“What, may I ask—” began M’Gourley, then he paused.
“You mean what was the reason of my being flung off by my father? Youthful indiscretions. Let’s sit down; I want to take my boot off.”
The road just here took a bend, and became wilder and more lovely, a stream gushed from the bank on which they took their seats, and before them lay a little valley, a valley hedged on either side by cypress trees, and thronged with crimson azaleas.
CHAPTER II
THE BLIND ONE
Crimson azaleas in wild profusion, here struck with sun, here shadowed by the cypress trees—a sight to gladden the heart of a poet. Between the cypress trees, beyond the azaleas, beyond country broken by sunlight and cloud shadows, lay the sea hills of Tanagura in the dimmest bluest distance.
“If I could get that into a gold frame,” said Leslie, as he inhaled the delicious perfume of the azaleas and bathed his naked foot in the tiny cascade breaking from the bank on which they sat, “I’d take it to London and send it to the Academy—and they’d reject it.”
“Vara likely,” replied Mac. “It is no fit for a peecture. Who ever saw the like of yon out of Japan? It’s nought but a fakement.”