Yea,
slimy things did crawl with legs Upon the
slimy sea.
For, now, the last of the fleet of ships was round the last low point we had headed; and the last green barge, straw-laden, with a brown sail, had followed; and some ballast-lighters, shaped like a child's first rude imitation of a boat, lay low in the mud; and a little squat shoal-lighthouse on open piles, stood crippled in the mud on stilts and crutches; and
slimy stakes stuck out of the mud, and
slimy stones stuck out of the mud, and red landmarks and tidemarks stuck out of the mud, and an old landing-stage and an old roofless building slipped into the mud, and all about us was stagnation and mud.
I had seen ice on the little horsepond that morning, and as we went through the garden we found the tall asparagus, with its red berries, lying on the ground, a mass of
slimy green.
I could have kissed their rough, cold iron palms in gratitude if they had not been buried in
slimy mud under ten fathoms of water.
While it had always been difficult for me to look upon these things as other than
slimy, winged crocodiles--which, by the way, they do not at all resemble--I was now forced to a realization of the fact that I was in the hands of enlightened creatures--for justice and grati-tude are certain hallmarks of rationality and culture.
Tarzan of the Apes curled up upon the
slimy timbers, and was soon asleep.
She gazed away toward Grande Terre and thought she would like to be alone there with Robert, in the sun, listening to the ocean's roar and watching the
slimy lizards writhe in and out among the ruins of the old fort.
Nor was that all, for crawling together on flat tables of rock or letting themselves drop into the sea with loud reports I beheld huge
slimy monsters--soft snails, as it were, of incredible bigness--two or three score of them together, making the rocks to echo with their barkings.
Soon the nature of the soil changed; to the sandy plain succeeded an extent of
slimy mud which the Americans call "ooze," composed of equal parts of silicious and calcareous shells.
In preparing these for use he manifested all the ostentation of a professed cook, although the chief mystery of the affair appeared to consist in pouring water in judicious quantities upon the
slimy contents of his cocoanut shells.
And then about him coiled the great,
slimy folds of a hideous monster of that prehistoric deep--a mighty serpent of the sea, with fanged jaws, and darting forked tongue, with bulging eyes, and bony protuberances upon head and snout that formed short, stout horns.
On the level with the surface of the water he saw a large opening in the dark and
slimy wall.