Conceive a bit of New York, a good deal
of Chicago, a scrap of Denver, a slice of Hoboken, and a whole lot
of Milwaukee; conceive this combination as being scoured every day
until it shines; conceive it as beautifully though somewhat profusely
governed, and laid out with magnificent drives, and dotted with
big, handsome public buildings, and full of reasonably honest and
more than reasonably kindly people - and you have Berlin.
It was in Berlin that I picked up the most unique art treasure I
found anywhere on my travels - a picture of the composer Verdi that
looked exactly like Uncle Joe Cannon, without the cigar; whereas
Uncle Joe Cannon does not look a thing in the world like Verdi,
and probably wouldn't if he could.
I have always regretted that our route through the German Empire
took us across the land of the Hessians after dark, for I wanted
to see those people. You will recollect that when George the
Third, of England, first put into actual use the doctrine of Hands
Across the Sea he used the Hessians.
They were hired hands.
Chapter VIII
A Tale of a String-bean
It was at a small dinner party in a home out in Passy - which is
to Paris what Flatbush is to Brooklyn - that the event hereinafter
set forth came to pass. Our host was an American who had lived
abroad a good many years; and his wife, our hostess, was a French
woman as charming as she was pretty and as pretty as she could be.
