fairy-tale concerning the delightful adventures of two children. Bosetti, a stout little German in spite of the Italian ring to her name, played Gretel and Fräulein Tordeck took the part of Hänsel. Both caught the spirit of the piece and sang and acted excellently. The music is fascinating in the extreme, and some of it—the prayer of the two mites in the wood, for example, which brought the tears to my eyes—very beautiful. There is no interruption. The music continues even during the pauses between the three so-called pictures of the opera. At the beginning of the second picture, which is laid in a wood, Gretel sings the loveliest solo, with the strings pizzicato and a flute obligato. Then there is a wonderful scene showing a flight of golden stairs thronged with white-robed angels who go up and down, while the children lie sleeping beneath a tree. If all the operas are produced as finely as this one I shall certainly think Germany the heaven of composers.

Yesterday Fräulein Hartmann, Frau von Waldfel's niece, arrived and proved a most agreeable surprise. Far from being what I had pictured, she is the prettiest creature imaginable, slight, with blue eyes, rosy cheeks, two fascinating dimples which come and go as she talks, and a bewildering profusion of light, fluffy hair which stubbornly refuses to remain in order, but curls about her head like a halo. Her aunt is immensely proud of her, although she treats her like a child. The chief cause of her pride seems to be that her niece is engaged—verlobt, as they say—to a German officer. You know it is considered the thing to marry into the army here, for it gives a woman at once the best social position, consequently all the young lieutenants are run after by diplomatic mammas and ambitious daughters, until I should think they would want to cry "Hold! Enough!" I believe the necessary dowry which the girl's parents pay over on the wedding day is twelve thousand marks, unless the bridegroom can show that he has that amount of money. It is, however, proverbial that the chief possession of a lieutenant are his unpaid bills, hence it seldom occurs that he himself can afford to marry at his own free will.

Fräulein Hartmann, while essentially German in type, has an unusually sweet expression characterized by a curious little droop at the corners of her mouth which puzzles me a bit. I am sure it is not the result of a spoiled nature, for her patience with her aunt's querulousness belies that, but it seems rather the expression which we associate with unhappiness or pain. At any rate she is decidedly the most interesting person in the pension, and I hope to know her better.

Six o'clock.

The day is dying royally, and as I look out across the now brown and barren tree-tops of the Platz, I see a sky which is one blaze of glory. There is always music in the clouds. Have you never heard the tender, inspiring melody in soft, fleecy puffs as they float in a sea of azure—or caught the melancholy strains of 'cello and oboe in lowering gray masses against a background darker still? On an afternoon like this, surely you have thrilled in response to the piercing cry of trumpets, horns, and trombones, in the riotous masses of scarlet, violet, and gold which flood the heaven? It does not last long, this intoxicating draught of color and melody, for, as I watch, the clouds dissolve with the resolution of a chord. I can hear the diminuendo rallentando of the orchestra as the gold dulls, the scarlet fades to rose, the rose to pink. It hovers—this last, long streak—in one delicate flush against the violet sky, while the strings sustain pianissimo the tonic harmony. Then it suddenly dies, and the music with it. The day is done.

III

Munich, November 8.

Behold me recovering this morning from the effects of my first participation in German frivolity. The occasion was the Namens-Tag (name day) of the Baroness.

"You see to-day is mother's saint's day, the one for whom she was named," explained Karl, not very clearly, at dinner.

"Is it the custom to celebrate this instead of the birthday?" I inquired.

Karl looked at me with an expression of pity at my ignorance.

"We always have a fête on both days," he said, "with extra wine and a lot of grand things to eat."

"Yes, indeed," said the Baroness, beaming from her end of the table.

"Yes, indeed," echoed the Baron, beaming back on her and radiating his delight along the line of pensionnaires each side. The eyes of Herr Doktor twinkled as he looked across at me. I met his glance with a half smile. Neither of us meant to be unkind. France and America were merely united in their appreciation of the humorous. Frau von Waldfel raised her eyebrows disagreeably, and looked as though about to start a discussion. To mention food in the presence of that woman is like brandishing a red flag before a bull. Luckily Herr Doktor saw the signs of approaching storm, and with his usual diplomacy turned the trend of conversation, so that an argument was averted for this meal at least.

Is there anything more pitiable than a number of guests, hitherto unknown to one another, endeavoring to appear at ease as they wait the summons to dinner? We had thought to avoid this situation by not appearing till half after seven that evening, the hour set for the supper party. Imagine, then, our feelings, when fifteen minutes, a half hour, three quarters dragged by, and no vestige of life from the dining-room! Everything moves slowly in Germany, and the culinary department is no exception. The Baroness never seemed so much like a beneficent angel as when she opened the dining-room door and invited us to the table. And now a light shone through the clouds, for the stupid Count with whom I had been struggling to converse was whisked away to the other end of the table, and Lieutenant Linder, a young man of about seven and twenty, in the dark blue and scarlet uniform of Bavaria, took the place on my left.

Oh, these officers! They simply own Munich. When they stride along the street, the entire sidewalk is their undisputed possession. How their swords clank, how faultlessly their jackets fit, how their heavenward-pointing mustaches curl! A few of them are really handsome, but if not, it doesn't matter in the slightest. The resplendency of their uniforms would make one forgive almost anything. When I became accustomed to the atmosphere of conceit in which Lieutenant Linder was enveloped, I found him distinctly entertaining, and, better yet, he had a sense of humor. What with his helping me with my German, and my giving him a lesson in English, we managed to get on famously.

The table was profusely decorated with flowers, and there was a great deal to eat and more to drink. The idea in cooking seems to be to produce a color effect. For example, we had as one course well-browned sausage surrounded by a mass of bright red carrots. Next came the eternal veal, reposing in a vivid green sea of spinach. Do your æsthetic sensibilities shrink at these materialistic descriptions? Remember I am in a materialistic land, amid a materialistic people. Truly the problem which continually confronts me is: how can a people who seem so lethargic, and who make no disguise of their love for the product of the soil and the grape, produce such marvellous, almost