I would fain have shown my appreciation of their courtesy by talking to them; but alas, I was one vast ache all over! Although the road had been a dead level, sixteen hours of jolting and bumping had reduced me to a limp, black-and-blue creature, with out a word or a smile.

Of course I retired to what was literally a pallet, and a very hard pallet too, as early as possible, but even after I had vanished behind the thin wooden partition which formed my bedroom, the greatest silence and decorum continued to reign among my fellow-travellers..