manded to travel! I, who cannot
bear the grating of my slow-moving wheels over the smooth gravel-walk,
without compressed lips and corrugated brow!

The Doctor ordained it; Kate executed it. I am no longer my own master;
and so here I am in New York, resting for a day, on my way to some
retired springs in the Green Mountains, where the water is medicinal,
the air cool and bracing, the scenery transcendent, and the visitors
few.

I have taken Ben for my valet. He looks quite a gentleman when dressed
in his Sunday clothes, and his Scotch shrewdness serves us many a good
turn. He has the knack of arresting any little advantages floating on
the stream of travel, and securing them for our benefit.

I journey on my wheeled couch from necessity, as I have not been able to
sit up at all since the heats of June set in. So I have, in this trip, a
novel experience,--on the railroad, being consigned to the baggage car,
and upon the steamboat, to the forward deck. I cannot endure the
close saloons, and prefer the fresh breeze, even when mingled with
tobacco-smoke. I go as freight, and Kate keeps a sharp eye to her
baggage, for she will not leave my side. I tried to flatter her by
saying that the true order of things was reversed,--her sex being
entitled to that name and position, and mine to the relation she now
bore to me. She had the perversity to consider this a _twit_, and gave
me a stinging reply, which I will not repeat to you, because you are a
woman likewise, and would enjoy it too much.

We left peaceful, green Bosky Dell late in the afternoon, and slept in
Philadelphia that night. Yesterday--the hottest day of the season--we
set out for New York. I thought it was going to be sultry, when, as we
passed Washington Square before sunrise, on our way to the boat, I saw
the blue haze among the trees, as still and soft and hay-scented as if
in the country. Ben often quotes an old Scotch proverb,--"Daylight will
peep through a sma' hole." So beauty will peep through every small
corner that is left to Nature, even under severe restrictions. Witness
our noble trees, walled in by houses and cramped by pavements!

The streets were quite deserted that morning,--for, being obliged to
ride very slowly, I had set out betimes. No one was up but ourselves and
the squirrels, except one wren, whose twittering sounded strangely loud
in the hushed city. Probably she took that opportunity to try her voice
and note her improvement in singing