Blue Jackets | Page 7

and he smiled a peculiarly saddened, pensive smile; for our messmate was leaning towards Ching.
"Don't eat any more of that," he said faintly.
"Eat um all up; velly good."
"Can one get a drop of brandy here?"
"Dlop blandy? No. Velly nicee 'lack."
"What's 'lack?"
"No, no 'lack! lice spilit."
"'Rack!" I said--"arrack?"
"Yes, allack," said Ching, nodding.
"Let's have some--a glass each," said Barkins; "and look sharp."
Ching summoned one of the smiling waiters, and the order was given. Then for the first time he noticed that we had not finished the contents of our little saucers.
"No eat lat?" he cried.
I shook my head.
"Velly good!"
"We're not quite well," said Smith.
"Been out in the sun too much," added Barkins.
"Ah, sun too much bad! Lit' dlop spilit make quite well. No eat lat?"
"No, no!" we cried in chorus.
"Velly good," said our guide; and in alarm lest such a delicacy should be wasted, he drew first one and then the other saucer over to his side, and finished their contents.
Long before this, though, the attendant had brought us three tiny glasses of white spirit, which we tossed off eagerly, with the result that the qualmish sensations passed away; but no recommendations on the part of our guide could induce us to touch anything that followed, saving sundry preparations of rice and fruit, which were excellent.
The dinner over, Ching took us about the garden to inspect the lilies in pots, the gold and silver fish, fat and wonderfully shaped, which glided about in the tanks and ponds, and then led us into a kind of arbour, where, beneath a kind of wooden eave, an instrument was hanging from a peg. It was not a banjo, for it was too long; and it was not a guitar, for it was too thin, and had not enough strings; but it was something of the kind, and evidently kept there for the use of musically-disposed visitors.
"You likee music?" said Ching.
"Oh yes," I replied dubiously, as I sat using the telescope, gazing right away over the lower part of the town at the winding river, with its crowds of craft.
"Why, he isn't going to play, is he?" whispered Smith. "We don't want to hear that. Let's go out in the town."
"Don't be in such a hurry," replied Barkins. "The sun's too hot. I say, our dinner wasn't such a very great success, was it?"
Smith shook his head, and just then Ching began to tune the instrument, screwing the pegs up and down, and producing the most lugubrious sounds, which somehow made me begin to think of home, and how strange it was to be sitting there in a place which seemed like part of a picture, listening to the Chinese guide.
I had forgotten the unpleasantry of the dinner in the beauty of the scene, for there were abundance of flowers, the sky was of a vivid blue, and the sun shone down brilliantly, and made the distant water of the river sparkle.
Close by there were the Chinese people coming and going in their strange costume; a busy hum came through the open windows; and I believe that in a few minutes I should have been asleep, if Ching had not awakened me by his vigorous onslaught upon the instrument, one of whose pegs refused to stay in exactly the right place as he kept on tuning.
@@@@
Then a little more screwing up.
Peng, peng, pang--pong.
Ching stopped, nursed the instrument upon his knee as if it were a baby, pulled out the offending peg as if it were a tooth, moistened the hole, replaced the peg, and began again--screw, screw, screw.
@@@@
Just a quarter of a tone out still, and he tried again diligently, while my eyes half closed, and the Tanner and Blacksmith both nodded in the heat.
@@@@
Right at last; and Ching threw himself back so that his mouth would open to the widest extent, struck a chord on the three strings, and burst forth with celestial accompaniment into what was in all probability a passionate serenade, full of allusions to nightingales, moonbeams, dew-wet roses, lattice-windows, and beautiful moon-faced maidens, but which sounded to me like--
"Ti ope I ow wow, Ti ope I ow yow, Ti ope I ow tow, Ti ope I ligh."
The words, I say, sounded like that: the music it would be impossible to give, for the whole blended together into so lamentable a howl, that both Barkins and Smith started up into wakefulness from a deep sleep, and the former looked wildly round, as confused and wondering he exclaimed--
"What's matter?"
As for Smith, he seemed to be still half-asleep, and he sat up, staring blankly at the performer, who kept on howling--I can call it nothing else--in the most doleful of minor keys.
"I say," whispered Barkins, "did you set him to do that?"
I shook my head.
"Because--oh, just look! here are all the people coming out to