any further; he seemed
grumpy about having committed himself that far.

He was one of those men who take everything in dead earnest; who regard
any expression of ideas outside their own sphere of life as trivial, or,
indeed, if addressed directly to them, as offensive; who, in fact, are
darkly suspicious of anything in the shape of a joke or laugh on the
part of an outsider in their own particular dust-hole. He seemed to
be always thinking, and thinking a lot; when his hands were not both
engaged, he would tilt his hat forward and scratch the base of his
skull with his little finger, and let his jaw hang. But his intellectual
powers were mostly concentrated on a doubtful swingle-tree, a misfitting
collar, or that there bay or piebald (on the off or near side) with the
sore shoulder.

Casual letters or papers, to be delivered on the road, were matters
which troubled him vaguely, but constantly--like the abstract ideas of
his passengers.

The joker of our party was a humourist of the dry order, and had been
slyly taking rises out of the driver for the last two or three stages.
But the driver only brooded. He wasn't the one to tell you straight if
you offended him, or if he fancied you offended him, and thus gain your
respect, or prevent a misunderstanding which would result in life-long
enmity. He might meet you in after years when you had forgotten all
about your trespass--if indeed you had ever been conscious of it--and
"stoush" you unexpectedly on the ear.

Also you might regard him as your friend, on occasion, and yet he would
stand by and hear a perfect stranger tell you the most outrageous lies,
to your hurt, and know that the stranger was telling lies, and never put
you up to it. It would never enter his head to do so. It wouldn't be any
affair of his--only an abstract question.

It grew darker and colder. The rain came as if the frozen south were
spitting at your face and neck and hands, and our feet grew as big as
camel's, and went dead, and we might as well have stamped the footboards
with wooden legs for all the feeling we got into ours. But they were
more comfortable that way, for the toes didn't curl up and pain so much,
nor did our corns stick out so hard against the leather, and shoot.

We looked out eagerly for some clearing, or fence, or light--some sign
of the shanty where we were to change horses--but there was nothing
save blackness all round. The long, straight, cleared road was no longer
reli