Dutch Cigar & Sharpers

"Americana are upe to think that they beloug to the only enterprising nation in tho world," said a New Yorker lately returned -from Europe to a New York Sun man, "but I had a little experience in Kolland recently which showed me that business is business all the world over. I was walking through one of the principal squares of Rotterdam smoking a cigar, when I was approached by a well-dressed, middleaged man, who had an unlighted cigar in his hand. He stopped me, and in good English asked me for a light. I gave him a Jight, and was about passing on when he said: 'I see that you are smoking a Dutch cigar. Would you mind telling me where you bought it, and what you paid for it?' Though somewhat surprised at the request, I tüld him I had bought it in a large shop in Hoog straat, and that I had paid 10 cents (ábout 3 cents American money) for it. 'The reason I asked, he said, 'is that they do not deal honestly with foreigners here. You should have got a better cigar for that money. If you wish I can show you the place where I get my cigars, and where you can get twice as good a cigar for the same price as the one you are smoking.' As I had intended to lay in a supply of cigars for a few days at least, and as I had nothing else to do, I agreed to go with him. "He led the way through quaint and crooked streets and over many canals to a tiny tobáceo shop in a narrow, out-of-the-way street. We entered the shop, and my new found friend had a brief conversation in Dutch with the woman behind the counter, which rësulted in the production of a box of cigars from a shelf near by. Taking ray cigar gently out of my hand my mentor snifTed at it, and then with a sudden gest-re of disgust threw it out of the doors. He then took a cigar from the box and offered it to me to try, saying that it would not cost me anything. While I was smoking this in a tentative way he had another conversation with sation in Dutch with the shopkeeper, and then, having apparently arrived at some compromise, he told me, with a glad light in his eyes, that she had agreed to let him have the whole boxof flfty for 4 guilders (about $1.60), and seemed very much pkined when I told him I did not care for so many, as I had to pass the English custom house in a day or two. I finally bought half the box and departed.