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On sandbars some dingy, log-like shapes, beginning stealthily to move toward the water, were revealed as crocodiles. In a bend of the river cashew trees overshadowed the thatch of fishing huts. Beyond fields of lilies one made out, flitting away, sooty wanderers clad in ragged kilts and carrying thin-bladed spears.
Like her father and brother and Hamil she was mounted on an unornamental but wiry Tallahassee horse; and she rode cross-saddle, wearing knee-coat and kilts of kahkee and brown leather puttees strapped from under the kneecap to the ankle. Like the others, too, she carried a small shotgun in a saddle boot, and in the web loops across her breast glimmered the metal rims of a dozen cartridges.
After about another quarter of an hour Sergeant Hermitage, my Orderly Room Sergeant, ran up from the rear to tell me to halt the column, as a man had slipped into a culvert and was stuck in the mud. In fishing him out the Sergeant had got stung with nettles. This made him hot. It did not mend matters when I suggested that his country was getting even with him for wearing kilts.
More than a hundred men were digging on the top of this hill. They wore the fezes and kilts of the modern Greek. Little two-wheeled horse-carts creaked about, loading and dumping. Some of the men were working about the wall near the stone lions. "This is the great gate of the city," said Dr. Schliemann. "Here the king and his warriors used to march through, thousands of years ago.
The skirl of the pipes and the sight of the kilts moved the population to great enthusiasm, both vocal and osculatory, and we had a regular triumphal procession. Our destination was Beclers, five miles east of Tournai. The consequent halt threw our time-table out of gear, and we finally stumbled in to our billeting area in the dark, covered with mud and very weary.
"We shall have, however, no little difficulty in replacing our clothing," I observed; "though, as fortunately Marian's box has been saved, she will be better off than any of us." "I don't despair of being able to manufacture clothing sufficient for our wants," said Uncle Paul, "shoes, hats, and cloaks; but we must take to kilts when our trousers give way.
The thatched piers were crowded with turbaned Mussulmen in their bajus or short jackets, full white trousers, and red sarongs or plaitless kilts the boys dressed in silver fig-leaves and silver bangles only. All looked at our unveiled faces silently, and, as I thought, disapprovingly.
But afore I wan to the brig, whan I was i' the shaidow o' Baillie Bapp's hoose, I heard sic a scushlin' and a shochlin' upo' the brig! and I saw something gang reelin' aboot; and afore I cud gaither my wits and rin foret, I heard an awfu' splash i' the water; and by gangs somebody wi' lang quaiet strides, and never saw me. He had on the kilts and the lave o' the fandangles.
And Billy comforted me in his sweet, babyish fashion that I remembered he used when he was in kilts. Billy became friends with old Amos that first evening, and that sufficed, for Amos had enriched my own childhood, and I knew that nothing which could amuse or instruct would be omitted.
He's a bit cranky, but he's clever and he'll teach you a lot about Ireland. He's up to his neck in Irish things, and speaks Gaelic and wears an Irish kilt. At least he used to wear one, but he's left it off now, partly because he gets cold in his knees and partly because he's not sure now that the ancient Irish ever wore kilts. I think you'll like him!...
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