IN OLD HEIDELBERG.
IN OLD HEIDELBERG.
Heidelberg, Germany, July 22, 1905.
This is the old and famous university town of Germany. It is about two miles long and 200 yards wide, lying between the river Neckar and the steep hills which rise 500 feet high and which can only be ascended by terraced roads or a modern tunnel railway. The town is of comparatively recent origin, being really started only 850 years ago, when a Rhenish count who wanted to build a strong and impregnable fortress selected a spot 400 feet straight up the hill from the river and built the old castle of Heidelberg. Being thus the capital of a little German state, the Palatinate of the Rhine, it was an important place during the Middle Ages, and was fought over every few years for several centuries. In the fourteenth century the ruling count, whose title was Elector, developed a literary streak and founded the university, which became the center of learning and scientific study in Germany, and has continued so until the present day, although some of the newer universities like Berlin and Leipsig are now larger. The valley of the Neckar joins the valley of the Rhine here and makes a fertile territory and a prosperous city, but the university and the students are the main features of modern Heidelberg, now that counts, electors and castles are ruins or relics. There are manystudents in Heidelberg from America and other countries, but it is the rollicking German “yunkers” who make the life of the place.
German universities differ somewhat from American universities in the character and method of work. There are no recitations—only lectures and examinations. A student does not have to attend either. He can attend Heidelberg year in and year out and devote himself exclusively to the beer-garden and the dueling-ground. Or he can work hard, receive the ablest instruction and the highest degrees. The discipline of the common schools in Germany is severe—military in its character. But at the university the young man or young woman (for women now attend lectures at Heidelberg) can do as they please and go to Hades if they desire. The university buildings are plain and ordinary. The picturesque feature is the students, especially the young men who belong to the various “corps.” Less than 10 per cent. of the students are members of these societies, but they color the town, for each corps has a distinctive cap,—red, yellow, white, etc. These organizations are the social life of the university, and at all hours of the day or night they are in evidence, parading with their caps and canes, occupying the beer-gardens and the promenade, jollying the girl waiters and having what is called in America a High Old Time.
Everybody has heard of the duel or sword-fighting. It is as much an institution at Heidelberg as football is at Princeton or K. U. Not many students take partin it, only members of the six corps, but it is the show feature of student life. Each corps has about twenty members. Each member has to fight at least one duel a term with a member of some other corps. This morning we went to the dueling-place just outside of the city and saw the game.
One gets a great deal of misinformation about this student dueling, but as near as I can find out it is done in a genteel and cold-blooded manner. When it is the turn of one of the corps members to fight he makes a face or refuses to salute a member of another corps. That constitutes cause for the duel, and the preliminaries are then arranged by the officers of the respective corps according to the rules and regulations that have come down through generations. The fighting is done in an inner court of a wine-garden. This morning there were ten duels on the program, and when we arrived the third was in progress. A young man of the bright-red-cap corps was trying to slice the face of a member of the dark-red-cap corps. Each was covered with felt armor, which protected all of his body, and also had goggles and nose-pad, a little bit more so than a football player. The seconds, very similarly attired, stood by the side of the principals and struck up the swords at the end of each round or when the blood came. The only unprotected places were the head and face, and the game was to slash the opponent there, not to stick him. Thrusting is evidently against the rules. A surgeon with an apron like a butcher attended to the cuts and the members of both corps stood quietly and calmly by, giving vent to no expression of feelingwhatever. The officers of each corps saluted, the word was given, the two swords clashed away for a minute, and each fellow had a nice long cut on his cheek. When the round was over the seconds sponged the cuts. There is no specified number of rounds, but whenever the two seconds are satisfied that one man is cut enough the other is declared the victor and they salute and retire to get court-plastered or sewed up as is necessary. We saw four duels and got tired of the fun. In the last fought one of the men was apparently an experienced swordsman and his opponent apparently a beginner. (I understand that in order to show his courage a new man always challenges an expert.) After four rounds the face of the weaker swordsman was streaming with blood from a half-dozen cuts. I suppose he looked upon his defeat as a real victory because he showed the fellows that he could stand up and take punishment and never wince. Some people have curious ideas of greatness.
They tell me no one is ever killed in these duels, but every member of every corps would be considered disfigured for life in America. Every one of them has long sears on his face and head. The restaurant where we eat is a favorite resort for the corps and we see much of them. It looks like a shame that every one of those bright young men will have to go through life with a face like a war map of Manchuria. But they wouldn’t trade those sears for love nor money. (I am told they are good for love.) They are the badges of bravery and ability, and are as highly prized as the bronze button of the Grand Army man. As I have remarked,some ambitions are very funny, and if the German students want to be hand-carved in this manner there is no use of a football-, prize-fight-loving nation making any kick.
THE GERMAN WAY.
THE GERMAN WAY.
Heidelberg is a “wet” town. I suppose half the places on the main street are beer-gardens and some of the others are wine-rooms. Everybody in Germany drinks beer and wine. There is this difference between France and Germany: In France the men do most of the drinking as they sit in the sidewalk cafés watching the women go by. In Germany the man brings his wife and children and they all sit around the table in the garden or restaurants and drink beer. They do not seem to get intoxicated. I haven’t seen anyone drunk, although they drink by the wholesale. Beer is high in Heidelberg, up to 2½ cents a quart, but out in the suburbs it is cheaper. I think beer-drinking makes the Germans have bad forms, for men and women get round and fat. But in Germany these forms are considered beautiful, so the sylph-like and the slender are looked down upon. It is an illustration of the fact that it is a good thing we don’t all think alike about such things as personal beauty, or some of us would have to always be away back sitting down.
I have been in Germany a week, and I have not seen a half-dozen men smoking pipes. I thought Germans were great pipe-smokers, but they are not in this part. The Heidelberg pipes are mostly made to sell to Americansand English. The Germans smoke a little the worst cigars I have ever met. They are cheap in price and the Germans consume them in large quantities. The kind the high-class Germans use closely resembles a brand known in our country as “The Pride of the Sewer,” and sells at about two for 5 cents. An American who is accustomed at home to buying “a good nickel cigar” can’t find anything that good in Germany, unless it may be in the big hotels where they cater to American and English trade. I had always had Germans pictured to me as big fat men with long pipes in their mouths, sitting around tables on which were large steins of beer. The beer is here all right, but the men are as bright and energetic as Americans, and they smoke cigars and not pipes.
Another dream gone up in smoke.
It is a great country for castles and “legends.” I think the average yield of legends per acre is larger in Germany than in any other country on earth, especially in the Black Forest and on the Rhine. That is one thing our country is short of—legends. Aside from a few old Indian stories, a tale of woe about the grasshoppers and reminiscences of the Populists, we haven’t anything that approaches the legends which hang on almost every tree in the Black Forest and stick out of every castle-window. And yet Kansas could raise legends as well as Germany, for a legend is nothing but a lie told so often that nobody knows where it started; and Kansas has her share of liars. Here is a sample“legend” from the old castle of Heidelberg which we visited to-day:
A HEIDELBERG LEGEND.
The count of Heidelberg had a beautiful daughter. (They all do—in legends.) Her reputation for beauty went all over Germany and reached the shores of Great Britain. The king of England saw the photograph of the fair lady dressed in her bicycle suit, and instantly fell in love with her. But he did not want the German beauty to marry him for his money and title, so he disguised himself as a cook, got a job in Heidelberg castle and made eyes at the princess. It was a case of two-hearts-that-beat-as-one, and the princess soon began to make dates and meet the supposed cook back of the castle and down on the Neckar. He revealed his real identity to her, but made her promise not to tell. He then went to the old man and asked him for the hand of his daughter. The count laughed at the cook, which made the latter mad and so he blurted out that the maiden loved him. Then the cook skipped out and the count sent for his daughter. She confessed to being in love with the cook, but on account of her promise did not tell his right name. The old count got into an awful rage and ordered his daughter whipped, and the lash was applied so well that the princess died. Before she passed away she told her father who the cook really was, and the count of Heidelberg was truly sorry; but that did no good. A few days later the king of England with an imposing suite arrived to ask the hand of the princess, and when hefound out what had happened he took the old man out behind the barn and sliced him up in fine pieces.
There is a song which tells all about this affair, and the music is about as good as the legend.