-A Tramp Decided On--The Start for Heilbronn--Our Walking
Dress--"Pleasant march to you"--We Take the Rail--German People on
Board--Not Understood--Speak only German and English--Wimpfen--A Funny
Tower--Dinner in the Garden--Vigorous Tramping--Ride in a Peasant's
Cart--A Famous Room
CHAPTER XII The Rathhaus--An Old Robber Knight, Gotz Von
Berlichingen--His Famous Deeds--The Square Tower--A Curious old
Church--A Gay Turn--out--A Legend--The Wives' Treasures--A Model
Waiter--A Miracle Performed--An Old Town--The Worn Stones
CHAPTER XIII Early to Bed--Lonesome--Nervous Excitement--The Room We
Occupied--Disturbed by a Mouse--Grow Desperate--The Old Remedy--A Shoe
Thrown--Result--Hopelessly Awake--An Attempt to Dress--A Cruise in the
Dark--Crawling on the Floor--A General Smash-up--Forty-seven Miles'
Travel
CHAPTER XIV A Famous Turn--out--Raftsmen on the Neckar--The Log
Rafts--The Neckar--A Sudden Idea--To Heidelberg on a Raft--Chartering
a Raft--Gloomy Feelings and Conversation--Delicious Journeying--View of
the Banks--Compared with Railroading
CHAPTER VIII
The Great French Duel
[I Second Gambetta in a Terrific Duel]
Much as the modern French duel is ridiculed by certain smart people, it
is in reality one of the most dangerous institutions of our day. Since
it is always fought in the open air, the combatants are nearly sure
to catch cold. M. Paul de Cassagnac, the most inveterate of the French
duelists, had suffered so often in this way that he is at last a
confirmed invalid; and the best physician in Paris has expressed
the opinion that if he goes on dueling for fifteen or twenty years
more--unless he forms the habit of fighting in a comfortable room where
damps and draughts cannot intrude--he will eventually endanger his life.
This ought to moderate the talk of those people who are so stubborn
in maintaining that the French duel is the most health-giving of
recreations because of the open-air exercise it affords. And it
ought also to moderate that foolish talk about French duelists and
socialist-hated monarchs being the only people who are immoral.
But it is time to get at my subject. As soon as I heard of the late
fiery outbreak between M. Gambetta and M. Fourtou in the French
Assembly, I knew that trouble must follow. I knew it because a long
personal friendship with M. Gambetta revealed to me the desperate and
implacable nature of the man. Vast as are his physical proportions,
I k
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