If the passage is rough, to put his feet on his neighbour's head, after
appropriating all the cushions in the cabin.
To call for crockery in time. N.B.--Most important.
To groan furiously for an hour and a half, if a sufferer; or, if utterly
callous to waves and their commotions, to eat beef and ham, and drink
porter and brandy-and-water, during the entire voyage, with as much
clattering of forks and noise of mastication as is compatible with
enjoyment.
To kiss his hand, on entering the harbour, to the _matelottes_ on the
quays, or send his love in bad French to the Prefect of Police.
To struggle for a front place, in crowding off the steamer, as if the
ship was on fire. And finally--
To answer every one who addresses him in good English in the worst
possible French.
* * * * *
"What with the horse-boats," said Mrs. Ramsbotham, "the steam-lunches,
the condolers, the out-ragers, the Canadian caboose, and the banyans, we
had the greatest difficulty, at Henley, in getting from one side of the
river to the other."
* * * * *
[Illustration: HOUSEBOAT AT THE ANCIENT HENLEIAN GAMES]
* * * * *
[Illustration: THE "CENTIPEDE"
A new flexible, patent-jointed, vertebral outrigger. (Seen--and
drawn--by our artist (the festive one), after an unusually scrumptious
lunch on board a houseboat at Henley).]
* * * * *
[Illustration: THE INFLUENCE OF PLACES
_Egeria._ "Surely, Mr. Swinson, it must have been here, and on such a
day as this, that you wrote those lines that end--
"'Give me the white-maned steeds to ride,
The Arabs of the main'----wasn't it?"
_Mr. Swinson_ (_faintly_). "N-no. Reading party--half-way up
Matterhorn!"]
* * * * *