ship ever after. The year before I was out of my apprenticeship, our
vessel was laid up for four months, and the skipper sent me to school
during the time, at his own expense, saying--
"Get navigation, Ben, my boy, and you will one day be a commodore--by
Jupiter, you'll be an honour to the navy."
I got as far as "_Dead Reckoning_" and there, I reckon, I made a dead
stand, or rather, I ceased to do anything but study "_Lunar
Observations_." Our owner had a daughter, my own age to a day. I can't
describe her, sir; I haven't enough of what I suppose you would call
poetry about me for that, but, upon the word of a sailor, her hair was
like night rendered transparent--black, jet black; her neck white as the
spray on the bosom of a billow; her face was lovelier than a rainbow;
and her figure handsome as a frigate in full sail. But she had twenty
thousand pounds--she was no bargain for orphan Ben! However, I saw her,
and that was enough--learning and I shook hands. Her father had a small
yacht--he proposed taking a pleasure party to the Coquet. Jess--for that
was her name--was one of the passengers, and the management of the yacht
was intrusted to me. In spite of myself, I gazed upon her by the hour--I
was intoxicated with passion--my heart swelled as if it would burst from
my bosom. I saw a titled puppy touch her fingers--I heard him prattle
love in her ears. My first impulse was to dash him overboard. I wished
the sea which I loved might rise and swallow us. I thought it would be
happiness to die in her company--perhaps to sink with her arm clinging
round my neck for protection. The wish of my madness was verified. We
were returning. We were five miles from the shore. A squall, then a
hurricane, came on--every sail was reefed--the mast was snapped as I
would snap that pipe between my fingers (here the old squire, suiting
the action to the word, broke the end off his pipe)--the sea rose--the
hurricane increased, the yacht capsised, as a feather twirls in the
wind. Every soul that had been on board was now struggling for
life--buffeting the billows. At that moment I had but one thought, and
that was of Jess; but one wish, and that was to die with her. I saw my
fellow-creatures in their death agonies, but I looked only for her. At
the moment we were upset, she was clinging to the arm of the titled
puppy for protection; and now I saw her within five yards of me still
clinging to the skirts of his coat, calling on him and on her father to
save her; and I saw him--yes, sir, I saw the monster, while struggling
with one hand, raise the other to strike her on the face, that he might
extricate himself from her grasp.
"Brute!--monster!" I exclaimed; and the next moment I had fixed my
clenched hands in the hair of his head. Then, with one hand, I grasped
the arm of her I loved; and, with the other, uttering a fiendish yell, I
endeavoured to hurl the coward to the bottom of the sea. The yacht still
lay bottom up, but was now a hundred yards from us; however, getting my
arm round the waist of my adored Jess--I laughed at the sea--I defied
the hurricane. We reached the yacht. Her keel was not three feet out of
the water; and with my right hand I managed to obtain a hold of it. I
saw two of the crew and six of the passengers perish; but her father,
and the coward who had struck her from him, still struggled with the
waves. They were borne far from us. Within half-an-hour I saw a vessel
pick them up. It tried to reach us, but could not. Two hours more had
passed, and night was coming on--my strength gave way--my hold loosened.
I made one more desperate effort; I fixed my teeth in the keel--but the
burden under my left arm was still sacred--I felt her breath upon my
cheek--it inspired me with a lion's strength, and for another hour I
clung to the keel. Then the fury of the storm slackened;--a boat from
the vessel that had picked up her father reached us--we were taken on
board. She was senseless, but still breathed--my arm seemed glued round
her waist. I was almost unconscious of everything, but an attempt to
take her from me. My teeth gnashed when they touched my hand to do so.
As we approached the vessel, those on board hailed us with three cheers.
We were lifted on deck. She was conveyed to the cabin. In a few minutes
I became fully conscious of our situation. Some one gave me brandy--my
brain became on fire.
"Where is she?" I exclaimed--"did I not save her?--save her from the
coward who would have murdered her?"
I rushed to the cabin--she was recovering--her father stood over
her--strangers were rubbing her bosom. Her father took my hand to thank
me; but I was frantic--I rushed towards her--I bent over her--I pressed
my lips to hers--I called her mine. Her father grasped me by the collar.
"Boy, beggar, bastard!" he exclaimed.
With his last word, half of my frenzy vanished; for a moment I seized
him by the throat--I cried, "Repeat the word!"
I groaned in the agony of shame and madness. I rushed upon the deck--we
were then within a quarter-of-a-mile from the shore--I plunged
overboard--I swam to the beach--I reached it.
I became interested in the narrative of the squire, and I begged he
would continue it with less rapidity.
Rapidity! (said he, fixing upon me a glance in which I thought there was
something like disdain). Youngster, if you cast a feather into the
stream, it will be borne on with it. But (added he, in a less hurried
tone, after pausing to breathe for a few moments), after struggling with
the strong surge for a good half-hour, I reached the shore. My utmost
strength was spent, and I was scarce able to drag myself a dozen yards
beyond tide-mark, when I sank exhausted on the beach. I lay, as though
in sleep, until night had gathered round me, and when I arose, cold and
benumbed, my delirium had passed away. My bosom, however, like a galley
manned with criminals, was still the prison-house of agonising feelings,
each more unruly than another. Every scene in which I had borne a part
during the day rushed before me in a moment--her image--the image of my
Jess, mingled with each. I hated existence--I almost despised myself;
but tears started from my eyes--the suffocation in my breast passed
away, and I again breathed freely. I will not trouble you with details.
I will pass over the next five years of my life, during which I was
man-of-war's man, privateer, and smuggler. But I will tell you how I
became a smuggler, for that calling I only followed for a week, and that
was from necessity; but, as you shall hear, it well-nigh cost me my
life. Britain had just launched into a war with France, and I was first
mate of a small privateer, carrying two guns and a long Tom. We were
trying our fortune within six leagues of the Dutch coast, when two
French merchantmen hove in sight. They were too heavy metal for us, and
we saw that it would be necessary to deal with them warily. So, hoisting
the republican flag, we bore down upon them; but the Frenchmen were not
to be had; and no sooner had we come within gunshot, than one of them
saluted our little craft with a broadside that made her dance in the
water. It was evident there was no chance for us but at close quarters.
"Cookson," says our commander to me, "what's to be done, my lad?"
"Leave the privateer," says I.
"What!" says he, "take the long boat and run, without singeing a
Frenchman's whisker! No, blow me," says he.
"No, sir," says I; "board them--give them a touch of the cold steel."
"Right, Ben, my boy," says he. "Helm about there--look to your
cutlasses, my hearties--and now for the Frenchman's deck, and French
wine to supper." The next moment we had tacked about, and were under the
Frenchman's bow. In turning round, long Tom had been discharged, and
clipped the rigging of the other vessel beautifully. The commander,
myself, and a dozen more, sprang upon the enemy's deck, cutlass in hand.
Our reception was as warm as powder and steel could make it--the
Frenchmen fought like devils, and disputed with us every inch of the
deck hand to hand. But, d'ye see, we beat them aft, though their numbers
were two to one; yet, as bad luck would have it, out of the twelve of us
who had boarded her, only seven were now able to handle a cutlass; and
amongst those who lay dying on the enemy's deck was our gallant
commander. He was a noble fellow, sir--a regular fire-eater, even in
death. Bleeding, dying as he was, he endeavoured to drag his body along
the deck to assist us--and when finding it would not do, and he could
move no farther, he drew a pistol from his belt, and raising himself on
one hand, he discharged it at the head of the French captain with the
other, and shouting out, "Go it, my hearties!--Ben! never yield!" his
head fell upon the deck; and "he died like a true British sailor." But,
sir, the other vessel that had been crippled at that moment made
alongside. Her crew also boarded to assist their countrymen, and we were
attacked fore and aft. There was nothing now left for us but to cut our
way to the privateer, which had been brought round to the other side of
the vessel we had boarded. She had been left to the care of the second
mate and six seamen; but the traitor, seeing our commander fall, and the
hopelessness of our success, cut the lashings and bore off, leaving us
to our fate on the deck of the enemy. Our number was now reduced to
five, and we were hemmed in on all sides--but we fought like tigers
bereaved of their cubs. We placed ourselves heel to heel, we formed a
little circle of death. I know not whether it was admiration of our
courage, or the cowardice of the enemy, that induced them to proclaim a
truce, and to offer us a boat, oars, and provisions, and to depart with
our arms. We agreed to their proposal, after fighting an hour upon their
deck. And here begins my short, but eventful history as a smuggler. We
had been six hours at sea in the open boat, when we were picked up by a
smuggling lugger named the Wildfire. Her captain was an Englishman, and
her cargo, which consisted principally of brandy and Hollands, was to be
delivered at Spittal and Boomer. It was about daybreak on the third
morning after we had been picked up; we were again within sight of the
Coquet Isle. I had not seen it for five years. It called up a thousand
recollections--I became entranced in the past. My Jess seemed again
clinging to my neck--I again thought I felt her breath upon my
cheek--and again involuntarily I exclaimed aloud, "_She shall be mine_."
But I was aroused from my reverie by a cry--"A cruiser--a cutter ahead!"
In a moment the deck of the lugger became a scene of consternation. The
cutter was making upon us rapidly; and though the Wildfire sailed nobly,
her pursuer skimmed over the sea like a swallow. The skipper of the
lugger seemed to become insane as the danger increased. He ordered every
gun to be loaded, and a six-oared gig to be got in readiness. The cutter
fired on us, the Wildfire returned the salute, and three of the cutter's
men fell. A few more shots were exchanged, and the lugger was disabled;
her skipper and the Englishmen of his crew took the gig, and made for
the shore. In a few minutes more, we were boarded by the commander of
the cutter, and a part of her crew. I knew the commander's face; his
countenance, his name, were engraved as with a sharp instrument on my
heart. His name was Melton--the Honourable Lieutenant Melton--my
enemy--the man I hated--the titled puppy of whom I spoke--my rival for
the hand of my Jess. He approached me--he knew me as I did him. We lost
no love between us--I heard his teeth grate as he fixed his eyes on me,
and mine echoed to the sound.
"Slave! scoundrel!" were his first words, "we have met again at last,
and your life shall pay the forfeit! Place him in irons!"
"Coward!" I hurled in his teeth a second time, and my hand grasped my
cutlass, which in a moment flashed in the air. His armed crew sprang
between us--I defied them all--he grew bold under their protection.
"Strike him down!" he exclaimed; and, springing forward, his sword
entered my side--but scarce was it withdrawn, ere _his_ blood streamed
from the point of my cutlass to my hand.
Suffice it to say, I was overpowered and disarmed--I was taken on board
his cutter, and put in irons. And now, sir (continued the squire,
raising his voice, for the subject seemed to wound him), know that you
are in the company of a man who has been condemned to die--yes, sir, to
die like a common murderer on the gallows! You start--but it is true;
and, if you do not like the company of a man for whom the hangman once
provided a neckerchief, I will drop my story.
I requested him to proceed.
Well, sir (continued he), I was lodged in prison. I was accused of being
a smuggler--of having drawn my sword against one of His Majesty's
officers--of having wounded him. On the testimony of my enemy and his
crew, I was tried and condemned--condemned to die without hope of
pardon. I had but a day to live, when a lady entered my miserable cell.
She came to comfort the criminal, to administer consolation in his last
hour. I was in no mood to listen to the admonitions of the female
Samaritan, and I was about to bid her depart from me. Her face was
veiled, and in the dim light of my dungeon I saw it not. But she spoke,
and her voice went through my soul like the remembrance of a national
air which we have sung in childhood, and hear in a foreign land.
"Lady!" I exclaimed, "what fiend hath sent thee? Come ye to ask me to
forgive my murderer? If _you_ command it, I will."
"I would ask you to forgive your enemies," replied she, mildly; "but not
for my sake."
"Yet it can only be for _your_ sake," said I; "but tell me, lady, are
you the _wife_ of the man who has pursued me to death?"
"No--not his wife."
"But you will be?" cried I, hastily; "and you love him--tell me, do you
not love him?"
She sighed--she burst into tears.
"Unhappy man," she returned, "what know you of me, that you torment me
with questions that torture me?"
I thrust forth my fettered hand--I grasped hers.
"Tell me, lady," I exclaimed, "before my soul can receive the words of
repentance which you come to preach--tell me--do you _love_ him?"
"No!" she pronounced, emphatically; and her whole frame shook.
"Thank God!" I cried, and clasped my fettered hands together. "Forgive
me, lady!--forgive me! Do you know me? I am Ben!--orphan Ben!--the boy
who saved you!"
She screamed aloud--she fell upon my bosom, and my chained arm once more
circled the neck of my Jess.
Yes, sir, it was my own Jess, who, without being conscious who I was,
had come to visit the doomed one in his miserable cell, to prepare him
for death, by pointing out the necessity of repentance and the way to
heaven. I need not tell you that, the moment my name was told, she
forgot her mission; and as, with my fettered arms, I held her to my
breast, and felt her burning tears drop upon my cheek, I forgot
imprisonment, I forgot death--my very dungeon became a heaven that I
would not have exchanged for a throne--for, oh! as her tears fell, and
her heaving bosom throbbed upon my heart, each throb told me that Jess
loved the persecuted orphan--the boy who saved her. I cannot tell you
what a trance is; but, as I clung round her neck, and her arms encircled
mine, I felt as if my very soul would have burst from my body in
ecstasy. She was soon convinced that I was no criminal--that I had been
guilty of no actual crime--that I was innocent, and doomed to die.
"No! no! you shall not die!" sobbed my heroic girl--"hope! hope! hope!
The man who saved me shall not die!" She hurried to the door of my
cell--it was opened by the keeper, and she left me, exclaiming,
"Hope!--hope!"
On that day his then Majesty George III. was to prorogue Parliament in
person. He was returning from the House of Lords; crowds were following
the royal procession, and thousands of spectators lined Parliament
Street, some showing their loyalty by shouts and the waving of hats and
handkerchiefs, and others manifesting their discontent in sullen silence
or half-suppressed murmurs. In the midst of the multitude, and opposite
Whitehall, stood a private carriage, the door of which was open, and out
of it, as the royal retinue approached, issued a female, and, with a
paper in her hand, knelt before the window of His Majesty's carriage,
clasping her hands together as she knelt, and crying--
"Look upon me, sire!"
"Stop! stop!" said the king--"coachman, stop! What! a lady kneeling,
eh--eh? A young lady, too! Poor thing--poor thing--give me the paper."
His Majesty glanced at it--he desired her to follow him to St James's. I
need not dwell upon particulars: that very night my Jess returned to my
prison with my pardon in her hand, and I left its gloomy walls with her
arm locked in mine.
And now you may think that I was the happiest dog alive--that I had
nothing more to do but to ask and obtain the hand of my Jess--but you
are wrong; and I will go over the rest of my life as briefly as I can.
No sooner did her father become acquainted with what she had done, than
he threatened to disinherit her--and he removed her, I know not where. I
became first desperate, then gloomy, and eventually sank into lassitude.
Even the sea, which I had loved from my first thought, lost its charms
for me. I fancied that money only stood between me and happiness--and I
saw no prospect of making the sum I thought necessary at sea. While in
the privateer service, I had saved about two hundred pounds in
prize-money. With this sum as a foundation, I determined to try my
fortune on shore. I embarked in many schemes; in some I was partially
successful; but I persevered in none. It was the curse of my life that I
had no settled plan--I wanted method; and let me tell you, sir, that the
want of a systematic plan, the want of method, has ruined many a wise
man. It was my ruin. From this cause, though I neither drank nor gamed,
nor seemed more foolish than my neighbours, my money wasted like a
snowball in the sun. Though I say it myself, I was not an ignorant man;
for, considering my opportunities, I had read much, and I had as much
worldly wisdom as most of people. In short, I was an excellent framer of
plans at night; but I wanted decision and activity to put them into
execution in the morning. I had also a dash of false pride and
generosity in my composition, and did actions without considering the
consequences, by which I was continually bringing myself into
difficulties. This system, or rather this want of system, quickly
stripped me of my last shilling, and left me the world's debtor into the
bargain. Then, sir, I gnashed my teeth together--I clenched my fist--I
could have cut the throat of my own conscience, had it been a thing of
flesh and blood, for spitting my thoughtlessness and folly in my teeth.
I took no oath--but I resolved, firmly, resolutely, deeply resolved, to
be wise for the future; and, let me tell you, my good fellow, such a
resolution is worth twenty hasty oaths. I sold my watch, the only piece
of property worth twenty shillings that I had left, and with the money
it produced in my pocket, I set out for Liverpool. That town, or city,
or whatever you have a mind to call it, was not then what it is now. I
was strolling along by the Duke's Little Dock, and saw a schooner of
about a hundred and sixty tons burden. Her masts lay well back, and I
observed her decks were double laid. I saw her character in a moment. I
went on board--I inquired of the commander if he would ship a hand. He
gave me a knowing look, and inquired if ever I had been in the _trade_
before. I mentioned my name and the ship in which I had last served.
"The deuce you are!" he said; "what! you Cookson!--ship you, ay, and a
hundred like you, if I could get them."
I need hardly tell you the vessel was a privateer. Within three days the
schooner left the Mersey, and I had the good fortune to be shipped as
mate. For two years we boxed about the Mediterranean, and I had cleared,
as my share of prize-money, nearly a thousand pounds. At that period,
our skipper, thinking he had made enough, resigned the command in favour
of me. My first cruise was so successful, that I was enabled to purchase
a privateer of my own, which I named the Jess. For, d'ye see, her idea
was like a never-waning moonlight in my brain--her emphatic words,
"Hope!--hope!--hope!" whispered eternally in my breast--and I did hope.
Sleeping or waking, on sea or on shore, a day never passed but the image
of my Jess arose on my sight, smiling and saying, "Hope!" In four years
more, I had cleared ten thousand pounds, and I sold the schooner for
another thousand. I now thought myself a match for Jess, and resolved to
go to the old man--her father, I mean--and offer to take her without a
shilling. Well, I had sold my craft at Plymouth, and, before proceeding
to the north, was stopping a few days in a small town in the south-west
of England, to breathe the land air--for my face, you see, had become a
little rough, by constant exposure to the weather. Well, sir, the
windows of my lodging faced the jail, and, for three days, I observed
the handsomest figure that ever graced a woman enter the prison at
meal-times. It was the very figure--the very gait of my Jess--only her
appearance was not genteel enough. But I had never seen her face. On the
fourth day I got a glimpse of it. Powers of earth! it was her!--it was
my Jess! I rushed downstairs like a madman--I flew to the prison-door,
and knocked. The jailer opened it. I eagerly inquired who the young lady
was that had just entered. He abruptly replied--
"The daughter of a debtor."
"For Heaven's sake!" I returned, "let me speak with them!"
He refused. I pushed a guinea into his hand, and he led me to the
debtors' room. And there, sir--there stood my Jess--my saviour--my
angel--there she stood, administering to the wants of her grey-haired
father! I won't, because I can't, describe to you the tragedy scene that
ensued. The old man had lost all that he possessed in the world--his
thousands had taken wings, and flown away, and he was now pining in jail
for fifty--and his daughter, my noble Jess, supported him by the labours
of her needle. I paid the debt before I left the prison, and out I came,
with Jess upon one arm, and the old man on the other. We were married
within a month. I went to sea again--but I will pass over that; and,
when the peace was made, we came down here to Northumberland, and
purchased a bit of ground and a snug cabin, about five miles from this;
and there six little Cooksons are romping about, and calling my Jess
their mother, and none of them orphans, like their father, thank Heaven!
And now, sir, you have heard the narrative of Squire Ben--what do you
think of it?
THE BATTLE OF DRYFFE SANDS.
The power of custom to render the mind indifferent or insensible to
danger, has never been better exemplified than by the mothers, and
wives, and daughters of the ancient Borderers. They were wont to regard
without apprehension the departure of their dearest relatives upon
perilous expeditions--neither expressing nor experiencing any feeling
except a wish for the success of the _raid_. Nay, as we have elsewhere
stated, the fair dames of these stern warriors and marauders not
unfrequently hinted that the larder needed replenishing, by placing on
the table a dish, which, on being uncovered, was found to contain a pair
of clean spurs; or by making the announcement that "hough's i' the pot;"
or by calling, within hearing of the laird, on the herds to bring out
THE COW; or, in short, by the thousand-and-one means which the ready wit
of woman could devise. Rapine and war were the sole business of the
chiefs and their retainers; and matrons and maidens, if they had wept
and wailed whenever their natural protectors went "to take a prey,"
would have been thought just as unreasonable as some of our modern
ladies, who will not allow their husbands to proceed about their daily
avocations, without bestowing on them tears, kisses, and embraces, in
superabundance.