For instance, there was the Fourth of July, officially celebrated in London. British Official—not American. The Americans are a patriotic people; but it certainly had not occurred to us, sojourning in Great Britain, to undertake, this year of all years, any ostentatious celebration of the foundation of our national liberties. But John Bull would have none of this false delicacy. “My dear fellow,” he said in effect, “of _course_ you must celebrate the Fourth of July. We know it is one of your greatest national festivals. We will help you. We will put up flags, arrange a demonstration, and devise special features for the day. Let me see—you usually have fireworks, don’t you? Sorry! I’m afraid we can’t quite manage fireworks this year. You see, they might be misconstrued into an air-raid warning. But anything else—bands, processions, baseball? My boy, you shall have them all! What else? Won’t you require pumpkin-pie, or cranberry sauce, or something of that kind? Oh—that’s _Thanksgiving_? I beg your pardon. Stupid of me to mix ’em. Anyway, you must have a jolly good time. We should never forgive ourselves if we didn’t give you a chance to celebrate an occasion like that. I know how _we_ should feel if we had to cut out Christmas, old man!” We forbore to explain that Christmas is also, to a certain extent, a recognized festival in the United States, and merely accepted John Bull’s invitation in the spirit in which it was offered—that is to say, with great heartiness but some vagueness as to the probable course of events. However, everything worked out right on the day. On the Fourth of July, nineteen eighteen, London was turned over to the Americans. In the morning, parties of American soldiers and sailors proceeded to explore the town. They enquired politely of passers-by for the Tower of London; the Old Curiosity Shop; the Houses of Parliament, Westminster Abbey; Buckingham Palace. The passers-by, though cordially disposed, did not always know where these places were. The Londoner takes his national monuments, like the British Constitution and the British Navy, for granted, and is seldom concerned with the Why and Wherefore thereof. However, we succeeded in discovering most of these places for ourselves, and were gratified to observe that Old Glory was amicably sharing a flagpole over the Palace of Westminster with the Union Jack. By high noon most of us had squeezed ourselves into Central Hall, Westminster, where all the Americans in London seemed to be gathered, together with a goodly percentage of the native element. A solid wedge of convalescent soldiers in hospital blue supplied the necessary reminder of the Thing which had brought us together. The speakers included a British ex-Ambassador, venerated on both sides of the Atlantic, a British Cabinet Minister, an American Admiral, and an American General. Altogether, an affair to write home about.