porters and the cabmen.
I selected a red-faced chunky porter who was a decidedly able person,
apparently capable of managing anything except the letter h. The
acrobatics which he performed with that defenceless consonant were
marvelous. I have said that I selected him; that he selected me would be
nearer the truth.

"Cab, sir. Yes, sir, thank you, sir," he said. "Leave that to me, sir.
Will you 'ave a fourwheeler or a hordinary cab, sir?"

I wasn't exactly certain what a fourwheeler might be. I had read about
them often enough, but I had never seen one pictured and properly
labeled. For the matter of that, all the vehicles in sight appeared to
have four wheels. So I said, at a venture, that I thought an ordinary
cab would do.

"Yes, sir; 'ere you are, sir. Your boxes are in the luggage van, I
suppose, sir."

I took it for granted he meant my trunks and those were in what I, in my
ignorance, would have called a baggage car:

"Yes, sir," said the porter. "If the lidy will be good enough to wait
'ere, sir, you and I will go hafter the boxes, sir."

Cautioning Hephzy not to stir from her moorings on any account I
followed my guide to the "luggage van." This crowded car disgorged
our two steamer trunks and, my particular porter having corraled a
fellow-craftsman to help him, the trunks were dragged to the waiting
cab.

I found Hephzy waiting, outwardly calm, but inwardly excited.

"I saw one at last," she declared. "I'd about come to believe there
wasn't such a thing, but there is; I just saw one."

"One--what?" I asked, puzzled.

"An Englishman with side-whiskers. They wasn't as big and long as those
in the pictures, but they were side-whiskers. I feel better. When you've
been brought up to believe every Englishman wore 'em, it was kind of
humiliatin' not to see one single set."

I paid my porters--I learned afterward that, like most Americans, I had
given them altogether too much--and we climbed into the cab with our
bags. The "boxes," or trunks, were on the driver's seat and on the roof.

"Where to, sir?" asked the driver.

I hesitated. Even at this late date I had not made up my mind exactly
"where to." My decision was a hasty one.

"Why--er--to--to Bancroft's Hotel," I said. "Blithe Street, just off
Piccadilly."

I think the driver was somewhat astonished. Very few of his American
passengers selected Bancroft's as a stopping place, I imagine. However,
his answer was prompt.

"Yes, sir, thank you,