“LAST CLEAN FROCK.”

[92]
]CHAPTER VI.
THE LONG LADDER.

There was a young pickle, and what do you think?

He liv’d upon nothing but victuals and drink;

Victuals and drink were the chief of his diet,

And yet this young pickle could never be quiet.

One fine sultry day in the month of August, Harry and Laura stood at the breakfast-room window, wondering to see the large broken white clouds, looking like curds and whey, while the sun was in such a blaze of heat, that every thing seemed almost red hot. The street door had become blistered by the sun-beams. Jowler the dog lay basking on the pavement; the green blinds were closed at every opposite house; the few gentlemen who ventured out, were fanning themselves with their pocket handkerchiefs; the ladies were strolling lazily along, under the umbrageous shade of their green parasols; and the poor people who were accustomed in winter to sell matches for lighting a fire, now carried about gaudy paper hangings for the empty grates. Lady Harriet found the butter so melted at breakfast, that she could scarcely lift it on her knife; and uncle David complained that the sight of hot smoking tea put him in a fever, and said he wished it could be iced.

“I wonder how iced porridge would taste!” said Harry. “I put mine at the open window to cool, but that only made it seem hotter. We were talking of the gentleman [93] ]you mentioned yesterday, who toasted his muffins at a volcano; and certainly yours might almost be done at the drawing-room window this morning.”

“Wait till you arrive at the countries I have visited, where, as somebody remarked, the very salamanders die of heat. At Agra, which is the hottest part of India, we could scarcely write a letter, because the ink dries in the pen before you can get it to the paper. I was obliged, when our regiment was there, to lie down in the middle of the day, during several hours, actually gasping for breath; and to make up for that, we all rose at midnight. An officer of ours, who lived long in India, got up always at three in the morning, after we returned home, and walked about the streets of Portsmouth, wondering what had become of everybody.”

“I shall try not to grumble about weather any more,” said Laura. “We seem no worse off than other people.”