and magnificent to the eye--careless, fearless, but stupid, harsh, and
proud--an English Phebus de Chateaupers--the son of a great contractor;
I remembered him well, and that he loved me not. Then the rank and file
in stable jackets, most of them (but for a stalwart corporal here and
there) raw, lanky youths, giving promise of much future strength, and
each leading a second horse; and among them, longest and lankiest of
them all, but ruddy as a ploughboy, and stolidly whistling _"On revient
toujours a ses premiers amours,"_ rode my former self--a sight (or
sound) that seemed to touch some tender chord in Mary's nature, where
there were so many, since it filled her eyes with tears.

[Illustration]

To describe in full a honey-moon filled with such adventures, and that
lasted for three years, is unnecessary. It would be but another
superficial record of travel, by another unskilled pen. And what a pen
is wanted for such a theme! It was not mere life, it was the very cream
and essence of life, that we shared with each other--all the toil and
trouble, the friction and fatigue, left out. The necessary earthly
journey through time and space from one joy to another was omitted,
unless such a journey were a joy in itself.

For instance, a pleasant hour can be spent on the deck of a splendid
steamer, as it cleaves its way through a sapphire tropical sea, bound
for some lovely West Indian islet; with a good cigar and the dearest
companion in the world, watching the dolphins and the flying-fish, and
mildly interesting one's self in one's fellow-passengers, the captain,
the crew. And then, the hour spent and the cigar smoked out, it is well
to shut one's eyes and have one's self quietly lowered down the side of
the vessel into a beautiful sledge, and then, half smothered in costly