8 
FROM EDINBURGH TO THE ANTARCTIC 
found me beaming vaguely at her corner of the carriage 
as we came out of a tunnel, and smiled bewitchingly ; 
the children laughed because she laughed ; and an old 
gentleman laughed at the children. The mother looked 
icy daggers at me, but what did I care ! I could have 
shaken hands all round, and kissed the — children. 
The rose-leaf in my happiness was that I knew Bruce 
was so utterly good-natured that he would never dream of 
refusing to put me up. How I rushed from the Waverley 
up the Mound five steps in the stride ! Bruce was seated 
amongst his baggage — coat off — hair on end, utterly dis- 
tracted between lists of packages and the finances of 
the Summer Gathering. I put my case before him as he 
sat there, knowing well what his reply would be : ' Why, 
of course I'll put you up,' he cried. * Man, I'll put you 
up for the whole voyage— there 's heaps of room in my 
berth.' Was there ever such generosity! The berth was 
about the size of a rabbit-hutch, and into this he had 
to cram scientific instruments, specimen bottles, camera, 
clothes, and half a doctor's stock-in-trade. . . . That was 
settled, and we shook hands over the rampart of baggage, 
and no more packing was clone that night, but we rested 
and went down to the club and drank whiskies-and-sodas 
to the success of our voyage. We could look with pity 
on the poor lawyer-fellows, bound to their desks with 
golden fetters. They may have the best of it in the long- 
run, those steady men ; but we did not envy them that 
evening, and the moon never winked down on jollier 
Bohemians than on us two, as we climbed the Mound, 
arm-in-arm, in the small hours of the morning. 
