and doubtfully revolving what he ought to do. A deliberate sound of

wheels arose in the distance, and then a cart was seen approaching, well

filled with parcels, driven by a good-natured looking man on a double

bench, and displaying on a board the legend, 'I Chandler, carrier'. In

the infamously prosaic mind of Mr Finsbury, certain streaks of poetry

survived and were still efficient; they had carried him to Asia Minor

as a giddy youth of forty, and now, in the first hours of his recovered

freedom, they suggested to him the idea of continuing his flight in Mr

Chandler's cart. It would be cheap; properly broached, it might even

cost nothing, and, after years of mittens and hygienic flannel, his

heart leaped out to meet the notion of exposure.

Mr Chandler was perhaps a little puzzled to find so old a gentleman, so

strangely clothed, and begging for a lift on so retired a roadside.

But he was a good-natured man, glad to do a service, and so he took the

stranger up; and he had his own idea of civility, and so he asked no

questions. Silence, in fact, was quite good enough for Mr Chandler;

but the cart had scarcely begun to move forward ere he found himself

involved in a one-sided conversation.

'I can see,' began Mr Finsbury, 'by the mixture of parcels and boxes

that are contained in your cart, each marked with its individual label,

and by the good Flemish mare you drive, that you occupy the post of

carrier in that great English system of transport which, with all its

defects, is the pride of our country.'

The Wrong Box