Walther was too happy to argue. He shoved the manual into one of pockets. "If I may suggest, Sir," said the customs officer, his eyes widening as he looked over Walther's letters of credit, "You will find the Hotel Altair most comfortable. It's where all important visitors in Uniport stay." The next few moments went by so quickly they left Walther a little dazed. A servo-robot took his bags and led him to a monorail car, which whisked him off to the hotel. "Gdegr," said the doorman, another servo-robot, in a brilliant scarlet uniform. Its wax-like features were set in a perpetual smile. Walther blinked. "I'm sorry," he began. "I--" "Thayr," said the majestic robot, taking Walther's handtooled overnight bag and motioning imperiously for two bellhop robots to bring the rest of the luggage. Silent and smiling, they leaped to obey. The desk clerk was a human, and greeted Walther with an efficient: "Wemtalr." He offered Walther a pen and a registration card on which appeared some undecipherable combination of letters. Walther began to have a sense of unreality about the whole thing, as if he were still day-dreaming in the Venus warp. "Really," he said, "I seem to be quite confused--" With a smile of sudden comprehension, the clerk produced a Manual and thumbed rapidly through its pages. He pointed to a phrase with the tip of his pen, and Walther read: What price room do you desire? Opposite these words was the phonetic jumble: Whprumuirer? Walther shrugged to indicate that price was not important, but his thoughts were spinning. And they were still spinning when the robot bellhop left him alone in his suite. The possibility of a language barrier on Earth was something he had never considered. With only six months planned for his visit, it would be impossible to learn a new language and still do all he had dreamed of doing. But the Von Koenigsburgs were noted for their stubbornness. Walther's chin set, and he opened the Manual to learn what this was all about. He promptly realized that this was a Manual only for the most elementary needs of conversation, and that a great amount of study would be necessary for normal discourse. The first section of the Manual devoted a short chapter to each of the basic languages of Earth. Turning from one to another, Walther discovered that an extreme degree of condensation had taken place in all languages. It was as though a form of speedwriting and shorthand had been vocalized. But why? What did it mean? Walther found a partial explanation in the Orientation section which began: "Be brief!" "Soyez bref!" "Mach' es kurz!" "Sea breze!" In a score of languages, first-time visitors were admonished that an understanding of these two words was essential to getting maximum enjoyment out of their stay on Earth.