i think that we all know the tourist in search of knowledge, the tourist who goes abroad determined not to waste a day, who is resolved to bring back with him when he returns from his travels information that shall be at any rate an equivalent to him for the money and time expended. this tourist in search of knowledge no doubt commands our respect in a certain degree. he is a sedulous man, probably exempt from any strong evil proclivities, anxious to do the best he can with his life, imbued with a respectable ambition, and animated by that desire to be better than those around him which generally saves a man[76] from being below the average if it does not suffice to do more for him than that. but, having said so much in praise of tourists of this class, i do not know that there is much more to be said in their favour. such men are usually bores as regards their effect upon others; and, as regards themselves, they seem in too many cases to have but little capacity for following up the special career which they have proposed to themselves. they are diligent in their inquiries, but have laid down for themselves no course of study. they wish to learn everything, but have too great a faith for learning everything easily. they have seldom realized to themselves how hard is the task of mastering information, and think that in going far afield from their own homes they have found, or are like to find, a royal road to knowledge. and then they have a worse fault than this incorrectness of idea which i have imputed to them. they are apt to forestall the merits which they should in truth never claim till the[77] knowledge has been won, and as seekers for wisdom, assume the graces which others should give them when such acquired wisdom has become the manifest result of their labours.
there are female tourists in search of knowledge as well as male; but a woman has so much more tact than a man, that she is usually able to hide that which is objectionable in her mode of action. perhaps the middle-aged single lady, or the lady who is not yet middle-aged but fears that she may soon become so, is more prone to belong to this class of travellers than any species of man; but she keeps her investigations somewhat in the background, goes through her heavy reading out of sight, and asks her most pressing questions sotto voce, when she and her hoped-for informant are beyond the hearing of the multitude. the male investigator of continental facts has no such reticence. he demands the price of wheat with bold voice before a crowd of fellow-travellers; he asks his question as to the population of the[78] country, and then answers it himself with a tone of conscious superiority, and he suggests his doubts as to the political action of the people around him with an air of omniscience that is intended to astonish all that stand within hearing of him.
what a glorious thing is knowledge, and how terrible to us are those lapses of opportunity with which the consciences of most of us are burdened in this respect! and to us who are ignorant, whose lapses in that respect have been too long to have been numerous, how great the man looms who has really used his intellect, and exercised his brain, and stirred his mind! but as he looms large, so does the ignorant man who affects acquirements and prides himself on knowledge which can hardly even be called superficial—as, spread it as thin as he may, he cannot make it cover a surface—appear infinitesimally mean and small! the getter-up of quotations from books which he has never read,—how vile he is to all of us! the man who allows it to be assumed that[79] he can understand a subject or a language till he breaks down, caught in the fact, despised, but pitied through the extent of his misery,—how poor a creature he is in his wretchedness! the tourist in search of knowledge may of course be a man infinitely too strong to fall into any of these pitfalls. he may be modest-minded though ambitious, silent in his search, conscious of his ignorance where he is ignorant, and doubtful of his learning where he is learned. no doubt there are such english tourists,—many of them probably passing from city to city year after year,—with eyes and ears more readily open than their mouths; but not such a one is the tourist of whom we are here speaking. travellers such as they become liable to no remark, and escape the notice of all observers. but the normal traveller in search of knowledge, with whom all of us who are habitual tourists are well acquainted, is altogether of a different nature. he is the pharisee among students. he is always thanking god that[80] he is not as those idlers who pass from country to country learning nothing of the institutions of the people among whom they travel,—not as that poor publican, that lonely traveller, who, standing apart, hardly daring to open his mouth, asks some humble question which shows thoroughly and at once the extent of his ignorance.
our tourist in search of knowledge,—the tourist who is searching for that which he thinks he has got, but which he never will find,—is seldom a very young man. nor is he often a man stricken in years. the man over fifty who makes inquiries with eager pretension but with no fixed aptitudes in that direction, after the price of flour and the fluctuations of the population, must be a fool indeed. the tourist now in question will usually be progressing from thirty to forty. he is a severe man in his mien, given to frowning at all puerilities, and especially hostile to his young countrymen who travel for fun, in denouncing whose sins he is prone to put forward his best[81] eloquence. nor is he much more gracious to young ladies who travel with their mammas, and who sometimes show a tendency to cultivate the acquaintance of those scandalous young british rioters. to the unprotected female tourist he will sometimes unbend, and will find in her a flattering listener, and one who is able to understand and appreciate the depth and breadth of his acquirements. he generally starts from home alone, but will occasionally be found joined for a time to a brother traveller, induced to adopt such company by sympathy in tastes and motives of economy. but sympathy in tastes will not carry the two far together, as, little as may be their capacity for fathoming depths, each will be able to fathom the depth of the other. the tourist in search of knowledge will generally be found dressed in gaiters, in a decorous suit of brown garments, and accompanied by a great coat, rug, and umbrella, carefully packed together with a strap. now, in these latter days, he has relinquished[82] his chimney-pot, and covered himself with a dark soft felt hat, which must add greatly to his comfort. indeed, his appearance would be much in his favour, as opposed in its decency to the violent indecency of some of our british tourists, were it not for a certain priggishness of apparel which tells a tale against him and acts terribly to his disfavour. it must, however, be acknowledged of the tourist in search of knowledge that he never misbehaves himself. he is not often to be seen in the churches during the hours of public worship,—for what is there for an inquiring tourist to learn in such places at such times?—but when chance does so place him he disturbs no one, and entails upon the big swiss, or verger with the cocked hat, no necessity to keep an eye upon him. he is no great frequenter of galleries, preferring the useful to the ornamental in his inquiries; but he makes his little tour of inspection to any art collections that are of especial note, so that he may be able to satisfy himself and his admirers[83] that he has seen everything. occasionally he will venture on a morsel of art criticism, and then the profundity of his ignorance is delightful to those who feel that, as a tourist in search of knowledge, he is turning up his nose at them. he will generally admire a "carlo dolci," and will have some word to say in favour of salvator rosa. but he will be found much more frequently in libraries and museums. these will be his hunting-grounds, though it will be out of the power of the ordinary tourist to ascertain what he does there. he is, however, an enduring, conscientious man, and can pass along from shelf to shelf and from one glass-covered repository to another, hardly missing a stuffed bird or an indian arrow-head. and he will listen with wondrous patience to the details of guides, jotting down figures in a little book, and asking wonder-working questions which no guide can answer. and he looks into municipal matters wherever he goes, learning all details as to mayors, aldermen, and councillors, as to custom[84] duties on provisions, as to import duties on manufactures, as to schools, convents, and gaols, to scholars, mendicants, and criminals. he does not often care much for scenery, but he will be careful to inquire how many passengers the steamboats carry on the lakes, and what average of souls is boarded and lodged at each large hotel that he passes. he would like to know how many eggs are consumed annually, and probably does ask some question as to the amount of soap used in the laundries.
to the romance and transcendental ebullitions of enthusiastic admirers of nature he is altogether hostile, and dislikes especially all quotations from poetry. "cui bono?" is his motto. to whom will any of these things do any good? has dante fed any hungry mouths, or has shakspeare put clothes on the backs of any but a poor company of players? he will tell you that byron wasted a fortune, and that shelley wasted himself. the jingle of rhymes is an injury to him, as is also the[85] scraping of a fiddle. to get up either poetry or music would be out of his line, and he recognizes no utility that does not show itself by figures. so he goes on from town to town, passing quickly through the mountains and by the lakes, and conscientiously performs the task which he had laid out for himself before he started. when he returns home he has never been enticed to the right or to the left. he has spent exactly the number of francs which he had allowed himself. he had ordered breakfast to be ready for him in his home on a certain morning by eight o'clock, and exactly at that hour he appears and is ready for his meal. he has kept his journal every day; and, over and beyond his journal, he has filled a pocket-book so full of figures that even his methodical mind can hardly disentangle them from the crowded pages. he has an idea of publishing an article on the consumption of rye-flour in pomerania, and is a happy man until he finds that the effort is[86] beyond his power.
but he has had no holiday, and it may be doubted whether such a man wants any holiday; whether the capability of enjoying holiday-time has been vouchsafed to him. to sit on a mountain-side and breathe sweeter air than that which his daily work affords him gives him no delight. neither the rivers nor the clouds nor the green valleys have been dear to him. but he has worked conscientiously in his vocation, and in the result of that work will be his reward. if his memory serves him, or even if it does not, he will be able to repeat among friends and foes an amount of facts which will show that he has not been a tourist in search of knowledge for nothing.
that such a man has made a mistake in his ideas as to knowledge and in his mode of seeking it may be our opinion and that of some others, and yet may be a very false opinion. and we may certainly confess that any true searching after knowledge must be beneficial, even though[87] the method of the search may to our eyes and in our estimation be ungainly and inefficacious. it is not against the search that protest is here made. it is against the pretence of the man that our battle is waged, against the broad phylacteries worn so openly on the foreheads of utilitarian tourists that our little shafts are pointed. let the tourist in search of knowledge work hard and despise all holiday-making, and sacrifice himself to statistics, if he have strength and will to do so; but in doing so, let him cease to thank god that he is not as other men are.
