Lilith started up to look through the port-hole of her state-room, but she could see nothing but the hulk of another great steamer that lay close alongside.
She dressed herself with eager, childish haste to go upon deck and look upon the shores of the old world, so new to her, and which she had so longed to see.
Such first sights are often a surprise and a disappointment to the young traveler. They expect to see something very new and very strange, instead of which they see what seem to be very familiar objects—all sea-port towns are at first view so very much alike in their general appearance.
When Lilith hurriedly dressed herself, and without waiting for Madame Von Bruyin, hastened up on deck, and looked around her, she saw what, as it seemed to her, she must have seen a hundred times before—a harbor with a forest of shipping, docks crowded with men, women and children, horses, mules, carts and vans, and laden with bales, boxes, barrels and bundles of merchandise; dingy warehouses rising to the sky, with dusty windows and many ropes and pulleys reaching from roof to basement; beyond these the crowded streets of the city.
“Why, but for that old tower in the distance, and those old churches, this might be New York or Baltimore,” said Lilith, unconscious of having spoken out.
“Yes, my dear, at a very casual and superficial glance; but wait until we get into the town. Then I will show you some antiquities of the time of Louis XI., when Havre was but a little fishing-hamlet and never dreamed of becoming the great sea-port that it now is,” said the baroness, who had come quietly up to the side of her young friend.
“Ah! but it is not beautiful to look upon from this point,” said Lilith.
“What sea-port town is? But it is interesting away from the docks—though I can well believe that the ships, docks and warehouses are decidedly the most interesting portion of the town to those busy business men whom we see in the crowd there. But, as I said, wait until we land and see the old city. And remember that beyond the city spread
‘Thy corn-fields green and sunny vines,
Oh, pleasant land of France.’