The people, however, are apparently all very active and very busy, though cool, with a self-possession that he cannot help envying, and which he tries to imitate without any marked degree of success.
There is an air of luxury and refinement about many of the buildings that quite impresses the young man, but he cannot help noticing that there is also a sort of business air about the streets which he hardly expected to find, and which reminds him forcibly of Glasgow and Manchester. He almost wishes it had been otherwise.
He marches on boldly enough.
Archie feels as if on a prospecting tour—prospecting for gold. Of course he is going to make his fortune, but how is he going to begin? That is the awkward part of the business. If he could once get in the thin end of the wedge he would quickly drive it home.
"There is nothing like ambition
If we steer a steady course."
Of course there isn't. But staring into a china-shop window will do him little good. I do not believe he saw anything in that window however. Only, on turning away from it, his foot goes splash into a pool of dirty water on the pavement, or rather on what ought to be a pavement. That boot is ruined for the day, and this reminds him that Sydney streets are not paved with gold, but with very unromantic matter-of-fact mud. Happy thought! he will dine.
The waiters are very polite, but not obsequious, and he makes a hearty meal, and feels more at home.
Shall he tip this waiter fellow? Is it the correct thing to tip waiters? Will the waiter think him green if he does, or green if he doesn't?
These questions, trifling though they may appear, really annoyed Archie; but he erred on the right side, and did tip the waiter—well too. And the waiter brightened up, and asked him if he would like to see a playbill.
Then this reminded Archie that he might as well call on some of the people to whom he had introductions. So he pulled out a small bundle of letters, and he asked the waiter where this, that, and t'other street was; and the waiter brought a map, and gave him so many hints, that when he found himself on the street again he did not feel half so foreign. He had something to do now, something in view. Besides he had dined.