one else. She only did it once; but she did
it quite magnificently. She could find her way, with the sole help
of Baedeker, as easily about any old monument as she could about any
American city where the blocks are all square and the streets all
numbered, so that you can go perfectly easily from Twenty-fourth to
Thirtieth.

Now it happens that fifty minutes away from Nauheim, by a good train, is
the ancient city of M----, upon a great pinnacle of basalt, girt with
a triple road running sideways up its shoulder like a scarf. And at the
top there is a castle--not a square castle like Windsor, but a castle
all slate gables and high peaks with gilt weathercocks flashing
bravely--the castle of St Elizabeth of Hungary. It has the disadvantage
of being in Prussia; and it is always disagreeable to go into that
country; but it is very old and there are many double-spired churches
and it stands up like a pyramid out of the green valley of the Lahn. I
don't suppose the Ashburnhams wanted especially to go there and I didn't
especially want to go there myself. But, you understand, there was no
objection. It was part of the cure to make an excursion three or four
times a week. So that we were all quite unanimous in being grateful
to Florence for providing the motive power. Florence, of course, had
a motive of her own. She was at that time engaged in educating Captain
Ashburnham--oh, of course, quite pour le bon motif! She used to say to
Leonora: "I simply can't understand how you can let him live by your
side and be so ignorant!" Leonora herself always struck me as being
remarkably well educated. At any rate, she knew beforehand all that
Florence had to tell her. Perhaps she got it up out of Baedeker before
Florence was up in the morning. I don't mean to say that you would ever
have known that Leonora knew anything, but if Florence started to tell
us how Ludwig the Courageous wanted to have three wives at once--in
which he differed from Henry VIII, who wanted them one after the other,
and this caused a good deal of trouble--if Florence started to tell us
this, Leonora would just nod her head in a way that quite pleasantly
rattled my poor wife.

She used to exclaim: "Well, if you knew it, why haven't you told it all
already to Captain Ashburnham? I'm sure he finds it interesting!" And
Leonora would look reflectively at her husband and say: "I have an idea
that it might injure his hand--the hand, you know, used in connection
with hor