FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82  
83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   >>   >|  
scharged into river barges by the paddle-wheeler. It was this verging upon a vision, unknown but longed for, and this inevitable falling back to known fact, which perhaps depressed me and made the time pass all too slowly here. The rattle of the cranes, so often interrupted, was all the more welcome; the news of progress began to assume a better look; the incidents of life in dock, from the angry officiousness of the wharf manager, a crude foreigner, to the arrival of passenger boats and the swarm of gay-coloured families to and from them, became worth attention again. Food, so interesting at sea, lately become a burden, was reinstated; boiled eggs for instance were welcomed, after a regime of steaks, by the whole saloon. The whole saloon--no; Bicker, the man about town, refused his with a criticism, likening them to plasticine. With his put-and-take top, the youthful-spirited chaplain came more often, and often expressed his regret that we were soon to be away. Orders were not yet forthcoming. It was feared, and often urged upon me with reference to my late troubles, that the _Bonadventure_ would be sent up the river to Rosario. I made a great mistake about Rosario and other possible destinations up the river, their names suggesting ancient Spanish romantic traditions to me: I mentioned my feelings to the assembled saloon. All the romance there, it seemed, was hidden behind a cloud of patriarchal mosquitoes. The discharge of coal was at last over and done. The day following, Hosea sent for me and told me that the ship would shift at two, and perhaps--for all he knew--straight out to sea. I told him I should not be clinging to the stones of Buenos Aires at that hour. But it was not our fate to depart altogether that day. Instead of going out into the open water, when at three the pilot and the tugs brought the _Bonadventure_ out from her Stygian berth at Wilson's Wharf and down to the outer port, we now turned into an arm of the docks called Riachuelo. There, between a steel sailing-ship which gave no sign of life and a great black mechanical ferry or transporter, and further--there was no doubt about this--beside a guano works, we were tied up for a time as yet undefined. The change was, partly on account of the neighbouring industry, "uncertain if for bale or balm." I felt that we might even miss the lively sight of the passenger boats coming and going, and all their gilded press of friends and acquaintances
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67   68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82  
83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   106   107   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

saloon

 

Bonadventure

 

passenger

 
Rosario
 
depart
 

mosquitoes

 
patriarchal
 

altogether

 

hidden

 

Instead


clinging
 

straight

 

Buenos

 

discharge

 

stones

 
partly
 

change

 

account

 

industry

 
neighbouring

undefined

 
uncertain
 

coming

 

gilded

 

acquaintances

 

friends

 

lively

 
transporter
 

turned

 

Wilson


brought

 

Stygian

 

mechanical

 

sailing

 

called

 

Riachuelo

 

reference

 

officiousness

 

manager

 

incidents


assume

 

foreigner

 

attention

 

interesting

 

families

 

arrival

 
coloured
 

progress

 

unknown

 

longed