on the advice
of the vendor, he had bought a fifth share in a lottery ticket. With
this qualification, he began to paint his future in all the colours of
L1,166--his possible, or as he wished to be assured, his probable,
harvest. A small schooner, in the enchanted atmosphere of his pipe,
seemed already to own him master; she would trade for long years of
prosperity in South Sea islands, where uncultivated fruits and beauties
abound. While we agreed on the plan, the moon went down; multitudes of
stars shone out, and meteors at moments ran down the sky. A broad glow
to starboard revealed the nearness of the coast. Everything was most
still, except perhaps Mead's spirit. There might be some hitch. But no, he
felt his luck was in; he was sure, something told him that he carried the
winning number.

The day's entries in my diary now began thus, or nearly: "Need I say
it again--One mosquito, etc., but I killed him; then, one mosquito, etc."
The persistence of these self-satisfied hovering devils was puzzling,
for the mornings dawned almost bitterly fresh, and the breeze was
always awake. Its direction had now laid, during the night, a carpet of
glittering coal-dust along the passage outside the door; and the day
being Sunday, which should by all precedent be marked by an increased
radiance in the outward as well as in the inward man, it was impossible
to keep clean. For the inward man, I once again took refuge in Young's
_Night Thoughts_, which, despite the disapproval of Mr. Masefield's
Dauber, I will maintain to give room and verge enough to annotate,
parody, wilfully miscomprehend, skip, doze, and indulge what trains of
thought whether ethical, fanciful, or reminiscent.

A gentler air, a bluer sea, a sandy coast in view. There was something
lyrical about the "dirty ship" as with the buoyancy of her cargoless
holds she fleeted to the south. Mead, his future resplendent with L1,166
and its South Sea bubble, seemed to feel this rhythmical impulse. Every
now and then, in his consultations, he would break forth into singing,
but seldom more than a fragment at a time; now it was "Farewell and adieu
to you, bright Spanish Ladies"--a grand old tune--now "Six men dancing
on the dead man's chest." But most, he gave in honour of his native
Australia a ballad of a monitory sort with a wild yet sweet refrain.
It began

I was born in the city of Sydney,
And I was an apprentice bound,
And many's the good old time I've