Chapter II.
Chapter III.
Chapter IV.
Chapter V.
Chapter VI.
Chapter VII.
Chapter VIII.
Chapter IX.
Chapter X.
Chapter XI.
Chapter XII.
Chapter XIII.
Chapter XIV.
Chapter XV.
Chapter XVI.
Chapter XVII.
Chapter XVIII.
Chapter XIX.
Chapter XX.
Chapter XXI.
Chapter XXII.
Chapter XXIII.
Chapter XXIV.
Chapter XXV.
Chapter XXVI.
Chapter XXVII.
Chapter XXVIII.
Chapter XXIX.
Chapter XXX.
Chapter XXXI.
Chapter XXXII.
Preface.
The Writer felt it necessary, on a former occasion, to state, that, in
sketching his marine life, he did not deem himself obliged to adhere,
very closely, to the chronological order of nautical improvements. It
is believed that no very great violation of dates will be found in the
following pages. If any keen-eyed critic of the ocean, however, should
happen to detect a rope rove through the wrong leading-block, or a term
spelt in such a manner as to destroy its true sound, he is admonished
of the duty of ascribing the circumstances, in charity, to any thing
but ignorance on the part of a brother. It must be remembered that
there is an undue proportion of landsmen employed in the mechanical as
well as the more spiritual part of book-making; a fact which, in
itself, accounts for the numberless imperfections that still embarrass
the respective departments of the occupation. In due time, no doubt, a
remedy will be found for this crying evil; and then the world may hope
to see the several branches of the trade a little better ordered. The
true Augustan age of literature can never exist until works shall be as
accurate, in their typography, as a “log book,” and as sententious, in
their matter, as a “watch-bill.”
On the less important point of the materials, which are very possibly
used to so little advantage in his present effort, the Writer does not
intend to be very communicative, if their truth be not apparent, by the
manner in which he has set forth the events in the tale itself, he must
be content to lie under the imputation of having disfigured it, by his
own clumsiness. All testimony must, in the nature of things, resolve
itself into three great classes—the positive, the negative, and the
circumstantial. The first and the last are universally admitted to be
entitled to the most consideration, since the third can only be
resorted to in the absence of the two others. Of the positive evidence
of the verity of its contents, the book itself is a striking proof. It
is hoped, also, that there is no want of circumstance to support this
desirable character. If these two opening points be admitted those who
may be still disposed to cavil are left to the full enjoyment of their
negation, with which the Writer wishes them just as much success as the
question may merit.
To W. B. Shubrick, Esquire, U. S. Navy.
In submitting this hastily-composed and imperfect picture of a few
scenes, peculiar to the profession, to your notice, dear Shubrick, I
trust much more to your kind feelings than to any merit in the
execution. Such as it may be, however, the book is offered as another
tribute to the constant esteem and friendship of
The Author.
The Red Rover.
Chapter I.
Par. “Mars dote on you for his novices.”
_All’s Well that ends Well._
No one, who is familiar with the bustle and activity of an American
commercial town, would recognize, in the repose which now reigns in the
ancient mart of Rhode Island, a place that, in its day, has been ranked
amongst the most important ports along the whole line of our extended
coast. It would seem, at the first glance, that nature had expressly
fashioned the spot to anticipate the wants and to realize the wishes of
the mariner. Enjoying the four great requisites of a safe and
commodious haven, a placid basin, an outer harbour, and a convenient
roadstead, with a clear offing, Newport appeared, to the eyes of our
European ancestors, designed to shelter fleets and to nurse a race of
hardy and expert seamen. Though the latter anticipation has not been
entirely disappointed, how little has reality answered to expectation
in respect to the former. A successful rival has arisen, even in the
immediate vicinity of this seeming favourite of nature, to defeat all
the calculations of mercantile sagacity, and to add another to the
thousand existing evidences “that the wisdom of man is foolishness.”
There are few towns of any magnitude, within our broad territories, in
which so little change has been effected in half a century as in
Newport. Until the vast resources of the interior were developed the
beautiful island on which it stands was a chosen retreat of the
affluent planters of the south, from the heats and diseases of their
burning climate. Here they resorted in crowds, to breathe the
invigorating breezes of the sea. Subjects of the same government, the
inhabitants of the Carolinas and of Jamaica met here, in amity, to
compare their respective habits and policies, and to strengthen each
other in a common delusion, which the descendants of both, in the third
generation, are beginning to perceive and to regret.
The communion left, on the simple and unpractised offspring of the
Puritans, its impression both of good and evil. The inhabitants of the
country, while they derived, from the intercourse, a portion of that
bland and graceful courtesy for which the gentry of the southern
British colonies were so distinguished did not fail to imbibe some of
those peculiar notions, concerning the distinctions in the races of
men, for which they are no less remarkable Rhode Island was the
foremost among the New England provinces to recede from the manners and
opinions of their simple ancestors. The first shock was given, through
her, to that rigid and ungracious deportment which was once believed a
necessary concomitant of true religion, a sort of outward pledge of the
healthful condition of the inward man; and it was also through her that
the first palpable departure was made from those purifying principles
which might serve as an apology for even far more repulsive exteriors.
By a singular combination of circumstances and qualities, which is,
however, no less true than perplexing, the merchants of Newport were
becoming, at the same time, both slave-dealers and gentlemen.
Whatever might have been the moral condition of its proprietors at the
precise period of 1759, the island itself was never more enticing and
lovely. Its swelling crests were still crowned with the wood of
centuries; its little vales were then covered with the living verdure
of the north; and its unpretending but neat and comfortable villas lay
sheltered in groves, and embedded in flowers. The beauty and fertility
of the place gained for it a name which, probably, expressed far more
than was, at that early day, properly understood. The inhabitants of
the country styled their possessions the “Garden of America.” Neither
were their guests, from the scorching plains of the south, reluctant to
concede so imposing a title to distinction. The appellation descended
even to our own time; nor was it entirely abandoned, until the
traveller had the means of contemplating the thousand broad and lovely
vallies which, fifty years ago, lay buried in the dense shadows of the
forest.
The date we have just named was a period fraught with the deepest
interest to the British possessions on this Continent. A bloody and
vindictive war, which had been commenced in defeat and disgrace, was
about to end in triumph. France was deprived of the last of her
possessions on the main, while the immense region which lay between the
bay of Hudson and the territories of Spain submitted to the power of
England. The colonists had shared largely in contributing to the
success of the mother country. Losses and contumely, that had been
incurred by the besotting prejudices of European commanders were
beginning to be forgotten in the pride of success. The blunders of
Braddock, the indolence of Loudon, and the impotency of Abercrombie,
were repaired by the vigour of Amherst, and the genius of Wolfe. In
every quarter of the globe the arms of Britain were triumphant. The
loyal provincials were among the loudest in their exultations and
rejoicings; wilfully shutting their eyes to the scanty meed of applause
that a powerful people ever reluctantly bestows on its dependants, as
though love of glory, like avarice, increases by its means of
indulgence.
The system of oppression and misrule, which hastened a separation that
sooner or later must have occurred, had not yet commenced. The mother
country, if not just, was still complaisant. Like all old and great
nations, she was indulging in the pleasing, but dangerous, enjoyment of
self-contemplation. The qualities and services of a race, who were
believed to be inferior, were, however, soon forgotten; or, if
remembered, it was in order to be misrepresented and vituperated. As
this feeling increased with the discontent of the civil dissensions, it
led to still more striking injustice, and greater folly. Men who, from
their observations, should have known better, were not ashamed to
proclaim, even in the highest council of the nation, their ignorance of
the character of a people with whom they had mingled their blood.
Self-esteem gave value to the opinions of fools. It was under this
soothing infatuation that veterans were heard to disgrace their noble
profession, by boastings that should have been hushed in the mouth of a
soldier of the carpet; it was under this infatuation that Burgoyne
gave, in the Commons of England, that memorable promise of marching
from Quebec to Boston, with a force he saw fit to name—a pledge that he
afterwards redeemed by going over the same ground, with twice the
number of followers, as captives; and it was under this infatuation
that England subsequently threw away her hundred thousand lives, and
lavished her hundred millions of treasure.
The history of that memorable struggle is familiar to every American.
Content with the knowledge that his country triumphed, he is willing to
let the glorious result take its proper place in the pages of history.
He sees that her empire rests on a broad and natural foundation, which
needs no support from venal pens; and, happily for his peace of mind,
no less than for his character, he feels that the prosperity of the
Republic is not to be sought in the degradation of surrounding nations.
Our present purpose leads us back to the period of calm which preceded
the storm of the Revolution. In the early days of the month of October
1759, Newport, like every other town in America, was filled with the
mingled sentiment of grief and joy. The inhabitants mourned the fall of
Wolfe while they triumphed in his victory. Quebec, the strong-hold of
the Canadas, and the last place of any importance held by a people whom
they had been educated to believe were their natural enemies, had just
changed its masters. That loyalty to the Crown of England, which
endured so much before the strange principle became extinct, was then
at its height; and probably the colonist was not to be found who did
not, in some measure, identify his own honour with the fancied glory of
the head of the house of Brunswick. The day on which the action of our
tale commences had been expressly set apart to manifest the sympathy of
the good people of the town, and its vicinity, in the success of the
royal arms. It had opened, as thousands of days have opened since, with
the ringing of bells and the firing of cannon; and the population had,
at an early hour, poured into the streets of the place, with that
determined zeal in the cause of merriment, which ordinarily makes
preconcerted joy so dull an amusement. The chosen orator of the day had
exhibited his eloquence, in a sort of prosaic monody in praise of the
dead hero, and had sufficiently manifested his loyalty, by laying the
glory, not only of that sacrifice, but all that had been reaped by so
many thousands of his brave companions also, most humbly at the foot of
the throne.
Content with these demonstrations of their allegiance the inhabitants
began to retire to their dwellings as the sun settled towards those
immense regions which then lay an endless and unexplored wilderness but
which now are teeming with the fruits and enjoyments of civilized life.
The countrymen from the environs, and even from the adjoining main were
beginning to turn their faces towards their distant homes, with that
frugal care which still distinguishes the inhabitants of the country
even in the midst of their greatest abandonment to pleasures, in order
that the approaching evening might not lead them into expenditures
which were not deemed germain to the proper feelings of the occasion.
In short, the excess of the hour was past, and each individual was
returning into the sober channels of his ordinary avocations, with an
earnestness and discretion which proved he was not altogether unmindful
of the time that had been squandered in the display of a spirit that he
already appeared half disposed to consider a little supererogatory.
The sounds of the hammer, the axe, and the saw were again heard in the
place; the windows of more than one shop were half opened, as if its
owner had made a sort of compromise between his interests and his
conscience; and the masters of the only three inns in the town were to
be seen standing before their doors, regarding the retiring countrymen
with eyes that plainly betrayed they were seeking customers among a
people who were always much more ready to sell than to buy. A few noisy
and thoughtless seamen, belonging to the vessels in the haven, together
with some half dozen notorious tavern-hunters were, however, the sole
fruits of all their nods of recognition, inquiries into the welfare of
wives and children, and, in some instances, of open invitations to
alight and drink.
Worldly care, with a constant, though sometimes an oblique, look at the
future state, formed the great characteristic of all that people who
then dwelt in what were called the provinces of New-England. The
business of the day, however, was not forgotten though it was deemed
unnecessary to digest its proceedings in idleness, or over the bottle.
The travellers along the different roads that led into the interior of
the island formed themselves into little knots, in which the policy of
the great national events they had just been commemorating, and the
manner they had been treated by the different individuals selected to
take the lead in the offices of the day, were freely handled, though
still with great deference to the established reputations of the
distinguished parties most concerned. It was every where conceded that
the prayers, which had been in truth a little conversational and
historical, were faultless and searching exercises; and, on the whole,
(though to this opinion there were some clients of an advocate adverse
to the orator, who were moderate dissenters) it was established, that a
more eloquent oration had never issued from the mouth of man, than had
that day been delivered in their presence. Precisely in the same temper
was the subject discussed by the workmen on a ship, which was then
building in the harbour, and which, in the same spirit of provincial
admiration that has since immortalized so many edifices, bridges, and
even individuals, within their several precincts, was confidently
affirmed to be the rarest specimen then extant of the nice proportions
of naval architecture!
Of the orator himself it may be necessary to say a word, in order that
so remarkable an intellectual prodigy should fill his proper place in
our frail and short-lived catalogue of the worthies of that day. He was
the usual oracle of his neighbourhood, when a condensation of its ideas
on any great event, like the one just mentioned, became necessary. His
learning was justly computed, by comparison, to be of the most profound
and erudite character; and it was very truly affirmed to have
astonished more than one European scholar, who had been tempted, by a
fame which, like heat, was only the more intense from its being so
confined, to grapple with him on the arena of ancient literature. He
was a man who knew how to improve these high gifts to his exclusive
advantage. In but one instance had he ever been thrown enough off his
guard to commit an act that had a tendency to depress the reputation he
had gained in this manner; and that was, in permitting one of his
laboured flights of eloquence to be printed; or, as his more witty
though less successful rival, the only other lawyer in the place,
expressed it, in suffering one of his _fugitive_ essays to be _caught._
But even this experiment, whatever might have been its effects abroad,
served to confirm his renown at home. He now stood before his admirers
in all the dignity of types; and it was in vain for that miserable
tribe of “animalculæ, who live by feeding on the body of genius,” to
attempt to undermine a reputation that was embalmed in the faith of so
many parishes. The brochure was diligently scattered through the
provinces, lauded around the tea-pot, openly extolled in the prints—by
some kindred spirit, as was manifest in the striking similarity of
style—and by one believer, more zealous or perhaps more interested than
the rest, actually put on board the next ship which sailed for “home,”
as England was then affectionately termed, enclosed in an envelope
which bore an address no less imposing than the Majesty of Britain. Its
effect on the straight-going mind of the dogmatic German, who then
filled the throne of the Conqueror, was never known, though they, who
were in the secret of the transmission, long looked, in vain, for the
signal reward that was to follow so striking an exhibition of human
intellect.
Notwithstanding these high and beneficent gifts, their possessor was
now as unconsciously engaged in that portion of his professional
labours which bore the strongest resemblance to the occupation of a
scrivener, as though nature, in bestowing such rare endowments had
denied him the phrenological quality of self-esteem. A critical
observer might, however, have seen, or fancied that he saw, in the
forced humility of his countenance, certain gleamings of a triumph that
should not properly be traced to the fall of Quebec. The habit of
appearing meek had, however, united with a frugal regard for the
precious and irreclaimable minutes, in producing this extraordinary
diligence in a pursuit of a character that was so humble, when compared
with his recent mental efforts.
Leaving this gifted favourite of fortune and nature, we shall pass to
an entirely different individual, and to another quarter of the place.
The spot, to which we wish now to transport the reader, was neither
more nor less than the shop of a tailor, who did not disdain to perform
the most minute offices of his vocation in his own heedful person. The
humble edifice stood at no great distance from the water, in the skirts
of the town, and in such a situation as to enable its occupant to look
out upon the loveliness of the inner basin, and, through a vista cut by
the element between islands, even upon the lake-like scenery of the
outer harbour. A small, though little frequented wharf lay before his
door, while a certain air of negligence, and the absence of bustle,
sufficiently manifested that the place itself was not the immediate
site of the much-boasted commercial prosperity of the port.
The afternoon was like a morning in spring, the breeze which
occasionally rippled the basin possessing that peculiarly bland
influence which is so often felt in the American autumn; and the worthy
mechanic laboured at his calling, seated on his shop board, at an open
window, far better satisfied with himself than many of those whose
fortune it is to be placed in state, beneath canopies of velvet and
gold. On the outer side of the little building, a tall, awkward, but
vigorous and well-formed countryman was lounging, with one shoulder
placed against the side of the shop, as if his legs found the task of
supporting his heavy frame too grievous to be endured with out
assistance, seemingly in waiting for the completion of the garment at
which the other toiled, and with which he intended to adorn the graces
of his person, in an adjoining parish, on the succeeding sabbath.
In order to render the minutes shorter, and, possibly in indulgence to
a powerful propensity to talk, of which he who wielded the needle was
somewhat the subject, but few of the passing moments were suffered to
escape without a word from one or the other of the parties. As the
subject of their discourse had a direct reference to the principal
matter of our tale, we shall take leave to give such portions of it to
the reader as we deem most relevant to a clear exposition of that which
is to follow. The latter will always bear in mind, that he who worked
was a man drawing into the wane of life; that he bore about him the
appearance of one who, either from incompetency or from some fatality
of fortune, had been doomed to struggle through the world, keeping
poverty from his residence only by the aid of great industry and rigid
frugality; and that the idler was a youth of an age and condition that
the acquisition of an entire set of habiliments formed to him a sort of
era in his adventures.
“Yes.” exclaimed the indefatigable shaper of cloth, with a species of
sigh which might have been equally construed into an evidence of the
fulness of his mental enjoyment, or of the excess of his bodily
labours; “yes, smarter sayings have seldom fallen from the lips of man,
than such as the squire pour’d out this very day. When he spoke of the
plains of father Abraham, and of the smoke and thunder of the battle,
Pardon, it stirred up such stomachy feelings in my bosom, that I verily
believe I could have had the heart to throw aside the thimble, and go
forth myself, to seek glory in battling in the cause of the King.”
The youth, whose Christian or ‘given’ name, as it is even now generally
termed in New-England, had been intended, by his pious sponsors, humbly
to express his future hopes, turned his head towards the heroic tailor,
with an expression of drollery about the eye, that proved nature had
not been niggardly in the gift of humour, however the quality was
suppressed by the restraints of a very peculiar manner, and no less
peculiar education.
“There’s an opening now, neighbour Homespun, for an ambitious man,” he
said, “sin’ his Majesty has lost his stoutest general.”
“Yes, yes,” returned the individual who, either in his youth or in his
age, had made so capital a blunder in the choice of a profession, “a
fine and promising chance it is for one who counts but five-and-twenty;
most of my day has gone by, and I must spend the rest of it here, where
you see me, between buckram and osnaburghs—who put the dye into your
cloth, Pardy? it is the best laid-in bark I’ve fingered this fall.”
“Let the old woman alone for giving the lasting colour to her web; I’ll
engage, neighbour Homespun, provided you furnish the proper fit,
there’ll not be a better dress’d lad on the island than my own mother’s
son! But, sin’ you cannot be a general good-man, you’ll have the
comfort of knowing there’ll be no more fighting without you. Every body
agrees the French won’t hold out much longer, and then we must have a
peace for want of enemies.”
“So best, so best, boy; for one, who has seen so much of the horrors of
war as I, knows how to put a rational value on the blessings of
tranquillity!”
“Then you ar’n’t altogether unacquainted, good-man, with the new trade
you thought of setting up?”
“I! I have been through five long and bloody wars, and I’ve reason to
thank God that I’ve gone through them all without a scratch so big as
this needle would make. Five long and bloody, ay, and I may say
glorious wars, have I liv’d through in safety!”
“A perilous time it must have been for you, neighbour. But I don’t
remember to have heard of more than two quarrels with the Frenchmen in
my day.”
“You are but a boy, compared to one who has seen the end of his third
score of years. Here is this war that is now so likely to be soon
ended—Heaven, which rules all things in wisdom, be praised for the
same! Then there was the business of ’45, when the bold Warren sailed
up and down our coasts; a scourge to his Majesty’s enemies, and a
safeguard to all the loyal subjects. Then, there was a business in
Garmany, concerning which we had awful accounts of battles fou’t, in
which men were mowed down like grass falling before the scythe of a
strong arm. That makes three. The fourth was the rebellion of ’15, of
which I pretend not to have seen much, being but a youth at the time;
and the fifth was a dreadful rumour, that was spread through the
provinces, of a general rising among the blacks and Indians, which was
to sweep all us Christians into eternity at a minute’s warning!”
“Well, I had always reckoned you for a home-staying and a peaceable
man, neighbour;” returned the admiring countryman; “nor did I ever
dream that you had seen such serious movings.”
“I have not boasted, Pardon, or I might have added other heavy matters
to the list. There was a great struggle in the East, no longer than the
year ’32, for the Persian throne. You have read of the laws of the
Medes and the Persians: Well, for the very throne that gave forth those
unalterable laws was there a frightful struggle, in which blood ran
like water; but, as it was not in Christendom, I do not account it
among my own experiences; though I might have spoken of the Porteous
mob with great reason, as it took place in another portion of the very
kingdom in which I lived.”
“You must have journeyed much, and been stirring late and early,
good-man, to have seen all these things, and to have got no harm.”
“Yes, yes, I’ve been something of a traveller too, Pardy. Twice have I
been over land to Boston, and once have I sailed through the Great
Sound of Long Island, down to the town of York. It is an awful
undertaking the latter, as it respects the distance, and more
especially because it is needful to pass a place that is likened, by
its name, to the entrance of Tophet.”
“I have often heard the spot call’d ‘Hell Gate’ spoken of, and I may
say, too, that I know a man _well_ who has been through it twice; once
in going to York, and once in coming homeward.”
“He had enough of it, as I’ll engage! Did he tell you of the pot which
tosses and roars as if the biggest of Beelzebub’s fires was burning
beneath, and of the hog’s-back over which the water pitches, as it may
tumble over the Great Falls of the West! Owing to reasonable skill in
our seamen, and uncommon resolution in the passengers, we happily made
a good time of it, through ourselves; though I care not who knows it, I
will own it is a severe trial to the courage to enter that same
dreadful Strait. We cast out our anchors at certain islands, which lie
a few furlongs this side the place, and sent the pinnace, with the
captain and two stout seamen, to reconnoitre the spot, in order to see
if it were in a peaceful state or not. The report being favourable, the
passengers were landed, and the vessel was got through, by the blessing
of Heaven, in safety. We had all reason to rejoice that the prayers of
the congregation were asked before we departed from the peace and
security of our homes!”
“You journeyed round the ‘Gate’ on foot?”—demanded the attentive boor.
“Certain! It would have been a sinful and a blasphemous tempting of
Providence to have done otherwise, seeing that our duty called us to no
such sacrifice. But all that danger is gone by, and so I trust will
that of this bloody war, in which we have both been actors; and then I
humbly hope his sacred Majesty will have leisure to turn his royal mind
to the pirates who infest the coast, and to order some of his stout
naval captains to mete out to the rogues the treatment they are so fond
of giving unto others. It would be a joyful sight to my old eyes to see
the famous and long-hunted Red Rover brought into this very port,
towing at the poop of a King’s cruiser.”
“And is it a desperate villain, he of whom you now make mention?”
“He! There are many he’s in that one, lawless ship, and bloody-minded
and nefarious thieves are they, to the smallest boy. It is
heart-searching and grievous, Pardy, to hear of their evil-doings on
the high seas of the King!”
“I have often heard mention made of the Rover,” returned the
countryman; “but never to enter into any of the intricate particulars
of his knavery.”
“How should you, boy, who live up in the country, know so much of what
is passing on the great deep, as we who dwell in a port that is so much
resorted to by mariners! I am fearful you’ll be making it late home,
Pardon,” he added, glancing his eye at certain lines drawn on his
shop-board, by the aid of which he was enabled to note the progress of
the setting sun. “It is drawing towards the hour of five, and you have
twice that number of miles to go, before you can, by any manner of
means, reach the nearest boundary of your father’s farm.”
“The road is plain, and the people honest,” returned the countryman,
who cared not if it were midnight, provided he could be the bearer of
tidings of some dreadful sea robbery to the ears of those whom he well
knew would throng around him, at his return, to hear the tidings from
the port. “And is he, in truth, so much feared and sought for, as
people say?”
“Is he sought for! Is Tophet sought by a praying Christian? Few there
are on the mighty deep, let them even be as stout for, battle as was
Joshua the great Jewish captain, that would not rather behold the land
than see the top-gallants of that wicked pirate! Men fight for glory,
Pardon, as I may say I have seen, after living through so many wars,
but none love to meet an enemy who hoists a bloody flag at the first
blow, and who is ready to cast both parties into the air, when he finds
the hand of Satan has no longer power to help him.”
“If the rogue is so desperate,” returned the youth straightening his
powerful limbs, with a look of rising pride, “why do not the Island and
the Plantations fit out a coaster in order to bring him in, that he
might get a sight of a wholesome gibbet? Let the drum beat on such a
message through our neighbourhood and I’ll engage that it don’t leave
it without one volunteer at least.”
“So much for not having seen war! Of what use would flails and
pitch-forks prove against men who have sold themselves to the devil?
Often has the Rover been seen at night, or just as the sun has been
going down, by the King’s cruisers, who, having fairly surrounded the
thieves, had good reason to believe that they had them already in the
bilboes; but, when the morning has come, the prize was vanished, by
fair means or by foul!”
“And are the villains so bloody-minded that they are called ‘Red?’”
“Such is the title of their leader,” returned the worthy tailor, who by
this time was swelling with the importance of possessing so interesting
a legend to communicate; “and such is also the name they give to his
vessel; because no man, who has put foot on board her, has ever come
back to say that she has a better or a worse; that is, no honest
mariner or lucky voyager. The ship is of the size of a King’s sloop,
they say, and of like equipments and form; but she has miraculously
escaped from the hands of many a gallant frigate; and once, it is
whispered for no loyal subject would like to say such a scandalous
thing openly, Pardon, that she lay under the guns of a fifty for an
hour, and seemingly, to all eyes, she sunk like hammered lead to the
bottom. But, just as every body was shaking hands, and wishing his
neighbour joy at so happy a punishment coming over the knaves, a
West-Indiaman came into port, that had been robbed by the Rover on the
morning after the night in which it was thought they had all gone into
eternity together. And what makes the matter worse, boy, while the
King’s ship was careening with her keel out, to stop the holes of
cannon balls, the pirate was sailing up and down the coast, as sound as
the day that the wrights first turned her from their hands!”
“Well, this is unheard of!” returned the countryman, on whom the tale
was beginning to make a sensible impression: “Is she a well-turned and
comely ship to the eye? or is it by any means certain that she is an
actual living vessel at all?”
“Opinions differ. Some say, yes; some say, no. But I am well acquainted
with a man who travelled a week in company with a mariner, who passed
within a hundred feet of her, in a gale of wind. Lucky it was for them,
that the hand of the Lord was felt so powerfully on the deep, and that
the Rover had enough to do to keep his own ship from foundering. The
acquaintance of my friend had a good view of both vessel and captain,
therefore, in perfect safety. He said, that the pirate was a man maybe
half as big again as the tall preacher over on the main, with hair of
the colour of the sun in a fog, and eyes that no man would like to look
upon a second time. He saw him as plainly as I see you; for the knave
stood in the rigging of his ship, beckoning, with a hand as big as a
coat-flap, for the honest trader to keep off, in order that the two
vessels might not do one another damage by coming foul.”
“He was a bold mariner, that trader, to go so nigh such a merciless
rogue.”
“I warrant you, Pardon, it was desperately against his will! But it was
on a night so dark—”
“Dark!” interrupted the other; by what contrivance then did he manage
to see so well?”
“No man can say!” answered the tailor, “but see he did, just in the
manner, and the very things I have named to you. More than that, he
took good note of the vessel, that he might know her, if chance, or
Providence, should ever happen to throw her again into his way. She was
a long, black ship, lying low in the water, like a snake in the grass,
with a desperate wicked look, and altogether of dishonest dimensions.
Then, every body says that she appears to sail faster than the clouds
above, seeming to care little which way the wind blows, and that no one
is a jot safer from her speed than her honesty. According to all that I
have heard, she is something such a craft as yonder slaver, that has
been lying the week past, the Lord knows why, in our outer harbour.”
As the gossipping tailor had necessarily lost many precious moments, in
relating the preceding history he now set about redeeming them with the
utmost diligence, keeping time to the rapid movement of his
needle-hand, by corresponding jerks of his head and shoulders. In the
meanwhile, the bumpkin, whose wondering mind was by this time charged
nearly to bursting with what he had heard, turned his look towards the
vessel the other had pointed out, in order to get the only image that
was now required, to enable him to do fitting credit to so moving a
tale, suitably engraved on his imagination. There was necessarily a
pause, while the respective parties were thus severally occupied. It
was suddenly broken by the tailor, who clipped the thread with which he
had just finished the garment, cast every thing from his hands, threw
his spectacles upon his forehead, and, leaning his arms on his knees in
such a manner as to form a perfect labyrinth with the limbs, he
stretched his body forward so far as to lean out of the window,
riveting his eyes also on the ship, which still attracted the gaze of
his companion.
“Do you know, Pardy,” he said, “that strange thoughts and cruel
misgivings have come over me concerning that very vessel? They say she
is a slaver come in for wood and water, and there she has been a week,
and not a stick bigger than an oar has gone up her side, and I’ll
engage that ten drops from Jamaica have gone on board her, to one from
the spring. Then you may see she is anchored in such a way that but one
of the guns from the battery can touch her; whereas, had she been a
real timid trader, she would naturally have got into a place where, if
a straggling picaroon should come into the port, he would have found
her in the very hottest of the fire.”
“You have an ingenious turn with you, good-man,” returned the wondering
countryman; “now a ship might have lain on the battery island itself,
and I would have hardly noticed the thing.”
“’Tis use and experience, Pardon, that makes men of us all. I should
know something of batteries, having seen so many wars, and I served a
campaign of a week, in that very fort, when the rumour came that the
French were sending cruisers from Louisburg down the coast. For that
matter, my duty was to stand sentinel over that very cannon; and, if I
have done the thing once, I have twenty times squinted along the piece,
to see in what quarter it would send its shot, provided such a calamity
should arrive as that it might become necessary to fire it loaded with
real warlike balls.”
“And who are these?” demanded Pardon, with that species of sluggish
curiosity which had been awakened by the wonders related by the other:
“Are these mariners of the slaver, or are they idle Newporters?”
“Them!” exclaimed the tailor; “sure enough, they are new-comers, and it
may be well to have a closer look at them in these troublesome times!
Here, Nab, take the garment, and press down the seams, you idle hussy;
for neighbour Hopkins is straitened for time, while your tongue is
going like a young lawyer’s in a justice court. Don’t be sparing of
your elbow, girl; for it’s no India muslin that you’ll have under the
iron, but cloth that would do to side a house with. Ah! your mother’s
loom, Pardy, robs the seamster of many an honest job.”
Having thus transferred the remainder of the job from his own hands to
those of an awkward, pouting girl, who was compelled to abandon her
gossip with a neighbour, she went to obey his injunctions, he quickly
removed his own person, notwithstanding a miserable limp with which he
had come into the world, from the shop-board to the open air. As more
important characters are, however, about to be introduced to the
reader, we shall defer the ceremony to the opening of another chapter.