phrase, that I have rights and that they
shall be respected. Answer my proper questions; respond to my fair
demands. Do not slide my key at me; do not deny me the poor politeness
of a nod as you give it in my hand. I am not your equal; few men are;
but I shall not presume upon your clemency. Come, I also am human!"

Basil found that, for his sin in asking for a cool room, the clerk
had given them a chamber into which the sun had been shining the whole
afternoon; but when his luggage had been put in it seemed useless to
protest, and like a true American, like you, like me, he shrank from
asserting himself. When the sun went down it would be cool enough; and
they turned their thoughts to supper, not venturing to hope that, as it
proved, the handsome clerk was the sole blemish of the house.

Isabel viewed with innocent surprise the evidences of luxury afforded
by all the appointments of a hotel so far west of Boston, and they both
began to feel that natural ease and superiority which an inn always
inspires in its guests, and which our great hotels, far from impairing,
enhance in flattering degree; in fact, the clerk once forgotten, I
protest, for my own part, I am never more conscious of my merits and
riches in any other place. One has there the romance of being a stranger
and a mystery to every one else, and lives in the alluring possibility
of not being found out a most ordinary person.

They were so late in coming to the supper-room, that they found
themselves alone in it. At the door they had a bow from the head-waiter,
who ran before them and drew out chairs for them at a table, and
signaled waiters to serve them, first laying before them with a gracious
flourish the bill of fare.

A force of servants flocked about them, as if to contest the honor
of ordering their supper; one set upon the table a heaping vase
of strawberries, another flanked it with flagons of cream, a third
accompanied it with Gates of varied flavor and device; a fourth
obsequiously smoothed the table-cloth; a fifth, the youngest of the
five, with folded arms stood by and admired the satisfaction the rest
were giving. When these had been dispatched for steak, for broiled
white-fish of the lakes,--noblest and delicatest of the fish that
swim,--for broiled chicken, for fried potatoes, for mums, for whatever
the lawless fancy, and ravening appetites of the wayfarers could
suggest, this fifth waiter remained to tempt them to further excess, and
vai