Woven with the Ship: A Novel of 1865 / Together with certain other veracious tales of various sorts

WOVEN WITH THE SHIP

By the Same Author

WHEN BLADES ARE OUT AND
LOVE'S AFIELD

Buff buckram, eight illustrations by E. Plaisted Abbott, with colored border decorations and head-pieces by Edward Stratton Holloway, $1.50

Mr. Brady's novel is full of fighting, gallant deeds and the surprises and alluring uncertainties of love-making. It has the vivid setting of Virginia and Carolina in 1781

"As a romance it is delightful."—Boston Transcript

"A perfect gem of a volume. One of the daintiest that ever came to the World's table."—New York World

"Oh, Captain Barry, you must do something!"
See page 35

WOVEN WITH THE SHIP

A NOVEL OF 1865

TOGETHER WITH CERTAIN
OTHER VERACIOUS TALES
OF VARIOUS SORTS

BY

CYRUS TOWNSEND BRADY, LL.D.

Author of "When Blades are Out and Love's Afield," "For the
Freedom of the Sea," "Hohenzollern," "The Quiberon
Touch," "Border Fights and Fighters," etc.

WITH MANY ILLUSTRATIONS BY

HOWARD CHANDLER CHRISTY, FRANK
X. LEYENDECKER, W. GLACKENS, WILL
CRAWFORD, AND H. L. V. PARKHURST

PHILADELPHIA & LONDON
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY
1902

Copyright, 1902, by
The Crowell & Kirkpatrick Company

Copyright, 1902, by
The Crowell Publishing Company

Copyright, 1902, by
J. B. Lippincott Company

Published October, 1902

Electrotyped and Printed by
J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia, U.S.A.

Lovingly Dedicated
to
Margaret and Katharine

Whose chief pleasure during one seashore
summer lay in listening to their
father while this
romance was

"Woven with the Ship"

PREFACE

Prefaces remind me of a certain text of Scripture,—i.e., "the last shall be first,"—for they are things written after which go before! Whether or not they serve a useful purpose is hard to say. I have several thousands of them in my library, most of which I have read, and perhaps the fact that I am a reader of prefaces may mark me as unique. And the mark may be accentuated to the gentle reader—if this preface should have any—when I say that I am also one of the few remaining authors who write them. Only one of my books is without a preface,—though some of them are disguised as notes, or forewords, or afterwords,—and I hereby apologize for the acephalous condition of that volume.

I am determined that this book shall be amply provided, and though I write the preface while I am sending back the proof galleys, yet I will begin at the beginning. Beginnings are sometimes interesting, although the interest of a beginning largely depends on the ending thereof. I shall hope that this book in the end may commend itself sufficiently to my indulgent readers to make the story of the beginning worth while.

"The years are many, the years are long," since a happy young sailor, fresh from his graduation at the United States Naval Academy, spent some of the pleasantest days of his life in the shadow of the old ship; for there was a ship, just such a one as I have described, and in just such a condition. There was a white house on the hill, too, and a very old naval officer, who took a great interest in the opening career of the young aspirant who passed so many hours lying on the grass amid the mouldering ways, with the huge bulk of the ship looming over his head and the sparkling waters of the bay breaking at his feet.

There were girls, too, and a sailor, and soldiers galore across the harbor in the barracks, and back of all the sleepy, dreamy, idle, quaint, and ancient little town. The story, of course, is only a romance; but the setting at least is actual, and there is this touch of realism in the tale: when the old ship was torn down to be made into kindling-wood, a part of it fell upon one of the destroyers and crushed the life out of him,—stern protest against an ignoble ending!

The idea of the story came to me twenty years ago. Indeed, in a brief, disconnected way I set it down on paper and forgot it until I chanced to resurrect it last year, when I threw aside the old notes and wrote the story de novo.

I intend it as a character sketch of the old admiral, the veteran sailor, the young officer, the innocent woman they all loved, and—dare I say it?—the mighty ship. Here are contrasts, surely.

When I wrote "Hohenzollern," I thought it would be perfectly plain to every one that it was not an historical novel. Vain hope! Yet I am not discouraged by the lack of perception on the part of the critics. Therefore I put this novel forth with a stronger confidence that it will not be considered in that category. Save for what I have admitted, there is not one word of history in it. Indeed, I have deliberately, and because it was my fancy, chosen to appropriate the name of Admiral Charles Stewart, "Old Ironsides,"—who did indeed live well into the Civil War period, but who died under very different circumstances,—for the name of the ancient captain in the white house on the hill. I apologize to his manes, his descendants, and his friends for the liberty.

Now, I do not write this because I wish to make any apology for the historical novel. Not at all. The thing is slightly overdone at present, but that is proof of its goodness. So far as I am concerned I will stand by my guns. I love to read historic romances when they are good, and I love to write them—even when they are as my own. I expect to write more of them, too; but this really is not one. It is a war story without any war, a sea story without any sea; yet it exhibits a great struggle and rings with a great victory. The reader may characterize it further at pleasure.

As for the second part of the volume I have called it Veracious Tales advisedly, for all of these stories are founded upon facts in one way or another. Some of them have been suggested to me by incidents with which I am familiar because in them I bore a small part. The substance of one of them came from a young English traveller who told a romantic incident at a delightful dinner at the New York University Club. A real diary suggested another. An historical mystery as to what became of a certain cargo of slaves captured by Decatur in the Mediterranean evoked a third. Neglected chapters in history and biography are responsible for some of the others, as the Martinique tale, for the Diamond Rock was once a ship! Sir Henry Irving's marvellous rendition of Matthias in The Bells so possessed me with its power that after I came home from the theatre I could not sleep until I had written the story. All of these tales represent real incidents, therefore, or are founded upon them in some way.

Writing a short story, with me at least, is very different from writing a novel. I can invent plots of novels without the slightest difficulty, but the making of a short story is different. The making is a case of birth! The single incident, the brief condensed plot, or the vivid character sketch which is necessary to a proper short story has to come to me from outside. The short story is the product of inspiration, the long story the result of labor. Perhaps, therefore, there is more truth in the short story than in the long—from my point of view.

At any rate, in this volume are two kinds, and the readers may decide. If they have half as much pleasure out of the book as I had, they will thank me for having written.

C. T. B.

The Lake Placid Club,
Adirondacks, New York,
June 16, 1902.

CONTENTS

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Part I

WOVEN WITH THE SHIP

CHAPTER I

The Building of the Ship

Just half a century had elapsed since, cutting down the virgin forest to make room for the ways, they laid her keel blocks in the clearing. With the cunning brain of Henry Eckford, one of the greatest of our shipbuilders, to plan, and the skilful hands of the New England shipwrights to execute, with timber cut by the sturdy woodsmen from where it stood in the forest, the giant frames rose apace, until presently, in an incredibly short time, there stood upon Ship House Point a mighty vessel ready for the launching.

Ship House Point—so called from the ship—was a long ridge of land sloping gently down from a low hill and extending far out into Lake Ontario. It helped to enclose on one side a commodious lake haven known in that day, and ever since, as Sewell's Harbor, from old George Sewell, a hunter, fisherman, innkeeper, and trader, who had settled there years before.

Thither, in the busy warlike days of 1813-14, had resorted dashing naval officers in their ruffled shirts, heavily laced blue coats, with their huge cocked hats, skin-tight kersey pantaloons, and tasselled half boots. In their wake rolled ancient tars in blue shirts and flowing trousers, their mouths full of strange oaths and tales of distant seas; some of the older veterans among them still wearing their hair in the time-honored pigtail of an already disappearing age.

On the bluff across the harbor mouth, and just opposite to Ship House Point, a rude log fort had been erected in 1812, a central block-house and a surrounding stockade, mounting a few inconsiderable pieces of artillery. From a tall staff on the parade the stars and stripes fluttered in the wind, and nodded in amicable salute toward a similar ensign which the patriotic builders had hoisted on the Point.

Government storehouses filled with munitions and supplies of various kinds, both for the naval forces on the lakes and for the armies designed for the long projected invasion of Canada likewise, stood back of the wharves crowded with the miscellaneous shipping of the suddenly thriving little town. Soldiers from the fort, therefore, in blue and gray uniforms mingled with the ship-carpenters, wood-cutters, pioneers, sailors, and traders, and the spot speedily became one of the busiest in the then far Northwest.

Sometimes in the offing the white sails of the English or American squadrons could be seen, and on the summer days from the distant horizon might have been heard the dull boom of cannon telling a tale of some spirited engagement. And more than once thereafter a melancholy and shattered ship brought in a ghastly cargo of dead, dying, and wounded, the care of which heavily taxed the resources of the community; and the women of the village—for there were women there from the beginning—had grim lessons, learned sometimes through breaking hearts, that war was a more serious business than the gay officers, the bright uniforms, the beautiful flags, and the brave ships had indicated.

The town had sprung into being around Sewell's store and tavern, amid all these activities and undertakings, almost as if by magic—quite as the great ship had risen on the shore, in truth. Men did things in a hurry in those days, and no one was much surprised when, some thirty days after the keel was laid, the indefatigable Eckford informed stout old Commodore Chauncey, the American commander on the lakes, that the Susquehanna—for so the ship-of-the-line which was to establish finally the American preponderance of force over the British on Lake Ontario was called—was ready for launching, and great preparations were made in the very early spring of 1815 for this important and interesting ceremony.

A few days before the appointed time, however, there came to the impatient commodore, the persevering builder, and the busy workmen a messenger bearing a heartrending despatch, long delayed in transmission, from the Secretary of the Navy. That official announced that the war was over, that peace with England had been declared at the close of the preceding year, and directed that the preparations for launching and completing the vessel must be at once abandoned. It was a sore grief to Eckford and his fellow-shipwrights, a great disappointment to Chauncey and his brave seamen, and a terrible blow to the thriving town. It had grown and flourished in war, and it was to languish and die in peace—a reversal of natural law apparently! But there was no help for it. The orders had to be obeyed. The war-ships on the lakes were broken up, or sold, and a few were laid up in ordinary, the officers and men were detached to the more congenial salt-water stations, and the ship-carpenters were withdrawn to the seaboard towns whence they had been collected. The fort was dismantled, the garrison mustered out of the service, and the storehouses emptied and closed.

The young ship-of-the-line, hastily housed over, was left alone with the abandoned town. The busy place, its reasons for being gone, speedily sank into a state of public decay. The deserted storehouses fell into ruin; the once noisy wharves, unvisited by any save an occasional small vessel, rotted away; the merchants and traders closed out their stocks and departed; the hunters and pioneers moved farther westward into the vast wilderness extending its mysterious beckoning call to their adventurous souls; the grass grew thick in the silent streets, and it seemed as if the death-sentence of the village had been written.

But as years sped away some of its pristine life came back to it. The farmer again speeded his plow and planted his corn in the clearings. Sheep and cattle once more dotted the fields. A new order took the place of the old. Country churches rose; little feet plodded unwillingly toward a small red school-house, where childish laughter and play at recess mingled with tears over puzzling lessons and unsolvable problems. The stores were opened one by one, and a few vessels came back to the harbor. On market days the farmers crowded the square with their teams, the village awoke from its long sleep and became a modestly thriving little country town again,—drowsing on into life once more. And although the very oldest inhabitants, remembering the busy days forever gone, were not satisfied, the younger people were content and happy in their pretty little hamlet.

Meanwhile, what of the ship in all these changing years? Time was when Ship House Point had been covered with a virgin forest extending even to the water's edge. It was now bare of trees, for the massive trunks had been wrought into the fabric of the ship, and no others had come to take their places. There, neglected and unnoticed, she had stood naked and gaunt for a long time, for the flimsy ship-house covering her had been the first thing to go. Through the swift years the burning sunshine of many summers fell upon her green, unseasoned planks, and the unsheltered wood shrinking in the fierce heat opened her seams widely on every hand. Upon her decks the rain descended and the snow fell. The storms of bitter winters drove upon her in successive and relentless attacks. The rough spring and autumn gales tore from her huge sections of timber, leaving gaping wounds, while the drying rot of time and neglect penetrated her very heart.

Rust consumed the bolt-heads and slowly ate up the metal that held her together. Yet in spite of all she still stood, outwardly indifferent alike to the attack of the storm or the kiss of the sun,—a mighty monster towering high in the air, unfinished, incomplete, inchoate, disintegrating, weaponless, but still typifying strength and power and war. In spite of her decay, in spite of her age, she looked the masterful vessel she was designed to be.

The waves broke in winter in icy assault upon the rocky shore on the seaward side, as if defying the ship to meet them. They rippled on the shoals, on the other hand, in summer with tender caressing voices, wooing her to her native element, stretching out white-fingered hands of invitation. And the air carried the message of the waters into every hidden recess in the most secret depths of the ship.

In some strange way, to those who grew to know her, the ship seemed to live; they imbued her with personality, and congenial spirits seemed to recognize her yearning for a plunge into that all-embracing inland sea. She hung poised, as it were, like a bird ready for flight, and watchers standing within her shadow divined her longing for that mad first rush from the ways.

The ripple of the water had never curled along that ship's massive keel; her broad bows had never buffeted a way through the thunderous attack of the storm-waves; she had never felt the ocean uplift; the long pitch and toss, the unsteady roll and heave which spoke of water-borne life had never been hers; yet, looking at the graceful lines, the mighty frames, the most unimaginative would have said that the old ship lusted for the sea, and, in futile and ungratified desire, passed her shore-bound days in earth-spurning discontent.

CHAPTER II

His Last Command

On the hill back of the Point, embowered on three sides in the trees, which had been cut away in front to afford a fair view of the ship, the Point itself, and the open waters of the lake beyond, stood an old white house facing the water, with a long covered porch, high-pillared and lofty, extending across its entire front. Old, yet young compared to the ship. Overlooking the ship, on a platform on the very brow of the hill, a long, old-fashioned six-pound gun was mounted on a naval carriage. Back of the gun rose a tall flag-staff, and from the top fluttered night and day a small blue flag with two stars, the ensign of a rear-admiral. There were no masts or spars upon the ship below the hill, of course, but aft from the mouldering taffrail a staff had been erected, and from it flew the stars and stripes, for during the last half of her existence the ship had rejoiced in a crew and a captain!

Some twenty-five years since a quaint old naval officer had taken up his abode at the house on the hill. With him had come a young sailor, who, disdaining the house, had slung his hammock aboard the ship,—finding a place between decks which, after a few repairs, would shelter him from the storms. When the old officer came, he hoisted at the mast which was at once erected in the yard the broad blue pennant of a commodore, and it was only after Farragut had made his splendid passage up the Mississippi, and awakened the quiet shores of the Father of Waters with the thunder of his guns, so that the title of commodore became too small for him, that the old veteran had been promoted with other veterans—and with Farragut himself—to the rank of rear-admiral, recently established,—certainly a rank entirely in consonance with his merit at least.

The old man had been practically forgotten, lost sight of, in the glory accruing to the newer names among the Civil War heroes; yet he had been among the foremost in that great galaxy of sailors who had made the navy of the United States so formidable in the War of 1812.

Old men of the town, whose memories as children ran back beyond even the life of the ship, recalled having seen, in those busy, unforgotten days of 1814-15, many uniforms like to the quaint old dress which the admiral sometimes wore on occasions of ceremony; and there were some yet living who remembered the day when the news came that the mighty Constitution had added to her record the last and most brilliant of her victories in the capture of the frigates Cyane and Levant. The man who had made the capture—who, when his wife had asked him to bring her a British frigate for a present when he set forth upon the cruise, had answered that he would bring her two, and who had done it—was the man who had been stationed in the white house on the hill to watch over the old ship.

The battles and storms, the trials and cares, the sorrows and troubles of eighty-five years had beat upon that white head; and though he was now bent and broken, though he tottered as he paced up and down the porch after the habit of the quarter-deck, though his eye was dim indeed and his natural force greatly abated, he was still master of himself. When the Civil War broke out his brave old soul had yearned to be upon a heaving deck once more, he had craved to hear the roar of guns from the mighty batteries beneath his feet, to feel again the kiss of the salt wind upon his tanned and weather-beaten cheek. He had longed in the deadly struggle of '61-'65 to strike another blow for the old flag he had done so much to make formidable and respected on the sea; but it was not to be. Superannuated, old, laid up in ordinary, he quietly watched over the rotting ship which was his last command.

In some strange way, with a sailor's superstition, as the years had passed, as he had grown feebler and the ship had grown older, he bound up his own term of life with that of the vessel. While it stood he should live, when it fell should come his end. He watched and waited.

When the night threatened to be wild and stormy, the report of the evening gun with which Captain Barry invariably saluted the flag ere he struck it would seem to him the sounding of his death-knell. When the tempest howled around the old house, he could hear, in fancy, above its wild screaming the crashing of the timbers of the ship falling in shapeless ruins on the mouldering ways. In the morning, after such a night, he would rise and creep to the door, totter out on the porch with the aid of his cane, and peer down on the ship. Some portion of it might have been swept away, perhaps, but if it still stood he would feel that he had a respite for another day.

Many a tall vessel had he commanded, many a gallant frigate or great ship-of-the-line he had driven through the tempestuous seas. Upon some of them, as on the Constitution, he had won eternal fame, yet never had he loved a vessel as his heart had gone out to the rotting mass of this incompleted ship.

He did not dream, when he came there twenty-five years before—an old man then—that either he or the ship would last so long; yet there they both stood; older, weaker, feebler, more broken, and breaking with every passing hour, but still a ship and still a captain.

During the years of their association the admiral had unconsciously invested the ship with a personality of its own. It seemed human to him. He dreamed about it when he slept. He was never so happy as when awake he sat and watched it. He talked to it like a friend when they were alone. Sometimes he reached his old trembling hand out to it in a caressing gesture. He had long since grown too feeble to go down to it; he could only look upon it from afar. Yet he understood its longing, its dissatisfaction, its despair. A certain sympathy grew up between them. He loved it as it had been a woman. He would fain have kissed its keel.

Yet the devotion the admiral felt for the ship was scarcely greater than that which had sprung up in the heart of the old sailor who lived aboard it.

Old John Barry had been a quartermaster on the Constitution, and had followed the fortunes of his captain from ship to ship, from shore to shore, until he died. After that the duty of looking after the captain devolved upon his son, young John Barry; and when the commodore had been ordered to Ship House Point, more with the intention of providing him with a congenial home for his declining years than for any other purpose, young John Barry had followed him.

Young John Barry he was no longer. He was fifty years old now, and, like the admiral, had unconsciously made the life of the ship stand for his own life as well. The witchery of disappointment and regret, pregnant in every timber, bore hard upon him also. He had been a gay, dashing, buoyant, happy-go-lucky jack-tar in his day; but, living alone on that great old ship, some of the melancholy, some of the dissatisfaction, some of the longing, some of the futile desire which fairly reeked from every plank had entered his own rough and rugged soul.

The bitter wind had sung through the timbers of the ship too many tales of might-have-been, as he lay in his hammock night after night, not to have left its impression upon him. He became a silent, taciturn, grave old man. Of huge bulk and massive build, his appearance suggested the ship-of-the-line,—strength in age, power in decay. He loved the ship in his way even as the admiral did.

Risking his life in the process, he climbed all over it, marking with skilful eyes and pained heart the slow process of disintegration. He did not kiss it,—kisses were foreign to his nature, he knew nothing of them,—but he laid his great hands caressingly upon the giant frames, he pressed his cheek against the mighty prow, he stretched himself with open arms upon the bleaching deck, as if he would embrace the ship.

When the storms beat upon it in the night, he sometimes made his way forward and stood upon the forecastle fronting the gale, and as the wind swept over him and the ship quivered and shook and vibrated under the tempestuous attack, he fancied that he felt the deck heave as it might under the motion of the uptossed wave.

He dreamed that the ship quivered in the long rush of the salt seas. Then the rain beat upon him unheeded. Wrapped in his great-coat in winter, he even disdained the driving snow, and as he stood by the weather cathead, from which no anchor had ever depended, and peered out into the whirling darkness, he seemed to hear the roar of a breaker ahead!

The ship was his own, his property. The loss of a single plank, the giving way of a single bolt, was like the loss of a part of himself. With it he lived, with it he would die. Alone he passed his nights in the hollow of that echo of the past. Sometimes he felt half mad in the rotting vessel; yet nothing could have separated him from the ship.

The little children of the adjacent village feared him, although he had never harmed any of them, and was as gentle as a mother in his infrequent dealings with them all; but he was so silent, so grave, so grim, so weird in some way, that they instinctively avoided him. Their light laughter was stifled, their childish play was quieted when Captain Barry—so they called him—passed by. He never noticed it, or, if he did, he gave no sign. Indeed, his heart was so wrapped up in a few things that he marked nothing else.

The old admiral, whom he watched over and cared for with the fidelity of a dog,—nay, I should say of a sailor,—was the earliest object of his affections. To look after him was a duty which had become the habit of his life. He cherished him in his heart along with the ship. When the others had gone to their rest, he often climbed up on the quarter-deck, if the night were still, and sat late in the evening staring at the lights in the house on the hill until they went out, musing in his quaint way on the situation. When the days were calm he thought first of the admiral, in stormy times first of the ship. But above both ship and captain in his secret heart there was another who completed the strange quartet on Ship House Point,—a woman.

Above duty and habit there is always a woman.

CHAPTER III

The Woman and the Man who Loved Her

The wife of the admiral, to whom he had brought the flags of the two British ships on that memorable cruise, had long since departed this life. Her daughter, too, who had married somewhat late in life, had died in giving birth to a girl, and this little maiden, Emily Sanford by name, in default of other haven or nearer relationship, had been brought, when still an infant in arms, to the white house on the hill, to be taken care of by the old admiral. In the hearts of both the old men she divided affection with the ship.

With the assistance of one of the admiral's distant connections, a faithful old woman, also passed to the enjoyment of her reward long since, Emily Sanford had been carried through the troubles and trials incident to early childhood. At first she had gone with other little children to the quaint red school-house in the village. She had been a regular attendant until she had exhausted its limited capacity for imparting knowledge. After that the admiral, a man of keen intelligence, of world-wide observation, and of a deeply reflective habit of mind, had completed her education himself, upon such old-fashioned lines as his experience suggested. She had been an apt pupil indeed, and the results reflected great credit upon his sound, if somewhat unusual, methods of training, or would have reflected had there been any one to see.

In all her life Emily Sanford had never been away from her grandfather for a single day; she had actually never left that little town, and, except in school-time, she had not often left the Point. Although just out of her teens, she was not old enough to have become discontented—not yet. She was as childlike, as innocent, as unworldly and unsophisticated a maiden as ever lived,—and beautiful as well. It was Prospero and Miranda translated to the present. The old admiral adored his granddaughter. If the ship was his Nemesis, Emily was his fortune.

As for Barry the sailor,—and it were injustice to the brave old seaman to think of him as Caliban,—he worshipped the ground the girl walked on. He was in love with her. A rude old man of fifty in love with a girl of twenty; a girl immeasurably above him in birth, station, education—in everything! It was surprising! Had any one known it, however, it would not have seemed grotesque,—only pitiful. Barry himself did not know it. He was too humble and too ignorant for self-examination, for subtle analysis. He loved, and he did not comprehend the meaning of the word! Even the wisest fail to solve the mysteries of the heart.

Although the veteran seaman was too ignorant of love rightly to characterize his passion, it was nevertheless a true one. It was not the feeling of a father, nor of a companion, nor yet that of a servant, though it partook in some measure of all three. That was an evidence of the genuineness of his feeling. Nothing noble, no feeling that is high, self-sacrificing, devoted, is foreign to love that is true, and love is the most comprehensive of the passions—it is a complete obsession. Captain Barry would have given his soul for Emily Sanford's happiness, and rejoiced in the bestowal.

He cherished no hopes, held no aspirations, dreamed no dreams concerning any future relationship. He was just possessed with an inexplicable feeling for her. A feeling that expected nothing, that asked nothing, that hoped for nothing but the steady happiness of being near her. To be in sight, in sound, in touch, that was all, that was enough. The sea in calmer mood gives no suggestion of potential storms. Barry's love was the acme of self-abnegation. If he had ever reached the covetous point he would have realized that she was not for him. He never did.

He loved her with a love beside which even his devotion to the old admiral, the passionate affection he bore for the old ship, were trifles. The girl had grown into his heart. Many a time he had carried her about in his arms when she was a baby. He had played with her as a child; she could always call a smile to his lips; he had cared for her as a young girl, he had served her as a woman.

He, too, had been happy to contribute to her education as he had been able. There was a full-rigged model of the Susquehanna in her room in the white house. He had made it for her. It was a perfect replica, complete, finished in every detail; so the ship might have looked if she had ever been put in commission. Emily knew every rope, every sheet, line, and brace upon it. She could knot and splice, box the compass, and every sailor's weather rhyme was familiar to her. She could handle a sail-boat as well as he, and with her strong young arms pulled a beautiful man-o'-war stroke. He had taught her all these things. When study hours were over and play-time began, the two together had explored the coast-line for miles in every direction.

So far as possible he had gratified every wish that she expressed. If a flower grew upon the face of an inaccessible cliff and she looked at it with a carelessly covetous glance, he got it for her, even at the risk of his life. He followed her about, when she permitted, as a great Newfoundland dog might have done, and was ever ready at her beck and call. His feeling towards her was of so exalted a character that he never ventured upon the slightest familiarity; he would have recoiled from such an idea; yet had there been any to mark, they might have seen him fondle the hem of her dress, lay his bronzed cheek upon her footprint in the sands, when he could do so without her knowing it.

There was no man in the village with whom Emily could associate on terms of equality. The admiral had come from a proud old family, and all its pride of birth and station was concentrated in his last descendant. Simply as she had been reared, she could not stoop to association with any beneath the best; it was part of her grandfather's training. He was of a day when democratic iconoclasm was confined to state papers, and aristocracy still ruled the land by right divine, even though the forms of government were ostensibly republican. There were some quaint old novels in the library, which the girl had read and re-read, however, and, as she was a woman, she had dreamed of love and lovers from over the sea, and waited.

Her life, too, had been bound up with the ship. Not that she feared an end when it ended, but she often wondered what would happen to her when it fell. What would she do when the admiral was gone? And Captain Barry also? Who would take care of her then? What would her life be in that great world of which she dreamed beyond that sparkling wave-lit circle of the horizon? Who would care for her then? That lover who was coming? Ah, well, time would bring him. Somewhere he lived, some day he would appear. With the light-heartedness of youth she put the future by and lived happily, if expectantly, in the present.

CHAPTER IV

Cast up by the Sea

One early autumn evening in 1865 the sun sank dull and coppery behind banks of black clouds which held ominous portent of a coming storm. The old admiral sat in a large arm-chair on the porch leaning his chin upon his cane, peering out toward the horizon where the distant waters already began to crisp and curl in white froth against the blackness beyond. Emily, a neglected book in her lap, sat on the steps of the porch at his feet, idly gazing seaward. The sharp report of the sunset gun on the little platform on the brow of the hill had just broken the oppressive stillness which preceded the outburst of the tempest.

Having carefully secured the piece with the thoroughness of a seaman to whom a loose gun is a potential engine of terrible destruction, Barry ran rapidly down the hill, clambered up on the high poop of the ship, and hauled down the colors. As the flag, looking unusually bright and brave against the dark background of the cloud-shrouded sky, came floating down, the admiral rose painfully to his feet and bared his gray hairs in reverent salute. Emily had been trained like the rest, and, following the admiral's example, she laid aside her book and stood gracefully erect, buoyant, and strong by her grandfather's side.

Old age and bright youth, the past with its history, memories, and associations, the future with all its possibilities and dreams, alike saluted the flag.

They made a pretty picture, thought Captain Barry, as he unbent the flag, belayed the halliards, and gathered up the folds of bunting upon the deck, rolling the colors into a small bundle which he placed in a chest standing against the rail at the foot of the staff. It was a nightly ceremony which had not been intermitted since the two came to the Point. Sometimes the admiral was unable to be present when the flag was formally hoisted in the morning, but it was rare indeed that night, however inclement the weather, did not find him on the porch at evening colors.

The smoke of the discharge and the faint acrid smell of the powder—both pleasant to the veterans—yet lingered in the still air as Barry came up the hill. He stopped before the foot of the porch, stood with his legs far apart, as if balancing to the roll of a ship, knuckled his forehead in true sailor-like fashion, and solemnly reported that the colors were down. The admiral acknowledged the salute and, in a voice still strong in spite of his great age, followed it with his nightly comment and question:

"Ay, Barry, and handsomely done. How is the ship?"

"She's all right, your honor."

"Nothing more gone?"

"No, sir."

"I thought I heard a crash last night in the gale."

"Not last night, sir. Everything's all ship-shape, leastways just as it was since that last piece of the to'gallant fo'k'sl was carried away last week."

"That's good, Barry. I suppose she's rotting though, still rotting."

"Ay, ay, sir, she is; an' some of the timbers you can stick your finger into."

"But she's sound at the heart, Captain Barry," broke in Emily, cheerily.

"Sound at the heart, Miss Emily, and always will be, I trust."

"Ay, lassie," said the old admiral, "we be all sound at the heart, we three; but when the dry rot gets into the timber, sooner or later the heart is bound to go. Now, to-night, see yonder, the storm is approaching. How the wind will rack the old timbers! I lie awake o' nights and hear it howling around the corners of the house and wait for the sound of the crashing of the old ship. I've heard the singing of the breeze through the top-hamper many a time, and have gone to sleep under it when a boy; but the wind here, blowing through the trees and about the ship, gets into my very vitals. Some of it will go to-night, and I shall be nearer the snug harbor aloft in the morning."

"Oh, don't say that, grandfather! Sound at the heart, the old ship will brave many a tempest, and you will, as well."

"Ay, girl, but not many like yonder brewing storm. Old things are for still days, not for tempests. What think ye of the prospect, Barry?"

"It's got an ugly look, your honor, in the nor'west. There's wind a plenty in them black clouds. I wish we'd a good frigate under us and plenty o' sea room. I lies on the old ship sometimes an' feels her shiver in the gale as if she was ashamed to be on shore. That'll be a hard blow, sir."

"Ay," said the admiral, "I remember it was just such a night as this once when I commanded the Columbus. She was a ship-of-the-line, Emily, pierced for one hundred guns, and when we came into the Mediterranean Admiral Dacres told me that he had never seen such a splendid ship. I was uneasy and could not sleep,—good captains sleep lightly, child,—so I came on deck about two bells in the mid-watch. Young Farragut, God bless him! was officer of the watch. The night was calm and quiet but very dark. It was black as pitch off to starboard. There was not a star to be seen. 'Mr. Farragut,' I said, 'you'd better get the canvas off the ship.' Just then a little puff struck me in the cheek, and there was a sort of a deep sigh in the still night. Barry, your father, old John, was at the wheel, and a better hand at steering a ship I never saw. 'Call all hands, sir,' I said, sharply, 'we've no time to spare,' and by gad,—excuse me, Emily,—we'd no more than settled away the halliards when the squall struck us. If it hadn't been for the quick handling and ready seamanship of that youngster, and I saw that he was master of the thing and let him have his own way, we'd have gone down with all standing. As it was——"

The speech of the old man was interrupted by a vivid flash of lightning, followed by a distant clap of thunder. In another moment the black water of the lake was churned into foam, and the wind swept upon them with the violence of a hurricane. As soon as the storm burst forth, Barry sprang upon the porch to assist the old admiral into the house.

"No," he said; "I'm feeling rather well this evening. Let me face the storm awhile. Fetch me my heavy cloak. That's well. Now pull the chair forward where I can get it full and strong. How good it feels! 'Tis like old times, man. Ah, if there were only a touch of salt in the gale!"

Closely wrapped in a heavy old-fashioned boat cloak which Barry brought him, he sat down near the railing of the porch, threw up his old head, and drank in the fresh gale with long breaths which brought with them pleasant recollections. The sailor stood on one side of the veteran, Emily on the other; youth and strength, man and woman, at the service of feeble age.

"See the ship!" muttered the old man; "how she sways, yet she rides it out! Up with the helm!" he cried, suddenly, as if she were in a seaway with the canvas on her. "Force your head around to it, ye old witch! Drive into it! You're good for many a storm yet. Bless me," he added, presently, "I forgot; yet 'tis still staunch. Ha, ha! Sound at the heart, and will weather many a tempest yet!"

"Oh, grandfather, what's that?" cried the girl; "look yonder!"

She left the side of the admiral, sprang to the edge of the porch, and pointed far out over the lake. A little sloop, its mainsail close reefed, was beating in toward the harbor. The twilight had so far faded in the storm that at the distance from them the boat then was they could scarcely distinguish more than a slight blur of white upon the water. But, flying toward them before the storm, she was fast rising into view.

"Where is it, child?" asked the old man, looking out into the growing darkness.

"There! Let your eye range across the ship; there, beyond the Point. She's running straight upon the sunken rocks."

"I sees it, Miss Emily," cried Barry, shading his eyes with his hand; "'tis a yacht, the mains'l's close reefed. She looks like a toy. There's a man in it. He's on the port tack, thinkin' to make the harbor without goin' about."

"He'll never do it," cried the girl, her voice shrill with apprehension. "He can't see the sunken ledge running out from the Point. He's a stranger to these waters, evidently."

"I see him, too," said the admiral. "God, what a storm! How he handles that boat! The man's a sailor, every inch of him!"

The cutter was nearer now, so near that the man could easily be seen. She was coming in with racing speed in spite of her small spread of canvas. The lake was roaring all about her and the wind threatened to rip the mast out of the little boat, but the man held her up to it with consummate skill, evidently expecting to gain an entrance to the harbor, where safety lay, on his present tack. This he could easily have done had it not been for a long, dangerous ledge of sunken rocks which extended out beyond Ship House Point. Being under water, it gave little sign of its presence to a mariner until one was right upon it. In his excitement the admiral scrambled to his feet, stepped to the rail of the porch, and stood leaning over it. Presently he hollowed his hand and shouted with a voice of astonishing power for so old a man:

"Down with your helm, boy! Hard down!"

But the stranger, of course, could not hear him, and the veteran stood looking with a grave frown upon his face as that human life, down on the waters beneath him, struggled for existence. It was not the first time he had watched life trembling in the balance—no; nor seen it go in the end. Emily's voice broke in murmurs of prayer, while Barry stared like the admiral.

Presently the man in the boat glanced up and caught sight of the party. He was very near now and coming on gallantly. He waved his hand, and was astonished to see them frantically gesture back at him. A warning! What could their movements mean?

He peered ahead into the growing darkness; the way seemed to be clear, yet something was evidently wrong. What could it be? Ah! He could not weather the Point. With a seaman's quick decision, he jammed the helm over.

"Oh, grandfather!" screamed Emily in the old man's ear; "can't something be done?"

"Nothing, child; nothing! He can't hear, he can't see, he does not know."

"It's awful to see him rush smilingly down to certain death!" exclaimed the girl, wringing her hands. "Captain Barry, can't you do something?"

"There goes his helm," said the admiral; "he realizes it at last. About he goes! Too late! too late!"

"Oh, Captain Barry, you must do something!" cried Emily.

"There's nothin' to do, Miss Emily."

"Yes, there is. We'll get the boat," she answered, springing from the steps as she spoke and running down the hill like a young fawn. The sailor instantly followed her, and in a moment they disappeared under the lee of the ship.

CHAPTER V

The Rescue

As the practised eye of the admiral had seen, the tiny yacht was too near the rocks to go about and escape them. She was caught in the trough of the sea before she had gathered way on the other tack, and flung upon the sunken ledge, broadside on. The mast snapped like a pipe-stem. After a few violent shocks she was hurled over on her beam ends, lodged securely on the rocks, and began to break up under the beating of the angry sea. A few moments and she would be beaten to pieces. The man was still there, however, the water breaking over him. He seemed to have been hurt, but clung tenaciously to the wreck of the boat until he recovered himself a little, and then rose slowly and stood gazing upon the tossing waters, seething and whirling about the wreck of his boat.

There was, during high winds, a dangerous whirlpool right in front of the reefs and extending between them and the smooth waters of the harbor. The water was beating over the rocks and fairly boiling before him. A man could not swim through it; could, indeed, scarcely enter it and live—even a boat would find it difficult, if not impossible. Things looked black to the shipwrecked man. He stood in hopeless hesitation, doom reaching for him on either hand. He could neither go nor stay with safety. Yet he apparently made up his mind at last to go and die, if need be, struggling.

"Don't try the whirlpool, boy," said the admiral softly to himself, as he looked down upon the scene. "You could never make it in this sea. Say a prayer, lad; 'tis all that is left you. By heaven! A noble girl, my own child! And a brave oar, too! Steady, Barry, steady! Don't come too near! Your skiff can't live in such a sea. Merciful God! can they do it?" continued the veteran, as the light skiff shot out from the lee of the Point and, with Barry at the oars and Emily at the helm, cautiously made its way toward the whirlpool.

The instant they got out from the lee of the Point the full force of the storm struck them, although they were still within the shelter of the harbor. But they struggled through it, for a stronger pair of arms never pulled oars and more skilful hands than those on that little skiff never guided a boat. Barry's strokes were as steady and powerful as if he had been a steam propeller, and not even the admiral himself could have steered the boat with greater dexterity than did the girl.

The man on the wrecked cutter saw them when the admiral did. Evidently he was a sailor, too, for he knew exactly what they intended to do. The two on the boat brought the skiff as near the rocks where the wreck of the cutter lay as they dared,—they were almost in the whirlpool, in fact,—and then Emily, gathering the yoke-lines in her left hand, with the other signalled him to jump. Nodding his head, he leaped far out over the whirling waves toward the boat. It was his only chance.

"A gallant lad, a brave boy!" exclaimed the admiral, as he saw the man spring from the wreck. "I believe they'll save him yet. No, by heavens! he's struck on one of the reefs! Is he gone? He rises! He's in the whirlpool! He strikes out feebly; the waves go over his head! No, he rises again! They have him! Well done, Emily; well pulled, Barry!"

Taking a desperate chance, the girl, seeing that the man was practically helpless, for he was swimming feebly and apparently scarcely able to keep his head up, boldly sheered the boat into the whirlpool and then turned her about. The man, retaining his self-possession, seized the stern with his uninjured hand. Emily leaned down and caught him by the coat collar, and then Barry pulled his strongest to escape from the twisting grip of the little maelstrom.

The girl boldly sheered the boat into the whirlpool

Emily steered the boat with one hand and with the other held on to the stranger. It was, of course, impossible to get him into the boat. Presently he fainted and hung a dead weight on her arm. The admiral watched them, praying fervently for their success. It was a terrible pull for the old sailor and a terrible strain on the young woman. Again and again she thought she would have to release the man dragging astern. Her arm was almost jerked from her body, yet she held on with grim determination, steering the boat as best she could with her single hand.

Barry pulled until the sweat beaded his forehead. His muscles stood out like whipcords. For a few moments he feared that he could not do it; but he looked at the resolute figure in the stern-sheets, the girl he loved, and that nerved his arms. Presently—and it seemed hours to both—he got the boat out of the whirlpool and into the comparatively smooth water under the lee of the Point. After a few weary strokes the keel grated upon the shore.

The sailor stepped out, made fast the painter, waded back to where the man lay in the water, lifted him up with the assistance of Emily, and slowly made his way up the hill, carrying him in his arms.

CHAPTER VI

The Water-Witch

We have a deeper sense of proprietorship in a thing we have earned by hard labor or gained by the exercise of our abilities than in that which has been given to us, has cost us nothing.

As Emily, walking close by Barry's side, giving him such assistance as was possible, looked with mingled pity and anxiety upon the white face of the man hanging limply back over the arms of the sailor, she was conscious that in her soul had arisen a new and curious sense of ownership in humanity,—the most satisfactory, yet disappointing, of our possessions. A strange and indefinable feeling surged in her breast as she thought hurriedly of the situation. A budding relationship—the deep relationship of services rendered, in fact—attached her inevitably to this stranger—if he were yet alive.

She flushed at the feeling, as if her privacy had been invaded, as she gazed upon him. Her thoughts ran riot in her bosom, her soul turning toward him, helpless, unconscious, water dripping from his torn, sodden clothing. Perhaps he was dead or dying. The thought gave her a sudden constriction of the heart. That would be untoward fate surely. It could not be.

She had saved him. The weak woman had been strong. Her heart leaped exultingly at that. He was hers by the divine right of service. The strange relationship had suddenly become a fact to her. Her arm still ached with the strain of holding him, yet she was glad of the pain. It was the inward and spiritual evidence of her ownership in that she had found and brought to shore. If he would only live!

As they walked she prayed.

She was not in love with him, of course,—not yet,—and yet she could scarcely analyze—hardly comprehend—her feelings. Her mind was in a whirl. Faint, exhausted physically, she did not yet see clearly. But he was there. She had brought him. This human bit of flotsam was hers—but for her he would have gone down forever in the dark waters. If he lived, what things might be? What might come? She admitted nothing, even to herself.

It was some distance from the landing-place to the top of the hill, and although the man they had rescued, albeit tall, was a slender young fellow, yet as the sailor toiled up the well-worn path he felt the weight of the inert body growing greater with every ascending step. Perhaps it would not have been so had he not previously exhausted himself in the desperate pull to gain the shore; but when at last he reached the porch, he felt that it would have been impossible for him to have carried his burden another pace. Indeed, had it not been for the assistance Emily had given him, he could not have managed it without a stop or two for rest. But he had plunged blindly on, something—an instinct of the future, perhaps—bidding him rid himself without delay of the growing oppression of his incubus. Not Sindbad had been more anxious to throw off his old man of the sea than he to cast down the man.

And Barry and Emily began to play at cross-purposes from that hour.

The man saved so hardly had as yet given no sign of life. When the three reached the porch, the sailor laid him down at the admiral's feet and stood panting, sweat beading on his bronzed brow. The old man, still wrapped in his cloak, stood on the steps, careless alike of the rising wind or the rain which had begun to fall.

"Well done!" he cried, extending his hand to them, as the sailor deposited his burden. "I never saw a boat better handled, girl! 'Twas a gallant rescue, Barry!"

"Oh, grandfather!" cried Emily, too anxious to heed approval, even from such a source; "is he dead, do you think?"

"I hope not; but we'll soon see. Call the servants, Emily. Barry, lift him up again and take him into my room."

"No, mine," exclaimed Emily, as she ran to call assistance. "I won't have you disturbed, and mine is right off the hall here."

"Very well. Lay him on the floor, Barry. And, Emily, bring me my flask. Bear a hand, all."

Presently the man was stretched out upon a blanket thrown upon the floor of Emily's room

Presently the man was stretched out upon a blanket thrown upon the floor of Emily's room, and the admiral knelt down by his side. He felt over him with his practised fingers, murmuring the while:

"No bones broken apparently. I guess he'll be all right. Have you the flask there, daughter? This will bring him around, I trust," he added, as he poured the restoring liquid down the man's throat. "Barry, go you for Dr. Wilcox as quick as you can. Present my compliments to him, and ask him to come here at once. Shake a leg, man! Emily, loosen the man's collar—your fingers are younger than mine—and give him another swallow. He's worth a dozen dead men yet, I'm sure."

As he spoke the admiral rose to his feet and gave place to Emily. Very gently the girl did as the old man bade her, and presently the man extended before her opened his eyes and stared up at her vacantly, wonderingly, for a few moments at first, and then, with a dawning light of recognition in his eyes, he smiled faintly as he remembered. His first words might have been considered flippant, unworthy of the situation, but to the girl they seemed not inappropriate.

"The blue-eyed water-witch!" he murmured. "To be saved by you," he continued, half jestingly,—it was a brave heart which could find place for pleasantry then, she thought,—"and then to find you smiling above me."

At these whispered words what he still lacked in color flickered into Emily's face, and as he gazed steadily upon her, the flicker became a flame which suffused her cheeks. He had noticed her even in those death-fronting moments on the wreck.

"Are you better now?" she asked him in her confusion.

"Better, miss?" he answered, softly, yet not striving to rise; "I am well again. I came down to——"

"Silence, lad, silence fore and aft! Belay all until the surgeon comes, and you shall tell us all about it then," interrupted the admiral. "He'll be here in a moment now, I think, if Barry have good luck. Will you have another swallow of whiskey?"

"No, sir, thank you; I've had enough."

At that moment the sailor entered the hall, fairly dragging the fat little doctor in his wake.

"I fell foul of him just outside of the yard, your honor," said Barry, as he appeared in the door-way.

"'Fell foul of me!' I should think you did! You fell on me like a storm," cried the doctor, dropping his wet cloak in the passage-way and bustling into the room. "What is it, admiral? Are you——?"

"I'm all right, doctor."

"It's not Miss Emily?"

"No, sir; I'm all right, too; but——"

"Oho!" said the doctor, his glance at last falling to the man extended on the floor; "this is the patient, is it? Well, young man, you look rather damp, I am sure. What's up?"

"Nothing seems to be up, sir," answered the man, smilingly, amusedly. "I seem to be down, though."

"I guess you're in pretty good shape, sir," said the doctor, laughingly, "if you can joke about it; and if you are down now, we'll soon have you up."

As he spoke, the physician knelt and examined his patient carefully.

"How did it happen, Miss Emily?" he asked, as he proceeded with his investigations.

"Why, doctor, we picked him up out of the water."

"We?"

"Yes, sir. Captain Barry and I."

"My sloop was wrecked on the rocks beyond the old ship," said the young man; "and when this young lady came along in a boat I jumped, and as I am not quite recovered from a wound I got at Mobile Bay, I suppose I lost consciousness from the shock. I'm all right now, though."

"I think so, too," said the doctor; "we'll get these wet clothes off you in a jiffy, and then I'll give you something, and in the morning you'll hardly know you've been in danger."

"I shall never forget that I was in danger this time, sir," said the young man, addressing the doctor, but looking fixedly at the young girl.

"No, of course not; but why particularly at this time?"

"Because I was saved by——"

"Oh, that's it, is it? Faith, I'd be willing to be half drowned myself to be saved in that way. Meanwhile, do you withdraw, Miss Emily, and we'll get him ready for bed. Where is he to lie?"

"Here," said the girl.

"In your room?"

"Certainly."

"I protest, sir," said the man, sitting up with astonishing access of vigor.

"Nobody protests when Miss Emily commands anything. Here you'll stay, sir!" said Barry, gruffly, as the girl left the room.

The doctor and the sailor soon tucked him away in bed, the admiral looking on. As they undressed him they noticed a long scar across his breast where a shell from Fort Morgan had keeled him over. The doctor examined it critically.

"That was a bad one," he said, touching the wound deftly with his pudgy yet knowing finger. "That'll be the one you spoke of, I take it?"

"Yes, sir," answered the young man; "it's been a long time in healing. I feel the effect of it yet sometimes."

"But you'll get over it in time, young man, I'm thinking," said the kindly little country doctor.

"I hope so, sir."

The patient was thin and pale from the effects of the wound, which, as he said, had been a long time healing. It was evident that he had not yet recovered his strength or his weight, either, or the burden on Captain Barry would have been heavier than it was.

"Did you say," said the admiral, as they prepared to leave him, "that you had been at Mobile Bay?"

"Yes, sir."

"What ship were you on?"

"The Hartford, sir."

"Bless me!" exclaimed the old man; "with Dave Farragut?"

"Yes, sir; I had that honor."

"Why, I knew that boy when he was a midshipman. I——"

"Now, admiral, excuse me for giving commands in your presence, but you know there are times when the doctor rules the ship. This young man must be left alone, and, after the excitement, I think you had better go to bed—excuse me, I mean turn in—yourself," interposed the physician, peremptorily.

"Hark to the storm!" said the old man, turning to the window, his thoughts diverted for the moment from the accident and his guest—it needed but little to turn his mind to the ship at any time or under any circumstances. "Mark the flash of the lightning, hear the thunder, doctor! She'll be sore racked to-night!"

He peered anxiously out into the darkness over the Point.

"Come, come, admiral."

"Nay, sir. I must wait for another flash to see whether the old ship still stands. Ay, there she is! Well, 'twill not be long; and were it not for Emily, I'd say, thank God! Good-night, lad. A boy with Farragut, and he a boy with me! Well, well! Good-night; sleep well, sir."

Long time the veteran lay awake listening to the wind and waiting for the crash of the ship. And in the room above, where the servants had made a bed for Emily, another kept sleepless watch, though she thought but little of the storm; or, if she did, it was with thankfulness for what it had brought her.

How handsome he had looked, even with that death-like pallor upon his brown sunburnt cheek, as she had knelt beside him! Had the waves of the tempest indeed brought the long-expected, long-dreamed-of lover to her feet? And he was a sailor; he had been with Farragut; he had been wounded in the service of his country—a hero! And what had he said? "Saved by a blue-eyed water-witch!" How delightful to think on! And he would never forget the rescue because she had done it! He jested, surely; yet could the words be true?

How different he was from the young men of the village! Even the few officers of the different detachments of volunteers which had successively garrisoned the fort were not as he. How different from Captain Barry, too—alas, poor old sailor! Her grandfather, now, might have been like him when he was younger.

What a storm it was! How the wind howled around the corners of the house! What had he come there for? Strangers rarely visited the quiet little town. What business or pleasure had brought him to the village? Was the ship braving the storm? If the ship went down, her grandfather would go, too, and perhaps Captain Barry. Who would care for her then? What was that young man's name? Pity he had not mentioned it. "A blue-eyed water-witch!"

She drifted off to sleep.

Down upon the deck of the old ship, heedless of the storm, Captain Barry paced restlessly up and down. What had he done it for? What fool's impulse had made him obey her sharp command? 'Twas his arm that had held the boat under iron control; 'twas his powerful stroke that had brought it near enough to enable the man to make the leap with the chance of safety; and he had carried him up the hill. The increasing weight of the incumbrance but typified the growing heaviness of his heart. The man was one of the admiral's class,—a gentleman, an officer, a man who had been wounded in the service of his country, a hero. How he had stared at Emily when his senses came back to him! He, Barry, was only a common sailor, a blue-jacket, the admiral's servitor, Miss Emily's dog, old enough to be her father,—a fool!

He stood up in the darkness and stretched out his arms to heaven,—what voiceless, wordless prayer in his lonely old heart? The storm beat full upon him. His mind was filled with foreboding, regret, jealousy, anguish. Why had the man come there? Was it for Emily? What should any man come there for if not for her?

But, stay; he was a sailor. Perhaps he had come for the ship! The war was over, retrenchment the cry. Poor Barry had heard strange rumors. There was no sleep for him that night.

CHAPTER VII

The Home of the Sea-Maiden

Mr. Richard Revere was a young lieutenant in the navy of the United States. He came of an ancient and honorable family, possessed of wealth and station. He had graduated from the Naval Academy in 1863, and, by an act of daring gallantry in cutting out a blockade-runner, had easily won a lieutenant's commission. When Farragut sailed into Mobile Bay on that hot August morning in 1864, the young man stood on the deck by his side. A Blakely shell from Fort Morgan had seriously wounded him, and this wound, coupled with a long siege of fever subsequently, had almost done for him.

Although over a year had elapsed since that eventful day, he had by no means regained his strength, although he seemed now on the fair road to recovery. Anxious to be on duty again after this long period of enforced idleness, he had recently applied for orders, and had been detailed to proceed to Lake Ontario and make arrangements for the sale, or other disposal, of the Susquehanna. His mother owned a cottage on one of the Thousand Isles, and the distance was, therefore, inconsiderable. When the orders had reached him there, he determined to sail down to Sewell's Harbor in a little yacht which he had chartered for lake cruising, instead of taking the longer and more tedious journey by land.

He had reached his destination in the way which has been told. It was imprudent in him to have attempted to make the mouth of an unknown harbor in such a storm, and he had nearly paid the penalty for his folly with his life. Exhausted by his adventure, he fell speedily into a sound and refreshing slumber, his last thought being of the radiant face bowed over him when he had opened his eyes in the very room in which he now sought rest.

He awoke in the morning feeling very much better. On a chair opposite the bed lay a suit of clothes. He glanced at the garments curiously and observed that they were the different articles of a blue-jacket's uniform. They evidently belonged to that sailor-man who had assisted in his rescue. They were new and spotlessly neat; certainly his best suit. His own uniform was nowhere to be seen. It must have been badly torn and, of course, thoroughly soaked by his adventure. His clothes, probably, were not yet fit to put on. If he were to get up at all he must make use of these. Well, it would not be the first time that he had worn a seaman's clothes. They reminded him of his cadet days, and so he arose, somewhat painfully be it known, and dressed himself, curiously surveying the room as he did so.

It was a strange room, he thought, for a young girl, as he remembered that it belonged to her. Her? How indefinite that was! He wished he knew her name. He wondered whether it were beautiful enough to be appropriate. He hoped so. The chamber was not at all like that of a young woman. For instance, there was a deadly looking harpoon standing in the corner. He picked up the sinister weapon and examined it.

"Queer toy, that thing, for a girl," he murmured; "quite a proper weapon for a whaler, though."

Its barbs were as sharp and keen as a razor. On the wooden staff the letters "J. B." were roughly carved. Were those her initials? Pshaw, of course not! But whose? He experienced quite a thrill of—it could not be jealousy! That was absurd.

"What's this? A model of a ship. By Jove! I believe it's the old Susquehanna herself,—the ship I am come to sell! And here's a shark's tooth rudely carved. Oars in the other corner, too. And a fish-net and lines! This bunch of wild flowers, though, and the contents of this bureau mark the woman; but I'm blessed if there isn't a boatswain's call, laniard and all! That's about the prettiest laniard I ever saw," he continued, critically examining the knots and strands and Turk's heads. "Have I stumbled into Master Jack's quarters by mistake, or—oh, I see how it is. I suppose that old sailor has loaded her with these treasures. He probably adores her—who could help it? And the admiral, too. Now, what's this, I wonder? What a queer-looking sword!"

He lifted up the weapon, which lay on a wooden shelf between the windows, crossed pistols of ancient make hanging above it beneath a fine old painting of a handsome young naval officer, in the uniform of a captain of the 1812 period. The leather scabbard was richly and artistically mounted in silver, but the hilt was a rough piece of unpolished, hammered iron. He drew the weapon from the sheath. The blade was of the most exquisite quality, beautifully chased, a rare bit of Toledo steel, handsome enough to throw a connoisseur into ecstasy. He tested it, cautiously at first, and then boldly; it was a magnificent weapon, tempered to perfection. Such a blade as a king or conqueror might have wielded,—and yet, that coarse iron hilt! What could it mean? He thrust it back reverently into its scabbard and laid it down, and then completed his toilet.

When he was dressed, he took a long look at himself in the little, old-fashioned mirror swinging between two lyre-shaped standards on the dresser, and smiled at the picture. In height he was, perhaps, as tall as the sailor, but in bulk there was no comparison. He laughed at the way the clothes hung about him. Yet the dashing, jaunty uniform was not ill adapted to set off his handsome face. It was complete, even to sheath-knife and belt. On the chair lay the flat cap, bearing on its ribbon, in letters of gold, the name Susquehanna. He put the cap on and went out on the porch.

Captain Barry was standing at the foot of the steps leading from the porch, looking at the ship. It was early morning.

"My man," said the young officer, meaning to be entirely friendly and cordial, as he was profoundly grateful, yet unable entirely to keep the difference of rank and station out of his voice and manner,—a condescension which irritated the sailor beyond expression. They were both dressed exactly alike, and certainly physically the older was the better man. He had lived long enough in the society of the girl and the old man to have developed some of the finer feelings of his nature, too. He shook himself angrily, therefore, as the other spoke.

"My man, you lay me under double obligation. You and your golden-haired mistress presented me with my life last night, and now you 'paint the lily'—gad, that's a good simile, isn't it?" he chuckled to himself—"by giving me your clothes. How am I to acquit myself of all I owe you?"

"Sir," said the old man, grimly, knuckling his forehead, with a sea-scrape of his foot, more as a matter of habit than as a token of respect, "you owe me nothing."

He turned abruptly, and went around the house without looking back.

"Queer duck, that," soliloquized the young man, staring after him in amazement; "seems to be mad about something. Mad at me, perhaps. I wonder why? Well, those old shellbacks are apt to take quaint notions. Never mind; let him do what he likes. Where would you be, Mr. Dick Revere, if it had not been for him and the girl? How funny I must look, though! I wonder whether the apparel becomes the man? I flatter myself I have given the proper hitch to the tie. It is 'a touch of wild civility that doth bewitch me,'" he quoted. "I wish I had brought that bo's'n's whistle out. I'd like to sound a call or two."

He drifted off into a brown study, thinking hard in this manner.

"I wonder what Josephine would say if she could see me now? Is all our difference of rank but a matter of uniform? By Jove! I forgot all about her. I don't believe I've thought of her since I left them; yet, if the novels are right, I should have been thinking of her when I stood on the deck of the yacht expecting every moment would be my last. I was thinking of that girl in the boat, though. Wasn't she splendid? Plucky, pretty—well! Gracious me, Richard Revere, at the age of twenty-four you are surely not going to fall in love with the first woman you see, especially since you have been engaged to Josephine Remington pretty much ever since you were born,—or ever since she was born, which was four years later. But I swear I'd give a year of Josephine's cold, classic, beautiful regularity for a minute of—pshaw, don't be a fool! I'll go and look at the yacht. I wonder whether anything's left of her? Nobody would think there had been a storm of any kind to look at the lake to-day. What a lovely morning!"

Indeed, the wind had gone down to a gentle breeze, and the surface of the lake was tossing in thousands of merry little waves, their white crests sparkling in the sunlight.

"The old ship is still standing," he continued, soliloquizing again, as he walked toward the bluff. "I suppose it will come awfully hard on the old man when he finds out that the government is going to sell her. What did they tell me his name was? Somebody or other distinguished; I forget who. Must have been a fine old chap in his day. What was it he said when he looked out of the window before he bade me good-night? This is going to be rather a tough sort of a job, I'm afraid, and I don't half like it."

He had reached the hill by this time, and, feeling a little tired, he sat down on the steps overlooking the sea. There, below him on the Point, stood the ship-of-the-line. An imposing picture, indeed. He had been too busy the night before to notice it. He stared at it with growing interest, and a feeling of pity, for whom, for what, he could scarcely say, slowly rose in his heart.

"Poor old ship!" he murmured.

A ragged mass of fallen timber on the lee side proclaimed that some portion of her had been carried away during the storm of the night,—and she had little left to spare. There, too, on the reef beyond, were the remains of the Josephine, battered into a shapeless ruin.

"Well, that was a close shave; the Josephine will never carry sail again. What melancholy pictures!" he said, thoughtfully; "poor little boat, too! I've had many a good time on her, and now I—But I'd cheerfully give a dozen yachts," he continued, with the reckless hyperbole of youth, "to be rescued by——"

CHAPTER VIII

"Old Ironsides"

The continuity of his thought was suddenly broken. A beautiful hand, of exquisite touch, sunburned, but shapely, delicate, but strong, was laid lightly on his shoulder. He glanced down at it, thrilled!

"Captain Barry," exclaimed a fresh, clear young voice, which in perfection matched the hand, "have you looked to the comfort of our guest? Oh, sir, I beg your pardon. I thought——" she cried in dismay, as Revere rose to his feet and bowed low before her.

"May I answer your question? He has, as these clothes, which account for your mistake, will witness."

"And are you well, sir? Are you none the worse for——?"

"Much the better, I should say," answered the young man, "since my adventure has gained me the privilege of your acquaintance."

"You might have had that without risking your life, sir," she responded, smiling.

"Not without risking my heart, I am sure," he replied, gallantly.

"What a strange way you have of addressing people!" she continued, looking at him so frankly and so innocently that he felt ashamed of himself. "Do you always talk in that way?"

"Well, not always," he replied, laughing; "but I jest——"

"Oh, it was only a jest, then," she interrupted, her heart sinking faintly.

"But I jest when I should be thanking you for giving me my life," he continued, disregarding her interruption. "You saved my life, Miss—I do not know your name."

"I am Emily Sanford, the admiral's granddaughter."

"You saved my life, Miss Sanford."

"I don't believe I've ever been called 'Miss Sanford' in my life. How strange it sounds!" she exclaimed, naïvely. "Everybody here calls me 'Miss Emily.'"

"You will not find me unwilling, I am sure, to adopt the common practice," he exclaimed, lightly. "But, seriously, death never seemed nearer to me than it did last night, and I have been near it before, too. Had it not been for you——"

"And Captain Barry," she interrupted, quickly.

"Of course, for him, too, I'd not be here thanking you now."

"But it was nothing, after all; anybody could have done it."

"There I disagree with you. I am sailor enough to know that it was a most desperate undertaking. You put your own life in hazard to save mine. If that old man had relaxed his efforts, if you had made a mistake with those yoke-lines,—well, there would have been three of us to go instead of one."