The Steam-Packet: A Tale of the River and the Ocean — page 45: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

28 THE STEAM PACKET, window aforesaid. Not that the window commanded any particularly fine prospect—unless a back view of Truman and Hanbury’s Brewery may be so denominated; but somehow or another one always does seek the window, in the summer-time, when one is smoking a cigar. And while the pale blue smoke curls upwards, imagination fre- quently plays a truant part, roving wildly amongst those scenes whither reality never could penetrate. So was it with Captain Pen- tonville. His musings were long and varied; and it may not be amiss to make the reader acquainted with a portion of them. ‘‘ Well, here I am on the eve of a trip for which I am but indiffer- ently well provided,” said the captain within himself ;—‘“ a trip that will cost me at least fifty pounds, and towards which I have not fifty shillings. Never mind—I never had a shilling of my own, that I recollect—and somehow or another I have always managed to knock on tolerably well. I suppose that my good fortune is not going to desert me just as Aramintha and her five thousand pounds certain, — with as much more in perspective, are in my grasp. ‘ Faint heart never won a fair lady;’ and all is fair in love and war, they say— je ne connots que cela. But papa Pifpaf must stand Moses for me on this trip ;—if he don’t, hang me if I know who will! Old. Pifpaf must —cela va sans dire. There!” he exclaimed, suddenly starting from his reverie, as a certain sound of vocal harmony broke upon his ears from the opposite garret,—‘‘as I live, those accursed tailors are going to begin their songs again: I am, in reality, growing weary of this life of melody. Ido not like these airs. I am assassinated by music. These trials are enough to convert a man into a swan—a goose would be a more technical expression—and make him sig his death-song. No doubt these tailors are all very honest men; and their actions are generally performed above-board. Sed hine ille lachryme. They have stentorian lungs; and there is not a song, from ‘ We won't go home till morning,’ to ‘ The dog’s-meat-man,’ that they are not thoroughly masters of; and I am obliged to become the unwilling learner of that mass of music. But, let me see, where was I? Oh! Pifpaf must pay for me—that’s settled. I must get the day named during the voyage—that is settled too; and I must have the marriage celebrated the moment we return—that’s settled.” ‘< Please, sir, here’s the hatter a-vaitin’, and would esteem it a wery great faviour if you’d be so obleeging as to likidate his ’count,” said a middle-sized, shrewd-looking youth of two-and-twenty, who suddenly — entered the room. ‘‘Qh! then that is 2o¢ settled,” observed the captain, continuing the same species of phraseology which he had used in his reverie. Eomichbooks.co