hours are
shrinking; but little margin is left. By midnight I am back in Calais
once more, listening to its old wheezy chimes. It seems like an old
friend, to which I have returned after a long, long absence, so many
events have been crowded into the day. It still wants some interval to
the hour past midnight, when the packet sails.

XII.

_ST. PIERRE LES CALAIS._

As I wandered down to the end of the long pier, which stretched out
its long arm, bent like an elbow, looking, like all French piers, as
if made of frail wickerwork, I thought of a day, some years ago, when
that eminent inventor, Bessemer, conceived the captivating idea of
constructing a steamboat that should abolish sea-sickness for ever!
The principle was that of a huge swinging saloon, moved by hydraulic
power, while a man directed the movement by a sort of spirit-level.
Previously the inventor had set up a model in his garden, where a
number of scientists saw the section of a ship rocking violently by
steam. I recall that pleasant day down at Denmark Hill, with all the
engineers assembled, who were thus going to sea in a garden. A small
steam-engine worked the apparatus--a kind of a section of a
boat--which was tossed up and down violently; while in the centre was
balanced a small platform, on which we experimenters stood. On large
tables were laid out the working plans of the grand Bessemer
steamship, to be brought out presently by a company.

A year and more passed away, the new vessel was completed, and nearly
the same party again invited to see the result, and make trial of it.
I repaired with the rest. Nothing more generous or hospitable could be
conceived. There was to be a banquet at Calais, with a free ticket on
to Paris. It was a gloomy iron-gray morning. The strange outlandish
vessel, which had an engine at each end, was crowded with
_connoisseurs_. But I was struck with the figure of the amiable and
brilliant inventor, who was depressed, and received the premature
congratulations of his friends somewhat ruefully. We could see the
curious 'swinging saloon' fitted into the vessel, with the ingenious
hydraulic leverage by which it could be kept nicely balanced. But it
was to be noted that the saloon was braced firmly to the sides of its
containing vessel; in fact, it was given out that, owing to some
defect in its mechanism, the thing could not be worked that day.
Nothing could be handsomer than this saloon, with its fittings and
dec