“No; but I 've shipped him to New York by the 'Persia.' Truby, of the Bowery Theatre, has taken a three years' lease of him, and of course cocktails and juleps will shorten even that.”
“That is a relief, by Jove!” cried Paten. “I own to you, Stocmar, the thought of being known by that man lay like a stone on my heart. Had you any trouble in inducing him to go?”
“Trouble? No. He went on board drunk; he 'll be drunk all the voyage, and he 'll land in America in the same happy state.”
Paten smiled pleasantly at this picture of beatitude, and smoked on. “There's no doubt about it, Stocmar,” said he, sententiously, “we all of us do make cowards of ourselves quite needlessly, imagining that the world is full of us, canvassing our characters and scrutinizing our actions, when the same good world is only thinking of itself and its own affairs.”
“That is true in part, Ludlow. But let us make ourselves foreground figures, and, take my word for it, we 'll not have to complain of want of notice.”
Paten made a movement of impatience at this speech, that showed how little he liked the sentiment, and then said,—
“There are the lights of Ostend. What a capital passage we have made! I can't express to you,” said he, with more animation, “what a relief it is to me to feel myself on the soil of the Continent. I don't know how it affects others, but to me it seems as if there were greater scope and a freer room for a man's natural abilities there.”
“I suppose you think we are cursed with 'respectability' at home.”
“The very thing I mean,” said he, gayly; “there's nothing I detest like it.”
“Colonel Paten,” cried the steward, collecting his fees.