Well, when they had
laughed, and I had laughed, and we had shaken hands afresh, laughing
heartily as we did so, and I began to feel it was time to go on and
catch up my boat, which was floating sluggishly down the winding stream
of the Peiho, I resolved on one final effect, like the last scene of a
dramatic performance. Making vigorous signs and noises, to intimate that
something was coming, and they must look out sharp, and feeling very
much like a conjurer who has requested his audience to keep their eyes
on him and 'see how it's done'--I slyly unbuttoned my gloves, and then
with much parade began to draw one off by the finger-tips.
"'Eyah! Eyah!' cried the Chinamen on all the notes of the gamut, as they
fell back over each other. _They thought I was skinning my hands_. I
'smiled superior,' as I took the gloves off, and made an effect almost
as great by putting them on again."
"Oh, Cousin Peregrine, weren't they astonished?"
"They were, Maggie, And unless they are more familiar with Europeans
now, the mystery is probably to this day as unsolved to them as the
trick of the ball of thread and the twelve needles still is to me. By
this time, however, my boat was
'Far off, a blot upon the stream,'
and I had to hasten away as fast as I could to catch it up.
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