A pair of large tortoise-shell spectacles straddled a big beak-like nose, and he wore a heavyish blond moustache with its points trained upwards and outwards rather after the fashion made famous in the Fatherland by William Hohenzollern. In his ill-cut suit of cheap-looking serge, which he wore with a pea-green toe. Robin thought he looked altogether a typical specimen of the German of the non-commissioned office class.
Valentine Williams describes this character in The Yellow Streak, a mystery novel from 1922. Although many people tend to think of fashion as something for women, this description makes clear not only the fashion in clothing but in facial hair which rules men’s appearance. It’s not like groups men all ended up looking alike by accident.
The William Hohenzollern here is Wilhelm II, the last German Emperor who abdicated at the end of World War I in 1918. Wikipedia has a portrait which shows off the mustache style here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wilhelm_II,_German_Emperor
Robin is our hero, an Englishman, who shares Williams’ own contempt for most things German, including this character who is not very helpful at first.
