Chapter XV: Part 15

The cauldron had now disappeared, leaving no trace but the blackened stone behind it; the remains of the water-gate were lying far up on the bank; the board had fallen into the water; the rude trellis was broken down; and masses of the gourd-vine, which had sprung from the scattered seeds, were running about in wild disorder wherever they could find anything to climb upon.

Lindsay turned to the spot "where once the garden smiled," and found it a wilderness of tall and tangled weeds, interspersed with three or four degenerate hollyhocks, and a few other flowers that had sowed themselves and dwindled into insignificance. And in the division appropriated to culinary purposes, were some straggling vegetables that had returned to a state worse than indigenous--with half a dozen rambling bushes that had long since ceased to bear fruit.

Lindsay had gazed on the gigantic remains of the Roman Coliseum, on "the castled crag of Drachenfels," and on the ivy-mantled arches of Tintern, but they awakened no sensation that could compare with the melancholy feeling that oppressed him as he explored the humble ruins of this simple farm-house, where every association came home to his heart, reminding him not of what he had read, but of what he had seen, and known, and felt, and enjoyed.

As he stood with folded arms contemplating the images of desolation before him, his attention was diverted by the sound of footsteps, and, on looking round, he perceived an old negro coming down the road, with a basket in one hand, and in the other a jug corked with a corn-cob. The negro pulled off his battered wool-hat, and making a bow and a scrape, said: "Sarvant, masser--" and Lindsay, on returning his bow, recognised the unusual breadth of nose and width of mouth that had distinguished a free black, well known in the neighbourhood by the name of Pharaoh, and in whom the lapse of time had made no other alteration than that of bleaching his wool, which was now quite white.

"Why, Pharaoh--my old fellow!" exclaimed Lindsay, "is this really yourself?"

"Can't say, masser," replied Pharaoh. "All people's much the same. Best not be too personal. But I b'lieve I'm he."

"Have you no recollection of Edward Lindsay?" inquired our hero.

"Lawful heart, masser!" exclaimed the negro. "I do b'lieve you're little Neddy, what used to come from town and stay at old Abram Hilliard's of summers, and what still kept wisiting there, by times, till you goed over sea."

"I am that identical Neddy," replied Lindsay, holding out his hand to the old negro, who evinced his delight by a series of loud laughs.

"Yes--yes," pursued Pharaoh, "now I look sharper at you, masser, I see plain you're 'xactly he. You've jist a same nose, and a same eyes, and a same mouth, what you had when you tumbled down the well, and fall'd out the chestnut tree, and when you was peck'd hard by the big turkey-cock, and butted by the old ram."

"Truly," said Lindsay, "you seem to have forgotten none of my juvenile disasters."

"To be sure not," replied Pharaoh, "I 'member every one of them, and a heap more, only I don't want to be personal."

"And now," said Lindsay, "as we have so successfully identified each other, let me know, at once, what has happened to my good friends the Hilliards, who I thought were fixed here for life. Why do I see their house a heap of ruins? Have the family been reduced to poverty?"

"Lawful heart, no," exclaimed the negro: "Masser Neddy been away so long in foreign parts, he forget how when people here in 'Merica give up their old houses, it's a'most always acause they've got new ones. Now old Abram Hilliard he got richer and richer every minute--though I guess he was pretty rich when you know'd him, only he never let on. And so he build him fine stone house beyont his piece of oak-woods, and there he live this blessed day.--And we goes there quite another road.--And so he gove this old frame to old Pharaoh; and so I had the whole house carted off, all that was good of it, and put it up on the road-side, just beyont here, in place of my old tumble-down cabin what I used to live in, that I've altered into a pig-pen. So now me and Binkey am quite comfabull."

"Show me the way," said Lindsay, "to the new residence of Mr. Hilliard. I have come from Philadelphia on purpose to visit the family."

"Bless your heart, masser, for that," said the old negro, as he held the stirrup for Lindsay to mount; and walking by his side, he proceeded with the usual garrulity of the African race, to relate many particulars of the Hilliards and their transit.

"Of course, Masser Neddy," said Pharaoh, "you 'member old Abram's two boys Isaac and Jacob, what you used to play with. You know Isaac mostly whipped you when you fout with him. Well, when they growed up, they thought they'd help'd their father long enough, and as they wanted right bad to go west, the old man gove 'em money to buy back land. So each took him horse--Isaac took Mike, and Jacob took Morgan, and they started west, and went to a place away back--away back--seven hundred thousand miles beyont Pitchburg. And they're like to get mighty rich; and word's come as Jacob's neighbours is going to set him up for congress, and I shouldn't be the least 'prized if he's presidump. You 'member, Masser Neddy, Jacob was always the tonguiest of the two boys."

"And where are Mr. Hilliard's daughters?" asked Lindsay.

"Oh, as to the two oldest," replied Pharaoh, "Kitty married Billy Pleasants, as keeps the store over at Candyville, and Betsey made a great match with a man what has a terrible big farm over on Siskahanna. And old Abram, after he got into him new house, sent him two youngest to the new school up at Wonderville, where they teaches the gals all sorts of wit and larning."

"And how are your own wife and children, Pharaoh?" inquired Lindsay; "I remember them very well."

"Bless your heart for that, masser!" replied the negro; "why Rose is hired at Abram Hilliard's--you know they brungt her up. And Cato lives out in Philadelphy--I wonders masser did not see him. And as for old Binkey, she holds her own pretty well. You know, masser, Binkey was always a great hand at quiltings, and weddings, and buryings, and such like frolics, and used to be sent for, high and low, to help cook at them times. But now she's a getting old,--being most a thousand,--and her birthday mostly comes on the forty-second of Feberwary--and so she stays at home, and makes rusk and gingerbread and molasses beer. This is molasses I have in the jemmy-john; I've jist come from the store. So she sells cakes and beer--that's the reason we lives on the road-side--and I works about. We used to have a sign that Sammy Spokes the wheelwright painted for us, for he was then the only man in these parts that had paints. There was two ginger-cakes on it, and one rusk, and a coal-black bottle with the beer spouting up high, and falling into a tumbler without ever spilling a drap. We were desperate pleased with the sign, for folks said it looked so nateral, and Sammy Spokes made us a present of it, and would not take it out in cakes and beer, as we wanted him, and that shewed him to be very much of a gemplan."

"As no doubt he is," remarked Lindsay; "I find, since my return to America, that gentlemen are 'as plenty as blackberries.'"

"You say very true, masser," rejoined the negro; "we are all gemplans now-a-days, and has plenty of blackberries. Well, as I was saying, we liked the sign a heap. But after Nelly Hilliard as was--we calls her Miss Ellen now--quit Wonderville school, where she learnt everything on the face of the yearth, she thought she would persecute painting at home, for she had a turn that way and wanted to keep her hand in. So she set to, and painted a new sign, and took it all out of her own head; and gove it to old Binkey and axplaned it to us. There's a thing on it that Miss Ellen calls a urn or wase--_that_ stands for beer--and then there's a sugarcane growing out of it--_that_ stands for molasses. And then there's a thick string of green leaves, with roots twisted amongst 'em--_that_ answers for ginger, for she told us that ginger grows like any other widgable, and has stalks and leaves, but the root is what we uses. Yet, somehow, folks doesn't seem to understand this sign as well as the old one. A great many thinks the wase be an old sugar-dish with a bit of a corn-stalk sticking out of it, and some passley and hossreddish plastered on the outside, and say they should never guess cakes and beer by it."

"I should suppose not," said Lindsay.

"But, Masser Neddy," pursued the old negro, "all this time, we have been calling Abram Hilliard 'Abram,' instead of saying squire. Only think of old Abram; he has been made a squire this good while, and marries people. After he move into him new house, he begun to get high, and took to putting on a clean shirt and shaving every day, which Rose says was a pretty tough job with him at first; but he parsewered. And he's apt to have fresh meat whenever it's to be got, and he won't eat stale pies: and so they have to do small bakings every day, instead of big ones twice a week. And sometimes he even go so far as to have geese took out of the flock, and killed and roasted, instead of saving 'em all for feathers. And he says that now he's clear of the world, he _will_ live as he likes, and have everything he wants, and be quite comfabull. And he made his old woman leave off wearing short gownds, and put on long gownds all the time, and quit calling him daddy, which Rose says went very hard with her for a while. The gals being young, were broke of it easy enough; and now they says pappy."

"Pshaw!" ejaculated Lindsay, whose regret at the general change which seemed to have come over the Hilliard family now amounted nearly to vexation.

"Now, Masser Neddy," continued Pharaoh, "we've got to the new house--there it stands, right afore you. An't you 'prised at it? I always am whenever I sees it. So please a jump off, and I'll take your hoss to the stable, and put him up, and tell the people at the barn that Masser Neddy's come; and you can go into the house and speak for you'mself."

Lindsay, at parting, put a dollar into the hand of the old negro. "What for this, Masser Neddy?" asked Pharaoh, trying to look very disinterested.

"Do whatever you please with it," answered Lindsay.

"Well, masser," replied the negro, "I never likes to hurt a gemplan's feelings by 'fusing him. So I'll keep it, just to 'blige you. But, I 'spect, to be sure, Masser Neddy'll step in some day at negor-man's cabin, and see old Binkey, and take part of him dollar out in cakes and beer. I'll let masser know when Binkey has a fresh baking."

Pharaoh then led off the horse, and Lindsay stood for a few moments to take a survey of the new residence of his old friends. It was a broad, substantial two-story stone house. There was a front garden, where large snow-ball trees

"Threw up their silver globes, light as the foamy surf,"

and where the conical clusters of the lilac, and the little May roses, were bursting into fragrance and beauty, and uniting their odours with those of the tall white lily, and the lowly but delicious pink. Behind the house ascended a woodland hill, whose trees at this season exhibited every shade of green, in tints as various as the diversified browns of autumn.

Lindsay found the front door unfastened, and opening it without ceremony, he entered a wide hall furnished with a long settee, a large table, a hat-stand, a hanging lamp, a map of the United States, and one of the world. There was a large parlour on each side of the hall, and Lindsay looked into both, the doors being open. One was carpeted, and seemed to be fitted up for winter, the other had a matted floor, and was evidently the summer sitting-room. The furniture in both, though by no means showy, was excellent of its kind and extremely neat; and in its form and arrangement convenience seemed to be the chief consideration. Lindsay thought he had never seen more pleasant-looking rooms. In the carpeted parlour, on the hearth of the Franklin stove, sat a blue china jar filled with magnolia flowers, whose spicy perfume was tempered by the outer air that came through the venetian blinds which were lowered to exclude the sunbeams. One recess was occupied by a mahogany book-case, and there was a side-board in the other. The chimney-place of the summer parlour was concealed by a drapery of ingeniously cut paper, and the various and beautiful flowers that adorned the mantel-piece had evidently been cultivated with care. Shelves of books hung in the recesses, and in both rooms were sofas and rocking-chairs.

"Is it possible," thought Lindsay, "that this can be the habitation of Abraham Hilliard?" And he ran over in his mind the humble aspect of their sitting-room in the old farm-house, with its home-made carpet of strips of listing; its tall-backed rush chairs; its walnut table; its corner cupboard; its hanging shelves suspended from the beams that crossed the ceiling, and holding miscellaneous articles of every description.

Having satisfied his curiosity by looking into the parlours, he proceeded through the hall to the back door, and there he found, in a porch canopied with honeysuckle, a woman busily engaged in picking the stems from a basket of early strawberries, as she transferred the fruit to a large bowl. Time had made so little change in her features, that, though much improved in her costume, he easily guessed her to be his old hostess Mrs. Hilliard. "Aunt Susan!" he exclaimed; for by that title he had been accustomed to address her in his boyhood. The old lady started up, and hastily snatched off her strawberry-stained apron.

"Have you no recollection of Edward Lindsay?" continued our hero, heartily shaking her hand.

She surveyed him from head to foot, till his identity dawned upon her, and then she ejaculated--"It is--it must be--though you are a gentleman, you _must_ be little Neddy--there--there, sit down--I'll be back in a moment."

She went into the house, and returned almost immediately, bringing with her a small coquelicot waiter, with cakes and wine, which she pressed Lindsay to partake of. He smiled as he recollected that one of the customs of Oakland Farm was to oblige every stranger to eat and drink immediately on his arrival. And while he was discussing a cake and a glass of wine, the good dame heaped a saucer with strawberries, carried it away for a few minutes, and then brought it back inundated with cream and sugar. This was also presented to Lindsay, recommending that he should eat another cake with the strawberries, and take another glass of wine after them.

On Edward's inquiring for her husband, Mrs. Hilliard replied that he was somewhere about the farm, and that the girls were drinking tea with some neighbours a few miles off; but she said she would send the carriage for them immediately, that they might be home early in the evening.

In a short time Abraham Hilliard came in, having seen Pharaoh at the barn, who had informed him of the arrival of "Master Neddy." The meeting afforded equal gratification to both parties. The old farmer looked as if quite accustomed to a clean shirt and to shaving every day; and Lindsay was glad to find that his manner of expressing himself had improved with his circumstances. Aunt Susan, however, had not, in this respect, kept pace with her husband, remaining, to use her own expression--"just the same old two and sixpence." Women who have not in early life enjoyed opportunities of cultivating their minds are rarely able at a late period to acquire much conversational polish.--With men the case is different.

Mrs. Hilliard now left her husband to entertain their guest, and, "on hospitable thoughts intent," withdrew to superintend the setting of a tea-table abounding in cakes and sweetmeats; the strawberry bowl and a pitcher of cream occupying the centre. This repast was laid out in the wide hall, and while engaged in arranging it, Mrs. Hilliard joined occasionally in the conversation which her husband and Lindsay were pursuing in her hearing, as they sat in the porch.

"Well, Edward," proceeded Mr. Hilliard, "you see a great alteration in things at the farm: and I conclude you are glad to find us in a better way than when you left us."

"Certainly," replied Lindsay.

"Now," said the penetrating old farmer, "that 'certainly' did not come from your heart.--Tell me the truth--you miss something, don't you?"

"Frankly, then," replied Lindsay, "I miss everything--I own myself so selfish as to feel some disappointment at the entire overthrow of all the images which during my long absence had been present to my mind's eye, in connexion with my remembrances of Oakland Farm. Thinking of the old farm house and its inhabitants, precisely as I had left them, and believing that time had passed over them without causing any essential change, I must say that I cannot, just at first, bring myself to be glad that it is otherwise. The happiness that seemed to dwell with the old house and the old-fashioned ways of its people, had been vividly impressed upon my feelings. And I fear--forgive me for saying so--that your family cannot have added much to their felicity by acquiring ideas and adopting habits to which they so long were strangers."

"There you are mistaken, my dear boy," answered the farmer. "I acknowledge that if, in removing to a larger house, and altering our way of living, we had in any one instance sacrificed comfort to show, or convenience to ostentation--which, unfortunately, has been the error of some of our neighbours--we should, indeed, have enjoyed far less happiness than heretofore. But we have not done so. We have made no attempts at mimicking what in the city is called style; and I have forbidden my daughters to mention the word fashion in my presence."

"Yes--yes," said Mrs. Hilliard, "I hope we have been wiser than the Newman family over at Poplar Plains. As soon as they got a little up in the world, they built a shell of a house that looks as if it was made of white pasteboard; and figured it all over with carved work inside and out; and stuck posts and pillars all about it with nothing of consequence to hold up; and furnished the rooms with all sorts of useless trumpery."

"Softly--softly--wife!" interrupted old Abraham--and turning to our hero, he proceeded--"well, as I was telling you, Edward, I endeavour to enjoy what I have worked so hard to acquire, and to enjoy it in a manner that really improves our condition, and renders it in every respect better. You know, that in former times, though I had very little leisure to read, I liked to take up a book whenever I had a few moments to spare, if I was not too tired with my work; and when I went to town with marketing, I always bought a book to bring home with me. Also, I took a weekly paper. As soon as I could afford it, I brought home more than one book, and took a daily paper. I gave my children the benefit of the best schooling that could be procured without sending them to town for the purpose; but at the same time, I was averse to their learning any showy and useless accomplishments."

"Well," rejoined Mrs. Hilliard, "we were certainly wiser than the Newmans, who sent their girls to a French school in Philadelphia, and had them taught music, both guitar and piano. And the Newman girls mix up their talk with all sorts of French words that sound very ugly to me. Instead of 'good night' they say _bone swear_;[77] and a 'trifle' they call a _bagtau_;[78] and they are always talking about having a _Gennessee Squaw_;[79] though what they mean by that I cannot imagine; for, I am sure I never saw any such thing in this part of the country. And the tunes they play on the piano seem to me like no tunes at all, but just a sort of scrambling up and down, that nobody can make either head or tail of. And when they sing to the guitar, it sounds to me just like moaning one minute, and screaming the next, with a little tinkling between whiles."

[Footnote 77: Bonsoir.]

[Footnote 78: Bagatelle.]

[Footnote 79: Je ne sais quoi.]

"Wife--wife," interrupted Abraham, "you are too severe on the poor girls."

"Well--well," proceeded Mrs. Hilliard, "I'll say nothing more, only this: that the airs they take on themselves make them the talk of the whole country--And then they've given up all sorts of work. The mother spends most of her time in taking naps, to make up, I suppose, for having had to rise early all the former part of her life. The girls sit about all day in stiff silk frocks, squeezed so tight in them that they can hardly move. Or they go round paying morning visits, interrupting people in the busy part of the day. And they invite company to their house, and give them no tea; and say they're having a _swearey_.[80] To be sure it's a shame for me to say so, but it's well known that they never have a good thing on their table now, but pretend it's genteel to live on bits and morsels that have neither taste nor substance. And no doubt that's the reason the whole family have grown so thin and yellow, and are always complaining of something they call dyspepsy."

[Footnote 80: Soirée.]

"_They_ have certainly changed for the worse," remarked Lindsay. "I remember the Newmans very well--a happy, homely family living in a long, low, red frame house, and having everything about them plain and plentiful."

"So had we in our former dwelling," said Mr. Hilliard, "yet I think we are living still better now."

"I have many pleasant recollections of the old house," said Lindsay.

"For you," observed the farmer, "our old house and the manner in which we then lived, owed most of their charms to novelty, and to the circumstance that children are seldom fastidious. I doubt much, if you had found everything in _statu quo_, and the old house and its inhabitants just as you left them, whether you could have been induced to make us as long a visit as I hope you will now."

"My husband," said Mrs. Hilliard, "is different from most men of his age. Instead of dwelling all the while upon old times, he stands up for the times we live in, and says everything now is better than it used to be. And he's brought me to agree with him pretty much--I never was an idle woman, and I keep myself busy enough still, but I do think it is pleasanter to keep hired people for the hard work than to have to help with it myself, as you know I used to. Though I never complained about it, still I cannot say, now I look back, that there was any great pleasure in helping on washing-days and ironing-days, or in making soft soap, and baking great batches of bread and pies--to be sure, my soft soap was admired all over the country, and my bread was always light, and my pie-crust never tough. Neither was there much delight in seeing my two eldest girls paddling to the barn-yard every morning and evening, through all weathers, to milk the cows; or setting them at heavy churnings, and other hard work. And then at harvest-time, and at killing-time, and when we were getting the marketing ready for husband to take to town in the wagon, we were on our feet the whole blessed day. To be sure, they were used to it, but I often felt sorry for Abraham and the boys, when they came home from the field in a warm evening, so tired with work they could hardly speak, and were glad to wash themselves, and get their supper, and go to bed at dark. And the girls and I were always glad enough, too, to get our rest as soon as we had put away the milk and washed the supper things; knowing we should have to be up before the stars were gone, to sweep the house and do the milking, and get the breakfast, that the men might be off early to work."

"I remember all this very well," said Lindsay.

"To be sure you do," pursued Mrs. Hilliard. "Then don't you think it's pleasant for us now not to be overworked during the day, so that in the evening, instead of going to bed, we can sit round the table in a nice parlour, and sew and knit; or read, for them that likes it. Husband and the girls always did take pleasure in reading--and, for my part, now I've time, I'm beginning to like a book myself. Last winter, I read a good deal in the second volume of the Spectator. In short, I have not the least notion of grieving after our way of living at the old house."

"Nor I neither," added Abraham; "and I really find it much more agreeable to superintend my farm, than to be obliged to labour on it myself."

"And now let us proceed with our tea," said Mrs. Hilliard; "and, Neddy, if you do not eat hearty of what you see before you, I shall think you are fretting after the mush and milk, and sowins, and pie and cheese, that we use to have on our old supper table, and which I do not believe you could eat now if they were before you. Come, you must not mind my speaking out so plainly. You know I always was a right-down sort of woman, and am so still."

Edward smiled, and pressed her hand kindly, acknowledging that all she had said was justified by truth and reason.

The carriage--they kept a very plain but a very capacious one--brought home the girls shortly after candle-light. Lindsay ran out to assist them in alighting, and was glad to find that on hearing his name they retained a perfect recollection of him, though they were in their earliest childhood at the time of his departure for Europe. When they came into the light, he found them both very pretty. Their skins had not been tanned by exposure to the sun and wind, nor their shoulders stooped, nor their hands reddened by hard work; as had been the case with their two elder sisters. They were dressed in white frocks, blue shawls, and straw bonnets with blue ribbons; neatly, and in good taste.

The evening passed pleasantly, and Lindsay soon discovered that the daughters of his host were very charming girls. Ellen, perhaps, had a little tinge of vanity, but Lucy was entirely free from it. Diffidence prevented her from talking much, but she listened understandingly, and when she did speak, it was with animation and intelligence. Lindsay felt that he should not have liked her so well had she looked, and dressed, and talked as he remembered her elder sisters.

When he retired for the night, his bed and room were so well furnished, and looked so inviting, that he could not regret the little low apartment with no chimney and only one window, that he had occupied in the old farm-house; and he slept quite as soundly under a white counterpane as he had formerly done under a patch-work quilt.

We have no space to enter more minutely into the details of our hero's visit, nor to relate by what process he speedily became a convert to the fact that even among country-people the march of improvement adds greatly to their comfort and happiness; provided always, that they do not mistake the road, and diverge into the path of folly and pretension.

Suffice it to say, that he protracted his stay to a week, during which he broke the girls of the habit of saying "pappy," substituting the more sensible and affectionate epithet of "father." When Pharaoh announced the proper time, he made a visit to the refectory of old Binkey, whom he afterwards desired the Candyville storekeeper to supply at his charge, with materials for her cakes and beer, _ad libitum_, during the remainder of her life.

The visit of Edward Lindsay to Oakland was in the course of the summer so frequently repeated, that no one was much surprised when, early in October, he conducted Lucy Hilliard to Philadelphia as his bride: acknowledging to himself that he could never have made her so, had she and her family continued exactly as he had known them at the OLD FARM-HOUSE.

THAT GENTLEMAN:

OR,

PENCILLINGS ON SHIP-BOARD.

"Yon sun that sets upon the sea
We follow in his flight."--BYRON.

"And now, dear Caroline, tell us some particulars of your passage home," said Mrs. Esdale to her sister, as they quitted the tea-table on the evening of Mr. and Mrs. Fenton's arrival from a visit to Europe.

"Our passage home," replied Mrs. Fenton, "was moderately short, and generally pleasant. We had a good ship, a good captain, splendid accommodations, and an excellent table, and were not crowded with too many passengers."

"Yet, let us hear something more circumstantial," said Mrs. Esdale.

"Dear Henrietta," replied her sister, "have I not often told you how difficult it is to relate anything amusingly or interestingly when you are expressly called upon to do so; when you are expected to sit up in form, and furnish a regular narrative, with a beginning, a middle, and an end."

"But indeed," rejoined Mrs. Esdale, "we have anticipated much pleasure from hearing your account of the voyage. Come,--let us take our seats in the front parlour, and leave your husband and mine to their discussion of the political prospects of both hemispheres. The girls and myself would much rather listen to your last impressions of life on ship-board."

"Do, dear aunt," said both the daughters of Mrs. Esdale, two fine girls of seventeen and fifteen--and taking their seats at the sofa-table, they urged Mrs Fenton to commence.

"Well, then," said Mrs. Fenton, "to begin in the manner of the fairy tales--once upon a time there lived in the city of New York, a merchant whose name was Edward Fenton--and he had a wife named Caroline Fenton. And notwithstanding that they had a town-house and a country-house, and a coach to ride in, and fine clothes, and fine furniture, and plenty of good things to eat and to drink, they grew tired of staying at home and being comfortable. So they sailed away in a ship, and never stopped till they got to England. And there they saw the king and queen, with gold crowns on their heads, and sceptres in their hands--(by-the-bye it was lucky that we arrived in time for the coronation)--and they heard the king cough, and the queen sneeze: and they saw lords with ribands and stars, and ladies with plumes and diamonds. They travelled and travelled, and often came to great castles that looked like giants' houses: and they went all over England and Wales, and Ireland and Scotland. Then they returned to London, and saw more sights; and then they were satisfied to come back to America, where they expect to live happily all the rest of their lives."

"Now, aunt, you are laughing at us," said Juliet Esdale--"your letters from Europe have somewhat taken off the edge of our curiosity as to your adventures there: and it is just now our especial desire to hear something of your voyage home."

"In truth," replied Mrs. Fenton, "I must explain, that on this, the first evening of my return, I feel too happy, and too much excited, to talk systematically on any subject whatever; much less to arrange my ideas into the form of a history. To-morrow I shall be engaged all day at my own house: for I must preside at the awakening of numerous articles of furniture that have been indulged during our absence with a long slumber; some being covered up in cases, and some shut up in closets, or disrespectfully imprisoned in the attics. But I will come over in the evening; and, if we are not interrupted by visiters, I will read you some memorandums that I made on the passage. I kept no regular journal, but I wrote a little now and then, chiefly for my amusement, and to diversify my usual occupations of reading, sewing, and walking the deck. Therefore excuse me to-night, and let me have my humour, for I feel exactly in the vein to talk 'an infinite deal of nothing.'"

"Aunt Caroline," said Clara, "you know that, talk as you will, we always like to hear you. But we shall long for to-morrow evening."

"Do not, however, expect a finished picture of a sea-voyage," said Mrs. Fenton, "I can only promise you a few slight outlines, filled up with a half tint, and without lights or shadows; like the things that the Chinese sometimes paint on their tea-chests."

On the following evening, the gentlemen having gone to a public meeting, and measures being taken for the exclusion of visitors, Mrs. Esdale and her daughters seated themselves at the table with their work, and Mrs. Fenton produced her manuscript book, and read as follows: having first reminded her auditors that her husband and herself, instead of embarking at London, had gone by land to Portsmouth, and from thence crossed over to the Isle of Wight, where they took apartments at the principal hotel in the little town of Cowes, at which place the ship was to touch on her way down the British channel.

* * * * *

Having amply availed ourselves of the opportunity (afforded by a three days' sojourn) of exploring the beauties of the Isle of Wight, we felt some impatience to find ourselves fairly afloat, and actually on our passage "o'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea." On the fourth afternoon, we walked down to the beach, and strolled amid shells and sea-weed, along the level sands at the foot of a range of those chalky cliffs that characterize the southern coast of England. It was a lovely day. A breeze from the west was ruffling the crests of the green transparent waves, and wafting a few light clouds across the effulgence of the declining sun, whose beams danced radiantly on the surface of the water, gilding the black and red sails of the fishing-boats, and then withdrawing, at intervals, and leaving the sea in shade.

"Should this wind continue," said Mr. Fenton, "we may be detained here a week, and have full leisure to clamber again among the ruins of Carisbrook Castle, and to gaze at the cloven chalk-rocks of Shankline Chine, and the other wonders of this pleasant little island."

We then approached an old disabled sailor, who was smoking his pipe, seated on a dismantled cannon that lay prostrate on the sands, its iron mouth choked up with the sea-weed that the tide had washed into it; and on entering into conversation with him, we found that he was an out-pensioner of Greenwich hospital, and that for the last ten years he had passed most of his time about Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight.

"Have you ever known a ship come down from London with such a wind as this?" inquired Mr. Fenton.

"No," replied the sailor.--"After she doubles Beachy Head, this wind would be right in her teeth."

"Then," said Mr. Fenton, turning to me--"till it changes, we may give up all hope of seeing our gallant vessel."

"What ship are you looking for?" asked the sailor.

"The Washington."

"Oh! an American ship--ay, _she'll_ come down. _They_ can make their way with any sort of wind."[81]

[Footnote 81: This implied compliment to our vessels and seamen was really made by a British sailor, in a similar conversation with an American gentleman.]

He had scarcely spoken, when the flag of our country appeared beyond the point, its bright stars half obscured by the ample folds of the white and crimson stripes that, blown backward by the adverse breeze, were waving across them. In a moment the snowy sails of the Washington came full into view, shaded with purple by the setting sun.

"There she is!" exclaimed my husband. "There she comes--is not an American ship one of the most beautiful objects created by the hand of man? Well, indeed, do they merit the admiration that is so frankly accorded to them by every nation of the earth."

My husband, in his enthusiasm, shook the hand of the old sailor, and slipped some money into it. We remained on the beach looking at the ship till

"----o'er her bow the rustling cable rung,
The sails were furl'd; and anchoring round she swung."

A boat was then lowered from her stern, and the captain came off in it. He walked with us to the hotel, and informed us that he should leave Cowes early the following day. We soon completed the preparations for our final departure, and before eight o'clock next morning we had taken our last step on British ground, and were installed in our new abode on the world of waters. Several of the passengers had come down in the ship from London; others, like ourselves, had preferred commencing their voyage from the Isle of Wight; and some, as we understood, were to join us at Plymouth.

We sailed immediately. The breeze freshened, and that night and the next day, there was much general discomfort from sea-sickness; but, fortunately for us both, I was very slightly affected by that distressing malady, and Mr. Fenton not at all.

On the third day, we were enabled to lay our course with a fair wind and a clear sky: the coast of Cornwall looking like a succession of low white clouds ranged along the edge of the northern horizon. Towards evening we passed the Lizard, to see land no more till we should descry it on the other side of the Atlantic. As Mr. Fenton and myself leaned over the taffrail, and saw the last point of England fade dimly from our view, we thought with regret of the shore we were leaving behind us, and of much that we had seen, and known, and enjoyed in that country of which all that remained to our lingering gaze was a dark spot so distant and so small as to be scarcely perceptible. Soon we could discern it no longer: and nothing of Europe was now left to us but the indelible recollections that it has impressed upon our minds. We turned towards the region of the descending sun--

"To where his setting splendours burn
Upon the western sea-maid's urn,"

and we vainly endeavoured to direct all our thoughts and feelings towards our home beyond the ocean--our beloved American home.

On that night, as on many others, when our ship was careering through the sea, with her yards squared, and her sails all trimmed to a fresh and favouring breeze, while we sat on a sofa in the lesser cabin, and looked up through the open skylight at the stars that seemed flying over our heads, we talked of the land we had so recently quitted. We talked of her people, who though differing from ours in a thousand minute particulars, are still essentially the same. Our laws, our institutions, our manners, and our customs are derived from theirs: we are benefited by the same arts, we are enlightened by the same sciences. Their noble and copious language is fortunately ours--their Shakspeare also belongs to us; and we rejoice that we can possess ourselves of his "thoughts that breathe, and words that burn," in all their original freshness and splendour, unobscured by the mist of translation. Though the ocean divides our dwelling-places: though the sword and the cannon-shot have sundered the bonds that once united us to her dominion: though the misrepresentations of travelling adventurers have done much to foster mutual prejudices, and to embitter mutual jealousies, still we share the pride of our parent in the glorious beings she can number among the children of her island home, for

"Yet lives the blood of England in our veins."

On the fourth day of our departure from the Isle of Wight, we found ourselves several hundred miles from land, and consigned to the solitudes of that ocean-desert, "dark-heaving-boundless--endless--and sublime"--whose travellers find no path before them, and leave no track behind. But the wind was favourable, the sky was bright, the passengers had recovered their health and spirits, and for the first time were all able to present themselves at the dinner-table; and there was really what might be termed a "goodly company."

It is no longer the custom in American packet ships for ladies to persevere in what is called a sea-dress: that is, a sort of dishabille prepared expressly for the voyage. Those who are not well enough to devote some little time and attention to their personal appearance, rarely come to the general table, but take their meals in their own apartment. The gentlemen, also, pay as much respect to their toilet as when on shore.

The _coup d'oeil_ of the dinner-table very much resembles that of a fashionable hotel. All the appurtenances of the repast are in handsome style. The eatables are many of them such as, even on shore, would be considered delicacies, and they are never deficient in abundance and variety. Whatever may be the state of the weather, or the motion of the ship, the steward and the cook are unfailing in their duty; constantly fulfilling their arduous functions with the same care and regularity. The breakfast-table is always covered with a variety of relishes, and warm cakes. At noon there is a luncheon of pickled oysters, cold ham, tongue, &c. The dinner consists of fowls, ducks, geese, turkeys, fresh pork or mutton; for every ship is well supplied with live poultry, pigs and sheep. During the first week of the voyage there is generally fresh beef on the table, it being brought on board from the last place at which the vessel has touched: and it is kept on deck wrapped closely in a sail-cloth, and attached to one of the masts, the salt atmosphere preserving it. Every day at the dessert there are delicious pies and puddings, followed by almonds, raisins, oranges, &c.; and the tea-table is profusely set out with rich cakes and sweetmeats. For the sick there is always an ample store of sago, arrow-root, pearl-barley, tamarinds, &c. Many persons have an opportunity, during their passage across the Atlantic, of living more luxuriously than they have ever done in their lives, or perhaps ever will again. Our passengers were not too numerous. The lesser cabin was appropriated to three other ladies and myself. It formed our drawing-room; the gentlemen being admitted only as visiters. One of the ladies was Mrs. Calcott, an amiable and intelligent woman, who was returning with her husband from a long residence in England. Another was Miss Harriet Audley, a very pretty and very lively young lady from Virginia, who had been visiting a married sister in London, and was now on her way home under the care of the captain, expecting to meet her father in New York. We were much amused during the voyage with the coquetry of our fair Virginian, as she aimed her arrows at nearly all the single gentlemen in turn; and with her frankness in openly talking of her designs, and animadverting on their good or ill success. The gentlemen, with the usual vanity of their sex, always believed Miss Audley's attacks on their hearts to be made in earnest, and that she was deeply smitten with each of them in succession; notwithstanding that the smile in her eye was far more frequent than the blush on her cheek; and notwithstanding that rumour had asserted the existence of a certain cavalier in the neighbourhood of Richmond, whose constancy it was supposed she would eventually reward with her hand, as he might be considered, in every sense of the term, an excellent match.

Our fourth female passenger was Mrs. Cummings, a plump, rosy-faced old lady of remarkably limited ideas, who had literally passed her whole life in the city of London. Having been recently left a widow, she had broken up housekeeping, and was now on her way to join a son established in New York, who had very kindly sent for her to come over and live with him. The rest of the world was almost a sealed book to her, but she talked a great deal of the Minories, the Poultry, the Old Jewry, Cheapside, Long Acre, Bishopsgate Within, and Bishopsgate Without, and other streets and places with, appellations equally expressive.

The majority of the male passengers were pleasant and companionable--and we thought we had seen them all in the course of the first three days--but on the fourth, we heard the captain say to one of the waiters, "Juba, ask that gentleman if I shall have the pleasure of taking wine with him." My eyes now involuntarily followed the direction of Juba's movements, feeling some curiosity to know who "that gentleman" was, as I now recollected having frequently heard the epithet within the last few days. For instance, when almost every one was confined by sea-sickness to their state-rooms, I had seen the captain despatch a servant to inquire of that gentleman if he would have anything sent to him from the table. Also, I had heard Hamilton, the steward, call out,--"There, boys, don't you hear that gentleman ring his bell--why don't you run spontaneously--jump, one of you, to number eleventeen." I was puzzled for a moment to divine which state-room bore the designation of eleventeen, but concluded it to be one of the many unmeaning terms that characterize the phraseology of our coloured people. Once or twice I wondered who that gentleman could be; but something else happened immediately to divert my attention.

Now, when I heard Captain Santlow propose taking wine with him, I concluded that, of course, that gentleman must be visible in _propriâ personâ_, and, casting my eyes towards the lower end of the table, I perceived a genteel-looking man whom I had not seen before. He was apparently of no particular age, and there was nothing in his face that could lead any one to guess at his country. He might have been English, Scotch, Irish, or American; but he had none of the characteristic marks of either nation. He filled his glass, and bowing his head to Captain Santlow, who congratulated him on his recovery, he swallowed his wine in silence. There was an animated conversation going on near the head of the table, between Miss Audley and two of her beaux, and we thought no more of him.

At the close of the dessert, we happened to know that he had quitted the table and gone on deck, by one of the waiters coming down and requesting Mr. Overslaugh (who was sitting a-tilt, while discussing his walnuts, with his chair balanced on one leg, and his head leaning against the wainscot) to let him pass for a moment, while he went into No. eleventeen for that gentleman's overcoat. I now found that the servants had converted No. 13 into eleventeen. By-the-bye, that gentleman had a state-room all to himself, sometimes occupying the upper and sometimes the under berth.

"Captain Santlow," said Mr. Fenton, "allow me to ask you the name of that gentleman."

"Oh! I don't know"--replied the captain, trying to suppress a smile--"at least I have forgotten it--some English name; for he is an Englishman--he came on board at Plymouth, and his indisposition commenced immediately. Mrs. Cummings, shall I have the pleasure of peeling an orange for you?"

I now recollected a little incident which had set me laughing soon after we left Plymouth, and when we were beating down the coast of Devonshire. I had been trying to write at the table in the Ladies' Cabin, but it was one of those days when

"Our paper, pen and ink, and we
Roll up and down our ships at sea."

And all I could do was to take refuge in my berth, and endeavour to read, leaving the door open for more air. My attention, however, was continually withdrawn from my book by the sound of things that were dislodged from their places, sliding or falling, and frequently suffering destruction; though sometimes miraculously escaping unhurt.

While I was watching the progress of two pitchers that had been tossed out of the washing-stand, and after deluging the floor with water, had met in the Ladies' Cabin, and were rolling amicably side by side, without happening to break each other, I saw a barrel of flour start from the steward's pantry, and running across the dining-room, stop at a gentleman that lay extended in a lower berth with his room door open, and pour out its contents upon him, completely enveloping him in a fog of meal. I heard the steward, who was busily engaged in mopping up the water that had flowed from the pitchers, call out, "Run, boys, run, that gentleman's smothering up in flour--go take the barrel off him--jump, I tell you!"

How that gentleman acted while hidden in the cloud of flour, I could not perceive, and immediately the closing of the folding doors shut out the scene.

For a few days after he appeared among us, there was some speculation with regard to this nameless stranger, whose taciturnity seemed his chief characteristic. One morning while we were looking at the gambols of a shoal of porpoises that were tumbling through the waves and sometimes leaping out of them, my husband made some remark on the clumsy antics of this unsightly fish, addressing himself, for the first time, to the unknown Englishman, who happened to be standing near him. That gentleman smiled affably, but made no reply. Mr. Fenton pursued the subject--and that gentleman smiled still more affably, and walked away.

Nevertheless, he was neither deaf nor dumb, nor melancholy, but had only "a great talent for silence," and as is usually the case with persons whose genius lies that way, he was soon left entirely to himself, no one thinking it worth while to take the trouble of extracting words from him. In truth, he was so impracticable, and at the same time so evidently insignificant, and so totally uninteresting, that his fellow-passengers tacitly conveyed him to Coventry; and in Coventry he seemed perfectly satisfied to dwell. Once or twice Captain Santlow was asked again if he recollected the name of that gentleman; but he always replied with a sort of smile, "I cannot say I do--not exactly, at least--but I'll look at my manifest and see"--and he never failed to turn the conversation to something else.

The only person that persisted in occasionally talking to that gentleman, was old Mrs. Cummings; and she confided to him her perpetual alarms at "the perils of the sea," considering him a good hearer, as he never made any reply, and was always disengaged, and sitting and standing about, apparently at leisure while the other gentlemen were occupied in reading, writing, playing chess, walking the deck, &c.

Whenever the ship was struck by a heavy sea, and after quivering with the shock, remained motionless for a moment before she recovered herself and rolled the other way, poor Mrs. Cummings supposed that we had run against a rock, and could not be convinced that rocks were not dispersed every where about the open ocean. And as that gentleman never attempted to undeceive her on this or any other subject, but merely listened with a placid smile, she believed that he always thought precisely as she did. She not unfrequently discussed to him, in an under tone, the obstinacy and incivility of the captain, who she averred, with truth, had never in any one instance had the politeness to stop the ship, often as she had requested, nay implored him to do so even when she was suffering with sea-sickness, and actually tossed out of her berth by the violence of the storm, though she was holding on with both hands.