The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1901-03-05


His Manners and Habits ns Far ns
They Possibly CouId-identity rs
tnbIished by IA whistIed Tune.
The first time 1 saw him he was walk
ing calmly and collectedly down the COR
geously gloomy dining-room of the Hotel
Continental. Like all great men, il not
supremacy unconscious of the immediate
world about him, he was at least delight
fully indifferent to it. He took the ar
on the pier alone, l noticed; he lunched
in silence, and in solitude he dined. let
from the moment he first stalked past me
with his gaze of gentle abstraction, la
beling him aristocrat as a Swiss hotel
labels your trunks, appropriated him. as
a personality, unto myself. l felt that he
was mine by right of discovery, and life
in that dull old German hotel took on
meaning and a purpose.
He was certainly a strengthening man.
When you described him as tall and dark
with clear-cut features, you merely de-
scribed the frame and not the picture.
After all / suppose it was that intangible,
that inscrutable thing called personality.
There was a retcent righteousness about
the shoulders that made even the big
blonde German officers who strolled over
from the fortress to smoke their 10
pfennig cigars on the hotel piazza stand
aside to let him pass. There was touch
OF command in the firm mouth and chin.
The dark shadows under his eyes, too,
said that he had had his day somewhere
or other. Just what that day hal been,
just what hand had penciled those inter-
esting shadows under the eyes. felt 1t my
duty to ascertain.
Over and above all this, he smoked good
cigars, dark perfectos of most haunting
bouquet And the man who smokes good
cigars in Germany is certainly somebody.
But he was such reticent, wordless
fellow | almost gave up in despair L had
been three weeks at the big hotel before
/ heard him utter syllable. Then l ac-
tually jumped with astonishment. He had
snoken English. 1t may be, l thought, that
he is royalty incognito; perhaps real
Prince Florzel. What was more, had
on several occasions seen the kellner hand
ing him impressive-loolingle tters-letters
with great flowing crests and seals.
So still 1 waited and fingered and
watched. but no chance came. The great
Hotel Continental grew deserted. the last
little group of Parisians had futtered
back like sparrows to their alluring Paris
and the cold autumn evenings had criven
the tall young Princess Won Koelenhausen
back to her obscure little principally in
the far south of the Empire. And that
had been a sign for every self-respecting
Teuton frau TO gather up her big trunks
and her big daughters and DEPART at cnce
After that only the bristling mustached
German officers. with their padded shout
ders and clinking swords strUtted over
from the fortress and sat Oh the big
piazza and smoked their 10-pfeunig CT
CARS in silence.
1 had to acknowledge my utter defeat.
Ny enigma was still an enigma. One the
next day the Victoria Augusta sailed for
New York | telegraphed to CuXhaven
for a stateroom. That day l could eat
nothing for dinner. All evening the hotel
seemed like great, solemn graveyard.
with empty white tables for tombstc mes
l slipped on my ulster at dusk and made
my escape from the tombstones and the
silent officers and the 10-pfennig cigar.
Buttoning up well against the Denmark
wind that came sweeping down the coast,
/ walked to the narrow old pier leading to
that lonely point of sand which runs out
into the North Sea just south of the Elbe.
Out at her anchorage l could see the
Victoria Augusta swinging round with the
tide. The keen, chilly autumn wind blew
in across the grey North Sea. The sun
was down. and the tumbling waters grew
dark in the cold twilight. In some strange
way it made one homesick.
Suddenly / stopped short and shifted
the codl sea air 1t was he!
/ could scent his fragrant Havana blown
in on the sea breeze. Those cigars cost
at least three marks apiece, and were
never bought in Germany Then he too,
had been watching the sun go down over
the great, wide restless North Sea. With
assumed nonchalance l sountered care
lessly around the little lighthouse.
There he stood. leaning out over the
railing, gazing over the tumbling waters
into the west l stood half a dozen PAGES
from him. and waited hopefully. Still he
did not speak.
Then ! whistled, for had to do some
thing to break that uncomfortable silence.
So l whistled After the Ball" as that
was the only thing ] ever could whistle.
With a sudden, quick movement he looked
at me-. He smiled.
do you know" he said. 81 heard a
travelling Hungarian band play that toon'
Il could have sworn he said toon-''last
summer down in Lippe-Detmold." L felt
like Cortez before the Pacific.
Yes" l stammered Tit is wonder
full how it had travelled l found May
gar hand playing it last June away up in
a Slovack hamlet in the heart Of the Car
pathiansi"
oh" he cried delightedly, then you
know Vienna" He gazed reniniscently
out over the grey North Sea. Il love
Yes. very much / answered, exasper-
ated Then came another silence. | could
hold in no longer. Growing reckless with
sheer impatience l said: Il know lists
an impertinence on my part. but won't
you tell me about it?"
'Eh? About what?" said the stranger,
with surprise.
why, all about it-yonr story, you
know"
Still he did not answer. He was max
ing Il very hard for me.
.You MAJ think 1t extraordinary and
quite objectionable" I blurted out, but
II you understood TIE circumstances, you
Won't you tell me who you are?'
me, Oh, I've just brought over cou-
pie Of brood mares for what-his- name,
the-er-the Prince of Swillenhauser. I'm
a horse breeder. you know. from Lexing-
ton. KY
''Kentuckyr' / said, and my own voice
sounded strange to me.
"Yep," said the stranger. Have a CT
gar won't you?''-Arthur Stringer in the
New York Commercial Advertiser.
The Snob Rampant.
(From the Free Lancet
At a well-known club in st. James-in