An American Idyll / The Life of Carleton H. Parker

n the industrial section of Essen, and thereabouts, coming home week-ends. We stopped off first at Bonn. Carl spent several days searching up and down the Rhi

ve, and automobiles touring by at a mile a

stones. What was my impecunious horror, when I heard a small crash and discovered that Jim had dislocated a loose figure of Christ (unconsciously Cubist in execution) from the top of a tombstone! Eight marks charges! the cost of sixteen Heidelberg sp

ing more and more depressed at the thought of leaving us anywhere. That Freiburg summer had seared us both deep, and each of us dreaded another separation more than either let the other know. And then, one night, after a

aggage, and parents went down the Rhine, almost through Heidelberg, to Munich, with such joy and contentment in our hearts as we could not describe. All those days of unhappy searchings Carl ha

busy over this, the boys were busy over-just busy. This time they both crawled up into a large clothes-press that stood in our room, when, crash! bang!-there lay the clothes-press, front down, on the floor, boys inside it. Such a commotion-hollerings and squallings from the internals of the cloth

ano's class, that lovable idol of the German students called him to his desk and had a long talk, which ended by his asking us both to tea at his house the following day. The excitement of our pension over that! We were looked upon as the anointed of the Lord. We were really a bit overawed, ourselves. We discussed neckties, and brushed and cleaned, and smelled considerably of gasoline as we strutted forth, too proud to tell, because we were to have tea with Brentano! I can see the street their house was

y desk now is hanging a photograph we have prized as one of our great treasures. Below it is written: "Mrs. and Mr. Parker, zur freundlichen Erinnerrung-Lujio Brentano." Professor Bonn, another of Carl's professors at the

hat was a love of a place on the English Channel, where we had two rooms with the Mebers in their funny little brick house, the "Netto." Simple folk they were: Mr. Meber a retired sailor, the wife rather worn

iversity of California waiting for us, and teaching was to begin in January. In one letter he wrote: "I now feel like landing on my exam, like a Bulgarian; I am that fierce to lay it out." We felt more than ever, in those days of work piling up behind us, that we owned the world; as Carl wrote in another letter: "We'll stick this out [this being the separation of his last trip to London,

ks, Mother Keck pressing and mending his clothes, hovering over him as if he were her own son. He wrote once: "To-day we had a small leg of venison which I sneaked in la

is mighty good and interesting every word, and also stuff which a man ought to know. This is the last man to see. From now on, it is only to study, and I am tickled. I do really like to

idings right and left. The community all knew that Carl was in Germany to take some kind of an examination, though it all seemed rather unexplainable. Yet they rejoiced with me,-the butcher, the baker, the candlestick-maker,-without having the least idea what they were rejoicing about. Mrs. M

ears later a Ph.D. summa cum laude from Heidelberg. Not Persia as we had planned it nine years before-a deeper, finer life than anyth

er out of ever starting; and I knew if you once got over ther

er, Privatdocent, California-Universit?t, St. Francisco)." That very day, however, the Prince Regent died, and everything was called off. We had our glory-and got our pay. Carl was so

ho came all the way from London for that purpose. It was not such a brash Herr Doktor that we found, after all: the Channel had begun to tell on him, as it were, and while it was plain that he loved us, it was also plain that he did not love the water. So we gave him his six days of

tmas present he most wanted, whatever it was. When he heard that we had been in Heidelberg, he and several other officials began a lusty rendering of "Old Heidelberg,"-and within an hour we were speeding toward California, a