The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-05-25

no struggling mob of women about it push
ing and elbowing each other out of the
way, row of hurried and overworked
girls behind the counter shrieking, Cash"
One phlegmatic German girl presided over
it to everybody's satisfaction.
| soon found, as l wandered from one de-
partment to another, that, according to the
American standard of prices, they were
all bargain counters If L had yielded to
my inclination to buy everything l saw
that was cheap l should soon become bank
rupt; the prices of everything were so
tonishingly low.
The largest department store in Berlin is
managed by an American, and we'll man
aged it is. A man who spoke English was
placed al my disposal and accompanied
me from counter to counter. making things
easy for me and still easier for the sales
woman. l patronized the American soda
fountain" like a true patriot and blessed
the manager for it. The girl behind the
counter spoke to me in the most volubie
English before 1 had a chance to open my
mouth l got along swimmingly in this shop
till 1 to the shirtwaist counter. Now,
l did not need a shirtwaist, but what wom-
an can resist them when they are pretty
band / wore. Just as l was about to say
thirteen and one-half inches 1 remem-
bered that l was in the land Of metres and
centimetres. The saleswoman looked at
me expectantly, while l mentally struggled
with the problem IF two and three-fifths
centimenters make one inch, how many
centimetres are there in my thirteen-and-
a-half-inch collar band?' 1 gave it up and
so did the woman She guessed at my size
and sold me two waists When 1 tried
them on ] found they would not come
around me, although the neck was entirely
too large. Then 1 realized that mine was
the American, and not the German figure.
In the smaller shops found very few per-
sons who spoke English 1 am too loyal
to my own tongue to try any other, except
in an emergency. do you speak Eng
lish?' was my first question in every shop.
Sometimes it was met by hopeless shake
of the head and an apologize smile, Oft
ener 1 was treated to the sight of pair of
flying heels as one clerk went in search of
another who spoke English "a leetle." And
"a leetle' 1 always found it. 1t usually
ended in my helping out from my small
store of German. This was sure TO be
fatal. for as soon as they found I knew a
little German they gave up trying TO speak
English. They had an eXasperating way
of saying the same thing over and over,
each time more volubly, under the impress
sion that, of course, 1 must speak German
and that was just stupid and did not COM
prehend. When I would shake my head
they would smile in a plying way and be-
gin all over. In the meantime the other
clerks stood around and looked at me as If
/ were something escaped from a menag-
erie. Occasionally they tried to help mat
tiers along by joining in the conversation,
all talking at once. and then there was but
one thing to do, and that was 10 beat re-
treat. 1 remember several years ago L
tried TO make a purchase in a small Ger
man town. Mainz. think IL was. l knew
no German then. The proprietor OF the
shop had a smattering only of both French
and English He brought his entire family
10 his aid. l finally made my purchase.
but IT took FIVE people and three languages
to accomplish il.
They have an amusing way of adapting
English words TO their own uses and TAX
ing all sorts OF liberties with the spelling.