XXXI

the main-top jib, or whatever the high thing is called, made friends with the engineers, and tooted on the captain’s speaking-trumpet, she’d have been in such a state of rapture. “It was all heavenly, but I was glad to see the Irish coast, and found it very lovely, so green and sunny, with brown cabins here and there, ruins on some of the hills, and gentlemen’s country-seats in the valleys, with deer feeding in the parks. It was early in the morning, but I didn’t regret getting up to see it, for the bay was full of little boats, the shore so picturesque, and a rosy sky overhead. I never shall forget it. “At Queenstown one of my new acquaintances left us⁠— Mr. Lennox⁠—and when I said something about the Lakes of Killarney, he sighed and sung, with a look at me⁠— “Wasn’t that nonsensical? “We only stopped at Liverpool a few hours. It’s a dirty, noisy place, and I was glad to leave it. Uncle rushed out and bought a pair of dog-skin gloves, some ugly, thick shoes, and an umbrella, and got shaved à la mutton-chop, the first thing. Then he flattered himself that he looked like a true Briton; but the first time he had the mud cleaned off his shoes, the little bootblack knew that an American stood in them, and said, with a grin, ‘There yer har, sir. I’ve give ’em the latest Yankee shine.’ It amused uncle immensely. Oh, I must tell you what that absurd Lennox did! He got his friend Ward, who came on with us, to order a bouquet for me, and the first thing I saw in my room was a lovely one, with ‘Robert Lennox’s