The innocents abroad; . FIRST SUPPER IN FRANCE. manner of curiously worded French signs—stared at bystrangely-habited, bearded French people—every thing grad-ually and surely forcing upon us the coveted consciousness thatat last, and beyond all question we were in beautiful France andabsorbing its nature to the forgetfulness of every thing else,and coming to feel the happy romance of the thing in all itsenchanting delightfalness—and to think of this skinny veteranintruding with her vile English, at such a moment, to blow thefair vision to the winds ! It was exasperating. We set out to find the
The innocents abroad; . FIRST SUPPER IN FRANCE. manner of curiously worded French signs—stared at bystrangely-habited, bearded French people—every thing grad-ually and surely forcing upon us the coveted consciousness thatat last, and beyond all question we were in beautiful France andabsorbing its nature to the forgetfulness of every thing else,and coming to feel the happy romance of the thing in all itsenchanting delightfalness—and to think of this skinny veteranintruding with her vile English, at such a moment, to blow thefair vision to the winds ! It was exasperating. We set out to find the centre of the city, inquiring the di-rection every now and then. We never did succeed in makingany body understand just exactly what we wanted, and neitherdid we ever succeed in comprehending just exactly what they 96 LOST.— said in reply—but then they always pointed—they always didthat, and we bowed politely and said Merci, Monsieur, andso it was a blighting triumph over the disaffected member, any way. He was restive underthese victories and often asked:What did that pirate say? Why, he told us which wayto go, to lind the Grand Casino. Yes, but what did he sayf^? Oh, it dont matter what hesaid—ive understood him. Theseare educated people—not like thatabsurd boatman. Well, I wish they were edu-cated enough to tell a man a di-rection that goes so7ne where—POINTING. for weve been going around in. a circle for an hour—Ive passedthis same old drug store seven times, We said it was a low, disreputable falsehood, (but weknew it was not.) It was plain that it would not do to passthat drug store again, though—we might go on asking direc-tions, but we must cease from following finger-pointings if wehoped to check the suspicions of the disaffected member. A long walk through smooth, asphaltum-paved
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Keywords: ., bo, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectvoyagesandtravels
