Then, still
higher, on the very summit--for even here, in the glare of this great
crater, where evaporation rains upward from the sea, all vapor is
quickly condensed and frozen on the higher peaks--we see, like the
tresses of the aged, the pearly snow and ice overhanging the Olympian
brow. Aye, may we not even--"
Well, dear reader, I expect to be censured. As Bainbridge drew toward
what I suppose would, under any circumstances, have been his close, I
was sitting with my face toward Arthur, and the actions of that
unpolished gem told me that the catastrophe was at hand. Those who say
that "the expected never happens" misinform us; for the expected very
frequently does happen. The wretched boy did not--would not--look at me,
and I could not, of course, interrupt the flow of eloquence that poured
from the lips of Bainbridge. What could I have done? Even at this late
day, I cannot see what I could have done, though I did know the nature
of what was coming. It was the words "snow and ice" that added the last
straw which broke the camel's back, and let fall the load of annoyance;
and as Bainbridge uttered the words, "Aye, may we not even----," Arthur,
that miserable factotum, whom I had so rashly trusted, shot from his
chair into the air; and, with arms waving, and eyes glistening with
excitement, he fairly yelled:
"Great geewhilikin! Think of that ice, and that salt, and that climate!
Now if a fellow only had a drove of Giganticus cows, with old Olympus
for 'em to run over free, where would the other ice-cream fellows be?
Free ice, free salt, free cream, free fodder, and no end of 'em all,
too! Why, in that hot hole a man 'ud be a ice-cream king in no time.
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