You have no idea how engrossing such a profession may
become--how imbecile, in view of that engrossment, appear the
ways of princes, of republics, of municipalities. A rough bit of
road beneath the motor tyres, a couple of succeeding
"thank'ee-marms" with their quick jolts would be enough to set me
grumbling to Leonora against the Prince or the Grand Duke or the
Free City through whose territory we might be passing. I would
grumble like a stockbroker whose conversations over the
telephone are incommoded by the ringing of bells from a city
church. I would talk about medieval survivals, about the taxes
being surely high enough. The point, by the way, about the
missing of the connections of the Calais boat trains at Brussels was
that the shortest possible sea journey is frequently of great
importance to sufferers from the heart. Now, on the Continent,
there are two special heart cure places, Nauheim and Spa, and to
reach both of these baths from England if in order to ensure a
short sea passage, you come by Calais--you have to make the
connection at Brussels. And the Belgian train never waits by so
much the shade of a second for the one coming from Calais or
from Paris.
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