The Kimball graphic. (Kimball, Brule County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1905, 1884-02-01

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inhabitants, has an area of only
twenty-three square miles, about the same
as that within the city limits of 81. Paul.
PEoPLING II PAST.
But here l am almost lost among these old
courts, and almost forgetting what brought
me there. What j was going to say was that
it doesn't require u lively fancy to restore
The old-fashioned architecture of these
streets and alleys and courts, and to people
them with the old-fashioned ancestors of
their present denizens the tail
ors, and thinkers, and weavers. and
smiths, and shoemakers, and craftsman of
every guild, and petty tradesmen of all sorts
-habited in their old-fashioned costumes and
acting over again the unclassical, but by no
means unheroic on unpicturesque, drama of
the COMMON life they used to live. For it
was in these humble homes and workshops
Where thrift was horn of frugal toll and only
honesty was honor-and not in the stately
halls where force fattened on the spoils OF
labor, and successful crime was glory-that
We're generated the controlling forces which
have nodded the characteristic virtues
ana what Is best i'll the genius and
institutions of the German people. Not
ably the world owes to these burgher
contemporaries of the feudal lords that or
ganic force of public will and action
sprlnging from a sense of common wrongs
and dangers and interests-which first
made the people n recognized power in the
state aud gave birth to that civic freedom
which has survived the walls that sheltered
1t to become the heritage of the civilized
world 1t seems to me that there are more
OF the clement of dramatic and picturesque
poetry in these old streets, and courts, and
market places-in this primitive theater OF
the low life OF the most plastic
and picturesque period of Euro
mean history-here where Hans Sachs
s ing and where Use wooed beauty, amid the
CRIME and sweat of toll, till beauty mar
RED use in the immortal works, for
example, of that other Nuremberg craftsman,
Peter Nlscher-than i'll all the storicd Exploits
OF mobiles, and knights, and kinus.
THEIR HERO WORSHIP.
And yet it is a curious characteristic of the
German people that they see only the real
and coarse in common life, while they fairly
dote on chiyalry and its romantic ideals. Il
suppose it is the old Alemanni in their blood;
but, however 1t is accounted for, the fact is
Il striking one that their most popular poems
and nearly all their dramas and operas turn
upon tales of chivalry or legends of the FAIRIES
and giants and supernal powers of the old
German mythology. Their imagination con-
soles them for the hard and dull realities of
their plodding, frugal, methodnal life by
creating for them a splendid ideal world,
peopled with invincible heroes and aerial
p pfwer al w sdsts help If the ,5ss0er heroes s, out
tons. l think, perhaps. 1t is because
of this imaginative tenderness for the
romantic side of feudal times that the
Germans love their dukes and princes almost
tp NS<'ii siH dI lsitG iiSiliiiuh JpNSS ii ltIi, moi
from any sentiment of scryile social snot-
bishness, but because these dukes and
princes represent to their i~maginationS the
heroic age of chivalry. These excellent gen
tlcmen have meanwhile neglected no means
OF fostering a sentiment so politically use
full. Munlticent patrons, rs they have been
for centuries of learning and literature and
art, literature and art have been thus insid-
lousy subsidized to perpetuate and exalt the
traditions and the renoWn of their feudal and
/ later ancestry The nnh1jc SulIaras and no rig
and the facades and pediments and tym-
panulns of public editices are everywhere
adorned with statues of royal personages,
The walls of these cditices are decorated
with their portraits and blazoned with fres-
Goes commemorative of their exploits or of
the historic events associated with their
ruilies. 1t Is impossible that the popular
feelin. should not be strongly impressed
with tue continual presence in their visible
forms OF the heroic traditions WHICH sonpect
the princely houses with the age of chfivalry.
The world of German art, which owes so
much to royal muniiicence, is dominated
by this aristocratic atmosphere. 1t was not
by accident that the great painters
of low life and grand subjects were nearly
all OF the Dutch and Nethcriand schools, and
that the first development Of q sympathetic
feeling III art for the beauty ard poetry OF
the homely everyday life of %hurghers and
peasants was in the republican IowCountries
where the common people We're OF had been
the ruling Of the state. Though there
is n strong socialistic element in Germany, il
is, suspect. rather speculative than practi.
cal. \ any rate IL is not visible on the sir
face in the ordinary conversation OF the peo.
pie SO far rs I can learn from Gerlni,
speaking Americans or ltngiisbmen who have
long lived III Germany. They are. on the con.
trary, proud of their aristocracy. and so lone
as their essential personal rights are carefully
respected and guarded, have neither Il socia
nor political envy of the superior
classes which absorb most of tb,
higher civil and military e~mployments.
They have, | think, a greater respect fol
authority which is associated with inherited
superiority OF rank, and the German land
welr, for the same reason, prefer to be
Differed by 1nen of noble birth. Frugal a.
the German people are-cnrefl1ly counting
the cost of everything--they seem 70 b,
cheerfully content to pay roundly for the
costly luxury of theirroyalties and aristocra
cies, on the condition, however, that the heil
OF an ancient title conforms to the Chiyalrit
tideal. SO far as modern conditions will per
nit. He must be at least a valiant soldier, a,
expert horselnan and swordslnan.
II SUPERB MILITARY.
So it is in entire accord with popular feel
ing that the army * Differed chiefly Ii,
dukes aud princes and counts and the scion
OF noble houses. And tine-lnokiur fellow
they ARE, most OF them. ! don't know
whether they are selected as Fred
eiick William selected his grenadi.rs
but | have never seen anywhere a class o
men uniformly of such superb physique a
the military officers who throng the street
of Berlin and Munich They are, as u rule
, tall above the average, well formed, well
knit, with an alhletic wiry spring III ihei
somewhat jaunty gait, which bespenks
thorough muscular training. Their hand
come blu uniforms are of a stylish cut
t which admirably sets off their fine shapes, O
even resort to the coquettish devices of pad
and corsets to give the required Apollo Belvi
derian symmetry to their shoulders an,
: waists. The common soldiers lre far inferio
in stature to their officers; though they. too
are robust, wel-knit fellows-as they ought t
, be in view of the severe course of muscula
drill to which they are subjected every day
: ! was struck with the marked general physi
J cal superiority of the German over tn,
: Frerch officers and oldlers that | have seen
, have noticed the decided inferiority of tn
!, Austrian soldiers here of all ranks to thos
,, of Prussia and Bavaria. 1t seems to me tina
l this simple physical fact goes far to explai
r Sedan and SadOwa.
That the duello--that barbarous relic q
the feudal era--shou be held in high estee1
in Germany follows, of course. Though tn
Germans on their practical side are the mos
, peaceable people in the world, ii result
: IRON their devotion to the ideally heroic tina
: one of their most cherished enthrlsiasms is 70
v martial prowess. They hate quarrelline, bu
they owe TO fight when it is til
order of the day. They k soldier
: and to be soldiers This LIS why tn
!, military system OF Germany, which exac,
9 years of military service of every able-bodie
t man in peace as a preparation for insta,
g service In war--a system which would be il
supportable In America or England-rests q
y lightly On the German people. With all il
e annoyances 1t falls in with the poptla
: humor. The university duel is an outcrcp
g this popular feeling. The student vii
wishes to be anybody must win his soci'
credentials through the ordeal of ut lea,