Chapter Fifty Four.

Chapter Fifty Four.Thou, God of this great vast, rebuke those surges which wash both heaven and hell; and thou that hast upon the winds command, bind then, in brass, having called them from the deep.Shakespeare.The shock threw the men off their feet as they raised an appealing cry to Heaven, which was mocked by the howling of the wind and the roar of the waters. The masts, which were thrown out from their steps, waved once, twice, and then fell over the sides with a crash, as an enormous sea broke over the vessel, forcing her further on the rocks, and causing every timber and knee in her to start from its place. The masts, as they fell, and the sea, that at the same moment poured over like an impetuous cataract, swept away thirty or forty of the seamen into the boiling element under the lee. Another and another shock from the resistless and furious waves decided the fate of the resolute captain and master. The frigate parted amidships. The fore part of her, which was firmly wedged on the rocks, remained. The quarter-deck and after-part turned over to the deep water, and disappeared. An enormous surge curled over it as it went down, and, as if disappointed at not being able to wreak its fury upon that part of the vessel, which, by sinking, had evaded it, it drove in revenge upon the remainder, forcing it several yards higher upon the reef.Two-thirds of the ship’s company were now gone—the captain, the master, and the major part of the officers and men, being on the quarter-deck when the ship divided. The cry of the drowning was not heard amidst the roaring of the elements. The behaviour of the captain and the officers at this dreadful crisis has not been handed down; but, if we may judge from what has already been narrated, they met their fate like British seamen.The fore part of the ship still held together, and, fortunately for the survivors, heeled towards the land, so as to afford some protection from the force of the seas, which dashed over it at each succeeding swell of the billows. Daylight left them, and darkness added to the despair and horror of nearly one hundred wretches, who felt, at each shock which threatened to separate the planks and timbers, as if death was loudly knocking to claim the residue of his destined victims. Not one word was exchanged; but, secured with ropes to the belaying-pins, and other parts of the forecastle where they could pass their lashings, they clung and huddled together, either absorbed in meditation or wailing with despair. Occasionally, one who had supported himself in a difficult and painful position, stimulated with the faint hopes of life, to which we all so fondly and so foolishly cling, would find that his strength was exhausted, and that he could hold no longer. After vainly imploring those near him to allow him to better his condition by a slight personal sacrifice on their part (an appeal that received no answer), he would gradually loose his hold, and drop into the surge that was commissioned by death to receive his prey.There are situations in human life of such powerful excitement, and in which the mechanism of the human frame becomes so rapid in its motion, that the friction of a few days will wear it out. The harrowed feelings of these poor creatures on the wreck, during the short time that they remained, had a greater effect in undermining the constitution than many years of laborious occupation on shore.Fellow-countrymen, if you are at all interested with the scenes I am now describing, and which, if you have any feeling, you must be (however imperfect the description), let the author, a sailor himself, take this favourable opportunity of appealing to you in behalf of a service at once your protection and your pride. For its sake, as well as your own, listen not to those who, expatiating upon its expense, and silent upon its deserts, would put a stop to hardly earned promotion, and blast with disappointment the energies of the incipient hero. And may those to whom the people at large have delegated their trust, and in whom they have reposed their confidence, treat with contempt the calculations, and miscalculations, of one without head and without heart!Daylight again, as if unwillingly, appeared, and the wild scud flew past the dark clouds, that seemed to sink down with their heavy burdens till they nearly touched the sea. The waves still followed each other mountains high; the wind blew with the same violence; and as the stormy petrels flew over the billows, indicating by their presence that the gale would continue, the unfortunate survivors looked at each other in silence and despair.I know not whether all seamen feel as I do; but I have witnessed so many miraculous escapes, so many sudden reverses, so much, beyond all hope and conception, achieved by a reliance upon Providence and your own exertions, that, under the most critical circumstances, I never should despair. If struggling in the centre of the Atlantic, with no vessel in sight, no strength remaining, and sinking under the wave that boiled in my ear, as memory and life were departing,—still, as long as lifedidremain, as long as recollection held her seat, I never should abandon Hope,—never believe that it is all over with me,—till I awoke in the next world, and found it confirmed.What would these men have valued their lives at in the morning? Yet at noon a change took place: the weather evidently moderated fast; and silence, that had reigned for so many hours, lost his empire, and the chances of being saved began to be calculated. A reef of rocks, many of them above water, over which the breakers still raged, lay between the wreck and the shore, and the certainty of being dashed to pieces precluded all attempts at reaching it, till the weather became more moderate and the sea less agitated. But when might that be?—and how long were they to resist the united attacks of hunger and fatigue?The number of men still surviving was about seventy. Many, exhausted and wounded, were hanging in a state of insensibility by the ropes with which they had secured themselves. That our hero was among those who remained need hardly be observed, or there would have been a close to this eventful history. He was secured to the weather side of the foremast-bitts, supported on the one side by the boatswain, and on the other by Price, the second-lieutenant, next to whom was the captain of the forecastle, one of the steadiest and best seamen in the ship, who had been pressed out of a West Indiaman, in which he had served in the capacity of second mate.Our hero had often turned round with an intention to speak to Price; but observing that he sat crouched with his face upon his hands and knees, he waited until his messmate should raise his head up, imagining that he was occupied in secret prayer. Finding that he still continued in the same position, Seymour called to him several times. Not receiving any answer, he extended his arm and shook Price by the collar, fearing that he had swooned from cold and fatigue.Price slowly raised his head, and looking at Seymour, answered not. His vacant stare and wild eye proclaimed at once that reason had departed. Still, as it afterwards appeared, his ruling passion remained; and, from that incomprehensible quality of our structure, which proves that the mind of man is more fearfully and wonderfully made than the body, the desertion of one sense was followed by the return of another. Hismemorywas perfect, now that hisreasonwas gone. Surveying the scene around him, he began with all the theatrical action which the ropes that secured him would permit, to quote his favourite author:—“‘Blow winds, and crack your cheeks—rage—blow,You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout—’“‘Poor Tom’s a-cold’”—then, shuddering, he covered up his face, and resumed his former position.“Is this a time for spouting profane plays, Mr Price?” said the fanatical boatswain, who was not aware of the poor man’s insanity. “Hold your peace, and call not judgment on our heads, and I prophesy that we shall be saved. ‘The waves of the sea are mighty, and rage horribly; but yet the Lord who dwelleth on high is mightier.’”Silence ensued, which, after a few minutes, was interrupted by Seymour lamenting over the fate of Captain M— and the rest of the crew who had perished.“Well, they are in heaven before this, I hope?” observed Robinson, the captain of the forecastle.“‘Many are called, but few chosen,’” rejoined the boatswain, who appeared, by the flashing of his eye, to be in a state of strong excitement. “No more in heaven than you would be, if the Almighty was pleased to cut you off in his wrath.”“Where then, Mr Hardsett?” inquired Robinson. “Surely not in—”“I know—I know,”—cried Price, who again lifted up his head, and, with a vacant laugh, commenced singing—“Nothing of him that doth fadeBut doth suffer a sea-changeInto something rich and strange.Sea nymphs hourly ring his knell!Hark! now I hear them—ding-dong-bell.”“For shame, Mr Price!” interrupted the boatswain.“Ding-dong-ding-dong-bell.”“Mr Price, what does the Scripture say? ‘Judgments are prepared for scorners,’” continued the boatswain with vehemence.Price had resumed his former attitude, and made no answer. As soon as the interruption of the lieutenant had ceased, Robinson resumed his interrogatory to the boatswain: “Where then?—not in hell, I hope.”“Ay,” returned the latter, “in the fire that is never quenched, and for ever and ever.”“I hope not,” replied Robinson; “I may deserve punishment, and I know I do. I’ve been overhauling my log-book, while the sea here has been dashing over my bows, and washing my figure-head; and there are some things I wish I could forget;—they will rise up in judgment against me; but surely not for ever?”“You should have thought of that before, my good fellow. I am sorry for you,—sorry for all those who have perished, for they were good seamen, and, in the worldly service, have done well. I was reflecting the other day whether, out of the whole navy, I should be able to muster one single ship’s company in heaven.”“Well, Mr Hardsett, it’s my firm opinion, that when the hands are turned up for punishment in the next world, we shall be sarved out according to our desarts. Now, that’s my belief; and I shan’t change it for yours, Mr Hardsett, for I thinks mine the more comfortable of the two.”“It won’t do, Robinson, you must have faith.”“So I have, in God’s mercy, boatswain.”“That won’t do. Yours is not the true faith.”“Mayhap not, but I hope to ride it out with it nevertheless, for I have it well backed with hope; and if I still drive,”—said Robinson, musing a short time—“why, I have charity as a sheet-anchor, to bring me up again. It’s long odds but our bodies will soon be knocked to shivers in those breakers, and we shall then know who’s right, and who’s wrong. I see small chance of our saving ourselves, unless indeed we could walk on the sea, and there was but one that ever did that.”“Had the apostle had faith, he would not have sunk,” rejoined the boatswain.“Have you then more faith than the apostle?”“I have, thanks be to Jehovah, the true faith,” cried the boatswain, raising his eyes and hands to heaven.“Thenwalk on shore,” said the captain of the forecastle, looking him steadfastly in the face.Stimulated by the request, which appeared to put his courage as a man, and his faith as a Christian, to the test, and, at the moment, fanatic even to insanity, the boatswain rose, and casting off the ropes which he had wound round his body, was about to comply with Robinson’s request.A few moments more, and the raging sea would have received him, had not our hero, in conjunction with the captain of the forecastle, held him down with all his power. “We doubt not your faith, Mr Hardsett,” said Seymour, “but the time of miracles is past. It would be self-murder. He who raised the storm, will, in his own good time, save us, if he thinks fit.”Price, who had listened to the conversation, and had watched the motions of the boatswain, who was casting off the lashings which had secured him, had, unperceived, done the same, and now jumped upon his legs, and collared the astonished boatswain, roaring out—“Zounds, show me what thou’lt do!Woul’t weep? woul’t fight? woul’t fast? woul’t tear thyself?”“Why, he’s mad!” exclaimed the terrified boatswain, who was not far off the point himself.“Mad!” resumed Price.“Not a soulBut felt a fever of the mad, and play’dSome tricks of desperation.“The king’s son, Ferdinand,With hair upstarting (then like reeds, not hair),Was the first man that leaped; cried, Hell is empty,And all the devils are here!”As the maniac finished the last words, before they could be aware of his intention, he made a spring from the deck over the bulwark, and disappeared under the wave. The boatswain, who had been diverted from his fanatical attempt by the unexpected attack of Price, more than by the remonstrances of his companions, resumed his position, folding his arms, and casting his eyes to heaven. The captain of the forecastle was silent, and so was our hero—the thoughts of the two were upon the same subject—eternity.Eternity—the only theme that confuses, humbles, and alarms the proud intellect of man. What is it? The human mind can grasp any defined space, any defined time, however vast; but this is beyond time, and too great for the limited conception of man. It had no beginning and can have no end. It cannot be multiplied, it cannot be divided, it cannot be added unto—you may attempt to subtract from it, but it is useless. Take millions and millions of years from it, take all the time that can enter into the compass of your imagination, it is still whole and undiminished as before—all calculation is lost. Think on—the brain becomes heated, and oppressed with a sensation of weight too powerful for it to bear; reason totters in her seat, and you rise with the conviction of the impossibility of the creature attempting to fathom the Creator—humiliated with the sense of your own nothingness, and impressed with the tremendous majesty of the Deity.Time is Man—Eternity is God!

Thou, God of this great vast, rebuke those surges which wash both heaven and hell; and thou that hast upon the winds command, bind then, in brass, having called them from the deep.Shakespeare.

Thou, God of this great vast, rebuke those surges which wash both heaven and hell; and thou that hast upon the winds command, bind then, in brass, having called them from the deep.

Shakespeare.

The shock threw the men off their feet as they raised an appealing cry to Heaven, which was mocked by the howling of the wind and the roar of the waters. The masts, which were thrown out from their steps, waved once, twice, and then fell over the sides with a crash, as an enormous sea broke over the vessel, forcing her further on the rocks, and causing every timber and knee in her to start from its place. The masts, as they fell, and the sea, that at the same moment poured over like an impetuous cataract, swept away thirty or forty of the seamen into the boiling element under the lee. Another and another shock from the resistless and furious waves decided the fate of the resolute captain and master. The frigate parted amidships. The fore part of her, which was firmly wedged on the rocks, remained. The quarter-deck and after-part turned over to the deep water, and disappeared. An enormous surge curled over it as it went down, and, as if disappointed at not being able to wreak its fury upon that part of the vessel, which, by sinking, had evaded it, it drove in revenge upon the remainder, forcing it several yards higher upon the reef.

Two-thirds of the ship’s company were now gone—the captain, the master, and the major part of the officers and men, being on the quarter-deck when the ship divided. The cry of the drowning was not heard amidst the roaring of the elements. The behaviour of the captain and the officers at this dreadful crisis has not been handed down; but, if we may judge from what has already been narrated, they met their fate like British seamen.

The fore part of the ship still held together, and, fortunately for the survivors, heeled towards the land, so as to afford some protection from the force of the seas, which dashed over it at each succeeding swell of the billows. Daylight left them, and darkness added to the despair and horror of nearly one hundred wretches, who felt, at each shock which threatened to separate the planks and timbers, as if death was loudly knocking to claim the residue of his destined victims. Not one word was exchanged; but, secured with ropes to the belaying-pins, and other parts of the forecastle where they could pass their lashings, they clung and huddled together, either absorbed in meditation or wailing with despair. Occasionally, one who had supported himself in a difficult and painful position, stimulated with the faint hopes of life, to which we all so fondly and so foolishly cling, would find that his strength was exhausted, and that he could hold no longer. After vainly imploring those near him to allow him to better his condition by a slight personal sacrifice on their part (an appeal that received no answer), he would gradually loose his hold, and drop into the surge that was commissioned by death to receive his prey.

There are situations in human life of such powerful excitement, and in which the mechanism of the human frame becomes so rapid in its motion, that the friction of a few days will wear it out. The harrowed feelings of these poor creatures on the wreck, during the short time that they remained, had a greater effect in undermining the constitution than many years of laborious occupation on shore.

Fellow-countrymen, if you are at all interested with the scenes I am now describing, and which, if you have any feeling, you must be (however imperfect the description), let the author, a sailor himself, take this favourable opportunity of appealing to you in behalf of a service at once your protection and your pride. For its sake, as well as your own, listen not to those who, expatiating upon its expense, and silent upon its deserts, would put a stop to hardly earned promotion, and blast with disappointment the energies of the incipient hero. And may those to whom the people at large have delegated their trust, and in whom they have reposed their confidence, treat with contempt the calculations, and miscalculations, of one without head and without heart!

Daylight again, as if unwillingly, appeared, and the wild scud flew past the dark clouds, that seemed to sink down with their heavy burdens till they nearly touched the sea. The waves still followed each other mountains high; the wind blew with the same violence; and as the stormy petrels flew over the billows, indicating by their presence that the gale would continue, the unfortunate survivors looked at each other in silence and despair.

I know not whether all seamen feel as I do; but I have witnessed so many miraculous escapes, so many sudden reverses, so much, beyond all hope and conception, achieved by a reliance upon Providence and your own exertions, that, under the most critical circumstances, I never should despair. If struggling in the centre of the Atlantic, with no vessel in sight, no strength remaining, and sinking under the wave that boiled in my ear, as memory and life were departing,—still, as long as lifedidremain, as long as recollection held her seat, I never should abandon Hope,—never believe that it is all over with me,—till I awoke in the next world, and found it confirmed.

What would these men have valued their lives at in the morning? Yet at noon a change took place: the weather evidently moderated fast; and silence, that had reigned for so many hours, lost his empire, and the chances of being saved began to be calculated. A reef of rocks, many of them above water, over which the breakers still raged, lay between the wreck and the shore, and the certainty of being dashed to pieces precluded all attempts at reaching it, till the weather became more moderate and the sea less agitated. But when might that be?—and how long were they to resist the united attacks of hunger and fatigue?

The number of men still surviving was about seventy. Many, exhausted and wounded, were hanging in a state of insensibility by the ropes with which they had secured themselves. That our hero was among those who remained need hardly be observed, or there would have been a close to this eventful history. He was secured to the weather side of the foremast-bitts, supported on the one side by the boatswain, and on the other by Price, the second-lieutenant, next to whom was the captain of the forecastle, one of the steadiest and best seamen in the ship, who had been pressed out of a West Indiaman, in which he had served in the capacity of second mate.

Our hero had often turned round with an intention to speak to Price; but observing that he sat crouched with his face upon his hands and knees, he waited until his messmate should raise his head up, imagining that he was occupied in secret prayer. Finding that he still continued in the same position, Seymour called to him several times. Not receiving any answer, he extended his arm and shook Price by the collar, fearing that he had swooned from cold and fatigue.

Price slowly raised his head, and looking at Seymour, answered not. His vacant stare and wild eye proclaimed at once that reason had departed. Still, as it afterwards appeared, his ruling passion remained; and, from that incomprehensible quality of our structure, which proves that the mind of man is more fearfully and wonderfully made than the body, the desertion of one sense was followed by the return of another. Hismemorywas perfect, now that hisreasonwas gone. Surveying the scene around him, he began with all the theatrical action which the ropes that secured him would permit, to quote his favourite author:—

“‘Blow winds, and crack your cheeks—rage—blow,You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout—’

“‘Blow winds, and crack your cheeks—rage—blow,You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout—’

“‘Poor Tom’s a-cold’”—then, shuddering, he covered up his face, and resumed his former position.

“Is this a time for spouting profane plays, Mr Price?” said the fanatical boatswain, who was not aware of the poor man’s insanity. “Hold your peace, and call not judgment on our heads, and I prophesy that we shall be saved. ‘The waves of the sea are mighty, and rage horribly; but yet the Lord who dwelleth on high is mightier.’”

Silence ensued, which, after a few minutes, was interrupted by Seymour lamenting over the fate of Captain M— and the rest of the crew who had perished.

“Well, they are in heaven before this, I hope?” observed Robinson, the captain of the forecastle.

“‘Many are called, but few chosen,’” rejoined the boatswain, who appeared, by the flashing of his eye, to be in a state of strong excitement. “No more in heaven than you would be, if the Almighty was pleased to cut you off in his wrath.”

“Where then, Mr Hardsett?” inquired Robinson. “Surely not in—”

“I know—I know,”—cried Price, who again lifted up his head, and, with a vacant laugh, commenced singing—

“Nothing of him that doth fadeBut doth suffer a sea-changeInto something rich and strange.Sea nymphs hourly ring his knell!Hark! now I hear them—ding-dong-bell.”

“Nothing of him that doth fadeBut doth suffer a sea-changeInto something rich and strange.Sea nymphs hourly ring his knell!Hark! now I hear them—ding-dong-bell.”

“For shame, Mr Price!” interrupted the boatswain.

“Ding-dong-ding-dong-bell.”

“Mr Price, what does the Scripture say? ‘Judgments are prepared for scorners,’” continued the boatswain with vehemence.

Price had resumed his former attitude, and made no answer. As soon as the interruption of the lieutenant had ceased, Robinson resumed his interrogatory to the boatswain: “Where then?—not in hell, I hope.”

“Ay,” returned the latter, “in the fire that is never quenched, and for ever and ever.”

“I hope not,” replied Robinson; “I may deserve punishment, and I know I do. I’ve been overhauling my log-book, while the sea here has been dashing over my bows, and washing my figure-head; and there are some things I wish I could forget;—they will rise up in judgment against me; but surely not for ever?”

“You should have thought of that before, my good fellow. I am sorry for you,—sorry for all those who have perished, for they were good seamen, and, in the worldly service, have done well. I was reflecting the other day whether, out of the whole navy, I should be able to muster one single ship’s company in heaven.”

“Well, Mr Hardsett, it’s my firm opinion, that when the hands are turned up for punishment in the next world, we shall be sarved out according to our desarts. Now, that’s my belief; and I shan’t change it for yours, Mr Hardsett, for I thinks mine the more comfortable of the two.”

“It won’t do, Robinson, you must have faith.”

“So I have, in God’s mercy, boatswain.”

“That won’t do. Yours is not the true faith.”

“Mayhap not, but I hope to ride it out with it nevertheless, for I have it well backed with hope; and if I still drive,”—said Robinson, musing a short time—“why, I have charity as a sheet-anchor, to bring me up again. It’s long odds but our bodies will soon be knocked to shivers in those breakers, and we shall then know who’s right, and who’s wrong. I see small chance of our saving ourselves, unless indeed we could walk on the sea, and there was but one that ever did that.”

“Had the apostle had faith, he would not have sunk,” rejoined the boatswain.

“Have you then more faith than the apostle?”

“I have, thanks be to Jehovah, the true faith,” cried the boatswain, raising his eyes and hands to heaven.

“Thenwalk on shore,” said the captain of the forecastle, looking him steadfastly in the face.

Stimulated by the request, which appeared to put his courage as a man, and his faith as a Christian, to the test, and, at the moment, fanatic even to insanity, the boatswain rose, and casting off the ropes which he had wound round his body, was about to comply with Robinson’s request.

A few moments more, and the raging sea would have received him, had not our hero, in conjunction with the captain of the forecastle, held him down with all his power. “We doubt not your faith, Mr Hardsett,” said Seymour, “but the time of miracles is past. It would be self-murder. He who raised the storm, will, in his own good time, save us, if he thinks fit.”

Price, who had listened to the conversation, and had watched the motions of the boatswain, who was casting off the lashings which had secured him, had, unperceived, done the same, and now jumped upon his legs, and collared the astonished boatswain, roaring out—

“Zounds, show me what thou’lt do!Woul’t weep? woul’t fight? woul’t fast? woul’t tear thyself?”

“Zounds, show me what thou’lt do!Woul’t weep? woul’t fight? woul’t fast? woul’t tear thyself?”

“Why, he’s mad!” exclaimed the terrified boatswain, who was not far off the point himself.

“Mad!” resumed Price.

“Not a soulBut felt a fever of the mad, and play’dSome tricks of desperation.“The king’s son, Ferdinand,With hair upstarting (then like reeds, not hair),Was the first man that leaped; cried, Hell is empty,And all the devils are here!”

“Not a soulBut felt a fever of the mad, and play’dSome tricks of desperation.“The king’s son, Ferdinand,With hair upstarting (then like reeds, not hair),Was the first man that leaped; cried, Hell is empty,And all the devils are here!”

As the maniac finished the last words, before they could be aware of his intention, he made a spring from the deck over the bulwark, and disappeared under the wave. The boatswain, who had been diverted from his fanatical attempt by the unexpected attack of Price, more than by the remonstrances of his companions, resumed his position, folding his arms, and casting his eyes to heaven. The captain of the forecastle was silent, and so was our hero—the thoughts of the two were upon the same subject—eternity.

Eternity—the only theme that confuses, humbles, and alarms the proud intellect of man. What is it? The human mind can grasp any defined space, any defined time, however vast; but this is beyond time, and too great for the limited conception of man. It had no beginning and can have no end. It cannot be multiplied, it cannot be divided, it cannot be added unto—you may attempt to subtract from it, but it is useless. Take millions and millions of years from it, take all the time that can enter into the compass of your imagination, it is still whole and undiminished as before—all calculation is lost. Think on—the brain becomes heated, and oppressed with a sensation of weight too powerful for it to bear; reason totters in her seat, and you rise with the conviction of the impossibility of the creature attempting to fathom the Creator—humiliated with the sense of your own nothingness, and impressed with the tremendous majesty of the Deity.

Time is Man—Eternity is God!

Chapter Fifty Five.Thou art perfect, then, that our ship hath touched upon the deserts of Bohemia?Ay, my lord and fear we have landed in ill time.Winter’s Tale.About midnight the moon burst through the clouds, which gradually rolled away to the western horizon, as if they had been furled by some invisible spirits in the air. The wind, after several feeble gusts, like the last breathings of some expiring creature unwilling to loosen the “silver cord,” subsided to a calm. It then shifted round to the eastward. The waves relaxed in their force until they did little more than play upon the side of the wreck, so lately the object of their fury. The dark shadows of the rocks were no longer relieved by the white foam of the surf, which had raged among them with such violence. Before morning all was calm, and the survivors, as they shrunk and shivered in their wet garments, encouraged each other with the prospect of a speedy termination to their sufferings on the reappearance of daylight. The sun rose in splendour, and seemed, as he darted his searching rays through the cloudless expanse, to exclaim in his pride, “Behold how I bring light and heat, joy and salvation, to you, late despairing creatures!” The rocks of the reef above water, which had previously been a source of horror, and had been contemplated as the sure engines of their destruction, were now joyfully reckoned as so many resting-spots for those who were about to attempt to reach the land.The most daring and expert swimmers launched themselves into the water, and made for the nearest cluster of rocks, with difficulty gaining a footing on them, after clinging by the dark and slippery sea-weed which covered their tops, like shaggy hair on the heads of so many emerging giants. The waving of the hands of the party who had succeeded in gaining the rocks, encouraged a second to follow; while others, who could not swim, were busily employed in searching for the means of supporting themselves in the water, and floating themselves on shore. Self, that had predominated, now lost its ground. Those who had allowed their shipmates to perish in attempting to gain the same place of security as themselves, without an effort in their favour, or one sigh for their unlucky fate, now that hope was revived almost to a certainty of deliverance, showed as much interest in the preservation of others lying in a state of exhaustion, as they did for their own. The remaining officers recovered their authority, which had been disregarded, and the shattered fragment of theAspasiareassumed their rights of discipline and obedience to the last. In a few hours, sick, disabled, and wounded were all safely landed, and the raft which had been constructed returned to the wreck, to bring on shore whatever might be useful.Our hero, who was the only officer who had been saved, with the exception of the boatswain, had taken upon himself the command, and occupied himself with the arrangements necessary for the shelter and sustenance of his men. A range of barren hills, abruptly rising from the iron-bound coast, covered with large fragments and detached pieces of rock, without any symptom of cultivation, or any domesticated animal in sight which might imply that human aid was not far distant, met the eye of Seymour, as he directed it to every point, in hopes of succour for his wounded and exhausted companions. One of the men, whom he had sent to reconnoitre, returned in a few minutes, stating, that behind a jutting rock, which he pointed to with his finger, not two hundred yards distant, he had discovered a hut, or what in Ireland is termed a shealing, and that there appeared to be a bridle road from it leading over the mountain. To this shelter our hero determined to remove his disabled men, and in company with the boatswain and the man who had returned with the intelligence, set off to examine the spot. Passing the rock, he perceived that the hut, which bore every sign, from its smokeless chimney and air of negligence and decay, to have been some time deserted, stood upon a piece of ground, about an acre in extent, which had once been cultivated, but was now luxuriant with a spontaneous crop of weeds and thistles. He approached the entrance, and as the rude door creaked upon its hinges when he threw it open, was saluted by a faint voice, which cried, “Qui va là?”“Why there’s Irishmen inside,” observed the sailor.“Frenchmen rather, I should imagine,” replied our hero, as he entered and discovered seven or eight of the unfortunate survivors of the French line-of-battle ship, who had crawled there, bruised, cut, and apparently in the last state of exhaustion.“Bonjour, camarade,” said one of them, with difficulty raising himself on his elbow—“As-tu d’eau-de-vie?”“I am afraid not,” replied Seymour, looking with compassion on the group, all of which had their eyes directed towards him, although, from their wounds and bruises, they were not able to turn their bodies. “We are shipwrecked as well as you.”“What! did you belong to that cursed frigate?”“We did,” replied Seymour, “and there are but few of us alive to tell the tale.”“Vive la France!” cried the Frenchman; “puisqu’elle n’a pas échappée—je n’ai plus des regrets.”“Viva, viva!” repeated the rest of the French party, in faint accents.“Et moi, je meurs content!” murmured one, who, in a few seconds afterwards expired.“Are you the only survivors?” demanded Seymour.“All that are left,” replied the spokesman of the party, “out of eight hundred and fifty men.Sacristie—as-tu d’eau-de-vie?”“I hardly know what we have—something has been saved from the wreck,” replied Seymour, “and shall cheerfully be shared with you with all the assistance we can afford. We were enemies, but we are now brothers in affliction. I must quit you to bring up our wounded men; there is sufficient room, I perceive, for all of us.Adieu, pour le moment!”“Savez-vous que c’est un brave garçon ce lieutenant-là?” observed the Frenchman to his companions, as Seymour and his party quitted the hut.Seymour returned to the beach, and, collecting his men, found the survivors to consist of forty-four seamen and marines, the boatswain and himself. Of these, fifteen were helpless, from wounds and fractured limbs. The articles which had been collected were a variety of spars and fragments of wood, some of the small sails which had been triced up in the rigging, one or two casks of beef and pork, and a puncheon of rum, which had miraculously steered its course between the breakers, and had been landed without injury. The sails which had been spread out to dry, were first carried up to form a bed for the sick and wounded, who, in the space of an hour, were all made as comfortable as circumstances would admit, a general bed having been made on the floor of the hut, upon which they and the wounded Frenchmen shared the sails between them. The spars and fragments were then brought up, and a fire made in the long deserted hearth, while another was lighted outside for the men to dry their clothes. The cask of rum was rolled up to the door, and a portion, mixed with the water from a rill that trickled down the sides of the adjacent mountain, served out to the exhausted parties. The seamen, stripping off their clothes, and spreading them out to dry before the fire which had been made outside, collected into the hut to shield their naked bodies from the inclemency of the weather.The spirits, which had been supplied with caution to the survivors of the French vessel, had been eagerly seized by the one who had first addressed our hero, and in half an hour he seemed to be quite revived. He rose, and after trying his limbs, by moving slowly to and fro, gradually recovered the entire use of them; and by the time that the circulation of his blood had been thoroughly restored by a second dose of spirits, appeared to have little to complain of. He was a powerful, well-looking man, with a large head, covered with a profusion of shaggy hair. Seymour looked at him earnestly, and thought he could not well be mistaken, long as it was since they had been in company.“Excuse me—but I think we once met at Cherbourg. Is not your name Debriseau?”“Sacristie!” replied the Frenchman, seizing himself by the hair, “je suis connu! And who are you?”“Oh! now I’m sure it’s you,” replied Seymour, laughing—“that’s your old trick—do you not recollect the boy that Captain McElvina took off the wreck?”“Ah mon ami—Seymour, I believe—midshipman, I believe,” cried Debriseau. “Est-ce donc vous? Mais, mon Dieu, que c’est drôle” (again pulling his hair as he grinded his teeth) “Un diable de rencontre!”“And how is it that you have been on board of a French man-of-war?”“How! oh, I was unlucky after McElvina went away, and I thought, on reflection, notwithstanding his arguments, that it was a dishonest sort of concern. Being pretty well acquainted with the coasts, I shipped on board as pilot.”“But, Debriseau, are you not a native of Guernsey, which is part of the British dominions?”“Bah! it’s all one,mon ami; we islanders are like the bat in the fable—beast or bird, as it suits us—we belong to either country. For my own part, I have a strong national affection forboth.”The conversation was here interrupted by the entrance of the boatswain, who had remained outside, in charge of the cask of rum, upon which he had seated himself occupied with his Bible. “Here’s assistance coming, Mr Seymour. There’s at least twenty or thirty men descending the hill.”“Hurrah for old Ireland! they are the boys that will look after a friend in distress,” shouted Conolly, one of the seamen, who thus eulogised his own countrymen, as he hung naked over the fire.

Thou art perfect, then, that our ship hath touched upon the deserts of Bohemia?Ay, my lord and fear we have landed in ill time.Winter’s Tale.

Thou art perfect, then, that our ship hath touched upon the deserts of Bohemia?

Ay, my lord and fear we have landed in ill time.

Winter’s Tale.

About midnight the moon burst through the clouds, which gradually rolled away to the western horizon, as if they had been furled by some invisible spirits in the air. The wind, after several feeble gusts, like the last breathings of some expiring creature unwilling to loosen the “silver cord,” subsided to a calm. It then shifted round to the eastward. The waves relaxed in their force until they did little more than play upon the side of the wreck, so lately the object of their fury. The dark shadows of the rocks were no longer relieved by the white foam of the surf, which had raged among them with such violence. Before morning all was calm, and the survivors, as they shrunk and shivered in their wet garments, encouraged each other with the prospect of a speedy termination to their sufferings on the reappearance of daylight. The sun rose in splendour, and seemed, as he darted his searching rays through the cloudless expanse, to exclaim in his pride, “Behold how I bring light and heat, joy and salvation, to you, late despairing creatures!” The rocks of the reef above water, which had previously been a source of horror, and had been contemplated as the sure engines of their destruction, were now joyfully reckoned as so many resting-spots for those who were about to attempt to reach the land.

The most daring and expert swimmers launched themselves into the water, and made for the nearest cluster of rocks, with difficulty gaining a footing on them, after clinging by the dark and slippery sea-weed which covered their tops, like shaggy hair on the heads of so many emerging giants. The waving of the hands of the party who had succeeded in gaining the rocks, encouraged a second to follow; while others, who could not swim, were busily employed in searching for the means of supporting themselves in the water, and floating themselves on shore. Self, that had predominated, now lost its ground. Those who had allowed their shipmates to perish in attempting to gain the same place of security as themselves, without an effort in their favour, or one sigh for their unlucky fate, now that hope was revived almost to a certainty of deliverance, showed as much interest in the preservation of others lying in a state of exhaustion, as they did for their own. The remaining officers recovered their authority, which had been disregarded, and the shattered fragment of theAspasiareassumed their rights of discipline and obedience to the last. In a few hours, sick, disabled, and wounded were all safely landed, and the raft which had been constructed returned to the wreck, to bring on shore whatever might be useful.

Our hero, who was the only officer who had been saved, with the exception of the boatswain, had taken upon himself the command, and occupied himself with the arrangements necessary for the shelter and sustenance of his men. A range of barren hills, abruptly rising from the iron-bound coast, covered with large fragments and detached pieces of rock, without any symptom of cultivation, or any domesticated animal in sight which might imply that human aid was not far distant, met the eye of Seymour, as he directed it to every point, in hopes of succour for his wounded and exhausted companions. One of the men, whom he had sent to reconnoitre, returned in a few minutes, stating, that behind a jutting rock, which he pointed to with his finger, not two hundred yards distant, he had discovered a hut, or what in Ireland is termed a shealing, and that there appeared to be a bridle road from it leading over the mountain. To this shelter our hero determined to remove his disabled men, and in company with the boatswain and the man who had returned with the intelligence, set off to examine the spot. Passing the rock, he perceived that the hut, which bore every sign, from its smokeless chimney and air of negligence and decay, to have been some time deserted, stood upon a piece of ground, about an acre in extent, which had once been cultivated, but was now luxuriant with a spontaneous crop of weeds and thistles. He approached the entrance, and as the rude door creaked upon its hinges when he threw it open, was saluted by a faint voice, which cried, “Qui va là?”

“Why there’s Irishmen inside,” observed the sailor.

“Frenchmen rather, I should imagine,” replied our hero, as he entered and discovered seven or eight of the unfortunate survivors of the French line-of-battle ship, who had crawled there, bruised, cut, and apparently in the last state of exhaustion.

“Bonjour, camarade,” said one of them, with difficulty raising himself on his elbow—“As-tu d’eau-de-vie?”

“I am afraid not,” replied Seymour, looking with compassion on the group, all of which had their eyes directed towards him, although, from their wounds and bruises, they were not able to turn their bodies. “We are shipwrecked as well as you.”

“What! did you belong to that cursed frigate?”

“We did,” replied Seymour, “and there are but few of us alive to tell the tale.”

“Vive la France!” cried the Frenchman; “puisqu’elle n’a pas échappée—je n’ai plus des regrets.”

“Viva, viva!” repeated the rest of the French party, in faint accents.

“Et moi, je meurs content!” murmured one, who, in a few seconds afterwards expired.

“Are you the only survivors?” demanded Seymour.

“All that are left,” replied the spokesman of the party, “out of eight hundred and fifty men.Sacristie—as-tu d’eau-de-vie?”

“I hardly know what we have—something has been saved from the wreck,” replied Seymour, “and shall cheerfully be shared with you with all the assistance we can afford. We were enemies, but we are now brothers in affliction. I must quit you to bring up our wounded men; there is sufficient room, I perceive, for all of us.Adieu, pour le moment!”

“Savez-vous que c’est un brave garçon ce lieutenant-là?” observed the Frenchman to his companions, as Seymour and his party quitted the hut.

Seymour returned to the beach, and, collecting his men, found the survivors to consist of forty-four seamen and marines, the boatswain and himself. Of these, fifteen were helpless, from wounds and fractured limbs. The articles which had been collected were a variety of spars and fragments of wood, some of the small sails which had been triced up in the rigging, one or two casks of beef and pork, and a puncheon of rum, which had miraculously steered its course between the breakers, and had been landed without injury. The sails which had been spread out to dry, were first carried up to form a bed for the sick and wounded, who, in the space of an hour, were all made as comfortable as circumstances would admit, a general bed having been made on the floor of the hut, upon which they and the wounded Frenchmen shared the sails between them. The spars and fragments were then brought up, and a fire made in the long deserted hearth, while another was lighted outside for the men to dry their clothes. The cask of rum was rolled up to the door, and a portion, mixed with the water from a rill that trickled down the sides of the adjacent mountain, served out to the exhausted parties. The seamen, stripping off their clothes, and spreading them out to dry before the fire which had been made outside, collected into the hut to shield their naked bodies from the inclemency of the weather.

The spirits, which had been supplied with caution to the survivors of the French vessel, had been eagerly seized by the one who had first addressed our hero, and in half an hour he seemed to be quite revived. He rose, and after trying his limbs, by moving slowly to and fro, gradually recovered the entire use of them; and by the time that the circulation of his blood had been thoroughly restored by a second dose of spirits, appeared to have little to complain of. He was a powerful, well-looking man, with a large head, covered with a profusion of shaggy hair. Seymour looked at him earnestly, and thought he could not well be mistaken, long as it was since they had been in company.

“Excuse me—but I think we once met at Cherbourg. Is not your name Debriseau?”

“Sacristie!” replied the Frenchman, seizing himself by the hair, “je suis connu! And who are you?”

“Oh! now I’m sure it’s you,” replied Seymour, laughing—“that’s your old trick—do you not recollect the boy that Captain McElvina took off the wreck?”

“Ah mon ami—Seymour, I believe—midshipman, I believe,” cried Debriseau. “Est-ce donc vous? Mais, mon Dieu, que c’est drôle” (again pulling his hair as he grinded his teeth) “Un diable de rencontre!”

“And how is it that you have been on board of a French man-of-war?”

“How! oh, I was unlucky after McElvina went away, and I thought, on reflection, notwithstanding his arguments, that it was a dishonest sort of concern. Being pretty well acquainted with the coasts, I shipped on board as pilot.”

“But, Debriseau, are you not a native of Guernsey, which is part of the British dominions?”

“Bah! it’s all one,mon ami; we islanders are like the bat in the fable—beast or bird, as it suits us—we belong to either country. For my own part, I have a strong national affection forboth.”

The conversation was here interrupted by the entrance of the boatswain, who had remained outside, in charge of the cask of rum, upon which he had seated himself occupied with his Bible. “Here’s assistance coming, Mr Seymour. There’s at least twenty or thirty men descending the hill.”

“Hurrah for old Ireland! they are the boys that will look after a friend in distress,” shouted Conolly, one of the seamen, who thus eulogised his own countrymen, as he hung naked over the fire.

Chapter Fifty Six.With dauntless hardihoodAnd brandish’d blade rush on him,And shed the luscious liquor on the ground,...though he and his cursed crewFierce sign of battle make, and menace high.Milton.The information received from Mr Hardsett induced our hero to break off his conversation with Debriseau, and he immediately quitted the hut. A party of men, wild in their appearance and demeanour, were bounding down through the rocks, flourishing their bludgeons over their heads, with loud shouts. They soon arrived within a few yards of the shealing, and, to the astonishment of Seymour and the boatswain, who, with a dozen more, had resumed their clothes, seemed to eye them with hostile, rather than with friendly glances. Their intentions were, however, soon manifested by their pouncing upon the habiliments of the seamen which were spread out to dry, holding them rolled up under one arm, while they flourished their shillelahs in defiance with the other.“Avast there, my lads!” cried the boatswain “why are you meddling with those clothes?”A shout, with confused answers in Irish, was the incomprehensible reply.“Conolly,” cried Seymour, “you can speak to them. Ask them what they mean?”Conolly addressed them in Irish, when an exchange of a few sentences took place.“Bloody end to the rapparees!” said Conolly, turning to our hero. “It’s helping themselves they’re a’ter, instead of helping us. They say all that comes on shore from a wreck is their own by right, and that they’ll have it. They asked me what was in the cask, and I told them it was the cratur, sure enough, and they say that they must have it, and everything else, and that if we don’t give it up peaceably, they’ll take the lives of us.”Seymour, who was aware that the surrender of the means of intoxication would probably lead to worse results, turned to his men, who had assembled outside of the hut, and had armed themselves with spars and fragments of the wreck on the first appearance of hostility, and directed them to roll the cask of rum into the hut, and prepare to act on the defensive. The English seamen, indignant at such violation of the laws of hospitality, and at the loss of their clothes, immediately complied with his instructions, and, with their blood boiling, were with difficulty restrained from commencing the attack.A shaggy-headed monster, apparently the leader of the hostile party, again addressed Conolly in his own language.“It’s to know whether ye’ll give up the cask quietly, or have a fight for it. The devil a pair of trousers will they give back, not even my own, though I’m an Irishman, and a Galway man to boot. By Jesus, Mr Seymour, it’s to be hoped ye’ll not give up the cratur without a bit of a row.”“No,” replied Seymour. “Tell them that they shall not have it, and that they shall be punished for the theft they have already committed.”“You’re to come and take it,” roared Conolly, in Irish, to the opposing party.“Now, my lads,” cried Seymour, “you must fight hard for it—they will show little mercy, if they gain the day.”The boatswain returned his Bible to his breast, and seizing the mast of the frigate’s jolly-boat, which had been thrown up with the other spars, poised it with both hands on a level with his head, so as to use the foot of it as a battering-ram, and stalked before his men.The Irish closed with loud yells, and the affray commenced with a desperation seldom to be witnessed. Many were the wounds given and received, and several of either party were levelled in the dust. The numbers were about even; but the weapons of the Irish were of a better description, each man being provided with his own shillelah of hard wood, which he had been accustomed to wield. But the boatswain did great execution, as he launched forward his mast, and prostrated an Irishman every time, with his cool and well-directed aim. After a few minutes’ contention, the Englishmen were beaten back to the shealing, where they rallied, and continued to stand at bay. Seymour, anxious at all events that the Irish should not obtain the liquor, directed Robinson, the captain of the forecastle, to go into the hut, take the bung out of the cask, and start the contents. This order was obeyed, while the contest was continued outside, till McDermot, the leader of the Irish, called off his men, that they might recover their breath for a renewal of the attack.“If it’s the liquor you want,” cried Conolly to them, by the direction of Seymour, “you must be quick about it. There it’s all running away through the doors of the shealing.”This announcement had, however, the contrary effect to that which Seymour intended it should produce. Enraged at the loss of the spirits, and hoping to gain possession of the cask before it was all out, the Irish returned with renewed violence to the assault, and drove the English to the other side of the shealing, obtaining possession of the door, which they burst into, to secure their prey. About eight or ten had entered, and had seized upon the cask, which was not more than half emptied, when the liquor, which had run out under the door of the hut, communicated, in its course, with the fire that had been kindled outside. With the rapidity of lightning the flame ran up the stream that continued to flow, igniting the whole of the spirits in the cask, which blew up with a tremendous explosion, darting the fiery liquid over the whole interior, and communicating the flame to the thatch, and every part of the building, which was instantaneously in ardent combustion. The shrieks of the poor disabled wretches, stretched on the sails, to which the fire had communicated, and who were now lying in a molten sea of flame like that described in Pandemonium by Milton—the yells of the Irish inside of the hut, vainly attempting to regain the door, as they writhed in their flaming apparel, which, like the shirt of Nessus, ate into their flesh—the burning thatch which had been precipitated in the air, and now descended in fiery flakes upon the parties outside, who stood aghast at the dreadful and unexpected catastrophe,—the volumes of black and suffocating smoke which poured out from every quarter, formed a scene of horror to which no pen can do adequate justice. But all was soon over. The shrieks and yells had yielded to suffocation, and the flames, in their fury, had devoured everything with such rapidity, that they subsided for the want of further aliment. In a few minutes, nothing remained but the smoking walls, and the blackened corpses which they encircled.Ill-fated wretches! ye had escaped the lightning’s blast—ye had been rescued from the swallowing wave—and little thought that you would encounter an enemy more cruel still—your fellow-creature—man.The first emotions of Seymour and his party, as soon as they had recovered from the horror which had been excited by the catastrophe, were those of pity and commiseration; but their reign was short—“Revenge impatient rose, And threw his blood-stain’d sword in thunder down.”The smoking ruins formed the altar at which he received their vows, and stimulated them to the sacrifice of further victims. Nor did he fail to inspire the breasts of the other party, indignant at the loss of their companions, and disappointed at the destruction of what they so ardently coveted.Debriseau, who had played no idle game in the previous skirmish, was the first who rushed to the attack. Crying out, with all the theatrical air of a Frenchman, which never deserts him, even in the agony of grief, “Mes braves compagnons, vous serez vengés!” he flew at McDermot, the leader of the Irish savages.A brand of half-consumed wood, with which he aimed at McDermot’s head, broke across the bludgeon which was raised to ward the blow. Debriseau closed; and, clasping his arms round his neck, tore him with his strong teeth with the power and ferocity of a tiger, and they rolled together in the dust, covered with the blood which poured in streams, and struggling for mastery and life. An American, one of theAspasia’screw, now closed in the same way with another of the Irish desperadoes, and as they fell together, twirling the side-locks on the temples of his antagonist round his fingers to obtain a fulcrum to his lever, he inserted his thumbs into the sockets of his eyes, forced out the balls of vision, and left him in agony and in darkness.“The sword of the Lord!” roared the boatswain, as he fractured the skull of a third with the mast of the boat, which, with herculean force, he now whirled round his head.“Fight,Aspasias, you fight for your lives,” cried Seymour, who was everywhere in advance, darting the still burning end of the large spar into the faces of his antagonists, who recoiled with suffocation and pain. It was, indeed, a struggle for life; the rage of each had mounted to delirium. The English sailors, stimulated by the passions of the moment, felt neither pain nor fatigue from their previous sufferings. The want of weapons had been supplied by their clasp knives, to which the Irish had also resorted, and deadly wounds were given and received.McDermot, the Irish leader, had just gained the mastery of Debriseau, bestriding his body and strangling him, with his fingers so fixed in his throat that they seemed deeply to have entered into the flesh. The Guernsey man was black in the face, and his eyes starting from their sockets: in a few minutes he would have been no more, when the mast in the hands of the boatswain descended upon the Irishman’s head, and dashed out his brains. At the same moment, one of the Irishmen darted his knife into the side of Seymour, who fell, streaming with his own blood. The fate of their officer, which excited the attention of the seamen, and the fall of McDermot, on the opposite side, to whose assistance the Irish immediately hastened, added to the suspension of their powers from want of breath, produced a temporary cessation of hostilities. Dragging away their killed and wounded, the panting antagonists retreated to the distance of a few yards from each other, tired, but not satisfied with their revenge, and fully intending to resume the strife as soon as they had recovered the power. But a very few seconds had elapsed, when they were interrupted by a third party; and the clattering of horses’ hoofs was immediately followed by the appearance of a female on horseback, who, galloping past the Irishmen, reined up her steed, throwing him on his haunches, in his full career, in the space between the late contending parties.“’Tis the daughter of the House!” exclaimed the Irishmen, in consternation.There wanted no such contrast as the scene described to add lustre to her beauty, or to enhance her charms. Fair as the snow-drift, her cheeks mantling with the roseate blush of exercise and animation—her glossy hair, partly uncurled, and still played with by the amorous breeze, hanging in long ringlets down her neck—her eye, which alternately beamed with pity or flashed with indignation, as it was directed to one side or the other—her symmetry of form, which the close riding-dress displayed—her graceful movements, as she occasionally restrained her grey palfrey, who fretted to resume his speed, all combined with her sudden and unexpected appearance to induce the boatswain and his men to consider her as superhuman.“She’s an angel of light!” muttered the boatswain to himself.She turned to the Irish, and, in an energetic tone, addressed them in their own dialect. What she had said was unknown to the English party, but the effect which her language produced was immediate. Their weapons were thrown aside, and they hung down their heads in confusion. They made an attempt to walk away, but a few words from her induced them to remain.The fair equestrian was now joined by two more, whose pace had not been so rapid; and the boatswain, who had been contemplating her with astonishment, as she was addressing the Irish, now that she was about to turn towards him, recollected that some of his men were not exactly in a costume to meet a lady’s eye. He raised his call to his mouth, and, with a sonorous whistle, cried out, “All you without trousers behind shealing, hoy!” an order immediately obeyed by the men who had been deprived of their habiliments.Conolly, who had understood the conversation which had taken place, called out in Irish, at the same time as he walked round behind the walls, “I think ye’ll be after giving us our duds now, ye dirty spalpeens, so bring ’um wid you quick;” a request which was immediately complied with, the clothes being collected by two of the Irish, and taken to the men who had retired behind the walls of the shealing.Mr Hardsett was not long in replying to her interrogations, and in giving her an outline of the tragical events which had occurred, while the ladies, trembling with pity and emotion, listened to the painful narrative.“Are you the only officer then of the frigate that is left?”“No, madam,” replied the boatswain, “the third-lieutenant is here; but there he lies, poor fellow, desperately wounded by these men, from whom we expected to have had relief.”“What was the name of your frigate?”“TheAspasia, Captain M—.”“O heaven!” cried the girl, catching at the collar of the boatswain’s coat in her trepidation.“And the wounded officer’s name?”“Seymour.”A cry of anguish and horror escaped from all the party as the beautiful interrogatress tottered in her seat, and then fell off into the arms of the boatswain.In a few seconds, recovering herself, she regained her feet. “Quick, quick—lead me to him.”Supported by Hardsett, she tottered to the spot where Seymour lay, with his eyes closed, faint and exhausted with loss of blood, attended by Robinson and Debriseau.She knelt down by his side, and taking his hand, which she pressed between her own, called him by his name.Seymour started at the sound of the voice, opened his eyes, and in the beauteous form which was reclining over him, beheld his dear, dear Emily.

With dauntless hardihoodAnd brandish’d blade rush on him,And shed the luscious liquor on the ground,...though he and his cursed crewFierce sign of battle make, and menace high.Milton.

With dauntless hardihoodAnd brandish’d blade rush on him,And shed the luscious liquor on the ground,...though he and his cursed crewFierce sign of battle make, and menace high.Milton.

The information received from Mr Hardsett induced our hero to break off his conversation with Debriseau, and he immediately quitted the hut. A party of men, wild in their appearance and demeanour, were bounding down through the rocks, flourishing their bludgeons over their heads, with loud shouts. They soon arrived within a few yards of the shealing, and, to the astonishment of Seymour and the boatswain, who, with a dozen more, had resumed their clothes, seemed to eye them with hostile, rather than with friendly glances. Their intentions were, however, soon manifested by their pouncing upon the habiliments of the seamen which were spread out to dry, holding them rolled up under one arm, while they flourished their shillelahs in defiance with the other.

“Avast there, my lads!” cried the boatswain “why are you meddling with those clothes?”

A shout, with confused answers in Irish, was the incomprehensible reply.

“Conolly,” cried Seymour, “you can speak to them. Ask them what they mean?”

Conolly addressed them in Irish, when an exchange of a few sentences took place.

“Bloody end to the rapparees!” said Conolly, turning to our hero. “It’s helping themselves they’re a’ter, instead of helping us. They say all that comes on shore from a wreck is their own by right, and that they’ll have it. They asked me what was in the cask, and I told them it was the cratur, sure enough, and they say that they must have it, and everything else, and that if we don’t give it up peaceably, they’ll take the lives of us.”

Seymour, who was aware that the surrender of the means of intoxication would probably lead to worse results, turned to his men, who had assembled outside of the hut, and had armed themselves with spars and fragments of the wreck on the first appearance of hostility, and directed them to roll the cask of rum into the hut, and prepare to act on the defensive. The English seamen, indignant at such violation of the laws of hospitality, and at the loss of their clothes, immediately complied with his instructions, and, with their blood boiling, were with difficulty restrained from commencing the attack.

A shaggy-headed monster, apparently the leader of the hostile party, again addressed Conolly in his own language.

“It’s to know whether ye’ll give up the cask quietly, or have a fight for it. The devil a pair of trousers will they give back, not even my own, though I’m an Irishman, and a Galway man to boot. By Jesus, Mr Seymour, it’s to be hoped ye’ll not give up the cratur without a bit of a row.”

“No,” replied Seymour. “Tell them that they shall not have it, and that they shall be punished for the theft they have already committed.”

“You’re to come and take it,” roared Conolly, in Irish, to the opposing party.

“Now, my lads,” cried Seymour, “you must fight hard for it—they will show little mercy, if they gain the day.”

The boatswain returned his Bible to his breast, and seizing the mast of the frigate’s jolly-boat, which had been thrown up with the other spars, poised it with both hands on a level with his head, so as to use the foot of it as a battering-ram, and stalked before his men.

The Irish closed with loud yells, and the affray commenced with a desperation seldom to be witnessed. Many were the wounds given and received, and several of either party were levelled in the dust. The numbers were about even; but the weapons of the Irish were of a better description, each man being provided with his own shillelah of hard wood, which he had been accustomed to wield. But the boatswain did great execution, as he launched forward his mast, and prostrated an Irishman every time, with his cool and well-directed aim. After a few minutes’ contention, the Englishmen were beaten back to the shealing, where they rallied, and continued to stand at bay. Seymour, anxious at all events that the Irish should not obtain the liquor, directed Robinson, the captain of the forecastle, to go into the hut, take the bung out of the cask, and start the contents. This order was obeyed, while the contest was continued outside, till McDermot, the leader of the Irish, called off his men, that they might recover their breath for a renewal of the attack.

“If it’s the liquor you want,” cried Conolly to them, by the direction of Seymour, “you must be quick about it. There it’s all running away through the doors of the shealing.”

This announcement had, however, the contrary effect to that which Seymour intended it should produce. Enraged at the loss of the spirits, and hoping to gain possession of the cask before it was all out, the Irish returned with renewed violence to the assault, and drove the English to the other side of the shealing, obtaining possession of the door, which they burst into, to secure their prey. About eight or ten had entered, and had seized upon the cask, which was not more than half emptied, when the liquor, which had run out under the door of the hut, communicated, in its course, with the fire that had been kindled outside. With the rapidity of lightning the flame ran up the stream that continued to flow, igniting the whole of the spirits in the cask, which blew up with a tremendous explosion, darting the fiery liquid over the whole interior, and communicating the flame to the thatch, and every part of the building, which was instantaneously in ardent combustion. The shrieks of the poor disabled wretches, stretched on the sails, to which the fire had communicated, and who were now lying in a molten sea of flame like that described in Pandemonium by Milton—the yells of the Irish inside of the hut, vainly attempting to regain the door, as they writhed in their flaming apparel, which, like the shirt of Nessus, ate into their flesh—the burning thatch which had been precipitated in the air, and now descended in fiery flakes upon the parties outside, who stood aghast at the dreadful and unexpected catastrophe,—the volumes of black and suffocating smoke which poured out from every quarter, formed a scene of horror to which no pen can do adequate justice. But all was soon over. The shrieks and yells had yielded to suffocation, and the flames, in their fury, had devoured everything with such rapidity, that they subsided for the want of further aliment. In a few minutes, nothing remained but the smoking walls, and the blackened corpses which they encircled.

Ill-fated wretches! ye had escaped the lightning’s blast—ye had been rescued from the swallowing wave—and little thought that you would encounter an enemy more cruel still—your fellow-creature—man.

The first emotions of Seymour and his party, as soon as they had recovered from the horror which had been excited by the catastrophe, were those of pity and commiseration; but their reign was short—

“Revenge impatient rose, And threw his blood-stain’d sword in thunder down.”

“Revenge impatient rose, And threw his blood-stain’d sword in thunder down.”

The smoking ruins formed the altar at which he received their vows, and stimulated them to the sacrifice of further victims. Nor did he fail to inspire the breasts of the other party, indignant at the loss of their companions, and disappointed at the destruction of what they so ardently coveted.

Debriseau, who had played no idle game in the previous skirmish, was the first who rushed to the attack. Crying out, with all the theatrical air of a Frenchman, which never deserts him, even in the agony of grief, “Mes braves compagnons, vous serez vengés!” he flew at McDermot, the leader of the Irish savages.

A brand of half-consumed wood, with which he aimed at McDermot’s head, broke across the bludgeon which was raised to ward the blow. Debriseau closed; and, clasping his arms round his neck, tore him with his strong teeth with the power and ferocity of a tiger, and they rolled together in the dust, covered with the blood which poured in streams, and struggling for mastery and life. An American, one of theAspasia’screw, now closed in the same way with another of the Irish desperadoes, and as they fell together, twirling the side-locks on the temples of his antagonist round his fingers to obtain a fulcrum to his lever, he inserted his thumbs into the sockets of his eyes, forced out the balls of vision, and left him in agony and in darkness.

“The sword of the Lord!” roared the boatswain, as he fractured the skull of a third with the mast of the boat, which, with herculean force, he now whirled round his head.

“Fight,Aspasias, you fight for your lives,” cried Seymour, who was everywhere in advance, darting the still burning end of the large spar into the faces of his antagonists, who recoiled with suffocation and pain. It was, indeed, a struggle for life; the rage of each had mounted to delirium. The English sailors, stimulated by the passions of the moment, felt neither pain nor fatigue from their previous sufferings. The want of weapons had been supplied by their clasp knives, to which the Irish had also resorted, and deadly wounds were given and received.

McDermot, the Irish leader, had just gained the mastery of Debriseau, bestriding his body and strangling him, with his fingers so fixed in his throat that they seemed deeply to have entered into the flesh. The Guernsey man was black in the face, and his eyes starting from their sockets: in a few minutes he would have been no more, when the mast in the hands of the boatswain descended upon the Irishman’s head, and dashed out his brains. At the same moment, one of the Irishmen darted his knife into the side of Seymour, who fell, streaming with his own blood. The fate of their officer, which excited the attention of the seamen, and the fall of McDermot, on the opposite side, to whose assistance the Irish immediately hastened, added to the suspension of their powers from want of breath, produced a temporary cessation of hostilities. Dragging away their killed and wounded, the panting antagonists retreated to the distance of a few yards from each other, tired, but not satisfied with their revenge, and fully intending to resume the strife as soon as they had recovered the power. But a very few seconds had elapsed, when they were interrupted by a third party; and the clattering of horses’ hoofs was immediately followed by the appearance of a female on horseback, who, galloping past the Irishmen, reined up her steed, throwing him on his haunches, in his full career, in the space between the late contending parties.

“’Tis the daughter of the House!” exclaimed the Irishmen, in consternation.

There wanted no such contrast as the scene described to add lustre to her beauty, or to enhance her charms. Fair as the snow-drift, her cheeks mantling with the roseate blush of exercise and animation—her glossy hair, partly uncurled, and still played with by the amorous breeze, hanging in long ringlets down her neck—her eye, which alternately beamed with pity or flashed with indignation, as it was directed to one side or the other—her symmetry of form, which the close riding-dress displayed—her graceful movements, as she occasionally restrained her grey palfrey, who fretted to resume his speed, all combined with her sudden and unexpected appearance to induce the boatswain and his men to consider her as superhuman.

“She’s an angel of light!” muttered the boatswain to himself.

She turned to the Irish, and, in an energetic tone, addressed them in their own dialect. What she had said was unknown to the English party, but the effect which her language produced was immediate. Their weapons were thrown aside, and they hung down their heads in confusion. They made an attempt to walk away, but a few words from her induced them to remain.

The fair equestrian was now joined by two more, whose pace had not been so rapid; and the boatswain, who had been contemplating her with astonishment, as she was addressing the Irish, now that she was about to turn towards him, recollected that some of his men were not exactly in a costume to meet a lady’s eye. He raised his call to his mouth, and, with a sonorous whistle, cried out, “All you without trousers behind shealing, hoy!” an order immediately obeyed by the men who had been deprived of their habiliments.

Conolly, who had understood the conversation which had taken place, called out in Irish, at the same time as he walked round behind the walls, “I think ye’ll be after giving us our duds now, ye dirty spalpeens, so bring ’um wid you quick;” a request which was immediately complied with, the clothes being collected by two of the Irish, and taken to the men who had retired behind the walls of the shealing.

Mr Hardsett was not long in replying to her interrogations, and in giving her an outline of the tragical events which had occurred, while the ladies, trembling with pity and emotion, listened to the painful narrative.

“Are you the only officer then of the frigate that is left?”

“No, madam,” replied the boatswain, “the third-lieutenant is here; but there he lies, poor fellow, desperately wounded by these men, from whom we expected to have had relief.”

“What was the name of your frigate?”

“TheAspasia, Captain M—.”

“O heaven!” cried the girl, catching at the collar of the boatswain’s coat in her trepidation.

“And the wounded officer’s name?”

“Seymour.”

A cry of anguish and horror escaped from all the party as the beautiful interrogatress tottered in her seat, and then fell off into the arms of the boatswain.

In a few seconds, recovering herself, she regained her feet. “Quick, quick—lead me to him.”

Supported by Hardsett, she tottered to the spot where Seymour lay, with his eyes closed, faint and exhausted with loss of blood, attended by Robinson and Debriseau.

She knelt down by his side, and taking his hand, which she pressed between her own, called him by his name.

Seymour started at the sound of the voice, opened his eyes, and in the beauteous form which was reclining over him, beheld his dear, dear Emily.

Chapter Fifty Seven.Ah me! what perils do environThe man that meddles with cold iron;What plaguey mischiefs and mishapsTo dog him still with after-claps.Hudibras.The melancholy loss of lives which we have detailed, occurred upon a reef of rocks close to Cape —, on the coast of Galway, and not four miles from the castle and property held by Mr Rainscourt. The intelligence had been communicated to McElvina by some of his tenants, early in the morning of the day on which the survivors had gained the shore. The western gales, sweeping the Atlantic, and blowing with such fury on the coast, would not permit any vegetation or culture so near the beach; but when once past the range of hills which exposed their rugged sides as barriers to the blast, the land was of good quality, and thickly tenanted. The people were barbarous to an excess, and, as they had stated, claimed a traditionary right to whatever property might be thrown up from the numerous wrecks which took place upon the dangerous and iron-bound coast. This will account for the tragical events of the day.When McElvina was informed of vessels having been stranded, he immediately went up to the castle to procure the means of assistance, which were always held there in readiness, and as many of Rainscourt’s people as could be collected. This, however, required some little delay; and Emily, shocked at the imperfect intelligence which had been conveyed to her, determined to ride down immediately, in company with Mrs McElvina, and a young friend who was staying with her during her father’s absence. On their arrival at the sea-range of hills, the explosion of the shealing, and subsequent conflict between the parties, met their eyes. Emily’s fears, and knowledge of the Irish peasantry, immediately suggested the cause, and, aware of her influence with the Rainscourt tenants, she made all the haste that the roads would permit to arrive at the spot, galloping down the hill, in so bold and dexterous a style, that her companions neither could nor would have dared to keep pace with her. How fortunate was her arrival need hardly be observed, as in all probability the English seamen would eventually have been sacrificed to the cupidity and resentment of the natives.“William, do you know me?” whispered Emily, as the tears ran down her cheeks, and her countenance betrayed the anguish of her mind.Seymour pressed the small white hand that trembled in his own, and a faint smile illuminated his features; but the excitement at the appearance of Emily was too great—the blood again gushed from his wound, his eyes closed, and his head fell on his shoulder, as he swooned from the loss of blood.“Oh, God, preserve him!” cried Emily clasping her hands, and raising her eyes to Heaven, and then sinking down in mental and fervent prayer.“My dear McElvina, I am so glad that you have come at last,” said Susan, bursting into tears. “Look at whose side Emily is kneeling—’tis William Seymour, dying.”“Seymour!” cried McElvina, who had but that moment arrived; but aware of the importance of prompt assistance, he called for the basket containing the restoratives, and gently removing Emily, he took her situation by the side of our wounded hero.To strip off his clothes, examine the wound, bandage it, so as to prevent a further loss of blood, and pour down his throat some diluted wine, was the work of a few minutes. Seymour, who had only fainted, reopened his eyes, and soon showed the good effects of McElvina’s presence of mind.“McElvina,—is it not?—Did not I see Emily?”“Yes, you did, my dear fellow; but keep quiet. I do not think your wound is dangerous.”“I am better now, McElvina—much better; but I must see Emily.”McElvina thought it advisable to accede to his wish, and returned to his wife, who was supporting the fainting girl. A glass of water, the assurance that Seymour would do well, if not too much agitated, and a promise exacted from her to say but little, was followed by an interview which had a reviving effect upon both.Medical practitioners, who dive into the inmost recesses of the human frame in pursuit of knowledge, and who search through the mineral and vegetable kingdom for relief, when will you produce a balm so healing, a specific so powerful, an elixir so instantaneous or restorative, as—joy?McElvina was in the meantime occupied in preparations for removing the wounded, and portioning out food and necessaries to the rest of the party. When he beheld the sad relics in the shealing, and heard from the boatswain the tragical events of the day, his indignation was beyond bounds. Seven Frenchmen, fifteen Englishmen, and eight Irishmen, had been burnt alive; three Englishmen and five Irishmen had been killed in the affray; making, independently of many severely wounded, a total of thirty-eight who had perished on this disastrous morning.The Irish who had attacked them were all tenants of the property belonging either to him or Rainscourt—an immediate notice to quit was given to them on the spot, and the dreadful word, emigration, thundered in their ears. This brought them on their knees, with such crying and beseeching, such uncouth and ridiculous gestures, as almost to create a laugh among the English seamen who were witnesses to the scene.“Well, if them ain’t funny beggars, I’ll be blowed,” cried one of the English seamen.“Just the wae wid ’em,” observed Conolly, “all honey or all vinegar—there’s never a good turn they won’t do ye now. If it had not been for the ‘cratur’, there wouldn’t have been this blow-up.”But to continue. The bodies of the dead in the shealing were consigned to the earth as they lay, the four walls composing a mausoleum where animosity was buried. The corpses of McDermot, and the Irish who had been killed in the conflict, were removed by their friends, that they might be waked. By the direction of McElvina the wounded English were carried up by their former antagonists to the small town at the foot of the castle, where surgical assistance was to be obtained. Seymour was placed on a sort of bier that had been constructed for him, Emily and her companions riding by his side; and the cavalcade wound up the hill, the rear brought up by Mr Hardsett and the remainder of the English crew. In two hours all were at their respective destinations; and Seymour, who had been examined by the surgeon upon his arrival at the castle, and whose wound had been pronounced by no means dangerous, was in bed and fast asleep, Susan and Emily watching by his side.Debriseau, who had recognised his quondam friend McElvina, and perceived by his appearance, and the respect that was shown to him, that he had been more fortunate in his career, since they had parted, than he had himself, from a proud feeling of the moment, did not make himself known. That McElvina, who had no idea of meeting him in such a quarter, should not, in the hurry of the scene, distinguish his former associate, covered as he was with dust and blood, and having the appearance more of a New Zealand warrior than of any other living being, was not surprising—and Debriseau joined the English party in the rear of the cavalcade, and remained with them at the town, while McElvina and the rest of the cortège continued their route to the castle, with the wounded Seymour.As soon as our hero’s wound had been dressed, and the favourable opinion of the surgeon had been pronounced, McElvina rode down to the town, to make arrangements for the board and lodging of the English seamen. It was then that he was asked by Mr Hardsett, what was to be done with the Frenchman who had been saved.“Where is he?” demanded McElvina.Debriseau was summoned to the magistrate, and having cleaned himself of the dust and gore, was immediately recognised.“Debriseau!” exclaimed McElvina, with astonishment, and a look of displeasure.“Even so, Captain McElvina,” replied Debriseau haughtily; “you do not seem very well pleased at meeting an old acquaintance.”“Captain Debriseau, will you do me the favour to step on one side with me. I will ‘be honest,’ with you,” continued McElvina to the Guernseyman, when they were out of hearing of the boatswain and the rest; “and confess that, although I wish you well, I was not pleased at meeting with you here. You addressed me as Captain McElvina—that title has long been dropped. I did once confide to you the secret of my former life, and will own, what I little imagined at the time, that I have in consequence put it into your power to do me serious injury. You must now listen to me, while I give you a sketch of my memoirs, from the time that we parted at Cherbourg.”McElvina then entered into a short history of what the reader is acquainted with.—“Judge, then, Debriseau,” pursued he, “if, after what has passed, I could ‘honestly’ say that I was glad to see you—who not only, by your presence, reminded me of my former irregularities, but had the means, if you thought proper, of acquainting my friends and acquaintances with what I wish I could forget myself.”“Captain—I beg your pardon—Mr McElvina,” replied Debriseau with dignity, “I will be as honest as you. I am here without a sou, and without a shirt, and when I leave this, I know not where to lay my hand upon either; but rather than betray a confidence reposed in me, rather than injure one who always was my friend, or, what is still more unworthy, attempt to work upon your fears to my own advantage, I would suffer death, nay, more—Sacristie—I would sooner turn custom-house officer. No, no, McElvina—je suis Français, moi—bah, I mean I am a true Englishman. Never mind what I am—all countries are alike, if a man’s heart is in the right place. I sincerely wish you joy of your good fortune, and know nobody that in my opinion deserves it more. I shall go to prison with some resignation, now that I know you have been so fortunate; and do me not the injustice to imagine that you will ever be troubled by either seeing or hearing from me.”“I waited for this answer, Debriseau: had you made any other, I would have run the risk and defied you; nothing would have induced me to have offered to bribe your silence. But I rejoice in your honest and manly conduct—‘Honesty is the best policy,’ Debriseau. I can now offer, and you can accept, without blushing on either side, that assistance which I have both the power and will to grant. There is no occasion for your going to prison. I make the returns as magistrate, and, as you are an English subject, will be answerable for the omission. We are too far from the world here to have any questions asked. And now let me know how I can be of any service to you, for my purse and interest you may command.”“Well, then, to tell you the truth, I am fit for nothing on shore. I must have another vessel, if I can get one.”“Not a smuggling vessel, I hope,” replied McElvina, gravely.“I should prefer it certainly. Why, there’s no harm in smuggling, if I recollect your arguments right,” replied Debriseau, smiling. “Do you remember the night that you convinced me?”“I do, very well,” said McElvina; “but I have reconsidered the subject, and I have one little remark to make, which will upset the whole theory, which is, that other people acting wrong cannot be urged as an excuse for our own conduct. If it were, the world would soon be left without virtue or honesty. You may think me scrupulous; but I am sincere. Cannot you hit upon something else?”“Why, I should have no objection to command a fine merchant vessel, if I could obtain such a thing.”“That you shall,” replied McElvina; “and to make sure of it, and render you more independent, you shall be part owner. Consider it asune affaire arrangée. And now allow me to offer you the means of improving your personal appearance—I presume the leathern bag is empty?”“Bah! a long while ago. After I had lost my vessel, I made up to Mademoiselle Picardon; I thought it would not be a bad speculation—but she never forgave me kicking that dirty puppy down stairs—little beast!”“Ah! you forget some of my remarks,” replied McElvina, laughing—“‘Love me, love my dog.’ Now oblige me by accepting this; and, Debriseau (excuse me), there’s a capital barber in this street.Au revoir.”

Ah me! what perils do environThe man that meddles with cold iron;What plaguey mischiefs and mishapsTo dog him still with after-claps.Hudibras.

Ah me! what perils do environThe man that meddles with cold iron;What plaguey mischiefs and mishapsTo dog him still with after-claps.Hudibras.

The melancholy loss of lives which we have detailed, occurred upon a reef of rocks close to Cape —, on the coast of Galway, and not four miles from the castle and property held by Mr Rainscourt. The intelligence had been communicated to McElvina by some of his tenants, early in the morning of the day on which the survivors had gained the shore. The western gales, sweeping the Atlantic, and blowing with such fury on the coast, would not permit any vegetation or culture so near the beach; but when once past the range of hills which exposed their rugged sides as barriers to the blast, the land was of good quality, and thickly tenanted. The people were barbarous to an excess, and, as they had stated, claimed a traditionary right to whatever property might be thrown up from the numerous wrecks which took place upon the dangerous and iron-bound coast. This will account for the tragical events of the day.

When McElvina was informed of vessels having been stranded, he immediately went up to the castle to procure the means of assistance, which were always held there in readiness, and as many of Rainscourt’s people as could be collected. This, however, required some little delay; and Emily, shocked at the imperfect intelligence which had been conveyed to her, determined to ride down immediately, in company with Mrs McElvina, and a young friend who was staying with her during her father’s absence. On their arrival at the sea-range of hills, the explosion of the shealing, and subsequent conflict between the parties, met their eyes. Emily’s fears, and knowledge of the Irish peasantry, immediately suggested the cause, and, aware of her influence with the Rainscourt tenants, she made all the haste that the roads would permit to arrive at the spot, galloping down the hill, in so bold and dexterous a style, that her companions neither could nor would have dared to keep pace with her. How fortunate was her arrival need hardly be observed, as in all probability the English seamen would eventually have been sacrificed to the cupidity and resentment of the natives.

“William, do you know me?” whispered Emily, as the tears ran down her cheeks, and her countenance betrayed the anguish of her mind.

Seymour pressed the small white hand that trembled in his own, and a faint smile illuminated his features; but the excitement at the appearance of Emily was too great—the blood again gushed from his wound, his eyes closed, and his head fell on his shoulder, as he swooned from the loss of blood.

“Oh, God, preserve him!” cried Emily clasping her hands, and raising her eyes to Heaven, and then sinking down in mental and fervent prayer.

“My dear McElvina, I am so glad that you have come at last,” said Susan, bursting into tears. “Look at whose side Emily is kneeling—’tis William Seymour, dying.”

“Seymour!” cried McElvina, who had but that moment arrived; but aware of the importance of prompt assistance, he called for the basket containing the restoratives, and gently removing Emily, he took her situation by the side of our wounded hero.

To strip off his clothes, examine the wound, bandage it, so as to prevent a further loss of blood, and pour down his throat some diluted wine, was the work of a few minutes. Seymour, who had only fainted, reopened his eyes, and soon showed the good effects of McElvina’s presence of mind.

“McElvina,—is it not?—Did not I see Emily?”

“Yes, you did, my dear fellow; but keep quiet. I do not think your wound is dangerous.”

“I am better now, McElvina—much better; but I must see Emily.”

McElvina thought it advisable to accede to his wish, and returned to his wife, who was supporting the fainting girl. A glass of water, the assurance that Seymour would do well, if not too much agitated, and a promise exacted from her to say but little, was followed by an interview which had a reviving effect upon both.

Medical practitioners, who dive into the inmost recesses of the human frame in pursuit of knowledge, and who search through the mineral and vegetable kingdom for relief, when will you produce a balm so healing, a specific so powerful, an elixir so instantaneous or restorative, as—joy?

McElvina was in the meantime occupied in preparations for removing the wounded, and portioning out food and necessaries to the rest of the party. When he beheld the sad relics in the shealing, and heard from the boatswain the tragical events of the day, his indignation was beyond bounds. Seven Frenchmen, fifteen Englishmen, and eight Irishmen, had been burnt alive; three Englishmen and five Irishmen had been killed in the affray; making, independently of many severely wounded, a total of thirty-eight who had perished on this disastrous morning.

The Irish who had attacked them were all tenants of the property belonging either to him or Rainscourt—an immediate notice to quit was given to them on the spot, and the dreadful word, emigration, thundered in their ears. This brought them on their knees, with such crying and beseeching, such uncouth and ridiculous gestures, as almost to create a laugh among the English seamen who were witnesses to the scene.

“Well, if them ain’t funny beggars, I’ll be blowed,” cried one of the English seamen.

“Just the wae wid ’em,” observed Conolly, “all honey or all vinegar—there’s never a good turn they won’t do ye now. If it had not been for the ‘cratur’, there wouldn’t have been this blow-up.”

But to continue. The bodies of the dead in the shealing were consigned to the earth as they lay, the four walls composing a mausoleum where animosity was buried. The corpses of McDermot, and the Irish who had been killed in the conflict, were removed by their friends, that they might be waked. By the direction of McElvina the wounded English were carried up by their former antagonists to the small town at the foot of the castle, where surgical assistance was to be obtained. Seymour was placed on a sort of bier that had been constructed for him, Emily and her companions riding by his side; and the cavalcade wound up the hill, the rear brought up by Mr Hardsett and the remainder of the English crew. In two hours all were at their respective destinations; and Seymour, who had been examined by the surgeon upon his arrival at the castle, and whose wound had been pronounced by no means dangerous, was in bed and fast asleep, Susan and Emily watching by his side.

Debriseau, who had recognised his quondam friend McElvina, and perceived by his appearance, and the respect that was shown to him, that he had been more fortunate in his career, since they had parted, than he had himself, from a proud feeling of the moment, did not make himself known. That McElvina, who had no idea of meeting him in such a quarter, should not, in the hurry of the scene, distinguish his former associate, covered as he was with dust and blood, and having the appearance more of a New Zealand warrior than of any other living being, was not surprising—and Debriseau joined the English party in the rear of the cavalcade, and remained with them at the town, while McElvina and the rest of the cortège continued their route to the castle, with the wounded Seymour.

As soon as our hero’s wound had been dressed, and the favourable opinion of the surgeon had been pronounced, McElvina rode down to the town, to make arrangements for the board and lodging of the English seamen. It was then that he was asked by Mr Hardsett, what was to be done with the Frenchman who had been saved.

“Where is he?” demanded McElvina.

Debriseau was summoned to the magistrate, and having cleaned himself of the dust and gore, was immediately recognised.

“Debriseau!” exclaimed McElvina, with astonishment, and a look of displeasure.

“Even so, Captain McElvina,” replied Debriseau haughtily; “you do not seem very well pleased at meeting an old acquaintance.”

“Captain Debriseau, will you do me the favour to step on one side with me. I will ‘be honest,’ with you,” continued McElvina to the Guernseyman, when they were out of hearing of the boatswain and the rest; “and confess that, although I wish you well, I was not pleased at meeting with you here. You addressed me as Captain McElvina—that title has long been dropped. I did once confide to you the secret of my former life, and will own, what I little imagined at the time, that I have in consequence put it into your power to do me serious injury. You must now listen to me, while I give you a sketch of my memoirs, from the time that we parted at Cherbourg.”

McElvina then entered into a short history of what the reader is acquainted with.—“Judge, then, Debriseau,” pursued he, “if, after what has passed, I could ‘honestly’ say that I was glad to see you—who not only, by your presence, reminded me of my former irregularities, but had the means, if you thought proper, of acquainting my friends and acquaintances with what I wish I could forget myself.”

“Captain—I beg your pardon—Mr McElvina,” replied Debriseau with dignity, “I will be as honest as you. I am here without a sou, and without a shirt, and when I leave this, I know not where to lay my hand upon either; but rather than betray a confidence reposed in me, rather than injure one who always was my friend, or, what is still more unworthy, attempt to work upon your fears to my own advantage, I would suffer death, nay, more—Sacristie—I would sooner turn custom-house officer. No, no, McElvina—je suis Français, moi—bah, I mean I am a true Englishman. Never mind what I am—all countries are alike, if a man’s heart is in the right place. I sincerely wish you joy of your good fortune, and know nobody that in my opinion deserves it more. I shall go to prison with some resignation, now that I know you have been so fortunate; and do me not the injustice to imagine that you will ever be troubled by either seeing or hearing from me.”

“I waited for this answer, Debriseau: had you made any other, I would have run the risk and defied you; nothing would have induced me to have offered to bribe your silence. But I rejoice in your honest and manly conduct—‘Honesty is the best policy,’ Debriseau. I can now offer, and you can accept, without blushing on either side, that assistance which I have both the power and will to grant. There is no occasion for your going to prison. I make the returns as magistrate, and, as you are an English subject, will be answerable for the omission. We are too far from the world here to have any questions asked. And now let me know how I can be of any service to you, for my purse and interest you may command.”

“Well, then, to tell you the truth, I am fit for nothing on shore. I must have another vessel, if I can get one.”

“Not a smuggling vessel, I hope,” replied McElvina, gravely.

“I should prefer it certainly. Why, there’s no harm in smuggling, if I recollect your arguments right,” replied Debriseau, smiling. “Do you remember the night that you convinced me?”

“I do, very well,” said McElvina; “but I have reconsidered the subject, and I have one little remark to make, which will upset the whole theory, which is, that other people acting wrong cannot be urged as an excuse for our own conduct. If it were, the world would soon be left without virtue or honesty. You may think me scrupulous; but I am sincere. Cannot you hit upon something else?”

“Why, I should have no objection to command a fine merchant vessel, if I could obtain such a thing.”

“That you shall,” replied McElvina; “and to make sure of it, and render you more independent, you shall be part owner. Consider it asune affaire arrangée. And now allow me to offer you the means of improving your personal appearance—I presume the leathern bag is empty?”

“Bah! a long while ago. After I had lost my vessel, I made up to Mademoiselle Picardon; I thought it would not be a bad speculation—but she never forgave me kicking that dirty puppy down stairs—little beast!”

“Ah! you forget some of my remarks,” replied McElvina, laughing—“‘Love me, love my dog.’ Now oblige me by accepting this; and, Debriseau (excuse me), there’s a capital barber in this street.Au revoir.”

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