. THE SUNDAY OREGOXTAX, PORTLAND, JUNE 7. 1914.
AHCMG THE,
rYir in r OOP '.caustic observations-
Vl J-VJJuSaL.'r J)V OF.A7?ICH TRAVELER.
ArncrciQns Are loerdLeci:b7 TjhciZL
-. . -
TToney
BI STERLING HEILIO.
PARIS. May 30.-, (Special Corre
spondence.) "Americans are tol
erated in Europe for their money."
A very rich American, who has spent
several years abroad, makes this state
ment. He Js now in Paris, on his way
home. .
"When we sight New Tork," he said,
"my secretary will have to hold me;
I'll be liable to Jump the boat for
gladness. Tes, I hired a secretary to
converse with."
"To hear the dear old language?" I
suggested.
"No, I said converse. Tou don't hear
anything but English in Europe;
they've" all learned it, to get at our
money. No. I said converse. The
Americans I met were too busy cuss
ing." '
Yet he regrets neither the time nor
the money.
' "Tears well spent, although I've suf
fered," he said. "When, we first came
abroad, my wife had to tie a rope to
our daughter's ankle to keep her from
eloping with a title; and I had to
watch my wife, to stop her buying: di
amonds and laces from hotel peddlers.
Now we're a united family."
"Tou have lived the gilded life," I
raid.
"We furnished the gilt," he answered.
"Of all the rlp-slammed, dog-swizzled
Idiocy in the world, the worst is how
the rich American is buncoed In Eu
rope! I've learned the lesson. I don't
mind the price. None of our legs are
broken."
In Kansas City and New Tork, they
know this man. They think that he
has been enjoying the time of his life
in the gay pleasure round of Europe.
When he sold out to the trust, the fam
ily began summering abroad. Then they
wintered.
"My wife said Winter might be bet
ter," he grinned. "Also, look you, one
don't like to own up. We've been back
and forth, and bragged up Europe, just
like all the others. All do. There are
thousands of us here with our families,
either because we thought that the time
was propitious and sold out, or weNgot
tired of playing at business because it
was managed by other people, and
which we really never did manage. So
we gave it up as nothing doing, and
came over here."
"But why Europe?" I asked.
"When a man has accumulated
enough money, ho craves something
more than he had," he answered. "He
has heard that European life is wider,
larger and more beautiful; and he
wants to see It."
He coughed.
"And get buncoed?! What galls me
UG" DONALDSON, who had
been roundhouse foreman so
long that he thought he
owned the entire system, gave out his
opinion of Lannigan at the end 'Of the
la tier's first week on the M. & S. I.
And this was it:
"That Grandfather Longlegs never'll
get to hold down a passenger lever on
this road, whatever he's done back
East. It ain't In him."
Then the old man chalked up the
limit on the side of his little smoke
discolored office, spat with emphasis,
and well, that closed the subject as
far as "Pug" was concerned.
I reckon if Lannigan hadn't begun
,by blowing about his Eastern record,
'he'd made more of a hit with us.. But
( he was a stranger in a strange land,
v the only engine-driver on the system
who hadn't held down a throttle west
of the , river, and he felt that "Tt de
volved on him to do some bragging.
He was a tall, awkwardly-built man,
with a shock of sandy hair and a
smooth, humorous face. His legs and
arms were remarkably long and thin,
and old Donaldson's sobriquet stuck to
him "Daddy Longlegs" seemed to fit.
Lannigan got a freight, and the
worst bunch of scrap iron on the road.,
which, in moments of enthusiasm,
"Pug" called an engine. If there was
any man handicapped in the race to
break the limit, it was the new man
from the land of tenderfoots.
The system of advancement followed
by the M. & S. P. did not include length
of service, or '"pull." Just one thing
counted the ability of a driver to get
speed out of his machine over the worst
track that God ever allowed man to
lay.
The country was .new when the M.
& S. P. was surveyed and laid down.
It had been a race between the M. &
S. P. and another corporation to see
which should reach the terminating
town, where connection could be made
with the Pacific road first.
We won, but at a cost which crip
pled the rovd financially for years, and
the renewing of the first roadbed was
a slow and laborious job.
We ran one fast passenger the Lim
ited. ' The through mall cars were at
tached to that train, too.
It was a continual fight all through
the year to keep that one train alone
up to the schedule called for by the
contract with the Government.
If any man on any other train
showed an ability to get, speed out of
his engine, he was watched, and, if
he "broke the limit" he stood a good
chance of displacing the driver then
running the mail train.
The roundhouse foreman had a habit
is the forced consumption. I don't
mind spending; I want to spend but I
hate to be forced, to know that other
wise the very waiters will laugh, or
answer insolently. I have seen a. grand
duke knuckle down to a head waiter.
The grand dukes are buncoed worse
than we are!"
I begged him to explain.
"The fault is with the leisure class
of Europe," he said. "It Is very mixed;
but it knows the game, lives on the
spot, and can run tto shelter. It makes
possible the so-called life of pleasure
following the seasons, idling in resorts,
the life of fads, fashions and mutual
rubbering. Those who profit are the
smoothest sharps in Europe hotel
men, resort managers, retail shopkeep
ers, and amusement purveyors. They
have the support of the press, because
they work for their locality. Each lo
cality has It's turn called It's "seasons.
And the American Is thrown Into it all,
without defense!"
He shook his finger at me.
"Of course, it's no conspiracy, al
though it looks it. The leisure class
takes its fling, and runs to cover. The
American must stand his ground. From
the day he lands, he Is exposed, he gets
no rest, finds no shelter, must com
pete! Spend! Spend! Do the right
thing! Slaves of 'the thing!' It is 'the
thing' to do Monte Carlo in Winter.
By Easter, it will be Biarritz or Rome!
then the Paris season; then the sea
coast: then the German spas! And dur
ing their 'season,' hotels, restaurants
and shopkeepers double their prices."
It is not because the rich American
is gullible, but because he is clear
sighted, that he acts the part of main
goat.
"Coming to Europe for the life of
leisure, he must lead t," said the
soured one. "Take the dress suit bunco.
You must put your ' dress suit on each
night or else go out in the back yard
and smoke with the servants. I mean,
eat with the cheap trippers; It's the
same thing; because 'the' dining-room
is reserved to evening clothes. So
everywhere, theater, casino, kursaal,
even the music under the trees; you're
like a yellow dog unless you're dressed.
Why? Evidently a man spends better,
gambles higher and is more polite in
his dress suit." . -
He says the gipsy orchestra the
same bunco.
"I am running away from gipsy or
chestras; they've. " driven me. daffy.
Everywhere in .Europe you will see
those red coats, that dulcimer piano
and those violins and wild whiskers!
Cardas and ragtime at dinner, at cof
fee and again in . the gambling hall.
What for? Evidently, to hypnotize the
of chalking up'the highest running at
the" end of the week where all hands
could see it, and sometimes the rivalry
ran high.
But' for Lannigan, the . new man,
there wasn't the ghost of a show.
His locomotive was an old affair which
had already done service on the mall
train and been condemned as untrust
worthy. His train seldom had the right of
way, and he and his fireman, Jimmy
Slosson, stood about as much show of
ever pulling out the Limited as they
did of running for president and vice
on the Populist ticket.
The M. & S. P. in those days was
a "farmers" railroad." Most of the way
stations were merely huts and water
tanks In forest clearings, tapping a
certain section of farming country
stretching westward of the" line.
Such villages or towns as there were
were roughly built, and in many of
them there wasn't a brick even the
chimneys of the slab houses being of
clay and poles.
A settlement grew quickly. Some
times it disappeared quite as rapidly
as it sprang up. A spark from a pass
ing engine might cause this last at
the proper season. '
As the lumber was removed and
farms laid out, however, more stable
houses were put up. Still, there was
many a little settlement like Yards
ley on the line when Lannigan and
Jimmy made their record run.
Lannigan had been with us since
the Winter before. He was a good
driver, but not brilliant. Anybody
but a prejudiced old fool like' Don
aldson would have recognized his
good points; but you never could stir
the roundhouse foreman , when he'd
once made up his mind.
Lannigan had learned the road
and his engine. If he followed an
other train he was on its heels all
the time, and got himself well cursed
for it.
Some of us began to see that there
really was more to the Eastern man
than we had believed.
The Fall was dry the sun and
wind all day, and every day, drying
the sap out of the trees and brush
and burning the leaves brown . before
the frost could make them pretty.
By and by the Inevitable happened;
fires began to light up the heavens
nightly, and by day streaks of blue
1 smoke hid the tops of the higher hills.
Reports reached us from all direc
tions of families burned out and set
tlements threatened; but for a week
SSAa -&e On 777C
7b iSeyVerer Sfomc
mind, to throw the stranger into an
unreal world of fictitious gayety and
recklessness. I don't say It's done for
that; but it does it."
Americans are greatest victims be
cause they are new to all this.
"We soon catch on," he said, "but
what's the use? We are always new
to.lt, and always will be, because it's
not our way it's their game, and we
have to play it. Take the gambling.
It makes my blood boil!"
Americans, certainly, - are not used
to public gambling as a social func
tion. "In Europe we. find it open and
above board," he said, "protected by
government, in pretentious surround
ings, the social center of each resort.
Not forced to gamble? , No, . but you
are forced to see and hear it The
gambling concession pays for the gar
dens, .fountains, . music, fireworks,
opera, theater, races, fetes and prom
enades.. You can see that they expect
you to gamble, hope you will gamble,
consider that you ought to gamble, and
watch you hungrily when you throw
down your first gold piece, not to cheat
them! You cannot get away from the
baccarat, roulette and boule. Where is
every one after tea? At the kursaal.
Where shall we take a turn after din
ner? To the tables, naturally. Women
catch it worse than men. I don't want
my old wife to become a gambler!"
Americans who won't gamble,' he
says, are charged dearer for .their ac-
the conflagrations kept away from the
line of the road.
Then suddenly, one Sunday morning,
a flood of fire swooped down the moun
tainside and crossed the tracks some
miles south of Yardsley.
The Limited came through somewhat
scorched, and the next day traffic on
the road between Lattell and the Junc
tion was cut off altogether.
This shut off several settlements as
well as Yardsley. except by telegraph.
The wires were still working, and our
operators stuck to their posts like the
brave fellows they were.
Pretty nearly every living soul in a
hundred square miles of territory lit
out for less dangerous ground. But
Yardsley . was caught napping,, and
its three hundred people were prac
tically hemmed in by the fiercest forest
fire the state "had ever experienced.
The village was in the crook of an
elbow of flames, yet the fluctuating
wind kept the conflagration off for
several days.. Meanwhile the settlers
chopped down timber, dug ditches and
did everything known to the pioneer
to stop the course of such- a devastating
conflagration.
Get a good, stiff breeze behind a
forest fire, - however, and the flames
will leap a clearing 200 feet wide, let
alone the sparks and brands falling
ahead of it
When this fire got ready, it swooped
down upon the devoted settlement in
a way which left no possibility of
escape. The entire system of the M.
& S. P. was pretty well tied up. We
bad pulled freight as near the fire line
as we dared, and the sidetracks were
about full of waiting cars.
The fire was still burning fiercely
beside the roadbed in more than one
place and we weren't asked to try to
pull a train through to Junction.
Naturally there were plenty of loco
motives and plenty of drivers at Lat
tell that day when the news came from
the Yardsley operator. It was his last
dispatch, for he had remained .until
it was too late to escape by any traxsk
through the forest, and there wasn't
even a handcar left at the Btatlon.
"Wind changed. Fire will reach us
in one hour. Three hundred people
In danger. Can you reach us?"
That was the message which the
yardmaster read to us from tho- steps
of the station at Lattell. He waa pale,
and his hands shook as he spelled the
words out slowly.
He didn't ' have any need to tell us
the danger. Nor did he call for vol
unteers. To try to get to Yardsley was
like bus'ing a through ticket for death.
. We. stood, around .and discussed; the
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commodations -turned
out, if
them.
and will , even be
a good gambler wants
"Gamblers are spenders," he said.
"That is why I order expensive wines,!
eat a la caTte and tip so heavily. Do
you know how we Americans got our
reputation for lavish tipping? By be
ing forced to it! Each American family
is alone in Europe up against a blank
wall of silence and inertia. Money Is
our only weapon. It Is a magic wand.
It turns sneers and frowns into laugh
ter. The waiters laugh behind our
backs, and the head waiter laughs in
our face!"
Tip the chambermaid, valet, room
waiter, bath woman, liftman, maitre
d'hotel, .dining-room waiter, cafe ditto,
portier, groom, chasseur, . trunkman,
chauffeur and collarman or have your,
trunks marked.
"They'll mark your trunks with ca- Finally he took me to see some von
b&llstic signs," he said, "and you ar- derful old family plate it was his own.
rive a dead one at your next stop. To In Florence my wife met a contessa
break down that wall of ill-will you whose daughter's husband was a brute,
will have to tip double!" To save her diamonds from him she
In spite of all this, he did not enjoy would sell them."
himself. .1 asked him what about American
"We have been lonely in the crowd," acquaintances,
he said. "Of course, the American can "They were too sad." he said. "How
buy company; titled parties will eat can you blame them? I've felt like an
terrible news and did nothing. Ex
cept Lannigan.
He appeared, at "Pug" Donaldson's
window, and, leaning 'his arms on the
sill, looked in with the same humorous
twist to his lean features.'
"Them three boxes are empty?" he
asked, jerking his head backward
toward the sidetrack.
Donaldson nodded.
"Tm going to hitch my engine onto
'em. Jimmy and me'll see if we can
git down there and beat that barbecue.
Gimme a clear switch?"
The roundhouse foreman only stared:
but after Lannigan had disappeared
from the window he rushed to the door
and yelled after him:
- "Hey, you! Grandfather Longlegs!
You'll be fried like a pancake on a
griddle!" "
But Lannigan only grinned and
leaped aboard the old engine. We
didn't know what he was up to .until
he'd coupled on the three empty box
cars andTattled away over the switches
and out of the yard. -
"He's making a bluff," some of us
said.
Others who respected the pluck. It
took to approach the fire, thought he'd'
never e:et through, but would " waste
his steam for nothing.
"Well, Jimmy, it's going to be a hot
run," the long-legged Yankee told his
stoker, as they neared the first belt of
fire. "You fill up the furnace, and I'll
slow down, so you can Jump. I don't
want to take another man to perdition
with- me."
.
U I I . sS I
I i . in
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our dinners and ride In our automo
biles; but it is such a trouble to keep
an eye on the wife's diamonds. Why
should the right kind of Europeans
hobnob with us? For our charms? We
don't even speak their language! Nice
Euro'peans are all around us. They
avoid us like the pest."
The likeliest acquaintances are ho
tel peddlers. It Is a new and high
profession. It's practitioners are cul
tivated, tactful, instructive, amusing.
You meet a gentleman or lady in your
hotel. You take tea together. go
sightseeing together. And it goes on
charmingly until your tastes and fads
are drawn out. Then 'the heavy bat
teries the special bargain opportunity
to pick up just the things of which you
have been dreaming.
"In London I got talking to the Hon.
Percy Blvvins in the Palm Lounge.
"Oh. I guess I'll stop," says Slosson,
kind of shamefaced.
Then they shook hands on It. and
from that moment neither questioned
the other's intention of sticking to
his job.
But Jimmy had loaded the ld en
gine for bear all right, before they
reached the fireline. She was whirling
miles under her drivers at a rate to
beat even our one fast train, and the
empty boxes behind were dancing like
mad over the rough roadway.
"We're gettln' there, Jimmy!" sings
out Lannigan, at last. "Shin over into
the water tank and fling a pail or so
over me when you get a chance."
He stood out on the running board
with a hand on the lever, his cap visor
shielding his eyes from the smoke and
flying sparks, peering' ahead as best
he could at the rails. Jimmy,' up to
his neck in the tank, flung pall after
pail of water over his long figure.
Suddenly the engine seemed to run
Into a veritable wall of flame. It ex
tended far across the roadbed, and it
wrapped the train about in a living,
seething mantle, as she rushed on.
It seemed as though no man could
go through that sea of five alive, but
when the old engine staggered out of
the fire belt, Lannigan still stood up
right at the Jever.
His sparse mustache, nis eyebrows,
his shock of sandy hair were gone.
He was as bald as a parrot, and his
clothinsr was afire in a dozen spots; but
he turned a horrible grin upon Jimmy
and waved his hand.
"Give ua another - bucket!" he
7 I II. , -
S3c .ScL&Se SO SCS777X 7s? c
absconding cashier ever since I've been
in Europe. Here and there one meets
American snobs who pretend to be
very European. If you sift matters,
you find that they have their reasons.
Their situation is unhappy at home.
They are like the fox who lost his tail,
said It was the style. I pass them
gently."
The men are bored to death, he says:
only the women are sincere.
"They are the laughing-stock of Par
Is and the watering places, those friv
olous, expatriated, exaggerated, Eu
ropeanized American women, who jab
ber a mixture of English and bad
French affectedly. They stick to the
centers where they can get heir finery.
That is what they live for. They want
to be where they can have immediate
and. see being worn the newest
things in gowns and hats and wraps
and jimcracks, and comment how they
look, and whether they will take, and
how they ought to be worn. The life
fascinates a certain type of discontent
ed American woman when she has
money.
"They do not love Europe, but the
dress center.
"They live in the great dressmaking
establishments. They don't know the
'are
croaked and the stoker climbed out of
the tank more dead than alive, himself,
and put out the burning garments.
Then they reached Yardsley.
I guess if any two men were ever
welcomed as angels straight from
heaven, it was Lannigan and his stoker,
though they must have looked a deal
more like devils from the pit.
Two hundred and ninety people who
had given up their last hope of con
tinued existence piled into those three
boxcars like cattle. The doors . were
closed, and then It was up to Lannigan
and Jimmy to run them back to Lattell.
They might have gone forward, but
a known danger was better than an
unknown. No knowing how many
miles of selid fire there was to the
south of them, so the old engine was
reversed, and back through the awful
belt of flame and smoke she went with
the three boxes.
And talk .about speed! She ate up
miles as a mortgage does grain and
potatoes! When that machine was fresh
from the shops she never dreamed of
making the time Lannigan got out of
her on that return run.
He certainly showed that day what
he could do when he had the right of
way!
Scorched almost to a cinder one
Instant and saturated the next, Lan
nigan stood at his post and brought
the rescue train through to Lattell.
Jtfarital Happiness Is Dissected
COXTIXXED FROM PAGE THREE.
has written for me to read. There are
passages in her reminiscences that
make me wonder even more than Is
customary for me to wonder over Mary;
over the Ignorance of all men. I fancy,
when they stand before the complex
subtleties of the feminine heart.
My idea and Mary's ideas of happiness
have always been largely at variance.
She has written that the first year of
our marriage was the happiest. In re
calling that period I rejoice that those
weeks and months, that year can never
be retraced. It was to me a period of
deepest joy and most acute bewilder
ment. .
I was "a wanderer, an explorer, and
my territory was the heart of the
woman I thought I knew until mar
riage revealed to me that I had wed
ded a stranger.
Still a Myatery.
I thought I knew her disposition, her
tastes, her temperament. Maybe I did.
But still Mary herself, my wife, was the
everlasting mystery.
What she calls "happiness" I am not
able exactly to classify. Certainly not
under that term. Happiness to my mind
is founded on security, a deep peace,
4jo6d so 7& SSaSrt
,Sirrc rSca. rt .
actresses and demi-mondaines
bump up against in thein; but
they
they
know their names, and love to
talk
about them. The tearooms, theaters
and night restaurants continue tho ex
citement. 'Look at So-and-So. she's in
the new cloak!" "Observe So-and-So.
she's got the hat we priced at Lewis'."
They paint their faces, expose their
forms and talk dirt. I'd rather see ray
daughter dead!"
As to cheap tourist trippers, his heart
bleeds for them.
"I have seen American tourist par
ties on schedule dropping their sick
members all across Europe," he said.
"What can they do? Stop for the sick
one? It would be a crying injustice to
the others. And the others pant on.
to keep up with the procession with
the schedule. They are like a pack of
wolves In Winter woe to the animal
that falls!"
Cheap American trippers, 011 their
own reHources. till one with eqilal pity.
"They lack even the protection of a
party. Isolated in a hostile land. 2500
miles from home, every mistake of lan
guage is a snare, every misunderstand
ing a trap, every extortion a surprise
and every snare," trap and surprise
source of new and unpremeditaded ex
pense. They have one precious re
source to stop together, in some hos
pitable second-class European town,
when dog-tired."
He puts the whole blame upon the
distance.
"Europe is too far and- different for
happy travel," he said. "The whole
dreary round is foreign to us. Take
the theaters. We don't understand
it's German. Italian, French. And when
vie buy a libretto, we're afraid that our
wife and child will understand! The
American is clean-minded. Ho sees
nothing but the bare argument of the
play and is disgusted. He misses tho
delicate humor and fancy which the
native's appreciate. No, bar the the
aters!" Bar everything.
The disillusioned - American million
aire banged the cafe tablo with his
fist.
"It's nothing doing. Europo is a
blind alley. Whenever you see earnest
men studying a programme, bill-board,
guide-book or printed notice with an
air of melancholy doubt, in Paris, Ber
lin. Rome or Vienna, you can go right
up and claim him for a fellow citizen
and sufferer. We are always seeking.
We never stop seeking. And we never
find what we are seeking!"
The box cars were afire and the pas
sengers half suffocated when they ar
rived. Jimmy was pretty nearly drowned
in the tank, and we picked Lanni
gan off the engine just as he caved
completely.
"Daddy Longlegs" was some time in
the hospital and came plaguey near
losing his sight, and all because of that
run. But If a man was ever popular
along the line of the old M. & S. P., his
name was Lannigan.
The first day he got down to thi
yard the super happened to be there
himself. The line was open again
and everything Tunning smooth by
that time, only the miles upon miles
of charred forest, and tho heap of
ashes where Yardsley had stood tellinsr
of the forest fire.
"Humph!" said the super, trying t
pick out the engineer's hand which
was least bandaged to shake. "I hear
you've been doing some tall running
down here. Lannigan."
And the driver grinned sheepishly,
aa though he had done something to
be ashamed of.
"Donaldson's got your record chalked
up on his office wall over the Limited:
guess we'll have to find you something
better than a freight to pull , out when
you're well enough."
And Lannigan got the mail train
the next fortnight.
(Copyright. 1914.)
and the first year of our marriage was
anything but peace. It was uncertainty
spelled with a large U. If I may be
permitted a very bad pun. I may say it
was the always disturbing you. I was
the you, the brute who always made
my Mary cry. I say that no man can
be happy when he's never sure that hir.
wife Isn't on the verge of tears. Now
Mary has since explained that she was
so afraid of losing me during thoe
first few months that she sat like Sis
ter Anne in the tower. mentally
watching afar off for the first sign that
1 might give that her tears were Justi
fied. Taklnjr Love for Grnated.
I never felt any of those qualms
it may be that I am phlegmat!; but
took my wife's love as a matter of
course. I was cocksure that I had it.
and I was sure that she was interested
in only ono man myself. As for her
self, she feared the "large world teem
ing with women." Each' one was a po
tential rival, and Mary on the qui vivc.
trembling on the gulf of uncertainty,
tells me" that that was the happiest year
of her life.
i