Whenever Martyn tried to help her, he was called off some other way,
and engaged at last in the hopeless task of teaching cricket where
these fisher boys had never heard of it.
That was all he saw of our old friends, and he was much hurt by such
ingratitude. So were we all, and though we soon acquitted the head
of the family of more than the forgetfulness of over occupation, the
soreness at his wife's coldness was not so soon passed over. Yet
from her own point of view, poor woman, she might be excused for a
panic lest her second daughter might go the way of the first.
CHAPTER XXXVII--OUTWARD BOUND
'As slow our ship her foamy track
Against the wind was cleaving,
Her trembling pennant still looked back
To the dear isle 'twas leaving.
So loath we part from all we love,
From all the links that bind us,
So turn our hearts as on we rove
To those we've left behind us.'
T. MOORE.
The first time I saw Clarence's menage was in that same summer of
poor Martyn's repulse. My father had come in for a small property
in his original county of Shropshire, and this led to his setting
forth with my mother to make necessary arrangements, and then to pay
visits to old friends; leaving Emily and me to be guests to our
brother at Clifton.
We told them it was their harvest honeymoon, and it was funny to see
how they enjoyed the scheme when they had once made up their minds
to it, and our share in the project was equally new and charming,
for Emily and I, though both some way on in our twenties, were still
in many respects home children, nor had I ever been out on a visit
on my own account.
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