GERMAN TRAVEL NOTES "TAKIN' NOTES" He who knows his Rhine and loves it must take of its charms in small doses, or satiety is the outcome. There are those, of course, who can travel from Dan to Beersheba and cry, "'Tis all barren"; but the ordinarily intelligent traveller may find much to delight and interest on the banks of the Rhine, always provided that he suits his mood to his environment, and takes but little of Rhine scenery at a time. For surely between Coblentz and Bingen there is an iteration as regards castles and ruins which is downright wearisome. Do we not between these points find Lahneck, Marksburg, Sterrenberg, Liebenstein, The Mouse, Rheinfels, The Cat, Schoenburg, Gutenfels, The Pfalz, Stahleck, Furstenberg, Hohneck, Sooneck, Falkenburg, Rheinstein, and Ehrenfels? Moreover, there is an affinity of form and colour and, indeed, of situation between all these which produces the effect of perpetual repetition. And we owe Byron a grudge for having written such trite words as "the castled crag" in relation to the Rhine, since no commonplace mind of the present day acquainted with his works but has fallen back on "the castled crag" to describe Drachenfels or Marksburg or Rheinfels, because, forsooth, its own English is too limited to supply a better adjective. So it is that conventional and inadequate English is perpetuated and individual force and expression are lost because people accept the ideas of others and will not seek language to convey their own. All of which above prosing is the result of a day on the Rhine when the thermometer registered 74 deg. to 84 deg. in the shade, and a white vapour hid the banks of the river from Koeln till close on Bonn. At Bonn a huge party of "personally-conducted" American tourists came on board. Their sharp, keen, eager, shrewd faces and shrill voices proclaimed their nationality at the outset. They were all obviously outside the pale of Society, and their thirst for information and keen interest in their surroundings were amazing. One learned before long that they had "done" the Paris Exhibition and meant to have a "look in" at most European countries before sailing from Naples. They took the whole ship into their confidence before a quarter of an hour had passed; and we shared alike in thrilling intelligences conveyed through the medium of Baedeker's pages. "The castled crag" resounded from one end of the boat to the other; and as for Roland and Hildegunde, the tragedy of their lives was discussed, and exclaimed over, and lamented, until, happily, a bend of the river hid Nonnenwerth from sight.