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About The courier. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1894-1903 | View Entire Issue (Dec. 1, 1900)
THE COURIER. I s f it 1" b i K k V' i 1 t I X name. It is as though we should march up to eome fair unknown on the street who pleases our fancy, and demand of her, "Madam, what do you call your Belf?" "Perhaps this epidemic of curiosity is only a source of amusement to its ob ject. I can quite fancy her peeping elf like through the lilac-hedges that guard her fairyland, laughing at her perplexed hordes of udmirero! It is not very strange that suspicion should have first lightei where it did. Any one who owns a photograph of the PrincesB Pless may see in the lovely and mischievous features of that spirited young woman much the sort of face that he would expect of Elizabeth re fined and vivacious, though the type of one whom the world and its gauds are considerably more attractive than flow er gardening lieutenants than solitude. But the publishers say no, and suspic ion goes hovering elsewhere. A letter in the Times Review of New York announces with a conclusive air that Elizabeth is the daughter of an Englishman, that her mother was an Australian and her childhood was passed in Australia. If that be true, it may account for various things in her books that puzzle the observant reader. Aus tralia is an unknown quantity to the mass of Americans; my own ignorance about it is immense; but I always thought of it as being chiefly British in atmosphere, slightly tainted (if you will permit the word) by other nationalities. And that is just the way the "Solitary Summer" and the "German Garden" have impressed me. Their language is nearly perfect; the correctness of 'Queen's English" most of the time, with a certain "rangy," breezy quality that is generally thought more Ameri can than English. Indeed, my first conviction on making acquaintance with these books, was that they must have been written by a highly educated American with a remarkable feeling for Nature. How in the world anybody could im agine Elizabeth to be a German is be yond understanding! It anyone born and educated in a country not English speaking should make such use of the English language as Elizabeth does in her books, it would be, in brief, a mira cle. It is inconceivable that a German, brought up in Germany, could even by any chance become so saturated with our idiom. Nor would it be at all usu al for a German child, as the artful Eliz abeth paints herself, to receive such thorough initiation into both the Eng lish and French languages. She would perhaps study them with her governess, and learn to read and speatt them; but to make them a part of herself, like her own hardly. That very insistence on her German extraction makes us suspicious of our fair Unknown. Why does she remind us so assiduously that she is "ouly an ordinary German woman" "a respect able German lady"' "a humble Her man" "u. s. w.?" Why, oh, you re spectable German lady, do you write your cnarming, geistreiche chapters in English? why, at any rate, do you write them so well? "Elizabeth touches up, with light flicks of friendly satire, 6ome of the foibles and eccentricities of her so called countrymen and women. It is some hing of a proverb that we are blind to our own oddities and our coun trymen's. Can you imagine a German Housfrau, for instance, docile and do mestic after her kind, realizing and sa tirizing the inanities of her Kajfeek-latsch-iag friends, or the momentous part that "das Essen" plays in their lives, as Elizabeth so merrily holds it up for our amusement? Remember the lady of long descent whose passion for the "crackling" of roast goose is chron icled in the "Solitary Summer;" and with what gusto is told how she used her knife and fork "with the awful dexterity only seen in perfection in the Fatherland." Is it credible that any child of the Fatherland could see that with the satirist's eye? or having seen, would find in her heart to chuckle over it in public? Elizabeth ia taquine per haps she might be capable of it I don't know. "Something she would curely not be capable of, if she were an out-and-out Teuton, is that paragraph touching on the "Sorrows of Werther;" wherein she recalls.how Lotte, in a wave of emotion stirred b the beauty of nature after a storm, laid her hand on Werther'a and murmured "Klopstock" over which hand and word the impressible youth dissolved bis tears. Elizabeth's medi tation on this incident is an amusing bit. The delightful whimsicality with which she mingles her senee of humor and her poetic sentiment! She wonders, with a twinkle under her pensive lashes, whether, if her "Man of Wrath" were present and she should murmur to him "Klopstock," he would "immediately shed tears of joy over her hand!" But it is the name of the poet that stirs her risibilities, after all. "Now. what German born would ever be conscious that "Klopstock" is a droll word? Is it a droll word? Not to me, who am not even a German. I don't remember that any German word has ever struck me as droll. Why? Un doubtedly because, as a child, my brightest stars shone on a German Christmas-tree; the scent of its wax lights among fir boughs is still the sweetest scent I can recall; the accents of those who lighted them year after year were the accents of the Vaterland; and year by year did Undines and kobolds weave their spell around my little New England brain. I know that the German speech is supposed to fall harshly, sometimes comically, on Saxon and Latin ears; and belike it may on some, but never, never on mine! And would Elizabeth have us believe that if she had grown up in the very land of Undines and kobolds, her ears and heart filled with its pleasant gutturals, ite deep musical vowels and rich rumblings in the throat, it would ever have occurred to her that "Klopstock" was a droll word? Never, Elizabeth, never! Further, how many German Fraus may be supposed to realize the unques tioned deficiencies of their lords and masters in the superficial graces of the cavalier? Elizabeth may accept with meekness (sic) the eomewhat mediaval views of her beloved Man of Wrath on the feminine status, and she apparently never expects him to open a door or carry an umbrella for her, tor pouts when he lets her spend six weeks in a convent under repairs, with a dinner bell for her sole safeguard at night; but through all her records of that com manding gentleman breathes the clear eyed tolerance of affection not the blind matter-of-course docility where with custom and tradition have endowed the wives of Germany. All through her pages you find an undertone of plajful malice in her illusions to hina recogni tion of and concession to the feelings of the "beloved object," precisely as would be the way with one of us American wiveti in similar case, and not in the least injuring the very distinct and ad mirable picture we receive of a typical well-born son of bis Fatherland. "Our fair recluse tells with glee the favorite luncheon of her best friend ex quisite woman and musician which consists of beer, pork chops, and cabbage-salad with caraway-seeds in it. And adds: 'What better proof can be needed to establish the superiority of the Teuton than the fact that after such meals he can produce such music?' Figure to yourself a genuine Hausfrau saying that! Was one ever known to bxeaiht) a whisper of disrespect against so national, so representative a meal? To make light of cabbage salad with caraway-seeds! Schrecklich! "Are we all takit.g Elizabeth too seri ously? I believe myself that she never expected us to think her a German, but simply made a transparent pretense at it, that she might behind the screen say more freely whatever flitted through her head about her adopted country and its ways. For otherwise, why not have studied to deceive us by foreign con structions of sptech? And I protest as she says I have found but one small phrase in the two books which even sug gest that a German might have written it. It by any strange chance she ia a German, what better compliment could she ask from an Anglo Saxon? "There are phrases, now and agaiu, that are not quite English either not quite perfect English, that is. It is a little surprise, for instance, to hear her speak of 'catching cold, of 'lunch' and lunch-time,' or using a phrase like 'not but what I may,' etc. But those are so slight flaws ia her charming language that really it is too bad to notice them. I clung, for a time, to the thought that she might be a compatriot, and found several things to bolster the theory. I did not know that anybody read Tho reau outside of America, nor, often, Holmes or Hawthorne. Probably my ignorance again "She has a jauntiness and energy, a frankness of approach that are very characteristic of our American young women. But lo! to this she joins the brilliancy and verve of the Frenchwo man, the talent for poetic idleness of the Italian, and the romantic passion for Nature and Mother Earth of the German! "O many-sided Elizabeth, mischievous spirit, how you muBt rejoice at our mys tified condition! "De Musset, in one of his poems 'Dupont et Durand,' I think makes a critic say, 'how sweet it is to depreciate everything!' Generally, I tuink that is true; reviewers know the fierce joy of slashing their way through the piles of helpless books, and serving them up brown to the public. But who could or would slash at so winning an aggrega tion of sweet fancies, piquant phrases, and curiously vivid word-painting of the face of nature as we have in these garden-bookB? Who can find anything in them that would not defy depreci ation? "Let us take pleasure in them as we should in the garden itself, and thank the light-hearted author for sharing a part of her fragrant, delectable life with us. If she persists in biding among her rose-bushes, and ever battla our IoDging to know her name, let us try to submit gracefully." We will admire blindly, aud wish for her nothing less than that her days should, as she charmingly says of lilac and acacia-time, 'melt away in a dream of pink and purple peace.' " SANTIAGO DE CHILE. BY MARIAN SMITH. Santiago, October 10, 1000. It is said that iu spite of the healthy location, climate and water supply the mortality of this city is three times that of London, ana that under ordinary cir cumstances a child born here has but one chance in seven for life. Just now this death rate is increased by epidem ics of meaalet. and typhoid fever, which, with their complication, leave hardly a household without anxiety for some of its members. Last month five hundred deaths were reported from measles alone and five thousand children were said to be ill with them, causing public schools and liceas to be closed for the present week. Healthfulness has little to do with the lives of the poorer classes of Chil ians. They have no understanding of cleanliness, either in their housekeep ing or personally and during the winter suffer all the ills which come from ex posure to dampness and cold. Their houses are built of unbaked mud bricks which have a marked tendency towards caving in on wet days and are at all times abounding with fleas. The floors are often of earth and usually below the level of the stroet and are swarming with illy cared-for children. In the raw wet days of winter every thing here seems to leak, from the coaches and street cars to wealthy dwellings, an annoyance unmitigated by any sort of artificial heat. Aa one wades along the streets in mid winter there are many windows wide open and people, huddled in all their available wraps, gazing placidly and immovably at the pass rs-by. For pure gazing abilities and plenty of time to use their talent, recommend mo to the Chilean population! A Chilean house in winter, unless rain is actually falling, is more comfortable outside than in, for the rooms of thn tine houses are large with high ceilings, cheerless places which it would be a difficult and expensive task to heat comfortably even if it were the national custom to make the attempt. The chief danger to the public health and the thing which must be largely re sponsible for the present state of the city is undoubtedly the system of open sewerage which is the sole relief of a city of 150,000 people. Ihere are occa sional attempts made to remedy the trouble, but Chilean politics has not yet reached that ideal state where money voted for a public purpose reaches its in tended destination. The weather in Santiago now is at most like winter and a heavy rain is falling, although it is a month past, the eighteenth of September, the holiday when people are supposed to begin wear ing summer clothes and to revel in a dry summer weather. The Diez-y-cho sea son was an unprecedeuted one. Five years ago the whole great Alameda was lined with drinking and dancing booths and fairly paved with men made drunk on cbicha, but this year almost the whole demonstration was confined to the park where the rotos had their cuecua, dancing and chicha drinking, the government troop their military pa rade and sham battle, and those who could afford it rode sedately back and forth in beautiful carriages and toilets which would have caused a Paris fash ion plate to hide its head for dullness. It is queer how "becoming accustom ed" changes one's point of view. Last year wandering out in the crowded park looking on at country couples dancing and waving handkerchiefs slowly around their heads, the men looking all eorts of unutterable things, merely as part of the danc and the women looking de murely and cbangelessly at their feet; the interim of drinking chicha from a common and immense glass; the gaily dressed girls pounding harps and guitars or clapping their hands; the motly mob of people trailing in and out, all seemed like beiog at some new sort of an opera, but this year it seemed inexpressibly cheap and coarse. This year the president, who is in his last year of office, did not appear at the national festivities, his place being filled by tne vice president. President Errazuriz is universally unpopular, and is said to be afraid of assassination. A few months ago when he was very ill, and it was rumored that he was dying, many people began to cheer. He is said to have even married his wife, an ex ceedingly unattractive woman, for her fortune, and is generally admitted to have bought and paid for his position as head of the government. That it is the nature of the South American, as well as of other men, "to
