y have dined with the queen, or
have a few drops of lordly blood distributed through his arteries.

I notice, however, that much of this charm has been broken. I used to think
that all English lords were talented, till I heard one of them make the
only poor speech that was made at the opening meeting of the Evangelical
Alliance. Our lecturing committees would not pay very large prices next
year for Mr. Bradlaugh and Edmund Yates. Indeed, we expect that the time
will soon come when the same kind of balances will weigh Englishmen,
Scotchmen, Irishmen, Frenchmen and Americans.

If a man can do anything well, he will be acceptable without reference to
whether he was born by the Clyde, the Thames, the Seine, or the Hudson. But
until those scales be lifted it is sufficient to announce the joyful
tidings that "Odger is coming."

CHAPTER VIII.

THE HOT AXLE.

The express train was flying from Cork to Queenstown. It was going like
sixty--that is, about sixty miles an hour. No sight of an Irish village to
arrest our speed, no sign of break-down, and yet the train halted. We
looked out of the window, saw the brakemen and a crowd of passengers
gathering around the locomotive and a dense smoke arising. What was the
matter? A hot axle!

We were on the lightning train for Cleveland. We had no time to spare. If
we stopped for a half hour we should be greeted by the anathema of a
lecturing committee. We felt a sort of presentiment that we should be too
late, when to confirm it the whistle blew, and the brakes fell, and the cry
all along the train was, "What is the matter?" Answer: "A hot axle!" The
wheels had been making too many revolutions in a minute. The car was on
fire. It was a very difficult thing to put it out; water, sand and swabs
were tried, and caused long detention and a smoke that threatened flame
down to the end of the journey.

We thought then, and think now, this is what is the matter with people
everywhere. In this swift, "express," American life, we go too fast for our
endurance. We think ourselves getting on splendidly, when in the midst of
our successes we come to a dead halt. What is the matter? Nerves or muscles
or brains give out. We have made too many revolutions in an hour. A hot
axle!

Men make the mistake of working according to their opportunities, and not
according to their capacity of endurance. "Can I run this train from
Springfield to Boston at the rate of fifty miles an hour?" says an