lt,--the last came between my
companion and myself, I could not see much of him, it was so dark;
but--woe is me!--there are other senses besides sight, and my
unfortunate nostrils drank in a most foetid polecatty odour, ever
increasing as he drew nearer and nearer. Room to sit there was none;
but, at the blast of the tube, the rattle over the pitty pavement soon
shook the obnoxious animal down between us, squeezing the poisonous
exhalation out of him at each successive jolt. As dawn rose, we saw he
was a German, and doubtless the poor fellow was very hard-up for money,
and had been feeding for some time past on putrid pork. As for his hide
and his linen, it would have been an unwarrantable tax upon his memory
to have asked him when they had last come in contact with soap and
water. My stomach felt like the Bay of Biscay in an equinoctial gale,
and I heartily wished I could have dispensed with the two holes at the
bottom of my nose. I dreaded asking how far he was going; but another
passenger--under the influence of the human nosegay he was constrained
to inhale--summed up the courage to pop the question, and received a
reply which extinguished in my breast the last flickering ray of Hope's
dim taper--"Sair, I vosh go to Nashveele." Only conceive the horror of
being squashed into such a neighbour for twenty-one long hours, and over
a road that necessarily kept jerking the unwashed and polecatty head
into your face ten times in a minute! Who that has bowels of compassion
but must commiserate me in such "untoward circumstances?"

Although we had left the hotel at four, it was five before we left the
town, and about seven before we unpacked for breakfast, nine miles out
of town. The stench of my neighbour had effectually banished all idea of
eating or drinking from my mind; so I walked up and down outside,
smoking my cigar, and thinking "What can I do?" At last, the bright idea
struck me--I will get in next time with my cigar; what if we are nine
herrings in the barrel?--everybody smokes in this country--they won't
object--and I think, by keeping the steam well up, I can neutralize a
little of the polecat. So when the time came for starting, I got my big
cigar-case, &c., out on my knees--as getting at your pockets, when once
packed, was impossible--and entering boldly with my weed at high
pressure, down I sat. We all gradually shook into our places. Very soon
a passenger looked me steadily in the face; he evidently was going