Chuckerbutty Ram, with whom, finding him at home in his lodgings in a distant suburb, I did hold politely affectionate intercourse for the space of two hours, and then departed, as I had come, by train, and the sole occupant of a second-class dual compartment divided by a low partition.
At the next station the adjoining compartment was suddenly invaded by a portly female of the matronly type, with a rubicund countenance and a bonnet in a dismantled and lopsided condition, who was bundled through the door-way by the impetuosity of a porter, and occupied a seat in immediate opposition to myself.
When the train resumed its motion, I observed that she was contemplating me with a beaming simper of indescribable suavity, and though she was of an unornamental exterior and many years my superior, I constrained myself from motives of merest politeness to do some simperings in return, since only a churlish would grudge such an economical and inexpensive civility.
But whether she was of an unusually ardent temperament, or whether, against my volition, I had invested my simper with an irresistible winsomeness, I cannot tell; but she fell to making nods and becks and wreathed smiles which reduced me to crimsoned sheepishness, and the necessity of looking earnestly out of window at vacancy.
At this she entreated me passionately not to
