At meals we all sat at a long table, during which some of our fellow guests took the opportunity of airing their English – such as it was – by way of putting my mother a little at her ease.  They also made all sorts of helpful suggestions; Frau Scott should take her small son to the Opera; she should take him to hear Lohengrin which was to be given a few days hence and was Wagner’s greatest Opera(?); she should also take him to the beautiful Palmengarten, and so on and so forth.  And my mother, who had never heard an opera in her life, did take me to hear Lohengrin – though I think all the time she may have had the uncomfortable feeling that Canon Robson might not altogether have approved.