I see now, as I think of it, that gold day of June, with the rippling Danube under the breeze, and the sunshine glinting on the towers and windows of Bratislava. I see the mists lifting towards midday, and the ebb of humanity from the scorching decks to the _Speisesaal_, where the wide-open windows are only an arm's length over the water. Everywhere, like a seething tropical incense, is the tang of paprika; paprika flavouring the soup: paprika stuffed with rice as an entrée; a slice of paprika with the veal and a wedge with dessert; rust-brown paprika pepper in all the cruets; golden Magyar wine and paprika--polyglot chatter and flashing gold-filled teeth and paprika--Heavens, what a meal--a strident C Major symphony of a meal.... And then the beat of the engines suddenly hushed, and the boat gliding against some wayside landing-place where all the local folk are gathered--red-bloused, yellow-bloused peasant women and a _gendarmerie_ in blue.... Swift and magical interlude--with the brown-skinned men, waist-naked, rowing in the river, and the boatmen half-singing as they haul in the gangway--"_Achtung_--_Achtung_...." Then off again into midstream, chug-chugging under the porcelain blaze of the afternoon.... But at last, with tropic swiftness, the sun sinks low and dusk falls; it is the grey Danube, and then the black Danube, with the forests rolling down to the far edge of it. And the tang of paprika, lulled for a while, is spreading and deepening again, until the boat is almost hushed with it--as if the ghosts of all the lunches and dinners that have ever been served on board have come back to haunt.... It is intolerable and unforgettable, with the waiters slinking round and the bald heads, glistening with sweat, and the clink of glasses, and the lights of Pesth already aglow in the southern sky, and Terry lingering over his coffee and telling me how pitiable it would be to interrupt his friendship with Mizzi by marrying her.... All that comes back to me now, as I write, more clearly than I could ever have believed. VI