Shooting
fires dart through his unhappy extremities, yet he smiles on and bears
his pain for his daughters' sake. But the elderly hero cannot be
compared with the ambitious exquisite of the Southern Seas, and we shall
prove this hypothesis. The careless voyager throws a beer-bottle
overboard, and that bottle drifts to the glad shore of a glittering
isle; the overjoyed savage bounds on the prize, and proceeds to announce
his good fortune to his bosom friend. Then the pleased cronies decide
that they will have a good, wholesome, thorough shave, and they will
turn all rivals green with unavailing envy. Solemnly those children of
nature go to a quiet place, and savage number one lies down while his
friend sits on his head; then with a shred of the broken bottle the
operator proceeds to rasp away. It is a great and grave function, and no
savage worthy the name of warrior would fulfil it in a slovenly way.
When the last scrape is given, and the stubbly irregular crop of
bristles stands up from a field of gore, then the operating brave lies
down, and his scarified friend sits on _his_ head. These sweet and
satisfying idyllic scenes are enacted whenever a bottle comes ashore,
and the broken pieces of the receptacles that lately held foaming Bass
or glistening Hochheimer are used until their edge gives way, to the
great contentment of true untutored dandies.
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