(_By our Blasé Contributor_)
That I missed so many chances of doing something more or less novel on
the continent.
That I did not try a cup of coffee on Dover Pier _before_ starting for
Calais.
That I avoided the smoke-room when the steamboat passed through a
choppy sea mid-Channel.
That I did not "declare" something to the _douane_, to see what would
come of it.
That I did not stay a day at St. Pol, and then take the slow train to
Boulogne, stopping an hour or so at each of the interim stations.
That I did not go to a third-rate hotel on the wrong side of the Seine
to find out what it was like.
That I didn't do the Bois de Boulogne in a fog.
That I left Paris without seeing Père-la-Chaise in a Scotch mist.
That I did not ride a horse in Venice.
That I neglected to spend a couple of days in the Catacombs in Rome.
That I refused to picnic on the top of the Tower of Pisa under an
umbrella.
That I neglected to return to Marseilles by a cargo-boat.
That I followed no system at Monte Carlo.
That I went out in summer clothing at Nice.
That I took the train up the Rhine instead of one of the lumbering
steam-boats.
That I overslept myself at the summit of the Rigi, instead of catching
cold under a blanket.
That I followed the system of Mark Tapley without attempting
cheerfulness.
Finally, that when I was in Japan, I did not save myself further
boredom by personally patronising "the happy despatch."
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