"I do not mean the glass-works. Come along—anywhere in a gondola will do, such an evening as this; and we can talk comfortably. You need not look at anything."
They entered a gondola, and were presently gliding smoothly over the coloured waters of the lagoon; shining with richer sky reflections than any mortal painter could put on canvas. Not long in silence.
"Where have you been, Tom, all this while?"
"I told you, everywhere!" said Tom, with another shrug of his shoulders. "The one thing one comes abroad for, you know, is to run away from the winter; so we have been doing that, as long as there was any winter to run from, and since then we have been running away from the summer. Let me see—we came over in November, didn't we? or December; we went to Rome as fast as we could. There was very good society in Rome last winter. Then, as spring came on, we coasted down to Naples and Palermo. We staid at Palermo a while. From there we went back to England; and from England we came to Switzerland. And there we have been till I couldn't stand Switzerland any longer; and I bolted."
"Palermo isn't a bad place to spend a while in."
"No;—but Sicily is stupid generally. It's all ridiculous, Philip.
Except for the name of the thing, one can get just as good nearer home.
I could get better sport at Appledore last summer, than in any place
I've been at in Europe."
"Ah! Appledore," said Philip slowly, and dipping his hand in the water.
"I surmise the society also was good there?"
"Would have been," Tom returned discontentedly, "if there had not been a little too much of it."
"Too much of it!"
"Yes. I couldn't stir without two or three at my heels. It's very kind, you know; but it rather hampers a fellow."