"Nor I neither," was the reply.
About mid channel a wave struck the windward quarter, just behind the wheel, with a stroke like a rock from a ballista, smashed in the bulwarks, stove the boat, which fell and hung in the water by one end, and sent the ladies, who were sitting there with boxes, baskets, shawls, hats, spectacles, umbrellas, cloaks, down to leeward, in a pond of water. One girl I saw with a bruise on her forehead as large as an egg, and the blood streaming from her nostrils. Shrieks resounded, and for a few moments, we had quite a tragic time.
About this time H. gave in, and descended to Tartarus, where the floor was compactly, densely stowed with one mass of heaving wretches, with nothing but washbowls to relieve the sombre mosaic. How H. fared there she may tell; I cannot. I stood by the bulwark with my boots full of water, my eyes full of salt spray, and my heart full of the most poignant regret that ever I was born. Alas! was that channel a channel at all? Had it two shores? Was England over there, where I saw nothing but monstrous, leaping, maddening billows, saying, "We are glad of it; we want you; come on here; we are waiting for you; we will serve you up"?
At last I seriously began to think of Tartarus myself, and of a calm repose flat on my back, such as H. told of in his memorable passage. But just then, dim and faint on the horizon, I thought I discerned the long line of a bank of land. It was. This was a channel; that was the shore. England had not sunk. I stood my ground; and in an hour we came running, bounding, and rolling towards the narrow mouth of the Folkstone pier heads.
LETTER XLIX
LONDON.
MY DEAR:—
Our last letters from home changed all our plans. We concluded to hurry away by the next steamer, if at that late hour we could get passage. We were all in a bustle. The last shoppings for aunts, cousins, and little folks were to be done by us all. The Palais Royal was to be rummaged; bronzes, vases, statuettes, bonbons, playthings—all that the endless fertility of France could show—was to be looked over for the "folks at home."
You ought to have seen our rooms at night, the last evening we spent in Paris. When the whole gleanings of a continental tour were brought forth for packing, and compared with the dimensions of original trunks—ah, what an hour was that! Who should reconcile these incongruous elements—bronzes, bonnets, ribbons and flowers, plaster casts, books, muslins and laces—elements as irreconcilable as fate and freedom; who should harmonize them? And I so tired!
"Ah," said Jladame B., "it is all quite easy; you must have a packer."