Then the young lady smiled, and hoped that Mr. Neuchamp would find their house pleasant, and become accustomed in time to papa’s jokes.
‘I can tell you it’s no joke at all, miss. You know very well that if Mr. Granville would have had you, I should have ordered you to marry him forthwith. Now, Mr. Neuchamp is a great friend of his, and all we can do for him will be too little.’
‘Mr. Granville was the nicest man I ever met,’ affirmed the young lady. ‘As for marrying, that is another matter. I daresay Mr. Neuchamp is coming to a proper understanding about your assertions, papa. How do you like the view, Mr. Neuchamp?’
As she spoke she leaned partly out of the carriage and gazed seawards. They were now driving upon a rather narrow and winding road, smoothly gravelled and well kept, much like a country lane in England. On the southern side the hill rose abruptly above them; on the lower side a dwarf wall of sandstone blocks occasionally protected the traveller from a too precipitous descent. Shrubs and flowers, as strange to Mr. Neuchamp as the flora of the far-famed bay, but a mile or two from them now, was to Sir Joseph Banks, bordered the road on either side in rich profusion. But the eye roamed over the intervening valley, over villas of trim beauty, clean-cut in the delicately pale sandstone, to the wondrous beauty of the landlocked sea. Blue as the Ægean, it was superior in its astonishing wealth of bays, mimic quays, and peerless anchorage to any harbour in the world. Crafts of all kinds and sizes floated upon its unruffled wave, from the majestic ocean steamer, gliding proudly to her anchorage, to the white-winged, over-rigged sailing boat, with her crew of lads seated desperately on her windward gunnel, to squatter out like a brood of wild ducks and right their crank craft, should fortune and the breeze desert them. Northward rose the ‘sullen shape’ of the great sandstone promontory, the North Head, towering over the surges that break endlessly at its base, and with its twin sentinel of the south, guarding the narrow entrance to the unrivalled haven. The fresh breeze swept through the girl’s hair and tinged her cheek with a transient glow, as she said, ‘Is not that lovely? I have seen it almost daily for years, but it never palls on me.’
‘Beautiful as a dream landscape,’ said Ernest from his heart. ‘It makes one recall dear old Sir Walter’s words—
‘“Where’s the coward that would not dare
To fight for such a land?”’
‘We are a peaceful people so far,’ said Mr. Frankston; ‘but I fancy that we should take to war kindly enough in the event of invasion, for instance, and hammer away as briskly and as doggedly as our forefathers.’
‘How many years have you been in this colony, may I ask?’ said Ernest. ‘Not long enough to shake off British feelings and prejudices, I am certain.’
‘About ten years,’ deposed Mr. Frankston confidently.