The next morning was sunny overhead and damp underfoot, with a thrill
in the air like a reminiscence of frost. I went up into the sloping
garden behind the inn and smoked a pipe pleasantly enough, to the
tune of my landlady's lamentations over sundry cabbages and
cauliflowers that had been spoiled by caterpillars. She had been so
much pleased in the summer-time, she said, to see the garden all
hovered over by white butterflies. And now, look at the end of it!
She could nowise reconcile this with her moral sense. And, indeed,
unless these butterflies are created with a side-look to the
composition of improving apologues, it is not altogether easy, even
for people who have read Hegel and Dr. M'Cosh, to decide intelligibly
upon the issue raised. Then I fell into a long and abstruse
calculation with my landlord; having for object to compare the
distance driven by him during eight years' service on the box of the
Wendover coach with the girth of the round world itself. We tackled
the question most conscientiously, made all necessary allowance for
Sundays and leap-years, and were just coming to a triumphant
conclusion of our labours when we were stayed by a small lacuna in my
information.
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