the American sense,
nor is the girl a barkeeper in any sense. It is the open club of the
village, where everybody is welcome who is decent and agreeable. Even
the curate drops in--not for his toddy, perhaps (although "You can't
generally sometimes almost always tell," as Mac said), but for a word
with anybody who happens to be about. And so does the big man of the
village who owns the mill, and the gardener from Lord So-and-So's
estate, and the lord himself, for that matter, the groom taking his
"bitter" from the side window, with one eye on his high stepper polished
to a piano finish. All have a word or a good-morning or a joke with the
barmaid. She isn't at all the kind of a girl you think she is. Try it
some day and you'll discover your mistake. It's Miss Nance, or Miss
Ellen, or whatever else her parents fancied; or Miss Figgins, or
Connors, or Pugby--but it is never Nance or Nell.

Our luncheon over, we joined the circle, the curate making room for
Lonnegan, Mac stretching his big frame half over a settle.

"From the States, gentlemen, I should judge," said the curate in a
cheery tone--an athletic and Oxford-looking curate, his high white
collar and high black waistcoat gripping a throat and chest that showed
oars and cricket bats in every muscle. Young, too--not over forty.

I returned the courtesy by pleading guilty, and in extenuation,
presented my comrades to the entire room, Lonnegan's graceful body
straightening to a present-arms posture as he grasped the outstretched
hand of a brother athlete, and Mac's heartiness capturing every one
present, including the barmaid.

Then some compounded extracts were passed over the counter and the talk
drifted as usual (I have never known it otherwise) into comparisons
between the two "Hands Across the Sea" people. That an Englishman will
ever really warm to a Frenchman or a German nobody who knows his race
will believe, but he can be entirely comfortable (and the well-bred
Englishman is the shyest man living) with the well-bred American.

Lonnegan as chief spokesman, in answer to an inquiry, and with an
assurance born of mastery of his subject instantly recognized by the
listeners, enlarged on the last architectural horror, the skyscraper,
its cost, and on the occupations of the myriads of human bees who were
hived between its floors, all so different from the more modest office
structures around the Bank of England: adding that he had the plans of
two on his drawing