Letters from High Latitudes by Lord Dufferin
page 296 of 305 (97%)
page 296 of 305 (97%)
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he would not have looked well in your boudoir; but he
never seemed out of place on my quarter-deck, and every man on board loved him as a brother. With what a languid grace he would wallow and roll in the water, when we chucked him overboard; and paddle and splash, and make himself thoroughly cool and comfortable, and then come and "beg to be taken up," like a fat baby, and allow the rope to be slipped round his extensive waist, and come up--sleek and dripping--among us again with a contented grunt, as much as to say, "Well, after all, there's no place like HOME!" How he would compose himself to placid slumber in every possible inconvenient place, with his head on the binnacle (especially when careful steering was a matter of moment), or across the companion entrance, or the cabin skylight, or on the shaggy back of "Sailor," the Newfoundland, who positively abhorred him. But how touching it was to see him waddle up and down the deck after Mr. Wyse, whom he evidently regarded in a maternal point of view--begging for milk with the most expressive snorts and grunts, and embarrassing my good-natured master by demonstrative appeals to his fostering offices! I shall never forget Mr. Wyse's countenance that day in Ullapool Bay, when he tried to command his feelings sufficiently to acquaint me with the creature's death, which he announced in this graphic sentence, "Ah, my Lord!--the poor thing!--TOES UP AT LAST!" Bergen is not as neat and orderly in its architectural arrangements as Drontheim; a great part of the city is |
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