Punch (89.1885)

September 26, 1885.]

PUNCH, OR THE LONDON CHARIVARI.

145

TOURING IN THE HIGHLANDS.

" Hullo, Sandy ! Why haven't you cleaned my Caeeiage,

as I told you last nlght ? "

" hech, SlB, what foe would it .need washing 1 It will be
just the same when you 'll be using it again ! "

EXTRACTS EROM THE DIARY OP AW EMINENT
CITIZEN.

I am spending my month's holiday in the Isle of Thanet. I select
this particular portion of the land of my birth because I meet here a
large number of acquaintances to whom fortune, or rather perhaps, I
should say strict integrity, has not been so propitious as to myself,
and who have learned to treat me with that abundant respect that is
so creditable to them, and so agreeable to me. I like to mingle with
my inferiors in position, and learn from them, as occasion offers, such
additions to my somewhat limited scientific acquirements as their
practical experience enables them to afiord me.

I am by the sea-shore, in view of the boundless ocean! I look, I
am told, straight to the North Pole, with nothing between us but the
rolling billows—shall I add the treacherous billows ? Tes, I think
so, with the experience of yesterday fresh in my memory. I learn
to my intense astonishment—after the fuss people make about going
there—that the exact distance from the spot where I am now sitting
—on a deserted castle of dry sand—to the actual Pole itself, is a mere
2679 miles, considerably less than the distance to New York! The
thought then flashes upon me, as the one voyage can be done in less
than a week, why not the other ? I pause for a reply. Perhaps Sir
Ebasmus will kindly enlighten me.

I feel so elated with my great discovery that I hasten home to my
early dinner with perfectly ravenous appetite. Here, strange to say,
another interesting scientific fact is revealed to me of which I was
previously in entire ignorance. _ I have remarked that the various
drinks in which I moderately indulge, for my stomach's sake—but
not, let me add, by way of outward application, as has been suggested
hy a fanatic teetotal Curate—have diminished in quantity with
strange rapidity, but I now learn on the unimpeachable authority of
ffiy most attentive Landlady, that it is the natural result of the pure
air of the briny Ocean which always producesrapid evaporation, and,
strange to say, with much more rapidity in regard to Port and
Brandy than to Claret.

I gave a recherche dinner last night to a few choice friends, and
perhaps as a natural consequence, I again find myself seated on
Ocean's brink, reasoning out some of the great problems of life. How
the usual difficulties seem to vanish when one is seated face to face
with Nature. I ask myself the three great questions that so puzzled
the Seven "Wise Men of Rome.

Whence came I P What am I ? Whither go I ? And I find
not the slightest difficulty in answering all three. Probably the
absence of Railways and Directories in those old days may have had
something to do with the making of that so difficult that appears so
simple to me. How difficulties bend before a stubborn will! Like
the bow of Ulysses in the hand of the Syren! I am watching with
absorbing interest the determined efforts of three juvenile engineers
—the Brummells of the future, possibly, who knows ?—to protect
their lofty castle from the assaults of the rapidly advancing tide.
I have removed my hat from my somewhat feverish brow, and
placed it carefully on the dry sand beside me. The fresh
sparkling waves come lovingly up to the lofty battlements to woo
their fond embrace. What glorious poetry there is in the very
breath of the loving Sea!—but in vain. The deeply cut_ trench re-
ceives and subdues them, and they retreat to join their laughing
comrades. Nearer and nearer they come, and harder and harder
work the undaunted engineers in raising still higher and higher the
lofty battlements, till a mighty wave approaches, and, like Napoleon
at the Bridge of Areola, carries all before it, and not only rushes
clean over the topmost tower of the lofty castle, but to my great and
doubtless unconcealed astonishment, continues its mad career to my
comfortable seat, soaks me to the skin before I can recover either my
presence of mind or my new hat, which I see carried off by the
retiring wave as the spoils of war.

A loud shout of laughter greets me as I beat a masterly retreat to
a friendly rock, safely standing upon which, I negotiate with one of
the bold though youthful engineers, for the recovery of my lately
new hat, which I at length obtain on fairly moderate terms, but in
such a dilapidated and disreputable condition that I am compelled to
seek another—unfortunately catching a bad cold by wearing it on my
way—and, strange to say, am repeatedly asked the perfectly un-
interesting question, "Who's your hatter ?" and by quite common
persons with whom I have, of course, no sort of acquaintance. How
unaccountable is this strange curiosity of the mere canaille concerning
quite unimportant matters. I well remember some years ago I used
to be asked, by perfect strangers, concerning the knowledge of my
maternal parent as to my absence from home.

One thing that greatly surprises me is the consummate ignorance
of the Sailors as regards the weather. On three several occasions
have I trusted to their long experience, and accepted their perfectly
unbiassed opinion that we should have a lovely afternoon, and on each
of these occasions have we all been bitterly disappointed, and the
regret of the honest fellows that they have so unwittingly deceived
me has been so poignant, that I have felt it only reasonable to
alleviate it in some small degree by paying them on each occasion
double the sum I should have paid them had it been a nice bright
afternoon. Poor fellows! it was quite sad to see how wet their shiny
clothes were.

One of them told me he was so afraid of what he called " Rhu-
matics," that he was forced to drink a glass of hot rum-and-water
whenever he got at all wet, so of course I felt bound in honour to
pay for one for him, on these several occasions. I should not like to
have it on my conscience that I had been the cause of the poor fellow
suffering all the tortures of rheumatism from his desire to give me a
pleasant sail on a sunny sea. Joseph G-beenhobn.

consolation foe gloucesteb.

Though their wins have not earned them the premier place,
Their losses they've borne with a very good Geace.

LATEST YACHTING JOTTING.

By Dumb Crambo Junior.

Ar-ran.

.. 'V>-

Two Masters.

vol. lxxxix.