stitch in their sides an' beseechin' everyone also to hold hard.
The blind men took a bit longer to get going; but by gosh, sir! once
started they laughed to do your heart good. O Lord, O Lord! I wish
you could ha' see that mild-mannered spokesman. Somebody had fished
out his spectacles for en, and that was all the clothing he stood
in--that, an' a grin. He fairly beamed; an' the more he beamed the
more we rocked, callin' on en to take pity an' stop it.

"Soon as I could catch a bit o' breath, 'Land's End next stop!'
gasped I. 'O, but this _is_ the Land's End! This is what the Land's
End oughter been all the time, an' never was yet. O, for the Lord's
sake,' says I, 'stop beamin', and pick up your concertina an' pitch
us a tune!'

"Well, he did too. He played us 'Home, sweet home' first of all--
'mid pleasure an' palaces--an' the rest o' the young men sat around
en an' started clappin' their hands to the tune; an' then some fool
slipped an arm round my waist. I'm only thankful he didn't kiss me.
Didn't think of it, perhaps; couldn't ha' been that he wasn't
capable. It must ha' been just then your train came along.
An' about twenty minutes later, when we was gettin' our friends back
into their outfits, we heard the search-engine about half a mile
below, whistlin' an' feelin' its way up very cautious towards us.

"They was sun-dried an' jolly as sandhoppers--all their eight
of 'em--as we helped 'em on board an' wished 'em ta-ta!
The search-party couldn' understand at all what had happened--in so
short a time, too--to make us so cordial; an' somehow we didn'
explain--neither we nor the blind men. I reckon the whole business
had been so loonatic we felt it kind of holy. But the pore fellas