quette of shopping in Germany seems to us rather topsy-turvy at
first. In a small shop the proprietor is as likely as not to conduct
business with a cigar in his mouth, even if you are a lady, but if you
are a man he will think you a boor if you omit to remove your hat as
you cross his threshold. Whether you are a man, woman, or child, you
will wish him good-morning or good-evening before you ask for what you
want, and he will answer you before he asks what your commands are. If
you are a woman, about as ignorant as most women, and with a humble
mind, you will probably have no fixed opinion about the question of
free or fair trade. You may even, if you are very humble, recognise
that it is not quite the simple question Dick, Tom, and Harry think it
is. But you will know for certain that when you want ribbons for a hat
you had better buy them in Kensington and not in Frankfurt, and that
though there are plenty of cheap materials in Germany, the same
quality would be cheaper still in London. Everything to do with
women's clothing is dearer there than here. So is stationery, so are
groceries, so are the better class of fancy goods. But the Germans,
say the Fair Traders, are a prosperous nation, and it is because their
manufactures are protected. This may be so. I can only look at various
quite small unimportant trifles, such as ribbons, for instance, or
pewter vases or blotting-paper or peppermint drops. I know that a
German woman either wears a common ribbon on her hat, or pays twice
as much as I do for a good one; she is content with one pewter vase
where your English suburban drawing-room packs twenty into one corner,
with twenty silver frames and vases near them. A few years ago the one
thing German blotting-paper refused to do was to absorb ink, and it
was so dear that in all small country inns and in old-fashioned
offices you were expected to use sand instead. The sand was kept
beside the ink in a vessel that had a top like a pepper pot; and it
was more amusing than blotting-paper, but not as efficacious. As for
the peppermint drops, they used to be a regular export from families
living in London to families living in Germany. They were probably
needed after having goose and chestnuts for dinner, and ours were
twice as large as the German ones and about six times as strong, so no
doubt they were like our blotting-paper, and performed what they
engaged to perform more thoroughly.

But shops of any kind are dull compar