Her husband reminded her, however, that there seemed to be nothing in the boys’ recent adventure that would justify so drastic a prohibition. The boys had successfully made a difficult journey without harm, and had proved that they were quite able to take care of themselves under unusual conditions of great danger, as he had all along maintained that they were. There was no question, though, of their going back to the Mexican mine. The entire State of Chihuahua was so unsettled by the frequent changes of the revolution that even Mr. Porter admitted it would be the wildest folly to attempt to return there. So the boys entered the El Paso High School for the rest of that year and the next, and their father gradually reconciled himself to the idea of losing his entire Mexican investments. It was difficult for Mr. Porter to settle down quietly at home, where he had no regular business, and, moreover, he possessed in a high degree the American mania for travel. The result was, that one year of inactivity was as much as he could endure, and as the second summer approached he began to long for a change of scene. Being cut off from his accustomed Mexican stamping ground, he was forced to look farther afield. One day he read an account of the great Russian Fair at Nizhni-Novgorod and that reminded him that he had long wished to visit that wonderful mart. So he proposed that the entire family should make the trip. It would, he said, be a liberal education for the boys, and it was providential that the date of the Fair and their summer vacation exactly coincided. Mrs. Porter was plunged in despair at the proposal, for to penetrate to the interior of Russia seemed to her like invading one of the wildest and most impossible countries on earth. In vain her husband assured her that Russian hotels were notoriously comfortable, and that, indeed, to attain comfort in every department of his living was the ideal of the Russian. To begin with, there was no more delightful course of ocean travel than that supplied by the steamers of the Russian-American line from New York to Libau. And to visit any of the peaceful countries of Europe was a very different matter, anyway, from a journey in strife-broken Mexico. Mr. Porter was obliged to admit that it would necessitate a long journey, but he was sure every part of it would be so delightful that his wife would never regret having gone. Mrs. Porter was not in the least convinced, but experience had taught her that when her husband once fixed his mind on a thing he seldom gave it up, so she proposed a compromise. She would make one of the party as far as New York, but would remain there with her sister, whom she had long wished to visit, until Mr. Porter and the boys returned in September.