"I never thought of that bill again till I was forcibly reminded of it in Hamburg as I was about to sail for home. I was haled before the court, and the judge fined me fifty _marks_. Of course I knew I had to pay it, so I handed him the money and told him in good English to take it and go to the hot place with it. I didn't dream that he understood, but he replied in as good English as I gave him: 'Officials of my rank travel first-class. I must therefore have fifty _marks_ more.' That little joke cost me a lot of money. I wouldn't want to live in a country where I couldn't tell anybody I pleased what I felt like telling him." The Herr Director doubted the accuracy of the story because "no German official would show so little dignity." I, too, doubted it; but on the ground that no German official would have so keen a sense of humor. There followed an animated argument between the Nebraskan and the Herr Director as to which is of more importance, the individual or the state. The Nebraskan insisted that the state being the creation of individuals, they are of supreme importance, while the Herr Director persisted in his theory that the state is supreme and that it is the business of the individual to make it dominant and powerful, to which end the state must make him effective. "An ineffective individual is a menace to the state, and a state which cannot impress its will upon the individual and make him submissive and effective will be vanquished in the great competitive struggle constantly going on." "I suppose you're effective enough, but you're as slow as molasses in January." "Oh, yes, we are slow, but we are thorough; we take our time to do a thing well, while your hurry is as wearing as it is useless. When we came down here this evening we were in a hurry. We were rushed to your crowded subway to take a certain train, although the next one would have done as well. In about three minutes we were pushed out of that train into another, because it went faster, and we reached here breathless. We saved time, but for what purpose? To see you eat your lobster and mince pie?" And he looked contemptuously at the Nebraskan. "What are we going to do now with the two or three minutes we saved?" This was a question I could not answer, for I did not know why I had hurried. Perhaps because of the excess of ozone in the air, or possibly because every one else was hurrying. "You see," he continued, "we Germans never make the mistake of confounding hurry with efficiency. We hurry, too, when we must, or when we have a rational purpose. We know that great things cannot be accomplished in a hurry. We lay our foundations not only patiently, but thoroughly and cheerfully. "You work like slaves who are eager to finish the job, as you call it. We cherish towards our job a sentiment of love and loyalty which we call '_Pflichttreue_,' a word for which you have no equivalent, proving of course that you have not the thing itself."