At last he
felt he could strive with fate no longer, and wandered mile after mile,
amused and forgetful of his own misery in the spectacle of the river--the
rose sky, the long perspectives, the houses and warehouses showing in fine
outline, and then the wonderful blue night gathering in the forest of masts
and rigging. He was admirably patient. There was no fretfulness in his
soul, nor did he rail against the world's injustice, but took his
misfortunes with sweet gentleness.
He slept in a public-house, and next day resumed his idle search for
employment. The weather was mild and beautiful, his wants were simple, a
cup of coffee and a roll, a couple of sausages, and the day passed in a
sort of morose and passionless contemplation. He thought of everything and
nothing, least of all of how he should find money for the morrow. When the
day came, and the penny to buy a cup of coffee was wanting, he quite
naturally, without giving it a second thought, engaged himself as a
labourer, and worked all day carrying sacks of grain out of a vessel's
hold. For a large part of his nature was patient and simple, docile as an
animal's. There was in him so much that was rudimentary, that in accepting
this burden of physical toil he was acting not in contradiction to, but in
full and perfect harmony with, his true nature.
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