Italian who carried a mandolin and had apparently come to give a
music lesson to her husband. She seemed to be from the Middle West
of America, but I am not disposed to insist upon this point, nor to
make any particular State in the Union blush for her crudities of
speech. She translated immediately everything that she said into
her own tongue, as if the hearer might, between French and English,
possibly understand something.

"Elle nay pars easy--he ain't here," she remarked, oblivious of
gender. "Elle retoorneray ah seas oors et dammi--he'll be back
sure by half-past six. Bone swar, I should say Bony naughty--Good-
night to you, and I won't let him forget to show up to-morrer."

This was neither so ingenious nor so felicitous as the language-
expedient of the man who wished to leave some luggage at a railway
station in Rome, and knowing nothing of any foreign tongue but a
few Latin phrases, mostly of an obituary character, pointed several
times to his effects, saying, "Requiescat in pace," and then,
pointing again to himself, uttered the one pregnant word
"Resurgam." This at any rate had the merit of tickling his own
sense of humour, if it availed nothing with the railway porters,
and if any one remarks that he has read the tale in some ancient
"Farmers' Almanack," I shall only retort that it is still worth
repeating.

My little red book on the "Study of Italian Made Easy for the
Traveller" is always in my pocket, but it is extraordinary how
little use it is to me. The critics need not assert that
individuality is dying out in the human race and that we are all
more or less alike. If we were, we should find our daily practical