Book-bot.com - read famous books online for free

Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town by Stephen Leacock
page 65 of 213 (30%)
The boat was due to leave at seven. There was no doubt about the
hour,--not only seven, but seven sharp. The notice in the Newspacket
said: "The boat will leave sharp at seven;" and the advertising
posters on the telegraph poles on Missinaba Street that began "Ho,
for Indian's Island!" ended up with the words: "Boat leaves at seven
sharp." There was a big notice on the wharf that said: "Boat leaves
sharp on time."

So at seven, right on the hour, the whistle blew loud and long, and
then at seven fifteen three short peremptory blasts, and at seven
thirty one quick angry call,--just one,--and very soon after that
they cast off the last of the ropes and the Mariposa Belle sailed off
in her cloud of flags, and the band of the Knights of Pythias, timing
it to a nicety, broke into the "Maple Leaf for Ever!"

I suppose that all excursions when they start are much the same.
Anyway, on the Mariposa Belle everybody went running up and down all
over the boat with deck chairs and camp stools and baskets, and found
places, splendid places to sit, and then got scared that there might
be better ones and chased off again. People hunted for places out of
the sun and when they got them swore that they weren't going to
freeze to please anybody; and the people in the sun said that they
hadn't paid fifty cents to be roasted. Others said that they hadn't
paid fifty cents to get covered with cinders, and there were still
others who hadn't paid fifty cents to get shaken to death with the
propeller.

Still, it was all right presently. The people seemed to get sorted
out into the places on the boat where they belonged. The women, the
older ones, all gravitated into the cabin on the lower deck and by
DigitalOcean Referral Badge