Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1

“‘I beg pardon, sir, for having disturbed you unconsciously; but, having done so, may I request you will assist me to fill this pitcher with water?’

“She pointed at the same time to a small stream which trickled down a fissure in the rock, and formed a little well of clear water beneath. I bowed deeply, and murmuring something, I know not what, took the pitcher from her hand, and scaling the rocky cliff, mounted to the clear source above, where having filled the vessel, I descended. When I reached the ground beneath, I discovered that she was joined by another person whom, in an instant, I recognized to be the old gentleman I had seen with her at Barmouth, and who in the most courteous manner apologized for the trouble I had been caused, and informed me that a party of his friends were enjoying a little picnic quite near, and invited me to make one of them.

“I need not say that I accepted the invitation, nor that with delight I seized the opportunity of forming an acquaintance with Isabella, who, I must confess, upon her part showed no disinclination to the prospect of my joining the party.

“After a few minutes’ walking, we came to a small rocky point which projected for some distance into the lake, and offered a view for several miles of the vale of Llanberris. Upon this lovely spot we found the party assembled; they consisted of about fourteen or fifteen persons, all busily engaged in the arrangement of a very excellent cold dinner, each individual having some peculiar province allotted to him or her, to be performed by their own hands. Thus, one elderly gentlemen was whipping cream under a chestnut-tree, while a very fashionably-dressed young man was washing radishes in the lake; an old lady with spectacles was frying salmon over a wood-fire, opposite to a short, pursy man with a bald head and drab shorts, deep in the mystery of a chicken salad, from which he never lifted his eyes when I came up. It was thus I found how the fair Isabella’s lot had been cast, as a drawer of water; she, with the others, contributing her share of exertion for the common good. The old gentleman who accompanied her seemed the only unoccupied person, and appeared to be regarded as the ruler of the feast; at least, they all called him general, and implicitly followed every suggestion he threw out. He was a man of a certain grave and quiet manner, blended with a degree of mild good-nature and courtesy, that struck me much at first, and gained greatly on me, even in the few minutes I conversed with him as we came along. Just before he presented me to his friends, he gently touched my arm, and drawing me aside, whispered in my ear: —

“‘Don’t be surprised at anything you may hear to-day here; for I must inform you this is a kind of club, as I may call it, where every one assumes a certain character, and is bound to sustain it under a penalty. We have these little meetings every now and then; and as strangers are never present, I feel some explanation necessary, that you may be able to enjoy the thing, – you understand?’

“‘Oh, perfectly,’ said I, overjoyed at the novelty of the scene, and anticipating much pleasure from my chance meeting with such very original characters.

“‘Mr. Sparks, Mrs. Winterbottom. Allow me to present Mr. Sparks.’

“‘Any news from Batavia, young gentleman?’ said the sallow old lady addressed. ‘How is coffee!’

“The general passed on, introducing me rapidly as he went.

“‘Mr. Doolittle, Mr. Sparks.’

“‘Ah, how do you do, old boy?’ said Mr. Doolittle; ‘sit down beside me. We have forty thousand acres of pickled cabbage spoiling for want of a little vinegar.’

“‘Fie, fie, Mr. Doolittle,’ said the general, and passed on to another.

“‘Mr. Sparks, Captain Crosstree.’

“‘Ah, Sparks, Sparks! son of old Blazes! ha, ha, ha!’ and the captain fell back into an immoderate fit of laughter.

“‘Le Rio est serci,’ said the thin meagre figure in nankeens, bowing, cap in hand, before the general; and accordingly, we all assumed our places upon the grass.

“‘Say it again! Say it again, and I’ll plunge this dagger in your heart!’ said a hollow voice, tremulous with agitation and rage, close beside me. I turned my head, and saw an old gentleman with a wart on his nose, sitting opposite a meat-pie, which he was contemplating with a look of fiery indignation. Before I could witness the sequel of the scene, I felt a soft hand pressed upon mine. I turned. It was Isabella herself, who, looking at me with an expression I shall never forget, said: —

“‘Don’t mind poor Faddy; he never hurts any one.’

“Meanwhile the business of dinner went on rapidly. The servants, of whom enormous numbers were now present, ran hither and thither; and duck, ham, pigeon-pie, cold veal, apple tarts, cheese, pickled salmon, melon, and rice pudding, flourished on every side. As for me, whatever I might have gleaned from the conversation around under other circumstances, I was too much occupied with Isabella to think of any one else. My suit – for such it was – progressed rapidly. There was evidently something favorable in the circumstances we last met under; for her manner had all the warmth and cordiality of old friendship. It is true that, more than once, I caught the general’s eye fixed upon us with anything but an expression of pleasure, and I thought that Isabella blushed and seemed confused also. ‘What care I?’ however, was my reflection; ‘my views are honorable; and the nephew and heir of Sir Toby Sparks – ’ Just in the very act of making this reflection, the old man in the shorts hit me in the eye with a roasted apple, calling out at the moment: —

“‘When did you join, thou child of the pale-faces?’

“‘Mr. Murdocks!’ cried the general, in a voice of thunder; and the little man hung down his head, and spoke not.

“‘A word with you, young gentleman,’ said a fat old lady, pinching my arm above the elbow.

“‘Never mind her,’ said Isabella, smiling; ‘poor dear old Dorking, she thinks she’s an hour-glass. How droll, isn’t it?’

“‘Young man, have you any feelings of humanity?’ inquired the old lady, with tears in her eyes as she spoke; ‘will you, dare you assist a fellow-creature under my sad circumstances?’

“‘What can I do for you, Madam?’ said I, really feeling for her distress.

“‘Just like a good dear soul, just turn me up, for I’m nearly run out.’

“Isabella burst out a laughing at the strange request, – an excess which, I confess, I was unable myself to repress; upon which the old lady, putting on a frown of the most ominous blackness, said: —

“‘You may laugh, Madam; but first before you ridicule the misfortunes of others, ask yourself are you, too, free from infirmity? When did you see the ace of spades, Madam? Answer me that.’

“Isabella became suddenly pale as death; her very lips blanched, and her voice, almost inaudible, muttered: —

“‘Am I, then, deceived? Is not this he?’ So saying, she placed her hand upon my shoulder.

“‘That the ace of spades?’ exclaimed the old lady, with a sneer, – ‘that the ace of spades!’

“‘Are you, or are you not, sir?’ said Isabella, fixing her deep and languid eyes upon me. ‘Answer me, as you are honest; are you the ace of spades?’

“‘He is the King of Tuscarora. Look at his war paint!’ cried an elderly gentleman, putting a streak of mustard across my nose and cheek.

“‘Then am I deceived,’ said Isabella. And flying at me, she plucked a handful of hair out of my whiskers.

“‘Cuckoo, cuckoo!’ shouted one; ‘Bow-wow-wow!’ roared another; ‘Phiz!’ went a third; and in an instant, such a scene of commotion and riot ensued. Plates, dishes, knives, forks, and decanters flew right and left; every one pitched into his neighbor with the most fearful cries, and hell itself seemed broke loose. The hour-glass and the Moulah of Oude had got me down and were pummelling me to death, when a short, thickset man came on all fours slap down upon them shouting out, ‘Way, make way for the royal Bengal tiger!’ at which they both fled like lightning, leaving me to the encounter single-handed. Fortunately, however, this was not of very long duration, for some well-disposed Christians pulled him from off me; not, however, before he had seized me in his grasp, and bitten off a portion of my left ear, leaving me, as you see, thus mutilated for the rest of my days.”

“What an extraordinary club,” broke in the doctor.

“Club, sir, club! it was a lunatic asylum. The general was no other than the famous Dr. Andrew Moorville, that had the great madhouse at Bangor, and who was in the habit of giving his patients every now and then a kind of country party; it being one remarkable feature of their malady that when one takes to his peculiar flight, whatever it be, the others immediately take the hint and go off at score. Hence my agreeable adventure: the Bengal tiger being a Liverpool merchant, and the most vivacious madman in England; while the hour-glass and the Moulah were both on an experimental tour to see whether they should not be pronounced totally incurable for life.”

“And Isabella?” inquired Power.

“Ah, poor Isabella had been driven mad by a card-playing aunt at Bath, and was in fact the most hopeless case there. The last words I heard her speak confirmed my mournful impression of her case, —

“‘Yes,’ said she, as they removed her to her carriage, ‘I must, indeed, have but a weak intellect, when I could have taken the nephew of a Manchester cotton-spinner, with a face like a printed calico, for a trump card, and the best in the pack!’”

Poor Sparks uttered these last words with a faltering accent, and finishing his glass at one draught withdrew without wishing us good-night.

CHAPTER XXXIII

THE SKIPPER

In such like gossipings passed our days away, for our voyage itself had nothing of adventure or incident to break its dull monotony; save some few hours of calm, we had been steadily following our seaward track with a fair breeze, and the long pennant pointed ever to the land where our ardent expectations were hurrying before it.

The latest accounts which had reached us from the Peninsula told that our regiment was almost daily engaged; and we burned with impatience to share with the others the glory they were reaping. Power, who had seen service, felt less on this score than we who had not “fleshed our maiden swords;” but even he sometimes gave way, and when the wind fell toward sunset, he would break out into some exclamation of discontent, half fearing we should be too late. “For,” said he, “if we go on in this way the regiment will be relieved and ordered home before we reach it.”

“Never fear, my boys, you’ll have enough of it. Both sides like the work too well to give in; they’ve got a capital ground and plenty of spare time,” said the major.

“Only to think,” cried Power, “that we should be lounging away our idle hours when these gallant fellows are in the saddle late and early. It is too bad; eh, O’Malley? You’ll not be pleased to go back with the polish on your sabre? What will Lucy Dashwood say?”

This was the first allusion Power had ever made to her, and I became red to the very forehead.

“By-the-bye,” added he, “I have a letter for Hammersley, which should rather have been entrusted to your keeping.”

At these words I felt cold as death, while he continued: —

“Poor fellow! certainly he is most desperately smitten; for, mark me, when a man at his age takes the malady, it is forty times as severe as with a younger fellow, like you. But then, to be sure, he began at the wrong end in the matter; why commence with papa? When a man has his own consent for liking a girl, he must be a contemptible fellow if he can’t get her; and as to anything else being wanting, I don’t understand it. But the moment you begin by influencing the heads of the house, good-by to your chances with the dear thing herself, if she have any spirit whatever. It is, in fact, calling on her to surrender without the honors of war; and what girl would stand that?”

“It’s vara true,” said the doctor; “there’s a strong speerit of opposition in the sex, from physiological causes.”

“Curse your physiology, old Galen; what you call opposition, is that piquant resistance to oppression that makes half the charm of the sex. It is with them – with reverence be it spoken – as with horses: the dull, heavy-shouldered ones, that bore away with the bit in their teeth, never caring whether you are pulling to the right or to the left, are worth nothing; the real luxury is in the management of your arching-necked curvetter, springing from side to side with every motion of your wrist, madly bounding at restraint, yet, to the practised hand, held in check with a silk tread. Eh, Skipper, am I not right?”

“Well, I can’t say I’ve had much to do with horse-beasts, but I believe you’re not far wrong. The lively craft that answers the helm quick, goes round well in stays, luffs up close within a point or two, when you want her, is always a good sea-boat, even though she pitches and rolls a bit; but the heavy lugger that never knows whether your helm is up or down, whether she’s off the wind or on it, is only fit for firewood, – you can do nothing with a ship or a woman if she hasn’t got steerage way on her.”

“Come, Skipper, we’ve all been telling our stories; let us hear one of yours?”

“My yarn won’t come so well after your sky-scrapers of love and courting and all that. But if you like to hear what happened to me once, I have no objection to tell you.

“I often think how little we know what’s going to happen to us any minute of our lives. To-day we have the breeze fair in our favor, we are going seven knots, studding-sails set, smooth water, and plenty of sea-room; to-morrow the wind freshens to half a gale, the sea gets up, a rocky coast is seen from the lee bow, and may be – to add to all – we spring a leak forward; but then, after all, bad as it looks, mayhap, we rub through even this, and with the next day, the prospect is as bright and cheering as ever. You’ll perhaps ask me what has all this moralizing to do with women and ships at sea? Nothing at all with them, except that I was a going to say, that when matters look worst, very often the best is in store for us, and we should never say strike when there is a timber together. Now for my story: —

“It’s about four years ago, I was strolling one evening down the side of the harbor at Cove, with my hands in my pocket, having nothing to do, nor no prospect of it, for my last ship had been wrecked off the Bermudas, and nearly all the crew lost; and somehow, when a man is in misfortune, the underwriters won’t have him at no price. Well, there I was, looking about me at the craft that lay on every side waiting for a fair wind to run down channel. All was active and busy; every one getting his vessel ship-shape and tidy, – tarring, painting, mending sails, stretching new bunting, and getting in sea-store; boats were plying on every side, signals flying, guns firing from the men-of-war, and everything was lively as might be, – all but me. There I was, like an old water-logged timber ship, never moving a spar, but looking for all the world as though I were a settling fast to go down stern foremost: may be as how I had no objection to that same; but that’s neither here nor there. Well, I sat down on the fluke of an anchor, and began a thinking if it wasn’t better to go before the mast than live on that way. Just before me, where I sat down, there was an old schooner that lay moored in the same place for as long as I could remember. She was there when I was a boy, and never looked a bit the fresher nor newer as long as I recollected; her old bluff bows, her high poop, her round stern, her flush deck, all Dutch-like, I knew them well, and many a time I delighted to think what queer kind of a chap he was that first set her on the stocks, and pondered in what trade she ever could have been. All the sailors about the port used to call her Noah’s Ark, and swear she was the identical craft that he stowed away all the wild beasts in during the rainy season. Be that as it might, since I fell into misfortune, I got to feel a liking for the old schooner; she was like an old friend; she never changed to me, fair weather or foul; there she was, just the same as thirty years before, when all the world were forgetting and steering wide away from me. Every morning I used to go down to the harbor and have a look at her, just to see that all was right and nothing stirred; and if it blew very hard at night, I’d get up and go down to look how she weathered it, just as if I was at sea in her. Now and then I’d get some of the watermen to row me aboard of her, and leave me there for a few hours; when I used to be quite happy walking the deck, holding the old worm-eaten wheel, looking out ahead, and going down below, just as though I was in command of her. Day after day this habit grew on me, and at last my whole life was spent in watching her and looking after her, – there was something so much alike in our fortunes, that I always thought of her. Like myself, she had had her day of life and activity; we had both braved the storm and the breeze; her shattered bulwarks and worn cutwater attested that she had, like myself, not escaped her calamities. We both had survived our dangers, to be neglected and forgotten, and to lie rotting on the stream of life till the crumbling hand of Time should break us up, timber by timber. Is it any wonder if I loved the old craft; nor if by any chance the idle boys would venture aboard of her to play and amuse themselves that I hallooed them away; or when a newly-arrived ship, not caring for the old boat, would run foul of her, and carry away some spar or piece of running rigging, I would suddenly call out to them to sheer off and not damage us? By degrees, they came all to notice this; and I found that they thought me out of my senses, and many a trick was played off upon old Noah, for that was the name the sailors gave me.

“Well, this evening, as I was saying, I sat upon the fluke of the anchor, waiting for a chance boat to put me aboard. It was past sunset, the tide was ebbing, and the old craft was surging to the fast current that ran by with a short, impatient jerk, as though she were well weary, and wished to be at rest; her loose stays creaked mournfully, and as she yawed over, the sea ran from many a breach in her worn sides, like blood trickling from a wound. ‘Ay, ay,’ thought I, ‘the hour is not far off; another stiff gale, and all that remains of you will be found high and dry upon the shore.’ My heart was very heavy as I thought of this; for in my loneliness, the old Ark – though that was not her name, as I’ll tell you presently – was all the companion I had. I’ve heard of a poor prisoner who, for many and many years, watched a spider that wove his web within his window, and never lost sight of him from morning till night; and somehow, I can believe it well. The heart will cling to something, and if it has no living object to press to, it will find a lifeless one, – it can no more stand alone than the shrouds can without the mast. The evening wore on, as I was thinking thus; the moon shone out, but no boat came, and I was just determining to go home again for the night, when I saw two men standing on the steps of the wharf below me, and looking straight at the Ark. Now, I must tell you I always felt uneasy when any one came to look at her; for I began to fear that some shipowner or other would buy her to break up, though, except the copper fastenings, there was little of any value about her. Now, the moment I saw the two figures stop short, and point to her, I said to myself, ‘Ah, my old girl, so they won’t even let the blue water finish you, but they must set their carpenters and dockyard people to work upon you.’ This thought grieved me more and more. Had a stiff sou’-wester laid her over, I should have felt it more natural, for her sand was run out; but just as this passed through my mind, I heard a voice from one of the persons, that I at once knew to be the port admiral’s: —

“‘Well, Dawkins,’ said he to the other, ‘if you think she’ll hold together, I’m sure I’ve no objection. I don’t like the job, I confess; but still the Admiralty must be obeyed.’

“‘Oh, my lord,’ said the other, ‘she’s the very thing; she’s a rakish-looking craft, and will do admirably. Any repair we want, a few days will effect; secrecy is the great thing.’

“‘Yes,’ said the admiral, after a pause, ‘as you observed, secrecy is the great thing.’

“‘Ho! ho!’ thought I, ‘there’s something in the wind, here;’ so I laid myself out upon the anchor-stock, to listen better, unobserved.

“‘We must find a crew for her, give her a few carronades, make her as ship-shape as we can, and if the skipper – ’

“‘Ay, but there is the real difficulty,’ said the admiral, hastily; ‘where are we to find a fellow that will suit us? We can’t every day find a man willing to jeopardize himself in such a cause as this, even though the reward be a great one.’

“‘Very true, my lord; but I don’t think there is any necessity for our explaining to him the exact nature of the service.’

“‘Come, come, Dawkins, you can’t mean that you’ll lead a poor fellow into such a scrape blindfolded?’

“‘Why, my lord, you never think it requisite to give a plan of your cruise to your ship’s crew before clearing out of harbor.’

“‘This may be perfectly just, but I don’t like it,’ said the admiral.

“‘In that case, my lord, you are imparting the secrets of the Admiralty to a party who may betray the whole plot.’

“‘I wish, with all my soul, they’d given the order to any one else,’ said the admiral, with a sigh; and for a few moments neither spoke a word.

“‘Well, then, Dawkins, I believe there is nothing for it but what you say; meanwhile, let the repairs be got in hand, and see after a crew.’

“‘Oh, as to that,’ said the other, ‘there are plenty of scoundrels in the fleet here fit for nothing else. Any fellow who has been thrice up for punishment in six months, we’ll draft on board of her; the fellows who have only been once to the gangway, we’ll make the officers.’

“‘A pleasant ship’s company,’ thought I, ‘if the Devil would only take the command.

“‘And with a skipper proportionate to their merit,’ said Dawkins.

“‘Begad, I’ll wish the French joy of them,’ said the admiral.

“‘Ho, ho!’ thought I, ‘I’ve found you out at last; so this is a secret expedition. I see it all; they’re fitting her out as a fire-ship, and going to send her slap in among the French fleet at Brest. Well,’ thought I, ‘even that’s better; that, at least, is a glorious end, though the poor fellows have no chance of escape.’

“‘Now, then,’ said the admiral, ‘to-morrow you’ll look out for the fellow to take the command. He must be a smart seaman, a bold fellow, too, otherwise the ruffianly crew will be too much for him; he may bid high, we’ll come to his price.’

“‘So you may,’ thought I, ‘when you’re buying his life.’

“‘I hope sincerely,’ continued the admiral, ‘that we may light upon some one without wife or child; I never could forgive myself – ’

“‘Never fear, my lord,’ said the other; ‘my care shall be to pitch upon one whose loss no one would feel; some one without friend or home, who, setting his life for nought, cares less for the gain than the very recklessness of the adventure.’

“‘That’s me,’ said I, springing up from the anchor-stock, and springing between them; ‘I’m that man.’

“Had the very Devil himself appeared at the moment, I doubt if they would have been more scared. The admiral started a pace or two backwards, while Dawkins, the first surprise over, seized me by the collar, and hold me fast.

“‘Who are you, scoundrel, and what brings you here?’ said he, in a voice hoarse with passion.

“‘I’m old Noah,’ said I; for somehow, I had been called by no other name for so long, I never thought of my real one.

“‘Noah!’ said the admiral, – ‘Noah! Well, but Noah, what were you doing here at this time of night?’

“‘I was a watching the Ark, my lord,’ said I, bowing, as I took off my hat.

“‘I’ve heard of this fellow before, my lord,’ said Dawkins; ‘he’s a poor lunatic that is always wandering about the harbor, and, I believe, has no harm in him.’

“‘Yes, but he has been listening, doubtless, to our conversation,’ said the admiral. ‘Eh, have you heard all we have been saying?’

“‘Every word of it, my lord.’

“At this the admiral and Dawkins looked steadfastly at each other for some minutes, but neither spoke; at last Dawkins said, ‘Well, Noah, I’ve been told you are a man to be depended on; may we rely upon your not repeating anything you overheard this evening, – at least, for a year to come?’