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  TRAVELLING SKETCHES.


  BY


  ANTHONY TROLLOPE.


  [REPRINTED FROM THE "PALL MALL GAZETTE."]




  LONDON:
  CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY.
  1866.




  CONTENTS.


                                                   PAGE

  THE FAMILY THAT GOES ABROAD BECAUSE IT'S THE
  THING TO DO                                         1

  THE MAN WHO TRAVELS ALONE                          15

  THE UNPROTECTED FEMALE TOURIST                     29

  THE UNITED ENGLISHMEN WHO TRAVEL FOR FUN           43

  THE ART TOURIST                                    57

  THE TOURIST IN SEARCH OF KNOWLEDGE                 71

  THE ALPINE CLUB MAN                                84

  TOURISTS WHO DON'T LIKE THEIR TRAVELS              98




TRAVELLING SKETCHES.




THE FAMILY THAT GOES ABROAD BECAUSE IT'S THE THING TO DO.


That men and women should leave their homes at the end of summer and go
somewhere,--though it be only to Margate,--has become a thing so fixed
that incomes the most limited are made to stretch themselves to fit the
rule, and habits the most domestic allow themselves to be interrupted
and set at naught. That we gain much in health there can be no doubt.
Our ancestors, with their wives and children, could do without their
autumn tour; but our ancestors did not work so hard as we work. And we
gain much also in general knowledge, though such knowledge is for the
most part superficial, and our mode of acquiring it too often absurd.
But the English world is the better for the practice. "Home-staying
youths have ever homely wits," and we may fairly suppose that our
youths are less homely in this particular after they have been a day
or two in Paris, and a week or two in Switzerland, and up and down the
Rhine, than they would have been had they remained in their London
lodgings through that month of September,--so weary to those who are
still unable to fly away during that most rural of months.

Upon the whole we are proud of our travelling; but yet we must own
that, as a nation of travellers, we have much to learn; and it always
seems that the travelling English family which goes abroad because it's
the thing to do, with no clearly defined object as to the pleasure to
be obtained or the delights to be expected,--with hardly a defined
idea of the place to be visited, has, as a class, more to learn than
any other class of tourists.

In such family arrangements daughters of course predominate. Sons can
travel alone or with their own friends. This arrangement they generally
prefer, and for it they are always able to give substantial reasons,
in which their mammas may, or may not, put implicit confidence.
Daughters can travel alone too occasionally, as I hope to be able to
show by-and-by in a sketch of that much abused but invaluable English
lady, the Unprotected Female Tourist. But such feminine independence
is an exception to the rule, and daughters are generally willing to
submit themselves to that paternal and maternal guidance from which
the adult male tourist so stoutly revolts. Paterfamilias of course is
there, paying the bills, strapping up the cloaks, scolding the waiters,
obeying, but not placidly obeying, the female behests to which he is
subject, and too frequently fretting uncomfortably beneath the burden
of the day, the heat and the dust, the absence of his slippers, and
the gross weight of his too-matured proportions. And he has, too, other
inward grievances of which he can say nothing to any ear. Something of
the salt of youth is left to him,--something of the spirit, though but
little of the muscle,--and he thinks of his boys who are far afield,
curtailed in their exploits by no petticoats, abridged by no stiff
proprieties; and he wishes that he was with them, feeling that his
trammels are heavy. The mother, of course, is there, kind to all her
party, but too often stiff and hard to all beyond it, anxious that papa
should have his comforts, anxious that her girls should see everything,
but afraid to let them see too much, sometimes a little cross when the
work becomes too hard or the pace of the pony is too rough, somewhat
dowdy in her cotton dress, and ill-suited to the hat which she wears.
She possesses every virtue under the sun. Of human beings she is the
least selfish. Her heart is full of love, and all who know her dote
upon her. At home she is charming, at home she is graceful and sweet
to be seen. But on her travels things do not go easily with her, and
her temper will sometimes become ruffled. The daughters are determined
to do the thing well, to see everything, to be stopped by no English
prejudices, to be at their ease, or at any rate look as though they
were; to talk French boldly in spite of their little slips; to wear
their dresses jauntily, and make the best of themselves; to have all
their eyes open, and carry home with them something from every day's
work. Who will say that they are wrong? Nay, who will not declare that
they are right in all this? But they overdo the thing in their intense
desire to utilize every moment; they are, alas, sometimes a little
ashamed of papa and mamma; and as they return down the Rhine, having
begun in Switzerland, and done Baden Baden, Frankfort, and Homburg on
their way, their dresses are not quite so jaunty, nor their gloves so
neat, nor their hats in such perfect trim, as when those articles were
inspected on the evening before they left home. That resolve to make
the best of themselves has been somewhat forgotten during the stern
realities of their journeys. A French girl will remember her crinoline
and her ribbons throughout every moment of her long day's work,--will
think of them through it all, preserving herself that she may preserve
them, if they were worth a thought at the beginning. If she is minded
to end dowdily, she will begin dowdily. But the trouble of such
continued care is too much for an English girl. She lapses first into
indifference, and from indifference to aversion; till at last she takes
an absolute pride in the absence of those little prettinesses which
she had at first been determined to maintain so stoutly. Who has not
seen her at the Dover railway station on her return home, as she stands
there grasping with one hand an Alpine stock and an umbrella, while she
leans listlessly on the other, regardless of the torn extremities of
her gloves and the battered form of her hat?

Such is the family that goes abroad because it is the thing to do.
The spirit that instigates them to roam afield is no hankering after
fashion. The father and mother, and daughters also, of the family of
which I speak, are well aware that such tourings are too common to
confer fashion or distinction. The days in which we heard that--

    Mrs. Grill is very ill,
      And nothing will improve her,
    Unless she sees the Tuileries,
      And waddles down the Louvre,--

are well nigh over, and are certainly over for such sensible people as
I am describing. It is not fashion that they seek, nor is it chiefly
amusement. Paterfamilias, when he starts, knows that he will not be
amused, and already wishes that the journey was over, and that he
could be back at his club. Mamma dreads it somewhat, and has more of
misgiving than of pleasant anticipation. She has not much of happiness
when papa is cross, and he is usually cross when he is uncomfortable.
And then the people at the inns are so often uncivil; and she fears the
beds! And the girls look for no unalloyed satisfaction. They know that
they have hard work before them, and the dread of those slips in their
French is not pleasant to them. But it is the thing to do. Not to have
seen Florence, Rome, Munich, and Dresden, not to be at home as regards
the Rhine, not to have ridden over the Gemmi or to have talked to
Alpine climbers at Zermatt, is to be behind the world. And then there
is so much to be done in Europe! Ars longa, vita brevis. Last year papa
wouldn't move,--that is, he wouldn't move beyond Cromer. Carry is,
alas! twenty-nine; Fanny is twenty-seven; even Sophie,--the childish
Sophie,--is twenty-four. Under such circumstances, who can dare to
think of ease, or even of pleasure? Years are flowing by, and the
realities of life,--still doubtful realities, but with so much of pain
in the doubt!--are coming on. Who can say how soon the income arising
from paternal energy may be at an end, and that the modest means of
pensioned age may render all such work impracticable? It is imperative
that the places be seen, that the lions be killed and ticked off as
difficulties done with and overcome. What may be the exact balance
of advantage to any of them when the tour is over, neither Carry nor
Fanny stops to inquire; but they put their heads together and determine
that the thing must be arranged. They feel that they are right. "It is
education," says Fanny, with her eyes glittering. "Home-staying youths
have ever homely wits," says Sophie, thinking perhaps too much of her
own advantage in point of years. "I will talk to papa in earnest,"
says Carry, with resolute mildness. She does talk to papa in earnest,
conscious that she is thereby doing her duty; and thus the family goes
abroad, because it is the thing to do.

In the old days,--days, let us say, that are now some hundred and fifty
years old,--young Englishmen used to travel for their education; but
it entered into the minds of those who sent them that they should see
something of the society of the countries which they visited. And in
such travelling time was given for such intercourse. But with the
ordinary English tourist, and especially with the ordinary English
tourist family, there is no such attempt now, no hope of any such good
fortune. Carry and Fanny mean to talk French boldly, but they intend
to do so in railway carriages, at hotel dinners, and to the guides and
waiters. No preparation is made for any attempt at social intercourse.
Letters of introduction are not obtained, nor is there time allowed
for any sojourn which would make an entrance into society possible.
That does not come even into Fanny's programme, though Fanny is
enthusiastic. Scenery, pictures, architecture, and a limited but minute
geographical inquiry, are the points to which it is intended that
attention shall be given. And of these much is learned. A true love of
scenery is common to almost all who will take the trouble to seek it. I
think that it is, at any rate, common to all English men and women. Of
pictures the knowledge acquired is most frequently what may be called
dead knowledge. Carry soon learns to know a Rubens from a Raphael,
and almost learns to know a Titian from a Tintoretto. She stores her
memory with facts as to individual pictures, remembers dates, and
can tell you who was the teacher of whom. She is sometimes a little
restless and mildly impatient during her labours in the galleries, and
rejoices often when the hard day's work is done and the custodian bids
her depart. But her toils have not been barren, and she enjoys after a
fashion what she has learned. Architecture comes easier, as the time
given to it is necessarily less, and the attention may be more vaguely
applied. But, on that account, less is carried away, and the memories
of the cathedral have dwindled to nothing, while the positions of the
world-famous pictures are still remembered. As to the geography,
it comes unsought, and remains unappreciated; but it is not on that
account the less valuable. How few of our young ladies can define the
position of Warsaw; while so many know accurately that of Wiesbaden!

Many accusations have been made against travelling English families,
touching that peculiarity of theirs in going hither and thither without
an attempt to see and know the people of the countries they visit; and
it is alleged, and truly alleged, that Frenchmen and Germans coming
here do make efforts to come among us and see us, and learn of what
like we are. But I think that we can defend ourselves on that score. We
travel among Frenchmen and Germans in bulk, while they come among us by
twos and threes. Our twos and our threes see as much of them as they
see of us. With them families do not go abroad because it is the thing
to do. How many an Englishman stays in Paris two days to see the city;
whereas no Frenchman comes to London for such a flying visit, unless he
be a _commis voyageur_, or has some business in hand.

The family that travels because it is the thing to do, is, I am sure,
in the right. Fanny understood her point when she said that it was
education. It is education; but if one can judge from the faces,
voices, and manners of the persons undergoing it, it is not often
pleasure. The work has been too hard, the toil too unremitting, the
endeavour to make the most of the short six weeks too unrelenting, to
allow of much of the softness of summer enjoyment. The stern Fanny,
who, as she has gone on her way, has made the foreign Bradshaw all
her own, has allowed no rest to her weary father, no ease to her
over-driven mother. "If we don't do Munich now, we shall never do it,"
she has said with energy. And thus the sullen father and the despairing
mother have been dragged along further dusty railroads, to another hot
city of pictures, in which Paterfamilias found nothing to comfort him
but the beer, and mamma no alleviation but the excessive punctuality
and neatness of the washerwoman.

But, at last, they are at home,--the penance is over, and the true
pleasure begins. They have done the work and have garnered the wages.
Papa is sufficiently happy in feeling that he cannot be again taken
away from his dressing-room and cellar, at any rate, for ten months;
and mamma, as she once more creeps into her own bed, thanks God that
she has been enabled to go through her duty. Carry and Fanny hide their
travelling gear with some little feeling of shame, and, as they toil
at their journals for the first week of their return, take pride in
thinking that they have seen at any rate as much as their neighbours.




THE MAN WHO TRAVELS ALONE.


Men who travel alone may be divided into two classes. There is the man
who cannot get a companion, and the man who does not want one. There is
also, between these two solitary men, an intermediate solitary man, who
travels alone because he cannot find the companion that would exactly
suit him. But, whatever may be the cause of his solitude, the man who
travels alone is not, I think, to be envied.

If he be a studious, thoughtful man, taking delight in museums and
houses of assembly, given to chemistry and the variations of European
politics, fond of statistics and well-instructed in stuffed vermin, he
may be as happy travelling alone as he would be alone in his library;
but such a man is exceptional, and I am not now speaking of him. He is
a student and not a tourist. He is going to school and not out for a
holiday. The man who travels alone, with whom we have to do, is one who
goes abroad for a little health, for a good deal of recreation if he
can find it, and for the pleasure of looking about him and seeing the
world. The improvement in health he may find; but the recreation will
be doubtful, unless he be one by nature averse to gregarious habits.

When we see such a one,--and such a one is often seen straying along
the Rhine or wandering listlessly among the mountains,--we always
suppose him to be alone because he cannot help it. We are never kind
enough to give him credit for a choice for solitude; and we avoid him
sedulously because we have it in our power to give him that one thing
that he wants. Such is the human nature of tourists, which in this
respect is very like to the human nature of people who stay at home. We
like to have at our houses those whom it is difficult to obtain, and do
not care to entertain those who are always ready to come to us.

It must be admitted that the ill-nature of tourist parties in this
respect is justified to a great degree by the experienced results of
any exceptional good-nature into which soft-hearted persons may be
occasionally betrayed. Who among us that has been thus soft-hearted
on an occasion has not repented in sackcloth and ashes? The solitary
tourist when once taken up can hardly be dropped; he appears, and
reappears, and comes up again till the original friends of the original
good-natured sinner become gloomy and sullen and talk of strong
measures. Whispers of an enforced separation are murmured about,
and Jones, who has picked the man up, and who "found that there was
something in him" as they sat next each other in a railway carriage, is
made to understand by Smith and Walker, that unless he can contrive
to drop Mr. Robinson, he must be dropped himself. It is not so easy to
drop Mr. Robinson. The paths of Switzerland, and the roads into Italy,
are open to all the world.

Poor Robinson! we will cling to him for a while, and endeavour to show
the nature of the misery which he suffers. At home he is