8 AN ANGLER AT LARGE 



promised would happen in every particular but 

 one, an important one. 



During the journey to London my wife com- 

 forted me, whenever I complained of the Spanish 

 Jug's excessive weight, by drawing word-pictures 

 of Victoria adorned with the Spanish Jug and 

 prophesying about the great draughts of cold 

 water which I should, during the hot days, quaff 

 from the Spanish Jug. She said that she would 

 never have let me burden us with the jug if I had 

 not been so mad about it in Madrid, if I had not 

 persuaded her, with all that about Victoria and 

 the coldness of water kept in such jugs, to let me 

 buy it. So, mindful of my past enthusiasm, I, 

 sweating, carried it through innumerable railway 

 stations and customs-houses into steamboats and 

 omnibuses and cabs and restaurants and railway 

 carriages and buffets. For it was too fragile for a 

 porter's clumsy hands. 



At last I sat upon it, as I have told. But I did 

 not crush it. It was not fragile enough for that. 



Suppose I finish with the Spanish Jug now and 

 for ever. Let me advance this narrative about 

 twenty minutes. 



While the harp and the harp-case were earning 

 me the undying hatred of the flyman, the driver 

 of the luggage cart, the driver of the milk-float, 

 and the gardener at our cottage, I, passing through 



