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CAPTAIN KYD;
OR,
THE WIZARD OF THE SEA.
A ROMANCE.
BY THE AUTHOR OF
"THE SOUTHWEST," "LAFITTE," "BURTON," &c.
"There's many a one who oft has heard
The name of Robert Kyd,
Who cannot tell, perhaps, a word
Of him, or what he did.
"So, though I never saw the man,
And lived not in his day,
I'll tell you how his guilt began--
To what it led the way."
H. F. Gould.
IN TWO VOLUMES.
VOL. II.
NEW-YORK:
HARPER & BROTHERS, 82 CLIFF-STREET.
1839.
Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1838,
By HARPER & BROTHERS,
In the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New-York.
CAPTAIN KYD;
OR,
THE WIZARD OF THE SEA.
BOOK I.
CONTINUED.
CHAPTER VIII.
"The wind blows fair! the vessel feels
The pressure of the rising breeze,
And swiftest of a thousand keels,
She leaps to the careering seas."
WILLIS.
"Commanding, aiding, animating all,
Where foe appear'd to press, or friend to fall,
Cheers Lara's voice."
_Lara._
Towards noon of the day on which the events related in the last chapter
transpired, a signal was displayed on one of the towers of Castle Cor,
and shortly afterward the yacht, which hitherto had appeared so
lifeless, got under weigh. Like a snowy seabird seeking her nest, she
spread her broad white sails and stood in towards the land, fired a gun,
and hove to within cable's length of the beach. A well-manned boat, with
a crimson awning stretched above the stern-sheets, and gay with the
flags of England and of Bellamont, presently put off from her, and
pulled to the foot of the path that led up to the castle. In a few
minutes afterward a party was seen descending the cliff, consisting of
Lady Bellamont, Grace Fitzgerald, Kate Bellamont and the earl, on the
arm of whom the latter leaned pale and sad, followed by a large number
of attendants, and others who had come to witness the embarcation. On
arriving at the boat, which lay against the rock so that they could
easily step into it, they were received by the commander of the yacht in
person--a bluff, middle-aged seaman, his manners characterized by a
sailor's frankness, united with the ease and courtesy of a well-bred
gentleman.
"How is the wind, Kenard?" asked the earl of the officer, as he came to
the place of embarking; "'tis somewhat light and contrary, methinks, for
our voyage."
"It comes from the south by west, my lord, but we can lay our course
till we clear the cape, when it will be full fair. I trust our cabin
will be honoured with a larger share of loveliness than I had
anticipated," he said, smiling with gallantry as he saw Kate Bellamont
and the countess were of the party.
"So you did not give me the credit for being so _very_ lovely until you
had seen me, Master Kenard," said Grace, wilfully misapplying his words.
"When I look on your face, I assuredly can have no wish that my cabins
should be graced with more beauty than I behold there, fair lady,"
answered the seaman, lifting his cap gallantly.
"A pretty speech to come from the sea," said Grace, laughing.
"Come, fair niece, the winds wait for no one," said the earl, stepping
from the rock upon the cushioned seats of the gig, after having taken a
tender leave of his countess and daughter.
"Adieu, then, sweet cousin!"
"Adieu, dear Grace!"
And, for a moment, the lovely girls lingered in a parting embrace,
kissing again and again each other's cheeks, while their full eyes ran
over. It seemed as if they never would separate!
"Nay, my sweet Grace, will you give all your adieus and affectionate
partings to your cousin?" said the countess, interrupting their
lingering parting.
With another warm embrace, another kiss, and a fresh shower of tears,
Grace released herself from Kate's entwining arms and threw herself into
those of Lady Bellamont. The earl then gently took her hand and led her
into the boat.
The baggage, in the mean while, had been placed in it by the servants
and seamen, and the earl and his niece having taken their seats beneath
the silken canopy and once more interchanged adieus with those on the
rock, the captain bade the men give way in the direction of the yacht,
the yards of which, at the same moment, were manned to receive the noble
party. The boat, urged on its way by eight oars, cut swiftly through the
crested waves, and in a short time after leaving the land was alongside.
The deck of the vessel was within a few feet of the water; and half a
dozen steps, let down by a hinge into the boat, formed a safe and easy
means of getting on board. As Grace, who had not ceased to wave her
handkerchief to the party on shore, placed her foot upon the deck, her
eyes rested, with surprise that nearly broke forth into an exclamation,
on Mark Meredith, who stood close beside her, manning, with other young
sailors, the rope that lifted the stairs. Forgetful of his duty, he
looked with all his soul after her retiring form, as, leaning on her
uncle's arm, she walked aft amid the loud cheers from the crew on the
yards.
"Run away with it!" cried the officer of the gangway to the young seamen
at the fall.
But Mark was deaf to the order, and was nearly thrown down by the rapid
movement of his companions ere he could recover himself.
"So, so, my green un! you must have quicker ears than this if you would
serve King Billy. And what are your eyes doing aft? Tom," he added, to a
seaman who was fitting a tompion to the starboard gun amidships, as
Mark, blushing and confused, retreated from this reproof among the crew,
"is this lad in your mess?"
"Ay, sir," said the man, ceasing his occupation and respectfully lifting
his cap.
"Then teach him that a seaman must look ahead and not astern," said the
officer, dryly.
"Ay, ay, sir," was the equally dry response.
"Lay in, lay in, off the yards!" now shouted the lieutenant; "all hands
make sail!"
The boatswain's whistle rung sharp and clear as it repeated the call to
the deck; and in an instant the yards, save two or three men left on
each to assist in loosening the canvass, were deserted, and the sailors
descended with activity to the deck.
The yards were now swung round to the wind, and every light sail was
spread to woo the gentle breeze that came off shore. Yielding to its
influence, with a ripple about her prow as she began to cleave the water
and a slight inclination towards the direction opposite from the wind,
the graceful yacht slid smoothly over the sea, with a rapid yet scarcely
perceptible motion.
Grace stood beneath the awning that covered the quarter-deck, and, as
they glided down the bay, watched the shore, which seemed to move past
like a revolving panorama. Castle Cor, with its lordly towers, rose to
the eye lone and commanding for many a league; and she could fancy, long
after the flag that fluttered on its topmost tower was no longer to be
seen, that she could discern the white kerchief of her cousin waving to
her from the cliff. As the vessel continued to gain an offing, the
battlements of Castle More, far inland, became visible; and as her eyes
wandered from the cliff to these towers, her thoughts ran rapidly over
the scenes in which Lester, the preceding day, had been an actor; and
she wondered as she thought. Had she known all--had Kate made her her
confidant after her interview with the sorceress, she would have had
food for wonder indeed!
Gradually the scenes with which she was familiar faded from her view.
The towers of Castle Cor and the far-distant battlements of Castle More
sunk beneath the horizon, and she found herself, on turning, after
taking a long, last, lingering look at these dear objects, to the scenes
about her, that the vessel was moving before a steady breeze past the
outermost rocky headland of the bay, and boldly entering the open sea.
The sun was shining redly in the west, his broad, flaming disk on a
level with the ocean, the top of every leaping wave of which he touched
with fire: a dark cloud hung just above it, with lurid edges; and the
whole aspect of the heavens was to her eye angry and menacing, and
betokened a tempest. The yacht cut her way swiftly through the water, as
if, so it seemed to her imagination, flying from the approaching storm,
with every sail flung broad to the breeze, which, after the course was
changed to the east on doubling the headland, blew directly aft. She
cast her eyes along the decks, and saw that the most perfect quiet and
order reigned throughout, and that every seaman was employed in some
occupation of his craft, or stationed at his post ready to obey the
orders of his officer. Now and then an old sailor would cast his eyes to
windward, look a moment at the sun, then lift them to the sails, and,
with an approving glance, again pursue his momentarily interrupted task.
This trained coolness of men accustomed to meet the dangers of the deep,
but whose very feelings were subdued and regulated by the stern
discipline of their profession, reassured her; and when she saw the
captain of the yacht carelessly lounging over the quarter-rail, chatting
with his first lieutenant, and her uncle lying at his length on one of
the luxurious couches calmly reading a book, all her fears vanished, and
she watched the descent of the sun, which resembled a vast round shield
of dead gold, into the sea, with a pleasure unalloyed by apprehension.
Slowly and majestically it descended till half its orb was beneath the
sea, which now no longer reflected fire, but grew black as ink up to its
blood-red face. All at once it appeared as if dark lines had been drawn
across its disk, as though traced by a pencil.
"Look!" she involuntarily exclaimed, pointing towards it; "see those
lines on the sun."
The earl threw aside his book and sprung to his feet, so sudden and
energetic was her exclamation. The captain and his officer both started,
and also looked in the direction indicated by her finger.
"What?" cried the former, after looking an instant, "lines on the sun?
_Ropes_, lady! By the rood, 'tis a ship!" he exclaimed.
The upper portion of the luminary was yet above the horizon, and the
practised eye of the seaman detected in the delicate tracery, that had
struck and pleased the eye of Grace, the outlines of a distant vessel
lying under bare poles. He looked a little longer, and distinctly saw
her hull rise on the swell in bold, black relief against the sun.
"My glass!" he hastily demanded.
It was placed in his hand by an under officer, when, directing it
towards the object, he looked steadily for an instant, and then, turning
to his noble passenger, gave him the spyglass, saying,
"Tis a pirate, my lord! Doubtless the same I have been advised to look
out for, as having been seen in these seas."
"What cause have you to suspect it?" asked the earl, surveying the
stranger through the telescope.
"His wish to avoid observation; his lowering his sails; his peculiar
rig--three straight sticks for masts--and the knowledge that they swarm
in these waters," was the confident reply.
"They have disappeared!" exclaimed Grace, as the upper rim of the sun
sunk beneath the watery waste, leaving all the sky cold and cheerless.
"He is still there, maiden," said the captain, "but has no longer a
bright background to show his spars on. If he is trying to hide from us,
he has made no calculation for the sun, and has been raw enough to run
directly in its wake; but doubtless he dropped sail just where he was
the instant he discovered us."
"From fear, captain?"
"No, my lord," was the reply, in a voice lowered so as not to reach the
ears of Grace. "These fellows are night-birds. His object is to hide
himself till dark, and then--no doubt taking us for a merchant
coaster--pop down upon us, under cover of the darkness, when he is least
expected. But we have him our own way now, thanks to the kindly sun and
our fair young lady here."
"Can you cope with him, should he come down upon you under cover of the
night?" asked the nobleman.
"I shall not run from him, my lord. I have eight bulldogs here that can
growl and bite as well as e'er a mastiff in his majesty's service: and
from the size of his sticks, and his light rig, he carries not so many.
But, more or less, he lies to windward of us, and so has the advantage;
and, if he can outsail us with a flowing sheet, will, if such be his
pleasure, be down upon us ere the middle watch is called. Besides, there
is a cap full of wind gathering in that quarter, which will help him
along if his humour takes him this way."
"Is there a probability that we shall be pursued, Kenard?" asked the
nobleman, with seriousness, glancing anxiously towards Grace, who was
watching, with a childish pleasure, the black waves as they leaped up to
the stern, broke in glaring white heads, and fell in crystal showers
back into the sea again.
"There is, my lord," was the quiet answer.
"It is my desire, then, that you use your best efforts to escape."
"My lord!" exclaimed the hardy seaman, in a tone of disappointment, yet
emphasizing the words as if he had not heard aright.
"Exert all your skill and seamanship to avoid a meeting with this
bucanier, if such he be," repeated the earl, who perfectly comprehended
him. "Those who are unfitted to encounter danger should not be
thoughtlessly exposed to it," he added, looking towards his niece.
"There is one here, whom you see, that cannot profit by your success,
yet will suffer everything by your defeat. Were I alone, my brave
captain, I would give you the weight of my blade in this matter. As it
is, we must fly."
"We will but let him come within reach of my barkers, my lord, and wake
him up with a couple of broadsides, and be off again before he knows
what has hurt him."
"I must be obeyed, Kenard," said the earl, decidedly, turning away and
joining his niece.
"That Dick Kenard should ever run away from a bucanier," said the
seaman, grumblingly, to himself, as he took up his trumpet to give
orders, "and without showing him his teeth, is a disgrace both to
himself and his majesty's navy. Bluff King Billy himself, were he on
board, would be the first to stand by me for a hard brush. This comes of
leaving my snug little clipper, the Roebuck, and taking command of this
gingerbread yacht, fit only for boarding-school girls to sail about in
on a park-lake. Howel," he said, to his lieutenant, in no very
good-humoured tones, "have all sail made on this penny whistle; stretch
out every rag she's got; make every thread tell. Set stun'sails both
sides alow and aloft. See to it!"
For a few moments the yacht was a scene of apparent confusion, but
really of the most perfect order. Commands were given and repeated, and
instantly obeyed. Additional sails rose on either side of those before
standing, as if by magic. Men moved quickly in all directions, yet each
obedient to his own officer, and each engaged in obeying a particular
order, as if but one had been given, and he the only one to execute it.
The masts were soon white with broad fields of canvass, stretching far
out on either side of the vessel; and the increased ripple around the
bow, and the gurgle heard about the rudder, indicated that she felt the
new impulse, and was moving with increased velocity.
The captain, who had, in the mean while, walked the deck with a moody
pace, looked up as the bustle made in increasing sail ceased.
"She is under all she will bear, sir!" said the lieutenant, approaching
him.
"What way has she?"
"Five knots."
"'Tis her canvass presses her along then," said the captain, looking
aloft with a gratified eye, "for there is scarce wind to float a
feather."
"She moves wing and wing, like a duck," said the officer, in reply; "for
I've sailed in her many a cruise before you took command of her, sir,
and know what she'll do; but, with the wind a point or two forward the
beam, a spar would work better and gain more headway than she will."
"Pray Heaven the wind soon chop round ahead, then," said the captain,
with energy; "I would not lose the chance of a brush with this
three-masted rigger for a post-captaincy. Keep good lookout astern, and
watch everything like a change in the wind: report if you see anything
moving between the sea and sky, he added, going to the companion-way.
"And what if I can change the wind for you by bringing her to, a few
points, by degrees," archly suggested the lieutenant, in a low voice, as
he was about to descend into the cabin.
"'Tis a temptation, i'faith, Howel," he said, laughingly; "but wouldst
have me keep a false log? No, no. Not Dick Kenard, for a score of
pirates."
The captain disappeared as he spoke, and the lieutenant, with his
speaking-trumpet beneath his arm, and his right hand thrust into the
breast of his jacket, mechanically paced the deck fore and aft the
starboard guns in the waste, leaving the whole of the quarter-deck to
the earl and his niece.
Twilight was stealing over the sea, and the headland of Cape Clear
looked, through the hazy distance, like a cloud resting on the water.
With her head reclining on her uncle's shoulder, Grace watched in
silence the stars, as one by one they came out of their blue homes and
took their places in the sky; and her fancy amused itself, as she saw
them light up one after another, with the idea that the invisible
angels, which are said to keep watch over the earth, were hanging out
lamps to give light to it in the absence of the sun. The musical murmur
of the parted water, as it rippled past the vessel's sides; the
occasional dash of a wave against the stern; the gentle, rocking motion
of the yacht, as it coursed along, threw over her spirit a pensive
sadness. Twilight is sacred to thought! Its dreamy influence begets
reflection. There is something in its deep silence that elevates and
spiritualizes. To religion and its mysteries, the mind then insensibly
turns, and always for its good. If men think at all, they will think at
this magic hour. If they are religious ever, they will be devotionally
so then. There is no man, however humble or however lost, who does not
at times feel its sanctifying influence. It is the sabbath of the day,
and its time to the thoughts of the heart of man is a holy time.
The mind of Grace experienced the sacred influences of the hour. For a
while she gave herself up to her thoughts, that would take to themselves
wings and fly whither they would. At length night came on in all her
starry glory, and the meditations of the maiden grew less ideal; and
returning from contemplating, as young and ardent minds delight to do,
creation and its wonders, religion and its mysteries, the wearied wing
of her imagination rested among those whom she had left at Castle Cor.
She thought of Kate and of Lester--grieved at their quarrel, and
sympathized with her unhappy cousin. She then thought of Mark; of his
intrepidity on the cliff; of his pride, and of his low station. She
caught herself wishing, she could hardly tell why or wherefore, that he
had been noble; and began devising some way of drawing him from his
degrading occupation of a fisherman, and elevating him to a worthier
station--when all at once she remembered, what she had forgotten, that
this was in part accomplished--that he was on board the same vessel with
herself! She started at the recollection, and looked around confused.
But the darkness concealed her changing colour from her uncle, who
nevertheless spoke, as she so suddenly lifted her head from his
shoulder.
"What, dreaming, my Gracy? It is growing late, and time for you to
retire. We will take some refreshment below, and then I will resign you
to your maid--for this little head should have a softer pillow than an
old uncle's arm."
As the earl spoke, he took the hand of his niece, and descended with her
to the cabin, where, after partaking of their evening meal, they parted,
one to go to the deck and join the captain, the other to retire to the
state cabin. This was furnished with costly hangings, couches of down,
gilded sofas, thick carpets, tables inlaid with pearl, a toilet stand
and laver of ebony and marble, and pier glasses extending from the
ceiling to the floor; while nothing that could contribute to the comfort
or administer to the luxury of the occupant was wanting.
When the earl returned to the deck it was nearly ten o'clock, and the
moon was high in the east. He wrapped himself in his cloak, and walked
for an hour thoughtfully, occasionally casting his eyes to windward, or
stopping to examine the compass. The captain, in the mean while, leaned
over the quarter, fixing his eyes steadily towards the direction from
which his vessel had come; at one moment putting his night-glass to his
eye; at another giving an order to the lieutenant of the watch, and now
and then addressing a brief sentence of caution or reprimand to the
helmsman.
Seven bells had struck, and it was near midnight, when, after taking a
long and scrutinizing survey of the horizon, he crossed the deck towards
the earl, and said, with impatient disappointment,
"We are safe enough, my lord. There will be no one to trouble us
to-night."
"I am glad it is so, Kenard. You may have been mistaken in his
character."
"No. But he probably has discovered what we are, and has thought better
of it. Ha! did not the main-topgallant-sail flap then?" he asked,
looking aloft.
"The wind is lulling, I believe," said the earl.
"It is, by Heaven!" exclaimed the seaman. "What headway do we make?
Heave the log."
"She logs full four, but makes not above three and a half knots way,"
repeated the officer of the deck.
"We have a strong current setting to the south and east in our favour by
the dip of this ripple, which will make it four again. Ten minutes ago
we were running eight! There is a chance of exchanging compliments with
our neighbour, my lord; yet I have done my best to keep out of his way."
"But, if we have no wind, he must be in the same situation."
"He will have it first, and bring it along with him. There was a
wind-bag hanging over the sun that will soon be piping a merry note.
There flaps the fore-topsail against the mast! The wind is leaving us.
She does not now move two knots through the water," he added, glancing
over the side. "We shall have it dead calm in ten minutes. Take in the
lower stun'sails, Howel, and stand by to hand all the light canvass! we
shall have it soon! Preparation is half the victory, my lord," he
added, turning to the earl with a formal bow.
"What mean these preparations?" inquired the earl; "for I profess to be
better landsman than seaman."
"And it requires no unskilled hand to sail the ship of state, my lord,
of which, I hear, you are an able officer," said the captain, in a
complimentary manner. "This southwest wind, which has held us so fair,
is dying away to make room for a tight blow here away from the
northwest, which I have been watching suspiciously. There heaves a cloud
now towards the zenith; you can scarcely discern its outline for the
haze, my lord; but you will find no stars in that direction, and the
horizon looks thick and black."
"The wind has quite gone," said the earl, raising his palm to catch the
air.
"It is now time to make ready to welcome its successor. Turn up all
hands, Howel. Take in every stitch of light sail!"
In a few moments the yacht was stripped to her two topsails, spanker,
and jib.
"Put a single reef in the topsails, Mr. Howel," ordered the captain, as
he saw that the dark cloud rose rapidly in the northwest.
"It is done, sir!" reported the officer, a few moments afterward.
"Very well! Secure the guns with single lashings only, and have the
decks clear for action!" was the next order.
"Action, captain?" exclaimed the earl, who had witnessed these
preparations with interest.
"It is best to be prepared, if that dark cloud rolling towards us should
chance to conceal a foe in its bosom. A dark cloud, as well as a dark
eye, sometimes hides dangers, my lord."
"You may be doing right, Kenard, but Heaven defend us from other dangers
than the elements threaten us with."
These several orders were executed; and the yacht lay rocking, with
scarcely any progressive motion, on the sluggish surges, which all at
once began to heave and swell, as if lifted by some vast and mysterious
power beneath. She was nearly divested of her canvass, yet still
beautiful in her nakedness, showing to advantage the graceful symmetry
of her tapering spars, and the exquisite shape and proportions of her
hull. Like a bird seated on the water, she yielded to every undulation
of the heaving billows with a grace that seemed the instinct of life.
The stillness that now reigned was profound and awful.
"List, my lord," said the captain, after the lapse of a few moments,
during which all eyes were turned to watch the storm-cloud walking the
skies in its power, and flinging its broad shadow on the sea.
The earl bent his ear more acutely, and heard a deep moaning sound, like
winds howling in caverns under-sea. Gradually it grew louder, and at the
same time the dark cloud cast itself across the skies towards the
zenith, its edges streaming in advance, like hair blown out by the wind.
In a few seconds the moon was darkened, the stars became suddenly
extinguished, and an impenetrable gloom fell like a pall over the deep.
Not a breath yet moved the air. But deeper and more awful grew the moan
of the storm as it swept down the sea. Louder and louder it came, and
now was distinctly heard the roar of agitated waves, tossed by the
shrieking winds; and between the sky and sea, which seemed to meet
within reach of the hand, glared a line of white foam, seeming, to
their imaginations, the glittering and gnashing teeth of the mad
tempest. The earl hid his head within his cloak, and uttered a prayer
for the safety of the souls on board; the captain stood upon a gun, with
his eyes upon the coming storm, professionally cool and collected.
"Two steady men go to the aid of the helmsman," he said, in a calm, low
voice. "She will bear nothing, Howel; we must make an Eolian harp of
her. So! stand by the topsail halyards."
"All ready, sir," replied the lieutenant, in the same subdued tone.
"Let go all!"
The topsails came down by the run, and in a moment's time were furled by
the active seamen.
"Let go the jib and spanker," he now shouted, in an energetic tone.
"All gone, sir!"
The yacht was now under bare poles, and left to the mercy of the
hurricane. The roar of the coming tempest was now deafening, and the
vessel began to pitch wildly, yet there was no sensible agitation of the
air.
"Every man throw himself on his face to the deck!" cried the captain,
suddenly, in a loud tone. "My lord, you will be safer below. Our decks
will be swept clean as your hand."
"I will remain, Kenard."
"And I will remain with you, uncle," said Grace, suddenly appearing
before them like a spirit, in her snowy night-robe, which seemed like a
garment of pale light in the surrounding blackness and gloom; "I will
share the danger by your side," she added, with decision.
There was no time to refuse her entreaty or conduct her to the
cabin--the tempest burst upon them, as if a cloud, swelling with wind
and rain, had broken over the vessel. Instantly all who were on their
feet were prostrated. Howling and shrieking through the rigging,
accompanied by a crashing and splintering that appalled every soul on
board with the present sense of danger, it swept over them with terrific
fury. Borne down by its weight, the vessel careened till she lay almost
on her beam's end, while the mad surges leaped over her bulwarks and
deluged the nearly perpendicular decks. The darkness became illumined by
a wild, strange light from the foaming sea, and every object was
distinctly seen by its supernatural glare. The captain got upon his
feet, and, climbing to windward, lashed himself to the main rigging, and
gave such orders as the crisis demanded. But his voice could not be
heard, and his presence and example were alike useless at a moment like
this. The vessel was driving in the van of the tempest with
inconceivable velocity. The waves seemed to lift her hull, and hurl her
onward like a feather. The brave seaman beheld many of his crew swept
off, and saw them, without the power to help them, struggling amid the
boiling sea; but their shrieks were lost in the louder shrieks of the
wind, and the flying vessel soon left them far astern. Others were
lashing themselves to the rigging; others clinging to the guns; and all
were exerting themselves to preserve their lives. Casting his eyes
aloft, he saw, with a pang of grief, that his main-topgallant-mast was
gone, and that his fore-topmast was wounded and tottering fearfully at
every pitch of the vessel. The first fury of the tempest was spent, and
there being a momentary lull, it occurred to him that it might yet be
saved.
"Ho, there, forward!" he shouted.
His words seemed to have an electrical effect upon the crew, as if the
sound of a cheerful human voice, in that fearful moment, inspired them
with hope. Half the danger was lessened to their minds, and twenty
voices replied,
"Ay, ay."
At the instant, there came a second blast of the tempest, and a huge sea
breaking over the vessel, swept the captain into the waste, and bore
three more of the men into the sea, who the next moment were lost in the
darkness astern. The first glance of the captain, on recovering his feet
and sustaining himself by clasping round a gun, was to the fore-topmast.
"She yet stands it!" he exclaimed, "but another such a blast will pitch
it end foremost through our decks. Ho, my lads, which of you will take a
couple of fathoms from the topgallant-halyards and go aloft and fish
that stick?"
Many an eye was turned upward, but not a foot moved.
"A light lad will do it best. The spar must be saved where it is; for,
if it falls inboard, 'twill make a hole through our decks big enough to
let the ocean in. Be quick, lads!"
"I will do it, sir," said a young sailor, springing into the weather
rigging, with a coil of rigging on his arm.
"That's my lad. You shall wear an epaulet for this."
With the eyes of the whole crew upon him, the intrepid young seaman
ascended the rigging, though with much difficulty, as the wind pressed
him so closely against the stays that he could scarcely climb from one
rattling to another. After great peril he gained the top. Here, breaking
from its latticed guard a couple of oaken slats, he swung himself into
the topmast rigging, and, ascending to where the stick was splintered,
commenced with great coolness, while the storm howled terrifically
about him, to wind the rope about both it and the pieces of wood he had
torn from the top. At every pitch of the vessel the wounded spar would
gape wide, and threaten to carry him with it into the sea. But to the
eyes of those below, who could plainly see him by the white light shed
from the phosphorescent waves, he appeared to be as cool as if engaged
in an ordinary duty on an ordinary occasion. After taking numerous turns
about the mast till his rope was exhausted, he skilfully fastened the
ends, and then, by a stay, descended like an arrow to the deck.
"What lad is that?" asked the captain, who had silently watched his
labour.
"The fisher's lad," replied one.
"Gallantly done, my lad," said the captain. "This night has made thy
fortune for thee, young man."
"I believe there is a vessel in sight, sir."
"What is that you say? Come aft, for this wind will let nobody hear
anything but its own howl."
"I discovered aloft what appeared to be a vessel to windward, scudding
under bare poles," repeated Mark.
"Ha, say you? Then we are like to have company in the gale."
As he attempted to ascend to the weatherside to look for the stranger, a
fresh gust of the tornado burst upon the vessel and threw her upon her
beam's end, the sea breaking over her bulwarks from stem to stern with
the force and volume of a cataract.
"My niece, my niece!" cried the Earl of Bellamont, suddenly; "save
her--oh, God! she is lost!"
The first shock of the tempest had thrown the nobleman and Grace to the
deck; but he had contrived to shelter her in his cloak, under the lee of
the companion-way, during its continuance, and, save the apprehension
attendant on the danger she was in, she had suffered comparatively
little. Her attention had been drawn, in the mean while, to the bold
enterprise of the young sailor. She would have shrieked as he
volunteered, but her voice failed her. She had watched his ascent and
the progress of his perilous duty with trembling and with prayer; and,
when he descended to the deck, she released her hold upon her uncle, and
clasped her hands together in gratitude for his preservation. It was at
this moment the vessel was thrown upon her beam's end, when, caught up
by a wave, she was borne far from the reach of the earl, whose cries now
drew all eyes towards him.
"My niece! Grace! Where is she?" he cried, in tones of despair.
"Here, uncle!" she faintly answered from the sea.
Guided by her voice, they discerned her at some distance from the
vessel, her body immersed in the water, clinging by one hand to a stay
which lay level with it. Every heave of the sea lifted her nearly out of
the water to let her descend again far beneath its surface. Yet she held
firmly to the stay with that tenacity which is taught by the love of
life.
The earl no sooner beheld her than he was about to jump overboard to her
rescue, when Mark, with a rope fastened around his waist, run along the
level bulwarks and arrested him before he could take the leap.
"Stay, my lord! Hold firmly by the end of this rope, and I will save her
or perish in the attempt."
As he spoke he cast himself into the sea; and partly by swimming and
partly by the aid of the stay, he had nearly reached her, when a wave
lifted her high on its crest, and forced her to release her grasp.
"Save me, Mark!" she cried, and sunk in the hollow it left, and almost
within reach of his arm.
He dove, and brought her to the surface scarce ere she had gone beneath
it. She instantly clasped her arms firmly around him with the instinct
of self-preservation; her cheek lying against his, and her rich tresses
blinding him.
"She is safe; draw us inboard," he shouted, buffeting the waves with one
arm, the other encircling her with a firm grasp.
The earl, assisted by the captain and sailors, the next moment drew his
half-drowned niece from the sea, dripping like a naiad, while the
captain did the same office for the brave youth.
"Two epaulets, by the rood!" he exclaimed. "'Twas a lucky day Dick
Kenard shipped a lad of your mettle. Ho, there, men! We must now look to
the craft. Save the ship first, and think of ourselves afterward, is my
maxim, my lord. Bear a hand with an axe! Cut away the masts!"
"Cast the lee guns overboard, and she may right, captain," said Mark,
shaking the salt spray from his locks.
"We can but try it, my boy. Overboard with the barkers!"
Forthwith the men set to work and pitched the starboard guns into the
sea, and, after cutting loose the fore and main yards, and giving every
man's weight to the weather side, the yacht righted with a tremendous
roll to windward and a lurch that threw every man flat upon the deck.
"There she is on her legs again," cried the captain, exultingly. "The
storm seems to have shown its roughest paw, and we'll ride it out yet.
We are less a topgallant-sail and a brace of yards, my lord; but an
hour's calm will make all shipshape again. But the poor fellows that are
washed overboard! there's no getting them back. They are gone to their
last muster," he added, with manly sympathy.
The fury of the tempest had been spent on the yacht; and though it now
blew a stiff gale, it was no longer attended with any of those
tremendous gusts which had characterized it at the first. The sea no
longer boiled and tossed confusedly, but on every side rolled its waves
in one direction to leeward; and though they broke in snowy heads, and
lifted themselves in mountainous billows, the regularity of their motion
indicated that the tornado had settled into a steady though violent
hurricane. The clouds, although still dark and laden with wind, flew
higher above the sea than before, and in the east they broke into
masses, showing between white places in the sky.
"She will bear her spanker close reefed, and a hand's breadth of the
jib, Mr. Howel. Pass the word forward to set the jib, sir!"
There was no reply.
"Where is Mr. Howel?" he demanded, with a foreboding of the fatal
result.
"He was washed overboard by the last sea we shipped," replied one of the
men.
"A noble seaman gone! a lovely woman widowed! It has been a fatal night!
Marston, ho! Where is my second lieutenant?"
"Mr. Marston was struck by a spar, and knocked into the water as we went
over on our beam," answered another.
"This has been a dear night indeed, my lord," said the captain,
addressing Lord Bellamont, who was supporting Grace in his arms by the
companion-way; "I have lost my two oldest officers, and how many of my
best men I know not. Edwards! Thank God, I have one lieutenant left. You
must be my second now, and act as my first! Muster all hands aft. Let
us see who are missing, and then let us set to work and put the crippled
craft under an inch or two of canvass, if only to ease the fore-topmast,
which, with this pitching, in spite of its support, will soon take leave
of the ship."
The men were mustered aft, and thirteen less than the yacht's complement
answered to their names.
"Ah, poor fellows!" sighed the captain, "they have got a seaman's end!
but they would have had the same fifty years hence; or else have been
thrown into a hole on shore, which is worse than they now have got. A
short life and a gallant one, is my maxim, my lord," he said, turning
round and speaking to the earl. "Poor brave boys, Heaven give them a
snug berth aloft! Well, lads, let us get a bit of sail on the craft, and
cry afterward. My lad," he continued, addressing Meredith, "I see you
are a sailor! You must take poor Marston's place, and wait till you get
on shore for your commission. Go forward and set the jib at once. Here!
a dozen of you close reef this spanker, and let us see how long it will
take for the wind to cut it up into ribands. Lively, men, lively! Stand
by there, at the helm, to bring her smartly up to the wind as soon as
she begins to feel her canvass. Hoist away briskly!"
In a few minutes the yacht was lying to under a reefed jib and
close-reefed spanker, with her helm lashed to the starboard bulwarks;
the steersman, with the two men who had been detailed to assist him at
the beginning of the storm, having been carried forward into the waste
on the first billow that broke over the stern.
The force of the wind gradually lessened, and, in half an hour after the
jib was set, an order was given to set the foresail, and shake the
reefs out of the spanker.
"Put her away a point or two, and give her headway," said the captain to
the lieutenant, as the above orders were executed. "So, steady! there
she walks bravely! See, my lord, how like a duck she rides on the top of
the waves. She's a tight boat for so gayly painted a craft, or we
should, ere this, have been helping the mermaids string coral in their
sea-caves below. Never judge a ship by the colour of her bends, is my
maxim, my lord."
The yacht was now under steerage way, and rose regularly on the billows,
which before had broken against her sides flinging the spray in showers
upon her decks. The wind blew steadily, but no longer with violence; the
storm-cloud, broken into a myriad of fragments, was scudding across the
heavens towards the southeast; the waves momently diminished in size;
and at intervals the moon shone down through an opening upon the sea,
like the smile of hope beaming on the tempest-tossed mariners: all
things indicated the termination of the hurricane, to the fury of which
they had so nearly been sacrificed. The pumps were now tried, and it was
ascertained that less than three inches of water had been made.
"A capital craft, my lord. The Roebuck would scarcely have ridden out a
tornado like this, especially after having been laid on her ribs. I
congratulate both your lordship and your niece on your escape from a
grave in the sea, for which landsmen, I am told, have a strange
antipathy. But bury me, my lord, in the deep sea; let the green waves,
which have borne me living, wrap about me dead. Let me lie where the
ripple of driving keels and the song of the sailor shall be my requiem."
"You are eloquent, Kenard; and perhaps you are right."
"It matters little where a man's bones are laid, my lord; and the sea is
as safe a repository, and will yield them up as readily at the judgment
day as the earth. Ay, more readily, it may be," said the captain.
"It may be so," replied the nobleman, smiling at the literal way in
which the seaman viewed the subject. "If it is now safe to unclose the
companion-way, I will convey my niece to the cabin for a change of
wardrobe."
"We shall have no more washing decks to-night," replied the captain,
giving the necessary orders to remove the companion-way and hatches,
which had been firmly closed as the storm came on.
They were now opened, and the earl awoke Grace, who, after her
submersion, had dropped into a gentle sleep in his arms, and assisted
her to her stateroom, where, arousing her terrified and almost
insensible maid from the floor, he left her with a kiss of paternal
affection, mingled with gratitude for her preservation.
"Shall I come to the deck again after I have changed my dripping dress?"
she asked, with playful entreaty, as he was leaving her.
"No, my child, you need rest after your bath. Your cheek is pale as
marble," he replied, tapping upon it.
"I shall be sick here; I miss the pure air; there is a suffocating
sensation of closeness; and I think I feel the motion of the vessel more
below. I must go on deck again, uncle," she said, earnestly. "Besides,
the moon is coming out, and it will be pleasant to watch the caps of the
waves sparkling in her light."
"There is no resisting you, Grace; I will come down for you when you are
ready. Let us be thankful, my child, for our preservation," he added,
devoutly.
"I am, uncle, indeed," she said, with touching sincerity.
And, as the earl closed the door of her stateroom, she kneeled by her
couch in her wet garments, and offered up a short, heartfelt prayer of
thanksgiving and gratitude for her safety; nor in it did she forget the
youth who had been the instrument of it. How much nearer did the gallant
service he had performed for her bring the handsome but humble young
sailor to her heart! How much closer did the union of his name with her
own in prayer bind him to her young and warm affections! And when she
rose from her knees, her thoughts, it is to be feared, ran much more
upon the instrument of her preservation than upon the Being who directed
it.
When the earl returned to the deck, the moon was riding in a broad field
of blue, unobscured by a single cloud, and on all sides the waves leaped
towards it to fall back into the shining sea in showers of silver. The
clouds were drifting far to leeward, and the darkness and terror that
had hitherto reigned had given place to brightness and serenity. The
yacht was gallantly riding over the crested waves, parting them with her
prow and dashing to either side their glittering drops in snowy jets of
spray. The fore-topgallant-sail was set, and drawing freely; and,
notwithstanding the loss of her topsails and main-topgallant-mast with
its yard, she held her course and was making good headway through the
water. Two of her larboard guns had been shifted to the starboard, and
other means had been taken to put her in suitable sailing trim. The men
were engaged in clearing the decks; serving the rigging where it had
been chafed; fishing the foremast, which Mark had before temporarily
secured and thereby saved; and otherwise repairing the disasters of the
storm. Some of them, the earl observed, were filling the beds around
the guns with shot, disposing cutlasses and muskets in stands and
beckets about the masts, and making altogether very plain preparations
for fight.
"You see, my lord, we are hard at work," said the captain, approaching
the earl as he saw him come to the deck. "In half an hour, save bending
a new set of topsails, we shall be as sound as we were before this
squall. See that those guns are as dry as a boatswain's whistle," he
shouted to the men.
"What is the meaning of these hostile preparations, Kenard?"
"I have reason to believe the pirate is lurking in this quarter. He was
seen from aloft during the blackest of the storm, scudding through it,
like the flying Dutchman, under bare poles. If he should discover us as
we are, we should have a hard matter to escape him."
"He is likely to be as crippled as ourselves."
"Not he, my lord; the masts of these craft are stout single sticks, and
their sails are fashioned so as to come down by the run at an instant's
warning. There is no way of sinking one of those fellows without
knocking his bottom out. Lively, men, lively. Ha! that's my lad! make
them fly!"
It was Meredith he addressed. In the absence of the usual number of
superior officers, prompted by an active spirit and the impulsiveness of
his nature, and inspirited by the scenes in which he was placed and to
which he readily adapted himself, he had involuntarily echoed the
encouraging cry of the commander. The seamen, with that instinct which
teaches men the presence of a master spirit, without questioning his
authority, moved with more alacrity, and obeyed his orders without
hesitation. They had borne witness to his courage and fearlessness, his
contempt of death and promptness of action in danger: these were virtues
which, in their eyes, were above all others, and in his case they atoned
for want of years, experience, and seamanship. The charm by which he
governed them, as if by common consent, was simply the exercise of the
same mysterious power which, since the world was made, has governed the
mass of mankind. Decision, bravery, and high moral energy of character!
in one word, _courage_; the attribute through which one man leads a
nation--speaks, and it is so! the dragon of human adoration! an
attribute pre-eminently possessed also by spirits as well as men, and
through the influence of which Lucifer was enabled to lead whole armies
out of Heaven into hell!
"Is not that the bold youth who saved my niece?" asked the earl. "I
think I should know the voice."
"The same, my lord; and, saving your lordship's presence, he is worthy
the hand of any niece, humble or high, whom he so promptly perilled his
life to save; for none but a brave man and a gentleman at heart would do
so noble an act; that's my maxim, my lord."
"Doubtless a true one, Kenard. I shall bear this youth in mind."
"Do so, my lord; and I will, with your leave, set you the example.
Though I am glad of the opportunity, I regret the necessity. My lad!"
"Sir," said the youth, coming forward with his cap in his hand.
"As I am without a third lieutenant, I have promoted you to this rank,
and his lordship will see that your appointment is confirmed in the
right quarter. You were bred upon the sea, and though, perhaps, have
never sailed in a ship, are, I perceive a natural sailor. Now you may go
to your duty, sir."
"Thank you, sir!" said Mark, with manly emotion. He could say no more,
but turned away to hide his tearful gratitude.
"Hear there, forward. Obey this youth, who fills the place of poor
Marston."
"Ay, ay, sir," cried the men, simultaneously; and, as their new officer
walked forward, many a cap was respectfully touched to him, and many a
gray head uncovered before the stripling--such is the tribute true
bravery everywhere receives! so universal is the homage it irresistibly
challenges!
"Do you see, my lord! That lad will make his way, mark me. Observe how
readily he assumes the duties of his station. He is already in the
rigging! going aloft to see that the men are properly fishing the
fore-topmast."
"Your protege shall not want advancement through my forgetfulness, be
assured, Kenard. But why are you so anxiously looking through your glass
to the windward?"
"For the three-masted frigatoon."
"You are doubtless mistaken in her character!"
"I cannot be, my lord. No honest trader in these waters ever had such a
rig. She is a pirate, and, if she is anywhere near us, will be sure to
give us a taste of her quality ere long."
"And we are far less prepared to meet him than before."
"Four guns, and a dozen men and two good officers less, my lord;
nevertheless, we must do what we can to fight him off. That he is in our
neighbourhood somewhere, I am confident. These gentry are like sleuth
hounds; once on your track, double and turn as you will, they never lose
it till they run you down. I believe I see an object in the wake of the
moon, under that cloud to the windward," he suddenly added, looking
steadily through his spyglass. "It is gone. It may have been the cap of
a wave! There, I think I see it again. By--"
"Sail, ho!" shouted Mark, from the fore rigging.
"Where away?" demanded the captain, without removing the glass from his
eye.
"Just in the moon's wake, three points off the weather quarter."
"I see it. 'Tis the same, my lord. I was sure he would not take his eye
off of us. Edwards, see all clear for action. Station all the men you
can spare from working ship at the guns, and select twenty of the best
for boarders. Be prompt. Keep away a point, helmsman. Aloft there! Get
through with your duty and come down. I give you command of the lee
battery, sir," he said to Mark. "Cheerily, men, all! Prepare for battle
with merry hearts, that's my maxim, my lord," he added, turning round to
the nobleman.
"How do you make her out now, Kenard?" asked the earl, who had heard the
announcement of the stranger's vicinage with a pang of anxious
solicitude for the safety of Grace; "I am unable to hold my glass
steadily with this pitching of the ship."
"She is walking this way with a nimble foot," replied the captain, who,
after giving his brief and rapid orders, once more turned to observe the
motions of the strange sail. "She is a three-masted lugger--with her
three huge topsails spread without a reef, ploughing her way towards us,
and sending a cloud of spray to her masthead."
"Is she heavily armed?"
"I cannot see; but above her bulwarks is something like a mass of human
heads."
"How far off is she?"
"Not more than two miles."
"In what time will she overtake us?"
"She must be going seven or eight knots; we do not make more than five,"
he said, glancing over the side. "Probably in two hours' time."
"In two hours! We can increase our sail; you have studding-sails,
captain?"
"But not a stun'sail boom--every deck-spar is washed overboard. Crippled
as I am, I cannot carry one stitch more sail, my lord. We must let him
come an he will, and trust the issue to Providence. That's my maxim, my
lord."
"Providence give us the victory!" said the earl, devoutly.
"Amen!" responded the captain, taking the glass from his eye, and
reverently touching his cap.
The earl immediately went below, and met Grace coming from her stateroom
wrapped in comfortable garments, and enveloped in a hood and cloak.
"My dear niece," he said, taking her hand and leading her to a sofa, "I
have come to prepare you for a scene of trial and danger infinitely
greater than that we have just passed through. Hitherto we have had to
contend with the terrible display of the power of the Almighty, when he
moves upon the deep in his anger--but it was tempered with mercy. We
have now to meet the fiercer passions of men, to whom the word mercy is
unknown."
"Speak, dear uncle!" she said, with a calmness that surprised him. "I
fear not for myself--I have a trust, thanks to my sainted mother, that
places me above all fear of death."
This was spoken with that serene confidence which innocence and purity
alone can wear.
The earl pressed her hand in silence, touched by the sweet simplicity of
her manner, and admiring the sublime hope which elevated her above the
fear that gives bitterness to the cup of life.
"There is a strange vessel bearing down upon us, which the captain has
reason to think is a pirate," he said, with more composure.
Grace turned pale, but betrayed no emotion beyond an upward glance of
her eyes and a movement of her lips, as if in silent prayer.
"It is our intention to fight him, and only surrender with our lives. In
case we should be overcome, and the pirates board us--and I should not
survive to protect you any longer--" Here the earl stopped from emotion,
pressed his niece to his heart, and then hastily added, "you are my
brother's daughter! you have his spirit and decision! I will trust to
you."
"Uncle, speak! explain, my lord!" gasped the young creature, terrified
at his manner rather than his words, which her innocence could not
comprehend.
He drew from his breast a dagger, and silently placed it in her hands.
"For what is this, my lord?" she gasped, half guessing its fearful
meaning.
"You must sacrifice yourself before you suffer these ruffians to lay
hands upon you," he said, with emotion that nearly rendered his words
inaudible.
She clasped her hands over her forehead and stared in his face with a
wild glare--her colourless lips parted with horror--and her whole frame
shivering. Like a thunderbolt, the horrible reality of her situation had
flashed upon her.
"Ha! what? ha! what? ha--wh--" and with a piercing and most
heart-rending shriek she fell upon the cabin floor. He raised her, and
spoke to her in tender accents of sympathy.
"Enough," she gasped--"enough, uncle--say no more."
"Dear niece, be calm!"
"Nay--do not think Grace Fitzgerald is not herself," she said, with
forced calmness. "Uncle!"
"My dear child!" he answered, folding her to his heart.
"Give it me!"
"Oh God!" groaned the earl, overcome with the full realization of the
evil that threatened her. "Must it be, my child?"
"It must. Give me the dagger," she added, with energy. "I will not now
shrink from it--it may yet be, next to Heaven, my best friend."
"Take it, heroic girl--but our danger may not be so great--we may yet
conquer! I feel, when I look on you, and reflect on your helpless state,
the might of a host in my single arm. Ha! there is a gun. I must leave
you for a while. Remain in your stateroom, and both you and your maid be
careful to lie on the floor below the line of shot. God bless you, my
child! Your presence alone should ensure the salvation of the ship."
He embraced her with almost parental affection, tenderly forced her to
enter her stateroom, and closed the door. Then arming himself from his
luggage with a brace of pistols, and buckling on his sword, he hurried
to the deck as the report of a second gun came booming over the sea.
"She has fired, captain?" he said, as he joined the commander on the
quarter-deck, who was looking to windward with his glass.
"A long shot to bring us to. It is plain he takes us for an unarmed
vessel."
"This gives us an advantage, then," said the earl, turning his telescope
in the direction of the stranger, who was plainly visible less than a
mile distant, white with canvass, and fast gaining on the yacht, as she
laboured slowly along under her diminished sail.
"A great one, if we can keep him in ignorance till he is close aboard,"
replied the captain. "By the rood! he comes down bravely. This it is,
your lordship, to have sound spars, and plenty of canvass to hang on
them," he added, looking moodily up, and surveying the bare poles of his
own ship. "You are armed, I see, my lord. It is time I should be. Will
your lordship be so good as to watch his motions. I will be on deck
again in a moment."
He descended to his cabin as he spoke, and soon afterward returned armed
with a cutlass, his head covered with a steel boarding cap, and with a
couple of braces of pistols stuck in a leathern belt buckled round his
waist. He caused his lieutenant and Mark to arm themselves in a similar
manner. Every seaman, also, had a serviceable blade girded to his side,
and one or more pistols in his belt; and harquebusses and cutlasses were
placed on the companion and capstan, ready for indiscriminate use.
Throughout the vessel, every preparation that the time and circumstances
would admit of, or consummate skill on the part of its master could
effect, was made; and every man stood at his post, silently and sullenly
awaiting the approach of the pirate--for such it was now plain to every
one was the character of the advancing stranger.
"There is a flash!" said the earl, who was intently watching the
bucanier.
"No, it is a battle-lantern passed along the decks. He will not fire
again seeing we do not heave to, but run us aboard, and carry us, if he
can, cutlass in hand--this is the mode of fighting with these devils."
"They must not board us, Kenard!" said the earl, with calm
determination in the tone of his voice.
"We will give him a touch of our quality before he comes to close
quarters. An introduction before an intimate acquaintance, is my maxim,
my lord."
"If you give him a broadside, I would suggest, sir, that the battery I
command be added to the guns on the weather side," said Mark, who, while
waiting the attack, had been pacing athwart ships near the cabin door,
as if the presence of Grace in the cabin had something to do with the
choice of his walk.
The captain stared at him a moment; but the respectful tones of the
young man's voice, and the deference of his manner, left no room for
reproof if he had designed to check the boldness of his new lieutenant.
"Born for a seaman, by the rood!" he exclaimed. "Shift the starboard
guns to the weather side, Mr. Edwards. We shall only have a chance of
one full broadside, and it is best to let him have all we can give him.
If you want to be generous, give all you've got, is my maxim, my lord."
By the time the change in the battery was effected, the pirate was
within three cables' length, or a third of a mile of the yacht, and, by
the light of the moon, the decks could be discovered with the naked eye
to be full of men, while her dimensions and rig were distinctly visible.
She was one of that small class of three-masted luggers called
frigatoons, common at the period, with very broad beam and round bows.
She came along with the wind on her starboard quarter, noisily ploughing
the waves before her with her blunt bows, under three huge lugger sails,
covering each mast from deck to truck, a jib, and triangular mizzen
sail not unlike a ship's spanker. The moon shone white on all, while its
rays were reflected in quick flashes here and there, as if from steel,
from amid the dark mass on her decks.
"A fine shot in that dense crowd, Edwards," said the captain. "Give
every man a musket after the broadside is discharged, and let him pick a
red cap for himself."
"Ay, ay, sir," responded the lieutenant, preparing to obey the order.
Silently and steadily, as if no man was in her, the dark hull continued
to approach.
"She is full near for a shot, Kenard," said the nobleman; "I can see the
very faces of the men."
"A man should know the colour of his enemy's eyes before he fights with
him, is my maxim, my lord," he said, coolly levelling his glass. "Let me
single out their captain. Ah, there he stands beside the helmsman, a
grisly old dog, and the moonlight on his weather-beaten features makes
them appear bronzed. There is a youth standing beside him with a glass
at his eye, whom he is speaking to. Ha! the old bucanier is giving
orders to prepare for boarding, I see, by the wave of his cutlass and
the motion of his lips. Now is our time," he added, energetically.
As he spoke he threw down his glass, drew his cutlass, and sprung upon
the companion-way.
"Stand by for a broadside," he shouted, in a voice that reached the
pirate.
"All ready!" answered the two lieutenants, in the same breath.
"Helm a starboard!"
"Starboard 'tis!"
"Steady now!"
"Steady."
"Let them have it!" he shouted, in a clear voice that rung like a
trumpet.
Terrible cries of men taken by surprise, of men wounded and in pain,
followed close the deep-mouthed roar of the guns: the volumes of smoke,
that shot half way towards the pirate, then rolled swiftly back upon the
yacht, and were blown to leeward, leaving a full view of the enemy. His
foremast was hanging over the side; a glaring gash along the hull showed
where a shot had told between wind and water; and a breach in the
forward bulwarks, near the catheads, and the groans of the wounded,
indicated the passage of a raking shot through the mass on deck;
instead, also, of presenting her starboard bow to the range of the
broadside as at first, she had yawed wide of her course, and was
shivering helplessly in the wind.
"Neatly done! We have thrown them into confusion. If we can only keep
her at this distance, we can riddle her like the top of a pepper-box,
and have the pleasure afterward of seeing her go down to Davy's locker,
bodily, before our faces. See your enemy buried handsomely, after you
have done for him, is my maxim, my lord. There it comes," he shouted,
suddenly. "Fall to the deck, all!"
He had hardly spoken, when, amid a loud yell from the pirates, who had
recovered from the surprise of their rough salutation where, apparently,
they had calculated on slight resistance, a heavy broadside was
discharged: the balls came singing through the air, knocking against the
sides of the yacht, and splintering and crashing the upper works,
tearing the decks, wounding the spars, and creating terrible ruin and
confusion, while shrieks of the wounded rose appalling from every part
of the ill-fated vessel. The captain glanced hastily at the poor
fellows that lay bleeding on the decks, then looked up anxiously at his
masts, and leaned over the bulwarks and run his eye along the side of
his vessel to see what injury she had sustained in the hull--for, in his
eye, the wounds of the ship were of infinitely more importance than the
wounds of the men.
"No damage to her timbers; but two poor fellows dead as they ever will
be," he said to the earl, who stood beside him. "Five--six--seven
wounded. Handle that man carefully, you lubbers, or you will do his
business for him before you can get him to the doctor. See that the
wounded are taken at once, and with care, to the cockpit, Mr. Edwards.
Lively, there, at the battery; charge to the muzzle! Now watch the
weather-roll. Fire!"
Again the sides of the yacht belched forth fire and smoke, shaking the
little vessel through every oaken joint.
"Fire away as you load," again shouted the captain. "Let each gun fight
for itself. Take sight at his poles, and bring his huge mainsails down
without giving him the trouble to let go his halyards. Give your foe a
lift when you can, is my maxim, my lord. There, he returns it," he
cried, as a flash illuminated the open decks of the pirate. "Down all!"
The hurricane of iron passed high above their heads, cutting the rigging
and splintering long, slender pieces from the spars. The smoke from the
guns, at the same time, rolled sullenly towards the yacht, hid the
pirate from them, and enveloped the brig in an impenetrable cloud of
sulphurous smoke.
"Stand by, boarders, to repel boarders!" shouted the captain, in a loud,
quick tone. "He will be down upon us in his smoke before we know it. I
thought there was more powder than iron in those guns, my lord, and
suspected there was an object in it. Boarders, all!"
"Boarders!" answered the lieutenant.
"Keep good look-out through the smoke. There it lifts. By the rood! see,
he is close upon us! Put a shot into his fore foot. Lame him, or he'll
be thrusting his snub nose between our ribs."
As the captain spoke, Mark sprang towards the after gun, and levelled it
against the bows of the pirate, who, having made sail under cover of his
smoke towards the yacht, was now within twenty fathoms of her. He
applied the flaming linstock and fired the piece. The shot, taking a
slightly ascending course, struck beneath the bowsprit, tore it from its
bed with its jib, and lodged in the mainmast ten feet from the deck,
nearly severing it in two. Deprived of her jib, the lugger broached to,
and once more presented her broadside to the yacht.
"Give it to him, my lads, before he brings his guns to bear!" shouted
the captain. "Pour in your iron! That's my hearties! You knocked her a
foot out of the water that shot, boys! Quit your guns now; there is no
time to reload! Take to your cutlasses and pistols. We have the rest of
it, lads, at close quarters. We'll show them what it is to board a
king's ship. If your muskets are in the way in the fight, throw 'em
aside and use your English fists! We'll whip them yet! If we believe we
can do a thing, we can do it; that's my maxim, my lord. Your lordship
will now have the pleasure of cutting a score or two of these murderer's
throats, with the advantage of exercise to the muscles. Pleasure with
business is my maxim. Stand ready all! When I give the word, each of you
bring down one of those red devils that are crowding about her bows."
The men replied with loud cheers, and prepared resolutely to receive the
attack.
The pirate, after the loss of his jib, being no longer able to hold a
direct course, drifted towards the yacht, which, being at leeward and
disabled both by the storm and action, was in no situation to choose her
own position, and had, therefore, no other alternative than to lie
passive as she was, and repel as she best could the expected attack.
The bucanier had now ceased firing, not being able to bring any of his
side guns to bear, and converted all his crew into boarders, who crowded
about the forepart of the lugger, ready to leap cutlass in hand on the
deck of the yacht when they should have drifted near enough. The brig
had also ceased her fire, her opponent having skilfully worked out of
the range of her guns, by coming down, as well as his crippled condition
would let him, upon her quarter.
The deck of the pirate was crowded with men, numbering eighty or ninety,
apparently, in all, while the crew of the yacht, exclusive of the
wounded, consisted of less than forty-five. But cool courage and
confidence in the right, opposed to fierce and sanguinary passions in an
evil cause, count to the righteous side in a battle for twice the number
of opponents. The earl trembled for the issue. But the brave Kenard,
with his knowledge of the spirit of his men, and his confidence in their
English courage and in their contempt for pirates, whom he gave them the
credit of despising as cordially as he himself did, gave not an anxious
thought about the result, assured that, if each man did his duty,
victory would side with the honest and brave. During the exchange of
broadsides, he had kept his place on the quarter-deck, encouraging his
men by his cheering voice: the earl was also beside him, scarcely less
energetic in inspiring the crew with his own spirit. The first
lieutenant was actively engaged, sword in hand, in directing the fire of
the battery; while Mark, who was in a new element, flamed with the
fierce fire of war, and seemed, amid the smoke and roar of battle, to
have been suddenly endued with a new and sublime character. He was
everywhere where his presence was most needed, encouraging and cheering
on the men both by his voice and example; but, notwithstanding his
animation and fire, was as cool and collected in the sagacious orders he
gave as the oldest veteran.
But, with all his devotion to the fight, he forgot not that the cabin
contained a lovely creature, helpless as she was beautiful, whose life
depended on the issue of that night's conflict. Though his heart may
have been proof against her charms, being shielded with the proof-plate
of another's love, yet he felt an interest akin to love in her fate. She
was the cousin of Kate! She had expressed an interest in him that he
could never forget! He had saved her life! It was a second time
endangered! These were all motives to sympathy; and, properly nurtured,
the germes were there from which might spring a tenderer and deeper
feeling. But he had no room in his breast for a second love. There was
but one polar star to the eye of his affections; and steadily he steered
the bark of his hopes towards it, although, like the north star of the
mariner, the farther and nearer he sailed in its direction, it would
higher and higher ascend the skies, mocking his aspiring ambition.
Nevertheless, he resolved to steer steadily onward, even if he should
perish at last amid the icebergs of her cold and wintry affections. But
whatever a lover, in the warmth of his affections, may sincerely feel
and solemnly vow--love unrequited, like the Persian flower, that withers
when the sun is hidden by a passing cloud, without the warmth of its sun
will speedily die. Time, in the present instance, will test the truth of
this proposition.
The vessels were now within twenty feet of each other, the pirate rising
heavily on each wave, and surging nearer and nearer at every heave of
the sea. Silence was broken only at intervals by a groan from a wounded
bucanier, and terrible expectation hung over the two vessels. The moon
at length broke from a cloud and lighted up the scene. There were beauty
and peace floating on her silvery beams; but the passions of men
reigned, and their souls were closed to everything bright and lovely.
Yet they hailed her light with a shout, for by it foe was able to see
foe nearly with the distinctness of noonday.
"Now pour in your fire!" shouted the cool Kenard to his crew; "aim
wherever you can see the glitter of an eye!"
The bows of the pirate vessel were within an oar's length of the yacht's
larboard and weather quarter as this order was given, and a dozen
half-naked, savage-looking men were just in the act of leaping into the
main rigging. The simultaneous discharge of pistols, muskets, and
blunderbusses was like the explosion of a volcano, and but one third of
the bucaniers succeeded in springing alive into the chains: the
remainder plunged, dead ere they struck the surface, into the sea. The
fire was answered by a loud yell from the pirates, and a few straggling
shots only from pistols; for these demons seemed to trust more to their
dangerous cutlasses in their wild conflicts than to firearms. They now
pressed forward over the bows in dark swarms. From every part of her
that offered any prospect of reaching the yacht, they leaped without
waiting for the vessels to come together, with cries and execrations
most appalling, into the main chains, or sprang for the bulwarks,
catching recklessly by their hands at whatever offered. Many fell short
into the sea, or were hurled into it by those who met them; some leaped
overboard, swam to the side, and drew themselves up by the rigging that
hung over the water, but fell back with curses and cries of pain,
leaving their hands, severed at the wrists and dripping with gore,
clinging to the rope. Grappling-irons were thrown on deck, but were cast
overboard by the crew before they could be entangled; and wherever a
pirate struck the side of the yacht with his foot, he was opposed by one
of its defenders.
Three times the Earl of Bellamont sheathed his sword in the breasts of
as many of these ferocious beings and cast them backward dead into the
sea, and as a fourth, who had thrown himself bodily upon the
quarter-deck, made a tremendous stroke at him with his yataghan, he blew
out his brains with a pistol. Everywhere, in their first daring attempt
to board them, were they encountered with equal resolution and success,
and of the twenty pirates that by some means or other succeeded in
reaching the brig, not one retained a foothold on her decks--every
individual of them being either slain outright, or hurled maimed into
the water, where several swam about amid dark spots of blood, lifting
their handless limbs, and in vain calling to their comrades to take them
on board. The fate of these checked for a moment the ardour of the
remainder, and they waited till the vessels should come together before
making a second attempt.
The pirate, who had some time before dropped his lugsails, to prevent
his shooting past the yacht, towards which the waves were slowly urging
him, was now lifted and dashed with great violence against it, striking
her on her quarter, carrying away her bulwarks, and opening her planks
in several places.
"Throw yourselves into her now," shouted the pirate chief, leaping
forward and waving his cutlass. "Flesh your blades in their carcasses!
Give no quarter to beards--but spare bright eyes! Board! board! clamber
over each other's backs--press on, press on! Follow your young leader.
He will shame the best of ye!"
Like a crew of demons, yelling and shouting menaces of death, mingled
with horrible execrations and oaths of vengeance for their slaughtered
comrades, they obeyed the energetic and sanguinary orders of their
chief. They were headed by the pirate's first lieutenant and a youth
with long fair hair, which, in the light of the moon, shone like silver,
who, with strange recklessness of life, cast himself from the bows as
they approached the side of the yacht, and fell feet foremost into the
midst of a grove of sharp steel, amid a shower of balls, that, while
they told in the bodies of his followers, seemed to pass him as if he
carried a charmed life. The old pirate captain himself headed another
party near the stern of his vessel, which was slowly swinging round
towards the yacht's bows, apparently for the purpose, when it should
come in contact, of boarding on the forecastle. Here stood Edwards the
lieutenant, with a force of fifteen men to oppose him; while midships,
and near the companion-way, Mark was stationed at the head of a third of
the yacht's crew, and, acting as a reserve, was prepared to throw in the
weight of his numbers as should be required, either on the forecastle or
the quarter-deck, at which latter point, at the head of an equal
number, stood the captain, supported by the earl's good blade, ready to
repel the attempt to board from the bows of the pirate.
More like devils incarnate than human beings, the pirates followed their
young leader, and cast themselves from the bows, some running over the
heads of their comrades and leaping on board; some, more active,
flinging somersets through the air into the melee; and all rushing,
crowding, and falling upon the deck in every possible attitude,
seemingly indifferent, so that the yacht's decks received them, whether
they landed head foremost or upright on their feet. Such a torrent of
desperate men was irresistible. The defenders of the quarter-deck were
borne down by the mere weight of the assailants' bodies, or their
cutlasses were turned aside like feathers as they were levelled to meet
this novel and terrible human storm. Immediately in advance of himself
and the earl, the captain had placed half a dozen men with pikes, the
bristly points of which served to protect, in some measure, their
position by turning to one side the current of boarders.
The conflict now became most terrible and sanguinary. The crew, that had
been borne down by the first shock, had recovered their feet, and nearly
every man was instantly struggling with a bucanier. Kenard fought like a
lion, thrice clearing a space around him in which he could sweep his
cutlass. The earl, at length, seeing some of the pirates rushing to the
companion-way and attempting to force it, placed his back against it,
and met their fierce lunges with well-directed thrusts, turning aside
their descending strokes aimed at his head, with the skill of a
swordsman and the coolness of a soldier. He fought not only on the
defensive, but his eye was quick to see where any of his own party
within his reach were being worsted, and his blade was instant in its
service of relieving them from their mortal peril. Every sweep of his
blade was fatal, for he fought for one dear to his heart whose life and
honour were at stake.
For some time the battle was waged with doubtful success. At one moment
the pirates, who, after the first wild charge, had formed into a body,
would be driven over the side, and at another they would press the
defending party towards the stern. Their youthful leader, who was
everywhere present, cheering them on with animating cries as often as
they were beaten back towards their own vessel, was at length opposed to
Kenard face to face.
"I would not slay a youth like thee if I could help it," he said,
parrying his attack, and endeavouring to close with him, and wrest the
cutlass from his grasp.
"Thou shalt have no space left for compunction if thou shouldst," said
the other, avoiding his grasp, and making a lunge at his neck, which he
grazed with his blade.
"Have at thee, then, if such be thy play! give as you get, is my maxim,
my lord!" he added, looking round as usual when he gave utterance to a
maxim, to catch the earl's attention.
But his lordship was too busily defending himself and the companion-way
against a gigantic and active Frenchman to acknowledge the usual appeal.
The turning of his head gave the youthful pirate an advantage, of which
he availed himself. With great dexterity, he twisted with his cutlass
the weapon out of his grasp, and sent it flying through the air into the
sea. He was about to follow up his advantage by sheathing his blade in
his breast, when it was struck up by an intervening one, and turning
round, the young pirate found himself confronted with the Earl of
Bellamont, who, having that instant freed himself from his assailants,
was looking round to see where his sword would be of most service, when
he discovered the peril of the captain. His presence had an electric
effect on the youthful bucanier. He started back with an exclamation of
surprise, and half repeated the name of the nobleman. But instantly he
checked himself, and successfully parried the pass he made at him,
retreating at the same time, and acting wholly on the defensive. The
earl wondered at his exclamation and at the sound of his voice, which
reminded him of a familiar one. This sudden change in the tactics of one
who hitherto seemed to know only how to advance and attack, also
surprised him; and, although he surveyed him closely, as the drifting
clouds across the moon let it shine brightly at intervals, his features
were so shaded by a drooping bonnet, and so black and begrimed by the
blood and smoke of battle, that his scrutiny was defeated.
"Nevertheless," thought he to himself, "have I heard that voice and seen
that form before!"
Inspired as much by curiosity to ascertain who it was that revived such
indefinable associations, as by a desire to put an end to a dangerous
foe, he pressed him hard. With all the youthful bucanier's coolness and
skill, he had been wellnigh worsted, never returning back a blow for
those the earl gave him so freely, when a loud shout from the forecastle
caused every combatant on the quarter-deck to suspend his descending
stroke, withhold his deadly thrust, or leave, half-sheathed, his sword
in the body of his antagonist. As the earl paused to look for the cause
of this fresh outcry, he saw that the lugger's stern had at length came
in contact with the bows of the yacht, and that the pirates, headed by
their old chief, were pouring across the bulwarks and leaping upon the
deck, wild with fury and thirsting for blood. Hitherto chafing with
inaction, and roused to a fearful pitch of excitement by the spectacle
and uproar of the combat from which they were withheld, like tigers
chained in an arena panting to mingle in the fierce conflict of their
species, terrific and overpowering in proportion to the length and
impatience of their restraint, was their first onset. The little band
under Edwards, who had reserved their energies for this moment, drew
back to the opposite side of the vessel to escape the tumultuous fall of
their almost flying bodies on the deck, and poured in upon them a fatal
fire of pistols and harquebusses.
"Now at them, my brave fellows, with your cutlasses," he cried; "throw
away your pistols, and grapple while they are crowded together! Set upon
the rascals, and give a good account of them!"
With a shout, they charged in a body, and a terrific and sanguinary
contest ensued. Mark, with his division, hitherto had not been idle. He
saw that the fate of the yacht would depend on the reception given to
the last boarding-party, headed by the old pirate chief himself, and
wished therefore to husband the strength of his men until this crisis.
Nevertheless, while he was anxiously watching the lugger as its stern
drifted round, he was present with two or three of his best men, to turn
the tide of the combat on the quarter-deck, as it went now against the
earl, now against the captain; and several times he received, in the
hottest of the fight, the warm acknowledgments of both for the
promptness in which he effected diversions in their favour. It now came
to his turn to enter more closely into the combat.
No sooner did the boarders find themselves in a mass on the forecastle
of the brig, than they separated into two bodies, one of which received
the charge of, and entered into fierce fight with, the division under
Edwards; while the other, consisting of twenty men, headed by the pirate
in person, made a rush aft to carry the quarter-deck. Here a few of
their comrades were fighting at a disadvantage under their youthful
leader, who, taking the advantage of the earl's pause at the shout of
the fresh boarders, had again mingled among his few remaining men, who
were defending themselves on the opposite side of the deck against a
much larger number of their antagonists.
Mark had anticipated the charge, and had formed his men in a firm
phalanx to meet it. The first line consisted of five men, who just
filled up the passage between the launch and the forward larboard gun,
along which the pirates were advancing. Besides their cutlasses, they
were armed with boarding-pikes, which protruded three feet in advance. A
second and third line were armed with cutlasses and pistols. Their young
leader himself sprung upon the gun as the rush was made, and in a cool,
steady tone of voice, said,
"Stand firm, pikemen. Never mind their cutlasses; your comrades behind
will take care of your heads. Now they come! Give them your pistols!" he
exclaimed, as the bucaniers came upon them like a wedge, as if they
would cleave bodily through their centre. They were checked by the
advanced pikes, and thrown into confusion by the discharge of a dozen
pistols, which they instantly returned with scarcely half as many,
without material effect.
"Cut them down. Let not a handful of cowards put ye back. No quarter!
Down with them! Strike off the poles of their pikes! Close with them,"
shouted the old pirate chief.
A second rush was made with better success. The old bucanier shivered
with his cutlass, as if they had been pipe-stems, two of the
pike-staffs, and the front line of men gave back.
"Drop your pikes and take your blades!" shouted Mark, at the same time
discharging his pistols at the pirate chief and wounding him in the
shoulder.
The combat was now waged with terrible ferocity.
"Fight hard, or we shall be routed!" cried Mark, with energy. "Stand
steady, men! Keep your ground, or you will be cut to pieces. Stand! fly
not, on your lives! One good blow--All is lost!" he suddenly cried, as
he saw the men give back before the obstinate attack of the pirates.
Leaping from the gun into the midst, he dealt blows as if he had the
strength of a Hercules, and essayed to stop, with his single arm and the
intervention of his body, their onward and victorious course. But the
impetus was already given, and they bore him forward with his men in a
dense mass, so crowded together that no man could use his weapon. They
were driven aft and upon the quarter deck, where the captain came to his
aid and succeeded in rallying them for the defence of this important
post. At the same instant the youthful pirate, seeing the success of his
party, called his followers from their unequal contest, and leaped down
with them among his crew, leaving half his men dead behind him.
On the forecastle Edwards fought for a while with success, and had
nearly beaten the pirates back to their vessel, when the victorious
shouts of the conquering party gave them renewed spirit, and filled the
minds of the crew with sudden panic. The bucaniers, taking advantage of
their hesitation, in their turn became the assailants; and the men,
completely routed, fled towards the quarter-deck, cutting their way
with the desperation of fear through the party that besieged it, and,
with the loss of a third of their number, succeeded in reaching it.
The whole of that portion of the yacht forward of the quarter-deck was
now in possession of the pirates, a portion of whom began to force open
the hatches; while the majority, under the direction of the chief and
his youthful lieutenant, prepared to carry this last post, which was
elevated four feet above the main deck, by forming their men into two
divisions, and attacking it on both sides of the companion-way at the
same time.
The earl, Mark, and the captain, though all three were wounded more or
less severely, the latter supporting his left arm in a sling, assembled
their force, now diminished to twenty men, to meet the escalade. The
pirates, with yells of vengeance for their slaughtered comrades, began
to bring to the assault loose spars, sails, and whatever they could lay
hands on, which they heaped against the wall the deck presented. The
harness-casks were rolled up, made firm, and covered with rolls of
canvass; and the hatches, which some of them had torn off for the
purpose of descending to plunder the hold, were laid against it, to aid
them in constructing a glacis.
"Bring along those carcasses! pile them up here!" shouted the old chief,
ferociously. "We will yet make a fair run of it."
The bodies of the dead, both of pirates and the crew of the yacht, were
eagerly dragged forward and thrown on the pile, and it was soon raised
so that the quarter-deck could be gained erect and sword in hand without
the danger to which they would be exposed in climbing a barrier so well
guarded.
"Now, men, make a run for it and sweep the deck!" he shouted.
The pirates retreated a few steps in two parties, headed by the old
chief and his young lieutenant, and, with a yell, rushed forward and up
the human glacis to the quarter-deck. But they were met with a
resolution that matched their own ferocity, and several of them fell
back dead, adding their own bodies to the pile they had the moment
before assisted in constructing. A few battled for a few seconds, giving
and receiving wounds, but were finally pressed back to the main deck. In
the assault, Mark and the young pirate leader had once crossed weapons;
but, ere they could exchange passes, the latter was forced back by the
retreat of his own party.
"Let them maintain the deck if they will," said the chief to his young
lieutenant; "we have the command of the cabin and hold. Keep them busy
while I force the companion-way, and see what kind of a prize she will
prove. I little thought we had engaged with a king's ship, but we must
now make the most of it. I have lost men enough for one night's work,
and don't care to make a capture of the yacht if I can get anything of
value out of her. So keep them employed on the quarter-deck till I take
a cruise through the cabins."
As he spoke he gave orders for his men to force a spar from the doors of
the companion-way which the earl had braced against it.
"Hold there, fiends!" cried the nobleman, as he saw these demonstrations
of the pirate's intentions.
He sprung forward as he spoke, and with a blow of his cutlass clove the
scull of a bucanier, who was wrenching the lock with a pike-head, so
that it fell in two parts over either shoulder. He aimed a second blow
at the pirate chief so suddenly that the point of the blade laid open
his cheek, and an active movement to one side only saved his head from
flying from his shoulders: at the same instant, a pistol-ball, fired by
the chief, struck the earl near the knee, and he fell over into the arms
of Mark.
The doors at once were forced open, and the old leader, accompanied by
two or three of his men, descended to the cabin.
"To the rescue! To the rescue!" shouted Mark, on seeing them disappear,
letting the earl down gently upon the deck.
"Protect or slay her, young man, and I will bless thee!" cried the earl,
faintly.
He made no reply to the earl's words; and, heedless whether he was
followed or not, leaped, cutlass in hand, through the top of the
companion-way, and lighted on his feet at the bottom of the stairs.
The doors of the first cabin were open, and a glance showed him two of
the pirates rifling the baggage of the earl, and the chief in the act of
forcing the inner door leading to the stateroom occupied by Grace.
Poor maiden! how had she been occupied during the fearful conflict above
and around her? How had she borne the terrific sounds of battle? From
the first moment of the fight she had been kneeling in silent
prayer--bearing on her heart's orisons the names of her uncle, and of
one, though of lowly origin, not less dear to her. Of herself she
scarcely thought: but at every report of cannon, every discharge of
musketry, she shuddered for those who were exposed to the dreadful
horrors of the fight. Her maid had become insensible through
overpowering terror. Terror, too, was acutely felt by herself, but it
was modified and subdued by the bright hopes of religion. She feared
not death. "The sting of death is sin." She knew no sin! For her it
could have no terrors. Nature, indeed, shrunk at contemplating its
violent dissolution; but the glorious certainties of a new life beyond
this reconciled her to put this away for that better one. She expected
to die within the hour--perhaps _by her own hand_! The dagger her uncle
had given her was hidden in her bosom, and, as she knelt, her grasp was
firmly laid upon its hilt. Long, long and terrible had been the conflict
to her ears--more terrible, perhaps, than if she had witnessed it. Its
sanguinary horrors were indeed hidden from her sight; but her
imagination, with its hundred eyes, aided by the horrid sounds that
reached her, reflected the scene upon her dizzy brain in colours, if it
could be possible, more dreadful than the reality. Who can imagine the
effect upon her of the loud roar of the cannon vibrating through every
oaken nerve of the vessel, and filling its hollow decks with a noise
more awful than the thunder that explodes at her feet. Who can conceive
the fearful shrinking of the heart at the rush of the balls--the sound
of the crashing decks--the wild and unearthly shrieks of the
wounded--the moans of the dying--the fierce yells of the combatants--and
all the thousand and terrific sounds that assimilate war to the hellish
pastime of accursed spirits. Who is there that, not participating in its
mad excitement, calmly witnesses a battle, that will not turn away in
disgust and horror, be ready to deny his humanity, and to believe men
neither more nor less than demons incarnate?
When the cabin doors burst open, she hurriedly committed her soul to
Heaven, and, rising from her knees, held the friendly dagger above her
virgin bosom, and stood facing the closed doors of her cabin, feeling
that the crisis of her fate was approaching its consummation.
The entrance of Mark into the forward cabin was not perceived by the
pirates nor their chief. With a blow of his cutlass he nearly severed
the head of one that was leaning over a chest, and, before the other
could rise, the ball of his pistol had laid him across the body of his
comrade. The next instant he was opposed to the terrible pirate leader
himself.
"Ha, my young fledging!" cried he, his cutlass descending with
tremendous force, and with a fatal accuracy of aim, that would have
cleft him to the chine had it taken effect; but, with youthful activity,
he avoided the stroke which he could not avert, and the point of the
pirate's weapon buried itself so deep in the floor of the cabin that he
was unable to extricate it. Mark instantly availed himself of this
singular advantage, and, quicker than lightning, sheathed his blade in
his heart.
"Oh! villain, you have done for me!" he cried, pressing his hand on his
side, through which the crimson tide rushed in an irresistible torrent.
He staggered as he spoke, and a lurch of the vessel at the same moment
sent him headlong, breaking his sword off close to the floor as he fell
with it in his grasp, upon the bodies of his men.
"Courage! my lady!" said Mark, bounding to the door, and speaking in the
triumphant tones of success. "Their leader is slain! we shall soon clear
the vessel of his base herd! Courage!"
"Bless you for these words of hope! You are safe! and my uncle! how
fares my dear uncle?"
Before he could reply the companion-stairway was filled with pirates.
"A female voice!" shouted one, as he entered the cabin.
"Love and ransom," cried another, with a sensual laugh.
"We will draw lots for her, Hans."
"The captain has saved us that trouble," growled a third. "Ho! who have
we here?" he cried, seeing Mark, with his dripping cutlass in his hand,
standing resolutely with his back against the door of the stateroom.
"Our captain is slain!" cried another, fiercely, now for the first time
seeing the body of his chief lying in its gore.
The pirates for a moment forgot Mark, and gathered around their fallen
leader. They raised him up, and his head fell back helpless upon his
shoulder, and his eyes glared with the fixed stare of death.
"He is dead! His sword is broken. Let us avenge the old man!" they
cried, with one voice. "Ha! here is the point of his weapon, that ne'er
failed him before, sticking in the deck, and he hath been taken at
vantage ere he could draw it out."
"He who hath done this for thee, old man, shall die by my hand!" said
one of them, letting him fall again.
With one accord, their glances rested on Mark, and he was fiercely
attacked by the one who had last spoken and another, while the remainder
commenced breaking open chests in search of treasure. For a few seconds
he defended himself with great skill and courage. But, being hard
pressed, and twice severely wounded by his fierce opponents, he became
faint with loss of blood; his head swam; his eyes became dim; he grew
bewildered, and struck at random. His assailants saw their advantage,
and one of them made a final lunge at his breast to transfix him. But,
ere the blow could take effect, he sunk sideways to the floor, and
falling behind the hangings, the blade buried itself within the door of
the cabin.
"Curses light on the foul steel! Finish him, Renard."
"He is done for," said the other, sheathing his blade through the
curtain.
"Now for the woman! His mistress, I dare say, he fought so like a lion.
I will try and console her for his loss," he added, with a laugh.
The fall of its brave defender left the way undisputed to the inner
cabin. With united efforts, they forced open the slightly-secured leaves
of the door. Grace stood before them in an attitude of sublime
self-sacrificing, her eyes raised heavenward full of hope and faith,
while the uplifted dagger was in the act of descending into her bosom.
The foremost pirate instantly comprehended her purpose. Quick as
lightning, he leaped forward, and, with his cutlass, struck the weapon
from her grasp as it was entering her bosom.
"By the Virgin! that was skilfully done, Renard!" said the other. "You
have won her fairly."
"And he who would have her must win her from me," he continued, with
dogged resolution, catching her as, with a shriek of hopeless despair
and wretchedness unspeakable, she was falling to the deck.
"A sweet voice, but somewhat loud!" said the other, with a laugh. "Ho!
what have we here? Another prize," he exclaimed, descrying the helpless
maid. "Smaller game! but not the less welcome. Dead, for a guilder! No,
she breathes! We are lucky, Renard. It will cost us some hard knocks to
keep possession of our prizes."
"We have no captain now, and each man is for himself."
"Not quite. Our new fighting lieutenant will command us now; and suppose
he should, as he is like to do, take a fancy to your bit of womankind?"
"He will first have to fancy me!" said the other, menacingly. "Nor shall
he command me while men older than he are in the lugger."
"He will have a word to say on that score, and here he comes to speak
for himself."
He had scarcely spoken ere the young pirate made his appearance in the
cabin. The shriek of Grace had drawn him from the deck, where he had
been defending the entrance to the companion-way against the whole force
of the yacht, under the captain and the earl--the danger menacing his
niece having suddenly restored the latter to almost supernatural
strength, and a fierceness of spirit that rose superior to physical
suffering. With his wound hastily bound up, he had once more joined in
the fight, and was foremost in battling with those who opposed his
passage to the cabin. Repeatedly his life was exposed, but saved by the
voice of the young leader, forbidding his men to harm him; and even in
the heat, and noise, and fury of battle, their wild spirits
involuntarily yielded obedience to a voice that seemed formed to command
and to be obeyed.
With flashing eyes he entered the stateroom, and his glance rested on
the lifeless form of Grace, clasped in the arms of the pirate Renard.
"I am right! It is she!" he cried. "Release your prize, villain!"
"You say well, boy; she is my prize," he answered, with a menacing look.
"Ha!" shouted the youth.
Quicker than thought he sprang upon him, got within his sword arm,
seized him by the throat, closed with him, and buried his sabre to its
hilt in his chest.
"So have I washed out the pollution of thy touch on this fair
creature," he said, attempting to disengage Grace from his hold as he
fell backward.
But his arm so firmly encircled her, that he was forced to sever the
tendons of it with his cutlass before he could release her from this
horrible embrace of lust and death.
"Oh God!" he said, involuntarily, "that I should be an actor in such a
scene as this. Yet my presence here has been her preservation. I will
save her and protect her now, even with the life of the captain!"
"His life is already ended," said the bucanier, who, on witnessing the
fate of his comrade, had quietly dropped the lifeless form of the maid
where he had found her.
He pointed as he spoke to his body.
"Dead!" exclaimed the youth. "Then am I chief here. I will save, for her
sake, all that are left alive. But she shall not know me! She shall ever
be ignorant to whom she is indebted. Yet methinks I would like to send
by her a message to the haughty daughter of the house of Bellamont."
This was spoken with bitter irony. "But I must try to restore her."
He poured a vase of water over her forehead, and moistened her lips, and
she revived.
"Where am I? What has transpired? Who--how--where--"
She glanced wildly around, and everything that had passed flashed upon
her mind. She bounded from him with a deplorable cry, and covered her
face with her hands. "Mercy, oh God! mercy!"
"Grace!" he said, in a gentle tone.
"Who speaks? who?"
"Grace!"
"Thou art no enemy! Bless thee for the sound of thy voice. Tell me what
has happened? Where is my uncle? Oh, speak as if life hung on thy
words."
"The Earl of Bellamont is living."
"Heaven, I thank thee! And this dead body?"
"I have protected thee from a fate worse than death, with the life of
this man."
"Who--who art thou? I should know that voice," she exclaimed, with
returning confidence and hope, gazing upon his now swarthy and
disfigured features which defeated her scrutiny, deeply shaded, too, as
they were by his bonnet, which he pulled farther over his brows.
"An outcast, unworthy a thought from innocence and purity like thee."
"Yet you are my friend. How came you here?"
"To save thee!"
"I am confused, puzzled, perplexed! your voice, your air! I know not
what to think or say. A pirate boarded us, and you--you are not a
pirate. Oh, my uncle! my dear uncle! Heaven be thanked, you are safe!"
she cried, darting forward and flinging herself into his arms as he
entered the cabin, literally covered with blood, while behind him
crowded a dark mass of pirates, through whom he had cut his way.
"How fares it with thee, my child?" he cried, with anxiety, pressing her
to his breast.
"Safe from all but terror!"
"God bless thee! we will die together; there is no hope. Come on, ye
fiends, now," he cried, turning upon his foes with one arm entwined
about her, and brandishing his cutlass in the calm defiance of despair.
They rushed upon him with a shout.
"Back!" cried the clear, commanding voice of their young leader, in a
tone that arrested every advancing foot and suspended every cutlass
mid-air. "Look! there lies your late captain in his blood! Your first
lieutenant is slain. I am now your leader. Obey me. Stand back, all of
ye!" The men sullenly dropped their weapons and retreated to the foot of
the stairs. "Earl of Bellamont! you and your niece are, from this
moment, safe. Your yacht shall be instantly cleared of every man but its
own crew, and you shall be at liberty to sail on your course. Call upon
your captain for a cessation of hostilities on deck, while I draw off my
men."
The astonished earl immediately obeyed.
"Who are you, mysterious young man?" he asked, turning to him after
communicating his request to the captain. "Your voice and air are
familiar."
"It matters not, my lord. I have saved thy niece from violence, and
would, had I the power, earlier have put an end to this scene of
bloodshed. Bid your captain call his crew to the quarter-deck, while I
pass to my own vessel with my men."
The order, with the object of it, was repeated to the captain.
"Ay, ay!" he replied from the deck. "Let them go, with a left-handed
blessing. But what has changed the devils about so? Have they had
fighting enough?"
"We have mistaken the character of your vessel," said the young leader,
evasively.
"Ha! you are there, my lion's cub, and can speak like a Christian, too.
A little fighting always makes a man feel more civilized, is my maxim,
my lord," he said, looking down upon them through the skylight.
"To your own vessel, men!" said the youth, sternly. "Throw down that
casket! Take not with you the value of a groat. Go as you came, with
only your arms in your hands."
The men looked at each other, and surveyed their athletic young chief,
who stood like a youthful Mars, with the look and bearing of resolute
command. His eye rested for an instant on each man, as he saw their
hesitation, with a searching and terrible glance, and, as each one
encountered it, he turned his eyes away and silently obeyed. As the last
man left the cabin, he said,
"Some of you return, and bear your captain's body to the decks of your
own vessel. Lay him decently along the quarter-deck."
Four of the pirates came back, and raised it without a word, while he
stood quietly by, leaning on his sabre.
"Michael," he said, to one who seemed to take the lead of the rest, "I
make you, for the present, second in command. Have the wounded conveyed
to the lugger, and the dead thrown into the sea. Be ready to cut clear
of the yacht at a moment's warning; and, with what time you have, repair
damages and get sail on. Work will keep the men from thinking of
mischief. Go! and see that I am obeyed. I shall instantly follow you."
The bucanier departed with ready obedience to the will of the lofty
spirit that had at once assumed such irresistible power over his mind.
The earl and Grace listened with surprise to the stern authority with
which he governed such fierce men, and witnessed with wonder the entire
control he seemed to possess over their wills. The former gazed on him
for a few seconds as he stood beneath the swinging lamp, his features
thrown into the deepest shadow by the falling brim of his bonnet and his
drooping plume, and then spoke:
"Mysterious and wonderful young man, whoever you are, we owe you much.
This life of crime and horror is not your sphere. There is humanity
about you. Tell me," he added, with irresistible curiosity, "who are
you?"
"A _bastard_!"
It is impossible to convey the manner and emphasis with which this word
was articulated. It expressed volumes to both uncle and niece. It told a
dark history of shame, scorn, and disgrace; explained why, being so
above them by nature, he herded with the basest. A painful tale of moral
wrong and suffering it unfolded to their imaginations, save that they
knew not his name or family. They read from his brief confession all
that could have been told them. The earl sighed, shook his head, and was
silent. Grace looked upon him with pity.
He contemplated for a moment the effect of this disclosure, and then,
turning haughtily away, said,
"The service I have done you is cancelled by your discovery of the
baseness of the instrument. There is debt on neither side. Adieu, my
lord--adieu, Lady Grace Fitzgerald."
"How know you my name and rank?"
"And _mine_!" simultaneously exclaimed both.
"It matters not. Thou wilt learn full soon enough to scorn as well as
pity me."
With these words he departed. The yacht was cleared of its piratical
horde, and the two vessels separated, and soon were steering on opposite
courses.
END OF BOOK I.
BOOK II.
THE EFFECT.
"'Twas in the third King William's time,
When many a pirate bold
Committed on the seas the crime
Of shedding blood for gold."
"My name is Captain Kyd,
As I sailed, as I sailed:
My name is Captain Kyd,
And so wickedly I did,
God's laws I did forbid
When I sailed."
OLD BALLAD.
BOOK II.
CHAPTER I.
"All in the olden time."
"Our ancestors smoked long pipes, wore breeches and buckles, spoke
in a strange tongue, and were called Dutchmen; for what saith the
chronicle?
"Dutchmen lived in those days in Nieuve-Amsterdam."
Five years have elapsed since the events narrated in the last book
transpired. In the interim, the seed then sown has had time to ripen to
the germe; the germe to bud, and blossom, and bear fruit: youth has
advanced to manhood; the characters then forming, formed; and the
effects of the various causes then in operation fully wrought, and
apparent to every eye. The scene, as well as the time of the story, is
now changed, and, with its actors, transformed from the Old to the New
World.
In the year 1695, William the Third appointed Richard, Earl of
Bellamont, governor of the province of New-York. He did not, however,
receive his commission until eighteen months afterward, nor arrive in
his government until April, 1698. At this period the American coast,
from New-England to the Capes of Virginia, were infested by a daring
bucanier, who not only swept the seas with his fast-sailing vessel, but
frequently run boldly, in open day, into the harbours of New-York,
Boston, and Newport. To such an extent did his depradations reach, so
fearful became the terrible name of "Kyd," that at length the fisherman
feared to launch his boat, the mariner to spread his sail, and citizens
trembled for their safety within the very centre of their fortified
towns.
Such being the state of things, Lord Bellamont, on assuming the
administration of colonial affairs, was especially instructed by the
English government to make use of all the means placed at his command to
remedy an evil so alarming, and fraught with consequences so fatal to
the growth and prosperity of the colonies. For this purpose, immediately
after his arrival at New-York, he had despatched the light-armed vessel
which had brought him over from England in pursuit of the pirate.
She had been absent some time, and her arrival in the bay was hourly and
anxiously looked for by the honest Dutch citizens. As the time for her
return drew nigh, it was the custom of certain of these worthies, after
the humble occupations of the day were over, to assemble at eventide
about the stoope of _frau_ Jost Stoll's tavern by the water side, and
with their long pipes supported in their mouths with one hand, and a mug
of double beer or mum held in the other, steadfastly to gaze down the
bay, in expectation of the return of the crusier, the while gravely
discussing their doubts of the bold bucanier's captivation by mortal
ship; and by times relieving their discourse with dark tales of his
marvellous and bloody exploits on the high seas.
Before entering further upon this division of the story, it perhaps may
be necessary, for the proper understanding of it, to describe New-York
as it was at this period. On the north side of the present Wall-street
there extended from East River, then called Salt River, to the North
River, a palisade ten feet high, constructed of piles firmly driven
into the earth, strengthened and sustained by crosspieces of timber. The
interstices were filled with earth and stone, and it was in every part
ball-proof. South of this palisade lay all that then was New-York.
Beyond were forests, and a vast tract called "King's Farms," now
embraced between Canal and Liberty streets. This wall was perforated
midway between the two rivers by a gateway, through which passed the
road to Albany: this avenue is now called Broadway. At the eastern
extremity of the wall, at the foot of Wall-street, and facing the water,
was a half-moon fort, called a Rondeel: another was at Coenties-slip, or
"Countess-slip," so called in honour of the fair Lady of Bellamont; and
a third, equidistant from it, on the site of what is now the corner of
State-street and the Battery. From Broadway, west, there was a sloping
shore to the beach, there being neither wharf nor landing on this side
of the town; and on the south, the tides came up nearly to the iron gate
of the Battery that at present opens into Broadway--the site of the
present "Marine Park" being at low tide a sandy beach strewn with vast
fragments of rock, and called "The Ledge," where fishermen spread their
nets and dried their fish.
At the foot of Broad-street, then called "Here Graft," and at that time
the principal street of New-Amsterdam, were two great docks, called
"West" or "East Dock," as they chanced to be on the east or west side of
Broad-street. Through this street nearly to Wall-street also run a
creek, widened into a canal, and spanned by bridges wherever it was
intersected by streets. Near the head of this canal was the abode of the
city ferryman, who conveyed passengers in a wherry either to the Island
or Jersey shore. The houses of the better class stood principally on
William and Pearl streets, the latter being open to the water, with
dwellings only on the west side facing it. Maiden-lane was then a green
lane with a fine spring at its head where the Dutch maidens were
accustomed to bleach the linen they wove. Fronting the river stood the
Stadt Huys (the ancient City Hall), a massive stone structure two
stories high, with battlements rising above the gable ends. The lower
story was used as the colonial prison. Opposite the Stadt Huys stood the
fish-market. In the Bowling Green, then an oblong square, surrounded by
locust-trees, was the City Market, which was held three times a week,
and opened and shut by the ringing of a bell. The gate of the city was
formed of a pair of massive leaves of oak, strengthened with bars of
iron: they were shut at night on the setting of the watch, and opened at
sunrise by ringing of bells. The citizens took watch by turns or were
fined. They were to be "good men and true, and free from cursing and
swearing." It was their duty to watch by the gate and the bridges, and
thrice during the night to take the rounds of the city, particularly to
see that neither Indians nor negroes were abroad, or lying about in the
market-places. In cases of emergency or alarm, they were commanded to
call on the nearest citizen for aid; each householder being required to
keep always in his house a "goode firelocke," and at least six rounds of
balls thereto. Gutters run through the centre of all the streets, which
were unpaved; and in the middle of Broadway, near Wall, and also in
Pearl-street, were public wells and pumps. The houses were built mostly
in the Dutch style, with gable-ends to the street, and stoopes.
The "Rondeel," or crescent before mentioned, that defended the south
side of the town at the foot of Broadway, was erected on the top of a
large mound, fourteen feet high, with a green sloping glacis on every
side. The wall of the fort was still twenty feet above the glacis,
strongly constructed of stone, with two square wings, the centre being
in the shape of a half-moon. On the north side stood a few apple-trees
and an aged linden that over-topped the walls, from the parapet of which
was a near view of the market, of the fields about the "Bowline Greene,"
the hay-scales, and the north gate of the city. In the centre of this
fort stood a small stone chapel, the first Dutch church erected in
New-York. Four cannon were mounted on the water side, and a heavy gun,
of vast calibre, planted on the north side of the wall, commanded the
gate of the palisades. East of the fort was a forest of several acres,
in which were kept the governor's deer. Nearly hid among its old trees,
yet open to the bay, stood, within a stone's throw of the gate of the
fort, the gubernatorial mansion of the earl, a stately Dutch edifice of
stone, painted white and ornate with scalloped gables, turret-like
chimneys, a cupola, latticed galleries, and "stoopes." The ground before
it sloped in a smooth lawn to the glittering beach; and from its door
the eye embraced the whole of the far-extended bay, with its green and
wooded islands, and a distant glimpse of the sea. On the east of this
mansion, which, from its white exterior and imposing appearance, was
named by the admiring burghers "Der Vite Sals," or White Hall; a name
the site has retained to this day, commenced Pearl, then called Dock
street. It was on the corner of this and Broad-street, and within one
hundred yards of the White Hall, that the public-house of frau Jost
Stoll was situated.
This ancient, well-frequented, and popular inn, the humble progenitor of
the numerous costly and palatial _hotels_ that now adorn the modern
city, was one story high, and extended far back on both streets, showing
a front on each. Its roof was tiled with glazed Dutch tiles, and
ascended almost perpendicularly to a great height, where it met a second
or super-roof, which was clapped over it like an extinguisher. In its
descent towards the ground, however, it look a horizontal curve outward,
and projected full seven feet from the walls across the sidewalk,
supported along its eaves by a row of rude columns. The gable-ends rose
ambitiously above the roof, from which be it said projected sundry
dormant windows, which were cut into steps or half-embrasures, giving
the building a sort of castellated aspect. Its windows, and they were
many of divers shapes, square, circular, oval, and diamond, were placed
in all possible positions, as the fancy of the architect dictated. On
each street was a broad door, with a narrow carved canopy above it, and
beneath a stoop with seats on either side. To these, for the
accommodation of her numerous customers, the bustling Dutch hostess had
of late placed four long benches, two on each side of the house, against
the wall and just beneath a row of windows with little three-cornered
panes of glass set in leaden sashes. The advantage of two fronts to the
inn is apparent, and was a very great convenience to the worthy
citizens. In the summer mornings they were wont to sit on the south and
shady side, which looked down the bay; and in the afternoon on the east
and now shady side, which commanded not only a side view of the harbour,
but a full view of the muddy dock, alive with ducks, at their feet, and
the clumsy stone bridge that crossed it. But, since they had begun to
watch for the reappearance of the "Ger-Falcon," the name of the vessel
which was despatched in pursuit of the pirate, the south front,
notwithstanding it was in the month of June, and the level sun lighted
up the little windows of the inn like an illumination, had become the
most frequented and popular; and, on the evening of the day in question,
the east side was deserted by all save a tawny slave, a recumbent
Indian, and one or two sleepy dogs. On the south front, therefore, at
the time of the opening of the second part of this story, were gathered,
towards sunset, beneath the shade of the projecting roof, a motley
group, composed of some of the best burghers of New-Amsterdam, and, what
is more, the choicest customers of _frau_ Stoll. They were seated on
benches on either side of the stoop, the two seats of which were
occupied by a little, short, fat member of the corporation, and a tall,
thin, long-nosed churchwarden, the chiefest dignitaries of the church
and state. Besides these worthies, there were several artisans, and
other worthy citizens of the ancient town.
"Dere vill be moche fear dat de tamt pucanier hash got de king's ship,
and no te king's ship haav got te pucanier," said one of the worthy
burghers, sagely shaking his head after a long look down the bay; and
taking his pipe from his mouth and emitting a generous cloud of smoke,
he looked round to see how his opinion was received.
"'Tis quite time, Mynheer Vandersplocken, that the ship should be back;
but whether she brings a prize or no is another thing," said the warden,
blowing through his pipe to ignite the tobacco therein.
"I'll ventur' to say you are right dere, Mynheer Varder," said an
antiquated Dutch skipper, blowing forth with his words a volume of smoke
that for a time rendered his round, rubicund visage and portly paunch
invisible; "dis skipper Kyd ish not to pe taken sho easily. Schnaps and
tunder! he would plow up his yocht to de tyfil first. Ay! he vill never
haav te hemp cravat, te plack rogue."
"Is he black?" asked the warden, eagerly.
"Ay--ish't plack he ish, schipper Schenk?" repeated the burgher.
"Goot! schipper Schenk, den hash seen him! how doesh dou know dat he ish
plack?" asked a third, who, from his greasy apparel, was the
tallow-chandler of the town, laying his pipe across his oily knee and
looking him in the face with the air of a man who expected to hear
something marvellous.
"'Tish not plack in te face I mean, put in te heart," said the skipper.
"I have seen him, as you say, Mynheer Schnops; and his hair vas white as
te lint, and his eye plue as te sky, and his skin fair as te lantlaty's
taughter here. A fair young man he vas to look upon."
"And cruel as fair," said the warden. "Tell us, worthy skipper Schenk,
o' the time you saw this bold rover; doubtless it will be a tale to
listen to."
"Ay, good schipper!" "Yaw, schipper Schenk, gif us te story," cried
several voices.
Ashes were knocked from some of the pipes, and others were refilled; the
more distant listeners moved nearer to the skipper, who, looking round
with the patronising and superior air of a man who hath seen more danger
than his fellows, settled himself into the attitude of a story-teller,
and took a long-drawn whiff at his meerschaum:
"It vas in te Long Island Sount," he began, "just after the last line
gale. I vas in mine little yocht, te Half Moon, and, haaving carried
away my powsprit, put into a creek unter Sachem's Heat to cut another
from te treesh dere. I left te men to vork hewing te spar, and valks
about on te shore, looking rount, and tinking vat a nice plaace it
vas--te Sachem's Heat--for a city, if te lant vas lower, so tat a tyke
micht be made all rount it."
"A tyke, sure; vat is te citee mitout te tyke? vera goot," were the
approving ejaculations of his listeners.
"Ton't interrupt me, or tish tyfil a pit more you get o' mine shtory.
Now vere vas I? Vell, as I vas saying, I vas valking by mineself ven I
comes to te oder side of te heatlant, ant tere lay anoder vessel mitout
a mast, ant more tan fifty men at vork putting new spars into her. Vell,
I vas vondering vat craft it vas, for she vas carry many kuns, vhen
somepoty vas lay a hant on mine shoulter, ant I looked rount ant vas see
a tall, hantsome, ant fair young man, mit plue eyes ant light locks, mit
pistols at belt ant swort py his side.
"'Goot tay, Mynheer Schipper,' says he, in a free ant easy vay. 'Ish tat
your craft pelow in te creek?'
"'It ish, mynheer,' says I. 'Dis gale has put us poth into von bipe, if
tat ish your craft pelow dere.'
"'It ish, schipper; vill you go on boart?'
"'Ish must get my repairs tone ant pe off,' I sait.
"'I haav a flasche of goot Scheitam, mynheer,' sait he.
"So I vent aboart, ant ve hat a merry time mit te Scheitam ant te bipe.
"'Tis ish te real shuniper from Deutch-lant, captain,' says I, pouring
te last trop out of te flasche.
"'It's made from the Italian shuniper, schipper,' says he.
"'Deutch or Italian,' says I, 'it's te oil ov life; ant never pefore tid
I trink such shin.'
"'I am glat you like it,' says he; ant he mate a negro, in golt ant
green jacket ant brocken, put on anoder flasche.
"By-ant-py, says I, 'Vat's te name o' your craft, captain,' tinking it a
ship in te king's navy.
"'Te Silfer Arrow,' says he.
"'Te Silfer Arrow. I haav not hear tis name in te navy.'
"'Nor ever vill,' sait he. 'Fill your glass, schipper, I vill give you a
toast.'
"So I filled to te top, ant, rising up, swore I't trink it on mine legs,
if he gave te tyfil himself, for te Scheitam vas in me. So I helt on to
te taple-corner, ant he sait,
"'I give te healt of Kyt.'
"'Nefer,' sait I; ant smashed my glass on te taple in a tousant atoms.
'I vill trink to te tyfil, put not to Kyt,' says I.
"His eyes flashed like coals ov vire, ant he put his hant on a pistol;
put ten he laughed ant sait,
"'Drink to my healt, ten, good schipper.'
"'I'll trink your healt, captain, from te neck ov te flasche, till tere
pe not von trop left pehint.'
"'Pledge me, den,' sait he.
"So ve filled, ant I trank a bumper to his goot healt.
"'Very vell, schipper. You haav done as I wished,' he sait, smiling.
'Who, tink you, is your entertainer?'
"'Te'il care I,' sait I; 'I know te Scheitam, tat is enough for schipper
Schenk to know.'
"'Did you ever hear of te Adventure Galley?' says he.
"'It's Kyt's vessel,' sait I, 'tat he scours te sea mit.'
"'Look here, schipper, ant reat,' said he, shoving asite a sliting panel
above te transum.
"I looked, ant reat, in large letters,
"'THE ADVENTURE GALLEY.'
"'Vat te tyfil!' sait I, laying a hant on my cutlass, 'tish is not te--'
"'Te Adventure Galley, ant I am Captain Kyt,' says he.
"So I drew my cutlass ant mate a lunge at him, supposing I vas in for a
death; but he wrested it vrom me, ant mate me sit down ant vinish te
pottle, ant we soon got right vell acquainted.
"'Vhen do you leave te creek, schipper Schenk?' says he.
"'It vill take me two tays yet, mit my three men, to set te bowsprit.
It's a pad pusiness, dish delay; ant I vish I vas vell out of dis
place'--for I pegan to fear for my throat, notmitstanding ve drank
Scheitam togedder. But Captain Kyt vas de shentleman. He sent his men to
help mine, ant in four hours I vas ready for sea again, sount as ever.
He came to see me off, sent two flasches ov de Scheitam, ant shook hants
mit me, mit many pleashant vords, ant gave me dis arrow, saying, 'Tese
are my passports for my frients. If you ever are in any tanger from my
peoplesh, it vill pe your safeguart.' Ant he spoke true; for it hash
twice saven my cargoesh."
As the skipper concluded, he held up to view a small silver arrow the
length of his fore-finger, on which the warden discovered, as it was
passed round from one to the other, the words:
"_Respect the sign._ KYD."
"Strange--it ish vonderful--vera goot!" exclaimed severally those to
whom it was handed.
"He is not so wicked after all, then, schipper Schenk," said the warden.
The skipper shook his head, and replied mysteriously, "I vish I may
alvays gif him a goot vide berth, datsh all, Mynheer Vorden,
notmitstanding te Schietam."
"I can tell you a tale that will give you a different opinion, Master
Warden," said an English mate, who formed one of the party of listeners.
"By all means let us hear it," said the warden, knocking the ashes from
his pipe against his shoe, and refilling the bowl from a leathern pouch
by his side wherein he was accustomed to carry a pound of loose Turkish
cut.
"Ve vill lishten; tell it, skipper Jack," all cried, directing their
eyes first down the bay to see if they could discover an approaching
sail, and then turning and fixing them upon the face of the seaman.
"Well, shipmates," said the sailor, dropping from his mouth carefully
into the palm of his hand a huge quid of tobacco, and sprinkling a
shower of saliva over the pavement; "you see as how it was in the West
Indies. Captain Kyd had captured a trader bound from Newport to
Barbadoes, and, having taken out all the valuables, set fire to her,
with every soul on board save a young gentleman and young lady--one
being sweetheart to the other, you must know. These he took on board his
vessel, the 'Ventur' Galley, and told the young lady, who was very rich,
that if she would pay forty thousand dollars for her ransom, she should
go free. So she went into the cabin with him, and wrote the order for
the money. 'Now,' says she to him, 'I will not give it to you unless you
promise to give me what I love best on earth.' 'Now,' says he to her,
'fair lady, what do you love best on earth?'
"'My betrothed husband,' said she.
"'Would you have his heart rather than all else in the world?' asked he.
"'Yes.'
"'I comply with your demand--but first you must dine with me,' said he.
"So a great dinner was served up, and only Kyd and the lady sat down to
it--for he treated her with great respect all the time, and more like a
gentleman than a bucanier. After they had dined, she said, 'Now grant me
my wish, and let me have what I love best on earth.'
"'You have had it,' said he.
"'Where--what?' she asked, trembling all over at his fearful looks, and
hardly knowing what to dread.
"'Your lover's heart.'
"'Where?' she asked.
"'You have just dined off of it,'" said he.
"What became of the lady?" asked the warden, after the exclamations of
horror and surprise had subsided.
"She became a maniac, and in three days was buried in the sea," replied
the narrator, replacing his quid and taking a hearty draught at a can of
ale handed him by Frau Stoll herself.
"Donder ant blixen! I don't pelieve it--tish not true, I vould shwear,"
said the skipper. "He ish pad enough, put not so pad ash dat--tish one
of te itle shtories tat peoplesh frighten von oder mit."
"'Tis said he always gets devil's luck, before he sails, from them as
has dealings with the Evil One, and always burns a Bible on his capstan
every time he weighs anchor," said the sailor, without regarding the
incredulous skipper.
"The last time he was here, when he walked our streets so boldly, with a
score of armed bucaniers at his back, before he set sail I heard how he
got evil charms from the witch at Hell Gate," observed the warden, in a
low, cautious tone.
"I can give ye a wrinkle on that point, I guess," said a lank,
half-farmer, half-sailor looking being, who commanded a trader between
the Rhode Island plantations and New-York--one of the first of the
species now so numerous. "I anchored once, waiting for the flood tide to
take me through the gate, close alongside the rock her hut is on.
Feeling kind o' neighbourly, and not knowin' then who lived there, I got
into my yawl, and pulled ashore to scrape acquaintance and talk a bit.
As I came up to the hut I heard a strange noise, and smelt a brimstonish
smell, and so thought I'd reconnoitre afore goin' in. Looking through
the window, I see the old Witch of Endor and Captain Kyd, as I learned
a'terward it was, goin' through the awfullest hellifications ever hearn
tell on. She hanged a piece o' yarn round his neck, and then said as how
he had a charmed life. Gracious! and the way it lightened and thundered
jist then was a sin to death! Blue blazes an' brimstone--great guns and
little guns--big devils and little devils, mixed up with owls and
hobgoblins, snakes and catamounts, with a sprinkling o' hell-cats and
flying sarpents, touched off with the tarnellest yells, 'nough to lift a
feller right off his feet by the hair of his head. I thought creation
was comin' to an eend, and dropped down on my marrow-bones and prayed
away like a disciple. Soon as I could get on my legs, I showed 'um some
purty tall walkin' till I got to my yawl again, I tell ye! I expected
nothin'd be left o' me when I got there but my eyebrows and shirt
risbands."
"She is a fearful woman," said the warden; "and little thanks do we owe
them for sending her among us. 'Tis said, before she was transported to
the colony from Ireland, that she had spirited away by her foul charms
the son of some noble house. Ill has fared the colony the three years
she has been in't."
"She shoult pe purned for von vitch vooman," said the skipper; "I would
pe te first to make te fagot plaze."
"I'll be there to help you a bit, I guess, too," said the Rhode
Islander. "I han't been to Salemtown in New-England for nothin', I
guess. The way they do with the critters there is a little the cutest.
If they want to tell for sartin if an old woman's a real witch, they
throw her into a pond. If she's drownded she's no witch; but if she
swims, its gospel proof she is--coz what old woman could swim if she
warn't a nat'ral witch. They then tie her to a stake and set fire to
her."
"Mit your leave, goot peoplesh, I vill shay vat dey doesh mit vitches in
mine countree," said the Dutch burgher, deliberately taking the pipe
from his mouth. "Virst, dey tries her py veighing her in te scales mit
von Piple; if she be heavier nor te Piple, she ish prove von olt vitch
voomans. Dis ish vera goot! Secont, dey tries to shoot her mit silver
pulletsh, ant den dey tiesh her heelsh ant het bot' togedder, and drops
her into te deep vater. Dat is alsho more vera goot!"
"What are ye gathered here for, ye idle knaves and fat burghers, ye
masses of smoked flesh--sponges steeped in ale--and paunches like your
own pint-pots, frightening each other's cowardly ears with tales of
fear. Who is it ye would kill with your silver bullet, Master Von
Schmidt?"
The company started at the harsh, stern voice that addressed them so
unexpectedly, and uttered, as they looked up, divers exclamations and
interjections of surprise, not unmingled with apprehension. The warden
rose from his wooden bench, and, hurrying away, disappeared quickly
round the corner of the inn; the tallow-chandler upset his can of ale in
his over-eagerness to gain the taproom; the burgher broke the long stem
of his pipe by striking it against the door-sill as he crowded in on the
tallow-chandler's heels; and on each countenance and in every gesture
of those who remained was depicted consternation and anxiety.
The personage who had caused this sudden movement was a female of low
stature, deformed and hideous in person, with a stern aspect, and a
wild, restless eye--indeed, none other than Elpsy the sorceress.
Suspected of having made way with the young Lester--the illegitimate
Lester--she had been arrested by the countess and thrown into prison.
But confessing nothing on trial, and the circumstances not being
sufficient in themselves to convict her, after remaining in prison two
years, she was sent, with other criminals and dangerous persons, to the
colonies. Forbidden by the worthy burghers to harbour in the town, she
had selected, as more in unison with her wild and wandering life, and
the mysterious character she claimed, a lonely abode, once a fisherman's
lodge, on the rocky islet on the right of the outlet of Hurl Gate, still
known as the Witch's Rock. Here she performed her unholy rites, and far
and wide her fame spread as a sorceress. Seamen, as they shot through
the dangerous pass, propitiated her; and those who would have fair winds
sought them of her in full faith. The good came to her for good, and the
evil for evil. The tender Dutch maiden would do pilgrimage there to ask
after the fate of an absent lover, or seek assurances of his happy and
speedy return. There were tales, too, that she favoured the bucaniers
who swarmed the coasts, and that their success was owing to the heavy
bribes of gold they gave her for prosperous cruises. Occasionally she
visited the town, to the consternation of its worthy citizens, who never
failed to presage evil to "scot and lot" from her presence.
"What is it ye fear, Master Warden--what is it leads ye to leave your
bench, schipper--is't your own shadows ye fear?" she now cried, fixing
her eyes darkly and angrily upon each countenance.
"It ish out ov reshpect, Frau Elpshy," replied the half-tipsy schipper,
mustering his physical to the aid of his moral courage, and speaking in
a deprecatory tone. "We knowsh your power, ant make reverensh to it by
getting up, ash you say."
"Ye are a hypocritical and fear-stricken set, all of ye--ever gulping
ale, ye have only ale courage. Jost Stoll, woman, give me a can of thy
best Island spirits. I have walked far, and am athirst and weary."
The strong potation was given her by the reluctant hostess, who dared
not refuse her demand, lest, in the evil that she would visit upon her
hearth-stone and roof-tree, she might lose far more than the value of a
goblet. The weird woman quaffed the beverage at a draught, and, placing
the cup on the bench with an emphasis, turned and looked down the bay
with a steady gaze. Every eye followed hers. The sun had just touched
the hills of Jersey with his lower edge, and the evening haze lifting
from the water gave a dimness to distant objects. For some seconds she
continued to gaze, and then suddenly cried,
"He comes!"
"Sail ho!" instantly shouted the Rhode Islander. At the same moment, a
universal exclamation from the observers upon the stoope showed that all
eyes had discovered the object that had attracted the attention and
caused the sudden outcry of the woman.
Far down the bay, near its junction with the sea, diminished to a mere
speck by the distance, and appearing not bigger than a snow-flake
floating above the water, or a white gull riding on the waves, a vessel
was seen entering the Narrows and standing towards the town. Instantly
all was excitement. The noise and rumour of its approach flew from the
Rondeel on the south even to the wall on the north. The worthy citizens,
attended by their fraus and their little folk, maids and matrons, old
and young, black and white, slaves and Indians, and everything that had
life in New-Amsterdam, assembled in front of Jost Stoll's inn, with
their eyes directed down the bay. With a steady, onward course, the
vessel came gallantly up the channel, and such was the way she made that
she promised to drop anchor off against the fort ere the twilight should
be deepened into night. Gradually, as she approached, her form and size
began to grow more distinct to the eye, and her proportions to stand out
clearer.
"She is a brig--but not the Ger-Falcon, I am thinking," said the warden,
who had again taken his place among the crowd, his curiosity overcoming
his superstitious fears--albeit, he gave the sorceress a wide berth. Nor
indeed was he alone in his aversion to her society; for every one
present seemed instinctively to avoid her neighbourhood: so that she
stood alone in an open space before the inn, intently watching, without
heeding those around her, the advancing sail.
"Vat oder prig can it pe, put te Sher-Falcon," said the skipper. "Dere
ish none expected here till next Shaint Andrew's tay. De Barbadoesh
packet vash just sail--de Glasgow merchantman ish not due till
Christmash, and tere ish put one oder prig dat trade here, vich is gone
to te Golt Coast for negroesh. 'Tis te Ger-Falcon, or te pucanier Kyt
himself."
"Got forbid!" was the exclamation from every tongue.
"She should carry her colours boldly aloft if she were an honest
trader," said the warden. "'Tis suspicious."
"The Ger-Falcon, neighbour, was a square-rigger, I guess," said the
Rhode Islander, making a focus of his closed hands, and looking long and
scrutinizingly at the stranger; "if I know a mainsail from a spanker,
that craft is a 'morfydite, with a reg'lar straight stem for a
mainmast."
"It ish true; tish not te king's vesshel," said the schipper, looking
eagerly at her. "She ish not square-rigged; nor ish she von 'morfridyte
neider. She ish polacca-rigged, and has von cut-vater like a pike's
nose. Dat craft ish here for no goot."
As the skipper spoke he felt in his pouch anxiously, and, drawing forth
his little arrow, looked at it between doubt and confidence, and,
shaking his head bodingly, walked into the taproom to comfort his
spirits with a fresh can of "mum."
The oracular shake of the skipper's head seemed to have affected all
present. Glances of apprehension and words of trembling inquiry were
interchanged; and, fluctuating between hope and fear, they continued
anxiously to watch the approaching stranger, at times turning their
glances towards the witch, to see if, on her dark features, they could
read a confirmation of the fears the skipper's words and mysterious
manner had awakened. As the vessel came nearer, it was clearly apparent
to the most unpractised eye that she was not the vessel sent out in
search of the bucanier, and for which they had so long been on the
watch. There was something, too, in the shape and air of the stranger,
that roused their suspicions of his pacific character, and the dreaded
monosyllable "Kyd" was whispered under breath from one to the other.
Many an anxious eye was turned towards the Rondeel, to see if the
vigilance of the town's defenders was roused, and, to the confirmation
of their fears, they saw that the little garrison was on the alert; that
armed men were on the walls; that the tompions were taken from the
guns; and that its captain stood with his glass on the outer bastion
watching the vessel, while ever and anon an order, hastening the warlike
preparations, reached their ears.
The stranger, a long, sharp, polacca-rigged brigantine, came swiftly on,
boldly passed Red Hook, disappeared a few moments behind the wooded
swell of Governor's Island, and reappeared on the east side, within
gunshot of the town. Just as the more timid citizens began to think of
withdrawing to the protection of the fort or the covert of their stout
stone houses, and just as a warning gun was fired from the Rondeel, she
rounded to, her canvass shivered in the wind, her after sails descended
to the deck by the run, and her fore sails one after the other rapidly
disappeared: a moment afterward, with everything furled, she dropped her
anchor, and, swinging slowly round to it, remained, dimly seen through
the thickening twilight, as stationary as the island off which she was
anchored. After commenting upon her appearance and character, and giving
vent to their doubts and suspicions, one by one the worthy citizens
retired to their well-defended mansions, trusting to the governor to
keep and hold the city should it be placed in peril before the coming
dawn. Elpsy was left alone where she had stood all the while, watching
the vessel's approach: the red light of the western sky lighted up her
dusky features with a baleful glare, and her features worked with some
deep, inward emotion. She would one moment strain her eyes towards the
reposing vessel, and the next, with an exclamation of disappointment,
stride, with an impatient step, to and fro the narrow strand before the
alehouse.
"'Tis he," she said, looking fixedly in the direction of the vessel.
"'Tis the day he said he should return, and he has not deceived me. Now
will I bring about that I have laboured five long years to accomplish.
He shall obey me; he shall do it; he shall do what I command--fulfil it
to the letter, or he shall die. No boat yet!" she said, pausing and
looking over the water. "He waits for night. He will scarce think to
meet me here; but he shall not come and go again without seeing me. He
escapes me no more. Let me lay my hand on his heart and get his promise
to see me, and I will go back to my rock; for I know then he will come
to me there."
The stars at length came out, and night took the place of the glowing
twilight. The customers of Jost Stoll had returned to their homes, or
were seated within, under protection of the massive shutters and bars,
which, earlier than at her accustomed time, the fore-guarding landlady
had placed over her windows. All was still throughout the town save the
tread of the sentinel on the parapet of the Rondeel, the tramp of the
night-guard going with quicker and more determined tread than usual to
their posts, the regular dash of the waves on the beach, and
occasionally the low, deep voice of the weird woman soliloquizing. At
length, after many an earnest look and impatient word, the distant dip
of oars in the direction of the brigantine reached her ears, and in a
few minutes afterward, faintly visible through the darkness, a boat was
seen approaching the entrance of the canal below the inn. With a glad
exclamation she hastened forward to meet it.