Before we reached Dover an example was vouchsafed to us in further proof, if such were needed, of the difficulty of saying good-bye agreeably at the window of a railway carriage. In this case the victims of the custom stood on the platform, smiling spasmodically at the other victim in the carriage, and saying at intervals, ‘Well, you’ll write, won’t you?’ ‘So good of you to come and see me off.’ ‘Well, _mind_ you write!’ ‘Oh yes, dear, and be sure you give my love to Mary and Aunt Williams.’ Then they all smiled brightly and nodded their heads, and the traveller, with her chin upon the window-sill, beamed galvanically down upon her friends, and in her turn adjured them not to forget to write. As the train moved off at last, the farewells thickened to a climax, and we were privileged to observe how, when the final delicate flutter of the hand had been given, the smile disappeared from the face of the traveller, and she thankfully yielded herself to the deferred enjoyment of her newspaper. Of the further journey to Paris there is happily little to record. ‘_Das höchste Glück hat reine Lieder_,’ and the most satisfactory travelling is that which lends itself least to description. The Calais boat made its journey in the most brilliant of sunshine and the most refreshing of breezes, trampling its way along the water at a pace that made the tall merchantmen look more old-world and stately than usual as they moved serenely down the Channel. The male part of the passengers walked the deck as if their lives depended on it, after the custom of men; the ladies sat in sheltered places and tried to keep their hair tidy; and all alike exhibited the hypnotic consciousness of the presence of a sketch-book, that makes the most cautious sketcher the object of instant remark and suspicion.