was vexed with both of them; but I was glad
to notice George evidently growing cross with Harris. It was
absurd of Harris to fancy he could find the way by the sun.

"I wish I knew," said Harris, thoughtfully, "for certain whether
that bisecting line points to the north or to the south."

"I should make up my mind about it," said George; "it's an
important point."

"It's impossible it can be the north," said Harris, "and I'll tell
you why."

"You needn't trouble," said George; "I am quite prepared to believe
it isn't."

"You said just now it was," said Harris, reproachfully.

"I said nothing of the sort," retorted George. "I said you said it
was--a very different thing. If you think it isn't, let's go the
other way. It'll be a change, at all events."

So Harris worked things out according to the contrary calculation,
and again we plunged into the wood; and again after half an hour's
stiff climbing we came in view of that same village. True, we were
a little higher, and this time it lay between us and the sun.

"I think," said George, as he stood looking down at it, "this is
the best view we've had of it, as yet. There is only one other
point from which we can see it. After that, I propose we go down
into it and get some rest."

"I don't believe it's the same village," said Harris; "it can't
be."

"There's no mistaking that church," said George. "But maybe it is
a case on all fours with that Prague statue. Possibly, the
authorities hereabout have had made some life-sized models of that
village, and have stuck them about the Forest to see where the
thing would look best. Anyhow, which way do we go now?"

"I don't know," said Harris, "and I don't care. I have done my
best; you've done nothing but grumble, and confuse me."

"I may have been critical," admitted George "but look at the thing
from my point of view. One of you says he's got an instinct, and
leads me to a wasps' nest in the middle of a wood."

"I can't help wasps building in a wood," I replied.

"I don't say you can," answered George. "I am not arguing; I am
merely stating incontrovertible facts. The other one, who leads me
up and down hill for hours on scientific principles, doesn't know
the north from the south, and is never quite sure whether he's
turned round or whether he hasn't. Personally, I profess to no
instincts beyond the ordinary, nor am I a scientist. But two
fields off I can see a man. I am going to offer him the worth of
the hay he is cutting, which I estimate at one mark fifty pfennig,
to leave his work, and lead me to within sight of Todtmoos. If you
two fellows like to follow, you can. If not, you can start another
system and work it out by yourselves."

George's plan lacked both originality and aplomb, but at the moment
it appealed to us. Fortunately, we had worked round to a very
short distance away from the spot where we had originally gone
wrong; with the result that, aided by the gentleman of the scythe,
we recovered the road, and reached Todtmoos four hours later than
we had calculated to reach it, with an appetite that took forty-
five minutes' steady work in silence to abate.

From Todtmoos we had intended to walk down to the Rhine; but having
regard to our extra exertions of the morning, we decided to
promenade in a carriage, as the French would say: and for this
purpose hired a picturesque-looking vehicle, drawn by a horse that
I should have called barrel-bodied but for contrast with his
driver, in comparison with whom he was angular. In Germany every
vehicle is arranged for a pair of horses, but drawn generally by
one. This gives to the equipage a lop-sided appearance, according
to our notions, but it is held here to indicate style. The idea to
be conveyed is that you usually drive a pair of horses, but that
for the moment you have mislaid the other one. The German driver
is not what we should call a first-class whip. He is at his best
when he is asleep. Then, at all events, he is harmless; and the
horse being, generally speaking, intelligent and experienced,
progress under these conditions is comparatively safe. If in
Germany they could only train the horse to collect the money at the
end of the journey, there would be no need for a coachman at all.
This would be a distinct relief to the passenger, for when the
German coachman is awake and not cracking his whip he is generally
occupied in getting himself into trouble or out of it. He is
better at the former. Once I recollect driving down a steep Black
Forest hill with a couple of ladies. It was one of those roads
winding corkscrew-wise down the slope. The hill rose at an angle
of seventy-five on the off-side, and fell away at an angle of
seventy-five on the near-side. We were proceeding very
comfortably, the driver, we were happy to notice, with his eyes
shut, when suddenly something, a bad dream or indigestion, awoke
him. He seized the reins, and, by an adroit movement, pulled the
near-side horse over the edge, where it clung, half supported by
the traces. Our driver did not appear in the least annoyed or
surprised; both horses, I also, noticed, seemed equally used to the
situation. We got out, and he got down. He took from under the
seat a huge clasp-knife, evidently kept there for the purpose, and
deftly cut the traces. The horse, thus released, rolled over and
over until he struck the road again some fifty feet below. There
he regained his feet and stood waiting for us. We re-entered the
carriage and descended with the single horse until we came to him.
There, with the help of some bits of string, our driver harnessed
him again, and we continued on our way. What impressed me was the
evident accustomedness of both driver and horses to this method of
working down a hill.

Evidently to them it appeared a short and convenient cut. I should
not have been surprised had the man suggested our strapping
ourselves in, and then rolling over and over, carriage and all, to
the bottom.

Another peculiarity of the German coachman is that he never
attempts to pull in or to pull up. He regulates his rate of speed,
not by the pace of the horse, but by manipulation of the brake.
For eight miles an hour he puts it on slightly, so that it only
scrapes the wheel, producing a continuous sound as of the
sharpening of a saw; for four miles an hour he screws it down
harder, and you travel to an accompaniment of groans and shrieks,
suggestive of a symphony of dying pigs. When he desires to come to
a full stop, he puts it on to its full. If his brake be a good
one, he calculates he can stop his carriage, unless the horse be an
extra powerful animal, in less than twice its own length. Neither
the German driver nor the German horse knows, apparently, that you
can stop a carriage by any other method. The German horse
continues to pull with his full strength until he finds it
impossible to move the vehicle another inch; then he rests. Horses
of other countries are quite willing to stop when the idea is
suggested to them. I have known horses content to go even quite
slowly. But your German horse, seemingly, is built for one
particular speed, and is unable to depart from it. I am stating
nothing but the literal, unadorned truth, when I say I have seen a
German coachman, with the reins lying loose over the splash-board,
working his brake with both hands, in terror lest he would not be
in time to avoid a collision.

At Waldshut, one of those little sixteenth-century towns through
which the Rhine flows during its earlier course, we came across
that exceedingly common object of the Continent: the travelling
Briton grieved and surprised at the unacquaintance of the foreigner
with the subtleties of the English language. When we entered the
station he was, in very fair English, though with a slight
Somersetshire accent, explaining to a porter for the tenth time, as
he informed us, the simple fact that though he himself had a ticket
for Donaueschingen, and wanted to go to Donaueschingen, to see the
source of the Danube, which is not there, though they tell you it
is, he wished his bicycle to be sent on to Engen and his bag to
Constance, there to await his arrival. He was hot and angry with
the effort of the thing. The porter was a young man in years, but
at the moment looked old and miserable. I offered my services. I
wish now I had not--though not so fervently, I expect, as he, the
speechless one, came subsequently to wish this. All three routes,
so the porter explained to us, were complicated, necessitating
changing and re-changing. There was not much time for calm
elucidation, as our own train was starting in a few minutes. The
man himself was voluble--always a mistake when anything entangled
has to be made clear; while the porter was only too eager to get
the job done with and so breathe again. It dawned upon me ten
minutes later, when thinking the matter over in the train, that
though I had agreed with the porter that it would be best for the
bicycle to go by way of Immendingen, and had agreed to his booking
it to Immendingen, I had neglected to give instructions for its
departure from Immendingen. Were I of a despondent temperament I
should be worrying myself at the present moment with the reflection
that in all probability that bicycle is still at Immendingen to
this day. But I regard it as good philosophy to endeavour always
to see the brighter side of things. Possibly the porter corrected
my omission on his own account, or some simple miracle may have
happened to restore that bicycle to its owner some time before the
end of his tour. The bag we sent to Radolfzell: but here I
console myself with the recollection that it was labelled
Constance; and no doubt after a while the railway authorities,
finding it unclaimed at Radolfzell, forwarded it on to Constance.

But all this is apart from the moral I wished to draw from the
incident. The true inwardness of the situation lay in the
indignation of this Britisher at finding a German railway porter
unable to comprehend English. The moment we spoke to him he
expressed this indignation in no measured terms.

"Thank you very much indeed," he said; "it's simple enough. I want
to go to Donaueschingen myself by train; from Donaueschingen I am
going to walk to Geisengen; from Geisengen I am going to take the
train to Engen, and from Engen I am going to bicycle to Constance.
But I don't want to take my bag with me; I want to find it at
Constance when I get there. I have been trying to explain the
thing to this fool for the last ten minutes; but I can't get it
into him."

"It is very disgraceful," I agreed. "Some of these German workmen
know hardly any other language than their own."

"I have gone over it with him," continued the man, "on the time
table, and explained it by pantomime. Even then I could not knock
it into him."

"I can hardly believe you," I again remarked; "you would think the
thing explained itself."

Harris was angry with the man; he wished to reprove him for his
folly in journeying through the outlying portions of a foreign
clime, and seeking in such to accomplish complicated railway tricks
without knowing a word of the language of the country. But I
checked the impulsiveness of Harris, and pointed out to him the
great and good work at which the man was unconsciously assisting.

Shakespeare and Milton may have done their little best to spread
acquaintance with the English tongue among the less favoured
inhabitants of Europe. Newton and Darwin may have rendered their
language a necessity among educated and thoughtful foreigners.
Dickens and Ouida (for your folk who imagine that the literary
world is bounded by the prejudices of New Grub Street, would be
surprised and grieved at the position occupied abroad by this at-
home-sneered-at lady) may have helped still further to popularise
it. But the man who has spread the knowledge of English from Cape
St. Vincent to the Ural Mountains is the Englishman who, unable or
unwilling to learn a single word of any language but his own,
travels purse in hand into every corner of the Continent. One may
be shocked at his ignorance, annoyed at his stupidity, angry at his
presumption. But the practical fact remains; he it is that is
anglicising Europe. For him the Swiss peasant tramps through the
snow on winter evenings to attend the English class open in every
village. For him the coachman and the guard, the chambermaid and
the laundress, pore over their English grammars and colloquial
phrase books. For him the foreign shopkeeper and merchant send
their sons and daughters in their thousands to study in every
English town. For him it is that every foreign hotel- and
restaurant-keeper adds to his advertisement: "Only those with fair
knowledge of English need apply."

Did the English-speaking races make it their rule to speak anything
else than English, the marvellous progress of the English tongue
throughout the world would stop. The English-speaking man stands
amid the strangers and jingles his gold.

"Here," cries, "is payment for all such as can speak English."

He it is who is the great educator. Theoretically we may scold
him; practically we should take our hats off to him. He is the
missionary of the English tongue.