urts, and Collins, alas, is not. His youngest son has a motor-garage,
and Polchester has asphalt--sic transit gloria, mundi.

Jeremy, clutching his green box with one hand and Hamlet's lead with the
other, was in an ecstasy of happiness. The louder the noise, the rocking
motion, the stronger the smell, the better. "Isn't it lovely?" he
murmured to Miss Jones during one of the pauses.

It may be that it was at this moment that Uncle Samuel finally made up
his mind about Jeremy. In spite of his dislike, even hatred of children,
he had been coming slowly, during the last two years, to an affection
for, and interest in, his nephew that was something quite new to his
cynical, egoistic nature. It had leapt into activity at Christmas time,
then had died again. Now as, flung first into his sister's bony arms,
then on to the terrified spectacles of his niece Mary, he tried to
recover himself, he was caught and held by that picture of his small
nephew, seated, solid and square, in his blue sailor suit, his bare
knees swinging, his hand clutching his precious box with an energy that
defied Fate itself to take it from him, his mouth set, his eyes staring,
radiant with joy, in front of him.

On arrival at the station it was found that the one o'clock to Liskane
was "just about due," so that there was no time to be lost. They had
to rush along under the great iron dome, passing by the main line,
disregarding the tempestuous express from Truxe that drew up, as it were
disdainfully, just as they passed, and finding the modest side line
to Liskane and St. Lowe. Here there was every kind of excitement for
Jeremy. Anyone who has any kind of passion for observation must have
discovered long ago that a side line has ever so much more charm and
appeal about it than a main line. A main line is scornful of the station
in whose heart it consents for a moment to linger, its eyes are staring
forward towards the vast cities who are impatiently awaiting it; but a
side line has its very home here. So much gossip passes from day to day
above its rails (and gossip that has for its circumference five green
fields, a country road, and a babbling brook), that it knows all its
passengers by heart.

To the people who travel on a side line, the train itself is still
something of a wonder. How much more was that true thirty years ago. On
this especial line there were only two stations-Liskane and St. Lowe,
and, of a certainty, these stations would not eve