O, Venice is a fine city, wherein a rat can
wander at his ease and take his pleasure! Or, when weary of
wandering, can sit at the edge of the Grand Canal at night, feasting
with his friends, when the air is full of music and the sky full of
stars, and the lights flash and shimmer on the polished steel prows of
the swaying gondolas, packed so that you could walk across the canal
on them from side to side! And then the food--do you like shellfish?
Well, well, we won't linger over that now.'
He was silent for a time; and the Water Rat, silent too and
enthralled, floated on dream-canals and heard a phantom song pealing
high between vaporous grey wave-lapped walls.
'Southwards we sailed again at last,' continued the Sea Rat, 'coasting
down the Italian shore, till finally we made Palermo, and there I
quitted for a long, happy spell on shore. I never stick too long to
one ship; one gets narrow-minded and prejudiced. Besides, Sicily is
one of my happy hunting-grounds. I know everybody there, and their
ways just suit me. I spent many jolly weeks in the island, staying
with friends up country.
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