Page:Eekhoud - The New Carthage.djvu/129

Rh After having executed several rxiktioeuvres; in order to show herself to full advantage to the fashionable and critical crowd that had attended her first gambollings The Gina put on double speed and flew off to the roadstead to rejoice the eyes of other spectators. A berth had been prepared for her near the quay, where she could wait until she had taken on her full equipment and crew and her first cargo of passengers and merchandise. It had been agreed by the owner and the captain that she was to put to sea in a week's time.

Dupoissy, a little mortified at the slight success of his verses, approached the water, and, his glass filled with champagne, standing at the extreme end of the ways from which the boat had taken to the water, he called the crowd, with the air of a juggler waiting to do a new trick: "Attention, please!"

Every one turned to look at him. He had drunk glass after glass of champagne while nobody was paying any attention to him, and now, dishevelled and a little grey, he had remembered the marriage of the Doge and the Adriatic, and the antique libations to the Ocean made by the pagans in order to propitiate Neptune and Amphytrite.

"May this nectar of Bacchus, poured into the kingdom of the waves, assure to the glorious Gina the clemency of the elements!"

He spoke, and, seeking a graceful pose, put all his weight upon one foot and poured the Roederer into the river. But, being a fat man, he narrowly escaped following it; had Bergmans not held him back by his coat-tails he would have taken a header. Every one applauded and laughed.