Donaueschingen I am going to walk
to Geisengen; from Geisengen I am going to take the train to Engen, and
from Engen I am going to bicycle to Constance. But I don't want to take
my bag with me; I want to find it at Constance when I get there. I have
been trying to explain the thing to this fool for the last ten minutes;
but I can't get it into him."

"It is very disgraceful," I agreed. "Some of these German workmen know
hardly any other language than their own."

"I have gone over it with him," continued the man, "on the time table,
and explained it by pantomime. Even then I could not knock it into him."

"I can hardly believe you," I again remarked; "you would think the thing
explained itself."

Harris was angry with the man; he wished to reprove him for his folly in
journeying through the outlying portions of a foreign clime, and seeking
in such to accomplish complicated railway tricks without knowing a word
of the language of the country. But I checked the impulsiveness of
Harris, and pointed out to him the great and good work at which the man
was unconsciously assisting.

Shakespeare and Milton may have done their little best to spread
acquaintance with the English tongue among the less favoured inhabitants
of Europe. Newton and Darwin may have rendered their language a
necessity among educated and thoughtful foreigners. Dickens and Ouida
(for your folk who imagine that the literary world is bounded by the
prejudices of New Grub Street, would be surprised and grieved at the
position occupied abroad by this at-home-sneered-at lady) may have helped
still further to popularise it. But the man who has spread the knowledge
of English from Cape St. Vincent to the Ural Mountains is the Englishman
who, unable or unwilling to learn a single word of any language but his
own, travels purse in hand into every corner of the Continent. One may
be shocked at his ignorance, annoyed at his stupidity, angry at his
presumption. But the practical fact remains; he it is that is
anglicising Europe. For him the Swiss peasant tramps through the snow on
winter evenings to attend the English class open in every village. For
him the coachman and the guard, the chambermaid and the laundress, pore
over their English grammars and colloquial phrase books. For him the
foreign shopkeeper and merchant send their sons and daughters in their
thousands to study in every English town. For him it is that every
foreign hotel- and resta