It was close now, so close that I could see the gleam of Lisbeth's
hair and the point of the little tan shoe. With my eyes on this, I
writhed my way along the bough, which bent more and more as I neared
the end. Here I hung, swaying up and down and to and fro in a highly
unpleasant manner, while I waited the crucial moment.
Never upon this whole round earth did anything creep as that boat
did. There was a majestic deliberation in its progress that
positively maddened me. I remember to have once read an article
somewhere upon the "Sensibility of Material Things," or something
of the sort, which I had forgotten long since, but as I hung there
suspended between heaven and earth, it came back to me with a rush,
and I was perfectly certain that, recognising my precarious position,
that time-worn, ancient boat checked its speed out of "pure
cussedness."
But all things have an end, and so, little by little the blunt bow
crept nearer until it was in the very shade of my tree. Grasping
the branch, I let myself swing at arm's length; and then I found
that I was at least a foot too near the bank.
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