e rooms of the Press Club, and
thoroughly enjoyed myself with the members. As I entered the Club, I was
amused to see two journalists, who had heard me at the lecture discourse
on chewing, go to a corner of the room, and there get rid of their
_wads_, before coming to shake hands with me.

* * * * *

If you have not journeyed in a vestibule train of the Pennsylvania
Railroad Company, you do not know what it is to travel in luxurious
comfort. Dining saloon, drawing room, smoking room, reading room with
writing tables, supplied with the papers and a library of books, all
furnished with exquisite taste and luxury. The cookery is good and well
served.

The day has passed without adventures, but in comfort. We left Pittsburg
at seven in the morning. At nine we passed Johnstown. The terrible
calamity that befell that city two years ago was before my mind's eye;
the town suddenly inundated, the people rushing on the bridge, and there
caught and burnt alive. America is the country for great disasters.
Everything here is on a huge scale. Toward noon, the country grew hilly,
and, for an hour before we reached Harrisburg, it gave me great
enjoyment, for in America, where there is so much sameness in the
landscapes, it is a treat to see the mountains of Central Pennsylvania
breaking the monotony of the huge flat stretch of land.

The employees (I must be careful not to say "servants") of the
Pennsylvania Railroad are polite and form an agreeable contrast to those
of the other railway companies. Unhappily, the employees whom you find
on board the Pullman cars are not in the control of the company.

* * * * *

The train will reach Jersey City for New York at seven to-night. I shall
dine at my hotel.

About 5.30 it occurred to me to go to the dining-room car and ask for a
cup of tea. Before entering the car I stopped at the lavatory to wash my
hands. Some one was using the basin. It was the conductor, the autocrat
in charge of the dining car, a fat, sleek, chewing, surly, frowning,
snarling cur.

He turned round.

"What do you want?" said he.

"I should very much like to wash my hands," I timidly ventured.

"You see very well I am using the basin. You go to the next car."

I came to America this time with a large provision of philosophy, and
quite determined to even enjoy such little scenes as this. So I quietly
went to the next lavatory, returned to the dini