e. She did all her own washing too, and dried it
in the narrow slip of a room her husband and she used for all
purposes. I discovered this by going in to see her when she was ill
one day, and finding rows of wet clothes hung on strings right across
her bed. I made no comment, for nothing that is an outrage of the
first laws of hygiene will surprise you if you have gone here and
there in the byways of Germany. An English girl told me that when she
was recovering from a slight attack of cholera in a Rhenish _Pension_,
they were quite hurt because she refused stewed cranberries. "_Das
schadet nichts, das ist gesund_," they said. I could hear them say it.
Only the summer before a kindly hotel-keeper had brought me a ragout
of _Schweinefleisch_ and vanilla ice under similar circumstances. The
German constitution seems able to survive anything, even roast goose
at night at the age of three.

A _Pension_ in Germany costs from L3 a month upwards. That is to say,
you will get offers of a room and full board for this sum, but I must
admit that I never tried one at so low a rate, and should not expect
it to be comfortable. Rent and food are too dear in the big towns to
make a reasonable profit possible on such terms, unless the household
is managed on starvation lines. To have a comfortable room and
sufficient food, you must pay from L5 to L7 a month, and then if you
choose carefully you will be satisfied. The society is usually
cosmopolitan in these establishments, and the German spoken is a
warning rather than a lesson. It is not really German life that you
see in this way, though the proprietress and her assistants may be
German. In most of the university towns some private families take
"paying guests," and when they are agreeable people this is a
pleasanter way of life than any _Pension_.

Before you have been in Germany a fortnight the police expects to know
all about you. You have to give them your father's Christian and
surname, and tell them how he earned his living, and where he was
born; also your mother's Christian and maiden name, and where she was
born. You must declare your religion, and if you are married give your
husband's Christian and surname; also where he was born, and what he
does for a living. If you happen to do anything yourself, though, you
need not mention it. They do not expect a woman to be anything further
than married or single. But you must say when and where you were last
in Germany, and how oft