n-mouthed
beholder on the sidewalk, among the social elect in Saxony.

Elsa was as good as engaged, as good as married. In her mother's
eyes, bloodshot with all this glory of excitement, her daughter was
already dwelling in a palace in that amazing city of Erie, in that
splendid commonwealth of Pennsylvania, of whose double fame she had
never before heard. For, of course, Deming sang constantly of the
wonders of his native haunts, where wealth flowed out of the ground
and the trolley system was the best in the world.

Thus the Americanization of Villa Elsa was accomplished in the
twinkling of an eye. No more did Gard hear of the Yankee pigs. No
more did he hear of the disgusting Yankee billions. Germany and
America in union would form the blessed state which would command
the globe, and the two excelling peoples, by intermarrying, would
produce a race too far ahead and above Frau Bucher's hoarse
vocabulary to admit of much more than her Ach Himmels and Ach
Gotts.

CHAPTER XXI

A PEOPLE PECULIAR OR PAGAN?

Concurrent with all these lively happenings Kirtley had cultivated
the acquaintance of Miles Anderson. The two became very friendly.
Gard had been so rudely treated by the great German professor in the
lecture room that he was quite willing to conclude he could learn
from the journalist far more of what he was interested in than from
a Teuton university pulpit.

Anderson, like himself, had entered Germany ignorant of the nation
and its folk, and fully disposed to find almost everything worthy
the highest praise. The elder's vivid convictions, his caustic
reflections, were honestly born of what he had seen and heard in
different parts of the land, not of what the Germans said of
themselves in books, as was the customary rule. By virtue of his
calling he had superior opportunities for observation. He was
therefore not a negligible imparter of information.

Gard usually found him in a high-ceilinged, majestic chamber in a
typical Dresden _pension_, frequented, however, by only three or
four boarders. It was a little like a home for Anderson, even if
gloomily august in the German style. Dark woodwork, severely waxed
floors on which Gard often slipped violently, huge doors, huge
chairs and tables--everything large to suit the national taste for
big Teuton gods and supermen. Long, thick stuffs concealed the
passageways and windows and contributed to the absence of cheering
light--that sign and symbol of th