Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1889-01-13

Billy fuckers concern who's got the
coin. - He spat with disgust and lurched
off, on which the group broke up, and
made in several detachments for the
various public houses or inns in Beach
street.
III.
Beach street was in those days much as
II Is now the Quaintest, safest, iniagin-
able thoroughfare on the coast of Great
Britain; Uttered with anchors of all
sizes, with huge coils of hemp cable, with
odd fantastic capstans for the winding up
of boats, with tall poles for the spread
ing of nets, lines from window to win
dow for the easy drying of linen, queer
dusky alleys leading at night time into
true smuggling blackness of atmosphere;
beer-house after beer-house in friendly
iuxtaposition, with a perpetual seething
and Kissing of surf upon the steep Single,
as regale to the ear, and miles of sand
plains beyond billowing to Sandwich, and
sweet and musical into late autumn day
time with wild flowers of fifty different
sorts and birds of all kinds
1T was now about 8 o CLOCK in the even
ing; there was no moon, the starlight
made no sheen, and the sea brimmed in
tremorless ebony to its confines. The
few oil lamps in Beach street threw a
feeble CLEAN upon the shingly road; but
how full of people Deal was OH this par
ticular night York might have gathered
from the groups of men showing through
every tavern window he passed; drink
ing, arguing, singing, caper-cutting, as
jack Will when newly come ashore amid
motiOnless fOgs of tobacco smoke. The
first sign his eye caught was that of
the Kentish Sickle He entered the
place, and found it crowded with boat
men and seamen The landlord,
purple-faced man, who had removed his
wig for air, and yet looked half dead for
heat, stood behind little bar or counter
drawing ale out of q cask, the top of
which was on level with his hand. York
inquired if he could have bed; the land
lord shook his head with glance at the
tall oouth, as though as he suspected
kind of impertinance in such question
i'll the face Of the crowd of people smok-
ing and drinking beyond.
Can you name me house in which |
am likely to obtain a bed for the night?
said York
"|No,'' said the purple-faced man,
continuing to draw ale into thick glass,
one-legged tumblers, which, as fast as
he filled them, he pushed to a couple of
fellows who carried them to the tables.
1t II be odd if you gifts bed to loie in
tonight, mate, in Deal. Whoy, it III be
ending III the boatmen having to turn
their boats keel up for lodgings; at
which observation a large heavy man in
a round hat and great belt round his
waist, fit for the smuggling of a horse
pistol or two, burst into a loud laugh.
York walked out and entered another
tavern hard by. This, too, was full, its
five bedrooms crammed, the state-bed of
the place to be occupied by no fewer
than four men, to lie heel to heel, when
ever it should suit them to withdraw to
it; as the perspiring, dried-up little land
lord Informed York with grin of eX-
quisite satisfaction
He tried third, fourth; tramped on
to the Cat O Nine Tails alehouse, but to
no purpose. Had every house had its forty
beds to let, they would not have ap-
parently met the demand that night for
accommodation from the captains, mates,
passengers, sailors who had come ashore
on special business, or who had deserted,
or who had to take the coach next day to
London or wherever they might live,
counting Gas passengers) upon days and
perhaps weeks of detention if they stuck
to the craft lying out in the Downs yon-
der
York had now reached the Shutdown
extremity of Deal; he retraced his steps,
and passing the houses he had visited, he
arrived at much such another one as
they called the Lonely Star, into which
he walked. At the end of a tolerably
long narrow passage was an open door,
out of which hoated clouds of tobacco
smoke along with the incense of the
punch-bowl. A little on this side the
door was Il staircase, and nearer yet to
the entrance Il recess, in which sat a
plump woman of fifty, with sloe- black
eyes and red cheeks and treble chins.
Over her head hung an Old-fashioned
lantern, the light of which was COM
fortably reflected i'll rows of bottles upon
shelves behind her filled with liquors of
various dyes
"'Can l have bed in this house?'
asked York of this plump, good-humOred
woman, who ut his approach let fall some
knitting SHE was at work upon.
She ran her bright black eyes over him
with an expression as though she found
pleasure in the sight of his long womanly
hair and pale handsome face and manli-
ness of stature, and answered after a
minutes thinking: 81 IN afraid not,
sir. Every bed i'll the house is taken.
never remember Deal so full of Stran-
gers.
81 shall have to return to the ship,
them he exclaimed. ''Yet L would
rather not. Plying betwixt the Downs
and the shore is costly work to poor
man-at least your boatmen make it so.
A spare sofa would serve me. l have been
i'll in South America, and am not yet
well, and burst not lie in the open A
pillow and roof for my head would suf-
flee. 1 must be up by daybreak, perhaps
before D. My sweetheart IS mother, Mrs
Bax, lives t'other side of Sandwich,
more Ministerway than that town. Dye
know her, ma amp
BY name, sir; Il very decent old lady,
l I'm sure.
''There IS bed for me there; but its
too far to reach it on foot Tonight Be-
sides, my sweetheart Jenny, viii not ex-
pect me till Tomorrow by noon or there
abouts. Now, what am I to do for bed?
There will be other houses of entertain
meut in this town besides those have
visited in this street?''
''There IS gentleman - said the land
lady, after short spell of thought, ely
ing up stairs vino has used my house for
some years running IT'S but a bit of a