osition at the side. Then the angles all change as the line of
vision is altered. The farm-house expands, shuts up again, turns itself
completely round, a window winks at you for an instant under one of the
gables, and then disappears; presently the farm-house itself vanishes,
and a rough, half-shaved corn-field, with sturdy sheaves of wheat
staggering about its back, comes running up out of a coppice to overtake
the farm. Then, as we hear the pulse of the engine throbbing quicker and
quicker, and the telegraph posts seem to have started off into a frantic
gallopade along the line, we plunge into a plantation. Long vistas of
straggling trees--and leaf-strewn pathways winding in among them--give
way to scattered clumps of firs and tangled masses of fern and
brushwood, while broken fences come dancing up between, and then shrink
down again behind rising knolls covered with a sudden growth of gorse
and heather. A pit yawns into a pond; the pond squeezes itself longways
into a thin ditch, which turns off sharply at a corner, and leaves a
dreamy-looking cow occupying its place. Then a gate flies out of a
thicket; a man leaning over with folded arms grows out of the gate,
which spins round into a lodge, and then strides off altogether; while
the trees slink away after it, and a momentary glimpse is caught of a
fine mansion perched upon rising ground at the back, and which has
become suddenly disentangled from the woods surrounding it. You have
hardly time to hazard a guess concerning the architecture, before a
sloping bank comes sliding in between, and you find yourself in a deep
cutting, with the soft snowy steam curling up the sides in ample folds,
and rolling its billows of white vapor over the bright green grass, that
seems all the fresher for the welcome moisture. Then comes the open
country again--a purple outline of distant hills, with a cloud or two
resting lazily upon them; a long-drawn shriek from the valve-whistle, a
few moments of slackened speed, and a gradual panoramic movement of
sheds, hoardings, cattle-trucks, and piled-up packages, and we emerge
upon a station, with a bustling company of anxious passengers ranged
along the platform eager for our arrival.

To us, at least, familiarity with the many phases of railroad traveling
has not engendered the proverbial consequence. The refreshment station
at Wolverton is always impressed upon our mind as a perpetual marvel. To
witness those well-stocked tables, one mom