charmed castle, waiting for the arrival of some one whose footsteps should quicken all to life again. There it stood, all ready for an awakened hospitality, at a moment's notice. We wandered through the great parlors, the spacious bedrooms, and out on the shaded balconies and verandas, peopling all, in imagination, with the home happiness for which it seemed so well prepared. The ample portico, with its great pillars; the luxuriant trees; the stately, silent house, and the tangle of roses and creeping plants made a picture long to be remembered. It did not seem quite right to romp and frolic in such a place, but such is the limit of our nature that one always loves and longs for contrasts; that is the reason, doubtless, why we awoke the echoes with many peals of ringing laughter and good fun. The ever-present kodak had its own share in our comedy, and brought away a shadow of our sport in the picture of "Rebekah at the Well."

The time came all too quickly for our departure from Thomasville. Even in our short stay we were charmed by the visits of many friends, among them some old acquaintances of other places and other times. We met, too, the genial editor of the "Daily Times-Enterprise," and found our departure duly mentioned in the issue of Saturday evening, April 16, 1898. It contained also the stupendous announcement of the certain opening of the war with Spain, which appeared in these startling head lines:

Separated from the above, with the telegraphic detail following, was another head line which read:

We can hear the cheery voice of our editorial friend, Captain Triplett, in all these lines, full of kindness and good feeling.

III

Departure from Thomasville. — Pet Superstitions. — Montgomery, Alabama. —  The Capitol. — The Public Fountain. — Montgomery to New Orleans.

It seemed as if we were commencing our journey in dead earnest as we were leaving Thomasville. Our party was complete, and we were all settled in our special places for the trip, our luggage and bags all in ship-shape order. The day, too, was Saturday, the 16th; hence our real beginning was not, after all, on the fatal "13th," when we left New York. Some of us had little pet superstitions about numbers. Sixteen, however, seemed to satisfy all parties. It was composed of seven and nine, and had also in it two eights and four fours. Here was completeness and perfection, besides the mystery and infinity of the sacred seven and the thrice perfect nine.

On our way from New York, had we not also a bad omen? The end extension step of our car got ripped off at one of the stations; and as we were also shunted about a little at Thomasville, just before starting, rip went the other step. There was suppressed gloom at these accidents; but the said gloom was all dispersed when, some hours after, we were detained by a broken bridge. "There," said one of the ladies, "that is the third accident since we left. We are all safe now." Although the third accident was to a bridge, and not to our car, it, however, answered all purposes, and set us completely at rest.

How inevitable those little superstitions are, and how hard it is to despise them, or, as we say, rise above them! We sometimes laugh at them, but we cherish them all the same, and fain would show our more exalted wisdom by the mirth they give us. Unlucky days and numbers, together with signs and omens, and all such, are open questions with me. I should be sorry to be incapable of a little superstition, so called, now and then. Indeed, I rather believe it is all a phantasmal flickering of the abyss of mysteries with which we are, at all times and in all places, ever enveloped.

Off we are, then, from Thomasville, with waving handkerchiefs and pleasant farewells from the dear friends we leave behind. Our journey lay through a rich country, the whole effect like an English landscape—luxuriant trees, and a verdant, undulating surface, glowing with flowers, and here and there, opulent with cultivation. We had hoped to have reached New Orleans in time for church service on Sunday morning, but the broken bridge prevented all that; and when we reached Montgomery, Alabama, we were too late, even there, for attendance at morning service, and were inexorably scheduled to leave for New Orleans early in the afternoon.

Our stay gave us an opportunity to get a sort of silent silhouette of the old Capitol of the Confederacy. A Sunday sleep was over the business portions of the town, broken only by the pathetic persistence of those who will run to the store, and look at the mail, or do something or other, from the mere fact that the average business man, in the average town, does not know what on earth to do with himself when not at work.