Just here Koenigin suddenly burst out laughing. "Really," she said, "we go about the world criticising people as if we were King Solomon and the queen of Sheba." "'Die Koenigin von Seba,'" said I. "That, I suppose, is you and our motto should be, 'Wir sind das Volk und die Weisheit stirbt mit uns.'" I was not at all sure of the accuracy of my translation, but its appropriateness was unquestionable. "What do you think of the Englishman, Koenigin?" I asked, giving the fire another poke, not from shamefacedness, but because it really needed it, for the evening was damp and chilly. "I like him," said Koenigin decidedly. Koenigin and I were always prepared with decided opinions, whether we knew anything about the subject in hand or not. "He has a fine head," Koenigin went on, "quite a ducal contour, according to our republican ideas of what a duke ought to be. I like the steady intense light of his eyes under those straight dark brows, and that little frown only increases the effect. Then his laugh is so frank and boyish. Yes, I like him very much." "He has a nice gentlemanly voice," I suggested--"rather on the 'gobble-gobble' order, but that is the fault of his English birth." This is enough of that conversation, for, after all, neither of us is the heroine of this tale. It is well that this should be distinctly understood at the start. Somehow, "the Jook" (as we generally called him, in memory of Jeames Yellowplush) and I became very intimate after that, but it was never anything more than a sort of _camaraderie_. Koenigin knew all about it, and she pronounced it the most remarkable instance of a purely intellectual flirtation which she had ever seen; which was all quite correct, except for the term "flirtation," of which it never had a spice.