Now and then
I raise my head (I am sitting on the hardest of wet seats, in the most
uncomfortable of wet attitudes, but I don't mind it) and notice that I
am a whirling shuttle-cock between a fiery battledore of a lighthouse on
the French coast and a fiery battledore of a lighthouse on the English
coast; but I don't notice it particularly, except to feel envenomed in
my hatred of Calais. Then I go on again, "Rich and rare were the ge-ems
she-e-e-e wore, And a bright gold ring on her wa-and she bo-ore, But O
her beauty was fa-a-a-r beyond"--I am particularly proud of my execution
here, when I become aware of another awkward shock from the sea, and
another protest from the funnel, and a fellow-creature at the paddle-box
more audibly indisposed than I think he need be--"Her sparkling gems, or
snow-white wand, But O her beauty was fa-a-a-a-a-r beyond"--another
awkward one here, and the fellow creature with the umbrella down and
picked up--"Her spa-a-arkling ge-ems, or her Port! port! steady! steady!
snow-white fellow-creature at the paddle-box very selfishly audible,
bump roar wash white wand."
As my execution of the Irish melodies partakes of my imperfect
perceptions of what is going on around me, so what is going on around me
becomes something else than what it is. The stokers open the
furnace-doors below, to feed the fires, and I am again on the box of the
old Exeter Telegraph fast coach, and that is the light of the
for-ever-extinguished coach-lamps, and the gleam on the hatches and
paddle-boxes is _their_ gleam on cottages and haystacks, and the
monotonous noise of the engines is the steady jingle of the splendid
team.
Pages:
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199
200
201
202
203
204
205
206
207
208
209
210
211
212