i8 MY AMERICAN FRIENDS

or ill. That evening I paid my bill with the
nonchalance of a millionaire, set out baggage in
hand (a hansom cab being now out of the«question)
for a wharf at the other end of the city, where I
took passage for Boston at the less honourable end
of a steamer, leaving my metaphysical friend to
come to the same decision a day or two later. On
arriving at Boston after a miserable night in evil
company my remaining assets consisted of
one ten-cent piece and this, though breakfastless,
I kept in reserve to pay my fare by the horse-tram
to Cambridge, for I was very tired. As the car
was crossing the Charles River Bridge—I have
good reason for remembering the spot—I handed
this precious coin to the conductor; he examined
it suspiciously and then threw it back at me;
there was a mark on it which showed that it was
counterfeit, I had no resource but to leave the
car which I had just boarded and walk through a
snow blizzard to Cambridge, meditating on the
u hell of the irrevocable." So einded my first and
last attempt to impersonate a millionaire. Clearly
the gods had not approved of it.

Such was the starting point. So far I had seen
next to nothing, in area, of the country, a con-
ventional trip to Niagara being the utmost in the
way of travel my means, after the New York
episode, would allow. On my next visit, in
1907, when I was no longer a student-adventurer
but a man with important responsibilities to
discharge, I moved more widely afield, but still