This was the first morning they had tried it, and from some cause or
other it had blown up the kidneys and scalded the cook. He said he hoped
that by the time we returned they would have got more used to it.

We caught the train by the skin of our teeth, as the saying is, and
reflecting upon the events of the morning, as we sat gasping in the
carriage, there passed vividly before my mind the panorama of my Uncle
Podger, as on two hundred and fifty days in the year he would start from
Ealing Common by the nine-thirteen train to Moorgate Street.

From my Uncle Podger's house to the railway station was eight minutes'
walk. What my uncle always said was:

"Allow yourself a quarter of an hour, and take it easily."

What he always did was to start five minutes before the time and run. I
do not know why, but this was the custom of the suburb. Many stout City
gentlemen lived at Ealing in those days--I believe some live there
still--and caught early trains to Town. They all started late; they all
carried a black bag and a newspaper in one hand, and an umbrella in the
other; and for the last quarter of a mile to the station, wet or fine,
they all ran.

Folks with nothing else to do, nursemaids chiefly and errand boys, with
now and then a perambulating costermonger added, would gather on the
common of a fine morning to watch them pass, and cheer the most
deserving. It was not a showy spectacle. They did not run well, they
did not even run fast; but they were earnest, and they did their best.
The exhibition appealed less to one's sense of art than to one's natural
admiration for conscientious effort.