LEAVING THE DOCKS. 11 



polite, a Frenchman would approach and ask a light 

 with a dozen pardonnez's, or tender you a cigarette. 

 The course pursued by the citizen of la belle France 

 is, in my j udgment , to be preferred. Why is it, then, 

 that a certain portion of our community will not try 

 and combine courtesy with independence ? It could 

 easily be done, and without trouble, as far as I can see. 

 Before the ship commenced to haul out, a more 

 miserable hour could not have been spent ; and, worse 

 than all, wherever you deposited your now drenched 

 and thoroughly uncomfortable body, you, without the 

 slightest intention, got in somebody's way. My friend 

 bore it stoically, but I fear my early military educa- 

 tion just gave sufficient irritability to evince that there 

 is a margin over which it would not be safe to go. 

 At length innumerable bells began to ring; there 

 was a vibration throughout the ship's length; immense 

 hawsers, rivalling in thickness boa-constrictors, were 

 made fast to the donkey-engine, and the giant vessel 

 commenced to move on her long and possibly perilous 

 voyage. I say immense vessel, for although not equal 

 in size to the new crafts of the Cunard line, such as 

 the Bothnia or Abyssinia, still she was three hundred 

 and forty feet long, with capacity to stow upwards of 

 three thousand tons. It always has been a surprise 

 to me how such a gigantic, towering mass can be 

 warped out through a narrow dock-entrance with 

 such wondrous skill : the explanation is that every one 

 employed in the process knows his work, and does it, 

 and how little disturbance there is during the per- 

 formance ! Gro on board a French, vessel, and learn 

 the difference. There every man seems to have a 

 say in the matter; and how volubly do their tongues 



