At last, the boat was pulled boldly to the gangway, and the excitable gentleman in spectacles, seizing hold of the after-braces, bowed and handed me a card, and begged, in bad French, that he might be permitted to come on board. Permission was soon obtained from R----, and, with hat in hand, on board the Dane, as I fancied, jumped, accompanied, of course, by the other gentleman. The whiteness of the deck attracted his attention, and turning to me he made, smiling, an observation in a language which I did not understand, but could not help desiring to hear its silvery sounds again.
"Vous n'êtes pas Français?" he then asked.
"Mais la langue, ne la comprenez-vous pas?"
"Dat is pitty; for I have been for shome toime past in Ingerlaand, but I not learn ze langwage. Ze Ingerleesh varry difficolt."
"You seemed," I replied, "to have overcome that difficulty, and you speak it with a pretty good accent."
"No, Zare, you varry goot to say so; but I feel I can at all not--at all not,--qu'est que veut dire, 'exprimer?'--ach! ach!" he exclaimed, putting his finger in his mouth, and pressing it, meditatively, between his front teeth, "I can at all not speak moin feeling in ze vay I shoult vish."
"If then, Sir," I went on, "after being one year in Denmark, I can speak the language so correctly as you do the English, I should think myself no deficient scholar."
"Oh! Zare, you too goot. I am not Dane, zough; I am from Sweden--ffr[=a]n Svenska landet; but I come to Kjobenhagen for ze painting. Zare," he said, turning round, and looking from stem to stern, and from the burgee at the top-mast head to the brass belaying pins, "dish Engelskt skepp varry--ach! ach!" again he exclaimed, stamping his foot and thrusting his finger in his mouth, "fy!--vat you call 'skönt'?"
"Ja; jag tackar. Det är skönt!" he exclaimed to his companion, who bowed in assent, and observed in the Swedish tongue,
"Det ser ut som en fregatt;" which, being interpreted, meant that the yacht was like a frigate.
"Ja," answered my friend; and, after allowing time that they might admire everything, which they did, walking to and fro the deck, looking down the pumps and up the rigging, I requested that they would follow me, and I would show them below. The compactness of the cabin, the comfort of the berths, the height between decks, the combination of ease and elegance in the furniture, the copper-plate drawings, the swinging table, the pantry with every drawer and cupboard exactly where they ought to be, and nowhere else, the forecastle, and, wonder upon wonder! the cooking apparatus with its moveable jack, and its particular copper for hot water,--all these things, and a thousand others too minute to tell, acted so impressively on their minds, that I could hear them extolling, in barbarous grammar, to the cook the singular sagacity of an English mechanic, and the collective greatness of the English nation. They remained on board nearly three hours; and, after conversing with R----, P----, and myself as well as they could, they presented each of us with their cards, and, begging that we would honour them with a visit, took their leave. I returned on deck with them; and the gentleman, whom I have distinguished from his fellow visitor by his spectacles, before he stepped into his boat, said to me,