Why, we were back in this world in one instant! Then we looked
the same startled thought into each other's eyes at the same
moment; more than two weeks gone, and that ship not back yet!
In another minute I appeared in the presence of my train. They
had been steeped in troubled bodings all this time--their faces
showed it. I called an escort and we galloped five miles to a
hilltop overlooking the sea. Where was my great commerce that
so lately had made these glistening expanses populous and beautiful
with its white-winged flocks? Vanished, every one! Not a sail,
from verge to verge, not a smoke-bank--just a dead and empty
solitude, in place of all that brisk and breezy life.
I went swiftly back, saying not a word to anybody. I told Sandy
this ghastly news. We could imagine no explanation that would
begin to explain. Had there been an invasion? an earthquake?
a pestilence? Had the nation been swept out of existence? But
guessing was profitless. I must go--at once. I borrowed the king's
navy--a "ship" no bigger than a steam launch--and was soon ready.
The parting--ah, yes, that was hard. As I was devouring the child
with last kisses, it brisked up and jabbered out its vocabulary!
--the first time in more than two weeks, and it made fools of us
for joy. The darling mispronunciations of childhood!--dear me,
there's no music that can touch it; and how one grieves when it
wastes away and dissolves into correctness, knowing it will never
visit his bereaved ear again.
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