ines on a water-gauge glass to tell the driver when
the boiler needs replenishing. We rush past Bermondsey all lighted up,
and we see in the distance blazing chimneys, down Deptford way, and red
lights on the Brighton Railway rushing at us in the air, and white and
green lights of engines rushing at us on the rails. We overtake and pass
a train whose passengers look nice and warm, and one little boy is
flattening his nose against the window, to see us pass, and no doubt
thinks _his_ train a very slow one, and _his_ engine-driver a "muff,"
for being beaten in the "race."

So we leave the ancient "Beormund's Eye" where many hundred years ago
was an abbey, and where now are tanneries and many trades with
accompanying and peculiar odours. Away we go in a direct line over the
Surrey Canal--the river and the ships we cannot see. We get a glimpse of
the lighted Crystal Palace and rush into Chislehurst, where the late
Emperor of the French and his son lie buried.

Puffing up hill as if it were short of breath the engine goes, and is
suddenly swallowed up in a great tunnel! Oh, the roaring, the
clattering, the clamp, clamp, clamp, the "dickery-dickery-dock" tune
which the wheels play upon the metals and chairs and joints of the line!
Suddenly we are out again under a starry sky; all the mist and fog and
smoke are gone. The light which surrounded us in the tunnel, the
flickering gleam which shone on us from roof and walls, is as suddenly
dispersed and hangs now overhead in the white curling steam, as the
fireman opens the furnace door, and the gleam dashes along with us like
a halo.

From Sevenoaks our speed increases; the driver slackens off the steam,
but we rush on faster and faster. Through another long tunnel, then into
the open air round a curve, flying along an embankment until we think we
_must_ go over it. Rush, roar, and rattle! Speed slackens, bump, thump,
whizz, a long whistle; green and red lights above and below, a big
station, engines beside us, people like phantoms on the platforms,
crash, bang! Tunbridge is passed, and we are running on level ground, in
a straight line for full twenty miles, to Ashford. Ah, we can breathe
again now. It _did_ seem rather alarming just then.

So on we go towards Folkestone and Dover. Now the salt-laden breeze
tells us we are near our destination. The sorting-clerks work harder and
faster. The Continental mail-bags, Indian mail-bags, Mediterranean and
China mail-bags, all are re