All around--the political, diplomatic world of Washington. General Hobson, as he passed through it, greeted by what was now a large acquaintance, found himself driven once more to the inward confession--the grudging confession--as though Providence had not played him fair in extorting it--that American politicians were of a vastly finer stamp than he had expected to find them. The American press was all--he vowed--that fancy had painted it, and more. But, as he looked about him at the members of the President's administration--at this tall, black-haired man, for instance, with the mild and meditative eye, the equal, social or intellectual, of any Foreign Minister that Europe might pit against him, or any diplomat that might be sent to handle him; or this younger man, sparely built, with the sane, handsome face--son of a famous father, modest, amiable, efficient; or this other, of huge bulk and height, the sport of caricature, the hope of a party, smiling already a presidential smile as he passed, observed and beset, through the crowded rooms; or these naval or military men, with their hard serviceable looks, and the curt good manners of their kind:--the General saw as clearly as anybody else, that America need make no excuses whatever for her best men, that she has evolved the leaders she wants, and Europe has nothing to teach them. He could only console himself by the remembrance of a speech, made by a well-known man, at a military function which the General had attended as a guest of honour the day before. There at last was the real thing! The real, Yankee, spread-eagle thing! The General positively hugged the thought of it. "The American soldier," said the speaker, standing among the ambassadors, the naval and military _attaches_, of all the European nations, "is the superior of all other soldiers in three respects--bravery, discipline, intelligence." _Bravery, discipline, intelligence!_ Just those--the merest trifle! The General had found himself chuckling over it in the visions of the night. Tired at last of these various impressions, acting on a mind not quite alert enough to deal with them, the General went in search of his nephew. Roger had been absent all day, and the General had left the hotel before his return. But the uncle was sure that he would sooner or later put in an appearance.