ere is not to be trifled
with, though in fine weather you may pass it safely in a mere
cockle-shell, and the last time I had sailed here alone it was in an open
boat, just ten feet long inside. Still the whole day may be summed up
now, as it was in the log of the Rob Roy, "Fine run to Margate;" the
pleasures of it were just the same as so often afterwards were met,
enjoyed, and thanked for, but which might be tedious to relate even once.

The harbour here dries bare at low tide, and as seventeen years had
elapsed since we had sailed into it, this bad habit of the harbour was
forgotten, but more years than that may pass before it will be forgotten
again, for as evening came, and the water ebbed, and I reclined
unharnessed in the cabin, reading intently, there suddenly came a rude
bumping shove upwards as from below, and then another--the Rob Roy had
grounded. Soon there was a swaying this way and that, as if yet
undecided, and at length a positive heel over to _that_; the whole of my
little world within being canted to half a right angle, and a ridiculous
distortion of every single thing in my bedroom was the result. The
humiliating sensation of being aground on hard unromantic mud is tempered
by the ludicrous crooked appearance of the contents of your cabin and by
the absurd sensation of sleeping in a corner with everything askance
except the lamp flame, which, because it burns upright, looks most awry
of all, and incongruously flares on the spout of the teapot in your
pantry.

And why this _bouleversement_ of all things? Because I had omitted to
bring a pair of "legs" with me, for a boat cannot stand upright on shore
without legs any more than an animal.

Next time the Rob Roy came to Margate we made one powerful leg for her by
lashing the two oars to the iron shroud, and took infinite pains to
incline the boat over to that side so as to be turned away from the wind
and screened from the tide, and I therefore weighted her down by placing
the dingey and heavy anchor on the lee gunwale, and then with misplaced
contentment proceeded to cook my dinner. At a solemn pause in the
repast, the yawl, without other warning than a loud splash, perversely
turned over to the _wrong_ side, with deck to sea and wind, and every
single thing exactly the contrary of what was proper. I had just time to
plunge my hissing spirit-lamp into the sea, and thus to prevent the cry
of "Ship on fire!" but had not time to put out my cabin-la