“A chieftain to the Highlands boundCries, 'Boatman, do not tarry!And I'll give thee a silver pound,To row us o'er the ferry.'”Lord Ullin's Daughter.
The sky had been without a cloud during the day, the gale having been dry and piercing, and thousands of stars were now shining through a chill atmosphere. As the eye, therefore, became accustomed to the change of light, it obtained a more distinct view of surrounding objects. At the head of the line that was stretched along the narrow pathway marched a platoon of the marines, who maintained the regular and steady front of trained warriors. They were followed at some little distance by a large and confused body of seamen, heavily armed, whose disposition to disorder and rude merriment, which became more violent from their treading on solid ground, was with difficulty restrained by the presence and severe rebukes of their own officers. In the centre of this confused mass the whole of the common prisoners were placed, but were not otherwise attended to by their nautical guard than as they furnished the subjects of fun and numberless quaint jokes. At some distance in their rear marched Colonel Howard and Borroughcliffe, arm in arm, both maintaining the most rigid and dignified silence, though under the influence of very bitter feelings. Behind these again, and pressing as nigh as possible to her uncle, was Miss Howard, leaning on the arm of Alice Dunscombe, and surrounded by the female domestics of the establishment of St. Ruth. Katherine Plowden moved lightly, by herself, in the shadow of this group, with elastic steps but with a maiden coyness that taught her to veil her satisfaction with the semblance of captivity. Barnstable watched her movements with delight, within six feet of her, but submitted to the air of caprice in his mistress, which seemed to require that he should come no nearer. Griffith, avoiding the direct line of the party, walked on its skirts in such a situation that his eye could command its whole extent, in order, if necessary, to direct the movements. Another body of the marines marched at the close of the procession, and Manual, in person, brought up the rear. The music had ceased by command, and nothing was now audible but the regular tread of the soldiers, with the sighs of the dying gale, interrupted occasionally by the voice of an officer, or the hum of low dialogue.
“This has been a Scotch prize that we've taken,” muttered a surly old seaman; “a ship without head-money or cargo! There was kitchen-timber enough in the old jug of a place to have given an outfit in crockery and knee-buckles to every lad in the ship; but, no! let a man's mouth water ever so much for food and raiment, damme, if the officers would give him leave to steal even so good a thing as a spare Bible.”
“You may say all that, and then make but a short yarn of the truth,” returned the messmate who walked by his side: “if there had been such a thing as a ready-made prayer handy, they would have choused a poor fellow out of the use of it.—I say, Ben, I'll tell ye what; it's my opinion that if a chap is to turn soldier and carry a musket, he should have soldier's play, and leave to plunder a little—now the devil a thing have I laid my hands on to-night, except this firelock and my cutlash—unless you can call this bit of a table-cloth something of a windfall.”
“Ay! you have fallen in there with a fresh bolt of duck, I see!” said the other, in manifest admiration of the texture of his companion's prize—“why, it would spread as broad a clew as our mizzen-royal, if it was loosened! Well, your luck hasn't been every man's luck—for my part, I think this here hat was made for some fellow's great toe: I've rigged it on my head both fore and aft, and athwart-ships; but curse the inch can I drive it down—I say, Sam! you'll give us a shirt off that table-cloth?”
“Ay, ay, you can have one corner of it; or for that matter, ye can take the full half, Nick; but I don't see that we go off to the ship any richer than we landed, unless you may muster she-cattle among your prize-money.”
“No richer!” interrupted a waggish young sailor, who had been hitherto a silent listener to the conversation between his older and more calculating shipmates; “I think we are set up for a cruise in them seas where the day watches last six months; don't you see we have caught a double allowance of midnight!”
While speaking, he laid his hands on the bare and woolly heads of Colonel Howard's two black slaves, who were moving near him, both occupied in mournful forebodings on the results that were to flow from this unexpected loss of their liberty. “Slew your faces this way, gentlemen,” he added; “there; don't you think that a sight to put out the binnacle lamps? there's darkness visible for ye!”
“Let the niggers alone,” grumbled one of the more aged speakers; “what are ye skylarking with the like of them for? The next thing they'll sing out, and then you'll hear one of the officers in your wake. For my part, Nick, I can't see why it is that we keep dodging along shore here, with less than ten fathoms under us, when, by stretching into the broad Atlantic, we might fall in with a Jamaicaman every day or two, and have sugar hogsheads and rum puncheons as plenty aboard us as hard fare is now.”
“It is all owing to that Pilot,” returned the other; “for, d'ye see, if there was no bottom, there would be no pilots. This is dangerous cruising-ground, where we stretch into five fathoms, and then drop our lead on a sand-pit or a rock! Besides, they make night-work of it, too! If we had daylight for fourteen hours instead of seven, a man might trust to feeling his way for the other ten.”
“Now, a'n't ye a couple of old horse-marines!” again interrupted the young sailor; “don't you see that Congress wants us to cut up Johnny Bull's coasters, and that old Blow-Hard has found the days too short for his business, and so he has landed a party to get hold of night. Here we have him! and when we get off to the ship, we shall put him under hatches, and then you'll see the face of the sun again! Come, my lilies! let these two gentlemen look into your cabin windows—what? you won't! Then I must squeeze your woolen nightcaps for ye!”
The negroes, who had been submitting to his humors with the abject humility of slavery, now gave certain low intimations that they were suffering pain, under the rough manipulation of their tormentor.
“What's that!” cried a stern voice, whose boyish tones seemed to mock the air of authority that was assumed by the speaker—“who's that, I say, raising that cry among ye?”
The willful young man slowly removed his two hands from the woolly polls of the slaves, but as he suffered them to fall reluctantly along their sable temples, he gave the ear of one of the blacks a tweak that caused him to give vent to another cry, that was uttered with a much greater confidence of sympathy than before.
“Do ye hear there!” repeated Merry—“who's skylarking with those negroes?”
“'Tis no one, sir,” the sailor answered with affected gravity; “one of the palefaces has hit his shin against a cobweb, and it has made his earache!”
“Harkye, you Mr. Jack Joker! how came you in the midst of the prisoners?—Did not I order you to handle your pike, sir, and to keep in the outer line?”
“Ay, ay, sir, you did; and I obeyed orders as long as I could; but these niggers have made the night so dark that I lost my way!”
A low laugh passed through the confused crowd of seamen; and even the midshipman might have been indulging himself in a similar manner at this specimen of quaint humor from the fellow, who was one of those licensed men that are to be found in every ship. At length:
“Well, sir,” he said, “you have found out your false reckoning now; so get you back to the place where I bid you stay.”
“Ay, ay, sir, I'm going. By all the blunders in the purser's book, Mr. Merry, but that cobweb has made one of these niggers shed tears! Do let me stay to catch a little ink, sir, to write a letter with to my poor old mother-devil the line has she had from me since we sailed from the Chesapeake!”
“If ye don't mind me at once, Mr. Jack Joker, I'll lay my cutlass over your head,” returned Merry, his voice now betraying a much greater sympathy in the sufferings of that abject race, who are still in some measure, but who formerly were much more, the butts of the unthinking and licentious among our low countrymen; “then ye can write your letter in red ink if ye will!”
“I wouldn't do it for the world,” said Joker, sneaking away towards his proper station—“the old lady wouldn't forget the hand, and swear it was a forgery—I wonder, though, if the breakers on the coast of Guinea be black! as I've heard old seamen say who have cruised in them latitudes.”
His idle levity was suddenly interrupted by a voice that spoke above the low hum of the march, with an air of authority, and a severity of tone, that could always quell, by a single word, the most violent ebullition of merriment in the crew.
The low buzzing sounds of “Ay, there goes Mr. Griffith!” and of “Jack has woke up the first lieutenant, he had better now go to sleep himself,” were heard passing among the men. But these suppressed communications soon ceased, and even Jack Joker himself pursued his way with diligence on the skirts of the party, as mutely as if the power of speech did not belong to his organization.
The reader has too often accompanied us over the ground between the abbey and the ocean, to require any description of the route pursued by the seamen during the preceding characteristic dialogue; and we shall at once pass to the incidents which occurred on the arrival of the party at the cliffs. As the man who had so unexpectedly assumed a momentary authority within St. Ruth had unaccountably disappeared from among them, Griffith continued to exercise the right of command, without referring to any other for consultation. He never addressed himself to Barnstable, and it was apparent that both the haughty young men felt that the tie which had hitherto united them in such close intimacy was, for the present at least, entirely severed. Indeed, Griffith was only restrained by the presence of Cecilia and Katherine from arresting his refractory inferior on the spot; and Barnstable, who felt all the consciousness of error, without its proper humility, with difficulty so far repressed his feelings as to forbear exhibiting in the presence of his mistress such a manifestation of his spirit as his wounded vanity induced him to imagine was necessary to his honor. The two, however, acted in harmony on one subject, though it was without concert or communication. The first object with both the young men was to secure the embarkation of the fair cousins; and Barnstable proceeded instantly to the boats, in order to hasten the preparations that were necessary before they could receive these unexpected captives: the descent of the Pilot having been made in such force as to require the use of all the frigate's boats, which were left riding in the outer edge of the surf, awaiting the return of the expedition. A loud call from Barnstable gave notice to the officer in command, and in a few moments the beach was crowded with the busy and active crews of the “cutters,” “launches,” “barges,” “jolly-boats,” “pinnaces,” or by whatever names the custom of the times attached to the different attendants of vessels of war. Had the fears of the ladies themselves been consulted, the frigate's launch would have been selected for their use, on account of its size; but Barnstable, who would have thought such a choice on his part humiliating to his guests, ordered the long, low barge of Captain Munson to be drawn upon the sand, it being peculiarly the boat of honor. The hands of fifty men were applied to the task, and it was soon announced to Colonel Howard and his wards that the little vessel was ready for their reception. Manual had halted on the summit of the cliffs with the whole body of the marines, where he was busily employed in posting pickets and sentinels, and giving the necessary instructions to his men to cover the embarkation of the seamen, in a style that he conceived to be altogether military. The mass of the common prisoners, including the inferior domestics of the abbey, and the men of Borroughcliffe, were also held in the same place, under a suitable guard: but Colonel Howard and his companion, attended by the ladies and their own maids, had descended the rugged path to the beach, and were standing passively on the sands, when the intelligence that the boat waited for them was announced.
“Where is he?” asked Alice Dunscombe, turning her head, as if anxiously searching for some other than those around her.
“Where is who?” inquired Barnstable; “we are all here, and the boat waits.”
“And will he tear me—even me, from the home of my infancy! the land of my birth and my affections!”
“I know not of whom you speak, madam, but if it be of Mr. Griffith, he stands there, just without that cluster of seamen.”
Griffith, hearing himself thus named, approached the ladies, and, for the first time since leaving the abbey, addressed them: “I hope I am already understood,” he said, “and that it is unnecessary for me to say that no female here is a prisoner; though, should any choose to trust themselves on board our ship, I pledge them to the honor of an officer that they shall find themselves protected, and safe.”
“Then will I not go,” said Alice.
“It is not expected of you,” said Cecilia; “you have no ties to bind you to any here.” (The eyes of Alice were still wandering over the listeners.) “Go, then, Miss Alice, and be the mistress of St. Ruth, until my return; or,” she added, timidly, “until Colonel Howard may declare his pleasure.”
“I obey you, dear child; but the agent of Colonel Howard, at B——, will undoubtedly, be authorized to take charge of his effects.”
While no one but his niece alluded to his will, the master of the abbey had found, in his resentment, a sufficient apology for his rigid demeanor; but he was far too well bred to bear, in silence, such a modest appeal to his wishes, from so fair and so loyal a subject as Alice Dunscombe.
“To relieve you, madam, and for no other reason, will I speak on this subject,” he said; “otherwise, I should leave the doors and windows of St. Ruth open, as a melancholy monument of rebellion, and seek my future compensation from the Crown, when the confiscated estates of the leaders of this accursed innovation on the rights of princes shall come to the hammer. But you, Miss Alice, are entitled to every consideration that a lady can expect from a gentleman. Be pleased, therefore, to write to my agent, and request him to seal up my papers, and transmit them to the office of his majesty's Secretary of State. They breathe no treason, madam, and are entitled to official protection. The house, and most of the furniture, as you know, are the property of my landlord, who, in due time, will doubtless take charge of his own interest. I kiss your hand, Miss Alice, and I hope we shall yet meet at St. James's—depend on it, madam, that the royal Charlotte shall yet honor your merits; I know she cannot but estimate your loyalty.”
“Here I was born, in humble obscurity—here I have lived, and here I hope to die in quiet,” returned the meek Alice; “if I have known any pleasure, in late years, beyond that which every Christian can find in our daily duties, it has been, my sweet friends, in your accidental society.—Such companions, in this remote corner of the kingdom, has been a boon too precious to be enjoyed without alloy, it seems; and I have now to exchange the past pleasure for present pain. Adieu! my young friend; let your trust be in Him, to whose eyes both prince and peasant, the European and the American, are alike, and we shall meet again, though it be neither in the island of Britain nor on your own wide continent.”
“That,” said Colonel Howard, advancing, and taking her hand with kindness, “that is the only disloyal sentiment I have ever heard fall from the lips of Miss Alice Dunscombe! Is it to be supposed that Heaven has established orders among men, and that it does not respect the works of its own formation! But adieu; no doubt, if time was allowed us for suitable explanations, we should find but little or no difference of opinion on this subject.”
Alice did not appear to consider the matter as worthy of further discussion at such a moment; for she gently returned the colonel's leave-taking, and then gave her undivided attention to her female friends. Cecilia wept bitterly on the shoulder of her respected companion, giving vent to her regret at parting, and her excited feelings, at the same moment; and Katherine pressed to the side of Alice, with the kindliness prompted by her warm but truant heart, Their embraces were given and received in silence, and each of the young ladies moved towards the boat, as she withdrew herself from the arms of Miss Dunscombe. Colonel Howard would not precede his wards, neither would he assist them into the barge. That attention they received from Barnstable, who, after seeing the ladies and their attendants seated, turned to the gentlemen, and observed:
“The boat waits.”
“Well, Miss Alice,” said Borroughcliffe, in bitter irony, “you are entrusted by our excellent host with a message to his agent; will you do a similar service to me, and write a report to the commander of the district, and just tell him what a dolt—ay, use the plainest terms, and say what an ass one Captain Borroughcliffe has proved himself in this affair? You may throw in, by way of episode, that he has been playing bo-peep with a rebellious young lady from the Colonies, and, like a great boy, has had his head broken for his pains! Come, my worthy host, or rather fellow-prisoner, I follow you, as in duty bound.”
“Stay,” cried Griffith; “Captain Borroughcliffe does not embark in that boat.”
“Ha! sir; am I to be herded with the common men? Forget you that I have the honor to bear the commission of his Britannic Majesty, and that—”
“I forget nothing that a gentleman is bound to remember, Captain Borroughcliffe; among other things, I recollect the liberality of your treatment to myself, when a prisoner. The instant the safety of my command will justify such a step, not only you, but your men, shall be set at liberty.”
Borroughcliffe started in surprise, but his feelings were too much soured by the destruction of those visions of glory, in which he had been luxuriously indulging for the last day or two, to admit of his answering as became a man. He swallowed his emotions, therefore, by a violent effort, and walked along the beach, affecting to whistle a low but lively air.
“Well, then,” cried Barnstable, “all our captives are seated. The boat waits only for its officers!”
In his turn, Griffith walked away, in haughty silence, as if disdaining to hold communion with his former friend. Barnstable paused a moment, from a deference that long habit had created for his superior officer, and which was not to be shaken off by every burst of angry passion; but perceiving that the other had no intention to return, he ordered the seamen to raise the boat from the sand, and bear it bodily into the water. The command was instantly obeyed; and, by the time the young lieutenant was in his seat, the barge was floating in the still heavy though no longer dangerous surf, and the crew sprang into their places.
“Bear her off, boys!” he cried; “never mind a wet jacket. I've seen many a worthy fellow tumbling on this beach in a worse time than this! Now you have her head to sea; give way, my souls, give way.”
The seamen rose simultaneously at their oars, and by an united effort obtained the command of their boat; which, after making a few sudden ascents, and as many heavy pitches in the breakers, gained the smoother seas of the swelling ocean, and stemmed the waters in a direction for the place where the Alacrity was supposed to be in waiting.
“His only plot was this—that, much provoked.He raised his vengeful arm against his country.”Thomson.
Alice Duncombe remained on the sands, watching the dark spot that was soon hid amid the waves in the obscurity of night, and listening, with melancholy interest, to the regulated sounds of the oars, which were audible long after the boat had been blended with the gloomy outline of the eastern horizon. When all traces of her departed friends were to be found only in her own recollections, she slowly turned from the sea, and hastening to quit the bustling throng that were preparing for the embarkation of the rest of the party, she ascended the path that conducted her once more to the summit of those cliffs along which she had so often roved, gazing at the boundless element that washed their base, with sensations that might have been peculiar to her own situation.
The soldiers of Borroughcliffe, who were stationed at the head of the pass, respectfully made way; nor did any of the sentinels of Manual heed her retiring figure, until she approached the rear guard of the marines, who were commanded by their vigilant captain in person.
“Who goes there?” cried Manual, advancing without the dusky group of soldiers, as she approached them.
“One who possesses neither the power nor the inclination to do ye harm,” answered the solitary female; “'tis Alice Dunscombe, returning, by permission of your leader, to the place of her birth.”
“Ay,” muttered Manual, “this is one of Griffith's unmilitary exhibitions of his politeness! Does the man think that there was ever a woman who had no tongue! Have you the countersign, madam, that I may know you bear a sufficient warrant to pass?”
“I have no other warrant besides my sex and weakness, unless Mr. Griffith's knowledge that I have left him can be so considered.”
“The two former are enough,” said a voice, that proceeded from a figure which had hitherto stood unseen, shaded by the trunk of an oak that spread its wide but naked arms above the spot where the guard was paraded.
“Who have we here!” Manual again cried; “come in; yield, or you will be fired at.”
“What, will the gallant Captain Manual fire on his own rescuer!” said the Pilot, with cool disdain, as he advanced from the shadow of the tree. “He had better reserve his bullets for his enemies, than waste them on his friends.”
“You have done a dangerous deed, sir, in approaching, clandestinely, a guard of marines! I wonder that a man who has already discovered, to-night, that he has some knowledge of tactics, by so ably conducting a surprise, should betray so much ignorance in the forms of approaching a picket!”
“'Tis now of no moment,” returned the Pilot; “my knowledge and my ignorance are alike immaterial, as the command of the party is surrendered to other and perhaps more proper hands. But I would talk to this lady alone, sir; she is an acquaintance of my youth, and I will see her on her way to the abbey.”
“The step would be unmilitary, Mr. Pilot, and you will excuse me if I do not consent to any of our expedition straggling without the sentries. If you choose to remain here to hold your discourse, I will march the picket out of hearing; though I must acknowledge I see no ground so favorable as this we are on, to keep you within range of our eyes. You perceive that I have a ravine to retreat into in case of surprise, with this line of wall on my left flank and the trunk of that tree to cover my right. A very pretty stand might be made here, on emergency; for even the oldest troops fight the best when their flanks are properly covered, and a way to make a regular retreat is open in their rear.”
“Say no more, sir; I would not break up such a position on any account,” returned the Pilot; “the lady will consent to retrace her path for a short distance.”
Alice followed his steps, in compliance with this request, until he had led her to a place, at some little distance from the marines, where a tree had been prostrated by the late gale. She seated herself quietly on its trunk, and appeared to wait with patience his own time for the explanation of his motives in seeking the interview. The pilot paced for several minutes back and forth, in front of the place where she was seated, in profound silence, as if communing with himself; when suddenly throwing off his air of absence, he came to her side, and assumed a position similar to the one which she herself had taken.
“The hour is at hand, Alice, when we must part,” he at length commenced; “it rests with yourself whether it shall be forever.”
“Let it then be forever, John,” she returned, with a slight tremor in her voice.
“That word would have been less appalling had this accidental meeting never occurred. And yet your choice may have been determined by prudence—for what is there in my fate that can tempt a woman to wish that she might share it?”
“If ye mean your lot is that of one who can find but few, or even none, to partake of his joys, or to share in his sorrows—whose life is a continual scene of dangers and calamities, of disappointments and mishaps—then do ye know but little of the heart of woman, if ye doubt of either her ability or her willingness to meet them with the man of her choice.”
“Say you thus, Alice? then have I misunderstood your meaning or misinterpreted your acts. My lot is not altogether that of a neglected man, unless the favor of princes and the smiles of queens are allowed to go for nothing. My life is, however, one of many and fearful dangers; and yet it is not filled altogether with calamities and mishaps; is it, Alice?” He paused a moment, but in vain, for her answer. “Nay, then, I have been deceived in the estimation that the world has affixed to my combats and enterprises! I am not, Alice, the man I would be, or even the man I had deemed myself.”
“You have gained a name, John, among the warriors of the age,” she answered, in a subdued voice; “and it is a name that may be said to be written in blood!”
“The blood of my enemies, Alice!”
“The blood of the subjects of your natural prince! The blood of those who breathe the air you first breathed, and who were taught the same holy lessons of instruction that you were first taught; but, which, I fear, you have too soon forgotten!”
“The blood of the slaves of despotism!” he sternly interrupted her; “the blood of the enemies of freedom! You have dwelt so long in this dull retirement, and you have cherished so blindly the prejudices of your youth, that the promise of those noble sentiments I once thought I could see budding in Alice Dunscombe has not been fulfilled.”
“I have lived and thought only as a woman, as become my sex and station,” Alice meekly replied; “and when it shall be necessary for me to live and think otherwise, I should wish to die.”
“Ay, there lie the first seeds of slavery! A dependent woman is sure to make the mother of craven and abject wretches, who dishonor the name of man!”
“I shall never be the mother of children, good or bad,” said Alice, with that resignation in her tones that showed she had abandoned the natural hopes of her sex. “Singly and unsupported have I lived; alone and unlamented must I be carried to my grave.”
The exquisite pathos of her voice, as she uttered this placid speech, blended as it was with the sweet and calm dignity of virgin pride, touched the heart of her listener, and he continued silent many moments, as if in reverence of her determination. Her sentiments awakened in his own breast those feelings of generosity and disinterestedness which had nearly been smothered in restless ambition and the pride of success. He resumed the discourse, therefore, more mildly, and with a much greater exhibition of deep feeling, and less of passion, in his manner.
“I know not, Alice, that I ought, situated as I am, and contented, if not happy, as you are, even to attempt to revive in your bosom those sentiments which I was once led to think existed there. It cannot, after all, be a desirable fate, to share the lot of a rover like myself; one who may be termed a Quixote in the behalf of liberal principles, and who may be hourly called to seal the truth of those principles with his life.”
“There never existed any sentiment in my breast, in which you are concerned, that does not exist there still, and unchanged,” returned Alice, with her single-hearted sincerity.
“Do I hear you right? or have I misconceived your resolution to abide in England? or have I not rather mistaken your early feelings?”
“You have fallen into no error now nor then, The weakness may still exist, John; but the strength to struggle with it has, by the goodness of God, grown with my years. It is not, however, of myself, but of you, that I would speak. I have lived like one of our simple daisies, which in the budding may have caught your eye; and I shall also wilt like the humble flower, when the winter of my time arrives, without being missed from the fields that have known me for a season. But your fall, John, will be like that of the oak that now supports us, and men shall pronounce on the beauty and grandeur of the noble stem while standing, as well as of its usefulness when felled.”
“Let them pronounce as they will!” returned the proud stranger. “The truth must be finally known: and when, that hour shall come, they will say, he was a faithful and gallant warrior in his day; and a worthy lesson for all who are born in slavery, but would live in freedom, shall be found in his example.”
“Such may be the language of that distant people, whom ye have adopted in the place of those that once formed home and kin to ye,” said Alice, glancing her eye timidly at his countenance, as if to discern how far she might venture, without awakening his resentment; “but what will the men of the land of your birth transmit to their children, who will be the children of those that are of your own blood?”
“They will say, Alice, whatever their crooked policy may suggest, or their disappointed vanity can urge. But the picture must be drawn by the friends of the hero, as well as by his enemies! Think you, that there are not pens as well as swords in America?”
“I have heard that America called a land, John, where God has lavished his favors with an unsparing hand; where he has bestowed many climes with their several fruits, and where his power is exhibited no less than his mercy. It is said her rivers are without any known end, and that lakes are found in her bosom which would put our German Ocean to shame! The plains, teeming with verdure, are spread over wide degrees; and yet those sweet valleys, which a single heart can hold, are not wanting. In short, John, I hear it is a broad land, that can furnish food for each passion, and contain objects for every affection.”
“Ay, you have found those, Alice, in your solitude, who have been willing to do her justice! It is a country that can form a world of itself; and why should they who inherit it look to other nations for their laws?”
“I pretend not to reason on the right of the children of that soil to do whatever they may deem most meet for their own welfare,” returned Alice—“but can men be born in such a land, and not know the feelings which bind a human being to the place of his birth?”
“Can you doubt that they should be patriotic?” exclaimed the Pilot, in surprise. “Do not their efforts in this sacred cause—their patient sufferings—their long privations—speak loudly in their behalf?”
“And will they who know so well how to love home sing the praises of him who has turned his ruthless hand against the land of his fathers?”
“Forever harping on that word home!” said the Pilot, who now detected the timid approaches of Alice to her hidden meaning. “Is a man a stick or a stone, that he must be cast into the fire, or buried in a wall, wherever his fate may have doomed him to appear on the earth? The sound of home is said to feed the vanity of an English man, let him go where he will; but it would seem to have a still more powerful charm with English women!”
“It is the dearest of all terms to every woman, John, for it embraces the dearest of all ties! If your dames of America are ignorant of its charm, all the favors which God has lavished on their land will avail their happiness but little.”
“Alice,” said the Pilot, rising in his agitation, “I see but too well the object of your allusions. But on this subject we can never agree; for not even your powerful influence can draw me from the path of glory in which I am now treading. But our time is growing brief; let us, then, talk of other things.—This may be the last time I shall ever put foot on the island of Britain.”
Alice paused to struggle with the feelings excited by this remark, before she pursued the discourse. But soon shaking off the weakness, she added, with a rigid adherence to that course which she believed to be her duty:
“And now, John, that you have landed, is the breaking up of a peaceful family, and the violence ye have shown towards an aged man, a fit exploit for one whose object is the glory of which ye have spoken?”
“Think you that I have landed, and placed my life in the hands of my enemies, for so unworthy an object! No, Alice: my motive for this undertaking has been disappointed, and therefore will ever remain a secret from the world. But duty to my cause has prompted the step which you so unthinkingly condemn. This Colonel Howard has some consideration with those in power, and will answer to exchange for a better man. As for his wards, you forget their home, their magical home is in America; unless, indeed, they find them nearer at hand, under the proud flag of a frigate that is now waiting for them in the offing.”
“You talk of a frigate!” said Alice, with sudden interest in the subject. “Is she your only means of escaping from your enemies?”
“Alice Dunscombe has taken but little heed of passing events, to ask such a question of me!” returned the haughty Pilot. “The question would have sounded more discreetly had it been, 'Is she the only vessel with you that your enemies will have to escape from?'”
“Nay, I cannot measure my language at such a moment,” continued Alice, with a still stronger exhibition of anxiety. “It was my fortune to overhear a part of a plan that was intended to destroy, by sudden means, those vessels of America that were in our seas.”
“That might be a plan more suddenly adopted than easily executed, my good Alice. And who were these redoubtable schemers?”
“I know not but my duty to the king should cause me to suppress this information,” said Alice, hesitating.
“Well, be it so,” returned the Pilot, coolly; “it may prove the means of saving the persons of some of the royal officers from death or captivity. I have already said, this may be the last of my visits to this island, and consequently, Alice, the last of our interviews—”
“And yet,” said Alice, still pursuing the train of her own thoughts, “there can be but little harm in sparing human blood; and least of all in serving those whom we have long known and regarded!”
“Ay, that is a simple doctrine, and one that is easily maintained,” he added, with much apparent indifference; “and yet King George might well spare some of his servants—the list of his abject minions is so long!”
“There was a man named Dillon, who lately dwelt in the abbey, but who has mysteriously disappeared,” continued Alice; “or rather, who was captured by your companions: know you aught of him, John?”
“I have heard there was a miscreant of that name, but we have never met. Alice, if it please Heaven that this should be the last—”
“He was a captive in the schooner called the Ariel,” she added, still unheeding his affected indifference to her communication; “and when permitted to return to St. Ruth, he lost sight of his solemn promise, and of his plighted honor, to wreak his malice. Instead of effecting the exchange that he had conditioned to see made, he plotted treason against his captors. Yes, it was most foul treason! for his treatment was generous and kind, and his liberation certain.”
“He was a most unworthy scoundrel! But, Alice——”
“Nay, listen, John,” she continued, urged to even a keener interest in his behalf by his apparent inattention; “and yet I should speak tenderly of his failings, for he is already numbered with the dead! One part of his scheme must have been frustrated; for he intended to destroy that schooner which you call the Ariel, and to have taken the person of the young Barnstable.”
“In both of which he has failed! The person of Barnstable I have rescued, and the Ariel has been stricken by a hand far mightier than any of this world!—she is wrecked.”
“Then is the frigate your only means of escape! Hasten, John, and seem not so proud and heedless; for the hour may come when all your daring will not profit ye against the machinations of secret enemies. This Dillon had also planned that expresses should journey to a seaport at the south, with the intelligence that your vessels were in these seas, in order that ships might be dispatched to intercept your retreat.”
The Pilot lost his affected indifference as she proceeded; and before she ceased speaking, his eye was endeavoring to anticipate her words, by reading her countenance through the dusky medium of the starlight.
“How know you this, Alice?” he asked quickly—“and what vessel did he name?”
“Chance made me an unseen listener to their plan, and—I know not but I forget my duty to my prince! but, John, 'tis asking too much of a weak woman, to require that she shall see the man whom she once viewed with eyes of favor sacrificed, when a word of caution, given in season, might enable him to avoid the danger!”
“Once viewed with an eye of favor! Is it then so?” said the Pilot, speaking in a vacant manner. “But, Alice, heard ye the force of the ships, or their names? Give me their names, and the first lord of your British admiralty shall not give so true an account of their force as I will furnish from this list of my own.”
“Their names were certainly mentioned,” said Alice, with tender melancholy; “but the name of one far nearer to me was ringing in my ears, and has driven them from my mind.”
“You are the same good Alice I once knew! And my name was mentioned? What said they of the Pirate? Had his arm stricken a blow that made them tremble in their abbey? Did they call him coward, girl?”
“It was mentioned in terms that pained my heart as I listened; for it is never too easy a task to forget the lapse of years, nor are the feelings of youth to be easily eradicated.”
“Ay, there is luxury in knowing that, with all their affected abuse, the slaves dread me in their secret holds!” exclaimed the Pilot, pacing in front of his listener with quick steps. “This it is to be marked, among men, above all others in your calling! I hope yet to see the day when the third George shall start at the sound of that name, even within the walls of his palace.”
Alice Dunscombe heard him in deep and mortified silence. It was too evident that a link in the chain of their sympathies was broken, and that the weakness in which she had been unconsciously indulging was met by no correspondent emotions in him. After sinking her head for a moment on her bosom, she arose with a little more than her usual air of meekness, and recalled the Pilot to a sense of her presence, by saying, in a yet milder voice:
“I have now communicated all that it can profit you to know, and it is meet that we separate.”
“What, thus soon?” he cried, starting and taking her hand. “This is but a short interview, Alice, to precede so long a separation.”
“Be it short, or be it long, it must now end,” she replied. “Your companions are on the eve of departure, and I trust you would be one of the last who would wish to be deserted. If ye do visit England again, I hope it may be with altered sentiments, so far as regards her interests. I wish ye peace, John, and the blessings of God, as ye may be found to deserve them.”
“I ask no farther, unless it may be the aid of your gentle prayers! But the night is gloomy, and I will see you in safety to the abbey.”
“It is unnecessary,” she returned, with womanly reserve. “The innocent can be as fearless, on occasion, as the most valiant among your warriors. But here is no cause for fear. I shall take a path that will conduct me in a different way from that which is occupied by your soldiers, and where I shall find none but Him who is ever ready to protect the helpless. Once more, John, I bid ye adieu.” Her voice faltered as she continued—“Ye will share the lot of humanity, and have your hours of care and weakness; at such moments ye can remember those ye leave on this despised island, and perhaps among them ye may think of some whose interest in your welfare has been far removed from selfishness.”
“God be with you, Alice!” he said, touched with her emotion, and losing all vain images in more worthy feelings—“but I cannot permit you to go alone.”
“Here we part, John,” she said firmly, “and forever! 'Tis for the happiness of both, for I fear we have but little in common.” She gently wrested her hand from his grasp, and once more bidding him adieu, in a voice that was nearly inaudible, she turned and slowly disappeared, moving, with lingering steps, in the direction of the abbey.
The first impulse of the pilot was certainly to follow, and insist on seeing her on the way; but the music of the guard on the cliffs at that moment sent forth its martial strains, and the whistle of the boatswain was heard winding Its shrill call among the rocks, in those notes that his practised ear well understood to be the last signal for embarking.
Obedient to the summons, this singular man, in whose breast the natural feelings, that were now on the eve of a violent eruption, had so long been smothered by the visionary expectations of a wild ambition, and perhaps of fierce resentments, pursued his course, in deep abstraction, towards the boats. He was soon met by the soldiers of Borroughcliffe, deprived of their arms, it is true, but unguarded, and returning peacefully to their quarters. The mind of the Pilot, happily for the liberty of these men, was too much absorbed in his peculiar reflections, to note this act of Griffith's generosity, nor did he arouse from his musing until his steps were arrested by suddenly encountering a human figure in the pathway. A light tap on his shoulder was the first mark of recognition he received, when Borroughcliffe, who stood before him, said:
“It is evident, sir, from what has passed this evening, that you are not what you seem. You may be some rebel admiral or general, for aught that I know, the right to command having been strangely contested among ye this night. But let who will own the chief authority, I take the liberty of whispering in your ear that I have been scurvily treated by you—I repeat, most scurvily treated by you all, generally, and by you in particular.”
The Pilot started at this strange address, which was uttered with all the bitterness that could be imparted to it by a disappointed man; but he motioned with his hand for the captain to depart, and turned aside to pursue his own way.
“Perhaps I am not properly understood,” continued the obstinate soldier: “I say, sir, you have treated me scurvily: and I would not be thought to say this to any gentleman, without wishing to give him an opportunity to vent his anger.”
The eye of the Pilot, as he moved forward, glanced at the pistols which Borroughcliffe held in his hands, the one by the handle, and the other by its barrel, and the soldier even fancied that his footsteps were quickened by the sight. After gazing at him until his form was lost in the darkness, the captain muttered to himself:
“He is no more than a common pilot, after all! No true gentleman would have received so palpable a hint with such a start. Ah! here comes the party of my worthy friend whose palate knows a grape of the north side of Madeira from one of the south. The dog has the throat of a gentleman; we will see how he can swallow a delicate allusion to his faults!”
Borroughcliffe stepped aside to allow the marines, who were also in motion for the boats, to pass, and watched with keen looks for the person of the commander. Manual, who had been previously apprised of the intention of Griffith to release the prisoners, had halted to see that none but those who had been liberated by authority were marching into the country. This accidental circumstance gave Borroughcliffe an opportunity of meeting the other at some little distance from either of their respective parties.
“I greet you, sir,” said Borroughcliffe, “with all affection. This has been a pleasant forage for you, Captain Manual.”
The marine was far from being disposed to wrangle, but there was that in the voice of the other which caused him to answer:
“It would have been far pleasanter, sir, if I had met an opportunity of returning to Captain Borroughcliffe some of the favors that I have received at his hands.”
“Nay, then, dear sir, you weigh my modesty to the earth! Surely you forget the manner in which my hospitality has already been requited—by some two hours mouthing of my sword-hilt; with a very unceremonious ricochet into a corner; together with a love-tap received over the shoulders of one of my men, by so gentle an instrument as the butt of a musket! Damme, sir, but I think an ungrateful man only a better sort of beast!”
“Had the love-tap been given to the officer instead of the man,” returned Manual, with all commendable coolness, “it would have been better justice; and the ramrod might have answered as well as the butt, to floor a gentleman who carried the allowance of four thirsty fiddlers under one man's jacket.”
“Now, that is rank ingratitude to your own cordial of the south side, and a most biting insult! I really see but one way of terminating this wordy war, which, if not discreetly ended, may lead us far into the morning.”
“Elect your own manner of determining the dispute, sir; I hope, however, it will not be by your innate knowledge of mankind, which has already mistaken a captain of marines in the service of Congress, for a runaway lover, bound to some green place or other.”
“You might just as well tweak my nose, sir!” said Borroughcliffe. “Indeed, I think it would be the milder reproach of the two! will you make your selection of these, sir? They were loaded for a very different sort of service, but I doubt not will answer on occasion.”
“I am provided with a pair, that are charged for any service,” returned Manual, drawing a pistol from his own belt, and stepping backward a few paces.
“You are destined for America, I know,” said Borroughcliffe, who stood his ground with consummate coolness; “but it would be more convenient for me, sir, if you could delay your march for a single moment.”
“Fire and defend yourself!” exclaimed Manual, furiously, retracing his steps towards his enemy.
The sounds of the two pistols were blended in one report, and the soldiers of Borroughcliffe and the marines all rushed to the place on the sudden alarm. Had the former been provided with arms, it is probable that a bloody fray would have been the consequence of the sight that both parties be held on arriving at the spot, which they did simultaneously. Manual lay on his back, without any signs of life, and Borroughcliffe had changed his cool, haughty, upright attitude for a recumbent posture, which was somewhat between lying and sitting.
“Is the poor fellow actually expended?” said the Englishman, in something like the tones of regret; “well, he had a soldier's mettle in him, and was nearly as great a fool as myself!”
The marines had, luckily for the soldiers and their captain, by this time discovered the signs of life in their own commander, who had been only slightly stunned by the bullet, which had grazed his crown, and who, being assisted on his feet, stood a minute or two rubbing his head, as if awaking from a dream. As Manual came gradually to his senses, he recollected the business in which he had just been engaged, and, in his turn, inquired after the fate of his antagonist.
“I am here, my worthy incognito,” cried the other, with the voice of perfect good nature; “lying in the lap of mother earth, and all the better for opening a vein or two in my right leg;—though I do think that the same effect might have been produced without treating the bone so roughly!—But I opine that I saw you also reclining on the bosom of our common ancestor.”
“I was down for a few minutes, I do believe,” returned Manual; “there is the path of a bullet across my scalp.”
“Humph! on the head!” said Borroughcliffe, dryly; “the hurt is not likely to be mortal, I see.—Well, I shall offer to raffle with the first poor devil I can find that has but one good leg, for who shall have both; and that will just set up a beggar and a gentleman!—Manual, give me your hand; we have drunk together, and we have fought; surely there is nothing now to prevent our being sworn friends.”
“Why,” returned Manual, continuing to rub his head, “I see no irremovable objections—but you will want a surgeon? Can I order anything to be done? There go the signals again to embark—march the fellows down at quick time, sergeant; my own man may remain with me, or, I can do altogether without assistance.”
“Ah! you are what I call a well-made man, my dear friend!” exclaimed Borroughcliffe; “no weak points about your fortress! Such a man is worthy to be theheadof a whole corps, instead of a solitary company.—Gently, Drill, gently; handle me as if I were made of potter's clay.—I will not detain you longer, my friend Manual, for I hear signal after signal; they must be in want of some of your astonishing reasoning faculties to set them afloat.”
Manual might have been offended at the palpable allusions that his new friend made to the firmness of his occiput, had not his perception of things been a little confused by a humming sound that seemed to abide near the region of thought. As it was, he reciprocated the good wishes of the other, whom he shook most cordially by the hand, and once more renewed his offers of service, after exchanging sundry friendly speeches.
“I thank you quite as much as if I were not at all indebted to you for letting blood, thereby saving me a fit of apoplexy; but Drill has already dispatched a messenger to B—— for a leech, and the lad may bring the whole depot down upon you.—Adieu, once more, and remember that if you ever visit England again as a friend, you are to let me see you.”
“I shall do it without fail; and I shall keep you to your promise if you once more put foot in America.”
“Trust me for that: I shall stand in need of your excellent head to guide me safely among those rude foresters. Adieu; cease not to bear me in your thoughts.”
“I shall never cease to remember you, my good friend,” returned Manual, again scratching the member which was snapping in a manner that caused him to fancy he heard it. Once more these worthies shook each other by the hand, and again they renewed their promises of future intercourse; after which they separated like two reluctant lovers—parting in a manner that would have put to shame the friendship of Orestes and Pylades.