"Have you been drinking much water as you went along?
...

H'm--it's been a very dry Summer, you know." And the words of our friend in the buggy came back to us with sickening emphasis.

O those innocent-looking fairy wells and magic mirrors by the road-side! And I thought, too, of the poor old blinded woman and the falling apple.

Was Nature really like that?
And then the wise man's verdict fell on our ears like a doom.
"Take my advice, and don't walk any more, but catch the night train for New York." Poor Colin! But there was no appeal.
The end of our trip had come, suddenly, unreasonably, stupidly, like this.
"So we've got to be shot into New York like a package through a tube, after all!" said Colin.

"No lordly gates of the Hudson for us! What a fool I feel, to be the one to spoil our trip like this!" And the tears glistened in our eyes, as we pressed each other's hand in that dreary inn bedroom, with the shadow of we knew not what for Colin over us--for our comradeship had been very good, day by day, together on the open road.
Our train did not go till midnight, so we had a long melancholy evening before us; but the doctor had given Colin some mysterious potion containing rest, and presently, as I sat by his side in the gray twilight, he fell into a deep sleep--a sleep, alas! of fire and wandering talk.