into a wide muddy high-road, bordered, as far as the eye could
reach on either hand, by an unsightly village. The houses stood
well back, leaving a ribbon of waste land on either side of the
road, where there were stacks of firewood, carts, barrows, rubbish-
heaps, and a little doubtful grass. Away on the left, a gaunt
tower stood in the middle of the street. What it had been in past
ages, I know not: probably a hold in time of war; but now-a-days
it bore an illegible dial-plate in its upper parts, and near the
bottom an iron letter-box.

The inn to which we had been recommended at Quartes was full, or
else the landlady did not like our looks. I ought to say, that
with our long, damp india-rubber bags, we presented rather a
doubtful type of civilisation: like rag-and-bone men, the
Cigarette imagined. 'These gentlemen are pedlars?--Ces messieurs
sont des marchands?'--asked the landlady. And then, without
waiting for an answer, which I suppose she thought superfluous in
so plain a case, recommended us to a butcher who lived hard by the
tower, and took in travellers to lodge.

Thither went we. But the butcher was flitting, and all his beds
were taken down. Or else he didn't like our look. As a parting
shot, we had 'These gentlemen are pedlars?'

It began to grow dark in earnest. We could no longer distinguish
the faces of the people who passed us by with an inarticulate good-
evening. And the householders of Pont seemed very economical with
their oil; for we saw not a single window lighted in all that long
village. I believe it is the longest village in the world; but I
daresay in our predicament every pace counted three times over. We