“I hope it will be no inconvenience to you, madam,” he said, “to keep me another night.”

“Oh, dear, no,” said I; “and my husband was saying this morning that he wished you was going to stay with us the rest of our time here.”

“Really!” exclaimed Mr. Poplington.  “Then I’ll do it.  I’ll go to the inn this minute and have the rest of my luggage brought over here.  If this is any punishment to Mrs. Locky she deserves it, for she shouldn’t have told those people they could stay longer without consulting me.”

In less than an hour there came a van to our cottage with the rest of his luggage.  There must have been over a dozen boxes and packages, besides things tied up and strapped; and as I saw them being carried up one at a time, I said to Miss Pondar that in our country we’d have two or three big trunks, which we could take about without any trouble.

“Yes, ma’am,” said she; but I could see by her face that she didn’t believe luggage would be luggage unless you could lug it, but was too respectful to say so.

When Mr. Poplington got settled down in our spare room he blossomed out like a full-blown friend of the family, and accordingly began to give us advice.  He said we should go as soon as we could and see Exmoor and all that region of country, and that if we didn’t mind he’d like to go with us; to which we answered, of course, we should like that very much, and asked him what he thought would be the best way to go.  So we had ever so much talk about that, and although we all agreed it would be nicer not to take a public coach, but travel private, we didn’t find it easy to decide as to the manner of travel.  We all agreed that a carriage and horses would be too expensive, and Jone was rather in favor of a dogcart for us if Mr. Poplington would like to go on horseback; but the old gentleman said it would be too much riding for him, and if we took a dogcart he’d have to take another one.  But this wouldn’t be a very sociable way of travelling, and none of us liked it.

“Now,” exclaimed Mr. Poplington, striking his hand on the table, “I’ll tell you exactly how we ought to go through that country—­we ought to go on cycles.”

“Bicycles?” said I.

“Tricycles, if you like,” he answered, “but that’s the way to do it.  It’ll be cheap, and we can go as we like and stop when we like.  We’ll be as free and independent as the Stars and Stripes, and more so, for they can’t always flap when they like and stop flapping when they choose.  Have you ever tried it, madam?”

I replied that I had, a little, because my daughter had a tricycle, and I had ridden on it for a short distance and after sundown, but as for regular travel in the daytime I couldn’t think of it.

At this Jone nearly took my breath away by saying that he thought that the bicycle idea was a capital one, and that for his part he’d like it better than any other way of travelling through a pretty country.  He also said he believed I could work a tricycle just as well as not, and that if I got used to it I would think it fine.