Page:Letters from Abroad to Kindred at Home (Volume 1).djvu/197

194 words "father," "mother," "brother," helped out with dumb show; and I found out that hehad one sister that was shorter than he, and one brother much taller, who was a soldier, and so would Johanne be. Against this resolution I expostulated vehemently (as a friend of William Ladd and a member of the Peace Society should do), but Johanne laughed at me; and I doubt not, as soon as he has inches and years enough, he will buckle on his sword.

When we got back to St. Goar the shower came on in earnest, and we took refuge at a jolly miller's, a fit impersonation of that classic character. In an interval of his work he was sitting over his bottle and cracking his jokes. We invited him to go to America. "No," he said, holding up his Rhenish and chuckling over it, "I should not get this there; and, besides, all the millers that go there die!" He is right to cherish a life so joyous.

The steamer came up at a snail's pace. We had the pleasure of finding on board one of our fellow-passengers in the Saint James. He had been purifying in the bubbles of Schlangenbad, which produce such miraculous effects on the skin that Sir Francis Head avers he heard a Frenchman say, "Monsieur, dans ces bains on devient absolument amoureux de soi-emme!" ("One falls in love with one's self in these baths"). Our friend was a witness to its recreative virtue.