I stopped for a meal at a way-side hotel, when, upon leaving, the German proprietor, knowing of the intended length of my trip, said, "Hold on one minute," and he ran back into the house. Returning directly with a small business card three or four inches square, on the back of which was a railroad map of the United States, in which the State of Connecticut did not appear larger than the end of a lead pencil, he said, "There, now, you go 'long, and when you come to a road you just take out your map and there you are. You will have to ask no questions. I am glad I thought of it." Thanking him, I went on.
Passing through places with such familiar names as New Hartford and Vernon, by houses--built of small cobble-stones, the size of an egg, laid in cement in rows like bricks, and arched over the doors and windows, making a very pretty appearance--by cheese factories with the accusing question painted in large black letters on a board nailed to the whey tank, "Who Steals the Whey?" (every farmer helps himself to enough whey to pay for the milk he brings, and it looks as if some helped themselves to a little more), by acres of hop-poles already stuck, by droves of mules all tied together, with an immense draft horse leading them along and another bringing up the rear: genuine horse guards, that trudged along past the bicycle without so much as deigning to look at it, while the captive mules, the tow-path mules, shied out at it; through Oneida Castle and through Auburn, where a minstrel brass band marching through the streets and a knapsack and bicycle going down the sidewalk gave the small boys and big ones, too, for that matter, altogether too much to attend to just at dinner-time, I finally came to the lake at Cayuga. Here a pleasant ride of half an hour across the lake in a row boat made a very agreeable change from the hot, dusty riding of the last three or four days, and then on to Geneva for the night. Next morning a cold rain drove me into a barn and finally into the farmer's house where I surprised the ancient granger in the act of making up his weekly letter to an agricultural journal. Here ends the second week of the trip.
Distance traveled during the week 288 miles; distance from starting point 557 miles.