admired his brusquerie and bustle; things of which he was himself never
guilty.

As for the prescription, that was a Delphic Oracle. Worlds could not have
tempted him to deviate from a letter in it.

He waited with impatience for the yacht; and, meantime, it struck him
that the first part of the prescription could be attacked at once.

It was the afternoon of the day succeeding his arrival. The Fifeshire
hills, seen across the Firth from his windows, were beginning to take
their charming violet tinge, a light breeze ruffled the blue water into a
sparkling smile, the shore was tranquil, and the sea full of noiseless
life, with the craft of all sizes gliding and dancing and courtesying on
their trackless roads.

The air was tepid, pure and sweet as heaven; this bright afternoon,
Nature had grudged nothing that could give fresh life and hope to such
dwellers in dust and smoke and vice as were there to look awhile on her
clean face and drink her honeyed breath.

This young gentleman was not insensible to the beauty of the scene. He
was a little lazy by nature, and made lazier by the misfortune of wealth,
but he had sensibilities; he was an artist of great natural talent; had
he only been without a penny, how he would have handled the brush! And
then he was a mighty sailor; if he had sailed for biscuit a few years,
how he would have handled a ship!

As he was, he had the eye of a hawk for Nature's beauties, and the sea
always came back to him like a friend after an absence.