ways, stamped the city for their own.

No other race carry their individuality with them as they do. They can
live years in a country and assimilate none of its customs; on the
contrary, imposing habits of their own. It is just this that makes them
such wonderful colonizers, and explains why you will find little groups
of English people drinking ale and playing golf in the shade of the
Pyramids or near the frozen slopes of Foosiyama. The real inwardness of
it is that they are a dull race, and, like dull people despise all that
they do not understand. To differ from them is to be in the wrong. They
cannot argue with you; they simply know, and that ends the matter.

I had a discussion recently with a Briton on the pronunciation of a word.
As there is no "Institute," as in France, to settle matters of this kind,
I maintained that we Americans had as much authority for our
pronunciation of this particular word as the English. The answer was
characteristic.

"I know I am right," said my Island friend, "because that is the way I
pronounce it!"

Walking along the principal streets of Cannes to-day, you might imagine
yourself (except for the climate) at Cowes or Brighton, so British are
the shops and the crowd that passes them. Every restaurant advertises
"afternoon tea" and Bass's ale, and every other sign bears a London name.
This little matter of tea is particularly characteristic of the way the
English have imposed a taste of their own on a rebellious nation. Nothing
is further from the French taste than tea-drinking, and yet a Parisian
lady will now invite you gravely to "five o'clocker" with her, although I
can remember when that beverage was abhorred by the French as a medicine;
if you had asked a Frenchman to take a cup of tea, he would have
answered:

"Why? I am not ill!"

Even Paris (that supreme and undisputed arbiter of taste) has submitted
to English influence; tailor-made dresses and low-heeled shoes have
become as "good form" in France as in London. The last two Presidents of
the French Republic have taken the oath of office dressed in frock-coats
instead of the dress clothes to which French officials formerly clung as
to the sacraments.

The municipalities of the little Southern cities were quick to seize
their golden opportunity, and everything was done to detain the rich
English wandering down towards Italy. Millions were spent in
transforming their cramped, dirty, little towns. Wide boule