The pilot a tale of the sea |
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 | CHAPTER VI. The pilot |  |
6. CHAPTER VI.
'Tis there a woman loves to speak her wishes;
It spares the blushes of the love-sick maiden,
And every word's a smile, each line a tongue.”
Duo.
The slumbers of Griffith continued till late on
the following morning, when he was awakened
by the report of a cannon, issuing from the deck
above him. He threw himself, listlessly, from
his cot, and perceiving the officer of marines
near him, as his servant opened the door of his
state-room, he inquired, with some little interest
in his manner, if “the ship was in chase of any
thing, that a gun was fired?”
The soldier replied—
“'Tis no more than a hint to the Ariel, that
there is bunting abroad for them to read. It
seems as if all hands were asleep on board her,
for we have shown her signal, these ten minutes,
and she takes us for a collier, I believe, by the
respect she pays it.”
“Say, rather, that she takes us for an enemy,
and is wary,” returned Griffith. “Brown Dick
has played the English so many tricks himself,
that he is tender of his faith.”
“Why, they have shown him a yellow flag
Ariel, in every signal-book we have; surely he
can't suspect the English of knowing how to read
Yankee.”
“I have known Yankees read more difficult
English,” said Griffith, smiling; “but, in truth,
I suppose that Barnstable has been, like myself,
keeping a dead reckoning of his time, and his
men have profited by the occasion. She is lying
too, I trust.”
“Ay! like a cork in a mill-pond, and I dare say
you are right. Give Barnstable plenty of sea-room,
a heavy wind, and but little sail, and he
will send his men below, put that fellow he calls
long Tom at the tiller, and follow himself, and
sleep as quietly as I ever could at church.”
“Ah! yours is a somniferous orthodoxy.
Captain Manual,” said the young sailor, laughing,
while he slipped his arms into the sleeves of
a morning round-about, covered with the gilded
trappings of his profession; “sleep appears to
come most naturally to all you idlers. But give
me a passage, and I will go up, and call the
schooner down to us, in the turning of an hour-glass.”
The indolent soldier raised himself from the
leaning posture he had taken against the door of
the state-room, and Griffith proceeded through
the dark ward-room, up the narrow stairs, that
led him to the principal battery of the ship, and
thence, by another and broader flight of steps, to
the open deck.
The gale still blew strong, but steadily; the
blue water of the ocean was rising in mimic
mountains, that were crowned with white foam,
which the wind, at times, lifted from its kindred
element, to propel, in mist, through the air, from
summit to summit. But the ship rode on these agitated
that denoted the skill with which her mechanical
powers were directed. The day was bright and
clear, and the lazy sun, who seemed unwilling to
meet the toil of ascending to the meridian, was
crossing the heavens with a southern inclination,
that hardly allowed him to temper the moist air
of the ocean with his genial heat. At the distance
of a mile, directly in the wind's eye, the
Ariel was seen, obeying the signal, which had
caused the dialogue we have related. Her low,
black hull was barely discernible, at moments,
when she rose to the crest of a larger wave than
common; but the spot of canvass that she exposed
to the wind, was to be seen, seeming to touch
the water on either hand, as the little vessel rolled
amid the seas. At times, she was entirely hid
from view, when the faint lines of her raking
masts would be again discovered, issuing, as it
were, from the ocean, and continuing to ascend,
until the hull itself would appear, thrusting its
bows into the air, surrounded by foam, and apparently
ready to take its flight into another element.
After dwelling a moment on the beautiful sight
we have attempted to describe, Griffith cast his
eyes upward, to examine, with the keenness of a
seaman, the disposition of things aloft, and then
turned his attention to those who were on the
deck of the frigate.
His commander stood, in his composed manner,
patiently awaiting the execution of his order
by the Ariel, and at his side was placed the stranger,
who had acted so recently such a conspicuous
part in the management of the ship. Griffith
availed himself of daylight and his situation, to
examine the appearance of this singular being more
closely than the darkness and confusion of the preceding
the middle size in stature, but his form was muscular
and athletic, exhibiting the finest proportions
of manly beauty. His face appeared rather
characterized by melancholy and thought, than
by that determined decision which he had so
powerfully displayed in the moments of their
most extreme danger; but Griffith well knew, that
it could also exhibit looks of the fiercest impatience.
At present, it appeared, to the curious
youth, when compared to the glimpses he had
caught by the lights of their lanterns, like the
ocean at rest, contrasted with the waters around
him. The eyes of the pilot rested on the deck,
or when they did wander, it was with uneasy and
rapid glances. The large pea-jacket, that concealed
most of his other attire, was as roughly
made, and of materials as coarse, as that worn
by the meanest seaman in the vessel; and yet, it
did not escape the inquisitive gaze of the young
lieutenant, that it was worn with an air of neatness
and care, that was altogether unusual in men
of his profession. The examination of Griffith
ended here, for the near approach of the Ariel
attracted the attention of all on the deck of the
frigate, to the conversation that was about to pass
between their respective commanders.
As the little schooner rolled along under their
stern, Captain Munson directed his subordinate
to leave his vessel, and repair on board the ship.
As soon as the order was received, the Ariel
rounded-to, and drawing ahead into the smooth
water occasioned by the huge fabric that protected
her from the gale, the whale-boat was
again launched from her decks, and manned by
the same crew that had landed on those shores
which were now faintly discerned far to leeward,
looking like blue clouds on the skirts of the ocean.
When Barnstable had entered his boat, a few
strokes of the oars sent it, dancing over the
waves, to the side of the ship. The little vessel
was then veered off, to a distance, where it rode in
safety, under the care of a boat-keeper, and the
officer and his men ascended the side of the lofty
frigate.
The usual ceremonials of reception were
rigidly observed by Griffith and his juniors, when
Barnstable touched the deck; and though every
hand was ready to be extended towards the reckless
seaman, none presumed to exceed the salutations
of official decorum, until a short and private
dialogue had taken place between him and
their captain.
In the mean time, the crew of the whale-boat
passed forward, and mingled with the seamen of
the frigate, with the exception of the cockswain,
who established himself in one of the gangways,
where he stood in the utmost composure, fixing
his eyes aloft, and shaking his head, in evident
dissatisfaction, as he studied the complicated
mass of rigging above him. This spectacle soon
attracted to his side some half-dozen youths, with
Mr. Merry at their head, who endeavoured to entertain
their guest in a manner that should most
conduce to the indulgence of their own waggish
propensities.
The conversation between Barnstable and his
superior soon ended; when the former, beckoning
to Griffith, passed the wondering group who
had collected around the capstern, awaiting his
leisure to greet him more cordially, and led the
way to the ward-room, with the freedom of one
who felt himself no stranger. As this unsocial
manner formed no part of the natural temper or
ordinary deportment of the man, the remainder
of the officers suffered their first lieutenant to follow
their interview should be private. Barnstable was
determined that it should be so, at all events; for
he seized the lamp from the mess-table, and entered
the state-room of his friend, closing the door
behind them, and turning the key. When they
were both within its narrow limits—pointing to
the only chair the little apartment contained, with
a sort of instinctive deference to his companion's
rank—the commander of the schooner threw himself
carelessly on a sea-chest, and, placing the
lamp on the table, he opened the discourse as
follows:
“What a night we had of it! twenty times I
thought I could see the sea breaking over you,
and I had given you over as drowned men, or,
what is worse, as men driven ashore, to be led to
the prison-ships of these islanders, when I saw
your lights in answer to my gun. Had you
hoisted the conscience out of a murderer, you
wouldn't have relieved him more than you did
me, by showing that bit of tallow and cotton,
tip'd with flint and steel.—But, Griffith, I have a
tale to tell of a different kind—”
“Of how you slept, when you found yourself
in deep water, and how your crew strove to outdo
their commander, and how all succeeded so well,
that there was a gray-head on board here, that
began to shake with displeasure,” interrupted
Griffith; “truly, Dick, you will get into lubberly
habits on board that bubble in which you float
about, where all hands go to sleep as regularly
as the inhabitants of a poultry yard go to roost.”
“Not so bad, not half so bad, Ned,” returned
the other, laughing; “I keep as sharp a discipline
as if we wore a flag. To be sure, forty
men can't make as much parade as three or four
I am your better, any day.”
“Ay, because a pocket handkerchief is sooner
opened and shut than a table-cloth. But I hold
it to be unseamanlike, to leave any vessel without
human eyes, and those open, to watch whether
she goes east or west, north or south.”
“And who is guilty of such a dead-man's
watch?”
“Why, they say on board here, that when it
blows hard, you seat the man you call long Tom
by the side of the tiller, tell him to keep her head-to-sea,
and then pipe all hands to their night-caps,
where you all remain, comfortably stowed
in your hammocks, until you are awakened by the
snoring of your helmsman.”
“'Tis a damned scandalous insinuation,” cried
Barnstable, with an indignation that he in vain
attempted to conceal. “Who gives currency to
such a libel, Mr. Griffith?”
“I had it of the marine,” said his friend, losing
the archness that had instigated him to worry
his companion, in the vacant air of one who was
careless of every thing; “but I don't believe
half of it myself—I have no doubt you all had
your eyes open, last night, whatever you might
have been about this morning.”
“Ah! this morning! there was an oversight,
indeed! But I was studying a new signal-book,
Griffith, that has a thousand times more interest
for me, than all the bunting you can show, from
the head to the heel of your masts.”
“What! have you found out the Englishman's
private talk?”
“No, no,” said the other, stretching forth his
hand, and grasping the arm of his friend. “I
met, last night, one, on those cliffs, who has proved
herself what I always believed her to be and
spirit.”
“Of whom do you speak?”
“Of Katherine—”
Griffith started from his chair involuntarily,
at the sound of this name, and the blood passed
quickly through the shades of his countenance,
leaving it now pale as death, and then burning as
if oppressed by a torrent from his heart. Struggling
to overcome an emotion, which he appeared
ashamed to betray even to the friend he most
loved, the young man soon recovered himself
so far as to resume his seat, when he asked,
gloomily—
“Was she alone?”
“She was; but she left with me this paper,
and this invaluable book, which is worth a library
of all other works.”
The eye of Griffith rested vacantly on the
treasure that the other valued so highly, but his
hand seized, eagerly, the open letter which was
laid on the table for his perusal. The reader
will at once understand, that it was in the handwriting
of a female, and that it was the communication
Barnstable had received from his betrothed,
on the cliffs. Its contents were as follows:
“Believing that Providence may conduct me
where we shall meet, or whence I may be able to
transmit to you this account, I have prepared a
short statement of the situation of Cecilia Howard
and myself; not, however, to urge you and
Griffith to any rash or foolish hazards, but that
you may both sit down, and, after due consultation,
determine on what is proper for our relief.
“By this time, you must understand the character
of Colonel Howard too well to expect he
will ever consent to give his niece to a rebel. He
it, (but I whisper to Cecilia, 'tis his treason,) not
only his native country, but no small part of his
fortune also. In the frankness of my disposition,
(you know my frankness, Barnstable, but too
well!) I confessed to him, after the defeat of the
mad attempt Griffith made to carry off Cecilia,
in Carolina, that I had been foolish enough to
enter into some weak promise to the brother officer
who had accompanied the young sailor in his
traitorous visits to the plantation. Heigho! I
sometimes think it would have been better for us
all, if your ship had never been chased into the
river, or after she was there, if Griffith had made
no attempt to renew his acquaintance with my
cousin. The colonel received the intelligence as
such a guardian would hear that his ward was
about to throw away thirty thousand dollars and
herself on a traitor to his king and country. I
defended you stoutly; said that you had no
king, as the tie was dissolved; that America was
your country, and that your profession was honourable;
but it would not all do. He called
you rebel; that I was used to. He said you
were a traitor; that, in his vocabulary, amounts
to the same thing. He even hinted that you were
a coward; and that I knew to be false, and did
not hesitate to tell him so. He used fifty opprobrious
terms that I cannot remember, but
among others were the beautiful epithets of `disorganizer,'
`leveller,' `democrat,' and `jacobin.'
(I hope he did not mean a monk!) In short, he
acted Colonel Howard in a rage. But as his
dominion does not, like that of his favourite kings,
continue from generation to generation, and one
short year will release me from his power, and
leave me mistress of my own actions, that is, if
your fine promises are to be believed, I bore it
but martyrdom, rather than abandon Cecilia.
She, dear girl, has much more to distress her than
I can have; she is not only the ward of Colonel
Howard, but his niece, and his sole heir. I am
persuaded this latter circumstance makes no difference
in either her conduct or her feelings, but
he appears to think it gives him a right to tyrannize
over her on all occasions. After all, Colonel
Howard is a gentleman when you do not
put him in a passion, and, I believe, a thoroughly
honest man, and Cecilia even loves him. But a
man who is driven from his country, in his sixtieth
year, with the loss of near half his fortune,
is not apt to canonize those who compel the
change.
“It seems that when the Howards lived on
this island, a hundred years ago, they dwelt in
the county of Northumberland. Hither, then,
he brought us, when political events, and his
dread of becoming the uncle to a rebel, induced
him to abandon America, as he says, for ever.
We have been here now three months, and for
two thirds of that time we lived in tolerable comfort;
but latterly, the papers have announced the
arrival of the ship and your schooner in France,
and from that moment as strict a watch has been
kept over us, as if we had meditated a renewal of
the Carolina flight. The colonel, on his arrival
here, hired an old building, that is part house,
part abbey, part castle, and all prison, because
it is said to have once belonged to an ancestor of
his. In this delightful dwelling there are many
cages, that will secure more uneasy birds than
we are. About a fortnight ago an alarm was
given in a neighbouring village, which is situated
on the shore, that two American vessels, answering
your description, had been seen hovering
dream of nothing but that terrible fellow,
Paul Jones, it was said that he was on board one
of them. But I believe that Colonel Howard
suspects who you really are. He was very minute
in his inquiries, I hear; and since then, has
established a sort of garrison in the house, under
the pretence of defending it against marauders,
like those who are said to have laid my Lady
Selkirk under contribution.
“Now, understand me, Barnstable; on no account
would I have you risk yourself on shore;
neither must there be blood spilt, if you love me;
but that you may know what sort of a place we
are confined in, and by whom surrounded, I will
describe both our prison and the garrison. The
whole building is of stone, and not to be attempted
with slight means. It has windings and turnings,
both internally and externally, that would
require more skill than I possess to make intelligible;
but the rooms we inhabit are in the upper
or third floor of a wing, that you may call a
tower, if you are in a romantic mood, but which,
in truth, is nothing but a wing. Would to God I
could fly with it! If any accident should bring
you in sight of the dwelling, you will know our
rooms, by the three smoky vanes that whiffle
about its pointed roof, and, also, by the windows
in that story being occasionally open. Opposite
to our windows, at the distance of half a mile, is
a retired, unfrequented ruin, concealed, in a great
measure, from observation by a wood, and affording
none of the best accommodations, it is
true, but shelter in some of its vaults or apartments.
I have prepared, according to the explanations
you once gave me on this subject, a
set of small signals, of differently coloured silks,
and a little dictionary of all the phrases that I
numbered to correspond with the key and the
flags, all of which I shall send you with this letter.
You must prepare your own flags, and of
course I retain mine, as well as a copy of the
key and book. If opportunity should ever offer,
we can have, at least, a pleasant discourse together;
you from the top of the old tower in the
ruins, and I from the east window of my dressing-room!
But now for the garrison. In addition
to the commandant, Colonel Howard, who
retains all the fierceness of his former military
profession, there is, as his second in authority,
that bane of Cecilia's happiness, Kit Dillon, with
his long Savannah face, scornful eyes of black, and
skin of the same colour. This gentleman, you
know, is a distant relative of the Howards, and
wishes to be more nearly allied. He is poor, it
is true, but then, as the colonel daily remarks,
he is a good and loyal subject, and no rebel.
When I asked why he was not in arms in these
stirring times, contending for the prince he loves
so much, the colonel answers, that it is not his
profession, that he has been educated for the
law, and was destined to fill one of the highest
judicial stations in the colonies, and that he
hoped he should yet live to see him sentence certain
nameless gentlemen to condign punishment.
This was consoling, to be sure, but I bore it.
However, he left Carolina with us, and here he
is, and here he is likely to continue, unless you
can catch him, and anticipate his judgment on
himself. This gentleman the colonel has long
desired to see the husband of Cecilia, and since
the news of your being on the coast, the siege
has nearly amounted to a storm. The consequences
are, that my cousin at first kept her
room, and then the colonel kept her there, and
we inhabit. In addition to these two principal
gaolers, we have four men servants, two black
and two white; and an officer and twenty soldiers
from the neighbouring town are billeted
on us, by particular desire, until the coast is declared
free from pirates! yes, that is the musical
name they give you—and when their own people
land, and plunder, and rob, and murder the men
and insult the women, they are called heroes!
It's a fine thing to be able to make dictionaries,
and invent names—and it must be your fault, if
mine has been framed for no purpose. I declare,
when I recollect all the insulting and cruel things
I hear in this country, of my own and her people,
it makes me lose my temper, and forget my
sex; but do not let my ill humour urge you to
any thing rash; remember your life, remember
their prisons, remember your reputation, but do
not, do not forget your
in the signal-book you will find a more particular
description of our prison, where it stands, and a
drawing of the grounds,” &c.
When Griffith concluded this epistle, he returned
it to the man to whom it was addressed, and
fell back in his chair, in an attitude that denoted
deep reflection.
“I knew she was here, or I should have accepted
the command offered to me by our commissioners
in Paris,” at length he uttered; “and
I thought that some lucky chance might throw
her in my way; but this is bringing us close, indeed!
This intelligence must be acted on, and
that promptly. Poor girl, what does she not
suffer, in such a situation!”
“What a beautiful hand she writes!” exclaimed
Barnstable; “'tis as clear, and as pretty, and as
small, as her own delicate fingers. Griff. what a
log-book she would keep!”
“Cecilia Howard touch the coarse leaves of a
log-book!” cried the other, in amazement; but
perceiving Barnstable to be poring over the contents
of his mistress's letter, he smiled at their
mutual folly, and continued silent. After a short
time spent in cool reflection, Griffith required of
his friend the nature and circumstances of his
interview with Katherine Plowden. Barnstable
related it, briefly, as it occurred, in the manner
already known to the reader.
“Then,” said Griffith, “Merry is the only one,
besides ourselves, who knows of this meeting,
and he will be too chary of the reputation of his
kinswoman to mention it.”
“Her reputation needs no shield, Mr. Griffith,”
cried her lover; “'tis as spotless as the canvass
above your head, and—”
“Peace, dear Richard; I entreat your pardon;
my words may have conveyed more than I intended;
but it is important that our measures
should be secret, as well as prudently concerted.”
“We must get them both off,” returned Barnstable,
forgetting his displeasure the moment it
was exhibited, “and that too before the old man
takes it into his wise head to leave the coast.
Did you ever get a sight of his instructions, or
does he keep silent?”
“As the grave. This is the first time we have
left port, that he has not conversed freely with me
on the nature of the cruise; but not a syllable
has been exchanged between us on the subject,
since we sailed from Brest.”
“Ah! that is your Jersey bashfulness,” said
Barnstable; “wait till I come alongside him,
to get it out of him in an hour.”
“'Twill be diamond cut diamond, I doubt,”
said Griffith, laughing; “you will find him as
acute at evasion, as you can possibly be at a
cross-examination.”
“At any rate, he gives me a chance to-day;
you know, I suppose, that he sent for me to attend
a consultation of his officers, on important
matters.”
“I did not,” returned Griffith, fixing his eyes
intently on the speaker; “what has he to offer?”
“Nay, that you must ask your pilot; for while
talking to me, the old man would turn and look at
the stranger, every minute, as if watching for
signals how to steer.”
“There is a mystery about that man, and our
connexion with him, that I cannot fathom,” said
Griffith. “But I hear the voice of Manual,
calling for me; we are wanted in the cabin. Remember,
you do not leave the ship without seeing
me again.”
“No, no, my dear fellow, from the public, we
must retire to a private consultation.”
The young men arose, and Griffith, throwing
off the round-about in which he had appeared on
deck, drew on a coat of more formal appearance,
and taking a sword carelessly in his hand, they
proceeded together, along the passage already
described, to the gun-deck, where they entered,
with the proper ceremonials, into the principal
cabin of the frigate.
| CHAPTER VI. The pilot | |