Right here it may be said that the Belgian State Railway did its best to compensate us for whatever shortcomings we found in the weather or in the country generally. Perfect its service can hardly be said to have been, but it was excellent and amazingly cheap. Our party purchased every two weeks _billets d'abonnement_ that cost us just forty-one francs each, or about $8.00, and entitled us to ride on any State-owned railway line in the country day or night for fifteen days. These were second-class, the third costing twenty-three francs, and first sixty francs. The last, by the way, is a useless luxury, as on the local lines the first-class compartments are identical with the second-class except for a white tidy placed at the back of the cushions. Frequently there was not even the tidy, but the sign, "_Reservé_--_Voorbehouden_," converted an ordinary second-class compartment into first-class--a distinction that gave the traveller very little for his money, save the privilege of riding alone. On the main express routes that radiate outward from Brussels in every direction there were a number of _rapides_, or fast express trains, that made very good time indeed--a speed of a kilometre per minute being about the average. On the international express trains, some of which are first-class only, the speed was somewhat higher, but these we never had occasion to use. After the _rapides_ came the express trains, generally marked "_direct_" or "_semi-direct_," according to whether or not they made any intermediate stops before reaching their final destination. These were only moderately fast, and, if they did stop anywhere, lingered so long that the time gained by their previous speed was largely lost. Then came the type of local train called _omnibus_ or _ordinaire_, that stopped at every station. To the American these trains would seem astoundingly slow, even for a land that is never in a hurry. Each stop is dragged out, minute after minute, until it seems certain that either a terrible accident must have occurred ahead, or the train crew has gone on strike. Actually, more than once, we did see part of the crew returning from an estaminet hard by whither they had gone to have a friendly glass. Finally, however, the red-capped station master blows his whistle and the train reluctantly pulls away. To make a trip of sixty kilometres (forty miles) by one of these trains took, on more than one occasion, two hours and a quarter, and the train arrived on time!