Page:Diary of a Pilgrimage (1891).pdf/48

 my mother lives. You could see the house if that church wasn't there." "Just passed Alost—great hop centre. My grandfather used to live there; he's dead now.' "There's the Royal chateau—here, just on this side. My sister is married to a man who lives there—not in the palace, I don't mean, but in Laeken." "That's the dome of the Palais de Justice—they call Brussels 'Paris in little'—I like it better than Paris, myself—not so crowded. I live in Brussels." "Louvain—there's Van de Weyer's statue, the 1830 revolutionist. My wife's mother lives in Louvain. She wants us to come and live there. She says we are too far away from her at Brussels, but I don't think so." "Leige—see the citadel? Got some cousins at Leige—only second ones. Most of my first ones live at Maestricht"; and so on all the way to Cologne.

I do not believe we passed a single town or village that did not possess one or more specimens of this man's relatives. Our journey seemed, not so much like a tour through Belgium and part of Northern Germany, as a visit to the neighbourhood where this man's family resided.

I was careful to take a seat facing the engine at Ostend. I prefer to travel that way. But when I awoke a little later on, I found myself going backwards. I naturally felt indignant. I said:

"Who's put me over here? I was over there, you know. You've no right to do that!"

They assured me, however, that nobody had shifted me, but that the train had turned round at Ghent.