TALES OF THE SEA: 12 Maritime Adventure Novels in One Volume (Illustrated)
exactitude, the former ambitious of manifesting his watchfulness, the latter awaiting the return of the marine. The captain now beckoned to Manual to advance and give the countersign.
“Loyalty,” whispered Manual, when he approached the sentinel. But the soldier had been allowed time to reflect; and as he well understood the situation of his officer, he hesitated to allow the prisoner to pass, After a moment’s pause, he said:
“Advance, friends.” At this summons the whole party moved to the point of his bayonet; when the man continued: “The prisoners have the countersign, Captain Borroughcliffe, but I dare not let them pass.”
“Why not?” asked the captain; “am I not here, sirrah? do you not know me?”
“Yes, sir, I know your honor, and respect your honor; but I was posted here by my sergeant, and ordered not to let these men pass out on any account.”
“That’s what I call good discipline,” said Borroughcliffe, with an exulting laugh; “I knew the lad would not mind me any more than that he would obey the orders of that lamp. Here are no slaves of the lamp, my amphibious comrade; drill ye your marines in this consummate style to niceties?”
“What means this trifling?” said the Pilot, sternly.
“Ah! I thought I should turn the laugh on you,” cried Manual, affecting to join in the mirth; “we know all these things well, and we practise them in our corps; but though the sentinel cannot know you, the sergeant will; so let him be called and orders be given through him to the man on post, that we may pass out.”
“Your throat grows uneasy, I see,” said Borroughcliffe; “you crave, another bottle of the generous fluid. Well, it shall be done. Sentinel, you can throw up yon window, and give a call to the sergeant.”
“The outcry will ruin us,” said the Pilot, in a whisper to Griffith.
“Follow me,” said the young sailor. The sentinel was turning to execute the orders of his captain as Griffith spoke, when springing forward, in an instant he wrenched the musket from his hands; a heavy blow with its butt felled the astonished soldier to the floor; then, poising his weapon, Griffith exclaimed:
“Forward! we can clear our own way now!”
“On!” said the Pilot, leaping lightly over the prostrate soldier, a dagger gleaming in one hand and a pistol presented in the other.
Manual was by his side in an instant, armed in a similar manner; and the three rushed together from the building, without meeting any one to oppose their flight.
Borroughcliffe was utterly unable to follow; and so astounded was he by this sudden violence, that several minutes passed before he was restored to the use of his speech, a faculty which seldom deserted him. The man had recovered his senses and his feet, however; and the two stood gazing at each other in mute condolence. At length the sentinel broke the silence:
“Shall I give the alarm, your honor?”
“I rather think not, Peters. I wonder if there be any such thing as gratitude or good-breeding in the marine corps!”
“I hope your honor will remember that I did my duty, and that I was disarmed while executing your orders.”
“I can remember nothing about it, Peters, except that it is rascally treatment, and such as I shall yet make this amphibious aquatic gentleman answer for. But lock the door-look as if nothing had happened, and——”
“Ah! your honor, that is not so easily done as your honor may please to think. I have not any doubt but there is the print of the breech of a musket stamped on my back and shoulders, as plainly to be seen as that light.”
“Then look as you please; but hold your peace, sirrah. Here is a crown to buy a plaster. I heard the dog throw away your musket on the stairs—go seek it, and return to your post; and when you are relieved, act as if nothing had happened. I take the responsibility on myself.”
The man obeyed; and when he was once more armed, Borroughcliffe, a good deal sobered by the surprise, made the best of his way to his own apartment, muttering threats and execrations against the “corps of marines and the whole race,” as he called them, “of aquatic amphibii.”
Chapter XVI
“Away! away! the covey’s fled the cover;
Put forth the dogs, and let the falcon fly—
I’ll spend some leisure in the keen pursuit,
Nor longer waste my hours in sluggish quiet.”
The soldier passed the remainder of the night in the heavy sleep of a bacchanalian, and awoke late on the following morning, only when aroused by the entrance of his servant. When the customary summons had induced the captain to unclose his eyelids, he arose in his bed, and after performing the usual operation of a diligent friction on his organs of vision, he turned sternly to his man, and remarked with an ill-humor that seemed to implicate the innocent servant in the fault which his master condemned:
“I thought, sirrah, that I ordered Sergeant Drill not to let a drumstick touch a sheepskin while we quartered in the dwelling of this hospitable old colonel! Does the fellow despise my commands? or does he think the roll of a drum, echoing through the crooked passages of St. Ruth, a melody that is fit to disturb the slumbers of its inmates?”
“I believe, sir,” returned the man, “it was the wish of Colonel Howard himself, that on this occasion the sergeant should turn out the guard by the roll of the drum.”
“The devil it was!—I see the old fellow loves to tickle the drum of his own ear now and then with familiar sounds; but have you had a muster of the cattle from the farmyard too, as well as a parade of the guard? I hear the trampling of feet, as if the old abbey were a second ark, and all the beasts of the field were coming aboard of us!”
“‘Tis nothing but the party of dragoons from——, who are wheeling into the courtyard, sir, where the colonel has gone out to receive them.”
“Courtyard! light dragoons!” repeated Borroughcliffe, in amazement; “and has it come to this, that twenty stout fellows of the ——th are not enough to guard such a rookery as this old abbey, against the ghosts and northeast storms, but we must have horse to reinforce us? Hum! I suppose some of these booted gentlemen have heard of this South Carolina Madeira.”
“Oh, no, sir!” cried his man; “it is only the party that Mr. Dillon went to seek last evening, after you saw fit, sir, to put the three pirates in irons.”
“Pirates in irons,” said Borroughcliffe, again passing his hands over his eyes, though in a more reflecting manner than before: “ha! oh! I remember to have put three suspicious looking rascals in the black-hole, or some such place; but what can Mr. Dillon, or the light dragoons, have to do with these fellows?”
“That we do not know, sir; but it is said below, sir, as some suspicions had fallen on their being conspirators and rebels from the colonies, and that they were great officers and Tories in disguise; some said that one was General Washington, and others that it was only three members of the Yankee parliament, come over to get our good old English fashions to set themselves up with.”
“Washington! Members of Congress! Go—go, simpleton, and learn how many these troopers muster, and what halt they make; but stay, place my clothes near me. Now, do as I bid you, and if the dragoon officer enquire for me, make my respects, and tell him I shall be with him soon. Go, fellow; go.”
When the man left the room, the captain, while he proceeded with the business of the toilet, occasionally gave utterance to the thoughts that crowded on his recollection, after the manner of a soliloquy.
“Ay! my commission to a half-pay ensigncy, that some of