In Colmar at the Hotel of the "Two Keys" we find as much English spoken as German, and have cabbage, boiled mutton, and carrots for luncheon. Many German officers enter and, pausing at the dining-room door, take out pocket combs and carefully arrange their hair. I noticed a change in the highway, the moment we entered the Empire, and only trust it will not hold throughout. The excellent road-beds, well rolled and oiled to prevent dust, vanished, and we jolted on over an ordinary pike, dirty and rough, until it was agreeable to stop at Colmar. All this was before luncheon. Now that the meal has placed me more at peace with the world, my point of view is different and I am forced to retract at once. The road from Colmar to Freiburg is an excellent one, well marked, and well kept up. We make quick time, crossing the Rhine at Breisach, and then on through its wide green valley until we reach Freiburg, nestling under the hills which form a lovely background for the stately red stone spire of the great Cathedral. CHAPTER XXXI FREIBURG--FANTASTIC CITY--THE YOUTHS OF GERMANY--MUSIC AND LEGENDS OF THE OLD TOWN--CATHEDRAL BY MOONLIGHT I cannot overcome the feeling in strolling through these old German towns that I am on the stage of a theatre. Painted houses never look solid or ancient and especially when they are fantastic in decoration and brilliant in colour and are kept up. This city certainly is ancient but it is too well scrubbed and done up to be pleasing. Even the very superb cathedral is subject to the same objection. All the images inside and out glow with colour, and all the monuments likewise, and when compared to a cathedral like Westminster, for instance, or many in France, it lacks dignity and for that very reason. If you can banish from your thoughts all this and remember only the beautiful lines of the church, then you will appreciate the structure, but you will never enjoy it. [Illustration: THE CATHEDRAL OF FREIBURG, BADEN By permission of F. Firth & Co.] The Cathedral is interesting and very stately, but in its inspection there is no such deep satisfaction, like unto a draught of spring water on a hot day, which one experiences in England and France. After I had wandered around the outside, which must appeal to every one, and through the nave, I approached the choir, to be greeted by the smell of soap and wet rags. Just inside the grating in the south aisle sat half a dozen scrub-women as loudly dirty as only scrub-women know how to be, munching great hunks of bread. I was told that I could not enter the holy of holies without the Sacristan. He was not to be found, but from the glimpse I had beyond, I don't regret it,--the chapels are full of monuments coloured to the last degree of gorgeousness,--saints in red, green, and blue with heads much too large for their bodies--which is generally the case with German statues--stand and lie around in all directions.