eBooks Base 2000

Turned the females'
heads he did. Might have had his pick of the lot, maids and wives alike
for 'arf a word. Well, good-bye to you, sir"--and, as certain coin
changed hands--"thank ye, sir, kindly. Wish you a pleasant voyage and a
rare good picking up of honours and glories, and gold and silver
likewise, there across the seas and oceans where you're a-going to."


BOOK II
THE HARD SCHOOL OF THINGS AS THEY ARE


CHAPTER I
IN MAIDEN MEDITATION

It was afternoon, about five o'clock. The fine September weather, hot and
cloudless, lasted still. The air was heavy with garden scents, the
aromatic sweetness of sun-baked gorse and pine-scrub on the warren, and
with the reek off the mud-flats of the Haven, the tide being low. Upon
the sandy skirts of the Bar, across the river just opposite, three
cormorants--glossy black against the yellow--postured in extravagant
angular attitudes drying their wings. Above the rim of the silver-blue
sea--patched with purple stains in the middle distance--webs of steamer
smoke lay along the southern sky.


Pages:
97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 106 107 108 109 110 111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121