said his friend.

"I daresay," remarked the other.

"I wonder," said the second speaker presently, "if they can give one a
bath?"

"I daresay not," rejoined the other.

"Oh, I say!" cried his comrade.

This animated discussion was checked by their arrival at the hotel,
which had been recommended to them by an American gentleman whose
acquaintance they made--with whom, indeed, they became very intimate--on
the steamer, and who had proposed to accompany them to the inn and
introduce them, in a friendly way, to the proprietor. This plan,
however, had been defeated by their friend's finding that his "partner"
was awaiting him on the wharf and that his commercial associate desired
him instantly to come and give his attention to certain telegrams
received from St. Louis. But the two Englishmen, with nothing but their
national prestige and personal graces to recommend them, were very well
received at the hotel, which had an air of capacious hospitality. They
found that a bath was not unattainable, and were indeed struck with
the facilities for prolonged and reiterated immersion with which their
apartment was supplied. After bathing a good deal--more, indeed, than
they had ever done before on a single occasion--they made their way into
the dining room of the hotel, which was a spacious restaurant, with a
fountain in the middle, a great many tall plants in ornamental tubs,
and an array of French waiters. The first dinner on land, after a sea
voyage, is, under any circumstances, a delightful occasion, and there
was something particularly agreeable in the circumstances in which our
young Englishmen found themselves. They were extremely good natured
young men; they were more observant than they appeared; in a sort of
inarticulate, accidentally dissimulative fashion, they were highly
appreciative. This was, perhaps, especially the case with the elder, who
was also, as I have said, the man of talent. They sat down at a little
table, which was a very different affair from the great clattering
seesaw in the saloon of the steamer. The wide doors and windows of the
restaurant stood open, beneath large awnings, to a wide pavement, where
there were other plants in tubs, and rows of spreading trees, and beyond
which there was a large shady square, without any palings, and with
marble-paved walks. And above the vivid verdure rose other facades of
white marble and of pale chocolate-colored stone, squaring themselves
against the deep bl