arrangement I, of course, enter no objections. In striking contrast to
these friendly advances is my own unpardonable conduct the same evening
in conversation with an honest old farmer.

"I see you are taking notes. I suppose you keep track of the crops as
you travel along?" says the H. O. F. "Certainly, I take more notice of
the crops than anything; I'm a natural born agriculturist myself." "Well,"
continues the farmer, "right here where we stand is Carson Township."
"Ah! indeed. Is it possible that I have at last arrived at Carson Township."
"You have heard of the township before, then, eh." "Heard of it!
why, man alive, Carson Township is all the talk out in the Rockies; in
fact, it is known all over the world as the finest Township for corn in
Iowa." This sort of conduct is, I admit, unwarrantable in the extreme;
but cycling is responsible for it all. If continuous cycling is productive
of a superfluity of exhilaration, and said exhilaration bubbles over
occasionally, plainly the bicycle is to blame. So forcibly does this
latter fact intrude upon me as I shake hands with the farmer, and
congratulate him on his rare good fortune in belonging to Carson Township
that I mount, and with a view of taking a little of the shine out of it,
ride down the long, steep hill leading to the bridge across the Nishnebotene
River at a tremendous pace. The machine "kicks" against this treatment,
however, and, when about half wray down, it strikes a hole and sends me
spinning and gyrating through space; and when I finally strike terra
firma, it thumps me unmercifully in the ribs ere it lets me up. "Variable"
is the word descriptive of the Iowa roads; for seventy-five miles due
east of Omaha the prairie rolls like a heavy Atlantic swell, and during
a day's journey I pass through a dozen alternate stretches of muddy and
dusky road; for like a huge watering-pot do the rain-clouds pass to and
fro over this great garden of the West, that is practically one continuous
fertile farm from the Missouri to the Mississippi. Passing through Des