A Book of Burlesques Part 10

_VI.--SEEING THE WORLD_

_VI.--Seeing The World_

_The scene is the brow of the Hungerberg at Innsbruck. It is the half hour before sunset, and the whole lovely valley of the Inn_--still wie die Nacht, tief wie das Meer--_begins to glow with mauves and apple greens, apricots and silvery blues. Along the peaks of the great snowy mountains which shut it in, as if from the folly and misery of the world, there are touches of piercing primary colours--red, yellow, violet. Far below, hugging the winding river, lies little Innsbruck, with its checkerboard parks and Christmas garden villas. A battalion of Austrian soldiers, drilling in the Exerzierplatz, appears as an army of grey ants, now barely visible. Somewhere to the left, beyond the broad flank of the Hungerberg, the night train for Venice labours toward the town.

It is a superbly beautiful scene, perhaps the most beautiful in all Europe. It has colour, dignity, repose. The Alps here come down a bit and so increase their spell. They are not the harsh precipices of Switzerland, nor the too charming stage mountains of the Trentino, but rotting billows of clouds and snow, the high flung waves of some t.i.tanic but stricken ocean. Now and then comes a faint clank of metal from the funicular railway, but the tracks themselves are hidden among the trees of the lower slopes. The tinkle of an angelus bell (or maybe it is only a sheep bell) is heard from afar. A great bird, an eagle or a falcon, sweeps across the crystal s.p.a.ces.

Here where we are is a shelf on the mountainside, and the hand of man has converted it into a terrace. To the rear, clinging to the mountain, is an Alpine_ gasthaus--_a bit overdone, perhaps, with its red-framed windows and elaborate fretwork, but still genuinely of the Alps. Along the front of the terrace, protecting sightseers from the sheer drop of a thousand feet, is a stout wooden rail.

A man in an American sack suit, with a bowler hat on his head, lounges against this rail. His elbows rest upon it, his legs are crossed in the fas.h.i.+on of a figure four, and his face is buried in the red book of Herr Baedeker. It is the volume on Southern Germany, and he is reading the list of Munich hotels. Now and then he stops to mark one with a pencil, which he wets at his lips each time. While he is thus engaged, another man comes ambling along the terrace, apparently from the direction of the funicular railway station. He, too, carries a red book. It is Baedeker on Austria-Hungary. After gaping around him a bit, this second man approaches the rail near the other and leans his elbows upon it.

Presently he takes a package of chewing gum from his coat pocket, selects two pieces, puts them into his mouth and begins to chew. Then he spits idly into s.p.a.ce, idly but homerically, a truly stupendous expectoration, a staggering discharge from the Alps to the first shelf of the Lombard plain! The first man, startled by the report, glances up.

Their eyes meet and there is a vague glimmer of recognition._

THE FIRST MAN

American?

THE SECOND MAN

Yes; St. Louis.

THE FIRST MAN

Been over long?

THE SECOND MAN

A couple of months.

THE FIRST MAN

What s.h.i.+p'd you come over in?

THE SECOND MAN

The _Kronprinz Friedrich_.

THE FIRST MAN

Aha, the German line! I guess you found the grub all right.

THE SECOND MAN

Oh, in the main. I have eaten better, but then again, I have eaten worse.

THE FIRST MAN

Well, they charge you enough for it, whether you get it or not. A man could live at the Plaza cheaper.

THE SECOND MAN

I should _say_ he could. What boat did _you_ come over in?

THE FIRST MAN

The _Maurentic_.

THE SECOND MAN

How is she?

THE FIRST MAN

Oh, so-so.

THE SECOND MAN

I hear the meals on those English s.h.i.+ps are nothing to what they used to be.

THE FIRST MAN

That's what everybody tells me. But, as for me, I can't say I found them so bad. I had to send back the potatoes twice and the breakfast bacon once, but they had very good lima beans.

THE SECOND MAN

Isn't that English bacon awful stuff to get down?