Page:Lieut Gullivar Jones - His Vacation - Edwin Arnold (1905).djvu/48

 arm upon his knee at our approach and pulling a blue convolvulous bud to pieces—a charming picture of dainty idleness. Anything so soft, so silken as that little lady was never seen before. Who am I, a poor quarter-deck loafer, that I should attempt to describe what poet and painter alike would have failed to realise? I know, of course, your stock descriptives: the melting eye, the coral lip, the peachy cheek, the raven tress; but these were coined for mortal woman—and this was not one of them. I will not attempt to describe the glorious tenderness of those eyes she turned upon me presently; the glowing radiance of her skin; the infinite grace of every action; the incredible soul-searching harmony of her voice, when later on I heard it—you must gather something of these things as I go—suffice it to say that when I saw her there for the first time in the plenitude of her beauty I fell desperately, wildly in love with her.

Meanwhile, even the most infatuated of mortals cannot stare for ever without saying something. The grating of our prow against the garlanded side of the royal barge roused me from my reverie, and nodding to An, to imply I would be back presently, I lightly jumped on to Hath's vessel, and, with the assurance of a free and independent American voter, approached that individual, holding out my palm, and saying as I did so—