"I should prefer any other cure."
"Very well, sir. I have heerd, from trippers as comes to Troy, to spend the day an' get drunk in anuther parish for vari'ty's sake, as a pennorth o' say es uncommon refreshin'."
"A pennyworth of sea?"
"That's so, sir. Twelve in a boat, an' a copper a head to the boatman to row so far as there an' back, which es cheap an' empt'in' at the price, as a chap told me."
"You advise me to take a row?"
"Iss, sir; on'y I reckon you'd best go up the river, ef you'm goin' alone. Though whether you prefers the resk o' meetin' Adm'ral Buzza to bein' turned topsy-versy outside the harbour-mouth, es a question I leaves to you. 'Tes a matter o' taste, as Mounseer said by the yaller frog."
Mr. Fogo decided to risk an encounter with the Admiral. In a few minutes he was afloat, and briskly rowing in the wake of the picnic-party.
But black Care, that clambers aboard the sea-going galley, did not disdain a seat in the stern of Mr. Fogo's boat. She sat her down there, and would not budge for all his pulling. Neither could the smile of the clear sky woo her thence, nor the voices of the day; but as on ship-board she must still be talking to the man at the wheel, and on horseback importunately whispering to the rider from her pillion, so now she besieged the ear of Mr. Fogo, to whom her very sex was hateful.
Further and further he rowed in vain attempt to shake off this incubus; passed at some distance the rock where the picnickers had spread their meal (luckily, the Admiral's back was turned to the river), doubled the next bend, ran his boat ashore on a little patch of shingle overarched with trees, and, stepping out, sat down to smoke a pipe.
Secure from observation, he could hear the laughter of the picnickers borne melodiously through the trees; and either this or the tobacco chased his companion from his side; for his brow cleared, the puffs of smoke came more calmly, and before the pipe was smoked out, Mr. Fogo had sunk into a most agreeable fit of abstraction.