ending with the invariable _"Bon jour_," or "_Bienvenu, compatriote"_

and demoniac "Ha! ha! ha!"

"The memory of the creature is perfectly wonderful," I said. "Many

parrots have I seen, but never one like this before. It must have sprung

out of the Arabian Nights."

"I can teach any thing to every thing," digressed Major Favraud, "and

without severity; it is my specialty. I was meant for a trainer of

beasts, probably. I will get up an entertainment, I believe, in

opposition to the industrious fleas, called the 'Desperate Doves,' and

teach pigeons to muster, drill, and go through all the military motions.

I could do it easily, and so repair my broken fortunes. I have one

already at home that feigns death at the word of command. I have amused

myself for hours at a time with this bird.--Don't say a word, Miss

Harz," speaking low, "I see what you think of it all, but I have had to

cheat misery some way or other. It was a wretched device and waste of

existence, though. And when I see that great, distinguished man, who had

such hopes of me as a boy, I feel that I could creep into an auger-hole

for sheer shame of my extinguished promise."

"Not extinguished!" I murmured, "only under a cloud, still destined to

be fulfilled."

"Only in the grave," he said, sadly, "with the promise common to all

mankind;" and thus by gloomy glimpses I caught the truth.

We staid that night at the house of an aunt of Madame La Vigne's, who

received us cordially, entertained us sumptuously, and dismissed us

graciously.

The next morning at sunrise we again set out for Savannah, into which

city we entered before the noonday heat, finding cool shelter and warm

welcome at once under the roof of General Curzon, the South's most

polished gentleman and finished man of letters, of whom it may be truly

said that, "Take him for all in all, we ne'er shall look upon his like

again."

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 2: It need not for one moment be supposed that the opinions of

the author are represented through the extremist Favraud. To her Mr.

Bryant stands forth as the high-priest of American poetry.]

[Footnote 3: The tariff.]

[Footnote 4: Since writing the above, the admirable picture of Mr.

Healey has filled this void; and those who have seen good copies of this

work, executed for and by the order of Louis Philippe, may have a clear

idea of that glorious countenance, the like of which we shall not see

again.

Perhaps it was from this very personal magnetism of which I have spoken

that Healey succeeded better with the portrait of Mr. Calhoun than any

of the others he was sent to this country to paint.]

[Footnote 5: It was about this time that Mr. Calhoun made his famous

anti-tariff crusade throughout the land, it may be remembered by some of

my readers.]

CHAPTER II.

Before leaving the hospitable roof of General Curzon--beneath which I

tarried for several days--awaiting the tardy sailing of the

packet-steamer Kosciusko, bound for New York, circumstances determined

me to leave in the hands of my host a desk which I had intended to carry

with me, and which contained most of my treasures. First among these,

indisputably, in intrinsic value were my diamonds--"sole remnant of a

past magnificence;" but the miniatures of my father and mother, and

Mabel, in the cases of which locks of twisted hair--brown, and black,

and golden, and gray--were contained and combined (dear, imperishable

memorials of vitality in most instances when all the rest was dust and

ashes), and the early letters of my parents, together with the

carefully-kept diary I had written at Beauseincourt, ranked beyond these

even in my estimation.

The cause of this deposit of valuables was simply owing to the unstable

lock of my trunk, the condition of which was detected too late to have

it repaired before sailing. Madame Curzon had suggested to me the unsafe

nature of such custody for objects of price, if, indeed, I possessed

such at all. I told her then of my diamonds, and it was agreed between

us that these, at least, had better be deposited in the bank of her

husband, who would bring them to me himself a few months later--and on

reflection I concluded to add my desk, pictures, and papers, to my more

substantial treasures. These, at least, I felt assured no accident

should throw into the hands of Bainrothe.

On my way to the ship I left the carriage for a moment, in pursuance

with this idea, and, followed by King, the bearer of my large and

weighty desk, entered the banking-house of my host, and was shown at

once, by attentive clerks, to his peculiar sanctum. I told him my errand

in a few words.

"Keep it until called for, unless you hear from me in the interval," I

had said in allusion to my deposit, for he acknowledged the chances were

slight of his leaving home until the following year, notwithstanding

Madame Curzon's convictions.

"Called for by whom?" he asked, calmly.

"By Miriam Monfort in person or her order," I replied, laughingly, "This

is a mystery that, by-and-by, shall be explained to you."

"I understand something of that already," he rejoined. "Marion has been

whispering to the reeds, you know, or Madame Curzon, the same thing

nearly; but let us be earnest, as your time is short, and mine precious

to-day. Life is uncertain, and, young and strong as you are, or seem to

be, you cannot foresee one hour even of the future, or of your own

existence. Suppose Miriam Monfort neither comes in person nor sends her

order for its restoration--what, then, is to become of this

treasure-chest of hers?"

"You shall keep it then," I replied, unhesitatingly, "until my little

sister reaches her majority, and cause it to be placed in her own hands,

none other--or, stay, let her have it on the day before her marriage,

should this occur earlier than the time mentioned, or when she reaches

her eighteenth year in any case; but, above all things, be careful."

"So many conflicting directions confuse and mystify me, I confess. Come,

let me write down your wishes, and the matter can be arranged formally,

which is always best in any case. There, I think I have the gist of your

idea," he said a few moments later, as he pushed over to me a slip of

paper to read and sign, which done, I shook hands with him cordially,

preparing to go. "But your receipt--you have forgotten to take it up!"

"O General Curzon! the whole proceeding seems so ominous," I said,

turning back at the door to receive the proffered scrap, which, in

another moment, dropped from my nerveless fingers, while these, clasped

over my streaming eyes, forgot their office.

"My dear young lady," he remonstrated, "I am shocked. What can have

occurred to impress you thus? Not this mere routine of affairs,

surely?--Duncan, a glass of water here for Miss Monfort."

"I do not know, I am sure, why I should be so weak for such a trifle," I

said, after a few swallows of ice-water had somewhat restored my

equilibrium; "but I do feel very dismally about this voyage--have done

so ever since I left Beauseincourt. This is the last straw on the

camel's back, believe me, General Curzon. You must not reproach yourself

in the least--nor me; and now let me bid you farewell once more, perhaps

eternally!"

These words of mine were remembered later in a very different spirit

from that in which they were then received (one of incredulous

compassion)--remembered as are ever the last utterances of the doomed,

whether innocent or guilty, in solemn awe and reverential tenderness,

not unmingled with a superstitious faith in presentiment.

"Why, you look bluer than your very obvious veil, bluer than your

invisible school-marmish stockings, bluer than the skies, or a blue bag,

or Madame de Staël's 'Corinne,' or Byron's 'dark-blue ocean,'" said

Major Favraud, as he assisted me again into the carriage, where Dr.

Durand and Marion awaited me, for, as I have said, we were now on our

way to the vessel which was to bear me and my destinies forever from

that lovely Southern land in which I had seen and suffered so much.

Dr. Durand looked serious at the sight of my woful aspect, and Marion

mutely proffered her _vinaigrette_, gratefully accepted, as was the good

doctor's compassionate silence; but, as usual, Favraud, after having

once gotten fairly under weigh, ran on. "What is the use of bewailing

the inevitable?" he pursued. "We have all seen your _penchant_ for

Curzon, and his for you, for three days past; but Octavia is as tough as

_lignum-vitae,_ I regret to assure you, my dear Miss Harz, and your

chance is _as blue_ as your spirits, or the flames of snap-dragon, or

Marion's eyes. You will have to just put up with the captain, I fear,

for even the doctor there is in harness for life. Southern women, you

know, proverbially survive their husbands; and, as the suttee is out of

fashion, they sometimes have to marry Yankees as a _dernier ressort_ of

desperation! Of course, there are occasional sad exceptions"--looking

grave for a moment, and glancing at the black hat-band on the Panama hat

he was nursing on his knees, so as to let the breeze blow through his

silky, silver-streaked black hair--"but--but--in short, why will you all

look so doleful? Isn't it bad enough to feel so?"

"The loveliest fade earliest, we all know," and the tears were in his

honest, frivolous eyes, dashed away in the next moment as he exclaimed,

eagerly, "Why, there goes the Lamarque equipage, as I live! I had

forgotten all about it. The pleasantest woman in Savannah, young or old,

is to be your _compagnon de voyage_, Miss Harz, and the most determined

widower on record her escort; a perfect John Rogers of a man, with nine

little motherless children, her brother Raguet ('Rag,' as we called him

at school, on account of his prim stiffness, so that 'limber as a rag'

seemed a most preposterous saying in his vicinity). He is handsome,

however, and intelligent, a perfect gentleman, but on the mourners'

bench just now, like some others you know of"--heaving a deep sigh. "His

wife, poor thing, died last autumn--a pretty girl in her day was

Cornelia Huger! I was a little weak in that direction once

myself--before--that is, before--O doctor! what a trouble it is to

remember!"

And again the small, fleet hand was dashed across the twinkling, tearful

eyes of this April day of a middle-aged man of the world--this modern

Mercutio--merry and mournful at once, as if there were two sides to his

every mood, like the famous shield of story. When we reached the quay

the Kosciusko was already getting up her steam, and, in less than an

hour afterward, the friends I loved were gone like dreams, the bustle of

departure was over, and, with lifted canvas and a puffing engine, we

were grandly steaming past the noble forts (poor Bertie's broach and

buckle, be it remembered) on our path of pride and power toward the

broad Atlantic.

The weather was oppressively hot, and, for the first thirty-six hours,

scarcely a breath of wind lifted us on our way, so that the engine,

wholly incompetent to the work of both sails and machinery, bore us very

slowly on our northward ocean-flight. Indeed, the failure of this

engine to do its duty, at first, had sorely disheartened both captain

and crew as we found later, for upon its execution and energies, in the

beginning, had rested our entire dependence.

On the evening of the second day's voyage, a sudden and violent

thunder-storm occurred, not unusual in those latitudes; during the

raging of which our mainmast was struck by lightning, and wholly

disabled.

The fire was extinguished in the only possible manner, by cutting it

away from the decks, letting it gently down upon them, deluging it, so

that our mast lay charred and blackened after its bath of sea-water,

like a mighty serpent stretched along the ship, from stem to stern, and

wrapped loosely in its shrouds. It did us good service later, though not

by defying the winds of heaven, nor spreading forth its snowy sails to

catch the tropic breezes.

Before many hours, it was destined to ride the waves in a shape that was

certainly never intended by those who chose it among many others--taper

and stately in its group of firs--to be the chief adornment of a gallant

ship, and lift a pointing finger to the stars themselves, as an index of

its might, and, with this exception, the hope of those it served--that

of a charred and blackened life raft.

The renewed freshness of the atmosphere, and the joyful upspringing of

the breezes, alone remained, at midnight, to tell the story of the

recent hurricane.

These tropic breezes came like benevolent fairies, to aid our groaning

Titan in his labors.

I can never rid myself for one moment of the idea that an engine really

works, with weary, reluctant strength like a genii slave, waiting

vengefully for the time of retaliation, which sooner or later is sure to

come; or of the visionary notion that a graceful, gliding ship, with

all sails set, receives the same pleasure from its own motion and beauty

that a snow-white swan must do "as down she bears before the gale," with

her white plumage and stately crest.

I think, if ever I am called to give a toast, it shall be "Sail-ships;

may their shadows never be less!" They are, indeed, a part of the

romance of ocean.

The moon was full, in the balmy summer night that succeeded the tempest,

and the ship's quarter-deck was crowded with the passengers of the

Kosciusko, enjoying to the utmost, as it seemed, the delicious,

newly-washed atmosphere, the moonlit heavens and sea, the

exquisitely-caressing softness of the tardily-awakened breezes that

filled the white sails of the vessel, and fluttered the silken scarf of

the maiden, with the same wooing breath of persuasive, subtle strength.

Around Miss Lamarque, the lady of whom Major Favraud had spoken so

admiringly, and to whose kindness he had committed me, a group had

gathered, chiefly of the young, not to be surpassed in any land for

manly bearing, graceful feminine beauty, gayety, wit, and refinement.

There was Helen Oscanyan, fair as a dream of Greece, in her serene,

marble perfectness of form and feature; and the lovely Mollie Cairns,

her cousin, small, dark, and sparkling--both under the care of that

stately gentleman, their uncle, Julius Severe, of Savannah; and there

were the sisters Percy, twins in age and appearance, with voices like

brook-ripples, and eyes like wood-violets, and feet of Chinese

minuteness and French perfection--the darlings and only joys of a mother

still beautiful, though sad in her widowhood, and gentle as the dove

that mourns its mate.

There was the brilliant Ralph Maxwell, whose jests, stinging and

slight, just glanced over the surface of society without inflicting a

wound, even as the skater's heel glides over ice, leaving its mark as it

goes, yet breaking no crust of frost; and there was the poetic dreamer

Dartmore, with his large, dark eyes, and moonlight face, and manner of

suffering serenity, on his way to put forth for fame, as he fondly

believed, his manuscript epic on the "Sorrows of the South."

All these, and more, were there gathering about the leader of their

home-society, on that alien deck, as securely as though they were

sitting in her own drawing-room at "Berthold," on one of her brilliant

reception-evenings.

How could they know--how could they dream the truth--or descry the

hidden skeleton at the festival, wreathed in flowers and veiled with

glittering, filmy draperies, which yet put forth its bony fingers to

beckon on and clutch them?

I too was joyous and unconscious as the rest, and for the first time for

many days felt the burden literally heaved rather than lifted away that

had oppressed me.

Was I not on my way to him in whose presence alone I lived my true life?

and what feeling of his morbid fancy was there that my hand could not

smooth away, when once entwined in his? Beauseincourt, and all its

shadows, had I not put behind me? The sunshine lay before, and in its

light and warmth I should still rejoice, as it was my birthright to do.

I was "fey" that night, as the Scotch say, when an unaccountable

lightness of mood precedes a heavy sorrow, which it so often does, as

well as the more usual mood, the presage of gloom. I felt that I had the

power to put aside all ills--to grapple with my fate, and compel back

my lost happiness. Truly my bosom's lord sat lightly on her throne, as

of late it had not been her wont to do.

Against my inclination had I been drawn into the current of that

youthful gayety, and now my bark floated without an effort on the

stream. I was in my own element again, and my powers were all

responsive.

The small hours came--the happy group dispersed--not without many

interchanges of social compliment, much _badinage_, and merry plans for

the morrow. The monster Sea-sickness had been defied on the balmy

voyage, save in the brief interval of tempest, and his victors mocked

him, baffled as he was, with their purpose of amusement.

"We shall get up the band to-morrow evening," said Major Ravenel, "and

have a dance; the gallop would go grandly here. See what reach of

quarter-deck we have! There are Germans on board who play in concert

violins and wind-instruments."

"Suppose we dress as sea-nymphs," said Honoria Pyne; "enact a masque for

old Neptune's benefit? It would be so complimentary, you know; bring

down the house, no doubt. I have a sea-green tarlatan lying so

conveniently. Colonel Latrobe looks exactly like a Triton, with that

wondrous beard. A little alum sprinkled over its red-gold ground would

do wonders in the way of effect--would be gorgeous--wouldn't it, now,

Miss Harz?"

"But all that could be done on shore as well, Miss Pyne," I replied, in

the way of reminiscence. "It is a pity to waste our opportunities of

observation now, in getting up costumes; and, for my part, I confess

that I have a wholesome dread of these sea-deities, and fear to

exasperate their finny feelings by reducing them to effigies. Thetis is

very spiteful, sometimes; and jealous, too, you remember."

Miss Pyne did not remember, but did not mean to be baffled either, she

would let Miss Harz know, even if that lady _did_ know more about

mythology than herself; and, if no one else would join her, meant to

play her _rôle_, of sea-nymph all alone, with Major Latrobe for her

Triton in waiting, tooting upon a conch-shell, and looking lovely! At

which compliment, open and above-board, poor Major Latrobe, who was over

head and ears in love with her, and a very ugly man, only bowed and

looked more silly than before, which seemed a work of supererogation.

After the rest were gone, Miss Lamarque and I concluded to promenade on

the nearly-deserted deck, in the moonlight, and let the excitement of

the evening die away through the medium of more serious conversation.

She was a woman of forty-five, still graceful and fine-looking, but

bearing few traces of earlier beauty, probably better to behold, in her

overripe maturity, than in the unfolding of her less attractive time of

bud and blossom. Self had been laid aside now (which it never can be

until the effervescence of youth and hope are over). She had accepted

her position of old maid and universal benefactress; and sustained it

nobly, gracefully. She was thoroughly well-bred and agreeable, very

vivacious, astute, and intelligent, rather than intellectual, yet she

had the capacity (had her training been different) to have been both of

these.

I remember how it chanced that, after a long promenade, during which we

had discussed men, manners, books, customs, costumes, and politics, even

(that once tabooed subject for women, now free, to all), with infinite

zest and responsiveness that charmed us mutually, so that we swore

allegiance on the strength of this one day's rencontre, like two

school-girls or knights of old--remember how the dropping of her comb at

his feet caused Miss Lamarque to pause, compelling me to follow her

example, by reason of our intertwined arms, in front of the man at the

wheel, as he stooped to raise it and hand it to her with a seaman's bow.

His ready politeness, unusual for one in his station, determined us to

cultivate his maritime acquaintance, and in a short time we had drawn

forth the outlines of his story, simple and bare as this was of

incident.

His picturesque appearance had impressed us equally during the day, but

until now we had not met in concert about Christian Garth, for such we

soon found was the name of our polite pilot.

He was a Jerseyman, he told us, of German descent, married to the girl

of his heart, and living on the coast of that adventurous little State,

famous alike for its peaches and wrecks.

"Sall had a stocking full of money," he informed us, "silver, and

copper, and gold, when he married her, for her mother had been a famous

huckster--and never missed her post in the Philadelphia market for

thirty years, and this was her child's inheritance, and with this money

he had fixed up his old hut, till it looked 'e'en a'most inside like a

ship-captain's cabin.'"

And now Sall wanted him to stay at home, he informed us, with her and

the children, but somehow or other he could never tarry long at the

hearth, for the sea pulled him like it was his mother, and the spell of

the tides was on him, and he must foller even if he went to his own

destruction, like them men that liquor lures to loss, or the love of

mermaids.

"All land service is dead when likened to the sea," he said, shaking his

great water-dog head, and looking out lovingly upon his idol. "But ships

a'n't like they oncst was, ladies," he added, "before men put these here

heavy iron ingines to work in 'em--it's like cropping a bird's wing to

make a river-boat of a ship, and a dead, dead shame to shorten sails

till it looks like a young gal dressed in breeches or any other

onnatural thing--for a sailing-ship and a full-flowing petticoat always

rise up in a true man's mind together--God bless them both, I say."

"To which we cordially say amen, of course," said Miss Lamarque,

laughing. "We should have been at a loss, however, Mr. Garth, but for

our engine during the dead calm preceding the storm, when our ship's

sails flapped so lazily about her masts, and she rocked like a baby's

cradle without making progress. It is well the engineer manoeuvred so

successfully while we lay fireless on the low rolling waves; but we are

speeding along merrily enough now, to make up for it all--I take comfort

in that--"

"But not exactly in the right direction, though, to suit my stripe," he

said, turning his quid in his mouth as he looked out to leeward,

revealing, as he did so, a fine yet rugged profile relieved against the

silvery purple sheen of the moonlit sky.

"Do you see that dark object lying beyond" (our eyes mechanically

followed his), "so still on the water?" and he indicated it with the

pipe he held in one sinewy hand--for the native courtesy of the man had

involuntarily proffered us the homage of removing it from his lips, when

we addressed him.

"Yes--what is it? a wreck? a whale? a small volcanic island? Do

explain, Mr. Garth," said Miss Lamarque.

"Nothing but an iceberg, and we are bearing down upon it rather too

rapidly, it seems to me."

And so speaking, he turned his wheel in silence warily.

"But you have the command of the helm, and have nothing to do but--"

"Obey orders," he interrupted, grimly. "Ef the captain was to tell me to

run the ship to purgatory, I'd have to do it, you know."

"But surely the captain would not jeopardize the lives of a ship's

company, even if he likes warm latitudes, by ordering you to run foul of

an iceberg; and, if he did, you certainly would not dare to obey him

with the fear of God before your eyes?" remonstrated Miss Lamarque,

indignantly. "For my part I shall go to him immediately and desire him

to change his course--but after all I don't believe that dingy black

thing is an iceberg at all--an old hencoop rather, thrown over from some

merchant-ship, or a vast lump of charred wood. You are only trying to

alarm us."

"Ef you was to see it close enough, you would find it to shine equal to

the diamond on your hand; but I hope you never will, that's all--I hope

you never will, lady! I sot on a peak of that sort oncst myself for

three days in higher latitudes than this here--me and five others, all

that was spared from the wreck of the schooner Delta, and we felt our

convoy melting away beneath us, and courtesying e'en a'most even with

the sea, before the merchant-ship Osprey took us off, half starved, and

half frozen, and half roasted all at oncst! Them is onpleasant

rickollections, ladies, and it makes my blood creep to this day to see

an iceberg in konsikence; but a man must do his dooty, whatsomever do

betide. It was in the dead of night, and Hans Schuyler had the wheel, I

remember, when we went to pieces on that iceberg, all for disregarding

the captain's orders; you see, he meant to graze it like!"

"Graze it!" almost shrieked Miss Lamarque. "Did he think he was driving

a curricle? Graze it--Heaven, what rashness!"

"Don't--don't! Mr. Garth," I petitioned; "I shall never sleep a wink on

this ship if you continue your narrative."

"Do--do! Mr. Garth," entreated Miss Lamarque, whose penetration showed

her by this time that the pilot was only playing on our fears, for want

of a better instrument for his skill. "I quite enjoy the idea that you

have actually been astride a fragment of the arctic glacier, and that we

may perhaps make the acquaintance of a white bear ourselves when we get

near our iceberg, or a gentle seal. Wouldn't you like one for a pet,

Miss Harz?"

"It is very cold," I said, digressively. "I feel the chill of that

fragment of Greenland freeze my marrow. I must go fetch my shawl; but

first reassure us, Mr. Garth, if possible."

He laughed. "I have paid you now for making fun of me to-day," he said,

saucily. "I saw your drawing of me in your books, and heerd the ladies

laughing. I peeped as I passed when Myers took the helm, and I wanted to

see what all the fun was about; then I said to myself, 'I will give her

a skeer for that if I have a chance'--but, all the same, the chill you

feel is a real one, for as sure as death that lump of darkness is an

iceberg. I have told you no yarn, as you will find out to-morrow when

you ask the captain. I'll steer you clear of the iceberg though, ladies,

never fear. Hans Schuyler has not got the wheel to-night--you see he was

three sheets in the wind anyhow, and the captain, says, 'Hans,' says he,

'don't tech another drop this night, or we'll never see another mornin'

till we are resurrected,' and so he turned into his hammock and swung

himself to sleep--a way he had, for he didn't keer for nothin' where his

comfort was concerned, having been raised up in the Injies."

"Come, Miss Lamarque," I interrupted. "I must not hear another word.

'Macbeth doth murder, sleep,' and I shall be nervous for a month after,

this. So, good-night, Mr. Garth, and be sure you merit your first name

by taking good care of us while we imitate the example of your worthy

captain and 'swing ourselves to sleep,' or rather let the waves perform

that office for us. I shall make it my care to-morrow morning early, if

you still hold the helm, to show you my sketch, and convince you that it

was never made for fun at all, but that it is a real portrait of a very

fine-looking seaman, a real viking in appearance, and somewhat better

than one at heart, I trust. I shall hope to earn your good opinion

instead of ill-will, when you have only seen my sketch."

"You have it already, you have it already, young gal--young miss, I

mean," he said, with a wave of the hand, which meant to be courteous, no

doubt, but seemed only defiant. "An' this much I kin say without injury

to Sall--that I'd rather hear you talk and see you smile, as I has been

watchin' of you constant do to-day, than go to the circus in New York,

or even to a Spanish bull-fight, or hear a Fourth-of-July oration,

or'tend camp-meetin'--and that's saying no little--an' no iceberg shall

come near you while Christian Garth lays a hand upon this helm. But

don't be skeered, ladies; no harm will come to the good ship Kosciusko."

"I declare our pilot is quite chivalrous, as far as you are concerned,

for I marked his glance, Miss Harz," said Miss Lamarque, archly, as we

turned our faces cabin-ward, under the protection of our helmsman's

promised vigilance. "See what it is to be young and pretty, and remark

the truth of the old proverb, as exemplified in his case, that 'extremes

meet.' Victoria herself is not more independent of me or my

position--established facts as both are in the eyes of some--than is

Christian Garth. To him, this outsider of the world of fashion, I am

only a homely old woman; no prestige comes in to garnish the unvarnished

fact--a plain old maid, my dear--with not even the remembrance of beauty

as a consolation, nor its remnant as a sign of past triumphs, 'only this

and nothing more,' as that wonderful man Poe makes his raven say. We

never find our level until we go among people who know and care nothing

about us, who have never 'heard of us'--that exordium of most greetings

from folks of our own class. It is absolutely refreshing to be so

unaffectedly despised and slighted--it does one a world of good, there

is no doubt of that, especially when one's grandfather was a

Revolutionary notability, and other antecedents of a piece--but men are

all alike at heart, only the worldly ones wear flimsy masks, you know,

and pretend to adore intellect and ugliness, when beauty is the only

thing they care for--all a sham, my dear, in any case."

"Yes, all alike," I repeated, making, as I spoke, one mental entire

reservation. "All _vain_ alike, I mean; flatter their vanity ever so

little and they are at your very feet, asking 'for more,' like Oliver

Twist; more bread for _amour propre_, the insatiable! It was that sketch

of mine that wrought the spell, though unintentionally, of course, and

the sly fellow knew very well that it was no caricature--that is, if he

peeped, as he pretends--but a tolerably correct likeness that might have

satisfied Sall herself. By-the-by, I have a great mind to bestow it upon

him as a 'sop for Cerberus,' should her jealousy ever be aroused by your

reports of his devotion to me, or admiration rather, most unequivocally

avowed, it must be acknowledged. I really had no intention of injuring

Sally, and, if you think it best, will make the _amende honorable_ by

being as cross as possible to him to-morrow."

"No, no, carry out your first intention and conciliate him; for,

remember, he has us in the hollow of his hand. Bestow the picture, by

all means, and just as many smiles and compliments as he can stand, or

you can afford to squander; for you are worse than a mermaid, Miss Harz,

for fascination, all the gentlemen say so; and, as to Captain

Falconer--"

"They are malignants," I rejoined, ignoring purposely the last clause of

the sentence which I had interrupted; "and you are perfidious to hear

them slander me so. I hate fascinating people; they always make my flesh

crawl like serpents. The few I have known have been so very base." "Good

specimens of '_thorough_ bass,'" she interpolated, laughing.--"I am sure

I am glad I have no attributes of fascination, if a strange old work I

met with at Beauseincourt may be considered responsible. Did you ever

see it, Miss Lamarque, you who see every thing? Hieronymus Frascatorius

tells of certain families in Crete who fascinated by praising, and to

avert this evil influence some charm was used consisting of a magic

word (I suppose this was typical of humility, though related as

literal). This _naïveté_ on the part of the old chronicler was simply

_impayable_, as Major Favraud would say, with his characteristic shrug.

One _Varius_ related (you see my theme has full possession of me, and

the book is, a collation of facts on the subject of fascination of all

kinds, even down to that of the serpent) that a friend of his saw a

fascinator with a look break in two a precious gem in the hands of a

lapidary--typical this, I suppose, of some fond, foolish, female heart.

Fire, according to this author, represents the quality of fascination;

and toads and moths are subject to its influence, as well as some higher

animals--deer, for instance, who are hunted successfully with torches;

and he relates, further, that in Abyssinia artificers of pottery and

iron are thus fearfully endowed, and are consequently forbidden to join

in the sacred rites of religion, as fire is their chief agent. Isn't

this a strange, quaint volume, to set before a king? and how do you like

my lecture delivered _extempore?_".

"Oh, vastly! but I did not know that was your style before. Don't

cultivate it, dear, if you hope to win manly hearts. Men like to do all

the lecturing themselves, and I find it diplomatic to feign profound

ignorance on all subjects, outside of a bandbox; it delights them so to

enlighten us. No wonder they fancy us fools when we feign foolishness so

admirably--lapwings that we are!"

"But I never do, in such society. My experience is different from yours.

I always pretend to know twice as much as I do, when they are about; it

bluffs them off, and they are credulous sometimes as well as ignorant,

notwithstanding their boasted acumen."

"Your lamp of experience needs trimming, my pretty Miriam," she said,

shaking her head, "if you really believe this. They never forgive

superiority, assumed or real; none but the noble ones, I mean; who, of

course, are in the minority. Give a pair of tongs pantaloons, and it

asserts itself. Trousers, my dear, are at the root of manly presumption.

I discovered that long ago. A man in petticoats would be as humble as a

woman. This is my theory, at least; take it for what it is worth. And

now to sleep, with what heart we may, an iceberg being in our vicinity;"

and, taking my face in her hand, she kissed me cordially. "It is very

early in our acquaintance for such manifestations to be allowable," she

said, kindly, "but I am a sort of spoiled child of society, and dare to

be natural. I consider that the best privilege that attaches to my

condition, that of the 'bell-wether' of Savannah _ton_--the

universally-accepted bore! You know--Favraud has told you, of course; he

always characterizes as he goes."

"He has called you the most agreeable woman in Savannah, I remember,

young or old, and was truly glad, on my account, to know that you were

on board. Of your brother he spoke very kindly also, even admiringly."

"Oh, yes, I know; but of Raguet there is little question now. His wife's

death has crushed him. I never saw so changed a man; he is half idiotic,

I believe; and I am with him now just to keep those children from

completing the work of destruction. Six little motherless ones--only

think--and as bad as they can possibly be; for poor Lucilla was no

manager. Isn't it strange, the influence those little cottony women get

over their husbands? You and I might try forever to establish such

absolute despotism, all in vain. It is your whimpering sort that rule

with the waving of a pocket-handkerchief; but poor, dear little woman,

she is powerless now; and I suppose the next will be like unto her.

Raguet would never look at any thing feminine that hadn't white eyes and

pink hair (yellow, I mean, of course)--his style, you know, being dark

and stern, he likes the downy, waxy kind. All this is shockingly

egotistical; but the question is, who that has a spark of individuality

is otherwise? Good-night, again, and may all sweet dreams attend you;

for my part, I never dream, being past the dreaming age, and realities

fortunately disappear with daylight; even cross children are wheedled

into quietness, and servants forget to fidget and giggle; and, for

mosquitoes, there are bars. Adieu."

And thus we parted, never to meet again in mutual mood like this!

Yet, had the free agency of which some men boast been ours, we had

scarcely chosen to face the awful change--to look into each other's eyes

through gathering death-doom!

CHAPTER III.

Before my dreaming eyes was the terror of a hungry, crunching tooth,

fixed in the vessel's side, that of the iceberg, lying black in the

moonlight like a great coal crystal, grimly awaiting our approach, but

the reality, as well as the figment, had disappeared when I emerged at

sunrise from the suffocating cabin, to the atmosphere of the cool and

quiet quarter-deck, which had just undergone its matutinal.

Armed with an orange and a biscuit for physical refreshment, I depended

on sea and sky for my mental entertainment; and in my hand I bore a

slender scroll, destined as a propitiatory offering to our offended

helmsman.

I was glad to find again at the wheel our pilot of yesterday.

"Your iceberg has disappeared, Mr. Garth," I said, as I extended to him

the sketch I had made of his noble _physique_ the day before, "and here

is a picture for your wife, which she will see was not drawn for fun.

Women are sharper than men about such matters. There, I bestow it not

without regret." He received my offering with a smile, and nod of his

great curly head, opened it, gazed long and seriously upon it, and, with

the single word "Good," rolled it up again, and consigned it to some

bosom pocket in his flannel shirt, into which it seemed to glide as a

telescope into its case, revealing, as he did so, glimpses of a hairy

breast, and vigorous chest, more admirable for strength than beauty,

certainly.

"I will keep it there," he said, "young miss," pressing it closely

against his side with his colossal hand, "until I get safe home to the

Jarseys, and to Sall, or go to Davy's locker, one or other, but which it

will be, young gal--young miss, I should be saying--is not for me to

know."

"Nor for any one," I rejoined, solemnly; "all rests with God."

"With God and our engineer," he resumed, tersely; "them sails is of

little account, now the mainmast is struck away; them floppen

petticoats, wat the wind loves to play in and out, layin' along like a

lazy lubber that it is, and leaving its work for others to do. It was a

noble mast, though, while it stood--and you could smell the turpentine

blood in its heart to the very last. It was as limber as a sapling, and

never growed brittle, like some wood, with age and dryness. No storm

could splinter it, and it would fling itself over into the high waves

sometimes, rayther than snap and lash them like a whip. But there it

lies, burned with the fire of heaven's wrath, at last, and leaving its

fires of hell behind, in the heart of the Kosciusko."

"You have changed your mind on the subject of engines, Mr. Garth, I am

glad to see. Truly, ours seems to be doing giant's work; now we are

flying, to be sure."

"Rushing, not flying, young lady--that's the word; our wings are little

use to-day, you see, such as are left to us. Runnin' for dear life, we'd

better say, for that's the truth of the matter, and may the merciful

Lord speed us, and have in his care all helpless ones this day!"

The lifted hand, the bared head, the earnest accents, with which these

words were spoken, gave to this simple utterance of good-will all the

solemnity of a benediction or prayer.

I noticed that, after replacing his tarpaulin, the lips of Garth

continued to move silently, then were compressed gravely for a time,

while his eye, large, clear, and expressive, was fixed on space.

"Do you still see an iceberg, Mr. Garth? Do you really apprehend danger

for us now?" I asked, after studying his countenance for a moment; "or,

are you again desirous to try the nerves of your female passengers? I

think I must apply to the captain this time for information."

"Yes, danger," he replied, in low, sad tones, ignoring my last remark,

or perhaps not hearing it at all--"danger, compared with which an

iceberg might be considered in the light of a heavenly marcy. There is a

chance of grazing one of them snow-bowlders, or of its drifting away

from a ship, when the ripples reach it, or, if the wust comes, a body

can scramble overboard, and manage to live on the top of one of them

peaks, or in one of their ice-caves, with a few blankets, and a little

bread and junk and water, fur a space, so as to get a chance of meetin'

a ship, or a schooner; but, when there is something wrong in a ship's

heart, there ain't much hope for rescue, onless it comes from above."

He hesitated, smiling grimly, rolled his quid, crammed his hat down over

his eyes, and again addressed himself to his wheel, and, for a few

moments, I stood beside him silently.

"The ship is leaking, I suppose," I said at last, "so that you apprehend

her loss, perhaps," and my heart sank coldly within me, as I spoke;

"but, if this be true, why does not the captain apprise us? No, you are

quizzing me again, and very cruelly this time, very unwarrantably."

Yet I did not think exactly as I spoke, strive as I might to believe the

man in jest. Too much solemnity and sorrow both were discernible in his

worn and rugged features, hewn grandly as if from granite, to admit of a

hope like this. His words were earnest, and some great calamity was in

store, I could not doubt, or at least he apprehended such. For some time

he replied not, then, slowing pointing to the base of the stricken

mainmast, which still showed an elevation of some inches above the deck,

he revealed to me the truth without a word.

As my eyes followed his guiding finger, I saw, with terror unspeakable,

a thin blue wavering smoke-wreath, float upward from the floor, and,

after curling feebly about the truncated mast, disappear in the clear

sunlit atmosphere, again to arise from the same point, that of the

juncture of the mast and deck, creeping through some invisible crevice,

as it seemed to form itself eternally in filmy folds, and successively

elude the eye as soon as it shaped to sight. I understood him then.

There was fire in the heart of the ship, and I knew the hold was filled

with cotton; it was smouldering slowly, and our safety was a question of

time alone!

Pale, transfixed, frozen, I lifted my eyes to the man, who seemed to

represent my fate for the moment. "Was it the lightning?" I asked, after

a pause, during which his pitying eye rested on me drearily. "Did the

fire occur in that way?"

"Yes, the lightning it was; and God's hand, which sent the shaft direct,

alone can deliver us."

I seemed to hear the voice of Bertie speak these words. Things grew

confused; I wavered as I stood, lifted my hand to my head; the face of

Christian Garth grew large and dim, then, faded utterly. I knew no more

until I found myself seated on a coil of rope, leaning against the

bulwark, while a young girl stood beside me, fanning and bathing my

face, and offering me a glass of water.

"You are better now," she said, kindly; "the man at the wheel called me

as I was passing, and pointed out your condition, and I led you here,

and ran for water. Being up so early is apt to disagree with some

people."

"What are these people crawling about the deck for? Is all hope over, or

was it only a dream?" I asked.

"Oh, you are quite wild yet from your swoon; it is only the calkers

stopping up the seams, one of the captain's queer whims they say; but

how they are to dance to-night, those _magnificos_ I mean, without

ruining their slippers with this pitch, I cannot see! Thank Goodness! I

belong to a church, and am not of this party, and don't care on my own

account, nor does the captain, I believe. I was placed under his care at

Savannah, and I suppose it is only to stop the ball that--"

She was interrupted by the approach of the officer under discussion, but

he passed us gloomily and went on to inspect the workmen so unseasonably

employed, as it seemed, in a labor that, save in a case of long voyages,

is always performed in port.

His melancholy air, and the preoccupation of his manner, confirmed my

worst fears.

Again I sought the Ixion of the vessel, who calmly and stolidly

performed his duty as if, indeed, Fate directed, without a change of

feature now, or expression.

"Has the captain no hope of rescue, Mr. Garth?"

"Oh yes; he thinks we shall meet a ship or two between now and noon--we

'most always do, you know"--rolling his quid slowly, and hesitating for

a while; "keep heart, keep heart! I had thought from your face you were

stronger; besides, the pumps are doing good work in the hold: who knows

what may come of it, who knows?"

Alas! alas! I could not rise to the level of this dim hope. "Think of

the burning crowd, the sheet of flame, the terrible destruction!" I

murmured; "I must go now and apprise those poor wretches below that

their time is short; they have a right to know."

His vice-like hand was on my arm. "You do not go a step on such an

errand," he muttered. "It is the captain's business; he will 'tend to it

when the time comes, for he is a true man, and, the bravest sailor on

the line. He means to do what's right, never fear. It is my dooty to

hold you here until he comes, onless you promise me to be discreet."

"I shall be discreet, never fear--" and his grasp relaxed. I sped me

back to the coil of rope on which I had left my young companion,

intending to partake with her there my biscuit and orange, so needed now

for strength.

I found in her stead (for she had departed in the interval) a

delicate-looking young woman, plain and poor, a widow evidently from the

style of her shabby mourning and sad expression of face, bearing in her

arms a weird and sickly-looking child, evidently a sufferer from spinal

disease--an infant as to size, but preternaturally old in countenance.

The steady gaze of its large and serious eyes affected me

magnetically--eyes that seemed ever seeking something that still eluded

them, and which now appeared to inquire into my very soul.

"Is your little boy ill, madam?" I asked at last; and at the sound of my

voice a smile broke over his small, sallow features, lending them

strange beauty, but dying away instantly again into an expression of

startled suspicion.

"Yes, very ill," she answered, clasping him tenderly as he clung to her

suddenly. "He has some settled trouble that no medicine reaches, and you

see how small and light he is. Many a twelve months' babe is heavier

than he, yet he is three years old come Monday next, and he is 'cute

beyond his years, it seems to me."

"You seem very weak and weary," I rejoined. "I noticed you yesterday

with interest, sitting all the time with your boy on your knee. You must

need exercise and rest. Go and walk now a little, while you can;" and I

stretched my arms for her baby.

To her surprise, evidently, he came to me willingly--attracted, no

doubt, by the gleam of the watch-chain about my neck, and still further

propitiated by a portion of my orange, which he greedily devoured.

In the mean time the poor, pale mother took a few turns on the

quarter-deck, and, disappearing therefrom a moment, returned with a

small supply of cakes and biscuits which she had sought in the steward's

room.

An inspiration of Providence, no doubt, she thought this proceeding

later, which at the moment was only intended to anticipate the delay

attendant on all second-class meals.

These cakes, with a pains-taking diligence, if not

fore-thought--peculiar to all feeble animals, squirrels, sick children,

and the like--did he one by one cram, and compel into my pocket,

unconscious as I was at the moment of his miser-like proceeding

(instinctive, probably), which later I detected, to his infinite

rejoicing. In company with my slender purse, and bunch of useless keys,

a pencil, and a small memorandum-book, they remained _perdu_ until that

moment of accidental discovery arrived which was to test their value and

place it "far above that of rubies."

Light as a pithless nut seemed this little creature in my strong,

energetic arms, and yet his mother staggered beneath his weight.

She insisted, however, after a time, on resuming her charge of him, as

it was proper she should do, and then sat beside me, delivering herself

of a long string of complaints and grievances, after the fashion of all

second-rate, solitary people when secure of sympathy.

She overrated my benevolence on this occasion, however. I was lost in

painful reverie, and scarcely understood a word of her communication,

which I was obliged at last to cut short, for I had resolved, now that

my strength was recruited, on the only visible course remaining to me--I

would seek Miss Lamarque, confide to her the statement of Christian

Garth, relate to her what my eyes had seen, and be guided by her

determination and judgment, with those of her brother, a man of sense, I

saw, and whose instincts, no doubt, would all be sharpened by the

jeopardy of his children.

She was sitting up in her state-room when I knocked at the door, still

in her berth, the lower one--from which the upper shelf had been lifted

so as to afford her room and air--looking very Oriental and handsomer

than I ever had seen her, in her bright Madras night-turban and fine

white cambric wrapper richly trimmed.

Her face broke into smiles as soon as she beheld me; and she invited

me, in a way not to be resisted, so resolute and yet so kindly was it,

to partake with her of the hot coffee her maid was just handing her in

bed, in a small gilded cup, a portion of the service on the stand beside

her.

"It is our Southern custom, you know, Miss Harz--always our _café noir_

before breakfast, as a safeguard against malaria. To be sure, there is

nothing of that sort to be apprehended at sea, but still habits are

inveterate; second nature, as the moralists and copy-books say, as if

there ever could be more than one. What nonsense these wiseacres talk,

to be sure! But there is cream, you see, for those who like it--boiled

down and bottled for the use of the children before leaving home--one of

Dominica's notions;" and here the smiling maid, with her little,

respectful courtesy, tendered me a reviving cup of Miss Lamarque's

morning beverage, Mocha, made to the last point of perfection, dripped

and filtered over a spirit-lamp by Dominica, the skillful and

neat-handed.

"But you are very pale to-day, my child--what on earth can be the

matter?--There, Dominica, I thought I heard Florry cry! Go and help

Caliste get the children ready for a trot upon deck before breakfast,

and don't forget to give each one a gill of cream and a biscuit--or,

stay, twice as much for the two elder before they go up. It may be some

time before they get their regular morning meal.--They have to wait, you

know, Miss Harz, which is such rank injustice where children are

concerned. Patience never belongs to unreasoning creatures, unless an

instinct, as with animals; men have to learn its lessons through the

teachings of experience--that strictest of school-masters. Now, you see,

I have my lecturing-cap on, and am almost equal to you or Dr. Lardner

in my way. But it takes you to define fascination! I suppose Mrs.

Heavyside, however, could help you there--for nothing short of

witchcraft could account to me for her elopement with that dreary man!

To leave her sweet children, too, as if all the men on earth could be

worth to a true mother her teething baby's little toe or finger!"

"Would she never stop--never give one loop-hole for doubt to enter?" I

thought.

"But what in the world ails you--has Dunmore, the disconsolate, been

making love again? Has Captain Falconer declared himself too soon? and

do you hesitate, on account of Miss Moore? Don't let that consideration

influence you, I beg, for she is the greatest flirt in Savannah, the

truest to the vocation, and I like her for that, anyhow. Whatever a man

or woman has to do, let him or her do earnestly. That isn't exactly

Scripture, but near enough, don't you think so?" and she laughed

merrily.

"I have been on deck this morning," I commenced, "Miss Lamarque, and saw

Christian Garth, and--"

"He has been terrifying and electrifying you again with his tale of

horrors--there, it is all out. Why, he is as sensational as 'Jane Eyre,'

this new English novel I am just reading," drawing it from under her

pillow and holding it aloft as she spoke. "Currer Bell is not more

mysteriously awful, but Garth is not artistic. I detected his intention

by the inconsistency of his expression of face, which bore no part in

his narrative, and at once exposed him, you must remember--"

"Oh, yes--but this time--"

"Nonsense, Miriam Harz! the iceberg is gone, I know. Why, what a nervous

coward you are, to be sure, with all that assumed bravery! I am twice

as courageous, I do believe, despite appearances; I really begin to be

of opinion that it is safer to be at sea than on land--now what do you

think of that for a heterodoxy?--A second cup? why, of course, and a

third, if you want it; I am delighted you like it. These little Sèvres

toys are but thimbles, but I always carry them about with me by sea and

land, and have for years; I feel as if there were luck in them, not one

of the original three has been broken--there--there!--just as I was

boasting, too!--never mind, such accidents _will_ occur; but your pretty

pongee dress is sadly stained with the coffee; besides, as _you_ dropped

the cup, it is _your_ luck, not mine; and I want an odd saucer, anyhow,

to feed Desirée out of; she sleeps in that willow basket you see in the

corner of the state-room, Miss Harz, and is lazy, like her mistress, of

mornings.--Desirée! Desirée! peep out, can't you, now you have your

long-desired Sèvres saucer to lap milk from?--She won't touch delft,

Miss Harz. She is the most fastidious little creature!"

"Alas! alas!" and I groaned aloud.

"Not taking on about that silly cup, I hope--no; what can it be then, a

megrim? No. Well, I can't imagine any thing worse, to save my life.

Here, let me read you this, it is fine--it is where Jane Eyre feels

herself deserted, and this comparison about 'the dried-up channel of a

river' thrills one. Just hear it;" and she was about commencing--

"Not now--not now, Miss Lamarque; stern realities demand our attention.

Lay your book aside, be calm, be firm, but listen to me seriously.

Christian Garth informs me, nor he alone--my own eyes have done the

rest--that the cotton in the hold has taken fire from the lightning

yesterday; has been slowly smouldering ever since the mast was

struck--and that the ship's hours are numbered!"

"O God! O God!" and she bowed her head upon her clasped and quivering

hands. "But, Captain Ambrose--he did not tell you so?" looking up

suddenly. "Christian Garth, indeed! his impudence is surprising--another

hoax, I suppose," and she tried to smile; "such a coarse creature, too!"

"We shall see, but for the present say nothing; only get up and dress as

quickly as you can, but it is important to be very quiet, for fear of

causing confusion. I have promised discretion."

"Call Dominica, then, for me, Miss Harz," gasping and stretching forth

her arms. "I can do nothing for myself--nothing--I am so weak, so

helpless. Yet I must believe he is--you are mistaken!"

"I trust it may prove so. But let me assist you; Dominica is best

employed making ready the little ones and giving them food--strengthening

them for the struggle. She will be nerveless if she knows the truth, and

you are not in a condition to conceal it."

"Just as you will, then. My trunk--will you be so kind as to unlock it

and give me out the tray--that picture? After that I can get along

alone."

I silently did as she desired, and saw her place a covered miniature

about her neck before she arose. Very few minutes sufficed this morning

for her toilet--usually a tedious and fastidious one--her dress, her

bonnet, her shawl, were hastily thrown on, her watch secured with the

few jewels lying upon the night-table; the rest of her valuables were

with other boxes in the hold, the repository of all unneeded baggage,

and these, of course, she could scarcely hope to save in case of fire,

even if lives were rescued.

Then, together, we went out, just in time to join the little troop of

young children and nurses on their way to the deck. Miss Lamarque did

not reply to their tumultuous greeting, but, silently taking the baby

Florry, her namesake, in her arms, kissed her many times. I had told her

while, she was dressing, of the smoke-wreaths about the base of the

broken mast, and she believed in the testimony my eyes had afforded me

far more than in the reports of Christian Garth. We did not encounter

Mr. Lamarque when we first went on deck; he had gone forward to smoke,

some one said; but Captain Ambrose was standing alone, telescope in

hand, and to him we addressed ourselves, quietly.

He seemed startled when I disclosed the result of my observation--for I

did not choose to commit the pilot--but he did not attempt to deny the

truth of the condition of things, and conjured us both to entire quiet

and composure, and, if possible, to absolute silence. The safety of five

hundred people, he said, depended on our discretion; the ship might not

ignite for days, if at all, he thought, so carefully had the air been

excluded from the cotton by the process of tight calking, so as to seal

it almost hermetically; indeed, the fire might be wholly extinguished by

the pumps, which were constantly at work, pouring streams of water

around and through the hold; and a panic would be equal to a fire in any

case. Such were his calmness and apparent faith in his own words, that

they did much to allay Miss Lamarque's fears. My own were little

soothed--I never doubted from the beginning what the end would be.

Mr. Lamarque approached us while the conference with the captain was

going on, and, under the seal of secrecy, the condition of affairs was

communicated to that gentleman.

I never saw a man so crushed and calm at the same time. His handsome

face seemed turned to stone--he scarcely spoke at all, and made no

inquiries. I think his mind, like mine, was made up to the worst. Yet he

commanded himself so far as to go to the breakfast-table and superintend

the meal of his little children, about whom he hung, like a mother-bird

who sees the shadow of a hawk above her brood, from that moment until

the _dénoûment_ of the drama separated us two forever.

Miss Lamarque and I sat down together on a bench, while the host of

hungry passengers crowded down to the cabin at the welcome summons of

the bell, and I was aware again of the pale widow and her patient child

standing near me.

A sudden thought occurred to me. This woman, more than any one among us,

needed the strengthening stimulus of good food, and this meal might be

her last on shipboard--on earth, perhaps--for a dull, low, ominous sound

began to make itself heard to my ear as soon as the murmur of the crowd

subsided.

"Trust me with your child again while you go down and eat your breakfast

in my place to-day. It is a whim of mine. I have had coffee with this

lady in her state-room, and shall not appear at the table. You may bring

me a slice of bread, if you choose, when you come back, and one for

baby. Do not refuse me this favor."

Much pleased at my attention, as I could see, she went to the grand

first table, with its high-heaped salvers of snowy rolls and biscuit,

its delicate birds and fowls, its fragrant coffee and tea, so different

from the dregs of the humble board at which her second-class ticket

alone entitled her to appear; and, to save her from possible

humiliation, I wrote a line to the steward; so she feasted, no doubt, in

state.

Again I enacted the _rôle_ of self-appointed nurse to a creature that

looked more like a fairy changeling than a flesh-and-blood creation.

"You are a strange woman, Miriam Harz! At such an hour as this, what

matters the quality of food?" said Miss Lamarque, sententiously. "After

all, what can that invalid and her child be to you in any case? They are

essentially common and mean. You never saw them before, and may never

see them again."

"In view of such a catastrophe as that before us, all distinctions fade,

Miss Lamarque. This is the last meal any one will take on the ship

Kosciusko--she is doomed! The woman might as well get strength for the

chance of saving herself and child. I doubt whether any second table

will be spread to-day!" I spoke with anguish.

"You cannot believe this! Why, after what the captain said, days may go

by before any real danger manifests itself! Ships must pass in the

interval--many ships may pass to-day, within a few hours, ready for our

relief, if needed; and see, the smoke has ceased to curl about your

broken main-mast! That shows convincingly that the fire is being gotten

under--extinguished, probably."

"Oh, no! no! no! not with that low, terrible roaring in the hold. The

fire is gaining strength, and our agony will soon be over."

I sat with clasped hands and bowed head before her, insensible to her

words. I suppose she strove to strengthen me. I think she tried to

soothe. Failing in both, she rose and went away, and in her place came

Christian Garth, relieved from the helm, and stood a moment beside me.

"Don't be down-hearted, young gal, an' wait for me. Ef the Lord lets me,

I will save you, and the old lady, too; that is, ef she is your aunt or

mother or near of kin."

I shook my head drearily.

"You have no hope, then, Mr. Garth?"

"Hope? yes; the best of hope--the Christian's hope. God can do any thing

He pleases, we all know, and He may stretch forth his hand when all

seems dark; but Captain Ambrose is not one to run a risk of that sort,

so he has sent me to work upon a raft--one of two he is making for the

seamen if the wust comes to the wust. But you see, I have been on lost

ships afore now, an' I know there is no larboard nor starboard rules

when men are skeered. So I shall make my raft to hold the womenfolk, for

the boats will be for the sailors--mark my word--and them that's wise

will wait till the press is over and take the rafts."

"There are little children," I said; "six of them belonging to that lady

and Mr. Lamarque. Don't forget them, Mr. Garth, and the poor little

widow coming now to claim her baby; this miserable little creature I am

holding until she breakfasts. Don't lose sight of these, either, in the

crowd, if, indeed, we are obliged to have recourse to your raft."

"Pray rayther that it may float us all to safety," he said, sternly,

"for your best chance of being saved will be on that raft, if matters go

as I think they will. Trust me, for I will come;" and he passed away

just before the little widow came to my side again.

"I came up as soon as I could, to relieve you. I know how cross baby is

when he gets restless, and I was afraid you might tire of him. See! I

have brought his bread, and this waiter of tea and toast for you; now

you must take a mouthful."

She knew nothing of our danger, it was plain. "Did you leave the other

passengers at table?" I asked; "the captain, was he there?"

The question was never answered, for the attention of my interlocutor

was riveted now, as was my own, on the companion-way, from which a wild

and frightened-looking crowd was densely emerging, with a confused hum

of voices that announced their recognition of their impending danger.

The change of age, of pain, of woe, seemed sealed upon each aspect, as

one by one, and phantom-like, in rapid succession, those who had so

lately gone down to feast returned to the upper day, like grim ghosts

coming from a church-yard carnival.

It was a sight to stir the stoutest spirit.

At the close of the repast, the captain had announced the truth to his

passengers, and followed them now to enjoin them to firmness and

efficiency, both so greatly needed at this crisis.

Mounted on the capstan, he addressed them briefly, and not without

influence. Such was the power of his simple and manly bearing over these

distracted souls, that even the wildest listened with decorum.

This was no immigrant-ship, loaded with stolid or desperate men,

insensible of high teachings, and alone desirous of personal safety. Yet

the universal instinct asserted itself, and for the time courtesies were

set aside, and family affections were all that were regarded.

Miss Lamarque, pale, yet collected, now stood surrounded by the children

of her brother, leaning upon his arm while the captain spoke. Husbands

and wives were together, sisters and brothers, servants and their

masters--each group revealed its several household affinities. We only

were alone--the dreary little widow, whose name I never knew, and Miriam

Monfort; and on natural principles we clung together.

It is true that Miss Lamarque, by many signs, implored me to come to

her, but I would not. It was like intruding on a bed of death, I felt,

to break through ties of blood at such a time, by thrusting a foreign

presence amid devoted relatives; and I was too proud, or perhaps too

selfish, to intrude where I must be secondary, unless I took away

another's rights.

The captain had promised, in his brief address, to protect his

passengers to the utmost of his power--leaving the result with God. He

had entreated them to be calm, and to preserve order--so essential to

safety; had mentioned his confidence that a ship must pass before the

catastrophe could possibly occur; but added that, to prepare for the

worst, he had ordered the construction of two rafts--one for the use of

the seamen, the other for the reception of food and necessaries.

His plan was to attach these to the larger boats, and so provide against

want; in the certainty, however, that on such a route relief must soon

present itself, in the shape of ship or steamer.

He called on all able to abet his exertions to present themselves

forthwith, so that universal safety might be insured; not only by making

the rafts, but the securing of food upon them, and comforts for the

women and children, who represented so large a portion of the

passengers. He answered for the fidelity of his seamen with his life.

There was not one among them, he knew, who would lift a finger to

disobey him. He said these words in conclusion:

"And now, if there is any one present sufficiently imbued with the grace

of God to fix the anxious minds of these voyagers in prayer, such at

least of them as are powerless otherwise to aid our exertions, let him

appear and minister to their tribulation. This task is not for me,

although the holiest. My duties call me elsewhere."

So adjured, a man, whose wild, fanatical appearance had given rise to

the rumor that the famous "Lorenzo Dow" was on board, sprang on a

bulkhead, and commenced to exhort the crowd about him, from which a file

of pale, determined-looking men was slowly emerging to join the seamen

at the other end of the vessel in their efforts for the public weal. But

many lingered, either overcome and paralyzed by the stringency of

circumstances, or unequal to exertions from personal causes--aged men,

women, and children, chiefly--and to these the frenzied speaker

continued to address his words of exhortation and warning.

Such a tirade of terrible objurgation I felt was entirely out of place

in a scene like this, and calculated to excite the worst passions of the

human mind, instead of persuading it to serenity and submission, so

essential now; for to me the captain's last words represented the final

grace of the preacher, when, with closed eyes and outspread hands, he

dismissed his flock from the temple at the close of the services. From

that vessel and all that concerned it we were virtually enfranchised

from that moment--dismissed to destruction, so to speak, by fire or

flood, or rescue from beyond, as the case might be, to life or death, as

God willed--for the ship's mission was accomplished.

I shrank as far as possible from the wild, waving arms, the frenzied

eyes, the gaunt and wolfish aspect, the piercing, agonized voice of the

fanatic, who had assumed to himself the solemn office of soul-comforter

in a time of extremity. I saw from a distance his long, lank figure

writhing like a sapling in a storm, as it overtopped the crowd; but his

words were lost on my ear, and I sat leaning back against the bulwark

with folded hands, absorbed in my own thoughts, when a young girl,

bursting from the throng, came and threw herself down before me, and

buried her face in my lap, convulsed with sobs. When she looked up, I

recognized the young person who had bathed my face in the morning during

my partial swoon--a fair and lovely-looking girl of about eighteen

years, pallid and ill now with excitement.

"Oh, it is so terrible!" she cried; "I cannot--cannot bear it, and he

says we are all hopelessly lost unless we have repented; that there is

no death-bed salvation; and this is our death-bed, you know, for the

Spanish ship passed us without stopping, and we scarcely hope to see

another. O cruel, cruel fiends! to pretend they did not understand our

signals, and leave us to destruction."

And she clasped her hands in mute and bitter despair--no actress was

ever so impressive.

"We must make up our minds to the worst," I said, as calmly as I could.

"Then, if God sees fit to deliver us, we shall be all the more thankful.

You must not believe what this ignorant and panic-stricken man tells

you. Think of the thief on the cross whom Christ pardoned in dying."

"Then you hope to be permitted to see God! You dare to hope this?" she

asked, gazing into my very eyes, so closely did she come to me.

"Oh, surely in his own good time! I have done nothing so very wicked, I

hope, as to exclude me from my Father's face forever--have you? Now,

don't be frightened; speak calmly."

"I don't know--I don't know. I should be afraid not to call myself

desperately wicked at such a time; he says we all are, you know. We are

all miserable sinners."

"It is very abject to talk and feel thus, and I don't believe that God

approves of it," I said, indignantly. "He gives us self-respect, and

commands us to cherish it. Such abasement is unworthy of Christian

souls. It is very bitter to die, as young as we are; but, if we have

done our best to serve Him, we need--we ought not to be afraid to meet

our God."

She clung to my outstretched hand. She strengthened my spirit by the

fullness of her need. The feeble widow with her child, too, crept close

to me, weeping and trembling.

"Do not leave me," she entreated; "let us stay together to the very

last."

"Nay, that may be a long time," I answered, smiling feebly, and nerved

for the first time to encouragement; "for the captain will do his best

to save his passengers--the women especially, I cannot doubt; and see

what bounteous provision he is making for their support!"

And I pointed to the piles of flour and sugar barrels, the boxes of

crackers and of hams; of figs and raisins, the hampers of wine and ale,

which were profusely piled on the quarter-deck ready for lowering to the

rafts.

"He means to take care of us, you see, by the permission of Providence,"

I said, almost strengthened by this dependence, "and we will remain

calmly together, and drink whatever cup God offers us--humbly, I hope."

Yet, even as I spoke, my heart rebelled against the fiat of my fate, and

the young life within me rose up in fierce conflict with its doom.

At this moment of bitter strife of heart, Mr. Dunmore, the youthful poet

of whom I have already spoken, stood before me.

"I have found you at last," he said, "deputed as I am to do so by Miss

Lamarque. It is a point of honor with her to care for you personally in

this crisis. You know Major Favraud placed you under her care; besides

that, her regard for you impels this request. She bids me say--"

I interrupted him hastily.

"This is no time for ceremonials, truly, Mr. Dunmore; yet, had family

concurrence been perfect, it seems to me that her brother might have

undertaken this mission. I have no wish to thrust myself undesired into

any household circle at such a crisis."

"He is wholly absorbed with his children."

"As he ought to be, Mr. Dunmore, and, when the time of peril comes, it

is of their needs alone that he will and must think. I am alone in this

vessel, as I shall remain. I did not leave Savannah under Miss

Lamarque's care. She is very generous, very considerate, but I will not

embarrass her motions, nor yours, nor any one's. It is the duty of

Captain Ambrose to see to the welfare of his female passengers. I shall

not be forgotten among these--"

He stood before me with his knightly head uncovered, his handsome face

as calm as though he were a guest at a festival instead of a patient and

interested watcher at a funeral-pyre. His birth, his breeding, his

genius even, asserted themselves in that mortal hour. He was calm,

collected, serious, but not afraid.

"The peril will be great to all, of course," he said, quietly, "but no

gentleman will prefer his own safety to that of the most humble and

desolate woman on the ship. To you, Miss Harz, I devote my energies

to-day, to you and these ladies of your party, whoever they may be--,"

bowing gently as he spoke. "I may fail in delivering you from danger,

but it shall not be for want of effort on my part. Believe my words, I

have less care for life than most people, and now let me offer you my

escort through that maddened crowd (the rest may follow closely), to

reach Miss Lamarque."

"No, Mr. Dunmore, I _must_ remain just where I am, I have promised

myself to do so; this is much; and these unhappy women--they, like

myself, are alone, or seem to be. Should you see fit to do so, and be

willing to be so encumbered, you can return after a lapse of time; but

make no point of this, I entreat you. I think that Captain Ambrose will

observe good order and save his helpless ones first. You know he

promised this--"

There was a moment's pause, and movement of eye and hand, and then he

spoke again, very softly:

"Yes, and much more that can never be fulfilled, for already the cabin

is in flames, the companion-way is closed, and the fire in the hold is

making fearful headway. I have heard the seamen have sworn to secure the

boats; you are strong and resolute--be prepared for the very worst."

Then, speaking in his usual tone, he added: "Since the banner of Spain

passed near enough to show us the rampant lions and castles on its

crimson shield, and yet made no sign, I have had little hope of rescue

from a ship. It was ominous!"

"Not intended, then," I said, eagerly. "Oh, I am glad of this, at

least, for the honor of human nature."

"A strange consideration at such a time! You are a study to me, Miss

Harz; yours is not apathy, like mine, but true courage, even in this

death-struggle, and I will save you if I can, for you have a noble

soul!"

All further dialogue was cut short by the wild shout that rose from the

crowd, the delusive cry of "A sail, a sail!" and Dunmore rushed with the

rest to descry its myth-like form, if possible. It was some moments

before hope again died down to a flat level of despair.

Too remote for signal or trumpet was that distant, white-winged vessel

gliding securely on its path of peace, unconscious of the extremity of

the mighty steamer it distinguished dimly, no doubt, by the aid of

telescopes.

However this might have been, for the second time on that day of direst

exigency, a ship went by, observed yet unobserving.

Fainter and fainter grew the accents of the fierce, fanatical preacher;

his excitement forsook him as the danger became more and more imminent.

The crowd broke into groups. Pale, stern men, with rigid features, who

had been employed aiding in the construction of the rafts, returned now

to the sides of their wives and children.

Through a vista on the deck I discerned Miss Lamarque, sitting quietly

with her youngest nursling in her arms, beside her brother. His children

and slaves were gathered around her knees. Dunmore was giving her my

message, I could not doubt, from the glances she cast in my direction,

as he stood near by. I knew that he would soon turn to come again, but

my resolution was fixed.

Captain Ambrose, with a face grown old in half a day, gray, abstracted,

wretched, passed and repassed me several times, telescope in hand.

Ralph Maxwell on the round-house kept constant watch, his attitude

dauntless, his face uplifted and keen, field-glass in hand. His

West-Point training stood him in good stead now. Captain Falconer, a

naval officer, had returned to the side of Miss Oscanyan, the woman he

had loved hopelessly for years, and, before the scene closed between us

forever, I saw him clasp her to his bosom; so that trying hour had for

some high spirits its crowning consolations, its solace and reward, and,

whatever else was in store, the martyrdom of love was over.

An eager hand caught my shawl. "He is coming back, coming to persuade

you to leave us," said the young girl; "but you have promised not to

part from us, and I feel that God will remember us if we remain together

firm and fast, we three."

Then the pale widow spoke in turn: "Let me stay beside you too," she

entreated; "it makes me feel stronger, I am so desolate--" and she bowed

her head and wept.

I would have said in the strange, calm bitterness that possessed my

soul: "What value has life to you and your deformed one? Poor, widowed,

sickly, and despised, why should you wish to live? Why encumber me?"

But thoughts like these were not for human utterance now, and we sat

together, hand locked in hand for a time, waiting for the end, as men

may wait in years to come, when the earth is gray with sin, for the

coming of the fiery comet that they know is destined to consume them.

For was not this ship our world, penned in as we were on every side, and

separated from all else by an ocean inexorable and illimitable as space,

and were not we likewise looking forward to a fiery doom--our finite,

perhaps final, day of judgment?

I could understand then, for the first time, how condemned criminals

feel--well, strong, yet dying! I knew how Walter La Vigne, the

self-doomed, had felt, and some passages of Madame Roland's appeal rose

visibly before me, as if written on the air rather than in my memory. I

had read the book at Beauseincourt, and it had powerfully impressed me;

and this, I remember, was the passage that swept across my brain:

"And thou whom I dare not name, wouldst thou mourn to see me preceding

thee to a place where we can love one another without wrong--where

nothing will prevent our union--where all pernicious prejudices, all

arbitrary exclusions, all hateful passions, and all tyranny, are silent?

I shall wait for thee, then, and rest!"

So centred were my dying thoughts on Wentworth--so calmly did I await

the great change that men call sudden death!

All this time--a time much briefer than that I have taken in recounting

my sensations--the glorious summer's sun, the sun of morning, was

bathing the sea; the ship, with beauty, and a soft, fresh breeze, was

fanning every pallid brow with a caressing, silken wing, that seemed to

mock its wretchedness.

I thought not once of Christian Garth. I had ceased to strain my eyes

for a distant sail, to seek to compromise with my fate or make

conditions with my Creator. Dunmore was forgotten. I was composed to

die--not resigned. These things are different; a bitter patience

possessed me that I felt would sustain me to the end, but I was not

satisfied that my doom was just or opportune.

"Farewell, sweet, young, vigorous life!" I moaned aloud. "Farewell,

Miriam! It will not be thou, but a phantom, that shall arise from dead

ashes! Farewell, dear hand, that hast served me long and well!" and I

kissed my own right hand. I had not known until that moment how truly I

loved myself. "Sister, lover, farewell! Mother, father, receive me!

Gentle Constance, reach forth thy guiding hand and lead me to my

parents! Wentworth, remember me! Saviour, my soul is thine!"

I bowed my head. I had no more to say. Unwilling I was to die--afraid I

was not; for, as I sat there, my whole life swept before me, as it is

said to do before the eyes of the drowning, and rapidly as one may sweep

the gamut on a piano with one introverted finger, and I saw myself as

though I had been another. I had done nothing to make me afraid to meet

my God; so, with closed eyes, I lingered in the shadow, conscious of

nothing save exceeding calm, when the grasp of my gentle friend of the

moment aroused me to a sense of what was occurring, and I saw, with

horror indescribable, the fierce flames leaping from the deck, heard the

hoarse shouts, beheld the lurid surging of an agonized and despairing

multitude! But above all rang the clear, trumpet-tones of Captain

Ambrose, soon to sink in death:

"To the boats--to the boats! but save the women first--the children--as

ye are Christian men! So help ye, mighty God!"

I heard later how signally this noble charge was disregarded; how

utterly self triumphed over generosity and duty; and how, in enforcing

the example all should have followed. Captain Ambrose lost his valiant,

valuable life. But this was thought nothing of then, and I sat patiently

down to perish!

CHAPTER IV.

It was sunset when I first felt able to sit up beneath the awning of

sails which provident hands had stretched above the central platform

reserved for the occupancy of the women and children, spread thick with

mattresses on the raft, and look about me understandingly.

We were riding smoothly over the long, low, level billows of that summer

sea, sustained beyond their reach on what seemed a rude barn-floor,

composed as this was of the masts, booms, and yards, roughly lashed

together by tarred ropes, no longer needed on the destined ship, and

which had been assigned by the captain for that purpose to Christian

Garth.

A mast was erected in the front of this hastily-constructed raft, on

three sides of which were breastworks, with strong, loose ropes

attached, so that those who clung to this refuge might support

themselves with comparative safety, or rather have a chance for life,

when our "floating grave" should hang suspended perpendicularly on the

steep side of a mountain-billow, or drift beneath it.

Just below, and surrounding the small, elevated platform on which I

found myself when I revived, stretched on a slender mattress by the side

of my feeble widow and her moaning child, were rows of barrels, firmly

fastened by cleats, so as insure, to some degree, not only the

preservation of our food and water, but to form a sort of bulwark of

protection for those who occupied the central portion of the raft.

The young girl, of whom I have spoken as having attached herself to me

during the last moments of my stay on shipboard, and an old negro woman,

whose crooning hymns made a strange accompaniment to the dashing waters,

and whose stolid tranquillity seemed to reproach my anguish, were our

only companions on the sort of dais assigned to his female passengers by

Christian Garth.

The man himself, to whom we owed our deliverance, stood near his

primitive mast, trimming his sail carefully, and looking out with his

far-reaching, sagacious ken over the waste of waters, into which the

blood-red, full-orbed sun seemed dipping, suddenly, as for his

night-bath.

A few of the common passengers of the Kosciusko, and a knot of the

seamen, comprising not more than twenty souls, composed the groups,

scattered about the roughly yet securely lashed raft, silent and

observant all, as men who face their doom are apt to be.

I looked in vain for one familiar face, and for a moment regretted that

I had been withheld, as by some spell, for whose weird influence I could

never sufficiently account, from having cast my destiny with theirs, who

were so much nearer to me in station and congeniality of spirit than

those around me. With Miss Lamarque's hand locked in mine, I should have

vied with her, I felt, in cheerful courage; and the knightly calmness of

Dunmore might have sustained my drooping, fainting soul. These were my

peers, and, _with_ them, I should have been better content to be tried.

But the white squall, which had in no way affected us (so small and

partial was the sphere of its influence), had sufficed to separate ours

irretrievably from our companion-raft, and the squadron of boats that

had promised not to forsake us. And now the eye of agony was strained in

vain over the weltering waste, for a vestige of those refugees from the

Kosciusko--buried, perhaps, a thousand fathoms deep, by their sudden

visitors, beneath the waves of that deadly Atlantic sea.

Tears rained over my face as I thought of this probability, and,

hopeless as I was of rescue, the almost certain fate of my

companion-voyagers fell over me like a pall. "Better, perhaps--far

better had it been"--I thought so then--"had we all perished together in

that terrific sheet of flame that rose up like a dividing barrier

between us at the last. Fit emblem of the final day of doom. Our trials

were but begun. What more remained? God in heaven only knew!"

And rapidly, and in panoramic succession, all the fearful adventures of

raft and boat that I had ever read of, or heard related, passed across

my mind, ending with that latest, and perhaps the most fearful of

all--the wreck of the Medusa!

The night came down serene and beautiful. As the sun disappeared in

ocean, up rose the full-orbed moon--crimson and magnified by surrounding

vapors--that to the practised eye portended future tempest, calm as the

ocean and the heavens then seemed.

The constellations, singularly distinct and splendid, had the power to

fix and fascinate my vision--never felt before--as they shone above me,

clear and crystalline as enthroned in space--judges, and spectators,

cold and pitiless as it seemed to me, in the strangeness and forlornness

of my condition--Arcturus, and the Ursas, great and little, and Lyra,

and the Corona Borealis, Berenice, and Hydra, and Cassiopea's chair;

these and many more. I marked them all with a calm scrutiny that belongs

to terror in some phases. The stars seemed mocking eyes that

night--smiling and safe in heaven--the moon, a cold and cruel enemy with

her vapory train, so grandly sailing across the cloudless heaven--so

careless of our fate--the wreck of a ruined world as many deem

her--veiling in light her inward desolation.

A faint and vapory comet lurked on the horizon--like a ghastly

messenger--scarcely discernible to the human eyes, yet vaguely ominous

and suggestive--a spirit-ship it might be--watching in silence to bear

away the souls of those lost at sea!

There was deep stillness--unbroken, save by the lapping and plashing

waters. Even the crooning hymns of the old negro woman had died away;

and the moans of the suffering child, and the sobs of the weary mother,

and the eager exclamations of Ada Greene (for such I learned was the

name of my young companion), were, for a season, lost alike in sleep.

Food had been distributed--prayer had been offered--all seemed favorable

so far to our preservation. We were on the track of voyage--the pathway

of ships--and the sea was tranquil as a summer lake; up to this point,

the arm of God had been extended over us almost visibly. Would He

forsake us now? I questioned thus, and yet I could not, dare not, hope

as others hoped!

The morning came; I woke, aroused by Salva's song, from troubled sleep;

and, as I rose to a sitting posture, a troop of sea-birds that had been

swooping overhead, fled with a fiend-like screaming.

The mother and child were already consuming their scant allowance of

food. Ada Greene was standing self-poised, swaying like a slender reed

with the motion of the raft, so as never to lose her balance, like a

young acrobat, with her folded arms, her floating hair, and fair Aurora

face, uplifted to the day.

Over the raft were scattered groups of men taking their morning meal;

but, as before, the stalwart form of Christian Garth was at the helm, or

rather, mast and rudder merged in one, which he controlled with calm,

sagacious power.

"Is there a ship in the distance, that you gaze so earnestly?" I asked

of the young girl as I put back my hair that had clustered thickly over

my face in my uneasy slumber, and followed eagerly the direction of her

eyes.

"Oh! no; only a school of dolphins; but it is so pretty! Some came quite

near just now; the men were harpooning them; but if we had them we could

not cook them, you know, on this miserable contrivance."

"One we should be very grateful for, Ada, since it is all that lies

between us and destruction!" I answered, sorrowfully, for the levity of

her spirit grieved and shocked me.

"I don't know about that; I think we might as well have gone down at

once as stay here, and be roasted and starved. How hot it is to-day!

What would I not give for a good glass of ice-water! Don't look so

shocked; we shall be saved, of course. I am not the least afraid about

that, for Mr. Garth says we _must_ see a ship before evening. Don't you

mark the flag flying at the mast-head? He brought it on board on

purpose, so that they might not mistake our country (the packets, I

mean), and give us the go-by as that Spanish vessel did! But they do say

that was a pirate; and that, instead of sitting on a plank, we should

have been walking a plank by this time, had they rescued us. I'm rather

glad they didn't, though, after all--things couldn't be much worse than

they are, could they, now?--There, I came very near falling, I declare!"

The moans of the sick woman at my side became almost constant toward

noon; and she was obliged to surrender her infant wholly to my charge,

for the haemorrhage of the day before had returned, and she was fast

drifting into unconsciousness. "Water, water!" was the only intelligible

cry that left her lips, and that we had to give was warm and brackish,

from the occasional lapping of the sea against the barrels, into which

it oozed insensibly.

The sun shone down hot and brazen, from the lurid heavens, covered with

filmy clouds, so equally overspreading it that a thin, gray veil seemed

to interpose between us and its scorching rays, scarcely tempering them

by its diaphanous medium.

Beneath it lay the sea, like a copper shield, smooth and glowing,

seething like a boiling caldron, with its level foam, for the long,

low-rolling billows lifted themselves but lazily from Ocean's breast,

and assumed no distinctness of form or motion. Not the faintest breeze

came to relieve the stifling closeness of the atmosphere, or lift the

collapsed sail, or furled flag, that clung around our mast. The air

shimmered visibly around us, as though undergoing some transformation

from the heat, some culinary process, through which it was to be

rendered unfit for human lips to breathe. Birds flew low and heavily

around the raft, as though their wings met such resistance as fish find

in water, alighting occasionally to pick up languidly morsels of

rejected food.

Still the old negro's crooning hymns went on, recommenced with morning

light. To my sad heart, the refrain bore a mournful significance:

"In the land of the New Jerusalem

There shall be no more sea."

She sat, a wrinkled hag, with a leering, repulsive face, with her feet

planted firmly on her mattress, her knees elevated, her long, ape-like

arms closely embracing these--her fingers, strung with brass and silver

rings, intertwined with snake-like flexibility.

On her head was the inevitable bright-colored handkerchief, the badge of

her race, or rather of her condition in those days, and she wore the

decent, blue-cotton frock, which marked her for a plantation-negro.

Large hoops were in her flat, enormous ears, that seemed to suspend her

shoulders as they touched them, drawn up and narrowed as these were,

even beyond their natural hideousness, by her attitude, one which she

maintained as stolidly as a dervish.

"You must help us," I said, at last, when the crisis came, and affairs

waxed desperate. "You must take the child, at least, and care for him.

See, it requires two persons to sustain his dying mother--one to wet her

lips, one--"

"'Deed, honey," she interrupted, coolly, "you must 'scuse me dis oncst;

I has jus' as much to do as I kin posomply 'complish, in keepin' of

myself dry, comfable, and singin' ob my hyme-toones. We has all to take

our chances dis time, an' do for our own selves, black and white; an' I

don't see none ob my own white folks on dis raf', wich I is mighty proud

of. Dar, now! I does b'leve dat is a ship sail way off dar. Does you see

it, honey?"

And she pointed to a large white gull, skimming the main at some

distance. Disgusted with her selfishness, I vouchsafed her no further

notice at the time, and her crooning went on during the whole period of

the bitter death-struggle of that poor sufferer, whose name I never

knew, but whose little, deformed waif, the orphan of the raft, remained

my heritage.

"You will take care of him," she had said to me, in her last conscious

moments, "my baby-boy, my little--" the name died on her lips, and she

never spoke again.

When she was dead, Christian Garth caused her to be wrapped in

sail-cloth, weighted with chains, and, with a brief prayer, consigned to

the deep. His superstitious sailor's fears rebelled against the idea of

keeping a corpse on board one moment longer than necessary, so the rites

of sepulture were speedily accomplished.

When I remonstrated, feebly enough it is true, for exhaustion was

supervening on long-sustained effort, at his haste, which, even under

the circumstances, seemed to me indecent, he coolly spoke of it as a

measure essential to the good of all.

Talismanic as were these words on such occasion, mine were the lips that

murmured the brief prayer, a portion of the solemn Episcopal

grave-service that I chanced to remember, above the poor, pale corpse,

even while my weary arms inclosed the struggling child, who,

understanding nothing of the truth, would fain have plunged after his

mother into depths unknown.

A low, long roll of thunder smote on the ear, like a message to the

ocean, from the heavens above, as we saw the waters close greedily over

the form of our dead passenger. The men who had launched the body from

the raft looked up and listened fearfully, and Christian Garth hastened

to trim his sail.

It was sunset now, and the clouds gathered so rapidly about the sun,

that he sank empalled in purple to his watery bed, leaving no trace

behind to mark his faded splendor.

A sudden breeze sprang up, infinitely refreshing at first to soul and

sense, and again the thunder lumbered and crashed about us. The billows

heaved and leaped like steeds just freed from harness, tossing their

white manes; the raft shuddered and reeled with a deadly, sickly motion,

like a creature in strong throes, plunging with frantic suddenness into

the troughs of the waves at one moment, as if impelled by fear, then

rallying to their summits, only to cast itself wildly down again.

All was confusion, dire and terrible. Then burst the storm upon

us--rain, wind!

I was conscious of clutching, with one hand, a rope which strained and

swayed desperately, while with the other I grasped the affrighted baby

to my breast.

Ada Greene and the old negro woman clung together, hanging to the same

cord of safety, flung to them, to all of us, by the hand of Christian

Garth.

The barrels strained and groaned, and broke from their fastenings; the

awning was wrenched from its mooring, and swept away; the bitter brine

broke over us and choked our cries; the anguish of death was upon us

without its submission. We struggled instinctively to breathe, to live;

we grappled desperately with circumstances; we fought against our doom.

Suddenly the sea dropped to rest--the storm was spent; a low, sighing,

soughing gale swept around our nucleus of despair, and the surging of

the sea was like a bitter funeral-wail. The air grew cold and chill; one

vast, pall-like cloud enveloped the whole face of the unpitying

heavens, that seemed literally "to press down upon our very faces like a

roof of black marble."

No moon, no stars, were visible; we had no light of any kind, nor could

we ascertain the damage done until the cold, gray morning broke in gloom

and rain upon us. Then it was made plain to us that our food had all

been swept overboard--together with six seamen and five of the

passengers. There remained on the raft only three shuddering women and a

little child--and a handful of weary and discouraged men, sustained and

led to a sense of duty by the dauntless master-spirit of one alone--the

presence of Christian Garth, indomitable through all hardships. So it

had fared with us for six-and-thirty hours of our experience on "our

floating grave."

We had been washed from our little platform, which ordinarily lifted us

above the lapping of the sea during the prevalence of the storm--and we

regained it now, glad to repose even on the sea-soaked mattresses bereft

of awning. By the mercy of God some glutinous sea-zoophytes had been

tangled among them, and by the help of the brine-soaked biscuit in my

pocket (crammed there, it may be remembered, as a precious hoard for a

time of dire necessity, on the morning of the fire, by the small,

cunning fingers of the sickly child), we breakfasted, or rather broke

our fast--we four, the child, the negress, Ada Greene, and I--and life

was aroused again in every breast by means of a briny morsel.

"A cup of coffee would not be amiss just now," said the girl, laughing,

"but the Lord knows we can wait."

There was a strange, bright light in the eyes of the young girl as she

spoke these words, and she was arraying her hair coquettishly with some

bunches of sea-weed, which had been cast up by the storm, and from which

the eager, famishing lips of the little boy had been permitted to suck

the gluten before discarding the skeleton stems.

That hair was in itself a grace and glory--rippling from crown to waist

in sheeny, golden splendor, fine as silk, and glossy as the yellow floss

threads of pale, ripe Indian-corn--beautiful, even in its dishevelled

and drenched condition, as an artist's dream. Devoid as it was of

regular beauty, the face beneath, with its clear blue eyes, red lips,

and pure complexion, the pink and white that reminds one of a sweet-pea

or ocean-shell, had struck me as very lovely from the first; nothing to

support this groundwork of excellence had I discovered, however, either

in the form of the head, which was ignoble, or the expression of the

face, which was both timid and defiant, or the tones of the voice, which

were shrill and harsh by turns--yet, as my fellow-voyager and sufferer,

I was interested in this young creature, not forgetting, either, her

attention during my pending swoon, of which mention has been made.

"I am going to the party, whatever the preacher may say, and whether

Captain Ambrose wills it or no. I am under his care and protection, you

see, to go to New York to my aunt, Madame Du Vert, the famous milliner,

and I am to learn her trade. Her name is Greene, so they call her Du

Vert, to make out that she is French--_vert_ is _green_, in French, you

see; or so they tell me. Now, Captain Ambrose is a church-member, too,

and he does not want dancing on his ship, and so he made the calkers

pitch the deck--that was to break up the ball, you know; but don't tell

any one this for the 'land's sake,'" drawing near to me and whispering

strangely, with her forefinger raised--"or all those proud Southern

people would pitch into me--pitch, you understand?" and she laughed

merrily--"their white satin slippers and all!"

"You must not talk so, Ada;" and I took her hand, which was burning.

"Why not? Who are you, to prevent me? I am as good as you any day--or

Miss Lamarque either, or any of those haughty ones--though my father was

a negro-trader. Well, whose business was that but God's? If He don't

care, who need care?--An't I right, old mammy?" appealing to the ancient

negress, who had suspended her croon to listen.

"Yes, indeed--that you is, honey; right to upholden your own dad--nebber

min' what he did to serbe the debble. But you looks mighty strange,

chile, outen your eyes. Wat dat you sees ober dar--is it a ship,

gal?--or must we--" and her voice sank to a mutter--"must we fall back

on dis picaninny, to keep from starvation?--"

I understood her dreadful suggestion even before the words fully left

her cannibal lips, exposing her yellow fangs; from the glance of her

cruel eye in the direction of the child, and the working of her long,

crooked talons, rather than fingers, writhed like knotted serpents; I

understood them with an instinct that made me clutch him closely to my

breast, and narrowly watch his enemy from that hour until the time when

my brain failed and my eyes closed in unconsciousness, and with the

determination to plunge with him into the sea rather than devote him to

such a fate or yield to such an alternative as this wretch in human form

had more than hinted--even should the animal instinct, underlying every

nature, presume to dictate to reason at the last!

We could but die--that was the very worst that Fate had in store for

us--_but_ die in the body! How infinitely worse that the soul should

perish through the selfish sensuousness of cannibalism, which would

degrade life itself below dissolution, even if preserved by such means!

"I am ready now to go to Captain Ambrose for assistance," said Ada

Greene, poising herself before me, and having surrendered or forgotten

her first idea, evidently, in the new mania of the moment. "Of course,

he does not intend to leave us here to perish, and he is in the next

cabin--but a step; see how easily I can get to him, and I shall be back

before you can say 'Presto!'"

As nimbly as a sea-gull runs upon the sand, the young creature flew

across the now level raft toward the sea, but a strong hand clutched her

as she was about to step overboard, and compelled her back to her place

on the platform, where, bound with cords, she lay raving, until sleep or

unconsciousness mercifully supervened to spare me the spectacle of her

agony, which no human power could alleviate.

Hours passed before this "consummation devoutly to be wished" took

effect, and, at the end of that time, my reeling brain, my fainting

energies, warned me that I, too, was probably approaching some dreadful

crisis. With a view to the refreshment its waters could possibly afford

my head, I crept quietly from the platform on which the old negro woman

held enforced guard over the insensible form of Ada Greene, and, still

clasping the poor helpless one, so mysteriously thrust upon my tender

mercies, to my bosom, I gained the edge of the raft, unnoticed by

Christian Garth, who might otherwise have apprehended me in turn, and

borne me back to my allotted precincts, and hung above the ocean, so as

to suffer its cooling spray to fall unceasingly across my burning

forehead.

From some instinctive prompting I had lashed the poor, frail baby to my

girdle with the scarf of knotted silk I wore about my neck, and, wan

and exhausted, he lay upon my shoulder tranquilly as any Indian papoose

might do on its mother's breast. A branch of sea-weed floated past as I

looked down--some gracious mermaid's gift, perhaps, extended by her

invisible fingers to greet our famishing lips--and I caught it eagerly,

dividing the welcome nutriment with the perishing child, now patient

from weakness and instinctive consciousness, perhaps, of the entire

uselessness of cries and tears.

Whether the weed was a sort of ocean-hasheesh, or wholesome aliment, I

never knew, but certain it is that, from the moment its juices passed my

lips, a strange and delightful quietude stole over my weary senses, fast

lapsing, as these had seemed, into, unconsciousness when I left my place

to seek the ocean's brink.

The rays of the declining sun seemed for a moment centred on one spot,

immediately before my impending face, supported as this was on one hand,

and my sight followed their lance-like rays to the very floor of ocean!

As the waters of the Red Sea divided for the passage of Moses and the

Israelites, so seemed these to part for my mental eyes, sundered as they

were by a golden sword of infinite splendor.

That power which neither pain nor peril can subdue had possession of me

now, and, above all, the bitter circumstances that surrounded me, and,

in the face of danger and of death, imagination asserted her supremacy.

My dream was not of passing ship or harbor gained, or rich repast, or

festival, or clustered grapes and sparkling wines, like other sufferers

from shipwreck, fevered with famine, frenzied with despair; but hasheesh

or opium never bestowed so fair, so strange a vision as that which, in

my extremity, was mercifully accorded to me.

My eyes pursued the sea-shaft to its base, as a telescope conducts the

mortal gaze to revel in the stars. Merman and mermaid, nereid and

triton, were there, rejoicing in the sunbeams thus poured upon them

through this subtle conduit of ocean, as do the motes of summer in her

rays; but soon these disappeared, a motley crowd, confused and joyous,

leaving the vision free to pierce the depths, glowing with golden light,

in search of still greater marvels.

Then I saw outspread before me the streets, the fanes, the towers, the

dwellings, of a vast, deserted city, one of those, I could not doubt,

that had existed before the flood, and which had lain submerged for

thousands of centuries; the fretwork of the coral-insect was over all

(that worker against time, so slow, so certain), in one monotonous web

of solid snow.

Statues of colossal size, and arches of Titanic strength and power,

adorned the portals, the pass-ways, the temples of this metropolis of

ocean, guarded as were these last by the effigies of griffin and dragon,

and winged elephant and lion, and stately mastodon and monstrous

ichthyosaurus, all white as gleaming spar.

Gods and demi-gods of gigantic proportions and majestic aspect were

carved on the external walls of the windowless abodes and fanes; and,

from the yawning portal of one of these, a temple vast as Dendera's

self, came forth, fold after fold, even as I seemed to gaze, the

monstrous sea-serpent of which mariners dream, more huge, more loathly,

than fancy or experience ever yet portrayed him. I still behold in

memory the stately, fearful head, with its eyes of emerald fire and

sweeping, sea-green mane, as it reared its neck for a moment as if to

scale the ladder the sunbeams had thrown down when first emerging from

its temple-cavern; and, later, the mottled, monstrous body, as coil

after coil was gradually unwound, until it seemed at last to lie in all

its loathsome length for roods along the silent, shell-paved

streets--the scaly monarch, of that scene of human desolation!

I recall the feeling of security that upheld me to look and to observe

every motion of the reptile of my dream.

"He cannot come to me here," I thought. "The ark is sacred, and God's

hand is over it; besides, I hear the singing of the priests, and the

dove is about to be cast forth! Will the raven never come back? Oh, the

sweet olive-branch! It falls so lightly! We are nearing the mountain

now, and we shall soon cast anchor!"

Then, among choral chants of joy and thanksgiving, I seemed to sleep.

How long this slumber lasted, or whether it came at all, I never knew.

It is a loving and tender thing in our Creator to decree to us this

curtain of unconsciousness when nerve and strength would otherwise give

way beneath the intensity of suffering--a holy and gentle thing for

which we are not half thankful enough in our estimate of blessings.

My sleep, or swoon, shielded me from long hours of agony, mental and

physical, that must have become unendurable ere the close. As it was, I

knew no more after the sea-shaft closed with its wondrous and mysterious

revelations (which I yet recall with marveling and admiration, as we are

wont to do a pageant of the past), until aroused from lethargy by the

hand and voice of Christian Garth.

It was night. I saw the glimmer of the moonlight on the seas, a

tranquil, balmy night; but some dark object was interposed between me

and the stars which, I knew, were shining above, and the raft lay

motionless upon the waters. I was aware, when my senses returned

temporarily, that the bow of a mighty vessel was projected above our

frail place of refuge, and that we were saved. The dove had come at

last!

When or how we were lifted to the deck of the ship I knew not, for,

having partially revived, I soon drifted away again into profound

lethargy and entire unconsciousness, which for a time seemed death.

CHAPTER V.

A woman sat sewing near my berth in the state-room in which I found

myself; a fan, lying on a small table at her side, betokened in what

manner she had divided her attentions--between her needle and her

helpless charge. I thought; indeed, that I had felt its soft plumes

glide gently across my face in the very moment of my awakening in the

first amazement of which I but dimly comprehended the circumstances that

surrounded me.

"What brought this stranger to my pillow! Who and what was she? Where

was I!" These were my mental queries at the first. Then, as the truth

gradually dawned over my sluggish and bewildered brain, I lay quietly

revolving matters, and noticed my self-constituted nurse, and my

surroundings, with the close yet careless observation of a child.

The woman, on whom my gaze was earliest fixed (while her own seemed

riveted on the work upon her knee), was of middle age or beyond it, of

medium size, of square and sturdy make, and homely to the very verge of

ugliness. She was dressed plainly if not commonly in black, but there

was a general air of decency about her that seemed to place her beyond

the sphere of servitude. She wore spectacles set in tortoise-shell

frames, and she wore her iron-gray hair straight back behind small,

funnel-shaped ears, and gathered into the tightest knot behind. Her

head was flat and narrow at the summit, though broad at and above the

base of the brain. Her forehead, wide yet low, was ignoble in

expression. The mouth, shaped like a horseshoe, was curved down at the

corners, and was full of sullen resolution. The nose, pinched, yet not

pointed, showed scarcely any nostril, and might as well have been made

of wood, for any meaning it betrayed. Her eyebrows were short, wide,

rugged, and irregular, though very black; the cast-down eyes, of course,

so far inscrutable.

She was shaping a flimsy, black-silk dress, and doing it deftly, though

it was a marvel to me how hands so stiff and cramped as hers appeared to

be could handle a needle at all.

On one of these gnarled and unlovely fingers she wore a ring which, in

the idleness of the mood that possessed me, I examined listlessly. It

was an old-fashioned and slender circle of gold, so pale that it looked

silvery, such as in times long past had commonly been used either for

troth-plight or marriage-vows, surmounted by two small united hearts of

the same dull metal by way of ornament. Mrs. Austin, I remembered,

possessed one, the aversion of my childhood, that seemed its

counterpart.

My weary eyes wandered from her at last, to take in the accessories of

my chamber, tiny as this was, and I saw that against the wall were

hanging a gentleman's greatcoat and hand-satchel. Cigars and books were

piled on the same table which held the spool and scissors of my

companion, and a pair of cloth slippers, embroidered with colored

chenilles and quilted lining, of masculine size and shape, reposed upon

the floor. A cane and umbrella were secured neatly in a small corner

rack. There were no traces, I saw, of feminine occupancy beyond the

transient implements of industry alluded to.

Suddenly, in their languid, listless roving, my eyes encountered those

of my attendant fixed full upon me, while a smile distorted the homely,

sallow face, disclosing a set of yellow teeth, sound, short, and strong,

like regular grains of corn.

In those eyes, in that mouth and saffron teeth, lay the whole power and

character of this repulsive and disagreeable physiognomy.

Those feline orbs of mingled gray and green, with their small, pointed

pupils, were keen, vigilant, and observing beyond all eyes it had ever

before or since been my lot to encounter. After meeting their

penetrating glance I was not surprised to hear their possessor accost me

in clear, metallic tones, that seemed only the result of her gift of

insight, and consistent with it.

"You are awake and yourself again, young lady, I am glad to see! You

have slept very quietly for the last few hours, and your fever is

wellnigh broken. Will you have some food now? You need it; you must be

weak."

"Yes, very weak; but not hungry at all. I do not want to eat. Just let

me lie quietly awhile. It is such enjoyment."

She complied silently and judiciously with my request.

After a satisfactory pause, during which I had gradually collected my

ideas, I inquired, suddenly:

"How long is it since we were lifted from the raft, and where are the

other survivors?"

"All safe, I believe, and onboard, well cared for, like yourself. It has

been nearly two days since your raft was overhauled. This was what the

captain called it," and she smiled.