The Rudder Grangers Abroad and Other StoriesStockton, Frank R.
General
The Rudder Grangers Abroad and Other Stories
Stockton, Frank R.
United States -- Social life and customs -- 19th century -- Fiction
"That sounds very well," said Baxter, "but in all those southern
countries you must be prepared in winter for the rigors of the climate.
The sun is pretty warm sometimes at this season, but as soon as you get
out of it you will freeze to death if you are not careful. The only way
to keep warm is to be in the sun, out of the wind, and that won't work
on rainy days, and winter is the rainy season, you know. In the houses
it is as cold as ice, and the fires don't amount to anything. You
might as well light a bundle of wooden tooth-picks and put it in the
fire-place. If you could sleep all the time you might be comfortable,
for they give you a feather-bed to cover yourself with. Outside you
may do well enough if you keep up a steady walking, but indoors you
will have hard work to keep warm. You must wear chest-protectors. They
sell them down there--great big ones, made of rabbit-skins; and a nice
thing for a man to have to wear in the house is a pair of cloth bags
lined with fur. They would keep his feet and legs warm when he isn't
walking. It is well, too, to have a pair of smaller fur bags for your
hands when you are in the house. You can have a little hole in the end
of one of them through which you can stick a pen-holder, and then you
can write letters. An india-rubber bag, filled with hot water, to lower
down your back, is a great comfort. You haven't any idea how cold your
spine gets in those warm countries. And, if I were you, I'd avoid a
place where you see them carting coal stoves around. Those are the
worst spots. And you need not expect to get one of the stoves, not
while they can sell you wood at two sticks for a franc. You had better
go to some place where they are not accustomed to having tourists. In
the regular resorts they are afraid to make any show of keeping warm,
for fear people will think they are in the habit of having cold
weather. And in Italy you've got to be precious careful, or you'll be
taken sick. And another thing. I suppose you brought a great deal of
baggage with you. You, for instance," said our friend, turning to me,
"packed up, I suppose, a heavy overcoat for cold weather, and a lighter
one, and a good winter suit, and a good summer one, besides another for
spring and fall, and an old suit to lie about in in the orange groves,
and a dress suit, besides such convenient articles as old boots for
tramping in, pocket-lanterns, and so forth."
Strange to say, I had all these, besides many other things of a similar
kind, and I could not help admitting it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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