uninteresting and diffuse, and was interfering with the railway
time-table. But I finished it in the car: "And the railway! What has
a person of fixed and independent habits to do with railways but
to growl at them? Before I was tempted upon the railway by that
impertinent engineer at Noisy, I got up and sat down when I liked, ate
wholesome food at my own hours, and was contented at home. Confusion
to him who made me the victim of his engineering calculations!
Confusion to Grandstone and his nest of serpents at Épernay! Did they
not introduce me to Fortnoye, who has doubly destroyed my peace? Where
are the conspirators, that I may pulverize them with my maledictions?"

[Illustration: BRUSSELS.]

This question--which Hohenfels called peevish as he buried himself in
his book--was not answered until we had passed Verviers, Chaudfontaine
and Liège. I was aroused from a sulky slumber in the station at
Brussels by Hohenfels, who said, in his musical scolding way, like the
busy wheeze of a clicking music-box, "You may say what you like, with
your left-handed flatteries, in regard to Fortnoye, and you may praise
Ariadnes and widows to the end of the chapter. You are sorry at
this moment not to be at Épernay to see the destroyer of your peace
married: you had rather assist at the making of a wife than at the
making of a widow."

I was just sending Fortnoye to the gloomiest shades of Acheron when a
strong hand entered the carriage-door, helped me handsomely down the
steps, and then began warmly to shake my own. Fortnoye!--Fortnoye
in flesh and blood was before me. While my mouth was yet filled with
maledictions he began to pour out a storm of thanks with all his own
particular warmth, expressing the most effusive gratitude for the