The Argosy — page 310: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

On the South Coast. 261 no wonder !), took compassion upon us, gave us a place, and made themselves as agreeable as their conscious position would allow. I caught sight of an earl’s coronet upon a small bag as we got out of the carriage, and a few days afterwards discovered who our polite fellow travellers had been. Returning from Chichester, even the dull, deadly-lively thorough- fares of Bognor had in them something almost pleasant; and at any rate there was the ever-moving, ever-changing sea for companionship. The dullest place in the world could never be dull if it bordered the sea. My regret at leaving Bognor had nothing to do with the place itself. But it must be remembered that it was emphatically the “dead season;” and at such times there is a certain air of stagnation: about the liveliest place, which never fails to depress. The lodging- house keepers have reaped their harvest and retired into their shells ; large windows, dirty and disrobed, stare you in the face with stony, unchanging aspect. Grass begins to grow in the streets, and. few footsteps interfere with its progress. ‘The little pleasure boats are all drawn up on the béach, high and dry for the winter; and if, on seeing an old boatman lounging about, he asks if you would likea sail, he does it unconsciously, by the force of habit: just as a clock mechanically strikes the appointed hours through the night watches, though none are near to listen. So I left Bognor. Winding about the South Coast, passing such lovely spots as Arundel, such quiet places as Worthing, such gay scenes as Brighton, I found myself in due time at St. Leonard’s, that most agreeable, most picturesque of watering-places. In the Alexandra Hotel, so pleasant an abiding place both in situation and management—where you receive rather the comforts of a home than the routine of an hotel—I found quietude and con- solation for the dulness of Bognor. ‘The elements, too, were at rest: fair skies and soft winds for the moment were the order of the day: and all the little world of St. Leonard’s congregated every afternoon on the waik in front of the sea, for the pleasure of that eternal pacing to-and-fro of which people seem never to grow weary—doubtless because it is done of their own free will. If the penance of Sisyphus became a fashionable amusement it would soon become as popular as lawn tennis: and, perhaps, would be as sensible a pastime as toboganning down stairs on a tea-tray. COMA (A) NOOKS (C(O) >