I am trying to take an interest in Germany and the Germans for your sake, but, as I told you before, Germany is a place I know little or nothing about.  France—­that noble, fine land—­I know and love well.  Italy I should like better if there were not so many Madonnas and Children (or ought I to say Madonnas and Childs?) to look at; Switzerland is my darling own place, but Germany I have hitherto only associated with Goethe whom as a poet I dislike, large sausages, and theological doubts.  Your description makes me feel that I may have misjudged the country and the people; in fact, your little town sounds a most attractive place to live in.  No, I don’t think I would expect you to make friends easily.  I think you are the sort of man to have hosts of acquaintances and only one or two real friends.  You know, you rather scare people.  I think it is partly your manner and greatly your monocle; you have such a detached air, and often I have noticed you very unresponsive when people were trying to be amusing.  Oh, I don’t mean you are ever rude, but you are sometimes chilling.  If I hadn’t known from Boggley that you were, as he puts it, a perfect jewel, I think I should have shrunk away from before you that first day we met and sat next each other at lunch.  I remember I talked a great deal of nonsense, partly, I think, because I was rather afraid of you; and somehow or other we have always gone on talking nonsense to each other since.  It has become a habit.

But you don’t really want to have a great crowd of friends, do you?  It is only weak-minded people like myself who flop on any stranger’s neck with protestations of undying affection.  It is the easiest thing in the world for any Douglas that ever was to make friends:  I think because we are always willing to laugh at the feeblest jest.  Nothing endears one so quickly to one’s fellow-beings as laughing at their jokes.  We have a way, too, of making friends with any casual stranger we may meet in trains, or coach, or steamer.  You superior people, who, ignoring your fellow-passengers, sit in a corner and read The Spectator, don’t know what you miss.  The thrilling stories I have listened to!  Once I heard a circumstantial story of a wreck in the South Seas told by the plucky little wife of the captain, who had stayed by her husband’s side—­“Papa” she called him—­while the ship slowly sank on a coral reef, and then drifted about in an open boat for days before they were rescued.

It is Mother, however, who meets with the oddest adventures travelling.  One day last summer I saw her off in the Scotch Express from Euston, comfortably seated in a corner with books and papers, expecting she would have a nice quiet day.  The occupant of the other corner was a Russian lady, and the friend who saw her off asked Mother if she would see she had lunch all right, for she knew no English.  This Mother readily promised, and the train started.  Mother tried once or twice to speak to the creature, but, receiving