To-day, we are on our way from Cologne to Dresden; sixteen hours and a half at a stretch. This of itself is enough to throw the equablest mind off its balance. We have a _coupé_ to ourselves. This is quite opposed to my wishes, nor is it Sir Roger's doing, but Schmidt, the courier, knowing what is seemly on those occasions--what he has always done for all former freshly-wed couples whom he has escorted--secured it before we could prevent him. As for me, it would have amused me to see the people come in and out, to air my timid German in little remarks about the weather; albeit I have thus early discovered that the German, which we have been exhorted to talk among ourselves in the school-room, to perfect us in that tongue, bears no very pronounced likeness to the language as talked by the indigenous inhabitants. They _will_ talk so fast, and they never say any thing in the least like Ollendorff. _Sixteen hours and a half_ of a _tête-à-tête_ more complete and unbroken than any we have yet enjoyed. All day I watch the endless, treeless, hedgeless German flats fly past; the straight-lopped poplars, the spread of tall green wheat, the blaze of rape-fields--the villages and towns, with two-towered German churches, over and over, and over again. Oh, for a hill, were it no bigger than a molehill! Oh, for a broad-armed English oak! At Minden we stop to lunch. The whole train pushes and jostles into the refreshment-room, and, in ten galloping minutes, we devour three filthy _plats_; a nauseous potage, a terrible dish of sickly veal, and a ragged Braten. Then a rush and tumble off again. The day rolls past, dustily, samely, wearily. There have been flying thunder-storms--lightning-flashes past the windows. I hide my face in my dusty gloves to avoid seeing the quick red forks, and leave a smear on each grimy cheek. Every moment, I am a rape-field--a corn-field, a bean-field, farther from Barbara, farther from the Brat, farther from the jackdaw. "This is rather a long day for you, child!" says Sir Roger, kindly, perceiving, I suppose, the joviality of the expression with which I am eying the German landscape. "The most tedious railway-journey you ever took, I suppose?" "Yes," reply I, "far! It seems like three Sundays rolled into one, does not it? What time is it now?" He takes out his watch and looks. "Twenty past five." "_Seven_ hours more!" say I, with a burst of desperateness. "I am so sorry for you, Nancy! what can one do for you?" says my husband, looking thoroughly discomfited, concerned, and helpless. "Would you care to have a book?" "I cannot read in a train," reply I, dolorously, "it makes me _sick_!" Then feeling rather ashamed of my peevishness--"Never mind me!" I say, with a dusty smile; "I am quite happy! I--I--like looking out."