* * * * *
Arriving at Portsmouth the next morning, I made my residence in the
first house in which I found an instrument, a spacious dwelling facing
the Harbour Pier. I then hurried round to the Exchange, which is on the
Hard near the Docks, a large red building with facings of Cornish
moor-stone, a bank on the ground-floor, and the Exchange on the first.
Here I plugged her number on to mine, ran back, rang--and, to my great
thanksgiving, heard her speak. (This instrument, however, did not prove
satisfactory: I broke the box, and put in another battery, and still the
voice was muffled: finally, I furnished the middle room at the Exchange
with a truckle-bed, stores, and a few things, and here have taken up
residence.)
I believe that she lives and sleeps under the instrument, as I here
live and sleep, sleep and live, under it. My instrument is quite near
one of the harbour-windows, so that, hearing her, I can gaze out toward
her over the expanse of waters, yet see her not; and she, too, looking
over the sea toward me, can hear a voice from the azure depths of
nowhere, yet see me not.
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