s my wife loves to phrase it, "a half a pound." You will also be
involved in a 3s. fare to get to Skerryvore; but this, I dare say,
friends could help you in on your arrival; so that you may reserve your
energies for the two tickets--costing the matter of a pound--and the
usual gratuities to porters. This does not seem to me much: considering
the intellectual pleasures that await you here, I call it dirt cheap. I
_believe_ the third class from Paris to London (_via_ Dover) is _about_
forty francs, but I cannot swear. Suppose it to be fifty.

frcs.
50 x 2 = 100 100

The expense of spirit or spontaneous lapse of coin on the journey,
at 5 frcs. a head, 5 x 2 = 10 10

Victuals on ditto, at 5 frcs. a head, 5 x 2 = 10 10

Gratuity to stewardess, in case of severe prostration, at 3 francs 3

One night in London, on a modest footing, say 20 20

Two tickets to Bournemouth at 12.50, 12.50 x 2 = 25 25

Porters and general devilment, say 5 5

Cabs in London, say 2 shillings, and in Bournemouth,
3 shillings = 5 shillings, 6 frcs. 25 6.25
------
frcs. 179.25

Or, the same in pounds, L7, 3s. 6-1/2d.
Or, the same in dollars, $35.45,

if there be any arithmetical virtue in me. I have left out dinner in
London in case you want to blow out, which would come extry, and with
the aid of _vangs fangs_ might easily double the whole amount--above all
if you have a few friends to meet you.

In making this valuable project, or budget, I discovered for the first
time a reason (frequently overlooked) for the singular costliness of
travelling with your wife. Anybody would count the tickets double; but
how few would have remembered--or indeed has any one ever
remembered?--to count the spontaneous lapse of coin double also? Yet
there are two of you, each must do his daily leakage, and it must be
done out of your travelling fund. You will tell me, perhaps, that you
carry the coin yourself: my dear sir, do you think you can fool your
Maker? Your wife has to lose her quota; and by God she will--if you kept
the coin in