A Tramp Abroad

M >> Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) >> A Tramp Abroad


"Then he cocked his head down and took another look; he glances up
perfectly joyful, this time; winks his wings and his tail both,
and says, 'Oh, no, this ain't no fat thing, I reckon! If I ain't in
luck!--Why it's a perfectly elegant hole!' So he flew down and got that
acorn, and fetched it up and dropped it in, and was just tilting his
head back, with the heavenliest smile on his face, when all of a
sudden he was paralyzed into a listening attitude and that smile faded
gradually out of his countenance like breath off'n a razor, and the
queerest look of surprise took its place. Then he says, 'Why, I didn't
hear it fall!' He cocked his eye at the hole again, and took a long
look; raised up and shook his head; stepped around to the other side of
the hole and took another look from that side; shook his head again. He
studied a while, then he just went into the Details--walked round and
round the hole and spied into it from every point of the compass.
No use. Now he took a thinking attitude on the comb of the roof and
scratched the back of his head with his right foot a minute, and finally
says, 'Well, it's too many for ME, that's certain; must be a mighty long
hole; however, I ain't got no time to fool around here, I got to "tend
to business"; I reckon it's all right--chance it, anyway.'

"So he flew off and fetched another acorn and dropped it in, and tried
to flirt his eye to the hole quick enough to see what become of it,
but he was too late. He held his eye there as much as a minute; then he
raised up and sighed, and says, 'Confound it, I don't seem to understand
this thing, no way; however, I'll tackle her again.' He fetched
another acorn, and done his level best to see what become of it, but he
couldn't. He says, 'Well, I never struck no such a hole as this before;
I'm of the opinion it's a totally new kind of a hole.' Then he begun
to get mad. He held in for a spell, walking up and down the comb of the
roof and shaking his head and muttering to himself; but his feelings got
the upper hand of him, presently, and he broke loose and cussed himself
black in the face. I never see a bird take on so about a little thing.
When he got through he walks to the hole and looks in again for half a
minute; then he says, 'Well, you're a long hole, and a deep hole, and
a mighty singular hole altogether--but I've started in to fill you, and
I'm damned if I DON'T fill you, if it takes a hundred years!'

"And with that, away he went. You never see a bird work so since you was
born. He laid into his work like a nigger, and the way he hove acorns
into that hole for about two hours and a half was one of the most
exciting and astonishing spectacles I ever struck. He never stopped to
take a look anymore--he just hove 'em in and went for more. Well, at
last he could hardly flop his wings, he was so tuckered out. He comes
a-dropping down, once more, sweating like an ice-pitcher, dropped his
acorn in and says, 'NOW I guess I've got the bulge on you by this time!'
So he bent down for a look. If you'll believe me, when his head come up
again he was just pale with rage. He says, 'I've shoveled acorns enough
in there to keep the family thirty years, and if I can see a sign of one
of 'em I wish I may land in a museum with a belly full of sawdust in two
minutes!'

"He just had strength enough to crawl up on to the comb and lean his
back agin the chimbly, and then he collected his impressions and
begun to free his mind. I see in a second that what I had mistook for
profanity in the mines was only just the rudiments, as you may say.

"Another jay was going by, and heard him doing his devotions, and stops
to inquire what was up. The sufferer told him the whole circumstance,
and says, 'Now yonder's the hole, and if you don't believe me, go and
look for yourself.' So this fellow went and looked, and comes back and
says, 'How many did you say you put in there?' 'Not any less than
two tons,' says the sufferer. The other jay went and looked again. He
couldn't seem to make it out, so he raised a yell, and three more jays
come. They all examined the hole, they all made the sufferer tell
it over again, then they all discussed it, and got off as many
leather-headed opinions about it as an average crowd of humans could
have done.

"They called in more jays; then more and more, till pretty soon this
whole region 'peared to have a blue flush about it. There must have been
five thousand of them; and such another jawing and disputing and ripping
and cussing, you never heard. Every jay in the whole lot put his eye to
the hole and delivered a more chuckle-headed opinion about the mystery
than the jay that went there before him. They examined the house all
over, too. The door was standing half open, and at last one old jay
happened to go and light on it and look in. Of course, that knocked the
mystery galley-west in a second. There lay the acorns, scattered all
over the floor.. He flopped his wings and raised a whoop. 'Come here!'
he says, 'Come here, everybody; hang'd if this fool hasn't been trying
to fill up a house with acorns!' They all came a-swooping down like a
blue cloud, and as each fellow lit on the door and took a glance, the
whole absurdity of the contract that that first jay had tackled hit him
home and he fell over backward suffocating with laughter, and the next
jay took his place and done the same.

"Well, sir, they roosted around here on the housetop and the trees for
an hour, and guffawed over that thing like human beings. It ain't any
use to tell me a bluejay hasn't got a sense of humor, because I know
better. And memory, too. They brought jays here from all over the United
States to look down that hole, every summer for three years. Other
birds, too. And they could all see the point except an owl that come
from Nova Scotia to visit the Yo Semite, and he took this thing in on
his way back. He said he couldn't see anything funny in it. But then he
was a good deal disappointed about Yo Semite, too."



CHAPTER IV Student Life [The Laborious Beer King]

The summer semester was in full tide; consequently the most frequent
figure in and about Heidelberg was the student. Most of the students
were Germans, of course, but the representatives of foreign lands
were very numerous. They hailed from every corner of the globe--for
instruction is cheap in Heidelberg, and so is living, too. The
Anglo-American Club, composed of British and American students, had
twenty-five members, and there was still much material left to draw
from.

Nine-tenths of the Heidelberg students wore no badge or uniform;
the other tenth wore caps of various colors, and belonged to social
organizations called "corps." There were five corps, each with a color
of its own; there were white caps, blue caps, and red, yellow, and green
ones. The famous duel-fighting is confined to the "corps" boys. The
"KNEIP" seems to be a specialty of theirs, too. Kneips are held, now and
then, to celebrate great occasions, like the election of a beer king,
for instance. The solemnity is simple; the five corps assemble at night,
and at a signal they all fall loading themselves with beer, out
of pint-mugs, as fast as possible, and each man keeps his own
count--usually by laying aside a lucifer match for each mud he empties.
The election is soon decided. When the candidates can hold no more, a
count is instituted and the one who has drank the greatest number of
pints is proclaimed king. I was told that the last beer king elected
by the corps--or by his own capabilities--emptied his mug seventy-five
times. No stomach could hold all that quantity at one time, of
course--but there are ways of frequently creating a vacuum, which those
who have been much at sea will understand.

One sees so many students abroad at all hours, that he presently begins
to wonder if they ever have any working-hours. Some of them have, some
of them haven't. Each can choose for himself whether he will work or
play; for German university life is a very free life; it seems to have
no restraints. The student does not live in the college buildings, but
hires his own lodgings, in any locality he prefers, and he takes his
meals when and where he pleases. He goes to bed when it suits him, and
does not get up at all unless he wants to. He is not entered at the
university for any particular length of time; so he is likely to change
about. He passes no examinations upon entering college. He merely pays
a trifling fee of five or ten dollars, receives a card entitling him to
the privileges of the university, and that is the end of it. He is now
ready for business--or play, as he shall prefer. If he elects to
work, he finds a large list of lectures to choose from. He selects the
subjects which he will study, and enters his name for these studies; but
he can skip attendance.

The result of this system is, that lecture-courses upon specialties
of an unusual nature are often delivered to very slim audiences,
while those upon more practical and every-day matters of education are
delivered to very large ones. I heard of one case where, day after day,
the lecturer's audience consisted of three students--and always the
same three. But one day two of them remained away. The lecturer began as
usual--

"Gentlemen,"--then, without a smile, he corrected himself, saying--

"Sir,"--and went on with his discourse.

It is said that the vast majority of the Heidelberg students are hard
workers, and make the most of their opportunities; that they have
no surplus means to spend in dissipation, and no time to spare for
frolicking. One lecture follows right on the heels of another, with very
little time for the student to get out of one hall and into the next;
but the industrious ones manage it by going on a trot. The professors
assist them in the saving of their time by being promptly in their
little boxed-up pulpits when the hours strike, and as promptly out again
when the hour finishes. I entered an empty lecture-room one day just
before the clock struck. The place had simple, unpainted pine desks and
benches for about two hundred persons.

About a minute before the clock struck, a hundred and fifty students
swarmed in, rushed to their seats, immediately spread open their
notebooks and dipped their pens in ink. When the clock began to strike,
a burly professor entered, was received with a round of applause, moved
swiftly down the center aisle, said "Gentlemen," and began to talk as he
climbed his pulpit steps; and by the time he had arrived in his box and
faced his audience, his lecture was well under way and all the pens were
going. He had no notes, he talked with prodigious rapidity and
energy for an hour--then the students began to remind him in certain
well-understood ways that his time was up; he seized his hat, still
talking, proceeded swiftly down his pulpit steps, got out the last word
of his discourse as he struck the floor; everybody rose respectfully,
and he swept rapidly down the aisle and disappeared. An instant rush for
some other lecture-room followed, and in a minute I was alone with the
empty benches once more.

Yes, without doubt, idle students are not the rule. Out of eight hundred
in the town, I knew the faces of only about fifty; but these I saw
everywhere, and daily. They walked about the streets and the wooded
hills, they drove in cabs, they boated on the river, they sipped beer
and coffee, afternoons, in the Schloss gardens. A good many of them wore
colored caps of the corps. They were finely and fashionably dressed,
their manners were quite superb, and they led an easy, careless,
comfortable life. If a dozen of them sat together and a lady or a
gentleman passed whom one of them knew and saluted, they all rose
to their feet and took off their caps. The members of a corps always
received a fellow-member in this way, too; but they paid no attention
to members of other corps; they did not seem to see them. This was not
a discourtesy; it was only a part of the elaborate and rigid corps
etiquette.

There seems to be no chilly distance existing between the German
students and the professor; but, on the contrary, a companionable
intercourse, the opposite of chilliness and reserve. When the professor
enters a beer-hall in the evening where students are gathered together,
these rise up and take off their caps, and invite the old gentleman to
sit with them and partake. He accepts, and the pleasant talk and the
beer flow for an hour or two, and by and by the professor, properly
charged and comfortable, gives a cordial good night, while the students
stand bowing and uncovered; and then he moves on his happy way homeward
with all his vast cargo of learning afloat in his hold. Nobody finds
fault or feels outraged; no harm has been done.

It seemed to be a part of corps etiquette to keep a dog or so, too.
I mean a corps dog--the common property of the organization, like the
corps steward or head servant; then there are other dogs, owned by
individuals.

On a summer afternoon in the Castle gardens, I have seen six students
march solemnly into the grounds, in single file, each carrying a bright
Chinese parasol and leading a prodigious dog by a string. It was a very
imposing spectacle. Sometimes there would be as many dogs around the
pavilion as students; and of all breeds and of all degrees of beauty and
ugliness. These dogs had a rather dry time of it; for they were tied
to the benches and had no amusement for an hour or two at a time except
what they could get out of pawing at the gnats, or trying to sleep and
not succeeding. However, they got a lump of sugar occasionally--they
were fond of that.

It seemed right and proper that students should indulge in dogs; but
everybody else had them, too--old men and young ones, old women and
nice young ladies. If there is one spectacle that is unpleasanter than
another, it is that of an elegantly dressed young lady towing a dog by a
string. It is said to be the sign and symbol of blighted love. It seems
to me that some other way of advertising it might be devised, which
would be just as conspicuous and yet not so trying to the proprieties.

It would be a mistake to suppose that the easy-going pleasure-seeking
student carries an empty head. Just the contrary. He has spent nine
years in the gymnasium, under a system which allowed him no freedom, but
vigorously compelled him to work like a slave. Consequently, he has left
the gymnasium with an education which is so extensive and complete, that
the most a university can do for it is to perfect some of its profounder
specialties. It is said that when a pupil leaves the gymnasium, he not
only has a comprehensive education, but he KNOWS what he knows--it is
not befogged with uncertainty, it is burnt into him so that it will
stay. For instance, he does not merely read and write Greek, but speaks
it; the same with the Latin. Foreign youth steer clear of the gymnasium;
its rules are too severe. They go to the university to put a mansard
roof on their whole general education; but the German student already
has his mansard roof, so he goes there to add a steeple in the nature of
some specialty, such as a particular branch of law, or diseases of the
eye, or special study of the ancient Gothic tongues. So this German
attends only the lectures which belong to the chosen branch, and drinks
his beer and tows his dog around and has a general good time the rest of
the day. He has been in rigid bondage so long that the large liberty
of the university life is just what he needs and likes and thoroughly
appreciates; and as it cannot last forever, he makes the most of it
while it does last, and so lays up a good rest against the day that must
see him put on the chains once more and enter the slavery of official or
professional life.



CHAPTER V At the Students' Dueling-Ground [Dueling by Wholesale]

One day in the interest of science my agent obtained permission to bring
me to the students' dueling-place. We crossed the river and drove up
the bank a few hundred yards, then turned to the left, entered a narrow
alley, followed it a hundred yards and arrived at a two-story public
house; we were acquainted with its outside aspect, for it was visible
from the hotel. We went upstairs and passed into a large whitewashed
apartment which was perhaps fifty feet long by thirty feet wide and
twenty or twenty-five high. It was a well-lighted place. There was no
carpet. Across one end and down both sides of the room extended a row of
tables, and at these tables some fifty or seventy-five students [1. See
Appendix C] were sitting.

Some of them were sipping wine, others were playing cards, others chess,
other groups were chatting together, and many were smoking cigarettes
while they waited for the coming duels. Nearly all of them wore colored
caps; there were white caps, green caps, blue caps, red caps, and
bright-yellow ones; so, all the five corps were present in strong
force. In the windows at the vacant end of the room stood six or eight,
narrow-bladed swords with large protecting guards for the hand,
and outside was a man at work sharpening others on a grindstone. He
understood his business; for when a sword left his hand one could shave
himself with it.

It was observable that the young gentlemen neither bowed to nor spoke
with students whose caps differed in color from their own. This did not
mean hostility, but only an armed neutrality. It was considered that
a person could strike harder in the duel, and with a more earnest
interest, if he had never been in a condition of comradeship with his
antagonist; therefore, comradeship between the corps was not permitted.
At intervals the presidents of the five corps have a cold official
intercourse with each other, but nothing further. For example, when the
regular dueling-day of one of the corps approaches, its president calls
for volunteers from among the membership to offer battle; three or more
respond--but there must not be less than three; the president lays their
names before the other presidents, with the request that they furnish
antagonists for these challengers from among their corps. This is
promptly done. It chanced that the present occasion was the battle-day
of the Red Cap Corps. They were the challengers, and certain caps of
other colors had volunteered to meet them. The students fight duels in
the room which I have described, TWO DAYS IN EVERY WEEK DURING SEVEN
AND A HALF OR EIGHT MONTHS IN EVERY YEAR. This custom had continued in
Germany two hundred and fifty years.


To return to my narrative. A student in a white cap met us and
introduced us to six or eight friends of his who also wore white caps,
and while we stood conversing, two strange-looking figures were led in
from another room. They were students panoplied for the duel. They were
bareheaded; their eyes were protected by iron goggles which projected an
inch or more, the leather straps of which bound their ears flat against
their heads were wound around and around with thick wrappings which
a sword could not cut through; from chin to ankle they were padded
thoroughly against injury; their arms were bandaged and rebandaged,
layer upon layer, until they looked like solid black logs. These weird
apparitions had been handsome youths, clad in fashionable attire,
fifteen minutes before, but now they did not resemble any beings one
ever sees unless in nightmares. They strode along, with their arms
projecting straight out from their bodies; they did not hold them out
themselves, but fellow-students walked beside them and gave the needed
support.

There was a rush for the vacant end of the room, now, and we followed
and got good places. The combatants were placed face to face, each with
several members of his own corps about him to assist; two seconds, well
padded, and with swords in their hands, took their stations; a student
belonging to neither of the opposing corps placed himself in a good
position to umpire the combat; another student stood by with a watch and
a memorandum-book to keep record of the time and the number and nature
of the wounds; a gray-haired surgeon was present with his lint, his
bandages, and his instruments. After a moment's pause the duelists
saluted the umpire respectfully, then one after another the several
officials stepped forward, gracefully removed their caps and saluted him
also, and returned to their places. Everything was ready now; students
stood crowded together in the foreground, and others stood behind
them on chairs and tables. Every face was turned toward the center of
attraction.

The combatants were watching each other with alert eyes; a perfect
stillness, a breathless interest reigned. I felt that I was going to
see some wary work. But not so. The instant the word was given, the two
apparitions sprang forward and began to rain blows down upon each other
with such lightning rapidity that I could not quite tell whether I saw
the swords or only flashes they made in the air; the rattling din of
these blows as they struck steel or paddings was something wonderfully
stirring, and they were struck with such terrific force that I could not
understand why the opposing sword was not beaten down under the assault.
Presently, in the midst of the sword-flashes, I saw a handful of hair
skip into the air as if it had lain loose on the victim's head and a
breath of wind had puffed it suddenly away.

The seconds cried "Halt!" and knocked up the combatants' swords with
their own. The duelists sat down; a student official stepped forward,
examined the wounded head and touched the place with a sponge once or
twice; the surgeon came and turned back the hair from the wound--and
revealed a crimson gash two or three inches long, and proceeded to bind
an oval piece of leather and a bunch of lint over it; the tally-keeper
stepped up and tallied one for the opposition in his book.

Then the duelists took position again; a small stream of blood was
flowing down the side of the injured man's head, and over his shoulder
and down his body to the floor, but he did not seem to mind this. The
word was given, and they plunged at each other as fiercely as before;
once more the blows rained and rattled and flashed; every few moments
the quick-eyed seconds would notice that a sword was bent--then they
called "Halt!" struck up the contending weapons, and an assisting
student straightened the bent one.

The wonderful turmoil went on--presently a bright spark sprung from
a blade, and that blade broken in several pieces, sent one of its
fragments flying to the ceiling. A new sword was provided and the fight
proceeded. The exercise was tremendous, of course, and in time the
fighters began to show great fatigue. They were allowed to rest a
moment, every little while; they got other rests by wounding each other,
for then they could sit down while the doctor applied the lint and
bandages. The laws is that the battle must continue fifteen minutes
if the men can hold out; and as the pauses do not count, this duel was
protracted to twenty or thirty minutes, I judged. At last it was decided
that the men were too much wearied to do battle longer. They were led
away drenched with crimson from head to foot. That was a good fight, but
it could not count, partly because it did not last the lawful fifteen
minutes (of actual fighting), and partly because neither man was
disabled by his wound. It was a drawn battle, and corps law requires
that drawn battles shall be refought as soon as the adversaries are well
of their hurts.

During the conflict, I had talked a little, now and then, with a young
gentleman of the White Cap Corps, and he had mentioned that he was to
fight next--and had also pointed out his challenger, a young gentleman
who was leaning against the opposite wall smoking a cigarette and
restfully observing the duel then in progress.

My acquaintanceship with a party to the coming contest had the effect of
giving me a kind of personal interest in it; I naturally wished he might
win, and it was the reverse of pleasant to learn that he probably would
not, because, although he was a notable swordsman, the challenger was
held to be his superior.

The duel presently began and in the same furious way which had marked
the previous one. I stood close by, but could not tell which blows told
and which did not, they fell and vanished so like flashes of light. They
all seemed to tell; the swords always bent over the opponents' heads,
from the forehead back over the crown, and seemed to touch, all the
way; but it was not so--a protecting blade, invisible to me, was always
interposed between. At the end of ten seconds each man had struck twelve
or fifteen blows, and warded off twelve or fifteen, and no harm done;
then a sword became disabled, and a short rest followed whilst a new one
was brought. Early in the next round the White Corps student got an ugly
wound on the side of his head and gave his opponent one like it. In the
third round the latter received another bad wound in the head, and the
former had his under-lip divided. After that, the White Corps student
gave many severe wounds, but got none of the consequence in return.
At the end of five minutes from the beginning of the duel the surgeon
stopped it; the challenging party had suffered such injuries that any
addition to them might be dangerous. These injuries were a fearful
spectacle, but are better left undescribed. So, against expectation, my
acquaintance was the victor.