ife when they were
fairly out-of-doors, "if Prussia rose in the strength of silence, as
Carlyle wants us to believe, she is taking it out in talk now, and tall
talk."

"Yes, isn't she!" Mrs. March assented, and with a passionate desire for
excess in a bad thing, which we all know at times, she looked eagerly
about her for proofs of that odious militarism of the empire, which ought
to have been conspicuous in the imperial capital; but possibly because
the troops were nearly all away at the manoeuvres, there were hardly more
in the streets than she had sometimes seen in Washington. Again the
German officers signally failed to offer her any rudeness when she met
them on the side-walks. There were scarcely any of them, and perhaps that
might have been the reason why they were not more aggressive; but a whole
company of soldiers marching carelessly up to the palace from the
Brandenburg gate, without music, or so much style as our own militia
often puts on, regarded her with inoffensive eyes so far as they looked
at her. She declared that personally there was nothing against the
Prussians; even when in uniform they were kindly and modest-looking men;
it was when they got up on pedestals, in bronze or marble, that they,
began to bully and to brag.

LXIV.

The dinner which the Marches got at a restaurant on Unter den Linden
almost redeemed the avenue from the disgrace it had fallen into with
them. It was, the best meal they had yet eaten in Europe, and as to fact
and form was a sort of compromise between a French dinner and an English
dinner which they did not hesitate to pronounce Prussian. The waiter who
served it was a friendly spirit, very sensible of their intelligent
appreciation of the dinner; and from him they formed a more respectful
opinion of Berlin civilization than they had yet held. After the manner
of strangers everywhere they judged the country they were visiting from
such of its inhabitants as chance brought them in contact with; and it
would really be a good thing for nations that wish to stand well with the
world at large to look carefully to the behavior of its cabmen and car
conductors, its hotel clerks and waiters, its theatre-ticket sellers and
ushers, its policemen and sacristans, its landlords and salesmen; for by
these rather than by its society women and its statesmen and divines, is
it really judged in the books of travellers; some attention also should
be paid to the weather, if the climate