on, say in the middle of the lovely
autumnal weather of November, will be surprised to find a host of
workmen in the Common and Public Garden busily engaged in laying down
miles of portable "plank paths" or "board walks," elevated three or
four inches above the level of the ground. A little later, when the
snowy season has well set in, he will discover the usefulness of these
apparently superfluous planks; and he will hardly be astonished to
learn that the whole of the Northern States are covered in winter with
a network of similar paths. These gangways are made in sections and
numbered, so that when they are withdrawn from their summer seclusion
they can be laid down with great precision and expedition. No
statistician, so far as I know, has calculated the total length of the
plank paths of an American winter; but I have not the least doubt that
they would reach from the earth to the moon, if not to one of the
planets.

The river and lake steamboats of the United States are on the average
distinctly better than any I am acquainted with elsewhere. The
much-vaunted splendours of such Scottish boats as the "Iona" and
"Columba" sink into insignificance when compared with the wonderful
vessels of the line plying from New York to Fall River. These steamers
deserve the name of floating hotel or palace much more than even the
finest ocean-liner, because to their sumptuous appointments they add
the fact that they are, except under very occasional circumstances,
_floating_ palaces and not _reeling_ or _tossing_ ones. The only hotel
to which I can honestly compare the "Campania" is the one at San
Francisco in which I experienced my first earthquake. But even the
veriest landsman of them all can enjoy the passage of Long Island
Sound in one of these stately and stable vessels, whether sitting
indoors listening to the excellent band in one of the spacious
drawing-rooms in which there is absolutely no rude reminder of the
sea, or on deck on a cool summer night watching the lights of New York
gradually vanish in the black wake, or the moon riding triumphantly as
queen of the heavenly host, and the innumerable twinkling beacons that
safeguard our course. And when he retires to his cabin, pleasantly
wearied by the glamour of the night and soothed by the supple
stability of his floating home, he will find his bed and his bedroom
twice as large as he enjoyed on the Atlantic, and may let the breeze
enter, undeterred by fear of intruding