Having exhausted England the young discoverer travelled to Paris and thence to Florence.  There are believed to be a few art galleries in Florence and some monuments of historical interest.  But about these Lochinvar did not disturb his head greatly.  Instead he discovered a cook—­“I paid the fellow twenty-four Pauls a day”—­whose manner of roasting a turkey was most extraordinary.  He cultivated the English doctor of the city and through him procured invitations to the balls given by the Grand Duke of Tuscany.  The King of Bavaria attended one of these balls, and something very terrible happened.  It was lese-majeste in its most virulent form.

The offender was an American girl who committed the crime while being whirled about in McAllister’s arms.  “I did it!  I was determined to do it!  As I passed the King I dug him in in the ribs with my elbow.  Now I am satisfied.”  “I soon disposed of the young woman,” recorded her partner of the dance, “and never ‘attempted her’ again.”

There were other eccentric Americans at large in Europe in those days besides the fair belle of Stonington.  One of them, in Rome, wore a decoration that excited the curiosity of his host, the Austrian Minister.  His Excellency finally found the opportunity to refer to it questioningly.  “Sir!” said the American, drawing himself up.  “My country is a Republic.  If it had been a Monarchy, I would have been the Duke of Pennsylvania.  The order I wear is that of the Cincinnati.”  The Minister, deeply impressed, withdrew.  In Rome McAllister found that the American Minister was in the habit of inviting Italians to meet Italians, and Americans to meet Americans.  When asked the reason, he replied:  “I have the greatest admiration for my countrymen:  they are enterprising, money-getting, in fact, a wonderful nation, but there is not a gentleman among them.”

In reading the blasting comment I am moved to wonder what manner of man the Minister was who took no shame in giving expression to such an opinion of his brethren of the western world.  “And then,” Thackeray might have written, “I sink another shaft, and come upon another rich vein of Snob-ore.  The Diplomatic Snob, etc.”  Yesterday Americans travelling in other lands had every reason to resent a type of representative that had been sent abroad to uphold the honour and dignity of our flag; the uncouth manners, the shirt sleeves, the narrow intolerance, that told all too plainly the story of party reward.  Yet, somehow, I rather prefer that man, unpleasant as he was, and humiliating to patriotic pride as he was, to the dandy and ingrate of whom Mr. McAllister told.  I like to think that, however Europeans may have laughed and wondered at the yokel out of place, for the sycophant denying his compatriots was reserved the bitterest of their contempt.