IV. GIULIETTA. 85 



comforts of a modern cheap excursion train, to the 

 chariot-and-four, with outriders and courier, of ancient 

 noblesse. I will compare only the actual facts, in the 

 former and in latter years, of my own journey from Paris 

 to Geneva. As matters are now arranged, I find myself, 

 at half past eight in the evening, wailing in a confused 

 crowd with which I am presently to contend for a seat, 

 in the dim light and cigar-stench of the great station of 

 the Lyons line. Making slow way through the hostili- 

 ties of the platform, in partly real, partly weak polite- 

 as may be, I find the corner seats of course already 

 full of prohibitory cloaks and umbrellas ; but manage to 

 get a middle back one ; the net overhead is already sur- 

 charged with a bulging extra portmanteau, so that I 

 squeeze my desk as well as I can between my legs, and 

 arrange what wraps I have about my knees and shoulders. 

 Follow a couple of hours of simple patience, with noth- 

 ing to entertain one's thoughts but the steady roar of the 

 line under the wheels, the blinking and dripping of the 

 oil lantern, and the more or less ungainly wretchedness, 

 and variously sullen compromises and encroachments of 

 posture, among the five other passengers preparing them- 

 selves for sleep : the last arrangement for the night be- 

 ing to shut up both windows, in order to effect, with our 

 six breaths, a salutary modification of the night air. 



4. The banging and bumping of the carriages over the 

 turn-tables wakes me up as I am beginning to doze, at 

 Fontainebleau, and again at Sens ; and the trilling and 



