PAINTED ROCK
we goes on, and after a thousand years, boys, we sees a light, and he says; 'That's the Lizard.' 'What Lizard?' I asked, and he laughed some and said it was the tail of England; and so we sails along up a place called the Channel, though I seen only parts of one side to it, and at nights there was towns strung all along like lighted cars, very handsome to see. And we got around a corner with more lights, and into a river. He tells me, 'This is the finest river in the world,' and I didn't contradict him none, though I tho't of the Brazos and my own home perairies. And the green grass was curious to see. And then we seen millions of steamboats and ships, and smoke ahead like a perairie fire. And I asked Tuckett where the fire was, and he said it was London. It made me sad to think I'd come so far to find her burnt up, and when I said so he sat down and nearly died. It appears, boys, they burns coal in London town all the year in several million fireplaces, and don't see the sun ever in consequence. And then the river narrowed and there was more houses, and then so thick no green could be seenany-
212
