" One day there was an attempt to disturb
Joe's monopoly as drunkard, and I am afraid I had a hand in it. A human
caricature in broken boots addressed me as I lay on the beach (writing
with a stylographic pen and blotting the sheets with the sand), and
besought me to buy sprigs of lavender. He proved to me by ocular
demonstration that he had no money in his pockets; whereupon I proved to
him by parity of reasoning that I had none in mine either. However, I
remembered me of a penny postage-stamp (unlicked), and tendered it
diffidently, and he received it with disproportionate benedictions. Later
in the day he reappeared under my window, hurling up maudlin abuse. He
had got drunk on my postage-stamp!
I told him to get along with him, which he did. For some time he
staggered about Broadstairs in search of its policeman. He came across
him at last, and was straightway clapped into an open victoria and driven
across the sunny fields to Ramsgate. Meantime, Broadstairs was left
unprotected--perhaps Joe kept an eye on it.
Broadstairs has also a jolly old waterman, who paddles about apparently
to pick up exhausted bathers. One morning as I was swimming past his boat
he warned me back. "Any danger?" I asked. "Ladies," he replied,
ambiguously enough.
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