y find myself niched into a
fame which my unattended and naked merit could never have claimed."

Halicarnassus was a little stunned, but, presently recovering himself,
suggested that I had travelled enough already to make out quite a
sizable book.

"Travelled!" I said, looking him steadily in the face,--"travelled!
I have been up to Tudiz huckleberrying; and once, when there was a
freshet, you took a superannuated broom and paddled me, around the
orchard in a leaky pig's trough!"

He could not deny it; so he laughed and said,--

"Ah, well!--ah, well! Suit yourself. Take your trunk and pitch into
Vesuvius, if you like. I won't stand in your way."

His acquiescence was ungraciously, and I believe I may say ambiguously,
expressed; but it mattered little, for in three days from that time I
took my trunk, Halicarnassus his cane, and we started on our travels. An
evil omen met us at the beginning. Just as I was stepping into the car,
I observed a violent smoke issuing from under it. I started back in
alarm.

"They are only getting up steam," said Halicarnassus. "Always do, when
they start."

"I know better!" I answered briskly, for there was no time to be
circumlocutional. "They don't get up steam under the cars."

"Why not? Bet a sixpence you couldn't get Uncle Cain's dobbin out of his
jog-trot without building a fire under him."

"I know that wheel is on fire," I said, not to be turned from the direct
and certain line of assertion into the winding ways of argument.

"No matter," replied Halicarnassus, conceding everything, "we are
insured."

Upon the strength of which consolatory information I went in. By-and-by
a man entered and took a seat in front of us. "The box is all afire,"
chuckled he to his neighbor, as if it were a fine joke. By-and-by
several people who had been looking out of the windows drew in their
heads, rose, and went into the next car.

"What do you suppose they did that for?" I asked Halicarnassus.

"More aristocratical. Belong to old families. This is a new car, don't
you see? We are _parvenus_."

"Nothing of the sort," I rejoined. "This car is on fire, and they have
gone into the next one so as not to be burned up."

"They are not going to write books, and can afford to run away from
adventures."

"But suppose I am burned up in my adventure?"

"Obviously, then, your book will end in smoke."

I ceased to talk, for I was provoked at his indifference. I leave every
impartial mind to