Therefore when he and his father boarded the express Thanksgiving week the lad was in the highest spirits.
"Motor-cars are all very well," observed Mr. Tolman, as the porter stowed their luggage away, "but on a cold night like this a Pullman car on a well-laid track is not to be despised. Eh, son?"
"I don't believe that I should want to travel to New York in a touring-car at this time of year," agreed Stephen, smiling.
"It is getting too late in the season to use an open car, anyway," rejoined his father. "I have delayed putting the car up because I have been hoping we might have a little more warm weather; but I guess the warm days have gone and the winter has come to stay now."
"But there is no snow yet, Dad."
"No. Still it is too chilly to drive with any comfort. The Taylors shipped their car off last week and when I get home I shall do the same."
"I don't mind the cold when I'm wrapped up," he ventured.
"You are not at the wheel, son," was his father's quick retort. "The man who is has his fingers nipped roundly, I can assure you. It is a pity we have become so soft and shrink so from discomfort. Think what our forbears endured when they went on journeys!"
"Neither the English stagecoaches nor Stephenson's railroad could have been very comfortable, to judge from your descriptions of them," laughed Steve.