There are certain things--as a spider, a ghost,
The income-tax, gout, an umbrella for three--
That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most
Is a thing they call the Sea.
Pour some salt water over the floor--
Ugly I’m sure you’ll allow it to be:
Suppose it extended a mile or more,
_That’s_ very like the Sea.
Beat a dog till it howls outright--
Cruel, but all very well for a spree:
Suppose that he did so day and night,
_That_ would be like the Sea.
I had a vision of nursery-maids;
Tens of thousands passed by me--
All leading children with wooden spades,
And this was by the Sea.
Who invented those spades of wood?
Who was it cut them out of the tree?
None, I think, but an idiot could--
Or one that loved the Sea.
It is pleasant and dreamy, no doubt, to float
With “thoughts as boundless, and souls as free”;
But suppose you are very unwell in the boat,[17]
How do you like the Sea?
There is an insect that people avoid
(Whence is derived the verb “to flee”),
Where have you been by it most annoyed?
In lodgings by the Sea.
If you like coffee with sand for dregs,
A decided hint of salt in your tea,
And a fishy taste in the very eggs--
By all means choose the Sea.
And if, with these dainties to drink and eat,
You prefer not a vestige of grass or tree,
And a chronic state of wet in your feet,
Then--I recommend the Sea.
For _I_ have friends who dwell by the coast--
Pleasant friends they are to me!
It is when I am with them I wonder most
That any one likes the Sea.
They take me a walk: though tired and stiff,
To climb the heights I madly agree:
And, after a tumble or so from the cliff,
They kindly suggest the Sea.
I try the rocks, and I think it cool
That they laugh with such an excess of glee,
As I heavily slip into every pool
That skirts the cold, cold Sea.
[Illustration]
[16] One is impelled to suspect that the satire in these verses is
intended wholly for effect, and was not at all representative of the
author’s feelings. Most of his summer holidays were spent by the sea,
and his letters contain complimentary references to Whitby, Sandown,
Margate, Eastbourne, and other seaside resorts. His particular
favourite was Eastbourne, where he seems to have spent most of his
summer vacations during the last thirty years of his life.
[17] Mr. Dodgson himself was an exceptionally good sailor. In his diary
for July 13, 1867, describing a Channel crossing, he says: “The pen
refuses to describe the sufferings of some of the passengers ... my own
sensations were those of extreme surprise, and a little indignation, at
there being no other sensations; it was not for _that_ I paid my money.”