Peck's Bad Boy Abroad Part 9

The Bad Boy and His Dad Visit the Pope--They Bow to the King of Italy and His Nine Spots--Dad Finds That "The Catacombs"

Is Not a Comic Opera.

Rome, Italy.--Dear Old Friend: You remember, don't you when you were a boy, playing "tag, you're it," and "b.u.t.ton, b.u.t.ton, who's got the b.u.t.ton?" that one of the trying situations was to be judged to "go to Rome," which meant that you were to kiss every girl in the room.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Had to kiss anybody they brought to me 238]

I never got enough "going to Rome" when I attended church sociables and parties, but always got blindfolded, and had to kiss anybody they brought to me, which was usually a boy or a colored cook, so I teased dad to take me to Rome, and when he got over his being rattled and robbed and burned by lava at Vesuvius, he said he didn't care where he went, and, besides, I told him about the Roman Coliseum, where they turned hungry tigers and lions and hyenas loose among the gladiators, and the people could see the beasts eat them alive, and dad said that was something like it, as the way he had been robbed and misued in Italy, he would enjoy seeing a good share of the population chewed by lions, if the lions could stand it. I didn't tell dad that the wild animal show had not been running for a couple of thousand years, 'cause I thought he would find it out when we got here.

Say, old man, I guess I can help you to locate Rome. You remember the time I spoke a piece at the school exhibition, when I put my hand inside my flannel shirt, like an orator, and said: "And this is Rome, that sat on her seven hills, and from her throne of beauty ruled the whole world." Well, this is it, where I am now, but the seven hills have been graded down, and Rome don't rule the whole world a little bit; but she has got religion awful.

The pope lives here, and he is the boss of more religious people than anybody, and though you may belong to any other kind of church, and when you are home you don't care a continental for any religion except your own, or your wife's religion, and you act like an infidel, and scoff at good people, when you get to Rome and see the churches thicker than saloons in Milwaukee, and everybody attending church and looking pious, you catch the fever, and try to forget bad things you have done, and if you get a chance to see the pope, you may go to his palace just 'cause you want to see everything that is going on, and you think you don't care whether school keeps or not, and you feel independent, as though this religion was something for weak people to indulge in, and finally you come face to face with the pope, and see his beautiful face, and his grand eyes, and his every movement is full of pious meaning, you "penuk"

right there, and want to kneel down and let him bless you, by gosh.

Say, I never saw dad weaken like he did when the pope came in. We got tickets to go to his reception, but dad said he had rather go to the catacombs, or the lion show at the Coliseum. He said he didn't want to encourage popes, because he didn't believe they amounted to any more than presiding elders at home. He said he had always been a Baptist, and they didn't have any popes in his church, and he didn't believe in 'em, but some other Americans were going to see the pope, and dad consented to go, under protest, it being understood that he didn't care two whoops, anyway.

Well, sir, we went, and it was the grandest thing you ever saw. There were guards by the thousand, beautiful gardens that would make Central Park look like a hay marsh, hundreds of people in church vestments, and an air of sanct.i.ty that we never dreamed; jewels that are never seen outside the pope's residence, and we lined up to see the holy father pa.s.s.

Gee, but dad trembled like a dog tied out in the snow, and the perspiration stood out on his face, and he looked sorry for himself.

Then came the procession, all n.o.bles and great people, and then there was a party of pious men carrying the most beautiful man we ever saw on a platform above us, and it was the pope, and he smiled at me, and the tears came to my eyes, and I couldn't swallow something which I s'pose was my sins, and then he looked at dad, and held up one hand, and dad was pale, and there was no funny business about dad any more, and then they set the platform down and the pope sat in a chair, and those who wanted to went up to him, and he blessed them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: For awhile dad da.s.sent go up 241]

Say, for awhile dad da.s.sent go up, 'cause he thought the pope could see right through him, and would know he was a Baptist, but the rest of the Americans were going up, and dad didn't want to be eccentric, so he and I went up. The pope put out his hand to dad, and instead of shaking it, as he would the hand of any other man on earth, and asking how his folks were, dad bent over and kissed the pope's hand, and the pope blessed him. Dad looked like a new man, a good man, and when the pope put his hand on my head, and blessed me, my heart came up in my throat, 'cause I thought he must know of all the mean things I had ever done, but I can feel his soft, beautiful hand on my head now, and from this out I would fight any boy twice my size that ever said a word against the pope and his religion. When we got outside dad says to me: "Hennery, don't you ever let me hear of your doing a thing that would make the good man sorry if he was to hear about it." And we went to our hotel and stayed all the afternoon, and all night, and just thought of that pope's angelic face, and when one of the Americans came to our room and wanted dad to play cinch, he was indignant, and said: "I would as soon think of robbing a child's bank," and we went to bed, and if dad wasn't a converted man I never saw one.

Well, sir, trouble, and sorrow, and religion, don't last very long on dad. The next morning we talked things over, and I quoted all the Roman stuff I could think of to dad, such as "In that elder day, to be a Roman was greater than a king," but before I could think twice there was a commotion in the streets and a porter came and made us take off our hats, because the king was riding by, and we looked at the king, and dad was hot. He said that fellow was nothing but a railroad hand, disguised in a uniform, and, by ginger, if we had seen that king out west working on a railroad, with canvas clothes on, he would not have looked like a king, on a bet. There was nothing but his good clothes that stood between the king and a dago digging sewers in Chicago.

After the king and his ninespots had pa.s.sed, dad said: "When you are in Rome, you must do as the Romans do," and he said he wanted to get that heavy feeling off his shoulders, which he got at the religious procession, and wanted me to suggest something devilish that we could do, and I told him we better go and see the "Catacombs." He wanted to know if it was anything like "a trip to Chinatown," or the "Black Crook," and I told him it was worse. Then he asked me if there was much low neck and long stockings in the "Catacombs," and I told him there was a plenty, and he said he was just ripe to see that kind of a show, and so we took a carriage for the "Catacombs," and dad could hardly keep still till we got there.

I suppose I ought to be killed for fooling dad, but he craved for excitement, and he got it. The "Catacombs" are where Roman citizens have been buried for thousands of years, in graves hewn out of solid rock, and they are petrified, and after they have laid in the graves for a few hundred years, the mummified bodies are taken out and stood up in corners, if the bodies will hang together, and if not the bones are piled up around for scenery.

We had to take torches to go in, and we wandered through corridors, gazing at the remains, until dad asked one of the men with us what it all meant, and the man said it was the greatest show on earth. Dad began to think he was nutty, and when I laughed, and said: "That is great,"

and clapped my hands, and said: "Encore," dad stopped and said: "Hennery, this is no leg show, this is a morgue," but to cheer him up I told him his head must be wrong, and I pointed to about a hundred dried corpses, a thousand years old, in a corner, with grinning skulls all around, and told him that was the ballet, and told him to look at the leading dancer, and asked him if she wasn't a beaut, from b.u.t.te, Mont., and that killed dad. He leaned against me, and said his eyes must have gone back on him, because everything looked dead to him. I told him he would get over it after awhile, and to stay where he was while I went and spoke to one of the ballet that was beckoning to me, and I left him there, dazed, and went around a corner and hid.

People were coming along with torches all the time, looking at the catacombs and reading the inscriptions cut in the rock, and after awhile I went back to where I left dad, and he was gone, but after awhile I found him standing up with the stiffs. He was glad to see me, and wanted to know if I thought he was' dead. I told him I was sure he was alive, though he had a deathly look on his face.

[Ill.u.s.tration: He would break me up into bones, and throw me into a pile 246]

"Well, sir," says dad, "I thought it was all over with me, after you left, for a man came along and moved me around, and took hold under my arms and jumped me along here by these stiffs, and told me if I didn't stay where I belonged he would break me up into bones, and throw me into a pile, and I thought I would have to do as the Romans do and stay here, and before the man left me he reached into my pocket and took my money, and said I couldn't spend any money in there where I was going to stay for a million years, and, by gosh, I was so petrified I couldn't stop him from robbing me. Say, Hennery, they will rob you anywhere, even in the grave, and if this Catacomb show is over, and the curtain has gone down, I want to get out of here, and go to the Coliseum or the Roman amphitheater, where the wild beasts eat people alive." And so we left the Catacombs and went back to town, and dad began to show life again.

Say, you tell the folks at home that dad is gaining every day, and his vacation is doing him good. He has promised to kill me for taking him to the Catacomb show, but dad never harbors revenge for long, and I guess your little nephew will pull through. I wish I had my skates, cause dad wants to go to Russia.

Yours,

Hennery.

CHAPTER XX.

The Bad Boy Tells About the Land of the Czar and the Trouble They Had to Get There--Dad Does a Stunt and Mixes It Up with the People and Soldiers.

St. Petersburg, Russia.--My Dear Groceryow-ski: Well, sir, I 'spose you will be surprised to hear from me in Russia, but there was no use talking when Dad said he was going to St. Petersburg if it was the last act of his life. He got talking with a j.a.paneser in Rome and the j.a.p said the war in the far east would last until every Russian was killed, unless America interfered to put a stop to it, and as Roosevelt didn't appear to have sand enough to offer his services to the czar, what it needed was for some representative American citizen who was brave and had nerve to go to St. Petersburg and see the czarovitch and give him the benefit of a good American talk. The j.a.p said the American who brought about peace, by a few well chosen remarks, would be the greatest man of the century, and would live to be bowed down to by kings and emperors and all the world would doff hats to him.

At first dad was a little leary about going on such a mission without credentials from Washington, but as luck would have it, he met an exiled Russian at a restaurant, who told dad that he reminded him of Gen.

Grant, because dad had a wart on the side of his nose, and he told dad that Russia would keep on fighting until every j.a.panese was killed unless some distinguished American should be raised up who deemed it his duty to go to St. Petersburg and see the Little Father, and in the interest of humanity advise the czar to call a halt before he had exterminated the whole yellow race. Dad asked the Russian if he thought the czar would grant an audience to an American of eminence in his own country, and the Russian told dad that Nicholas just doted on Americans, and that there was hardly ever an American ballet dancer that went to Russia but what the czar sent for her to come and see him and dance before the grand dukes, and he always gave them jewels and cans of caviar as souvenirs of their visit.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Russian told dad that Nicholas just doted on Americans 250]

Dad thought it over all night, and the next morning we started for Russia and I wish we had joined an expedition to discover the North Pole instead of coming here. Say, it is harder to get into Russia than it would be to get out of a penitentiary at home. At the frontier we were met by guards on horseback and on foot, policemen, detectives and other grafters, who took our pa.s.sports and money, and one fellow made me exchange my socks with him. Then they imprisoned us in a stable with some cows until they could hold a coroner's inquest on our pa.s.sports and divide our money. We slept with the cows the first night in Russia, and I do not want to sleep again with animals that chew cuds all night, and get up half a dozen times to hump up their backs and stretch and bellow.

We never slept a wink, and could look out through the cracks in the stable and see the guards shaking dice for our money.

[Ill.u.s.tration: See the guards shaking dice for our money 253]

Finally they looked at the great seal on our pa.s.sports and saw it was an American doc.u.ment, and they began to turn pale, as pale as a Russian can get without using soap, and when I said, "Washington, emba.s.sador, minister plenipotentiary, Roosevelt, Hot Time in the Old Town Tonight, E Pluribus Unum, whoopla, San Juan Hill," and pointed to dad, who was just coming out of the stable, looking like Washington at Valley Forge, the guards and other robbers bowed to dad, gave him a bag full of Russian money in place of that which they had taken away, and let us take a freight train for St. Petersburg, and they must have told the train men who we were, because everybody on the cars took off their hats to us, and divided their lunch with us.

Dad could not understand the change in the att.i.tude of the people towards us until I told him that they took him for a distinguished American statesman, and that as long as we were in Russia he must try to look like George Washington and act like Theodore Roosevelt, so every little while dad would stand up in the aisle of the car and pose like George Washington and when anybody gave him a sandwich or a cigarette he would show his teeth and say, "Deelighted," and all the way to St.

Petersburg dad carried out his part of the programme and we were not robbed once on the trip, but dad tried to smoke one of the cigarettes that was given him by a Cossack, and he died in my arms, pretty near.

They make cigarettes out of baled hay that has been used for beddings and covered with paper that has been used to poison flies. I never smelled anything so bad since they fumigated our house by the board of health after the hired girl had smallpox.

Well, we got to St. Petersburg in an awful time, and went to a hotel, suspected by the police, and marked as undesirable guests by the Cossacks, and winked at by the walking delegates and strikers, who thought we were non-union men looking for their jobs.

The next day the religious ceremony of "blessing the Neva" took place, where all the population gets out on the bank of the river, with overshoes on, and fur coats, and looks down on the river, covered with ice four feet thick, and the river is blessed. In our country the people would d.a.m.n a river that had ice four feet thick, but in Russia they bless anything that will stand it. We got a good place on the bank of the river, with about a million people who had sheepskin coats on, and who steamed like a sheep ranch, and were enjoying the performance, looking occasionally at the Winter palace, where the czar was peeking out of a window, wondering from which direction a bomb would come to blow him up, when a battery of artillery across the river started to fire a salute, and then the devil was to pay. It seems that the gentlemen who handled the guns, and who were supposed to fire blank cartridges into the air, put in loaded cartridges, filled with grape shot, and took aim at the Winter palace, and cut loose at Mr. Czar.

Well, you would have been paralyzed to see the change that came over that crowd, blessing the river one minute and d.a.m.ning the czar and the grand dukes the next. The shot went into the Winter palace and tore the furniture and ripped up the ceiling of the room the czar was in, and in a moment all was chaos, as though every Russian knew the czar was to be a.s.sa.s.sinated at that particular moment, and all rushed toward the Winter palace as though they expected pieces of the Little Father would be thrown out the window for them to play football with. For a people who are supposed to be lawful and law-abiding, and who love their rulers, it seemed strange to see them all so tickled when they thought he was blown higher than a kite by his own soldiers.

Dad and I started with the crowd for the Winter palace, and then we had a taste of monarchial government. The crowd was rushing over us and dad got mad and pulled off his coat and said he could whip any confounded foreigner that rubbed against him with a sheepskin coat on, and he was just on the point of smiting a fellow with whiskers that looked like scrambled bristles off a black hog when a regiment of Cossacks came down on the crowd, riding horses like a wild west show, and with whips in their hands, with a dozen lashes to each whip, and they began to lash the crowd and ride over them, while the people covered their faces with their arms, and run away, afraid of the whips, which cut and wound and kill, as each lash has little lead bullets fastened to them and a stroke of the whip is like being shot with buck shot or kicked with a frozen boot.

[Ill.u.s.tration: a Cossack rode right up to him and lashed him over the back 258]

Well, sir, dad was going to show the Cossacks that he was pretty near an American citizen and didn't propose to be whipped like a school boy by a teacher that looked like a valentine, so he tried to look like George Washington defying the British, but it didn't work, for a Cossack rode right up to him and lashed him over the back (and about 15 buck shot in his whip took dad right where the pants are tight when you bend over to pick up something) and the Cossack laughed when dad straightened up and started to run. I never saw such a change in a man as there was in dad.

He started for our hotel, and as good a sprinter as I am I couldn't keep up with him, but I kept him in sight. Before we got to the hotel a sledge came along, not an "old sledge," such as you play with cards, high-low-Jack-game, but a sort of a sleigh, with three horses abreast, and I yelled to dad to take a hitch on the sledge, and he grabbed on with his feet on the runners, and a man in the sledge with a uniform on, who seemed to be a grand duke, 'cause everybody was chasing him and yelling to head him off, hit dad in the nose with the b.u.t.t of a revolver, and dad fell off in the snow and the crowd that was chasing the grand duke picked dad up and carried him on their shoulders because they thought he had tried to a.s.sa.s.sinate the duke, and we were escorted to our hotel by the strikers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Hit dad in the nose with the b.u.t.t of a revolver 255]

We didn't know what they were, but you can tell the laboring men here because they wear blouses and look hungry, and when they left us the landlord notified the police that suspicious characters were at the hotel, and came there escorted by the mob, and the police surrounded the house and dad went to our room and used witch hazel on himself where the Cossack hit him with the loaded whip. He says Russia will pay pretty dear for that stroke of the whip by the Cossack, and I think dad is going to join the revolution that is going to be pulled off next Sunday.

They are going to get about a million men to take a pet.i.tion to the czar, workingmen and anarchists, and dad says he is going as an American anarchist who is smarting from injustice, and I guess no native is smarting more than dad is, 'cause he has to stand up to eat and lie on his stummick to sleep. There is going to be a hades of a time here in St. Petersburg this next week, and dad and I are going to be in it clear up to our necks.

Dad has given up trying to see the czar about stopping the war and says the czar and the whole bunch can go plum (to the devil) and he will die with the mob and follow a priest who is stirring the people to revolt.

Gee, I hope dad will not get killed here and be buried in a trench with a thousand Russians, smelling as they do.

I met a young man from Chicago, who is here selling reapers for the harvester trust, and he says if you are once suspected of having sympathy with the working people who are on a strike you might just as well say your prayers and take rough on rats, 'cause the Cossacks will get you, and he would advise me and dad to get out of here pretty quick, but when I told dad about it he put one hand on his heart and the other on his pants and said "Arnica, arnica, arnica!" and the police that were on guard near his room thought he meant anarchy, and they sent four detectives to stay in dad's room.

The people here, the Chicago young man told me, think the Cossacks are human hyenas, that they have had their hearts removed by a surgical operation when young, and a piece of gizzard put in in place of the heart, and that they are natural murderers, the sight of blood acting on them the same as champagne on a human being, and that but for the Cossacks Russia would have a population of loving subjects that would make it safe for the Little Father to go anywhere in Russia unattended, but with Cossacks ready to whip and murder and laugh at suffering, the people are becoming like men bitten by rabid dogs, and they froth at the mouth and have spasms and carry bombs up their sleeves, ready to blow up the members of the royal family, and there you are.

If you do not hear from me after next Sunday you can put dad's obituary and mine in the local papers and say we died of an overdose of Cossack.