From a final cat-nap I at last drew up my blind to greet the oncoming day, and was rewarded by one of the finest and most poetical views I have ever seen:  a misty, brown river flanked by a jungle of dark reddish and yellowish chimneys and furnaces that covered it with shifting canopies of white steam and of smoke, varying from the delicatest grays to intense black; a beautiful dim gray sky lightening, and on the ground and low, flat roofs a thin crust of snow:  Toledo!  A wonderful and inspiring panorama, just as romantic in its own way as any Spanish Toledo.  Yet I regretted its name, and I regretted the grotesque names of other towns on the route—­Canaan, Syracuse, Utica, Geneva, Ceylon, Waterloo, and odd combinations ending in “burg.”  The names of most of the States are superb.  What could be more beautiful than Ohio, Idaho, Kentucky, Iowa, Missouri, Wyoming, Illinois—­above all, Illinois?  Certain cities, too, have grand names.  In its vocal quality “Chicago” is a perfect prince among names.  But the majority of town names in America suffer, no doubt inevitably, from a lack of imagination and of reflection.  They have the air of being bought in haste at a big advertising “ready-for-service” establishment.

Remembering in my extreme prostration that I was in a hotel and club, and not in an experiment, I rang the bell, and a smiling negro presented himself.  It was only a quarter to seven in Toledo, but I was sustained in my demeanor by the fact that it was a quarter to eight in New York.

“Will you bring me some tea, please?”

He was sympathetic, but he said flatly I couldn’t have tea, nor anything, and that nobody could have anything at all for an hour and a half, as there would be no restaurant-car till Elkhart, and Elkhart was quite ninety miles off.  He added that an engine had broken down at Cleveland.

I lay in collapse for over an hour, and then, summoning my manhood, arose.  On the previous evening the hot-water tap of my toilette had yielded only cold water.  Not wishing to appear hypercritical, I had said nothing, but I had thought.  I now casually turned on the cold-water tap and was scalded by nearly boiling water.  The hot-water tap still yielded cold water.  Lest I should be accused of inventing this caprice of plumbing in a hotel and club, I give the name of the car.  It was appropriately styled “Watertown” (compartment E).

In the corridor an admiral, audaciously interrogated, admitted that the train was at that moment two hours and ten minutes late.  As for Elkhart, it seemed to be still about ninety miles away.  I went into the observation-saloon to cheer myself up by observing, and was struck by a chill, and by the chilly, pinched demeanor of sundry other passengers, and by the apologetic faces of certain captains.  Already in my state-room my senses had suspected a chill; but I had refused to believe my senses.  I knew and had known all my life that American trains were too hot, and I had put down the supposed chill to a psychological delusion.  It was, however, no delusion.  As we swept through a snowy landscape the apologetic captains announced sadly that the engine was not sparing enough steam to heat the whole of the train.  We put on overcoats and stamped our feet.