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It was about this time, while sitting at breakfast in the gunroom one fine morning, with the other officers of our mess, gossiping about I hardly remember what, that we heard the captain's voice on deck. "Call the first lieutenant." "He is at breakfast, sir," said the man, whoever he might have been, to whom the order was addressed. Stop, tell Mr Cringle also to get ready to go in the gig."
I could not take an observation, which I very much regretted, as the captain's quadrant was in the cabin; but from the day of setting sail from the island of the savages I had kept a dead reckoning, and as I knew pretty well now how much leeway the schooner made, I hoped to hit the Coral Island without much difficulty.
That is the time, after your Departure is taken, when the spirit of your commander communes with you in a muffled voice, as if from the sanctum sanctorum of a temple; because, call her a temple or a "hell afloat" as some ships have been called the captain's state- room is surely the august place in every vessel.
Unhappily neither I nor any one on board could tell the poor fellow that there is but one way by which sins can be washed away. I did indeed suggest that he should try and borrow a Bible from one of the gentlemen in the cabin, if they had one among them, for there was not one for'ard nor in the captain's or officers' berths.
"Can't smell powder too young in such days as these," was the Captain's utterance; and, sure enough, they took to it, like sons of guns. "I should be so frightened," Mrs. It is over now, thank goodness! But how can you have endured it, how can you have gone about your household duties calmly, with seven of your children I think you said going about in that fiery furnace?"
From that moment the gloomy lookout ahead seemed to pass away, the veldt seeming glorious in the afternoon sunshine; and, cantering through the invigorating air, I could have enjoyed my ride but for the constrained position in which I sat, and the dull pain in my arms and shoulders. I tried to forget this, and listened to the captain's words, for he grew more and more loquacious.
It was accordingly agreed between the two gentlemen that they should coalesce against the common enemy; that they should, by reciting many perfectly well-founded stories in the Captain's disfavour, influence the minds of Miss Crump's parents, and of herself, if possible, against this wolf in sheep's clothing; and that, when they were once fairly rid of him, each should be at liberty, as before, to prefer his own claim.
We had thoroughly cleared out the three after-compartments of the ship: all the stuff from the main cabin and the mate's and captain's quarters lay piled about the wheel; but in the forward stateroom with the two bunks, where Nares had said the mate and cook most likely berthed, we had as yet done nothing. Thither I went.
I did cry and laugh though, and was very silly; but she said I must not be foolish, but brave like a captain's daughter, and that I ought to thank GOD for being so good to me, when the children of the other poor men who died will never have their fathers back in this world: and I am thankful, so thankful! Only it is like a mill going in my head, and I cannot help crying.
"You must be very civil and very kind to him," said Mr Culpepper; "for depend upon it, the very circumstance of the captain's being compelled to keep the boy at a distance will make him feel more fond of him."
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