* * * * * The first great stumbling–block in the way of going abroad is to many, especially elderly persons, the want of knowledge of the language of the country to which they wish to direct their steps, or the want of power to converse in it freely. There can be no doubt that it is of great consequence to have an acquaintance with the language of the country in which one desires to travel or reside for a time. People are saved much inconvenience and often money when they can talk it with fluency, and can comprehend what the natives say—usually the more difficult operation. At the same time, in all frequented parts of France, Italy, and Switzerland, either English or French will carry any one through. French is spoken by nearly every educated person who travels on the Continent, with perhaps the exception of the Germans, who, though they may know a little French, seem to give a preference to the acquisition of the English language, in which frequently they converse with great purity and ease. At the hotels, the landlord, or one of the waiters, sometimes all of them, can speak English more or less perfectly. Nay, what is very surprising is, that the man sometimes called _portier_, who sits in a little chamber at the door, has often a better acquaintance with English than even landlord or waiter. This porter or, as he is more correctly designated, _concierge_, is attached to all large hotels, and his ostensible duty is not that of carrying luggage (for which business there are men of a different stamp under him), but consists in keeping the keys of the rooms, attending to letters, and answering inquiries. In reality he is a man of superior intelligence, and acts often as the interpreter of the house; for he is generally acquainted with many languages, and usually with at least French, English, and German, and has to reply to questions in these different languages almost in the same breath. In frontier places, his acquaintance is extended to the language of the neighbouring country—it may be, for instance, Italian or Spanish. However, among employees and others with whom the traveller has to do, the knowledge of many languages is not confined to the _gens portier_. At Mentone I was informed that a hairdresser there could speak five languages; and how else could he hope, from a hairdresser’s point of view, to please his patients? At Rome, having gone to the wrong shop, I had to experience the difficulties of undergoing an operation by a gentleman of the fraternity who could speak nothing but Italian; and we should never have succeeded in coming to a mutual understanding, but for the kindly intervention of a priest who was being shaved and could speak French, and after all it did not wholly save me from that ‘croppiness’ in which the foreign _coiffeur_ delights. This linguistic faculty does not stop at hairdressers, who may be considered to be men of an advanced race. At Mentone we