ONE:"The wrestlers were the largest men I have seen in Japan; and the fact is I didn't suppose the country contained any men so large. As near as I could see, they had more fat than muscle on them; but there must have been a good deal of muscle, too, for they were strong as oxen. Doctor Bronson says he has seen some of these wrestlers carry two sacks of rice weighing a hundred and twenty-five pounds each, and that one man carried a sack with his teeth, while another took one under his arm and turned somersets with it, and did not once lose his hold. The Doctor says these men are a particular race of Japanese, and it used to be the custom for each prince to have a dozen or more of these wrestlers in his suite to furnish amusement for himself and his friends. Sometimes two princes would get up a match with their wrestlers, just as men in New York get up matches between dogs and chickens. Then there were troupes of wrestlers, who went around giving exhibitions, just as they sometimes do in America. But you never saw such fat men in all your life as they were; not fat in one place, like the man that keeps the grocery on[Pg 230] the corner of the public square in our town, but fat all over. I felt the back and arms of one of them, and his muscles were as hard as iron. The flesh on his breast was soft, and seemed like a thick cushion of fat. I think you might have hit him there with a mallet without hurting him much.Lord Inverbroom lives near, does he not? she asked. Thats a wonderful library. Is the public allowed to see it? I suppose not. I would not trust Charles within arms length of a Caxton if I had one.
TWO:"Let me explain," urged the Clockwork man, who was gaining in verbal ease and intellectual elasticity every moment. "Supposing[Pg 90] I was to hit you hard. You would fall down. You would become supine. You would assume a horizontal position at right angles to your present perpendicularity." He gazed upwards at the tall figure of the constable. "But if you were to hit me, I should have an alternative. I could, for example, fall into the middle of next week."
ONE:They exchanged. The slave girl sank forward upon her face moaning and sobbing. Harry silently wept. "Now, Gholson, you know me; draw--pistol."He had begun to know that moment which few men of fifty, and those the luckiest of all, are unaware of. He wanted a companion, somebody who satisfied his human, not his corporal needs. While we are young, the youthful vital force feeds itself by its own excursions, satisfies itself with the fact of its travel and explorations. It is enough to go on, to lead the gipsy life and make the supper hot under the hedge-side, and sleep sound in the knowledge that next day there will be more travel and fresh horizons, and a dawn that shines on new valleys and hillsides. But when the plateau of life is reached, those are the fortunate ones who have their home already made. For thirty years he had had his own fireside and his wife, and his growing children. But never had he found his home: some spirit of the secret garden had inspired him, and now he felt mateless and all his money was dust and ashes in his mouth. Two things he wanted, one to be{121} different in breed from that which he was, the other to find a companion. The shadow of a companion lurked in his room, where were the piles of his books. Somewhere in that direction lay the lodestone.
TWO:"We bought some things in the shops, but they did not amount to much either in cost or quality. Fred found a pair of Chinese spectacles which he paid half a dollar for; they were big round things, with glasses nearly as large as a silver dollar, and looked very comical when put on. But I am told that they are very comfortable to the eyes, and that the foreigners who live in China, and have occasion to wear spectacles, generally prefer those made by the Chinese opticians. A pair of really fine pebbles will cost from ten to twenty dollars. The glasses that Fred bought were only the commonest kind of stuff, colored with a smoky tint so as to reduce the glare of the sun.
ONE:
TWO:"Don't you know? Oh, I remember, you were asleep when Quinn told us. Well, sir,"--he tried to speak calmly but he had to speak somehow or explode--"it was soldiers' pay--for Dick Taylor's army, over in the Trans-Mississippi; a million and a half dollars!" He was as proud to tell the news as he would have been to own the money.A CHINESE FAMILY PARTY. A CHINESE FAMILY PARTY.
