"Hame's hame," runs the proverb, "as the devil said when he found himself in the Court of Session," and I had lost any desire for that sinister company.

Besides, I liked the notion of having to do with ships and far lands; for I was at the age when youth burns fiercely in a lad, and his fancy is as riotous as a poet's.
Yet the events I have just related had worked a change in my life.

They had driven the unthinking child out of me and forced me to reflect on my future.

Two things rankled in my soul--a wench's mocking laughter and the treatment I had got from the dragoon.

It was not that I was in love with the black-haired girl; indeed, I think I hated her; but I could not get her face out of my head or her voice out of my ears.