Around the World in Seventy-Two Days | Page 9

freed us.
"Declare your tobacco and tea or tip the man," I said teazingly to a
passenger who stood with poor, thin, shaking "Homie" under one arm,
searching frantically through his pockets for his keys.
"I've fixed him!" he answered with an expressive wink.
Passing through the custom house we were made happy by the
information that it had been decided to attach a passenger coach to the
special mail train to oblige the passengers who wished to go to London
without delay. The train was made up then, so we concluded to get into
our car and try to warm up.
A porter took my bag and another man in uniform drew forth an
enormous key with which he unlocked the door in the side of the car
instead of the end, as in America. I managed to compass the
uncomfortable long step to the door and striking my toe against some
projection in the floor, went most ungracefully and unceremoniously on
to the seat.
My escort after giving some order to the porter went out to see about
my ticket, so I took a survey of an English railway compartment. The
little square in which I sat looked like a hotel omnibus and was about as
comfortable. The two red leather seats in it run across the car, one
backing the engine, the other backing the rear of the train. There was a
door on either side and one could hardly have told that there was a
dingy lamp there to cast a light on the scene had not the odor from it
been so loud. I carefully lifted the rug that covered the thing I had
fallen over, curious to see what could be so necessary to an English
railway carriage as to occupy such a prominent position. I found a
harmless object that looked like a bar of iron and had just dropped the
rug in place when the door opened and the porter, catching the iron at
one end, pulled it out, replacing it with another like it in shape and size.
"Put your feet on the foot warmer and get warm, Miss," he said, and I

mechanically did as he advised.
My escort returned soon after, followed by a porter who carried a large
basket which he put in our carriage. The guard came afterwards and
took our tickets. Pasting a slip of paper on the window, which
backwards looked like "etavirP," he went out and locked the door.
"How should we get out if the train ran the track?" I asked, not half
liking the idea of being locked in a box like an animal in a freight train.
"Trains never run off the track in England," was the quiet, satisfied
answer.
"Too slow for that," I said teasingly, which only provoked a gentle
inquiry as to whether I wanted anything to eat.
With a newspaper spread over our laps for a table-cloth, we brought out
what the basket contained and put in our time eating and chatting about
my journey until the train reached London.
As no train was expected at that hour, Waterloo Station was almost
deserted. It was some little time after we stopped before the guard
unlocked the door of our compartment and released us. Our few
fellow-passengers were just about starting off in shabby cabs when we
alighted. Once again we called goodbye and good wishes to each other,
and then I found myself in a four-wheeled cab, facing a young
Englishman who had come to meet us and who was glibly telling us the
latest news.
I don't know at what hour we arrived, but my companions told me that
it was daylight. I should not have known it. A gray, misty fog hung like
a ghostly pall over the city. I always liked fog, it lends such a soft,
beautifying light to things that otherwise in the broad glare of day
would be rude and commonplace.
"How are these streets compared with those of New York?" was the
first question that broke the silence after our leaving the station.

"They are not bad," I said with a patronizing air, thinking shamefacedly
of the dreadful streets of New York, although determined to hear no
word against them.
Westminster Abbey and the Houses of Parliament were pointed out to
me, and the Thames, across which we drove. I felt that I was taking
what might be called a bird's-eye view of London. A great many
foreigners have taken views in the same rapid way of America, and
afterwards gone home and written books about America, Americans,
and Americanisms.
We drove first to the London office of the New York World. After
receiving the cables that were waiting for my arrival, I started for the
American Legation to get a passport