by three well-known initials, was London.  And the only way we had to get to London was on our bicycle.  We thought we had better get busy.  It’s a long bike ride from Basel to London.  So we just went as far as the Basel Cathedral, so as not to seem too unappreciative of all the treasures that Switzerland had been saving for us for countless centuries; then we got on board our patient steed and trundled off through Alsace.

That was in August, 1912, and we firmly intended to go back to Switzerland the next year to have another look at, the rainfall and the rest of the statistics and status quos.  But the opportunity has not come.

So that is why we wander disconsolately about Washington Square, trying to make up our mind to unburden our bosom to the Swiss consul and tell him the worst.  But how can one go and interrupt a consul to tell him that sort of thing?  Perhaps he wouldn’t understand it at all; he would misunderstand our pathetic little story and be angry that we took up his time.  He wouldn’t think that a shortage of tobacco and clothing was a sufficient excuse for slighting William Tell and the Jungfrau.  He wouldn’t appreciate the frustrated emotion and longing with which we watch the little red cross at his front door, and think of all it means to us and all it might have meant.

We took another turn around Washington Square, trying to embolden ourself enough to go in and tell the consul all this.  And then our heart failed us.  We decided to write a piece for the paper about it, and if the consul ever sees it he will be generous and understand.  He will know why, behind the humble facade of his consulate on Washington Square, we see the heaven-piercing summits of Switzerland rising like a dream, blue and silvery and tantalizing.

P.S.  Since the above we have definitely decided not to go to call on the Swiss consul.  Suppose he were only a vice-consul, a Philadelphia Swiss, who had never been to Switzerland in his life!

IF MR. WILSON WERE THE WEATHER MAN

My Fellow Citizens:  It is very delightful to be here, if I may be permitted to say so, and I consider it a distinguished privilege to open the discussion as to the probable weather to-morrow not only, but during the days to come.  I can easily conceive that many of our forecasts will need subsequent reconsideration, for if I may judge by my own study of these matters, the climate is not susceptible of confident judgments at present.

An overwhelming majority of the American people is in favor of fine weather.  This underlying community of purpose warms my heart.  If we do not guarantee them fine weather, cannot you see the picture of what would come to pass?  Your hearts have instructed you where the rain falls.  It falls upon senators and congressmen not only—­and for that we need not feel so much chagrin—­it falls upon humble homes everywhere, upon plain men, and women, and children.  If I were to disappoint the united expectation of my fellow citizens for fine weather to-morrow I would incur their merited scorn.