Once a party which included a Californiac were taking an evening stroll. Presently a huge full moon cut loose from the horizon and began a tour of the sky. Admiring comments were made. "I suppose you have them bigger in California," a young woman observed slyly to the Californiac. He did not smile; he only looked serious. Again, a Californiac mentioned to me that he had married an eastern woman. "Any eastern woman who marries a Californian," I observed in the spirit of badinage, "really takes a very great risk. Her husband must always be comparing her with the beautiful women of his native state." "Yes," he answered, "I've often said to my wife, 'Lucy, you're a very pretty woman, but you ought to see some of our San Francisco girls.'" "I hope," I replied, "that she boxed your ears." He did not smile; he only looked pained. Once only have I seen the Californiac silenced. A dinner party which included a globe-trotter, were listening to a victim of an advanced stage of Californoia. He had just disposed of the East, South and Middle West with a few caustic phrases and had started on his favorite subject. "You are certainly a wonderful people," the globe-trotter said, when he had finished. "Every large city in Europe has a colony of Californians, all rooting for California as hard as they can, and all living as far away as they can possibly get." Myself, Californoia did not bother me for a long time after I first went to California. I am not only accustomed to an offensive insular patriotism on the part of my countrymen, but, in addition, all my life I have had to apologize to them for being a New Englander. The statement that I was brought up in Boston always produces a sad silence in my listeners, and a long look of pity. Soft-hearted strangers do their best to conceal their tears, but they rarely succeed. I have reached the point now, however, where I no longer apologize for being a Bostonian; I proffer no explanations. I make the damaging admission the instant I meet people and leave the matter of further recognition to them. If they choose to consider that Boston bringing-up a social bar sinister, so be it. I have discovered recently that the fact that I happened to be born in Rio Janeiro offers some amelioration. But nothing can entirely remove the handicap. So, I reiterate, indurated as I am to pity, the contemptuous attitude of the average Californiac did not at first annoy me. But after a while even I, calloused New Englander that I am, began to resent it. This, for instance, may happen to you at any time in California--it is the Californiac's way of paying the greatest tribute he knows: "Do you know," somebody says, "I should never guess that you were an Eastener. You're quite like one of us--cordial and simple and natural." "But-but," you say, trying to collect your wits against this left-handed compliment, "I don't think I differ from the average Easterner."