So we were all told to put our things together and get ready to land.  I got, out of one of our boxes, an old frock coat for Uncle William.  It is frayed at the ends of the sleeves and it shines a little, but I had stitched it here and there and it looked quite nice.  He put it on with a pair of gray trousers that are quite good, and not very much bagged, and I had knitted for him a red necktie that he wears over his blue shirt with a collar, called a celluloid collar, that American gentlemen wear.

The sea is so calm that Uncle doesn’t mind being on deck now, and he even came close to the bulwarks, which he wouldn’t do all the way across.  He stood there in quite an attitude with his imperfect hand folded into his coat.  He looked something, but not quite, as he used to look on the deck of the Meteor in the Baltic.

Presently he said, “Henry, your arm!” and walked up and down with Uncle Henry.  I could see that the other passengers were quite impressed with the way Uncle looked, and it pleased him.  I heard some rough young loafers saying, “Catch on to the old Dutch, will you?  Eh, what?”

Uncle Henry is going ashore just as he is, in his blue jersey.  But Cousin Ferdinand has put on a bright red tie that Mr. Mosenhammer has loaned to him for three hours.

Cousin Willie only came on deck at the very last minute, and he seemed anxious to slink behind the other passengers and to keep out of sight.  I think it must have something to do with the brooch that he showed me, and the rings.  His eyes looked very red and bloodshot and his face more crooked and furtive than ever.  I am sure that he had been drinking again.

I have written the last lines of this diary sitting on the deck.  We have just passed a huge statue that rises out of the water, the name of which they mentioned but I can’t remember, as it was not anything I ever heard of before.

Just think—­in a little while we shall land in America!

CHAPTER II

City New York. 2nd Avenue

We came off the steamer late yesterday afternoon and came across the city to a pension on Second Avenue where we are now.  Only here they don’t call it a pension but a boarding house.  Cousin Ferdinand and Cousin Willie drove across in the cart with our boxes, and Uncle William and Uncle Henry and I came on a street car.  It cost us fifteen cents.  A cent is four and one-sixth pfennigs.  We tried to reckon what it came to, but we couldn’t; but Uncle Henry thinks it could be done.

This house is a tall house in a mean street, crowded and noisy with carts and street-sellers.  I think it would be better to have all the boarding houses stand far back from the street with elm trees and fountains and lawns where peacocks could walk up and down.  I am sure it would be much better.

We have taken a room for Uncle William and Uncle Henry on the third floor at the back and a small room in the front for me of the kind called a hall bedroom, which I don’t ever remember seeing before.  There were none at Sans Souci and none, I think, at any of the palaces.  Cousin Willie has a room at the top of the house, and Cousin Ferdinand in the basement.