eased he gave
a supper-party and had them placed on the table. Of course she was very
proud."

"Germany," boomed the Traveller, biting round a potato which he had
speared with his knife, "is the home of the Family."

Followed an appreciative silence.

The dishes were changed for beef, red currants and spinach. They wiped
their forks upon black bread and started again.

"How long are you remaining here?" asked the Herr Rat.

"I do not know exactly. I must be back in London in September."

"Of course you will visit Munchen?"

"I am afraid I shall not have time. You see, it is important not to
break into my 'cure.'"

"But you MUST go to Munchen. You have not seen Germany if you have
not been to Munchen. All the Exhibitions, all the Art and Soul life
of Germany are in Munchen. There is the Wagner Festival in August, and
Mozart and a Japanese collection of pictures--and there is the beer! You
do not know what good beer is until you have been to Munchen. Why, I
see fine ladies every afternoon, but fine ladies, I tell you, drinking
glasses so high." He measured a good washstand pitcher in height, and I
smiled.

"If I drink a great deal of Munchen beer I sweat so," said Herr
Hoffmann. "When I am here, in the fields or before my baths, I sweat,
but I enjoy it; but in the town it is not at all the same thing."

Prompted by the thought, he wiped his neck and face with his dinner
napkin and carefully cleaned his ears.

A glass dish of stewed apricots was placed upon the table.

"Ah, fruit!" said Fraulein Stiegelauer, "that is so necessary to health.
The doctor told me this morning that the more fruit I could eat the
better."

She very obviously followed the advice.

Said the Traveller: "I suppose you are frightened of an invasion, too,
eh? Oh, that's good. I've been reading all about your English play in a
newspaper. Did you see it?"

"Yes." I sat upright. "I assure you we are not afraid."

"Well, then, you ought to be," said the Herr Rat. "You have got no army
at all--a few little boys with their veins full of nicotine poisoning."

"Don't be afraid," Herr Hoffmann said. "We don't want England. If we did
we would have had her long ago. We really do not want you."

He waved his spoon airily, looking across at me as though I were a
little child whom he would keep or dismiss as he pleased.

"We certainly do not want Germany," I said.

"This morning I took a half bath. Then this afternoon I must take a knee
ba