The other two were English, not knowing one word of any
language but their own. I had a long talk with these two
Englishmen, and asked them whether they were familiar with the
varying monetary standards of the countries they were going to
visit; for the nominal dollar represents a widely different value
in each South American State. No, they knew nothing whatever about
this, and were quite ignorant of Spanish-American weights and
measures. Now what possible object did the firms sending out these
ill-equipped representatives hope to attain? Could they in their
wildest moments have supposed that they would get one single order
through their agency? And how came it about that these young men
were so ignorant of the language and customs of the countries they
were proposing to travel? During the voyage I noticed the German
travellers constantly conversing with South Americans from the
Pacific Coast, in an endeavour to improve their working knowledge
of Spanish; meanwhile the young Englishmen played deck-quoits and
talked English. That in itself is quite sufficiently
characteristic.
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