ties of common instincts and interests, and the mystic brotherhood of a
common language and a common civilization, that nothing of a serious
nature can ever come between them. But now I am verily among strangers,
and the first thing talked of is to make me pay duty on the bicycle.

The captain of the vessel, into whose hands Mr. C---- assigned me at
Newhaven, protests on my behalf, and I likewise enter a gentle demurrer;
but the custom-house officer declares that a duty will have to be
forthcoming, saying that the amount will be returned again when I pass
over the German frontier. The captain finally advises the payment of the
duty and the acceptance of a receipt for the amount, and takes his leave.
Not feeling quite satisfied as yet about paying the duty, I take a short
stroll about Dieppe, leaving my wheel at tho custom-house and when I
shortly return, prepared to pay the assessment, whatever it may be, the
officer who, but thirty minutes since, declared emphatically in favor
of a duty, now answers, with all the politeness imaginable: "Monsieur
is at liberty to take the velocipede and go whithersoever he will." It
is a fairly prompt initiation into the impulsiveness of the French
character. They don't accept bicycles as baggage, though, on the Channel
steamers, and six shillings freight, over and above passage-money, has
to be yielded up.

Although upon a foreign shore, I am not yet, it seems, to be left entirely
alone to the tender mercies of my own lamentable inability to speak
French. Fortunately there lives at Dieppe a gentleman named Mr. Parkinson,
who, besides being an Englishman to the backbone, is quite an enthusiastic
wheelman, and, among other things, considers it his solemn duty to take
charge of visiting 'cyclers from England and America and see them safely
launched along the magnificent roadways of Normandy, headed fairly toward
their destination. Faed has thoughtfully notified Mr. Parkinson of my