Chapter XIII
THERE is no large body of water which can assume the profound smoothness of the Indian Ocean; to every other ocean there is a ground swell, as if it had never settled from the rude measures of the Creation. The Indian Ocean on good behavior is smoother than the sky above it—by day sunnier and bluer, starrier by night. It is so warm that the sun goes to bed naked, with an unperverted smile; so sweet that you hate to breathe out, so even tempered that ports swing wide around the clock, so unhurried that the restless abandon haste. But that voyage there were days of impatience for Beauling. He had received a letter which on the face of it was merely trying to slander him into good behavior; he thought he read a different and hap-
