Jacob Faithful

“No, that I acknowledge; but what I dislike in the choice is, that it is dictated by feelings of resentment.”

“What’s done can’t be helped,” replied I, quickly, wishing to break off the conversation.

“Very true, Jacob; but I follow that up with another of your remarks, which is, ‘Better luck next time.’ God bless you, my boy; take care of yourself, and don’t get under the ice again!”

“For you I would to-morrow,” replied I, taking the proffered hand: “but if I could only see that Hodgson near a hole—”

“You’d not push him in?”

“Indeed I would,” replied I, bitterly.

“Jacob, you would not, I tell you—you think so now, but if you saw him in distress you would assist him as you did me. I know you, my boy, better than you know yourself.”

Whether Captain Turnbull or I were right remains to be proved in the sequel. We then shook hands, and I hastened away to see Mary, whom I had often thought of during my absence.

“Who do you think has been here?” said Mary, after our first greeting.

“I cannot guess,” replied I. “Not old Tom and his son?”

“No; I don’t think it was old Tom, but it was such an old quiz—with such a nose—O heavens! I thought I should have died with laughing as soon as he went downstairs. Do you know, Jacob, that I made love to him, just to see how he’d take it. You know who it is now?”

“O yes! you mean the Dominie, my schoolmaster.”

“Yes, he told me so; and I talked so much about you, and about your teaching me to read and write, and how fond I was of learning, and how I should like to be married to an elderly man who was a great scholar, who would teach me Latin and Greek, that the old gentleman became quite chatty, and sat for two hours talking to me. He desired me to say that he should call here to-morrow afternoon, and I begged him to stay the evening, as you are to have two more of your friends here. Now, who do you think are those?”

“I have no others, except old Tom Beazeley and his son.”

“Well, it is your old Tom after all, and a nice old fellow he is, although I would not like him for a husband; but as for his son—he’s a lad after my own heart—I’m quite in love with him.”

“Your love will do you no harm, Mary; but, recollect, what may be a joke to you may not be so to other people. As for the Dominie meeting old Beazeley and his son, I don’t exactly know how that will suit, for I doubt if he will like to see them.”

“Why not?” inquired Mary.

Upon a promise never to hint at them, I briefly stated the circumstances attending the worthy man’s voyage on board of the lighter. Mary paused, and then said, “Jacob, did we not read the last time that the most dangerous rocks to men were wine and women?”

“Yes, we did, if I recollect right.”

“Humph,” said she; “the old gentleman has given plenty of lessons in his time, and it appears that he has received one.”

“We may do so to the last day of our existence, Mary.”

“Well, he is a very clever, learned man, I’ve no doubt, and looks down upon all of us (not you, Jacob) as silly people. I’ll try if I can’t give him a lesson.”

“You, Mary, what can you teach him?”

“Never mind, we shall see;” and Mary turned the discourse on her father. “You know, I suppose, that father is gone up to Mr Turnbull’s.”

“No, I did not.”

“Yes, he has; he was desired to go there this morning, and hasn’t been back since. Jacob, I hope you won’t be so foolish again, for I don’t want to lose my master.”

“Oh, never fear; I shall teach you all you want to know before I die,” I replied.

“Don’t be too sure of that,” replied Mary; “how do you know how much I may wish to have of your company?”

“Well, if I walk off in a hurry, I’ll make you over to young Tom Beazeley. You’re half in love with him already, you know,” replied I, laughing.

“Well, he is a nice fellow,” replied she; “he laughs more than you do, Jacob.”

“He has suffered less,” replied I, gloomily, calling to mind what had occurred; “but, Mary, he is a fine young man, and a good-hearted, clever fellow to boot; and when you do know him, you will like him very much.” As I said this, I heard her father coming up stairs; he came in high good-humour with his interview with Captain Turnbull, called for his pipe and pot, and was excessively fluent upon “human natur’.”

Chapter Twenty Five

“The feast of reason and the flow of soul”—Stapleton, on human nature, proves the former; the Dominie, in his melting mood, the latter—Sall’s shoe particularly noted, and the true “reading made easy” of a mind at ease, by Old Tom

The afternoon of the next day I heard a well-known voice, which carolled forth, as Mary huddled up her books, and put them out of the way; for at that time I was, as usual, giving her a lesson:—

“And many strange sights I’ve seen,    And long I’ve been a rover,And everywhere I’ve been,    But now the wars are over.I’ve been across the line,    Where the sun will burn your nose off;And I’ve been in northern climes,    Where the frost would bite your toes off.        Fal de ral, fal de ral, fal de ral de liddy.”

“Heave a-head, Tom, and let me stump up at my leisure. It’s like warping ’gainst wind and tide with me—and I gets up about as fast as lawyers go to heaven.”

I thought when Tom came up first that he had been at unusual trouble in setting off his person, and certainly a better-looking, frank, open, merry countenance was seldom to be seen. In person he was about an inch taller than I, athletic, and well formed. He made up to Mary, who, perceiving his impatience, and either to check him before me, or else from her usual feeling of coquetry, received him rather distantly, and went up to old Tom, with whom she shook hands warmly.

“Whew! what’s in the wind now, Jacob? Why, we parted the best friends in the world,” said Tom, looking at Mary.

“Sheer off yourself, Tom,” replied I, laughing; “and you’ll see that she’ll come to again.”

“Oh, oh! so the wind’s in that quarter, is it?” replied Tom. “With all my heart—I can show false colours as well as she can. But I say, Jacob, before I begin my manoeuvres, tell me if you wish me to hoist the neutral flag—for I won’t interfere with you.”

“Here’s my hand upon it, Tom, that the coast is clear as far as I’m concerned; but take care—she’s a clipper, and not unlikely to slip through your fingers, even when you have her under your lee, within hail.”

“Let me alone, Jacob, for that.”

“And more, Tom, when you’re in possession of her, she will require a good man at the helm.”

“Then she’s just the craft after my fancy. I hate your steady, slow-sailing craft, that will steer themselves, almost; give me one that requires to be managed by a man and a seaman.”

“If well manned, she will do anything, depend upon it, Tom, for she’s as sound below as possible; and although she is down to her bearings on the puff of the moment, yet she’d not careen further.”

“Well, then, Jacob, all’s right; and now you’ve told me what tack she’s on, see if I don’t shape a course to cut her off.”

“Well, Jacob, my good boy, so you’ve been under the water again; I thought you had enough of it when Fleming gave you such a twist; but, however, this time you went to sarve a friend, which was all right. My sarvice to you Mr Stapleton,” continued old Tom, as Stapleton made his appearance. “I was talking to Jacob about his last dive.”

“Nothing but human natur’,” replied Stapleton.

“Well, now,” replied old Tom, “I consider that going plump into the river, when covered with ice, to be quite contrary to human natur’.”

“But not to save a friend, father?”

“No—because, that be Jacob’s nature; so you see one nature conquered the other, and that’s the whole long and short of it.”

“Well, now, suppose we sit down and make ourselves comfortable,” observed Stapleton; “but here be somebody else coming up—who can it be?”

“I say, old codger, considering you be as deaf as a post, you hears pretty well,” said old Tom.

“Yes, I hear very well in the house, provided people don’t speak loud.”

“Well, that’s a queer sort of deafness; I think we are all troubled with the same complaint,” cried Tom, laughing.

During this remark, the Dominie made his appearance. “Salve Domine,” said I upon his entering, taking my worthy pedagogue by the hand.

“Et tu quoque, fili mi, Jacobe! But whom have we here? the deaf man, the maiden, and—ehu!—the old man called old Tom, and likewise the young Tom;” and the Dominie looked very grave.

“Nay, sir,” said young Tom, going up to the Dominie; “I know you are angry with us, because we both drank too much when we were last in your company; but we promise—don’t we father?—not to do so again.”

This judicious reply of young Tom’s put the Dominie more at his ease; what he most feared was raillery and exposure on their parts.

“Very true, old gentleman; Tom and I did bowse our jibs up a little too taut when we last met—but what then?—there was the grog, and there was nothing to do.”

“All human natur’,” observed Stapleton.

“Come, sir, you have not said one word to me,” said Mary, going up to the Dominie. “Now you must sit down by me, and take care of me, and see that they all behave themselves and keep sober.”

The Dominie cast a look at Mary, which was intended for her alone, but which was not unperceived by young Tom or me. “We shall have some fun, Jacob,” said he, aside, as we all sat down to the table, which just admitted six, with close stowage. The Dominie on one side of Mary, Tom on the other, Stapleton next to Tom, then I and old Tom, who closed in on the other side of the Dominie, putting one of his timber toes on the old gentleman’s corns, which induced him to lift up his leg in a hurry, and draw his chair still closer to Mary, to avoid a repetition of the accident; while old Tom was axing pardon, and Stapleton demonstrating that, on the part of old Tom, not to feel with a wooden leg, and on the part of the Dominie, to feel with a bad corn, was all nothing but “human natur’.” At last we were all seated, and Mary, who had provided for the evening, produced two or three pots of beer, a bottle of spirits, pipes, and tobacco.

“Liberty Hall—I smokes,” said Stapleton, lighting his pipe, and falling back on his chair.

“I’ll put a bit of clay in my mouth too,” followed up old Tom; “it makes one thirsty, and enjoy one’s liquor.”

“Well, I malts,” said Tom, reaching a pot of porter, and taking a long pull. “What do you do, Jacob?”

“I shall wait a little, Tom.”

“And what do you do, sir?” said Mary to the Dominie. The Dominie shook his head. “Nay but you must—or I shall think you do not like my company. Come, let me fill a pipe for you.” Mary filled a pipe, and handed it to the Dominie, who hesitated, looked at her, and was overcome. He lighted it, and smoked furiously.

“The ice is breaking up—we shall have a change of weather—the moon quarters to-morrow,” observed old Tom, puffing between every observation; “and then honest men may earn their bread again. Bad times for you, old codger, heh!” continued he, addressing Stapleton. Stapleton nodded an assent through the smoke, which was first perceived by old Tom. “Well, he ar’nt deaf, a’ter all; I thought he was only shamming a bit. I say, Jacob, this is the weather to blow your fingers, and make your eyes bright.”

“Rather to blow a cloud and make your eyes water,” replied Tom, taking up the pot: “I’m just as thirsty with swallowing smoke, as if I had a pipe myself—at all events, I pipe my eye. Jacob,” continued Tom, to me apart, “do look how the old gentleman is funking Mary, and casting sheeps’ eyes at her through the smoke.”

“He appears as if he were inclined to board her in the smoke,” replied I.

“Yes, and she to make no fight of it, but surrender immediately,” said Tom.

“Don’t you believe it, Tom; I know her better; she wants to laugh at him—nothing more; she winked her eye at me just now, but I would not laugh, as I did not choose that the old gentleman should be trifled with. I will tax her severely to-morrow.”

During all this time old Tom and Stapleton smoked in silence: the Dominie made use of his eyes in dumb parlance to Mary, who answered him with her own bright glances, and Tom and I began to find it rather dull; when at last old Tom’s pipe was exhausted, and he laid it down; “There, I’ll smoke no more—the worst of a pipe is that one can’t smoke and talk at the same time. Mary, my girl, take your eyes off the Dominie’s nose, and hand me that bottle of stuff. What, glass to mix it in; that’s more genteel than we are on board, Tom.” Tom filled a rummer of grog, took half off at a huge sip, and put it down on the table. “Will you do as we do, sir?” said he, addressing the Dominie.

“Nay, friend Dux, nay—pr’ythee persuade me not—avaunt!” and the Dominie, with an appearance of horror, turned away from the bottle handed towards him by old Tom.

“Not drink anything?” said Mary to the Dominie, looking at him with surprise, “but indeed you must, or I shall think you despise us, and do not think us fit to be in your company.”

“Nay, maiden, entreat me not. Ask anything of me but this,” replied the Dominie.

“Ask anything but this—that’s just the way people have of refusing,” replied Mary; “were I to ask anything else, it would be the same answer—‘ask anything but this.’ Now, if you will not drink to please me, I shall quarrel with you. You shall drink a glass, and I’ll mix it for you.” The Dominie shook his head. Mary made a glass of grog, and then put it to her lips. “Now, if you refuse to drink it, after I have tasted it, I’ll never speak to you again.” So saying, she handed the glass to the Dominie.

“Verily, maiden, I must needs refuse, for I did make a mental vow.”

“What vow was that? was it sworn on the Bible?”

“Nay, not on the sacred book, but in my thoughts most solemnly.”

“Oh! I make those vows every day, and never keep one of them; so that won’t do. Now, observe, I give you one more chance. I shall drink a little more, and if you do not immediately put your lips to the same part of the tumbler, I’ll never drink to you again;” Mary put the tumbler again to her lips, drank a little, with her eyes fixed upon the Dominie, who watched her with distended nostrils and muscular agitation of countenance. With her sweetest smile, she handed him the tumbler; the Dominie half held out his hand, withdrew it, put it down again, and by degrees took the tumbler. Mary conquered, and I watched the malice of her look as the liquor trickled down the Dominie’s throat. Tom and I exchanged glances. The Dominie put down the tumbler, and then, looking round, like a guilty person, coloured up to the eyes; but Mary, who perceived that her victory was but half achieved, put her hand upon his shoulder, and asked him to let her taste the grog again. I also, to make him feel more at ease, helped myself to a glass. Tom did the same, and old Tom with more regard to the feelings of the Dominie than in his own bluntness of character I would have given him credit for, said in a quiet tone, “The old gentleman is afraid of grog, because he seed me take a drop too much, but that’s no reason why grog ar’n’t a good thing, and wholesome in moderation. A glass or two is very well, and better still when sweetened by the lips of a pretty girl; and, even if the Dominie does not like it, he’s too much of a gentleman not to give up his dislikes to please a lady. More’s the merit; for, if he did like it, it would be no sacrifice, that’s sartain. Don’t you think so, my old boozer?” continued he, addressing Stapleton, who smoked in silence.

“Human natur’,” replied Stapleton, taking the pipe out of his mouth, and spitting under the table.

“Very true, master; and so here’s to your health, Mr Dominie, and may you never want a pretty girl to talk to, or a glass of grog to drink her health with.”

“Oh, but the Dominie don’t care about pretty girls, father,” replied Tom; “he’s too learned and clever; he thinks about nothing but the moon, and Latin and Greek, and all that.”

“Who can say what’s under the skin, Tom? There’s no knowing what is, and what isn’t—Sall’s shoe for that.”

“Never heard of Sall’s shoe, father; that’s new to me.”

“Didn’t I ever tell you that, Tom?—Well, then, you shall have it now—that is, if all the company be agreeable.”

“Oh, yes,” cried Mary; “pray tell us.”

“Would you like to hear it, sir?”

“I never heard of Sall Sue in my life, and would fain hear her history,” replied the Dominie; “proceed, friend Dux.”

“Well, then, you must know when I was a-board of the Terp-sy-chore, there was a fore-topman, of the name of Bill Harness, a good sort of chap enough, but rather soft in the upper-works. Now, we’d been on the Jamaica station for some years, and had come home, and merry enough, and happy enough we were (those that were left of us), and we were spending our money like the devil. Bill Harness had a wife, who was very fond of he, and he was very fond of she, but she was a slatternly sort of a body, never tidy in her rigging, all adrift at all times, and what’s more, she never had a shoe up at heel, so she went by the name of Slatternly Sall, and the first lieutenant, who was a ’ticular sort of a chap, never liked to see her on deck, for you see she put her hair in paper on New Year’s day, and never changed it or took it out till the year came round again. However, be it as it may be, she loved Bill, and Bill loved she, and they were very happy together. A’ter all, it ain’t whether a woman’s tidy without that makes a man’s happiness; it depends upon whether she be right within; that is, if she be good-tempered, and obliging, and civil, and ’commodating, and so forth. A’ter the first day or two, person’s nothing—eyes get palled, like the cap-stern when the anchor’s up to the bows; but what a man likes is, not to be disturbed by vagaries, or gusts of temper. Well, Bill was happy—but one day he was devilish unhappy, because Sall had lost one of her shoes, which wasn’t to be wondered at, considering as how she was always slipshod. ‘Who has seen my wife’s shoe?’ says he. ‘Hang your wife’s shoe,’ said one, ‘it warn’t worth casting an eye upon;’ Still he cried out, ‘Who has seen my wife’s shoe?’ ‘I seed it,’ says another. ‘Where?’ says Bill. ‘I seed it down at heel,’ says the fellow. But Bill still hallooed out about his wife’s shoe, which it appeared she had dropped off her foot as she was going up the forecastle ladder to take the air a bit, just as it was dark. At last Bill made so much fuss about it that the ship’s company laughed, and all called out to each other, ‘Who has seen Sall’s shoe?—Have you got Sall’s shoe?’ and they passed the word fore and aft the whole evening, till they went to their hammocks. Notwithstanding, as Sall’s shoe was not forthcoming, the next morning Bill goes on the quarter-deck, and complains to the first lieutenant, as how he had lost Sall’s shoe. ‘Damn Sall’s shoe,’ said he, ‘haven’t I enough to look after without your wife’s confounded shoes, which can’t be worth twopence?’ Well, Bill argues that his wife had only one shoe left, and that won’t keep two feet dry, and begs the first lieutenant to order a search for it; but the first lieutenant turns away, and tells him to go to the devil, and all the men grin at Bill’s making such a fuss about nothing. So Bill at last goes up to the first lieutenant, and whispers something, and the first lieutenant booms him off with his speaking trumpet, as if he were making too free, in whispering to his commanding officer, and then sends for the master-at-arms. ‘Collier,’ says he, ‘this man has lost his wife’s shoe: let a search be made for it immediately—take all the ship’s boys, and look everywhere for it; if you find it bring it up to me.’ So away goes the master-at-arms with his cane, and collects all the boys to look for Sall’s shoe—and they go peeping about the maindeck, under the guns, and under the hen-coops, and in the sheep-pen, and everywhere; now and then getting a smart slap with the cane behind, upon the taut part of their trowsers, to make them look sharp, until they all wished Sall’s shoe at Old Nick, and her too, and Bill in the bargain. At last one of the boys picks it out of the manger, where it had lain all the night, poked up and down by the noses of the pigs, who didn’t think it eatable, although it might have smelt human-like; the fact was, it was the same boy who had picked up Sall’s shoe when she dropped it, and had shied it forward. It sartainly did not seem to be worth all the trouble, but howsomever it was taken aft by the master-at-arms, and laid on the capstern head. Then Bill steps out and takes the shoe before the first lieutenant, and cuts it open, and from between the lining pulls out four ten pound notes, which Sall had sewn up there by way of security; and the first lieutenant tells Bill he was a great fool to trust his money in the shoe of a woman who always went slipshod, and tells him to go about his business, and stow his money away in a safer place next time. A’ter, if any thing was better than it looked to be, the ship’s company used always to say it was like Sall’s shoe. There you have it all.”

“Well,” says Stapleton, taking the pipe out of his mouth, “I know a fact, much of a muchness with that, which happened to me when I was below the river, tending a ship at Sheerness—for at one time, d’ye see, I used to ply there. She was an old fifty-gun ship, called the Adamant, if I recollect right. One day the first lieutenant, who, like yourn, was a mighty particular sort of chap, was going round the maindeck, and he sees an old pair of canvas trowsers stowed in under the trunnion of one of the guns. So says he, ‘Whose be these?’ Now, no man would answer, because they knowed very well that it would be as good as a fortnight in the black list. With that, the first lieutenant bundles them out of the port, and away they floats astern with the tide. It was about half-an-hour after that, that I comes off with the milk for the wardroom mess, and a man named Will Heaviside says to me, ‘Stapleton,’ says he, ‘the first lieutenant has thrown my canvas trowsers overboard, and be damned to him; now I must have them back.’ ‘But where be they?’ says I: ‘I suppose down at the bottom by this time, and the flat-fish dubbing their noses into them.’ ‘No, no,’ says he, ‘they wo’n’t never sink, but float till eternity; they be gone down with the tide, and they will come back again; only you keep a sharp look-out for them, and I’ll give you five shillings if you bring them.’ Well, I seed little chance of ever seeing them again, or of my seeing five shillings, but as it so happened next tide, the very ’denticle pair of trowsers comes up staring me in the face. I pulls them in, and takes them to Will Heaviside, who appears to be mightily pleased, and gives me the money. ‘I wouldn’t have lost them for ten, no, not fur twenty pounds,’ says he. ‘At all events you’ve paid me more than they are worth,’ says I. ‘Have I?’ says he; ‘stop a bit;’ and he outs with his knife, and rips open the waistband, and pulls out a piece of linen, and out of the piece of linen he pulls out a child’s caul. ‘There,’ says he, ‘now you knows why the trowsers wouldn’t sink, and I’ll leave you to judge whether they ar’n’t worth five shillings.’ That’s my story.”

“Well, I can’t understand how it is, that a caul should keep people up,” observed old Tom.

“At all events, a call makes people come up fast enough on board a man-of-war, father.”

“That’s true enough, but I’m talking of a child’s caul, not of a boatswain’s, Tom.”

“I’ll just tell you how it is,” replied Stapleton, who had recommenced smoking; “it’s human natur’.”

“What is your opinion, sir?” said Mary to the Dominie.

“Maiden,” replied the Dominie, taking his pipe out of his mouth, “I opine that it’s a vulgar error. Sir Thomas Brown, I think it is, hath the same idea; many and strange were the superstitions which have been handed down by our less enlightened ancestors—all of which mists have been cleared away by the powerful rays of truth.”

“Well, but, master, if a vulgar error saves a man from Davy Jones’s locker, ar’n’t it just as well to sew it up in the waistband of your trowsers?”

“Granted, good Dux; if it would save a man; but how is it possible? it is contrary to the first elements of science.”

“What matter does that make, provided it holds a man up?”

“Friend Dux, thou art obtuse.”