was absorbed with his spokes, and, what little
time he had to spare, was devoted to dexterously
ejecting the juice from the quid he was chewing
over the leeward bulwark. Now and then he
missed his aim, and then he swore
monosyllabically. Lily couldn't make friends with
him, and presently stole away.

In those days rich people were not quite so
proud as they are now. At least, they did not
appear quite so genteel, quite so exclusive, quite
so shut up, as I learn they are at present. In
these days a member of the "superior orders"
would faint at the bare idea of travelling to
Boulogne by the common packet from London Bridge;
but, when Lily was young, a great many wealthy
and high-born people were content to take that
route as the pleasantest though not the shortest.
And more than that, they took their servants
and their carriages with them.

There was a handsome private carriage—a
berline painted green, with a rumble, heavy
wheels, and a big imperial on the roof aboard
the Harlequin, nearly amidships but slightly
forward. Lily was wandering about the deck,
and occasionally tripping herself up over the stiff
protrusions of tarpaulin when she came to this
carriage. She was admiring the pretty manner
in which the wheels were lashed to bolts in the
deck, when she heard a voice she recognised, and
looking up saw that the carriage door was open.
Standing there at was the bearded gentleman with
the braided surtout who spoke such very funny
English.

"Acht Himmel!" he cried, pleased to see
her. "Here is de liddle cal vat eat de joggolate.
Mein Signor Generale, she is ver preddy. She
is the dordor of de handsome dame dat loog
lige de diger."

There was a gentleman in the carriage,
reclining at full length on a mattress. He was
covered to the chin with rugs, and cloaks, and furs,
and had a yellow face, and looked very ill. He
shrugged his shoulders peevishly at the courier's
remark, and a thin voice, which seemed very tired
of itself and all the world, bade Stimm not bother
him, but bring him some orange-flower water.

"Bedder 'ave som brandies, my lord generale,"
observed Mr. Stimm, in respectful expostulation.
"Ve gom ver soon do de Nore, and de eau de
fleur d'oranger, he play de teufels vid your
stomjacks. Bedder drinks de brandy."

"Hang your brandy," cried the yellow-faced
invalid, peevishly. " One would think I was a
private still. My stomach's my own—at least
what I've got left of it. Get me the orange-
flower water, do you hear me, hey?"

The courier turned to do his behest, and Lily,
frightened, was moving out of his way, when her
eyes met those of the sallow gentleman. His
eyes were very languid and jaundiced, but they
were very black.

He started up eagerly on his invalid couch.
"Merciful Heavens!" he cried, "where have I
seen that face before? Stimm, bring that child
here."

But before Mr. Stimm could approach Lily, a
harsh hand was laid on the child's shoulder. It
was the handsome lady.

"You little plague! you little demon!" she
ried furiously. "Here have I been à la chasse
for you this half-hour. "What am I to do with
you? Shall I throw you into the water to be
eaten by the black man—by the whales and
sharks, I mean? Come away this moment;" and
she dragged Lily aft.

The sallow gentleman was not quite so great
an invalid as he seemed to be. He descended,
rumbling and moaning, however, from his
carriage, and followed the lady and child to the
quarter-deck; but they hastily descended the
companion-ladder, and then the lady shut herself
with the child in the ladies' cabin.

Lily underwent many hours of the direst agony.
It grew dark, and the stewardess brought her
some tea and bread-and-butter, but she could
scarcely swallow a mouthful. The tea-things
clattered on the table horribly. A lamp was
kindled, and it swung to and fro. They put Lily
to bed on a shelf in a cupboard, and the shelf
began to pitch forward, and dart backward,
and then it seemed to be sliding away from Lily,
and then she herself was dashed against the
cupboard wall. She looked out, terrified, into
the cabin, and lo! the ceiling was where the
floor should have been. And all this while there
was a dreadful creaking noise, as though a
giant were being stretched on the rack, and a
dreadful throbbing sensation, which shook the
very pillow beneath her head, as though the
giant's heart was bursting under the torture.

She was very sick. There were eleven ladies
in the cabin, and they were all sick. There was
a little girl of timid aspect, a year or so older
than Lily, who appeared to look upon sea-sickness
as a kind of penal chastisement ordained for her
sins, and who, in the intervals of nausea, screamed,
"Oh, don't! oh, please don't! oh, I will be
good!" and the like deprecatory ejaculations.
There was one lady, tall and thin, with sad-
coloured ringlets, who perpetually reiterated a
request to be thrown overboard; there was
another, stout, of a rubicund countenance, who
had been exceedingly jolly all the afternoon, and
who now, with a ghastly visage, and rolled up
into a ball in a corner, repeated at short intervals,
"It's coming, it's coming! I hear it, I hear it! I
hear it. Lawks ha' mercy upon us!" probably
anticipating the immediate scuttling of the ship,
or the end of the world. And there was a poor
little baby, who, in the course of seven hours,
assumed many cadaverous hues, from Indian
yellow to bistre, and from neutral tint to pea-
green, and was given up for dead many times. It
was an awful night. The stewardess bore it
unmoved. She was a hardy young woman, paid
not to be sea-sick, but to keep a sharp look-out
after her dues; and although on shore I dare say
she was as truthful a young woman as ever wore
the brown merino of ordinary life, she was, on
board the Harlequin, a prodigy of cool mendacity,