“Well, there are plenty of states to choose from,” I said.
“A lot of people have gone from this place,” he replied.
It rained hard on the way to Dover; but when I reached there it had ceased, and I even went so far as to leave my umbrella in the train. When I early discovered my loss I reported it at once to the porter who was carrying my belongings.
“Don’t let that worry you,” he replied, in the calmest and most assuring of English tones. “They always look through the trains. You’ll find it in the parcel-room.”
Sure enough, when I returned there it was behind the clerk’s desk; and it was handed to me promptly. If I had not had everything which I had lost, barring one stick, promptly returned to me since I had been in England, I should not have thought so much of this; but it confirmed my impression that I was among a people who are temperamentally honest.
My guide led me to the Lord Warden Hotel, where I arranged myself comfortably in a good room for the night. It pleased me, on throwing open my windows, to see that this hotel fronted a bay or arm of the sea and that I was in the realm of great ships and sea traffic instead of the noisy heart of a city. Because of a slight haze, not strong enough to shut out the lights entirely, fog-horns and fog-bells were going; and I could hear the smash of waves on the shore. I decided that after dinner I would reconnoiter Dover. There was a review of warships in the harbor at the time; and the principal streets were crowded with marines in red jackets and white belts and the comic little tambourine caps cocked jauntily over one ear. Such a swarm of red-jackets I never saw in my life. They were walking up and down in pairs and trios, talking briskly and flirting with the girls. I fancy that representatives of the underworld of women who prey on this type of youth were here in force.
Much to my astonishment, in this Snargate Street I found a south-of-England replica of the “Fish, Chip, and Pea” institution of the Manchester district. I concluded from this that it must be an all-English institution, and wherever there was much drunkenness there would be these restaurants. In such a port as Dover, where sailors freely congregate, it would be apt to be common; and so it proved.
Farther up High Street, in its uttermost reaches in fact, I saw a sign which read: “Thomas Davidge, Bone-setter and Tooth-surgeon”—whatever that may be. Its only rival was another I had seen in Boulton which ran: “Temperance Bar and Herbal Stores.”
The next morning I was up early and sought the famous castle on the hill, but could not gain admission and could not see it for the fog. I returned to the beach when the fog had lifted and I could see not only the castle on the hill, but the wonderful harbor besides. It was refreshing to see the towering cliff of chalk, the pearl-blue water, the foaming surf along the interesting sea walk, and the lines of summer—or perhaps they are winter—residences facing the sea on this one best street. Dover, outside of this one street, was not—to me—handsome, but here all was placid, comfortable, socially interesting. I wondered what type of Englishman it was that came to summer or winter at Dover—so conveniently located between London and Paris.
At ten-thirty this morning the last train from London making the boat for Calais was to arrive and with it Barfleur and all his paraphernalia bound for Paris.