The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Garret and the Garden, by R.M. Ballantyne

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Title: The Garret and the Garden

Author: R.M. Ballantyne

Release Date: June 7, 2007 [EBook #21737]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE GARRET AND THE GARDEN ***

Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England

THE GARRET AND THE GARDEN, BY R.M. BALLANTYNE.

CHAPTER ONE.

THE GARRET AND THE GARDEN OR LOW LIFE HIGH UP.

SUDDEN FRIENDSHIPS.

In the midst of the great wilderness--we might almost say the wilds--of
that comparatively unknown region which lies on the Surrey side of the
Thames, just above London Bridge, there sauntered one fine day a big
bronzed seaman of middle age. He turned into an alley, down which,
nautically speaking, he rolled into a shabby little court. There he
stood still for a few seconds and looked around him as if in quest of
something.

It was a miserable poverty-stricken court, with nothing to commend it to
the visitor save a certain air of partial-cleanliness and
semi-respectability, which did not form a feature of the courts in its
neighbourhood.

"I say, Capting," remarked a juvenile voice close at hand, "you've bin
an sailed into the wrong port."

The sailor glanced in all directions, but was unable to see the owner of
the voice until a slight cough--if not a suppressed laugh--caused him to
look up, when he perceived the sharp, knowing, and dirty face of a small
boy, who calmly contemplated him from a window not more than a foot
above his head. Fun, mischief, intelligence, precocity sat enthroned on
the countenance of that small boy, and suffering wrinkled his young
brow.

"How d'ee know I'm in the wrong port--monkey?" demanded the sailor.

"'Cause there ain't no grog-shop in it--gorilla!" retorted the boy.

There is a mysterious but well-known power of attraction between kindred
spirits which induces them to unite, like globules of quicksilver, at
the first moment of contact. Brief as was this interchange of
politenesses, it sufficed to knit together the souls of the seaman and
the small boy. A mutual smile, nod, and wink sealed, as it were, the
sudden friendship.