As Seen By Me

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As Seen By Me

The Project Gutenberg EBook of As Seen By Me, by Lilian Bell This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net
Title: As Seen By Me
Author: Lilian Bell
Release Date: May 23, 2004 [EBook #12416]
Language: English
Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
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[Illustration: THE FAMOUS RELIEF OF CLEOPATRA AT TEMPLE OF DENDERAH]
As Seen By Me
Lilian Bell
1900
* * * * *
By LILIAN BELL.
THE INSTINCT OF STEP-FATHERHOOD. A Novel. 16mo, Cloth, $1.25.
A LITTLE SISTER TO THE WILDERNESS. A Novel. 16mo, Cloth, $1.25.
THE LOVE AFFAIRS OF AN OLD MAID. 16mo, Cloth, $1.25.
THE UNDER SIDE OF THINGS. 16mo, Cloth, $1.25.
FROM A GIRL'S POINT OF VIEW. 16mo, Cloth, $1.25.
* * * * *
TO
THAT MOST INTERESTING SPECK OF HUMANITY, ALL PERPETUAL MOTION AND KINDLING INTELLIGENCE AND SWEETNESS UNSPEAKABLE, MY LITTLE NEPHEW
BILLY
ABSENCE FROM WHOM RACKED MY SPIRIT WITH ITS MOST UNAPPEASABLE PANGS OF HOMESICKNESS, AND WHOSE CONSTANT PRESENCE IN MY STUDY SINCE MY RETURN HAS SPARED THE PUBLIC NO SMALL AMOUNT OF PAIN

AUTHOR'S APOLOGY
The frank conceit of the title to this book will, I hope, not prejudice my friends against it, and will serve not only to excuse my being my own Boswell, but will fasten the blame of all inaccuracies, if such there be, upon the offender--myself. This is not a continuous narrative of a continuous journey, but covers two years of travel over some thirty thousand miles, and presents peoples and things, not as you saw them, perhaps, or as they really are, but only As Seen By Me.

CONTENTS
CHAPTER
I.
FIRST LETTER--ON THE WAY
II. LONDON
III. PARIS
IV. ON BOARD THE YACHT "HELA"
V. VILNA, RUSSIA
VI. ST. PETERSBURG
VII. RUSSIA
VIII. MOSCOW
IX. CONSTANTINOPLE
X. CAIRO
XI. THE NILE
XII. GREECE
XIII. NAPLES
XIV. ROME

I
FIRST LETTER--ON THE WAY
In this day and generation, when everybody goes to Europe, it is difficult to discover the only person who never has been there. But I am that one, and therefore the stir it occasioned in the bosom of my amiable family when I announced that I, too, was about to join the vast majority, is not easy to imagine. But if you think that I at once became a person of importance it only goes to show that you do not know the family. My mother, to be sure, hovered around me the way she does when she thinks I am going into typhoid fever. I never have had typhoid fever, but she is always on the watch for it, and if it ever comes it will not catch her napping. She will meet it half-way. And lest it elude her watchfulness, she minutely questions every pain which assails any one of us, for fear, it may be her dreaded foe. Yet when my sister's blessed lamb baby had it before he was a year old, and after he had got well and I was not afraid he would be struck dead for my wickedness, I said to her, "Well, mamma, you must have taken solid comfort out of the first real chance you ever had at your pet fever," she said I ought to be ashamed of myself.
My father began to explain international banking to me as his share in my preparations, but I utterly discouraged him by asking the difference between a check and a note. He said I reminded him of the juryman who asked the difference between plaintiff and defendant. I soothed him by assuring him that I knew I would always find somebody to go to the bank with me.
"Most likely 'twill be Providence, then, as He watches over children and fools," said my cousin, with what George Eliot calls "the brutal candor of a near relation."
My brother-in-law lent me ten Baedekers, and offered his hampers and French trunks to me with such reckless generosity that I had to get my sister to stop him so that I wouldn't hurt his feelings by refusing.
My sister said, "I am perfectly sure, mamma, that if I don't go with her, she will go about with an ecstatic smile on her face, and let herself get cheated and lost, and she would just as soon as not tell everybody that she had never been abroad before. She has no pride."
"Then you had better come along and take care of me and see that I don't disgrace you," I urged.
"Really, mamma, I do think I had better go," said my sister. So she actually consented to leave husband and baby in order to go and take care of me. I do assure you, however, that I have bought all the tickets, and carried the common purse,