. But suddenly, without any reason
that seemed to us justifiable, Mr. Gilbert, the only surviving
parent of Janet, broke off the match; and he and his daughter soon
after left the town for a trip to the West.

This blow nearly broke poor Herbert's heart. He gave up his
professional studies and came home to us, and for a time we thought
he would be seriously ill. Then we took him to Europe, and after a
Continental tour of a month or two we left him, at his own request,
in Goettingen, where he thought it would do him good to go to work
again. Then we went down to the little town in Italy where my story
first finds us. My wife had suffered much in mind and body on her
son's account, and for this reason I was anxious that she should
take outdoor exercise, and enjoy as much as possible the bracing air
of the country. I had brought with me both my little machines. One
was still in my knapsack, and the other I had fastened to the inside
of an enormous family trunk. As one is obliged to pay for nearly
every pound of his baggage on the Continent, this saved me a great
deal of money. Everything heavy was packed into this great
trunk--books, papers, the bronze, iron, and marble relics we had
picked up, and all the articles that usually weigh down a tourist's
baggage. I screwed up the negative-gravity apparatus until the trunk
could be handled with great ease by an ordinary porter. I could have
made it weigh nothing at all, but this, of course, I did not wish to
do. The lightness of my baggage, however, had occasioned some
comment, and I had overheard remarks which were not altogether
complimentary about people travelling around with empty trunks; but
this only amused me.

Desirous that my wife should have the advantage of negative gravity
while taking our walks, I had removed the machine from the trunk and
fastened it inside of the basket, which she could carry under her
arm. This assisted her wonderfully. When one arm was tired she put
the basket under the other, and thus, with one hand on my arm, she
could easily keep up with the free and buoyant steps my knapsack
enabled me to take. She did not object to long tramps here, because
nobody knew that she was not a walker, and she always carried some
wine or other refreshment in the basket, not only because it was
pleasant to have it with us, but because it seemed ridiculous to go
about carrying an empty basket.

There were English-speaking people stopping at the hotel where we