Miss Barclay went leaping down the beach to examine the depth of water, but came back disconsolate. "We could never get Celia round now, disabled as she is - I doubt if any of us could do it, with the waves crashing in like that. Anyway, it's too dangerous to try - there is nothing else for it - we'll just have to climb up beyond high-water mark and wait for the tide to do down. Thank goodness the cliff doesn't become sheer till above high-water mark."
From THE MOOCHERS ABROAD, Chapter 2, The Picnic. Despite the title, the characters spend a considerable amount of time actually getting out of Cornwall. First they are trapped at the school in quarantine for the mumps. Then in this chapter, Celia has sprained her ankle and the girls and Miss Barclay are cut off by the tide and have to spend several hours on the cliff waiting for the tide to go out. It is only in Chapter 5 that they finally leave England. This is in contrast with Jane Shaw's other holiday stories, which either begin already in the foreign country (Breton Adventure, Susan Interferes, Fivepenny Mystery) or see the characters in the new country fairly quickly (Crooks Tour, Twopence Coloured, Susan's Kind Heart).
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