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Updated: June 27, 2025
Wrapped in a flowery robe, fat as if he belonged to the most distinguished people in the country, he had not a prepossessing face. After all, it was only a verification of our papers, and as ours were in order it did not much matter how repulsive he looked. "What an air he has!" murmured Madame Caterna. "The air of a Chinaman!" said her husband, "and frankly I do not want to have one like it."
I am reduced to strolling from one car to another, lounging on the platforms, interrogating the horizon, which obstinately refuses to reply, listening on all sides. Hello! there are the actor and his wife apparently in animated conversation. I approach. They sing in an undertone. I listen. "I'm fond of my turkeys eys eys," says Madame Caterna.
The same result with regard to the actor and actress. Nevertheless it was worth while looking at Caterna while his papers were being examined.
The conqueror of Asia seemed to him to be wanting in actuality. And leaning toward his wife, Caterna hastened to say: "As a scene, I have seen a better at the Porte-Saint Martin, in the Fils de la Nuit " "And I have at the Châtelet in Michael Strogoff." We cannot do better than leave our comedians alone. They look at everything from the theatrical point of view.
"Birds that talk " "What parrots?" "No; criminals' heads." "Horrible!" said the actress, with a most expressive grimace. "What would you have, Caroline?" said Caterna. "It is the custom of the country." On leaving Lan-Tcheou, the railway crosses a well-cultivated country, watered by numerous streams, and hilly enough to necessitate frequent curves.
However, as soon as the Mongols appeared, Popof hurried Madame Caterna, Miss Horatia Bluett, and the other women into the cars. We took every means for putting them in safety. My only weapon was a six-shot revolver, and I knew how to use it. Ah! I wanted incidents and accidents, and impressions of the journey!
Madame Caterna appeared extraordinarily tempted, as if she were among the counters of the Bon Marché or the Louvre. "That stuff would do well for my costume in the Grande Duchesse!" she said. "And those slippers would suit me down to the ground as Ali Bajou in the Caid!" said Caterna.
After that nothing more could be done than leave a town so dishonored by the masterpiece of mechanical locomotion, and that was what we did at eight o'clock. We dined an hour after the train left. In the dining car were several newcomers, among others two negroes whom Caterna began to speak of as darkies.
Then it continues to move for about half a kilometre. It stops. Popof, the major, Caterna, most of the passengers are out on the line in an instant. A network of scaffolding appears confusedly in the darkness, above the piers which were to carry the viaduct across the Tjon valley. Two hundred yards further the train would have been lost in the abyss.
The company politely rise as the bride and bridegroom enter. They "mark time," as Caterna says. Then they advance toward the clergyman, who is standing with his hand resting on a Bible, open probably at the place where Isaac, the son of Abraham, espouses Rebecca, the daughter of Rachel. We might fancy we were in a chapel if we only had a harmonium. And the music is here!
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