g our
coast, and 'by ---,' ready at a minute to land anywhere on the other
shore, to give the French as good a thrashing as they got in the last
war, 'by ---'. In fact, a rumbling cannonade of oaths was fired by the
two veterans during the whole of their conversation.

There was a Frenchman in the room, but as he had not been above ten
years in London, of course he did not speak the language, and lost the
benefit of the conversation. 'But, O my country!' said I to myself, it's
no wonder that you are so beloved! If I were a Frenchman, how I would
hate you!'

That brutal, ignorant, peevish bully of an Englishman is showing himself
in every city of Europe. One of the dullest creatures under heaven, he
goes travelling Europe under foot, shouldering his way into galleries
and cathedrals, and bustling into palaces with his buck-ram uniform.
At church or theatre, gala or picture-gallery, HIS face never varies.
A thousand delightful sights pass before his bloodshot eyes, and don't
affect him. Countless brilliant scenes of life and manners are shown
him, but never move him. He goes to church, and calls the practices
there degrading and superstitious: as if HIS altar was the only one that
was acceptable. He goes to picture-galleries, and is more ignorant about
Art than a French shoeblack. Art, Nature pass, and there is no dot of
admiration in his stupid eyes: nothing moves him, except when a very
great man comes his way, and then the rigid, proud, self-confident,
inflexible British Snob can be as humble as a flunkey and as supple as a
harlequin.

CHAPTER XXIII--ENGLISH SNOBS ON THE CONTINENT

'WHAT is the use of Lord Rome's telescope?' my friend Panwiski exclaimed
the other day. 'It only enables you to see a few hundred thousands of
miles farther. What were thought to be mere nebulae, turn out to be most
perceivable starry systems; and beyond these, you see other nebulae,
which a more powerful glass will show to be stars, again; and so they go
on glittering and winking away into eternity.' With which my friend Pan,
heaving a great sigh, as if confessing his inability to look Infinity in
the face, sank back resigned, and swallowed a large bumper of claret.

I (who, like other great men, have but one idea), thought to myself,
that as the stars are, so are the Snobs:--the more you gaze upon those
luminaries, the more you behold--now nebulously congregated--now faintly
distinguishable--now brightly defined--until they twinkl