This English steamer crossing the channel to France was a disappointment to me in one way. I had heard for some time past that the old uncomfortable channel boats had been dispensed with and new commodious steamers put in their place. As a matter of fact, these boats were not nearly so large as those that run from New York to Coney Island, nor so commodious, though much cleaner and brighter. If it had rained, as Barfleur anticipated, the cabin below would have been intolerably overcrowded and stuffy. As it was, all the passengers were on the upper deck, sitting in camp chairs and preparing stoically to be sick. It was impossible to conceive that a distance so short, not more than twenty-three or four miles, should be so disagreeable as Barfleur said it was at times. The boat did not pitch to any extent on this trip over. On my return, some three months later, I had a different experience. But now the wind blew fiercely and it was cold. The channel was as gray as a rabbit and offensively bleak. I did not imagine the sea could be so dull-looking, and France, when it appeared in the distance, was equally bleak in appearance. As we drew near Calais it was no better--a shore-line beset with gas tanks and iron foundries. But when we actually reached the dock and I saw a line of sparkling French _facteurs_ looking down on the boat from the platform above--presto! England was gone. Gone all the solemnity and the politeness of the porters who had brought our luggage aboard, gone the quiet civility of ship officers and train-men, gone the solid doughlike quiescence of the whole English race. It seemed to me on the instant as if the sky had changed and instead of the gray misty pathos of English life--albeit sweet and romantic--had come the lively slap-dash of another world. These men who looked down on us with their snappy birdlike eyes were no more like the English than a sparrow is like a great auk. They were black-haired, black-eyed, lean, brown, active. They had on blue aprons and blue jumpers and a kind of military cap. There was a touch of scarlet somewhere, either in their caps or their jackets, I forget which; and somewhere near by I saw a French soldier--his scarlet woolen trousers and lead-blue coat contrasting poorly, so far as _éclat_ goes, with the splendid trimness of the British. Nevertheless he did not look inefficient, but raw and forceful, as one imagines the soldiers of Napoleon should be. The vividness of the coloring made up for much, and I said at once that I would not give France for fifty million Englands. I felt, although I did not speak the language, as though I had returned to America.