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"I didn't say anything about it, but you know Governor Hannis is an old friend of my father's, and one of the finest men I ever knew." "Oh, yes, I don't doubt that," said Curtiss, easily. "They put up these fine, respectable old gentlemen. Of course, he's simply a figure-head he probably has no idea of what he's really doing.
The next moment he was plodding steadily forward on his mission. Herrick at first followed. Then a noise in his rear startled him, and he turned about to find Davis already advanced as far as the figure-head.
Another voice almost simultaneously yelled out of the fog, "Port your helm!" Suddenly out of the mist, and close aboard the Maria, appeared the hull and canvas of a large ship. The brig was crossing her course, and her great bowsprit barely missed the brig's mainsail. It stood for a moment over Wylie's head. He looked up, and there was the figure-head of the ship looming almost within his reach.
Didn't I with my own eyes see a lubberly rascal take a chisel, or some o' their land tools, and shave every lock of hair off the figure-head of the 'Royal Charles, and even off the beard, shorten the nose into a stub, and then scrawl under it, 'The blessed change; this regenerated vessel will be known hereafter as the Holy Oliver'? Wasn't that blasphemy?
It is well for them that he is dead, for he was a man who would never forget an injury, and if he had laid hands upon any one of them he would have stuffed him with straw and hung him for a figure-head."
There was an abundance of boats too, and what strongly resembled a stockade; but what most took up the attention of all on board were a couple of long, low, well-made vessels, each displaying a curious figure-head bearing a faint resemblance to some fabulous monster; and in these armed boats both the soldiers and sailors of the little expedition were quite right in believing that they saw nothing more nor less than the much-talked-of vessels of the kris-bearing pirates of Malaya, the well-known, much-dreaded prahus.
The wretched Davis came staggering forward from his place against the figure-head, fell upon his knees, and waved his hands, and fainted. When he came to himself again, his head was on Attwater's arm, and close by stood one of the men in divers' helmets, holding a bucket of water, from which his late executioner now laved his face.
So dreadful was it to see the fleet of long ships coming up to the shore, with a serpent for the figure-head, and a raven as the flag, and crowds of fierce warriors with axes in their hands longing for prey and bloodshed, that where we pray in church that God would deliver us from lightning and tempest, and battle and murder, our forefathers used to add, "From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord deliver us."
"But, Ben, I know all that, for you have already explained to me the difference between a ship and a barque. What I wish to ascertain is what kind of a vessel she is?" "Oh! what kind; that's what you're after. Well, then, I should say a faster sailer never set figure-head to the sea; she's got just one fault, she be a little too crank for my liking, and pitches too much in a swell.
No cabin could confine me at such a time as this. I stood out on the upper deck in the extreme bow of the boat; and from an unobstructed point of view, nearly over the figure-head, in the very abandonment of daring, feasted my senses on the wondrous glories of this mountain-scene of enchantment. De Aery was at the helm. But I have scarcely introduced this extraordinary gentleman to the reader.
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