Chapter C: H a P. LXXXV

NOW hang it! quoth I, as I look’d towards the _French_ coast—a man should know something of his own country too, before he goes abroad——and I never gave a peep into _Rochester_ church, or took notice of the dock of _Chatham_, or visited St. _Thomas_ at _Canterbury_, though they all three laid in my way——

—But mine, indeed, is a particular case——

So without arguing the matter further with _Thomas o’Becket_, or any one else—I skip’d into the boat, and in five minutes we got under sail, and scudded away like the wind.

Pray, captain, quoth I, as I was going down into the cabin, is a man never overtaken by _Death_ in this passage?

Why, there is not time for a man to be sick in it, replied he——What a cursed lyar! for I am sick as a horse, quoth I, already——what a brain!——upside down!——hey-day! the cells are broke loose one into another, and the blood, and the lymph, and the nervous juices, with the fix’d and volatile salts, are all jumbled into one mass——good G—! every thing turns round in it like a thousand whirlpools——I’d give a shilling to know if I shan’t write the clearer for it——

Sick! sick! sick! sick!——

—When shall we get to land? captain—they have hearts like stones——O I am deadly sick!——reach me that thing, boy——’tis the most discomfiting sickness——I wish I was at the bottom—Madam! how is it with you? Undone! undone! un——O! undone! sir——What the first time?——No, ’tis the second, third, sixth, tenth time, sir,——hey-day!—what a trampling over head!—hollo! cabin boy! what’s the matter?

The wind chopp’d about! s’Death—then I shall meet him full in the face.

What luck!—’tis chopp’d about again, master——O the devil chop it——

Captain, quoth she, for heaven’s sake, let us get ashore.

C H A P. LXXXVI

IT is a great inconvenience to a man in a haste, that there are three distinct roads between _Calais_ and _Paris_, in behalf of which there is so much to be said by the several deputies from the towns which lie along them, that half a day is easily lost in settling which you’ll take.

First, the road by _Lisle_ and _Arras_, which is the most about——but most interesting, and instructing.

The second, that by _Amiens_, which you may go, if you would see _Chantilly_——

And that by _Beauvais_, which you may go, if you will.

For this reason a great many chuse to go by _Beauvais._