Baddeck and That Sort of Thing | Page 6

buildings all
tumbling in upon us, or had a bomb fallen into the neighboring
crockery-store? It was the suddenness of the onset that startled us, for
we soon perceived that it began with the clash of cymbals, the
pounding of drums, and the blaring of dreadful brass. It was
somebody's idea of music. It opened without warning. The men
composing the band of brass must have stolen silently into the alley
about the sleeping hotel, and burst into the clamor of a rattling
quickstep, on purpose. The horrible sound thus suddenly let loose had
no chance of escape; it bounded back from wall to wall, like the
clapping of boards in a tunnel, rattling windows and stunning all cars,
in a vain attempt to get out over the roofs. But such music does not go

up. What could have been the intention of this assault we could not
conjecture. It was a time of profound peace through the country; we
had ordered no spontaneous serenade, if it was a serenade. Perhaps the
Boston bands have that habit of going into an alley and disciplining
their nerves by letting out a tune too big for the alley, and taking the
shock of its reverberation. It may be well enough for the band, but
many a poor sinner in the hotel that night must have thought the
judgment day had sprung upon him. Perhaps the band had some
remorse, for by and by it leaked out of the alley, in humble, apologetic
retreat, as if somebody had thrown something at it from the sixth-story
window, softly breathing as it retired the notes of "Fair Harvard."
The band had scarcely departed for some other haunt of slumber and
weariness, when the notes of singing floated up that prolific alley, like
the sweet tenor voice of one bewailing the prohibitory movement; and
for an hour or more a succession of young bacchanals, who were
evidently wandering about in search of the Maine Law, lifted up their
voices in song. Boston seems to be full of good singers; but they will
ruin their voices by this night exercise, and so the city will cease to be
attractive to travelers who would like to sleep there. But this
entertainment did not last the night out.
It stopped just before the hotel porter began to come around to rouse
the travelers who had said the night before that they wanted to be
awakened. In all well-regulated hotels this process begins at two
o'clock and keeps up till seven. If the porter is at all faithful, he wakes
up everybody in the house; if he is a shirk, he only rouses the wrong
people. We treated the pounding of the porter on our door with silent
contempt. At the next door he had better luck. Pound, pound. An angry
voice, "What do you want?"
"Time to take the train, sir."
"Not going to take any train."
"Ain't your name Smith?"
"Yes."
"Well, Smith"--
"I left no order to be called." (Indistinct grumbling from Smith's room.)
Porter is heard shuffling slowly off down the passage. In a little while
he returns to Smith's door, evidently not satisfied in his mind. Rap, rap,
rap!

"Well, what now?"
"What's your initials? A. T.; clear out!"
And the porter shambles away again in his slippers, grumbling
something about a mistake. The idea of waking a man up in the middle
of the night to ask him his "initials" was ridiculous enough to banish
sleep for another hour. A person named Smith, when he travels, should
leave his initials outside the door with his boots.
Refreshed by this reposeful night, and eager to exchange the stagnation
of the shore for the tumult of the ocean, we departed next morning for
Baddeck by the most direct route. This we found, by diligent study of
fascinating prospectuses of travel, to be by the boats of the
International Steamship Company; and when, at eight o'clock in the
morning, we stepped aboard one of them from Commercial Wharf, we
felt that half our journey and the most perplexing part of it was
accomplished. We had put ourselves upon a great line of travel, and
had only to resign ourselves to its flow in order to reach the desired
haven. The agent at the wharf assured us that it was not necessary to
buy through tickets to Baddeck,--he spoke of it as if it were as easy a
place to find as Swampscott,--it was a conspicuous name on the cards
of the company, we should go right on from St. John without difficulty.
The easy familiarity of this official with Baddeck, in short, made us
ashamed to exhibit any anxiety about its situation or the means of
approach to it. Subsequent experience led us to believe that the only
man