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+The Project Gutenberg eBook of Israel Potter, by Herman Melville
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
+most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
+whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
+of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at
+www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you
+will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before
+using this eBook.
+
+Title: Israel Potter
+
+Author: Herman Melville
+
+Release Date: March 20, 2005 [eBook #15422]
+[Most recently updated: June 15, 2022]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+Produced by: Dave Maddock, Mary Meehan and the PG Online Distributed Proofreading Team
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ISRAEL POTTER ***
+
+
+
+
+ISRAEL POTTER
+
+His Fifty Years of Exile
+
+By Herman Melville
+
+1855
+
+
+DEDICATION
+
+TO
+HIS HIGHNESS
+THE
+Bunker-Hill Monument
+
+Biography, in its purer form, confined to the ended lives of the true
+and brave, may be held the fairest meed of human virtue—one given and
+received in entire disinterestedness—since neither can the biographer
+hope for acknowledgment from the subject, nor the subject at all avail
+himself of the biographical distinction conferred.
+
+Israel Potter well merits the present tribute—a private of Bunker Hill,
+who for his faithful services was years ago promoted to a still deeper
+privacy under the ground, with a posthumous pension, in default of any
+during life, annually paid him by the spring in ever-new mosses and
+sward.
+
+I am the more encouraged to lay this performance at the feet of your
+Highness, because, with a change in the grammatical person, it
+preserves, almost as in a reprint, Israel Potter’s autobiographical
+story. Shortly after his return in infirm old age to his native land, a
+little narrative of his adventures, forlornly published on sleazy gray
+paper, appeared among the peddlers, written, probably, not by himself,
+but taken down from his lips by another. But like the crutch-marks of
+the cripple by the Beautiful Gate, this blurred record is now out of
+print. From a tattered copy, rescued by the merest chance from the
+rag-pickers, the present account has been drawn, which, with the
+exception of some expansions, and additions of historic and personal
+details, and one or two shiftings of scene, may, perhaps, be not
+unfitly regarded something in the light of a dilapidated old tombstone
+retouched.
+
+Well aware that in your Highness’ eyes the merit of the story must be
+in its general fidelity to the main drift of the original narrative, I
+forbore anywhere to mitigate the hard fortunes of my hero; and
+particularly towards the end, though sorely tempted, durst not
+substitute for the allotment of Providence any artistic recompense of
+poetical justice; so that no one can complain of the gloom of my
+closing chapters more profoundly than myself.
+
+Such is the work, and such, the man, that I have the honor to present
+to your Highness. That the name here noted should not have appeared in
+the volumes of Sparks, may or may not be a matter for astonishment; but
+Israel Potter seems purposely to have waited to make his, popular
+advent under the present exalted patronage, seeing that your Highness,
+according to the definition above, may, in the loftiest sense, be
+deemed the Great Biographer: the national commemorator of such of the
+anonymous privates of June 17, 1775, who may never have received other
+requital than the solid reward of your granite.
+
+Your Highness will pardon me, if, with the warmest ascriptions on this
+auspicious occasion, I take the liberty to mingle my hearty
+congratulations on the recurrence of the anniversary day we celebrate,
+wishing your Highness (though indeed your Highness be somewhat
+prematurely gray) many returns of the same, and that each of its
+summer’s suns may shine as brightly on your brow as each winter snow
+shall lightly rest on the grave of Israel Potter.
+
+Your Highness’
+Most devoted and obsequious,
+THE EDITOR.
+
+
+JUNE 17th, 1854.
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+ ISRAEL POTTER
+ CHAPTER I. — THE BIRTHPLACE OF ISRAEL.
+ CHAPTER II. — THE YOUTHFUL ADVENTURES OF ISRAEL.
+ CHAPTER III. — ISRAEL GOES TO THE WARS; AND REACHING BUNKER HILL IN TIME TO BE OF SERVICE THERE, SOON AFTER IS FORCED TO EXTEND HIS TRAVELS ACROSS THE SEA INTO THE ENEMY’S LAND.
+ CHAPTER IV. — FURTHER WANDERINGS OF THE REFUGEE, WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF A GOOD KNIGHT OF BRENTFORD WHO BEFRIENDED HIM.
+ CHAPTER V. — ISRAEL IN THE LION’S DEN.
+ CHAPTER VI. — ISRAEL MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCE OF CERTAIN SECRET FRIENDS OF AMERICA, ONE OF THEM BEING THE FAMOUS AUTHOR OF THE “DIVERSIONS OF PURLEY,” THESE DESPATCH HIM ON A SLY ERRAND ACROSS THE CHANNEL.
+ CHAPTER VII. — AFTER A CURIOUS ADVENTURE UPON THE PONT NEUF, ISRAEL ENTERS THE PRESENCE OF THE RENOWNED SAGE, DR. FRANKLIN, WHOM HE FINDS RIGHT LEARNEDLY AND MULTIFARIOUSLY EMPLOYED.
+ CHAPTER VIII. — WHICH HAS SOMETHING TO SAY ABOUT DR. FRANKLIN AND THE LATIN QUARTER.
+ CHAPTER IX. — ISRAEL IS INITIATED INTO THE MYSTERIES OF LODGING-HOUSES IN THE LATIN QUARTER.
+ CHAPTER X. — ANOTHER ADVENTURER APPEARS UPON THE SCENE.
+ CHAPTER XI. — PAUL JONES IN A REVERIE.
+ CHAPTER XII. — RECROSSING THE CHANNEL, ISRAEL RETURNS TO THE SQUIRE’S ABODE—HIS ADVENTURES THERE.
+ CHAPTER XIII. — HIS ESCAPE FROM THE HOUSE, WITH VARIOUS ADVENTURES FOLLOWING.
+ CHAPTER XIV. — IN WHICH ISRAEL IS SAILOR UNDER TWO FLAGS, AND IN THREE SHIPS, AND ALL IN ONE NIGHT.
+ CHAPTER XV. — THEY SAIL AS FAR AS THE CRAG OF AILSA.
+ CHAPTER XVI. — THEY LOOK IN AT CARRICKFERGUS, AND DESCEND ON WHITEHAVEN.
+ CHAPTER XVII. — THEY CALL AT THE EARL OF SELKIRK’S, AND AFTERWARDS FIGHT THE SHIP-OF-WAR DRAKE.
+ CHAPTER XVIII. — THE EXPEDITION THAT SAILED FROM GROIX.
+ CHAPTER XIX. — THEY FIGHT THE SERAPIS.
+ CHAPTER XX. — THE SHUTTLE.
+ CHAPTER XXI. — SAMSON AMONG THE PHILISTINES.
+ CHAPTER XXII. — SOMETHING FURTHER OF ETHAN ALLEN; WITH ISRAEL’S FLIGHT TOWARDS THE WILDERNESS.
+ CHAPTER XXIII. — ISRAEL IN EGYPT.
+ CHAPTER XXIV. — CONTINUED.
+ CHAPTER XXV. — IN THE CITY OF DIS.
+ CHAPTER XXVI. — FORTY-FIVE YEARS.
+ CHAPTER XXVII. — REQUIESCAT IN PACE.
+
+
+
+
+ISRAEL POTTER
+
+Fifty Years of Exile
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+THE BIRTHPLACE OF ISRAEL.
+
+
+The traveller who at the present day is content to travel in the good
+old Asiatic style, neither rushed along by a locomotive, nor dragged by
+a stage-coach; who is willing to enjoy hospitalities at far-scattered
+farmhouses, instead of paying his bill at an inn; who is not to be
+frightened by any amount of loneliness, or to be deterred by the
+roughest roads or the highest hills; such a traveller in the eastern
+part of Berkshire, Massachusetts, will find ample food for poetic
+reflection in the singular scenery of a country, which, owing to the
+ruggedness of the soil and its lying out of the track of all public
+conveyances, remains almost as unknown to the general tourist as the
+interior of Bohemia.
+
+Travelling northward from the township of Otis, the road leads for
+twenty or thirty miles towards Windsor, lengthwise upon that long
+broken spur of heights which the Green Mountains of Vermont send into
+Massachusetts. For nearly the whole of the distance, you have the
+continual sensation of being upon some terrace in the moon. The feeling
+of the plain or the valley is never yours; scarcely the feeling of the
+earth. Unless by a sudden precipitation of the road you find yourself
+plunging into some gorge, you pass on, and on, and on, upon the crests
+or slopes of pastoral mountains, while far below, mapped out in its
+beauty, the valley of the Housatonie lies endlessly along at your feet.
+Often, as your horse gaining some lofty level tract, flat as a table,
+trots gayly over the almost deserted and sodded road, and your admiring
+eye sweeps the broad landscape beneath, you seem to be Bootes driving
+in heaven. Save a potato field here and there, at long intervals, the
+whole country is either in wood or pasture. Horses, cattle and sheep
+are the principal inhabitants of these mountains. But all through the
+year lazy columns of smoke, rising from the depths of the forest,
+proclaim the presence of that half-outlaw, the charcoal-burner; while
+in early spring added curls of vapor show that the maple sugar-boiler
+is also at work. But as for farming as a regular vocation, there is not
+much of it here. At any rate, no man by that means accumulates a
+fortune from this thin and rocky soil, all whose arable parts have long
+since been nearly exhausted.
+
+Yet during the first settlement of the country, the region was not
+unproductive. Here it was that the original settlers came, acting upon
+the principle well known to have regulated their choice of site,
+namely, the high land in preference to the low, as less subject to the
+unwholesome miasmas generated by breaking into the rich valleys and
+alluvial bottoms of primeval regions. By degrees, however, they quitted
+the safety of this sterile elevation, to brave the dangers of richer
+though lower fields. So that, at the present day, some of those
+mountain townships present an aspect of singular abandonment. Though
+they have never known aught but peace and health, they, in one lesser
+aspect at least, look like countries depopulated by plague and war.
+Every mile or two a house is passed untenanted. The strength of the
+frame-work of these ancient buildings enables them long to resist the
+encroachments of decay. Spotted gray and green with the weather-stain,
+their timbers seem to have lapsed back into their woodland original,
+forming part now of the general picturesqueness of the natural scene.
+They are of extraordinary size, compared with modern farmhouses. One
+peculiar feature is the immense chimney, of light gray stone,
+perforating the middle of the roof like a tower.
+
+On all sides are seen the tokens of ancient industry. As stone abounds
+throughout these mountains, that material was, for fences, as ready to
+the hand as wood, besides being much more durable. Consequently the
+landscape is intersected in all directions with walls of uncommon
+neatness and strength.
+
+The number and length of these walls is not more surprising than the
+size of some of the blocks comprising them. The very Titans seemed to
+have been at work. That so small an army as the first settlers must
+needs have been, should have taken such wonderful pains to enclose so
+ungrateful a soil; that they should have accomplished such herculean
+undertakings with so slight prospect of reward; this is a consideration
+which gives us a significant hint of the temper of the men of the
+Revolutionary era.
+
+Nor could a fitter country be found for the birthplace of the devoted
+patriot, Israel Potter.
+
+To this day the best stone-wall builders, as the best wood-choppers,
+come from those solitary mountain towns; a tall, athletic, and hardy
+race, unerring with the axe as the Indian with the tomahawk; at
+stone-rolling, patient as Sisyphus, powerful as Samson.
+
+In fine clear June days, the bloom of these mountains is beyond
+expression delightful. Last visiting these heights ere she vanishes,
+Spring, like the sunset, flings her sweetest charms upon them. Each
+tuft of upland grass is musked like a bouquet with perfume. The balmy
+breeze swings to and fro like a censer. On one side the eye follows for
+the space of an eagle’s flight, the serpentine mountain chains,
+southwards from the great purple dome of Taconic—the St. Peter’s of
+these hills—northwards to the twin summits of Saddleback, which is the
+two-steepled natural cathedral of Berkshire; while low down to the west
+the Housatonie winds on in her watery labyrinth, through charming
+meadows basking in the reflected rays from the hill-sides. At this
+season the beauty of every thing around you populates the loneliness of
+your way. You would not have the country more settled if you could.
+Content to drink in such loveliness at all your senses, the heart
+desires no company but Nature.
+
+With what rapture you behold, hovering over some vast hollow of the
+hills, or slowly drifting at an immense height over the far sunken
+Housatonie valley, some lordly eagle, who in unshared exaltation looks
+down equally upon plain and mountain. Or you behold a hawk sallying
+from some crag, like a Rhenish baron of old from his pinnacled castle,
+and darting down towards the river for his prey. Or perhaps, lazily
+gliding about in the zenith, this ruffian fowl is suddenly beset by a
+crow, who with stubborn audacity pecks at him, and, spite of all his
+bravery, finally persecutes him back to his stronghold. The otherwise
+dauntless bandit, soaring at his topmost height, must needs succumb to
+this sable image of death. Nor are there wanting many smaller and less
+famous fowl, who without contributing to the grandeur, yet greatly add
+to the beauty of the scene. The yellow-bird flits like a winged jonquil
+here and there; like knots of violets the blue-birds sport in clusters
+upon the grass; while hurrying from the pasture to the grove, the red
+robin seems an incendiary putting torch to the trees. Meanwhile the air
+is vocal with their hymns, and your own soul joys in the general joy.
+Like a stranger in an orchestra, you cannot help singing yourself when
+all around you raise such hosannas.
+
+But in autumn, those gay northerners, the birds, return to their
+southern plantations. The mountains are left bleak and sere. Solitude
+settles down upon them in drizzling mists. The traveller is beset, at
+perilous turns, by dense masses of fog. He emerges for a moment into
+more penetrable air; and passing some gray, abandoned house, sees the
+lofty vapors plainly eddy by its desolate door; just as from the plain
+you may see it eddy by the pinnacles of distant and lonely heights. Or,
+dismounting from his frightened horse, he leads him down some scowling
+glen, where the road steeply dips among grim rocks, only to rise as
+abruptly again; and as he warily picks his way, uneasy at the menacing
+scene, he sees some ghost-like object looming through the mist at the
+roadside; and wending towards it, beholds a rude white stone, uncouthly
+inscribed, marking the spot where, some fifty or sixty years ago, some
+farmer was upset in his wood-sled, and perished beneath the load.
+
+In winter this region is blocked up with snow. Inaccessible and
+impassable, those wild, unfrequented roads, which in August are
+overgrown with high grass, in December are drifted to the arm-pit with
+the white fleece from the sky. As if an ocean rolled between man and
+man, intercommunication is often suspended for weeks and weeks.
+
+Such, at this day, is the country which gave birth to our hero:
+prophetically styled Israel by the good Puritans, his parents, since,
+for more than forty years, poor Potter wandered in the wild wilderness
+of the world’s extremest hardships and ills.
+
+How little he thought, when, as a boy, hunting after his father’s stray
+cattle among these New England hills he himself like a beast should be
+hunted through half of Old England, as a runaway rebel. Or, how could
+he ever have dreamed, when involved in the autumnal vapors of these
+mountains, that worse bewilderments awaited him three thousand miles
+across the sea, wandering forlorn in the coal- foes of London. But so
+it was destined to be. This little boy of the hills, born in sight of
+the sparkling Housatonic, was to linger out the best part of his life a
+prisoner or a pauper upon the grimy banks of the Thames.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+THE YOUTHFUL ADVENTURES OF ISRAEL.
+
+
+Imagination will easily picture the rural day of the youth of Israel.
+Let us pass on to a less immature period.
+
+It appears that he began his wanderings very early; moreover, that ere,
+on just principles throwing off the yoke off his king, Israel, on
+equally excusable grounds, emancipated himself from his sire. He
+continued in the enjoyment of parental love till the age of eighteen,
+when, having formed an attachment for a neighbor’s daughter—for some
+reason, not deemed a suitable match by his father—he was severely
+reprimanded, warned to discontinue his visits, and threatened with some
+disgraceful punishment in case he persisted. As the girl was not only
+beautiful, but amiable—though, as will be seen, rather weak—and her
+family as respectable as any, though unfortunately but poor, Israel
+deemed his father’s conduct unreasonable and oppressive; particularly
+as it turned out that he had taken secret means to thwart his son with
+the girl’s connections, if not with the girl herself, so as to place
+almost insurmountable obstacles to an eventual marriage. For it had not
+been the purpose of Israel to marry at once, but at a future day, when
+prudence should approve the step. So, oppressed by his father, and
+bitterly disappointed in his love, the desperate boy formed the
+determination to quit them both for another home and other friends.
+
+It was on Sunday, while the family were gone to a farmhouse church near
+by, that he packed up as much of his clothing as might be contained in
+a handkerchief, which, with a small quantity of provision, he hid in a
+piece of woods in the rear of the house. He then returned, and
+continued in the house till about nine in the evening, when, pretending
+to go to bed, he passed out of a back door, and hastened to the woods
+for his bundle.
+
+It was a sultry night in July; and that he might travel with the more
+ease on the succeeding day, he lay down at the foot of a pine tree,
+reposing himself till an hour before dawn, when, upon awaking, he heard
+the soft, prophetic sighing of the pine, stirred by the first breath of
+the morning. Like the leaflets of that evergreen, all the fibres of his
+heart trembled within him; tears fell from his eyes. But he thought of
+the tyranny of his father, and what seemed to him the faithlessness of
+his love; and shouldering his bundle, arose, and marched on.
+
+His intention was to reach the new countries to the northward and
+westward, lying between the Dutch settlements on the Hudson, and the
+Yankee settlements on the Housatonic. This was mainly to elude all
+search. For the same reason, for the first ten or twelve miles,
+shunning the public roads, he travelled through the woods; for he knew
+that he would soon be missed and pursued.
+
+He reached his destination in safety; hired out to a farmer for a month
+through the harvest; then crossed from the Hudson to the Connecticut.
+Meeting here with an adventurer to the unknown regions lying about the
+head waters of the latter river, he ascended with this man in a canoe,
+paddling and pulling for many miles. Here again he hired himself out
+for three months; at the end of that time to receive for his wages two
+hundred acres of land lying in New Hampshire. The cheapness of the land
+was not alone owing to the newness of the country, but to the perils
+investing it. Not only was it a wilderness abounding with wild beasts,
+but the widely-scattered inhabitants were in continual dread of being,
+at some unguarded moment, destroyed or made captive by the Canadian
+savages, who, ever since the French war, had improved every opportunity
+to make forays across the defenceless frontier.
+
+His employer proving false to his contract in the matter of the land,
+and there being no law in the country to force him to fulfil it,
+Israel—who, however brave-hearted, and even much of a dare-devil upon a
+pinch, seems nevertheless to have evinced, throughout many parts of his
+career, a singular patience and mildness—was obliged to look round for
+other means of livelihood than clearing out a farm for himself in the
+wilderness. A party of royal surveyors were at this period surveying
+the unsettled regions bordering the Connecticut river to its source. At
+fifteen shillings per month, he engaged himself to this party as
+assistant chain-bearer, little thinking that the day was to come when
+he should clank the king’s chains in a dungeon, even as now he trailed
+them a free ranger of the woods. It was midwinter; the land was
+surveyed upon snow-shoes. At the close of the day, fires were kindled
+with dry hemlock, a hut thrown up, and the party ate and slept.
+
+Paid off at last, Israel bought a gun and ammunition, and turned
+hunter. Deer, beaver, etc., were plenty. In two or three months he had
+many skins to show. I suppose it never entered his mind that he was
+thus qualifying himself for a marksman of men. But thus were tutored
+those wonderful shots who did such execution at Bunker’s Hill; these,
+the hunter-soldiers, whom Putnam bade wait till the white of the
+enemy’s eye was seen.
+
+With the result of his hunting he purchased a hundred acres of land,
+further down the river, toward the more settled parts; built himself a
+log hut, and in two summers, with his own hands, cleared thirty acres
+for sowing. In the winter seasons he hunted and trapped. At the end of
+the two years, he sold back his land—now much improved—to the original
+owner, at an advance of fifty pounds. He conveyed his cash and furs to
+Charlestown, on the Connecticut (sometimes called No. 4), where he
+trafficked them away for Indian blankets, pigments, and other showy
+articles adapted to the business of a trader among savages. It was now
+winter again. Putting his goods on a hand-sled, he started towards
+Canada, a peddler in the wilderness, stopping at wigwams instead of
+cottages. One fancies that, had it been summer, Israel would have
+travelled with a wheelbarrow, and so trundled his wares through the
+primeval forests, with the same indifference as porters roll their
+barrows over the flagging of streets. In this way was bred that
+fearless self-reliance and independence which conducted our forefathers
+to national freedom.
+
+This Canadian trip proved highly successful. Selling his glittering
+goods at a great advance, he received in exchange valuable peltries and
+furs at a corresponding reduction. Returning to Charlestown, he
+disposed of his return cargo again at a very fine profit. And now, with
+a light heart and a heavy purse, he resolved to visit his sweetheart
+and parents, of whom, for three years, he had had no tidings.
+
+They were not less astonished than delighted at his reappearance; he
+had been numbered with the dead. But his love still seemed strangely
+coy; willing, but yet somehow mysteriously withheld. The old intrigues
+were still on foot. Israel soon discovered, that though rejoiced to
+welcome the return of the prodigal son—so some called him—his father
+still remained inflexibly determined against the match, and still
+inexplicably countermined his wooing. With a dolorous heart he mildly
+yielded to what seemed his fatality; and more intrepid in facing peril
+for himself, than in endangering others by maintaining his rights (for
+he was now one-and-twenty), resolved once more to retreat, and quit his
+blue hills for the bluer billows.
+
+A hermitage in the forest is the refuge of the narrow-minded
+misanthrope; a hammock on the ocean is the asylum for the generous
+distressed. The ocean brims with natural griefs and tragedies; and into
+that watery immensity of terror, man’s private grief is lost like a
+drop.
+
+Travelling on foot to Providence, Rhode Island, Israel shipped on board
+a sloop, bound with lime to the West Indies. On the tenth day out, the
+vessel caught fire, from water communicating with the lime. It was
+impossible to extinguish the flames. The boat was hoisted out, but
+owing to long exposure to the sun, it needed continual bailing to keep
+it afloat. They had only time to put in a firkin of butter and a
+ten-gallon keg of water. Eight in number, the crew entrusted themselves
+to the waves, in a leaky tub, many leagues from land. As the boat swept
+under the burning bowsprit, Israel caught at a fragment of the
+flying-jib, which sail had fallen down the stay, owing to the charring,
+nigh the deck, of the rope which hoisted it. Tanned with the smoke, and
+its edge blackened with the fire, this bit of canvass helped them
+bravely on their way. Thanks to kind Providence, on the second day they
+were picked up by a Dutch ship, bound from Eustatia to Holland. The
+castaways were humanely received, and supplied with every necessary. At
+the end of a week, while unsophisticated Israel was sitting in the
+maintop, thinking what should befall him in Holland, and wondering what
+sort of unsettled, wild country it was, and whether there was any
+deer-shooting or beaver-trapping there, lo! an American brig, bound
+from Piscataqua to Antigua, comes in sight. The American took them
+aboard, and conveyed them safely to her port. There Israel shipped for
+Porto Rico; from thence, sailed to Eustatia.
+
+Other rovings ensued; until at last, entering on board a Nantucket
+ship, he hunted the leviathan off the Western Islands and on the coast
+of Africa, for sixteen months; returning at length to Nantucket with a
+brimming hold. From that island he sailed again on another whaling
+voyage, extending, this time, into the great South Sea. There, promoted
+to be harpooner, Israel, whose eye and arm had been so improved by
+practice with his gun in the wilderness, now further intensified his
+aim, by darting the whale-lance; still, unwittingly, preparing himself
+for the Bunker Hill rifle.
+
+In this last voyage, our adventurer experienced to the extreme all the
+hardships and privations of the whaleman’s life on a long voyage to
+distant and barbarous waters—hardships and privations unknown at the
+present day, when science has so greatly contributed, in manifold ways,
+to lessen the sufferings, and add to the comforts of seafaring men.
+Heartily sick of the ocean, and longing once more for the bush, Israel,
+upon receiving his discharge at Nantucket at the end of the voyage,
+hied straight back for his mountain home.
+
+But if hopes of his sweetheart winged his returning flight, such hopes
+were not destined to be crowned with fruition. The dear, false girl was
+another’s.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+ISRAEL GOES TO THE WARS; AND REACHING BUNKER HILL IN TIME TO BE OF
+SERVICE THERE, SOON AFTER IS FORCED TO EXTEND HIS TRAVELS ACROSS THE
+SEA INTO THE ENEMY’S LAND.
+
+
+Left to idle lamentations, Israel might now have planted deep furrows
+in his brow. But stifling his pain, he chose rather to plough, than be
+ploughed. Farming weans man from his sorrows. That tranquil pursuit
+tolerates nothing but tranquil meditations. There, too, in mother
+earth, you may plant and reap; not, as in other things, plant and see
+the planting torn up by the roots. But if wandering in the wilderness,
+and wandering upon the waters, if felling trees, and hunting, and
+shipwreck, and fighting with whales, and all his other strange
+adventures, had not as yet cured poor Israel of his now hopeless
+passion, events were at hand for ever to drown it.
+
+It was the year 1774. The difficulties long pending between the
+colonies and England were arriving at their crisis. Hostilities were
+certain. The Americans were preparing themselves. Companies were formed
+in most of the New England towns, whose members, receiving the name of
+minute-men, stood ready to march anywhere at a minute’s warning.
+Israel, for the last eight months, sojourning as a laborer on a farm in
+Windsor, enrolled himself in the regiment of Colonel John Patterson of
+Lenox, afterwards General Patterson.
+
+The battle of Lexington was fought on the 18th of April, 1775; news of
+it arrived in the county of Berkshire on the 20th about noon. The next
+morning at sunrise, Israel swung his knapsack, shouldered his musket,
+and, with Patterson’s regiment, was on the march, quickstep, towards
+Boston.
+
+Like Putnam, Israel received the stirring tidings at the plough. But
+although not less willing than Putnam to fly to battle at an instant’s
+notice, yet—only half an acre of the field remaining to be finished—he
+whipped up his team and finished it. Before hastening to one duty, he
+would not leave a prior one undone; and ere helping to whip the
+British, for a little practice’ sake, he applied the gad to his oxen.
+From the field of the farmer, he rushed to that of the soldier,
+mingling his blood with his sweat. While we revel in broadcloth, let us
+not forget what we owe to linsey-woolsey.
+
+With other detachments from various quarters, Israel’s regiment
+remained encamped for several days in the vicinity of Charlestown. On
+the seventeenth of June, one thousand Americans, including the regiment
+of Patterson, were set about fortifying Bunker’s Hill. Working all
+through the night, by dawn of the following day, the redoubt was thrown
+up. But every one knows all about the battle. Suffice it, that Israel
+was one of those marksmen whom Putnam harangued as touching the enemy’s
+eyes. Forbearing as he was with his oppressive father and unfaithful
+love, and mild as he was on the farm, Israel was not the same at Bunker
+Hill. Putnam had enjoined the men to aim at the officers; so Israel
+aimed between the golden epaulettes, as, in the wilderness, he had
+aimed between the branching antlers. With dogged disdain of their foes,
+the English grenadiers marched up the hill with sullen slowness; thus
+furnishing still surer aims to the muskets which bristled on the
+redoubt. Modest Israel was used to aver, that considering his practice
+in the woods, he could hardly be regarded as an inexperienced marksman;
+hinting, that every shot which the epauletted grenadiers received from
+his rifle, would, upon a different occasion, have procured him a
+deerskin. And like stricken deers the English, rashly brave as they
+were, fled from the opening fire. But the marksman’s ammunition was
+expended; a hand-to-hand encounter ensued. Not one American musket in
+twenty had a bayonet to it. So, wielding the stock right and left, the
+terrible farmers, with hats and coats off, fought their way among the
+furred grenadiers, knocking them right and left, as seal-hunters on the
+beach knock down with their clubs the Shetland seal. In the dense crowd
+and confusion, while Israel’s musket got interlocked, he saw a blade
+horizontally menacing his feet from the ground. Thinking some fallen
+enemy sought to strike him at the last gasp, dropping his hold on his
+musket, he wrenched at the steel, but found that though a brave hand
+held it, that hand was powerless for ever. It was some British
+officer’s laced sword-arm, cut from the trunk in the act of fighting,
+refusing to yield up its blade to the last. At that moment another
+sword was aimed at Israel’s head by a living officer. In an instant the
+blow was parried by kindred steel, and the assailant fell by a
+brother’s weapon, wielded by alien hands. But Israel did not come off
+unscathed. A cut on the right arm near the elbow, received in parrying
+the officer’s blow, a long slit across the chest, a musket ball buried
+in his hip, and another mangling him near the ankle of the same leg,
+were the tokens of intrepidity which our Sicinius Dentatus carried from
+this memorable field. Nevertheless, with his comrades he succeeded in
+reaching Prospect Hill, and from thence was conveyed to the hospital at
+Cambridge. The bullet was extracted, his lesser wounds were dressed,
+and after much suffering from the fracture of the bone near the ankle,
+several pieces of which were extracted by the surgeon, ere long, thanks
+to the high health and pure blood of the farmer, Israel rejoined his
+regiment when they were throwing up intrenchments on Prospect Hill.
+Bunker Hill was now in possession of the foe, who in turn had fortified
+it.
+
+On the third of July, Washington arrived from the South to take the
+command. Israel witnessed his joyful reception by the huzzaing
+companies.
+
+The British now quartered in Boston suffered greatly from the scarcity
+of provisions. Washington took every precaution to prevent their
+receiving a supply. Inland, all aid could easily be cut off. To guard
+against their receiving any by water, from tories and other disaffected
+persons, the General equipped three armed vessels to intercept all
+traitorous cruisers. Among them was the brigantine Washington, of ten
+guns, commanded by Captain Martiedale. Seamen were hard to be had. The
+soldiers were called upon to volunteer for these vessels. Israel was
+one who so did; thinking that as an experienced sailor he should not be
+backward in a juncture like this, little as he fancied the new service
+assigned.
+
+Three days out of Boston harbor, the brigantine was captured by the
+enemy’s ship Foy, of twenty guns. Taken prisoner with the rest of the
+crew, Israel was afterwards put on board the frigate Tartar, with
+immediate sailing orders for England. Seventy-two were captives in this
+vessel. Headed by Israel, these men—half way across the sea—formed a
+scheme to take the ship, but were betrayed by a renegade Englishman. As
+ringleader, Israel was put in irons, and so remained till the frigate
+anchored at Portsmouth. There he was brought on deck; and would have
+met perhaps some terrible fate, had it not come out, during the
+examination, that the Englishman had been a deserter from the army of
+his native country ere proving a traitor to his adopted one. Relieved
+of his irons, Israel was placed in the marine hospital on shore, where
+half of the prisoners took the small-pox, which swept off a third of
+their number. Why talk of Jaffa?
+
+From the hospital the survivors were conveyed to Spithead, and thrust
+on board a hulk. And here in the black bowels of the ship, sunk low in
+the sunless sea, our poor Israel lay for a month, like Jonah in the
+belly of the whale.
+
+But one bright morning, Israel is hailed from the deck. A bargeman of
+the commander’s boat is sick. Known for a sailor, Israel for the nonce
+is appointed to pull the absent man’s oar.
+
+The officers being landed, some of the crew propose, like merry
+Englishmen as they are, to hie to a neighboring ale-house, and have a
+cosy pot or two together. Agreed. They start, and Israel with them. As
+they enter the ale-house door, our prisoner is suddenly reminded of
+still more imperative calls. Unsuspected of any design, he is allowed
+to leave the party for a moment. No sooner does Israel see his
+companions housed, than putting speed into his feet, and letting grow
+all his wings, he starts like a deer. He runs four miles (so he
+afterwards affirmed) without halting. He sped towards London; wisely
+deeming that once in that crowd detection would be impossible.
+
+Ten miles, as he computed, from where he had left the bargemen,
+leisurely passing a public house of a little village on the roadside,
+thinking himself now pretty safe—hark, what is this he hears?—
+
+“Ahoy!”
+
+“No ship,” says Israel, hurrying on.
+
+“Stop.”
+
+“If you will attend to your business, I will endeavor to attend to
+mine,” replies Israel coolly. And next minute he lets grow his wings
+again; flying, one dare say, at the rate of something less than thirty
+miles an hour.
+
+“Stop thief!” is now the cry. Numbers rushed from the roadside houses.
+After a mile’s chase, the poor panting deer is caught.
+
+Finding it was no use now to prevaricate, Israel boldly confesses
+himself a prisoner-of-war. The officer, a good fellow as it turned out,
+had him escorted back to the inn; where, observing to the landlord that
+this must needs be a true-blooded Yankee, he calls for liquors to
+refresh Israel after his run. Two soldiers are then appointed to guard
+him for the present. This was towards evening; and up to a late hour at
+night, the inn was filled with strangers crowding to see the Yankee
+rebel, as they politely termed him. These honest rustics seemed to
+think that Yankees were a sort of wild creatures, a species of ’possum
+or kangaroo. But Israel is very affable with them. That liquor he drank
+from the hand of his foe, has perhaps warmed his heart towards all the
+rest of his enemies. Yet this may not be wholly so. We shall see. At
+any rate, still he keeps his eye on the main chance—escape. Neither the
+jokes nor the insults of the mob does he suffer to molest him. He is
+cogitating a little plot to himself.
+
+It seems that the good officer—not more true to the king his master
+than indulgent towards the prisoner which that same loyalty made—had
+left orders that Israel should be supplied with whatever liquor he
+wanted that night. So, calling for the can again and again, Israel
+invites the two soldiers to drink and be merry. At length, a wag of the
+company proposes that Israel should entertain the public with a jig, he
+(the wag) having heard that the Yankees were extraordinary dancers. A
+fiddle is brought in, and poor Israel takes the floor. Not a little cut
+to think that these people should so unfeelingly seek to be diverted at
+the expense of an unfortunate prisoner, Israel, while jigging it up and
+down, still conspires away at his private plot, resolving ere long to
+give the enemy a touch of certain Yankee steps, as yet undreamed of in
+their simple philosophy. They would not permit any cessation of his
+dancing till he had danced himself into a perfect sweat, so that the
+drops fell from his lank and flaxen hair. But Israel, with much of the
+gentleness of the dove, is not wholly without the wisdom of the
+serpent. Pleased to see the flowing bowl, he congratulates himself that
+his own state of perspiration prevents it from producing any
+intoxicating effect upon him.
+
+Late at night the company break up. Furnished with a pair of handcuffs,
+the prisoner is laid on a blanket spread upon the floor at the side of
+the bed in which his two keepers are to repose. Expressing much
+gratitude for the blanket, with apparent unconcern, Israel stretches
+his legs. An hour or two passes. All is quiet without.
+
+The important moment had now arrived. Certain it was, that if this
+chance were suffered to pass unimproved, a second would hardly present
+itself. For early, doubtless, on the following morning, if not some way
+prevented, the two soldiers would convey Israel back to his floating
+prison, where he would thenceforth remain confined until the close of
+the war; years and years, perhaps. When he thought of that horrible old
+hulk, his nerves were restrung for flight. But intrepid as he must be
+to compass it, wariness too was needed. His keepers had gone to bed
+pretty well under the influence of the liquor. This was favorable. But
+still, they were full-grown, strong men; and Israel was handcuffed. So
+Israel resolved upon strategy first; and if that failed, force
+afterwards. He eagerly listened. One of the drunken soldiers muttered
+in his sleep, at first lowly, then louder and louder,—“Catch ’em!
+Grapple ’em! Have at ’em! Ha—long cutlasses! Take that, runaway!”
+
+“What’s the matter with ye, Phil?” hiccoughed the other, who was not
+yet asleep. “Keep quiet, will ye? Ye ain’t at Fontenoy now.”
+
+“He’s a runaway prisoner, I say. Catch him, catch him!”
+
+“Oh, stush with your drunken dreaming,” again hiccoughed his comrade,
+violently nudging him. “This comes o’ carousing.”
+
+Shortly after, the dreamer with loud snores fell back into dead sleep.
+But by something in the sound of the breathing of the other soldier,
+Israel knew that this man remained uneasily awake. He deliberated a
+moment what was best to do. At length he determined upon trying his old
+plea. Calling upon the two soldiers, he informed them that urgent
+necessity required his immediate presence somewhere in the rear of the
+house.
+
+“Come, wake up here, Phil,” roared the soldier who was awake; “the
+fellow here says he must step out; cuss these Yankees; no better
+edication than to be gettin’ up on nateral necessities at this time
+o’night. It ain’t nateral; its unnateral. D—-n ye, Yankee, don’t ye
+know no better?”
+
+With many more denunciations, the two now staggered to their feet, and
+clutching hold of Israel, escorted him down stairs, and through a long,
+narrow, dark entry; rearward, till they came to a door. No sooner was
+this unbolted by the foremost guard, than, quick as a flash, manacled
+Israel, shaking off the grasp of the one behind him, butts him
+sprawling back into the entry; when, dashing in the opposite direction,
+he bounces the other head over heels into the garden, never using a
+hand; and then, leaping over the latter’s head, darts blindly out into
+the midnight. Next moment he was at the garden wall. No outlet was
+discoverable in the gloom. But a fruit-tree grew close to the wall.
+Springing into it desperately, handcuffed as he was, Israel leaps atop
+of the barrier, and without pausing to see where he is, drops himself
+to the ground on the other side, and once more lets grow all his wings.
+Meantime, with loud outcries, the two baffled drunkards grope
+deliriously about in the garden.
+
+After running two or three miles, and hearing no sound of pursuit,
+Israel reins up to rid himself of the handcuffs, which impede him.
+After much painful labor he succeeds in the attempt. Pressing on again
+with all speed, day broke, revealing a trim-looking, hedged, and
+beautiful country, soft, neat, and serene, all colored with the fresh
+early tints of the spring of 1776.
+
+Bless me, thought Israel, all of a tremble, I shall certainly be caught
+now; I have broken into some nobleman’s park.
+
+But, hurrying forward again, he came to a turnpike road, and then knew
+that, all comely and shaven as it was, this was simply the open country
+of England; one bright, broad park, paled in with white foam of the
+sea. A copse skirting the road was just bursting out into bud. Each
+unrolling leaf was in very act of escaping from its prison. Israel
+looked at the budding leaves, and round on the budding sod, and up at
+the budding dawn of the day. He was so sad, and these sights were so
+gay, that Israel sobbed like a child, while thoughts of his mountain
+home rushed like a wind on his heart. But conquering this fit, he
+marched on, and presently passed nigh a field, where two figures were
+working. They had rosy cheeks, short, sturdy legs, showing the blue
+stocking nearly to the knee, and were clad in long, coarse, white
+frocks, and had on coarse, broad-brimmed straw hats. Their faces were
+partly averted.
+
+“Please, ladies,” half roguishly says Israel, taking off his hat, “does
+this road go to London?”
+
+At this salutation, the two figures turned in a sort of stupid
+amazement, causing an almost corresponding expression in Israel, who
+now perceived that they were men, and not women. He had mistaken them,
+owing to their frocks, and their wearing no pantaloons, only breeches
+hidden by their frocks.
+
+“Beg pardon, ladies, but I thought ye were something else,” said Israel
+again.
+
+Once more the two figures stared at the stranger, and with added
+boorishness of surprise.
+
+“Does this road go to London, gentlemen?”
+
+“Gentlemen—egad!” cried one of the two.
+
+“Egad!” echoed the second.
+
+Putting their hoes before them, the two frocked boors now took a good
+long look at Israel, meantime scratching their heads under their
+plaited straw hats.
+
+“Does it, gentlemen? Does it go to London? Be kind enough to tell a
+poor fellow, do.”
+
+“Yees goin’ to Lunnun, are yees? Weel—all right—go along.”
+
+And without another word, having now satisfied their rustic curiosity,
+the two human steers, with wonderful phlegm, applied themselves to
+their hoes; supposing, no doubt, that they had given all requisite
+information.
+
+Shortly after, Israel passed an old, dark, mossy-looking chapel, its
+roof all plastered with the damp yellow dead leaves of the previous
+autumn, showered there from a close cluster of venerable trees, with
+great trunks, and overstretching branches. Next moment he found himself
+entering a village. The silence of early morning rested upon it. But
+few figures were seen. Glancing through the window of a now noiseless
+public-house, Israel saw a table all in disorder, covered with empty
+flagons, and tobacco-ashes, and long pipes; some of the latter broken.
+
+After pausing here a moment, he moved on, and observed a man over the
+way standing still and watching him. Instantly Israel was reminded that
+he had on the dress of an English sailor, and that it was this probably
+which had arrested the stranger’s attention. Well knowing that his
+peculiar dress exposed him to peril, he hurried on faster to escape the
+village; resolving at the first opportunity to change his garments. Ere
+long, in a secluded place about a mile from the village, he saw an old
+ditcher tottering beneath the weight of a pick-axe, hoe and shovel,
+going to his work; the very picture of poverty, toil and distress. His
+clothes were tatters.
+
+Making up to this old man, Israel, after a word or two of salutation,
+offered to change clothes with him. As his own clothes were prince-like
+compared to the ditchers, Israel thought that however much his
+proposition might excite the suspicion of the ditcher, yet
+self-interest would prevent his communicating the suspicions. To be
+brief, the two went behind a hedge, and presently Israel emerged,
+presenting the most forlorn appearance conceivable; while the old
+ditcher hobbled off in an opposite direction, correspondingly improved
+in his aspect; though it was rather ludicrous than otherwise, owing to
+the immense bagginess of the sailor-trowsers flapping about his lean
+shanks, to say nothing of the spare voluminousness of the pea-jacket.
+But Israel—how deplorable, how dismal his plight! Little did he ween
+that these wretched rags he now wore, were but suitable to that long
+career of destitution before him: one brief career of adventurous
+wanderings; and then, forty torpid years of pauperism. The coat was all
+patches. And no two patches were alike, and no one patch was the color
+of the original cloth. The stringless breeches gaped wide open at the
+knee; the long woollen stockings looked as if they had been set up at
+some time for a target. Israel looked suddenly metamorphosed from youth
+to old age; just like an old man of eighty he looked. But, indeed,
+dull, dreary adversity was now in store for him; and adversity, come it
+at eighteen or eighty, is the true old age of man. The dress befitted
+the fate.
+
+From the friendly old ditcher, Israel learned the exact course he must
+steer for London; distant now between seventy and eighty miles. He was
+also apprised by his venerable friend, that the country was filled with
+soldiers on the constant look-out for deserters whether from the navy
+or army, for the capture of whom a stipulated reward was given, just as
+in Massachusetts at that time for prowling bears.
+
+Having solemnly enjoined his old friend not to give any information,
+should any one he meet inquire for such a person as Israel, our
+adventurer walked briskly on, less heavy of heart, now that he felt
+comparatively safe in disguise.
+
+Thirty miles were travelled that day. At night Israel stole into a
+barn, in hopes of finding straw or hay for a bed. But it was spring;
+all the hay and straw were gone. So after groping about in the dark, he
+was fain to content himself with an undressed sheep-skin. Cold, hungry,
+foot-sore, weary, and impatient for the morning dawn, Israel drearily
+dozed out the night.
+
+By the first peep of day coming through the chinks of the barn, he was
+up and abroad. Ere long finding himself in the suburbs of a
+considerable village, the better to guard against detection he supplied
+himself with a rude crutch, and feigning himself a cripple, hobbled
+straight through the town, followed by a perverse-minded cur, which
+kept up a continual, spiteful, suspicious bark. Israel longed to have
+one good rap at him with his crutch, but thought it would hardly look
+in character for a poor old cripple to be vindictive.
+
+A few miles further, and he came to a second village. While hobbling
+through its main street, as through the former one, he was suddenly
+stopped by a genuine cripple, all in tatters, too, who, with a
+sympathetic air, inquired after the cause of his lameness.
+
+“White swelling,” says Israel.
+
+“That’s just my ailing,” wheezed the other; “but you’re lamer than me,”
+he added with a forlorn sort of self-satisfaction, critically eyeing
+Israel’s limp as once, more he stumped on his way, not liking to tarry
+too long.
+
+“But halloo, what’s your hurry, friend?” seeing Israel fairly
+departing—“where’re you going?”
+
+“To London,” answered Israel, turning round, heartily wishing the old
+fellow any where else than present.
+
+“Going to limp to Lunnun, eh? Well, success to ye.”
+
+“As much to you, sir,” answers Israel politely.
+
+Nigh the opposite suburbs of this village, as good fortune would have
+it, an empty baggage-wagon bound for the metropolis turned into the
+main road from a side one. Immediately Israel limps most deplorably,
+and begs the driver to give a poor cripple a lift. So up he climbs; but
+after a time, finding the gait of the elephantine draught-horses
+intolerably slow, Israel craves permission to dismount, when, throwing
+away his crutch, he takes nimbly to his legs, much to the surprise of
+his honest friend the driver.
+
+The only advantage, if any, derived from his trip in the wagon, was,
+when passing through a third village—but a little distant from the
+previous one—Israel, by lying down in the wagon, had wholly avoided
+being seen.
+
+The villages surprised him by their number and proximity. Nothing like
+this was to be seen at home. Well knowing that in these villages he ran
+much more risk of detection than in the open country, he henceforth did
+his best to avoid them, by taking a roundabout course whenever they
+came in sight from a distance. This mode of travelling not only
+lengthened his journey, but put unlooked-for obstacles in his
+path—walls, ditches, and streams.
+
+Not half an hour after throwing away his crutch, he leaped a great
+ditch ten feet wide, and of undiscoverable muddy depth. I wonder if the
+old cripple would think me the lamer one now, thought Israel to
+himself, arriving on the hither side.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+FURTHER WANDERINGS OF THE REFUGEE, WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF A GOOD KNIGHT
+OF BRENTFORD WHO BEFRIENDED HIM.
+
+
+At nightfall, on the third day, Israel had arrived within sixteen miles
+of the capital. Once more he sought refuge in a barn. This time he
+found some hay, and flinging himself down procured a tolerable night’s
+rest.
+
+Bright and early he arose refreshed, with the pleasing prospect of
+reaching his destination ere noon. Encouraged to find himself now so
+far from his original pursuers, Israel relaxed in his vigilance, and
+about ten o’clock, while passing through the town of Staines, suddenly
+encountered three soldiers. Unfortunately in exchanging clothes with
+the ditcher, he could not bring himself to include his shirt in the
+traffic, which shirt was a British navy shirt, a bargeman’s shirt, and
+though hitherto he had crumpled the blue collar out of sight, yet, as
+it appeared in the present instance, it was not thoroughly concealed.
+At any rate, keenly on the look-out for deserters, and made acute by
+hopes of reward for their apprehension, the soldiers spied the fatal
+collar, and in an instant laid violent hands on the refugee.
+
+“Hey, lad!” said the foremost soldier, a corporal, “you are one of his
+majesty’s seamen! come along with ye.”
+
+So, unable to give any satisfactory account of himself, he was made
+prisoner on the spot, and soon after found himself handcuffed and
+locked up in the Bound House of the place, a prison so called,
+appropriated to runaways, and those convicted of minor offences. Day
+passed dinnerless and supperless in this dismal durance, and night came
+on.
+
+Israel had now been three days without food, except one two-penny loaf.
+The cravings of hunger now became sharper; his spirits, hitherto arming
+him with fortitude, began to forsake him. Taken captive once again upon
+the very brink of reaching his goal, poor Israel was on the eve of
+falling into helpless despair. But he rallied, and considering that
+grief would only add to his calamity, sought with stubborn patience to
+habituate himself to misery, but still hold aloof from despondency. He
+roused himself, and began to bethink him how to be extricated from this
+labyrinth.
+
+Two hours sawing across the grating of the window, ridded him of his
+handcuffs. Next came the door, secured luckily with only a hasp and
+padlock. Thrusting the bolt of his handcuffs through a small window in
+the door, he succeeded in forcing the hasp and regaining his liberty
+about three o’clock in the morning.
+
+Not long after sunrise, he passed nigh Brentford, some six or seven
+miles from the capital. So great was his hunger that downright
+starvation seemed before him. He chewed grass, and swallowed it. Upon
+first escaping from the hulk, six English pennies was all the money he
+had. With two of these he had bought a small loaf the day after fleeing
+the inn. The other four still remained in his pocket, not having met
+with a good opportunity to dispose of them for food.
+
+Having torn off the collar of his shirt, and flung it into a hedge, he
+ventured to accost a respectable carpenter at a pale fence, about a
+mile this side of Brentford, to whom his deplorable situation now
+induced him to apply for work. The man did not wish himself to hire,
+but said that if he (Israel) understood farming or gardening, he might
+perhaps procure work from Sir John Millet, whose seat, he said, was not
+remote. He added that the knight was in the habit of employing many men
+at that season of the year, so he stood a fair chance.
+
+Revived a little by this prospect of relief, Israel starts in quest of
+the gentleman’s seat, agreeably to the direction received. But he
+mistook his way, and proceeding up a gravelled and beautifully
+decorated walk, was terrified at catching a glimpse of a number of
+soldiers thronging a garden. He made an instant retreat before being
+espied in turn. No wild creature of the American wilderness could have
+been more panic-struck by a firebrand, than at this period hunted
+Israel was by a red coat. It afterwards appeared that this garden was
+the Princess Amelia’s.
+
+Taking another path, ere long he came to some laborers shovelling
+gravel. These proved to be men employed by Sir John. By them he was
+directed towards the house, when the knight was pointed out to him,
+walking bare-headed in the inclosure with several guests. Having heard
+the rich men of England charged with all sorts of domineering
+qualities, Israel felt no little misgiving in approaching to an
+audience with so imposing a stranger. But, screwing up his courage, he
+advanced; while seeing him coming all rags and tatters, the group of
+gentlemen stood in some wonder awaiting what so singular a phantom
+might want.
+
+“Mr. Millet,” said Israel, bowing towards the bare-headed gentleman.
+
+“Ha,—who are you, pray?”
+
+“A poor fellow, sir, in want of work.”
+
+“A wardrobe, too, I should say,” smiled one of the guests, of a very
+youthful, prosperous, and dandified air.
+
+“Where’s your hoe?” said Sir John.
+
+“I have none, sir.”
+
+“Any money to buy one?”
+
+“Only four English pennies, sir.”
+
+“_English_ pennies. What other sort would you have?”
+
+“Why, China pennies to be sure,” laughed the youthful gentleman. “See
+his long, yellow hair behind; he looks like a Chinaman. Some
+broken-down Mandarin. Pity he’s no crown to his old hat; if he had, he
+might pass it round, and make eight pennies of his four.”
+
+“Will you hire me, Mr. Millet,” said Israel.
+
+“Ha! that’s queer again,” cried the knight.
+
+“Hark ye, fellow,” said a brisk servant, approaching from the porch,
+“this is Sir John Millet.”
+
+Seeming to take pity on his seeming ignorance, as well as on his
+undisputable poverty, the good knight now told Israel that if he would
+come the next morning he would see him supplied with a hoe, and
+moreover would hire him.
+
+It would be hard to express the satisfaction of the wanderer at
+receiving this encouraging reply. Emboldened by it, he now returns
+towards a baker’s he had spied, and bravely marching in, flings down
+all four pennies, and demands bread. Thinking he would not have any
+more food till next morning, Israel resolved to eat only one of the
+pair of two-penny loaves. But having demolished one, it so sharpened
+his longing, that yielding to the irresistible temptation, he bolted
+down the second loaf to keep the other company.
+
+After resting under a hedge, he saw the sun far descended, and so
+prepared himself for another hard night. Waiting till dark, he crawled
+into an old carriage-house, finding nothing there but a dismantled old
+phaeton. Into this he climbed, and curling himself up like a
+carriage-dog, endeavored to sleep; but, unable to endure the constraint
+of such a bed, got out, and stretched himself on the bare boards of the
+floor.
+
+No sooner was light in the east than he fastened to await the commands
+of one who, his instinct told him, was destined to prove his
+benefactor. On his father’s farm accustomed to rise with the lark,
+Israel was surprised to discover, as he approached the house, that no
+soul was astir. It was four o’clock. For a considerable time he walked
+back and forth before the portal ere any one appeared. The first riser
+was a man servant of the household, who informed Israel that seven
+o’clock was the hour the people went to their work. Soon after he met
+an hostler of the place, who gave him permission to lie on some straw
+in an outhouse. There he enjoyed a sweet sleep till awakened at seven
+o’clock by the sounds of activity around him.
+
+Supplied by the overseer of the men with a large iron fork and a hoe,
+he followed the hands into the field. He was so weak he could hardly
+support his tools. Unwilling to expose his debility, he yet could not
+succeed in concealing it. At last, to avoid worse imputations, he
+confessed the cause. His companions regarded him with compassion, and
+exempted him from the severer toil.
+
+About noon the knight visited his workmen. Noticing that Israel made
+little progress, he said to him, that though he had long arms and broad
+shoulders, yet he was feigning himself to be a very weak man, or
+otherwise must in reality be so.
+
+Hereupon one of the laborers standing by informed the gentleman how it
+was with Israel, when immediately the knight put a shilling into his
+hands and bade him go to a little roadside inn, which was nearer than
+the house, and buy him bread and a pot of beer. Thus refreshed he
+returned to the band, and toiled with them till four o’clock, when the
+day’s work was over.
+
+Arrived at the house he there again saw his employer, who, after
+attentively eyeing him without speaking, bade a meal be prepared for
+him, when the maid presenting a smaller supply than her kind master
+deemed necessary, she was ordered to return and bring out the entire
+dish. But aware of the danger of sudden repletion of heavy food to one
+in his condition, Israel, previously recruited by the frugal meal at
+the inn, partook but sparingly. The repast was spread on the grass, and
+being over, the good knight again looking inquisitively at Israel,
+ordered a comfortable bed to be laid in the barn, and here Israel spent
+a capital night.
+
+After breakfast, next morning, he was proceeding to go with the
+laborers to their work, when his employer approaching him with a
+benevolent air, bade him return to his couch, and there remain till he
+had slept his fill, and was in a better state to resume his labors.
+
+Upon coming forth again a little after noon, he found Sir John walking
+alone in the grounds. Upon discovering him, Israel would have
+retreated, fearing that he might intrude; but beckoning him to advance,
+the knight, as Israel drew nigh, fixed on him such a penetrating
+glance, that our poor hero quaked to the core. Neither was his dread of
+detection relieved by the knight’s now calling in a loud voice for one
+from the house. Israel was just on the point of fleeing, when
+overhearing the words of the master to the servant who now appeared,
+all dread departed:
+
+“Bring hither some wine!”
+
+It presently came; by order of the knight the salver was set down on a
+green bank near by, and the servant retired.
+
+“My poor fellow,” said Sir John, now pouring out a glass of wine, and
+handing it to Israel, “I perceive that you are an American; and, if I
+am not mistaken, you are an escaped prisoner of war. But no fear—drink
+the wine.”
+
+“Mr. Millet,” exclaimed Israel aghast, the untasted wine trembling in
+his hand, “Mr. Millet, I—”
+
+“_Mr_. Millet—there it is again. Why don’t you say _Sir John_ like the
+rest?”
+
+“Why, sir—pardon me—but somehow, I can’t. I’ve tried; but I can’t. You
+won’t betray me for that?”
+
+“Betray—poor fellow! Hark ye, your history is doubtless a secret which
+you would not wish to divulge to a stranger; but whatever happens to
+you, I pledge you my honor I will never betray you.”
+
+“God bless you for that, Mr. Millet.”
+
+“Come, come; call me by my right name. I am not Mr. Millet. _You_ have
+said _Sir_ to me; and no doubt you have a thousand times said _John_ to
+other people. Now can’t you couple the two? Try once. Come. Only _Sir_
+and then _John_—_Sir John_—that’s all.”
+
+“John—I can’t—Sir, sir!—your pardon. I didn’t mean that.”
+
+“My good fellow,” said the knight looking sharply upon Israel, “tell
+me, are all your countrymen like you? If so, it’s no use fighting them.
+To that effect, I must write to his Majesty myself. Well, I excuse you
+from Sir Johnning me. But tell me the truth, are you not a seafaring
+man, and lately a prisoner of war?”
+
+Israel frankly confessed it, and told his whole story. The knight
+listened with much interest; and at its conclusion, warned Israel to
+beware of the soldiers; for owing to the seats of some of the royal
+family being in the neighborhood, the red-coats abounded hereabout.
+
+“I do not wish unnecessarily to speak against my own countrymen,” he
+added, “I but plainly speak for your good. The soldiers you meet
+prowling on the roads, are not fair specimens of the army. They are a
+set of mean, dastardly banditti, who, to obtain their fee, would betray
+their best friends. Once more, I warn you against them. But enough;
+follow me now to the house, and as you tell me you have exchanged
+clothes before now, you can do it again. What say you? I will give you
+coat and breeches for your rags.”
+
+Thus generously supplied with clothes and other comforts by the good
+knight, and implicitly relying upon the honor of so kind-hearted a man,
+Israel cheered up, and in the course of two or three weeks had so
+fattened his flanks, that he was able completely to fill Sir John’s old
+buckskin breeches, which at first had hung but loosely about him.
+
+He was assigned to an occupation which removed him from the other
+workmen. The strawberry bed was put under his sole charge. And often,
+of mild, sunny afternoons, the knight, genial and gentle with dinner,
+would stroll bare-headed to the pleasant strawberry bed, and have nice
+little confidential chats with Israel; while Israel, charmed by the
+patriarchal demeanor of this true Abrahamic gentleman, with a smile on
+his lip, and tears of gratitude in his eyes, offered him, from time to
+time, the plumpest berries of the bed.
+
+When the strawberry season was over, other parts of the grounds were
+assigned him. And so six months elapsed, when, at the recommendation of
+Sir John, Israel procured a good berth in the garden of the Princess
+Amelia.
+
+So completely now had recent events metamorphosed him in all outward
+things, that few suspected him of being any other than an Englishman.
+Not even the knight’s domestics. But in the princess’s garden, being
+obliged to work in company with many other laborers, the war was often
+a topic of discussion among them. And “the d—d Yankee rebels” were not
+seldom the object of scurrilous remark. Illy could the exile brook in
+silence such insults upon the country for which he had bled, and for
+whose honored sake he was that very instant a sufferer. More than once,
+his indignation came very nigh getting the better of his prudence. He
+longed for the war to end, that he might but speak a little bit of his
+mind.
+
+Now the superintendent of the garden was a harsh, overbearing man. The
+workmen with tame servility endured his worst affronts. But Israel,
+bred among mountains, found it impossible to restrain himself when made
+the undeserved object of pitiless epithets. Ere two months went by, he
+quitted the service of the princess, and engaged himself to a farmer in
+a small village not far from Brentford. But hardly had he been here
+three weeks, when a rumor again got afloat that he was a Yankee
+prisoner of war. Whence this report arose he could never discover. No
+sooner did it reach the ears of the soldiers, than they were on the
+alert. Luckily, Israel was apprised of their intentions in time. But he
+was hard pushed. He was hunted after with a perseverance worthy a less
+ignoble cause. He had many hairbreadth escapes. Most assuredly he would
+have been captured, had it not been for the secret good offices of a
+few individuals, who, perhaps, were not unfriendly to the American side
+of the question, though they durst not avow it.
+
+Tracked one night by the soldiers to the house of one of these friends,
+in whose garret he was concealed, he was obliged to force the skuttle,
+and running along the roof, passed to those of adjoining houses to the
+number of ten or twelve, finally succeeding in making his escape.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+ISRAEL IN THE LION’S DEN.
+
+
+Harassed day and night, hunted from food and sleep, driven from hole to
+hole like a fox in the woods, with no chance to earn an hour’s wages,
+he was at last advised by one whose sincerity he could not doubt, to
+apply, on the good word of Sir John Millet, for a berth as laborer in
+the King’s Gardens at Kew. There, it was said, he would be entirely
+safe, as no soldier durst approach those premises to molest any soul
+therein employed. It struck the poor exile as curious, that the very
+den of the British lion, the private grounds of the British King,
+should be commended to a refugee as his securest asylum.
+
+His nativity carefully concealed, and being personally introduced to
+the chief gardener by one who well knew him; armed, too, with a line
+from Sir John, and recommended by his introducer as uncommonly expert
+at horticulture; Israel was soon installed as keeper of certain less
+private plants and walks of the park.
+
+It was here, to one of his near country retreats, that, coming from
+perplexities of state—leaving far behind him the dingy old bricks of
+St. James—George the Third was wont to walk up and down beneath the
+long arbors formed by the interlockings of lofty trees.
+
+More than once, raking the gravel, Israel through intervening foliage
+would catch peeps in some private but parallel walk, of that lonely
+figure, not more shadowy with overhanging leaves than with the shade of
+royal meditations.
+
+Unauthorized and abhorrent thoughts will sometimes invade the best
+human heart. Seeing the monarch unguarded before him; remembering that
+the war was imputed more to the self-will of the King than to the
+willingness of parliament or the nation; and calling to mind all his
+own sufferings growing out of that war, with all the calamities of his
+country; dim impulses, such as those to which the regicide Ravaillae
+yielded, would shoot balefully across the soul of the exile. But
+thrusting Satan behind him, Israel vanquished all such temptations. Nor
+did these ever more disturb him, after his one chance conversation with
+the monarch.
+
+As he was one day gravelling a little by-walk, wrapped in thought, the
+King turning a clump of bushes, suddenly brushed Israel’s person.
+
+Immediately Israel touched his hat—but did not remove it—bowed, and was
+retiring; when something in his air arrested the King’s attention.
+
+“You ain’t an Englishman,—no Englishman—no, no.”
+
+Pale as death, Israel tried to answer something; but knowing not what
+to say, stood frozen to the ground.
+
+“You are a Yankee—a Yankee,” said the King again in his rapid and
+half-stammering way.
+
+Again Israel assayed to reply, but could not. What could he say? Could
+he lie to a King?
+
+“Yes, yes,—you are one of that stubborn race,—that very stubborn race.
+What brought you here?”
+
+“The fate of war, sir.”
+
+“May it please your Majesty,” said a low cringing voice, approaching,
+“this man is in the walk against orders. There is some mistake, may it
+please your Majesty. Quit the walk, blockhead,” he hissed at Israel.
+
+It was one of the junior gardeners who thus spoke. It seems that Israel
+had mistaken his directions that morning.
+
+“Slink, you dog,” hissed the gardener again to Israel; then aloud to
+the King, “A mistake of the man, I assure your Majesty.”
+
+“Go you away—away with ye, and leave him with me,” said the king.
+
+Waiting a moment, till the man was out of hearing, the king again
+turned upon Israel.
+
+“Were you at Bunker Hill?—that bloody Bunker Hill—eh, eh?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Fought like a devil—like a very devil, I suppose?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Helped flog—helped flog my soldiers?”
+
+“Yes, sir; but very sorry to do it.”
+
+“Eh?—eh?—how’s that?”
+
+“I took it to be my sad duty, sir.”
+
+“Very much mistaken—very much mistaken, indeed. Why do ye sir me?—eh?
+I’m your king—your king.”
+
+“Sir,” said Israel firmly, but with deep respect, “I have no king.”
+
+The king darted his eye incensedly for a moment; but without quailing,
+Israel, now that all was out, still stood with mute respect before him.
+The king, turning suddenly, walked rapidly away from Israel a moment,
+but presently returning with a less hasty pace, said, “You are rumored
+to be a spy—a spy, or something of that sort—ain’t you? But I know you
+are not—no, no. You are a runaway prisoner of war, eh? You have sought
+this place to be safe from pursuit, eh? eh? Is it not so?—eh? eh? eh?”
+
+“Sir, it is.”
+
+“Well, ye’re an honest rebel—rebel, yes, rebel. Hark ye, hark. Say
+nothing of this talk to any one. And hark again. So long as you remain
+here at Kew, I shall see that you are safe—safe.”
+
+“God bless your Majesty!”
+
+“Eh?”
+
+“God bless your noble Majesty?”
+
+“Come—come—come,” smiled the king in delight, “I thought I could
+conquer ye—conquer ye.”
+
+“Not the king, but the king’s kindness, your Majesty.”
+
+“Join my army—army.”
+
+Sadly looking down, Israel silently shook his head.
+
+“You won’t? Well, gravel the walk then—gravel away. Very stubborn
+race—very stubborn race, indeed—very—very—very.”
+
+And still growling, the magnanimous lion departed. How the monarch came
+by his knowledge of so humble an exile, whether through that swift
+insight into individual character said to form one of the miraculous
+qualities transmitted with a crown, or whether some of the rumors
+prevailing outside of the garden had come to his ear, Israel could
+never determine. Very probably, though, the latter was the case,
+inasmuch as some vague shadowy report of Israel not being an
+Englishman, had, a little previous to his interview with the king, been
+communicated to several of the inferior gardeners. Without any
+impeachment of Israel’s fealty to his country, it must still be
+narrated, that from this his familiar audience with George the Third,
+he went away with very favorable views of that monarch. Israel now
+thought that it could not be the warm heart of the king, but the cold
+heads of his lords in council, that persuaded him so tyrannically to
+persecute America. Yet hitherto the precise contrary of this had been
+Israel’s opinion, agreeably to the popular prejudice throughout New
+England.
+
+Thus we see what strange and powerful magic resides in a crown, and how
+subtly that cheap and easy magnanimity, which in private belongs to
+most kings, may operate on good-natured and unfortunate souls. Indeed,
+had it not been for the peculiar disinterested fidelity of our
+adventurer’s patriotism, he would have soon sported the red coat; and
+perhaps under the immediate patronage of his royal friend, been
+advanced in time to no mean rank in the army of Britain. Nor in that
+case would we have had to follow him, as at last we shall, through
+long, long years of obscure and penurious wandering.
+
+Continuing in the service of the king’s gardeners at Kew, until a
+season came when the work of the garden required a less number of
+laborers, Israel, with several others, was discharged; and the day
+after, engaged himself for a few months to a farmer in the neighborhood
+where he had been last employed. But hardly a week had gone by, when
+the old story of his being a rebel, or a runaway prisoner, or a Yankee,
+or a spy, began to be revived with added malignity. Like bloodhounds,
+the soldiers were once more on the track. The houses where he harbored
+were many times searched; but thanks to the fidelity of a few earnest
+well-wishers, and to his own unsleeping vigilance and activity, the
+hunted fox still continued to elude apprehension. To such extremities
+of harassment, however, did this incessant pursuit subject him, that in
+a fit of despair he was about to surrender himself, and submit to his
+fate, when Providence seasonably interposed in his favor.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+ISRAEL MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCE OF CERTAIN SECRET FRIENDS OF AMERICA, ONE
+OF THEM BEING THE FAMOUS AUTHOR OF THE “DIVERSIONS OF PURLEY,” THESE
+DESPATCH HIM ON A SLY ERRAND ACROSS THE CHANNEL.
+
+
+At this period, though made the victims indeed of British oppression,
+yet the colonies were not totally without friends in Britain. It was
+but natural that when Parliament itself held patriotic and gifted men,
+who not only recommended conciliatory measures, but likewise denounced
+the war as monstrous; it was but natural that throughout the nation at
+large there should be many private individuals cherishing similar
+sentiments, and some who made no scruple clandestinely to act upon
+them.
+
+Late one night while hiding in a farmer’s granary, Israel saw a man
+with a lantern approaching. He was about to flee, when the man hailed
+him in a well-known voice, bidding him have no fear. It was the farmer
+himself. He carried a message to Israel from a gentleman of Brentford,
+to the effect, that the refugee was earnestly requested to repair on
+the following evening to that gentleman’s mansion.
+
+At first, Israel was disposed to surmise that either the farmer was
+playing him false, or else his honest credulity had been imposed upon
+by evil-minded persons. At any rate, he regarded the message as a
+decoy, and for half an hour refused to credit its sincerity. But at
+length he was induced to think a little better of it. The gentleman
+giving the invitation was one Squire Woodcock, of Brentford, whose
+loyalty to the king had been under suspicion; so at least the farmer
+averred. This latter information was not without its effect.
+
+At nightfall on the following day, being disguised in strange clothes
+by the farmer, Israel stole from his retreat, and after a few hours’
+walk, arrived before the ancient brick house of the Squire; who opening
+the door in person, and learning who it was that stood there, at once
+assured Israel in the most solemn manner, that no foul play was
+intended. So the wanderer suffered himself to enter, and be conducted
+to a private chamber in the rear of the mansion, where were seated two
+other gentlemen, attired, in the manner of that age, in long laced
+coats, with small-clothes, and shoes with silver buckles.
+
+“I am John Woodcock,” said the host, “and these gentlemen are Horne
+Tooke and James Bridges. All three of us are friends to America. We
+have heard of you for some weeks past, and inferring from your conduct,
+that you must be a Yankee of the true blue stamp, we have resolved to
+employ you in a way which you cannot but gladly approve; for surely,
+though an exile, you are still willing to serve your country; if not as
+a sailor or soldier, yet as a traveller?”
+
+“Tell me how I may do it?” demanded Israel, not completely at ease.
+
+“At that in good time,” smiled the Squire. “The point is now—do you
+repose confidence in my statements?”
+
+Israel glanced inquiringly upon the Squire; then upon his companions;
+and meeting the expressive, enthusiastic, candid countenance of Horne
+Tooke—then in the first honest ardor of his political career—turned to
+the Squire, and said, “Sir, I believe what you have said. Tell me now
+what I am to do.”
+
+“Oh, there is just nothing to be done to-night,” said the Squire; “nor
+for some days to come perhaps, but we wanted to have you prepared.”
+
+And hereupon he hinted to his guest rather vaguely of his general
+intention; and that over, begged him to entertain them with some
+account of his adventures since he first took up arms for his country.
+To this Israel had no objections in the world, since all men love to
+tell the tale of hardships endured in a righteous cause. But ere
+beginning his story, the Squire refreshed him with some cold beef, laid
+in a snowy napkin, and a glass of Perry, and thrice during the
+narration of the adventures, pressed him with additional draughts.
+
+But after his second glass, Israel declined to drink more, mild as the
+beverage was. For he noticed, that not only did the three gentlemen
+listen with the utmost interest to his story, but likewise interrupted
+him with questions and cross-questions in the most pertinacious manner.
+So this led him to be on his guard, not being absolutely certain yet,
+as to who they might really be, or what was their real design. But as
+it turned out, Squire Woodcock and his friends only sought to satisfy
+themselves thoroughly, before making their final disclosures, that the
+exile was one in whom implicit confidence might be placed.
+
+And to this desirable conclusion they eventually came, for upon the
+ending of Israel’s story, after expressing their sympathies for his
+hardships, and applauding his generous patriotism in so patiently
+enduring adversity, as well as singing the praises of his gallant
+fellow-soldiers of Bunker Hill, they openly revealed their scheme. They
+wished to know whether Israel would undertake a trip to Paris, to carry
+an important message—shortly to be received for transmission through
+them—to Doctor Franklin, then in that capital.
+
+“All your expenses shall be paid, not to speak of a compensation
+besides,” said the Squire; “will you go?”
+
+“I must think of it,” said Israel, not yet wholly confirmed in his
+mind. But once more he cast his glance on Horne Tooke, and his
+irresolution was gone.
+
+The Squire now informed Israel that, to avoid suspicions, it would be
+necessary for him to remove to another place until the hour at which he
+should start for Paris. They enjoined upon him the profoundest secresy,
+gave him a guinea, with a letter for a gentleman in White Waltham, a
+town some miles from Brentford, which point they begged him to reach as
+soon as possible, there to tarry for further instructions.
+
+Having informed him of thus much, Squire Woodcock asked him to hold out
+his right foot.
+
+“What for?” said Israel.
+
+“Why, would you not like to have a pair of new boots against your
+return?” smiled Home Tooke.
+
+“Oh, yes; no objection at all,” said, Israel.
+
+“Well, then, let the bootmaker measure you,” smiled Horne Tooke.
+
+“Do _you_ do it, Mr. Tooke,” said the Squire; “you measure men’s parts
+better than I.”
+
+“Hold out your foot, my good friend,” said Horne Tooke—“there—now let’s
+measure your heart.”
+
+“For that, measure me round the chest,” said Israel.
+
+“Just the man we want,” said Mr. Bridges, triumphantly.
+
+“Give him another glass of wine, Squire,” said Horne Tooke.
+
+Exchanging the farmer’s clothes for still another disguise, Israel now
+set out immediately, on foot, for his destination, having received
+minute directions as to his road, and arriving in White Waltham on the
+following morning was very cordially received by the gentleman to whom
+he carried the letter. This person, another of the active English
+friends of America, possessed a particular knowledge of late events in
+that land. To him Israel was indebted for much entertaining
+information. After remaining some ten days at this place, word came
+from Squire Woodcock, requiring Israel’s immediate return, stating the
+hour at which he must arrive at the house, namely, two o’clock on the
+following morning. So, after another night’s solitary trudge across the
+country, the wanderer was welcomed by the same three gentlemen as
+before, seated in the same room.
+
+“The time has now come,” said Squire Woodcock. “You must start this
+morning for Paris. Take off your shoes.”
+
+“Am I to steal from here to Paris on my stocking-feet?” said Israel,
+whose late easy good living at White Waltham had not failed to bring
+out the good-natured and mirthful part of him, even as his prior
+experiences had produced, for the most part, something like a contrary
+result.
+
+“Oh, no,” smiled Horne Tooke, who always lived well, “we have
+seven-league-boots for you. Don’t you remember my measuring you?”
+
+Hereupon going to the closet, the Squire brought out a pair of new
+boots. They were fitted with false heels. Unscrewing these, the Squire
+showed Israel the papers concealed beneath. They were of a fine tissuey
+fibre, and contained much writing in a very small compass. The boots,
+it need hardly be said, had been particularly made for the occasion.
+
+“Walk across the room with them,” said the Squire, when Israel had
+pulled them on.
+
+“He’ll surely be discovered,” smiled Horne Tooke. “Hark how he creaks.”
+
+“Come, come, it’s too serious a matter for joking,” said the Squire.
+“Now, my fine fellow, be cautious, be sober, be vigilant, and above all
+things be speedy.”
+
+Being furnished now with all requisite directions, and a supply of
+money, Israel, taking leave of Mr. Tooke and Mr. Bridges, was secretly
+conducted down stairs by the Squire, and in five minutes’ time was on
+his way to Charing Cross in London, where taking the post-coach for
+Dover, he thence went in a packet to Calais, and in fifteen minutes
+after landing, was being wheeled over French soil towards Paris. He
+arrived there in safety, and freely declaring himself an American, the
+peculiarly friendly relations of the two nations at that period,
+procured him kindly attentions even from strangers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+AFTER A CURIOUS ADVENTURE UPON THE PONT NEUF, ISRAEL ENTERS THE
+PRESENCE OF THE RENOWNED SAGE, DR. FRANKLIN, WHOM HE FINDS RIGHT
+LEARNEDLY AND MULTIFARIOUSLY EMPLOYED.
+
+
+Following the directions given him at the place where the diligence
+stopped, Israel was crossing the Pont Neuf, to find Doctor Franklin,
+when he was suddenly called to by a man standing on one side of the
+bridge, just under the equestrian statue of Henry IV.—The man had a
+small, shabby-looking box before him on the ground, with a box of
+blacking on one side of it, and several shoe-brushes upon the other.
+Holding another brush in his hand, he politely seconded his verbal
+invitation by gracefully flourishing the brush in the air.
+
+“What do you want of me, neighbor?” said Israel, pausing in somewhat
+uneasy astonishment.
+
+“Ah, Monsieur,” exclaimed the man, and with voluble politeness he ran
+on with a long string of French, which of course was all Greek to poor
+Israel. But what his language failed to convey, his gestures now made
+very plain. Pointing to the wet muddy state of the bridge, splashed by
+a recent rain, and then to the feet of the wayfarer, and lastly to the
+brush in his hand, he appeared to be deeply regretting that a gentleman
+of Israel’s otherwise imposing appearance should be seen abroad with
+unpolished boots, offering at the same time to remove their blemishes.
+
+“Ah, Monsieur, Monsieur,” cried the man, at last running up to Israel.
+And with tender violence he forced him towards the box, and lifting
+this unwilling customer’s right foot thereon, was proceeding vigorously
+to work, when suddenly illuminated by a dreadful suspicion, Israel,
+fetching the box a terrible kick, took to his false heels and ran like
+mad over the bridge.
+
+Incensed that his politeness should receive such an ungracious return,
+the man pursued, which but confirming Israel in his suspicions he ran
+all the faster, and thanks to his fleetness, soon succeeded in escaping
+his pursuer.
+
+Arrived at last at the street and the house to which he had been
+directed, in reply to his summons, the gate very strangely of itself
+swung open, and much astonished at this unlooked-for sort of
+enchantment, Israel entered a wide vaulted passage leading to an open
+court within. While he was wondering that no soul appeared, suddenly he
+was hailed from a dark little window, where sat an old man cobbling
+shoes, while an old woman standing by his side was thrusting her head
+into the passage, intently eyeing the stranger. They proved to be the
+porter and portress, the latter of whom, upon hearing his summons, had
+invisibly thrust open the gate to Israel, by means of a spring
+communicating with the little apartment.
+
+Upon hearing the name of Doctor Franklin mentioned, the old woman, all
+alacrity, hurried out of her den, and with much courtesy showed Israel
+across the court, up three flights of stairs to a door in the rear of
+the spacious building. There she left him while Israel knocked.
+
+“Come in,” said a voice.
+
+And immediately Israel stood in the presence of the venerable Doctor
+Franklin.
+
+Wrapped in a rich dressing-gown, a fanciful present from an admiring
+Marchesa, curiously embroidered with algebraic figures like a
+conjuror’s robe, and with a skull-cap of black satin on his hive of a
+head, the man of gravity was seated at a huge claw-footed old table,
+round as the zodiac. It was covered with printer papers, files of
+documents, rolls of manuscript, stray bits of strange models in wood
+and metal, odd-looking pamphlets in various languages, and all sorts of
+books, including many presentation-copies, embracing history,
+mechanics, diplomacy, agriculture, political economy, metaphysics,
+meteorology, and geometry. The walls had a necromantic look, hung round
+with barometers of different kinds, drawings of surprising inventions,
+wide maps of far countries in the New World, containing vast empty
+spaces in the middle, with the word DESERT diffusely printed there, so
+as to span five-and-twenty degrees of longitude with only two
+syllables,—which printed word, however, bore a vigorous pen-mark, in
+the Doctor’s hand, drawn straight through it, as if in summary repeal
+of it; crowded topographical and trigonometrical charts of various
+parts of Europe; with geometrical diagrams, and endless other
+surprising hangings and upholstery of science.
+
+The chamber itself bore evident marks of antiquity. One part of the
+rough-finished wall was sadly cracked, and covered with dust, looked
+dim and dark. But the aged inmate, though wrinkled as well, looked neat
+and hale. Both wall and sage were compounded of like materials,—lime
+and dust; both, too, were old; but while the rude earth of the wall had
+no painted lustre to shed off all fadings and tarnish, and still keep
+fresh without, though with long eld its core decayed: the living lime
+and dust of the sage was frescoed with defensive bloom of his soul.
+
+The weather was warm; like some old West India hogshead on the wharf,
+the whole chamber buzzed with flies. But the sapient inmate sat still
+and cool in the midst. Absorbed in some other world of his occupations
+and thoughts, these insects, like daily cark and care, did not seem one
+whit to annoy him. It was a goodly sight to see this serene, cool and
+ripe old philosopher, who by sharp inquisition of man in the street,
+and then long meditating upon him, surrounded by all those queer old
+implements, charts and books, had grown at last so wondrous wise. There
+he sat, quite motionless among those restless flies; and, with a sound
+like the low noon murmur of foliage in the woods, turning over the
+leaves of some ancient and tattered folio, with a binding dark and
+shaggy as the bark of any old oak. It seemed as if supernatural lore
+must needs pertain to this gravely, ruddy personage; at least far
+foresight, pleasant wit, and working wisdom. Old age seemed in no wise
+to have dulled him, but to have sharpened; just as old dinner-knives—so
+they be of good steel—wax keen, spear-pointed, and elastic as
+whale-bone with long usage. Yet though he was thus lively and vigorous
+to behold, spite of his seventy-two years (his exact date at that time)
+somehow, the incredible seniority of an antediluvian seemed his. Not
+the years of the calendar wholly, but also the years of sapience. His
+white hairs and mild brow, spoke of the future as well as the past. He
+seemed to be seven score years old; that is, three score and ten of
+prescience added to three score and ten of remembrance, makes just
+seven score years in all.
+
+But when Israel stepped within the chamber, he lost the complete effect
+of all this; for the sage’s back, not his face, was turned to him.
+
+So, intent on his errand, hurried and heated with his recent run, our
+courier entered the room, inadequately impressed, for the time, by
+either it or its occupant.
+
+“Bon jour, bon jour, monsieur,” said the man of wisdom, in a cheerful
+voice, but too busy to turn round just then.
+
+“How do you do, Doctor Franklin?” said Israel.
+
+“Ah! I smell Indian corn,” said the Doctor, turning round quickly on
+his chair. “A countryman; sit down, my good sir. Well, what news?
+Special?”
+
+“Wait a minute, sir,” said Israel, stepping across the room towards a
+chair.
+
+Now there was no carpet on the floor, which was of dark-colored wood,
+set in lozenges, and slippery with wax, after the usual French style.
+As Israel walked this slippery floor, his unaccustomed feet slid about
+very strangely as if walking on ice, so that he came very near falling.
+
+“’Pears to me you have rather high heels to your boots,” said the grave
+man of utility, looking sharply down through his spectacles; “don’t you
+know that it’s both wasting leather and endangering your limbs, to wear
+such high heels? I have thought, at my first leisure, to write a little
+pamphlet against that very abuse. But pray, what are you doing now? Do
+your boots pinch you, my friend, that you lift one foot from the floor
+that way?”
+
+At this moment, Israel having seated himself, was just putting his
+right foot across his left knee.
+
+“How foolish,” continued the wise man, “for a rational creature to wear
+tight boots. Had nature intended rational creatures should do so, she
+would have made the foot of solid bone, or perhaps of solid iron,
+instead of bone, muscle, and flesh,—But,—I see. Hold!”
+
+And springing to his own slippered feet, the venerable sage hurried to
+the door and shot-to the bolt. Then drawing the curtain carefully
+across the window looking out across the court to various windows on
+the opposite side, bade Israel proceed with his operations.
+
+“I was mistaken this time,” added the Doctor, smiling, as Israel
+produced his documents from their curious recesses—“your high heels,
+instead of being idle vanities, seem to be full of meaning.”
+
+“Pretty full, Doctor,” said Israel, now handing over the papers. “I had
+a narrow escape with them just now.”
+
+“How? How’s that?” said the sage, fumbling the papers eagerly.
+
+“Why, crossing the stone bridge there over the _Seen_”—
+
+“_Seine_”—interrupted the Doctor, giving the French
+pronunciation.—“Always get a new word right in the first place, my
+friend, and you will never get it wrong afterwards.”
+
+“Well, I was crossing the bridge there, and who should hail me, but a
+suspicious-looking man, who, under pretence of seeking to polish my
+boots, wanted slyly to unscrew their heels, and so steal all these
+precious papers I’ve brought you.”
+
+“My good friend,” said the man of gravity, glancing scrutinizingly upon
+his guest, “have you not in your time, undergone what they call hard
+times? Been set upon, and persecuted, and very illy entreated by some
+of your fellow-creatures?”
+
+“That I have, Doctor; yes, indeed.”
+
+“I thought so. Sad usage has made you sadly suspicious, my honest
+friend. An indiscriminate distrust of human nature is the worst
+consequence of a miserable condition, whether brought about by
+innocence or guilt. And though want of suspicion more than want of
+sense, sometimes leads a man into harm, yet too much suspicion is as
+bad as too little sense. The man you met, my friend, most probably had
+no artful intention; he knew just nothing about you or your heels; he
+simply wanted to earn two sous by brushing your boots. Those
+blacking-men regularly station themselves on the bridge.”
+
+“How sorry I am then that I knocked over his box, and then ran away.
+But he didn’t catch me.”
+
+“How? surely, my honest friend, you—appointed to the conveyance of
+important secret dispatches—did not act so imprudently as to kick over
+an innocent man’s box in the public streets of the capital, to which
+you had been especially sent?”
+
+“Yes, I did, Doctor.”
+
+“Never act so unwisely again. If the police had got hold of you, think
+of what might have ensued.”
+
+“Well, it was not very wise of me, that’s a fact, Doctor. But, you see,
+I thought he meant mischief.”
+
+“And because you only thought he _meant_ mischief, _you_ must
+straightway proceed to _do_ mischief. That’s poor logic. But think over
+what I have told you now, while I look over these papers.”
+
+In half an hour’s time, the Doctor, laying down the documents, again
+turned towards Israel, and removing his spectacles very placidly,
+proceeded in the kindest and most familiar manner to read him a
+paternal detailed lesson upon the ill-advised act he had been guilty
+of, upon the Pont Neuf; concluding by taking out his purse, and putting
+three small silver coins into Israel’s hands, charging him to seek out
+the man that very day, and make both apology and restitution for his
+unlucky mistake.
+
+“All of us, my honest friend,” continued the Doctor, “are subject to
+making mistakes; so that the chief art of life, is to learn how best to
+remedy mistakes. Now one remedy for mistakes is honesty. So pay the man
+for the damage done to his box. And now, who are you, my friend? My
+correspondents here mention your name—Israel Potter—and say you are an
+American, an escaped prisoner of war, but nothing further. I want to
+hear your story from your own lips.”
+
+Israel immediately began, and related to the Doctor all his adventures
+up to the present time.
+
+“I suppose,” said the Doctor, upon Israel’s concluding, “that you
+desire to return to your friends across the sea?”
+
+“That I do, Doctor,” said Israel.
+
+“Well, I think I shall be able to procure you a passage.”
+
+Israel’s eyes sparkled with delight. The mild sage noticed it, and
+added: “But events in these times are uncertain. At the prospect of
+pleasure never be elated; but, without depression, respect the omens of
+ill. So much my life has taught me, my honest friend.”
+
+Israel felt as though a plum-pudding had been thrust under his
+nostrils, and then as rapidly withdrawn.
+
+“I think it is probable that in two or three days I shall want you to
+return with some papers to the persons who sent you to me. In that case
+you will have to come here once more, and then, my good friend, we will
+see what can be done towards getting you safely home again.”
+
+Israel was pouring out torrents of thanks when the Doctor interrupted
+him.
+
+“Gratitude, my friend, cannot be too much towards God, but towards man,
+it should be limited. No man can possibly so serve his fellow, as to
+merit unbounded gratitude. Over gratitude in the helped person, is apt
+to breed vanity or arrogance in the helping one. Now in assisting you
+to get home—if indeed I shall prove able to do so—I shall be simply
+doing part of my official duty as agent of our common country. So you
+owe me just nothing at all, but the sum of these coins I put in your
+hand just now. But that, instead of repaying to me hereafter, you can,
+when you get home, give to the first soldier’s widow you meet. Don’t
+forget it, for it is a debt, a pecuniary liability, owing to me. It
+will be about a quarter of a dollar, in the Yankee currency. A quarter
+of a dollar, mind. My honest friend, in pecuniary matters always be
+exact as a second-hand; never mind with whom it is, father or stranger,
+peasant or king, be exact to a tick of your honor.”
+
+“Well, Doctor,” said Israel, “since exactness in these matters is so
+necessary, let me pay back my debt in the very coins in which it was
+loaned. There will be no chance of mistake then. Thanks to my Brentford
+friends, I have enough to spare of my own, to settle damages with the
+boot-black of the bridge. I only took the money from you, because I
+thought it would not look well to push it back after being so kindly
+offered.”
+
+“My honest friend,” said the Doctor, “I like your straightforward
+dealing. I will receive back the money.”
+
+“No interest, Doctor, I hope,” said Israel.
+
+The sage looked mildly over his spectacles upon Israel and replied: “My
+good friend, never permit yourself to be jocose upon pecuniary matters.
+Never joke at funerals, or during business transactions. The affair
+between us two, you perhaps deem very trivial, but trifles may involve
+momentous principles. But no more at present. You had better go
+immediately and find the boot-black. Having settled with him, return
+hither, and you will find a room ready for you near this, where you
+will stay during your sojourn in Paris.”
+
+“But I thought I would like to have a little look round the town,
+before I go back to England,” said Israel.
+
+“Business before pleasure, my friend. You must absolutely remain in
+your room, just as if you were my prisoner, until you quit Paris for
+Calais. Not knowing now at what instant I shall want you to start, your
+keeping to your room is indispensable. But when you come back from
+Brentford again, then, if nothing happens, you will have a chance to
+survey this celebrated capital ere taking ship for America. Now go
+directly, and pay the boot-black. Stop, have you the exact change
+ready? Don’t be taking out all your money in the open street.”
+
+“Doctor,” said Israel, “I am not so simple.”
+
+“But you knocked over the box.”
+
+“That, Doctor, was bravery.”
+
+“Bravery in a poor cause, is the height of simplicity, my friend.—Count
+out your change. It must be French coin, not English, that you are to
+pay the man with.—Ah, that will do—those three coins will be enough.
+Put them in a pocket separate from your other cash. Now go, and hasten
+to the bridge.”
+
+“Shall I stop to take a meal anywhere, Doctor, as I return? I saw
+several cookshops as I came hither.”
+
+“Cafes and restaurants, they are called here, my honest friend. Tell
+me, are you the possessor of a liberal fortune?”
+
+“Not very liberal,” said Israel.
+
+“I thought as much. Where little wine is drunk, it is good to dine out
+occasionally at a friend’s; but where a poor man dines out at his own
+charge, it is bad policy. Never dine out that way, when you can dine
+in. Do not stop on the way at all, my honest friend, but come directly
+back hither, and you shall dine at home, free of cost, with me.”
+
+“Thank you very kindly, Doctor.”
+
+And Israel departed for the Pont Neuf. Succeeding in his errand
+thither, he returned to Dr. Franklin, and found that worthy envoy
+waiting his attendance at a meal, which, according to the Doctor’s
+custom, had been sent from a neighboring restaurant. There were two
+covers; and without attendance the host and guest sat down. There was
+only one principal dish, lamb boiled with green peas. Bread and
+potatoes made up the rest. A decanter-like bottle of uncolored glass,
+filled with some uncolored beverage, stood at the venerable envoy’s
+elbow.
+
+“Let me fill your glass,” said the sage.
+
+“It’s white wine, ain’t it?” said Israel.
+
+“White wine of the very oldest brand; I drink your health in it, my
+honest friend.”
+
+“Why, it’s plain water,” said Israel, now tasting it.
+
+“Plain water is a very good drink for plain men,” replied the wise man.
+
+“Yes,” said Israel, “but Squire Woodcock gave me perry, and the other
+gentleman at White Waltham gave me port, and some other friends have
+given me brandy.”
+
+“Very good, my honest friend; if you like perry and port and brandy,
+wait till you get back to Squire Woodcock, and the gentleman at White
+Waltham, and the other friends, and you shall drink perry and port and
+brandy. But while you are with me, you will drink plain water.”
+
+“So it seems, Doctor.”
+
+“What do you suppose a glass of port costs?”
+
+“About three pence English, Doctor.”
+
+“That must be poor port. But how much good bread will three pence
+English purchase?”
+
+“Three penny rolls, Doctor.”
+
+“How many glasses of port do you suppose a man may drink at a meal?”
+
+“The gentleman at White Waltham drank a bottle at a dinner.”
+
+“A bottle contains just thirteen glasses—that’s thirty-nine pence,
+supposing it poor wine. If something of the best, which is the only
+sort any sane man should drink, as being the least poisonous, it would
+be quadruple that sum, which is one hundred and fifty-six pence, which
+is seventy-eight two-penny loaves. Now, do you not think that for one
+man to swallow down seventy-two two-penny rolls at one meal is rather
+extravagant business?”
+
+“But he drank a bottle of wine; he did not eat seventy-two two-penny
+rolls, Doctor.”
+
+“He drank the money worth of seventy-two loaves, which is drinking the
+loaves themselves; for money is bread.”
+
+“But he has plenty of money to spare, Doctor.”
+
+“To have to spare, is to have to give away. Does the gentleman give
+much away?”
+
+“Not that I know of, Doctor.”
+
+“Then he thinks he has nothing to spare; and thinking he has nothing to
+spare, and yet prodigally drinking down his money as he does every day,
+it seems to me that that gentleman stands self- contradicted, and
+therefore is no good example for plain sensible folks like you and me
+to follow. My honest friend, if you are poor, avoid wine as a costly
+luxury; if you are rich, shun it as a fatal indulgence. Stick to plain
+water. And now, my good friend, if you are through with your meal, we
+will rise. There is no pastry coming. Pastry is poisoned bread. Never
+eat pastry. Be a plain man, and stick to plain things. Now, my friend,
+I shall have to be private until nine o’clock in the evening, when I
+shall be again at your service. Meantime you may go to your room. I
+have ordered the one next to this to be prepared for you. But you must
+not be idle. Here is Poor Richard’s Almanac, which, in view of our late
+conversation, I commend to your earnest perusal. And here, too, is a
+Guide to Paris, an English one, which you can read. Study it well, so
+that when you come back from England, if you should then have an
+opportunity to travel about Paris, to see its wonders, you will have
+all the chief places made historically familiar to you. In this world,
+men must provide knowledge before it is wanted, just as our countrymen
+in New England get in their winter’s fuel one season, to serve them the
+next.”
+
+So saying, this homely sage, and household Plato, showed his humble
+guest to the door, and standing in the hall, pointed out to him the one
+which opened into his allotted apartment.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+WHICH HAS SOMETHING TO SAY ABOUT DR. FRANKLIN AND THE LATIN QUARTER.
+
+
+The first, both in point of time and merit, of American envoys was
+famous not less for the pastoral simplicity of his manners than for the
+politic grace of his mind. Viewed from a certain point, there was a
+touch of primeval orientalness in Benjamin Franklin. Neither is there
+wanting something like his Scriptural parallel. The history of the
+patriarch Jacob is interesting not less from the unselfish devotion
+which we are bound to ascribe to him, than from the deep worldly wisdom
+and polished Italian tact, gleaming under an air of Arcadian
+unaffectedness. The diplomatist and the shepherd are blended; a union
+not without warrant; the apostolic serpent and dove. A tanned
+Machiavelli in tents.
+
+Doubtless, too, notwithstanding his eminence as lord of the moving
+manor, Jacob’s raiment was of homespun; the economic envoy’s plain coat
+and hose, who has not heard of?
+
+Franklin all over is of a piece. He dressed his person as his periods;
+neat, trim, nothing superfluous, nothing deficient. In some of his
+works his style is only surpassed by the unimprovable sentences of
+Hobbes of Malmsbury, the paragon of perspicuity. The mental habits of
+Hobbes and Franklin in several points, especially in one of some
+moment, assimilated. Indeed, making due allowance for soil and era,
+history presents few trios more akin, upon the whole, than Jacob,
+Hobbes, and Franklin; three labyrinth-minded, but plain-spoken
+Broadbrims, at once politicians and philosophers; keen observers of the
+main chance; prudent courtiers; practical magians in linsey-woolsey.
+
+In keeping with his general habitudes, Doctor Franklin while at the
+French Court did not reside in the aristocratical faubourgs. He deemed
+his worsted hose and scientific tastes more adapted in a domestic way
+to the other side of the Seine, where the Latin Quarter, at once the
+haunt of erudition and economy, seemed peculiarly to invite the
+philosophical Poor Richard to its venerable retreats. Here, of gray,
+chilly, drizzly November mornings, in the dark-stoned quadrangle of the
+time-honored Sorbonne, walked the lean and slippered
+metaphysician,—oblivious for the moment that his sublime thoughts and
+tattered wardrobe were famous throughout Europe,—meditating on the
+theme of his next lecture; at the same time, in the well-worn chambers
+overhead, some clayey-visaged chemist in ragged robe-de-chambre, and
+with a soiled green flap over his left eye, was hard at work stooping
+over retorts and crucibles, discovering new antipathies in acids, again
+risking strange explosions similar to that whereby he had already lost
+the use of one optic; while in the lofty lodging-houses of the
+neighboring streets, indigent young students from all parts of France,
+were ironing their shabby cocked hats, or inking the whity seams of
+their small-clothes, prior to a promenade with their pink-ribboned
+little grisettes in the Garden of the Luxembourg.
+
+Long ago the haunt of rank, the Latin Quarter still retains many old
+buildings whose imposing architecture singularly contrasts with the
+unassuming habits of their present occupants. In some parts its general
+air is dreary and dim; monastic and theurgic. In those lonely narrow
+ways—long-drawn prospectives of desertion—lined with huge piles of
+silent, vaulted, old iron-grated buildings of dark gray stone, one
+almost expects to encounter Paracelsus or Friar Bacon turning the next
+corner, with some awful vial of Black-Art elixir in his hand.
+
+But all the lodging-houses are not so grim. Not to speak of many of
+comparatively modern erection, the others of the better class, however
+stern in exterior, evince a feminine gayety of taste, more or less, in
+their furnishings within. The embellishing, or softening, or screening
+hand of woman is to be seen all over the interiors of this metropolis..
+Like Augustus Caesar with respect to Rome, the Frenchwoman leaves her
+obvious mark on Paris. Like the hand in nature, you know it can be none
+else but hers. Yet sometimes she overdoes it, as nature in the peony;
+or underdoes it, as nature in the bramble; or—what is still more
+frequent—is a little slatternly about it, as nature in the pig-weed.
+
+In this congenial vicinity of the Latin Quarter, and in an ancient
+building something like those alluded to, at a point midway between the
+Palais des Beaux Arts and the College of the Sorbonne, the venerable
+American Envoy pitched his tent when not passing his time at his
+country retreat at Passy. The frugality of his manner of life did not
+lose him the good opinion even of the voluptuaries of the showiest of
+capitals, whose very iron railings are not free from gilt. Franklin was
+not less a lady’s man, than a man’s man, a wise man, and an old man.
+Not only did he enjoy the homage of the choicest Parisian literati, but
+at the age of seventy-two he was the caressed favorite of the highest
+born beauties of the Court; who through blind fashion having been
+originally attracted to him as a famous _savan_, were permanently
+retained as his admirers by his Plato-like graciousness of good humor.
+Having carefully weighed the world, Franklin could act any part in it.
+By nature turned to knowledge, his mind was often grave, but never
+serious. At times he had seriousness—extreme seriousness—for others,
+but never for himself. Tranquillity was to him instead of it. This
+philosophical levity of tranquillity, so to speak, is shown in his easy
+variety of pursuits. Printer, postmaster, almanac maker, essayist,
+chemist, orator, tinker, statesman, humorist, philosopher, parlor man,
+political economist, professor of housewifery, ambassador, projector,
+maxim-monger, herb-doctor, wit:—Jack of all trades, master of each and
+mastered by none—the type and genius of his land. Franklin was
+everything but a poet. But since a soul with many qualities, forming of
+itself a sort of handy index and pocket congress of all humanity, needs
+the contact of just as many different men, or subjects, in order to the
+exhibition of its totality; hence very little indeed of the sage’s
+multifariousness will be portrayed in a simple narrative like the
+present. This casual private intercourse with Israel, but served to
+manifest him in his far lesser lights; thrifty, domestic, dietarian,
+and, it may be, didactically waggish. There was much benevolent irony,
+innocent mischievousness, in the wise man. Seeking here to depict him
+in his less exalted habitudes, the narrator feels more as if he were
+playing with one of the sage’s worsted hose, than reverentially
+handling the honored hat which once oracularly sat upon his brow.
+
+So, then, in the Latin Quarter lived Doctor Franklin. And accordingly
+in the Latin Quarter tarried Israel for the time. And it was into a
+room of a house in this same Latin Quarter that Israel had been
+directed when the sage had requested privacy for a while.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+ISRAEL IS INITIATED INTO THE MYSTERIES OF LODGING-HOUSES IN THE LATIN
+QUARTER.
+
+
+Closing the door upon himself, Israel advanced to the middle of the
+chamber, and looked curiously round him.
+
+A dark tessellated floor, but without a rug; two mahogany chairs, with
+embroidered seats, rather the worse for wear; one mahogany bed, with a
+gay but tarnished counterpane; a marble wash-stand, cracked, with a
+china vessel of water, minus the handle. The apartment was very large;
+this part of the house, which was a very extensive one, embracing the
+four sides of a quadrangle, having, in a former age, been the hotel of
+a nobleman. The magnitude of the chamber made its stinted furniture
+look meagre enough.
+
+But in Israel’s eyes, the marble mantel (a comparatively recent
+addition) and its appurtenances, not only redeemed the rest, but looked
+quite magnificent and hospitable in the extreme. Because, in the first
+place, the mantel was graced with an enormous old-fashioned square
+mirror, of heavy plate glass, set fast, like a tablet, into the wall.
+And in this mirror was genially reflected the following delicate
+articles:—first, two boquets of flowers inserted in pretty vases of
+porcelain; second, one cake of white soap; third, one cake of
+rose-colored soap (both cakes very fragrant); fourth, one wax candle;
+fifth, one china tinder-box; sixth, one bottle of Eau de Cologne;
+seventh, one paper of loaf sugar, nicely broken into sugar-bowl size;
+eighth, one silver teaspoon; ninth, one glass tumbler; tenth, one glass
+decanter of cool pure water; eleventh, one sealed bottle containing a
+richly hued liquid, and marked “Otard.”
+
+“I wonder now what O-t-a-r-d is?” soliloquised Israel, slowly spelling
+the word. “I have a good mind to step in and ask Dr. Franklin. He knows
+everything. Let me smell it. No, it’s sealed; smell is locked in. Those
+are pretty flowers. Let’s smell them: no smell again. Ah, I see—sort of
+flowers in women’s bonnets—sort of calico flowers. Beautiful soap. This
+smells anyhow—regular soap-roses—a white rose and a red one. That
+long-necked bottle there looks like a crane. I wonder what’s in that?
+Hallo! E-a-u—d-e—C-o-l-o-g-n-e. I wonder if Dr. Franklin understands
+that? It looks like his white wine. This is nice sugar. Let’s taste.
+Yes, this is very nice sugar, sweet as—yes, it’s sweet as sugar; better
+than maple sugar, such as they make at home. But I’m crunching it too
+loud, the Doctor will hear me. But here’s a teaspoon. What’s this for?
+There’s no tea, nor tea-cup; but here’s a tumbler, and here’s drinking
+water. Let me see. Seems to me, putting this and that and the other
+thing together, it’s a sort of alphabet that spells something. Spoon,
+tumbler, water, sugar,—brandy—that’s it. O-t-a-r-d is brandy. Who put
+these things here? What does it all mean? Don’t put sugar here for
+show, don’t put a spoon here for ornament, nor a jug of water. There is
+only one meaning to it, and that is a very polite invitation from some
+invisible person to help myself, if I like, to a glass of brandy and
+sugar, and if I don’t like, let it alone. That’s my reading. I have a
+good mind to ask Doctor Franklin about it, though, for there’s just a
+chance I may be mistaken, and these things here be some other person’s
+private property, not at all meant for me to help myself from. Cologne,
+what’s that—never mind. Soap: soap’s to wash with. I want to use soap,
+anyway. Let me see—no, there’s no soap on the wash-stand. I see, soap
+is not given gratis here in Paris, to boarders. But if you want it,
+take it from the marble, and it will be charged in the bill. If you
+don’t want it let it alone, and no charge. Well, that’s fair, anyway.
+But then to a man who could not afford to use soap, such beautiful
+cakes as these lying before his eyes all the time, would be a strong
+temptation. And now that I think of it, the O-t-a-r-d looks rather
+tempting too. But if I don’t like it now, I can let it alone. I’ve a
+good mind to try it. But it’s sealed. I wonder now if I am right in my
+understanding of this alphabet? Who knows? I’ll venture one little sip,
+anyhow. Come, cork. Hark!”
+
+There was a rapid knock at the door.
+
+Clapping down the bottle, Israel said, “Come in.”
+
+It was the man of wisdom.
+
+“My honest friend,” said the Doctor, stepping with venerable briskness
+into the room, “I was so busy during your visit to the Pont Neuf, that
+I did not have time to see that your room was all right. I merely gave
+the order, and heard that it had been fulfilled. But it just occurred
+to me, that as the landladies of Paris have some curious customs which
+might puzzle an entire stranger, my presence here for a moment might
+explain any little obscurity. Yes, it is as I thought,” glancing
+towards the mantel.
+
+“Oh, Doctor, that reminds me; what is O-t-a-r-d, pray?”
+
+“Otard is poison.”
+
+“Shocking.”
+
+“Yes, and I think I had best remove it from the room forthwith,”
+replied the sage, in a business-like manner putting the bottle under
+his arm; “I hope you never use Cologne, do you?”
+
+“What—what is that, Doctor?”
+
+“I see. You never heard of the senseless luxury—a wise ignorance. You
+smelt flowers upon your mountains. You won’t want this, either;” and
+the Cologne bottle was put under the other arm. “Candle—you’ll want
+that. Soap—you want soap. Use the white cake.”
+
+“Is that cheaper, Doctor?”
+
+“Yes, but just as good as the other. You don’t ever munch sugar, do
+you? It’s bad for the teeth. I’ll take the sugar.” So the paper of
+sugar was likewise dropped into one of the capacious coat pockets.
+
+“Oh, you better take the whole furniture, Doctor Franklin. Here, I’ll
+help you drag out the bedstead.” “My honest friend,” said the wise man,
+pausing solemnly, with the two bottles, like swimmer’s bladders, under
+his arm-pits; “my honest friend, the bedstead you will want; what I
+propose to remove you will not want.”
+
+“Oh, I was only joking, Doctor.”
+
+“I knew that. It’s a bad habit, except at the proper time, and with the
+proper person. The things left on the mantel were there placed by the
+landlady to be used if wanted; if not, to be left untouched. To-morrow
+morning, upon the chambermaid’s coming in to make your bed, all such
+articles as remained obviously untouched would have been removed, the
+rest would have been charged in the bill, whether you used them up
+completely or not.”
+
+“Just as I thought. Then why not let the bottles stay, Doctor, and save
+yourself all this trouble?”
+
+“Ah! why indeed. My honest friend, are you not my guest? It were
+unhandsome in me to permit a third person superfluously to entertain
+you under what, for the time being, is my own roof.”
+
+These words came from the wise man in the most graciously bland and
+flowing tones. As he ended, he made a sort of conciliatory half bow
+towards Israel.
+
+Charmed with his condescending affability, Israel, without another
+word, suffered him to march from the room, bottles and all. Not till
+the first impression of the venerable envoy’s suavity had left him, did
+Israel begin to surmise the mild superiority of successful strategy
+which lurked beneath this highly ingratiating air.
+
+“Ah,” pondered Israel, sitting gloomily before the rifled mantel, with
+the empty tumbler and teaspoon in his hand, “it’s sad business to have
+a Doctor Franklin lodging in the next room. I wonder if he sees to all
+the boarders this way. How the O-t-a-r-d merchants must hate him, and
+the pastry-cooks too. I wish I had a good pie to pass the time. I
+wonder if they ever make pumpkin pies in Paris? So I’ve got to stay in
+this room all the time. Somehow I’m bound to be a prisoner, one way or
+another. Never mind, I’m an ambassador; that’s satisfaction. Hark! The
+Doctor again.—Come in.”
+
+No venerable doctor, but in tripped a young French lass, bloom on her
+cheek, pink ribbons in her cap, liveliness in all her air, grace in the
+very tips of her elbows. The most bewitching little chambermaid in
+Paris. All art, but the picture of artlessness.
+
+“Monsieur! pardon!”
+
+“Oh, I pardon ye freely,” said Israel. “Come to call on the
+Ambassador?”
+
+“Monsieur, is de—de—” but, breaking down at the very threshold in her
+English, she poured out a long ribbon of sparkling French, the purpose
+of which was to convey a profusion of fine compliments to the stranger,
+with many tender inquiries as to whether he was comfortably roomed, and
+whether there might not be something, however trifling, wanting to his
+complete accommodation. But Israel understood nothing, at the time, but
+the exceeding grace, and trim, bewitching figure of the girl.
+
+She stood eyeing him for a few moments more, with a look of pretty
+theatrical despair, and, after vaguely lingering a while, with another
+shower of incomprehensible compliments and apologies, tripped like a
+fairy from the chamber. Directly she was gone Israel pondered upon a
+singular glance of the girl. It seemed to him that he had, by his
+reception, in some way, unaccountably disappointed his beautiful
+visitor. It struck him very strangely that she had entered all
+sweetness and friendliness, but had retired as if slighted, with a sort
+of disdainful and sarcastic levity, all the more stinging from its
+apparent politeness.
+
+Not long had she disappeared, when a noise in the passage apprised him
+that, in her hurried retreat, the girl must have stumbled against
+something. The next moment he heard a chair scraping in the adjacent
+apartment, and there was another knock at the door.
+
+It was the man of wisdom this time.
+
+“My honest friend, did you not have a visitor, just now?”
+
+“Yes, Doctor, a very pretty girl called upon me.”
+
+“Well, I just stopped in to tell you of another strange custom of
+Paris. That girl is the chambermaid, but she does not confine herself
+altogether to one vocation. You must beware of the chambermaids of
+Paris, my honest friend. Shall I tell the girl, from you, that,
+unwilling to give her the fatigue of going up and down so many flights
+of stairs, you will for the future waive her visits of ceremony?”
+
+“Why, Doctor Franklin, she is a very sweet little girl.”
+
+“I know it, my honest friend; the sweeter the more dangerous. Arsenic
+is sweeter than sugar. I know you are a very sensible young man, not to
+be taken in by an artful Ammonite, and so I think I had better convey
+your message to the girl forthwith.”
+
+So saying, the sage withdrew, leaving Israel once more gloomily seated
+before the rifled mantel, whose mirror was not again to reflect the
+form of the charming chambermaid.
+
+“Every time he comes in he robs me,” soliloquised Israel, dolefully;
+“with an air all the time, too, as if he were making me presents. If he
+thinks me such a very sensible young man, why not let me take care of
+myself?”
+
+It was growing dusk, and Israel, lighting the wax candle, proceeded to
+read in his Guide-book.
+
+“This is poor sight-seeing,” muttered he at last, “sitting here all by
+myself, with no company but an empty tumbler, reading about the fine
+things in Paris, and I myself a prisoner in Paris. I wish something
+extraordinary would turn up now; for instance, a man come in and give
+me ten thousand pounds. But here’s ‘Poor Richard;’ I am a poor fellow
+myself; so let’s see what comfort he has for a comrade.”
+
+Opening the little pamphlet, at random, Israel’s eyes fell on the
+following passages: he read them aloud—
+
+“‘_So what signifies waiting and hoping for better times? We may make
+these times better, if we bestir ourselves. Industry need not wish, and
+he that lives upon hope will die fasting, as Poor Richard says. There
+are no gains, without pains. Then help hands, for I have no lands, as
+Poor Richard says._’ Oh, confound all this wisdom! It’s a sort of
+insulting to talk wisdom to a man like me. It’s wisdom that’s cheap,
+and it’s fortune that’s dear. That ain’t in Poor Richard; but it ought
+to be,” concluded Israel, suddenly slamming down the pamphlet.
+
+He walked across the room, looked at the artificial flowers, and the
+rose-colored soap, and again went to the table and took up the two
+books.
+
+“So here is the ‘Way to Wealth,’ and here is the ‘Guide to Paris.’
+Wonder now whether Paris lies on the Way to Wealth? if so, I am on the
+road. More likely though, it’s a parting-of-the-ways. I shouldn’t be
+surprised if the Doctor meant something sly by putting these two books
+in my hand. Somehow, the old gentleman has an amazing sly look—a sort
+of wild slyness—about him, seems to me. His wisdom seems a sort of sly,
+too. But all in honor, though. I rather think he’s one of those old
+gentlemen who say a vast deal of sense, but hint a world more. Depend
+upon it, he’s sly, sly, sly. Ah, what’s this Poor Richard says: ‘God
+helps them that help themselves:’ Let’s consider that. Poor Richard
+ain’t a Dunker, that’s certain, though he has lived in Pennsylvania.
+‘God helps them that help themselves.’ I’ll just mark that saw, and
+leave the pamphlet open to refer to it again—Ah!”
+
+At this point, the Doctor knocked, summoning Israel to his own
+apartment. Here, after a cup of weak tea, and a little toast, the two
+had a long, familiar talk together; during which, Israel was delighted
+with the unpretending talkativeness, serene insight, and benign
+amiability of the sage. But, for all this, he could hardly forgive him
+for the Cologne and Otard depredations.
+
+Discovering that, in early life, Israel had been employed on a farm,
+the man of wisdom at length turned the conversation in that direction;
+among other things, mentioning to his guest a plan of his (the
+Doctor’s) for yoking oxen, with a yoke to go by a spring instead of a
+bolt; thus greatly facilitating the operation of hitching on the team
+to the cart. Israel was very much struck with the improvement; and
+thought that, if he were home, upon his mountains, he would immediately
+introduce it among the farmers.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+ANOTHER ADVENTURER APPEARS UPON THE SCENE.
+
+
+About half-past ten o’clock, as they were thus conversing, Israel’s
+acquaintance, the pretty chambermaid, rapped at the door, saying, with
+a titter, that a very rude gentleman in the passage of the court,
+desired to see Doctor Franklin.
+
+“A very rude gentleman?” repeated the wise man in French, narrowly
+looking at the girl; “that means, a very fine gentleman who has just
+paid you some energetic compliment. But let him come up, my girl,” he
+added patriarchially.
+
+In a few moments, a swift coquettish step was heard, followed, as if in
+chase, by a sharp and manly one. The door opened. Israel was sitting so
+that, accidentally, his eye pierced the crevice made by the opening of
+the door, which, like a theatrical screen, stood for a moment between
+Doctor Franklin and the just entering visitor. And behind that screen,
+through the crack, Israel caught one momentary glimpse of a little bit
+of by-play between the pretty chambermaid and the stranger. The
+vivacious nymph appeared to have affectedly run from him on the
+stairs—doubtless in freakish return for some liberal advances—but had
+suffered herself to be overtaken at last ere too late; and on the
+instant Israel caught sight of her, was with an insincere air of rosy
+resentment, receiving a roguish pinch on the arm, and a still more
+roguish salute on the cheek.
+
+The next instant both disappeared from the range of the crevice; the
+girl departing whence she had come; the stranger—transiently invisible
+as he advanced behind the door—entering the room. When Israel now
+perceived him again, he seemed, while momentarily hidden, to have
+undergone a complete transformation.
+
+He was a rather small, elastic, swarthy man, with an aspect as of a
+disinherited Indian Chief in European clothes. An unvanquishable
+enthusiasm, intensified to perfect sobriety, couched in his savage,
+self-possessed eye. He was elegantly and somewhat extravagantly dressed
+as a civilian; he carried himself with a rustic, barbaric jauntiness,
+strangely dashed with a superinduced touch of the Parisian _salon_. His
+tawny cheek, like a date, spoke of the tropic, A wonderful atmosphere
+of proud friendlessness and scornful isolation invested him. Yet there
+was a bit of the poet as well as the outlaw in him, too. A cool
+solemnity of intrepidity sat on his lip. He looked like one who of
+purpose sought out harm’s way. He looked like one who never had been,
+and never would be, a subordinate.
+
+Israel thought to himself that seldom before had he seen such a being.
+Though dressed à-la-mode, he did not seem to be altogether civilized.
+
+So absorbed was our adventurer by the person of the stranger, that a
+few moments passed ere he began to be aware of the circumstance, that
+Dr. Franklin and this new visitor having saluted as old acquaintances,
+were now sitting in earnest conversation together.
+
+“Do as you please; but I will not bide a suitor much longer,” said the
+stranger in bitterness. “Congress gave me to understand that, upon my
+arrival here, I should be given immediate command of the _Indien_; and
+now, for no earthly reason that I can see, you Commissioners have
+presented her, fresh from the stocks at Amsterdam, to the King of
+France, and not to me. What does the King of France with such a
+frigate? And what can I _not_ do with her? Give me back the “Indien,”
+and in less than one month, you shall hear glorious or fatal news of
+Paul Jones.”
+
+“Come, come, Captain,” said Doctor Franklin, soothingly, “tell me now,
+what would you do with her, if you had her?”
+
+“I would teach the British that Paul Jones, though born in Britain, is
+no subject to the British King, but an untrammelled citizen and sailor
+of the universe; and I would teach them, too, that if they ruthlessly
+ravage the American coasts, their own coasts are vulnerable as New
+Holland’s. Give me the _Indien_, and I will rain down on wicked England
+like fire on Sodom.”
+
+These words of bravado were not spoken in the tone of a bravo, but a
+prophet. Erect upon his chair, like an Iroquois, the speaker’s look was
+like that of an unflickering torch.
+
+His air seemed slightly to disturb the old sage’s philosophic repose,
+who, while not seeking to disguise his admiration of the unmistakable
+spirit of the man, seemed but illy to relish his apparent measureless
+boasting.
+
+As if both to change the subject a little, as well as put his visitor
+in better mood—though indeed it might have been but covertly to play
+with his enthusiasm—the man of wisdom now drew his chair confidentially
+nearer to the stranger’s, and putting one hand in a very friendly,
+conciliatory way upon his visitor’s knee, and rubbing it gently to and
+fro there, much as a lion-tamer might soothingly manipulate the
+aggravated king of beasts, said in a winning manner:—“Never mind at
+present, Captain, about the ‘_Indien_’ affair. Let that sleep a moment.
+See now, the Jersey privateers do us a great deal of mischief by
+intercepting our supplies. It has been mentioned to me, that if you had
+a small vessel—say, even your present ship, the ‘Amphitrite,’—then, by
+your singular bravery, you might render great service, by following
+those privateers where larger ships durst not venture their bottoms;
+or, if but supported by some frigates from Brest at a proper distance,
+might draw them out, so that the larger vessels could capture them.”
+
+“Decoy-duck to French frigates!—Very dignified office, truly!” hissed
+Paul in a fiery rage. “Doctor Franklin, whatever Paul Jones does for
+the cause of America, it must be done through unlimited orders: a
+separate, supreme command; no leader and no counsellor but himself.
+Have I not already by my services on the American coast shown that I am
+well worthy all this? Why then do you seek to degrade me below my
+previous level? I will mount, not sink. I live but for honor and glory.
+Give me, then, something honorable and glorious to do, and something
+famous to do it with. Give me the _Indien_”
+
+The man of wisdom slowly shook his head. “Everything is lost through
+this shillyshallying timidity, called prudence,” cried Paul Jones,
+starting to his feet; “to be effectual, war should be carried on like a
+monsoon, one changeless determination of every particle towards the one
+unalterable aim. But in vacillating councils, statesmen idle about like
+the cats’-paws in calms. My God, why was I not born a Czar!”
+
+“A Nor’wester, rather. Come, come, Captain,” added the sage, “sit down,
+we have a third person present, you see,” pointing towards Israel, who
+sat rapt at the volcanic spirit of the stranger.
+
+Paul slightly started, and turned inquiringly upon Israel, who, equally
+owing to Paul’s own earnestness of discourse and Israel’s motionless
+bearing, had thus far remained undiscovered.
+
+“Never fear, Captain,” said the sage, “this man is true blue, a secret
+courier, and an American born. He is an escaped prisoner of war.”
+
+“Ah, captured in a ship?” asked Paul eagerly; “what ship? None of mine!
+Paul Jones never was captured.”
+
+“No, sir, in the brigantine Washington, out of Boston,” replied Israel;
+“we were cruising to cut off supplies to the English.”
+
+“Did your shipmates talk much of me?” demanded Paul, with a look as of
+a parading Sioux demanding homage to his gewgaws; “what did they say of
+Paul Jones?”
+
+“I never heard the name before this evening,” said Israel.
+
+“What? Ah—brigantine Washington—let me see; that was before I had
+outwitted the Soleby frigate, fought the Milford, and captured the
+Mellish and the rest off Louisbergh. You were long before the news, my
+lad,” he added, with a sort of compassionate air.
+
+“Our friend here gave you a rather blunt answer,” said the wise man,
+sagely mischievous, and addressing Paul.
+
+“Yes. And I like him for it. My man, will you go a cruise with Paul
+Jones? You fellows so blunt with the tongue, are apt to be sharp with
+the steel. Come, my lad, return with me to Brest. I go in a few days.”
+
+Fired by the contagious spirit of Paul, Israel, forgetting all about
+his previous desire to reach home, sparkled with response to the
+summons. But Doctor Franklin interrupted him.
+
+“Our friend here,” said he to the Captain, “is at present engaged for
+very different duty.”
+
+Much other conversation followed, during which Paul Jones again and
+again expressed his impatience at being unemployed, and his resolution
+to accept of no employ unless it gave him supreme authority; while in
+answer to all this Dr. Franklin, not uninfluenced by the uncompromising
+spirit of his guest, and well knowing that however unpleasant a trait
+in conversation, or in the transaction of civil affairs, yet in war
+this very quality was invaluable, as projectiles and combustibles,
+finally assured Paul, after many complimentary remarks, that he would
+immediately exert himself to the utmost to procure for him some
+enterprise which should come up to his merits.
+
+“Thank you for your frankness,” said Paul; “frank myself, I love to
+deal with a frank man. You, Doctor Franklin, are true and deep, and so
+you are frank.”
+
+The sage sedately smiled, a queer incredulity just lurking in the
+corner of his mouth.
+
+“But how about our little scheme for new modelling ships-of-war?” said
+the Doctor, shifting the subject; “it will be a great thing for our
+infant navy, if we succeed. Since our last conversation on that
+subject, Captain, at odds and ends of time, I have thought over the
+matter, and have begun a little skeleton of the thing here, which I
+will show you. Whenever one has a new idea of anything mechanical, it
+is best to clothe it with a body as soon as possible. For you can’t
+improve so well on ideas as you can on bodies.”
+
+With that, going to a little drawer, he produced a small basket, filled
+with a curious looking unfinished frame-work of wood, and several bits
+of wood unattached. It looked like a nursery basket containing broken
+odds and ends of playthings.
+
+“Now look here, Captain, though the thing is but begun at present, yet
+there is enough to show that _one_ idea at least of yours is not
+feasible.”
+
+Paul was all attention, as if having unbounded confidence in whatever
+the sage might suggest, while Israel looked on quite as interested as
+either, his heart swelling with the thought of being privy to the
+consultations of two such men; consultations, too, having ultimate
+reference to such momentous affairs as the freeing of nations.
+
+“If,” continued the Doctor, taking up some of the loose bits and piling
+them along on one side of the top of the frame, “if the better to
+shelter your crew in an engagement, you construct your rail in the
+manner proposed—as thus—then, by the excessive weight of the timber,
+you will too much interfere with the ship’s centre of gravity. You will
+have that too high.”
+
+“Ballast in the hold in proportion,” said Paul.
+
+“Then you will sink the whole hull too low. But here, to have less
+smoke in time of battle, especially on the lower decks, you proposed a
+new sort of hatchway. But that won’t do. See here now, I have invented
+certain ventilating pipes, they are to traverse the vessel thus”—laying
+some toilette pins along—“the current of air to enter here and be
+discharged there. What do you think of that? But now about the main
+things—fast sailing driving little to leeward, and drawing little
+water. Look now at this keel. I whittled it only night before last,
+just before going to bed. Do you see now how—”
+
+At this crisis, a knock was heard at the door, and the chambermaid
+reappeared, announcing that two gentlemen were that moment crossing the
+court below to see Doctor Franklin.
+
+“The Duke de Chartres, and Count D’Estang,” said the Doctor; “they
+appointed for last night, but did not come. Captain, this has something
+indirectly to do with your affair. Through the Duke, Count D’Estang has
+spoken to the King about the secret expedition, the design of which you
+first threw out. Call early to-morrow, and I will inform you of the
+result.”
+
+With his tawny hand Paul pulled out his watch, a small, richly-jewelled
+lady’s watch.
+
+“It is so late, I will stay here to-night,” he said; “is there a
+convenient room?”
+
+“Quick,” said the Doctor, “it might be ill-advised of you to be seen
+with me just now. Our friend here will let you share his chamber.
+Quick, Israel, and show the Captain thither.”
+
+As the door closed upon them in Israel’s apartment, Doctor Franklin’s
+door closed upon the Duke and the Count. Leaving the latter to their
+discussion of profound plans for the timely befriending of the American
+cause, and the crippling of the power of England on the seas, let us
+pass the night with Paul Jones and Israel in the neighboring room.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+PAUL JONES IN A REVERIE.
+
+
+“‘God helps them that help themselves.’ That’s a clincher. That’s been
+my experience. But I never saw it in words before. What pamphlet is
+this? ‘Poor Richard,’ hey!”
+
+Upon entering Israel’s room, Captain Paul, stepping towards the table
+and spying the open pamphlet there, had taken it up, his eye being
+immediately attracted to the passage previously marked by our
+adventurer.
+
+“A rare old gentleman is ‘Poor Richard,’” said Israel in response to
+Paul’s observations.
+
+“So he seems, so he seems,” answered Paul, his eye still running over
+the pamphlet again; “why, ‘Poor Richard’ reads very much as Doctor
+Franklin speaks.”
+
+“He wrote it,” said Israel.
+
+“Aye? Good. So it is, so it is; it’s the wise man all over. I must get
+me a copy of this and wear it around my neck for a charm. And now about
+our quarters for the night. I am not going to deprive you of your bed,
+my man. Do you go to bed and I will doze in the chair here. It’s good
+dozing in the crosstrees.”
+
+“Why not sleep together?” said Israel; “see, it is a big bed. Or
+perhaps you don’t fancy your bed-fellow. Captain?”
+
+“When, before the mast, I first sailed out of Whitehaven to Norway,”
+said Paul, coolly, “I had for hammock-mate a full-blooded Congo. We had
+a white blanket spread in our hammock. Every time I turned in I found
+the Congo’s black wool worked in with the white worsted. By the end of
+the voyage the blanket was of a pepper-and-salt look, like an old man’s
+turning head. So it’s not because I am notional at all, but because I
+don’t care to, my lad. Turn in and go to sleep. Let the lamp burn. I’ll
+see to it. There, go to sleep.”
+
+Complying with what seemed as much a command as a request, Israel,
+though in bed, could not fall into slumber for thinking of the little
+circumstance that this strange swarthy man, flaming with wild
+enterprises, sat in full suit in the chair. He felt an uneasy misgiving
+sensation, as if he had retired, not only without covering up the fire,
+but leaving it fiercely burning with spitting fagots of hemlock.
+
+But his natural complaisance induced him at least to feign himself
+asleep; whereupon. Paul, laying down “Poor Richard,” rose from his
+chair, and, withdrawing his boots, began walking rapidly but
+noiselessly to and fro, in his stockings, in the spacious room, wrapped
+in Indian meditations. Israel furtively eyed him from beneath the
+coverlid, and was anew struck by his aspect, now that Paul thought
+himself unwatched. Stern relentless purposes, to be pursued to the
+points of adverse bayonets and the muzzles of hostile cannon, were
+expressed in the now rigid lines of his brow. His ruffled right hand
+was clutched by his side, as if grasping a cutlass. He paced the room
+as if advancing upon a fortification. Meantime a confused buzz of
+discussion came from the neighboring chamber. All else was profound
+midnight tranquillity. Presently, passing the large mirror over the
+mantel, Paul caught a glimpse of his person. He paused, grimly
+regarding it, while a dash of pleased coxcombry seemed to mingle with
+the otherwise savage satisfaction expressed in his face. But the latter
+predominated. Soon, rolling up his sleeve, with a queer wild smile,
+Paul lifted his right arm, and stood thus for an interval, eyeing its
+image in the glass. From where he lay, Israel could not see that side
+of the arm presented to the mirror, but he saw its reflection, and
+started at perceiving there, framed in the carved and gilded wood,
+certain large intertwisted ciphers covering the whole inside of the
+arm, so far as exposed, with mysterious tattooings. The design was
+wholly unlike the fanciful figures of anchors, hearts, and cables,
+sometimes decorating small portions of seamen’s bodies. It was a sort
+of tattooing such as is seen only on thoroughbred savages—deep blue,
+elaborate, labyrinthine, cabalistic. Israel remembered having beheld,
+on one of his early voyages, something similar on the arm of a New
+Zealand warrior, once met, fresh from battle, in his native village. He
+concluded that on some similar early voyage Paul must have undergone
+the manipulations of some pagan artist. Covering his arm again with his
+laced coat-sleeve, Paul glanced ironically at the hand of the same arm,
+now again half muffled in ruffles, and ornamented with several Parisian
+rings. He then resumed his walking with a prowling air, like one
+haunting an ambuscade; while a gleam of the consciousness of possessing
+a character as yet un-fathomed, and hidden power to back unsuspected
+projects, irradiated his cold white brow, which, owing to the shade of
+his hat in equatorial climates, had been left surmounting his swarthy
+face, like the snow topping the Andes.
+
+So at midnight, the heart of the metropolis of modern civilization was
+secretly trod by this jaunty barbarian in broadcloth; a sort of
+prophetical ghost, glimmering in anticipation upon the advent of those
+tragic scenes of the French Revolution which levelled the exquisite
+refinement of Paris with the bloodthirsty ferocity of Borneo; showing
+that broaches and finger-rings, not less than nose-rings and tattooing,
+are tokens of the primeval savageness which ever slumbers in human
+kind, civilized or uncivilized.
+
+Israel slept not a wink that night. The troubled spirit of Paul paced
+the chamber till morning; when, copiously bathing himself at the
+wash-stand, Paul looked care-free and fresh as a daybreak hawk. After a
+closeted consultation with Doctor Franklin, he left the place with a
+light and dandified air, switching his gold-headed cane, and throwing a
+passing arm round all the pretty chambermaids he encountered, kissing
+them resoundingly, as if saluting a frigate. All barbarians are rakes.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+RECROSSING THE CHANNEL, ISRAEL RETURNS TO THE SQUIRE’S ABODE—HIS
+ADVENTURES THERE.
+
+
+On the third day, as Israel was walking to and fro in his room, having
+removed his courier’s boots, for fear of disturbing the Doctor, a quick
+sharp rap at the door announced the American envoy. The man of wisdom
+entered, with two small wads of paper in one hand, and several crackers
+and a bit of cheese in the other. There was such an eloquent air of
+instantaneous dispatch about him, that Israel involuntarily sprang to
+his boots, and, with two vigorous jerks, hauled them on, and then
+seizing his hat, like any bird, stood poised for his flight across the
+channel.
+
+“Well done, my honest friend,” said the Doctor; “you have the papers in
+your heel, I suppose.”
+
+“Ah,” exclaimed Israel, perceiving the mild irony; and in an instant
+his boots were off again; when, without another word, the Doctor took
+one boot, and Israel the other, and forthwith both parties proceeded to
+secrete the documents.
+
+“I think I could improve the design,” said the sage, as,
+notwithstanding his haste, he critically eyed the screwing apparatus of
+the boot. “The vacancy should have been in the standing part of the
+heel, not in the lid. It should go with a spring, too, for better
+dispatch. I’ll draw up a paper on false heels one of these days, and
+send it to a private reading at the Institute. But no time for it now.
+My honest friend, it is now half past ten o’clock. At half past eleven
+the diligence starts from the Place-du-Carrousel for Calais. Make all
+haste till you arrive at Brentford. I have a little provender here for
+you to eat in the diligence, as you will not have time for a regular
+meal. A day-and-night courier should never be without a cracker in his
+pocket. You will probably leave Brentford in a day or two after your
+arrival there. Be wary, now, my good friend; heed well, that, if you
+are caught with these papers on British ground, you will involve both
+yourself and our Brentford friends in fatal calamities. Kick no man’s
+box, never mind whose, in the way. Mind your own box. You can’t be too
+cautious, but don’t be too suspicious. God bless you, my honest friend.
+Go!”
+
+And, flinging the door open for his exit, the Doctor saw Israel dart
+into the entry, vigorously spring down the stairs, and disappear with
+all celerity across the court into the vaulted way.
+
+The man of wisdom stood mildly motionless a moment, with a look of
+sagacious, humane meditation on his face, as if pondering upon the
+chances of the important enterprise: one which, perhaps, might in the
+sequel affect the weal or woe of nations yet to come. Then suddenly
+clapping his hand to his capacious coat-pocket, dragged out a bit of
+cork with some hen’s feathers, and hurrying to his room, took out his
+knife, and proceeded to whittle away at a shuttlecock of an original
+scientific construction, which at some prior time he had promised to
+send to the young Duchess D’Abrantes that very afternoon.
+
+Safely reaching Calais, at night, Israel stepped almost from the
+diligence into the packet, and, in a few moments, was cutting the
+water. As on the diligence he took an outside and plebeian seat, so,
+with the same secret motive of preserving unsuspected the character
+assumed, he took a deck passage in the packet. It coming on to rain
+violently, he stole down into the forecastle, dimly lit by a solitary
+swinging lamp, where were two men industriously smoking, and filling
+the narrow hole with soporific vapors. These induced strange drowsiness
+in Israel, and he pondered how best he might indulge it, for a time,
+without imperilling the precious documents in his custody.
+
+But this pondering in such soporific vapors had the effect of those
+mathematical devices whereby restless people cipher themselves to
+sleep. His languid head fell to his breast. In another moment, he
+drooped half-lengthwise upon a chest, his legs outstretched before him.
+
+Presently he was awakened by some intermeddlement with his feet.
+Starting to his elbow, he saw one of the two men in the act of slyly
+slipping off his right boot, while the left one, already removed, lay
+on the floor, all ready against the rascal’s retreat Had it not been
+for the lesson learned on the Pont Neuf, Israel would instantly have
+inferred that his secret mission was known, and the operator some
+designed diplomatic knave or other, hired by the British Cabinet, thus
+to lie in wait for him, fume him into slumber with tobacco, and then
+rifle him of his momentous dispatches. But as it was, he recalled
+Doctor Franklin’s prudent admonitions against the indulgence of
+premature suspicions.
+
+“Sir,” said Israel very civilly, “I will thank you for that boot which
+lies on the floor, and, if you please, you can let the other stay where
+it is.”
+
+“Excuse me,” said the rascal, an accomplished, self-possessed
+practitioner in his thievish art; “I thought your boots might be
+pinching you, and only wished to ease you a little.”
+
+“Much obliged to ye for your kindness, sir,” said Israel; “but they
+don’t pinch me at all. I suppose, though, you think they wouldn’t pinch
+_you_ either; your foot looks rather small. Were you going to try ’em
+on, just to see how they fitted?”
+
+“No,” said the fellow, with sanctimonious seriousness; “but with your
+permission I should like to try them on, when we get to Dover. I
+couldn’t try them well walking on this tipsy craft’s deck, you know.”
+
+“No,” answered Israel, “and the beach at Dover ain’t very smooth
+either. I guess, upon second thought, you had better not try ’em on at
+all. Besides, I am a simple sort of a soul—eccentric they call me—and
+don’t like my boots to go out of my sight. Ha! ha!”
+
+“What are you laughing at?” said the fellow testily.
+
+“Odd idea! I was just looking at those sad old patched boots there on
+your feet, and thinking to myself what leaky fire-buckets they would be
+to pass up a ladder on a burning building. It would hardly be fair now
+to swop my new boots for those old fire-buckets, would it?”
+
+“By plunko!” cried the fellow, willing now by a bold stroke to change
+the subject, which was growing slightly annoying; “by plunko, I believe
+we are getting nigh Dover. Let’s see.”
+
+And so saying, he sprang up the ladder to the deck. Upon Israel
+following, he found the little craft half becalmed, rolling on short
+swells almost in the exact middle of the channel. It was just before
+the break of the morning; the air clear and fine; the heavens spangled
+with moistly twinkling stars. The French and English coasts lay
+distinctly visible in the strange starlight, the white cliffs of Dover
+resembling a long gabled block of marble houses. Both shores showed a
+long straight row of lamps. Israel seemed standing in the middle of the
+crossing of some wide stately street in London. Presently a breeze
+sprang up, and ere long our adventurer disembarked at his destined
+port, and directly posted on for Brentford.
+
+The following afternoon, having gained unobserved admittance into the
+house, according to preconcerted signals, he was sitting in Squire
+Woodcock’s closet, pulling off his boots and delivering his dispatches.
+
+Having looked over the compressed tissuey sheets, and read a line
+particularly addressed to himself, the Squire, turning round upon
+Israel, congratulated him upon his successful mission, placed some
+refreshment before him, and apprised him that, owing to certain
+suspicious symptoms in the neighborhood, he (Israel) must now remain
+concealed in the house for a day or two, till an answer should be ready
+for Paris.
+
+It was a venerable mansion, as was somewhere previously stated, of a
+wide and rambling disorderly spaciousness, built, for the most part, of
+weather-stained old bricks, in the goodly style called Elizabethan. As
+without, it was all dark russet bricks, so within, it was nothing but
+tawny oak panels.
+
+“Now, my good fellow,” said the Squire, “my wife has a number of
+guests, who wander from room to room, having the freedom of the house.
+So I shall have to put you very snugly away, to guard against any
+chance of discovery.”
+
+So saying, first locking the door, he touched a spring nigh the open
+fire-place, whereupon one of the black sooty stone jambs of the chimney
+started ajar, just like the marble gate of a tomb. Inserting one leg of
+the heavy tongs in the crack, the Squire pried this cavernous gate wide
+open.
+
+“Why, Squire Woodcock, what is the matter with your chimney?” said
+Israel.
+
+“Quick, go in.”
+
+“Am I to sweep the chimney?” demanded Israel; “I didn’t engage for
+that.”
+
+“Pooh, pooh, this is your hiding-place. Come, move in.”
+
+“But where does it go to, Squire Woodcock? I don’t like the looks of
+it.”
+
+“Follow me. I’ll show you.”
+
+Pushing his florid corpulence into the mysterious aperture, the elderly
+Squire led the way up steep stairs of stone, hardly two feet in width,
+till they reached a little closet, or rather cell, built into the
+massive main wall of the mansion, and ventilated and dimly lit by two
+little sloping slits, ingeniously concealed without, by their forming
+the sculptured mouths of two griffins cut in a great stone tablet
+decorating that external part of the dwelling. A mattress lay rolled up
+in one corner, with a jug of water, a flask of wine, and a wooden
+trencher containing cold roast beef and bread.
+
+“And I am to be buried alive here?” said Israel, ruefully looking
+round.
+
+“But your resurrection will soon be at hand,” smiled the Squire; “two
+days at the furthest.”
+
+“Though to be sure I was a sort of prisoner in Paris, just as I seem
+about to be made here,” said Israel, “yet Doctor Franklin put me in a
+better jug than this, Squire Woodcock. It was set out with boquets and
+a mirror, and other fine things. Besides, I could step out into the
+entry whenever I wanted.”
+
+“Ah, but, my hero, that was in France, and this is in England. There
+you were in a friendly country: here you are in the enemy’s. If you
+should be discovered in my house, and your connection with me became
+known, do you know that it would go very hard with me; very hard
+indeed?”
+
+“Then, for your sake, I am willing to stay wherever you think best to
+put me,” replied Israel.
+
+“Well, then, you say you want boquets and a mirror. If those articles
+will at all help to solace your seclusion, I will bring them to you.”
+
+“They really would be company; the sight of my own face particularly.”
+
+“Stay here, then. I will be back in ten minutes.”
+
+In less than that time, the good old Squire returned, puffing and
+panting, with a great bunch of flowers, and a small shaving-glass.
+
+“There,” said he, putting them down; “now keep perfectly quiet; avoid
+making any undue noise, and on no account descend the stairs, till I
+come for you again.”
+
+“But when will that be?” asked Israel.
+
+“I will try to come twice each day while you are here. But there is no
+knowing what may happen. If I should not visit you till I come to
+liberate you—on the evening of the second day, or the morning of the
+third—you must not be at all surprised, my good fellow. There is plenty
+of food-and water to last you. But mind, on no account descend the
+stone-stairs till I come for you.”
+
+With that, bidding his guest adieu, he left him.
+
+Israel stood glancing pensively around for a time. By and by, moving
+the rolled mattress under the two air-slits, he mounted, to try if
+aught were visible beyond. But nothing was to be seen but a very thin
+slice of blue sky peeping through the lofty foliage of a great tree
+planted near the side-portal of the mansion; an ancient tree, coeval
+with the ancient dwelling it guarded.
+
+Sitting down on the Mattress, Israel fell into a reverie.
+
+“Poverty and liberty, or plenty and a prison, seem to be the two horns
+of the constant dilemma of my life,” thought he. “Let’s look at the
+prisoner.”
+
+And taking up the shaving-glass, he surveyed his lineaments.
+
+“What a pity I didn’t think to ask for razors and soap. I want shaving
+very badly. I shaved last in France. How it would pass the time here.
+Had I a comb now and a razor, I might shave and curl my hair, and keep
+making a continual toilet all through the two days, and look spruce as
+a robin when I get out. I’ll ask the Squire for the things this very
+night when he drops in. Hark! ain’t that a sort of rumbling in the
+wall? I hope there ain’t any oven next door; if so, I shall be scorched
+out. Here I am, just like a rat in the wainscot. I wish there was a low
+window to look out of. I wonder what Doctor Franklin is doing now, and
+Paul Jones? Hark! there’s a bird singing in the leaves. Bell for
+dinner, that.”
+
+And for pastime, he applied himself to the beef and bread, and took a
+draught of the wine and water.
+
+At last night fell. He was left in utter darkness. No Squire.
+
+After an anxious, sleepless night, he saw two long flecks of pale gray
+light slanting into the cell from the slits, like two long spears. He
+rose, rolled up his mattress, got upon the roll, and put his mouth to
+one of the griffins’ months. He gave a low, just audible whistle,
+directing it towards the foliage of the tree. Presently there was a
+slight rustling among the leaves, then one solitary chirrup, and in
+three minutes a whole chorus of melody burst upon his ear.
+
+“I’ve waked the first bird,” said he to himself, with a smile, “and
+he’s waked all the rest. Now then for breakfast. That over, I dare say
+the Squire will drop in.”
+
+But the breakfast was over, and the two flecks of pale light had
+changed to golden beams, and the golden beams grew less and less
+slanting, till they straightened themselves up out of sight altogether.
+It was noon, and no Squire.
+
+“He’s gone a-hunting before breakfast, and got belated,” thought
+Israel.
+
+The afternoon shadows lengthened. It was sunset; no Squire.
+
+“He must be very busy trying some sheep-stealer in the hall,” mused
+Israel. “I hope he won’t forget all about me till to-morrow.”
+
+He waited and listened; and listened and waited.
+
+Another restless night; no sleep; morning came. The second day passed
+like the first, and the night. On the third morning the flowers lay
+shrunken by his side. Drops of wet oozing through the air- slits, fell
+dully on the stone floor. He heard the dreary beatings of the tree’s
+leaves against the mouths of the griffins, bedashing them with the
+spray of the rain-storm without. At intervals a burst of thunder rolled
+over his head, and lightning flashing down through the slits, lit up
+the cell with a greenish glare, followed by sharp splashings and
+rattlings of the redoubled rain-storm.
+
+“This is the morning of the third day,” murmured Israel to himself; “he
+said he would at the furthest come to me on the morning of the third
+day. This is it. Patience, he will be here yet. Morning lasts till
+noon.”
+
+But, owing to the murkiness of the day, it was very hard to tell when
+noon came. Israel refused to credit that noon had come and gone, till
+dusk set plainly in. Dreading he knew not what, he found himself buried
+in the darkness of still another night. However patient and hopeful
+hitherto, fortitude now presently left him. Suddenly, as if some
+contagious fever had seized him, he was afflicted with strange
+enchantments of misery, undreamed of till now.
+
+He had eaten all the beef, but there was bread and water sufficient to
+last, by economy, for two or three days to come. It was not the pang of
+hunger then, but a nightmare originating in his mysterious
+incarceration, which appalled him. All through the long hours of this
+particular night, the sense of being masoned up in the wall, grew, and
+grew, and grew upon him, till again and again he lifted himself
+convulsively from the floor, as if vast blocks of stone had been laid
+on him; as if he had been digging a deep well, and the stonework with
+all the excavated earth had caved in upon him, where he burrowed ninety
+feet beneath the clover. In the blind tomb of the midnight he stretched
+his two arms sideways, and felt as if coffined at not being able to
+extend them straight out, on opposite sides, for the narrowness of the
+cell. He seated himself against one side of the wall, crosswise with
+the cell, and pushed with his feet at the opposite wall. But still
+mindful of his promise in this extremity, he uttered no cry. He mutely
+raved in the darkness. The delirious sense of the absence of light was
+soon added to his other delirium as to the contraction of space. The
+lids of his eyes burst with impotent distension. Then he thought the
+air itself was getting unbearable. He stood up at the griffin slits,
+pressing his lips far into them till he moulded his lips there, to suck
+the utmost of the open air possible.
+
+And continually, to heighten his frenzy, there recurred to him again
+and again what the Squire had told him as to the origin of the cell. It
+seemed that this part of the old house, or rather this wall of it, was
+extremely ancient, dating far beyond the era of Elizabeth, having once
+formed portion of a religious retreat belonging to the Templars. The
+domestic discipline of this order was rigid and merciless in the
+extreme. In a side wall of their second storey chapel, horizontal and
+on a level with the floor, they had an internal vacancy left, exactly
+of the shape and average size of a coffin. In this place, from time to
+time, inmates convicted of contumacy were confined; but, strange to
+say, not till they were penitent. A small hole, of the girth of one’s
+wrist, sunk like a telescope three feet through the masonry into the
+cell, served at once for ventilation, and to push through food to the
+prisoner. This hole opening into the chapel also enabled the poor
+solitaire, as intended, to overhear the religious services at the
+altar; and, without being present, take part in the same. It was deemed
+a good sign of the state of the sufferer’s soul, if from the gloomy
+recesses of the wall was heard the agonized groan of his dismal
+response. This was regarded in the light of a penitent wail from the
+dead, because the customs of the order ordained that when any inmate
+should be first incarcerated in the wall, he should be committed to it
+in the presence of all the brethren, the chief reading the burial
+service as the live body was sepulchred. Sometimes several weeks
+elapsed ere the disentombment, the penitent being then usually found
+numb and congealed in all his extremities, like one newly stricken with
+paralysis.
+
+This coffin-cell of the Templars had been suffered to remain in the
+demolition of the general edifice, to make way for the erection of the
+new, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It was enlarged somewhat, and
+altered, and additionally ventilated, to adapt it for a place of
+concealment in times of civil dissension.
+
+With this history ringing in his solitary brain, it may readily be
+conceived what Israel’s feelings must have been. Here, in this very
+darkness, centuries ago, hearts, human as his, had mildewed in despair;
+limbs, robust as his own, had stiffened in immovable torpor.
+
+At length, after what seemed all the prophetic days and years of
+Daniel, morning broke. The benevolent light entered the cell, soothing
+his frenzy, as if it had been some smiling human face—nay, the Squire
+himself, come at last to redeem him from thrall. Soon his dumb ravings
+entirely left him, and gradually, with a sane, calm mind, he revolved
+all the circumstances of his condition.
+
+He could not be mistaken; something fatal must have befallen his
+friend. Israel remembered the Squire’s hinting that in case of the
+discovery of his clandestine proceedings it would fare extremely hard
+with him, Israel was forced to conclude that this same unhappy
+discovery had been made; that owing to some untoward misadventure his
+good friend had been carried off a State-prisoner to London; that prior
+to his going the Squire had not apprised any member of his household
+that he was about to leave behind him a prisoner in the wall; this
+seemed evident from the circumstance that, thus far, no soul had
+visited that prisoner. It could not be otherwise. Doubtless the Squire,
+having no opportunity to converse in private with his relatives or
+friends at the moment of his sudden arrest, had been forced to keep his
+secret, for the present, for fear of involving Israel in still worse
+calamities. But would he leave him to perish piecemeal in the wall? All
+surmise was baffled in the unconjecturable possibilities of the case.
+But some sort of action must speedily be determined upon. Israel would
+not additionally endanger the Squire, but he could not in such
+uncertainty consent to perish where he was. He resolved at all hazards
+to escape, by stealth and noiselessly, if possible; by violence and
+outcry, if indispensable.
+
+Gliding out of the cell, he descended the stone stairs, and stood
+before the interior of the jamb. He felt an immovable iron knob, but no
+more. He groped about gently for some bolt or spring. When before he
+had passed through the passage with his guide, he had omitted to notice
+by what precise mechanism the jamb was to be opened from within, or
+whether, indeed, it could at all be opened except from without.
+
+He was about giving up the search in despair, after sweeping with his
+two hands every spot of the wall-surface around him, when chancing to
+turn his whole body a little to one side, he heard a creak, and saw a
+thin lance of light. His foot had unconsciously pressed some spring
+laid in the floor. The jamb was ajar. Pushing it open, he stood at
+liberty, in the Squire’s closet.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+HIS ESCAPE FROM THE HOUSE, WITH VARIOUS ADVENTURES FOLLOWING.
+
+
+He started at the funereal aspect of the room, into which, since he
+last stood there, undertakers seemed to have stolen. The curtains of
+the window were festooned with long weepers of crape. The four corners
+of the red cloth on the round table were knotted with crape.
+
+Knowing nothing of these mournful customs of the country, nevertheless,
+Israel’s instinct whispered him that Squire Woodcock lived no more on
+this earth. At once the whole three days’ mystery was made clear. But
+what was now to be done? His friend must have died very suddenly; most
+probably struck down in a fit, from which he never more rose. With him
+had perished all knowledge of the fact that a stranger was immured in
+the mansion. If discovered then, prowling here in the inmost privacies
+of a gentleman’s abode, what would befall the wanderer, already not
+unsuspected in the neighborhood of some underhand guilt as a fugitive?
+If he adhered to the strict truth, what could he offer in his own
+defence without convicting himself of acts which, by English tribunals,
+would be accounted flagitious crimes? Unless, indeed, by involving the
+memory of the deceased Squire Woodcock in his own self acknowledged
+proceedings, so ungenerous a charge should result in an abhorrent
+refusal to credit his extraordinary tale, whether as referring to
+himself or another, and so throw him open to still more grievous
+suspicions?
+
+While wrapped in these dispiriting reveries, he heard a step not very
+far off in the passage. It seemed approaching. Instantly he flew to the
+jamb, which remained unclosed, and disappearing within, drew the stone
+after him by the iron knob. Owing to his hurried violence the jamb
+closed with a dull, dismal and singular noise. A shriek followed from
+within the room. In a panic, Israel fled up the dark stairs, and near
+the top, in his eagerness, stumbled and fell back to the last step with
+a rolling din, which, reverberated by the arch overhead, smote through
+and through the wall, dying away at last indistinctly, like low muffled
+thunder among the clefts of deep hills. When raising himself instantly,
+not seriously bruised by his fall, Israel instantly listened, the
+echoing sounds of his descent were mingled with added shrieks from
+within the room. They seemed some nervous female’s, alarmed by what
+must have appeared to her supernatural, or at least unaccountable,
+noises in the wall. Directly he heard other voices of alarm
+undistinguishably commingled, and then they retreated together, and all
+again was still.
+
+Recovering from his first amazement, Israel revolved these occurrences.
+“No creature now in the house knows of the cell,” thought he. “Some
+woman, the housekeeper, perhaps, first entered the room alone. Just as
+she entered the jamb closed. The sudden report made her shriek; then,
+afterwards, the noise of my fall prolonging itself, added to her
+fright, while her repeated shrieks brought every soul in the house to
+her, who aghast at seeing her lying in a pale faint, it may be, like a
+corpse, in a room hung with crape for a man just dead, they also
+shrieked out, and then with blended lamentations they bore the fainting
+person away. Now this will follow; no doubt it _has_ followed ere
+now:—they believe that the woman saw or heard the spirit of Squire
+Woodcock. Since I seem then to understand how all these strange events
+have occurred, since I seem to know that they have plain common causes,
+I begin to feel cool and calm again. Let me see. Yes. I have it. By
+means of the idea of the ghost prevailing among the frightened
+household, by that means I will this very night make good my escape. If
+I can but lay hands on some of the late Squire’s clothing, if but a
+coat and hat of his, I shall be certain to succeed. It is not too early
+to begin now. They will hardly come back to the room in a hurry. I will
+return to it and see what I can find to serve my purpose. It is the
+Squire’s private closet, hence it is not unlikely that here some at
+least of his clothing will be found.”
+
+With these, thoughts, he cautiously sprung the iron under foot, peeped
+in, and, seeing all clear, boldly re-entered the apartment. He went
+straight to a high, narrow door in the opposite wall. The key was in
+the lock. Opening the door, there hung several coats, small-clothes,
+pairs of silk stockings, and hats of the deceased. With little
+difficulty Israel selected from these the complete suit in which he had
+last seen his once jovial friend. Carefully closing the door, and
+carrying the suit with him, he was returning towards the chimney, when
+he saw the Squire’s silver-headed cane leaning against a corner of the
+wainscot. Taking this also, he stole back to his cell.
+
+Slipping off his own clothing, he deliberately arrayed himself in the
+borrowed raiment, silk small-clothes and all, then put on the cocked
+hat, grasped the silver-headed cane in his right hand, and moving his
+small shaving-glass slowly up and down before him, so as by piecemeal
+to take in his whole figure, felt convinced that he would well pass for
+Squire Woodcock’s genuine phantom. But after the first feeling of
+self-satisfaction with his anticipated success had left him, it was not
+without some superstitious embarrassment that Israel felt himself
+encased in a dead man’s broadcloth; nay, in the very coat in which the
+deceased had no doubt fallen down in his fit. By degrees he began to
+feel almost as unreal and shadowy as the shade whose part he intended
+to enact.
+
+Waiting long and anxiously till darkness came, and then till he thought
+it was fairly midnight, he stole back into the closet, and standing for
+a moment uneasily in the middle of the floor, thinking over all the
+risks he might run, he lingered till he felt himself resolute and calm.
+Then groping for the door leading into the hall, put his hand on the
+knob and turned it. But the door refused to budge. Was it locked? The
+key was not in. Turning the knob once more, and holding it so, he
+pressed firmly against the door. It did not move. More firmly still,
+when suddenly it burst open with a loud crackling report. Being
+cramped, it had stuck in the sill. Less than three seconds passed when,
+as Israel was groping his way down the long wide hall towards the large
+staircase at its opposite end, he heard confused hurrying noises from
+the neighboring rooms, and in another instant several persons, mostly
+in night-dresses, appeared at their chamber-doors, thrusting out
+alarmed faces, lit by a lamp held by one of the number, a rather
+elderly lady in widow’s weeds, who by her appearance seemed to have
+just risen from a sleepless chair, instead of an oblivious couch.
+Israel’s heart beat like a hammer; his face turned like a sheet. But
+bracing himself, pulling his hat lower down over his eyes, settling his
+head in the collar of his coat, he advanced along the defile of wildly
+staring faces. He advanced with a slow and stately step, looked neither
+to the right nor the left, but went solemnly forward on his now faintly
+illuminated way, sounding his cane on the floor as he passed. The faces
+in the doorways curdled his blood by their rooted looks. Glued to the
+spot, they seemed incapable of motion. Each one was silent as he
+advanced towards him or her, but as he left each individual, one after
+another, behind, each in a frenzy shrieked out, “The Squire, the
+Squire!” As he passed the lady in the widow’s weeds, she fell senseless
+and crosswise before him. But forced to be immutable in his purpose,
+Israel, solemnly stepping over her prostrate form, marched deliberately
+on.
+
+In a few minutes more he had reached the main door of the mansion, and
+withdrawing the chain and bolt, stood in the open air. It was a bright
+moonlight night. He struck slowly across the open grounds towards the
+sunken fields beyond. When-midway across the grounds, he turned towards
+the mansion, and saw three of the front windows filled with white
+faces, gazing in terror at the wonderful spectre. Soon descending a
+slope, he disappeared from their view.
+
+Presently he came to hilly land in meadow, whose grass having been
+lately cut, now lay dotting the slope in cocks; a sinuous line of
+creamy vapor meandered through the lowlands at the base of the hill;
+while beyond was a dense grove of dwarfish trees, with here and there a
+tall tapering dead trunk, peeled of the bark, and overpeering the rest.
+The vapor wore the semblance of a deep stream of water, imperfectly
+descried; the grove looked like some closely-clustering town on its
+banks, lorded over by spires of churches.
+
+The whole scene magically reproduced to our adventurer the aspect of
+Bunker Hill, Charles River, and Boston town, on the well-remembered
+night of the 16th of June. The same season; the same moon; the same
+new-mown hay on the shaven sward; hay which was scraped together during
+the night to help pack into the redoubt so hurriedly thrown up.
+
+Acted on as if by enchantment, Israel sat down on one of the cocks, and
+gave himself up to reverie. But, worn out by long loss of sleep, his
+reveries would have soon merged into slumber’s still wilder dreams, had
+he not rallied himself, and departed on his way, fearful of forgetting
+himself in an emergency like the present. It now occurred to him that,
+well as his disguise had served him in escaping from the mansion of
+Squire Woodcock, that disguise might fatally endanger him if he should
+be discovered in it abroad. He might pass for a ghost at night, and
+among the relations and immediate friends of the gentleman deceased;
+but by day, and among indifferent persons, he ran no small risk of
+being apprehended for an entry-thief. He bitterly lamented his omission
+in not pulling on the Squire’s clothes over his own, so that he might
+now have reappeared in his former guise.
+
+As meditating over this difficulty, he was passing along, suddenly he
+saw a man in black standing right in his path, about fifty yards
+distant, in a field of some growing barley or wheat. The gloomy
+stranger was standing stock-still; one outstretched arm, with weird
+intimation pointing towards the deceased Squire’s abode. To the
+brooding soul of the now desolate Israel, so strange a sight roused a
+supernatural suspicion. His conscience morbidly reproaching him for the
+terrors he had bred in making his escape from the house, he seemed to
+see in the fixed gesture of the stranger something more than humanly
+significant. But somewhat of his intrepidity returned; he resolved to
+test the apparition. Composing itself to the same deliberate
+stateliness with which it had paced the hall, the phantom of Squire
+Woodcock firmly, advanced its cane, and marched straight forward
+towards the mysterious stranger.
+
+As he neared him, Israel shrunk. The dark coat-sleeve flapped on the
+bony skeleton of the unknown arm. The face was lost in a sort of
+ghastly blank. It was no living man.
+
+But mechanically continuing his course, Israel drew still nearer and
+saw a scarecrow.
+
+Not a little relieved by the discovery, our adventurer paused, more
+particularly to survey so deceptive an object, which seemed to have
+been constructed on the most efficient principles; probably by some
+broken down wax figure costumer. It comprised the complete wardrobe of
+a scarecrow, namely: a cocked hat, bunged; tattered coat; old velveteen
+breeches; and long worsted stockings, full of holes; all stuffed very
+nicely with straw, and skeletoned by a frame-work of poles. There was a
+great flapped pocket to the coat—which seemed to have been some
+laborer’s—standing invitingly opened. Putting his hands in, Israel drew
+out the lid of an old tobacco-box, the broken bowl of a pipe, two rusty
+nails, and a few kernels of wheat. This reminded him of the Squire’s
+pockets. Trying them, he produced a handsome handkerchief, a
+spectacle-case, with a purse containing some silver and gold, amounting
+to a little more than five pounds. Such is the difference between the
+contents of the pockets of scarecrows and the pockets of well-to-do
+squires. Ere donning his present habiliments, Israel had not omitted to
+withdraw his own money from his own coat, and put it in the pocket of
+his own waistcoat, which he had not exchanged.
+
+Looking upon the scarecrow more attentively, it struck him that,
+miserable as its wardrobe was, nevertheless here was a chance for
+getting rid of the unsuitable and perilous clothes of the Squire. No
+other available opportunity might present itself for a time. Before he
+encountered any living creature by daylight, another suit must somehow
+be had. His exchange with the old ditcher, after his escape from the
+inn near Portsmouth, had familiarized him with the most deplorable of
+wardrobes. Well, too, he knew, and had experienced it, that for a man
+desirous of avoiding notice, the more wretched the clothes, the better.
+For who does not shun the scurvy wretch, Poverty, advancing in battered
+hat and lamentable coat?
+
+Without more ado, slipping off the Squire’s raiment, he donned the
+scarecrow’s, after carefully shaking out the hay, which, from many
+alternate soakings and bakings in rain and sun, had become quite broken
+up, and would have been almost dust, were it not for the mildew which
+damped it. But sufficient of this wretched old hay remained adhesive to
+the inside of the breeches and coat-sleeves, to produce the most
+irritating torment.
+
+The grand moral question now came up, what to do with the purse. Would
+it be dishonest under the circumstances to appropriate that purse?
+Considering the whole matter, and not forgetting that he had not
+received from the gentleman deceased the promised reward for his
+services as courier, Israel concluded that he might justly use the
+money for his own. To which opinion surely no charitable judge will
+demur. Besides, what should he do with the purse, if not use it for his
+own? It would have been insane to have returned it to the relations.
+Such mysterious honesty would have but resulted in his arrest as a
+rebel, or rascal. As for the Squire’s clothes, handkerchief, and
+spectacle-case, they must be put out of sight with all dispatch. So,
+going to a morass not remote, Israel sunk them deep down, and heaped
+tufts of the rank sod upon them. Then returning to the field of corn,
+sat down under the lee of a rock, about a hundred yards from where the
+scarecrow had stood, thinking which way he now had best direct his
+steps. But his late ramble coming after so long a deprivation of rest,
+soon produced effects not so easy to be shaken off, as when reposing
+upon the haycock. He felt less anxious too, since changing his apparel.
+So before he was aware, he fell into deep sleep.
+
+When he awoke, the sun was well up in the sky. Looking around he saw a
+farm-laborer with a pitchfork coming at a distance into view, whose
+steps seemed bent in a direction not far from the spot where he lay.
+Immediately it struck our adventurer that this man must be familiar
+with the scarecrow; perhaps had himself fashioned it. Should he miss it
+then, he might make immediate search, and so discover the thief so
+imprudently loitering upon the very field of his operations.
+
+Waiting until the man momentarily disappeared in a little hollow,
+Israel ran briskly to the identical spot where the scarecrow had stood,
+where, standing stiffly erect, pulling the hat well over his face, and
+thrusting out his arm, pointed steadfastly towards the Squire’s abode,
+he awaited the event. Soon the man reappeared in sight, and marching
+right on, paused not far from Israel, and gave him an one earnest look,
+as if it were his daily wont to satisfy that all was right with the
+scarecrow. No sooner was the man departed to a reasonable distance,
+than, quitting his post, Israel struck across the fields towards
+London. But he had not yet quite quitted the field when it occurred to
+him to turn round and see if the man was completely out of sight, when,
+to his consternation, he saw the man returning towards him, evidently
+by his pace and gesture in unmixed amazement. The man must have turned
+round to look before Israel had done so. Frozen to the ground, Israel
+knew not what to do; but next moment it struck him that this very
+motionlessness was the least hazardous plan in such a strait. Thrusting
+out his arm again towards the house, once more he stood stock still,
+and again awaited the event.
+
+It so happened that this time, in pointing towards the house, Israel
+unavoidably pointed towards the advancing man. Hoping that the
+strangeness of this coincidence might, by operating on the man’s
+superstition, incline him to beat an immediate retreat, Israel kept
+cool as he might. But the man proved to be of a braver metal than
+anticipated. In passing the spot where the scarecrow had stood, and
+perceiving, beyond the possibility of mistake, that by, some
+unaccountable agency it had suddenly removed itself to a distance,
+instead of being, terrified at this verification of his worst
+apprehensions, the man pushed on for Israel, apparently resolved to
+sift this mystery to the bottom.
+
+Seeing him now determinately coming, with pitchfork valiantly
+presented, Israel, as a last means of practising on the fellow’s fears
+of the supernatural, suddenly doubled up both fists, presenting them
+savagely towards him at a distance of about twenty paces, at the same
+time showing his teeth like a skull’s, and demoniacally rolling his
+eyes. The man paused bewildered, looked all round him, looked at the
+springing grain, then across at some trees, then up at the sky, and
+satisfied at last by those observations that the world at large had not
+undergone a miracle in the last fifteen minutes, resolutely resumed his
+advance; the pitchfork, like a boarding-pike, now aimed full at the
+breast of the object. Seeing all his stratagems vain, Israel now threw
+himself into the original attitude of the scarecrow, and once again
+stood immovable. Abating his pace by degrees almost to a mere creep,
+the man at last came within three feet of him, and, pausing, gazed
+amazed into Israel’s eyes. With a stern and terrible expression Israel
+resolutely returned the glance, but otherwise remained like a statue,
+hoping thus to stare his pursuer out of countenance. At last the man
+slowly presented one prong of his fork towards Israel’s left eye.
+Nearer and nearer the sharp point came, till no longer capable of
+enduring such a test, Israel took to his heels with all speed, his
+tattered coat-tails streaming behind him. With inveterate purpose the
+man pursued. Darting blindly on, Israel, leaping a gate, suddenly found
+himself in a field where some dozen laborers were at work, who
+recognizing the scarecrow—an old acquaintance of theirs, as it would
+seem—lifted all their hands as the astounding apparition swept by,
+followed by the man with the pitchfork. Soon all joined in the chase,
+but Israel proved to have better wind and bottom than any. Outstripping
+the whole pack he finally shot out of their sight in an extensive park,
+heavily timbered in one quarter. He never saw more of these people.
+
+Loitering in the wood till nightfall, he then stole out and made the
+best of his way towards the house of that good natured farmer in whose
+corn-loft he had received his first message from Squire Woodcock.
+Rousing this man up a little before midnight, he informed him somewhat
+of his recent adventures, but carefully concealed his having been
+employed as a secret courier, together with his escape from Squire
+Woodcock’s. All he craved at present was a meal. The meal being over,
+Israel offered to buy from the farmer his best suit of clothes, and
+displayed the money on the spot.
+
+“Where did you get so much money?” said his entertainer in a tone of
+surprise; “your clothes here don’t look as if you had seen prosperous
+times since you left me. Why, you look like a scarecrow.”
+
+“That may well be,” replied Israel, very soberly. “But what do you say?
+will you sell me your suit?—here’s the cash.”
+
+“I don’t know about it,” said the farmer, in doubt; “let me look at the
+money. Ha!—a silk purse come out of a beggars pocket!—Quit the house,
+rascal, you’ve turned thief.”
+
+Thinking that he could not swear to his having come by his money with
+absolute honesty—since indeed the case was one for the most subtle
+casuist—Israel knew not what to reply. This honest confusion confirmed
+the farmer, who with many abusive epithets drove him into the road,
+telling him that he might thank himself that he did not arrest him on
+the spot.
+
+In great dolor at this unhappy repulse, Israel trudged on in the
+moonlight some three miles to the house of another friend, who also had
+once succored him in extremity. This man proved a very sound sleeper.
+Instead of succeeding in rousing him by his knocking, Israel but
+succeeded in rousing his wife, a person not of the greatest amiability.
+Raising the sash, and seeing so shocking a pauper before her, the woman
+upbraided him with shameless impropriety in asking charity at dead of
+night, in a dress so improper too. Looking down at his deplorable
+velveteens, Israel discovered that his extensive travels had produced a
+great rent in one loin of the rotten old breeches, through which a
+whitish fragment protruded.
+
+Remedying this oversight as well as he might, he again implored the
+woman to wake her husband.
+
+“That I shan’t!” said the woman, morosely. “Quit the premises, or I’ll
+throw something on ye.”
+
+With that she brought some earthenware to the window, and would have
+fulfilled her threat, had not Israel prudently retreated some paces.
+Here he entreated the woman to take mercy on his plight, and since she
+would not waken her husband, at least throw to him (Israel) her
+husband’s breeches, and he would leave the price of them, with his own
+breeches to boot, on the sill of the door.
+
+“You behold how sadly I need them,” said he; “for heaven’s sake
+befriend me.”
+
+“Quit the premises!” reiterated the woman.
+
+“The breeches, the breeches! here is the money,” cried Israel, half
+furious with anxiety.
+
+“Saucy cur,” cried the woman, somehow misunderstanding him; “do you
+cunningly taunt me with _wearing_ the breeches’? begone!”
+
+Once more poor Israel decamped, and made for another friend. But here a
+monstrous bull-dog, indignant that the peace of a quiet family should
+be disturbed by so outrageous a tatterdemalion, flew at Israel’s
+unfortunate coat, whose rotten skirts the brute tore completely off,
+leaving the coat razeed to a spencer, which barely came down to the
+wearer’s waist. In attempting to drive the monster away, Israel’s hat
+fell off, upon which the dog pounced with the utmost fierceness, and
+thrusting both paws into it, rammed out the crown and went snuffling
+the wreck before him. Recovering the wretched hat, Israel again beat a
+retreat, his wardrobe sorely the worse for his visits. Not only was his
+coat a mere rag, but his breeches, clawed by the dog, were slashed into
+yawning gaps, while his yellow hair waved over the top of the crownless
+beaver, like a lonely tuft of heather on the highlands.
+
+In this plight the morning discovered him dubiously skirmishing on the
+outskirts of a village.
+
+“Ah! what a true patriot gets for serving his country!” murmured
+Israel. But soon thinking a little better of his case, and seeing yet
+another house which had once furnished him with an asylum, he made bold
+to advance to the door. Luckily he this time met the man himself, just
+emerging from bed. At first the farmer did not recognize the fugitive,
+but upon another look, seconded by Israel’s plaintive appeal, beckoned
+him into the barn, where directly our adventurer told him all he
+thought prudent to disclose of his story, ending by once more offering
+to negotiate for breeches and coat. Having ere this emptied and thrown
+away the purse which had played him so scurvy a trick with the first
+farmer, he now produced three crown-pieces.
+
+“Three crown-pieces in your pocket, and no crown to your hat!” said the
+farmer.
+
+“But I assure you, my friend,” rejoined Israel, “that a finer hat was
+never worn, until that confounded bull-dog ruined it.”
+
+“True,” said the farmer, “I forgot that part of your story. Well, I
+have a tolerable coat and breeches which I will sell you for your
+money.”
+
+In ten minutes more Israel was equipped in a gray coat of coarse cloth,
+not much improved by wear, and breeches to match. For half-a-crown more
+he procured a highly respectable looking hat.
+
+“Now, my kind friend,” said Israel, “can you tell me where Horne Tooke
+and John Bridges live?”
+
+Our adventurer thought it his best plan to seek out one or other of
+those gentlemen, both to report proceedings and learn confirmatory
+tidings concerning Squire Woodcock, touching whose fate he did not like
+to inquire of others.
+
+“Horne Tooke? What do you want with Horne Tooke,” said the farmer. “He
+was Squire Woodcock’s friend, wasn’t he? The poor Squire! Who would
+have thought he’d have gone off so suddenly. But apoplexy comes like a
+bullet.”
+
+“I was right,” thought Israel to himself. “But where does Horne Tooke
+live?” he demanded again.
+
+“He once lived in Brentford, and wore a cassock there. But I hear he’s
+sold out his living, and gone in his surplice to study law in Lunnon.”
+
+This was all news to Israel, who, from various amiable remarks he had
+heard from Horne Tooke at the Squire’s, little dreamed he was an
+ordained clergyman. Yet a good-natured English clergyman translated
+Lucian; another, equally good-natured, wrote Tristam Shandy; and a
+third, an ill-natured appreciator of good-natured Rabelais, died a
+dean; not to speak of others. Thus ingenious and ingenuous are some of
+the English clergy.
+
+“You can’t tell me, then, where to find Horne Tooke?” said Israel, in
+perplexity.
+
+“You’ll find him, I suppose, in Lunnon.”
+
+“What street and number?”
+
+“Don’t know. Needle in a haystack.”
+
+“Where does Mr. Bridges live?”
+
+“Never heard of any Bridges, except Lunnon bridges, and one Molly
+Bridges in Bridewell.”
+
+So Israel departed; better clothed, but no wiser than before.
+
+What to do next? He reckoned up his money, and concluded he had plenty
+to carry him back to Doctor Franklin in Paris. Accordingly, taking a
+turn to avoid the two nearest villages, he directed his steps towards
+London, where, again taking the post-coach for Dover, he arrived on the
+channel shore just in time to learn that the very coach in which he
+rode brought the news to the authorities there that all intercourse
+between the two nations was indefinitely suspended. The characteristic
+taciturnity and formal stolidity of his fellow-travellers—all
+Englishmen, mutually unacquainted with each other, and occupying
+different positions in life—having prevented his sooner hearing the
+tidings.
+
+Here was another accumulation of misfortunes. All visions but those of
+eventual imprisonment or starvation vanished from before the present
+realities of poor Israel Potter. The Brentford gentleman had flattered
+him with the prospect of receiving something very handsome for his
+services as courier. That hope was no more. Doctor Franklin had
+promised him his good offices in procuring him a passage home to
+America. Quite out of the question now. The sage had likewise intimated
+that he might possibly see him some way remunerated for his sufferings
+in his country’s cause. An idea no longer to be harbored. Then Israel
+recalled the mild man of wisdom’s words—“At the prospect of pleasure
+never be elated; but without depression respect the omens of ill.” But
+he found it as difficult now to comply, in all respects, with the last
+section of the maxim, as before he had with the first.
+
+While standing wrapped in afflictive reflections on the shore, gazing
+towards the unattainable coast of France, a pleasant-looking cousinly
+stranger, in seamen’s dress, accosted him, and, after some pleasant
+conversation, very civilly invited him up a lane into a house of rather
+secret entertainment. Pleased to be befriended in this his strait,
+Israel yet looked inquisitively upon the man, not completely satisfied
+with his good intentions. But the other, with good-humored violence,
+hurried him up the lane into the inn, when, calling for some spirits,
+he and Israel very affectionately drank to each other’s better health
+and prosperity.
+
+“Take another glass,” said the stranger, affably.
+
+Israel, to drown his heavy-heartedness, complied. The liquor began to
+take effect.
+
+“Ever at sea?” said the stranger, lightly.
+
+“Oh, yes; been a whaling.”
+
+“Ah!” said the other, “happy to hear that, I assure you. Jim! Bill!”
+And beckoning very quietly to two brawny fellows, in a trice Israel
+found himself kidnapped into the naval service of the magnanimous old
+gentleman of Kew Gardens—his Royal Majesty, George III.—“Hands off!”
+said Israel, fiercely, as the two men pinioned him.
+
+“Reglar game-cock,” said the cousinly-looking man. “I must get three
+guineas for cribbing him. Pleasant voyage to ye, my friend,” and,
+leaving Israel a prisoner, the crimp, buttoning his coat, sauntered
+leisurely out of the inn.
+
+“I’m no Englishman,” roared Israel, in a foam.
+
+“Oh! that’s the old story,” grinned his jailers. “Come along. There’s
+no Englishman in the English fleet. All foreigners. You may take their
+own word for it.”
+
+To be short, in less than a week Israel found himself at Portsmouth,
+and, ere long, a foretopman in his Majesty’s ship of the line,
+“Unprincipled,” scudding before the wind down channel, in company with
+the “Undaunted,” and the “Unconquerable;” all three haughty Dons bound
+to the East Indian waters as reinforcements to the fleet of Sir Edward
+Hughs.
+
+And now, we might shortly have to record our adventurer’s part in the
+famous engagement off the coast of Coromandel, between Admiral
+Suffrien’s fleet and the English squadron, were it not that fate
+snatched him on the threshold of events, and, turning him short round
+whither he had come, sent him back congenially to war against England;
+instead of on her behalf. Thus repeatedly and rapidly were the fortunes
+of our wanderer planted, torn up, transplanted, and dropped again,
+hither and thither, according as the Supreme Disposer of sailors and
+soldiers saw fit to appoint.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV.
+IN WHICH ISRAEL IS SAILOR UNDER TWO FLAGS, AND IN THREE SHIPS, AND ALL
+IN ONE NIGHT.
+
+
+As running down channel at evening, Israel walked the crowded main-deck
+of the seventy-four, continually brushed by a thousand hurrying
+wayfarers, as if he were in some great street in London, jammed with
+artisans, just returning from their day’s labor, novel and painful
+emotions were his. He found himself dropped into the naval mob without
+one friend; nay, among enemies, since his country’s enemies were his
+own, and against the kith and kin of these very beings around him, he
+himself had once lifted a fatal hand. The martial bustle of a great
+man-of-war, on her first day out of port, was indescribably jarring to
+his present mood. Those sounds of the human multitude disturbing the
+solemn natural solitudes of the sea, mysteriously afflicted him. He
+murmured against that untowardness which, after condemning him to long
+sorrows on the land, now pursued him with added griefs on the deep. Why
+should a patriot, leaping for the chance again to attack the oppressor,
+as at Bunker Hill, now be kidnapped to fight that oppressor’s battles
+on the endless drifts of the Bunker Hills of the billows? But like many
+other repiners, Israel was perhaps a little premature with upbraidings
+like these.
+
+Plying on between Scilly and Cape Clear, the Unprincipled—which vessel
+somewhat outsailed her consorts—fell in, just before dusk, with a large
+revenue cutter close to, and showing signals of distress. At the
+moment, no other sail was in sight.
+
+Cursing the necessity of pausing with a strong fair wind at a juncture
+like this, the officer-of-the-deck shortened sail, and hove to; hailing
+the cutter, to know what was the matter. As he hailed the small craft
+from the lofty poop of the bristling seventy-four, this lieutenant
+seemed standing on the top of Gibraltar, talking to some lowland
+peasant in a hut. The reply was, that in a sudden flaw of wind, which
+came nigh capsizing them, not an hour since, the cutter had lost all
+four foremost men by the violent jibing of a boom. She wanted help to
+get back to port.
+
+“You shall have one man,” said the officer-of-the-deck, morosely.
+
+“Let him be a good one then, for heaven’s sake,” said he in the cutter;
+“I ought to have at least two.”
+
+During this talk, Israel’s curiosity had prompted him to dart up the
+ladder from the main-deck, and stand right in the gangway above,
+looking out on the strange craft. Meantime the order had been given to
+drop a boat. Thinking this a favorable chance, he stationed himself so
+that he should be the foremost to spring into the boat; though crowds
+of English sailors, eager as himself for the same opportunity to escape
+from foreign service, clung to the chains of the as yet imperfectly
+disciplined man-of-war. As the two men who had been lowered in the boat
+hooked her, when afloat, along to the gangway, Israel dropped like a
+comet into the stern-sheets, stumbled forward, and seized an oar. In a
+moment more, all the oarsmen were in their places, and with a few
+strokes the boat lay alongside the cutter.
+
+“Take which of them you please,” said the lieutenant in command,
+addressing the officer in the revenue-cutter, and motioning with his
+hand to his boat’s crew, as if they were a parcel of carcasses of
+mutton, of which the first pick was offered to some customer. “Quick
+and choose. Sit down, men”—to the sailors. “Oh, you are in a great
+hurry to get rid of the king’s service, ain’t you? Brave chaps
+indeed!—Have you chosen your man?”
+
+All this while the ten faces of the anxious oarsmen looked with mute
+longings and appealings towards the officer of the cutter; every face
+turned at the same angle, as if managed by one machine. And so they
+were. One motive.
+
+“I take the freckled chap with the yellow hair—him,” pointing to
+Israel.
+
+Nine of the upturned faces fell in sullen despair, and ere Israel could
+spring to his feet, he felt a violent thrust in his rear from the toes
+of one of the disappointed behind him.
+
+“Jump, dobbin!” cried the officer of the boat.
+
+But Israel was already on board. Another moment, and the boat and
+cutter parted. Ere long, night fell, and the man-of-war and her
+consorts were out of sight.
+
+The revenue vessel resumed her course towards the nighest port, worked
+by but four men: the captain, Israel, and two officers. The cabin-boy
+was kept at the helm. As the only foremast man, Israel was put to it
+pretty hard. Where there is but one man to three masters, woe betide
+that lonely slave. Besides, it was of itself severe work enough to
+manage the vessel thus short of hands. But to make matters still worse,
+the captain and his officers were ugly-tempered fellows. The one
+kicked, and the others cuffed Israel. Whereupon, not sugared with his
+recent experiences, and maddened by his present hap, Israel seeing
+himself alone at sea, with only three men, instead of a thousand, to
+contend against, plucked up a heart, knocked the captain into the lee
+scuppers, and in his fury was about tumbling the first-officer, a small
+wash of a fellow, plump overboard, when the captain, jumping to his
+feet, seized him by his long yellow hair, vowing he would slaughter
+him. Meanwhile the cutter flew foaming through the channel, as if in
+demoniac glee at this uproar on her imperilled deck. While the
+consternation was at its height, a dark body suddenly loomed at a
+moderate distance into view, shooting right athwart the stern of the
+cutter. The next moment a shot struck the water within a boat’s length.
+
+“Heave to, and send a boat on board!” roared a voice almost as loud as
+the cannon.
+
+“That’s a war-ship,” cried the captain of the revenue vessel, in alarm;
+“but she ain’t a countryman.”
+
+Meantime the officers and Israel stopped the cutter’s way.
+
+“Send a boat on board, or I’ll sink you,” again came roaring from the
+stranger, followed by another shot, striking the water still nearer the
+cutter.
+
+“For God’s sake, don’t cannonade us. I haven’t got the crew to man a
+boat,” replied the captain of the cutter. “Who are you?”
+
+“Wait till I send a boat to you for that,” replied the stranger.
+
+“She’s an enemy of some sort, that’s plain,” said the Englishman now to
+his officers; “we ain’t at open war with France; she’s some
+bloodthirsty pirate or other. What d’ye say, men?” turning to his
+officers; “let’s outsail her, or be shot to chips. We can beat her at
+sailing, I know.”
+
+With that, nothing doubting that his counsel would be heartily
+responded to, he ran to the braces to get the cutter before the wind,
+followed by one officer, while the other, for a useless bravado,
+hoisted the colors at the stern.
+
+But Israel stood indifferent, or rather all in a fever of conflicting
+emotions. He thought he recognized the voice from the strange vessel.
+
+“Come, what do ye standing there, fool? Spring to the ropes here!”
+cried the furious captain.
+
+But Israel did not stir.
+
+Meantime the confusion on board the stranger, owing to the hurried
+lowering of her boat, with the cloudiness of the sky darkening the
+misty sea, united to conceal the bold manoeuvre of the cutter. She had
+almost gained full headway ere an oblique shot, directed by mere
+chance, struck her stern, tearing the upcurved head of the tiller in
+the hands of the cabin-boy, and killing him with the splinters. Running
+to the stump, the captain huzzaed, and steered the reeling ship on.
+Forced now to hoist back the boat ere giving chase, the stranger was
+dropped rapidly astern.
+
+All this while storms of maledictions were hurled on Israel. But their
+exertions at the ropes prevented his shipmates for the time from using
+personal violence. While observing their efforts, Israel could not but
+say to himself, “These fellows are as brave as they are brutal.”
+
+Soon the stranger was seen dimly wallowing along astern, crowding all
+sail in chase, while now and then her bow-gun, showing its red tongue,
+bellowed after them like a mad bull. Two more shots struck the cutter,
+but without materially damaging her sails, or the ropes immediately
+upholding them. Several of her less important stays were sundered,
+however, whose loose tarry ends lashed the air like scorpions. It
+seemed not improbable that, owing to her superior sailing, the keen
+cutter would yet get clear.
+
+At this juncture Israel, running towards the captain, who still held
+the splintered stump of the tiller, stood full before him, saying, “I
+am an enemy, a Yankee, look to yourself.”
+
+“Help here, lads, help,” roared the captain, “a traitor, a traitor!”
+
+The words were hardly out of his mouth when his voice was silenced for
+ever. With one prodigious heave of his whole physical force, Israel
+smote him over the taffrail into the sea, as if the man had fallen
+backwards over a teetering chair. By this time the two officers were
+hurrying aft. Ere meeting them midway, Israel, quick as lightning, cast
+off the two principal halyards, thus letting the large sails all in a
+tumble of canvass to the deck. Next moment one of the officers was at
+the helm, to prevent the cutter from capsizing by being without a
+steersman in such an emergency. The other officer and Israel
+interlocked. The battle was in the midst of the chaos of blowing
+canvass. Caught in a rent of the sail, the officer slipped and fell
+near the sharp iron edge of the hatchway. As he fell he caught Israel
+by the most terrible part in which mortality can be grappled. Insane
+with pain, Israel dashed his adversary’s skull against the sharp iron.
+The officer’s hold relaxed, but himself stiffened. Israel made for the
+helmsman, who as yet knew not the issue of the late tussle. He caught
+him round the loins, bedding his fingers like grisly claws into his
+flesh, and hugging him to his heart. The man’s ghost, caught like a
+broken cork in a gurgling bottle’s neck, gasped with the embrace.
+Loosening him suddenly, Israel hurled him from him against the
+bulwarks. That instant another report was heard, followed by the savage
+hail—“You down sail at last, do ye? I’m a good mind to sink ye for your
+scurvy trick. Pull down that dirty rag there, astern!”
+
+With a loud huzza, Israel hauled down the flag with one hand, while
+with the other he helped the now slowly gliding craft from falling off
+before the wind.
+
+In a few moments a boat was alongside. As its commander stepped to the
+deck he stumbled against the body of the first officer, which, owing to
+the sudden slant of the cutter in coming to the wind, had rolled
+against the side near the gangway. As he came aft he heard the moan of
+the other officer, where he lay under the mizzen shrouds.
+
+“What is all this?” demanded the stranger of Israel.
+
+“It means that I am a Yankee impressed into the king’s service, and for
+their pains I have taken the cutter.”
+
+Giving vent to his surprise, the officer looked narrowly at the body by
+the shrouds, and said, “This man is as good as dead, but we will take
+him to Captain Paul as a witness in your behalf.”
+
+“Captain Paul?—Paul Jones?” cried Israel.
+
+“The same.”
+
+“I thought so. I thought that was his voice hailing. It was Captain
+Paul’s voice that somehow put me up to this deed.”
+
+“Captain Paul is the devil for putting men up to be tigers. But where
+are the rest of the crew?”
+
+“Overboard.”
+
+“What?” cried the officer; “come on board the Ranger. Captain Paul will
+use you for a broadside.”
+
+Taking the moaning man along with them, and leaving the cutter
+untenanted by any living soul, the boat now left her for the enemy’s
+ship. But ere they reached it the man had expired.
+
+Standing foremost on the deck, crowded with three hundred men, as
+Israel climbed the side, he saw, by the light of battle-lanterns, a
+small, smart, brigandish-looking man, wearing a Scotch bonnet, with a
+gold band to it.
+
+“You rascal,” said this person, “why did your paltry smack give me this
+chase? Where’s the rest of your gang?”
+
+“Captain Paul,” said Israel, “I believe I remember you. I believe I
+offered you my bed in Paris some months ago. How is Poor Richard?”
+
+“God! Is this the courier? The Yankee courier? But how now? in an
+English revenue cutter?”
+
+“Impressed, sir; that’s the way.”
+
+“But where’s the rest of them?” demanded Paul, turning to the officer.
+
+Thereupon the officer very briefly told Paul what Israel told him.
+
+“Are we to sink the cutter, sir?” said the gunner, now advancing
+towards Captain Paul. “If it is to be done, now is the time. She is
+close under us, astern; a few guns pointed downwards will settle her
+like a shotted corpse.”
+
+“No. Let her drift into Penzance, an anonymous earnest of what the
+whitesquall in Paul Jones intends for the future.”
+
+Then giving directions as to the course of the ship, with an order for
+himself to be called at the first glimpse of a sail, Paul took Israel
+down with him into his cabin.
+
+“Tell me your story now, my yellow lion. How was it all? Don’t stand,
+sit right down there on the transom. I’m a democratic sort of sea-king.
+Plump on the woolsack, I say, and spin the yarn. But hold; you want
+some grog first.”
+
+As Paul handed the flagon, Israel’s eye fell upon his hand.
+
+“You don’t wear any rings now, Captain, I see. Left them in Paris for
+safety.”
+
+“Aye, with a certain marchioness there,” replied Paul, with a dandyish
+look of sentimental conceit, which sat strangely enough on his
+otherwise grim and Fejee air.
+
+“I should think rings would be somewhat inconvenient at sea,” resumed
+Israel. “On my first voyage to the West Indies, I wore a girl’s ring on
+my middle finger here, and it wasn’t long before, what with hauling wet
+ropes, and what not, it got a kind of grown down into the flesh, and
+pained me very bad, let me tell you, it hugged the finger so.”
+
+“And did the girl grow as close to your heart, lad?”
+
+“Ah, Captain, girls grow themselves off quicker than we grow them on.”
+
+“Some experience with the countesses as well as myself, eh? But the
+story; wave your yellow mane, my lion—the story.”
+
+So Israel went on and told the story in all particulars.
+
+At its conclusion Captain Paul eyed him very earnestly. His wild,
+lonely heart, incapable of sympathizing with cuddled natures made
+humdrum by long exemption from pain, was yet drawn towards a being, who
+in desperation of friendlessness, something like his own, had so
+fiercely waged battle against tyrannical odds.
+
+“Did you go to sea young, lad?”
+
+“Yes, pretty young.”
+
+“I went at twelve, from Whitehaven. Only so high,” raising his hand
+some four feet from the deck. “I was so small, and looked so queer in
+my little blue jacket, that they called me the monkey. They’ll call me
+something else before long. Did you ever sail out of Whitehaven?”
+
+“No, Captain.”
+
+“If you had, you’d have heard sad stories about me. To this hour they
+say there that I—bloodthirsty, coward dog that I am—flogged a sailor,
+one Mungo Maxwell, to death. It’s a lie, by Heaven! I flogged him, for
+he was a mutinous scamp. But he died naturally, some time afterwards,
+and on board another ship. But why talk? They didn’t believe the
+affidavits of others taken before London courts, triumphantly
+acquitting me; how then will they credit _my_ interested words? If
+slander, however much a lie, once gets hold of a man, it will stick
+closer than fair fame, as black pitch sticks closer than white cream.
+But let ’em slander. I will give the slanderers matter for curses. When
+last I left Whitehaven, I swore never again to set foot on her pier,
+except, like Caesar, at Sandwich, as a foreign invader. Spring under
+me, good ship; on you I bound to my vengeance!”
+
+Men with poignant feelings, buried under an air of care-free self
+command, are never proof to the sudden incitements of passion. Though
+in the main they may control themselves, yet if they but once permit
+the smallest vent, then they may bid adieu to all self-restraint, at
+least for that time. Thus with Paul on the present occasion. His
+sympathy with Israel had prompted this momentary ebullition. When it
+was gone by, he seemed not a little to regret it. But he passed it over
+lightly, saying, “You see, my fine fellow, what sort of a bloody
+cannibal I am. Will you be a sailor of mine? A sailor of the Captain
+who flogged poor Mungo Maxwell to death?”
+
+“I will be very happy, Captain Paul, to be sailor under the man who
+will yet, I dare say, help flog the British nation to death.”
+
+“You hate ’em, do ye?”
+
+“Like snakes. For months they’ve hunted me as a dog,” half howled and
+half wailed Israel, at the memory of all he had suffered.
+
+“Give me your hand, my lion; wave your wild flax again. By Heaven, you
+hate so well, I love ye. You shall be my confidential man; stand sentry
+at my cabin door; sleep in the cabin; steer my boat; keep by my side
+whenever I land. What do you say?”
+
+“I say I’m glad to hear you.”
+
+“You are a good, brave soul. You are the first among the millions of
+mankind that I ever naturally took to. Come, you are tired. There, go
+into that state-room for to-night—it’s mine. You offered me your bed in
+Paris.”
+
+“But you begged off, Captain, and so must I. Where do you sleep?”
+
+“Lad, I don’t sleep half a night out of three. My clothes have not been
+off now for five days.”
+
+“Ah, Captain, you sleep so little and scheme so much, you will die
+young.”
+
+“I know it: I want to: I mean to. Who would live a doddered old stump?
+What do you think of my Scotch bonnet?”
+
+“It looks well on you, Captain.”
+
+“Do you think so? A Scotch bonnet, though, ought to look well on a
+Scotchman. I’m such by birth. Is the gold band too much?”
+
+“I like the gold band, Captain. It looks something as I should think a
+crown might on a king.”
+
+“Aye?”
+
+“You would make a better-looking king than George III.”
+
+“Did you ever see that old granny? Waddles about in farthingales, and
+carries a peacock fan, don’t he? Did you ever see him?”
+
+“Was as close to him as I am to you now, Captain. In Kew Gardens it
+was, where I worked gravelling the walks. I was all alone with him,
+talking for some ten minutes.”
+
+“By Jove, what a chance! Had I but been there! What an opportunity for
+kidnapping a British king, and carrying him off in a fast sailing smack
+to Boston, a hostage for American freedom. But what did you? Didn’t you
+try to do something to him?”
+
+“I had a wicked thought or two, Captain, but I got the better of it.
+Besides, the king behaved handsomely towards me; yes, like a true man.
+God bless him for it. But it was before that, that I got the better of
+the wicked thought.”
+
+“Ah, meant to stick him, I suppose. Glad you didn’t. It would have been
+very shabby. Never kill a king, but make him captive. He looks better
+as a led horse, than a dead carcass. I propose now, this trip, falling
+on the grounds of the Earl of Selkirk, a privy counsellor and
+particular private friend of George III. But I won’t hurt a hair of his
+head. When I get him on board here, he shall lodge in my best
+state-room, which I mean to hang with damask for him. I shall drink
+wine with him, and be very friendly; take him to America, and introduce
+his lordship into the best circles there; only I shall have him
+accompanied on his calls by a sentry or two disguised as valets. For
+the Earl’s to be on sale, mind; so much ransom; that is, the nobleman,
+Lord Selkirk, shall have a bodily price pinned on his coat-tail, like
+any slave up at auction in Charleston. But, my lad with the yellow
+mane, you very strangely draw out my secrets. And yet you don’t talk.
+Your honesty is a magnet which attracts my sincerity. But I rely on
+your fidelity.”
+
+“I shall be a vice to your plans, Captain Paul. I will receive, but I
+won’t let go, unless you alone loose the screw.”
+
+“Well said. To bed now; you ought to. I go on deck. Good night,
+ace-of-hearts.”
+
+“That is fitter for yourself, Captain Paul, lonely leader of the suit.”
+
+“Lonely? Aye, but number one cannot but be lonely, my trump.”
+
+“Again I give it back. Ace-of-trumps may it prove to you, Captain Paul;
+may it be impossible for you ever to be taken. But for me—poor deuce, a
+trey, that comes in your wake—any king or knave may take me, as before
+now the knaves have.”
+
+“Tut, tut, lad; never be more cheery for another than for yourself. But
+a fagged body fags the soul. To hammock, to hammock! while I go on deck
+to clap on more sail to your cradle.”
+
+And they separated for that night.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV.
+THEY SAIL AS FAR AS THE CRAG OF AILSA.
+
+
+Next morning Israel was appointed quartermaster—a subaltern selected
+from the common seamen, and whose duty mostly stations him in the stern
+of the ship, where the captain walks. His business is to carry the
+glass on the look-out for sails; hoist or lower the colors; and keep an
+eye on the helmsman. Picked out from the crew for their superior
+respectability and intelligence, as well as for their excellent
+seamanship, it is not unusual to find the quartermasters of an armed
+ship on peculiarly easy terms with the commissioned officers and
+captain. This birth, therefore, placed Israel in official contiguity to
+Paul, and without subjecting either to animadversion, made their public
+intercourse on deck almost as familiar as their unrestrained converse
+in the cabin.
+
+It was a fine cool day in the beginning of April. They were now off the
+coast of Wales, whose lofty mountains, crested with snow, presented a
+Norwegian aspect. The wind was fair, and blew with a strange,
+bestirring power. The ship—running between Ireland and England,
+northwards, towards the Irish Sea, the inmost heart of the British
+waters—seemed, as she snortingly shook the spray from her bow, to be
+conscious of the dare-devil defiance of the soul which conducted her on
+this anomalous cruise. Sailing alone from out a naval port of France,
+crowded with ships-of-the-line, Paul Jones, in his small craft, went
+forth in single-armed championship against the English host. Armed with
+but the sling-stones in his one shot-locker, like young David of old,
+Paul bearded the British giant of Gath. It is not easy, at the present
+day, to conceive the hardihood of this enterprise. It was a marching up
+to the muzzle; the act of one who made no compromise with the
+cannonadings of danger or death; such a scheme as only could have
+inspired a heart which held at nothing all the prescribed prudence of
+war, and every obligation of peace; combining in one breast the
+vengeful indignation and bitter ambition of an outraged hero, with the
+uncompunctuous desperation of a renegade. In one view, the Coriolanus
+of the sea; in another, a cross between the gentleman and the wolf.
+
+As Paul stood on the elevated part of the quarter-deck, with none but
+his confidential quartermaster near him, he yielded to Israel’s natural
+curiosity to learn something concerning the sailing of the expedition.
+Paul stood lightly, swaying his body over the sea, by holding on to the
+mizzen-shrouds, an attitude not inexpressive of his easy audacity;
+while near by, pacing a few steps to and fro, his long spy-glass now
+under his arm, and now presented at his eye, Israel, looking the very
+image of vigilant prudence, listened to the warrior’s story. It
+appeared that on the night of the visit of the Duke de Chartres and
+Count D’Estaing to Doctor Franklin in Paris—the same night that Captain
+Paul and Israel were joint occupants of the neighboring chamber—the
+final sanction of the French king to the sailing of an American
+armament against England, under the direction of the Colonial
+Commissioner, was made known to the latter functionary. It was a very
+ticklish affair. Though swaying on the brink of avowed hostilities with
+England, no verbal declaration had as yet been made by France.
+Undoubtedly, this enigmatic position of things was highly advantageous
+to such an enterprise as Paul’s.
+
+Without detailing all the steps taken through the united efforts of
+Captain Paul and Doctor Franklin, suffice it that the determined rover
+had now attained his wish—the unfettered command of an armed ship in
+the British waters; a ship legitimately authorized to hoist the
+American colors, her commander having in his cabin-locker a regular
+commission as an officer of the American navy. He sailed without any
+instructions. With that rare insight into rare natures which so largely
+distinguished the sagacious Franklin, the sage well knew that a
+prowling _brave_, like Paul Jones, was, like the prowling lion, by
+nature a solitary warrior. “Let him alone,” was the wise man’s answer
+to some statesman who sought to hamper Paul with a letter of
+instructions.
+
+Much subtile casuistry has been expended upon the point, whether Paul
+Jones was a knave or a hero, or a union of both. But war and warriors,
+like politics and politicians, like religion and religionists, admit of
+no metaphysics.
+
+On the second day after Israel’s arrival on board the Ranger, as he and
+Paul were conversing on the deck, Israel suddenly levelling his glass
+towards the Irish coast, announced a large sail bound in. The Ranger
+gave chase, and soon, almost within sight of her destination—the port
+of Dublin—the stranger was taken, manned, and turned round for Brest.
+
+The Ranger then stood over, passed the Isle of Man towards the
+Cumberland shore, arriving within remote sight of Whitehaven about
+sunset. At dark she was hovering off the harbor, with a party of
+volunteers all ready to descend. But the wind shifted and blew fresh
+with a violent sea.
+
+“I won’t call on old friends in foul weather,” said Captain Paul to
+Israel. “We’ll saunter about a little, and leave our cards in a day or
+two.”
+
+Next morning, in Glentinebay, on the south shore of Scotland, they fell
+in with a revenue wherry. It was the practice of such craft to board
+merchant vessels. The Ranger was disguised as a merchantman, presenting
+a broad drab-colored belt all round her hull; under the coat of a
+Quaker, concealing the intent of a Turk. It was expected that the
+chartered rover would come alongside the unchartered one. But the
+former took to flight, her two lug sails staggering under a heavy wind,
+which the pursuing guns of the Ranger pelted with a hail-storm of shot.
+The wherry escaped, spite the severe cannonade.
+
+Off the Mull of Galoway, the day following, Paul found himself so nigh
+a large barley-freighted Scotch coaster, that, to prevent her carrying
+tidings of him to land, he dispatched her with the news, stern
+foremost, to Hades; sinking her, and sowing her barley in the sea
+broadcast by a broadside. From her crew he learned that there was a
+fleet of twenty or thirty sail at anchor in Lochryan, with an armed
+brigantine. He pointed his prow thither; but at the mouth of the lock,
+the wind turned against him again in hard squalls. He abandoned the
+project. Shortly after, he encountered a sloop from Dublin. He sunk her
+to prevent intelligence.
+
+Thus, seeming as much to bear the elemental commission of Nature, as
+the military warrant of Congress, swarthy Paul darted hither and
+thither; hovering like a thundercloud off the crowded harbors; then,
+beaten off by an adverse wind, discharging his lightnings on
+uncompanioned vessels, whose solitude made them a more conspicuous and
+easier mark, like lonely trees on the heath. Yet all this while the
+land was full of garrisons, the embayed waters full of fleets. With the
+impunity of a Levanter, Paul skimmed his craft in the land-locked heart
+of the supreme naval power of earth; a torpedo-eel, unknowingly
+swallowed by Britain in a draught of old ocean, and making sad havoc
+with her vitals.
+
+Seeing next a large vessel steering for the Clyde, he gave chase,
+hoping to cut her off. The stranger proving a fast sailer, the pursuit
+was urged on with vehemence, Paul standing, plank-proud, on the
+quarter-deck, calling for pulls upon every rope, to stretch each
+already half-burst sail to the uttermost.
+
+While thus engaged, suddenly a shadow, like that thrown by an eclipse,
+was seen rapidly gaining along the deck, with a sharp defined line,
+plain as a seam of the planks. It involved all before it. It was the
+domineering shadow of the Juan Fernandez-like crag of Ailsa. The Ranger
+was in the deep water which makes all round and close up to this great
+summit of the submarine Grampians.
+
+The crag, more than a mile in circuit, is over a thousand feet high,
+eight miles from the Ayrshire shore. There stands the cove, lonely as a
+foundling, proud as Cheops. But, like the battered brains surmounting
+the Giant of Gath, its haughty summit is crowned by a desolate castle,
+in and out of whose arches the aerial mists eddy like purposeless
+phantoms, thronging the soul of some ruinous genius, who, even in
+overthrow, harbors none but lofty conceptions.
+
+As the Ranger shot higher under the crag, its height and bulk dwarfed
+both pursuer and pursued into nutshells. The main-truck of the Ranger
+was nine hundred feet below the foundations of the ruin on the crag’s
+top:
+
+While the ship was yet under the shadow, and each seaman’s face shared
+in the general eclipse, a sudden change came over Paul. He issued no
+more sultanical orders. He did not look so elate as before. At length
+he gave the command to discontinue the chase. Turning about, they
+sailed southward.
+
+“Captain Paul,” said Israel, shortly afterwards, “you changed your mind
+rather queerly about catching that craft. But you thought she was
+drawing us too far up into the land, I suppose.”
+
+“Sink the craft,” cried Paul; “it was not any fear of her, nor of King
+George, which made me turn on my heel; it was yon cock of the walk.”
+
+“Cock of the walk?”
+
+“Aye, cock of the walk of the sea; look—yon Crag of Ailsa.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI.
+THEY LOOK IN AT CARRICKFERGUS, AND DESCEND ON WHITEHAVEN.
+
+
+Next day, off Carrickfergus, on the Irish coast, a fishing boat,
+allured by the Quaker-like look of the incognito craft, came off in
+full confidence. Her men were seized, their vessel sunk. From them Paul
+learned that the large ship at anchor in the road, was the ship-of-war
+Drake, of twenty guns. Upon this he steered away, resolving to return
+secretly, and attack her that night.
+
+“Surely, Captain Paul,” said Israel to his commander, as about sunset
+they backed and stood in again for the land “surely, sir, you are not
+going right in among them this way? Why not wait till she comes out?”
+
+“Because, Yellow-hair, my boy, I am engaged to marry her to-night. The
+bride’s friends won’t like the match; and so, this very night, the
+bride must be carried away. She has a nice tapering waist, hasn’t she,
+through the glass? Ah! I will clasp her to my heart.”
+
+He steered straight in like a friend; under easy sail, lounging towards
+the Drake, with anchor ready to drop, and grapnels to hug. But the wind
+was high; the anchor was not dropped at the ordered time. The ranger
+came to a stand three biscuits’ toss off the unmisgiving enemy’s
+quarter, like a peaceful merchantman from the Canadas, laden with
+harmless lumber.
+
+“I shan’t marry her just yet,” whispered Paul, seeing his plans for the
+time frustrated. Gazing in audacious tranquillity upon the decks of the
+enemy, and amicably answering her hail, with complete self-possession,
+he commanded the cable to be slipped, and then, as if he had
+accidentally parted his anchor, turned his prow on the seaward tack,
+meaning to return again immediately with the same prospect of advantage
+possessed at first—his plan being to crash suddenly athwart the Drake’s
+bow, so as to have all her decks exposed point-blank to his musketry.
+But once more the winds interposed. It came on with a storm of snow; he
+was obliged to give up his project.
+
+Thus, without any warlike appearance, and giving no alarm, Paul, like
+an invisible ghost, glided by night close to land, actually came to
+anchor, for an instant, within speaking-distance of an English
+ship-of-war; and yet came, anchored, answered hail, reconnoitered,
+debated, decided, and retired, without exciting the least suspicion.
+His purpose was chain-shot destruction. So easily may the deadliest
+foe—so he be but dexterous—slide, undreamed of, into human harbors or
+hearts. And not awakened conscience, but mere prudence, restrain such,
+if they vanish again without doing harm. At daybreak no soul in
+Carrickfergus knew that the devil, in a Scotch bonnet, had passed close
+that way over night.
+
+Seldom has regicidal daring been more strangely coupled with
+octogenarian prudence, than in many of the predatory enterprises of
+Paul. It is this combination of apparent incompatibilities which ranks
+him among extraordinary warriors.
+
+Ere daylight, the storm of the night blew over. The sun saw the Ranger
+lying midway over channel at the head of the Irish Sea; England,
+Scotland, and Ireland, with all their lofty cliffs, being as
+simultaneously as plainly in sight beyond the grass-green waters, as
+the City Hall, St. Paul’s, and the Astor House, from the triangular
+Park in New York. The three kingdoms lay covered with snow, far as the
+eye could reach.
+
+“Ah, Yellow-hair,” said Paul, with a smile, “they show the white flag,
+the cravens. And, while the white flag stays blanketing yonder heights,
+we’ll make for Whitehaven, my boy. I promised to drop in there a moment
+ere quitting the country for good. Israel, lad, I mean to step ashore
+in person, and have a personal hand in the thing. Did you ever drive
+spikes?”
+
+“I’ve driven the spike-teeth into harrows before now,” replied Israel;
+“but that was before I was a sailor.”
+
+“Well, then, driving spikes into harrows is a good introduction to
+driving spikes into cannon. You are just the man. Put down your glass;
+go to the carpenter, get a hundred spikes, put them in a bucket with a
+hammer, and bring all to me.”
+
+As evening fell, the great promontory of St. Bee’s Head, with its
+lighthouse, not far from Whitehaven, was in distant sight. But the wind
+became so light that Paul could not work his ship in close enough at an
+hour as early as intended. His purpose had been to make the descent and
+retire ere break of day. But though this intention was frustrated, he
+did not renounce his plan, for the present would be his last
+opportunity.
+
+As the night wore on, and the ship, with a very light wind, glided
+nigher and nigher the mark, Paul called upon Israel to produce his
+bucket for final inspection. Thinking some of the spikes too large, he
+had them filed down a little. He saw to the lanterns and combustibles.
+Like Peter the Great, he went into the smallest details, while still
+possessing a genius competent to plan the aggregate. But oversee as one
+may, it is impossible to guard against carelessness in subordinates.
+One’s sharp eyes can’t see behind one’s back. It will yet be noted that
+an important omission was made in the preparations for Whitehaven.
+
+The town contained, at that period, a population of some six or seven
+thousand inhabitants, defended by forts.
+
+At midnight, Paul Jones, Israel Potter, and twenty-nine others, rowed
+in two boats to attack the six or seven thousand inhabitants of
+Whitehaven. There was a long way to pull. This was done in perfect
+silence. Not a sound was heard except the oars turning in the
+row-locks. Nothing was seen except the two lighthouses of the harbor.
+Through the stillness and the darkness, the two deep-laden boats swam
+into the haven, like two mysterious whales from the Arctic Sea. As they
+reached the outer pier, the men saw each other’s faces. The day was
+dawning. The riggers and other artisans of the shipping would before
+very long be astir. No matter.
+
+The great staple exported from Whitehaven was then, and still is, coal.
+The town is surrounded by mines; the town is built on mines; the ships
+moor over mines. The mines honeycomb the land in all directions, and
+extend in galleries of grottoes for two miles under the sea. By the
+falling in of the more ancient collieries numerous houses have been
+swallowed, as if by an earthquake, and a consternation spread, like
+that of Lisbon, in 1755. So insecure and treacherous was the site of
+the place now about to be assailed by a desperado, nursed, like the
+coal, in its vitals.
+
+Now, sailing on the Thames, nigh its mouth, of fair days, when the wind
+is favorable for inward-bound craft, the stranger will sometimes see
+processions of vessels, all of similar size and rig, stretching for
+miles and miles, like a long string of horses tied two and two to a
+rope and driven to market. These are colliers going to London with
+coal.
+
+About three hundred of these vessels now lay, all crowded together, in
+one dense mob, at Whitehaven. The tide was out. They lay completely
+helpless, clear of water, and grounded. They were sooty in hue. Their
+black yards were deeply canted, like spears, to avoid collision. The
+three hundred grimy hulls lay wallowing in the mud, like a herd of
+hippopotami asleep in the alluvium of the Nile. Their sailless, raking
+masts, and canted yards, resembled a forest of fish-spears thrust into
+those same hippopotamus hides. Partly flanking one side of the grounded
+fleet was a fort, whose batteries were raised from the beach. On a
+little strip of this beach, at the base of the fort, lay a number of
+small rusty guns, dismounted, heaped together in disorder, as a litter
+of dogs. Above them projected the mounted cannon.
+
+Paul landed in his own boat at the foot of this fort. He dispatched the
+other boat to the north side of the haven, with orders to fire the
+shipping there. Leaving two men at the beach, he then proceeded to get
+possession of the fort.
+
+“Hold on to the bucket, and give me your shoulder,” said he to Israel.
+
+Using Israel for a ladder, in a trice he scaled the wall. The bucket
+and the men followed. He led the way softly to the guard-house, burst
+in, and bound the sentinels in their sleep. Then arranging his force,
+ordered four men to spike the cannon there.
+
+“Now, Israel, your bucket, and follow me to the other fort.”
+
+The two went alone about a quarter of a mile.
+
+“Captain Paul,” said Israel, on the way, “can we two manage the
+sentinels?”
+
+“There are none in the fort we go to.”
+
+“You know all about the place, Captain?”
+
+“Pretty well informed on that subject, I believe. Come along. Yes, lad,
+I am tolerably well acquainted with Whitehaven. And this morning intend
+that Whitehaven shall have a slight inkling of _me_. Come on. Here we
+are.”
+
+Scaling the walls, the two involuntarily stood for an instant gazing
+upon the scene. The gray light of the dawn showed the crowded houses
+and thronged ships with a haggard distinctness.
+
+“Spike and hammer, lad;—so,—now follow me along, as I go, and give me a
+spike for every cannon. I’ll tongue-tie the thunderers. Speak no more!”
+and he spiked the first gun. “Be a mute,” and he spiked the second.
+“Dumbfounder thee,” and he spiked the third. And so, on, and on, and
+on, Israel following him with the bucket, like a footman, or some
+charitable gentleman with a basket of alms.
+
+“There, it is done. D’ye see the fire yet, lad, from the south? I
+don’t.”
+
+“Not a spark, Captain. But day-sparks come on in the east.”
+
+“Forked flames into the hounds! What are they about? Quick, let us back
+to the first fort; perhaps something has happened, and they are there.”
+
+Sure enough, on their return from spiking the cannon, Paul and Israel
+found the other boat back, the crew in confusion, their lantern having
+burnt out at the very instant they wanted it. By a singular fatality
+the other lantern, belonging to Paul’s boat, was likewise extinguished.
+No tinder-box had been brought. They had no matches but sulphur
+matches. Locofocos were not then known.
+
+The day came on apace.
+
+“Captain Paul,” said the lieutenant of the second boat, “it is madness
+to stay longer. See!” and he pointed to the town, now plainly
+discernible in the gray light.
+
+“Traitor, or coward!” howled Paul, “how came the lanterns out? Israel,
+my lion, now prove your blood. Get me a light—but one spark!”
+
+“Has any man here a bit of pipe and tobacco in his pocket?” said
+Israel.
+
+A sailor quickly produced an old stump of a pipe, with tobacco.
+
+“That will do,” and Israel hurried away towards the town.
+
+“What will the loon do with the pipe?” said one. “And where goes he?”
+cried another.
+
+“Let him alone,” said Paul.
+
+The invader now disposed his whole force so as to retreat at an
+instant’s warning. Meantime the hardy Israel, long experienced in all
+sorts of shifts and emergencies, boldly ventured to procure, from some
+inhabitant of Whitehaven, a spark to kindle all Whitehaven’s
+habitations in flames.
+
+There was a lonely house standing somewhat disjointed from the town,
+some poor laborer’s abode. Rapping at the door, Israel, pipe in mouth,
+begged the inmates for a light for his tobacco.
+
+“What the devil,” roared a voice from within, “knock up a man this time
+of night to light your pipe? Begone!”
+
+“You are lazy this morning, my friend,” replied Israel, “it is
+daylight. Quick, give me a light. Don’t you know your old friend?
+Shame! open the door.”
+
+In a moment a sleepy fellow appeared, let down the bar, and Israel,
+stalking into the dim room, piloted himself straight to the fire-place,
+raked away the cinders, lighted his tobacco, and vanished.
+
+All was done in a flash. The man, stupid with sleep, had looked on
+bewildered. He reeled to the door, but, dodging behind a pile of
+bricks, Israel had already hurried himself out of sight.
+
+“Well done, my lion,” was the hail he received from Paul, who, during
+his absence, had mustered as many pipes as possible, in order to
+communicate and multiply the fire.
+
+Both boats now pulled to a favorable point of the principal pier of the
+harbor, crowded close up to a part of which lay one wing of the
+colliers.
+
+The men began to murmur at persisting in an attempt impossible to be
+concealed much longer. They were afraid to venture on board the grim
+colliers, and go groping down into their hulls to fire them. It seemed
+like a voluntary entrance into dungeons and death.
+
+“Follow me, all of you but ten by the boats,” said Paul, without
+noticing their murmurs. “And now, to put an end to all future burnings
+in America, by one mighty conflagration of shipping in England. Come
+on, lads! Pipes and matches in the van!”
+
+He would have distributed the men so as simultaneously to fire
+different ships at different points, were it not that the lateness of
+the hour rendered such a course insanely hazardous. Stationing his
+party in front of one of the windward colliers, Paul and Israel sprang
+on board.
+
+In a twinkling they had broken open a boatswain’s locker, and, with
+great bunches of oakum, fine and dry as tinder, had leaped into the
+steerage. Here, while Paul made a blaze, Israel ran to collect the
+tar-pots, which being presently poured on the burning matches, oakum
+and wood, soon increased the flame.
+
+“It is not a sure thing yet,” said Paul, “we must have a barrel of
+tar.”
+
+They searched about until they found one, knocked out the head and
+bottom, and stood it like a martyr in the midst of the flames. They
+then retreated up the forward hatchway, while volumes of smoke were
+belched from the after one. Not till this moment did Paul hear the
+cries of his men, warning him that the inhabitants were not only
+actually astir, but crowds were on their way to the pier.
+
+As he sprang out of the smoke towards the rail of the collier, he saw
+the sun risen, with thousands of the people. Individuals hurried close
+to the burning vessel. Leaping to the ground, Paul, bidding his men
+stand fast, ran to their front, and, advancing about thirty feet,
+presented his own pistol at now tumultuous Whitehaven.
+
+Those who had rushed to extinguish what they had deemed but an
+accidental fire, were now paralyzed into idiotic inaction, at the
+defiance of the incendiary, thinking him some sudden pirate or fiend
+dropped down from the moon.
+
+While Paul thus stood guarding the incipient conflagration, Israel,
+without a weapon, dashed crazily towards the mob on the shore.
+
+“Come back, come back,” cried Paul.
+
+“Not till I start these sheep, as their own wolves many a time started
+me!”
+
+As he rushed bare-headed like a madman, towards the crowd, the panic
+spread. They fled from unarmed Israel, further than they had from the
+pistol of Paul.
+
+The flames now catching the rigging and spiralling around the masts,
+the whole ship burned at one end of the harbor, while the sun, an hour
+high, burned at the other. Alarm and amazement, not sleep, now ruled
+the world. It was time to retreat.
+
+They re-embarked without opposition, first releasing a few prisoners,
+as the boats could not carry them.
+
+Just as Israel was leaping into the boat, he saw the man at whose house
+he had procured the fire, staring like a simpleton at him.
+
+“That was good seed you gave me;” said Israel, “see what a yield,”
+pointing to the flames. He then dropped into the boat, leaving only
+Paul on the pier.
+
+The men cried to their commander, conjuring him not to linger.
+
+But Paul remained for several moments, confronting in silence the
+clamors of the mob beyond, and waving his solitary hand, like a
+disdainful tomahawk, towards the surrounding eminences, also covered
+with the affrighted inhabitants.
+
+When the assailants had rowed pretty well off, the English rushed in
+great numbers to their forts, but only to find their cannon no better
+than so much iron in the ore. At length, however, they began to fire,
+having either brought down some ship’s guns, or else mounted the rusty
+old dogs lying at the foot of the first fort.
+
+In their eagerness they fired with no discretion. The shot fell short;
+they did not the slightest damage.
+
+Paul’s men laughed aloud, and fired their pistols in the air.
+
+Not a splinter was made, not a drop of blood spilled throughout the
+affair. The intentional harmlessness of the result, as to human life,
+was only equalled by the desperate courage of the deed. It formed,
+doubtless, one feature of the compassionate contempt of Paul towards
+the town, that he took such paternal care of their lives and limbs.
+
+Had it been possible to have landed a few hours earlier not a ship nor
+a house could have escaped. But it was the lesson, not the loss, that
+told. As it was, enough damage had been done to demonstrate—as Paul had
+declared to the wise man of Paris—that the disasters caused by the
+wanton fires and assaults on the American coasts, could be easily
+brought home to the enemy’s doors. Though, indeed, if the retaliators
+were headed by Paul Jones, the satisfaction would not be equal to the
+insult, being abated by the magnanimity of a chivalrous, however
+unprincipled a foe.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII.
+THEY CALL AT THE EARL OF SELKIRK’S, AND AFTERWARDS FIGHT THE
+SHIP-OF-WAR DRAKE.
+
+
+The Ranger now stood over the Solway Frith for the Scottish shore, and
+at noon on the same day, Paul, with twelve men, including two officers
+and Israel, landed on St. Mary’s Isle, one of the seats of the Earl of
+Selkirk.
+
+In three consecutive days this elemental warrior either entered the
+harbors or landed on the shores of each of the Three Kingdoms.
+
+The morning was fair and clear. St. Mary’s Isle lay shimmering in the
+sun. The light crust of snow had melted, revealing the tender grass and
+sweet buds of spring mantling the sides of the cliffs.
+
+At once, upon advancing with his party towards the house, Paul augured
+ill for his project from the loneliness of the spot. No being was seen.
+But cocking his bonnet at a jaunty angle, he continued his way.
+Stationing the men silently round about the house, fallowed by Israel,
+he announced his presence at the porch.
+
+A gray-headed domestic at length responded.
+
+“Is the Earl within?”
+
+“He is in Edinburgh, sir.”
+
+“Ah—sure?—Is your lady within?”
+
+“Yes, sir—who shall I say it is?”
+
+“A gentleman who calls to pay his respects. Here, take my card.”
+
+And he handed the man his name, as a private gentleman, superbly
+engraved at Paris, on gilded paper.
+
+Israel tarried in the hall while the old servant led Paul into a
+parlor.
+
+Presently the lady appeared.
+
+“Charming Madame, I wish you a very good morning.”
+
+“Who may it be, sir, that I have the happiness to see?” said the lady,
+censoriously drawing herself up at the too frank gallantry of the
+stranger.
+
+“Madame, I sent you my card.”
+
+“Which leaves me equally ignorant, sir,” said the lady, coldly,
+twirling the gilded pasteboard.
+
+“A courier dispatched to Whitehaven, charming Madame, might bring you
+more particular tidings as to who has the honor of being your visitor.”
+
+Not comprehending what this meant, and deeply displeased, if not
+vaguely alarmed, at the characteristic manner of Paul, the lady, not
+entirely unembarrassed, replied, that if the gentleman came to view the
+isle, he was at liberty so to do. She would retire and send him a
+guide.
+
+“Countess of Selkirk,” said Paul, advancing a step, “I call to see the
+Earl. On business of urgent importance, I call.”
+
+“The Earl is in Edinburgh,” uneasily responded the lady, again about to
+retire.
+
+“Do you give me your honor as a lady that it is as you say?”
+
+The lady looked at him in dubious resentment.
+
+“Pardon, Madame, I would not lightly impugn a lady’s lightest word, but
+I surmised that, possibly, you might suspect the object of my call, in
+which case it would be the most excusable thing in the world for you to
+seek to shelter from my knowledge the presence of the Earl on the
+isle.”
+
+“I do not dream what you mean by all this,” said the lady with a
+decided alarm, yet even in her panic courageously maintaining her
+dignity, as she retired, rather than retreated, nearer the door.
+
+“Madame,” said Paul, hereupon waving his hand imploringly, and then
+tenderly playing with his bonnet with the golden band, while an
+expression poetically sad and sentimental stole over his tawny face;
+“it cannot be too poignantly lamented that, in the profession of arms,
+the officer of fine feelings and genuine sensibility should be
+sometimes necessitated to public actions which his own private heart
+cannot approve. This hard case is mine. The Earl, Madame, you say is
+absent. I believe those words. Far be it from my soul, enchantress, to
+ascribe a fault to syllables which have proceeded from so faultless a
+source.”
+
+This probably he said in reference to the lady’s mouth, which was
+beautiful in the extreme.
+
+He bowed very lowly, while the lady eyed him with conflicting and
+troubled emotions, but as yet all in darkness as to his ultimate
+meaning. But her more immediate alarm had subsided, seeing now that the
+sailor-like extravagance of Paul’s homage was entirely unaccompanied
+with any touch of intentional disrespect. Indeed, hyperbolical as were
+his phrases, his gestures and whole carriage were most heedfully
+deferential.
+
+Paul continued: “The Earl, Madame, being absent, and he being the sole
+object of my call, you cannot labor under the least apprehension, when
+I now inform you, that I have the honor of being an officer in the
+American Navy, who, having stopped at this isle to secure the person of
+the Earl of Selkirk as a hostage for the American cause, am, by your
+assurances, turned away from that intent; pleased, even in
+disappointment, since that disappointment has served to prolong my
+interview with the noble lady before me, as well as to leave her
+domestic tranquillity unimpaired.”
+
+“Can you really speak true?” said the lady in undismayed wonderment.
+
+“Madame, through your window you will catch a little peep of the
+American colonial ship-of-war, Ranger, which I have the honor to
+command. With my best respects to your lord, and sincere regrets at not
+finding him at home, permit me to salute your ladyship’s hand and
+withdraw.”
+
+But feigning not to notice this Parisian proposition, and artfully
+entrenching her hand, without seeming to do so, the lady, in a
+conciliatory tone, begged her visitor to partake of some refreshment
+ere he departed, at the same time thanking him for his great civility.
+But declining these hospitalities, Paul bowed thrice and quitted the
+room.
+
+In the hall he encountered Israel, standing all agape before a Highland
+target of steel, with a claymore and foil crossed on top.
+
+“Looks like a pewter platter and knife and fork, Captain Paul.”
+
+“So they do, my lion; but come, curse it, the old cock has flown; fine
+hen, though, left in the nest; no use; we must away empty-handed.”
+
+“Why, ain’t Mr. Selkirk in?” demanded Israel in roguish concern.
+
+“Mr. Selkirk? Alexander Selkirk, you mean. No, lad, he’s not on the
+Isle of St. Mary’s; he’s away off, a hermit, on the Isle of Juan
+Fernandez—the more’s the pity; come.”
+
+In the porch they encountered the two officers. Paul briefly informed
+them of the circumstances, saying, nothing remained but to depart
+forthwith.
+
+“With nothing at all for our pains?” murmured the two officers.
+
+“What, pray, would you have?”
+
+“Some pillage, to be sure—plate.”
+
+“Shame. I thought we were three gentlemen.”
+
+“So are the English officers in America; but they help themselves to
+plate whenever they can get it from the private houses of the enemy.”
+
+“Come, now, don’t be slanderous,” said Paul; “these officers you speak
+of are but one or two out of twenty, mere burglars and light-fingered
+gentry, using the king’s livery but as a disguise to their nefarious
+trade. The rest are men of honor.”
+
+“Captain Paul Jones,” responded the two, “we have not come on this
+expedition in much expectation of regular pay; but we _did_ rely upon
+honorable plunder.”
+
+“Honorable plunder! That’s something new.”
+
+But the officers were not to be turned aside. They were the most
+efficient in the ship. Seeing them resolute, Paul, for fear of
+incensing them, was at last, as a matter of policy, obliged to comply.
+For himself, however, he resolved to have nothing to do with the
+affair. Charging the officers not to allow the men to enter the house
+on any pretence, and that no search must be made, and nothing must be
+taken away, except what the lady should offer them upon making known
+their demand, he beckoned to Israel and retired indignantly towards the
+beach. Upon second thoughts, he dispatched Israel back, to enter the
+house with the officers, as joint receiver of the plate, he being, of
+course, the most reliable of the seamen.
+
+The lady was not a little disconcerted on receiving the officers. With
+cool determination they made known their purpose. There was no escape.
+The lady retired. The butler came; and soon, several silver salvers,
+and other articles of value, were silently deposited in the parlor in
+the presence of the officers and Israel.
+
+“Mister Butler,” said Israel, “let me go into the dairy and help to
+carry the milk-pans.”
+
+But, scowling upon this rusticity, or roguishness—he knew not which—the
+butler, in high dudgeon at Israel’s republican familiarity, as well as
+black as a thundercloud with the general insult offered to an
+illustrious household by a party of armed thieves, as he viewed them,
+declined any assistance. In a quarter of an hour the officers left the
+house, carrying their booty.
+
+At the porch they were met by a red-cheeked, spiteful-looking lass,
+who, with her brave lady’s compliments, added two child’s rattles of
+silver and coral to their load.
+
+Now, one of the officers was a Frenchman, the other a Spaniard.
+
+The Spaniard dashed his rattle indignantly to the ground. The Frenchman
+took his very pleasantly, and kissed it, saying to the girl that he
+would long preserve the coral, as a memento of her rosy cheeks.
+
+When the party arrived on the beach, they found Captain Paul writing
+with pencil on paper held up against the smooth tableted side of the
+cliff. Next moment he seemed to be making his signature. With a
+reproachful glance towards the two officers, he handed the slip to
+Israel, bidding him hasten immediately with it to the house and place
+it in Lady Selkirk’s own hands.
+
+The note was as follows:
+
+“Madame:
+
+“After so courteous a reception, I am disturbed to make you no better
+return than you have just experienced from the actions of certain
+persons under my command.—actions, lady, which my profession of arms
+obliges me not only to brook, but, in a measure, to countenance. From
+the bottom of my heart, my dear lady, I deplore this most melancholy
+necessity of my delicate position. However unhandsome the desire of
+these men, some complaisance seemed due them from me, for their general
+good conduct and bravery on former occasions. I had but an instant to
+consider. I trust, that in unavoidably gratifying them, I have
+inflicted less injury on your ladyship’s property than I have on my own
+bleeding sensibilities. But my heart will not allow me to say more.
+Permit me to assure you, dear lady, that when the plate is sold, I
+shall, at all hazards, become the purchaser, and will be proud to
+restore it to you, by such conveyance as you may hereafter see fit to
+appoint.
+
+“From hence I go, Madame, to engage, to-morrow morning, his Majesty’s
+ship, Drake, of twenty guns, now lying at Carrickfergus. I should meet
+the enemy with more than wonted resolution, could I flatter myself
+that, through this unhandsome conduct on the part of my officers, I lie
+not under the disesteem of the sweet lady of the Isle of St. Mary’s.
+But unconquerable as Mars should I be, could but dare to dream, that in
+some green retreat of her charming domain, the Countess of Selkirk
+offers up a charitable prayer for, my dear lady countess, one, who
+coming to take a captive, himself has been captivated.
+
+“Your ladyship’s adoring enemy,
+
+“JOHN PAUL JONES.”
+
+How the lady received this super-ardent note, history does not relate.
+But history has not omitted to record, that after the return of the
+Ranger to France, through the assiduous efforts of Paul in buying up
+the booty, piece by piece, from the clutches of those among whom it had
+been divided, and not without a pecuniary private loss to himself,
+equal to the total value of the plunder, the plate was punctually
+restored, even to the silver heads of two pepper-boxes; and, not only
+this, but the Earl, hearing all the particulars, magnanimously wrote
+Paul a letter, expressing thanks for his politeness. In the opinion of
+the noble Earl, Paul was a man of honor. It were rash to differ in
+opinion with such high-born authority.
+
+Upon returning to the ship, she was instantly pointed over towards the
+Irish coast. Next morning Carrickfergus was in sight. Paul would have
+gone straight in; but Israel, reconnoitring with his glass, informed
+him that a large ship, probably the Drake, was just coming out.
+
+“What think you, Israel, do they know who we are? Let me have the
+glass.”
+
+“They are dropping a boat now, sir,” replied Israel, removing the glass
+from his eye, and handing it to Paul.
+
+“So they are—so they are. They don’t know us. I’ll decoy that boat
+alongside. Quick—they are coming for us—take the helm now yourself, my
+lion, and keep the ship’s stern steadily presented towards the
+advancing boat. Don’t let them have the least peep at our broadside.”
+
+The boat came on, an officer in its bow all the time eyeing the Ranger
+through a glass. Presently the boat was within hail.
+
+“Ship ahoy! Who are you?”
+
+“Oh, come alongside,” answered Paul through his trumpet, in a rapid
+off-hand tone, as though he were a gruff sort of friend, impatient at
+being suspected for a foe.
+
+In a few moments the officer of the boat stepped into the Ranger’s
+gangway. Cocking his bonnet gallantly, Paul advanced towards him,
+making a very polite bow, saying: “Good morning, sir, good morning;
+delighted to see you. That’s a pretty sword you have; pray, let me look
+at it.”
+
+“I see,” said the officer, glancing at the ship’s armament, and turning
+pale, “I am your prisoner.”
+
+“No—my guest,” responded Paul, winningly. “Pray, let me relieve you of
+your—your—cane.”
+
+Thus humorously he received the officer’s delivered sword.
+
+“Now tell me, sir, if you please,” he continued, “what brings out his
+Majesty’s ship Drake this fine morning? Going a little airing?”
+
+“She comes out in search of you, but when I left her side half an hour
+since she did not know that the ship off the harbor was the one she
+sought.”
+
+“You had news from Whitehaven, I suppose, last night, eh?”
+
+“Aye: express; saying that certain incendiaries had landed there early
+that morning.”
+
+“What?—what sort of men were they, did you say?” said Paul, shaking his
+bonnet fiercely to one side of his head, and coming close to the
+officer. “Pardon me,” he added derisively, “I had forgot you are my
+_guest_. Israel, see the unfortunate gentleman below, and his men
+forward.”
+
+The Drake was now seen slowly coming out under a light air, attended by
+five small pleasure-vessels, decorated with flags and streamers, and
+full of gaily-dressed people, whom motives similar to those which drew
+visitors to the circus, had induced to embark on their adventurous
+trip. But they little dreamed how nigh the desperate enemy was.
+
+“Drop the captured boat astern,” said Paul; “see what effect that will
+have on those merry voyagers.”
+
+No sooner was the empty boat descried by the pleasure-vessels than
+forthwith, surmising the truth, they with all diligence turned about
+and re-entered the harbor. Shortly after, alarm-smokes were seen
+extending along both sides of the channel.
+
+“They smoke us at last, Captain Paul,” said Israel.
+
+“There will be more smoke yet before the day is done,” replied Paul,
+gravely.
+
+The wind was right under the land, the tide unfavorable. The Drake
+worked out very slowly.
+
+Meantime, like some fiery-heated duellist calling on urgent business at
+frosty daybreak, and long kept waiting at the door by the dilatoriness
+of his antagonist, shrinking at the idea of getting up to be cut to
+pieces in the cold—the Ranger, with a better breeze, impatiently tacked
+to and fro in the channel. At last, when the English vessel had fairly
+weathered the point, Paul, ranging ahead, courteously led her forth, as
+a beau might a belle in a ballroom, to mid-channel, and then suffered
+her to come within hail.
+
+“She is hoisting her colors now, sir,” said Israel.
+
+“Give her the stars and stripes, then, my lad.”
+
+Joyfully running to the locker, Israel attached the flag to the
+halyards. The wind freshened. He stood elevated. The bright flag blew
+around him, a glorified shroud, enveloping him in its red ribbons and
+spangles, like up-springing tongues, and sparkles of flame.
+
+As the colors rose to their final perch, and streamed in the air, Paul
+eyed them exultingly.
+
+“I first hoisted that flag on an American ship, and was the first among
+men to get it saluted. If I perish this night, the name of Paul Jones
+shall live. Hark! they hail us.”
+
+“What ship are you?”
+
+“Your enemy. Come on! What wants the fellow of more prefaces and
+introductions?”
+
+The sun was now calmly setting over the green land of Ireland. The sky
+was serene, the sea smooth, the wind just sufficient to waft the two
+vessels steadily and gently. After the first firing and a little
+manoeuvring, the two ships glided on freely, side by side; in that mild
+air Exchanging their deadly broadsides, like two friendly horsemen
+walking their steeds along a plain, chatting as they go. After an hour
+of this running fight, the conversation ended. The Drake struck. How
+changed from the big craft of sixty short minutes before! She seemed
+now, above deck, like a piece of wild western woodland into which
+choppers had been. Her masts and yards prostrate, and hanging in
+jack-straws; several of her sails ballooning out, as they dragged in
+the sea, like great lopped tops of foliage. The black hull and
+shattered stumps of masts, galled and riddled, looked as if gigantic
+woodpeckers had been tapping them.
+
+The Drake was the larger ship; more cannon; more men. Her loss in
+killed and wounded was far the greater. Her brave captain and
+lieutenant were mortally wounded.
+
+The former died as the prize was boarded, the latter two days after.
+
+It was twilight, the weather still severe. No cannonade, naught that
+mad man can do, molests the stoical imperturbability of Nature, when
+Nature chooses to be still. This weather, holding on through the
+following day, greatly facilitated the refitting of the ships. That
+done, the two vessels, sailing round the north of Ireland, steered
+towards Brest. They were repeatedly chased by English cruisers, but
+safely reached their anchorage in the French waters.
+
+“A pretty fair four weeks’ yachting, gentlemen,” said Paul Jones, as
+the Ranger swung to her cable, while some French officers boarded her.
+“I bring two travellers with me, gentlemen,” he continued. “Allow me to
+introduce you to my particular friend Israel Potter, late of North
+America, and also to his Britannic Majesty’s ship Drake, late of
+Carrickfergus, Ireland.”
+
+This cruise made loud fame for Paul, especially at the court of France,
+whose king sent Paul, a sword and a medal. But poor Israel, who also
+had conquered a craft, and all unaided too—what had he?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII.
+THE EXPEDITION THAT SAILED FROM GROIX.
+
+
+Three months after anchoring at Brest, through Dr. Franklin’s
+negotiations with the French king, backed by the bestirring ardor of
+Paul, a squadron of nine vessels, of various force, were ready in the
+road of Groix for another descent on the British coasts. These craft
+were miscellaneously picked up, their crews a mongrel pack, the
+officers mostly French, unacquainted with each other, and secretly
+jealous of Paul. The expedition was full of the elements of
+insubordination and failure. Much bitterness and agony resulted to a
+spirit like Paul’s. But he bore up, and though in many particulars the
+sequel more than warranted his misgivings, his soul still refused to
+surrender.
+
+The career of this stubborn adventurer signally illustrates the idea
+that since all human affairs are subject to organic disorder, since
+they are created in and sustained by a sort of half-disciplined chaos,
+hence he who in great things seeks success must never wait for smooth
+water, which never was and never will be, but, with what straggling
+method he can, dash with all his derangements at his object, leaving
+the rest to Fortune.
+
+Though nominally commander of the squadron, Paul was not so in effect.
+Most of his captains conceitedly claimed independent commands. One of
+them in the end proved a traitor outright; few of the rest were
+reliable.
+
+As for the ships, that commanded by Paul in person will be a good
+example of the fleet. She was an old Indiaman, clumsy and crank,
+smelling strongly of the savor of tea, cloves, and arrack, the cargoes
+of former voyages. Even at that day she was, from her venerable
+grotesqueness, what a cocked hat is, at the present age, among ordinary
+beavers. Her elephantine bulk was houdahed with a castellated poop like
+the leaning tower of Pisa. Poor Israel, standing on the top of this
+poop, spy-glass at his eye, looked more an astronomer than a mariner,
+having to do, not with the mountains of the billows, but the mountains
+in the moon. Galileo on Fiesole. She was originally a single-decked
+ship, that is, carried her armament on one gun-deck; but cutting ports
+below, in her after part, Paul rammed out there six old
+eighteen-pounders, whose rusty muzzles peered just above the
+water-line, like a parcel of dirty mulattoes from a cellar-way. Her
+name was the Duras, but, ere sailing, it was changed to that other
+appellation, whereby this sad old hulk became afterwards immortal.
+Though it is not unknown, that a compliment to Doctor Franklin was
+involved in this change of titles, yet the secret history of the affair
+will now for the first time be disclosed.
+
+It was evening in the road of Groix. After a fagging day’s work, trying
+to conciliate the hostile jealousy of his officers, and provide, in the
+face of endless obstacles (for he had to dance attendance on scores of
+intriguing factors and brokers ashore), the requisite stores for the
+fleet, Paul sat in his cabin in a half-despondent reverie, while
+Israel, cross-legged at his commander’s feet, was patching up some old
+signals.
+
+“Captain Paul, I don’t like our ship’s name.—Duras? What’s that
+mean?—Duras? Being cribbed up in a ship named Duras! a sort of makes
+one feel as if he were in durance vile.”
+
+“Gad, I never thought of that before, my lion. Duras—Durance vile. I
+suppose it’s superstition, but I’ll change Come, Yellow-mane, what
+shall we call her?”
+
+“Well, Captain Paul, don’t you like Doctor Franklin? Hasn’t he been the
+prime man to get this fleet together? Let’s call her the Doctor
+Franklin.”
+
+“Oh, no, that will too publicly declare him just at present; and Poor
+Richard wants to be a little shady in this business.”
+
+“Poor Richard!—call her Poor Richard, then,” cried Israel, suddenly
+struck by the idea.
+
+“’Gad, you have it,” answered Paul, springing to his feet, as all trace
+of his former despondency left him;—“Poor Richard shall be the name, in
+honor to the saying, that ‘God helps them that help themselves,’ as
+Poor Richard says.”
+
+Now this was the way the craft came to be called the _Bon Homme
+Richard_; for it being deemed advisable to have a French rendering of
+the new title, it assumed the above form.
+
+A few days after, the force sailed. Ere long, they captured several
+vessels; but the captains of the squadron proving refractory, events
+took so deplorable a turn, that Paul, for the present, was obliged to
+return to Groix. Luckily, however, at this junction a cartel arrived
+from England with upwards of a hundred exchanged American seamen, who
+almost to a man enlisted under the flag of Paul.
+
+Upon the resailing of the force, the old troubles broke out afresh.
+Most of her consorts insubordinately separated from the Bon Homme
+Richard. At length Paul found himself in violent storms beating off the
+rugged southeastern coast of Scotland, with only two accompanying
+ships. But neither the mutiny of his fleet, nor the chaos of the
+elements, made him falter in his purpose. Nay, at this crisis, he
+projected the most daring of all his descents.
+
+The Cheviot Hills were in sight. Sundry vessels had been described
+bound in for the Firth of Forth, on whose south shore, well up the
+Firth, stands Leith, the port of Edinburgh, distant but a mile or two
+from that capital. He resolved to dash at Leith, and lay it under
+contribution or in ashes. He called the captains of his two remaining
+consorts on board his own ship to arrange details. Those worthies had
+much of fastidious remark to make against the plan. After losing much
+time in trying to bring to a conclusion their sage deliberations, Paul,
+by addressing their cupidity, achieved that which all appeals to their
+gallantry could not accomplish. He proclaimed the grand prize of the
+Leith lottery at no less a figure than £200,000, that being named as
+the ransom. Enough: the three ships enter the Firth, boldly and freely,
+as if carrying Quakers to a Peace-Congress.
+
+Along both startled shores the panic of their approach spread like the
+cholera. The three suspicious crafts had so long lain off and on, that
+none doubted they were led by the audacious viking, Paul Jones. At five
+o’clock, on the following morning, they were distinctly seen from the
+capital of Scotland, quietly sailing up the bay. Batteries were hastily
+thrown up at Leith, arms were obtained from the castle at Edinburgh,
+alarm fires were kindled in all directions. Yet with such tranquillity
+of effrontery did Paul conduct his ships, concealing as much as
+possible their warlike character, that more than once his vessels were
+mistaken for merchantmen, and hailed by passing ships as such.
+
+In the afternoon, Israel, at his station on the tower of Pisa, reported
+a boat with five men coming off to the Richard from the coast of Fife.
+
+“They have hot oat-cakes for us,” said Paul; “let ’em come. To
+encourage them, show them the English ensign, Israel, my lad.”
+
+Soon the boat was alongside.
+
+“Well, my good fellows, what can I do for you this afternoon?” said
+Paul, leaning over the side with a patronizing air.
+
+“Why, captain, we come from the Laird of Crokarky, who wants some
+powder and ball for his money.”
+
+“What would you with powder and ball, pray?”
+
+“Oh! haven’t you heard that that bloody pirate, Paul Jones, is
+somewhere hanging round the coasts?”
+
+“Aye, indeed, but he won’t hurt you. He’s only going round among the
+nations, with his old hat, taking up contributions. So, away with ye;
+ye don’t want any powder and ball to give him. He wants contributions
+of silver, not lead. Prepare yourselves with silver, I say.”
+
+“Nay, captain, the Laird ordered us not to return without powder and
+ball. See, here is the price. It may be the taking of the bloody
+pirate, if you let us have what we want.”
+
+“Well, pass ’em over a keg,” said Paul, laughing, but modifying his
+order by a sly whisper to Israel: “Oh, put up your price, it’s a gift
+to ye.”
+
+“But ball, captain; what’s the use of powder without ball?” roared one
+of the fellows from the boat’s bow, as the keg was lowered in. “We want
+ball.”
+
+“Bless my soul, you bawl loud enough as it is. Away with ye, with what
+you have. Look to your keg, and hark ye, if ye catch that villain, Paul
+Jones, give him no quarter.”
+
+“But, captain, here,” shouted one of the boatmen, “there’s a mistake.
+This is a keg of pickles, not powder. Look,” and poking into the
+bung-hole, he dragged out a green cucumber dripping with brine. “Take
+this back, and give us the powder.”
+
+“Pooh,” said Paul, “the powder is at the bottom, pickled powder, best
+way to keep it. Away with ye, now, and after that bloody embezzler,
+Paul Jones.”
+
+This was Sunday. The ships held on. During the afternoon, a long tack
+of the Richard brought her close towards the shores of Fife, near the
+thriving little port of Kirkaldy.
+
+“There’s a great crowd on the beach. Captain Paul,” said Israel,
+looking through his glass. “There seems to be an old woman standing on
+a fish-barrel there, a sort of selling things at auction to the people,
+but I can’t be certain yet.”
+
+“Let me see,” said Paul, taking the glass as they came nigher. “Sure
+enough, it’s an old lady—an old quack-doctress, seems to me, in a black
+gown, too. I must hail her.”
+
+Ordering the ship to be kept on towards the port, he shortened sail
+within easy distance, so as to glide slowly by, and seizing the
+trumpet, thus spoke:
+
+“Old lady, ahoy! What are you talking about? What’s your text?”
+
+“The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance. He shall wash
+his feet in the blood of the wicked.”
+
+“Ah, what a lack of charity. Now hear mine:—God helpeth them that help
+themselves, as Poor Richard says.”
+
+“Reprobate pirate, a gale shall yet come to drive thee in wrecks from
+our waters.”
+
+“The strong wind of your hate fills my sails well. Adieu,” waving his
+bonnet—“tell us the rest at Leith.”
+
+Next morning the ships were almost within cannon-shot of the town. The
+men to be landed were in the boats. Israel had the tiller of the
+foremost one, waiting for his commander to enter, when just as Paul’s
+foot was on the gangway, a sudden squall struck all three ships,
+dashing the boats against them, and causing indescribable confusion.
+The squall ended in a violent gale. Getting his men on board with all
+dispatch, Paul essayed his best to withstand the fury of the wind, but
+it blew adversely, and with redoubled power. A ship at a distance went
+down beneath it. The disappointed invader was obliged to turn before
+the gale, and renounce his project.
+
+To this hour, on the shores of the Firth of Forth, it is the popular
+persuasion, that the Rev. Mr. Shirrer’s (of Kirkaldy) powerful
+intercession was the direct cause of the elemental repulse experienced
+off the endangered harbor of Leith.
+
+Through the ill qualities of Paul’s associate captains: their timidity,
+incapable of keeping pace with his daring; their jealousy, blind to his
+superiority to rivalship; together with the general reduction of his
+force, now reduced by desertion, from nine to three ships; and last of
+all, the enmity of seas and winds; the invader, driven, not by a fleet,
+but a gale, out of the Scottish water’s, had the mortification in
+prospect of terminating a cruise, so formidable in appearance at the
+onset, without one added deed to sustain the reputation gained by
+former exploits. Nevertheless, he was not disheartened. He sought to
+conciliate fortune, not by despondency, but by resolution. And, as if
+won by his confident bearing, that fickle power suddenly went over to
+him from the ranks of the enemy—suddenly as plumed Marshal Ney to the
+stubborn standard of Napoleon from Elba, marching regenerated on Paris.
+In a word, luck—that’s the word—shortly threw in Paul’s way the great
+action of his life: the most extraordinary of all naval engagements;
+the unparalleled death-lock with the Serapis.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX.
+THEY FIGHT THE SERAPIS.
+
+
+The battle between the Bon Homme Richard and the Serapis stands in
+history as the first signal collision on the sea between the Englishman
+and the American. For obstinacy, mutual hatred, and courage, it is
+without precedent or subsequent in the story of ocean. The strife long
+hung undetermined, but the English flag struck in the end.
+
+There would seem to be something singularly indicatory in this
+engagement. It may involve at once a type, a parallel, and a prophecy.
+Sharing the same blood with England, and yet her proved foe in two
+wars—not wholly inclined at bottom to forget an old grudge—intrepid,
+unprincipled, reckless, predatory, with boundless ambition, civilized
+in externals but a savage at heart, America is, or may yet be, the Paul
+Jones of nations.
+
+Regarded in this indicatory light, the battle between the Bon Homme
+Richard and the Serapis—in itself so curious—may well enlist our
+interest.
+
+Never was there a fight so snarled. The intricacy of those incidents
+which defy the narrator’s extrication, is not illy figured in that
+bewildering intertanglement of all the yards and anchors of the two
+ships, which confounded them for the time in one chaos of devastation.
+
+Elsewhere than here the reader must go who seeks an elaborate version
+of the fight, or, indeed, much of any regular account of it whatever.
+The writer is but brought to mention the battle because he must needs
+follow, in all events, the fortunes of the humble adventurer whose life
+lie records. Yet this necessarily involves some general view of each
+conspicuous incident in which he shares.
+
+Several circumstances of the place and time served to invest the fight
+with a certain scenic atmosphere casting a light almost poetic over the
+wild gloom of its tragic results. The battle was fought between the
+hours of seven and ten at night; the height of it was under a full
+harvest moon, in view of thousands of distant spectators crowning the
+high cliffs of Yorkshire.
+
+From the Tees to the Humber, the eastern coast of Britain, for the most
+part, wears a savage, melancholy, and Calabrian aspect. It is in course
+of incessant decay. Every year the isle which repulses nearly all other
+foes, succumbs to the Attila assaults of the deep. Here and there the
+base of the cliffs is strewn with masses of rock, undermined by the
+waves, and tumbled headlong below, where, sometimes, the water
+completely surrounds them, showing in shattered confusion detached
+rocks, pyramids, and obelisks, rising half-revealed from the surf—the
+Tadmores of the wasteful desert of the sea. Nowhere is this desolation
+more marked than for those fifty miles of coast between Flamborough
+Head and the Spurm.
+
+Weathering out the gale which had driven them from Leith, Paul’s ships
+for a few days were employed in giving chase to various merchantmen and
+colliers; capturing some, sinking others, and putting the rest to
+flight. Off the mouth of the Humber they ineffectually manoeuvred with
+a view of drawing out a king’s frigate, reported to be lying at anchor
+within. At another time a large fleet was encountered, under convoy of
+some ships of force. But their panic caused the fleet to hug the edge
+of perilous shoals very nigh the land, where, by reason of his having
+no competent pilot, Paul durst not approach to molest them. The same
+night he saw two strangers further out at sea, and chased them until
+three in the morning, when, getting pretty nigh, he surmised that they
+must needs be vessels of his own squadron, which, previous to his
+entering the Firth of Forth, had separated from his command. Daylight
+proved this supposition correct. Five vessels of the original squadron
+were now once more in company. About noon a fleet of forty merchantmen
+appeared coming round Flamborough Head, protected by two English
+man-of-war, the Serapis and Countess of Scarborough. Descrying the five
+cruisers sailing down, the forty sail, like forty chickens, fluttered
+in a panic under the wing of the shore. Their armed protectors bravely
+steered from the land, making the disposition for battle. Promptly
+accepting the challenge, Paul, giving the signal to his consorts,
+earnestly pressed forward. But, earnest as he was, it was seven in the
+evening ere the encounter began. Meantime his comrades, heedless of his
+signals, sailed independently along. Dismissing them from present
+consideration, we confine ourselves, for a while, to the Richard and
+the Serapis, the grand duellists of the fight.
+
+The Richard carried a motley, crew, to keep whom in order one hundred
+and thirty-five soldiers—themselves a hybrid band—had been put on
+board, commanded by French officers of inferior rank. Her armament was
+similarly heterogeneous; guns of all sorts and calibres; but about
+equal on the whole to those of a thirty-two-gun frigate. The spirit of
+baneful intermixture pervaded this craft throughout.
+
+The Serapis was a frigate of fifty guns, more than half of which
+individually exceeded in calibre any one gun of the Richard. She had a
+crew of some three hundred and twenty trained man-of-war’s men.
+
+There is something in a naval engagement which radically distinguishes
+it from one on the land. The ocean, at times, has what is called its
+_sea_ and its _trough of the sea_; but it has neither rivers, woods,
+banks, towns, nor mountains. In mild weather it is one hammered plain.
+Stratagems, like those of disciplined armies—ambuscades, like those of
+Indians, are impossible. All is clear, open, fluent. The very element
+which sustains the combatants, yields at the stroke of a feather. One
+wind and one tide at one time operate upon all who here engage. This
+simplicity renders a battle between two men-of-war, with their huge
+white wings, more akin to the Miltonic contests of archangels than to
+_the comparatively squalid_ tussles of earth.
+
+As the ships neared, a hazy darkness overspread the water. The moon was
+not yet risen. Objects were perceived with difficulty. Borne by a soft
+moist breeze over gentle waves, they came within pistol- shot. Owing to
+the obscurity, and the known neighborhood of other vessels, the Serapis
+was uncertain who the Richard was. Through the dim mist each ship
+loomed forth to the other vast, but indistinct, as the ghost of Morven.
+Sounds of the trampling of resolute men echoed from either hull, whose
+tight decks dully resounded like drum-heads in a funeral march.
+
+The Serapis hailed. She was answered by a broadside. For half an hour
+the combatants deliberately manoeuvred, continually changing their
+position, but always within shot fire. The. Serapis—the better sailer
+of the two—kept critically circling the Richard, making lounging
+advances now and then, and as suddenly steering off; hate causing her
+to act not unlike a wheeling cock about a hen, when stirred by the
+contrary passion. Meantime, though within easy speaking distance, no
+further syllable was exchanged; but an incessant cannonade was kept up.
+
+At this point, a third party, the Scarborough, drew near, seemingly
+desirous of giving assistance to her consort. But thick smoke was now
+added to the night’s natural obscurity. The Scarborough imperfectly
+discerned two ships, and plainly saw the common fire they made; but
+which was which, she could not tell. Eager to befriend the Serapis, she
+durst not fire a gun, lest she might unwittingly act the part of a foe.
+As when a hawk and a crow are clawing and beaking high in the air, a
+second crow flying near, will seek to join the battle, but finding no
+fair chance to engage, at last flies away to the woods; just so did the
+Scarborough now. Prudence dictated the step; because several chance
+shot—from which of the combatants could not be known—had already struck
+the Scarborough. So, unwilling uselessly to expose herself, off went
+for the present this baffled and ineffectual friend.
+
+Not long after, an invisible hand came and set down a great yellow lamp
+in the east. The hand reached up unseen from below the horizon, and set
+the lamp down right on the rim of the horizon, as on a threshold; as
+much as to say, Gentlemen warriors, permit me a little to light up this
+rather gloomy looking subject. The lamp was the round harvest moon; the
+one solitary foot-light of the scene. But scarcely did the rays from
+the lamp pierce that languid haze. Objects before perceived with
+difficulty, now glimmered ambiguously. Bedded in strange vapors, the
+great foot-light cast a dubious, half demoniac glare across the waters,
+like the phantasmagoric stream sent athwart a London flagging in a
+night-rain from an apothecary’s blue and green window. Through this
+sardonical mist, the face of the Man-in-the-Moon—looking right towards
+the combatants, as if he were standing in a trap-door of the sea,
+leaning forward leisurely with his arms complacently folded over upon
+the edge of the horizon—this queer face wore a serious, apishly
+self-satisfied leer, as if the Man-in-the-Moon had somehow secretly put
+up the ships to their contest, and in the depths of his malignant old
+soul was not unpleased to see how well his charms worked. There stood
+the grinning Man-in-the-Moon, his head just dodging into view over the
+rim of the sea:—Mephistopheles prompter of the stage.
+
+Aided now a little by the planet, one of the consorts of the Richard,
+the Pallas, hovering far outside the fight, dimly discerned the
+suspicious form of a lonely vessel unknown to her. She resolved to
+engage it, if it proved a foe. But ere they joined, the unknown
+ship—which proved to be the Scarborough—received a broadside at long
+gun’s distance from another consort of the Richard the Alliance. The
+shot whizzed across the broad interval like shuttlecocks across a great
+hall. Presently the battledores of both batteries were at work, and
+rapid compliments of shuttlecocks were very promptly exchanged. The
+adverse consorts of the two main belligerents fought with all the rage
+of those fiery seconds who in some desperate duels make their
+principal’s quarrel their own. Diverted from the Richard and the
+Serapis by this little by-play, the Man-in-the-Moon, all eager to see
+what it was, somewhat raised himself from his trap-door with an added
+grin on his face. By this time, off sneaked the Alliance, and down
+swept the Pallas, at close quarters engaging the Scarborough; an
+encounter destined in less than an hour to end in the latter ship’s
+striking her flag.
+
+Compared to the Serapis and the Richard, the Pallas and the Scarborough
+were as two pages to two knights. In their immature way they showed the
+same traits as their fully developed superiors.
+
+The Man-in-the-Moon now raised himself still higher to obtain a better
+view of affairs.
+
+But the Man-in-the-Moon was not the only spectator. From the high
+cliffs of the shore, and especially from the great promontory of
+Flamborough Head, the scene was witnessed by crowds of the islanders.
+Any rustic might be pardoned his curiosity in view of the spectacle,
+presented. Far in the indistinct distance fleets of frightened
+merchantmen filled the lower air with their sails, as flakes of snow in
+a snow-storm by night. Hovering undeterminedly, in another direction,
+were several of the scattered consorts of Paul, taking no part in the
+fray. Nearer, was an isolated mist, investing the Pallas and
+Scarborough—a mist slowly adrift on the sea, like a floating isle, and
+at intervals irradiated with sparkles of fire and resonant with the
+boom of cannon. Further away, in the deeper water, was a lurid cloud,
+incessantly torn in shreds of lightning, then fusing together again,
+once more to be rent. As yet this lurid cloud was neither stationary
+nor slowly adrift, like the first-mentioned one; but, instinct with
+chaotic vitality, shifted hither and thither, foaming with fire, like a
+valiant water-spout careering off the coast of Malabar.
+
+To get some idea of the events enacting in that cloud, it will be
+necessary to enter it; to go and possess it, as a ghost may rush into a
+body, or the devils into the swine, which running down the steep place
+perished in the sea; just as the Richard is yet to do.
+
+Thus far the Serapis and the Richard had been manoeuvring and chasing
+to each other like partners in a cotillion, all the time indulging in
+rapid repartee.
+
+But finding at last that the superior managableness of the enemy’s ship
+enabled him to get the better of the clumsy old Indiaman, the Richard,
+in taking position, Paul, with his wonted resolution, at once sought to
+neutralize this, by hugging him close. But the attempt to lay the
+Richard right across the head of the Serapis ended quite otherwise, in
+sending the enemy’s jib-boom just over the Richard’s great tower of
+Pisa, where Israel was stationed; who, catching it eagerly, stood for
+an instant holding to the slack of the sail, like one grasping a horse
+by the mane prior to vaulting into the saddle.
+
+“Aye, hold hard, lad,” cried Paul, springing to his side with a coil of
+rigging. With a few rapid turns he knitted himself to his foe. The wind
+now acting on the sails of the Serapis forced her, heel and point, her
+entire length, cheek by jowl, alongside the Richard. The projecting
+cannon scraped; the yards interlocked; but the hulls did not touch. A
+long lane of darkling water lay wedged between, like that narrow canal
+in Venice which dozes between two shadowy piles, and high in air is
+secretly crossed by the Bridge of Sighs. But where the six yard-arms
+reciprocally arched overhead, three bridges of sighs were both seen and
+heard, as the moon and wind kept rising.
+
+Into that Lethean canal—pond-like in its smoothness as compared with
+the sea without—fell many a poor soul that night; fell, forever
+forgotten.
+
+As some heaving rent coinciding with a disputed frontier on a volcanic
+plain, that boundary abyss was the jaws of death to both sides. So
+contracted was it, that in many cases the gun-rammers had to be thrust
+into the opposite ports, in order to enter to muzzles of their own
+cannon. It seemed more an intestine feud, than a fight between
+strangers. Or, rather, it was as if the Siamese Twins, oblivious of
+their fraternal bond, should rage in unnatural fight.
+
+Ere long, a horrible explosion was heard, drowning for the instant the
+cannonade. Two of the old eighteen-pounders—before spoken of, as having
+been hurriedly set up below the main deck of the Richard—burst all to
+pieces, killing the sailors who worked them, and shattering all that
+part of the hull, as if two exploded steam-boilers had shot out of its
+opposite sides. The effect was like the fall of the walls of a house.
+Little now upheld the great tower of Pisa but a few naked crow
+stanchions. Thenceforth, not a few balls from the Serapis must have
+passed straight through the Richard without grazing her. It was like
+firing buck-shot through the ribs of a skeleton.
+
+But, further forward, so deadly was the broadside from the heavy
+batteries of the Serapis—levelled point-blank, and right down the
+throat and bowels, as it were, of the Richard—that it cleared
+everything before it. The men on the Richard’s covered gun-deck ran
+above, like miners from the fire-damp. Collecting on the forecastle,
+they continued to fight with grenades and muskets. The soldiers also
+were in the lofty tops, whence they kept up incessant volleys,
+cascading their fire down as pouring lava from cliffs.
+
+The position of the men in the two ships was now exactly reversed. For
+while the Serapis was tearing the Richard all to pieces below deck, and
+had swept that covered part almost of the last man, the Richard’s crowd
+of musketry had complete control of the upper deck of the Serapis,
+where it was almost impossible for man to remain unless as a corpse.
+Though in the beginning, the tops of the Serapis had not been
+unsupplied with marksmen, yet they had long since been cleared by the
+overmastering musketry of the Richard. Several, with leg or arm broken
+by a ball, had been seen going dimly downward from their giddy perch,
+like falling pigeons shot on the wing.
+
+As busy swallows about barn-eaves and ridge-poles, some of the
+Richard’s marksmen, quitting their tops, now went far out on their
+yard-arms, where they overhung the Serapis. From thence they dropped
+hand-grenades upon her decks, like apples, which growing in one field
+fall over the fence into another. Others of their band flung the same
+sour fruit into the open ports of the Serapis. A hail-storm of aerial
+combustion descended and slanted on the Serapis, while horizontal
+thunderbolts rolled crosswise through the subterranean vaults of the
+Richard. The belligerents were no longer, in the ordinary sense of
+things, an English ship and an American ship. It was a co-partnership
+and joint-stock combustion-company of both ships; yet divided, even in
+participation. The two vessels were as two houses, through whose
+party-wall doors have been cut; one family (the Guelphs) occupying the
+whole lower story; another family (the Ghibelines) the whole upper
+story.
+
+Meanwhile, determined Paul flew hither and thither like the meteoric
+corposant-ball, which shiftingly dances on the tips and verges of
+ships’ rigging in storms. Wherever he went, he seemed to cast a pale
+light on all faces. Blacked and burnt, his Scotch bonnet was compressed
+to a gun-wad on his head. His Parisian coat, with its gold-laced sleeve
+laid aside, disclosed to the full the blue tattooing on his arm, which
+sometimes in fierce gestures streamed in the haze of the cannonade,
+cabalistically terrific as the charmed standard of Satan. Yet his
+frenzied manner was less a testimony of his internal commotion than
+intended to inspirit and madden his men, some of whom seeing him, in
+transports of intrepidity stripped themselves to their trowsers,
+exposing their naked bodies to the as naked shot The same was done on
+the Serapis, where several guns were seen surrounded by their buff
+crews as by fauns and satyrs.
+
+At the beginning of the fray, before the ships interlocked, in the
+intervals of smoke which swept over the ships as mist over
+mountain-tops, affording open rents here and there—the gun-deck of the
+Serapis, at certain points, showed, congealed for the instant in all
+attitudes of dauntlessness, a gallery of marble statues—fighting
+gladiators.
+
+Stooping low and intent, with one braced leg thrust behind, and one arm
+thrust forward, curling round towards the muzzle of the gun, there was
+seen the _loader_, performing his allotted part; on the other side of
+the carriage, in the same stooping posture, but with both hands holding
+his long black pole, pike-wise, ready for instant use—stood the eager
+_rammer and sponger_; while at the breech, crouched the wary _captain
+of the gun_, his keen eye, like the watching leopard’s, burning along
+the range; and behind all, tall and erect, the Egyptian symbol of
+death, stood the _matchman_, immovable for the moment, his long-handled
+match reversed. Up to their two long death-dealing batteries, the
+trained men of the Serapis stood and toiled in mechanical magic of
+discipline. They tended those rows of guns, as Lowell girls the rows of
+looms in a cotton factory. The Parcae were not more methodical; Atropos
+not more fatal; the automaton chess-player not more irresponsible.
+
+“Look, lad; I want a grenade, now, thrown down their main hatchway. I
+saw long piles of cartridges there. The powder monkeys have brought
+them up faster than they can be used. Take a bucket of combustibles,
+and let’s hear from you presently.”
+
+These words were spoken by Paul to Israel. Israel did as ordered. In a
+few minutes, bucket in hand, begrimed with powder, sixty feet in air,
+he hung like Apollyon from the extreme tip of the yard over the fated
+abyss of the hatchway. As he looked down between the eddies of smoke
+into that slaughterous pit, it was like looking from the verge of a
+cataract down into the yeasty pool at its base. Watching, his chance,
+he dropped one grenade with such faultless precision, that, striking
+its mark, an explosion rent the Serapis like a volcano. The long row of
+heaped cartridges was ignited. The fire ran horizontally, like an
+express on a railway. More than twenty men were instantly killed:
+nearly forty wounded. This blow restored the chances of battle, before
+in favor of the Serapis.
+
+But the drooping spirits of the English were suddenly revived, by an
+event which crowned the scene by an act on the part of one of the
+consorts of the Richard, the incredible atrocity of which has induced
+all humane minds to impute it rather to some incomprehensible mistake
+than to the malignant madness of the perpetrator.
+
+The cautious approach and retreat of a consort of the Serapis, the
+Scarborough, before the moon rose, has already been mentioned. It is
+now to be related how that, when the moon was more than an hour high, a
+consort of the Richard, the Alliance, likewise approached and
+retreated. This ship, commanded by a Frenchman, infamous in his own
+navy, and obnoxious in the service to which he at present belonged;
+this ship, foremost in insurgency to Paul hitherto, and which, for the
+most part, had crept like a poltroon from the fray; the Alliance now
+was at hand. Seeing her, Paul deemed the battle at an end. But to his
+horror, the Alliance threw a broadside full into the stern of the
+Richard, without touching the Serapis. Paul called to her, for God’s
+sake to forbear destroying the Richard. The reply was, a second, a
+third, a fourth broadside, striking the Richard ahead, astern, and
+amidships. One of the volleys killed several men and one officer.
+Meantime, like carpenters’ augers, and the sea-worm called Remora, the
+guns of the Serapis were drilling away at the same doomed hull. After
+performing her nameless exploit, the Alliance sailed away, and did no
+more. She was like the great fire of London, breaking out on the heel
+of the great Plague. By this time, the Richard had so many shot-holes
+low down in her hull, that like a sieve she began to settle.
+
+“Do you strike?” cried the English captain.
+
+“I have not yet begun to fight,” howled sinking Paul.
+
+This summons and response were whirled on eddies of smoke and flame.
+Both vessels were now on fire. The men of either knew hardly which to
+do; strive to destroy the enemy, or save themselves. In the midst of
+this, one hundred human beings, hitherto invisible strangers, were
+suddenly added to the rest. Five score English prisoners, till now
+confined in the Richard’s hold, liberated in his consternation by the
+master at arms, burst up the hatchways. One of them, the captain of a
+letter of marque, captured by Paul, off the Scottish coast, crawled
+through a port, as a burglar through a window, from the one ship to the
+other, and reported affairs to the English captain.
+
+While Paul and his lieutenants were confronting these prisoners, the
+gunner, running up from below, and not perceiving his official
+superiors, and deeming them dead, believing himself now left sole
+surviving officer, ran to the tower of Pisa to haul down the colors.
+But they were already shot down and trailing in the water astern, like
+a sailor’s towing shirt. Seeing the gunner there, groping about in the
+smoke, Israel asked what he wanted.
+
+At this moment the gunner, rushing to the rail, shouted “Quarter!
+quarter!” to the Serapis.
+
+“I’ll quarter ye,” yelled Israel, smiting the gunner with the flat of
+his cutlass.
+
+“Do you strike?” now came from the Serapis.
+
+“Aye, aye, aye!” involuntarily cried Israel, fetching the gunner a
+shower of blows.
+
+“Do you strike?” again was repeated from the Serapis; whose captain,
+judging from the augmented confusion on board the Richard, owing to the
+escape of the prisoners, and also influenced by the report made to him
+by his late guest of the port-hole, doubted not that the enemy must
+needs be about surrendering.
+
+“Do you strike?”
+
+“Aye!—I strike _back_” roared Paul, for the first time now hearing the
+summons.
+
+But judging this frantic response to come, like the others, from some
+unauthorized source, the English captain directed his boarders to be
+called, some of whom presently leaped on the Richard’s rail, but,
+throwing out his tattooed arm at them, with a sabre at the end of it,
+Paul showed them how boarders repelled boarders. The English retreated,
+but not before they had been thinned out again, like spring radishes,
+by the unfaltering fire from the Richard’s tops.
+
+An officer of the Richard, seeing the mass of prisoners delirious with
+sudden liberty and fright, pricked them with his sword to the pumps,
+thus keeping the ship afloat by the very blunder which had promised to
+have been fatal. The vessels now blazed so in the rigging that both
+parties desisted from hostilities to subdue the common foe.
+
+When some faint order was again restored upon the Richard her chances
+of victory increased, while those of the English, driven under cover,
+proportionably waned. Early in the contest, Paul, with his own hand,
+had brought one of his largest guns to bear against the enemy’s
+mainmast. That shot had hit. The mast now plainly tottered.
+Nevertheless, it seemed as if, in this fight, neither party could be
+victor. Mutual obliteration from the face of the waters seemed the only
+natural sequel to hostilities like these. It is, therefore, honor to
+him as a man, and not reproach to him as an officer, that, to stay such
+carnage, Captain Pearson, of the Serapis, with his own hands hauled
+down his colors. But just as an officer from the Richard swung himself
+on board the Serapis, and accosted the English captain, the first
+lieutenant of the Serapis came up from below inquiring whether the
+Richard had struck, since her fire had ceased.
+
+So equal was the conflict that, even after the surrender, it could be,
+and was, a question to one of the warriors engaged (who had not
+happened to see the English flag hauled down) whether the Serapis had
+struck to the Richard, or the Richard to the Serapis. Nay, while the
+Richard’s officer was still amicably conversing with the English
+captain, a midshipman of the Richard, in act of following his superior
+on board the surrendered vessel, was run through the thigh by a pike in
+the hand of an ignorant boarder of the Serapis. While, equally
+ignorant, the cannons below deck were still thundering away at the
+nominal conqueror from the batteries of the nominally conquered ship.
+
+But though the Serapis had submitted, there were two misanthropical
+foes on board the Richard which would not so easily succumb—fire and
+water. All night the victors were engaged in suppressing the flames.
+Not until daylight were the flames got under; but though the pumps were
+kept continually going, the water in the hold still gained. A few hours
+after sunrise the Richard was deserted for the Serapis and the other
+vessels of the squadron of Paul. About ten o’clock the Richard, gorged
+with slaughter, wallowed heavily, gave a long roll, and blasted by
+tornadoes of sulphur, slowly sunk, like Gomorrah, out of sight.
+
+The loss of life in the two ships was about equal; one-half of the
+total number of those engaged being either killed or wounded.
+
+In view of this battle one may ask—What separates the enlightened man
+from the savage? Is civilization a thing distinct, or is it an advanced
+stage of barbarism?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX.
+THE SHUTTLE.
+
+
+For a time back, across the otherwise blue-jean career of Israel, Paul
+Jones flits and re-flits like a crimson thread. One more brief
+intermingling of it, and to the plain old homespun we return.
+
+The battle won, the squadron started for the Texel, where they arrived
+in safety. Omitting all mention of intervening harassments, suffice it,
+that after some months of inaction as to anything of a warlike nature,
+Paul and Israel (both, from different motives, eager to return to
+America) sailed for that country in the armed ship Ariel, Paul as
+commander, Israel as quartermaster.
+
+Two weeks out, they encountered by night a frigate-like craft, supposed
+to be an enemy. The vessels came within hail, both showing English
+colors, with purposes of mutual deception, affecting to belong to the
+English Navy. For an hour, through their speaking trumpets, the
+captains equivocally conversed. A very reserved, adroit, hoodwinking,
+statesman-like conversation, indeed. At last, professing some little
+incredulity as to the truthfulness of the stranger’s statement, Paul
+intimated a desire that he should put out a boat and come on board to
+show his commission, to which the stranger very affably replied, that
+unfortunately his boat was exceedingly leaky. With equal politeness,
+Paul begged him to consider the danger attending a refusal, which
+rejoinder nettled the other, who suddenly retorted that he would answer
+for twenty guns, and that both himself and men were knock-down
+Englishmen. Upon this, Paul said that he would allow him exactly five
+minutes for a sober, second thought. That brief period passed, Paul,
+hoisting the American colors, ran close under the other ship’s stern,
+and engaged her. It was about eight o’clock at night that this strange
+quarrel was picked in the middle of the ocean. Why cannot men be
+peaceable on that great common? Or does nature in those fierce
+night-brawlers, the billows, set mankind but a sorry example?
+
+After ten minutes’ cannonading, the stranger struck, shouting out that
+half his men were killed. The Ariel’s crew hurrahed. Boarders were
+called to take possession. At this juncture, the prize shifting her
+position so that she headed away, and to leeward of the Ariel, thrust
+her long spanker-boom diagonally over the latter’s quarter; when
+Israel, who was standing close by, instinctively caught hold of it—just
+as he had grasped the jib-boom of the Serapis—and, at the same moment,
+hearing the call to take possession, in the valiant excitement of the
+occasion, he leaped upon the spar, and made a rush for the stranger’s
+deck, thinking, of course, that he would be immediately followed by the
+regular boarders. But the sails of the strange ship suddenly filled;
+she began to glide through the sea; her spanker-boom, not having at all
+entangled itself, offering no hindrance. Israel, clinging midway along
+the boom, soon found himself divided from the Ariel by a space
+impossible to be leaped. Meantime, suspecting foul play, Paul set every
+sail; but the stranger, having already the advantage, contrived to make
+good her escape, though perseveringly chased by the cheated conqueror.
+
+In the confusion, no eye had observed our hero’s spring. But, as the
+vessels separated more, an officer of the strange ship spying a man on
+the boom, and taking him for one of his own men, demanded what he did
+there.
+
+“Clearing the signal halyards, sir,” replied Israel, fumbling with the
+cord which happened to be dangling near by.
+
+“Well, bear a hand and come in, or you will have a bow-chaser at you
+soon,” referring to the bow guns of the Ariel.
+
+“Aye, aye, sir,” said Israel, and in a moment he sprang to the deck,
+and soon found himself mixed in among some two hundred English sailors
+of a large letter of marque. At once he perceived that the story of
+half the crew being killed was a mere hoax, played off for the sake of
+making an escape. Orders were continually being given to pull on this
+and that rope, as the ship crowded all sail in flight. To these orders
+Israel, with the rest, promptly responded, pulling at the rigging
+stoutly as the best of them; though Heaven knows his heart sunk deeper
+and deeper at every pull which thus helped once again to widen the gulf
+between him and home.
+
+In intervals he considered with himself what to do. Favored by the
+obscurity of the night and the number of the crew, and wearing much the
+same dress as theirs, it was very easy to pass himself off for one of
+them till morning. But daylight would be sure to expose him, unless
+some cunning, plan could be hit upon. If discovered for what he was,
+nothing short of a prison awaited him upon the ship’s arrival in port.
+
+It was a desperate case, only as desperate a remedy could serve. One
+thing was sure, he could not hide. Some audacious parade of himself
+promised the only hope. Marking that the sailors, not being of the
+regular navy, wore no uniform, and perceiving that his jacket was the
+only garment on him which bore any distinguishing badge, our adventurer
+took it off, and privily dropped it overboard, remaining now in his
+dark blue woollen shirt and blue cloth waistcoat.
+
+What the more inspirited Israel to the added step now contemplated, was
+the circumstance that the ship was not a Frenchman’s or other
+foreigner, but her crew, though enemies, spoke the same language that
+he did.
+
+So very quietly, at last, he goes aloft into the maintop, and sitting
+down on an old sail there, beside some eight or ten topmen, in an
+off-handed way asks one for tobacco.
+
+“Give us a quid, lad,” as he settled himself in his seat.
+
+“Halloo,” said the strange sailor, “who be you? Get out of the top! The
+fore and mizzentop men won’t let us go into their tops, and blame me if
+we’ll let any of their gangs come here. So, away ye go.”
+
+“You’re blind, or crazy, old boy,” rejoined Israel. “I’m a topmate;
+ain’t I, lads?” appealing to the rest.
+
+“There’s only ten maintopmen belonging to our watch; if you are one,
+then there’ll be eleven,” said a second sailor. “Get out of the top!”
+
+“This is too bad, maties,” cried Israel, “to serve an old topmate this
+way. Come, come, you are foolish. Give us a quid.” And, once more, with
+the utmost sociability, he addressed the sailor next to him.
+
+“Look ye,” returned the other, “if you don’t make away with yourself,
+you skulking spy from the mizzen, we’ll drop you to deck like a
+jewel-block.”
+
+Seeing the party thus resolute, Israel, with some affected banter,
+descended.
+
+The reason why he had tried the scheme—and, spite of the foregoing
+failure, meant to repeat it—was this: As customary in armed ships, the
+men were in companies allotted to particular places and functions.
+Therefore, to escape final detection, Israel must some way get himself
+recognized as belonging to some one of those bands; otherwise, as an
+isolated nondescript, discovery ere long would be certain, especially
+upon the next general muster. To be sure, the hope in question was a
+forlorn sort of hope, but it was his sole one, and must therefore be
+tried.
+
+Mixing in again for a while with the general watch, he at last goes on
+the forecastle among the sheet-anchor-men there, at present engaged in
+critically discussing the merits of the late valiant encounter, and
+expressing their opinion that by daybreak the enemy in chase would be
+hull-down out of sight.
+
+“To be sure she will,” cried Israel, joining in with the group, “old
+ballyhoo that she is, to be sure. But didn’t we pepper her, lads? Give
+us a chew of tobacco, one of ye. How many have we wounded, do ye know?
+None killed that I’ve heard of. Wasn’t that a fine hoax we played on
+’em? Ha! ha! But give us a chew.”
+
+In the prodigal fraternal patriotism of the moment, one of the old
+worthies freely handed his plug to our adventurer, who, helping
+himself, returned it, repeating the question as to the killed and
+wounded.
+
+“Why,” said he of the plug, “Jack Jewboy told me, just now, that
+there’s only seven men been carried down to the surgeon, but not a soul
+killed.”
+
+“Good, boys, good!” cried Israel, moving up to one of the
+gun-carriages, where three or four men were sitting—“slip along, chaps,
+slip along, and give a watchmate a seat with ye.”
+
+“All full here, lad; try the next gun.”
+
+“Boys, clear a place here,”, said Israel, advancing, like one of the
+family, to that gun.
+
+“Who the devil are _you_, making this row here?” demanded a
+stern-looking old fellow, captain of the forecastle, “seems to me you
+make considerable noise. Are you a forecastleman?”
+
+“If the bowsprit belongs here, so do I,” rejoined Israel, composedly.
+
+“Let’s look at ye, then!” and seizing a battle-lantern, before thrust
+under a gun, the old veteran came close to Israel before he had time to
+elude the scrutiny.
+
+“Take that!” said his examiner, and fetching Israel a terrible thump,
+pushed him ignominiously off the forecastle as some unknown interloper
+from distant parts of the ship.
+
+With similar perseverance of effrontery, Israel tried other quarters of
+the vessel. But with equal ill success. Jealous with the spirit of
+class, no social circle would receive him. As a last resort, he dived
+down among the _holders_.
+
+A group of them sat round a lantern, in the dark bowels of the ship,
+like a knot of charcoal burners in a pine forest at midnight.
+
+“Well, boys, what’s the good word?” said Israel, advancing very
+cordially, but keeping as much as possible in the shadow.
+
+“The good word is,” rejoined a censorious old _holder_, “that you had
+best go where you belong—on deck—and not be a skulking down here where
+you _don’t_ belong. I suppose this is the way you skulked during the
+fight.”
+
+“Oh, you’re growly to-night, shipmate,” said Israel, pleasantly—“supper
+sits hard on your conscience.”
+
+“Get out of the hold with ye,” roared the other. “On deck, or I’ll call
+the master-at-arms.”
+
+Once more Israel decamped.
+
+Sorely against his grain, as a final effort to blend himself openly
+with the crew, he now went among the _waisters_: the vilest caste of an
+armed ship’s company, mere dregs and settlings—sea-Pariahs, comprising
+all the lazy, all the inefficient, all the unfortunate and fated, all
+the melancholy, all the infirm, all the rheumatical scamps,
+scapegraces, ruined prodigal sons, sooty faces, and swineherds of the
+crew, not excluding those with dismal wardrobes.
+
+An unhappy, tattered, moping row of them sat along dolefully on the
+gun-deck, like a parcel of crest-fallen buzzards, exiled from civilized
+society.
+
+“Cheer up, lads,” said Israel, in a jovial tone, “homeward-bound, you
+know. Give us a seat among ye, friends.”
+
+“Oh, sit on your head!” answered a sullen fellow in the corner.
+
+“Come, come, no growling; we’re homeward-bound. Whoop, my hearties!”
+
+“Workhouse bound, you mean,” grumbled another sorry chap, in a darned
+shirt.
+
+“Oh, boys, don’t be down-hearted. Let’s keep up our spirits. Sing us a
+song, one of ye, and I’ll give the chorus.”
+
+“Sing if ye like, but I’ll plug my ears, for one,” said still another
+sulky varlet, with the toes out of his sea-boots, while all the rest
+with one roar of misanthropy joined him.
+
+But Israel, riot to be daunted, began:
+
+“‘Cease, rude Boreas, cease your growling!’”
+
+“And you cease your squeaking, will ye?” cried a fellow in a banged
+tarpaulin. “Did ye get a ball in the windpipe, that ye cough that way,
+worse nor a broken-nosed old bellows? Have done with your groaning,
+it’s worse nor the death-rattle.”
+
+“Boys, is this the way you treat a watchmate” demanded Israel
+reproachfully, “trying to cheer up his friends? Shame on ye, boys.
+Come, let’s be sociable. Spin us a yarn, one of ye. Meantime, rub my
+back for me, another,” and very confidently he leaned against his
+neighbor.
+
+“Lean off me, will ye?” roared his friend, shoving him away.
+
+“But who _is_ this ere singing, leaning, yarn-spinning chap? Who are
+ye? Be you a waister, or be you not?”
+
+So saying, one of this peevish, sottish band staggered close up to
+Israel. But there was a deck above and a deck below, and the lantern
+swung in the distance. It was too dim to see with critical exactness.
+
+“No such singing chap belongs to our gang, that’s flat,” he
+dogmatically exclaimed at last, after an ineffectual scrutiny. “Sail
+out of this!”
+
+And with a shove once more, poor Israel was ejected.
+
+Blackballed out of every club, he went disheartened on deck. So long,
+while light screened him at least, as he contented himself with
+promiscuously circulating, all was safe; it was the endeavor to
+fraternize with any one set which was sure to endanger him. At last,
+wearied out, he happened to find himself on the berth deck, where the
+watch below were slumbering. Some hundred and fifty hammocks were on
+that deck. Seeing one empty, he leaped in, thinking luck might yet some
+way befriend him. Here, at last, the sultry confinement put him fast
+asleep. He was wakened by a savage whiskerando of the other watch, who,
+seizing him by his waistband, dragged him most indecorously out,
+furiously denouncing him for a skulker.
+
+Springing to his feet, Israel perceived from the crowd and tumult of
+the berth deck, now all alive with men leaping into their hammocks,
+instead of being full of sleepers quietly dosing therein, that the
+watches were changed. Going above, he renewed in various quarters his
+offers of intimacy with the fresh men there assembled; but was
+successively repulsed as before. At length, just as day was breaking,
+an irascible fellow whose stubborn opposition our adventurer had long
+in vain sought to conciliate—this man suddenly perceiving, by the gray
+morning light, that Israel had somehow an alien sort of general look,
+very savagely pressed him for explicit information as to who he might
+be. The answers increased his suspicion. Others began to surround the
+two. Presently, quite a circle was formed. Sailors from distant parts
+of the ship drew near. One, and then another, and another, declared
+that they, in their quarters, too, had been molested by a vagabond
+claiming fraternity, and seeking to palm himself off upon decent
+society. In vain Israel protested. The truth, like the day, dawned
+clearer and clearer. More and more closely he was scanned. At length
+the hour for having all hands on deck arrived; when the other watch
+which Israel had first tried, reascending to the deck, and hearing the
+matter in discussion, they endorsed the charge of molestation and
+attempted imposture through the night, on the part of some person
+unknown, but who, likely enough, was the strange man now before them.
+In the end, the master-at-arms appeared with his bamboo, who, summarily
+collaring poor Israel, led him as a mysterious culprit to the officer
+of the deck, which gentleman having heard the charge, examined him in
+great perplexity, and, saying that he did not at all recognize that
+countenance, requested the junior officers to contribute their
+scrutiny. But those officers were equally at fault.
+
+“Who the deuce _are_ you?” at last said the officer-of-the-deck, in
+added bewilderment. “Where did you come from? What’s your business?
+Where are you stationed? What’s your name? Who are you, any way? How
+did you get here? and where are you going?”
+
+“Sir,” replied Israel very humbly, “I am going to my regular duty, if
+you will but let me. I belong to the maintop, and ought to be now
+engaged in preparing the topgallant stu’n’-sail for hoisting.”
+
+“Belong to the maintop? Why, these men here say you have been trying to
+belong to the foretop, and the mizzentop, and the forecastle, and the
+hold, and the waist, and every other part of the ship. This is
+extraordinary,” he added, turning upon the junior officers.
+
+“He must be out of his mind,” replied one of them, the sailing-master.
+
+“Out of his mind?” rejoined the officer-of-the-deck. “He’s out of all
+reason; out of all men’s knowledge and memories! Why, no one knows him;
+no one has ever seen him before; no imagination, in the wildest flight
+of a morbid nightmare, has ever so much as dreamed of him. Who _are_
+you?” he again added, fierce with amazement. “What’s your name? Are you
+down in the ship’s books, or at all in the records of nature?”
+
+“My name, sir, is Peter Perkins,” said Israel, thinking it most prudent
+to conceal his real appellation.
+
+“Certainly, I never heard that name before. Pray, see if Peter Perkins
+is down on the quarter-bills,” he added to a midshipman. “Quick, bring
+the book here.”
+
+Having received it, he ran his fingers along the columns, and dashing
+down the book, declared that no such name was there.
+
+“You are not down, sir. There is no Peter Perkins here. Tell me at once
+who are you?”
+
+“It might be, sir,” said Israel, gravely, “that seeing I shipped under
+the effects of liquor, I might, out of absent-mindedness like, have
+given in some other person’s name instead of my own.”
+
+“Well, what name have you gone by among your shipmates since you’ve
+been aboard?”
+
+“Peter Perkins, sir.”
+
+Upon this the officer turned to the men around, inquiring whether the
+name of Peter Perkins was familiar to them as that of a shipmate. One
+and all answered no.
+
+“This won’t do, sir,” now said the officer. “You see it won’t do. Who
+are you?”
+
+“A poor persecuted fellow at your service, sir.”
+
+“_Who_ persecutes you?”
+
+“Every one, sir. All hands seem to be against me; none of them willing
+to remember me.”
+
+“Tell me,” demanded the officer earnestly, “how long do you remember
+yourself? Do you remember yesterday morning? You must have come into
+existence by some sort of spontaneous combustion in the hold. Or were
+you fired aboard from the enemy, last night, in a cartridge? Do you
+remember yesterday?”
+
+“Oh, yes, sir.”
+
+“What was you doing yesterday?”
+
+“Well, sir, for one thing, I believe I had the honor of a little talk
+with yourself.”
+
+“With _me_?”
+
+“Yes, sir; about nine o’clock in the morning—the sea being smooth and
+the ship running, as I should think, about seven knots—you came up into
+the maintop, where I belong, and was pleased to ask my opinion about
+the best way to set a topgallant stu’n’-sail.”
+
+“He’s mad! He’s mad!” said the officer, with delirious conclusiveness.
+“Take him away, take him away, take him away—put him somewhere,
+master-at-arms. Stay, one test more. What mess do you belong to?”
+
+“Number 12, sir.”
+
+“Mr. Tidds,” to a midshipman, “send mess No. 12 to the mast.”
+
+Ten sailors replied to the summons, and arranged themselves before
+Israel.
+
+“Men, does this man belong to your mess?”
+
+“No, sir; never saw him before this morning.”
+
+“What are those men’s names?” he demanded of Israel.
+
+“Well, sir, I am so intimate with all of them,” looking upon them with
+a kindly glance, “I never call them by their real names, but by
+nicknames. So, never using their real names, I have forgotten them. The
+nicknames that I know, them by, are Towser, Bowser, Rowser, Snowser.”
+
+“Enough. Mad as a March hare. Take him away. Hold,” again added the
+officer, whom some strange fascination still bound to the bootless
+investigation. “What’s _my_ name, sir?”
+
+“Why, sir, one of my messmates here called you Lieutenant Williamson,
+just now, and I never heard you called by any other name.”
+
+“There’s method in his madness,” thought the officer to himself.
+“What’s the captain’s name?”
+
+“Why, sir, when we spoke the enemy, last night, I heard him say,
+through his trumpet, that he was Captain Parker; and very likely he
+knows his own name.”
+
+“I have you now. That ain’t the captain’s real name.”
+
+“He’s the best judge himself, sir, of what his name is, I should
+think.”
+
+“Were it not,” said the officer, now turning gravely upon his juniors,
+“were it not that such a supposition were on other grounds absurd, I
+should certainly conclude that this man, in some unknown way, got on
+board here from the enemy last night.”
+
+“How could he, sir?” asked the sailing-master.
+
+“Heaven knows. But our spanker-boom geared the other ship, you know, in
+manoeuvring to get headway.”
+
+“But supposing he _could_ have got here that fashion, which is quite
+impossible under all the circumstances, what motive could have induced
+him voluntarily to jump among enemies?”
+
+“Let him answer for himself,” said the officer, turning suddenly upon
+Israel, with the view of taking him off his guard, by the matter of
+course assumption of the very point at issue.
+
+“Answer, sir. Why did you jump on board here, last night, from the
+enemy?”
+
+“Jump on board, sir, from the enemy? Why, sir, my station at general
+quarters is at gun No. 3, of the lower deck, here.”
+
+“He’s cracked—or else I am turned—or all the world is;—take him away!”
+
+“But where am I to take him, sir?” said the master-at-arms. “He don’t
+seem to belong anywhere, sir. Where—where am I to take him?”
+
+“Take him-out of sight,” said the officer, now incensed with his own
+perplexity. “Take him out of sight, I say.”
+
+“Come along, then, my ghost,” said the master-at-arms. And, collaring
+the phantom, he led it hither and thither, not knowing exactly what to
+do with it.
+
+Some fifteen minutes passed, when the captain coming from his cabin,
+and observing the master-at-arms leading Israel about in this
+indefinite style, demanded the reason of that procedure, adding that it
+was against his express orders for any new and degrading punishments to
+be invented for his men.
+
+“Come here, master-at-arms. To what end do you lead that man about?”
+
+“To no end in the world, sir. I keep leading him about because he has
+no final destination.”
+
+“Mr. Officer-of-the-deck, what does this mean? Who is this strange man?
+I don’t know that I remember him. Who is he? And what is signified by
+his being led about?”
+
+Hereupon the officer-of-the-deck, throwing himself into a tragical
+posture, set forth the entire mystery; much to the captain’s
+astonishment, who at once indignantly turned upon the phantom.
+
+“You rascal—don’t try to deceive me. Who are you? and where did you
+come from last?”
+
+“Sir, my name is Peter Perkins, and I last came from the forecastle,
+where the master-at-arms last led me, before coming here.”
+
+“No joking, sir, no joking.”
+
+“Sir, I’m sure it’s too serious a business to joke about.”
+
+“Do you have the assurance to say, that you, as a regularly shipped
+man, have been on board this vessel ever since she sailed from
+Falmouth, ten months ago?”
+
+“Sir, anxious to secure a berth under so good a commander, I was among
+the first to enlist.”
+
+“What ports have we touched at, sir?” said the captain, now in a little
+softer tone.
+
+“Ports, sir, ports?”
+
+“Yes, sir, _ports_”
+
+Israel began to scratch his yellow hair.
+
+“What _ports_, sir?”
+
+“Well, sir:—Boston, for one.”
+
+“Right there,” whispered a midshipman.
+
+“What was the next port, sir?”
+
+“Why, sir, I was saying Boston was the _first_ port, I believe; wasn’t
+it?—and”—
+
+“The _second_ port, sir, is what I want.”
+
+“Well—New York.”
+
+“Right again,” whispered the midshipman.
+
+“And what port are we bound to, now?”
+
+“Let me see—homeward-bound—Falmouth, sir.”
+
+“What sort of a place is Boston?”
+
+“Pretty considerable of a place, sir.”
+
+“Very straight streets, ain’t they?”
+
+“Yes, sir; cow-paths, cut by sheep-walks, and intersected with
+hen-tracks.”
+
+“When did we fire the first gun?”
+
+“Well, sir, just as we were leaving Falmouth, ten months
+ago—signal-gun, sir.”
+
+“Where did we fire the first _shotted_ gun, sir?—and what was the name
+of the privateer we took upon that occasion?”
+
+“’Pears to me, sir, at that time I was on the sick list. Yes, sir, that
+must have been the time; I had the brain fever, and lost my mind for a
+while.”
+
+“Master-at-arms, take this man away.”
+
+“Where shall I take him, sir?” touching his cap.
+
+“Go, and air him on the forecastle.”
+
+So they resumed their devious wanderings. At last, they descended to
+the berth-deck. It being now breakfast-time, the master-at-arms, a
+good-humored man, very kindly’ introduced our hero to his mess, and
+presented him with breakfast, during which he in vain endeavored, by
+all sorts of subtle blandishments, to worm out his secret.
+
+At length Israel was set at liberty; and whenever there was any
+important duty to be done, volunteered to it with such cheerful
+alacrity, and approved himself so docile and excellent a seaman, that
+he conciliated the approbation of all the officers, as well as the
+captain; while his general sociability served, in the end, to turn in
+his favor the suspicious hearts of the mariners. Perceiving his good
+qualities, both as a sailor and man, the captain of the maintop applied
+for his admission into that section of the ship; where, still improving
+upon his former reputation, our hero did duty for the residue of the
+voyage.
+
+One pleasant afternoon, the last of the passage, when the ship was
+nearing the Lizard, within a few hours’ sail of her port, the
+officer-of-the-deck, happening to glance upwards towards the maintop,
+descried Israel there, leaning very leisurely over the rail, looking
+mildly down where the officer stood.
+
+“Well, Peter Perkins, you seem to belong to the maintop, after all.”
+
+“I always told you so, sir,” smiled Israel benevolently down upon him,
+“though, at first, you remember, sir, you would not believe it.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI.
+SAMSON AMONG THE PHILISTINES.
+
+
+At length, as the ship, gliding on past three or four vessels at anchor
+in the roadstead—one, a man-of-war just furling her sails—came nigh
+Falmouth town, Israel, from his perch, saw crowds in violent commotion
+on the shore, while the adjacent roofs were covered with sightseers. A
+large man-of-war cutter was just landing its occupants, among whom were
+a corporal’s guard and three officers, besides the naval lieutenant and
+boat’s crew. Some of this company having landed, and formed a sort of
+lane among the mob, two trim soldiers, armed to the teeth, rose in the
+stern-sheets; and between them, a martial man of Patagonian stature,
+their ragged and handcuffed captive, whose defiant head overshadowed
+theirs, as St. Paul’s dome its inferior steeples. Immediately the mob
+raised a shout, pressing in curiosity towards the colossal stranger; so
+that, drawing their swords, four of the soldiers had to force a passage
+for their comrades, who followed on, conducting the giant.
+
+As the letter of marque drew still nigher, Israel heard the officer in
+command of the party ashore shouting, “To the castle! to the castle!”
+and so, surrounded by shouting throngs, the company moved on, preceded
+by the three drawn swords, ever and anon flourished at the rioters,
+towards a large grim pile on a cliff about a mile from the landing.
+Long as they were in sight, the bulky form of the captive was seen at
+times swayingly towering over the flashing bayonets and cutlasses, like
+a great whale breaching amid a hostile retinue of sword-fish. Now and
+then, too, with barbaric scorn, he taunted them with cramped gestures
+of his manacled hands.
+
+When at last the vessel had gained her anchorage, opposite a distant
+detached warehouse, all was still; and the work of breaking out in the
+hold immediately commencing, and continuing till nightfall, absorbed
+all further attention for the present.
+
+Next day was Sunday; and about noon Israel, with others, was allowed to
+go ashore for a stroll. The town was quiet. Seeing nothing very
+interesting there, he passed out, alone, into the fields alongshore,
+and presently found himself climbing the cliff whereon stood the grim
+pile before spoken of.
+
+“What place is yon?” he asked of a rustic passing.
+
+“Pendennis Castle.”
+
+As he stepped upon the short crisp sward under its walls, he started at
+a violent sound from within, as of the roar of some tormented lion.
+Soon the sound became articulate, and he heard the following words
+bayed out with an amazing vigor:
+
+“Brag no more, Old England; consider you are but an island! Order back
+your broken battalions! home, and repent in ashes! Long enough have
+your hired tories across the sea forgotten the Lord their God, and
+bowed down to Howe and Kniphausen—the Hessian!—Hands off, red-skinned
+jackal! Wearing the king’s plate,[1] as I do, I have treasures of wrath
+against you British.”
+
+ [1] Meaning, probably, certain manacles.
+
+
+Then came a clanking, as of a chain; many vengeful sounds, all
+confusedly together; with strugglings. Then again the voice:
+
+“Ye brought me out here, from my dungeon to this green—affronting yon
+Sabbath sun—to see how a rebel looks. But I show ye how a true
+gentleman and Christian can conduct in adversity. Back, dogs! Respect a
+gentleman and a Christian, though he _be_ in rags and smell of
+bilge-water.”
+
+Filled with astonishment at these words, which came from over a massive
+wall, enclosing what seemed an open parade-space, Israel pressed
+forward, and soon came to a black archway, leading far within,
+underneath, to a grassy tract, through a tower. Like two boar’s tusks,
+two sentries stood on guard at either side of the open jaws of the
+arch. Scrutinizing our adventurer a moment, they signed him permission
+to enter.
+
+Arrived at the end of the arched-way, where the sun shone, Israel stood
+transfixed, at the scene.
+
+Like some baited bull in the ring, crouched the Patagonian-looking
+captive, handcuffed as before; the grass of the green trampled, and
+gored up all about him, both by his own movements and those of the
+people around. Except some soldiers and sailors, these seemed mostly
+townspeople, collected here out of curiosity. The stranger was
+outlandishly arrayed in the sorry remains of a half-Indian,
+half-Canadian sort of a dress, consisting of a fawn-skin jacket—the fur
+outside and hanging in ragged tufts—a half-rotten, bark-like belt of
+wampum; aged breeches of sagathy; bedarned worsted stockings to the
+knee; old moccasins riddled with holes, their metal tags yellow with
+salt-water rust; a faded red woollen bonnet, not unlike a Russian
+night-cap, or a portentous, ensanguined full- moon, all soiled, and
+stuck about with bits of half-rotted straw. He seemed just broken from
+the dead leases in David’s outlawed Cave of Adullam. Unshaven, beard
+and hair matted, and profuse as a corn-field beaten down by hailstorms,
+his whole marred aspect was that of some wild beast; but of a royal
+sort, and unsubdued by the cage.
+
+“Aye, stare, stare! Though but last night dragged out of a ship’s hold,
+like a smutty tierce; and this morning out of your littered barracks
+here, like a murderer; for all that, you may well stare at Ethan
+Ticonderoga Allen, the unconquered soldier, by ——! You Turks never saw
+a Christian before. Stare on! I am he, who, when your Lord Howe wanted
+to bribe a patriot to fall down and worship him by an offer of a
+major-generalship and five thousand acres of choice land in old
+Vermont—(Ha! three-times-three for glorious old Vermont, and my
+Green-Mountain boys! Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!) I am he, I say, who
+answered your Lord Howe, ‘You, _you_ offer _our_ land? You are like the
+devil in Scripture, offering all the kingdoms in the world, when the
+d——d soul had not a corner-lot on earth! Stare on!’”
+
+“Look you, rebel, you had best heed how you talk against General Lord
+Howe,” here said a thin, wasp-waisted, epauletted officer of the
+castle, coming near and flourishing his sword like a schoolmaster’s
+ferule.
+
+“General Lord Howe? Heed how I talk of that toad-hearted king’s
+lick-spittle of a scarlet poltroon; the vilest wriggler in God’s
+worm-hole below? I tell you, that herds of red-haired devils are
+impatiently snorting to ladle Lord Howe with all his gang (you
+included) into the seethingest syrups of tophet’s flames!”
+
+At this blast, the wasp-waisted officer was blown backwards as from
+before the suddenly burst head of a steam-boiler.
+
+Staggering away, with a snapped spine, he muttered something about its
+being beneath his dignity to bandy further words with a low-lived
+rebel.
+
+“Come, come, Colonel Allen,” here said a mild-looking man in a sort of
+clerical undress, “respect the day better than to talk thus of what
+lies beyond. Were you to die this hour, or what is more probable, be
+hung next week at Tower-wharf, you know not what might become, in
+eternity, of yourself.”
+
+“Reverend Sir,” with a mocking bow, “when not better employed braiding
+my beard, I have a little dabbled in your theologies. And let me tell
+you, Reverend Sir,” lowering and intensifying his voice, “that as to
+the world of spirits, of which you hint, though I know nothing of the
+mode or manner of that world, no more than do you, yet I expect when I
+shall arrive there to be treated as well as any other gentleman of my
+merit. That is to say, far better than you British know how to treat an
+American officer and meek-hearted Christian captured in honorable war,
+by ——! Every one tells me, as you yourself just breathed, and as,
+crossing the sea, every billow dinned into my ear, that I, Ethan Allen,
+am to be hung like a thief. If I am, the great Jehovah and the
+Continental Congress shall avenge me; while I, for my part, shall show
+you, even on the tree, how a Christian gentleman can die. Meantime,
+sir, if you are the clergyman you look, act out your consolatory
+function, by getting an unfortunate Christian gentleman about to die, a
+bowl of punch.”
+
+The good-natured stranger, not to have his religious courtesy appealed
+to in vain, immediately dispatched his servant, who stood by, to
+procure the beverage.
+
+At this juncture, a faint rustling sound, as of the advance of an army
+with banners, was heard. Silks, scarfs, and ribbons fluttered in the
+background. Presently, a bright squadron of fair ladies drew nigh,
+escorted by certain outriding gallants of Falmouth.
+
+“Ah,” sighed a soft voice, “what a strange sash, and furred vest, and
+what leopard-like teeth, and what flaxen hair, but all mildewed;—is
+that he?”
+
+“Yea, is it, lovely charmer,” said Allen, like an Ottoman, bowing over
+his broad, bovine forehead, and breathing the words out like a lute;
+“it is he—Ethan Allen, the soldier; now, since ladies’ eyes visit him,
+made trebly a captive.”
+
+“Why, he talks like a beau in a parlor, this wild, mossed American from
+the woods,” sighed another fair lady to her mate; “but can this be he
+we came to see? I must have a lock of his hair.”
+
+“It is he, adorable Delilah; and fear not, even though incited by the
+foe, by clipping my locks, to dwindle my strength. Give me your sword,
+man,” turning to an officer:—“Ah! I’m fettered. Clip it yourself,
+lady.”
+
+“No, no—I am—”
+
+“Afraid, would you say? Afraid of the vowed friend and champion of all
+ladies all round the world? Nay, nay, come hither.”
+
+The lady advanced; and soon, overcoming her timidity, her white hand
+shone like whipped foam amid the matted waves of flaxen hair.
+
+“Ah, this is like clipping tangled tags of gold-lace,” cried she; “but
+see, it is half straw.”
+
+“But the wearer is no man-of-straw, lady; were I free, and you had ten
+thousand foes—horse, foot, and dragoons—how like a friend I could fight
+for you! Come, you have robbed me of my hair; let me rob your dainty
+hand of its price. What, afraid again?”
+
+“No, not that; but—”
+
+“I see, lady; I may do it, by your leave, but not by your word; the
+wonted way of ladies. There, it is done. Sweeter that kiss, than the
+bitter heart of a cherry.”
+
+When at length this lady left, no small talk was had by her with her
+companions about someway relieving the hard lot of so knightly an
+unfortunate. Whereupon a worthy, judicious gentleman, of middle- age,
+in attendance, suggested a bottle of good wine every day, and clean
+linen once every week. And these the gentle Englishwoman—too polite and
+too good to be fastidious—did indeed actually send to Ethan Allen, so
+long as he tarried a captive in her land.
+
+The withdrawal of this company was followed by a different scene.
+
+A perspiring man in top-boots, a riding-whip in his hand, and having
+the air of a prosperous farmer, brushed in, like a stray bullock, among
+the rest, for a peep at the giant; having just entered through the
+arch, as the ladies passed out.
+
+“Hearing that the man who took Ticonderoga was here in Pendennis
+Castle, I’ve ridden twenty-five miles to see him; and to-morrow my
+brother will ride forty for the same purpose. So let me have first
+look. Sir,” he continued, addressing the captive, “will you let me ask
+you a few plain questions, and be free with you?”
+
+“Be free with me? With all my heart. I love freedom of all things. I’m
+ready to die for freedom; I expect to. So be free as you please. What
+is it?”
+
+“Then, sir, permit me to ask what is your occupation in life—in time of
+peace, I mean?”
+
+“You talk like a tax-gatherer,” rejoined Allen, squinting diabolically
+at him; “what is my occupation in life? Why, in my younger days I
+studied divinity, but at present I am a conjurer by profession.”
+
+Hereupon everybody laughed, equally at the manner as the words, and the
+nettled farmer retorted:
+
+“Conjurer, eh? well, you conjured wrong that time you were taken.”
+
+“Not so wrong, though, as you British did, that time I took
+Ticonderoga, my friend.”
+
+At this juncture the servant came with the punch, when his master bade
+him present it to the captive.
+
+“No!—give it me, sir, with your own hands, and pledge me as gentleman
+to gentleman.”
+
+“I cannot pledge a state-prisoner, Colonel Allen; but I will hand you
+the punch with my own hands, since you insist upon it.”
+
+“Spoken and done like a true gentleman, sir; I am bound to you.”
+
+Then receiving the bowl into his gyved hands, the iron ringing against
+the china, he put it to his lips, and saying, “I hereby give the
+British nation credit for half a minute’s good usage,” at one draught
+emptied it to the bottom.
+
+“The rebel gulps it down like a swilling hog at a trough,” here scoffed
+a lusty private of the guard, off duty.
+
+“Shame to you!” cried the giver of the bowl.
+
+“Nay, sir; his red coat is a standing blush to him, as it is to the
+whole scarlet-blushing British army.” Then turning derisively upon the
+private: “You object to my way of taking things, do ye? I fear I shall
+never please ye. You objected to the way, too, in which I took
+Ticonderoga, and the way in which I meant to take Montreal. Selah! But
+pray, now that I look at you, are not you the hero I caught dodging
+round, in his shirt, in the cattle-pen, inside the fort? It was the
+break of day, you remember.”
+
+“Come, Yankee,” here swore the incensed private; “cease this, or I’ll
+darn your old fawn-skins for ye with the flat of this sword;” for a
+specimen, laying it lashwise, but not heavily, across the captive’s
+back.
+
+Turning like a tiger, the giant, catching the steel between his teeth,
+wrenched it from the private’s grasp, and striking it with his
+manacles, sent it spinning like a juggler’s dagger into the air,
+saying, “Lay your dirty coward’s iron on a tied gentleman again, and
+these,” lifting his handcuffed fists, “shall be the beetle of mortality
+to you!”
+
+The now furious soldier would have struck him with all his force, but
+several men of the town interposed, reminding him that it were
+outrageous to attack a chained captive.
+
+“Ah,” said Allen, “I am accustomed to that, and therefore I am
+beforehand with them; and the extremity of what I say against Britain,
+is not meant for you, kind friends, but for my insulters, present and
+to come.” Then recognizing among the interposers the giver of the bowl,
+he turned with a courteous bow, saying, “Thank you again and again, my
+good sir; you may not be the worse for this; ours is an unstable world;
+so that one gentleman never knows when it may be his turn to be helped
+of another.”
+
+But the soldier still making a riot, and the commotion growing general,
+a superior officer stepped up, who terminated the scene by remanding
+the prisoner to his cell, dismissing the townspeople, with all
+strangers, Israel among the rest, and closing the castle gates after
+them.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII.
+SOMETHING FURTHER OF ETHAN ALLEN; WITH ISRAEL’S FLIGHT TOWARDS THE
+WILDERNESS.
+
+
+Among the episodes of the Revolutionary War, none is stranger than that
+of Ethan Allen in England; the event and the man being equally
+uncommon.
+
+Allen seems to have been a curious combination of a Hercules, a Joe
+Miller, a Bayard, and a Tom Hyer; had a person like the Belgian giants;
+mountain music in him like a Swiss; a heart plump as Coeur de Lion’s.
+Though born in New England, he exhibited no trace of her character. He
+was frank, bluff, companionable as a Pagan, convivial, a Roman, hearty
+as a harvest. His spirit was essentially Western; and herein is his
+peculiar Americanism; for the Western spirit is, or will yet be (for no
+other is, or can be), the true American one.
+
+For the most part, Allen’s manner while in England was scornful and
+ferocious in the last degree; however, qualified by that wild, heroic
+sort of levity, which in the hour of oppression or peril seems
+inseparable from a nature like his; the mode whereby such a temper best
+evinces its barbaric disdain of adversity, and how cheaply and
+waggishly it holds the malice, even though triumphant, of its foes!
+Aside from that inevitable egotism relatively pertaining to pine trees,
+spires, and giants, there were, perhaps, two special incidental reasons
+for the Titanic Vermonter’s singular demeanor abroad. Taken captive
+while heading a forlorn hope before Montreal, he was treated with
+inexcusable cruelty and indignity; something as if he had fallen into
+the hands of the Dyaks. Immediately upon his capture he would have been
+deliberately suffered to have been butchered by the Indian allies in
+cold blood on the spot, had he not, with desperate intrepidity, availed
+himself of his enormous physical strength, by twitching a British
+officer to him, and using him for a living target, whirling him round
+and round against the murderous tomahawks of the savages. Shortly
+afterwards, led into the town, fenced about by bayonets of the guard,
+the commander of the enemy, one Colonel McCloud, flourished his cane
+over the captive’s head, with brutal insults promising him a rebel’s
+halter at Tyburn. During his passage to England in the same ship
+wherein went passenger Colonel Guy Johnson, the implacable tory, he was
+kept heavily ironed in the hold, and in all ways treated as a common
+mutineer; or, it may be, rather as a lion of Asia; which, though caged,
+was still too dreadful to behold without fear and trembling, and
+consequent cruelty. And no wonder, at least for the fear; for on one
+occasion, when chained hand and foot, he was insulted on shipboard by
+an officer; with his teeth he twisted off the nail that went through
+the mortise of his handcuffs, and so, having his arms at liberty,
+challenged his insulter to combat. Often, as at Pendennis Castle, when
+no other avengement was at hand, he would hurl on his foes such howling
+tempests of anathema as fairly to shock them into retreat. Prompted by
+somewhat similar motives, both on shipboard and in England, he would
+often make the most vociferous allusions to Ticonderoga, and the part
+he played in its capture, well knowing, that of all American names,
+Ticonderoga was, at that period, by far the most famous and galling to
+Englishmen.
+
+Parlor-men, dancing-masters, the graduates of the Albe Bellgarde, may
+shrug their laced shoulders at the boisterousness of Allen in England.
+True, he stood upon no punctilios with his jailers; for where modest
+gentlemanhood is all on one side, it is a losing affair; as if my Lord
+Chesterfield should take off his hat, and smile, and bow, to a mad
+bull, in hopes of a reciprocation of politeness. When among wild
+beasts, if they menace you, be a wild beast. Neither is it unlikely
+that this was the view taken by Allen. For, besides the exasperating
+tendency to self-assertion which such treatment as his must have bred
+on a man like him, his experience must have taught him, that by
+assuming the part of a jocular, reckless, and even braggart barbarian,
+he would better sustain himself against bullying turnkeys than by
+submissive quietude. Nor should it be forgotten, that besides the petty
+details of personal malice, the enemy violated every international
+usage of right and decency, in treating a distinguished prisoner of war
+as if he had been a Botany-Bay convict. If, at the present day, in any
+similar case between the same States, the repetition of such outrages
+would be more than unlikely, it is only because it is among nations as
+among individuals: imputed indigence provokes oppression and scorn; but
+that same indigence being risen to opulence, receives a politic
+consideration even from its former insulters.
+
+As the event proved, in the course Allen pursued, he was right.
+Because, though at first nothing was talked of by his captors, and
+nothing anticipated by himself, but his ignominious execution, or at
+the least, prolonged and squalid incarceration, nevertheless, these
+threats and prospects evaporated, and by his facetious scorn for scorn,
+under the extremest sufferings, he finally wrung repentant usage from
+his foes; and in the end, being liberated from his irons, and walking
+the quarter-deck where before he had been thrust into the hold, was
+carried back to America, and in due time, at New York, honorably
+included in a regular exchange of prisoners.
+
+It was not without strange interest that Israel had been an eye-witness
+of the scenes on the Castle Green. Neither was this interest abated by
+the painful necessity of concealing, for the present, from his brave
+countryman and fellow-mountaineer, the fact of a friend being nigh.
+When at last the throng was dismissed, walking towards the town with
+the rest, he heard that there were some forty or more Americans,
+privates, confined on the cliff. Upon this, inventing a pretence, he
+turned back, loitering around the walls for any chance glimpse of the
+captives. Presently, while looking up at a grated embrasure in the
+tower, he started at a voice from it familiarly hailing him:
+
+“Potter, is that you? In God’s name how came you here?”
+
+At these words, a sentry below had his eye on our astonished
+adventurer. Bringing his piece to bear, he bade him stand. Next moment
+Israel was under arrest. Being brought into the presence of the forty
+prisoners, where they lay in litters of mouldy straw, strewn with
+gnawed bones, as in a kennel, he recognized among them one Singles, now
+Sergeant Singles, the man who, upon our hero’s return home from his
+last Cape Horn voyage, he had found wedded to his mountain Jenny.
+Instantly a rush of emotions filled him. Not as when Damon found
+Pythias. But far stranger, because very different. For not only had
+this Singles been an alien to Israel (so far as actual intercourse
+went), but impelled to it by instinct, Israel had all but detested him,
+as a successful, and perhaps insidious rival. Nor was it altogether
+unlikely that Singles had reciprocated the feeling. But now, as if the
+Atlantic rolled, not between two continents, but two worlds—this, and
+the next—these alien souls, oblivious to hate, melted down into one.
+
+At such a juncture, it was hard to maintain a disguise, especially when
+it involved the seeming rejection of advances like the Sergeant’s.
+Still, converting his real amazement into affected surprise, Israel, in
+presence of the sentries, declared to Singles that he (Singles) must
+labor under some unaccountable delusion; for he (Potter) was no Yankee
+rebel, thank Heaven, but a true man to his king; in short, an honest
+Englishman, born in Kent, and now serving his country, and doing what
+damage he might to her foes, by being first captain of a carronade on
+board a letter of marque, that moment in the harbor.
+
+For a moment the captive stood astounded, but observing Israel more
+narrowly, detecting his latent look, and bethinking him of the useless
+peril he had thoughtlessly caused to a countryman, no doubt unfortunate
+as himself, Singles took his cue, and pretending sullenly to apologize
+for his error, put on a disappointed and crest-fallen air.
+Nevertheless, it was not without much difficulty, and after many
+supplemental scrutinies and inquisitions from a board of officers
+before whom he was subsequently brought, that our wanderer was finally
+permitted to quit the cliff.
+
+This luckless adventure not only nipped in the bud a little scheme he
+had been revolving, for materially befriending Ethan Allen and his
+comrades, but resulted in making his further stay at Falmouth perilous
+in the extreme. And as if this were not enough, next day, while hanging
+over the side, painting the hull, in trepidation of a visit from the
+castle soldiers, rumor came to the ship that the man-of-war in the
+haven purposed impressing one-third of the letter of marque’s crew;
+though, indeed, the latter vessel was preparing for a second cruise.
+Being on board a private armed ship, Israel had little dreamed of its
+liability to the same governmental hardships with the meanest
+merchantman. But the system of impressment is no respecter either of
+pity or person.
+
+His mind was soon determined. Unlike his shipmates, braving immediate
+and lonely hazard, rather than wait for a collective and ultimate one,
+he cunningly dropped himself overboard the same night, and after the
+narrowest risk from the muskets of the man-of-war’s sentries (whose
+gangways he had to pass), succeeded in swimming to shore, where he fell
+exhausted, but recovering, fled inland, doubly hunted by the thought,
+that whether as an Englishman, or whether as an American, he would, if
+caught, be now equally subject to enslavement.
+
+Shortly after the break of day, having gained many miles, he succeeded
+in ridding himself of his seaman’s clothing, having found some mouldy
+old rags on the banks of a stagnant pond, nigh a rickety building,
+which looked like a poorhouse—clothing not improbably, as he surmised,
+left there on the bank by some pauper suicide. Marvel not that he
+should with avidity seize these rags; what the suicides abandon, the
+living hug.
+
+Once more in beggar’s garb, the fugitive sped towards London, prompted
+by the same instinct which impels the hunted fox to the wilderness; for
+solitudes befriend the endangered wild beast, but crowds are the
+security, because the true desert, of persecuted man. Among the things
+of the capital, Israel for more than forty years was yet to disappear,
+as one entering at dusk into a thick wood. Nor did ever the German
+forest, nor Tasso’s enchanted one, contain in its depths more things of
+horror than eventually were revealed in the secret clefts, gulfs, caves
+and dens of London.
+
+But here we anticipate a page.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII.
+ISRAEL IN EGYPT.
+
+
+It was a gray, lowering afternoon that, worn out, half starved, and
+haggard, Israel arrived within some ten or fifteen miles of London, and
+saw scores and scores of forlorn men engaged in a great brickyard.
+
+For the most part, brickmaking is all mud and mire. Where, abroad, the
+business is carried on largely, as to supply the London market, hordes
+of the poorest wretches are employed, their grimy tatters naturally
+adapting them to an employ where cleanliness is as much out of the
+question as with a drowned man at the bottom of the lake in the Dismal
+Swamp.
+
+Desperate with want, Israel resolved to turn brickmaker, nor did he
+fear to present himself as a stranger, nothing doubting that to such a
+vocation his rags would be accounted the best letters of introduction.
+
+To be brief, he accosted one of the many surly overseers, or
+taskmasters of the yard, who, with no few pompous airs, finally engaged
+him at six shillings a week, almost equivalent to a dollar and a half.
+He was appointed to one of the mills for grinding up the ingredients.
+This mill stood in the open air. It was of a rude, primitive, Eastern
+aspect, consisting of a sort of hopper, emptying into a barrel-shaped
+receptacle. In the barrel was a clumsy machine turned round at its axis
+by a great bent beam, like a well-sweep, only it was horizontal; to
+this beam, at its outer end, a spavined old horse was attached. The
+muddy mixture was shovelled into the hopper by spavined-looking old
+men, while, trudging wearily round and round, the spavined old horse
+ground it all up till it slowly squashed out at the bottom of the
+barrel, in a doughy compound, all ready for the moulds. Where the dough
+squeezed out of the barrel a pit was sunken, so as to bring the moulder
+here stationed down to a level with the trough, into which the dough
+fell. Israel was assigned to this pit. Men came to him continually,
+reaching down rude wooden trays, divided into compartments, each of the
+size and shape of a brick. With a flat sort of big ladle, Israel
+slapped the dough into the trays from the trough; then, with a bit of
+smooth board, scraped the top even, and handed it up. Half buried there
+in the pit, all the time handing those desolate trays, poor Israel
+seemed some gravedigger, or churchyard man, tucking away dead little
+innocents in their coffins on one side, and cunningly disinterring them
+again to resurrectionists stationed on the other.
+
+Twenty of these melancholy old mills were in operation. Twenty
+heartbroken old horses, rigged out deplorably in cast-off old cart
+harness, incessantly tugged at twenty great shaggy beams; while from
+twenty half-burst old barrels, twenty wads of mud, with a lava-like
+course, gouged out into twenty old troughs, to be slapped by twenty
+tattered men into the twenty-times-twenty battered old trays.
+
+Ere entering his pit for the first, Israel had been struck by the
+dismally devil-may-care gestures of the moulders. But hardly had he
+himself been a moulder three days, when his previous sedateness of
+concern at his unfortunate lot, began to conform to the reckless sort
+of half jolly despair expressed by the others. The truth indeed was,
+that this continual, violent, helter-skelter slapping of the dough into
+the moulds, begat a corresponding disposition in the moulder, who, by
+heedlessly slapping that sad dough, as stuff of little worth, was
+thereby taught, in his meditations, to slap, with similar heedlessness,
+his own sadder fortunes, as of still less vital consideration. To these
+muddy philosophers, men and bricks were equally of clay. “What
+signifies who we be—dukes or ditchers?” thought the moulders; “all is
+vanity and clay.”
+
+So slap, slap, slap, care-free and negligent, with bitter unconcern,
+these dismal desperadoes flapped down the dough. If this recklessness
+were vicious of them, be it so; but their vice was like that weed which
+but grows on barren ground; enrich the soil, and it disappears.
+
+For thirteen weary weeks, lorded over by the taskmaster, Israel toiled
+in his pit. Though this condemned him to a sort of earthy dungeon, or
+gravedigger’s hole, while he worked, yet even when liberated to his
+meals, naught of a cheery nature greeted him. The yard was encamped,
+with all its endless rows of tented sheds, and kilns, and mills, upon a
+wild waste moor, belted round by bogs and fens. The blank horizon, like
+a rope, coiled round the whole.
+
+Sometimes the air was harsh and bleak; the ridged and mottled sky
+looked scourged, or cramping fogs set in from sea, for leagues around,
+ferreting out each rheumatic human bone, and racking it; the sciatic
+limpers shivered; their aguish rags sponged up the mists. No shelter,
+though it hailed. The sheds were for the bricks. Unless, indeed,
+according to the phrase, each man was a “brick,” which, in sober
+scripture, was the case; brick is no bad name for any son of Adam; Eden
+was but a brickyard; what is a mortal but a few luckless shovelfuls of
+clay, moulded in a mould, laid out on a sheet to dry, and ere long
+quickened into his queer caprices by the sun? Are not men built into
+communities just like bricks into a wall? Consider the great wall of
+China: ponder the great populace of Pekin. As man serves bricks, so God
+him, building him up by billions into edifices of his purposes. Man
+attains not to the nobility of a brick, unless taken in the aggregate.
+Yet is there a difference in brick, whether quick or dead; which, for
+the last, we now shall see.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV.
+CONTINUED.
+
+
+All night long, men sat before the mouth of the kilns, feeding them
+with fuel. A dull smoke—a smoke of their torments—went up from their
+tops. It was curious to see the kilns under the action of the fire,
+gradually changing color, like boiling lobsters. When, at last, the
+fires would be extinguished, the bricks being duly baked, Israel often
+took a peep into the low vaulted ways at the base, where the flaming
+fagots had crackled. The bricks immediately lining the vaults would be
+all burnt to useless scrolls, black as charcoal, and twisted into
+shapes the most grotesque; the next tier would be a little less
+withered, but hardly fit for service; and gradually, as you went higher
+and higher along the successive layers of the kiln, you came to the
+midmost ones, sound, square, and perfect bricks, bringing the highest
+prices; from these the contents of the kiln gradually deteriorated in
+the opposite direction, upward. But the topmost layers, though inferior
+to the best, by no means presented the distorted look of the
+furnace-bricks. The furnace-bricks were haggard, with the immediate
+blistering of the fire—the midmost ones were ruddy with a genial and
+tempered glow—the summit ones were pale with the languor of too
+exclusive an exemption from the burden of the blaze.
+
+These kilns were a sort of temporary temples constructed in the yard,
+each brick being set against its neighbor almost with the care taken by
+the mason. But as soon as the fire was extinguished, down came the kiln
+in a tumbled ruin, carted off to London, once more to be set up in
+ambitious edifices, to a true brickyard philosopher, little less
+transient than the kilns.
+
+Sometimes, lading out his dough, Israel could not but bethink him of
+what seemed enigmatic in his fate. He whom love of country made a hater
+of her foes—the foreigners among whom he now was thrown—he who, as
+soldier and sailor, had joined to kill, burn and destroy both them and
+theirs—here he was at last, serving that very people as a slave, better
+succeeding in making their bricks than firing their ships. To think
+that he should be thus helping, with all his strength, to extend the
+walls of the Thebes of the oppressor, made him half mad. Poor Israel!
+well-named—bondsman in the English Egypt. But he drowned the thought by
+still more recklessly spattering with his ladle: “What signifies who we
+be, or where we are, or what we do?” Slap-dash! “Kings as clowns are
+codgers—who ain’t a nobody?” Splash! “All is vanity and clay.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV.
+IN THE CITY OF DIS.
+
+
+At the end of his brickmaking, our adventurer found himself with a
+tolerable suit of clothes—somewhat darned—on his back, several
+blood-blisters in his palms, and some verdigris coppers in his pocket.
+Forthwith, to seek his fortune, he proceeded on foot to the capital,
+entering, like the king, from Windsor, from the Surrey side.
+
+It was late on a Monday morning, in November—a Blue Monday—a Fifth of
+November—Guy Fawkes’ Day!—very blue, foggy, doleful and gunpowdery,
+indeed, as shortly will be seen, that Israel found himself wedged in
+among the greatest everyday crowd which grimy London presents to the
+curious stranger: that hereditary crowd—gulf-stream of humanity—which,
+for continuous centuries, has never ceased pouring, like an endless
+shoal of herring, over London Bridge.
+
+At the period here written of, the bridge, specifically known by that
+name, was a singular and sombre pile, built by a cowled monk—Peter of
+Colechurch—some five hundred years before. Its arches had long been
+crowded at the sides with strange old rookeries of disproportioned and
+toppling height, converting the bridge at once into the most densely
+occupied ward and most jammed thoroughfare of the town, while, as the
+skulls of bullocks are hung out for signs to the gateways of shambles,
+so the withered heads and smoked quarters of traitors, stuck on pikes,
+long crowned the Southwark entrance.
+
+Though these rookeries, with their grisly heraldry, had been pulled
+down some twenty years prior to the present visit, still enough of
+grotesque and antiquity clung to the structure at large to render it
+the most striking of objects, especially to one like our hero, born in
+a virgin clime, where the only antiquities are the forever youthful
+heavens and the earth.
+
+On his route from Brentford to Paris, Israel had passed through the
+capital, but only as a courier; so that now, for the first time, he had
+time to linger, and loiter, and lounge—slowly absorb what he
+saw—meditate himself into boundless amazement. For forty years he never
+recovered from that surprise—never, till dead, had done with his
+wondering.
+
+Hung in long, sepulchral arches of stone, the black, besmoked bridge
+seemed a huge scarf of crape, festooning the river across. Similar
+funeral festoons spanned it to the west, while eastward, towards the
+sea, tiers and tiers of jetty colliers lay moored, side by side, fleets
+of black swans.
+
+The Thames, which far away, among the green fields of Berks, ran clear
+as a brook, here, polluted by continual vicinity to man, curdled on
+between rotten wharves, one murky sheet of sewerage. Fretted by the
+ill-built piers, awhile it crested and hissed, then shot balefully
+through the Erebus arches, desperate as the lost souls of the harlots,
+who, every night, took the same plunge. Meantime, here and there, like
+awaiting hearses, the coal-scows drifted along, poled broadside,
+pell-mell to the current.
+
+And as that tide in the water swept all craft on, so a like tide seemed
+hurrying all men, all horses, all vehicles on the land. As ant-hills,
+the bridge arches crawled with processions of carts, coaches, drays,
+every sort of wheeled, rumbling thing, the noses of the horses behind
+touching the backs of the vehicles in advance, all bespattered with
+ebon mud—ebon mud that stuck like Jews’ pitch. At times the mass,
+receiving some mysterious impulse far in the rear, away among the
+coiled thoroughfares out of sight, would, start forward with a
+spasmodic surge. It seemed as if some squadron of centaurs, on the
+thither side of Phlegethon, with charge on charge, was driving
+tormented humanity, with all its chattels, across.
+
+Whichever way the eye turned, no tree, no speck of any green thing was
+seen—no more than in smithies. All laborers, of whatsoever sort, were
+hued like the men in foundries. The black vistas of streets were as the
+galleries in coal mines; the flagging, as flat tomb-stones, minus the
+consecration of moss, and worn heavily down, by sorrowful tramping, as
+the vitreous rocks in the cursed Gallipagos, over which the convict
+tortoises crawl.
+
+As in eclipses, the sun was hidden; the air darkened; the whole dull,
+dismayed aspect of things, as if some neighboring volcano, belching its
+premonitory smoke, were about to whelm the great town, as Herculaneum
+and Pompeii, or the Cities of the Plain. And as they had been upturned
+in terror towards the mountain, all faces were more or less snowed or
+spotted with soot. Nor marble, nor flesh, nor the sad spirit of man,
+may in this cindery City of Dis abide white.
+
+As retired at length, midway, in a recess of the bridge, Israel
+surveyed them, various individual aspects all but frighted him. Knowing
+not who they were; never destined, it may be, to behold them again; one
+after the other, they drifted by, uninvoked ghosts in Hades. Some of
+the wayfarers wore a less serious look; some seemed hysterically merry;
+but the mournful faces had an earnestness not seen in the others:
+because man, “poor player,” succeeds better in life’s tragedy than
+comedy.
+
+Arrived, in the end, on the Middlesex side, Israel’s heart was
+prophetically heavy; foreknowing, that being of this race, felicity
+could never be his lot.
+
+For five days he wandered and wandered. Without leaving statelier
+haunts unvisited, he did not overlook those broader areas—hereditary
+parks and manors of vice and misery. Not by constitution disposed to
+gloom, there was a mysteriousness in those impulses which led him at
+this time to rovings like these. But hereby stoic influences were at
+work, to fit him at a soon-coming day for enacting a part in the last
+extremities here seen; when by sickness, destitution, each busy ill of
+exile, he was destined to experience a fate, uncommon even to luckless
+humanity—a fate whose crowning qualities were its remoteness from
+relief and its depth of obscurity—London, adversity, and the sea, three
+Armageddons, which, at one and the same time, slay and secrete their
+victims.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI.
+FORTY-FIVE YEARS.
+
+
+For the most part, what befell Israel during his forty years wanderings
+in the London deserts, surpassed the forty years in the natural
+wilderness of the outcast Hebrews under Moses.
+
+In that London fog, went before him the ever-present cloud by day, but
+no pillar of fire by the night, except the cold column of the monument,
+two hundred feet beneath the mocking gilt flames on whose top, at the
+stone base, the shiverer, of midnight, often laid down.
+
+But these experiences, both from their intensity and his solitude, were
+necessarily squalid. Best not enlarge upon them. For just as extreme
+suffering, without hope, is intolerable to the victim, so, to others,
+is its depiction without some corresponding delusive mitigation. The
+gloomiest and truthfulest dramatist seldom chooses for his theme the
+calamities, however extraordinary, of inferior and private persons;
+least of all, the pauper’s; admonished by the fact, that to the craped
+palace of the king lying in state, thousands of starers shall throng;
+but few feel enticed to the shanty, where, like a pealed knuckle-bone,
+grins the unupholstered corpse of the beggar.
+
+Why at one given stone in the flagging does man after man cross yonder
+street? What plebeian Lear or Oedipus, what Israel Potter, cowers there
+by the corner they shun? From this turning point, then, we too cross
+over and skim events to the end; omitting the particulars of the
+starveling’s wrangling with rats for prizes in the sewers; or his
+crawling into an abandoned doorless house in St. Giles’, where his
+hosts were three dead men, one pendant; into another of an alley nigh
+Houndsditch, where the crazy hovel, in phosphoric rottenness, fell
+sparkling on him one pitchy midnight, and he received that injury,
+which, excluding activity for no small part of the future, was an added
+cause of his prolongation of exile, besides not leaving his faculties
+unaffected by the concussion of one of the rafters on his brain.
+
+But these were some of the incidents not belonging to the beginning of
+his career. On the contrary, a sort of humble prosperity attended him
+for a time; insomuch that once he was not without hopes of being able
+to buy his homeward passage so soon as the war should end. But, as
+stubborn fate would have it, being run over one day at Holborn Bars,
+and taken into a neighboring bakery, he was there treated with such
+kindliness by a Kentish lass, the shop-girl, that in the end he thought
+his debt of gratitude could only be repaid by love. In a word, the
+money saved up for his ocean voyage was lavished upon a rash
+embarkation in wedlock.
+
+Originally he had fled to the capital to avoid the dilemma of
+impressment or imprisonment. In the absence of other motives, the dread
+of those hardships would have fixed him there till the peace. But now,
+when hostilities were no more, so was his money. Some period elapsed
+ere the affairs of the two governments were put on such a footing as to
+support an American consul at London. Yet, when this came to pass, he
+could only embrace the facilities for a return here furnished, by
+deserting a wife and child, wedded and born in the enemy’s land.
+
+The peace immediately filled England, and more especially London, with
+hordes of disbanded soldiers; thousands of whom, rather than starve, or
+turn highwaymen (which no few of their comrades did, stopping coaches
+at times in the most public streets), would work for such a pittance as
+to bring down the wages of all the laboring classes. Neither was our
+adventurer the least among the sufferers. Driven out of his previous
+employ—a sort of porter in a river-side warehouse—by this sudden influx
+of rivals, destitute, honest men like himself, with the ingenuity of
+his race, he turned his hand to the village art of chair-bottoming. An
+itinerant, he paraded the streets with the cry of “Old chairs to mend!”
+furnishing a curious illustration of the contradictions of human life;
+that he who did little but trudge, should be giving cosy seats to all
+the rest of the world. Meantime, according to another well-known
+Malthusian enigma in human affairs, his family increased. In all,
+eleven children were born to him in certain sixpenny garrets in
+Moorfields. One after the other, ten were buried.
+
+When chair-bottoming would fail, resort was had to match-making. That
+business being overdone in turn, next came the cutting of old rags,
+bits of paper, nails, and broken glass. Nor was this the last step.
+From the gutter he slid to the sewer. The slope was smooth. In
+poverty—“Facilis descensus Averni.”
+
+But many a poor soldier had sloped down there into the boggy canal of
+Avernus before him. Nay, he had three corporals and a sergeant for
+company.
+
+But his lot was relieved by two strange things, presently to appear. In
+1793 war again broke out, the great French war. This lighted London of
+some of its superfluous hordes, and lost Israel the subterranean
+society of his friends, the corporals and sergeant, with whom wandering
+forlorn through the black kingdoms of mud, he used to spin yarns about
+sea prisoners in hulks, and listen to stories of the Black Hole of
+Calcutta; and often would meet other pairs of poor soldiers, perfect
+strangers, at the more public corners and intersections of sewers—the
+Charing-Crosses below; one soldier having the other by his remainder
+button, earnestly discussing the sad prospects of a rise in bread, or
+the tide; while through the grating of the gutters overhead, the rusty
+skylights of the realm, came the hoarse rumblings of bakers’ carts,
+with splashes of the flood whereby these unsuspected gnomes of the city
+lived.
+
+Encouraged by the exodus of the lost tribes of soldiers, Israel
+returned to chair-bottoming. And it was in frequenting Covent-Garden
+market, at early morning, for the purchase of his flags, that he
+experienced one of the strange alleviations hinted of above. That
+chatting with the ruddy, aproned, hucksterwomen, on whose moist cheeks
+yet trickled the dew of the dawn on the meadows; that being surrounded
+by bales of hay, as the raker by cocks and ricks in the field; those
+glimpses of garden produce, the blood-beets, with the damp earth still
+tufting the roots; that mere handling of his flags, and bethinking him
+of whence they must have come, the green hedges through which the wagon
+that brought them had passed; that trudging home with them as a gleaner
+with his sheaf of wheat;—all this was inexpressibly grateful. In want
+and bitterness, pent in, perforce, between dingy walls, he had rural
+returns of his boyhood’s sweeter days among them; and the hardest
+stones of his solitary heart (made hard by bare endurance alone) would
+feel the stir of tender but quenchless memories, like the grass of
+deserted flagging, upsprouting through its closest seams. Sometimes,
+when incited by some little incident, however trivial in itself,
+thoughts of home would—either by gradually working and working upon
+him, or else by an impetuous rush of recollection—overpower him for a
+time to a sort of hallucination.
+
+Thus was it:—One fair half-day in the July of 1800, by good luck, he
+was employed, partly out of charity, by one of the keepers, to trim the
+sward in an oval enclosure within St. James’ Park, a little green but a
+three-minutes’ walk along the gravelled way from the brick-besmoked and
+grimy Old Brewery of the palace which gives its ancient name to the
+public resort on whose borders it stands. It was a little oval, fenced
+in with iron pailings, between whose bars the imprisoned verdure peered
+forth, as some wild captive creature of the woods from its cage. And
+alien Israel there—at times staring dreamily about him—seemed like some
+amazed runaway steer, or trespassing Pequod Indian, impounded on the
+shores of Narraganset Bay, long ago; and back to New England our exile
+was called in his soul. For still working, and thinking of home; and
+thinking of home, and working amid the verdant quietude of this little
+oasis, one rapt thought begat another, till at last his mind settled
+intensely, and yet half humorously, upon the image of Old Huckleberry,
+his mother’s favorite old pillion horse; and, ere long, hearing a
+sudden scraping noise (some hob-shoe without, against the iron
+pailing), he insanely took it to be Old Huckleberry in his stall,
+hailing him (Israel) with his shod fore-foot clattering against the
+planks—his customary trick when hungry—and so, down goes Israel’s hook,
+and with a tuft of white clover, impulsively snatched, he hurries away
+a few paces in obedience to the imaginary summons. But soon stopping
+midway, and forlornly gazing round at the enclosure, he bethought him
+that a far different oval, the great oval of the ocean, must be crossed
+ere his crazy errand could be done; and even then, Old Huckleberry
+would be found long surfeited with clover, since, doubtless, being dead
+many a summer, he must be buried beneath it. And many years after, in a
+far different part of the town, and in far less winsome weather too,
+passing with his bundle of flags through Red-Cross street, towards
+Barbican, in a fog so dense that the dimmed and massed blocks of
+houses, exaggerated by the loom, seemed shadowy ranges on ranges of
+midnight hills, he heard a confused pastoral sort of sounds—tramplings,
+lowings, halloos—and was suddenly called to by a voice to head off
+certain cattle, bound to Smithfield, bewildered and unruly in the fog.
+Next instant he saw the white face—white as an orange-blossom—of a
+black-bodied steer, in advance of the drove, gleaming ghost-like
+through the vapors; and presently, forgetting his limp, with rapid
+shout and gesture, he was more eager, even than the troubled farmers,
+their owners, in driving the riotous cattle back into Barbican.
+Monomaniac reminiscences were in him—“To the right, to the right!” he
+shouted, as, arrived at the street corner, the farmers beat the drove
+to the left, towards Smithfield: “To the right! you are driving them
+back to the pastures—to the right! that way lies the barn-yard!”
+“Barn-yard?” cried a voice; “you are dreaming, old man.” And so,
+Israel, now an old man, was bewitched by the mirage of vapors; he had
+dreamed himself home into the mists of the Housatonic mountains; ruddy
+boy on the upland pastures again. But how different the flat,
+apathetic, dead, London fog now seemed from those agile mists which,
+goat-like, climbed the purple peaks, or in routed armies of phantoms,
+broke down, pell-mell, dispersed in flight upon the plain, leaving the
+cattle-boy loftily alone, clear-cut as a balloon against the sky.
+
+In 1817 he once more endured extremity; this second peace again
+drifting its discharged soldiers on London, so that all kinds of labor
+were overstocked. Beggars, too, lighted on the walks like locusts.
+Timber-toed cripples stilted along, numerous as French peasants in
+_sabots_. And, as thirty years before, on all sides, the exile had
+heard the supplicatory cry, not addressed to him, “An honorable scar,
+your honor, received at Bunker Hill, or Saratoga, or Trenton, fighting
+for his most gracious Majesty, King George!” so now, in presence of the
+still surviving Israel, our Wandering Jew, the amended cry was anew
+taken up, by a succeeding generation of unfortunates, “An honorable
+scar, your honor, received at Corunna, or at Waterloo, or at
+Trafalgar!” Yet not a few of these petitioners had never been outside
+of the London smoke; a sort of crafty aristocracy in their way, who,
+without having endangered their own persons much if anything, reaped no
+insignificant share both of the glory and profit of the bloody battles
+they claimed; while some of the genuine working heroes, too brave to
+beg, too cut-up to work, and too poor to live, laid down quietly in
+corners and died. And here it may be noted, as a fact nationally
+characteristic, that however desperately reduced at times, even to the
+sewers, Israel, the American, never sunk below the mud, to actual
+beggary.
+
+Though henceforth elbowed out of many a chance threepenny job by the
+added thousands who contended with him against starvation,
+nevertheless, somehow he continued to subsist, as those tough old oaks
+of the cliffs, which, though hacked at by hail-stones of tempests, and
+even wantonly maimed by the passing woodman, still, however cramped by
+rival trees and fettered by rocks, succeed, against all odds, in
+keeping the vital nerve of the tap-root alive. And even towards the
+end, in his dismallest December, our veteran could still at intervals
+feel a momentary warmth in his topmost boughs. In his Moorfields’
+garret, over a handful of reignited cinders (which the night before
+might have warmed some lord), cinders raked up from the streets, he
+would drive away dolor, by talking with his one only surviving, and now
+motherless child—the spared Benjamin of his old age—of the far Canaan
+beyond the sea; rehearsing to the lad those well-remembered adventures
+among New England hills, and painting scenes of rustling happiness and
+plenty, in which the lowliest shared. And here, shadowy as it was, was
+the second alleviation hinted of above.
+
+To these tales of the Fortunate Isles of the Free, recounted by one who
+had been there, the poor enslaved boy of Moorfields listened, night
+after night, as to the stories of Sinbad the Sailor. When would his
+father take him there? “Some day to come, my boy,” would be the hopeful
+response of an unhoping heart. And “Would God it were to-morrow!” would
+be the impassioned reply.
+
+In these talks Israel unconsciously sowed the seeds of his eventual
+return. For with added years, the boy felt added longing to escape his
+entailed misery, by compassing for his father and himself a voyage to
+the Promised Land. By his persevering efforts he succeeded at last,
+against every obstacle, in gaining credit in the right quarter to his
+extraordinary statements. In short, charitably stretching a technical
+point, the American Consul finally saw father and son embarked in the
+Thames for Boston.
+
+It was the year 1826; half a century since Israel, in early manhood,
+had sailed a prisoner in the Tartar frigate from the same port to which
+he now was bound. An octogenarian as he recrossed the brine, he showed
+locks besnowed as its foam. White-haired old Ocean seemed as a brother.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII.
+REQUIESCAT IN PACE.
+
+
+It happened that the ship, gaining her port, was moored to the dock on
+a Fourth of July; and half an hour after landing, hustled by the
+riotous crowd near Faneuil Hall, the old man narrowly escaped being run
+over by a patriotic triumphal car in the procession, flying a broidered
+banner, inscribed with gilt letters:
+
+“BUNKER-HILL
+
+1775.
+
+GLORY TO THE HEROES THAT FOUGHT!”
+
+It was on Copps’ Hill, within the city bounds, one of the enemy’s
+positions during the fight, that our wanderer found his best repose
+that day. Sitting down here on a mound in the graveyard, he looked off
+across Charles River towards the battle-ground, whose incipient
+monument, at that period, was hard to see, as a struggling sprig of
+corn in a chilly spring. Upon those heights, fifty years before, his
+now feeble hands had wielded both ends of the musket. There too he had
+received that slit upon the chest, which afterwards, in the affair with
+the Serapis, being traversed by a cutlass wound, made him now the
+bescarred bearer of a cross.
+
+For a long time he sat mute, gazing blankly about him. The sultry July
+day was waning. His son sought to cheer him a little ere rising to
+return to the lodging for the present assigned them by the
+ship-captain. “Nay,” replied the old man, “I shall get no fitter rest
+than here by the mounds.”
+
+But from this true “Potter’s Field,” the boy at length drew him away;
+and encouraged next morning by a voluntary purse made up among the
+reassembled passengers, father and son started by stage for the country
+of the Housatonie. But the exile’s presence in these old mountain
+townships proved less a return than a resurrection. At first, none knew
+him, nor could recall having heard of him. Ere long it was found, that
+more than thirty years previous, the last known survivor of his family
+in that region, a bachelor, following the example of three-fourths of
+his neighbors, had sold out and removed to a distant country in the
+west; where exactly, none could say.
+
+He sought to get a glimpse of his father’s homestead. But it had been
+burnt down long ago. Accompanied by his son, dim-eyed and dim-hearted,
+he next went to find the site. But the roads had years before been
+changed. The old road was now browsed over by sheep; the new one ran
+straight through what had formerly been orchards. But new orchards,
+planted from other suckers, and in time grafted, throve on sunny slopes
+near by, where blackberries had once been picked by the bushel. At
+length he came to a field waving with buckwheat. It seemed one of those
+fields which himself had often reaped. But it turned out, upon inquiry,
+that but three summers since a walnut grove had stood there. Then he
+vaguely remembered that his father had sometimes talked of planting
+such a grove, to defend the neighboring fields against the cold north
+wind; yet where precisely that grove was to have been, his shattered
+mind could not recall. But it seemed not unlikely that during his long
+exile, the walnut grove had been planted and harvested, as well as the
+annual crops preceding and succeeding it, on the very same soil.
+
+Ere long, on the mountain side, he passed into an ancient natural wood,
+which seemed some way familiar, and midway in it, paused to contemplate
+a strange, mouldy pile, resting at one end against a sturdy beech.
+Though wherever touched by his staff, however lightly, this pile would
+crumble, yet here and there, even in powder, it preserved the exact
+look, each irregularly defined line, of what it had originally
+been—namely, a half-cord of stout hemlock (one of the woods least
+affected by exposure to the air), in a foregoing generation chopped and
+stacked up on the spot, against sledging-time, but, as sometimes
+happens in such cases, by subsequent oversight, abandoned to oblivious
+decay—type now, as it stood there, of forever arrested intentions, and
+a long life still rotting in early mishap.
+
+“Do I dream?” mused the bewildered old man, “or what is this vision
+that comes to me of a cold, cloudy morning, long, long ago, and I
+heaving yon elbowed log against the beech, then a sapling? Nay, nay, I
+cannot be so old.”
+
+“Come away, father, from this dismal, damp wood,” said his son, and led
+him forth.
+
+Blindly ranging to and fro, they next saw a man ploughing. Advancing
+slowly, the wanderer met him by a little heap of ruinous burnt masonry,
+like a tumbled chimney, what seemed the jams of the fire- place, now
+aridly stuck over here and there, with thin, clinging, round,
+prohibitory mosses, like executors’ wafers. Just as the oxen were bid
+stand, the stranger’s plough was hitched over sideways, by sudden
+contact with some sunken stone at the ruin’s base.
+
+“There, this is the twentieth year my plough has struck this old
+hearthstone. Ah, old man,—sultry day, this.”
+
+“Whose house stood here, friend?” said the wanderer, touching the
+half-buried hearth with his staff, where a fresh furrow overlapped it.
+
+“Don’t know; forget the name; gone West, though, I believe. You know
+’em?”
+
+But the wanderer made no response; his eye was now fixed on a curious
+natural bend or wave in one of the bemossed stone jambs.
+
+“What are you looking at so, father?”
+
+“‘_Father_!’ Here,” raking with his staff, “_my_ father would sit, and
+here, my mother, and here I, little infant, would totter between, even
+as now, once again, on the very same spot, but in the unroofed air, I
+do. The ends meet. Plough away, friend.”
+
+Best followed now is this life, by hurrying, like itself, to a close.
+
+Few things remain.
+
+He was repulsed in efforts after a pension by certain caprices of law.
+His scars proved his only medals. He dictated a little book, the record
+of his fortunes. But long ago it faded out of print—himself out of
+being—his name out of memory. He died the same day that the oldest oak
+on his native hills was blown down.
+
+THE END.
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ISRAEL POTTER ***
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