TALES OF THE SEA: 12 Maritime Adventure Novels in One Volume (Illustrated)
fingers.”
“And you fed the child, though fasting yourselves?”
“No, we wer’n’t altogether idle, my Lady, seeing that we kept our teeth jogging on the skin of the dog, though I will not say that the food was over savoury. And then, as we had no occasion to lose time in eating, we kept the oars going so much the livelier. Well, we got in at one of the islands after a time, though neither I nor the nigger had much to boast of as to strength or weight when we made the first kitchen we fell in with.”
“And the child?”
“Oh! he was doing well enough; for, as the doctors afterwards told us, the short allowance on which he was put did him no harm.”
“You sought his friends?”
“Why, as for that matter, my Lady, so far as I have been able to discover, he was with his best friends already. We had neither chart nor bearings by which we knew how to steer in search of his family. His name he called master Harry, by which it is clear he was a gentleman born, as indeed any one may see by looking at him; but not another word could I learn of his relations or country, except that, as he spoke the English language, and was found in an English ship, there is a natural reason to believe he is of English build himself.”
“Did you not learn the name of the ship?” demanded the attentive Rover, in whose countenance the traces of a lively interest were very distinctly discernible.
“Why, as to that matter, your Honour, schools were scarce in my part of the country; and in Africa, you know, there is no great matter of learning; so that, had her name been out of water, which it was not, we might have been bothered to read it. Howsomever, there was a horse-bucket kicking about her decks, and which, as luck would have it, got jammed-in with the pumps in such a fashion that it did not go overboard until we took it with us. Well, this bucket had a name painted on it; and, after we had leisure for the thing, I got Guinea, who has a natural turn at tattooing, to rub it into my arm in gunpowder, as the handiest way of logging these small particulars. Your Honour shall see what the black has made of it.”
So saying, Fid very coolly doffed his jacket, and laid bare, to the elbow, one of his brawny arms, on which the blue impression was still very plainly visible Although the letters were rudely imitated, it was not difficult to read, in the skin, the words “Ark, of Lynnhaven.”
“Here, then, you had a clue at once to find the relatives of the boy,” observed the Rover, after he had deciphered the letters.
“It seems not, your Honour; for we took the child with us aboard the ‘Proserpine,’ and our worthy Captain carried sail hard after the people; but no one could give any tidings of such a craft as the ‘Ark, of Lynnhaven;’ and, after a twelvemonth, or more, we were obliged to give up the chase.”
“Could the child give no account of his friends?” demanded the governess.
“But little, my Lady; for the reason he knew but little about himself. So we gave the matter over altogether; I, and Guinea, and the Captain, and all of us, turning-to to educate the boy. He got his seamanship of the black and myself, and mayhap some little of his manners also; and his navigation and Latin of the Captain, who proved his friend till such a time as he was able to take care of himself, and, for that matter, some years afterwards.”
“And how long did Mr Wilder continue in a King’s ship?” asked the Rover, in a careless and apparently indifferent manner.
“Long enough to learn all that is taught there, your Honour,” was the evasive reply.
“He came to be an officer, I suppose?”
“If he didn’t, the King had the worst of the bargain.—But what is this I see hereaway, atween the backstay and the vang? It looks like a sail; or is it only a gull flapping his wings before he rises?”
“Sail, ho!” called the look-out from the mast head. “Sail, ho!” was echoed from a top and from the deck; the glittering though distant object having struck a dozen vigilant eyes at the same instant. The Rover was compelled to lend his attention to a summons so often repeated; and Fid profited by the circumstance to quit the poop, with the hurry of one who was not sorry for the interruption. Then the governess arose too, and, thoughtful and melancholy she sought the privacy of her cabin.
Chapter XXV
“Their preparation is to-day by sea.”
—Anthony and Cleopatra
“Sail, ho!” in the little frequented sea in which the “Rover” lay, was a cry that quickened every dull pulsation in the bosoms of her crew. Many weeks had now, according to their method of calculation, been entirely lost in the visionary and profitless plans of their chief. They were not of a temper to reason on the fatality which had forced the Bristol trader from their toils; it was enough, for their rough natures, that the rich spoil had escaped them. Without examining for the causes of this loss, as has been already seen, they had been but too well disposed to visit their disappointment on the head of the innocent officer who was charged with the care of a vessel that they already considered a prize. Here, then, was at length an opportunity to repair their loss. The stranger was about to encounter them in a part of the ocean where succour was nearly hopeless, and where time might be afforded to profit, to the utmost, by any success that the freebooters should obtain. Every man in the ship seemed sensible of these advantages; and, as the words sounded from mast to yard, and from yard to deck, they were taken up in cheerful echos from fifty mouths, which repeated the cry, until it was heard issuing from the inmost recesses of the vessel.
The Rover himself manifested more than usual satisfaction at this prospect of a capture. He was quite aware of the necessity of some brilliant or of some profitable exploit, to curb the rising tempers of his men; and long experience had taught him that he could ever draw the cords of discipline the tightest in moments that appeared the most to require the exercise of his own high courage and consummate skill. He walked forward, therefore, among his people, with a countenance that was no longer buried in reserve, speaking to several, whom he addressed by name, and of whom he did not even disdain to ask opinions concerning the character of the distant sail. When a sort of implied assurance that their recent offences were overlooked had thus been given, he summoned Wilder, the General, and one or two others of the superior officers, to the poop, where they all disposed themselves, to make more particular and more certain observations, by the aid of a half-dozen excellent glasses.
Many minutes were now passed in silent and intense scrutiny. The day was cloudless, the wind fresh, without being heavy, the sea long, even, and far from high, and, in short, all things combined, as far as is ever seen on the restless ocean, not only to aid their examination, but to favour those subsequent evolutions which each instant rendered more probable would become necessary.
“It is a ship!” exclaimed the Rover, lowering his glass, the first to proclaim the result of his long and close inspection.
“It is a ship!” echoed the General, across whose disciplined features a ray of something like animated satisfaction was making an effort to display itself.
“A full-rigged ship!” continued a third, relieving his eye in turn, and answering to the grim smile of the soldier.
“There must be something to hold up all those lofty spars,” resumed their Commander. “A hull of price is beneath.—But you say nothing, Mr Wilder! You make her out”——
“A ship of size,” returned our adventurer, who, though hitherto silent, had been far from the least interested in his investigations. “Does my glass deceive me—or”——
“Or what, sir?”
“I see her to the heads of her courses.”
“You see her as I do. It is a tall ship on an easy bow-line, with every thing set that will draw. And she is standing hitherward. Her lower sails have lifted within five