I am willing to apologize for that." "Oh, that is different," I said.

I tossed the paper to him.

"You are welcome to the paper." I covertly watched him as he tried to read the French.

By and by he passed the paper back.
"I am not a very good French scholar, and the French are tiresome." "They would not have been if they had had a General who thought more of fighting than of wearing pretty clothes." "Oh, it would not have mattered," confidently.
"Prussia was once humbled by a Frenchman." I was irritating him with a purpose in view.
"Bah!" "The only reason the French were beaten was because they did not think the German race worth troubling about." He laughed pleasantly.

"You Americans have a strange idea of the difference between the German and the Frenchman." This was just what I wanted.
"And who informed you that I was an American ?" He was disconcerted.
"Why," he said, lamely, "it is easily apparent, the difference between the American and the Englishman." Then, as though a bright idea had come to him, "The English never engage in conversation with strangers while traveling.