An Old Sailor's Yarns Part 7

The old Don, whose intellectuals were none of the brightest, had got himself, without perceiving it, completely into a _premunire_, by the Socratic mode of reasoning adopted by his more skilful antagonist, who at parting once more addressed him:--

"Take my advice, Signor de Luna, and leave your niece to herself on this subject: a young female heart cannot be made, like one of your soldiers, to march and countermarch at the word of command; it is, besides, of very frail materials, and, when once injured or broken, can never be repaired. The happiness of one so dear to you as your niece, may be destroyed forever, by forcing her into a match she detests; but it will then be too late to repair your fault, and it will always be to you a subject of the bitterest regret and unavailing remorse."

With these words he departed. But the governor, although convinced by the priest's arguments, and set into profound meditation by his last words, was one of those people, of whom we see so many at every step we take through life, who ask advice when they need it, are convinced of its soundness when given, and yet, though their natural good sense a.s.sents to dispa.s.sionate reasoning, return to their old, foolish, absurd, and ruinous opinions and intentions.

Don Gaspar, therefore, although convinced that he was a fool, and an unfeeling relation in attempting to force his niece into a marriage with such a worthless puppy as he readily admitted the proposed lover was in every respect, continued to adhere to his original intention, which he thought best, however, to defer for a time.

CHAPTER V.

There is as weighty reason For secresy in love, as treason.

Love is a burglarer, a felon, That at the window-eye doth steal in To rob the heart, and with his prey Steals out again a closer way.

HUDIBRAS.

The morning of the day appointed for the visit to the s.h.i.+p Orion rose as pure, and clear, and beautiful, as though no party of pleasure was intended, but not more pure, and clear, and beautiful, than the weather always is during the dry season of tropical climates, which, with the cool and refres.h.i.+ng sea-breeze, is one of the delights of those climates that I forgot to particularise in its proper place. With us of the temperate section of this round world the case is altogether different--the day appointed a week beforehand for a party of pleasure being almost invariably rainy, blowy, haily, snowy, drizzly, foggy, cold, uncomfortable, villainous weather; or else so hot that the mere act of breathing is too much for feeble human nature--and this, too, whether the party is made for sailing, riding, rambling about in the woods, or even for dancing, or tea-drinking, or whist-playing in a warm, comfortable room. This is, perhaps, one reason why geographers call our part of the globe the temperate zone; because all our proposed and antic.i.p.ated pleasures, that depend in the slightest possible degree upon the weather, are sure to be tempered and qualified by some unexpected botheration on the part of the weather.

The party from the sh.o.r.e accordingly arrived alongside the Orion about eleven o'clock in the forenoon, without accident by sea or land. The governor was in high spirits and full regimentals; Madame Governor was as stately, dignified, and bejewelled, as became a lady of her station and rank; the two daughters sparkled with gems and fluttered with silks, thinking of the impression they were to make upon the officers of the strange s.h.i.+p; the priest, in sacerdotal dignity, and with his weight giving the boat three streaks heel to starboard, sat hoping some contingency might take place that would elicit a present from the Yankee commander; the young officers, but three in number, including, of course, the military aspirant to the fair Isabella's hand and fortune, thought of but little or nothing except their pretty persons and das.h.i.+ng regimentals.

Isabella, who expected no pleasure from this party of pleasure, but the reverse, as it would compel her to be for some hours in the company of a man she had so much reason to detest, sat in the stern sheets, with the fat clergyman directly in front, and forming an impenetrable rampart against the impertinent gallantries of the c.o.xcomb Gregorio. She wore no jewels or ornaments, and from her pensive and serious expression of countenance, might have pa.s.sed for an Athenian tribute-maiden whom the annual s.h.i.+p was about to carry to the den of the Minotaur.

An arm-chair of capacious and old-fas.h.i.+oned dimensions, its ponderous wood-work carefully hidden by the American ensign, the _fly_ of which was to serve as an envelope for the feet and ancles of the ladies, was strongly slung and lowered into the stern sheets of the governor's state barge, a _craft_ containing nearly as much timber as a fis.h.i.+ng schooner, and about as burdensome. Mr. Morton, the first officer of the s.h.i.+p, and a remarkably handsome man, now came over the side into the barge, to arrange the ladies for their aeronautic excursion, safer than Durant's, for their car was slung with strong hemp not dependent upon a bag of inflammable gas. As a matter of course, he tendered his services to the old lady first, who, though she had been _whipped_ in and out of as many s.h.i.+ps as any English dragoon-horse during the war of the Peninsula, thought proper to curvet and prance, and show as much skittishness as a mule embarking at Hartford, or Weathersfield, or Middletown, for a tour of duty at Surinam or Demerara. She was, however, hoisted in without accident, and received on deck by Captain Hazard and Mr. Coffin, the second officer, with much politeness. The two young ladies were the next in order, and accomplished their flight successfully. Isabella lastly took her seat in the chair without trepidation or affectation of alarm.

Morton's eyes had already done hommage to her superior beauty; but he was too busy with the other ladies to notice her any farther than as the most lovely of the female visitors. He now remarked the pensive expression of her lovely countenance, and it excited in his heart an undefinable and uncontrollable interest. We have already said that Isabella inherited her mother's beauty, which had not one of the usual characteristics of a Spanish female countenance; and it was this peculiarity that struck the young seaman forcibly, and probably increased the interest he felt towards her, and the curiosity to know something more of her history, as he had only understood vaguely that she was Don Gaspar's niece.

There is a peculiar phrase, or rather word, that I have left unexplained, and concerning which I will now proceed to enlighten the terrestrial and unenlightened reader. I spoke of whipping the ladies into the s.h.i.+p. The whip, then, consists of a tail-block on the main yard-arm, with a sufficient rope rove through it, and a similar purchase on the collar of the main-stay. One end of each of these ropes is made fast to a stout arm-chair, covered generally with the s.h.i.+p's ensign, with the loose part of which the lady wraps her feet. The other ends are in the hands of careful, steady seamen. The lady, being arranged and fixed in the chair, with a "breast-rope" from arm to arm, (of the chair, not of the lady,) is hoisted up by the yard-whip till she has approached the zenith sufficiently to go clear of the waist hammock-nettings, when the stay-whip is hauled upon, carrying her in a horizontal direction over the gangway, when both whips being lowered, she is disentangled of her "wrappers and twine," and received in the arms of a lover, a husband, or a brother, as the case may be. Ladies and gentlemen, whose curiosity on the subject of whips is still unsatisfied, will find their theory demonstrated and ill.u.s.trated by a diagram in "Enfield's Natural Philosophy."

I have known the somewhat startling nautical command, "Get the whip ready for the ladies," blanch many a fair cheek with sudden and most causeless alarm. It cannot be denied that we "gentlemen of the ocean"

have singular names for things; but every thing at sea must have a name, or there would be no getting along.

I have only farther to remark on this subject, that horses are infinitely more tractable in taking on board a s.h.i.+p, than ladies; for the moment the horse perceives his feet are clear of the ground, he becomes perfectly quiet and pa.s.sive; whereas, the lady is always quiet while a handsome young officer is arranging the flags, &c. about her feet; but as soon as she is fairly in the air, she begins to scream, and kick, and bounce about, to the imminent risk of her bones; and just at the time when common sense and instinct teach the quadruped to keep perfectly still, women, who have but little common sense in such cases, and no instinct at all, are the most intractable and restless.

Morton followed the last lady, namely, Isabella, and, as he stepped over the gangway, was accosted by his brother officer.

"What a thundering pretty girl that last one is!"

"She is the governor's niece," said Morton.

"You may tell that to the marines," said Coffin; "I'll be shot if there's as much Spanish blood in her veins as would grease the point of a sail-needle."

"They say so ash.o.r.e," said Morton.

"I don't care what they say; I'll believe my eyes before the best Spaniard among them."

"Who knows," said Morton, "but that infernal soldier, that's buzzing about her, may one day be the husband of that sweet girl?"

"There's no knowing," said Coffin, yawning; "but you and I, Charlie, can't marry all the pretty girls that are like to have fools for husbands."

As this conversation went on, the mates had walked aft, and were close behind Isabella, who stood by the companion-way, while the governor, and his lady, who was not far behind him in corporeal dimensions, were accomplis.h.i.+ng their descent into the lower regions.

"That rascally soldier," said Morton, "wants nothing but a tail to make him a full-rigged monkey, and that lovely girl is about to be sacrificed to him."

"Poor girl!" said Coffin; "it's bad enough to marry a sojer, any how; but to marry such a critter as that is going it a little too fine."

Poor Isabella, who had heard and properly understood every syllable of their conversation, was exceedingly affected. She had heard a person, whose appearance and manners approached her _beau ideal_ of a gentleman, expressing, in warm and energetic language, the liveliest compa.s.sion for her, and guessing (for she could not imagine how he could know with certainty) her exact situation, and manifesting an apparently sincere and hearty interest towards her. Although her uncle had forborne to trouble her upon that hateful subject, after he had first proposed it, she knew his disposition too well to regard the reprieve as an abandonment of his original design.

As she turned away to conceal her emotion from her cousins, her streaming eyes encountered those of Morton. The young seaman was shocked and alarmed at her tears, though he had not the most distant suspicion that she had understood a word that had been said. Her beauty had first attracted his notice--it was so un-Spanish, and so nearly resembling that of New England ladies; the pensive expression of her countenance had excited a lively interest and curiosity towards her; but her tears, the evidence of that "secret grief" that the heart, and only the heart, knoweth, had called up all the sympathies of his heart.

I believe there are few men, who deserve the name, that are proof against a woman's tears, and there are few such men, who, when they perceive a woman, especially a young and beautiful one, oppressed with grief, anxiety, or distress, do not feel an irresistible impulse to a.s.sist and relieve her.

It may be objected that I have made my hero fall in love at first sight.

To this I answer that I cannot spare time to lead him step by step through all the crooks and turns of the bewitching pa.s.sion; secondly, love is _not_ like the consumption; people do not go gradually into it by a beaten road, every foot of which is marked and designated by its appropriate and peculiar symptoms. "Nemo est repente vitiosus," says Juvenal--n.o.body becomes completely depraved all at once; very true, but folks certainly do, to my certain knowledge, fall in love all at once, and that is doubtless the reason why they are said to _fall_ in love.

Love is like the Asiatic cholera; a man is suddenly laid flat on his back, with all the marked and violent symptoms, when he thought all the while he was in perfect health. "Love," says Corporal Trim, "is exactly like war in this, that a soldier, though he has escaped three weeks complete o' Sat.u.r.day night, may nevertheless be shot through the heart on Sunday morning." In the third place, a man, who for two or three years has seen nothing in the female form more attractive than the copper-colored beauties of Asia, the South Sea Islands, and the whole western coast of America, or the ebony _fair_ ones of Africa, is most astonis.h.i.+ngly susceptible when once more restored to the society of ladies of his own complexion, and of more refinement than those we have mentioned. I have had the ineffable pleasure of testing the truth of this theory more than a dozen times in my own person. If any gentleman doubts the fact, I can only advise him to banish himself from female society, in a man-of-war or whaleman, for three or four years. If he does not fall in love fifty times a month, when he returns, he is either more or less than human, and, in either case, I should wish to remain a stranger to him.

The whole party were now "under hatches," and examining the wonders of a whaleman's cabin. Morton had attached himself to Isabella, and, as he spoke the Spanish language fluently, and, what was more to the purpose, was impelled by an irresistible feeling to entertain and amuse her, soon drew her into conversation, and was astonished and delighted with her good sense. He had visited different parts of South America before, and had seen enough of the women to perceive that they were excessively ignorant, superst.i.tious, and vulgar. He was therefore not a little surprised to perceive in Isabella's conversation marks of a cultivated and polished understanding.

The rest of the party had gone into the steerage to examine some of those curious specimens of whalebone work, in the fabrication of which whalemen employ so much patience and time, during their long and often unsuccessful voyages. As Isabella and Morton stood together by the cabin table, the lady opened a bible that was lying there, and seemed for a moment or two engaged in reading it.

"Do you understand that?" said the seaman, still speaking Spanish.

"Yes," she replied, in English, "my mother was a Scotchwoman, and a Protestant."

"Good heavens! then I am afraid--I am sure--that--in short, I believe that something was said before you came below, that must have been unpleasant--that, indeed, could not but hurt your feelings."

Isabella was extremely agitated, and turned away her head.

"What would I not give," continued he, in a low voice, "what would I not sacrifice, to be able--to be permitted, to a.s.sist you in any way."

He stopped, scarcely knowing what he said, or hardly knowing whether he had spoken at all. The poor girl raised her swimming eyes in supplication.

"For heaven's sake! drop this subject; if my uncle knew that you had spoken thus to me, he would carry me back immediately."

"But tell me, dearest lady, tell me, is there no way in which I can be of service to you?"

"No, no, no, leave me; if you have any regard for me, leave me. I thank you for the interest you have shown for me; but it will avail nothing."

The tone of extreme dejection, and melancholy, in which she p.r.o.nounced these last words, almost drove Morton beside himself. He was completely bewildered with conflicting emotions--a young and beautiful woman, lovely in person and in mind, and, what made her irresistible to an unsophisticated, warm, generous, and feeling heart, in affliction--affliction that seemed more remediless, because not understood by one, nor communicated by the other.

From this situation of mutual embarra.s.sment, they were relieved by the entrance of one of the young ladies, who came to call her cousin into the steerage, to see the wonders already alluded to. Luckily, Carlota, although a good-natured girl, and fond of her cousin Isabella, was not remarkably keen-sighted, or she must have noticed the agitation and embarra.s.sment of both parties.

In the meantime, Mr. Coffin, who had a large share of a particular kind of shrewdness, had noticed that his friend seemed inclined to enjoy the society of Isabella uninterrupted; and, to a.s.sist that manoeuvre as much as possible, engaged the young officers with some tremendous tough fish stories, in which he was ably supported by one of the boat-steerers, a Portuguese, who spoke Spanish, as a matter of course, and helped out his officer, when his imperfect knowledge of the language brought him to a stand still. So he managed to hold them, as jacka.s.ses are held,--by the ears,--till he saw his companion and the young lady come into the steerage, when he broke off somewhat abruptly, in the middle of a very tough yarn, leaving the gentlemen of the sword to guess at the catastrophe.

As the party stood around a chest, upon which these whalebone toys, and other curiosities, were displayed, Antonia dropt a bouquet from her bosom. As Morton picked it up, and returned it to its fair owner, he made some remark upon the beauty, and fragrance, of the flowers.

"Are you fond of flowers?" said the young lady.

"Yes, very."