in frankfurt-am-main was born one of the three supreme poets since greece and rome—goethe—from whom i shall quote more than once; but frankfurt has present glories that i saw. it is one of many beautifully governed german cities. i grew even fond of its union station, since through this gate i entered so often the pleasures and edifications of the town. the trains were a symbol of the whole empire. about a mile north of nauheim the railroad passes under a bridge and curves out of sight. the four-fifteen was apt to be my express to frankfurt. i would stand on the platform, watch in hand, looking northward for my train. at four-eleven the bridge was invariably an empty hole. invariably at four-twelve the engine filled the hole; then the train glided in quietly, and smoothly glided on, almost punctual to the second. so did the other trains.
the conductors were officials of disciplined courtesy and informed minds. they appeared at the door of your compartment, erect, requesting your ticket in an established formula. if you asked them something they told you correctly and with a teutonic adequacy that was grave, but not gruff. once only in a score of journeys did i encounter bad manners. now i should never choose these admirable conductors for companions, but as conductors they were superior to the engaging fellow citizen who took my ticket down in georgia and, when i asked did his train usually make its scheduled connection at yemassee junction, cried out with contagious mirth:
"my lawd, suh, 'most nevah!"
in these german trains another little discord jarred with some regularity: the german passengers they brought from berlin, or were taking back to berlin, were of a heavy impenetrable rudeness—quite another breed than the kindly hessians of frankfurt.
we know the saying of a floor—that it is so clean "you could eat your dinner off it." all the streets of frankfurt, that i saw, were clean like this. the system of street cars was lucid—and blessedly noiseless!—and their conductors informed with the same adequate gravity i have already noted.
i found that i developed a special affection for route 19, because this took me from the station to the opera house. but all routes took one to and through aspects of municipal perfection at which one stared with envy as one thought of home.
oh, yes! frankfurt is a name to me compact with memories—memories of clean streets; of streets full of by-passers who could direct you when you asked your way; of streets empty of beggars, empty of all signs of desolate, drunken or idle poverty; of streets bordered by substantial stone dwellings, with fragrant gardens; of excellent shops; the streets full of prosperous movement and bustle; an absence of rags, a presence of good stout clothes; a people of contented faces, whether they talked or were silent—the same firm and broad contentment, like a tree deep-rooted, in the city face that was in the country face.
these burghers, these frankfurters, seemed to be going about their business with a sort of solid yet placid energy, well and deliberately aimed, that would hit the mark at once without wasting powder. it was very different and very superior to the ill-arranged and hectic haste of new york and chicago; here nobody seemed driven as though by invisible furies—the german business mind was not out of breath.
such are my memories of frankfurt at work. frankfurt at leisure was to be seen in its palm garden. this was the town's place of general recreation; large, various, beautifully and intelligently planned; with space for babies to roll in safety, and there were the babies rolling, and their nurses; with courts for tennis, and thither i saw adolescent frankfurt strolling in flannels and short skirts after business hours; with benches where sat the more elderly, taking the air and gazing at the games or the flowers or the pleasant trees; with paths more sequestered that wound among bowers, convenient for sweethearts—but i did not see any, because i forbore to look. a central building held tropic plants and basins, and large rooms for bad weather, i suppose, with a restaurant; but on this fine day the music played and we dined outside.
an entrance fee, very small, served to make you respect the palm garden, since humanity seldom respects what it pays nothing for. most unexpected show of all in this palm garden were the flowers under glass. i had erroneously supposed that any german scheme of color would be heavy, and possibly garish. never had i beheld more exquisite subtlety on so extended a scale of arrangement. one walked through aisle after aisle of roses and other blooms in these greenhouses—everywhere was the same delicate sense and feeling; the same, in fact, in these flower schemes that one finds in german lyric verse, and in the songs of schubert, schumann and franz.
it was in the opera house—frankfurt has a fine and commodious one—that my whole impression of germany's glory culminated. the performances drew their light from no melbas or carusos, or other meteors, but from a fixed constellation, now and then enriched by some visitor; it was teamwork of drilled and even excellence, singers, chorus, orchestra and scenery unitedly equal to the occasion, in operas old and new, an immense sweep of repertory, with an audience to match—an accustomed audience, to whom music was traditional food, music having always grown hereabout plenteously, indigenously, so that they took it as naturally as they took their rhine wine, paying for it as moderately, going to hear it in rather plain clothes, as a rule—men in day dress, women in high-neck; not an audience that had to put on its diamonds in order to listen conspicuously to a costly and not comprehended exotic.
the difference between hearing opera where it grows and hearing it in new york is the difference between eating strawberries warm from their vines in june and strawberries in january that have come a thousand miles by freight. where opera grows, it is the blend of native music, singers and listeners that gives a ripe flavor of a warmth which fifth avenue can never purchase.
this, every performance in frankfurt had; but even this could be raised to a higher key of inspiration. i walked in one night and found myself amid a pious ceremonial. they were giving an old work, of bygone design, stiff in outline, noble, remote from all present things. why did they revive this somewhat pale and rigid classic? for contrast, variety? not at all. two hundred years ago this day, gluck had been born. gluck had written this opera. for this reason, then, frankfurt was assembled to hear gluck's music and remember him; and, as i looked at these living germans honoring their classics, i thought it was truly a splendid people that not only possessed but practically nourished themselves with these masterpieces of their great dead.
but this was not all. this was germany looking at its past. in the frankfurt opera house i also learned one of the ways in which germany attends to its future. it was on a sunday afternoon. as i crossed the open space toward the opera house it seemed as though i were the only grown person bound there. children by threes and fours, and in little groups, were streaming from every quarter, entering every door, tripping up the wide, handsome stairs, filling all the seats—boys and girls; it was like the pied piper of hamelin. after a few minutes i found that i was indeed almost alone amid a rippling sea of children—nearly two thousand, as i later learned. in the boxes here and there was a parent or two with a family party, and dotted about the house a few scattered older heads among the young ones.
the overture began. "hush!" went several little voices; the sprightly, expectant babel fell to silence; they listened like a congregation in church.
then the curtain rose. it was a gay old opera, tuneful, full of boisterous, innocent comedy and simple sentiment. not gluck this time; gluck would have been a trifle severe for their young understandings. the enthusiasm and the attention of these boys and girls, with their clapping of hands and their laughter, soon affected the spirits of the singers as a radiant day in spring; it affected me. i envied the happy parents who had their children round them; it was like some sort of wonderful april light. beneath it the quaint, sweet old opera shone like a fruit tree in blossom. the actors became as children again themselves; so did the fiddlers; so did the conductor. i doubt if that little old opera, czaar und zimmermann, had ever felt younger in its life; and i thought if the spirit of goethe were watching frankfurt, his city, to-day, it would add a new happiness to a moment of his eternity.
between the acts i was full of questions. what occasion was this? i read the program, wherein was set forth a most interesting account of the composer—his character, life and adventures, with a historic account also of peter the great, the hero of the opera; but nothing about the occasion. so in the lobby i addressed myself to a group of the men i had seen dotted among the rows of children. the men were schoolmasters. the occasion was an experiment. the children were of the public schools of frankfurt—not the oldest scholars, but the middle grades of the schools. for the oldest, frankfurt had already provided opera days, but this was the first ever given for these younger boys and girls. the cost was twelve-and-a-half cents a seat. if it proved a success, a second would follow in two weeks. at the theater, throughout each winter school term, plays were given expressly for them in this way—the great german classics; but never any opera before to-day.
well, the performance went on; but i was obliged, near the end of it, to hasten away to my train for nauheim, most reluctantly leaving the sight and company of those two thousand joyous children of the frankfurt public schools. "rosy cheeks predominated; eyeglasses were rare."—again i quote from my own diary:—"the children seemed between ten and fifteen. the boys had good foreheads and big backs to their heads."
