Page:Peter Whiffle (1922).djvu/163

 and stevedores. One of these young men came nearly every day until his entire body, with the exception of his eye-balls, lips, and nails, had become a living Persian carpet, a subtle tracery of arabesques and fantastic beasts, birds and reptiles. The process of application was interesting. First, the pattern must be pricked out on glazed paper, smeared with lamp-black; this was laid on the surface to be tattooed and the outline left by the lamp-black was worked over with needles. The artist utilized a piece of wood into which were fixed with wires, nine or ten sharp points. The victims seemed to suffer a good deal of pain, but they suffered in silence. It was not, however, fear of pain that caused Peter to hesitate. I think he would have been frescoed from head to foot, could he have once decided upon a design. Day after day, he looked over the sketches, professional symbols, military, patriotic, and religious, symbols of love, metaphorical emblems and emblems fantastic and historical, frogs, tarantulas, serpents, hearts transfixed with arrows, crosses surmounted by spheres, and cannon. He was most tempted, I think, by the design of an Indian holding aloft the flag of the United States.

Late in March, he suggested a trip to Bermuda.

We must go somewhere, he explained, and why not Bermuda? It's not too far away.

I had been working hard and welcomed the idea of a vacation. To the question of a destination I was comparatively indifferent. It was, however,