Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 66, No. 407, September, 1849

In a little while it was proposed amongst the cadets, hot as the calm was, to make a party to go and see the French vessel. Ford of course was at the head of it. Winterton thought they would no doubt have plenty of champagne on board, and some others, who could row, wanted to try their hands. Accordingly the captain's gig was got ready, a sort of awning rigged over it, and two or three of them got in; when one, who was Miss Fortescue's cousin, persuaded her to join, if Mr Rollock would come. Then the Brigadier, being rather a goodhumoured man, said he should like to face the French once more, and Daniel Snout shoved himself in without asking by your leave. One of the men was sent to take charge; and as there was room still, I was just going to jump in too, for the amusement of it, when Mrs Brady hurried to the taffrail with her parasol up, and said, if the Brigadier went, she should go as well, – in fact, the old woman's jealousy of her rib was always laughably plain. "Hang it! then," thought I, "catch me putting myself in the same boat with her! the same ship is enough, in all conscience!" So away they were lowered off the davits, and began pulling in tolerable style for the brig, a couple of hours' good work for such hands at mid-day, smooth water as it was. "Now, gentlemen," said the first officer briskly, as we looked after, them dipping over the long bright blue heave – "now, gentlemen, and ladies also, if they please, we'll have another party as soon as the men get their dinner – give these gentlemen a full hour's law, we'll overhaul them. See the larboard quarter-boat clear, Jacobs." It was just the least possible hazy again behind the brig in the distance, and as the Judge stood talking to his daughter on the poop, I heard her say, "Is the other vessel not coming nearer already, papa? See how much more distinct its sails are this moment – there! – one almost observes the white canvass!" "Pooh, Lota child!" answered Sir Charles, "that cannot be – 'tis perfectly calm, don't you know?" In fact, however, Lota showed a sailor's eye for air, and I was noticing it myself; but it was only the air made it look so. "All! now," exclaimed she again, "'tis as distant as ever! That must have been the light: " besides, the brig had been lifting on a wide swell. "I beg pardon, Sir Charles," said the mate, coming up and taking off his cap, "but might I use the freedom – perhaps yourself and Miss Hyde would like to visit the French brig?" The Judge looked at his daughter as much as to ask if she would like it. "Oh yes! so much!" exclaimed she, her bright eyes sparkling, "shall we? No, the deuce! Not I!" said Sir Charles: "I shall take my siesta. Quite safe, sir – eh?" "Oh, quite safe, Sir Charles!" said Finch, "a dead calm, sir – I'll take the utmost care you may be sure, Sir Charles – as safe as the deck, sir!" "Oh, very well," replied the Judge, and he walked down to see after his tiffin. The young lady was going down the quarter-gallery stair, when I caught my opportunity to say – "I hope you'll excuse it, Miss Hyde, ma'am – but I do trust you'll not risk going in the boat so far, just now!" Half a minute after I spoke, she turned round, and looked at me with a curious sort of expression in her charming face, which I couldn't make out, – whether it was mischievous, whether it was pettish, or whether 'twas inquisitive. "Dear me!" said she, "why – do you – " "The weather might change," I said, looking round about, "and I shouldn't wonder if it did – or a swell might get up – or – " "I must say, Mr – Mr Collins," said she, laughing slightly, "you are very gloomy in anticipating – almost timorous, I declare! I wonder how you came to be so weather-wise! But why did you not advise – poor Mrs Brady, now?" I couldn't see her face as she spoke, but the tone of the last words made me feel I'd have given worlds to look round and see what it was like at the moment. "Perhaps, ma'am," said I, "you may remember the rain?" "Well, we shall see, sir!" replied she, glancing up with a bright sparkle in her eye for an instant, but only toward the end of the spanker-boom, as it were; and then tripping down the stair.

I kept watching the gig pull slowly toward the brig in the distance, and the cutter making ready on our quarter, till the men were in, with Jacobs amongst them; where they sat waiting in no small glee for the mate and his party, who came up a few minutes after: and I was just beginning to hope that Violet Hyde had taken my advice, when she and another young lady came out of the round-house, dressed for the trip, and the captain gallantly handed them in. "My compliments to the French skipper, Mr Finch," said the captain, laughing, "and if he an't better engaged, happy to see him to dinner at two bells11 in the dog-watch, we'll make it!" "Ay, ay, sir," said Finch. "Now then! – all ready?" "Smythe's coming yet," said a "writer." "We can't wait any longer for him," replied the mate; "ease away the falls, handsomely, on deck!" "Stop," said I, "I'll go, then!" "Too late, young gentleman," answered the mate, sharply, "you'll cant us gunnel up, sir! – lower away, there!" However, I caught hold of a rope and let myself down the side, time enough to jump lightly into her stern-sheets the moment they touched the water. The officer stared at me as he took the yokelines to steer, but he said nothing, and the boat shoved off; while Miss Hyde's blue eyes only opened out, as it were, for an instant, at seeing me drop in so unceremoniously; and her companion laughed. "I shouldn't have supposed you so nimble, Mr Collins!" said the writer, looking at me through his eye-glass. "Oh," said I, "Ford and I have practised climbing a good deal lately." "Ha! ha!" said the civilian, "shouldn't be surprised, now, if your friend were to take the navigation out of Mr Finch's hands, some day!" "Bless me, yes, sir!" said Finch, with a guffaw, as he sat handling the lines carelessly, and smiling to the ladies, with his cap over one ear; "to be sure – ha! ha! ha! – it's certain, Mr Beveridge! Wouldn't you take the helm here, sir?" to me. "Oh, thank you, no, sir!" replied I, modestly, "I'm not quite so far yet– but we've got a loan of Hamilton Moore and Falconer's Dictionary from the midshipmen, and mean to – " "No doubt you'll teach us a trick or two yet!" said Finch, with a sneer. "Now, for instance," said I coolly, "aloft yonder, you've got the throat halliards jammed in the block with a gasket, and the mizen-topsail cluelines rove wrong-side of it, which Hamilton Moore distinctly – " "Hang the lubber that did it, so they are!" exclaimed the mate, looking through the spy-glass we had with us. "Now you've your jibs hauled down, sir," continued I, "and if a squall came on abeam, no doubt they'd wish to shorten sail from aft, and keep her away – however, she would broach-to at once, as Hamilton Moore shows must – " "You and Hamilton Moore be – ; no fear of a squall just now, at any rate, ladies," said he. "Stretch out, men – let's head upon Mr Ford and his gig, yet!" Terribly hot it was close to the water, and so stifling that you scarce could breathe, while the long glassy swell was far higher than one thought it from the ship's deck; however, we had an awning hoisted, and it refreshed one a little both to hear the water and feel it below again, as the cutter went sliding and rippling over it to long slow strokes of the oars; her crew being all man-o'-war's-men, that knew how to pull together and take it easy. The young ladies kept gazing rather anxiously at the big old Seringapatam, as she rose and dropped heavily on the calm, amused though they were at first by a sight of their late home turning "gable" on to us, with her three masts in one, and a white straw hat or two watching us from her taffrail; whereas, ahead, they only now and then caught a glimpse of the brig's upper canvass, over a hot, hazy, sullen-looking sweep of water as deep-blue as indigo – with six hairy brown breasts bending before them to the oars, and as many pair of queer, rollicking, fishy sort of eyes fixed steadily on their bonnets, in a shame-faced, down-hill kind of way, like fellows that couldn't help it. In fact, I noticed a curious grin now and then on every one of the men's faces, and a look to each other, when they caught sight of myself, sitting behind the mate as he paid off his high-flying speeches; Jacobs, again, regarding me all the while out of the whites of his eyes, as it were, in a wooden, unknowing fashion, fit to have made a cat laugh – seeing he never missed his mark for one moment, and drew back his head at every pull with the air of a drunk man keeping sight of his waistcoat buttons. By the time we were half-way, the swell began to get considerable, and the mate stepped up abaft to look for the gig. "Can't see the boat yet," said he; "give way there, my lads – stretch out and bend your backs! there's the brig!" "Hal-lo!" exclaimed he again, "she's clued up royals and to'gallants'ls! By heavens! there go her tops'ls down too! Going to bend new sails, though, I daresay, for it looks clear enough there." "The ship's run up a flag aft, sir," said Jacobs. "The – so she has," said Finch, turning round; "recall signal! What's wrong? Sorry we can't dine aboard the French vessel this time, ladies!" said he – "extremely so– and the griffins there after all, too. I hope you won't be disappointed in any great measure, Miss Hyde – but if you wished it now, Miss, I'd even keep on, and – " The young lady coloured a little at this, and turned to her companion just as I remembered her doing from the dragoon in the ball-room. "Do you not think, Miss Wyndham," said she, "we ought not to wish any officer of the ship should get reproved, perhaps, on our account?" "Oh dear no," said Miss Wyndham; "indeed, Mr Finch, you had better go back, if the captain orders you." "Hold on there with your larboard oars, you lubbers!" sang out Finch, biting his lip, and round we went pulling for the Indiaman again; but by this time the swell was becoming so heavy as to make it hard work, and it was soon rarely we could see her at all; for nothing gets up so fast as a swell, sometimes, near the Line; neither one way nor the other, but right up and down, without a breath of wind, in huge smooth hills of water, darker than lead, not a speck of foam, and the sky hot and clear. 'Twas almost as if a weight had been lifted from off the long heaving calm, and the whole round of it were going up dark into the sky, in one weltering jumble, the more strange that it was quiet: sweep up it took the boat, and the bright wet oar-blades spread feathering out for another stroke to steady her, let alone making way; though that was nothing to the look of the Indiaman when we got near. She was rolling her big black hull round in it as helpless as a cask; now one side, then the other, dipping gunwale to in the round swell that came heaping up level with her very rail, and went sheeting out bright through the bulwarks again the masts jumping, clamps and boom-irons creaking on the yards, and every sail on her shaking, as her lower yardarms took it by turns to aim at the water – you heard all the noise of it, the plunge of her flat broadside, the plash from her scuppers, the jolts of her rudder, and voices on board; and wet you may swear she was from stem to stern. "Comfortable!" thought I; "we've come home too soon of a washing-day, and may wait at the door, I fear!" "Oh dear," exclaimed the three griffins, "how are we to get in!" and the young ladies looked pale at the sight. The mate steered for her larboard quarter without saying a word, but I saw he lost coolness and got nervous – not at all the man for a hard pinch: seemingly, he meant to dash alongside and hook on. "If you do, sir," said I, "you'll be smashed to staves;" and all at once the ship appeared almost over our heads, while the boat took a send in. I looked to Jacobs and the men, and they gave one long stroke off, that seemed next heave to put a quarter of a mile between us. "D – d close shave that," said the bowman. "Begs pardon, sir," said Jacobs, touching his hat, with his eyes still fixed past the mate, upon me; "hasn't we better keep steadying off, sir, till such time as the swell – " "Hold your jaw, sirrah," growled Finch, as he looked ahead still more flurried; "there's a squall coming yonder, gentlemen, and if we don't get quick aboard, we may lose the ship in it! Pull round, d'ye hear there." Sure enough, when we lifted, there was the French brig clear out against a sulky patch of dark-gray sky, growing in as it were far off behind the uneven swell, till it began to pale; the Indiaman's topsails gave a loud flap out, too, one after the other, and fell to the mast again. Suddenly I caught the glance of Violet Hyde's eyes watching me seriously as I sat overhauling the Indiaman for a notion of what to do, and I fancied the charming girl had somehow got nearer to me during the last minute or two, whether she knew it or not: at any rate the thought of protecting such a creature made all my blood tingle. "Never fear, ma'am," said I, in a half whisper; when Finch's eye met mine, and he threw me a malicious look, sufficient to show what a devil the fellow would be if ever he had occasion; however, he gave the sign for the men to stretch out again, and high time it was, as the Indiaman's maintopsail made another loud clap like a musket-shot. Still he was holding right for her quarter– the roll the ship had on her was fearful, and it was perfect madness to try it; but few merchant mates have chanced to be boating in a Line swell, I daresay: when just as we came head on for her starboard counter, I took the boat's tiller a sudden shove with my foot, as if by accident, that sent us sheering in close under her stern. The bowman prized his boat-hook into the rudder-chains, where the big hull swung round us on both sides like an immense wheel round its barrel, every stern-window with a face watching us – though one stroke of the loose rudder would have stove us to bits, and the swell was each moment like to make the men let go, as it hove us up almost near enough to have caught a hand from the lower-deck. "For godsake steady your wheel," said I; "hard a-port!" while the mate was singing out for a line. "Now, up you go," said I to Jacobs in the hubbub, "look sharp, and send us down a whip and basket from the boom-end, as we did once in the Pandora, you know!" Up the rope went Jacobs like a cat, hand over hand; and five minutes after, down came the "basket" over our heads into the boat, made out of a studding-sail and three capstan-bars, like a big grocer's scale dangling from the spanker-boom. The mate proposed to go up first with Miss Hyde, but she hung back in favour of her companion; so away aloft went Miss Wyndham and he, swinging across the Indiaman's stern as she rolled again, with a gantline to steady them in – Finch holding on to the whip by one hand, and the other round the young lady, while my blood crept at the thought how it might have been Lota herself! As soon as it came down again, she looked for a moment from me to Jacobs, when Captain Williamson himself shouted over the taffrail, "Sharp, sharp there! the squall's coming down! she'll be up in the wind! let's get the helm free!" and directly after I found myself swinging twenty feet over the water with Violet Hyde, as the ship heeled to a puff that filled the spanker, and rose again on a huge swell, gathering steerage way, while every bolt of canvass in her flapped in again at once like thunder. I felt her shudder and cling to me – there was one half minute we swung fairly clear of the stern, they stopped hoisting, – and I almost thought I'd have wished that same half minute half a day; but a minute after she was in the Judge's arms on the poop; the men had contrived to get the cadets on board, too, and the boat was dragging astern, with the line veered out, and her crew still in it baling her out.

I fixed my eyes at once, breathless as we of the boat-party were, on the weather-signs and the other vessel, which everybody on the poop was looking at, as soon as we were safe, and our friends in the gig had to be thought of. The short top-swell was beginning to soften in long regular seas, with just air enough aloft to give our light sails a purchase on it, and put an end to the infernal clatter; but the vapour had gathered quicker than you could well fancy behind the brig in the distance, so that she looked already a couple of miles nearer, rising up two or three times on as many huge swells that shone like blue glass, while she steadied herself like a tightrope dancer on the top of them, by a studding-sail set high from each side. On the far horizon beyond her, you'd have thought there was a deep black ditch sunk along under the thickening blue haze, as it stretched out past her to both hands, till actually the solid breast of it seemed to shove the brig bodily forward over the oily-like water, every spar and rope distinct; then the fog lifted below as if the teeth of a saw came spitting through it, and we saw her bearing down toward us – cloud, water, and all, as it were – with a white heap of foam at her bows. "Brace up sharp, Mr Finch!" said the old skipper hastily, "and stand over to meet her. Confound this! we must have these people out of that brig in a trice! we shall soon have a touch of the Horse Latitudes, or my name's not Richard Williamson – ay, and bid good-bye to 'em, too, I think!"

For a quarter of an hour or so, accordingly, we kept forging slowly ahead, while the brig continued to near us. No one spoke, almost – you heard the lazy swash of the water round our fore-chains, and the stillness aboard had a gloomy enough effect, as one noticed the top of the haze creep up into round vapoury heads upon the sky, and felt it darkening aloft besides. We were scarce three quarters of a mile apart, and could see her sharp black bows drip over the bright sheathing, as she rolled easily on the swell, when the Indiaman suddenly lost way again, sheered head round, and slap went all her sails from the royals down, as if she had fired a broadside. Almost the next moment, a long, low growl ran muttering and rumbling far away round the horizon, from the clouds and back to them again, as if they had been some huge monster or other on the watch, with its broad grim muzzle shooting quietly over us as it lay; the brig dipped her gilt figurehead abeam of us, and then showed her long red streak; the swell sinking fast, and the whole sea, far and wide coming out from the sky as dark and round as the mahogany drum-head of the capstan.

"Bless me, Small," said the Captain, "but I hope they've not knocked a hole in my gig – ay, there they are, I think, looking over the brig's quarter; but don't seem to have a boat to swim! Get the cutter hauled alongside, Mr Stebbing," continued he to the fourth mate, "and go aboard for them at once – confounded bothering, this! Mind get my gig safe, sir, if you please – can you parley-voo, though, Mr Stebbing?" "Not a word, sir," said the young mate, a gentlemanly, rather soft fellow, whom the other three all used to snub. "Bless me, can't we muster a bit o' French amongst us?" said the skipper; "catch a monshoor that knows a word of English like any other man – 'specially if they've a chance of keeping my gig!" "Well, sir," said I, "I'll be happy to go with the officer, as I can speak French well enough!" "Thank ye, young gentleman, thank ye," said he, "you'll do it as well as any man, I'm sure – only look sharp, if you please, and bring my gig with you!" So down the side we bundled into the cutter, and pulled straight for the brig, which had just hoisted French colours, not old "three-patches," of course, but the new Restoration flag.

I overhauled her well as we got near, and a beautiful long schooner-model she was, with sharp bows, and a fine easy-run hull from stem to stern, but dreadfully dirty and spoilt with top-bulwarks, as if they meant to make her look as clumsy as possible; while the brig-rig of her aloft, with the ropes hanging in bights and hitches, gave her the look of a hedge-parson on a race-horse: at the same time, I counted six closed ports of a side, in her red streak, the exact breadth and colour of itself. Full of men, with a long gun, and schooner-rigged, she could have sailed round the Indiaman in a light breeze, and mauled her to any extent.

They hove us a line out of the gangway at once, the mate got up her side as she rolled gently over, and I followed him: the scene that met our eyes as soon as we reached her deck, however, struck me a good deal on various accounts. We couldn't at first see where Mr Rollock and his party might be, for the shadow of a thick awning after the glare of the water, and the people near the brig's gangway – but I saw two or three dark-faced, very French-like individuals, in broad-brimmed straw hats and white trousers, seemingly passengers; while about twenty Kroomen and Negroes, and as many seamen with unshaven chins, ear-rings, and striped frocks, were in knots before the longboat, turned keel up amidships, careless enough, to all appearance, about us. One of the passengers leant against the mainmast, with his arms folded over his broad chest, and his legs crossed, looking curiously at us as we came up; his dark eyes half closed, the shadow of his hat down to his black mustache, and his shirt-collar open, showing a scar on his hairy breast; one man, whom I marked for the brig's surgeon, beside him; and another waiting for us near the bulwarks – a leathery-faced little fellow, with twinkling black eyes, and a sort of cocked hat fore-and-aft on his cropped head. "Moi, Monsieur," said he, slapping his hand on his breast as the mate looked about him, "oui, je suis capitaine, monsieur." "Good-day, sir;" said Stebbing, "we've just come aboard for our passengers – and the gig – sir, if you please." "Certainement, monsieur," said the French skipper, bowing and taking a paper from his pocket, which he handed to the mate, "I comprind, sare – monsieur le capitaine d' la fregatte Anglaise, il nous demande nos – vat you call, —peppares– voilà! I have 'ad le honneur, messieurs, to be already sarch by vun off vos crusoes– pour des esclaves! vous imaginez cela, messieurs!" and here the worthy Frenchman cast up his hands and gave a grin which seemed meant for innocent horror. "Slaifs! chez le brigantin Louis Bourbon, Capitaine Jean Duprez? Non!" said he, talking away like a windmill, "de Marseilles à l'Isle de France, avec les vins choisis – " "You mistake, monsieur," said I, in French; "the ship is an Indiaman, and we have only come for our friends, who are enjoying your wine, I daresay, but we must – " "Comment?" said he, staring, "what, monsieur? have de gotness to – " Here the mustached passenger suddenly raised himself off the mast, and made one stride between us to the bulwarks, where he looked straight out at the Indiaman, his arms still folded, then from us to the French master. He was a noble-looking man, with an eye I never saw the like of in any one else, 'twas so clear, bold, and prompt, – it actually went into you like a sword, and I couldn't help fancying him in the thick of a battle, with thousands of men and miles of smoke. "Duprez," said he, quickly, "je vous le dis encore – debarquez ces miserables! – nous combattrons!" "Then, mon ami," said the surgeon, in a low, cool, determined tone, stepping up and laying a hand on his shoulder, "aussi, nous couperons les ailes de l'Aigle, seulement! – Hush, mon ami, restrain this unfortunate madness of yours! – c'est bien malapropos, à present!" and he whispered something additional, on which the passenger fell back and leant against the main-mast as before. "Ah!" said the French master, shaking his head, and giving his forehead a tap, "le pauvre homme-la! He has had a coup-de-soleil, messieurs, or rather of the moon, you perceive, from sleeping in its rays! Ma foi!" exclaimed he, on my explaining the matter, "c'est pos-sible? – we did suppose your boat intended to visit us, when evidently deterred by the excessive undulation! – My friends, resign yourselves to a misfort – " "Great heavens! Mr Stebbing," said I, "the boat is lost!" "By George! what will the captain say, then!" replied he; however, as soon as I told him the sad truth, poor Stebbing, being a good-hearted fellow, actually put his hands to his face and sobbed. All this time the brig's crew were gabbling and kicking up a confounded noise about something they were at with the spare spars, and in throwing tarpaulins over the hatches; for it was fearfully dark, and going to rain heavy; the slight swell shone and slid up betwixt the two vessels like oil, and the clouds to south-westward had gathered up to a steep black bank, with round coppery heads, like smoke over a town on fire. "Will you go down, messieurs," said the Frenchman, politely, "and taste my vin de– " "No, sir," said I, "we must make haste off, or else – besides, by the way, we couldn't, for you've got all your hatches battened down!" "Diable, so they are!" exclaimed he, "par honneur, gentlemen, I regret the occasion of – ha!" Just before, a glaring brassy sort of touch had seemed to come across the face of the immense cloud; and though every thing, far and wide, was as still as death, save the creaking of the two ships' yards, it made you think of the last trumpet's mouth! But at this moment a dazzling flash leaped zig-zag out of it, running along from one cloud to another, while the huge dark mass, as it were, tore right up, changing and turning its inside out like dust – you saw the sea far away under it, heaving from glassy blue into unnatural-like brown – when crash broke the thunder over our very heads, as if something had fallen out of heaven, then a long bounding roar. The mad French passenger stood up, walked to the bulwarks, and looked out with his hand over his eyes for the next; while the young mate and I tumbled down the brig's side without further to do, and pulled fast for the ship, where we hardly got aboard before there was another wild flash, another tremendous clap, and the rain fell in one clash, more like stone than water, on sea and decks. For half-an-hour we were rolling and soaking in the midst of it, the lightning hissing through the rain, and showing it glitter; while every five minutes came a burst of thunder and then a rattle fit to split one's ears. At length, just as the rain began to slacken, you could see it lift bodily, the standing sheets of it drove right against our canvass and through the awnings, – when we made out the French brig with her jib, topsails, and boom-mainsail full, leaning over as she clove through it before the wind. The squall burst into our wet topsails as loud as the thunder, with a flash almost like the lightning itself, taking us broad abeam; the ship groaned and shook for a minute ere gathering way and falling off, and when she rose and began to go plunging through the black surges, no brig was to be seen: every man on deck let his breath out almost in a cry, scarce feeling as yet but it was equal to losing sight for ever of our late shipmates, or the least hope of them. The passengers, ladies and all, crowded in the companion-hatch in absolute terror, every face aghast, without thinking of the rain and spray: now and then the sulky crest of a bigger wave would be caught sight of beyond the bulwarks, as the sea rose with its green back curling over into white; and you'd have said the shudder ran down into the cabin, at thought of seeing one or other of the lost boat's crew come weltering up from the mist and vanish again. I knew it was of no use, but held on in the weather mizen-rigging, and looked out to westward, against a wild break of light which the setting sun made through the troughs of the sea; once and again I could fancy I saw the boat lift keel up, far off betwixt me and the fierce glimmer. "Oh, do you see them? do you not see it yet!" was passed up to me over and over, from one sharp-pitched voice to another; but all I could answer was to shake my head. At last, one by one, they went below; and after what had happened, I must say I could easily fancy what a chill, dreary-like, awful notion of the sea must have come for the first time on a landsman, not to speak of delicate young girls fresh from home: at sight of the drenched quarterdeck leaning bare down to leeward, the sleet and spray battering bleak against the round-house doors, where I had seen Miss Hyde led sobbing in, with her wet hair about her face; then the ship driving off from where she had lost them, with her three strong lower-masts aslant into the gale, ghastly white and dripping – her soaked sheets of canvass blown gray and stiff into the rigging, and it strained taut as iron; while you saw little of her higher than the tops, as the scud and the dark together closed aloft. Poor Miss Fortescue's mother was in fits below in her berth – the two watches were on the yards aloft, where no eye could see them, struggling hard to furl and reef; so altogether it was a gloomy enough moment. I stayed awhile on deck, wrapped in a peacoat, keeping my feet and hanging on, and thinking how right down in earnest matters could turn of a sudden. I wasn't remarkably thoughtful in these days, I daresay, but there did I keep, straining my eyes into the mist to see I couldn't tell what, and repeating over and over again to myself these few words out of the prayer-book, "In the midst of life we are in death," though scarce knowing what I said.