Remonstrance was thus made much more effective.

Whenever I was in a difficulty, or the crowd too obtrusive, I had only to say a few grave sentences in English, and I was master of the situation.

This method of speaking often reminded me of that employed by a Cornish lady of high family whose husband was a colleague of mine in Spain.

She had been many years in Andalusia, but had never succeeded in mastering Spanish.

At a dinner party given by this lady, at which I was present, she thus addressed her Spanish servant, who did not "possess" a single word of English: "Bring me," she said in an angry aside, "bring me the _cuchillo_ with the black-handled heft," adding, as she turned to us and thumped her fist on the table, while the servant stood still mystified, "D---- the language! I wish I had never learnt it." The inn, where the sedan left me, was built over the pathway, which was here a narrow track, two feet six inches wide.