Chapter XXXIII: A Friend in need 268 (5)

But never had the ribbed ship's side appeared to him as now. And yet it was the same; but he was not the same. He was no longer the bright, hopeful, happy boy as before, but miserable, guilty, broken-hearted. And as we are, so is the world to us; the most familiar objects changing their aspect with every change in the soul. Does the sunshine, which was bright yesterday, look cold to-day? and is the sweet singing of birds suddenly become as a mockery to the ear? and the faces of friends, late so pleasant to see, have they grown strange and reproachful? and is life, before so full of hope, turned sour, and vapid, and bitter? O, my friend, I pity you; but the change, which you probably think is in the world, is only in yourself.

"The parson seems to have fallen from grace," said John Winch, sarcastically.

"Hold your tongue!" said Atwater, sternly. "You are all more to blame than he is. Of course, a boy of his age will do what he sees older ones do. It's a shame to get his money and watch away from him so."

And the honest fellow went and sat by Frank, and tried to console him.

"Go away! go away!" said Frank, in his anguish. "Don't trouble yourself about such a miserable fool as I am. I deserve it all. Let me be!"

Atwater, who was sadly deficient in what is called the gift of gab, had no soothing words at his command, full as his heart was of compassion. And after sitting some time by the unhappy boy, patting him softly on the shoulder, he arose, and went away; concluding that his absence would be a relief to one so utterly miserable.

Then Seth Tucket came, and took his place.

"That's always the way with bad luck, I swan," he said, sympathizingly. "Misfortunes always come in heaps. It never rains but it pours."

"I wish you'd let me alone!" said the boy, peevishly.

"That's fair, I swan!" said Seth. "But le' me tell ye. Ef I hed won the watch, I'd give it back to ye in a minute. But Harris is the winner, and I've only the watch now to show for my money. But here's a half dollar to begin again with. You know what luck is at cards,--how it shifts, now this way, now that, like a cow's tail in fly-time,--and I hain't the least doubt but with that half dollar you'll win back all your money, and your watch too."

The offer was kindly meant; and it encouraged a little spark of comfort in Frank's heart. To win back his losses--that was his only hope. He took the money, silently pressing Seth's hand. After that he struggled to forget his grief in thoughts of his former good fortune, which he believed would now return to him.

XVII.

IN WHICH FRANK SEES STRANGE THINGS.

In this frame of mind, Frank went on deck. He saw the old drum-major coming towards him. Being in any thing but a social mood, he tried to avoid him; and turning his back, walked away. But the veteran followed, and came to his side.

"Well, my young man," said the old cynic, exhibiting a little agitation, and speaking in a hurried tone, unusual with him, "I hear brave tidings of you."

His voice sounded harsh and sarcastic to the irritated boy; and, indeed, there was resentment enough in the veteran's breast, as well as a bitter sense of injury and disappointment, as he spoke.

Frank, nursing his sore heart, the wounds of which he could not bear to have touched by the most friendly hand, compressed his lips together, and made no reply.

"So you have been really gambling--have you?" added the old man, in tones of suppressed emotion.

"That's my business," said Frank, curtly.

He regretted the undutiful words the instant they escaped his lips. But he was too proud to ask pardon for them. As for the old man, he stood silent for a long time, looking down at the boy, who looked not up again at him. And there was a tremor in his lip, and a dilatation in his eye, which at length grew misty with a tear that gathered, but did not fall. And with a sigh, he turned away.

"Well, be it so!" Frank heard him say, as if to himself. "I thought--I hoped--but no matter."

He thought--he hoped--what? That his early faith in love and friendship, which had so long been dead, might be raised to life again by this boy, for whom he had conceived so singular a liking, and who, like all the rest, proved ungrateful and unworthy when the hour of trial came.

Alas! such is the result of our transgressions. Once having offended our own souls, we are quick to offend others. And vice makes us irritable, ungenerous, unjust. And not a crime can be committed, but its evil consequences follow, not the author of it only, but also the innocent, upon whom its blighting shadow falls.

"Frank, if you want some fun!" said an eager whisper, with a promise of mischief in it; a hand at the same time twitching the boy's coat.

It was Ned Ellis, who had come for him, and was hastening away again. Frank followed--all too ready for any enterprise that would bring the balm of forgetfulness to his hurt mind.

The boys entered the hold of the vessel, where, in the hush and obscurity, a group of their companions; stood or sat, among the barrels and boxes, still as statues, until they recognized the new comers.

"All right! nobody but us," whispered Ned, clambering over the freight, accompanied by Frank.

"Come along, and make no noise, if you value your hides," said Harris. "Here, Frank, is something to console ye for your bad luck." And he held out something in a tin cup.

"What is it?" said Frank; "water?"

"Something almost as good," said Harris. "It was water the boys came down here in search of; and they've tapped five barrels of sirup in the operation, and finally they've stuck the gimlet into a cask of--taste on't."

Frank knew what it was by the smell. It was not the first time he had smelt whiskey; or tasted it, either. But hitherto he had stopped at the taste, having nothing but his curiosity to gratify. Now, however, he bad something else to gratify--a burning thirst of the body, aggravated by his feverish excitement, and a burning thirst of the soul, which demanded stimulus of any kind whatsoever that would allay the inward torment.

And so he drank. He did not love the liquor, although the rank taste of it was ameliorated by a liberal admixture of sirup. But he felt the internal sinking and wretchedness of heart and stomach braced up and assuaged by the first draught; so he took another. And for the same reason he indulged in a third. And so it happened that his head began shortly to swim, his eyes to see double, and things to look queer to them generally. The dim hold of the vessel might have been the pit of darkness, and the obscure grinning faces of his comrades might have been those of imps therein abiding, for aught he knew to the contrary, or cared. He began to laugh.

"What's the matter, Frank?"

"Nothing," he said, thickly; "only it's so droll." And he sat down on a cask, laughing again with uncontrollable merriment--at nothing; an infallible symptom that a person is either tipsy or a fool. But Frank was not a fool. _Ergo:_ he was tipsy.

"Get him up as quick as we can, boys," he heard some one saying, "or else we can't get him up at all."

"Better leave him here till he gets over it," said another. "That'll be the best way."

"Who'd have thought a little dodger like that would upset him?" said somebody else. "By George we'll all get found out, through him."

"Whads mare?" said Frank, meaning to ask, "What is the matter?" but somehow he could not make his organs of articulation go off right. "'Zis wachecall drung?" (Is this what you call drunk?)

"Can ye walk?"--He recognized the voice of his friend Tucket.--"It's too bad to leave him here, boys. We must get him to his berth 'fore he's any worse."

"Zhue, Sef?" (Is it you, Seth?) Frank, with the help of his friend, got upon his feet. "No, I don' breeve I'm drung; I be bernaliddlewile;" meaning to say he did not believe he was intoxicated, and to express his conviction that he would be better in a little while.

Seth repeated his first inquiry.

"Izzindee! I kung wong!" (Yes, indeed, I can walk.) And Frank, as if to demonstrate the absurdity of the pretence, went stumbling loosely over the freight, saved from falling only by the assistance of his friend.

"Here's the ladder," said Tucket; "now be careful."

"'M I goung upthlarer, or am I goung downth larer?" (Was he going up the ladder or was he going down the ladder?)

Tucket proceeded to show him that the ladder was to be ascended; and, directing him how to hold on, and how to place his feet, boosted him gently, while a comrade above drew him also gently, until he was got safely out.

"I did that perrywell!" said Frank. "Now lemme hell Sef!" (Now let me help Seth.) "You're a bully fellel, Sef. I'll hellup ye!"

"Thank ye, boy," said Tucket; indulging him in the ludicrous notion that _he_ was helping _his friends_. "Much obliged."

"Nod tall!" (Not at all,) said Frank. "Bully fellels like youme mushellpitchuthth." (Must help each other.) "You unstan me, Sef?"

"Yes, I understand you. But keep quiet now, and come along with me."

So saying, the athletic soldier threw his arm affectionately around Frank, hurried him away to his bunk, and tumbled him into it without much ceremony.

Not unobserved, however. Captain Edney, who had had an anxious eye on Frank of late, saw him retire to his quarters in this rather suspicious manner.

"What's the matter with him?" he inquired of Seth.

"Nothing very serious, I believe, sir," replied Tucket, with the most perfect seriousness. "A little seasick, or sunthin of the kind. He'll git over it in a jiffy."

The waves were not running sufficiently high in the sound, however, to render the theory of seasickness very plausible; and, to satisfy his mind, Captain Edney approached Frank's bunk, putting to him the same question.

Frank replied in scarcely intelligible language, with a swimming gaze, tending to the cross-eyed, at the captain, "that there was nothing in partiggler the mare with him, but he was very busy.

"Busy?" said Captain Edney, severely; "what do you mean?"

"Not busy; but _busy, busy_!" repeated Frank.

"You mean dizzy?"

"Yes, thad's it! bizzy." He had somehow got _boozy_ and _dizzy_ mixed up.

"What makes you dizzy?"

"Boys gimme some drink, I donowat."

"The boys gave you some drink? You don't know what?--Tucket," said Captain Edney, "what's all this? Who has been getting that boy drunk?"

Seth perceived that any attempt to disguise the truth would be futile, except so far as it might be possible by ingenious subtleties to shield his companions. The alarm, be believed, must have reached them by this time, and have scattered the group at the whiskey barrel; so he answered boldly,--

"The fact, sir, is jest this. We've been about half crazy for water, as you know, for the past week or two; and men'll do almost any thing for relief, under such circumstances. It got rumored around, somehow, that there was plenty of water in the vessel, and the boys went to hunting for't, and stumbled on the quartermaster's stores, and tapped a few casks, I believe, mostly sirup, but one turned out to be whiskey. Dry as we be, it's no more'n nat'ral 't we should drink a drop, under the circumstances."

"Who tapped the casks?"

"That's more'n I know. I didn't see it done," said Seth.

"Who drank?"

"I drinked a little, for one; jest enough to know 't wan't water.

"And how many of you are drunk?" demanded Captain Edney.

"I a'n't, for one. But I believe Manly is a little how-come ye-so. I'll say this for him, though: he had nothing to do with tapping the casks, and he didn't seem to know what it was the boys gin him. He was dry; it tasted sweet, and he drinked, nat'rally."

"Who gave him the whiskey?"

"I didn't notice, particularly," said Seth.

His accomplices were summoned, the quartermaster was notified, and the affair was still further investigated. All confessed to having tasted the liquor, but nobody knew who tapped the casks, or who had given the whiskey to Frank, and all had the same plausible excuse for their offence--intolerable thirst. It was impossible, where all were leagued together, and all seemed equally culpable, to single out the ringleaders for punishment, and it was not desirable to punish all. After a while, therefore, the men were dismissed with a reprimand, and the subject postponed indefinitely. That very afternoon forty barrels of water came on board, and the men had no longer a pretext for tapping casks in the hold; and a few days later was the battle, in which they wiped out by their bravery all memory of past transgressions.

And Frank? The muss, as the boys called it, was over before his senses recovered from their infinite bewilderment. He lay stupefied in his bunk, which went whirling round and round with him, sinking down and down and down, into void and bottomless chaos, where solid earth was none--type of the drunkard's moral state, where virtue has lost its foot-hold, and there is no firm ground of self-respect, and conscience is a loosened ledge toppling treacherously, and there is no steady hope to stay his horrible whirling and sinking. Stupefaction became sleep; with sleep inebriation passed; and Frank awoke to misery.

It was evening. The boys were playing cards again by the light of the ship's lantern. The noise and the glimmer reached Frank in his berth, and called him back to time and space and memory. He remembered his watch, his insolent reply to his old friend Sinjin, the scene in the hold of the vessel, the sweet-tasting stuff, and the dizziness, a strange ladder somewhere which he had either climbed or dreamed of climbing; and he thought of his mother and sisters with a pang like the sting of a scorpion. He could bear any thing but that.

He got up, determined not to let vain regrets torment him. He shut out from his mind those pure images of home, the presence of which was maddening to him. Having stepped so deep into guilt, he would not, he could not, turn back. For Frank carried even into his vices that steadiness of resolution which distinguishes such natures from those of the Jack Winch stamp, wavering and fickle alike in good and ill. He possessed that perseverance and purpose which go to form either the best and noblest men, or, turned to evil, the most hardy and efficient villains. Frank was no milksop.

"O, I'm all right," said he, with a reckless laugh, in reply to his comrades' bantering. "Give me a chance there--can't you?"

For he was bent on winning back his watch. It seemed that nothing short of the impossible could turn him aside from that intent. The players made room for him, and he prepared his counters, and took up his cards.

"What do you do, Frank?" was asked impatiently; all were waiting for him.

What ailed the boy? He held his cards, but he was not looking at them. His eyes were not on the board, nor on his companions, nor on any object there. But he was staring with a pallid, intense expression--at something. There were anguish, and alarm, and yearning affection in his look. His hair was disordered, his countenance was white and amazed; his comrades were astonished as they watched him.

"What's the matter, Frank? what's the matter?"

Their importunity brought him to himself.

"Did you see?" he asked in a whisper.

They had seen nothing that he had seen. Then it was all an illusion? a fragment of his drunken dreams? But no drunken dream was ever like that.

"Yes, I'll play," he said, trying to collect himself thinking that he would forget the illusion, and remembering he had his watch to win back.

But his heart failed him. His brain, his hand failed him also. Absolutely, he could not play.

"Boys, I'm not very well. Excuse me--I can't play to-night."

And hesitatingly, like a person who has been stunned, he got up, and left the place. Few felt inclined to jeer him. John Winch begun to say something about "the parson going to pray," but it was frowned down.

Frank went on deck. The evening was mild, the wind was south, the sky was clear and starry; it was like a May night in New England. The schooner was riding at anchor in the sound; other vessels of the fleet lay around her, rocking gently on the tide--dim hulls, with glowing, fiery eyes; and here there was a band playing, and from afar off came the sound of solemn singing, wafted on the wind. And the water was all a weltering waste of waves and molten stars.

But little of all this Frank saw, or heard, or heeded. His soul was rapt from him; he was lost in wonder and grief.

"Can you tell me any thing?" said a voice at his side.

"O, Atwater," said Frank, clutching his hand, "what does it mean? As I was playing, I saw--I saw--every thing else disappeared; cards, counters, the bench we were playing on, and there before me, as plainly as I ever saw any thing in my life----"

"What was it?" asked Atwater, as Frank paused, unable to proceed.

"My sister Hattie." then said Frank, in a whisper of awe, "in her coffin! in her shroud! But she did not seem dead at all. She was white as the purest snow; and she smiled up at me--such a sweet, sad smile--O! O!"

And Frank wrung his hands.

XVIII.

BITTER THINGS.

Atwater could not have said much to comfort him, even if he had had the opportunity. Some young fellows who had heard of Frank's losses at bluff, and of his intoxication, saw him on deck, and came crowding around to have some jokes with him. Atwater retired. And Frank, who had little relish for jokes just then, went below, and got into his berth, where he could be quiet, and think a little.

But thinking alone there with his conscience was torture to him. He turned on his bed and looked, and saw Atwater sitting in his bunk, with a book in his hand, reading by the dim light. The card-playing was going on close by, and jokes and oaths and laughter were heard on all sides; but Atwater heeded no one, and no one heeded him.

Only Frank: he regarded the still, earnest soldier a long time, silently admiring his calmness and strength, so perfectly expressed in his mild, firm, kindly, taciturn face, and wondering what book he had.

"What are you reading, Atwater?" he at length asked.

"My Bible," replied the soldier, giving him a grave, pleasant smile.

Frank felt pained,--almost jealous. I can't tell how it is, but we don't like too well the sight of our companions cheerfully performing those duties which we neglect or hate. Cain slew Abel for that cause.

"I didn't know you read that," said Frank.

"I never have too much. But my wife----" The soldier's voice always sunk with a peculiarly tender thrill whenever he spoke of his bride of an hour, or rather of a minute, whom he had wedded and left in such haste. "She slipped a Bible in my knapsack unbeknown to me. I had a letter from her to-day, in which she asked me if I read it. So I must read it, and say yes, if only to please her. But the truth is," said Atwater, with a brightening eye, "I find good in it I never thought was there before."

Frank had no word to answer him. Conscience-stricken, sick at heart, miserable as he could be, he could only lie there in his berth, and look at the brave soldier, and envy him.

He remembered how, not long ago, when his mother's wishes were more to him than they had been of late, he had desired to read his Testament for her sake, but had not dared to do so openly, fearing the sneers of his comrades. And his mother, in every letter, repeated her injunction, "My son, read your Testament;"--which had become to him as the idle wind. For never now, either by stealth or openly, did he read that book.

Yet here was this plain, honest soldier,--many called him dull,--for whom a word from one he loved was sufficient; he took the book as if that word were law. And the looks, the jests, which Frank had feared, were nothing to him.

Ashamed, remorseful, angry with himself, the boy lay thinking what he should do. A few bitter moments only. Then, opening his knapsack, he took out his Testament, and sitting in his bunk so that the light would shine on the page, opened it and read. His companions saw, and were surprised enough. But nobody jeered. What was the reason, I wonder?

And this was what Frank read. Written on a blank leaf, with a pencil, in his own hand, were these words:--

_"I do now solemnly promise my mother and sisters that, when I am
in the army, I will never be guilty of swearing, or gambling, or
drinking, or any other mean thing I know they would not approve of.
And I do solemnly pledge my word that they shall sooner hear of my
death than of my being guilty of any of those things._ Frank Manly."

And beneath those words were written these also, in his mother's hand:--

_"O heavenly Father! I beseech Thee, help my dear son to keep his
promises. Give him strength to resist temptation. Save him, I pray
Thee, from those who kill the body, but above all from those who kill
the soul. If it be Thy gracious will, let him pass safely through
whatever evils may beset him, and return to us uncontaminated and
unhurt. But if this may not be, then, O, our Saviour! take him, take
my precious child, I implore Thee, pure unto Thyself. And help us all
so to live, that we shall meet again in joy and peace, if not here,
hereafter. Amen._"

Frank did not turn that page, but sat looking at it long. And he saw something besides the words there written. He saw himself once more a boy at home, the evening before his enlistment; pencil in hand, writing that solemn promise; his mother watching near; the bright face of his sister Helen yonder, shadowed by the thought of his going; the little invalid Hattie on the lounge, her sad face smiling very much as he saw it smiling out just now from the flowers in the coffin.

He saw his mother also, pencil in hand, writing that prayer,--her countenance full of anxious love and tears, her gentle lips tremulous with blessings. He saw her come to his bed in the moonlight night, when last he slept there with little Willie at his side, as maybe he will never sleep again. And he heard her counsels and entreaties, as she knelt there beside him; and felt her kisses; and lived over once more the thoughts of that night after she was gone, and when he lay sleepless with the moonlight on his bed.

But here he was now--not away there in the room at home, but here, among soldiers, on shipboard. And the pure, innocent Frank of that night lived no more. And all those promises had been broken, one by one. And he knew not what to do, he was so miserable.

Yet--the sudden thought warmed and thrilled his breast--he might be pure as then, he might be innocent as then, and all the stronger for having known what temptation was, and fallen, and risen again. And he might keep those promises in a higher and nobler sense than he dreamed of when he made them; and his mother's prayer might, after all, be answered.

"Frank," said the voice of Captain Edney. He had come to visit the quarters of his company, and, seeing the boy sitting there so absorbed, his young face charged with thought and grief, had stopped some moments to regard him, without speaking.

Frank started, almost like a guilty person, and gave the military salute rather awkwardly as he got upon his feet. He had been secretly dreading Captain Edney's displeasure, and now he thought he was to be called to an account.

"I have something for you in my room," said the officer, with a look of serious reserve, unlike the cheerful, open, brotherly glance with which he formerly regarded the drummer boy.

Frank accompanied him, wondering what that something was. A reproof for his drunkenness, or for gambling away the watch, he expected more than any thing else; and his heart was heavy by the way.

"Did you know a mail came on board to-day?" said the captain, as they entered his stateroom.

Frank remembered hearing Atwater say he had that day got a letter from his wife. But his mind had been too much agitated by other things to consider the subject then.

"No, sir, I didn't know it."

"How happens that? You are generally one of the most eager to receive letters."

Frank hung his head. What answer could he make? That he was intoxicated in his berth when the mail arrived? A sweat of shame covered him. He was silent.

"Well, well, my boy!"--Captain Edney patted him gently on the shoulder,--"you are forgiven this time. I am sure you did not mean to get drunk."

"O, sir!" began Frank, but stopped there, over whelmed by the captain's kindness.

"I know all about it," said Captain Edney. "Tucket assures me that he and the rest were more to blame than you. But, for the sake of your friends, Frank, take warning by this experience, and never be betrayed into any thing of the kind again. I trust you. And here, my boy, are your letters."

He put half a dozen into Frank's hands. And Frank, as he took them, felt his very heart melt within him with gratitude and contrition. He was not thinking so much of the letters as of Captain Edney and his watch.

"Forgive me; forgive me!" he humbly entreated.

"I do, freely, as I told you," said the captain.

"But--the watch you gave me!"

"Dear boy!"--the captain put his arm kindly about him,--"haven't I always told you I knew nothing about the watch? I did not give it to you, nor do I know what generous friend did."

"It is true, then?" Frank looked up with a half-glad, half-disappointed expression. He was disappointed to know that so good a friend was not the donor of the watch, and yet glad that he had not wronged _him_ by gambling it away. "Then, Captain Edney, I wish you would tell me what to do. I have done the worst and meanest thing. I have lost the watch."

And he went on to relate how he had lost it. Captain Edney heard him with deep concern. He had all along felt a sense of responsibility for the boy Mrs. Manly had intrusted to him, as well as a genuine affection for him; he had therefore double cause to be pained by this unexpected development.

"Frank," said he, "I am glad I did not first hear this story from any body else; and I am glad that the proof of your thorough repentance accompanies the confession. That breaks the pain of it. To-morrow I will see what can be done about the watch. Perhaps we shall get it again. To-night I have only one piece of advice to give. Don't think of winning it back with cards."

"Then how shall I ever get it?" asked Frank, in despair. For he did not wish his mother to know of the circumstances; and to buy the watch back when he was paid off again, would be to withhold money which he felt belonged to her.

Captain Edney could not solve the difficulty; and with that burden upon his mind, Frank returned to his bunk with his letters.

He bent over them with doubt and foreboding. The first he selected was from his mother. As he opened it, his eye caught these words:--

"... He says that you beat some of the worst men in the regiment at
their own vices. He says you are generally smoking, except when you
take out your pipe to swear. According to his account, you are one of
the profanest of the profane. And he tells of your going with others
to steal turkeys of a secessionist in Maryland, and how you got out
of the scrape by the most downright lying. He gives the story so
circumstantially that I cannot think he invented it, but am compelled
to believe there is something in it. O, my child, is it possible? Ill
as your sister is, to hear these things of you is a greater trial
than the thought of parting with her so soon. Have you forgotten your
promises to me? Have you forgotten----"

Frank could read no more. He gnashed his teeth together, and held them tight, like a person struggling against some insupportable pain. His sister so ill? That was Hattie. He saw the name written farther back. "He says,"--"according to his account,"--who was it sending home such stories about him? He glanced up the page, until his eye fell upon the name.

"_John Winch_----"

O, but this was too much! To be accused of swearing by _him_! To be charged with stealing by one who went with him to steal, and did not, only because he was a coward! Frank felt an impulse to fall instantly upon that wretched youth, and choke the unmanly life out of him. John was at that moment writing a letter under the lantern, probably filling it with more tales about him;--and couldn't he tell some great ones now!--grinning, too, as he wrote; quite unaware what a tiger was watching him, athirst for his blood.

Yes. Winch had got letters to-day, and, learning what a lively sensation his stories of Frank created, had set to work to furnish the sequel to them; giving interesting particulars up to latest dates.

N. B. He was writing on the head of Frank's drum, which he had borrowed for the purpose. He had written his previous letters on the same. It was a good joke, he thought, to get the boy he was abusing to contribute some needful assistance towards the work; it added a flavor to treachery. But Frank did not so much enjoy the pleasantry. He was wild to be beating the tattoo, not on the said drum, but on the head of the rogue who was writing on the drum, and with his fist for drumsticks.

But he reflected, "I shall only be getting deeper into trouble, if I pitch into him. Besides, he is a good deal bigger than I,"--a powerful argument in favor of forbearance. "I'll wait; but I'll be revenged on him some way."

Little did he know--and as little did Winch surmise--how that revenge was to be accomplished. But it was to be, and soon.

For the present, Frank had other things to think of. He read of Hattie's fading away; of her love for him; and the tender messages she sent,--perhaps the last she would ever send to him. And he remembered his wonderful vision of her that evening. And tears came to cool and soften his heart.

And so we quit him for the night, leaving him alone with his letters, his grief, and his remorse.

XIX.

SETH GETS "RILED."

There is in the life of nearly every young person a turning-point of destiny. It may be some choice which he makes for himself, or which others make for him, whether of occupation, or companion, or rule of life. It may be some deep thought which comes to him in solitary hours,--some seed of wisdom dropped from the lips of teacher, parent, or friend, sinking silently as starlight into the soul, and taking immortal root there, unconsciously, perhaps, even to himself. Now it is the quickening of the spirit at the sight of God's beautiful universe--a rapture of love awakened by a morning in spring, by the blue infinity of the sky, by the eternal loneliness and sublimity of the sea. Or, in some moment of susceptibility, the smiles of dear home faces, the tender trill of a voice, a surge of solemn music, may have power over the young heart to change its entire future. And again, it is some vivid experience of temptation and suffering that shapes the great hereafter. For the Divinity that maketh and loveth us is forever showering hints of beauty and blessedness to win back our wandering affections,--dropping cords of gentlest influences to draw home again all hearts that will come.

Then the spirit of the youth rises up within him, and says,--

"Whereas I was blind, now I am beginning to see. And whereas I was weak, now, with God's help, I will strive for better things. Long enough have I been the companion of folly, and all the days of my life have I been a child. But now I perceive that I am to become a man, and I will henceforth think the thoughts and do the deeds of a man."

Such an experience had come to Frank; and thus, on the new morning, as he beheld it rise out of the sea, his spirit spake unto him.

He answered his mother's letter, confessing that his conduct had afforded only too good a foundation for Jack's stories.

"The trouble, I think, is," said he, "that I wrote my promises first with _a pencil_. They did get a little _rubbed out_ I own. I have since taken _a pen_, and written them all over again, word by word, and letter by letter, _with ink_. So you may depend upon it, dear mother, that not another syllable of my pledge will _get blurred_ or _dimmed_, either on the _leaf of my Testament_; or on the _page of my heart_. Only _believe this_, and then you may believe as much as you please of what J. W. writes."

Not a word to the same _J. W._ did Frank say of the base thing he had done; and as for the revenge he had vowed, the impulse to wreak it in tigerish fashion had passed like a night-fog before the breezy purity of the new life that had dawned.

In a couple of days Frank had mostly recovered his equanimity. The loss of the watch was still a source of anxious grief to him, however; less on his own account, let me say, than for the sake of the unknown giver. Nor had he, as yet, found any opportunity to atone for his rudeness to the old drum-major, who had lately, for some cause, gone over to the other wing of the regiment on board the steamer, so that Frank yearned in vain to go to him and humbly beg forgiveness for his fault.

"What has taken Mr. Sinjin away?" he asked of his friend, the young corporal.

Gray shrugged his shoulders, and looked at Frank as if he had a good mind to tell a secret.

"How should I know? He's such a crotchety old boy. I don't think he could account for his conduct himself. He asked permission to remove his quarters to the steamer, and got it; pretending, I believe, that he could have better accommodations there."

"And _I_ believe," said Frank, "that you know more about it than you will own."

"Well, I have my suspicions. Shall I be candid with you, Frank? and you'll forgive me if I hurt your feelings?"

"Yes," said Frank, anxiously.

"Well, then," said Gray. "I suppose you know Sinjin had taken a great fancy to you."

"I thought at one time he liked me."

"At one time? I'll wager my head he was liking you the most when he appeared to the least--he's such a queer old cove! I've heard he was disappointed in love once, and that some friend of his proved traitor to him; and that's what has made him so shy of showing any thing like affection for any body. Well, he heard of your gambling, and went to talk with you about it, and you said something to him that wounded him so I think he couldn't bear the sight of you afterwards."

The boy's heart was wrung by this revelation. What reason, he demanded to know, had Gray for thinking thus?

"Because I know the man, and because I know something which I think you ought to know." Gray drew Frank confidentially aside. "He may anathematize me for betraying his secret; but I think it is time to do him justice, even against his will. Frank, it was Old Sinjin who gave you the watch."

Frank's heart leaped up, but fell again instantly, convulsed with pain and regret.

"Are you sure, Gray?"

"Sure as this: I was with him when he bought the watch in Annapolis. I helped him to do it up in the wrappers. And it was I that pitched it into the tent at you Thanksgiving-day evening. That is being pretty sure--isn't it?"

"And he knows that I lost it?" said Frank.

"He had just heard so when he went to speak with you about gambling."

"And I told him it was none of his business," said Frank, remorsefully. "O, he will never forgive me now; and who can blame him? Good old man! dear, good old man! My mother told me to be always very kind to him--and how have I repaid his goodness to me!"

It seemed now that the boy could not control his impatience until once more he had seen his benefactor, confessed all to him, and heard him say he was forgiven for his unkindness and ingratitude.

But the old drummer still remained on board the steamer. And Frank had only this faith to comfort him--that if his repentance was sincere, and he henceforth did only what was right, all would yet be well.

The next morning he was viewing the sunrise from the deck, when Seth Tucket came to his side.

"'Once more upon the waters! yet once more! and the waves bound beneath me as the steed that knows his rider--welcome to their roar!' Only they don't bound much, and they don't roar to-day," said Seth. "The boys have found out it's Sunday; and as we're to have a battle 'fore the week's out, they seem to think it's about as well to remember there's a difference in days. How are you, Manly?"

"Better," said Frank, with a smile.

"Happy?"--with a grimace meant to be sympathizing, but which was droll enough to be laughable.

"Happier than I was," said the drummer boy. "Happier than I've been for a long time."

"What! not happier, now you've lost every thing, than when you was hevin' such luck at play?"

"I wasn't happy then. I thought I was. But I was only excited. I am happier now that I've lost every thing; it's true, Tucket."

"Well, I swan to man! I thought you was mourning over your luck, and I was bringing ye sunthin' to kind o' cheer ye up. Glad to hear you've no need. Fine day, but rather windy. Wonder what's the time!"

So saying, Seth drew out the watch, and regarded it with provoking coolness.

"I'm plagued ef the darned thing hain't run down! Say, Frank, ye couldn't think of throwin' in the key, too--could ye? I can't wind her up without a key."

Frank choked a little, but his look was cheerful, as he put his hand in his pocket, and, without a word, delivered over to the new owner of the watch the key also.

"Thank ye; much obleeged;" and Seth "wound her up" with extraordinary parade. Then he shook it, and held it to his ear. Then he said, "All right! she's a puttin' in again, lickety-switch! Good watch, that." Then he set it "by guess." Then he was returning it to his pocket, when a new thought seemed to strike him.

"What do ye do for a watch-pocket, Frank? Gov'ment don't provide watch-pockets, seems."

"I made one for myself," said Frank.

"Sho now! ye didn't, though--did ye? What with?"

"With a needle and thread I brought from home, and with another old pocket," said Frank.

"Well, you air the cutest! Say, what'll ye tax to make me one? I don't care to hev it very large; a small watch, so."

A dry proposal, that. It was not enough to furnish watch and watch-key; but Frank was required also to provide a watch-pocket.

"What do ye say?" asked Seth, with a shrewd squint.

"I'll make you one for nothing," said Frank.

"Come, by darn!" exclaimed Seth; "none o' that, now!"

"None of what?"

"You're a-trying my disposition!"--And, indeed, Tucket was visibly moved; there was a tear in his eye--a bona fide tear. "I've a good disposition, nat'rally; but I shall git riled ef you say much more. I've got your watch, and that's all right. I've got the key, and that's all right, too. But when you talk of makin' a watch-pocket for nothin', I tell ye a saint couldn't stand that."

Frank, who thought he had learned to know pretty well the man's oddities, was puzzled this time.

"I didn't mean to offend you, Tucket."

"No, you didn't. And now see here, Manly. We'll jest compromise this matter, ef you've no 'bjection. I've no watch-pocket, and you've no watch. So, s'posin' you carry the watch for me, and tell me what time it is when I ax ye? That won't be too much trouble--will it?"

"Are you in earnest?" asked Frank.

"Yes, I be, clean up to the hub. The truth is, I can't carry that watch with any kind o' comfort, and I'm bent on gitt'n' it off my hands, ef I hef to throw it overboard. Here! It's yours; take it, and be darned!" said Seth.

"I was going to propose to you,"--stammered Frank from his too full heart,--"to take the watch, and pay you for it when I can."

"Ez for that the pay's no consequence. I was more to blame than you; and the loss ought to be mine."

"But----" insisted Frank.

"No buts! Besides, I never make bargains Sundays." And Seth turned away, abruptly, leaving the watch in Frank's hand.

The boy would have called him back, but a rush of emotions--joy, gratitude, contrition--choked his voice. A dash of tears fell upon the watch as he gazed on it, and pressed it, and would have kissed it, had he been alone. It was his again; and that, after all, was an unalloyed satisfaction. He could lie awake nights and study days to devise means to reward Seth's generosity. And he would do it, he resolved. And Mr. Sinjin should know that he had recovered the prize, and that he held it all the more precious since he had found out the giver.

XX.

SUNDAY BEFORE THE BATTLE.

Frank was leaning over the rail of the schooner gazing down at the beautiful flashing water, and thinking of home. It was Sunday there, too, he remembered; and he could almost hear the sweet-toned bells solemnly chiming, and see the atmosphere of Sabbath peace brooding over field and village, and feel the serious gladness of the time. The folks were getting ready for church. There was his father, shaved and clean, in his black stock and somewhat threadbare, but still respectable, best coat. And there was Helen, bright and blooming, with her bonnet on, and with her Bible and question-book in her hand, setting out for the morning Sunday-school. His mother was not going to meeting; she was to stay at home with Hattie, and read to her, or, what was better, comfort her with affectionate, gentle, confiding words. But Willie was going with Helen, as he seemed anxious, by strut, and hurry, and loud, impatient talk, to let every body know. And Frank wished from his heart that he could be with them that day; and he wondered, did they miss him, and were they thinking of him, far off here in Carolina waters, alone in the midst of such crowds of men?

"Wouldn't I like to be in that boat, boys!" said Ellis. "Don't she come dancing on the waves!"

"She's pulling towards us," said Atwater. "I believe they're coming aboard."

"O, Atwater!" cried Frank, as the boat drew near. "There's a face there I know! One you know, too!" And he clapped his hands with joy; for it was a face he had seen in Boston, and he felt that it came with news from home.

The rare brightness kindled in Atwater's eyes as he gazed, and remembered. The boat came alongside, and hailed the schooner. And a man in the bow, as it rose upon a wave, seizing hold of the ladder of tarred rope, stepped quickly upon it, and came on board, cordially received by Captain Edney, who appeared to have been expecting him.

"It's the minister that married Atwater!" the rumor ran round among the troops. "What's his name, Frank?"

"His name's Egglestone," said Frank, his heart swelling with anxiety to speak with him.

The minister had come on a mission of Christian love to the soldiers of the expedition; and having, the day before, sent word to Captain Edney of his arrival, he had in return received an invitation to visit the schooner and preach to the men this Sunday morning.

A previous announcement that religious services would probably be held on board, had excited little interest; the troops surmising that the chaplain of the regiment, who had never been with them enough to win their hearts or awaken their attention, was to rejoin them, and preach one of his formal discourses.

But far different was the feeling when it was known that the "man that married Atwater" was to conduct the exercises. Then the soldiers remembered that they were New Englanders; and that here also God's Sabbath shed its silent influence, far though they were from the rude hills and rocky shores of home.

'Tis curious how a little leaven of memory will sometimes work in the heart. Here was half a regiment of men, who had come to fight the battles of their country. As with one accord they had left the amenities of peaceful life behind them, and assumed the rugged manners of war. Of late they had seemed almost oblivious of the fact that God, and Christian worship, and Christian rules of life were still in existence. But to-day they were reminded. To-day the child was awakened--the child that had known the wholesome New England nurture, that had sat on mother's knee, and had its earliest thought tuned to the music of Sunday bells; the child that lay hidden in the deep heart of every man of them, the same lived again, and looked forth from the eyes, and smiled once more in the softened visage of the man. And the man was carried back, far from these strange scenes, far from the relentless iron front of war, across alien lands, and over stormy seas,--carried back by the child yearning within,--to the old door yard, the village trees, the family fireside, the family pew, and the hushed congregation.

It was Mr. Egglestone's aim, in the beginning of the sermon he preached that morning, to remind the soldiers of their childhood. "It is a thought," he said, "which almost moves me to tears,--that all these hardy frames around me were but the soft, warm, dimpled forms of so many infants once. And nearly every one of you was, I suppose, watched over by tender parents, who beheld, with mutual joy, the development of each beautiful faculty. The first step taken by the babe's unassisted feet, the first articulate word spoken by the little lisping lips,--what delight they gave, and how long were they remembered! And what thoughts of the child's future came day and night to those parents' breasts! and of what earnest prayers was it the subject! And of all the parents of all those children who are here as men to-day, not one foresaw a scene like this; none dreamed that they were raising up patriots to fight for freedom's second birth on this continent, in the most stupendous of civil wars.

"But Providence leads us by strange ways, and by hidden paths we come upon brinks of destiny which no prophet foresaw. Now the days of peace are over. Many of you who were children are now the fathers of children. But your place is not at home to watch over them as you were watched over, but to strive by some means to work out a harder problem than any ever ciphered on slates at school."

Then he explained to his audience the origin of the war; for he believed it best that every soldier should understand well the cause he was fighting for. He spoke of the compact of States, which could not be rightfully broken. He spoke of the serpent that had been nursed in the bosom of those States. He related how slavery, from being at first a merely tolerated evil, which all good men hoped soon to see abolished, had grown arrogant, aggressive, monstrous; until, angered by resistance to its claims, it had deluged the land with blood. Such was the nature of an institution based upon selfishness and wrong. And such was the bitter result of building a LIE into the foundations of our national structure. Proclaiming to the world, as the first principle of our republican form of government, that "all men are created free and equal," we had at the same time held a race in bondage.

"Neither nation nor individual," said he, "can in any noble sense succeed, with such rotten inconsistency woven into its life. It was this shoddy in the garment of our Goddess of Liberty, which has occasioned the rent which those needles there"--pointing to some bayonets--"must mend. And it is this shoddy of contradiction and infidelity which makes many a man's prosperity, seemingly substantial at first, promising warmth and wear, fall suddenly to pieces, and leave his soul naked to the winds of heaven."

It was not so much a sermon as a friendly, affectionate, earnest talk with the men, whom he sought to counsel and encourage. There was a melting love in his tones which went to their inmost souls. And when he exhorted them to do the work of men who feared God, but not any mortal foe, who dreaded dishonor, but not death, he made every heart ring with the stirring appeal.

Then suddenly his voice sank to a tone of solemn sweetness, as he said,--

"Peace! O, my brothers! struggle and violence are not the all of life. But God's love, the love of man to man, holiness, blessedness,--it is for these realities we are created, and placed here on this beautiful earth, under this blue sky, with human faces and throbbing human hearts around us. And the end of all is PEACE. But only through fiery trial and valiant doing can any peace worth the name come to us; and to make the future truly blessed, we must make the present truly brave."

Before and after the discourse the men sang some of the good old tunes which all had been familiar with at home, and which descended like warm rain upon the ground where the scattered seed of the sermon fell.

The services ended, Mr. Egglestone went freely among the soldiers, and conversed with any who wanted to have speech of him; especially with Atwater; whose wife he had seen a few days before leaving Boston, where she came to see him, having learned who he was, and that he was about departing for the army in which her husband served.

After long waiting, Frank's turn came at last. They sat down on a bench apart; and the clergyman told him he had lately seen his mother, and that she had charged him with many messages. And one was a message of sorrow.

"She had heard unwelcome news of you," he said, holding the boy's hand. "And she wished me to say to you what I could to save you from what she dreads most--what any wise, loving mother dreads most for her child. But is there need of my saying any thing? By what your captain tells me, and still more by what your face tells me, I am convinced that I may spare my words. You have had in your own experience a better lesson than any body can teach you. You have erred, you have suffered. And"--he took a letter from his pocket--"I have something here to make you remember what you have learned--I think, for always."