_Monday Evening._--We had three mortal hours on our hands this morning in Boston. I called on my dear old surviving friends of the ---- family. Not one of them, they tell me, has yet risked his life in a rail-car. Wisdom is not extinct! Called on dear Widow O----, who gave me a nice lunch of pickled oysters, rolls and butter, and a glass of old Madeira. Meantime the girls were ranging round studios(?) and picture-shops. This rage for art has come in with the foreign tongues, since my time. Picked them up at a restaurateur's. What a misnomer! What refreshment could be found in the little back-parlor of a shop, with herds coming in and herd going out, and a few faint rays of light stealing in between the windows and the walls of back-buildings surrounding them? Came in the cars to Portland. Dust disgusting! Shall never again see the original color of my coat! Dust laid on inches deep, the continual presence of a mob, and peril to life and limb; death staring you in the face, ready to grab you at any moment. This is what we get by the modern improvement of rail-cars over a gentleman's carriage, with select and elect friends, and leisure to look at a beautiful country! Travelers now are prisoners under sentence of probable death--their jailer being called a _conductor_. Oh! I cry with my old friend Touchstone: 'When I was at home, I was in a better place!' Rather a nice house, this of the Misses Jones--old-fashioned, neatness, and comfort. But the lady should not favor us with the company of her guest! Bad butter for tea. And my daughters pronounce the house perfect! _Tuesday Morning._--Bad butter again! could eat nothing. _Tuesday Afternoon._--Happy illustration from a smoking old woman, this morning, of the pleasant accessories of railroad traveling. Found only an open wagon at Gorham, and a rain impending. Convenience of travelers much talked of, but in my opinion, the convenience of those who transport them is alone consulted. The approach to the mountain, dreary. The girls--Lord, help us!--call it beautiful, sublime! Not very cold, but the driver says the bulb has already burst on Mount Washington! What an arrant old fool I was to propose coming up here! The 'Glen-House closed!' But the landlord graciously, as a favor, 'took us in'--a 'take in' to the tune of his summer-prices, no doubt. Fried salt-ham at dinner, and mince-pie for a supplement!