Three in a hansom cab is not, under all circumstances, the most comfortable method of conveyance,—when one of the trio happens to be Sydney Atherton in one of his ‘moments of excitement’ it is distinctly the opposite; as, on that occasion, Mr Lessingham and I both quickly found. Sometimes he sat on my knees, sometimes on Lessingham’s, and frequently, when he unexpectedly stood up, and all but precipitated¹ himself on to the horse’s back, on nobody’s. In the eagerness of his gesticulations, first he knocked off my hat, then he knocked off Lessingham’s, then his own, then all three together,—once, his own hat rolling into the mud, he sprang into the road, without previously² going through the empty form of advising the driver of his intention, to pick it up. When he turned to speak to Lessingham, he thrust his elbow into my eye; and when he turned to speak to me, he thrust it into Lessingham’s. Never, for one solitary³ instant, was he at rest, or either of us at ease. The wonder is that the gymnastics in which he incessantly⁴ indulged did not sufficiently⁵ attract public notice to induce a policeman to put at least a momentary⁶ period to our progress. Had speed not been of primary importance I should have insisted on the transference of the expedition to the somewhat wider limits of a four-wheeler.

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