usiasm was a little noisy and crude,
and consisted mainly in emphatic repetitions of "Just FANCY! we're
going to Rome, my dear!--Rome!"--they gave their attention to their
fellow-travellers. Helen was anxious to secure a compartment to
themselves, and, in order to discourage intruders, got out and planted
herself firmly on the step. Miss Winchelsea peeped out over her
shoulder, and made sly little remarks about the accumulating people on
the platform, at which Fanny laughed gleefully.

They were travelling with one of Mr. Thomas Gunn's parties--fourteen
days in Rome for fourteen pounds. They did not belong to the personally
conducted party of course--Miss Winchelsea had seen to that--but they
travelled with it because of the convenience of that arrangement. The
people were the oddest mixture, and wonderfully amusing. There was a
vociferous red-faced polyglot personal conductor in a pepper-and-salt
suit, very long in the arms and legs and very active. He shouted
proclamations. When he wanted to speak to people he stretched out an arm
and held them until his purpose was accomplished. One hand was full of
papers, tickets, counterfoils of tourists. The people of the personally
conducted party were, it seemed, of two sorts; people the conductor
wanted and could not find, and people he did not want and who followed
him in a steadily growing tail up and down the platform. These people
seemed, indeed, to think that their one chance of reaching Rome lay
in keeping close to him. Three little old ladies were particularly
energetic in his pursuit, and at last maddened him to the pitch of
clapping them into a carriage and daring them to emerge again. For the
rest of the time, one, two, or three of their heads protruded from the
window wailing enquiries about "a little wickerwork box" whenever he
drew near. There was a very stout man with a very stout wife in shiny
black; there was a little old man like an aged hostler.

"What CAN such people want in Rome?" asked Miss Winchelsea. "What can it
mean to them?" There was a very tall curate in a very small straw hat,
and a very short curate encumbered by a long camera stand. The contrast
amused Fanny very much. Once they heard some one calling for "Snooks."
"I always thought that name was invented by novelists," said Miss
Winchelsea. "Fancy! Snooks. I wonder which IS Mr. Snooks." Finally they
picked out a very stout and resolute little man in a large check suit.
"If he isn't Snooks, he o