But by-and-bye, as we caught the first draught of the trades, the boy
began to punctuate my fables with that hateful cough. This went on for
a week; and one day, in the midst of our short stroll, his legs gave
way under him. As I caught him in my arms, he looked up with a smile.
"I'm very weak, you know. But it'll be all right when I get to
England."
But it was not till we had passed well beyond the equatorial belt that
Johnny grew visibly worse. In a week he had to lie still on his couch
beneath the awning, and the patter of his feet ceased on the deck. The
captain, who was a bit of a doctor, said to me one day--
"He will never live to see England."
But he did.
It was a soft spring afternoon when the _Midas_ sighted the Lizard,
and Johnny was still with us, lying on his couch, though almost too
weak to move a limb. As the day wore on we lifted him once or twice to
look.
"Can you see them quite plain?" he asked; "and the precious stones
hanging on the trees? And the palaces--and the white elephants?"
I stared through my glass at the serpentine rocks and white-washed
lighthouse above them, all powdered with bronze and gold by the
sinking sun, and answered--
"Yes, they are all there.
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