"How happy could I be with heather
If builder were only away!"
No sooner is a house (most of them excellently-planned houses) set up, with garden and lovely view of sea, than down in front of him squats another squatter, up goes another house, the situation is robbed of the charm of privacy, and unless the owner of the first house sits on his own roof or has a special tower built, which erection would probably involve him in difficulties with his neighbours, his view of the sea is reduced to a mere peep, and in course of time will, it is probable, be altogether blocked out. However, as Boys will be Boys, so Builders will be Builders.
One of the chief advantages offered by Pinemouth as a place where a summer holiday may be happily spent, is the facility afforded for getting away from it, in every possible direction; by sea, river, rail, and road. À propos of "road," the fly-drivers, shopkeepers, and livery-stable keepers of P'm'th, are, for the most part, like the fly-drivers, livery-stablers, and shopkeepers at any place which boasts a recognised season. The eccentric visitor, who chooses to come out of the regulation time, must take his chance, and be content with out-of-season manners to suit his out-of-season custom; still, in the words of the immortal bard, "They're all right when you know 'em, but you've got to know 'em fust!"
As to the hiring of flys and midgets, there is a board of rules and regulations stuck up in the railway station and elsewhere, the interpretation whereof may possibly be mastered by those able and willing to devote a few days to the study of its dark sayings.
"What's the meaning of this rule?" I inadvertently ask a ruddy-faced policeman, on whose broad shoulders time unoccupied seems to be weighing somewhat heavily, at the same time pointing to one of the regulations on the board in question.
"Well, Sir," replies the civil constable, in a carefully measured tone, "it is this way"—and then he commences.
* * * * * *
I breathe again; it is half an hour since I addressed that ruddy-faced official, from whom, thank goodness, I have at last contrived to escape. He has kept me there, giving me, as it were, a lecture on the black board, telling me what this rule might mean if it were read one way, and what that rule might mean if it were read another way, and what both rules might mean if they were each of them read in totally different ways; and how one was labelled "a" (which I saw for myself), and how another was distinguished by being lettered "b"; and how he (my constabulary instructor) "wasn't quite sure himself whether his reading of 'em was quite right;" then going over all the paragraphs again in detail, indicating each syllable with his finger, as though he were teaching an infant spelling-class, and finally coming to the conclusion whereat Bottom the Weaver arrived when he surmised that it was all "past the wit of man to understand," and advising me that, on the whole, if any particular case of attempted extortion should happen to arise, I should do well not to appeal to these rules and regulations, but to summon the extortionist before the nearest police magistrate. "But," said he, as if struck by a new light, "it may be that this rule 'a'"——And here he faced round, in order more closely to inspect the mysterious cryptogram. Taking advantage of his eye being off me for one second, which it had never once been during the previous thirty minutes, I stepped as lightly and rapidly away as my thirteen stone will permit, and fled. I fancied I heard him calling after me that he had discovered something or other; but not even if he had shouted "Stop thief!" should I have paused in my Mazeppa-like career. "Once aboard the lugger," I exclaim to myself, quoting the melodramatic pirate, "and I am free!" So saying, I entered the hospitable gates of my present tenancy, and sank exhausted on the sofa.
Mem.—Never again ask a policeman to explain strange cab-rules and regulations.