. His cultivation enables him--and me, now--to see water in that
glaring yellow mud, and natural effects in those lurid explosions
of mixed smoke and flame, and crimson sunset glories; it reconciles
him--and me, now--to the floating of iron cable-chains and other
unfloatable things; it reconciles us to fishes swimming around on top
of the mud--I mean the water. The most of the picture is a manifest
impossibility--that is to say, a lie; and only rigid cultivation can
enable a man to find truth in a lie. But it enabled Mr. Ruskin to do
it, and it has enabled me to do it, and I am thankful for it. A Boston
newspaper reporter went and took a look at the Slave Ship floundering
about in that fierce conflagration of reds and yellows, and said it
reminded him of a tortoise-shell cat having a fit in a platter
of tomatoes. In my then uneducated state, that went home to my
non-cultivation, and I thought here is a man with an unobstructed eye.
Mr. Ruskin would have said: This person is an ass. That is what I would
say, now.

Months after this was written, I happened into the National Gallery in
London, and soon became so fascinated with the Turner pictures that I
could hardly get away from the place. I went there often, afterward,
meaning to see the rest of the gallery, but the Turner spell was too
strong; it could not be shaken off. However, the Turners which attracted
me most did not remind me of the Slave Ship.

However, our business in Baden-Baden this time, was to join our courier.
I had thought it best to hire one, as we should be in Italy, by and by,
and we did not know the language. Neither did he. We found him at the
hotel, ready to take charge of us. I asked him if he was "all fixed." He
said he was. That was very true. He had a trunk, two small satchels,
and an umbrella. I was to pay him fifty-five dollars a month and railway
fares. On the continent the railway fare on a trunk is about the same
it is on a man. Couriers do not have to pay any board and lodging. This
seems a great saving to the tourist--at first. It does not occur to the
tourist that SOMEBODY pays that man's board and lodging. It occurs to
him by and by, however, in one of his lucid moments.

CHAPTER XXV

[Hunted by the Little Chamois]

Next morning we left in the train for Switzerland, and reached Lucerne
about ten o'clock at night. The first discovery I made was that the
beauty of the lake had not been exaggerated. Within a day or two I made