n them reproduced in the Australian papers.

The delivery of these orations by Dr. Talmage is so superior to the
matter they are made of, that to read them is slow indeed compared to
hearing them.

At the back of the programme was a flaring advertisement of Dr.
Talmage's paper, called:

CHRISTIAN HERALD AND SIGNS OF OUR TIMES.

A live, undenominational, illustrated Christian paper, with a weekly
circulation of fifty thousand copies, and rapidly increasing. Every
State of the Union, every Province of Canada, and every country in the
world is represented on its enormous subscription list. Address your
subscription to Mr. N., treasurer, etc.

"Signs of our times," indeed!

[Illustration]

CHAPTER XXXI.

VIRGINIA--THE HOTELS--THE SOUTH--I WILL KILL A RAILWAY CONDUCTOR
BEFORE I LEAVE AMERICA--PHILADELPHIA--IMPRESSIONS OF THE OLD CITY.

_Petersburg, Va., March 3._

Left New York last night and arrived here at noon. No change in the
scenery. The same burnt-up fields, the same placards all over the land.
The roofs of houses, the trees in the forests, the fences in the fields,
all announce to the world the magic properties of castor oil, aperients,
and liver pills.

[Illustration: MY SUPPER.]

A little village inn in the bottom of old Brittany is a palace of
comfort compared to the best hotel of a Virginia town. I feel wretched.
My bedroom is so dirty that I shall not dare to undress to-night. I have
just had lunch: a piece of tough dried-up beef, custard pie, and a glass
of filthy water, the whole served by an old negro on an old, ragged,
dirty table-cloth.

Petersburg, which awakes so many souvenirs of the War of Secession, is a
pretty town scattered with beautiful villas. It strikes one as a
provincial town. To me, coming from the busy North, it looks asleep. The
South has not yet recovered from its disasters of thirty years ago. That
is what struck me most, when, two years ago, I went through Virginia,
Carolina, and Georgia.

Now and then American eccentricity reveals itself. I have just seen a
church built on the model of a Greek temple, and surmounted with a
pointed spire lately added. Just imagine to yourself Julius Caesar with
his toga and buskin on, and having a chimney-top hat on his head.

The streets seemed deserted, dead.

To my surprise, the Opera House was crowded to-night. The audience was
fashionable and appreciative, but very cool, almost as cool as in
Connecti