“Whither, 'midst falling dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?”
_Bryant._
When the young seaman who now commanded the frigate descended from the
quarter-deck in compliance with the of ten-repeated summons, he found
the vessel restored to the same neatness as if nothing had occurred to
disturb its order. The gun-deck had been cleansed of its horrid stains,
and the smoke of the fight had long since ascended through the hatches
and mingled with the clouds that flitted above the ship. As he walked
along the silent batteries, even the urgency of his visit could not
prevent him from glancing his eyes towards the splintered sides, those
terrible vestiges, by which the paths of the shot of their enemy might
be traced; and by the time he tapped lightly at the door of the cabin,
his quick look had embraced every material injury the vessel had
sustained in her principal points of defence. The door was opened by the
surgeon of the frigate, who, as he stepped aside to permit Griffith to
enter, shook his head with that air of meaning, which, in one of his
profession, is understood to imply the abandonment of all hopes, and
then immediately quitted the apartment, in order to attend to those who
might profit by his services.
The reader is not to imagine that Griffith had lost sight of Cecilia and
her cousin during the occurrences of that eventful day: on the contrary,
his troubled fancy had presented her terror and distress, even in the
hottest moments of the fight; and the instant that the crew were called
from their guns he had issued an order to replace the bulkheads of the
cabin, and to arrange its furniture for their accommodation, though the
higher and imperious duties of his station had precluded his attending
to their comfort in person. He expected, therefore, to find the order
of the rooms restored; but he was by no means prepared to encounter the
scene he was now to witness.
Between two of the sullen cannon, which gave such an air of singular
wildness to the real comfort of the cabin, was placed a large couch, on
which the colonel was lying, evidently near his end. Cecilia was weeping
by his side, her dark ringlets falling in unheeded confusion around her
pale features, and sweeping in their rich exuberance the deck on which
she kneeled. Katherine leaned tenderly over the form of the dying
veteran, while her dark, tearful eyes seemed to express self-accusation
blended with deep commiseration. A few attendants of both sexes
surrounded the solemn scene, all of whom appeared to be under the
influence of the hopeless intelligence which the medical officer had
but that moment communicated. The servants of the ship had replaced the
furniture with a care that mocked the dreadful struggle that so recently
disfigured the warlike apartment, and the stout square frame of Boltrope
occupied the opposite settee, his head resting on the lap of the
captain's steward, and his hand gently held in the grasp of his friend
the chaplain. Griffith had heard of the wound of the master, but his
own eyes now conveyed the first intelligence of the situation of Colonel
Howard. When the shock of this sudden discovery had a little subsided,
the young man approached the couch of the latter, and attempted to
express his regret and pity, in a voice that afforded an assurance of
his sincerity.
“Say no more, Edward Griffith,” interrupted the colonel, waving his
hand feebly for silence; “it seemeth to be the will of God that this
rebellion should triumph, and it is not for vain man to impeach the
acts of Omnipotence. To my erring faculties, it wears an appearance
of mystery, but doubtless it Is to answer the purpose of his own
inscrutable providence. I have sent for you, Edward, on a business that
I would fain see accomplished before I die, that it may not be said that
old George Howard neglected his duty, even in his last moments. You
see this weeping child at my side; tell me, young man, do you love the
maiden?”
“Am I to be asked such a question?” exclaimed Griffith.
“And will you cherish her--will you supply to her the places of father
and mother--will you become the fond guardian of her innocence and
weakness?”
Griffith could give no other answer than a fervent pressure of the hand
he had clasped.
“I believe you,” continued the dying man; “for however he may have
forgotten to inculcate his own loyalty, worthy Hugh Griffith could never
neglect to make his son a man of honor. I had weak and perhaps evil
wishes in behalf of my late unfortunate kinsman, Mr. Christopher Dillon;
but, they have told me that he was false to his faith. If this be true,
I would refuse him the hand of the girl, though he claimed the fealty of
the British realms. But he has passed away, and I am about to follow him
into a world where we shall find but one Lord to serve; and it may have
been better for us both had we more remembered our duty to him, while
serving the princes of the earth. One thing further--know you this
officer of your Congress well--this Mr. Barnstable?”
“I have sailed with him for years,” returned Griffith, “and can answer
for him as myself.”
The veteran made an effort to rise, which in part succeeded, and he
fastened on the youth a look of keen scrutiny, that gave to his pallid
features an expression of solemn meaning, as he continued:
“Speak not now, sir, as the Companion of his idle pleasures, and as the
unthinking associate commends his fellow, but remember that your opinion
is given to a dying man who leans on your judgment for advice. The
daughter of John Plowden is a trust not to be neglected, nor will
my death prove easy, if a doubt of her being worthily bestowed shall
remain.”
“He is a gentleman,” returned Griffith, “and one whose heart is not less
kind than gallant--he loves your ward, and great as may be her merit,
he is deserving of it all.--Like myself, he has also loved the land that
gave him birth, before the land of his ancestors, but----”
“That is now forgotten,” interrupted the colonel; “after what I have
this day witnessed, I am forced to believe that it is the pleasure of
Heaven that you are to prevail! But sir, a disobedient inferior will
be apt to make an unreasonable commander. The recent contention between
you----”
“Remember it not, dear sir,” exclaimed Griffith with generous zeal;
“'twas unkindly provoked, and it is already forgotten and pardoned. He
has sustained me nobly throughout the day, and my life on it, that he
knows how to treat a woman as a brave man should!”
“Then am I content!” said the veteran, sinking back on his couch; “let
him be summoned.”
The whispering message, which Griffith gave requesting Mr. Barnstable
to enter the cabin, was quickly conveyed, and he had appeared before his
friend deemed it discreet to disturb the reflections of the veteran
by again addressing him. When the entrance of the young sailor was
announced, the colonel again roused himself, and addressed his wondering
listener, though in a manner much less confiding and familiar than that
which he had adopted towards Griffith.
“The declarations you made last night relative to my ward, the daughter
of the late Captain John Plowden, sir, have left me nothing to learn on
the subject of your wishes. Here, then, gentlemen, you both obtain the
reward of your attentions! Let that reverend divine hear you pronounce
the marriage vows, while I have strength to listen, that I may be a
witness against ye, in heaven, should ye forget their tenor!”
“Not now, not now,” murmured Cecilia; “oh, ask it not now, my uncle!”
Katherine spoke not; but, deeply touched by the tender interest her
guardian manifested in her welfare, she bowed her face to her bosom, in
subdued feeling, and suffered the tears that had been suffusing her eyes
to roll down her cheeks in large drops, till they bathed the deck.
“Yes, now, my love,” continued the colonel, “or I fail in my duty. I go
shortly to stand face to face with your parents, my children; for the
man who, dying, expects not to meet worthy Hugh Griffith and honest Jack
Plowden in heaven can have no clear view of the rewards that belong to
lives of faithful service to the country, or of gallant loyalty to the
king! I trust no one can justly say that I ever forgot the delicacy due
to your gentle sex; but it is no moment for idle ceremony when time is
shortening into minutes, and heavy duties remain to be discharged. I
could not die in peace, children, were I to leave you here in the wide
ocean, I had almost said in the wide world, without that protection
which becomes your tender years and still more tender characters. If it
has pleased God to remove your guardian, let his place be supplied by
those he wills to succeed him!”
Cecilia no longer hesitated, but she arose slowly from her knees,
and offered her hand to Griffith with an air of forced resignation.
Katherine submitted to be led by Barnstable to her side; and the
chaplain, who had been an affected listener to the dialogue, in
obedience to an expressive signal from the eye of Griffith, opened the
prayer-book from which he had been gleaning consolation for the dying
master, and commenced reading, in trembling tones, the marriage service.
The vows were pronounced by the weeping brides in voices more distinct
and audible than if they had been uttered amid the gay crowds that
usually throng a bridal; for though they were the irreclaimable words
that bound them forever to the men whose power over their feelings they
thus proclaimed to the world, the reserve of maiden diffidence was lost
in one engrossing emotion of solemnity, created by the awful presence
in which they stood. When the benediction was pronounced, the head
of Cecilia dropped on the shoulder of her husband, where she wept
violently, for a moment, and then resuming her place at the couch, she
once more knelt at the side of her uncle. Katherine received the warm
kiss of Barnstable passively, and returned to the spot whence she had
been led.
Colonel Howard succeeded in raising his person to witness the ceremony,
and had answered to each prayer with a fervent “Amen.” He fell back with
the last words; and a look of satisfaction shone in his aged and pallid
features, that declared the interest he had taken in the scene.
“I thank you, my children,” he at length uttered, “I thank you; for I
know how much you have sacrificed to my wishes. You will find all my
papers relative to the estates of my wards, gentlemen, in the hands of
my banker in London; and you will also find there my will, Edward,
by which you will learn that Cicely has not come to your arms an
unportioned bride. What my wards are in persons and manners your eyes
can witness, and I trust the vouchers in London will show that I have
not been an unfaithful steward to their pecuniary affairs!”
“Name it not--say no more, or you will break my heart,” cried Katherine,
sobbing aloud, in the violence of her remorse at having ever pained
so true a friend. “Oh! talk of yourself, think of yourself; we are
unworthy--at least I am unworthy of another thought!”
The dying man extended a hand to her in kindness, and continued, though
his voice grew feebler as he spoke:
“Then to return to myself--I would wish to lie, like my ancestors, in
the bosom of the earth--and in consecrated ground.”
“It shall be done,” whispered Griffith, “I will see it done myself.”
“I thank thee, my son,” said the veteran; “for such thou art to me
in being the husband of Cicely--you will find in my will that I have
liberated and provided for all my slaves--except those ungrateful
scoundrels who deserted their master--they have seized their own
freedom, and they need not be indebted to me for the same. There is,
Edward, also an unworthy legacy to the king; his majesty will deign to
receive it--from an old and faithful servant, and you will not miss the
trifling gift.” A long pause followed, as if he had been summing up the
account of his earthly duties, and found them duly balanced, when he
added, “Kiss me, Cicely--and you, Katherine--I find you have the genuine
feelings of honest Jack, your father.--My eyes grow dim--which is the
hand of Griffith? Young gentleman, I have given you all that a fond old
man had to bestow--deal tenderly with the precious child--we have
not properly understood each other--I had mistaken both you and Mr.
Christopher Dillon, I believe; perhaps I may also have mistaken my
duty to America--but I was too old to change my politics or my
religion--I-I-I loved the king--God bless him--”
His words became fainter and fainter as he proceeded; and the breath
deserted his body with this benediction on his livid lips, which the
proudest monarch might covet from so honest a man.
The body was instantly borne into a stateroom by the attendants; and
Griffith and Barnstable supported their brides into the after-cabin,
where they left them seated on the sofa that lined the stern of the
ship, weeping bitterly, in each other's arms.
No part of the preceding scene had been unobserved by Boltrope, whose
small, hard eyes were observed by the young men to twinkle, when they
returned into the state apartment; and they approached their wounded
comrade to apologize for the seeming neglect that their conduct had
displayed.
“I heard you were hurt, Boltrope,” said Griffith, taking him kindly by
the hand; “but as I know you are not unused to being marked by shot, I
trust we shall soon see you again on deck.”
“Ay, ay,” returned the master, “you'll want no spy glasses to see the
old hulk as you launch it into the sea. I have had shot, as you say,
before now to tear my running-gear, and even to knock a splinter out
of some of my timbers; but this fellow has found his way into my
bread-room; and the cruise of life is up!”
“Surely the case is not so bad, honest David,” said Barnstable; “you
have kept afloat, to my knowledge, with a bigger hole in your skin than
this unlucky hit has made!”
“Ay, ay,” returned the master, “that was in my upper works, where the
doctor could get at it with a plug; but this chap has knocked away the
shifting-boards, and I feel as if the whole cargo was broken up. You
may say that Tourniquet rates me all the same as a dead man; for after
looking at the shot-hole, he has turned me over to the parson here, like
a piece of old junk which is only fit to be worked up into something
new. Captain Munson had a lucky time of it! I think you said, Mr.
Griffith, that the old gentleman was launched overboard with everything
standing, and that Death made but one rap at his door, before he took
his leave!”
“His end was indeed sudden!” returned Griffith; “but it is what we
seamen must expect.”
“And for which there is so much the more occasion to be prepared,” the
chaplain ventured to add, in a low, humble, and, perhaps, timid voice.
The sailing-master looked keenly from one to the other as they spoke;
and, after a short pause, he continued, with an air of great submission:
“'Twas his luck; and I suppose it is sinful to begrudge a man his lawful
luck. As for being prepared, parson, that is your business, and not
mine; therefore, as there is but little time to spare, why, the sooner
you set about it the better: and, to save unnecessary trouble I may as
well tell you not to strive to make too much of me; for, I must own it
to my shame, I never took learning kindly. If you can fit me for some
middling berth in the other world, like the one I hold in this ship, it
will suit me as well, and, perhaps, be easier to all hands of us.”
If there was a shade of displeasure blended with the surprise that
crossed the features of the divine at this extraordinary limitation of
his duties, it entirely disappeared when he considered more closely the
perfect expression of simplicity with which the dying master uttered his
wishes. After a long and melancholy pause, which neither Griffith or his
friend felt any inclination to interrupt, the chaplain replied:
“It is not the province of man to determine on the decrees of the
merciful dispensations of the Deity; and nothing that I can do, Mr.
Boltrope, will have any weight in making up the mighty and irrevocable
decree. What I said to you last night, in our conversation on this very
subject, must still be fresh in your memory, and there is no good reason
why I should hold a different language to you now.”
“I can't say that I logg'd all that passed,” returned the master; “and
that which I do recollect fell chiefly from myself, for the plain reason
that a man remembers his own better than his neighbor's ideas. And this
puts me in mind, Mr. Griffith, to tell you that one of the forty-two's
from the three-decker traveled across the forecastle, and cut the best
bower within a fathom of the clinch, as handily as an old woman would
clip her rotten yarn with a pair of tailor's shears! If you will be so
good as to order one of my mates to shift the cable end-for-end, and
make a new bend of it, I'll do as much for you another time.”
“Mention it not,” said Griffith; “rest assured that everything shall be
done for the security of the ship in your department-I will superintend
the whole duty in person; and I would have you release your mind from
all anxiety on the subject, to attend to your more important interests
elsewhere.”
“Why,” returned Boltrope, with a little show of pertinacity, “I have an
opinion that the cleaner a man takes his hands into the other world,
of the matters of duty in this the better he will be fitted to handle
anything new.--Now, the parson, here, undertook to lay down the doctrine
last night that it was no matter how well or how ill a man behaved
himself, so that he squared his conscience by the lifts and braces
of faith; which I take to be a doctrine that is not to be preached on
shipboard; for it would play the devil with the best ship's company that
was ever mustered.”
“Oh! no--no--dear Mr. Boltrope, you mistook me and my doctrine
altogether!” exclaimed the chaplain; “at least you mistook----”
“Perhaps, sir,” interrupted Griffith, gently, “our honest friend will
not be more fortunate now. Is there nothing earthly that hangs upon your
mind, Boltrope? no wish to be remembered to any one, nor any bequest to
make of your property?”
“He has a mother, I know,” said Barnstable in a low voice, “he often
spoke of her to me in the night-watches, I think she must still be
living.”
The master, who distinctly heard his young shipmates continued for more
than a minute rolling the tobacco, which he still retained, from one
side of his mouth to the other, with an industry that denoted singular
agitation for the man; and raising one of his broad hands, with the
other he picked the worn skin from fingers which were already losing
their brownish yellow hue in the fading color of death, before he
answered:
“Why, yes, the old woman still keeps her grip upon life, which is more
than can be said of her son David. The old man was lost the time the
Susan and Dorothy was wrecked on the back of Cape Cod; you remember it,
Mr. Barnstable? you were then a lad, sailing on whaling voyages from the
island: well, ever since that gale, I've endeavored to make smooth water
for the old woman myself, though she has had but a rough passage of
it, at the best; the voyage of life, with her, having been pretty much
crossed by rugged weather and short stores.”
“And you would have us carry some message to her?” said Griffith,
kindly.
“Why, as to messages,” continued the master, whose voice was
rapidly growing more husky and broken, “there never has been many
compliments--passed between us, for the reason--that she is not more
used to receive them--than I am to make them. But if any one of you will
overhaul--the purser's books, and see what there is standing here--to
my side of the leaf--and take a little pains to get it to the old
woman--you will find her moored in the lee side of a house--ay, here it
is, No. 10 Cornhill, Boston. I took care--to get her a good warm berth,
seeing that a woman of eighty wants a snug anchorage--at her time of
life, if ever.”
“I will do it myself, David,” cried Barnstable, struggling to conceal
his emotion; “I will call on her the instant we let go our anchor in
Boston harbor; and as your credit can't be large, I will divide my own
purse with her!”
The sailing-master was powerfully affected by this kind offer, the
muscles of his hard, weatherbeaten face working convulsively, and it was
a moment before he could trust his voice in reply.
“I know you would, Dicky, I know you would,” he at length uttered,
grasping the hand of Barnstable with a portion of his former strength;
“I know you would give the old woman one of your own limbs, if it would
do a service--to the mother of a messmate--which it would not--seeing
that I am not the son of a--cannibal; but you are out of your own
father's books, and it's too often shoal water in your pockets to help
any one--more especially since you have just been spliced to a pretty
young body--that will want all your spare coppers.”
“But I am master of my own fortune,” said Griffith, “and am rich.”
“Ay, ay, I have heard it said you could build a frigate and set her
afloat all a-taunt-o without thrusting your hand--into any man's
purse--but your own!”
“And I pledge you the honor of a naval officer,” continued the young
sailor, “that she shall want for nothing; not eyes the care and
tenderness of a dutiful son.”
Boltrope appeared to be choking; he made an attempt to raise his
exhausted frame on the couch; but fell back exhausted and dying, perhaps
a little prematurely, through the powerful and unusual emotions that
were struggling for Boltrope appeared to be choking; he made an attempt
to raise his 'exhausted frame on the couch; but fell back exhausted and
dying, perhaps a little prematurely, through the powerful and unusual
emotions that were struggling for utterance. “God forgive me my
misdeeds!” he at length said, “and chiefly for ever speaking a word
against your discipline; remember the best bower--and look to the slings
of the lower yards--and--and--he'll do it, Dicky, he'll do it! I'm
casting off--the fasts--of life--and so God bless ye all--and give ye
good weather--going large--or on a bowline!”
The tongue of the master failed him, but a look of heart felt
satisfaction gleamed across his rough visage, as its muscles suddenly
contracted, when the faded lineaments slowly settled into the appalling
stiffness of death.
Griffith directed the body to be removed to the apartment of the master,
and proceeded with a heavy heart to the upper deck. The Alacrity had
been unnoticed during the arduous chase of the frigate, and, favored by
daylight, and her light draught of water, she had easily effected her
escape also among the mazes of the shoals. She was called down to her
consort by signal, and received the necessary instructions how to steer
during the approaching night. The British ships were now only to be
faintly discovered like white specks on the dark sea; and as it was
known that a broad barrier of shallow water lay between them, the
Americans no longer regarded their presence as at all dangerous.
When the necessary orders had been given, and the vessels were fully
prepared, they were once more brought up to the wind, and their heads
pointed in the direction of the coast of Holland. The wind, which
freshened towards the decline of the day, hauled round with the sun;
and when that luminary retreated from the eye, so rapid had been the
progress of the mariners, it seemed to sink in the bosom of the ocean,
the land having long before settled into its watery bed. All night
the frigate continued to dash through the seas with a sort of sullen
silence, that was soothing to the melancholy of Cecilia and Katherine,
neither of whom closed an eye during that gloomy period. In addition
to the scene they had witnessed, their feelings were harrowed by the
knowledge that, in conformity to the necessary plans of Griffith, and in
compliance with the new duties he had assumed, they were to separate in
the morning for an indefinite period, and possibly forever.
With the appearance of light, the boatswain sent his rough summons
through the vessel, and the crew were collected in solemn silence in her
gangways to “bury the dead.” The bodies of Boltrope, of one or two of
her inferior officers, and of several common men who had died of their
wounds in the night, were, with the usual formalities, committed to the
deep; when the yards of the ship were again braced by the wind, and she
glided along the trackless waste, leaving no memorial, in the midst of
the ever-rolling waters, to mark the place of their sepulture.
When the sun had gained the meridian, the vessels were once more
hove-to, and the preparations were made for a final separation. The
body of Colonel Howard was transferred to the Alacrity, whither it
was followed by Griffith and his cheerless bride, while Katherine hung
fondly from the window of the ship, suffering her own scalding tears
to mingle with the brine of the ocean. After everything was arranged,
Griffith waved his hand to Barnstable, who had now succeeded to the
command of the frigate, and the yards of the latter were braced sharp to
the wind, when she proceeded to the dangerous experiment of forcing her
way to the shores of America, by attempting the pass of the Straits of
Dover, and running the gauntlet through the English ships that crowded
their own Channel; an undertaking, however, for which she had the
successful example of the Alliance frigate, which had borne the stars of
America along the same hazardous path but a few months previously.
In the mean while the Alacrity, steering more to the west drew in
swiftly towards the shores of Holland; and about an hour before the
setting of the sun had approached so nigh as to be once more hove into
the wind, in obedience to the mandate of Griffith. A small, light boat
was lowered into the sea, when the young sailor, and the Pilot, who had
found his way into the cutter unheeded, and almost unseen, ascended from
the small cabin together. The stranger glanced his eyes along the range
of coast, as if he would ascertain the exact position of the vessel, and
then turned them on the sea and the western horizon to scan the weather.
Finding nothing in the appearance of the latter to induce him to change
his determination, he offered his hand frankly to Griffith, and said:
“Here we part. As our acquaintance has not led to all we wished, let it
be your task, sir, to forget we ever met.”
Griffith bowed respectfully, but in silence, when the other continued,
shaking his hand contemptuously towards the land:
“Had I but a moiety of the navy of that degenerate republic, the
proudest among those haughty islanders should tremble in his castle, and
be made to feel there is no security against a foe that trusts his own
strength and knows the weakness of his enemy! But,” he muttered in
a lower and more hurried voice, “this has been like Liverpool,
and--Whitehaven--and Edinburgh, and fifty more! It is past, sir; let it
be forgotten.”
Without heeding the wondering crew, who were collected as curious
spectators of his departure, the stranger bowed hastily to Griffith,
and, springing into the boat, he spread her light sails with the
readiness of one who had nothing to learn even in the smallest matters
of his daring profession. Once more, as the boat moved briskly away from
the cutter, he waved his hand in adieu; and Griffith fancied that
even through the distance he could trace a smile of bitter resignation
lighting his calm features with a momentary gleam. For a long time the
young man stood an abstracted gazer at his solitary progress, watching
the small boat as it glided towards the open ocean, nor did he remember
to order the head-sheets of the Alacrity drawn, in order to put the
vessel again in motion, until the dark speck was lost in the strong
glare that fell obliquely across the water from the setting sun.
Many wild and extraordinary conjectures were tittered among the crew
of the cutter, as she slowly drew in towards her friendly haven, on the
appearance of the mysterious Pilot, during their late hazardous visit to
the coast of Britain, and on his still more extraordinary disappearance,
as it were, amid the stormy wastes of the North Sea. Griffith himself
was not observed to smile, nor to manifest any evidence of his being a
listener to their rude discourse, until it was loudly announced that a
small boat was pressing for their own harbor, across the forefoot of the
cutter, under a single lug-sail. Then, indeed, the sudden and cheerful
lighting of his troubled eye betrayed the vast relief that was imparted
to his feelings by the interesting discovery.