University of Virginia Library

17. CHAPTER XVII.

Tempest.

If Captain Truck distrusted the situation of his own ship
when he saw that the mate had changed her course, he liked
it still less after he was on board, and had an opportunity
to form a more correct judgment. The current had set the
vessel not only to the southward, but in-shore, and the send
of the ground-swell was gradually, but inevitably, heaving
her in towards the land. At this point the coast was more
broken than at the spot where the Dane had been wrecked,
some signs of trees appearing, and rocks running off in
irregular reefs into the sea. More to the south, these rocks
were seen without the ship, while directly astern they were
not half a mile distant. Still the wind was favourable,
though light and baffling, and Mr. Leach had got up every
stitch of canvas that circumstances would at all allow; the
lead, too, had been tried, and the bottom was found to be a
hard sand mixed with rocks, and the depth of the water
such as to admit of anchoring. It was a sign that Captain
Truck did not absolutely despair after ascertaining all these
facts, that he caused Mr. Saunders to be summoned; for
as yet, none of those who had been in the boats had breakfasted.

“Step this way, Mr. Steward,” said the captain; “and
report the state of the coppers. You were rummaging, as

usual, among the lockers of yonder unhappy Dane, and I
desire to know what discoveries you have made! You will
please to recollect, that on all public expeditions of this nature,
there must be no peculation or private journal kept.
Did you see any stock-fish?”

“Sir, I should deem this ship disgraced by the admission
into her pantry of such an article, sir. We have tongues
and sounds in plenty, Captain Truck, and no gentleman
that has such diet, need ambition a stock-fish!”

“I am not quite of your way of thinking; but the earth
is not made of stock-fish. Did you happen to fall in with
any butter?”

“Some, sir, that is scarcely fit to slush a mast with, and
I do think, one of the most atrocious cheeses, sir, it was
ever my bad fortune to meet with. I do not wonder the
Africans left the wreck.”

“You followed their example, of course, Mr. Saunders,
and left the cheese.”

“I followed my own judgment, sir, for I would not stay
in a ship with such a cheese, Captain Truck, sir, even to
have the honour of serving under so great a commander as
yourself. I think it no wonder that vessel was wrecked!
Even the sharks would abandon her. The very thoughts
of her impurities, sir, make me feel unsettled in the stomach.”

The captain nodded his head in approbation of this sentiment,
called for a coal, and then ordered breakfast. The
meal was silent, thoughtful, and even sad; every one was
thinking of the poor Danes and their sad fate, while they
who had been on the plain had the additional subject of the
murdered man for their contemplation.

“Is it possible to do nothing to redeem these poor people,
father, from captivity?” Eve at length demanded.

“I have been thinking of this, my child; but I see no
other method than to acquaint their government of their
situation.”

“Might we not contribute something from our own means
to that effect? Money, I fancy, is the chief thing necessary.”

The gentlemen looked at each other in approbation,

though a reluctance to be the first to speak kept most of
them silent.

“If a hundred pounds, Miss Effingham, will be useful,”
Sir George Templemore said, after the pause had continued
an awkward minute, laying a banknote of that amount on
the table, “and you will honour us by becoming the keeper
of the redemption money, I have great pleasure in making
the offer.”

This was handsomely said, and as Captain Truck afterwards
declared, handsomely done too, though it was a little
abrupt, and caused Eve to hesitate and redden.

“I shall accept your gift, sir,” she said; “and with your
permission will transfer it to Mr. Effingham, who will better
know what use to put it to, in order to effect our benevolent
purpose. I think I can answer for as much more from
himself.”

“You may, with certainty, my dear—and twice as much,
if necessary. John, this is a proper occasion for your interference.”

“Put me down at what you please,” said John Effingham,
whose charities in a pecuniary sense were as unlimited,
as in feeling they were apparently restrained. “One
hundred or one thousand, to rescue that poor crew!”

“I believe, sir, we must all follow so good an example,”
Mr. Sharp observed; “and I sincerely hope that this scheme
will not prove useless. I think it may be effected by means
of some of the public agents at Mogadore.”

Mr. Dodge raised many objections, for it really exceeded
his means to give so largely, and his character was formed
in a school too envious and jealous to confess an inferiority
on a point even as worthless as that of money. Indeed, he
had so long been accustomed to maintain that “one man
was as good as another,” in opposition to his senses, that,
like most of those who belong to this impracticable school,
he had tacitly admitted in his own mind, the general and
vulgar ascendency of mere wealth; and, quite as a matter
of course, he was averse to confessing his own inferiority
on a point that he had made to be all in all, while loudest
in declaiming against any inferiority whatever. He walked
out of the cabin, therefore, with strong heart-burnings and

jealousies, because others had presumed to give that which
it was not really in his power to bestow.

On the other hand, both Mademoiselle Viefville and Mr.
Monday manifested the superiority of the opinions in which
they had been trained. The first quietly handed a Napoleon
to Mr. Effingham, who took it with as much attention
and politeness as he received any of the larger contributions;
while the latter produced a five-pound note, with a
hearty good-will that redeemed the sin of many a glass of
punch in the eyes of his companions.

Eve did not dare to look towards Paul Blunt, while this
collection was making; but she felt regret that he did not
join in it. He was silent and thoughtful, and even seemed
pained, and she wondered if it were possible that one, who
certainly lived in a style to prove that his income was large,
could be so thoughtless as to have deprived himself of the
means of doing that which he so evidently desired to do.
But most of the company was too well-bred to permit the
matter to become the subject of conversation, and they soon
rose from table in a body. The mind of Eve, however,
was greatly relieved when her father told her that the young
man had put a hundred sovereigns in gold into his hands as
soon as possible, and that he had seconded this offering with
another, of embarking for Mogadore in person, should they
get into the Cape de Verds, or the Canaries, with a view
of carrying out the charitable plan with the least delay.

“He is a noble-hearted young man,” said the pleased
father, as he communicated this fact to his daughter and
cousin; “and I shall not object to the plan.”

“If he offer to quit this ship one minute sooner than is
necessary, he does, indeed, deserve a statue of gold,” said
John Effingham; “for it has all that can attract a young
man like him, and all too that can awaken his jealousy.”

“Cousin Jack!” exclaimed Eve reproachfully, quite
thrown off her guard by the abruptness and plainness of
this language.

The quiet smile of Mr. Effingham proved that he understood
both, but he made no remark. Eve instantly recovered
her spirits, and angry at herself for the girlish exclamation
that had escaped her, she turned on her assailant.
“I do not know that I ought to be seen in an aside with

Mr. John Effingham,” she said, “even when it is sanctioned
with the presence of my own father.”

“And may I ask why so much sudden reserve, my
offended beauty?”

“Merely that the report is already active, concerning the
delicate relation in which we stand towards each other.”

John Effingham looked surprised, but he suppressed his
curiosity from a long habit of affecting an indifference he
did not always feel. The father was less dignified, for he
quietly demanded an explanation.

“It would seem,” returned Eve, assuming a solemnity
suited to a matter of interest, “that our secret is discovered.
While we were indulging our curiosity about this unfortunate
ship, Mr. Dodge was gratifying the laudable industry
of the Active Inquirer, by prying into our state-rooms.”

“This meanness is impossible!” exclaimed Mr. Effingham.

“Nay,” said John, “no meanness is impossible to a
demagogue,—a pretender to things of which he has even
no just conception,—a man who lives to envy and traduce;
in a word, a quasi gentleman. Let us hear what Eve has
to say.”

“My information is from Ann Sidley, who saw him in
the act. Now the kind letter you wrote my father, cousin
Jack, just before we left London, and which you wrote because
you would not trust that honest tongue of yours to
speak the feelings of that honest heart, is the subject of my
daily study; not on account of its promises, you will believe
me, but on account of the strong affection it displays
to a girl who is not worthy of one half you feel and do for
her.”

“Pshaw!”

“Well, let it then be pshaw! I had read that letter this
very morning, and carelessly left it on my table. This letter
Mr. Dodge, in his undying desire to lay everything before
the public, as becomes his high vocation, and as in
duty bound, has read; and misconstruing some of the
phrases, as will sometimes happen to a zealous circulator
of news, he has drawn the conclusion that I am to be
made a happy woman as soon as we reach America, by

being converted from Miss Eve Effingham into Mrs. John
Effingham.”

“Impossible! No man can be such a fool, or quite so
great a miscreant!”

“I should rather think, my child,” added the milder
father, “that injustice has been done Mr. Dodge. No person,
in the least approximating to the station of a gentleman,
could even think of an act so base as this you mention.”

“Oh! if this be all your objection to the tale,” observed
the cousin, “I am ready to swear to its truth. But Eve has
caught a little of Captain Truck's spirit of mystifying, and
is determined to make a character by a bold stroke in the
beginning. She is clever, and in time may rise to be a
quiz.”

“Thank you for the compliment, cousin Jack, which,
however, I am forced to disclaim, as I never was more serious
in my life. That the letter was read, Nanny, who is
truth itself, affirms she saw. That Mr. Dodge has since
been industriously circulating the report of my great good
fortune, she has heard from the mate, who had it from the
highest source of information direct, and that such a man
would be likely to come to such a conclusion, you have
only to recall the terms of the letter yourself, to believe.”

“There is nothing in my letter to justify any notion so
silly.”

“An Active Inquirer might make discoveries you little
dream of, dear cousin Jack. You speak of its being time
to cease roving, of settling yourself at last, of never parting,
and, prodigal as you are, of making Eve the future
mistress of your fortune. Now to all this, recreant, confess,
or I shall never again put faith in man.”

John Effingham made no answer, but the father warmly
expressed his indignation, that any man of the smallest pretentions
to be admitted among gentlemen, should be guilty
of an act so base.

“We can hardly tolerate his presence, John, and it is
almost a matter of conscience to send him to Coventry.”

“If you entertain such notions of decorum, your wisest
way, Edward, will be to return to the place whence you

have come; for, trust me, you will find scores of such gentlemen
where you are going!”

“I shall not allow you to persuade me I know my own
country so little. Conduct like this will stamp a man with
disgrace in America as well as elsewhere.”

“Conduct like this would, but it will no longer. The
pell-mell that rages has brought honourable men into a sad
minority, and even Mr. Dodge will tell you the majority
must rule. Were he to publish my letter, a large portion
of his readers would fancy he was merely asserting the
liberty of the press. Heavens save us! You have been
dreaming abroad, Ned Effingham, while your country has
retrograded, in all that is respectable and good, a century
in a dozen years!”

As this was the usual language of John Effingham, neither
of his listeners thought much of it, though Mr. Effingham
more decidedly expressed an intention to cut off even the
slight communication with the offender, he had permitted
himself to keep up, since they had been on board.

“Think better of it, dear father,” said Eve; “for such
a man is scarcely worthy of even your resentment. He is
too much your inferior in principles, manners, character,
station, and everything else, to render him of so much
account; and then, were we to clear up this masquerade
into which the chances of a ship have thrown us, we might
have our scruples concerning others, as well as concerning
this wolf in sheep's clothing.”

“Say rather an ass, shaved and painted to resemble a
zebra,” muttered John. “The fellow has no property as
respectable as the basest virtue of a wolf.”

“He has at least rapacity.”

“And can howl in a pack. This much, then, I will
concede to you: but I agree with Eve, we must either punish
him affirmatively, by pulling his ears, or treat him with
contempt, which is always negative or silent. I wish he
had entered the state-room of that fine young fellow, Paul
Blunt, who is of an age and a spirit to give him a lesson
that might make a paragraph for his Active Inquirer, if not
a scissors' extract of himself.”

Eve knew that the offender had been there too, but she
had too much prudence to betray him.

“This will only so much the more oblige him,” she said,
laughingly; “for Mr. Blunt, in speaking of the editor of
the Active Inquirer, said that he had the failing to believe
that this earth, and all it contained, was created merely to
furnish materials for newspaper paragraphs.”

The gentlemen laughed with the amused Eve, and Mr.
Effingham remarked, that “there did seem to be men so
perfectly selfish, so much devoted to their own interests,
and so little sensible of the rights and feelings of others, as
to manifest a desire to render the press superior to all other
power; not,” he concluded, “in the way of argument, or
as an agent of reason, but as a master, coarse, corrupt,
tyrannical and vile; the instrument of selfishness, instead
of the right, and when not employed as the promoter of
personal interests, to be employed as the tool of personal
passions.”

“Your father will become a convert to my opinions, Miss
Effingham,” said John, “and he will not be home a twelve-month
before he will make the discovery that the government
is a press-ocracy, and its ministers, self-chosen and usurpers,
composed of those who have the least at stake, even as to
character.”

Mr. Effingham shook his head in dissent, but the conversation
changed in consequence of a stir in the ship.
The air from the land had freshened, and even the heavy
canvas on which the Montauk was now compelled principally
to rely, had been asleep, as mariners term it, or had
blown out from the mast, where it stood inflated and steady,
a proof at sea, where the water is always in motion, that
the breeze is getting to be fresh. Aided by this power, the
ship had overcome the united action of the heavy ground-swell
and of the current, and was stealing out from under
the land, when the air murmured for an instant, as if about
to blow still fresher, and then all the sails flapped. The
wind had passed away like a bird, and a dark line to sea-ward,
denoted the approach of the breeze from the ocean.
The stir in the vessel was occasioned by the preparations to
meet this change.

The new wind brought little with it beyond the general
danger of blowing on shore. The breeze was light, and
not more than sufficient to force the vessel through the water,

in her present condition, a mile and a half in the hour,
and this too in a line nearly parallel with the coast. Captain
Truck saw therefore at a glance, that he should be
compelled to anchor. Previously, however, to doing this,
he had a long talk with his mates, and a boat was lowered.

The lead was cast, and the bottom was found to be still
good, though a hard sand, which is not the best holding
ground.

“A heavy sea would cause the ship to drag,” Captain
Truck remarked, “should it come on to blow, and the lines
of dark rocks astern of them would make chips of the
Pennsylvania in an hour, were that great ship to lie on it.”

He entered the boat, and pulled along the reefs to examine
an inlet that Mr. Leach reported to have been seen, before
he got the ship's head to the northward. Could an entrance
be found at this point, the vessel might possibly be
carried within the reef, and a favourite scheme of the captain's
could be put in force, one to which he now attached
the highest importance. A mile brought the boat up to the
inlet, where Mr. Truck found the following appearances:
The general formation of the coast in sight was that of a
slight curvature, within which the ship had so far drifted
as to be materially inside a line drawn from headland to
headland. There was, consequently, little hope of urging
a vessel, crippled like the Montauk, against wind, sea and
current, out again into the ocean. For about a league
abreast of the ship the coast was rocky, though low, the
rocks running off from the shore quite a mile in places, and
every where fully half that distance. The formation was
irregular, but it had the general character of a reef, the
position of which was marked by breakers, as well as by
the black heads of rocks that here and there showed themselves
above the water. The inlet was narrow, crooked,
and so far environed by rocks as to render it questionable
whether there was a passage at all, though the smoothness
of the water had raised hopes to that effect in Mr.
Leach.

As soon as captain Truck arrived at the mouth of this
passage, he felt so much encouraged by the appearance of
things that he gave the concerted signal for the ship to veer
round and to stand to the southward. This was losing

ground in the way of offing, but tack the Montauk could
not with so little wind, and the captain saw by the drift she
had made since he left her, that promptitude was necessary.
The ship might anchor off the inlet, as well as anywhere
else, if reduced to anchoring outside at all, and then there
was always the chance of entering.

As soon as the ship's head was again to the southward,
and Captain Truck felt certain that she was lying along the
reef at a reasonably safe distance, and in as good a direction
as he could hope for, he commenced his examination.
Like a discreet seaman he pulled off from the rocks to a
suitable distance, for should an obstacle occur outside, he
well knew any depth of water further in would be useless.
The day was so fine, and in the absence of rivers, the ocean
so limpid in that low latitude, that it was easy to see the bottom
at a considerable depth. But to this sense, of course,
the captain did not trust, for he kept the lead going constantly,
although all eyes were also employed in searching
for rocks.

The first cast of the lead was in five fathoms, and these
soundings were held nearly up to the inlet, where the lead
struck a rock in three fathoms and a half. At this point,
then, a more careful examination was made, but three and
a half was the shallowest cast. As the Montauk drew
nearly a fathom less than this, the cautious old master proceeded
closer in. Directly in the mouth of the inlet was a
large flat rock, that rose nearly to the surface of the sea,
and which, when the tide was low, was probably bare.
This rock Captain Truck at first believed would defeat his
hopes of success, which by this time were strong; but a
closer examination showed him that on one side of it was a
narrow passage, just wide enough to admit a ship.

From this spot the channel became crooked, but it was
sufficiently marked by the ripple on the reef; and after a
careful investigation, he found it was possible to carry three
fathoms quite within the reef, where a large space existed
that was gradually filling up with sand, but which was
nearly all covered with water when the tide was in, as was
now the case, and which had channels, as usual, between
the banks. Following one of these channels a quarter of
a mile, he found a basin of four fathoms of water, large

enough to take a ship in, and, fortunately, it was in close
proximity to a portion of the reef that was always bare,
when a heavy sea was not beating over it. Here he dropped
a buoy, for he had come provided with several fragments
of spars for this purpose; and, on his return, the
channel was similarly marked off, at all the critical points.
On the flat rock, in the inlet, one of the men was left, standing
up to his waist in the water, it being certain that the
tide was falling.

The boat now returned to the ship, which it met at the
distance of half a mile from the inlet. The current setting
southwardly, her progress had been more rapid than when
heading north, and her drift had been less towards the land.
Still there was so little wind, so steady a ground-swell, and
it was possible to carry so little after-sail, that great doubts
were entertained of being able to weather the rocks sufficiently
to turn into the inlet. Twenty times in the next
half hour was the order to let go the anchor, on the point
of being given, as the wind baffled, and as often was it
countermanded, to take advantage of its reviving. These
were feverish moments, for the ship was now so near the
reef as to render her situation very insecure in the event of
the wind's rising, or of a sea's getting up, the sand of the
bottom being too hard to make good holding-ground. Still,
as there was a possibility, in the present state of the weather,
of kedging the ship off a mile into the offing, if necessary,
Captain Truck stood on with a boldness he might
not otherwise have felt. The anchor hung suspended by a
single turn of the stopper, ready to drop at a signal, and
Mr. Truck stood between the knight-heads, watching the
slow progress of the vessel, and accurately noticing every
foot of leeward set she made, as compared with the rocks.

All this time the poor fellow stood in the water, awaiting
the arrival of his friends, who, in their turn, were anxiously
watching his features, as they gradually grew more distinct.

“I see his eyes,” cried the captain cheerily; “take a
drag at the bowlines, and let her head up as much as she
will, Mr. Leach, and never mind those sham topsails.
Take them in at once, sir; they do us, now, more harm
than good.”

The clewline blocks rattled, and the top-gallant sails,

which were made to do the duty of top-sails, but which
would hardly spread to the lower yards, so as to set on a
wind, came rapidly in. Five minutes of intense doubt followed,
when the captain gave the animating order to—

“Man the main-clew garnets, boys, and stand by to
make a run of it!”

This was understood to be a sign that the ship was far
enough to windward, and the command to “in main-sail,”
which soon succeeded, was received with a shout.

“Hard up with the helm, and stand by to lay the fore-yard
square,” cried Captain Truck, rubbing his hands.
“Look that both bowers are clear for a run; and you,
Toast, bring me the brightest coal in the galley.”

The movements of the Montauk were necessarily slow;
but she obeyed her helm, and fell off until her bows pointed
in towards the sailor in the water. This fine fellow, the
moment he saw the ship approaching, waded to the verge
of the rock, where it went off perpendicularly to the bottom,
and waved to them to come on without fear.

“Come within ten feet of me,” he shouted. “There is
nothing to spare on the other side.”

As the captain was prepared for this, the ship was steered
accordingly, and as she hove slowly past on the rising and
falling water, a rope was thrown to the man, who was
hauled on board.

“Port!” cried the captain, as soon as the rock was
passed; “port your helm, sir, and stand for the first buoy.”

In this manner the Montauk drove slowly but steadily
on, until she had reached the basin, where one anchor was
let go almost as soon as she entered. The chain was paid
out until the vessel was forced over to some distance, and
then the other bower was dropped. The fore-sail was
hauled up and handed, and chain was given the ship, which
was pronounced to be securely moored.

“Now,” cried the captain, all his anxiety ceasing with
the responsibility, “I expect to be made a member of the
New-York Philosophical Society at least, which is learned
company for a man who has never been at college, for discovering
a port on the coast of Africa, which harbour, ladies
and gentlemen, without too much vanity, I hope to be

permitted to call Port Truck. If Mr. Dodge, however,
should think this too anti-republican, we will compromise
the matter by calling it Port Truck and Dodge; or the
town that no doubt will sooner or later arise on its banks,
may be called Dodgeborough, and I will keep the harbour
to myself.”

“Should Mr. Dodge consent to this arrangement, he will
render himself liable to the charge of aristocracy,” said
Mr. Sharp; for as all felt relieved by finding themselves in a
place of security, so all felt disposed to join in the pleasantry.
“I dare say his modesty would prevent his consenting to
the plan.”

“Why, gentlemen,” returned the subject of these remarks,
“I do not know that we are to refuse honours that
are fairly imposed on us by the popular voice; and the
practice of naming towns and counties after distinguished
citizens, is by no means uncommon with us. A few of my
own neighbours have been disposed to honour me in this
way already, and my paper is issued from a hamlet that
certainly does bear my own unworthy name. So you perceive
there will be no novelty in the appellation.”

“I would have made oath to it,” cried the captain, “from
your well-established humility. Is the place as large as
London?”

“It can boast of little more than my own office, a tavern,
a store, and a blacksmith's shop, captain, as yet; but Rome
was not built in a day.”

“Your neighbours, sir, must be people of extraordinary
discernment; but the name?”

“That is not absolutely decided. At first it was called
Dodgetown, but this did not last long, being thought vulgar
and common-place. Six or eight weeks afterwards, we—”

“We, Mr. Dodge!”

“I mean the people, sir,—I am so much accustomed to
connect myself with the people, that whatever they do, I
think I had a hand in.”

“And very properly, sir,” observed John Effingham,
“as probably without you, there would have been no people
at all.”

“What may be the population of Dodgetown, sir?”
asked the persevering captain, on this hint.

“At the census of January, it was seventeen; but by the
census of March, there were eighteen. I have made a calculation
that shows, if we go on at this rate, or by arithmetical
progression, it will be a hundred in about ten years,
which will be a very respectable population for a country
place. I beg pardon, sir, the people six or eight weeks
afterwards, altered the name to Dodgeborough; but a new
family coming in that summer, a party was got up to change
it to Dodge-ville, a name that was immensely popular, as
ville means city in Latin; but it must be owned the people
like change, or rotation in names, as well as in office, and
they called the place Butterfield Hollow, for a whole month,
after the new inhabitant, whose name is Butterfield. He
moved away in the fall; and so, after trying Belindy,
(Anglice Belinda,) Nineveh, Grand Cairo, and Pumpkin
Valley, they made me the offer to restore the ancient name,
provided some addendum more noble and proper could be
found than town, or ville, or borough; it is not yet determined
what it shall be, but I believe we shall finally settle
down in Dodgeople, or Dodgeopolis.”

“For the season; and a very good name it will prove
for a short cruise, I make no question. The Butterfield
Hollow was a little like rotation in office, in truth, sir.”

“I didn't like it, captain, so I gave Squire Butterfield to
understand, privately; for as he had a majority with him,
I didn't approve of speaking too strongly on the subject.
As soon as I got him out of the tavern, however, the current
set the other way.”

“You fairly uncorked him!”

“That I did, and no one ever heard of him, or of his
hollow, after his retreat. There are a few discontented and
arrogant innovators, who affect to call the place by its old
name of Morton; but these are the mere vassals of a man
who once owned the patent, and who has now been dead
these forty years. We are not the people to keep his old
musty name, or to honour dry bones.”

“Served him right, sir, and like men of spirit! If he
wants a place called after himself, let him live, like other
people. A dead man has no occasion for a name, and
there should be a law passed, that when a man slips his

cables, he should bequeath his name to some honest fellow
who has a worse one. It might be well to compel all great
men in particular, to leave their renown to those who cannot
get any for themselves.”

“I will venture to suggest an improvement on the name,
if Mr. Dodge will permit me,” said Mr. Sharp, who had
been an amused listener to the short dialogue. “Dodgeople
is a little short, and may be offensive by its brusquerie. By
inserting a single letter, it will become Dodge-people; or,
there is the alternative of Dodge-adrianople, which will be
a truly sonorous and republican title. Adrian was an emperor,
and even Mr. Dodge might not disdain the conjunction.”

By this time, the editor of the Active Inquirer began to
be extremely elevated—for this was assailing him on his
weakest side—and he laughed and rubbed his hands as if
he thought the joke particularly pleasant. This person had
also a peculiarity of judgment that was singularly in opposition
to all his open professions, a peculiarity, however,
that belongs rather to his class than to the individual member
of it. Ultra as a democrat and an American, Mr. Dodge
had a sneaking predilection in favour of foreign opinions.
Although practice had made him intimately acquainted with
all the frauds, deceptions, and vileness of the ordinary arts
of paragraph-making, he never failed to believe religiously
in the veracity, judgment, good faith, honesty and talents
of anything that was imported in the form of types. He
had been weekly, for years, accusing his nearest brother of
the craft, of lying, and he could not be altogether ignorant
of his own propensity in the same way; but, notwithstanding
all this experience in the secrets of the trade, whatever
reached him from a European journal, he implicitely swallowed
whole. One, who knew little of the man, might have
supposed he feigned credulity to answer his own purposes;
but this would be doing injustice to his faith, which was
perfect, being based on that provincial admiration, and provincial
ignorance, that caused the countryman, who went to
London for the first time, to express his astonishment at
finding the king a man. As was due to his colonial origin,
his secret awe and reverence for an Englishman was exactly

in proportion to his protestations of love for the people, and
his deference for rank was graduated on a scale suited to
the heart-burning and jealousies he entertained for all whom
he felt to be his superiors. Indeed, one was the cause of
the other; for they who really are indifferent to their own
social position, are usually equally indifferent to that of
others, so long as they are not made to feel the difference
by direct assumptions of superiority.

When Mr. Sharp, whom even Mr. Dodge had discovered
to be a gentleman,—and an English gentleman of course,—
entered into the trifling of the moment, therefore, so far
from detecting the mystification, the latter was disposed to
believe himself a subject of interest with this person, against
whose exclusiveness and haughty reserve, notwithstanding,
he had been making side-hits ever since the ship had sailed.
But the avidity with which the Americans of Mr. Dodge's
temperament are apt to swallow the crumbs of flattery that
fall from the Englishman's table, is matter of history, and
the editor himself was never so happy as when he could lay
hold of a paragraph to republish, in which a few words of
comfort were doled out by the condescending mother to the
never-dying faith of the daughter. So far, therefore, from
taking umbrage at what had been said, he continued the
subject long after the captain had gone to his duty, and with
so much perseverance that Paul Blunt, as soon as Mr. Sharp
escaped, took an occasion to compliment that gentleman on
his growing intimacy with the refined and single-minded
champion of the people. The other admitted his indiscretion;
and if the affair had no other consequences, it afforded
these two fine young men a moment's merriment, at a
time when anxiety had been fast getting the ascendency
over their more cheerful feelings. When they endeavoured
to make Miss Effingham share in the amusement, however,
that young lady heard them with gravity; for the meanness
of the act discovered by Nanny Sidley, had indisposed her
to treat the subject of their comments with the familiarity
of even ridicule. Perceiving this, though unable to account
for it, the gentlemen changed the discourse, and soon became
sufficiently grave by contemplating their own condition.

The situation of the Montauk was now certainly one to
excite uneasiness in those who were little acquainted with
the sea, as well as in those who were. It was very much
like that for which Miss Effingham's nurse had pined, having
many rocks and sands in sight, with the land at no
great distance. In order that the reader may understand it
more clearly, we shall describe it with greater minuteness.

To the westward of the ship lay the ocean, broad, smooth,
glittering, but, heaving and setting, with its eternal breathings,
which always resemble the respiration of some huge
monster. Between the vessel and this waste of water, and
within three hundred feet of the first, stretched an irregular
line of ripple, dotted here and there with the heads of low
naked rocks, marking the presence and direction of the reef.

This was all that would interpose between the basin and
the raging billows, should another storm occur; but Captain
Truck thought this would suffice so far to break the
waves as to render the anchorage sufficiently secure.
Astern of the ship, however, a rounded ridge of sand began
to appear as the tide fell, within forty fathoms of the vessel,
and as the bottom was hard, and difficult to get an anchor
into it, there was the risk of dragging on this bank. We
say that the bottom was hard, for the reader should know
that it is not the weight of the anchor that secures the ship,
but the hold its pointed fluke and broad palm get of the
ground. The coast itself was distant less than a mile, and
the entire basin within the reef was fast presenting spits of
sand, as the water fell on the ebb. Still there were many
channels, and it would have been possible, for one who
knew their windings, to have sailed a ship several leagues
among them, without passing the inlet; these channels
forming a sort of intricate net-work, in every direction from
the vessel.

When Captain Truck had coolly studied all the peculiarities
of his position, he set about the duty of securing his
ship, in good earnest. The two light boats were brought
under the bows, and the stream anchor was lowered, and
fastened to a spar that lay across both. This anchor was
carried to the bank astern, and, by dint of sheer strength,
it was laid over its summit with a fluke buried to the shank

in the hard sand. By means of a hawser, and a purchase
applied to its end, the men on the banks next roused the
chain out, and shackled it to the ring. The bight was hove-in,
and the ship secured astern, so as to prevent a shift of
wind, off the land, from forcing her on the reef. As no
sea could come from this quarter, the single anchor and
chain were deemed sufficient for this purpose. As soon as
the boats were at liberty, and before the chain had been got
ashore, two kedges were carried to the reef, and laid among
the rocks, in such a way that their flukes and stocks equally
got hold of the projections. To these kedges lighter chains
were secured; and when all the bights were hove-in, to as
equal a strain as possible, Captain Truck pronounced his
ship in readiness to ride out any gale that would be likely
to blow. So far as the winds and waves might affect her,
the Montauk was, in truth, reasonably safe; for on the side
where danger was most to be apprehended, she had two
bowers down, and four parts of smaller chain were attached
to the two kedges. Nor had Captain Truck fallen into the
common error of supposing he had so much additional
strength in his fastenings, by simply running the chains
through the rings, but he had caused each to be separately
fastened, both in-board and to the kedges, by which means
each length of the chain formed a distinct and independent
fastening of itself.

So absolute is the sovereignty of a ship, that no one had
presumed to question the master as to his motives for all
this extraordinary precaution, though it was the common
impression that he intended to remain where they were until
the wind became favourable, or at least, until all danger of
being thrown upon the coast, from the currents and the
ground-swell, should have ceased. Paul Blunt observed,
that he fancied it was the intention to take advantage of the
smooth water within the reef, to get up a better and a more
efficient set of jury-masts. But Captain Truck soon removed
all doubts by letting the truth be known. While on
board the Danish wreck, he had critically examined her
spars, sails, and rigging, and, though adapted for a ship two
hundred tons smaller than the Montauk, he was of opinion
they might be fitted to the latter vessel, and made to answer

all the necessary purposes for crossing the ocean, provided
the Mussulmans and the weather would permit the transfer.

“We have smooth water and light airs,” he said, when
concluding his explanation, “and the current sets southwardly
along this coast; by means of all our force, hard
working, a kind Providence, and our own enterprise, I hope
yet to see the Montauk enter the port of New York, with
royals set, and ready to carry sail on a wind. The seaman
who cannot rig his ship with sticks and ropes and
blocks enough, might as well stay ashore, Mr. Dodge, and
publish an hebdomadal. And so, my dear young lady, by
looking along the land, the day after to-morrow, in the
northern board here, you may expect to see a raft booming
down upon you that will cheer your heart, and once more
raise the hope of a Christmas dinner in New York, in all
lovers of good fare.”