Olivia in India | Page 3

Portraits. It comforts me to read of such steady, quiet places as the Pentland Hills and of the decent men who do their herding there.
Is it really only three days since I left you all, and you envied me going out into the sunshine? Oh! you warm, comfortable people, how I, in this heaving uncertain horror of a ship, envy you!
_25th_.
(Still in pencil.)
You mustn't think I have been lying here all the time. On Tuesday we managed to get on deck, and on Wednesday it was warm and sunny, and we began to enjoy life again and to congratulate ourselves on having got our sea-legs. But we got them only to lose them, for yesterday the wind got up, the ship rolled, we became every minute more thoughtful, until about tea-time we retired in disorder. It didn't need the little steward's shocked remark, "Oh my! You never 'ave gone back to bed again!" to make us feel ashamed.
However, we reach Marseilles to-day at noon, and, glorious thought, the ship will stand still for twenty-four hours. Also there will be letters!
This isn't a letter so much as a wail.
Don't scoff. I know I'm a coward.
_S.S.Scotia, Oct. 27_.
... A fountain-pen is really a great comfort. I am writing with my new one, so this letter won't, I hope, be such a puzzle to decipher as my pencil scrawl.
We are off again, but now the sun shines from a cloudless sky on a sea of sapphire, and the passengers are sunning themselves on deck like snails after a shower. I'm glad, after all, I didn't go back from Marseilles by train.
When we reached Marseilles the rain was pouring, but that didn't prevent us ("us" means G. and myself) from bounding on shore. We found a dilapidated fiacre driven by a still more dilapidated cocher, who, for the sum of six francs, drove us to the town. I don't know whether, ordinarily, Marseilles is a beautiful town or an ugly one. Few people, I expect, would have seen anything attractive in it this dark, rainy October afternoon, but to us it was a sort of Paradise regained. We had tea at a caf��, real French tea tasting of hay-seed and lukewarm water, and real French cakes; we wandered through the streets, stopping to stare in at every shop window; we bought violets to adorn ourselves, and picture-postcards, and sheets of foreign stamps for Peter, and all the time the rain poured and the street lamps were cheerily reflected in the wet pavements, and it was so damp, and dark, and dirty, and home-like, we sloppered joyfully through the mud and were happy for the first time for a whole week. The thought of letters was the only thing that tempted us back to the ship.
I heard from all the home people, even Peter wrote, a most characteristic epistle with only about half the words wrongly spelt, and finishing with a spirited drawing of the Scotia attacked by pirates, an abject figure crouching in the bows being labelled "You!" How I miss that young brother of mine! I ache to see his nubbly features ("nubbly" is a portmanteau word and exactly describes them) and the hair that no brush can persuade to lie straight, and to hear the broad accent--a legacy from a nurse who hailed from a mining village in Lithgow--which is such a trial to his relatives I have no illusions about Peter's looks any more than he has himself. A too candid relative commenting once on his excessive plainness in his presence, he replied, "Yes, I know, but I've a nice good face." I sometimes feel that if Peter turns out badly it will be greatly my fault. Mother was so busy with many things that I naturally, as the big sister, did most of the training, and it wasn't easy. When I read to him on Sunday Tales of the Covenanters, he at once made up his mind that he much preferred Claverhouse to John Brown of Priesthill, an unheard-of heresy, and yawning vigorously, announced that he was as dull as a bull and as sick as a daisy. One night when I went to hear him say his prayers, he said:
"I'm not going to say any prayers,"
"Oh, Peter," I said, "why?"
"'Cos I've prayed for a whole year it would be snow on Christmas and it wasn't--just rain."
"Then," I said very gravely, "God won't take care of you through the night."
"Put me in my bed," said the little ruffian, "and I'll see;" and I was awakened at break of day by a small figure in pyjamas dancing at my bedside, shouting with unholy joy, "I'm here, you see, I'm here," and it was weeks before I could bring him to a better state of mind.
So much younger than any of us--the