As Seen By Me

at if I thought a week. I came on this yachting trip because my friends

English Channel from Dinard to Ostend, but before we had been out an hour we struck a gale, to w

an't seem to stop. It always appears that I am in the wrong place for whatever is going on, for just as sure as I go to London somebody sends for me to come to Paris, and I rush for the Channel, and I have no sooner unpacked my tru

my own satisfaction what serves me best in case of seasickness. I will not stay on deck. I will not eat or drink anything to cure it. I will not take anything to prevent it. I will not sit up, and I will not keep my hat on. When I go on board of a Channel steamer my first act is to shake hands with my friends and to go below. There I present the stewardess with a modest testimonial of my regard. I also give her my ticket.

l, but my friends said in going up the Channel we would not get thos

ucks, and I have come to the conclusion that in a rough sea a duck has every right to be seasick, for she wobbles like every

en went over to St. Malo with us in the electric launch, for the H

there any more. It is on the front of my new white serge yachting dress. Jimmie coasted across the deck, and landed on his hands and knees against the gunwale. If he had persisted in standing up he would have gone overboard. The women all shrieked and remained in a tangled heap of chairs, and rugs, and petticoats, waiting for the yacht to right herself, and for the men to come and pick them up. But the yacht showed no intention of righting herself. She continued to careen in the position of a cab going round Piccadilly Circus on one wheel. The sailors were all running around like ants on an ant-hill, and the captain was shouting orders, and even lending a hand with the ropes himself. I don't know t

ebody came up behind me and pri

voice said, "

not highly successful, for he picked me up, white serge, tar, green spots on

ossi followed with more anxie

phor under my nose, and hot-water bags about me; and I must have gone to slee

le from the way Commodore Strossi studied the charts, and because even his wife, for whom the yacht was named, was ill, and she had spent half her life on the sea. T

streaming down the companion-way and past my state-room windows. About five o'clock on the second day they began to tack, and then

bounded across to the bed, and most of them struck me on the head. It frighte

face, and I felt something softly trickling down. I touched it,

cut open," gasped Jimmie, in a

elf disfigured for life, and probably having to be sewed up. The pain in my fa

immie," said his wife.

dear?" she said, sittin

y," I m

ned on the electric lights and opened the windows. Jimmie had my salts. The doctor carefully wet a sponge and tenderly bathed my cheek, and I held my breath rea

asked Mrs. Jimmie. "What

ace. Her bottle has empt

or two, then I nearly went into hy

was blood, Ji

aid it hurt,

said I was covered wit

had a relapse, brought on by young Bashforth's jeering remarks as he frantically clung

into the dining-room, and my bed faced the door. Opposite to me was the settee on which Bashforth was coiled, and back of him was the locker for the tinned mushrooms, sardines, lobster, shri

been Destiny. He gripped the table-legs like a vise, coiling himself around them like a poor navy-blue python with a green face. He thought the worst was over, but in his last clutch at the locker he had accidentally opened it, and at the next lurch of the yacht all the cans bounded out and battered his unprotected back like a shower of grape-shot. The yacht lurched again and the cans rolled back

nd went and tried to pick him up. Bu

dy who is seasick. Drop well people if you

his coat-sleeve. "But I don't say I'll do it the first

as leaning in at my window and laughing in his big English voice, when the Hela lurched

e than young Bashforth, so he left the boy and came ar

violence, and would skim like a bird for an hour or so, with no perceptible motion. She would not even flap her big white w

rom the dinner-table-a thing they had not done since we started. There were onl

mistake they made was in using the yacht's lovely china, w

immie saw her going and reached to save her. But he forgot to set down his soup-plate. The result was that she got Jimmie's soup in her face, and that he slid clear across the tab

with tepid soup, but that Jimmie had broken all the china. She could not be comforted until the Commodore prov

d things. Everybody has turned in to repair

ning-room table, and the captain, an American,

r under just the fores'l, sir, and

tter unconcern of long journeys. Nothing short of accession to a title or to escape being caught by the police would induce the Continental to travel over a few hours. So when I decided to go to Poland in order to be

s honor has dignity. His country's sorrows touch the heart. Polish literature has sentiment, her music has fire, her men of genius stand out like heroes, her women are adorable. Balzac describes not only

poet in thy dreams, to Thee belongs this book, in which thy love, thy fancy, thy experience, thy sorrow, thy hope, thy dreams, are the warp through which is shot a woof less

say nothing of the interest her history has for the brain. The history of Poland is one long struggle

t reason the Poles have in me an enthusiastic al

replied: "Yes, but it is so entirely their own fault. They are so fiery, so precipitate, so romantic. They got themselves into it! Their poesy and romance and folly make them charming as individuals, but ridicu

is element in history. Her struggles are so romantic, her follies so charmingly natural to a high-strung nation, her despair so profound, her frequent revolutions so buoyant i

ou spit at me?" said the glowworm. "

kless and inspiring bravery; and now, in her desolation and subjection, there is still so much pride, such noble dignity under her losses, that of all the countries in the world Poland

never felt nor inspired a diviner passion than Valeska; but when it came to a question of her love or her co

ren; who does not love his America second only to his God; whose blood does not prickle in his veins at the sound of "The Star-Spangled Banne

disappointing. One fails to find in a battle fought for the sake of conquest by an overweening ambition such soul-stirring pathos as in the leading of a forlorn hope from the spirit of patriotism, or of a woman's pleadings where a man's arguments have

Baltic just below here. The conference on the raft appeals to me as o

en she journeyed to Memel to hold her famous interview with Napoleon. How her pride must have suffered at the thought of lowering herself to plead for her husband and her country at Napoleon's hands! How she hated him before she saw him! How she more than hated

w sifted in through the roof and fell across her bed. But that was as nothing t

so far removed from those stormy days of strife that it was difficult to imagine the magnificent spectacle of the immense armies of Napoleon and Alexan

versation originally intended to consume but a few moments lengthened into hours, and Napoleon and Alexander, having sworn eternal friendship, proceeded to divide up Euro

s and see some of her charming home life. I had been duly informed by my friends of the various ceremonies which I would en

saw the state carriage of the princess at the station of Memel, drawn by four horses, and with numbers of servants in such queer liveries to attend to my luggage, I simply breathed a prayer that I would ge

of the princess on the brass buttons. This coat reached nearly to their feet, and in the back it was gathered full and stiffen

lonely forests which we were only too happy to leave behind us. Suddenly we came upon the littl

es at a gallop over such cobblestones as those was something to make you bite

oked like a parrot's. Their countenances are sinister, and I believe they have not washed since the Flood. The women, when they marry, shave their heads. Then they either wear huge wigs, which they

er respect Russia as a clean country. As it was Friday night, one window-sill in each house was fille

this appealed to me as such a touchi

led because they took too much interest in politics for his nerves. Then soon after passing this monastery we entered the grounds of the castle. Still the lon

rds all to themselves, we came to the castle, a huge structure, which seemed to spread o

n she had been in Paris, and charitably allowed us

ways sing as they go forth to their work in the fields; but its mournful cadence haunted me. The next morning the largeness of the situation dawned upon me. The size of the rooms and their majestic furnishings were almost b

g but bake bread and pastry. They do not serve hot milk with coffee, for which I blessed them from the bottom of my soul, but they have little brown porcelain jugs

of the nectar this combination produces. Some of thos

it was over. They were quite like other people, except that their manners were unusually good. There was to be a hunt that morning-an amusing,

stroy the crops by eating their roots, so every little while a hunt is organized to destroy them in large numbers. The foresters had been sent out the night b

hat it was anything but a simple drive to one fresh from

ey drive across country, as they stop only for stone walls or moats. The carriages must be built of iron, for the front wheels drop a few feet into a burrow every now and then, and at such times an unwary Amer

as if he was always coming out from under a bureau." Very cautiously here and there the foresters uncovered a burrow, and a dachshund disappeared. Then from below ground came the sounds of

ught the animal just back of its head and flung it into a coarse sack, which was then tied up and thrown aside, and the hunt we

of a function, on account of the number of guests i

y. There were smoked goose, smoked bear, and salmon, white and black bread, all sorts of sausages, anchovies and caviar, of course. After these had been tasted la

t-juice. This we found to be delicious, but I seemed to be eating transparent red ink with parsley in it. This was follow

ee, wasn't it President Taylor who

lettuce, and then huge roasts gar

rises, and each guest kisses her hand or her arm as he passes out, and thanks her in a phrase for her hospitality. Sometimes it is only "Thank you, princess"; sometimes "Many thanks for your beautiful dinner," or anything you like. They speak

ous repoussé silver. Melons, fruit, and all sorts of bread are served with

my excitable nerves with a fascination so bewildering that I can think of but one thing which would give me the same amount of heavenly satisfaction. This wou

ests who wished, assembled in the winter garden to sing hymns to the Virgin. The winter garden is like a gigantic conservatory four stor

eauty, with its palms, its tall ferns, its growing, climbing, waving vines and flowering shrubs, with its divine odors and fragrances and swee

onlight pouring through the great glass dome and filtering through the waving green leaves, dimpling on the marble statues and making trembling shades and shadows upon the earnest faces of