down the long straight reaches and soared in and out of the bends
and around the corners. We raced after it, and seemed to flash by the
capes and crags with the speed of light; and now and then we almost
overtook it--and had hopes; but it was only playing with us; when we got
near, it released its brake, make a spring around a corner, and the next
time it spun into view, a few seconds later, it looked as small as a
wheelbarrow, it was so far away. We played with the train in the same
way. We often got out to gather flowers or sit on a precipice and look
at the scenery, then presently we would hear a dull and growing roar, and
the long coils of the train would come into sight behind and above us;
but we did not need to start till the locomotive was close down upon us
--then we soon left it far behind. It had to stop at every station,
therefore it was not an embarrassment to us. Our brake was a good piece
of machinery; it could bring the car to a standstill on a slope as steep
as a house-roof.

The scenery was grand and varied and beautiful, and there was no hurry;
we could always stop and examine it. There was abundance of time. We
did not need to hamper the train; if it wanted the road, we could switch
off and let it go by, then overtake it and pass it later. We stopped at
one place to see the Gladstone Cliff, a great crag which the ages and the
weather have sculptured into a recognizable portrait of the venerable
statesman. Mr. Gladstone is a stockholder in the road, and Nature began
this portrait ten thousand years ago, with the idea of having the
compliment ready in time for the event.

We saw a banyan tree which sent down supporting stems from branches which
were sixty feet above the ground. That is, I suppose it was a banyan;
its bark resembled that of the great banyan in the botanical gardens at
Calcutta, that spider-legged thing with its wilderness of vegetable
columns. And there were frequent glimpses of a totally leafless tree
upon whose innumerable twigs and branches a cloud of crimson butterflies
had lighted--apparently. In fact these brilliant red butterflies were
flowers, but the illusion was good. Afterward in South Africa, I saw
another splendid effect made by red flowers. This flower was probably
called the torch-plant--should have been so named, anyway. It had a
slender stem several feet high, and from its top stood up a single tongue
of flame, an intensely red flower of the size and sha