The shop-girls take no notice of what we eat; we can pick and choose freely, and at the end they trust us to say how many cakes we have had. We can get here also cups of thick rich chocolate, and, if we wanted it, some tea, though it is only of late years that French people have taken to drinking tea at all freely, for coffee is their national beverage.
Well, come along, tear yourself away, we must get a cab and go down to our ship which is at the docks.
In the cab we pass what is called the Old Port with picturesque rows of weather-beaten sailing boats; only the sailing boats are allowed to come in here. Rising up against the sky at the far end of the port is a curious bridge quite unlike any other you have seen, for the bridge part is at a great height and there is nothing below by which people or vehicles can cross over. How is anyone going to take the trouble to climb up there? How, above all, are carts or carriages going to manage it?
You can easily make a rough model to see the principle of this bridge for yourself. Get a couple of the tallest candlesticks in the house, and put a stick across them, run a curtain ring on to the stick, and to the ring attach numerous threads fastened at the lower end to a flat bit of card or board like a raft. Then, by pushing the ring along the stick, you can make the raft follow across below. The stick represents the high bridge, and the raft in reality rests on the surface of the water, and when the machinery above, represented by the ring, is set in motion, it rumbles across and draws with it the floating raft, which is large enough to take a great number of men and vehicles. Every ten minutes or so this floating bridge passes over from one side to another, and people pay a sou, which is the French halfpenny, to travel with it. Thus, you see, when a tall ship comes in she has only to avoid the raft, and she can sail in beneath the high bridge without any trouble. We could, if we wished, go up in a lift to the high bridge; but the railings up there are far apart, and there is a high wind blowing, you are not very big, and if you slipped between I should have to give up my voyage round the world; so I think we won't, if you don't mind!
Besides, we have to catch our ship waiting at the docks, and she will be off very soon.
Now that you have heard what we should probably do and see if we went across France, will you take this journey or will you start from England and go right round in the ship?
You answer that though you would like to see the little blue-bloused porters, and that it would amuse you to think that the little French boys and girls could speak no English, and though you would certainly love the marrons glacés, you think, after all, having heard about it, we might just as well go the other way round, though, of course—the marrons glacés——
Sensible boy! Forget about them! We'll go round. In the very next chapter we'll be up and off in earnest.