ISRAEL POTTER

 His Fifty Years of Exile

 BY HERMAN MELVILLE

 AUTHOR OF "TYPEE, " "OMOO, " ETC. 

 1855

Dedication

TO HIS HIGHNESS THE Bunker-Hill Monument

Biography, in its purer form, confined to the ended lives of the trueand brave, may be held the fairest meed of human virtue--one given andreceived in entire disinterestedness--since neither can the biographerhope for acknowledgment from the subject, nor the subject at all availhimself of the biographical distinction conferred. 

Israel Potter well merits the present tribute--a private of Bunker Hill, who for his faithful services was years ago promoted to a still deeperprivacy under the ground, with a posthumous pension, in default of anyduring life, annually paid him by the spring in ever-new mosses andsward. 

I am the more encouraged to lay this performance at the feet of yourHighness, because, with a change in the grammatical person, itpreserves, almost as in a reprint, Israel Potter's autobiographicalstory. Shortly after his return in infirm old age to his native land, alittle narrative of his adventures, forlornly published on sleazy graypaper, appeared among the peddlers, written, probably, not by himself, but taken down from his lips by another. But like the crutch-marks ofthe cripple by the Beautiful Gate, this blurred record is now out ofprint. From a tattered copy, rescued by the merest chance from therag-pickers, the present account has been drawn, which, with theexception of some expansions, and additions of historic and personaldetails, and one or two shiftings of scene, may, perhaps, be not unfitlyregarded something in the light of a dilapidated old tombstoneretouched. 

Well aware that in your Highness' eyes the merit of the story must be inits general fidelity to the main drift of the original narrative, Iforbore anywhere to mitigate the hard fortunes of my hero; andparticularly towards the end, though sorely tempted, durst notsubstitute for the allotment of Providence any artistic recompense ofpoetical justice; so that no one can complain of the gloom of my closingchapters more profoundly than myself. 

Such is the work, and such, the man, that I have the honor to present toyour Highness. That the name here noted should not have appeared in thevolumes of Sparks, may or may not be a matter for astonishment; butIsrael Potter seems purposely to have waited to make his, popular adventunder the present exalted patronage, seeing that your Highness, according to the definition above, may, in the loftiest sense, be deemedthe Great Biographer: the national commemorator of such of the anonymousprivates of June 17, 1775, who may never have received other requitalthan the solid reward of your granite. 

Your Highness will pardon me, if, with the warmest ascriptions on thisauspicious occasion, I take the liberty to mingle my heartycongratulations on the recurrence of the anniversary day we celebrate, wishing your Highness (though indeed your Highness be somewhatprematurely gray) many returns of the same, and that each of itssummer's suns may shine as brightly on your brow as each winter snowshall lightly rest on the grave of Israel Potter. 

Your Highness' Most devoted and obsequious, THE EDITOR. 

JUNE 17th, 1854. 

CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER

I. The birthplace of Israel

II. The youthful adventures of Israel

III. Israel goes to the wars; and reaching Bunker Hill in time to be ofservice there, soon after is forced to extend his travels across the seainto the enemy's land

IV. Further wanderings of the Refugee, with some account of a goodknight of Brentford who befriended him

V. Israel in the Lion's Den

VI. Israel makes the acquaintance of certain secret friends of America, one of them being the famous author of the "Diversions of Purley. " Thesedespatch him on a sly errand across the Channel

VII. After a curious adventure upon the Pont Neuf, Israel enters thepresence of the renowned sage, Dr. Franklin, whom he finds rightlearnedly and multifariously employed

VIII. Which has something to say about Dr. Franklin and the LatinQuarter

IX. Israel is initiated into the mysteries of lodging-houses in theLatin Quarter

X. Another adventurer appears upon the scene

XI. Paul Jones in a reverie

XII. Recrossing the Channel, Israel returns to the Squire's abode--Hisadventures there

XIII. His escape from the house, with various adventures following

XIV. In which Israel is sailor under two flags, and in three ships, andall in one night

XV. They sail as far as the Crag of Ailsa

XVI. They look in at Carrickfergus, and descend on Whitehaven

XVII. They call at the Earl of Selkirk's, and afterwards fight theship-of-war Drake

XVIII. The Expedition that sailed from Groix

XIX. They fight the Serapis. 

XX. The Shuttle

XXI. Samson among the Philistines

XXII. Something further of Ethan Allen; with Israel's flight towards thewilderness

XXIII. Israel in Egypt

XXIV. Continued

XXV. In the City of Dis

XXVI Forty-five years

XXVII. Requiescat in pace

ISRAEL POTTER

Fifty Years of Exile

CHAPTER I. 

THE BIRTHPLACE OF ISRAEL. 

The traveller who at the present day is content to travel in the goodold Asiatic style, neither rushed along by a locomotive, nor dragged bya stage-coach; who is willing to enjoy hospitalities at far-scatteredfarmhouses, instead of paying his bill at an inn; who is not to befrightened by any amount of loneliness, or to be deterred by theroughest roads or the highest hills; such a traveller in the easternpart of Berkshire, Massachusetts, will find ample food for poeticreflection in the singular scenery of a country, which, owing to theruggedness of the soil and its lying out of the track of all publicconveyances, remains almost as unknown to the general tourist as theinterior of Bohemia. 

Travelling northward from the township of Otis, the road leads fortwenty or thirty miles towards Windsor, lengthwise upon that long brokenspur of heights which the Green Mountains of Vermont send intoMassachusetts. For nearly the whole of the distance, you have thecontinual sensation of being upon some terrace in the moon. The feelingof the plain or the valley is never yours; scarcely the feeling of theearth. Unless by a sudden precipitation of the road you find yourselfplunging into some gorge, you pass on, and on, and on, upon the crestsor slopes of pastoral mountains, while far below, mapped out in itsbeauty, the valley of the Housatonie lies endlessly along at your feet. Often, as your horse gaining some lofty level tract, flat as a table, trots gayly over the almost deserted and sodded road, and your admiringeye sweeps the broad landscape beneath, you seem to be Bootes driving inheaven. Save a potato field here and there, at long intervals, the wholecountry is either in wood or pasture. Horses, cattle and sheep are theprincipal inhabitants of these mountains. But all through the year lazycolumns of smoke, rising from the depths of the forest, proclaim thepresence of that half-outlaw, the charcoal-burner; while in early springadded curls of vapor show that the maple sugar-boiler is also at work. But as for farming as a regular vocation, there is not much of it here. At any rate, no man by that means accumulates a fortune from this thinand rocky soil, all whose arable parts have long since been nearlyexhausted. 

Yet during the first settlement of the country, the region was notunproductive. Here it was that the original settlers came, acting uponthe principle well known to have regulated their choice of site, namely, the high land in preference to the low, as less subject to theunwholesome miasmas generated by breaking into the rich valleys andalluvial bottoms of primeval regions. By degrees, however, they quittedthe safety of this sterile elevation, to brave the dangers of richerthough lower fields. So that, at the present day, some of those mountaintownships present an aspect of singular abandonment. Though they havenever known aught but peace and health, they, in one lesser aspect atleast, look like countries depopulated by plague and war. Every mile ortwo a house is passed untenanted. The strength of the frame-work ofthese ancient buildings enables them long to resist the encroachments ofdecay. Spotted gray and green with the weather-stain, their timbers seemto have lapsed back into their woodland original, forming part now ofthe general picturesqueness of the natural scene. They are ofextraordinary size, compared with modern farmhouses. One peculiarfeature is the immense chimney, of light gray stone, perforating themiddle of the roof like a tower. 

On all sides are seen the tokens of ancient industry. As stone aboundsthroughout these mountains, that material was, for fences, as ready tothe hand as wood, besides being much more durable. Consequently thelandscape is intersected in all directions with walls of uncommonneatness and strength. 

The number and length of these walls is not more surprising than thesize of some of the blocks comprising them. The very Titans seemed tohave been at work. That so small an army as the first settlers mustneeds have been, should have taken such wonderful pains to enclose soungrateful a soil; that they should have accomplished such herculeanundertakings with so slight prospect of reward; this is a considerationwhich gives us a significant hint of the temper of the men of theRevolutionary era. 

Nor could a fitter country be found for the birthplace of the devotedpatriot, Israel Potter. 

To this day the best stone-wall builders, as the best wood-choppers, come from those solitary mountain towns; a tall, athletic, and hardyrace, unerring with the axe as the Indian with the tomahawk; atstone-rolling, patient as Sisyphus, powerful as Samson. 

In fine clear June days, the bloom of these mountains is beyondexpression delightful. Last visiting these heights ere she vanishes, Spring, like the sunset, flings her sweetest charms upon them. Each tuftof upland grass is musked like a bouquet with perfume. The balmy breezeswings to and fro like a censer. On one side the eye follows for thespace of an eagle's flight, the serpentine mountain chains, southwardsfrom the great purple dome of Taconic--the St. Peter's of thesehills--northwards to the twin summits of Saddleback, which is thetwo-steepled natural cathedral of Berkshire; while low down to the westthe Housatonie winds on in her watery labyrinth, through charmingmeadows basking in the reflected rays from the hill-sides. At thisseason the beauty of every thing around you populates the loneliness ofyour way. You would not have the country more settled if you could. Content to drink in such loveliness at all your senses, the heartdesires no company but Nature. 

With what rapture you behold, hovering over some vast hollow of thehills, or slowly drifting at an immense height over the far sunkenHousatonie valley, some lordly eagle, who in unshared exaltation looksdown equally upon plain and mountain. Or you behold a hawk sallying fromsome crag, like a Rhenish baron of old from his pinnacled castle, anddarting down towards the river for his prey. Or perhaps, lazily glidingabout in the zenith, this ruffian fowl is suddenly beset by a crow, whowith stubborn audacity pecks at him, and, spite of all his bravery, finally persecutes him back to his stronghold. The otherwise dauntlessbandit, soaring at his topmost height, must needs succumb to this sableimage of death. Nor are there wanting many smaller and less famous fowl, who without contributing to the grandeur, yet greatly add to the beautyof the scene. The yellow-bird flits like a winged jonquil here andthere; like knots of violets the blue-birds sport in clusters upon thegrass; while hurrying from the pasture to the grove, the red robin seemsan incendiary putting torch to the trees. Meanwhile the air is vocalwith their hymns, and your own soul joys in the general joy. Like astranger in an orchestra, you cannot help singing yourself when allaround you raise such hosannas. 

But in autumn, those gay northerners, the birds, return to theirsouthern plantations. The mountains are left bleak and sere. Solitudesettles down upon them in drizzling mists. The traveller is beset, atperilous turns, by dense masses of fog. He emerges for a moment intomore penetrable air; and passing some gray, abandoned house, sees thelofty vapors plainly eddy by its desolate door; just as from the plainyou may see it eddy by the pinnacles of distant and lonely heights. Or, dismounting from his frightened horse, he leads him down some scowlingglen, where the road steeply dips among grim rocks, only to rise asabruptly again; and as he warily picks his way, uneasy at the menacingscene, he sees some ghost-like object looming through the mist at theroadside; and wending towards it, beholds a rude white stone, uncouthlyinscribed, marking the spot where, some fifty or sixty years ago, somefarmer was upset in his wood-sled, and perished beneath the load. 

In winter this region is blocked up with snow. Inaccessible andimpassable, those wild, unfrequented roads, which in August areovergrown with high grass, in December are drifted to the arm-pit withthe white fleece from the sky. As if an ocean rolled between man andman, intercommunication is often suspended for weeks and weeks. 

Such, at this day, is the country which gave birth to our hero:prophetically styled Israel by the good Puritans, his parents, since, for more than forty years, poor Potter wandered in the wild wildernessof the world's extremest hardships and ills. 

How little he thought, when, as a boy, hunting after his father's straycattle among these New England hills he himself like a beast should behunted through half of Old England, as a runaway rebel. Or, how could heever have dreamed, when involved in the autumnal vapors of thesemountains, that worse bewilderments awaited him three thousand milesacross the sea, wandering forlorn in the coal-foes of London. But so itwas destined to be. This little boy of the hills, born in sight of thesparkling Housatonic, was to linger out the best part of his life aprisoner or a pauper upon the grimy banks of the Thames. 

CHAPTER II. 

THE YOUTHFUL ADVENTURES OF ISRAEL. 

Imagination will easily picture the rural day of the youth of Israel. Let us pass on to a less immature period. 

It appears that he began his wanderings very early; moreover, that ere, on just principles throwing off the yoke off his king, Israel, onequally excusable grounds, emancipated himself from his sire. Hecontinued in the enjoyment of parental love till the age of eighteen, when, having formed an attachment for a neighbor's daughter--for somereason, not deemed a suitable match by his father--he was severelyreprimanded, warned to discontinue his visits, and threatened with somedisgraceful punishment in case he persisted. As the girl was not onlybeautiful, but amiable--though, as will be seen, rather weak--and herfamily as respectable as any, though unfortunately but poor, Israeldeemed his father's conduct unreasonable and oppressive; particularly asit turned out that he had taken secret means to thwart his son with thegirl's connections, if not with the girl herself, so as to place almostinsurmountable obstacles to an eventual marriage. For it had not beenthe purpose of Israel to marry at once, but at a future day, whenprudence should approve the step. So, oppressed by his father, andbitterly disappointed in his love, the desperate boy formed thedetermination to quit them both for another home and other friends. 

It was on Sunday, while the family were gone to a farmhouse church nearby, that he packed up as much of his clothing as might be contained in ahandkerchief, which, with a small quantity of provision, he hid in apiece of woods in the rear of the house. He then returned, and continuedin the house till about nine in the evening, when, pretending to go tobed, he passed out of a back door, and hastened to the woods for hisbundle. 

It was a sultry night in July; and that he might travel with the moreease on the succeeding day, he lay down at the foot of a pine tree, reposing himself till an hour before dawn, when, upon awaking, he heardthe soft, prophetic sighing of the pine, stirred by the first breath ofthe morning. Like the leaflets of that evergreen, all the fibres of hisheart trembled within him; tears fell from his eyes. But he thought ofthe tyranny of his father, and what seemed to him the faithlessness ofhis love; and shouldering his bundle, arose, and marched on. 

His intention was to reach the new countries to the northward andwestward, lying between the Dutch settlements on the Hudson, and theYankee settlements on the Housatonic. This was mainly to elude allsearch. For the same reason, for the first ten or twelve miles, shunning the public roads, he travelled through the woods; for he knewthat he would soon be missed and pursued. 

He reached his destination in safety; hired out to a farmer for a monththrough the harvest; then crossed from the Hudson to the Connecticut. Meeting here with an adventurer to the unknown regions lying about thehead waters of the latter river, he ascended with this man in a canoe, paddling and pulling for many miles. Here again he hired himself out forthree months; at the end of that time to receive for his wages twohundred acres of land lying in New Hampshire. The cheapness of the landwas not alone owing to the newness of the country, but to the perilsinvesting it. Not only was it a wilderness abounding with wild beasts, but the widely-scattered inhabitants were in continual dread of being, at some unguarded moment, destroyed or made captive by the Canadiansavages, who, ever since the French war, had improved every opportunityto make forays across the defenceless frontier. 

His employer proving false to his contract in the matter of the land, and there being no law in the country to force him to fulfil it, Israel--who, however brave-hearted, and even much of a dare-devil upon apinch, seems nevertheless to have evinced, throughout many parts of hiscareer, a singular patience and mildness--was obliged to look round forother means of livelihood than clearing out a farm for himself in thewilderness. A party of royal surveyors were at this period surveying theunsettled regions bordering the Connecticut river to its source. Atfifteen shillings per month, he engaged himself to this party asassistant chain-bearer, little thinking that the day was to come when heshould clank the king's chains in a dungeon, even as now he trailed thema free ranger of the woods. It was midwinter; the land was surveyed uponsnow-shoes. At the close of the day, fires were kindled with dryhemlock, a hut thrown up, and the party ate and slept. 

Paid off at last, Israel bought a gun and ammunition, and turnedhunter. Deer, beaver, etc. , were plenty. In two or three months he hadmany skins to show. I suppose it never entered his mind that he was thusqualifying himself for a marksman of men. But thus were tutored thosewonderful shots who did such execution at Bunker's Hill; these, thehunter-soldiers, whom Putnam bade wait till the white of the enemy's eyewas seen. 

With the result of his hunting he purchased a hundred acres of land, further down the river, toward the more settled parts; built himself alog hut, and in two summers, with his own hands, cleared thirty acresfor sowing. In the winter seasons he hunted and trapped. At the end ofthe two years, he sold back his land--now much improved--to the originalowner, at an advance of fifty pounds. He conveyed his cash and furs toCharlestown, on the Connecticut (sometimes called No. 4), where hetrafficked them away for Indian blankets, pigments, and other showyarticles adapted to the business of a trader among savages. It was nowwinter again. Putting his goods on a hand-sled, he started towardsCanada, a peddler in the wilderness, stopping at wigwams instead ofcottages. One fancies that, had it been summer, Israel would havetravelled with a wheelbarrow, and so trundled his wares through theprimeval forests, with the same indifference as porters roll theirbarrows over the flagging of streets. In this way was bred that fearlessself-reliance and independence which conducted our forefathers tonational freedom. 

This Canadian trip proved highly successful. Selling his glitteringgoods at a great advance, he received in exchange valuable peltries andfurs at a corresponding reduction. Returning to Charlestown, he disposedof his return cargo again at a very fine profit. And now, with a lightheart and a heavy purse, he resolved to visit his sweetheart andparents, of whom, for three years, he had had no tidings. 

They were not less astonished than delighted at his reappearance; he hadbeen numbered with the dead. But his love still seemed strangely coy;willing, but yet somehow mysteriously withheld. The old intrigues werestill on foot. Israel soon discovered, that though rejoiced to welcomethe return of the prodigal son--so some called him--his father stillremained inflexibly determined against the match, and still inexplicablycountermined his wooing. With a dolorous heart he mildly yielded to whatseemed his fatality; and more intrepid in facing peril for himself, thanin endangering others by maintaining his rights (for he was nowone-and-twenty), resolved once more to retreat, and quit his blue hillsfor the bluer billows. 

A hermitage in the forest is the refuge of the narrow-mindedmisanthrope; a hammock on the ocean is the asylum for the generousdistressed. The ocean brims with natural griefs and tragedies; and intothat watery immensity of terror, man's private grief is lost like adrop. 

Travelling on foot to Providence, Rhode Island, Israel shipped on boarda sloop, bound with lime to the West Indies. On the tenth day out, thevessel caught fire, from water communicating with the lime. It wasimpossible to extinguish the flames. The boat was hoisted out, but owingto long exposure to the sun, it needed continual bailing to keep itafloat. They had only time to put in a firkin of butter and a ten-gallonkeg of water. Eight in number, the crew entrusted themselves to thewaves, in a leaky tub, many leagues from land. As the boat swept underthe burning bowsprit, Israel caught at a fragment of the flying-jib, which sail had fallen down the stay, owing to the charring, nigh thedeck, of the rope which hoisted it. Tanned with the smoke, and its edgeblackened with the fire, this bit of canvass helped them bravely ontheir way. Thanks to kind Providence, on the second day they were pickedup by a Dutch ship, bound from Eustatia to Holland. The castaways werehumanely received, and supplied with every necessary. At the end of aweek, while unsophisticated Israel was sitting in the maintop, thinkingwhat should befall him in Holland, and wondering what sort of unsettled, wild country it was, and whether there was any deer-shooting orbeaver-trapping there, lo! an American brig, bound from Piscataqua toAntigua, comes in sight. The American took them aboard, and conveyedthem safely to her port. There Israel shipped for Porto Rico; fromthence, sailed to Eustatia. 

Other rovings ensued; until at last, entering on board a Nantucket ship, he hunted the leviathan off the Western Islands and on the coast ofAfrica, for sixteen months; returning at length to Nantucket with abrimming hold. From that island he sailed again on another whalingvoyage, extending, this time, into the great South Sea. There, promotedto be harpooner, Israel, whose eye and arm had been so improved bypractice with his gun in the wilderness, now further intensified hisaim, by darting the whale-lance; still, unwittingly, preparing himselffor the Bunker Hill rifle. 

In this last voyage, our adventurer experienced to the extreme all thehardships and privations of the whaleman's life on a long voyage todistant and barbarous waters--hardships and privations unknown at thepresent day, when science has so greatly contributed, in manifold ways, to lessen the sufferings, and add to the comforts of seafaring men. Heartily sick of the ocean, and longing once more for the bush, Israel, upon receiving his discharge at Nantucket at the end of the voyage, hiedstraight back for his mountain home. 

But if hopes of his sweetheart winged his returning flight, such hopeswere not destined to be crowned with fruition. The dear, false girl wasanother's. 

CHAPTER III. 

ISRAEL GOES TO THE WARS; AND REACHING BUNKER HILL IN TIME TO BE OFSERVICE THERE, SOON AFTER IS FORCED TO EXTEND HIS TRAVELS ACROSS THE SEAINTO THE ENEMY'S LAND. 

Left to idle lamentations, Israel might now have planted deep furrows inhis brow. But stifling his pain, he chose rather to plough, than beploughed. Farming weans man from his sorrows. That tranquil pursuittolerates nothing but tranquil meditations. There, too, in mother earth, you may plant and reap; not, as in other things, plant and see theplanting torn up by the roots. But if wandering in the wilderness, andwandering upon the waters, if felling trees, and hunting, and shipwreck, and fighting with whales, and all his other strange adventures, had notas yet cured poor Israel of his now hopeless passion, events were athand for ever to drown it. 

It was the year 1774. The difficulties long pending between the coloniesand England were arriving at their crisis. Hostilities were certain. TheAmericans were preparing themselves. Companies were formed in most ofthe New England towns, whose members, receiving the name of minute-men, stood ready to march anywhere at a minute's warning. Israel, for thelast eight months, sojourning as a laborer on a farm in Windsor, enrolled himself in the regiment of Colonel John Patterson of Lenox, afterwards General Patterson. 

The battle of Lexington was fought on the 18th of April, 1775; news ofit arrived in the county of Berkshire on the 20th about noon. The nextmorning at sunrise, Israel swung his knapsack, shouldered his musket, and, with Patterson's regiment, was on the march, quickstep, towardsBoston. 

Like Putnam, Israel received the stirring tidings at the plough. Butalthough not less willing than Putnam to fly to battle at an instant'snotice, yet--only half an acre of the field remaining to be finished--hewhipped up his team and finished it. Before hastening to one duty, hewould not leave a prior one undone; and ere helping to whip the British, for a little practice' sake, he applied the gad to his oxen. From thefield of the farmer, he rushed to that of the soldier, mingling hisblood with his sweat. While we revel in broadcloth, let us not forgetwhat we owe to linsey-woolsey. 

With other detachments from various quarters, Israel's regiment remainedencamped for several days in the vicinity of Charlestown. On theseventeenth of June, one thousand Americans, including the regiment ofPatterson, were set about fortifying Bunker's Hill. Working all throughthe night, by dawn of the following day, the redoubt was thrown up. Butevery one knows all about the battle. Suffice it, that Israel was oneof those marksmen whom Putnam harangued as touching the enemy's eyes. Forbearing as he was with his oppressive father and unfaithful love, andmild as he was on the farm, Israel was not the same at Bunker Hill. Putnam had enjoined the men to aim at the officers; so Israel aimedbetween the golden epaulettes, as, in the wilderness, he had aimedbetween the branching antlers. With dogged disdain of their foes, theEnglish grenadiers marched up the hill with sullen slowness; thusfurnishing still surer aims to the muskets which bristled on theredoubt. Modest Israel was used to aver, that considering his practicein the woods, he could hardly be regarded as an inexperienced marksman;hinting, that every shot which the epauletted grenadiers received fromhis rifle, would, upon a different occasion, have procured him adeerskin. And like stricken deers the English, rashly brave as theywere, fled from the opening fire. But the marksman's ammunition wasexpended; a hand-to-hand encounter ensued. Not one American musket intwenty had a bayonet to it. So, wielding the stock right and left, theterrible farmers, with hats and coats off, fought their way among thefurred grenadiers, knocking them right and left, as seal-hunters on thebeach knock down with their clubs the Shetland seal. In the dense crowdand confusion, while Israel's musket got interlocked, he saw a bladehorizontally menacing his feet from the ground. Thinking some fallenenemy sought to strike him at the last gasp, dropping his hold on hismusket, he wrenched at the steel, but found that though a brave handheld it, that hand was powerless for ever. It was some Britishofficer's laced sword-arm, cut from the trunk in the act of fighting, refusing to yield up its blade to the last. At that moment another swordwas aimed at Israel's head by a living officer. In an instant the blowwas parried by kindred steel, and the assailant fell by a brother'sweapon, wielded by alien hands. But Israel did not come off unscathed. Acut on the right arm near the elbow, received in parrying the officer'sblow, a long slit across the chest, a musket ball buried in his hip, andanother mangling him near the ankle of the same leg, were the tokens ofintrepidity which our Sicinius Dentatus carried from this memorablefield. Nevertheless, with his comrades he succeeded in reaching ProspectHill, and from thence was conveyed to the hospital at Cambridge. Thebullet was extracted, his lesser wounds were dressed, and after muchsuffering from the fracture of the bone near the ankle, several piecesof which were extracted by the surgeon, ere long, thanks to the highhealth and pure blood of the farmer, Israel rejoined his regiment whenthey were throwing up intrenchments on Prospect Hill. Bunker Hill wasnow in possession of the foe, who in turn had fortified it. 

On the third of July, Washington arrived from the South to take thecommand. Israel witnessed his joyful reception by the huzzaingcompanies. 

The British now quartered in Boston suffered greatly from the scarcityof provisions. Washington took every precaution to prevent theirreceiving a supply. Inland, all aid could easily be cut off. To guardagainst their receiving any by water, from tories and other disaffectedpersons, the General equipped three armed vessels to intercept alltraitorous cruisers. Among them was the brigantine Washington, of tenguns, commanded by Captain Martiedale. Seamen were hard to be had. Thesoldiers were called upon to volunteer for these vessels. Israel was onewho so did; thinking that as an experienced sailor he should not bebackward in a juncture like this, little as he fancied the new serviceassigned. 

Three days out of Boston harbor, the brigantine was captured by theenemy's ship Foy, of twenty guns. Taken prisoner with the rest of thecrew, Israel was afterwards put on board the frigate Tartar, withimmediate sailing orders for England. Seventy-two were captives in thisvessel. Headed by Israel, these men--half way across the sea--formed ascheme to take the ship, but were betrayed by a renegade Englishman. Asringleader, Israel was put in irons, and so remained till the frigateanchored at Portsmouth. There he was brought on deck; and would have metperhaps some terrible fate, had it not come out, during the examination, that the Englishman had been a deserter from the army of his nativecountry ere proving a traitor to his adopted one. Relieved of his irons, Israel was placed in the marine hospital on shore, where half of theprisoners took the small-pox, which swept off a third of their number. Why talk of Jaffa?

From the hospital the survivors were conveyed to Spithead, and thrust onboard a hulk. And here in the black bowels of the ship, sunk low in thesunless sea, our poor Israel lay for a month, like Jonah in the bellyof the whale. 

But one bright morning, Israel is hailed from the deck. A bargeman ofthe commander's boat is sick. Known for a sailor, Israel for the nonceis appointed to pull the absent man's oar. 

The officers being landed, some of the crew propose, like merryEnglishmen as they are, to hie to a neighboring ale-house, and have acosy pot or two together. Agreed. They start, and Israel with them. Asthey enter the ale-house door, our prisoner is suddenly reminded ofstill more imperative calls. Unsuspected of any design, he is allowed toleave the party for a moment. No sooner does Israel see his companionshoused, than putting speed into his feet, and letting grow all hiswings, he starts like a deer. He runs four miles (so he afterwardsaffirmed) without halting. He sped towards London; wisely deeming thatonce in that crowd detection would be impossible. 

Ten miles, as he computed, from where he had left the bargemen, leisurely passing a public house of a little village on the roadside, thinking himself now pretty safe--hark, what is this he hears?--

"Ahoy!"

"No ship, " says Israel, hurrying on. 

"Stop. "

"If you will attend to your business, I will endeavor to attend tomine, " replies Israel coolly. And next minute he lets grow his wingsagain; flying, one dare say, at the rate of something less than thirtymiles an hour. 

"Stop thief!" is now the cry. Numbers rushed from the roadside houses. After a mile's chase, the poor panting deer is caught. 

Finding it was no use now to prevaricate, Israel boldly confesseshimself a prisoner-of-war. The officer, a good fellow as it turned out, had him escorted back to the inn; where, observing to the landlord thatthis must needs be a true-blooded Yankee, he calls for liquors torefresh Israel after his run. Two soldiers are then appointed to guardhim for the present. This was towards evening; and up to a late hour atnight, the inn was filled with strangers crowding to see the Yankeerebel, as they politely termed him. These honest rustics seemed to thinkthat Yankees were a sort of wild creatures, a species of 'possum orkangaroo. But Israel is very affable with them. That liquor he drankfrom the hand of his foe, has perhaps warmed his heart towards all therest of his enemies. Yet this may not be wholly so. We shall see. At anyrate, still he keeps his eye on the main chance--escape. Neither thejokes nor the insults of the mob does he suffer to molest him. He iscogitating a little plot to himself. 

It seems that the good officer--not more true to the king his masterthan indulgent towards the prisoner which that same loyalty made--hadleft orders that Israel should be supplied with whatever liquor hewanted that night. So, calling for the can again and again, Israelinvites the two soldiers to drink and be merry. At length, a wag of thecompany proposes that Israel should entertain the public with a jig, he(the wag) having heard that the Yankees were extraordinary dancers. Afiddle is brought in, and poor Israel takes the floor. Not a little cutto think that these people should so unfeelingly seek to be diverted atthe expense of an unfortunate prisoner, Israel, while jigging it up anddown, still conspires away at his private plot, resolving ere long togive the enemy a touch of certain Yankee steps, as yet undreamed of intheir simple philosophy. They would not permit any cessation of hisdancing till he had danced himself into a perfect sweat, so that thedrops fell from his lank and flaxen hair. But Israel, with much of thegentleness of the dove, is not wholly without the wisdom of the serpent. Pleased to see the flowing bowl, he congratulates himself that his ownstate of perspiration prevents it from producing any intoxicating effectupon him. 

Late at night the company break up. Furnished with a pair of handcuffs, the prisoner is laid on a blanket spread upon the floor at the side ofthe bed in which his two keepers are to repose. Expressing muchgratitude for the blanket, with apparent unconcern, Israel stretches hislegs. An hour or two passes. All is quiet without. 

The important moment had now arrived. Certain it was, that if thischance were suffered to pass unimproved, a second would hardly presentitself. For early, doubtless, on the following morning, if not some wayprevented, the two soldiers would convey Israel back to his floatingprison, where he would thenceforth remain confined until the close ofthe war; years and years, perhaps. When he thought of that horrible oldhulk, his nerves were restrung for flight. But intrepid as he must be tocompass it, wariness too was needed. His keepers had gone to bed prettywell under the influence of the liquor. This was favorable. But still, they were full-grown, strong men; and Israel was handcuffed. So Israelresolved upon strategy first; and if that failed, force afterwards. Heeagerly listened. One of the drunken soldiers muttered in his sleep, atfirst lowly, then louder and louder, --"Catch 'em! Grapple 'em! Have at'em! Ha--long cutlasses! Take that, runaway!"

"What's the matter with ye, Phil?" hiccoughed the other, who was not yetasleep. "Keep quiet, will ye? Ye ain't at Fontenoy now. "

"He's a runaway prisoner, I say. Catch him, catch him!"

"Oh, stush with your drunken dreaming, " again hiccoughed his comrade, violently nudging him. "This comes o' carousing. "

Shortly after, the dreamer with loud snores fell back into dead sleep. But by something in the sound of the breathing of the other soldier, Israel knew that this man remained uneasily awake. He deliberated amoment what was best to do. At length he determined upon trying his oldplea. Calling upon the two soldiers, he informed them that urgentnecessity required his immediate presence somewhere in the rear of thehouse. 

"Come, wake up here, Phil, " roared the soldier who was awake; "thefellow here says he must step out; cuss these Yankees; no betteredication than to be gettin' up on nateral necessities at this timeo'night. It ain't nateral; its unnateral. D---n ye, Yankee, don't yeknow no better?"

With many more denunciations, the two now staggered to their feet, andclutching hold of Israel, escorted him down stairs, and through a long, narrow, dark entry; rearward, till they came to a door. No soonerwas this unbolted by the foremost guard, than, quick as a flash, manacled Israel, shaking off the grasp of the one behind him, butts himsprawling back into the entry; when, dashing in the opposite direction, he bounces the other head over heels into the garden, never using ahand; and then, leaping over the latter's head, darts blindly out intothe midnight. Next moment he was at the garden wall. No outlet wasdiscoverable in the gloom. But a fruit-tree grew close to the wall. Springing into it desperately, handcuffed as he was, Israel leaps atopof the barrier, and without pausing to see where he is, drops himself tothe ground on the other side, and once more lets grow all his wings. Meantime, with loud outcries, the two baffled drunkards gropedeliriously about in the garden. 

After running two or three miles, and hearing no sound of pursuit, Israel reins up to rid himself of the handcuffs, which impede him. Aftermuch painful labor he succeeds in the attempt. Pressing on again withall speed, day broke, revealing a trim-looking, hedged, and beautifulcountry, soft, neat, and serene, all colored with the fresh early tintsof the spring of 1776. 

Bless me, thought Israel, all of a tremble, I shall certainly be caughtnow; I have broken into some nobleman's park. 

But, hurrying forward again, he came to a turnpike road, and then knewthat, all comely and shaven as it was, this was simply the open countryof England; one bright, broad park, paled in with white foam of thesea. A copse skirting the road was just bursting out into bud. Eachunrolling leaf was in very act of escaping from its prison. Israellooked at the budding leaves, and round on the budding sod, and up atthe budding dawn of the day. He was so sad, and these sights were sogay, that Israel sobbed like a child, while thoughts of his mountainhome rushed like a wind on his heart. But conquering this fit, hemarched on, and presently passed nigh a field, where two figures wereworking. They had rosy cheeks, short, sturdy legs, showing the bluestocking nearly to the knee, and were clad in long, coarse, whitefrocks, and had on coarse, broad-brimmed straw hats. Their faces werepartly averted. 

"Please, ladies, " half roguishly says Israel, taking off his hat, "doesthis road go to London?"

At this salutation, the two figures turned in a sort of stupidamazement, causing an almost corresponding expression in Israel, who nowperceived that they were men, and not women. He had mistaken them, owingto their frocks, and their wearing no pantaloons, only breeches hiddenby their frocks. 

"Beg pardon, ladies, but I thought ye were something else, " said Israelagain. 

Once more the two figures stared at the stranger, and with addedboorishness of surprise. 

"Does this road go to London, gentlemen?"

"Gentlemen--egad!" cried one of the two. 

"Egad!" echoed the second. 

Putting their hoes before them, the two frocked boors now took a goodlong look at Israel, meantime scratching their heads under their plaitedstraw hats. 

"Does it, gentlemen? Does it go to London? Be kind enough to tell a poorfellow, do. "

"Yees goin' to Lunnun, are yees? Weel--all right--go along. "

And without another word, having now satisfied their rustic curiosity, the two human steers, with wonderful phlegm, applied themselves to theirhoes; supposing, no doubt, that they had given all requisiteinformation. 

Shortly after, Israel passed an old, dark, mossy-looking chapel, itsroof all plastered with the damp yellow dead leaves of the previousautumn, showered there from a close cluster of venerable trees, withgreat trunks, and overstretching branches. Next moment he found himselfentering a village. The silence of early morning rested upon it. But fewfigures were seen. Glancing through the window of a now noiselesspublic-house, Israel saw a table all in disorder, covered with emptyflagons, and tobacco-ashes, and long pipes; some of the latter broken. 

After pausing here a moment, he moved on, and observed a man over theway standing still and watching him. Instantly Israel was reminded thathe had on the dress of an English sailor, and that it was this probablywhich had arrested the stranger's attention. Well knowing that hispeculiar dress exposed him to peril, he hurried on faster to escape thevillage; resolving at the first opportunity to change his garments. Erelong, in a secluded place about a mile from the village, he saw an oldditcher tottering beneath the weight of a pick-axe, hoe and shovel, going to his work; the very picture of poverty, toil and distress. Hisclothes were tatters. 

Making up to this old man, Israel, after a word or two of salutation, offered to change clothes with him. As his own clothes were prince-likecompared to the ditchers, Israel thought that however much hisproposition might excite the suspicion of the ditcher, yet self-interestwould prevent his communicating the suspicions. To be brief, the twowent behind a hedge, and presently Israel emerged, presenting the mostforlorn appearance conceivable; while the old ditcher hobbled off in anopposite direction, correspondingly improved in his aspect; though itwas rather ludicrous than otherwise, owing to the immense bagginess ofthe sailor-trowsers flapping about his lean shanks, to say nothing ofthe spare voluminousness of the pea-jacket. But Israel--how deplorable, how dismal his plight! Little did he ween that these wretched rags henow wore, were but suitable to that long career of destitution beforehim: one brief career of adventurous wanderings; and then, forty torpidyears of pauperism. The coat was all patches. And no two patches werealike, and no one patch was the color of the original cloth. Thestringless breeches gaped wide open at the knee; the long woollenstockings looked as if they had been set up at some time for a target. Israel looked suddenly metamorphosed from youth to old age; just like anold man of eighty he looked. But, indeed, dull, dreary adversity was nowin store for him; and adversity, come it at eighteen or eighty, is thetrue old age of man. The dress befitted the fate. 

From the friendly old ditcher, Israel learned the exact course he muststeer for London; distant now between seventy and eighty miles. He wasalso apprised by his venerable friend, that the country was filled withsoldiers on the constant look-out for deserters whether from the navy orarmy, for the capture of whom a stipulated reward was given, just as inMassachusetts at that time for prowling bears. 

Having solemnly enjoined his old friend not to give any information, should any one he meet inquire for such a person as Israel, ouradventurer walked briskly on, less heavy of heart, now that he feltcomparatively safe in disguise. 

Thirty miles were travelled that day. At night Israel stole into a barn, in hopes of finding straw or hay for a bed. But it was spring; all thehay and straw were gone. So after groping about in the dark, he was fainto content himself with an undressed sheep-skin. Cold, hungry, foot-sore, weary, and impatient for the morning dawn, Israel drearilydozed out the night. 

By the first peep of day coming through the chinks of the barn, he wasup and abroad. Ere long finding himself in the suburbs of a considerablevillage, the better to guard against detection he supplied himself witha rude crutch, and feigning himself a cripple, hobbled straight throughthe town, followed by a perverse-minded cur, which kept up a continual, spiteful, suspicious bark. Israel longed to have one good rap at himwith his crutch, but thought it would hardly look in character for apoor old cripple to be vindictive. 

A few miles further, and he came to a second village. While hobblingthrough its main street, as through the former one, he was suddenlystopped by a genuine cripple, all in tatters, too, who, with asympathetic air, inquired after the cause of his lameness. 

"White swelling, " says Israel. 

"That's just my ailing, " wheezed the other; "but you're lamer than me, "he added with a forlorn sort of self-satisfaction, critically eyeingIsrael's limp as once, more he stumped on his way, not liking to tarrytoo long. 

"But halloo, what's your hurry, friend?" seeing Israel fairlydeparting--"where're you going?"

"To London, " answered Israel, turning round, heartily wishing the oldfellow any where else than present. 

"Going to limp to Lunnun, eh? Well, success to ye. "

"As much to you, sir, " answers Israel politely. 

Nigh the opposite suburbs of this village, as good fortune would haveit, an empty baggage-wagon bound for the metropolis turned into the mainroad from a side one. Immediately Israel limps most deplorably, and begsthe driver to give a poor cripple a lift. So up he climbs; but after atime, finding the gait of the elephantine draught-horses intolerablyslow, Israel craves permission to dismount, when, throwing away hiscrutch, he takes nimbly to his legs, much to the surprise of his honestfriend the driver. 

The only advantage, if any, derived from his trip in the wagon, was, when passing through a third village--but a little distant from theprevious one--Israel, by lying down in the wagon, had wholly avoidedbeing seen. 

The villages surprised him by their number and proximity. Nothing likethis was to be seen at home. Well knowing that in these villages he ranmuch more risk of detection than in the open country, he henceforth didhis best to avoid them, by taking a roundabout course whenever they camein sight from a distance. This mode of travelling not only lengthenedhis journey, but put unlooked-for obstacles in his path--walls, ditches, and streams. 

Not half an hour after throwing away his crutch, he leaped a great ditchten feet wide, and of undiscoverable muddy depth. I wonder if the oldcripple would think me the lamer one now, thought Israel to himself, arriving on the hither side. 

CHAPTER IV. 

FURTHER WANDERINGS OF THE REFUGEE, WITH SOME ACCOUNT OF A GOOD KNIGHT OFBRENTFORD WHO BEFRIENDED HIM. 

At nightfall, on the third day, Israel had arrived within sixteen milesof the capital. Once more he sought refuge in a barn. This time he foundsome hay, and flinging himself down procured a tolerable night's rest. 

Bright and early he arose refreshed, with the pleasing prospect ofreaching his destination ere noon. Encouraged to find himself now so farfrom his original pursuers, Israel relaxed in his vigilance, and aboutten o'clock, while passing through the town of Staines, suddenlyencountered three soldiers. Unfortunately in exchanging clothes with theditcher, he could not bring himself to include his shirt in the traffic, which shirt was a British navy shirt, a bargeman's shirt, and thoughhitherto he had crumpled the blue collar ought of sight, yet, as itappeared in the present instance, it was not thoroughly concealed. Atany rate, keenly on the look-out for deserters, and made acute by hopesof reward for their apprehension, the soldiers spied the fatal collar, and in an instant laid violent hands on the refugee. 

"Hey, lad!" said the foremost soldier, a corporal, "you are one of hismajesty's seamen! come along with ye. "

So, unable to give any satisfactory account of himself, he was madeprisoner on the spot, and soon after found himself handcuffed and lockedup in the Bound House of the place, a prison so called, appropriated torunaways, and those convicted of minor offences. Day passed dinnerlessand supperless in this dismal durance, and night came on. 

Israel had now been three days without food, except one two-penny loaf. The cravings of hunger now became sharper; his spirits, hitherto arminghim with fortitude, began to forsake him. Taken captive once again uponthe very brink of reaching his goal, poor Israel was on the eve offalling into helpless despair. But he rallied, and considering thatgrief would only add to his calamity, sought with stubborn patience tohabituate himself to misery, but still hold aloof from despondency. Heroused himself, and began to bethink him how to be extricated from thislabyrinth. 

Two hours sawing across the grating of the window, ridded him of hishandcuffs. Next came the door, secured luckily with only a hasp andpadlock. Thrusting the bolt of his handcuffs through a small window inthe door, he succeeded in forcing the hasp and regaining his libertyabout three o'clock in the morning. 

Not long after sunrise, he passed nigh Brentford, some six or sevenmiles from the capital. So great was his hunger that downrightstarvation seemed before him. He chewed grass, and swallowed it. Uponfirst escaping from the hulk, six English pennies was all the money hehad. With two of these he had bought a small loaf the day after fleeingthe inn. The other four still remained in his pocket, not having metwith a good opportunity to dispose of them for food. 

Having torn off the collar of his shirt, and flung it into a hedge, heventured to accost a respectable carpenter at a pale fence, about a milethis side of Brentford, to whom his deplorable situation now induced himto apply for work. The man did not wish himself to hire, but said thatif he (Israel) understood farming or gardening, he might perhaps procurework from Sir John Millet, whose seat, he said, was not remote. He addedthat the knight was in the habit of employing many men at that season ofthe year, so he stood a fair chance. 

Revived a little by this prospect of relief, Israel starts in quest ofthe gentleman's seat, agreeably to the direction received. But hemistook his way, and proceeding up a gravelled and beautifully decoratedwalk, was terrified at catching a glimpse of a number of soldiersthronging a garden. He made an instant retreat before being espied inturn. No wild creature of the American wilderness could have been morepanic-struck by a firebrand, than at this period hunted Israel was by ared coat. It afterwards appeared that this garden was the PrincessAmelia's. 

Taking another path, ere long he came to some laborers shovellinggravel. These proved to be men employed by Sir John. By them he wasdirected towards the house, when the knight was pointed out to him, walking bare-headed in the inclosure with several guests. Having heardthe rich men of England charged with all sorts of domineering qualities, Israel felt no little misgiving in approaching to an audience with soimposing a stranger. But, screwing up his courage, he advanced; whileseeing him coming all rags and tatters, the group of gentlemen stood insome wonder awaiting what so singular a phantom might want. 

"Mr. Millet, " said Israel, bowing towards the bare-headed gentleman. 

"Ha, --who are you, pray?"

"A poor fellow, sir, in want of work. "

"A wardrobe, too, I should say, " smiled one of the guests, of a veryyouthful, prosperous, and dandified air. 

"Where's your hoe?" said Sir John. 

"I have none, sir. "

"Any money to buy one?"

"Only four English pennies, sir. "

"_English_ pennies. What other sort would you have?"

"Why, China pennies to be sure, " laughed the youthful gentleman. "Seehis long, yellow hair behind; he looks like a Chinaman. Some broken-downMandarin. Pity he's no crown to his old hat; if he had, he might pass itround, and make eight pennies of his four. "

"Will you hire me, Mr. Millet, " said Israel. 

"Ha! that's queer again, " cried the knight. 

"Hark ye, fellow, " said a brisk servant, approaching from the porch, "this is Sir John Millet. "

Seeming to take pity on his seeming ignorance, as well as on hisundisputable poverty, the good knight now told Israel that if he wouldcome the next morning he would see him supplied with a hoe, and moreoverwould hire him. 

It would be hard to express the satisfaction of the wanderer atreceiving this encouraging reply. Emboldened by it, he now returnstowards a baker's he had spied, and bravely marching in, flings down allfour pennies, and demands bread. Thinking he would not have any morefood till next morning, Israel resolved to eat only one of the pair oftwo-penny loaves. But having demolished one, it so sharpened his longing, that yielding to the irresistible temptation, he bolted down the secondloaf to keep the other company. 

After resting under a hedge, he saw the sun far descended, and soprepared himself for another hard night. Waiting till dark, he crawledinto an old carriage-house, finding nothing there but a dismantled oldphaeton. Into this he climbed, and curling himself up like acarriage-dog, endeavored to sleep; but, unable to endure the constraintof such a bed, got out, and stretched himself on the bare boards of thefloor. 

No sooner was light in the east than he fastened to await the commandsof one who, his instinct told him, was destined to prove his benefactor. On his father's farm accustomed to rise with the lark, Israel wassurprised to discover, as he approached the house, that no soul wasastir. It was four o'clock. For a considerable time he walked back andforth before the portal ere any one appeared. The first riser was a manservant of the household, who informed Israel that seven o'clock was thehour the people went to their work. Soon after he met an hostler of theplace, who gave him permission to lie on some straw in an outhouse. There he enjoyed a sweet sleep till awakened at seven o'clock by thesounds of activity around him. 

Supplied by the overseer of the men with a large iron fork and a hoe, he followed the hands into the field. He was so weak he could hardlysupport his tools. Unwilling to expose his debility, he yet could notsucceed in concealing it. At last, to avoid worse imputations, heconfessed the cause. His companions regarded him with compassion, andexempted him from the severer toil. 

About noon the knight visited his workmen. Noticing that Israel madelittle progress, he said to him, that though he had long arms and broadshoulders, yet he was feigning himself to be a very weak man, orotherwise must in reality be so. 

Hereupon one of the laborers standing by informed the gentleman how itwas with Israel, when immediately the knight put a shilling into hishands and bade him go to a little roadside inn, which was nearer thanthe house, and buy him bread and a pot of beer. Thus refreshed hereturned to the band, and toiled with them till four o'clock, when theday's work was over. 

Arrived at the house he there again saw his employer, who, afterattentively eyeing him without speaking, bade a meal be prepared forhim, when the maid presenting a smaller supply than her kind masterdeemed necessary, she was ordered to return and bring out the entiredish. But aware of the danger of sudden repletion of heavy food to onein his condition, Israel, previously recruited by the frugal meal at theinn, partook but sparingly. The repast was spread on the grass, andbeing over, the good knight again looking inquisitively at Israel, ordered a comfortable bed to be laid in the barn, and here Israel spenta capital night. 

After breakfast, next morning, he was proceeding to go with the laborersto their work, when his employer approaching him with a benevolent air, bade him return to his couch, and there remain till he had slept hisfill, and was in a better state to resume his labors. 

Upon coming forth again a little after noon, he found Sir John walkingalone in the grounds. Upon discovering him, Israel would have retreated, fearing that he might intrude; but beckoning him to advance, the knight, as Israel drew nigh, fixed on him such a penetrating glance, that ourpoor hero quaked to the core. Neither was his dread of detectionrelieved by the knight's now calling in a loud voice for one from thehouse. Israel was just on the point of fleeing, when overhearing thewords of the master to the servant who now appeared, all dread departed:

"Bring hither some wine!"

It presently came; by order of the knight the salver was set down on agreen bank near by, and the servant retired. 

"My poor fellow, " said Sir John, now pouring out a glass of wine, andhanding it to Israel, "I perceive that you are an American; and, if Iam not mistaken, you are an escaped prisoner of war. But no fear--drinkthe wine. "

"Mr. Millet, " exclaimed Israel aghast, the untasted wine trembling inhis hand, "Mr. Millet, I--"

"_Mr_. Millet--there it is again. Why don't you say _Sir John_ like therest?"

"Why, sir--pardon me--but somehow, I can't. I've tried; but I can't. Youwon't betray me for that?"

"Betray--poor fellow! Hark ye, your history is doubtless a secret whichyou would not wish to divulge to a stranger; but whatever happens toyou, I pledge you my honor I will never betray you. "

"God bless you for that, Mr. Millet. "

"Come, come; call me by my right name. I am not Mr. Millet. _You_ havesaid _Sir_ to me; and no doubt you have a thousand times said _John_ toother people. Now can't you couple the two? Try once. Come. Only _Sir_and then _John_--_Sir John_--that's all. "

"John--I can't--Sir, sir!--your pardon. I didn't mean that. "

"My good fellow, " said the knight looking sharply upon Israel, "tell me, are all your countrymen like you? If so, it's no use fighting them. Tothat effect, I must write to his Majesty myself. Well, I excuse you fromSir Johnning me. But tell me the truth, are you not a seafaring man, andlately a prisoner of war?"

Israel frankly confessed it, and told his whole story. The knightlistened with much interest; and at its conclusion, warned Israel tobeware of the soldiers; for owing to the seats of some of the royalfamily being in the neighborhood, the red-coats abounded hereabout. 

"I do not wish unnecessarily to speak against my own countrymen, " headded, "I but plainly speak for your good. The soldiers you meetprowling on the roads, are not fair specimens of the army. They are aset of mean, dastardly banditti, who, to obtain their fee, would betraytheir best friends. Once more, I warn you against them. But enough;follow me now to the house, and as you tell me you have exchangedclothes before now, you can do it again. What say you? I will give youcoat and breeches for your rags. "

Thus generously supplied with clothes and other comforts by the goodknight, and implicitly relying upon the honor of so kind-hearted a man, Israel cheered up, and in the course of two or three weeks had sofattened his flanks, that he was able completely to fill Sir John's oldbuckskin breeches, which at first had hung but loosely about him. 

He was assigned to an occupation which removed him from the otherworkmen. The strawberry bed was put under his sole charge. And often, ofmild, sunny afternoons, the knight, genial and gentle with dinner, wouldstroll bare-headed to the pleasant strawberry bed, and have nice littleconfidential chats with Israel; while Israel, charmed by the patriarchaldemeanor of this true Abrahamic gentleman, with a smile on his lip, andtears of gratitude in his eyes, offered him, from time to time, theplumpest berries of the bed. 

When the strawberry season was over, other parts of the grounds wereassigned him. And so six months elapsed, when, at the recommendation ofSir John, Israel procured a good berth in the garden of the PrincessAmelia. 

So completely now had recent events metamorphosed him in all outwardthings, that few suspected him of being any other than an Englishman. Not even the knight's domestics. But in the princess's garden, beingobliged to work in company with many other laborers, the war was oftena topic of discussion among them. And "the d--d Yankee rebels" were notseldom the object of scurrilous remark. Illy could the exile brook insilence such insults upon the country for which he had bled, and forwhose honored sake he was that very instant a sufferer. More than once, his indignation came very nigh getting the better of his prudence. Helonged for the war to end, that he might but speak a little bit of hismind. 

Now the superintendent of the garden was a harsh, overbearing man. Theworkmen with tame servility endured his worst affronts. But Israel, bredamong mountains, found it impossible to restrain himself when made theundeserved object of pitiless epithets. Ere two months went by, hequitted the service of the princess, and engaged himself to a farmer ina small village not far from Brentford. But hardly had he been herethree weeks, when a rumor again got afloat that he was a Yankee prisonerof war. Whence this report arose he could never discover. No sooner didit reach the ears of the soldiers, than they were on the alert. Luckily, Israel was apprised of their intentions in time. But he was hard pushed. He was hunted after with a perseverance worthy a less ignoble cause. Hehad many hairbreadth escapes. Most assuredly he would have beencaptured, had it not been for the secret good offices of a fewindividuals, who, perhaps, were not unfriendly to the American side ofthe question, though they durst not avow it. 

Tracked one night by the soldiers to the house of one of these friends, in whose garret he was concealed, he was obliged to force the skuttle, and running along the roof, passed to those of adjoining houses to thenumber of ten or twelve, finally succeeding in making his escape. 

CHAPTER V. 

ISRAEL IN THE LION'S DEN. 

Harassed day and night, hunted from food and sleep, driven from hole tohole like a fox in the woods, with no chance to earn an hour's wages, hewas at last advised by one whose sincerity he could not doubt, to apply, on the good word of Sir John Millet, for a berth as laborer in theKing's Gardens at Kew. There, it was said, he would be entirely safe, asno soldier durst approach those premises to molest any soul thereinemployed. It struck the poor exile as curious, that the very den of theBritish lion, the private grounds of the British King, should becommended to a refugee as his securest asylum. 

His nativity carefully concealed, and being personally introduced to thechief gardener by one who well knew him; armed, too, with a line fromSir John, and recommended by his introducer as uncommonly expert athorticulture; Israel was soon installed as keeper of certain lessprivate plants and walks of the park. 

It was here, to one of his near country retreats, that, coming fromperplexities of state--leaving far behind him the dingy old bricks ofSt. James--George the Third was wont to walk up and down beneath thelong arbors formed by the interlockings of lofty trees. 

More than once, raking the gravel, Israel through intervening foliagewould catch peeps in some private but parallel walk, of that lonelyfigure, not more shadowy with overhanging leaves than with the shade ofroyal meditations. 

Unauthorized and abhorrent thoughts will sometimes invade the best humanheart. Seeing the monarch unguarded before him; remembering that the warwas imputed more to the self-will of the King than to the willingness ofparliament or the nation; and calling to mind all his own sufferingsgrowing out of that war, with all the calamities of his country; dimimpulses, such as those to which the regicide Ravaillae yielded, wouldshoot balefully across the soul of the exile. But thrusting Satan behindhim, Israel vanquished all such temptations. Nor did these ever moredisturb him, after his one chance conversation with the monarch. 

As he was one day gravelling a little by-walk, wrapped in thought, theKing turning a clump of bushes, suddenly brushed Israel's person. 

Immediately Israel touched his hat--but did not remove it--bowed, andwas retiring; when something in his air arrested the King's attention. 

"You ain't an Englishman, --no Englishman--no, no. "

Pale as death, Israel tried to answer something; but knowing not what tosay, stood frozen to the ground. 

"You are a Yankee--a Yankee, " said the King again in his rapid andhalf-stammering way. 

Again Israel assayed to reply, but could not. What could he say? Couldhe lie to a King?

"Yes, yes, --you are one of that stubborn race, --that very stubborn race. What brought you here?"

"The fate of war, sir. "

"May it please your Majesty, " said a low cringing voice, approaching, "this man is in the walk against orders. There is some mistake, may itplease your Majesty. Quit the walk, blockhead, " he hissed at Israel. 

It was one of the junior gardeners who thus spoke. It seems that Israelhad mistaken his directions that morning. 

"Slink, you dog, " hissed the gardener again to Israel; then aloud to theKing, "A mistake of the man, I assure your Majesty. "

"Go you away--away with ye, and leave him with me, " said the king. 

Waiting a moment, till the man was out of hearing, the king again turnedupon Israel. 

"Were you at Bunker Hill?--that bloody Bunker Hill--eh, eh?"

"Yes, sir. "

"Fought like a devil--like a very devil, I suppose?"

"Yes, sir. "

"Helped flog--helped flog my soldiers?"

"Yes, sir; but very sorry to do it. "

"Eh?--eh?--how's that?"

"I took it to be my sad duty, sir. "

"Very much mistaken--very much mistaken, indeed. Why do ye sir me?--eh?I'm your king--your king. "

"Sir, " said Israel firmly, but with deep respect, "I have no king. "

The king darted his eye incensedly for a moment; but without quailing, Israel, now that all was out, still stood with mute respect before him. The king, turning suddenly, walked rapidly away from Israel a moment, but presently returning with a less hasty pace, said, "You are rumoredto be a spy--a spy, or something of that sort--ain't you? But I know youare not--no, no. You are a runaway prisoner of war, eh? You have soughtthis place to be safe from pursuit, eh? eh? Is it not so?--eh? eh? eh?"

"Sir, it is. "

"Well, ye're an honest rebel--rebel, yes, rebel. Hark ye, hark. Saynothing of this talk to any one. And hark again. So long as you remainhere at Kew, I shall see that you are safe--safe. "

"God bless your Majesty!"

"Eh?"

"God bless your noble Majesty?"

"Come--come--come, " smiled the king in delight, "I thought I couldconquer ye--conquer ye. "

"Not the king, but the king's kindness, your Majesty. "

"Join my army--army. "

Sadly looking down, Israel silently shook his head. 

"You won't? Well, gravel the walk then--gravel away. Very stubbornrace--very stubborn race, indeed--very--very--very. "

And still growling, the magnanimous lion departed. How the monarch cameby his knowledge of so humble an exile, whether through that swiftinsight into individual character said to form one of the miraculousqualities transmitted with a crown, or whether some of the rumorsprevailing outside of the garden had come to his ear, Israel could neverdetermine. Very probably, though, the latter was the case, inasmuch assome vague shadowy report of Israel not being an Englishman, had, alittle previous to his interview with the king, been communicated toseveral of the inferior gardeners. Without any impeachment of Israel'sfealty to his country, it must still be narrated, that from this hisfamiliar audience with George the Third, he went away with veryfavorable views of that monarch. Israel now thought that it could not bethe warm heart of the king, but the cold heads of his lords in council, that persuaded him so tyrannically to persecute America. Yet hithertothe precise contrary of this had been Israel's opinion, agreeably to thepopular prejudice throughout New England. 

Thus we see what strange and powerful magic resides in a crown, and howsubtly that cheap and easy magnanimity, which in private belongs to mostkings, may operate on good-natured and unfortunate souls. Indeed, had itnot been for the peculiar disinterested fidelity of our adventurer'spatriotism, he would have soon sported the red coat; and perhaps underthe immediate patronage of his royal friend, been advanced in time to nomean rank in the army of Britain. Nor in that case would we have had tofollow him, as at last we shall, through long, long years of obscure andpenurious wandering. 

Continuing in the service of the king's gardeners at Kew, until aseason came when the work of the garden required a less number oflaborers, Israel, with several others, was discharged; and the dayafter, engaged himself for a few months to a farmer in the neighborhoodwhere he had been last employed. But hardly a week had gone by, when theold story of his being a rebel, or a runaway prisoner, or a Yankee, or aspy, began to be revived with added malignity. Like bloodhounds, thesoldiers were once more on the track. The houses where he harbored weremany times searched; but thanks to the fidelity of a few earnestwell-wishers, and to his own unsleeping vigilance and activity, thehunted fox still continued to elude apprehension. To such extremities ofharassment, however, did this incessant pursuit subject him, that in afit of despair he was about to surrender himself, and submit to hisfate, when Providence seasonably interposed in his favor. 

CHAPTER VI. 

ISRAEL MAKES THE ACQUAINTANCE OF CERTAIN SECRET FRIENDS OF AMERICA, ONEOF THEM BEING THE FAMOUS AUTHOR OF THE "DIVERSIONS OF PURLEY, " THESEDESPATCH HIM ON A SLY ERRAND ACROSS THE CHANNEL. 

At this period, though made the victims indeed of British oppression, yet the colonies were not totally without friends in Britain. It was butnatural that when Parliament itself held patriotic and gifted men, whonot only recommended conciliatory measures, but likewise denounced thewar as monstrous; it was but natural that throughout the nation at largethere should be many private individuals cherishing similar sentiments, and some who made no scruple clandestinely to act upon them. 

Late one night while hiding in a farmer's granary, Israel saw a man witha lantern approaching. He was about to flee, when the man hailed him ina well-known voice, bidding him have no fear. It was the farmer himself. He carried a message to Israel from a gentleman of Brentford, to theeffect, that the refugee was earnestly requested to repair on thefollowing evening to that gentleman's mansion. 

At first, Israel was disposed to surmise that either the farmer wasplaying him false, or else his honest credulity had been imposed upon byevil-minded persons. At any rate, he regarded the message as a decoy, and for half an hour refused to credit its sincerity. But at length hewas induced to think a little better of it. The gentleman giving theinvitation was one Squire Woodcock, of Brentford, whose loyalty to theking had been under suspicion; so at least the farmer averred. Thislatter information was not without its effect. 

At nightfall on the following day, being disguised in strange clothes bythe farmer, Israel stole from his retreat, and after a few hours' walk, arrived before the ancient brick house of the Squire; who opening thedoor in person, and learning who it was that stood there, at onceassured Israel in the most solemn manner, that no foul play wasintended. So the wanderer suffered himself to enter, and be conductedto a private chamber in the rear of the mansion, where were seated twoother gentlemen, attired, in the manner of that age, in long lacedcoats, with small-clothes, and shoes with silver buckles. 

"I am John Woodcock, " said the host, "and these gentlemen are HorneTooke and James Bridges. All three of us are friends to America. We haveheard of you for some weeks past, and inferring from your conduct, thatyou must be a Yankee of the true blue stamp, we have resolved to employyou in a way which you cannot but gladly approve; for surely, though anexile, you are still willing to serve your country; if not as a sailoror soldier, yet as a traveller?"

"Tell me how I may do it?" demanded Israel, not completely at ease. 

"At that in good time, " smiled the Squire. "The point is now--do yourepose confidence in my statements?"

Israel glanced inquiringly upon the Squire; then upon his companions;and meeting the expressive, enthusiastic, candid countenance of HorneTooke--then in the first honest ardor of his political career--turnedto the Squire, and said, "Sir, I believe what you have said. Tell me nowwhat I am to do. "

"Oh, there is just nothing to be done to-night, " said the Squire; "norfor some days to come perhaps, but we wanted to have you prepared. "

And hereupon he hinted to his guest rather vaguely of his generalintention; and that over, begged him to entertain them with some accountof his adventures since he first took up arms for his country. To thisIsrael had no objections in the world, since all men love to tell thetale of hardships endured in a righteous cause. But ere beginning hisstory, the Squire refreshed him with some cold beef, laid in a snowynapkin, and a glass of Perry, and thrice during the narration of theadventures, pressed him with additional draughts. 

But after his second glass, Israel declined to drink more, mild as thebeverage was. For he noticed, that not only did the three gentlemenlisten with the utmost interest to his story, but likewiseinterrupted him with questions and cross-questions in the mostpertinacious manner. So this led him to be on his guard, not beingabsolutely certain yet, as to who they might really be, or what wastheir real design. But as it turned out, Squire Woodcock and his friendsonly sought to satisfy themselves thoroughly, before making their finaldisclosures, that the exile was one in whom implicit confidence might beplaced. 

And to this desirable conclusion they eventually came, for upon theending of Israel's story, after expressing their sympathies for hishardships, and applauding his generous patriotism in so patientlyenduring adversity, as well as singing the praises of his gallantfellow-soldiers of Bunker Hill, they openly revealed their scheme. Theywished to know whether Israel would undertake a trip to Paris, to carryan important message--shortly to be received for transmission throughthem--to Doctor Franklin, then in that capital. 

"All your expenses shall be paid, not to speak of a compensationbesides, " said the Squire; "will you go?"

"I must think of it, " said Israel, not yet wholly confirmed in his mind. But once more he cast his glance on Horne Tooke, and his irresolutionwas gone. 

The Squire now informed Israel that, to avoid suspicions, it would benecessary for him to remove to another place until the hour at which heshould start for Paris. They enjoined upon him the profoundest secresy, gave him a guinea, with a letter for a gentleman in White Waltham, atown some miles from Brentford, which point they begged him to reachas soon as possible, there to tarry for further instructions. 

Having informed him of thus much, Squire Woodcock asked him to hold outhis right foot. 

"What for?" said Israel. 

"Why, would you not like to have a pair of new boots against yourreturn?" smiled Home Tooke. 

"Oh, yes; no objection at all, " said, Israel. 

"Well, then, let the bootmaker measure you, " smiled Horne Tooke. 

"Do _you_ do it, Mr. Tooke, " said the Squire; "you measure men's partsbetter than I. "

"Hold out your foot, my good friend, " said Horne Tooke--"there--nowlet's measure your heart. "

"For that, measure me round the chest, " said Israel. 

"Just the man we want, " said Mr. Bridges, triumphantly. 

"Give him another glass of wine, Squire, " said Horne Tooke. 

Exchanging the farmer's clothes for still another disguise, Israel nowset out immediately, on foot, for his destination, having receivedminute directions as to his road, and arriving in White Waltham on thefollowing morning was very cordially received by the gentleman to whomhe carried the letter. This person, another of the active Englishfriends of America, possessed a particular knowledge of late events inthat land. To him Israel was indebted for much entertaining information. After remaining some ten days at this place, word came from SquireWoodcock, requiring Israel's immediate return, stating the hour at whichhe must arrive at the house, namely, two o'clock on the followingmorning. So, after another night's solitary trudge across the country, the wanderer was welcomed by the same three gentlemen as before, seatedin the same room. 

"The time has now come, " said Squire Woodcock. "You must start thismorning for Paris. Take off your shoes. "

"Am I to steal from here to Paris on my stocking-feet?" said Israel, whose late easy good living at White Waltham had not failed to bring outthe good-natured and mirthful part of him, even as his prior experienceshad produced, for the most part, something like a contrary result. 

"Oh, no, " smiled Horne Tooke, who always lived well, "we haveseven-league-boots for you. Don't you remember my measuring you?"

Hereupon going to the closet, the Squire brought out a pair of newboots. They were fitted with false heels. Unscrewing these, the Squireshowed Israel the papers concealed beneath. They were of a fine tissueyfibre, and contained much writing in a very small compass. The boots, itneed hardly be said, had been particularly made for the occasion. 

"Walk across the room with them, " said the Squire, when Israel hadpulled them on. 

"He'll surely be discovered, " smiled Horne Tooke. "Hark how he creaks. "

"Come, come, it's too serious a matter for joking, " said the Squire. "Now, my fine fellow, be cautious, be sober, be vigilant, and above allthings be speedy. "

Being furnished now with all requisite directions, and a supply ofmoney, Israel, taking leave of Mr. Tooke and Mr. Bridges, was secretlyconducted down stairs by the Squire, and in five minutes' time was onhis way to Charing Cross in London, where taking the post-coach forDover, he thence went in a packet to Calais, and in fifteen minutesafter landing, was being wheeled over French soil towards Paris. Hearrived there in safety, and freely declaring himself an American, thepeculiarly friendly relations of the two nations at that period, procured him kindly attentions even from strangers. 

CHAPTER VII. 

AFTER A CURIOUS ADVENTURE UPON THE PONT NEUF, ISRAEL ENTERS THE PRESENCEOF THE RENOWNED SAGE, DR. FRANKLIN, WHOM HE FINDS RIGHT LEARNEDLY ANDMULTIFARIOUSLY EMPLOYED. 

Following the directions given him at the place where the diligencestopped, Israel was crossing the Pont Neuf, to find Doctor Franklin, when he was suddenly called to by a man standing on one side of thebridge, just under the equestrian statue of Henry IV. 

The man had a small, shabby-looking box before him on the ground, witha box of blacking on one side of it, and several shoe-brushes upon theother. Holding another brush in his hand, he politely seconded hisverbal invitation by gracefully flourishing the brush in the air. 

"What do you want of me, neighbor?" said Israel, pausing in somewhatuneasy astonishment. 

"Ah, Monsieur, " exclaimed the man, and with voluble politeness he ranon with a long string of French, which of course was all Greek to poorIsrael. But what his language failed to convey, his gestures now madevery plain. Pointing to the wet muddy state of the bridge, splashed bya recent rain, and then to the feet of the wayfarer, and lastly to thebrush in his hand, he appeared to be deeply regretting that a gentlemanof Israel's otherwise imposing appearance should be seen abroad withunpolished boots, offering at the same time to remove their blemishes. 

"Ah, Monsieur, Monsieur, " cried the man, at last running up to Israel. And with tender violence he forced him towards the box, and lifting thisunwilling customer's right foot thereon, was proceeding vigorously towork, when suddenly illuminated by a dreadful suspicion, Israel, fetching the box a terrible kick, took to his false heels and ran likemad over the bridge. 

Incensed that his politeness should receive such an ungracious return, the man pursued, which but confirming Israel in his suspicions he ranall the faster, and thanks to his fleetness, soon succeeded in escapinghis pursuer. 

Arrived at last at the street and the house to which he had beendirected, in reply to his summons, the gate very strangely of itselfswung open, and much astonished at this unlooked-for sort ofenchantment, Israel entered a wide vaulted passage leading to an opencourt within. While he was wondering that no soul appeared, suddenly hewas hailed from a dark little window, where sat an old man cobblingshoes, while an old woman standing by his side was thrusting her headinto the passage, intently eyeing the stranger. They proved to be theporter and portress, the latter of whom, upon hearing his summons, hadinvisibly thrust open the gate to Israel, by means of a springcommunicating with the little apartment. 

Upon hearing the name of Doctor Franklin mentioned, the old woman, allalacrity, hurried out of her den, and with much courtesy showed Israelacross the court, up three flights of stairs to a door in the rear ofthe spacious building. There she left him while Israel knocked. 

"Come in, " said a voice. 

And immediately Israel stood in the presence of the venerable DoctorFranklin. 

Wrapped in a rich dressing-gown, a fanciful present from an admiringMarchesa, curiously embroidered with algebraic figures like a conjuror'srobe, and with a skull-cap of black satin on his hive of a head, the manof gravity was seated at a huge claw-footed old table, round as thezodiac. It was covered with printer papers, files of documents, rolls ofmanuscript, stray bits of strange models in wood and metal, odd-lookingpamphlets in various languages, and all sorts of books, including manypresentation-copies, embracing history, mechanics, diplomacy, agriculture, political economy, metaphysics, meteorology, and geometry. The walls had a necromantic look, hung round with barometers ofdifferent kinds, drawings of surprising inventions, wide maps of farcountries in the New World, containing vast empty spaces in the middle, with the word DESERT diffusely printed there, so as to spanfive-and-twenty degrees of longitude with only two syllables, --whichprinted word, however, bore a vigorous pen-mark, in the Doctor's hand, drawn straight through it, as if in summary repeal of it; crowdedtopographical and trigonometrical charts of various parts of Europe;with geometrical diagrams, and endless other surprising hangings andupholstery of science. 

The chamber itself bore evident marks of antiquity. One part of therough-finished wall was sadly cracked, and covered with dust, looked dimand dark. But the aged inmate, though wrinkled as well, looked neat andhale. Both wall and sage were compounded of like materials, --lime anddust; both, too, were old; but while the rude earth of the wall had nopainted lustre to shed off all fadings and tarnish, and still keep freshwithout, though with long eld its core decayed: the living lime and dustof the sage was frescoed with defensive bloom of his soul. 

The weather was warm; like some old West India hogshead on the wharf, the whole chamber buzzed with flies. But the sapient inmate sat stilland cool in the midst. Absorbed in some other world of his occupationsand thoughts, these insects, like daily cark and care, did not seem onewhit to annoy him. It was a goodly sight to see this serene, cool andripe old philosopher, who by sharp inquisition of man in the street, andthen long meditating upon him, surrounded by all those queer oldimplements, charts and books, had grown at last so wondrous wise. Therehe sat, quite motionless among those restless flies; and, with a soundlike the low noon murmur of foliage in the woods, turning over theleaves of some ancient and tattered folio, with a binding dark andshaggy as the bark of any old oak. It seemed as if supernatural loremust needs pertain to this gravely, ruddy personage; at least farforesight, pleasant wit, and working wisdom. Old age seemed in no wiseto have dulled him, but to have sharpened; just as old dinner-knives--sothey be of good steel--wax keen, spear-pointed, and elastic aswhale-bone with long usage. Yet though he was thus lively and vigorousto behold, spite of his seventy-two years (his exact date at that time)somehow, the incredible seniority of an antediluvian seemed his. Not theyears of the calendar wholly, but also the years of sapience. His whitehairs and mild brow, spoke of the future as well as the past. He seemedto be seven score years old; that is, three score and ten of prescienceadded to three score and ten of remembrance, makes just seven scoreyears in all. 

But when Israel stepped within the chamber, he lost the complete effectof all this; for the sage's back, not his face, was turned to him. 

So, intent on his errand, hurried and heated with his recent run, ourcourier entered the room, inadequately impressed, for the time, byeither it or its occupant. 

"Bon jour, bon jour, monsieur, " said the man of wisdom, in a cheerfulvoice, but too busy to turn round just then. 

"How do you do, Doctor Franklin?" said Israel. 

"Ah! I smell Indian corn, " said the Doctor, turning round quickly on hischair. "A countryman; sit down, my good sir. Well, what news? Special?"

"Wait a minute, sir, " said Israel, stepping across the room towards achair. 

Now there was no carpet on the floor, which was of dark-colored wood, set in lozenges, and slippery with wax, after the usual French style. As Israel walked this slippery floor, his unaccustomed feet slid aboutvery strangely as if walking on ice, so that he came very near falling. 

"'Pears to me you have rather high heels to your boots, " said the graveman of utility, looking sharply down through his spectacles; "don't youknow that it's both wasting leather and endangering your limbs, to wearsuch high heels? I have thought, at my first leisure, to write a littlepamphlet against that very abuse. But pray, what are you doing now? Doyour boots pinch you, my friend, that you lift one foot from the floorthat way?"

At this moment, Israel having seated himself, was just putting his rightfoot across his left knee. 

"How foolish, " continued the wise man, "for a rational creature to weartight boots. Had nature intended rational creatures should do so, shewould have made the foot of solid bone, or perhaps of solid iron, instead of bone, muscle, and flesh, --But, --I see. Hold!"

And springing to his own slippered feet, the venerable sage hurried tothe door and shot-to the bolt. Then drawing the curtain carefully acrossthe window looking out across the court to various windows on theopposite side, bade Israel proceed with his operations. 

"I was mistaken this time, " added the Doctor, smiling, as Israelproduced his documents from their curious recesses--"your high heels, instead of being idle vanities, seem to be full of meaning. "

"Pretty full, Doctor, " said Israel, now handing over the papers. "I hada narrow escape with them just now. "

"How? How's that?" said the sage, fumbling the papers eagerly. 

"Why, crossing the stone bridge there over the _Seen_"--

"_Seine_"--interrupted the Doctor, giving the Frenchpronunciation. --"Always get a new word right in the first place, my friend, and you will never get it wrong afterwards. "

"Well, I was crossing the bridge there, and who should hail me, buta suspicious-looking man, who, under pretence of seeking to polish myboots, wanted slyly to unscrew their heels, and so steal all theseprecious papers I've brought you. "

"My good friend, " said the man of gravity, glancing scrutinizingly uponhis guest, "have you not in your time, undergone what they call hardtimes? Been set upon, and persecuted, and very illy entreated by some ofyour fellow-creatures?"

"That I have, Doctor; yes, indeed. "

"I thought so. Sad usage has made you sadly suspicious, my honestfriend. An indiscriminate distrust of human nature is the worstconsequence of a miserable condition, whether brought about by innocenceor guilt. And though want of suspicion more than want of sense, sometimes leads a man into harm, yet too much suspicion is as bad as toolittle sense. The man you met, my friend, most probably had no artfulintention; he knew just nothing about you or your heels; he simplywanted to earn two sous by brushing your boots. Those blacking-menregularly station themselves on the bridge. "

"How sorry I am then that I knocked over his box, and then ran away. But he didn't catch me. "

"How? surely, my honest friend, you--appointed to the conveyance ofimportant secret dispatches--did not act so imprudently as to kick overan innocent man's box in the public streets of the capital, to which youhad been especially sent?"

"Yes, I did, Doctor. "

"Never act so unwisely again. If the police had got hold of you, thinkof what might have ensued. "

"Well, it was not very wise of me, that's a fact, Doctor. But, you see, I thought he meant mischief. "

"And because you only thought he _meant_ mischief, _you_ muststraightway proceed to _do_ mischief. That's poor logic. But think overwhat I have told you now, while I look over these papers. "

In half an hour's time, the Doctor, laying down the documents, againturned towards Israel, and removing his spectacles very placidly, proceeded in the kindest and most familiar manner to read him a paternaldetailed lesson upon the ill-advised act he had been guilty of, upon thePont Neuf; concluding by taking out his purse, and putting three smallsilver coins into Israel's hands, charging him to seek out the man thatvery day, and make both apology and restitution for his unlucky mistake. 

"All of us, my honest friend, " continued the Doctor, "are subject tomaking mistakes; so that the chief art of life, is to learn how best toremedy mistakes. Now one remedy for mistakes is honesty. So pay the manfor the damage done to his box. And now, who are you, my friend? Mycorrespondents here mention your name--Israel Potter--and say you are anAmerican, an escaped prisoner of war, but nothing further. I want tohear your story from your own lips. "

Israel immediately began, and related to the Doctor all his adventuresup to the present time. 

"I suppose, " said the Doctor, upon Israel's concluding, "that you desireto return to your friends across the sea?"

"That I do, Doctor, " said Israel. 

"Well, I think I shall be able to procure you a passage. "

Israel's eyes sparkled with delight. The mild sage noticed it, andadded: "But events in these times are uncertain. At the prospect ofpleasure never be elated; but, without depression, respect the omens ofill. So much my life has taught me, my honest friend. "

Israel felt as though a plum-pudding had been thrust under his nostrils, and then as rapidly withdrawn. 

"I think it is probable that in two or three days I shall want you toreturn with some papers to the persons who sent you to me. In that caseyou will have to come here once more, and then, my good friend, we willsee what can be done towards getting you safely home again. "

Israel was pouring out torrents of thanks when the Doctor interruptedhim. 

"Gratitude, my friend, cannot be too much towards God, but towards man, it should be limited. No man can possibly so serve his fellow, as tomerit unbounded gratitude. Over gratitude in the helped person, is aptto breed vanity or arrogance in the helping one. Now in assisting youto get home--if indeed I shall prove able to do so--I shall be simplydoing part of my official duty as agent of our common country. So youowe me just nothing at all, but the sum of these coins I put in yourhand just now. But that, instead of repaying to me hereafter, you can, when you get home, give to the first soldier's widow you meet. Don'tforget it, for it is a debt, a pecuniary liability, owing to me. It willbe about a quarter of a dollar, in the Yankee currency. A quarter of adollar, mind. My honest friend, in pecuniary matters always be exact asa second-hand; never mind with whom it is, father or stranger, peasantor king, be exact to a tick of your honor. "

"Well, Doctor, " said Israel, "since exactness in these matters is sonecessary, let me pay back my debt in the very coins in which it wasloaned. There will be no chance of mistake then. Thanks to my Brentfordfriends, I have enough to spare of my own, to settle damages with theboot-black of the bridge. I only took the money from you, because Ithought it would not look well to push it back after being so kindlyoffered. "

"My honest friend, " said the Doctor, "I like your straightforwarddealing. I will receive back the money. "

"No interest, Doctor, I hope, " said Israel. 

The sage looked mildly over his spectacles upon Israel and replied: "Mygood friend, never permit yourself to be jocose upon pecuniary matters. Never joke at funerals, or during business transactions. The affairbetween us two, you perhaps deem very trivial, but trifles may involvemomentous principles. But no more at present. You had better goimmediately and find the boot-black. Having settled with him, returnhither, and you will find a room ready for you near this, where you willstay during your sojourn in Paris. "

"But I thought I would like to have a little look round the town, beforeI go back to England, " said Israel. 

"Business before pleasure, my friend. You must absolutely remain in yourroom, just as if you were my prisoner, until you quit Paris for Calais. Not knowing now at what instant I shall want you to start, your keepingto your room is indispensable. But when you come back from Brentfordagain, then, if nothing happens, you will have a chance to survey thiscelebrated capital ere taking ship for America. Now go directly, and paythe boot-black. Stop, have you the exact change ready? Don't be takingout all your money in the open street. "

"Doctor, " said Israel, "I am not so simple. "

"But you knocked over the box. "

"That, Doctor, was bravery. "

"Bravery in a poor cause, is the height of simplicity, my friend. --Countout your change. It must be French coin, not English, that you are topay the man with. --Ah, that will do--those three coins will be enough. Put them in a pocket separate from your other cash. Now go, and hastento the bridge. "

"Shall I stop to take a meal anywhere, Doctor, as I return? I sawseveral cookshops as I came hither. "

"Cafes and restaurants, they are called here, my honest friend. Tellme, are you the possessor of a liberal fortune?"

"Not very liberal, " said Israel. 

"I thought as much. Where little wine is drunk, it is good to dine outoccasionally at a friend's; but where a poor man dines out at his owncharge, it is bad policy. Never dine out that way, when you can dine in. Do not stop on the way at all, my honest friend, but come directly backhither, and you shall dine at home, free of cost, with me. "

"Thank you very kindly, Doctor. "

And Israel departed for the Pont Neuf. Succeeding in his errand thither, he returned to Dr. Franklin, and found that worthy envoy waiting hisattendance at a meal, which, according to the Doctor's custom, had beensent from a neighboring restaurant. There were two covers; and withoutattendance the host and guest sat down. There was only one principaldish, lamb boiled with green peas. Bread and potatoes made up the rest. A decanter-like bottle of uncolored glass, filled with some uncoloredbeverage, stood at the venerable envoy's elbow. 

"Let me fill your glass, " said the sage. 

"It's white wine, ain't it?" said Israel. 

"White wine of the very oldest brand; I drink your health in it, myhonest friend. "

"Why, it's plain water, " said Israel, now tasting it. 

"Plain water is a very good drink for plain men, " replied the wise man. 

"Yes, " said Israel, "but Squire Woodcock gave me perry, and the othergentleman at White Waltham gave me port, and some other friends havegiven me brandy. "

"Very good, my honest friend; if you like perry and port and brandy, wait till you get back to Squire Woodcock, and the gentleman at WhiteWaltham, and the other friends, and you shall drink perry and port andbrandy. But while you are with me, you will drink plain water. "

"So it seems, Doctor. "

"What do you suppose a glass of port costs?"

"About three pence English, Doctor. "

"That must be poor port. But how much good bread will three penceEnglish purchase?"

"Three penny rolls, Doctor. "

"How many glasses of port do you suppose a man may drink at a meal?"

"The gentleman at White Waltham drank a bottle at a dinner. "

"A bottle contains just thirteen glasses--that's thirty-nine pence, supposing it poor wine. If something of the best, which is the only sortany sane man should drink, as being the least poisonous, it would bequadruple that sum, which is one hundred and fifty-six pence, which isseventy-eight two-penny loaves. Now, do you not think that for one manto swallow down seventy-two two-penny rolls at one meal is ratherextravagant business?"

"But he drank a bottle of wine; he did not eat seventy-two two-pennyrolls, Doctor. "

"He drank the money worth of seventy-two loaves, which is drinking theloaves themselves; for money is bread. "

"But he has plenty of money to spare, Doctor. "

"To have to spare, is to have to give away. Does the gentleman give muchaway?"

"Not that I know of, Doctor. "

"Then he thinks he has nothing to spare; and thinking he has nothing tospare, and yet prodigally drinking down his money as he does every day, it seems to me that that gentleman stands self-contradicted, andtherefore is no good example for plain sensible folks like you and me tofollow. My honest friend, if you are poor, avoid wine as a costlyluxury; if you are rich, shun it as a fatal indulgence. Stick to plainwater. And now, my good friend, if you are through with your meal, wewill rise. There is no pastry coming. Pastry is poisoned bread. Nevereat pastry. Be a plain man, and stick to plain things. Now, my friend, Ishall have to be private until nine o'clock in the evening, when I shallbe again at your service. Meantime you may go to your room. I haveordered the one next to this to be prepared for you. But you must not beidle. Here is Poor Richard's Almanac, which, in view of our lateconversation, I commend to your earnest perusal. And here, too, is aGuide to Paris, an English one, which you can read. Study it well, sothat when you come back from England, if you should then have anopportunity to travel about Paris, to see its wonders, you will have allthe chief places made historically familiar to you. In this world, menmust provide knowledge before it is wanted, just as our countrymen inNew England get in their winter's fuel one season, to serve them thenext. "

So saying, this homely sage, and household Plato, showed his humbleguest to the door, and standing in the hall, pointed out to him the onewhich opened into his allotted apartment. 

CHAPTER VIII. 

WHICH HAS SOMETHING TO SAY ABOUT DR. FRANKLIN AND THE LATIN QUARTER. 

The first, both in point of time and merit, of American envoys wasfamous not less for the pastoral simplicity of his manners than for thepolitic grace of his mind. Viewed from a certain point, there was atouch of primeval orientalness in Benjamin Franklin. Neither is therewanting something like his Scriptural parallel. The history of thepatriarch Jacob is interesting not less from the unselfish devotionwhich we are bound to ascribe to him, than from the deep worldly wisdomand polished Italian tact, gleaming under an air of Arcadianunaffectedness. The diplomatist and the shepherd are blended; a unionnot without warrant; the apostolic serpent and dove. A tannedMachiavelli in tents. 

Doubtless, too, notwithstanding his eminence as lord of the movingmanor, Jacob's raiment was of homespun; the economic envoy's plain coatand hose, who has not heard of?

Franklin all over is of a piece. He dressed his person as his periods;neat, trim, nothing superfluous, nothing deficient. In some of his workshis style is only surpassed by the unimprovable sentences of Hobbes ofMalmsbury, the paragon of perspicuity. The mental habits of Hobbes andFranklin in several points, especially in one of some moment, assimilated. Indeed, making due allowance for soil and era, historypresents few trios more akin, upon the whole, than Jacob, Hobbes, andFranklin; three labyrinth-minded, but plain-spoken Broadbrims, at oncepoliticians and philosophers; keen observers of the main chance; prudentcourtiers; practical magians in linsey-woolsey. 

In keeping with his general habitudes, Doctor Franklin while at theFrench Court did not reside in the aristocratical faubourgs. He deemedhis worsted hose and scientific tastes more adapted in a domestic way tothe other side of the Seine, where the Latin Quarter, at once the hauntof erudition and economy, seemed peculiarly to invite the philosophicalPoor Richard to its venerable retreats. Here, of gray, chilly, drizzlyNovember mornings, in the dark-stoned quadrangle of the time-honoredSorbonne, walked the lean and slippered metaphysician, --oblivious forthe moment that his sublime thoughts and tattered wardrobe were famousthroughout Europe, --meditating on the theme of his next lecture; at thesame time, in the well-worn chambers overhead, some clayey-visagedchemist in ragged robe-de-chambre, and with a soiled green flap over hisleft eye, was hard at work stooping over retorts and crucibles, discovering new antipathies in acids, again risking strange explosionssimilar to that whereby he had already lost the use of one optic; whilein the lofty lodging-houses of the neighboring streets, indigent youngstudents from all parts of France, were ironing their shabby cockedhats, or inking the whity seams of their small-clothes, prior to apromenade with their pink-ribboned little grisettes in the Garden of theLuxembourg. 

Long ago the haunt of rank, the Latin Quarter still retains many oldbuildings whose imposing architecture singularly contrasts with theunassuming habits of their present occupants. In some parts its generalair is dreary and dim; monastic and theurgic. In those lonely narrowways--long-drawn prospectives of desertion--lined with huge piles ofsilent, vaulted, old iron-grated buildings of dark gray stone, onealmost expects to encounter Paracelsus or Friar Bacon turning the nextcorner, with some awful vial of Black-Art elixir in his hand. 

But all the lodging-houses are not so grim. Not to speak of many ofcomparatively modern erection, the others of the better class, howeverstern in exterior, evince a feminine gayety of taste, more or less, intheir furnishings within. The embellishing, or softening, or screeninghand of woman is to be seen all over the interiors of this metropolis.. Like Augustus Caesar with respect to Rome, the Frenchwoman leaves herobvious mark on Paris. Like the hand in nature, you know it can be noneelse but hers. Yet sometimes she overdoes it, as nature in the peony; orunderdoes it, as nature in the bramble; or--what is still morefrequent--is a little slatternly about it, as nature in the pig-weed. 

In this congenial vicinity of the Latin Quarter, and in an ancientbuilding something like those alluded to, at a point midway between thePalais des Beaux Arts and the College of the Sorbonne, the venerableAmerican Envoy pitched his tent when not passing his time at his countryretreat at Passy. The frugality of his manner of life did not lose himthe good opinion even of the voluptuaries of the showiest of capitals, whose very iron railings are not free from gilt. Franklin was not less alady's man, than a man's man, a wise man, and an old man. Not only didhe enjoy the homage of the choicest Parisian literati, but at the age ofseventy-two he was the caressed favorite of the highest born beauties ofthe Court; who through blind fashion having been originally attracted tohim as a famous _savan_, were permanently retained as his admirers byhis Plato-like graciousness of good humor. Having carefully weighed theworld, Franklin could act any part in it. By nature turned to knowledge, his mind was often grave, but never serious. At times he hadseriousness--extreme seriousness--for others, but never for himself. Tranquillity was to him instead of it. This philosophical levity oftranquillity, so to speak, is shown in his easy variety of pursuits. Printer, postmaster, almanac maker, essayist, chemist, orator, tinker, statesman, humorist, philosopher, parlor man, political economist, professor of housewifery, ambassador, projector, maxim-monger, herb-doctor, wit:--Jack of all trades, master of each and mastered bynone--the type and genius of his land. Franklin was everything but apoet. But since a soul with many qualities, forming of itself a sort ofhandy index and pocket congress of all humanity, needs the contact ofjust as many different men, or subjects, in order to the exhibition ofits totality; hence very little indeed of the sage's multifariousnesswill be portrayed in a simple narrative like the present. This casualprivate intercourse with Israel, but served to manifest him in his farlesser lights; thrifty, domestic, dietarian, and, it may be, didactically waggish. There was much benevolent irony, innocentmischievousness, in the wise man. Seeking here to depict him in his lessexalted habitudes, the narrator feels more as if he were playing withone of the sage's worsted hose, than reverentially handling the honoredhat which once oracularly sat upon his brow. 

So, then, in the Latin Quarter lived Doctor Franklin. And accordingly inthe Latin Quarter tarried Israel for the time. And it was into a room ofa house in this same Latin Quarter that Israel had been directed whenthe sage had requested privacy for a while. 

CHAPTER IX. 

ISRAEL IS INITIATED INTO THE MYSTERIES OF LODGING-HOUSES IN THE LATINQUARTER. 

Closing the door upon himself, Israel advanced to the middle of thechamber, and looked curiously round him. 

A dark tessellated floor, but without a rug; two mahogany chairs, withembroidered seats, rather the worse for wear; one mahogany bed, with agay but tarnished counterpane; a marble wash-stand, cracked, with achina vessel of water, minus the handle. The apartment was very large;this part of the house, which was a very extensive one, embracing thefour sides of a quadrangle, having, in a former age, been the hotel of anobleman. The magnitude of the chamber made its stinted furniture lookmeagre enough. 

But in Israel's eyes, the marble mantel (a comparatively recentaddition) and its appurtenances, not only redeemed the rest, but lookedquite magnificent and hospitable in the extreme. Because, in the firstplace, the mantel was graced with an enormous old-fashioned squaremirror, of heavy plate glass, set fast, like a tablet, into the wall. And in this mirror was genially reflected the following delicatearticles:--first, two boquets of flowers inserted in pretty vases ofporcelain; second, one cake of white soap; third, one cake ofrose-colored soap (both cakes very fragrant); fourth, one wax candle;fifth, one china tinder-box; sixth, one bottle of Eau de Cologne;seventh, one paper of loaf sugar, nicely broken into sugar-bowl size;eighth, one silver teaspoon; ninth, one glass tumbler; tenth, one glassdecanter of cool pure water; eleventh, one sealed bottle containing arichly hued liquid, and marked "Otard. "

"I wonder now what O-t-a-r-d is?" soliloquised Israel, slowly spellingthe word. "I have a good mind to step in and ask Dr. Franklin. He knowseverything. Let me smell it. No, it's sealed; smell is locked in. Thoseare pretty flowers. Let's smell them: no smell again. Ah, I see--sort offlowers in women's bonnets--sort of calico flowers. Beautiful soap. Thissmells anyhow--regular soap-roses--a white rose and a red one. Thatlong-necked bottle there looks like a crane. I wonder what's in that?Hallo! E-a-u--d-e--C-o-l-o-g-n-e. I wonder if Dr. Franklin understandsthat? It looks like his white wine. This is nice sugar. Let's taste. Yes, this is very nice sugar, sweet as--yes, it's sweet as sugar; betterthan maple sugar, such as they make at home. But I'm crunching it tooloud, the Doctor will hear me. But here's a teaspoon. What's this for?There's no tea, nor tea-cup; but here's a tumbler, and here's drinkingwater. Let me see. Seems to me, putting this and that and the otherthing together, it's a sort of alphabet that spells something. Spoon, tumbler, water, sugar, --brandy--that's it. O-t-a-r-d is brandy. Who putthese things here? What does it all mean? Don't put sugar here for show, don't put a spoon here for ornament, nor a jug of water. There is onlyone meaning to it, and that is a very polite invitation from someinvisible person to help myself, if I like, to a glass of brandy andsugar, and if I don't like, let it alone. That's my reading. I have agood mind to ask Doctor Franklin about it, though, for there's just achance I may be mistaken, and these things here be some other person'sprivate property, not at all meant for me to help myself from. Cologne, what's that--never mind. Soap: soap's to wash with. I want to use soap, anyway. Let me see--no, there's no soap on the wash-stand. I see, soapis not given gratis here in Paris, to boarders. But if you want it, takeit from the marble, and it will be charged in the bill. If you don'twant it let it alone, and no charge. Well, that's fair, anyway. But thento a man who could not afford to use soap, such beautiful cakes as theselying before his eyes all the time, would be a strong temptation. Andnow that I think of it, the O-t-a-r-d looks rather tempting too. But ifI don't like it now, I can let it alone. I've a good mind to try it. Butit's sealed. I wonder now if I am right in my understanding of thisalphabet? Who knows? I'll venture one little sip, anyhow. Come, cork. Hark!"

There was a rapid knock at the door. 

Clapping down the bottle, Israel said, "Come in. "

It was the man of wisdom. 

"My honest friend, " said the Doctor, stepping with venerable brisknessinto the room, "I was so busy during your visit to the Pont Neuf, that Idid not have time to see that your room was all right. I merely gave theorder, and heard that it had been fulfilled. But it just occurred to me, that as the landladies of Paris have some curious customs which mightpuzzle an entire stranger, my presence here for a moment might explainany little obscurity. Yes, it is as I thought, " glancing towards themantel. 

"Oh, Doctor, that reminds me; what is O-t-a-r-d, pray?"

"Otard is poison. "

"Shocking. "

"Yes, and I think I had best remove it from the room forthwith, " repliedthe sage, in a business-like manner putting the bottle under his arm; "Ihope you never use Cologne, do you?"

"What--what is that, Doctor?"

"I see. You never heard of the senseless luxury--a wise ignorance. Yousmelt flowers upon your mountains. You won't want this, either;" and theCologne bottle was put under the other arm. "Candle--you'll want that. Soap--you want soap. Use the white cake. "

"Is that cheaper, Doctor?"

"Yes, but just as good as the other. You don't ever munch sugar, do you?It's bad for the teeth. I'll take the sugar. " So the paper of sugar waslikewise dropped into one of the capacious coat pockets. 

"Oh, you better take the whole furniture, Doctor Franklin. Here, I'llhelp you drag out the bedstead. " "My honest friend, " said the wise man, pausing solemnly, with the two bottles, like swimmer's bladders, underhis arm-pits; "my honest friend, the bedstead you will want; what Ipropose to remove you will not want. "

"Oh, I was only joking, Doctor. "

"I knew that. It's a bad habit, except at the proper time, and with theproper person. The things left on the mantel were there placed by thelandlady to be used if wanted; if not, to be left untouched. To-morrowmorning, upon the chambermaid's coming in to make your bed, all sucharticles as remained obviously untouched would have been removed, therest would have been charged in the bill, whether you used them upcompletely or not. "

"Just as I thought. Then why not let the bottles stay, Doctor, and saveyourself all this trouble?"

"Ah! why indeed. My honest friend, are you not my guest? It wereunhandsome in me to permit a third person superfluously to entertain youunder what, for the time being, is my own roof. "

These words came from the wise man in the most graciously bland andflowing tones. As he ended, he made a sort of conciliatory half bowtowards Israel. 

Charmed with his condescending affability, Israel, without another word, suffered him to march from the room, bottles and all. Not till the firstimpression of the venerable envoy's suavity had left him, did Israelbegin to surmise the mild superiority of successful strategy whichlurked beneath this highly ingratiating air. 

"Ah, " pondered Israel, sitting gloomily before the rifled mantel, withthe empty tumbler and teaspoon in his hand, "it's sad business to have aDoctor Franklin lodging in the next room. I wonder if he sees to all theboarders this way. How the O-t-a-r-d merchants must hate him, and thepastry-cooks too. I wish I had a good pie to pass the time. I wonder ifthey ever make pumpkin pies in Paris? So I've got to stay in this roomall the time. Somehow I'm bound to be a prisoner, one way or another. Never mind, I'm an ambassador; that's satisfaction. Hark! The Doctoragain. --Come in. "

No venerable doctor, but in tripped a young French lass, bloom on hercheek, pink ribbons in her cap, liveliness in all her air, grace in thevery tips of her elbows. The most bewitching little chambermaid inParis. All art, but the picture of artlessness. 

"Monsieur! pardon!"

"Oh, I pardon ye freely, " said Israel. "Come to call on theAmbassador?"

"Monsieur, is de--de--" but, breaking down at the very threshold in herEnglish, she poured out a long ribbon of sparkling French, the purposeof which was to convey a profusion of fine compliments to the stranger, with many tender inquiries as to whether he was comfortably roomed, andwhether there might not be something, however trifling, wanting to hiscomplete accommodation. But Israel understood nothing, at the time, butthe exceeding grace, and trim, bewitching figure of the girl. 

She stood eyeing him for a few moments more, with a look of prettytheatrical despair, and, after vaguely lingering a while, with anothershower of incomprehensible compliments and apologies, tripped like afairy from the chamber. Directly she was gone Israel pondered upon asingular glance of the girl. It seemed to him that he had, by hisreception, in some way, unaccountably disappointed his beautifulvisitor. It struck him very strangely that she had entered all sweetnessand friendliness, but had retired as if slighted, with a sort ofdisdainful and sarcastic levity, all the more stinging from its apparentpoliteness. 

Not long had she disappeared, when a noise in the passage apprised himthat, in her hurried retreat, the girl must have stumbled againstsomething. The next moment he heard a chair scraping in the adjacentapartment, and there was another knock at the door. 

It was the man of wisdom this time. 

"My honest friend, did you not have a visitor, just now?"

"Yes, Doctor, a very pretty girl called upon me. "

"Well, I just stopped in to tell you of another strange custom of Paris. That girl is the chambermaid, but she does not confine herselfaltogether to one vocation. You must beware of the chambermaids ofParis, my honest friend. Shall I tell the girl, from you, that, unwilling to give her the fatigue of going up and down so many flightsof stairs, you will for the future waive her visits of ceremony?"

"Why, Doctor Franklin, she is a very sweet little girl. "

"I know it, my honest friend; the sweeter the more dangerous. Arsenic issweeter than sugar. I know you are a very sensible young man, not to betaken in by an artful Ammonite, and so I think I had better convey yourmessage to the girl forthwith. "

So saying, the sage withdrew, leaving Israel once more gloomily seatedbefore the rifled mantel, whose mirror was not again to reflect the formof the charming chambermaid. 

"Every time he comes in he robs me, " soliloquised Israel, dolefully;"with an air all the time, too, as if he were making me presents. If hethinks me such a very sensible young man, why not let me take care ofmyself?"

It was growing dusk, and Israel, lighting the wax candle, proceeded toread in his Guide-book. 

"This is poor sight-seeing, " muttered he at last, "sitting here all bymyself, with no company but an empty tumbler, reading about the finethings in Paris, and I myself a prisoner in Paris. I wish somethingextraordinary would turn up now; for instance, a man come in and give meten thousand pounds. But here's 'Poor Richard;' I am a poor fellowmyself; so let's see what comfort he has for a comrade. "

Opening the little pamphlet, at random, Israel's eyes fell on thefollowing passages: he read them aloud--

"'_So what signifies waiting and hoping for better times? We may makethese times better, if we bestir ourselves. Industry need not wish, andhe that lives upon hope will die fasting, as Poor Richard says. Thereare no gains, without pains. Then help hands, for I have no lands, asPoor Richard says. _' Oh, confound all this wisdom! It's a sort ofinsulting to talk wisdom to a man like me. It's wisdom that's cheap, and it's fortune that's dear. That ain't in Poor Richard; but it oughtto be, " concluded Israel, suddenly slamming down the pamphlet. 

He walked across the room, looked at the artificial flowers, and therose-colored soap, and again went to the table and took up the twobooks. 

"So here is the 'Way to Wealth, ' and here is the 'Guide to Paris. 'Wonder now whether Paris lies on the Way to Wealth? if so, I am on theroad. More likely though, it's a parting-of-the-ways. I shouldn't besurprised if the Doctor meant something sly by putting these two booksin my hand. Somehow, the old gentleman has an amazing sly look--a sortof wild slyness--about him, seems to me. His wisdom seems a sort of sly, too. But all in honor, though. I rather think he's one of those oldgentlemen who say a vast deal of sense, but hint a world more. ^Dependupon it, he's sly, sly, sly. Ah, what's this Poor Richard says: ^{c} Godhelps them that help themselves:' Let's consider that. Poor Richardain't a Dunker, that's certain, though he has lived in Pennsylvania. 'God helps them that help themselves. ' I'll just mark that saw, andleave the pamphlet open to refer to it again--Ah!"

At this point, the Doctor knocked, summoning Israel to his ownapartment. Here, after a cup of weak tea, and a little toast, the twohad a long, familiar talk together; during which, Israel was delightedwith the unpretending talkativeness, serene insight, and benignamiability of the sage. But, for all this, he could hardly forgive himfor the Cologne and Otard depredations. 

Discovering that, in early life, Israel had been employed on a farm, the man of wisdom at length turned the conversation in that direction;among other things, mentioning to his guest a plan of his (the Doctor's)for yoking oxen, with a yoke to go by a spring instead of a bolt; thusgreatly facilitating the operation of hitching on the team to the cart. Israel was very much struck with the improvement; and thought that, ifhe were home, upon his mountains, he would immediately introduce itamong the farmers. 

CHAPTER X. 

ANOTHER ADVENTURER APPEARS UPON THE SCENE. 

About half-past ten o'clock, as they were thus conversing, Israel'sacquaintance, the pretty chambermaid, rapped at the door, saying, with atitter, that a very rude gentleman in the passage of the court, desiredto see Doctor Franklin. 

"A very rude gentleman?" repeated the wise man in French, narrowlylooking at the girl; "that means, a very fine gentleman who has justpaid you some energetic compliment. But let him come up, my girl, " headded patriarchially. 

In a few moments, a swift coquettish step was heard, followed, as if inchase, by a sharp and manly one. The door opened. Israel was sitting sothat, accidentally, his eye pierced the crevice made by the opening ofthe door, which, like a theatrical screen, stood for a moment betweenDoctor Franklin and the just entering visitor. And behind that screen, through the crack, Israel caught one momentary glimpse of a little bitof by-play between the pretty chambermaid and the stranger. Thevivacious nymph appeared to have affectedly run from him on thestairs--doubtless in freakish return for some liberal advances--but hadsuffered herself to be overtaken at last ere too late; and on theinstant Israel caught sight of her, was with an insincere air of rosyresentment, receiving a roguish pinch on the arm, and a still moreroguish salute on the cheek. 

The next instant both disappeared from the range of the crevice; thegirl departing whence she had come; the stranger--transiently invisibleas he advanced behind the door--entering the room. When Israel nowperceived him again, he seemed, while momentarily hidden, to haveundergone a complete transformation. 

He was a rather small, elastic, swarthy man, with an aspect as of adisinherited Indian Chief in European clothes. An unvanquishableenthusiasm, intensified to perfect sobriety, couched in his savage, self-possessed eye. He was elegantly and somewhat extravagantly dressedas a civilian; he carried himself with a rustic, barbaric jauntiness, strangely dashed with a superinduced touch of the Parisian _salon_. Histawny cheek, like a date, spoke of the tropic, A wonderful atmosphere ofproud friendlessness and scornful isolation invested him. Yet there wasa bit of the poet as well as the outlaw in him, too. A cool solemnity ofintrepidity sat on his lip. He looked like one who of purpose sought outharm's way. He looked like one who never had been, and never would be, asubordinate. 

Israel thought to himself that seldom before had he seen such a being. Though dressed à-la-mode, he did not seem to be altogether civilized. 

So absorbed was our adventurer by the person of the stranger, that a fewmoments passed ere he began to be aware of the circumstance, that Dr. Franklin and this new visitor having saluted as old acquaintances, werenow sitting in earnest conversation together. 

"Do as you please; but I will not bide a suitor much longer, " said thestranger in bitterness. "Congress gave me to understand that, upon myarrival here, I should be given immediate command of the _Indien_; andnow, for no earthly reason that I can see, you Commissioners havepresented her, fresh from the stocks at Amsterdam, to the King ofFrance, and not to me. What does the King of France with such a frigate?And what can I _not_ do with her? Give me back the "Indien, " and in lessthan one month, you shall hear glorious or fatal news of Paul Jones. "

"Come, come, Captain, " said Doctor Franklin, soothingly, "tell me now, what would you do with her, if you had her?"

"I would teach the British that Paul Jones, though born in Britain, isno subject to the British King, but an untrammelled citizen and sailorof the universe; and I would teach them, too, that if they ruthlesslyravage the American coasts, their own coasts are vulnerable as NewHolland's. Give me the _Indien_, and I will rain down on wicked Englandlike fire on Sodom. "

These words of bravado were not spoken in the tone of a bravo, but aprophet. Erect upon his chair, like an Iroquois, the speaker's look waslike that of an unflickering torch. 

His air seemed slightly to disturb the old sage's philosophic repose, who, while not seeking to disguise his admiration of the unmistakablespirit of the man, seemed but illy to relish his apparent measurelessboasting. 

As if both to change the subject a little, as well as put his visitor inbetter mood--though indeed it might have been but covertly to play withhis enthusiasm--the man of wisdom now drew his chair confidentiallynearer to the stranger's, and putting one hand in a very friendly, conciliatory way upon his visitor's knee, and rubbing it gently to andfro there, much as a lion-tamer might soothingly manipulate theaggravated king of beasts, said in a winning manner:--"Never mind atpresent, Captain, about the '_Indien_' affair. Let that sleep a moment. See now, the Jersey privateers do us a great deal of mischief byintercepting our supplies. It has been mentioned to me, that if you hada small vessel--say, even your present ship, the 'Amphitrite, '--then, byyour singular bravery, you might render great service, by followingthose privateers where larger ships durst not venture their bottoms; or, if but supported by some frigates from Brest at a proper distance, mightdraw them out, so that the larger vessels could capture them. "

"Decoy-duck to French frigates!--Very dignified office, truly!" hissedPaul in a fiery rage. "Doctor Franklin, whatever Paul Jones does for thecause of America, it must be done through unlimited orders: a separate, supreme command; no leader and no counsellor but himself. Have I notalready by my services on the American coast shown that I am well worthyall this? Why then do you seek to degrade me below my previous level? Iwill mount, not sink. I live but for honor and glory. Give me, then, something honorable and glorious to do, and something famous to do itwith. Give me the _Indien_"

The man of wisdom slowly shook his head. "Everything is lost throughthis shillyshallying timidity, called prudence, " cried Paul Jones, starting to his feet; "to be effectual, war should be carried on like amonsoon, one changeless determination of every particle towards the oneunalterable aim. But in vacillating councils, statesmen idle about likethe cats'-paws in calms. My God, why was I not born a Czar!"

"A Nor'wester, rather. Come, come, Captain, " added the sage, "sit down, we have a third person present, you see, " pointing towards Israel, whosat rapt at the volcanic spirit of the stranger. 

Paul slightly started, and turned inquiringly upon Israel, who, equallyowing to Paul's own earnestness of discourse and Israel's motionlessbearing, had thus far remained undiscovered. 

"Never fear, Captain, " said the sage, "this man is true blue, a secretcourier, and an American born. He is an escaped prisoner of war. "

"Ah, captured in a ship?" asked Paul eagerly; "what ship? None of mine!Paul Jones never was captured. "

"No, sir, in the brigantine Washington, out of Boston, " replied Israel;"we were cruising to cut off supplies to the English. "

"Did your shipmates talk much of me?" demanded Paul, with a look as ofa parading Sioux demanding homage to his gewgaws; "what did they say ofPaul Jones?"

"I never heard the name before this evening, " said Israel. 

"What? Ah--brigantine Washington--let me see; that was before I hadoutwitted the Soleby frigate, fought the Milford, and captured theMellish and the rest off Louisbergh. You were long before the news, mylad, " he added, with a sort of compassionate air. 

"Our friend here gave you a rather blunt answer, " said the wise man, sagely mischievous, and addressing Paul. 

"Yes. And I like him for it. My man, will you go a cruise with PaulJones? You fellows so blunt with the tongue, are apt to be sharp withthe steel. Come, my lad, return with me to Brest. I go in a few days. "

Fired by the contagious spirit of Paul, Israel, forgetting all about hisprevious desire to reach home, sparkled with response to the summons. But Doctor Franklin interrupted him. 

"Our friend here, " said he to the Captain, "is at present engaged forvery different duty. "

Much other conversation followed, during which Paul Jones again andagain expressed his impatience at being unemployed, and his resolutionto accept of no employ unless it gave him supreme authority; while inanswer to all this Dr. Franklin, not uninfluenced by the uncompromisingspirit of his guest, and well knowing that however unpleasant a traitin conversation, or in the transaction of civil affairs, yet in war thisvery quality was invaluable, as projectiles and combustibles, finallyassured Paul, after many complimentary remarks, that he wouldimmediately exert himself to the utmost to procure for him someenterprise which should come up to his merits. 

"Thank you for your frankness, " said Paul; "frank myself, I love to dealwith a frank man. You, Doctor Franklin, are true and deep, and so youare frank. "

The sage sedately smiled, a queer incredulity just lurking in the cornerof his mouth. 

"But how about our little scheme for new modelling ships-of-war?" saidthe Doctor, shifting the subject; "it will be a great thing for ourinfant navy, if we succeed. Since our last conversation on that subject, Captain, at odds and ends of time, I have thought over the matter, andhave begun a little skeleton of the thing here, which I will show you. Whenever one has a new idea of anything mechanical, it is best to clotheit with a body as soon as possible. For you can't improve so well onideas as you can on bodies. "

With that, going to a little drawer, he produced a small basket, filledwith a curious looking unfinished frame-work of wood, and several bitsof wood unattached. It looked like a nursery basket containing brokenodds and ends of playthings. 

"Now look here, Captain, though the thing is but begun at present, yetthere is enough to show that _one_ idea at least of yours is notfeasible. "

Paul was all attention, as if having unbounded confidence in whateverthe sage might suggest, while Israel looked on quite as interested aseither, his heart swelling with the thought of being privy to theconsultations of two such men; consultations, too, having ultimatereference to such momentous affairs as the freeing of nations. 

"If, " continued the Doctor, taking up some of the loose bits and pilingthem along on one side of the top of the frame, "if the better toshelter your crew in an engagement, you construct your rail in themanner proposed--as thus--then, by the excessive weight of the timber, you will too much interfere with the ship's centre of gravity. You willhave that too high. "

"Ballast in the hold in proportion, " said Paul. 

"Then you will sink the whole hull too low. But here, to have less smokein time of battle, especially on the lower decks, you proposed a newsort of hatchway. But that won't do. See here now, I have inventedcertain ventilating pipes, they are to traverse the vessel thus"--layingsome toilette pins along--"the current of air to enter here and bedischarged there. What do you think of that? But now about the mainthings--fast sailing driving little to leeward, and drawing littlewater. Look now at this keel. I whittled it only night before last, justbefore going to bed. Do you see now how"--

At this crisis, a knock was heard at the door, and the chambermaidreappeared, announcing that two gentlemen were that moment crossing thecourt below to see Doctor Franklin. 

"The Duke de Chartres, and Count D'Estang, " said the Doctor; "theyappointed for last night, but did not come. Captain, this has somethingindirectly to do with your affair. Through the Duke, Count D'Estang hasspoken to the King about the secret expedition, the design of which youfirst threw out. Call early to-morrow, and I will inform you of theresult. "

With his tawny hand Paul pulled out his watch, a small, richly-jewelledlady's watch. 

"It is so late, I will stay here to-night, " he said; "is there aconvenient room?"

"Quick, " said the Doctor, "it might be ill-advised of you to be seenwith me just now. Our friend here will let you share his chamber. Quick, Israel, and show the Captain thither. "

As the door closed upon them in Israel's apartment, Doctor Franklin'sdoor closed upon the Duke and the Count. Leaving the latter to theirdiscussion of profound plans for the timely befriending of the Americancause, and the crippling of the power of England on the seas, let uspass the night with Paul Jones and Israel in the neighboring room. 

CHAPTER XI. 

PAUL JONES IN A REVERIE. 

"'God helps them that help themselves. ' That's a clincher. That's beenmy experience. But I never saw it in words before. What pamphlet isthis? 'Poor Richard, ' hey!"

Upon entering Israel's room, Captain Paul, stepping towards the tableand spying the open pamphlet there, had taken it up, his eye beingimmediately attracted to the passage previously marked by ouradventurer. 

"A rare old gentleman is 'Poor Richard, '" said Israel in response toPaul's observations. 

"So he seems, so he seems, " answered Paul, his eye still running overthe pamphlet again; "why, 'Poor Richard' reads very much as DoctorFranklin speaks. "

"He wrote it, " said Israel. 

"Aye? Good. So it is, so it is; it's the wise man all over. I must getme a copy of this and wear it around my neck for a charm. And now aboutour quarters for the night. I am not going to deprive you of your bed, my man. Do you go to bed and I will doze in the chair here. It's gooddozing in the crosstrees. "

"Why not sleep together?" said Israel; "see, it is a big bed. Or perhapsyou don't fancy your bed-fellow. Captain?"

"When, before the mast, I first sailed out of Whitehaven to Norway, "said Paul, coolly, "I had for hammock-mate a full-blooded Congo. We hada white blanket spread in our hammock. Every time I turned in I foundthe Congo's black wool worked in with the white worsted. By the end ofthe voyage the blanket was of a pepper-and-salt look, like an old man'sturning head. So it's not because I am notional at all, but because Idon't care to, my lad. Turn in and go to sleep. Let the lamp burn. I'llsee to it. There, go to sleep. "

Complying with what seemed as much a command as a request, Israel, though in bed, could not fall into slumber for thinking of the littlecircumstance that this strange swarthy man, flaming with wildenterprises, sat in full suit in the chair. He felt an uneasy misgivingsensation, as if he had retired, not only without covering up the fire, but leaving it fiercely burning with spitting fagots of hemlock. 

But his natural complaisance induced him at least to feign himselfasleep; whereupon. Paul, laying down "Poor Richard, " rose from hischair, and, withdrawing his boots, began walking rapidly but noiselesslyto and fro, in his stockings, in the spacious room, wrapped in Indianmeditations. Israel furtively eyed him from beneath the coverlid, andwas anew struck by his aspect, now that Paul thought himself unwatched. Stern relentless purposes, to be pursued to the points of adversebayonets and the muzzles of hostile cannon, were expressed in the nowrigid lines of his brow. His ruffled right hand was clutched by hisside, as if grasping a cutlass. He paced the room as if advancing upon afortification. Meantime a confused buzz of discussion came from theneighboring chamber. All else was profound midnight tranquillity. Presently, passing the large mirror over the mantel, Paul caught aglimpse of his person. He paused, grimly regarding it, while a dash ofpleased coxcombry seemed to mingle with the otherwise savagesatisfaction expressed in his face. But the latter predominated. Soon, rolling up his sleeve, with a queer wild smile, Paul lifted his rightarm, and stood thus for an interval, eyeing its image in the glass. Fromwhere he lay, Israel could not see that side of the arm presented to themirror, but he saw its reflection, and started at perceiving there, framed in the carved and gilded wood, certain large intertwisted cipherscovering the whole inside of the arm, so far as exposed, with mysterioustattooings. The design was wholly unlike the fanciful figures ofanchors, hearts, and cables, sometimes decorating small portions ofseamen's bodies. It was a sort of tattooing such as is seen only onthoroughbred savages--deep blue, elaborate, labyrinthine, cabalistic. Israel remembered having beheld, on one of his early voyages, somethingsimilar on the arm of a New Zealand warrior, once met, fresh frombattle, in his native village. He concluded that on some similar earlyvoyage Paul must have undergone the manipulations of some pagan artist. Covering his arm again with his laced coat-sleeve, Paul glancedironically at the hand of the same arm, now again half muffled inruffles, and ornamented with several Parisian rings. He then resumed hiswalking with a prowling air, like one haunting an ambuscade; while agleam of the consciousness of possessing a character as yet un-fathomed, and hidden power to back unsuspected projects, irradiated his cold whitebrow, which, owing to the shade of his hat in equatorial climates, hadbeen left surmounting his swarthy face, like the snow topping the Andes. 

So at midnight, the heart of the metropolis of modern civilization wassecretly trod by this jaunty barbarian in broadcloth; a sort ofprophetical ghost, glimmering in anticipation upon the advent of thosetragic scenes of the French Revolution which levelled the exquisiterefinement of Paris with the bloodthirsty ferocity of Borneo; showingthat broaches and finger-rings, not less than nose-rings and tattooing, are tokens of the primeval savageness which ever slumbers in human kind, civilized or uncivilized. 

Israel slept not a wink that night. The troubled spirit of Paul pacedthe chamber till morning; when, copiously bathing himself at thewash-stand, Paul looked care-free and fresh as a daybreak hawk. After acloseted consultation with Doctor Franklin, he left the place with alight and dandified air, switching his gold-headed cane, and throwing apassing arm round all the pretty chambermaids he encountered, kissingthem resoundingly, as if saluting a frigate. All barbarians are rakes. 

CHAPTER XII. 

RECROSSING THE CHANNEL, ISRAEL RETURNS TO THE SQUIRE'S ABODE--HISADVENTURES THERE. 

On the third day, as Israel was walking to and fro in his room, havingremoved his courier's boots, for fear of disturbing the Doctor, a quicksharp rap at the door announced the American envoy. The man of wisdomentered, with two small wads of paper in one hand, and several crackersand a bit of cheese in the other. There was such an eloquent air ofinstantaneous dispatch about him, that Israel involuntarily sprang tohis boots, and, with two vigorous jerks, hauled them on, and thenseizing his hat, like any bird, stood poised for his flight across thechannel. 

"Well done, my honest friend, " said the Doctor; "you have the papers inyour heel, I suppose. "

"Ah, " exclaimed Israel, perceiving the mild irony; and in an instant hisboots were off again; when, without another word, the Doctor took oneboot, and Israel the other, and forthwith both parties proceeded tosecrete the documents. 

"I think I could improve the design, " said the sage, as, notwithstanding his haste, he critically eyed the screwing apparatus ofthe boot. "The vacancy should have been in the standing part of theheel, not in the lid. It should go with a spring, too, for betterdispatch. I'll draw up a paper on false heels one of these days, andsend it to a private reading at the Institute. But no time for it now. My honest friend, it is now half past ten o'clock. At half past eleventhe diligence starts from the Place-du-Carrousel for Calais. Make allhaste till you arrive at Brentford. I have a little provender here foryou to eat in the diligence, as you will not have time for a regularmeal. A day-and-night courier should never be without a cracker in hispocket. You will probably leave Brentford in a day or two after yourarrival there. Be wary, now, my good friend; heed well, that, if you arecaught with these papers on British ground, you will involve bothyourself and our Brentford friends in fatal calamities. Kick no man'sbox, never mind whose, in the way. Mind your own box. You can't be toocautious, but don't be too suspicious. God bless you, my honest friend. Go!"

And, flinging the door open for his exit, the Doctor saw Israel dartinto the entry, vigorously spring down the stairs, and disappear withall celerity across the court into the vaulted way. 

The man of wisdom stood mildly motionless a moment, with a look ofsagacious, humane meditation on his face, as if pondering upon thechances of the important enterprise: one which, perhaps, might in thesequel affect the weal or woe of nations yet to come. Then suddenlyclapping his hand to his capacious coat-pocket, dragged out a bit ofcork with some hen's feathers, and hurrying to his room, took out hisknife, and proceeded to whittle away at a shuttlecock of an originalscientific construction, which at some prior time he had promised tosend to the young Duchess D'Abrantes that very afternoon. 

Safely reaching Calais, at night, Israel stepped almost from thediligence into the packet, and, in a few moments, was cutting the water. As on the diligence he took an outside and plebeian seat, so, with thesame secret motive of preserving unsuspected the character assumed, hetook a deck passage in the packet. It coming on to rain violently, hestole down into the forecastle, dimly lit by a solitary swinging lamp, where were two men industriously smoking, and filling the narrow holewith soporific vapors. These induced strange drowsiness in Israel, andhe pondered how best he might indulge it, for a time, withoutimperilling the precious documents in his custody. 

But this pondering in such soporific vapors had the effect of thosemathematical devices whereby restless people cipher themselves to sleep. His languid head fell to his breast. In another moment, he droopedhalf-lengthwise upon a chest, his legs outstretched before him. 

Presently he was awakened by some intermeddlement with his feet. Starting to his elbow, he saw one of the two men in the act of slylyslipping off his right boot, while the left one, already removed, lay onthe floor, all ready against the rascal's retreat Had it not been forthe lesson learned on the Pont Neuf, Israel would instantly haveinferred that his secret mission was known, and the operator somedesigned diplomatic knave or other, hired by the British Cabinet, thusto lie in wait for him, fume him into slumber with tobacco, and thenrifle him of his momentous dispatches. But as it was, he recalled DoctorFranklin's prudent admonitions against the indulgence of prematuresuspicions. 

"Sir, " said Israel very civilly, "I will thank you for that boot whichlies on the floor, and, if you please, you can let the other stay whereit is. "

"Excuse me, " said the rascal, an accomplished, self-possessedpractitioner in his thievish art; "I thought your boots might bepinching you, and only wished to ease you a little. "

"Much obliged to ye for your kindness, sir, " said Israel; "but theydon't pinch me at all. I suppose, though, you think they wouldn't pinch_you_ either; your foot looks rather small. Were you going to try 'emon, just to see how they fitted?"

"No, " said the fellow, with sanctimonious seriousness; "but with yourpermission I should like to try them on, when we get to Dover. Icouldn't try them well walking on this tipsy craft's deck, you know. "

"No, " answered Israel, "and the beach at Dover ain't very smooth either. I guess, upon second thought, you had better not try 'em on at all. Besides, I am a simple sort of a soul--eccentric they call me--and don'tlike my boots to go out of my sight. Ha! ha!"

"What are you laughing at?" said the fellow testily. 

"Odd idea! I was just looking at those sad old patched boots there onyour feet, and thinking to myself what leaky fire-buckets they would beto pass up a ladder on a burning building. It would hardly be fair nowto swop my new boots for those old fire-buckets, would it?"

"By plunko!" cried the fellow, willing now by a bold stroke to changethe subject, which was growing slightly annoying; "by plunko, I believewe are getting nigh Dover. Let's see. "

And so saying, he sprang up the ladder to the deck. Upon Israelfollowing, he found the little craft half becalmed, rolling on shortswells almost in the exact middle of the channel. It was just before thebreak of the morning; the air clear and fine; the heavens spangled withmoistly twinkling stars. The French and English coasts lay distinctlyvisible in the strange starlight, the white cliffs of Dover resembling along gabled block of marble houses. Both shores showed a long straightrow of lamps. Israel seemed standing in the middle of the crossing ofsome wide stately street in London. Presently a breeze sprang up, andere long our adventurer disembarked at his destined port, and directlyposted on for Brentford. 

The following afternoon, having gained unobserved admittance into thehouse, according to preconcerted signals, he was sitting in SquireWoodcock's closet, pulling off his boots and delivering his dispatches. 

Having looked over the compressed tissuey sheets, and read a lineparticularly addressed to himself, the Squire, turning round uponIsrael, congratulated him upon his successful mission, placed somerefreshment before him, and apprised him that, owing to certainsuspicious symptoms in the neighborhood, he (Israel) must now remainconcealed in the house for a day or two, till an answer should be readyfor Paris. 

It was a venerable mansion, as was somewhere previously stated, of awide and rambling disorderly spaciousness, built, for the most part, ofweather-stained old bricks, in the goodly style called Elizabethan. Aswithout, it was all dark russet bricks, so within, it was nothing buttawny oak panels. 

"Now, my good fellow, " said the Squire, "my wife has a number ofguests, who wander from room to room, having the freedom of the house. So I shall have to put you very snugly away, to guard against any chanceof discovery. "

So saying, first locking the door, he touched a spring nigh the openfire-place, whereupon one of the black sooty stone jambs of the chimneystarted ajar, just like the marble gate of a tomb. Inserting one leg ofthe heavy tongs in the crack, the Squire pried this cavernous gate wideopen. 

"Why, Squire Woodcock, what is the matter with your chimney?" saidIsrael. 

"Quick, go in. "

"Am I to sweep the chimney?" demanded Israel; "I didn't engage forthat. "

"Pooh, pooh, this is your hiding-place. Come, move in. "

"But where does it go to, Squire Woodcock? I don't like the looks ofit. "

"Follow me. I'll show you. "

Pushing his florid corpulence into the mysterious aperture, the elderlySquire led the way up steep stairs of stone, hardly two feet in width, till they reached a little closet, or rather cell, built into themassive main wall of the mansion, and ventilated and dimly lit by twolittle sloping slits, ingeniously concealed without, by their formingthe sculptured mouths of two griffins cut in a great stone tabletdecorating that external part of the dwelling. A mattress lay rolled upin one corner, with a jug of water, a flask of wine, and a woodentrencher containing cold roast beef and bread. 

"And I am to be buried alive here?" said Israel, ruefully looking round. 

"But your resurrection will soon be at hand, " smiled the Squire; "twodays at the furthest. "

"Though to be sure I was a sort of prisoner in Paris, just as I seemabout to be made here, " said Israel, "yet Doctor Franklin put me in abetter jug than this, Squire Woodcock. It was set out with boquets and amirror, and other fine things. Besides, I could step out into the entrywhenever I wanted. "

"Ah, but, my hero, that was in France, and this is in England. There youwere in a friendly country: here you are in the enemy's. If you shouldbe discovered in my house, and your connection with me became known, doyou know that it would go very hard with me; very hard indeed?"

"Then, for your sake, I am willing to stay wherever you think best toput me, " replied Israel. 

"Well, then, you say you want boquets and a mirror. If those articleswill at all help to solace your seclusion, I will bring them to you. "

"They really would be company; the sight of my own face particularly. "

"Stay here, then. I will be back in ten minutes. "

In less than that time, the good old Squire returned, puffing andpanting, with a great bunch of flowers, and a small shaving-glass. 

"There, " said he, putting them down; "now keep perfectly quiet; avoidmaking any undue noise, and on no account descend the stairs, till Icome for you again. "

"But when will that be?" asked Israel. 

"I will try to come twice each day while you are here. But there is noknowing what may happen. If I should not visit you till I come toliberate you--on the evening of the second day, or the morning of thethird--you must not be at all surprised, my good fellow. There is plentyof food-and water to last you. But mind, on no account descend thestone-stairs till I come for you. "

With that, bidding his guest adieu, he left him. 

Israel stood glancing pensively around for a time. By and by, moving therolled mattress under the two air-slits, he mounted, to try if aughtwere visible beyond. But nothing was to be seen but a very thin slice ofblue sky peeping through the lofty foliage of a great tree planted nearthe side-portal of the mansion; an ancient tree, coeval with the ancientdwelling it guarded. 

Sitting down on the Mattress, Israel fell into a reverie. 

"Poverty and liberty, or plenty and a prison, seem to be the two hornsof the constant dilemma of my life, " thought he. "Let's look at theprisoner. "

And taking up the shaving-glass, he surveyed his lineaments. 

"What a pity I didn't think to ask for razors and soap. I want shavingvery badly. I shaved last in France. How it would pass the time here. Had I a comb now and a razor, I might shave and curl my hair, and keepmaking a continual toilet all through the two days, and look spruce as arobin when I get out. I'll ask the Squire for the things this very nightwhen he drops in. Hark! ain't that a sort of rumbling in the wall? Ihope there ain't any oven next door; if so, I shall be scorched out. Here I am, just like a rat in the wainscot. I wish there was a lowwindow to look out of. I wonder what Doctor Franklin is doing now, andPaul Jones? Hark! there's a bird singing in the leaves. Bell for dinner, that. "

And for pastime, he applied himself to the beef and bread, and took adraught of the wine and water. 

At last night fell. He was left in utter darkness. No Squire. 

After an anxious, sleepless night, he saw two long flecks of pale graylight slanting into the cell from the slits, like two long spears. Herose, rolled up his mattress, got upon the roll, and put his mouth toone of the griffins' months. He gave a low, just audible whistle, directing it towards the foliage of the tree. Presently there was aslight rustling among the leaves, then one solitary chirrup, and inthree minutes a whole chorus of melody burst upon his ear. 

"I've waked the first bird, " said he to himself, with a smile, "and he'swaked all the rest. Now then for breakfast. That over, I dare say theSquire will drop in. "

But the breakfast was over, and the two flecks of pale light had changedto golden beams, and the golden beams grew less and less slanting, tillthey straightened themselves up out of sight altogether. It was noon, and no Squire. 

"He's gone a-hunting before breakfast, and got belated, " thought Israel. 

The afternoon shadows lengthened. It was sunset; no Squire. 

"He must be very busy trying some sheep-stealer in the hall, " musedIsrael. "I hope he won't forget all about me till to-morrow. "

He waited and listened; and listened and waited. 

Another restless night; no sleep; morning came. The second day passedlike the first, and the night. On the third morning the flowers layshrunken by his side. Drops of wet oozing through the air-slits, felldully on the stone floor. He heard the dreary beatings of the tree'sleaves against the mouths of the griffins, bedashing them with the sprayof the rain-storm without. At intervals a burst of thunder rolled overhis head, and lightning flashing down through the slits, lit up the cellwith a greenish glare, followed by sharp splashings and rattlings of theredoubled rain-storm. 

"This is the morning of the third day, " murmured Israel to himself; "hesaid he would at the furthest come to me on the morning of the thirdday. This is it. Patience, he will be here yet. Morning lasts tillnoon. "

But, owing to the murkiness of the day, it was very hard to tell whennoon came. Israel refused to credit that noon had come and gone, tilldusk set plainly in. Dreading he knew not what, he found himself buriedin the darkness of still another night. However patient and hopefulhitherto, fortitude now presently left him. Suddenly, as if somecontagious fever had seized him, he was afflicted with strangeenchantments of misery, undreamed of till now. 

He had eaten all the beef, but there was bread and water sufficient tolast, by economy, for two or three days to come. It was not the pang ofhunger then, but a nightmare originating in his mysteriousincarceration, which appalled him. All through the long hours of thisparticular night, the sense of being masoned up in the wall, grew, andgrew, and grew upon him, till again and again he lifted himselfconvulsively from the floor, as if vast blocks of stone had been laid onhim; as if he had been digging a deep well, and the stonework with allthe excavated earth had caved in upon him, where he burrowed ninety feetbeneath the clover. In the blind tomb of the midnight he stretched histwo arms sideways, and felt as if coffined at not being able to extendthem straight out, on opposite sides, for the narrowness of the cell. Heseated himself against one side of the wall, crosswise with the cell, and pushed with his feet at the opposite wall. But still mindful of hispromise in this extremity, he uttered no cry. He mutely raved in thedarkness. The delirious sense of the absence of light was soon added tohis other delirium as to the contraction of space. The lids of his eyesburst with impotent distension. Then he thought the air itself wasgetting unbearable. He stood up at the griffin slits, pressing his lipsfar into them till he moulded his lips there, to suck the utmost of theopen air possible. 

And continually, to heighten his frenzy, there recurred to him again andagain what the Squire had told him as to the origin of the cell. Itseemed that this part of the old house, or rather this wall of it, wasextremely ancient, dating far beyond the era of Elizabeth, having onceformed portion of a religious retreat belonging to the Templars. Thedomestic discipline of this order was rigid and merciless in theextreme. In a side wall of their second storey chapel, horizontal and ona level with the floor, they had an internal vacancy left, exactly ofthe shape and average size of a coffin. In this place, from time totime, inmates convicted of contumacy were confined; but, strange to say, not till they were penitent. A small hole, of the girth of one's wrist, sunk like a telescope three feet through the masonry into the cell, served at once for ventilation, and to push through food to theprisoner. This hole opening into the chapel also enabled the poorsolitaire, as intended, to overhear the religious services at the altar;and, without being present, take part in the same. It was deemed a goodsign of the state of the sufferer's soul, if from the gloomy recesses ofthe wall was heard the agonized groan of his dismal response. This wasregarded in the light of a penitent wail from the dead, because thecustoms of the order ordained that when any inmate should be firstincarcerated in the wall, he should be committed to it in the presenceof all the brethren, the chief reading the burial service as the livebody was sepulchred. Sometimes several weeks elapsed ere thedisentombment, the penitent being then usually found numb and congealedin all his extremities, like one newly stricken with paralysis. 

This coffin-cell of the Templars had been suffered to remain in thedemolition of the general edifice, to make way for the erection of thenew, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth. It was enlarged somewhat, andaltered, and additionally ventilated, to adapt it for a place ofconcealment in times of civil dissension. 

With this history ringing in his solitary brain, it may readily beconceived what Israel's feelings must have been. Here, in this verydarkness, centuries ago, hearts, human as his, had mildewed in despair;limbs, robust as his own, had stiffened in immovable torpor. 

At length, after what seemed all the prophetic days and years of Daniel, morning broke. The benevolent light entered the cell, soothing hisfrenzy, as if it had been some smiling human face--nay, the Squirehimself, come at last to redeem him from thrall. Soon his dumb ravingsentirely left him, and gradually, with a sane, calm mind, he revolvedall the circumstances of his condition. 

He could not be mistaken; something fatal must have befallen his friend. Israel remembered the Squire's hinting that in case of the discovery ofhis clandestine proceedings it would fare extremely hard with him, Israel was forced to conclude that this same unhappy discovery had beenmade; that owing to some untoward misadventure his good friend had beencarried off a State-prisoner to London; that prior to his going theSquire had not apprised any member of his household that he was about toleave behind him a prisoner in the wall; this seemed evident from thecircumstance that, thus far, no soul had visited that prisoner. It couldnot be otherwise. Doubtless the Squire, having no opportunity toconverse in private with his relatives or friends at the moment of hissudden arrest, had been forced to keep his secret, for the present, forfear of involving Israel in still worse calamities. But would he leavehim to perish piecemeal in the wall? All surmise was baffled in theunconjecturable possibilities of the case. But some sort of action mustspeedily be determined upon. Israel would not additionally endanger theSquire, but he could not in such uncertainty consent to perish where hewas. He resolved at all hazards to escape, by stealth and noiselessly, if possible; by violence and outcry, if indispensable. 

Gliding out of the cell, he descended the stone stairs, and stood beforethe interior of the jamb. He felt an immovable iron knob, but no more. He groped about gently for some bolt or spring. When before he hadpassed through the passage with his guide, he had omitted to notice bywhat precise mechanism the jamb was to be opened from within, orwhether, indeed, it could at all be opened except from without. 

He was about giving up the search in despair, after sweeping with histwo hands every spot of the wall-surface around him, when chancing toturn his whole body a little to one side, he heard a creak, and saw athin lance of light. His foot had unconsciously pressed some spring laidin the floor. The jamb was ajar. Pushing it open, he stood at liberty, in the Squire's closet. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

HIS ESCAPE FROM THE HOUSE, WITH VARIOUS ADVENTURES FOLLOWING. 

He started at the funereal aspect of the room, into which, since he laststood there, undertakers seemed to have stolen. The curtains of thewindow were festooned with long weepers of crape. The four corners ofthe red cloth on the round table were knotted with crape. 

Knowing nothing of these mournful customs of the country, nevertheless, Israel's instinct whispered him that Squire Woodcock lived no more onthis earth. At once the whole three days' mystery was made clear. Butwhat was now to be done? His friend must have died very suddenly; mostprobably struck down in a fit, from which he never more rose. With himhad perished all knowledge of the fact that a stranger was immured inthe mansion. If discovered then, prowling here in the inmost privaciesof a gentleman's abode, what would befall the wanderer, already notunsuspected in the neighborhood of some underhand guilt as a fugitive?If he adhered to the strict truth, what could he offer in his owndefence without convicting himself of acts which, by English tribunals, would be accounted flagitious crimes? Unless, indeed, by involving thememory of the deceased Squire Woodcock in his own self acknowledgedproceedings, so ungenerous a charge should result in an abhorrentrefusal to credit his extraordinary tale, whether as referring tohimself or another, and so throw him open to still more grievoussuspicions?

While wrapped in these dispiriting reveries, he heard a step not veryfar off in the passage. It seemed approaching. Instantly he flew to thejamb, which remained unclosed, and disappearing within, drew the stoneafter him by the iron knob. Owing to his hurried violence the jambclosed with a dull, dismal and singular noise. A shriek followed fromwithin the room. In a panic, Israel fled up the dark stairs, and nearthe top, in his eagerness, stumbled and fell back to the last step witha rolling din, which, reverberated by the arch overhead, smote throughand through the wall, dying away at last indistinctly, like low muffledthunder among the clefts of deep hills. When raising himself instantly, not seriously bruised by his fall, Israel instantly listened, theechoing sounds of his descent were mingled with added shrieks fromwithin the room. They seemed some nervous female's, alarmed by what musthave appeared to her supernatural, or at least unaccountable, noises inthe wall. Directly he heard other voices of alarm undistinguishablycommingled, and then they retreated together, and all again was still. 

Recovering from his first amazement, Israel revolved these occurrences. "No creature now in the house knows of the cell, " thought he. "Somewoman, the housekeeper, perhaps, first entered the room alone. Just asshe entered the jamb closed. The sudden report made her shriek; then, afterwards, the noise of my fall prolonging itself, added to her fright, while her repeated shrieks brought every soul in the house to her, whoaghast at seeing her lying in a pale faint, it may be, like a corpse, ina room hung with crape for a man just dead, they also shrieked out, andthen with blended lamentations they bore the fainting person away. Nowthis will follow; no doubt it _has_ followed ere now:--they believe thatthe woman saw or heard the spirit of Squire Woodcock. Since I seem thento understand how all these strange events have occurred, since I seemto know that they have plain common causes, I begin to feel cool andcalm again. Let me see. Yes. I have it. By means of the idea of theghost prevailing among the frightened household, by that means I willthis very night make good my escape. If I can but lay hands on some ofthe late Squire's clothing, if but a coat and hat of his, I shall becertain to succeed. It is not too early to begin now. They will hardlycome back to the room in a hurry. I will return to it and see what I canfind to serve my purpose. It is the Squire's private closet, hence it isnot unlikely that here some at least of his clothing will be found. "

With these, thoughts, he cautiously sprung the iron under foot, peepedin, and, seeing all clear, boldly re-entered the apartment. He wentstraight to a high, narrow door in the opposite wall. The key was in thelock. Opening the door, there hung several coats, small-clothes, pairsof silk stockings, and hats of the deceased. With little difficultyIsrael selected from these the complete suit in which he had last seenhis once jovial friend. Carefully closing the door, and carrying thesuit with him, he was returning towards the chimney, when he saw theSquire's silver-headed cane leaning against a corner of the wainscot. Taking this also, he stole back to his cell. 

Slipping off his own clothing, he deliberately arrayed himself in theborrowed raiment, silk small-clothes and all, then put on the cockedhat, grasped the silver-headed cane in his right hand, and moving hissmall shaving-glass slowly up and down before him, so as by piecemeal totake in his whole figure, felt convinced that he would well pass forSquire Woodcock's genuine phantom. But after the first feeling ofself-satisfaction with his anticipated success had left him, it was notwithout some superstitious embarrassment that Israel felt himselfencased in a dead man's broadcloth; nay, in the very coat in which thedeceased had no doubt fallen down in his fit. By degrees he began tofeel almost as unreal and shadowy as the shade whose part he intended toenact. 

Waiting long and anxiously till darkness came, and then till he thoughtit was fairly midnight, he stole back into the closet, and standing fora moment uneasily in the middle of the floor, thinking over all therisks he might run, he lingered till he felt himself resolute and calm. Then groping for the door leading into the hall, put his hand on theknob and turned it. But the door refused to budge. Was it locked? Thekey was not in. Turning the knob once more, and holding it so, hepressed firmly against the door. It did not move. More firmly still, when suddenly it burst open with a loud crackling report. Being cramped, it had stuck in the sill. Less than three seconds passed when, as Israelwas groping his way down the long wide hall towards the large staircaseat its opposite end, he heard confused hurrying noises from theneighboring rooms, and in another instant several persons, mostly innight-dresses, appeared at their chamber-doors, thrusting out alarmedfaces, lit by a lamp held by one of the number, a rather elderly lady inwidow's weeds, who by her appearance seemed to have just risen from asleepless chair, instead of an oblivious couch. Israel's heart beat likea hammer; his face turned like a sheet. But bracing himself, pulling hishat lower down over his eyes, settling his head in the collar of hiscoat, he advanced along the defile of wildly staring faces. He advancedwith a slow and stately step, looked neither to the right nor the left, but went solemnly forward on his now faintly illuminated way, soundinghis cane on the floor as he passed. The faces in the doorways curdledhis blood by their rooted looks. Glued to the spot, they seemedincapable of motion. Each one was silent as he advanced towards him orher, but as he left each individual, one after another, behind, each ina frenzy shrieked out, "The Squire, the Squire!" As he passed the ladyin the widow's weeds, she fell senseless and crosswise before him. Butforced to be immutable in his purpose, Israel, solemnly stepping overher prostrate form, marched deliberately on. 

In a few minutes more he had reached the main door of the mansion, andwithdrawing the chain and bolt, stood in the open air. It was a brightmoonlight night. He struck slowly across the open grounds towards thesunken fields beyond. When-midway across the grounds, he turned towardsthe mansion, and saw three of the front windows filled with white faces, gazing in terror at the wonderful spectre. Soon descending a slope, hedisappeared from their view. 

Presently he came to hilly land in meadow, whose grass having beenlately cut, now lay dotting the slope in cocks; a sinuous line of creamyvapor meandered through the lowlands at the base of the hill; whilebeyond was a dense grove of dwarfish trees, with here and there a talltapering dead trunk, peeled of the bark, and overpeering the rest. Thevapor wore the semblance of a deep stream of water, imperfectlydescried; the grove looked like some closely-clustering town on itsbanks, lorded over by spires of churches. 

The whole scene magically reproduced to our adventurer the aspect ofBunker Hill, Charles River, and Boston town, on the well-rememberednight of the 16th of June. The same season; the same moon; the samenew-mown hay on the shaven sward; hay which was scraped together duringthe night to help pack into the redoubt so hurriedly thrown up. 

Acted on as if by enchantment, Israel sat down on one of the cocks, andgave himself up to reverie. But, worn out by long loss of sleep, hisreveries would have soon merged into slumber's still wilder dreams, hadhe not rallied himself, and departed on his way, fearful of forgettinghimself in an emergency like the present. It now occurred to him that, well as his disguise had served him in escaping from the mansion ofSquire Woodcock, that disguise might fatally endanger him if he shouldbe discovered in it abroad. He might pass for a ghost at night, andamong the relations and immediate friends of the gentleman deceased; butby day, and among indifferent persons, he ran no small risk of beingapprehended for an entry-thief. He bitterly lamented his omission in notpulling on the Squire's clothes over his own, so that he might now havereappeared in his former guise. 

As meditating over this difficulty, he was passing along, suddenly hesaw a man in black standing right in his path, about fifty yardsdistant, in a field of some growing barley or wheat. The gloomy strangerwas standing stock-still; one outstretched arm, with weird intimationpointing towards the deceased Squire's abode. To the brooding soul ofthe now desolate Israel, so strange a sight roused a supernaturalsuspicion. His conscience morbidly reproaching him for the terrors hehad bred in making his escape from the house, he seemed to see in thefixed gesture of the stranger something more than humanly significant. But somewhat of his intrepidity returned; he resolved to test theapparition. Composing itself to the same deliberate stateliness withwhich it had paced the hall, the phantom of Squire Woodcock firmly, advanced its cane, and marched straight forward towards the mysteriousstranger. 

As he neared him, Israel shrunk. The dark coat-sleeve flapped on thebony skeleton of the unknown arm. The face was lost in a sort of ghastlyblank. It was no living man. 

But mechanically continuing his course, Israel drew still nearer and sawa scarecrow. 

Not a little relieved by the discovery, our adventurer paused, moreparticularly to survey so deceptive an object, which seemed to have beenconstructed on the most efficient principles; probably by some brokendown wax figure costumer. It comprised the complete wardrobe of ascarecrow, namely: a cocked hat, bunged; tattered coat; old velveteenbreeches; and long worsted stockings, full of holes; all stuffed verynicely with straw, and skeletoned by a frame-work of poles. There was agreat flapped pocket to the coat--which seemed to have been somelaborer's--standing invitingly opened. Putting his hands in, Israel drewout the lid of an old tobacco-box, the broken bowl of a pipe, two rustynails, and a few kernels of wheat. This reminded him of the Squire'spockets. Trying them, he produced a handsome handkerchief, aspectacle-case, with a purse containing some silver and gold, amountingto a little more than five pounds. Such is the difference between thecontents of the pockets of scarecrows and the pockets of well-to-dosquires. Ere donning his present habiliments, Israel had not omitted towithdraw his own money from his own coat, and put it in the pocket ofhis own waistcoat, which he had not exchanged. 

Looking upon the scarecrow more attentively, it struck him that, miserable as its wardrobe was, nevertheless here was a chance forgetting rid of the unsuitable and perilous clothes of the Squire. Noother available opportunity might present itself for a time. Before heencountered any living creature by daylight, another suit must somehowbe had. His exchange with the old ditcher, after his escape from the innnear Portsmouth, had familiarized him with the most deplorable ofwardrobes. Well, too, he knew, and had experienced it, that for a mandesirous of avoiding notice, the more wretched the clothes, the better. For who does not shun the scurvy wretch, Poverty, advancing in batteredhat and lamentable coat?

Without more ado, slipping off the Squire's raiment, he donned thescarecrow's, after carefully shaking out the hay, which, from manyalternate soakings and bakings in rain and sun, had become quite brokenup, and would have been almost dust, were it not for the mildew whichdamped it. But sufficient of this wretched old hay remained adhesive tothe inside of the breeches and coat-sleeves, to produce the mostirritating torment. 

The grand moral question now came up, what to do with the purse. Wouldit be dishonest under the circumstances to appropriate that purse?Considering the whole matter, and not forgetting that he had notreceived from the gentleman deceased the promised reward for hisservices as courier, Israel concluded that he might justly use themoney for his own. To which opinion surely no charitable judge willdemur. Besides, what should he do with the purse, if not use it for hisown? It would have been insane to have returned it to the relations. Such mysterious honesty would have but resulted in his arrest as arebel, or rascal. As for the Squire's clothes, handkerchief, andspectacle-case, they must be put out of sight with all dispatch. So, going to a morass not remote, Israel sunk them deep down, and heapedtufts of the rank sod upon them. Then returning to the field of corn, sat down under the lee of a rock, about a hundred yards from where thescarecrow had stood, thinking which way he now had best direct hissteps. But his late ramble coming after so long a deprivation of rest, soon produced effects not so easy to be shaken off, as when reposingupon the haycock. He felt less anxious too, since changing his apparel. So before he was aware, he fell into deep sleep. 

When he awoke, the sun was well up in the sky. Looking around he saw afarm-laborer with a pitchfork coming at a distance into view, whosesteps seemed bent in a direction not far from the spot where he lay. Immediately it struck our adventurer that this man must be familiar withthe scarecrow; perhaps had himself fashioned it. Should he miss it then, he might make immediate search, and so discover the thief so imprudentlyloitering upon the very field of his operations. 

Waiting until the man momentarily disappeared in a little hollow, Israelran briskly to the identical spot where the scarecrow had stood, where, standing stiffly erect, pulling the hat well over his face, andthrusting out his arm, pointed steadfastly towards the Squire's abode, he awaited the event. Soon the man reappeared in sight, and marchingright on, paused not far from Israel, and gave him an one earnest look, as if it were his daily wont to satisfy that all was right with thescarecrow. No sooner was the man departed to a reasonable distance, than, quitting his post, Israel struck across the fields towards London. But he had not yet quite quitted the field when it occurred to him toturn round and see if the man was completely out of sight, when, to hisconsternation, he saw the man returning towards him, evidently by hispace and gesture in unmixed amazement. The man must have turned round tolook before Israel had done so. Frozen to the ground, Israel knew notwhat to do; but next moment it struck him that this very motionlessnesswas the least hazardous plan in such a strait. Thrusting out his armagain towards the house, once more he stood stock still, and againawaited the event. 

It so happened that this time, in pointing towards the house, Israelunavoidably pointed towards the advancing man. Hoping that thestrangeness of this coincidence might, by operating on the man'ssuperstition, incline him to beat an immediate retreat, Israel kept coolas he might. But the man proved to be of a braver metal thananticipated. In passing the spot where the scarecrow had stood, andperceiving, beyond the possibility of mistake, that by, someunaccountable agency it had suddenly removed itself to a distance, instead of being, terrified at this verification of his worstapprehensions, the man pushed on for Israel, apparently resolved to siftthis mystery to the bottom. 

Seeing him now determinately coming, with pitchfork valiantly presented, Israel, as a last means of practising on the fellow's fears of thesupernatural, suddenly doubled up both fists, presenting them savagelytowards him at a distance of about twenty paces, at the same timeshowing his teeth like a skull's, and demoniacally rolling his eyes. Theman paused bewildered, looked all round him, looked at the springinggrain, then across at some trees, then up at the sky, and satisfied atlast by those observations that the world at large had not undergone amiracle in the last fifteen minutes, resolutely resumed his advance; thepitchfork, like a boarding-pike, now aimed full at the breast of theobject. Seeing all his stratagems vain, Israel now threw himself intothe original attitude of the scarecrow, and once again stood immovable. Abating his pace by degrees almost to a mere creep, the man at last camewithin three feet of him, and, pausing, gazed amazed into Israel's eyes. With a stern and terrible expression Israel resolutely returned theglance, but otherwise remained like a statue, hoping thus to stare hispursuer out of countenance. At last the man slowly presented one prongof his fork towards Israel's left eye. Nearer and nearer the sharp pointcame, till no longer capable of enduring such a test, Israel took to hisheels with all speed, his tattered coat-tails streaming behind him. Withinveterate purpose the man pursued. Darting blindly on, Israel, leapinga gate, suddenly found himself in a field where some dozen laborerswere at work, who recognizing the scarecrow--an old acquaintance oftheirs, as it would seem--lifted all their hands as the astoundingapparition swept by, followed by the man with the pitchfork. Soon alljoined in the chase, but Israel proved to have better wind and bottomthan any. Outstripping the whole pack he finally shot out of their sightin an extensive park, heavily timbered in one quarter. He never saw moreof these people. 

Loitering in the wood till nightfall, he then stole out and made thebest of his way towards the house of that good natured farmer in whosecorn-loft he had received his first message from Squire Woodcock. Rousing this man up a little before midnight, he informed him somewhatof his recent adventures, but carefully concealed his having beenemployed as a secret courier, together with his escape from SquireWoodcock's. All he craved at present was a meal. The meal being over, Israel offered to buy from the farmer his best suit of clothes, anddisplayed the money on the spot. 

"Where did you get so much money?" said his entertainer in a tone ofsurprise; "your clothes here don't look as if you had seen prosperoustimes since you left me. Why, you look like a scarecrow. "

"That may well be, " replied Israel, very soberly. "But what do you say?will you sell me your suit?--here's the cash. "

"I don't know about it, " said the farmer, in doubt; "let me look at themoney. Ha!--a silk purse come out of a beggars pocket!--Quit the house, rascal, you've turned thief. "

Thinking that he could not swear to his having come by his money withabsolute honesty--since indeed the case was one for the most subtlecasuist--Israel knew not what to reply. This honest confusion confirmedthe farmer, who with many abusive epithets drove him into the road, telling him that he might thank himself that he did not arrest him onthe spot. 

In great dolor at this unhappy repulse, Israel trudged on in themoonlight some three miles to the house of another friend, who also hadonce succored him in extremity. This man proved a very sound sleeper. Instead of succeeding in rousing him by his knocking, Israel butsucceeded in rousing his wife, a person not of the greatest amiability. Raising the sash, and seeing so shocking a pauper before her, the womanupbraided him with shameless impropriety in asking charity at dead ofnight, in a dress so improper too. Looking down at his deplorablevelveteens, Israel discovered that his extensive travels had produced agreat rent in one loin of the rotten old breeches, through which awhitish fragment protruded. 

Remedying this oversight as well as he might, he again implored thewoman to wake her husband. 

"That I shan't!" said the woman, morosely. "Quit the premises, or I'llthrow something on ye. "

With that she brought some earthenware to the window, and would havefulfilled her threat, had not Israel prudently retreated some paces. Here he entreated the woman to take mercy on his plight, and since shewould not waken her husband, at least throw to him (Israel) herhusband's breeches, and he would leave the price of them, with his ownbreeches to boot, on the sill of the door. 

"You behold how sadly I need them, " said he; "for heaven's sake befriendme. "

"Quit the premises!" reiterated the woman. 

"The breeches, the breeches! here is the money, " cried Israel, halffurious with anxiety. 

"Saucy cur, " cried the woman, somehow misunderstanding him; "do youcunningly taunt me with _wearing_ the breeches'? begone!"

Once more poor Israel decamped, and made for another friend. But here amonstrous bull-dog, indignant that the peace of a quiet family should bedisturbed by so outrageous a tatterdemalion, flew at Israel'sunfortunate coat, whose rotten skirts the brute tore completely off, leaving the coat razeed to a spencer, which barely came down to thewearer's waist. In attempting to drive the monster away, Israel's hatfell off, upon which the dog pounced with the utmost fierceness, andthrusting both paws into it, rammed out the crown and went snuffling thewreck before him. Recovering the wretched hat, Israel again beat aretreat, his wardrobe sorely the worse for his visits. Not only was hiscoat a mere rag, but his breeches, clawed by the dog, were slashed intoyawning gaps, while his yellow hair waved over the top of the crownlessbeaver, like a lonely tuft of heather on the highlands. 

In this plight the morning discovered him dubiously skirmishing on theoutskirts of a village. 

"Ah! what a true patriot gets for serving his country!" murmuredIsrael. But soon thinking a little better of his case, and seeing yetanother house which had once furnished him with an asylum, he made boldto advance to the door. Luckily he this time met the man himself, justemerging from bed. At first the farmer did not recognize the fugitive, but upon another look, seconded by Israel's plaintive appeal, beckonedhim into the barn, where directly our adventurer told him all he thoughtprudent to disclose of his story, ending by once more offering tonegotiate for breeches and coat. Having ere this emptied and thrown awaythe purse which had played him so scurvy a trick with the first farmer, he now produced three crown-pieces. 

"Three crown-pieces in your pocket, and no crown to your hat!" said thefarmer. 

"But I assure you, my friend, " rejoined Israel, "that a finer hat wasnever worn, until that confounded bull-dog ruined it. "

"True, " said the farmer, "I forgot that part of your story. Well, I havea tolerable coat and breeches which I will sell you for your money. "

In ten minutes more Israel was equipped in a gray coat of coarse cloth, not much improved by wear, and breeches to match. For half-a-crown morehe procured a highly respectable looking hat. 

"Now, my kind friend, " said Israel, "can you tell me where Horne Tookeand John Bridges live?"

Our adventurer thought it his best plan to seek out one or other ofthose gentlemen, both to report proceedings and learn confirmatorytidings concerning Squire Woodcock, touching whose fate he did not liketo inquire of others. 

"Horne Tooke? What do you want with Horne Tooke, " said the farmer. "Hewas Squire Woodcock's friend, wasn't he? The poor Squire! Who would havethought he'd have gone off so suddenly. But apoplexy comes like abullet. "

"I was right, " thought Israel to himself. "But where does Horne Tookelive?" he demanded again. 

"He once lived in Brentford, and wore a cassock there. But I hear he'ssold out his living, and gone in his surplice to study law in Lunnon. "

This was all news to Israel, who, from various amiable remarks he hadheard from Horne Tooke at the Squire's, little dreamed he was anordained clergyman. Yet a good-natured English clergyman translatedLucian; another, equally good-natured, wrote Tristam Shandy; and athird, an ill-natured appreciator of good-natured Rabelais, died a dean;not to speak of others. Thus ingenious and ingenuous are some of theEnglish clergy. 

"You can't tell me, then, where to find Horne Tooke?" said Israel, inperplexity. 

"You'll find him, I suppose, in Lunnon. "

"What street and number?"

"Don't know. Needle in a haystack. "

"Where does Mr. Bridges live?"

"Never heard of any Bridges, except Lunnon bridges, and one MollyBridges in Bridewell. "

So Israel departed; better clothed, but no wiser than before. 

What to do next? He reckoned up his money, and concluded he had plentyto carry him back to Doctor Franklin in Paris. Accordingly, taking aturn to avoid the two nearest villages, he directed his steps towardsLondon, where, again taking the post-coach for Dover, he arrived on thechannel shore just in time to learn that the very coach in which he rodebrought the news to the authorities there that all intercourse betweenthe two nations was indefinitely suspended. The characteristictaciturnity and formal stolidity of his fellow-travellers--allEnglishmen, mutually unacquainted with each other, and occupyingdifferent positions in life--having prevented his sooner hearing thetidings. 

Here was another accumulation of misfortunes. All visions but those ofeventual imprisonment or starvation vanished from before the presentrealities of poor Israel Potter. The Brentford gentleman had flatteredhim with the prospect of receiving something very handsome for hisservices as courier. That hope was no more. Doctor Franklin had promisedhim his good offices in procuring him a passage home to America. Quiteout of the question now. The sage had likewise intimated that he mightpossibly see him some way remunerated for his sufferings in hiscountry's cause. An idea no longer to be harbored. Then Israel recalledthe mild man of wisdom's words--"At the prospect of pleasure never beelated; but without depression respect the omens of ill. " But he foundit as difficult now to comply, in all respects, with the last section ofthe maxim, as before he had with the first. 

While standing wrapped in afflictive reflections on the shore, gazingtowards the unattainable coast of France, a pleasant-looking cousinlystranger, in seamen's dress, accosted him, and, after some pleasantconversation, very civilly invited him up a lane into a house of rathersecret entertainment. Pleased to be befriended in this his strait, Israel yet looked inquisitively upon the man, not completely satisfiedwith his good intentions. But the other, with good-humored violence, hurried him up the lane into the inn, when, calling for some spirits, heand Israel very affectionately drank to each other's better health andprosperity. 

"Take another glass, " said the stranger, affably. 

Israel, to drown his heavy-heartedness, complied. The liquor began totake effect. 

"Ever at sea?" said the stranger, lightly. 

"Oh, yes; been a whaling. "

"Ah!" said the other, "happy to hear that, I assure you. Jim! Bill!" Andbeckoning very quietly to two brawny fellows, in a trice Israel foundhimself kidnapped into the naval service of the magnanimous oldgentleman of Kew Gardens--his Royal Majesty, George III. 

"Hands off!" said Israel, fiercely, as the two men pinioned him. 

"Reglar game-cock, " said the cousinly-looking man. "I must get threeguineas for cribbing him. Pleasant voyage to ye, my friend, " and, leaving Israel a prisoner, the crimp, buttoning his coat, saunteredleisurely out of the inn. 

"I'm no Englishman, " roared Israel, in a foam. 

"Oh! that's the old story, " grinned his jailers. "Come along. There'sno Englishman in the English fleet. All foreigners. You may take theirown word for it. "

To be short, in less than a week Israel found himself at Portsmouth, and, ere long, a foretopman in his Majesty's ship of the line, "Unprincipled, " scudding before the wind down channel, in company withthe "Undaunted, " and the "Unconquerable;" all three haughty Dons boundto the East Indian waters as reinforcements to the fleet of Sir EdwardHughs. 

And now, we might shortly have to record our adventurer's part in thefamous engagement off the coast of Coromandel, between AdmiralSuffrien's fleet and the English squadron, were it not that fatesnatched him on the threshold of events, and, turning him short roundwhither he had come, sent him back congenially to war against England;instead of on her behalf. Thus repeatedly and rapidly were the fortunesof our wanderer planted, torn up, transplanted, and dropped again, hither and thither, according as the Supreme Disposer of sailors andsoldiers saw fit to appoint. 

CHAPTER XVI. 

IN WHICH ISRAEL IS SAILOR UNDER TWO FLAGS, AND IN THREE SHIPS, AND ALLIN ONE NIGHT. 

As running down channel at evening, Israel walked the crowded main-deckof the seventy-four, continually brushed by a thousand hurryingwayfarers, as if he were in some great street in London, jammed withartisans, just returning from their day's labor, novel and painfulemotions were his. He found himself dropped into the naval mob withoutone friend; nay, among enemies, since his country's enemies were hisown, and against the kith and kin of these very beings around him, hehimself had once lifted a fatal hand. The martial bustle of a greatman-of-war, on her first day out of port, was indescribably jarring tohis present mood. Those sounds of the human multitude disturbing thesolemn natural solitudes of the sea, mysteriously afflicted him. Hemurmured against that untowardness which, after condemning him to longsorrows on the land, now pursued him with added griefs on the deep. Whyshould a patriot, leaping for the chance again to attack the oppressor, as at Bunker Hill, now be kidnapped to fight that oppressor's battleson the endless drifts of the Bunker Hills of the billows? But like manyother repiners, Israel was perhaps a little premature with upbraidingslike these. 

Plying on between Scilly and Cape Clear, the Unprincipled--which vesselsomewhat outsailed her consorts--fell in, just before dusk, with a largerevenue cutter close to, and showing signals of distress. At the moment, no other sail was in sight. 

Cursing the necessity of pausing with a strong fair wind at a juncturelike this, the officer-of-the-deck shortened sail, and hove to; hailingthe cutter, to know what was the matter. As he hailed the small craftfrom the lofty poop of the bristling seventy-four, this lieutenantseemed standing on the top of Gibraltar, talking to some lowland peasantin a hut. The reply was, that in a sudden flaw of wind, which came nighcapsizing them, not an hour since, the cutter had lost all four foremostmen by the violent jibing of a boom. She wanted help to get back toport. 

"You shall have one man, " said the officer-of-the-deck, morosely. 

"Let him be a good one then, for heaven's sake, " said he in the cutter;"I ought to have at least two. "

During this talk, Israel's curiosity had prompted him to dart up theladder from the main-deck, and stand right in the gangway above, lookingout on the strange craft. Meantime the order had been given to drop aboat. Thinking this a favorable chance, he stationed himself so that heshould be the foremost to spring into the boat; though crowds of Englishsailors, eager as himself for the same opportunity to escape fromforeign service, clung to the chains of the as yet imperfectlydisciplined man-of-war. As the two men who had been lowered in the boathooked her, when afloat, along to the gangway, Israel dropped like acomet into the stern-sheets, stumbled forward, and seized an oar. In amoment more, all the oarsmen were in their places, and with a fewstrokes the boat lay alongside the cutter. 

"Take which of them you please, " said the lieutenant in command, addressing the officer in the revenue-cutter, and motioning with hishand to his boat's crew, as if they were a parcel of carcasses ofmutton, of which the first pick was offered to some customer. "Quick andchoose. Sit down, men"--to the sailors. "Oh, you are in a great hurry toget rid of the king's service, ain't you? Brave chaps indeed!--Have youchosen your man?"

All this while the ten faces of the anxious oarsmen looked with mutelongings and appealings towards the officer of the cutter; every faceturned at the same angle, as if managed by one machine. And so theywere. One motive. 

"I take the freckled chap with the yellow hair--him, " pointing toIsrael. 

Nine of the upturned faces fell in sullen despair, and ere Israel couldspring to his feet, he felt a violent thrust in his rear from the toesof one of the disappointed behind him. 

"Jump, dobbin!" cried the officer of the boat. 

But Israel was already on board. Another moment, and the boat and cutterparted. Ere long, night fell, and the man-of-war and her consorts wereout of sight. 

The revenue vessel resumed her course towards the nighest port, workedby but four men: the captain, Israel, and two officers. The cabin-boywas kept at the helm. As the only foremast man, Israel was put to itpretty hard. Where there is but one man to three masters, woe betidethat lonely slave. Besides, it was of itself severe work enough tomanage the vessel thus short of hands. But to make matters still worse, the captain and his officers were ugly-tempered fellows. The one kicked, and the others cuffed Israel. Whereupon, not sugared with his recentexperiences, and maddened by his present hap, Israel seeing himselfalone at sea, with only three men, instead of a thousand, to contendagainst, plucked up a heart, knocked the captain into the lee scuppers, and in his fury was about tumbling the first-officer, a small wash of afellow, plump overboard, when the captain, jumping to his feet, seizedhim by his long yellow hair, vowing he would slaughter him. Meanwhilethe cutter flew foaming through the channel, as if in demoniac glee atthis uproar on her imperilled deck. While the consternation was at itsheight, a dark body suddenly loomed at a moderate distance into view, shooting right athwart the stern of the cutter. The next moment a shotstruck the water within a boat's length. 

"Heave to, and send a boat on board!" roared a voice almost as loud asthe cannon. 

"That's a war-ship, " cried the captain of the revenue vessel, in alarm;"but she ain't a countryman. "

Meantime the officers and Israel stopped the cutter's way. 

"Send a boat on board, or I'll sink you, " again came roaring from thestranger, followed by another shot, striking the water still nearer thecutter. 

"For God's sake, don't cannonade us. I haven't got the crew to man aboat, " replied the captain of the cutter. "Who are you?"

"Wait till I send a boat to you for that, " replied the stranger. 

"She's an enemy of some sort, that's plain, " said the Englishman now tohis officers; "we ain't at open war with France; she's some bloodthirstypirate or other. What d'ye say, men?" turning to his officers; "let'soutsail her, or be shot to chips. We can beat her at sailing, I know. "

With that, nothing doubting that his counsel would be heartily respondedto, he ran to the braces to get the cutter before the wind, followed byone officer, while the other, for a useless bravado, hoisted the colorsat the stern. 

But Israel stood indifferent, or rather all in a fever of conflictingemotions. He thought he recognized the voice from the strange vessel. 

"Come, what do ye standing there, fool? Spring to the ropes here!" criedthe furious captain. 

But Israel did not stir. 

Meantime the confusion on board the stranger, owing to the hurriedlowering of her boat, with the cloudiness of the sky darkening the mistysea, united to conceal the bold manoeuvre of the cutter. She had almostgained full headway ere an oblique shot, directed by mere chance, struckher stern, tearing the upcurved head of the tiller in the hands of thecabin-boy, and killing him with the splinters. Running to the stump, thecaptain huzzaed, and steered the reeling ship on. Forced now to hoistback the boat ere giving chase, the stranger was dropped rapidly astern. 

All this while storms of maledictions were hurled on Israel. But theirexertions at the ropes prevented his shipmates for the time from usingpersonal violence. While observing their efforts, Israel could not butsay to himself, "These fellows are as brave as they are brutal. "

Soon the stranger was seen dimly wallowing along astern, crowding allsail in chase, while now and then her bow-gun, showing its red tongue, bellowed after them like a mad bull. Two more shots struck the cutter, but without materially damaging her sails, or the ropes immediatelyupholding them. Several of her less important stays were sundered, however, whose loose tarry ends lashed the air like scorpions. It seemednot improbable that, owing to her superior sailing, the keen cutterwould yet get clear. 

At this juncture Israel, running towards the captain, who still held thesplintered stump of the tiller, stood full before him, saying, "I am anenemy, a Yankee, look to yourself. "

"Help here, lads, help, " roared the captain, "a traitor, a traitor!"

The words were hardly out of his mouth when his voice was silenced forever. With one prodigious heave of his whole physical force, Israelsmote him over the taffrail into the sea, as if the man had fallenbackwards over a teetering chair. By this time the two officers werehurrying aft. Ere meeting them midway, Israel, quick as lightning, castoff the two principal halyards, thus letting the large sails all in atumble of canvass to the deck. Next moment one of the officers was atthe helm, to prevent the cutter from capsizing by being without asteersman in such an emergency. The other officer and Israelinterlocked. The battle was in the midst of the chaos of blowingcanvass. Caught in a rent of the sail, the officer slipped and fell nearthe sharp iron edge of the hatchway. As he fell he caught Israel by themost terrible part in which mortality can be grappled. Insane with pain, Israel dashed his adversary's skull against the sharp iron. Theofficer's hold relaxed, but himself stiffened. Israel made for thehelmsman, who as yet knew not the issue of the late tussle. He caughthim round the loins, bedding his fingers like grisly claws into hisflesh, and hugging him to his heart. The man's ghost, caught like abroken cork in a gurgling bottle's neck, gasped with the embrace. Loosening him suddenly, Israel hurled him from him against the bulwarks. That instant another report was heard, followed by the savage hail--"Youdown sail at last, do ye? I'm a good mind to sink ye for your scurvytrick. Pull down that dirty rag there, astern!"

With a loud huzza, Israel hauled down the flag with one hand, while withthe other he helped the now slowly gliding craft from falling off beforethe wind. 

In a few moments a boat was alongside. As its commander stepped to thedeck he stumbled against the body of the first officer, which, owing tothe sudden slant of the cutter in coming to the wind, had rolled againstthe side near the gangway. As he came aft he heard the moan of the otherofficer, where he lay under the mizzen shrouds. 

"What is all this?" demanded the stranger of Israel. 

"It means that I am a Yankee impressed into the king's service, and fortheir pains I have taken the cutter. "

Giving vent to his surprise, the officer looked narrowly at the body bythe shrouds, and said, "This man is as good as dead, but we will takehim to Captain Paul as a witness in your behalf. "

"Captain Paul?--Paul Jones?" cried Israel. 

"The same. "

"I thought so. I thought that was his voice hailing. It was CaptainPaul's voice that somehow put me up to this deed. "

"Captain Paul is the devil for putting men up to be tigers. But whereare the rest of the crew?"

"Overboard. "

"What?" cried the officer; "come on board the Ranger. Captain Paul willuse you for a broadside. "

Taking the moaning man along with them, and leaving the cutteruntenanted by any living soul, the boat now left her for the enemy'sship. But ere they reached it the man had expired. 

Standing foremost on the deck, crowded with three hundred men, as Israelclimbed the side, he saw, by the light of battle-lanterns, a small, smart, brigandish-looking man, wearing a Scotch bonnet, with a gold bandto it. 

"You rascal, " said this person, "why did your paltry smack give me thischase? Where's the rest of your gang?"

"Captain Paul, " said Israel, "I believe I remember you. I believe Ioffered you my bed in Paris some months ago. How is Poor Richard?"

"God! Is this the courier? The Yankee courier? But how now? in anEnglish revenue cutter?"

"Impressed, sir; that's the way. "

"But where's the rest of them?" demanded Paul, turning to the officer. 

Thereupon the officer very briefly told Paul what Israel told him. 

"Are we to sink the cutter, sir?" said the gunner, now advancing towardsCaptain Paul. "If it is to be done, now is the time. She is close underus, astern; a few guns pointed downwards will settle her like a shottedcorpse. "

"No. Let her drift into Penzance, an anonymous earnest of what thewhitesquall in Paul Jones intends for the future. "

Then giving directions as to the course of the ship, with an order forhimself to be called at the first glimpse of a sail, Paul took Israeldown with him into his cabin. 

"Tell me your story now, my yellow lion. How was it all? Don't stand, sit right down there on the transom. I'm a democratic sort of sea-king. Plump on the woolsack, I say, and spin the yarn. But hold; you want somegrog first. "

As Paul handed the flagon, Israel's eye fell upon his hand. 

"You don't wear any rings now, Captain, I see. Left them in Paris forsafety. "

"Aye, with a certain marchioness there, " replied Paul, with a dandyishlook of sentimental conceit, which sat strangely enough on his otherwisegrim and Fejee air. 

"I should think rings would be somewhat inconvenient at sea, " resumedIsrael. "On my first voyage to the West Indies, I wore a girl's ring onmy middle finger here, and it wasn't long before, what with hauling wetropes, and what not, it got a kind of grown down into the flesh, andpained me very bad, let me tell you, it hugged the finger so. "

"And did the girl grow as close to your heart, lad?"

"Ah, Captain, girls grow themselves off quicker than we grow them on. "

"Some experience with the countesses as well as myself, eh? But thestory; wave your yellow mane, my lion--the story. "

So Israel went on and told the story in all particulars. 

At its conclusion Captain Paul eyed him very earnestly. His wild, lonelyheart, incapable of sympathizing with cuddled natures made humdrum bylong exemption from pain, was yet drawn towards a being, who indesperation of friendlessness, something like his own, had so fiercelywaged battle against tyrannical odds. 

"Did you go to sea young, lad?"

"Yes, pretty young. "

"I went at twelve, from Whitehaven. Only so high, " raising his hand somefour feet from the deck. "I was so small, and looked so queer in mylittle blue jacket, that they called me the monkey. They'll call mesomething else before long. Did you ever sail out of Whitehaven?"

"No, Captain. "

"If you had, you'd have heard sad stories about me. To this hour theysay there that I--bloodthirsty, coward dog that I am--flogged a sailor, one Mungo Maxwell, to death. It's a lie, by Heaven! I flogged him, forhe was a mutinous scamp. But he died naturally, some time afterwards, and on board another ship. But why talk? They didn't believe theaffidavits of others taken before London courts, triumphantly acquittingme; how then will they credit _my_ interested words? If slander, howevermuch a lie, once gets hold of a man, it will stick closer than fairfame, as black pitch sticks closer than white cream. But let 'emslander. I will give the slanderers matter for curses. When last I leftWhitehaven, I swore never again to set foot on her pier, except, likeCaesar, at Sandwich, as a foreign invader. Spring under me, good ship;on you I bound to my vengeance!"

Men with poignant feelings, buried under an air of care-free selfcommand, are never proof to the sudden incitements of passion. Thoughin the main they may control themselves, yet if they but once permit thesmallest vent, then they may bid adieu to all self-restraint, at leastfor that time. Thus with Paul on the present occasion. His sympathy withIsrael had prompted this momentary ebullition. When it was gone by, heseemed not a little to regret it. But he passed it over lightly, saying, "You see, my fine fellow, what sort of a bloody cannibal I am. Will yoube a sailor of mine? A sailor of the Captain who flogged poor MungoMaxwell to death?"

"I will be very happy, Captain Paul, to be sailor under the man who willyet, I dare say, help flog the British nation to death. "

"You hate 'em, do ye?"

"Like snakes. For months they've hunted me as a dog, " half howled andhalf wailed Israel, at the memory of all he had suffered. 

"Give me your hand, my lion; wave your wild flax again. By Heaven, youhate so well, I love ye. You shall be my confidential man; stand sentryat my cabin door; sleep in the cabin; steer my boat; keep by my sidewhenever I land. What do you say?"

"I say I'm glad to hear you. "

"You are a good, brave soul. You are the first among the millions ofmankind that I ever naturally took to. Come, you are tired. There, gointo that state-room for to-night--it's mine. You offered me your bed inParis. "

"But you begged off, Captain, and so must I. Where do you sleep?"

"Lad, I don't sleep half a night out of three. My clothes have not beenoff now for five days. "

"Ah, Captain, you sleep so little and scheme so much, you will dieyoung. "

"I know it: I want to: I mean to. Who would live a doddered old stump?What do you think of my Scotch bonnet?"

"It looks well on you, Captain. "

"Do you think so? A Scotch bonnet, though, ought to look well on aScotchman. I'm such by birth. Is the gold band too much?"

"I like the gold band, Captain. It looks something as I should think acrown might on a king. "

"Aye?"

"You would make a better-looking king than George III. "

"Did you ever see that old granny? Waddles about in farthingales, andcarries a peacock fan, don't he? Did you ever see him?"

"Was as close to him as I am to you now, Captain. In Kew Gardens it was, where I worked gravelling the walks. I was all alone with him, talkingfor some ten minutes. "

"By Jove, what a chance! Had I but been there! What an opportunity forkidnapping a British king, and carrying him off in a fast sailing smackto Boston, a hostage for American freedom. But what did you? Didn't youtry to do something to him?"

"I had a wicked thought or two, Captain, but I got the better of it. Besides, the king behaved handsomely towards me; yes, like a true man. God bless him for it. But it was before that, that I got the better ofthe wicked thought. "

"Ah, meant to stick him, I suppose. Glad you didn't. It would have beenvery shabby. Never kill a king, but make him captive. He looks better asa led horse, than a dead carcass. I propose now, this trip, falling onthe grounds of the Earl of Selkirk, a privy counsellor and particularprivate friend of George III. But I won't hurt a hair of his head. WhenI get him on board here, he shall lodge in my best state-room, which Imean to hang with damask for him. I shall drink wine with him, and bevery friendly; take him to America, and introduce his lordship into thebest circles there; only I shall have him accompanied on his calls by asentry of two disguised as valets. For the Earl's to be on sale, mind;so much ransom; that is, the nobleman, Lord Selkirk, shall have a bodilyprice pinned on his coat-tail, like any slave up at auction inCharleston. But, my lad with the yellow mane, you very strangely drawout my secrets. And yet you don't talk. Your honesty is a magnet whichattracts my sincerity. But I rely on your fidelity. "

"I shall be a vice to your plans, Captain Paul. I will receive, but Iwon't let go, unless you alone loose the screw. "

"Well said. To bed now; you ought to. I go on deck. Good night, ace-of-hearts. "

"That is fitter for yourself, Captain Paul, lonely leader of the suit. "

"Lonely? Aye, but number one cannot but be lonely, my trump. "

"Again I give it back. Ace-of-trumps may it prove to you, Captain Paul;may it be impossible for you ever to be taken. But for me--poor deuce, atrey, that comes in your wake--any king or knave may take me, as beforenow the knaves have. "

"Tut, tut, lad; never be more cheery for another than for yourself. Buta fagged body fags the soul. To hammock, to hammock! while I go on deckto clap on more sail to your cradle. "

And they separated for that night. 

CHAPTER XV. 

THEY SAIL AS FAR AS THE CRAG OF AILSA. 

Next morning Israel was appointed quartermaster--a subaltern selectedfrom the common seamen, and whose duty mostly stations him in the sternof the ship, where the captain walks. His business is to carry the glasson the look-out for sails; hoist or lower the colors; and keep an eye onthe helmsman. Picked out from the crew for their superior respectabilityand intelligence, as well as for their excellent seamanship, it is notunusual to find the quartermasters of an armed ship on peculiarly easyterms with the commissioned officers and captain. This birth, therefore, placed Israel in official contiguity to Paul, and without subjectingeither to animadversion, made their public intercourse on deck almost asfamiliar as their unrestrained converse in the cabin. 

It was a fine cool day in the beginning of April. They were now off thecoast of Wales, whose lofty mountains, crested with snow, presented aNorwegian aspect. The wind was fair, and blew with a strange, bestirringpower. The ship--running between Ireland and England, northwards, towards the Irish Sea, the inmost heart of the British waters--seemed, as she snortingly shook the spray from her bow, to be conscious of thedare-devil defiance of the soul which conducted her on this anomalouscruise. Sailing alone from out a naval port of France, crowded withships-of-the-line, Paul Jones, in his small craft, went forth insingle-armed championship against the English host. Armed with but thesling-stones in his one shot-locker, like young David of old, Paulbearded the British giant of Gath. It is not easy, at the present day, to conceive the hardihood of this enterprise. It was a marching up tothe muzzle; the act of one who made no compromise with the cannonadingsof danger or death; such a scheme as only could have inspired a heartwhich held at nothing all the prescribed prudence of war, and everyobligation of peace; combining in one breast the vengeful indignationand bitter ambition of an outraged hero, with the uncompunctuousdesperation of a renegade. In one view, the Coriolanus of the sea; inanother, a cross between the gentleman and the wolf. 

As Paul stood on the elevated part of the quarter-deck, with none but hisconfidential quartermaster near him, he yielded to Israel's naturalcuriosity to learn something concerning the sailing of the expedition. Paul stood lightly, swaying his body over the sea, by holding on to themizzen-shrouds, an attitude not inexpressive of his easy audacity; whilenear by, pacing a few steps to and fro, his long spy-glass now under hisarm, and now presented at his eye, Israel, looking the very image ofvigilant prudence, listened to the warrior's story. It appeared that onthe night of the visit of the Duke de Chartres and Count D'Estaing toDoctor Franklin in Paris--the same night that Captain Paul and Israelwere joint occupants of the neighboring chamber--the final sanction ofthe French king to the sailing of an American armament against England, under the direction of the Colonial Commissioner, was made known to thelatter functionary. It was a very ticklish affair. Though swaying on thebrink of avowed hostilities with England, no verbal declaration had asyet been made by France. Undoubtedly, this enigmatic position of thingswas highly advantageous to such an enterprise as Paul's. 

Without detailing all the steps taken through the united efforts ofCaptain Paul and Doctor Franklin, suffice it that the determined roverhad now attained his wish--the unfettered command of an armed ship inthe British waters; a ship legitimately authorized to hoist the Americancolors, her commander having in his cabin-locker a regular commission asan officer of the American navy. He sailed without any instructions. With that rare insight into rare natures which so largely distinguishedthe sagacious Franklin, the sage well knew that a prowling _brave_, likePaul Jones, was, like the prowling lion, by nature a solitary warrior. "Let him alone, " was the wise man's answer to some statesman who soughtto hamper Paul with a letter of instructions. 

Much subtile casuistry has been expended upon the point, whether PaulJones was a knave or a hero, or a union of both. But war and warriors, like politics and politicians, like religion and religionists, admit ofno metaphysics. 

On the second day after Israel's arrival on board the Ranger, as he andPaul were conversing on the deck, Israel suddenly levelling his glasstowards the Irish coast, announced a large sail bound in. The Rangergave chase, and soon, almost within sight of her destination--the portof Dublin--the stranger was taken, manned, and turned round for Brest. 

The Ranger then stood over, passed the Isle of Man towards theCumberland shore, arriving within remote sight of Whitehaven aboutsunset. At dark she was hovering off the harbor, with a party ofvolunteers all ready to descend. But the wind shifted and blew freshwith a violent sea. 

"I won't call on old friends in foul weather, " said Captain Paul toIsrael. "We'll saunter about a little, and leave our cards in a day ortwo. "

Next morning, in Glentinebay, on the south shore of Scotland, they fellin with a revenue wherry. It was the practice of such craft to boardmerchant vessels. The Ranger was disguised as a merchantman, presentinga broad drab-colored belt all round her hull; under the coat of aQuaker, concealing the intent of a Turk. It was expected that thechartered rover would come alongside the unchartered one. But the formertook to flight, her two lug sails staggering under a heavy wind, whichthe pursuing guns of the Ranger pelted with a hail-storm of shot. Thewherry escaped, spite the severe cannonade. 

Off the Mull of Galoway, the day following, Paul found himself so nigh alarge barley-freighted Scotch coaster, that, to prevent her carryingtidings of him to land, he dispatched her with the news, stern foremost, to Hades; sinking her, and sowing her barley in the sea broadcast by abroadside. From her crew he learned that there was a fleet of twenty orthirty sail at anchor in Lochryan, with an armed brigantine. He pointedhis prow thither; but at the mouth of the lock, the wind turned againsthim again in hard squalls. He abandoned the project. Shortly after, heencountered a sloop from Dublin. He sunk her to prevent intelligence. 

Thus, seeming as much to bear the elemental commission of Nature, as themilitary warrant of Congress, swarthy Paul darted hither and thither;hovering like a thundercloud off the crowded harbors; then, beaten offby an adverse wind, discharging his lightnings on uncompanioned vessels, whose solitude made them a more conspicuous and easier mark, like lonelytrees on the heath. Yet all this while the land was full of garrisons, the embayed waters full of fleets. With the impunity of a Levanter, Paulskimmed his craft in the land-locked heart of the supreme naval power ofearth; a torpedo-eel, unknowingly swallowed by Britain in a draught ofold ocean, and making sad havoc with her vitals. 

Seeing next a large vessel steering for the Clyde, he gave chase, hopingto cut her off. The stranger proving a fast sailer, the pursuit wasurged on with vehemence, Paul standing, plank-proud, on thequarter-deck, calling for pulls upon every rope, to stretch each alreadyhalf-burst sail to the uttermost. 

While thus engaged, suddenly a shadow, like that thrown by an eclipse, was seen rapidly gaining along the deck, with a sharp defined line, plain as a seam of the planks. It involved all before it. It was thedomineering shadow of the Juan Fernandez-like crag of Ailsa. The Kangerwas in the deep water which makes all round and close up to this greatsummit of the submarine Grampians. 

The crag, more than a mile in circuit, is over a thousand feet high, eight miles from the Ayrshire shore. There stands the cove, lonely as afoundling, proud as Cheops. But, like the battered brains surmountingthe Giant of Gath, its haughty summit is crowned by a desolate castle, in and out of whose arches the aerial mists eddy like purposelessphantoms, thronging the soul of some ruinous genius, who, even inoverthrow, harbors none but lofty conceptions. 

As the Ranger shot higher under the crag, its height and bulk dwarfedboth pursuer and pursued into nutshells. The main-truck of the Rangerwas nine hundred feet below the foundations of the ruin on the crag'stop:

While the ship was yet under the shadow, and each seaman's face sharedin the general eclipse, a sudden change came over Paul. He issued nomore sultanical orders. He did not look so elate as before. At length hegave the command to discontinue the chase. Turning about, they sailedsouthward. 

"Captain Paul, " said Israel, shortly afterwards, "you changed your mindrather queerly about catching that craft. But you thought she wasdrawing us too far up into the land, I suppose. "

"Sink the craft, " cried Paul; "it was not any fear of her, nor of KingGeorge, which made me turn on my heel; it was yon cock of the walk. "

"Cock of the walk?"

"Aye, cock of the walk of the sea; look--yon Crag of Ailsa. "

CHAPTER XVI. 

THEY LOOK IN AT CARRICKFERGUS, AND DESCEND ON WHITEHAVEN. 

Next day, off Carrickfergus, on the Irish coast, a fishing boat, alluredby the Quaker-like look of the incognito craft, came off in fullconfidence. Her men were seized, their vessel sunk. From them Paullearned that the large ship at anchor in the road, was the ship-of-warDrake, of twenty guns. Upon this he steered away, resolving to returnsecretly, and attack her that night. 

"Surely, Captain Paul, " said Israel to his commander, as about sunsetthey backed and stood in again for the land "surely, sir, you are notgoing right in among them this way? Why not wait till she comes out?"

"Because, Yellow-hair, my boy, I am engaged to marry her to-night. Thebride's friends won't like the match; and so, this very night, the bridemust be carried away. She has a nice tapering waist, hasn't she, throughthe glass? Ah! I will clasp her to my heart. "

He steered straight in like a friend; under easy sail, lounging towardsthe Drake, with anchor ready to drop, and grapnels to hug. But the windwas high; the anchor was not dropped at the ordered time. The rangercame to a stand three biscuits' toss off the unmisgiving enemy'squarter, like a peaceful merchantman from the Canadas, laden withharmless lumber. 

"I shan't marry her just yet, " whispered Paul, seeing his plans for thetime frustrated. Gazing in audacious tranquillity upon the decks of theenemy, and amicably answering her hail, with complete self-possession, he commanded the cable to be slipped, and then, as if he hadaccidentally parted his anchor, turned his prow on the seaward tack, meaning to return again immediately with the same prospect of advantagepossessed at first--his plan being to crash suddenly athwart the Drake'sbow, so as to have all her decks exposed point-blank to his musketry. But once more the winds interposed. It came on with a storm of snow; hewas obliged to give up his project. 

Thus, without any warlike appearance, and giving no alarm, Paul, like aninvisible ghost, glided by night close to land, actually came to anchor, for an instant, within speaking-distance of an English ship-of-war; andyet came, anchored, answered hail, reconnoitered, debated, decided, andretired, without exciting the least suspicion. His purpose waschain-shot destruction. So easily may the deadliest foe--so he be butdexterous--slide, undreamed of, into human harbors or hearts. And notawakened conscience, but mere prudence, restrain such, if they vanishagain without doing harm. At daybreak no soul in Carrickfergus knew thatthe devil, in a Scotch bonnet, had passed close that way over night. 

Seldom has regicidal daring been more strangely coupled withoctogenarian prudence, than in many of the predatory enterprises ofPaul. It is this combination of apparent incompatibilities which rankshim among extraordinary warriors. 

Ere daylight, the storm of the night blew over. The sun saw the Rangerlying midway over channel at the head of the Irish Sea; England, Scotland, and Ireland, with all their lofty cliffs, being assimultaneously as plainly in sight beyond the grass-green waters, as theCity Hall, St. Paul's, and the Astor House, from the triangular Park inNew York. The three kingdoms lay covered with snow, far as the eye couldreach. 

"Ah, Yellow-hair, " said Paul, with a smile, "they show the white flag, the cravens. And, while the white flag stays blanketing yonder heights, we'll make for Whitehaven, my boy. I promised to drop in there a momentere quitting the country for good. Israel, lad, I mean to step ashore inperson, and have a personal hand in the thing. Did you ever drivespikes?"

"I've driven the spike-teeth into harrows before now, " replied Israel;"but that was before I was a sailor. "

"Well, then, driving spikes into harrows is a good introduction todriving spikes into cannon. You are just the man. Put down your glass;go to the carpenter, get a hundred spikes, put them in a bucket with ahammer, and bring all to me. "

As evening fell, the great promontory of St. Bee's Head, with itslighthouse, not far from Whitehaven, was in distant sight. But the windbecame so light that Paul could not work his ship in close enough at anhour as early as intended. His purpose had been to make the descent andretire ere break of day. But though this intention was frustrated, hedid not renounce his plan, for the present would be his lastopportunity. 

As the night wore on, and the ship, with a very light wind, glidednigher and nigher the mark, Paul called upon Israel to produce hisbucket for final inspection. Thinking some of the spikes too large, hehad them filed down a little. He saw to the lanterns and combustibles. Like Peter the Great, he went into the smallest details, while stillpossessing a genius competent to plan the aggregate. But oversee as onemay, it is impossible to guard against carelessness in subordinates. One's sharp eyes can't see behind one's back. It will yet be noted thatan important omission was made in the preparations for Whitehaven. 

The town contained, at that period, a population of some six or seventhousand inhabitants, defended by forts. 

At midnight, Paul Jones, Israel Potter, and twenty-nine others, rowed intwo boats to attack the six or seven thousand inhabitants of Whitehaven. There was a long way to pull. This was done in perfect silence. Not asound was heard except the oars turning in the row-locks. Nothing wasseen except the two lighthouses of the harbor. Through the stillness andthe darkness, the two deep-laden boats swam into the haven, like twomysterious whales from the Arctic Sea. As they reached the outer pier, the men saw each other's faces. The day was dawning. The riggers andother artisans of the shipping would before very long be astir. Nomatter. 

The great staple exported from Whitehaven was then, and still is, coal. The town is surrounded by mines; the town is built on mines; the shipsmoor over mines. The mines honeycomb the land in all directions, andextend in galleries of grottoes for two miles under the sea. By thefalling in of the more ancient collieries numerous houses have beenswallowed, as if by an earthquake, and a consternation spread, like thatof Lisbon, in 1755. So insecure and treacherous was the site of theplace now about to be assailed by a desperado, nursed, like the coal, inits vitals. 

Now, sailing on the Thames, nigh its mouth, of fair days, when the windis favorable for inward-bound craft, the stranger will sometimes seeprocessions of vessels, all of similar size and rig, stretching formiles and miles, like a long string of horses tied two and two to a ropeand driven to market. These are colliers going to London with coal. 

About three hundred of these vessels now lay, all crowded together, inone dense mob, at Whitehaven. The tide was out. They lay completelyhelpless, clear of water, and grounded. They were sooty in hue. Theirblack yards were deeply canted, like spears, to avoid collision. Thethree hundred grimy hulls lay wallowing in the mud, like a herd ofhippopotami asleep in the alluvium of the Nile. Their sailless, rakingmasts, and canted yards, resembled a forest of fish-spears thrust intothose same hippopotamus hides. Partly flanking one side of the groundedfleet was a fort, whose batteries were raised from the beach. On alittle strip of this beach, at the base of the fort, lay a number ofsmall rusty guns, dismounted, heaped together in disorder, as a litterof dogs. Above them projected the mounted cannon. 

Paul landed in his own boat at the foot of this fort. He dispatched theother boat to the north side of the haven, with orders to fire theshipping there. Leaving two men at the beach, he then proceeded to getpossession of the fort. 

"Hold on to the bucket, and give me your shoulder, " said he to Israel. 

Using Israel for a ladder, in a trice he scaled the wall. The bucket andthe men followed. He led the way softly to the guard-house, burst in, and bound the sentinels in their sleep. Then arranging his force, ordered four men to spike the cannon there. 

"Now, Israel, your bucket, and follow me to the other fort. "

The two went alone about a quarter of a mile. 

"Captain Paul, " said Israel, on the way, "can we two manage thesentinels?"

"There are none in the fort we go to. "

"You know all about the place, Captain?"

"Pretty well informed on that subject, I believe. Come along. Yes, lad, I am tolerably well acquainted with Whitehaven. And this morning intendthat Whitehaven shall have a slight inkling of _me_. Come on. Here weare. "

Scaling the walls, the two involuntarily stood for an instant gazingupon the scene. The gray light of the dawn showed the crowded houses andthronged ships with a haggard distinctness. 

"Spike and hammer, lad;--so, --now follow me along, as I go, and give mea spike for every cannon. I'll tongue-tie the thunderers. Speak nomore!" and he spiked the first gun. "Be a mute, " and he spiked thesecond. "Dumbfounder thee, " and he spiked the third. And so, on, and on, and on, Israel following him with the bucket, like a footman, or somecharitable gentleman with a basket of alms. 

"There, it is done. D'ye see the fire yet, lad, from the south? Idon't. "

"Not a spark, Captain. But day-sparks come on in the east. "

"Forked flames into the hounds! What are they about? Quick, let us backto the first fort; perhaps something has happened, and they are there. "

Sure enough, on their return from spiking the cannon, Paul and Israelfound the other boat back, the crew in confusion, their lantern havingburnt out at the very instant they wanted it. By a singular fatality theother lantern, belonging to Paul's boat, was likewise extinguished. Notinder-box had been brought. They had no matches but sulphur matches. Locofocos were not then known. 

The day came on apace. 

"Captain Paul, " said the lieutenant of the second boat, "it is madnessto stay longer. See!" and he pointed to the town, now plainlydiscernible in the gray light. 

"Traitor, or coward!" howled Paul, "how came the lanterns out? Israel, my lion, now prove your blood. Get me a light--but one spark!"

"Has any man here a bit of pipe and tobacco in his pocket?" saidIsrael. 

A sailor quickly produced an old stump of a pipe, with tobacco. 

"That will do, " and Israel hurried away towards the town. 

"What will the loon do with the pipe?" said one. "And where goes he?"cried another. 

"Let him alone, " said Paul. 

The invader now disposed his whole force so as to retreat at aninstant's warning. Meantime the hardy Israel, long experienced in allsorts of shifts and emergencies, boldly ventured to procure, from someinhabitant of Whitehaven, a spark to kindle all Whitehaven's habitationsin flames. 

There was a lonely house standing somewhat disjointed from the town, some poor laborer's abode. Rapping at the door, Israel, pipe in mouth, begged the inmates for a light for his tobacco. 

"What the devil, " roared a voice from within, "knock up a man this timeof night to light your pipe? Begone!"

"You are lazy this morning, my friend, " replied Israel, "it is daylight. Quick, give me a light. Don't you know your old friend? Shame! open thedoor. "

In a moment a sleepy fellow appeared, let down the bar, and Israel, stalking into the dim room, piloted himself straight to the fire-place, raked away the cinders, lighted his tobacco, and vanished. 

All was done in a flash. The man, stupid with sleep, had looked onbewildered. He reeled to the door, but, dodging behind a pile ofbricks, Israel had already hurried himself out of sight. 

"Well done, my lion, " was the hail he received from Paul, who, duringhis absence, had mustered as many pipes as possible, in order tocommunicate and multiply the fire. 

Both boats now pulled to a favorable point of the principal pier of theharbor, crowded close up to a part of which lay one wing of thecolliers. 

The men began to murmur at persisting in an attempt impossible to beconcealed much longer. They were afraid to venture on board the grimcolliers, and go groping down into their hulls to fire them. It seemedlike a voluntary entrance into dungeons and death. 

"Follow me, all of you but ten by the boats, " said Paul, withoutnoticing their murmurs. "And now, to put an end to all future burningsin America, by one mighty conflagration of shipping in England. Come on, lads! Pipes and matches in the van!"

He would have distributed the men so as simultaneously to fire differentships at different points, were it not that the lateness of the hourrendered such a course insanely hazardous. Stationing his party in frontof one of the windward colliers, Paul and Israel sprang on board. 

In a twinkling they had broken open a boatswain's locker, and, withgreat bunches of oakum, fine and dry as tinder, had leaped into thesteerage. Here, while Paul made a blaze, Israel ran to collect thetar-pots, which being presently poured on the burning matches, oakum andwood, soon increased the flame. 

"It is not a sure thing yet, " said Paul, "we must have a barrel oftar. "

They searched about until they found one, knocked out the head andbottom, and stood it like a martyr in the midst of the flames. They thenretreated up the forward hatchway, while volumes of smoke were belchedfrom the after one. Not till this moment did Paul hear the cries of hismen, warning him that the inhabitants were not only actually astir, butcrowds were on their way to the pier. 

As he sprang out of the smoke towards the rail of the collier, he sawthe sun risen, with thousands of the people. Individuals hurried closeto the burning vessel. Leaping to the ground, Paul, bidding his menstand fast, ran to their front, and, advancing about thirty feet, presented his own pistol at now tumultuous Whitehaven. 

Those who had rushed to extinguish what they had deemed but anaccidental fire, were now paralyzed into idiotic inaction, at thedefiance of the incendiary, thinking him some sudden pirate or fienddropped down from the moon. 

While Paul thus stood guarding the incipient conflagration, Israel, without a weapon, dashed crazily towards the mob on the shore. 

"Come back, come back, " cried Paul. 

"Not till I start these sheep, as their own wolves many a time startedme!"

As he rushed bare-headed like a madman, towards the crowd, the panicspread. They fled from unarmed Israel, further than they had from thepistol of Paul. 

The flames now catching the rigging and spiralling around the masts, the whole ship burned at one end of the harbor, while the sun, an hourhigh, burned at the other. Alarm and amazement, not sleep, now ruled theworld. It was time to retreat. 

They re-embarked without opposition, first releasing a few prisoners, asthe boats could not carry them. 

Just as Israel was leaping into the boat, he saw the man at whose househe had procured the fire, staring like a simpleton at him. 

"That was good seed you gave me;" said Israel, "see what a yield, "pointing to the flames. He then dropped into the boat, leaving only Paulon the pier. 

The men cried to their commander, conjuring him not to linger. 

But Paul remained for several moments, confronting in silence theclamors of the mob beyond, and waving his solitary hand, like adisdainful tomahawk, towards the surrounding eminences, also coveredwith the affrighted inhabitants. 

When the assailants had rowed pretty well off, the English rushed ingreat numbers to their forts, but only to find their cannon no betterthan so much iron in the ore. At length, however, they began to fire, having either brought down some ship's guns, or else mounted the rustyold dogs lying at the foot of the first fort. 

In their eagerness they fired with no discretion. The shot fell short;they did not the slightest damage. 

Paul's men laughed aloud, and fired their pistols in the air. 

Not a splinter was made, not a drop of blood spilled throughout theaffair. The intentional harmlessness of the result, as to human life, was only equalled by the desperate courage of the deed. It formed, doubtless, one feature of the compassionate contempt of Paul towardsthe town, that he took such paternal care of their lives and limbs. 

Had it been possible to have landed a few hours earlier not a ship nor ahouse could have escaped. But it was the lesson, not the loss, thattold. As it was, enough damage had been done to demonstrate--as Paul haddeclared to the wise man of Paris--that the disasters caused by thewanton fires and assaults on the American coasts, could be easilybrought home to the enemy's doors. Though, indeed, if the retaliatorswere headed by Paul Jones, the satisfaction would not be equal to theinsult, being abated by the magnanimity of a chivalrous, howeverunprincipled a foe. 

CHAPTER XVII. 

THEY CALL AT THE EARL OF SELKIRK'S, AND AFTERWARDS FIGHT THE SHIP-OF-WARDRAKE. 

The Ranger now stood over the Solway Frith for the Scottish shore, andat noon on the same day, Paul, with twelve men, including two officersand Israel, landed on St. Mary's Isle, one of the seats of the Earl ofSelkirk. 

In three consecutive days this elemental warrior either entered theharbors or landed on the shores of each of the Three Kingdoms. 

The morning was fair and clear. St. Mary's Isle lay shimmering in thesun. The light crust of snow had melted, revealing the tender grass andsweet buds of spring mantling the sides of the cliffs. 

At once, upon advancing with his party towards the house, Paul auguredill for his project from the loneliness of the spot. No being was seen. But cocking his bonnet at a jaunty angle, he continued his way. Stationing the men silently round about the house, fallowed by Israel, he announced his presence at the porch. 

A gray-headed domestic at length responded. 

"Is the Earl within?"

"He is in Edinburgh, sir. "

"Ah--sure?--Is your lady within?"

"Yes, sir--who shall I say it is?"

"A gentleman who calls to pay his respects. Here, take my card. "

And he handed the man his name, as a private gentleman, superblyengraved at Paris, on gilded paper. 

Israel tarried in the hall while the old servant led Paul into a parlor. 

Presently the lady appeared. 

"Charming Madame, I wish you a very good morning. "

"Who may it be, sir, that I have the happiness to see?" said the lady, censoriously drawing herself up at the too frank gallantry of thestranger. 

"Madame, I sent you my card. "

"Which leaves me equally ignorant, sir, " said the lady, coldly, twirlingthe gilded pasteboard. 

"A courier dispatched to Whitehaven, charming Madame, might bring youmore particular tidings as to who has the honor of being your visitor. "

Not comprehending what this meant, and deeply displeased, if not vaguelyalarmed, at the characteristic manner of Paul, the lady, not entirelyunembarrassed, replied, that if the gentleman came to view the isle, hewas at liberty so to do. She would retire and send him a guide. 

"Countess of Selkirk, " said Paul, advancing a step, "I call to see theEarl. On business of urgent importance, I call. "

"The Earl is in Edinburgh, " uneasily responded the lady, again about toretire. 

"Do you give me your honor as a lady that it is as you say?"

The lady looked at him in dubious resentment. 

"Pardon, Madame, I would not lightly impugn a lady's lightest word, butI surmised that, possibly, you might suspect the object of my call, inwhich case it would be the most excusable thing in the world for you toseek to shelter from my knowledge the presence of the Earl on the isle. "

"I do not dream what you mean by all this, " said the lady with a decidedalarm, yet even in her panic courageously maintaining her dignity, asshe retired, rather than retreated, nearer the door. 

"Madame, " said Paul, hereupon waving his hand imploringly, and thentenderly playing with his bonnet with the golden band, while anexpression poetically sad and sentimental stole over his tawny face; "itcannot be too poignantly lamented that, in the profession of arms, theofficer of fine feelings and genuine sensibility should be sometimesnecessitated to public actions which his own private heart cannotapprove. This hard case is mine. The Earl, Madame, you say is absent. Ibelieve those words. Far be it from my soul, enchantress, to ascribe afault to syllables which have proceeded from so faultless a source. "

This probably he said in reference to the lady's mouth, which wasbeautiful in the extreme. 

He bowed very lowly, while the lady eyed him with conflicting andtroubled emotions, but as yet all in darkness as to his ultimatemeaning. But her more immediate alarm had subsided, seeing now that thesailor-like extravagance of Paul's homage was entirely unaccompaniedwith any touch of intentional disrespect. Indeed, hyperbolical as werehis phrases, his gestures and whole carriage were most heedfullydeferential. 

Paul continued: "The Earl, Madame, being absent, and he being the soleobject of my call, you cannot labor under the least apprehension, when Inow inform you, that I have the honor of being an officer in theAmerican Navy, who, having stopped at this isle to secure the person ofthe Earl of Selkirk as a hostage for the American cause, am, by yourassurances, turned away from that intent; pleased, even indisappointment, since that disappointment has served to prolong myinterview with the noble lady before me, as well as to leave herdomestic tranquillity unimpaired. "

"Can you really speak true?" said the lady in undismayed wonderment. 

"Madame, through your window you will catch a little peep of theAmerican colonial ship-of-war, Banger, which I have the honor tocommand. With my best respects to your lord, and sincere regrets at notfinding him at home, permit me to salute your ladyship's hand andwithdraw. "

But feigning not to notice this Parisian proposition, and artfullyentrenching her hand, without seeming to do so, the lady, in aconciliatory tone, begged her visitor to partake of some refreshment erehe departed, at the same time thanking him for his great civility. Butdeclining these hospitalities, Paul bowed thrice and quitted the room. 

In the hall he encountered Israel, standing all agape before a Highlandtarget of steel, with a claymore and foil crossed on top. 

"Looks like a pewter platter and knife and fork, Captain Paul. "

"So they do, my lion; but come, curse it, the old cock has flown; finehen, though, left in the nest; no use; we must away empty-handed. "

"Why, ain't Mr. Selkirk in?" demanded Israel in roguish concern. 

"Mr. Selkirk? Alexander Selkirk, you mean. No, lad, he's not on the Isleof St. Mary's; he's away off, a hermit, on the Isle of JuanFernandez--the more's the pity; come. "

In the porch they encountered the two officers. Paul briefly informedthem of the circumstances, saying, nothing remained but to departforthwith. 

"With nothing at all for our pains?" murmured the two officers. 

"What, pray, would you have?"

"Some pillage, to be sure--plate. "

"Shame. I thought we were three gentlemen. "

"So are the English officers in America; but they help themselves toplate whenever they can get it from the private houses of the enemy. "

"Come, now, don't be slanderous, " said Paul; "these officers you speakof are but one or two out of twenty, mere burglars and light-fingeredgentry, using the king's livery but as a disguise to their nefarioustrade. The rest are men of honor. "

"Captain Paul Jones, " responded the two, "we have not come on thisexpedition in much expectation of regular pay; but we _did_ rely uponhonorable plunder. "

"Honorable plunder! That's something new. "

But the officers were not to be turned aside. They were the mostefficient in the ship. Seeing them resolute, Paul, for fear of incensingthem, was at last, as a matter of policy, obliged to comply. Forhimself, however, he resolved to have nothing to do with the affair. Charging the officers not to allow the men to enter the house on anypretence, and that no search must be made, and nothing must be takenaway, except what the lady should offer them upon making known theirdemand, he beckoned to Israel and retired indignantly towards the beach. Upon second thoughts, he dispatched Israel back, to enter the house withthe officers, as joint receiver of the plate, he being, of course, themost reliable of the seamen. 

The lady was not a little disconcerted on receiving the officers. Withcool determination they made known their purpose. There was no escape. The lady retired. The butler came; and soon, several silver salvers, andother articles of value, were silently deposited in the parlor in thepresence of the officers and Israel. 

"Mister Butler, " said Israel, "let me go into the dairy and help tocarry the milk-pans. "

But, scowling upon this rusticity, or roguishness--he knew notwhich--the butler, in high dudgeon at Israel's republican familiarity, as well as black as a thundercloud with the general insult offered toan illustrious household by a party of armed thieves, as he viewed them, declined any assistance. In a quarter of an hour the officers left thehouse, carrying their booty. 

At the porch they were met by a red-cheeked, spiteful-looking lass, who, with her brave lady's compliments, added two child's rattles of silverand coral to their load. 

Now, one of the officers was a Frenchman, the other a Spaniard. 

The Spaniard dashed his rattle indignantly to the ground. The Frenchmantook his very pleasantly, and kissed it, saying to the girl that hewould long preserve the coral, as a memento of her rosy cheeks. 

When the party arrived on the beach, they found Captain Paul writingwith pencil on paper held up against the smooth tableted side of thecliff. Next moment he seemed to be making his signature. With areproachful glance towards the two officers, he handed the slip toIsrael, bidding him hasten immediately with it to the house and place itin Lady Selkirk's own hands. 

The note was as follows:

"Madame:

"After so courteous a reception, I am disturbed to make you no betterreturn than you have just experienced from the actions of certainpersons under my command. --actions, lady, which my profession of armsobliges me not only to brook, but, in a measure, to countenance. Fromthe bottom of my heart, my dear lady, I deplore this most melancholynecessity of my delicate position. However unhandsome the desire of thesemen, some complaisance seemed due them from me, for their general goodconduct and bravery on former occasions. I had but an instant toconsider. I trust, that in unavoidably gratifying them, I have inflictedless injury on your ladyship's property than I have on my own bleedingsensibilities. But my heart will not allow me to say more. Permit me toassure you, dear lady, that when the plate is sold, I shall, at allhazards, become the purchaser, and will be proud to restore it toyou, by such conveyance as you may hereafter see fit to appoint. 

"From hence I go, Madame, to engage, to-morrow morning, his Majesty'sship, Drake, of twenty guns, now lying at Carrickfergus. I should meetthe enemy with more than wonted resolution, could I flatter myself that, through this unhandsome conduct on the part of my officers, I lie notunder the disesteem of the sweet lady of the Isle of St. Mary's. Butunconquerable as Mars should I be, could but dare to dream, that in somegreen retreat of her charming domain, the Countess of Selkirk offers up acharitable prayer for, my dear lady countess, one, who coming to take acaptive, himself has been captivated. 

"Your ladyship's adoring enemy, "JOHN PAUL JONES. "

How the lady received this super-ardent note, history does not relate. But history has not omitted to record, that after the return of theRanger to France, through the assiduous efforts of Paul in buying upthe booty, piece by piece, from the clutches of those among whom it hadbeen divided, and not without a pecuniary private loss to himself, equalto the total value of the plunder, the plate was punctually restored, even to the silver heads of two pepper-boxes; and, not only this, butthe Earl, hearing all the particulars, magnanimously wrote Paul aletter, expressing thanks for his politeness. In the opinion of thenoble Earl, Paul was a man of honor. It were rash to differ in opinionwith such high-born authority. 

Upon returning to the ship, she was instantly pointed over towards theIrish coast. Next morning Carrickfergus was in sight. Paul would havegone straight in; but Israel, reconnoitring with his glass, informed himthat a large ship, probably the Drake, was just coming out. 

"What think you, Israel, do they know who we are? Let me have theglass. "

"They are dropping a boat now, sir, " replied Israel, removing the glassfrom his eye, and handing it to Paul. 

"So they are--so they are. They don't know us. I'll decoy that boatalongside. Quick--they are coming for us--take the helm now yourself, mylion, and keep the ship's stern steadily presented towards the advancingboat. Don't let them have the least peep at our broadside. "

The boat came on, an officer in its bow all the time eyeing the Rangerthrough a glass. Presently the boat was within hail. 

"Ship ahoy! Who are you?"

"Oh, come alongside, " answered Paul through his trumpet, in a rapidoff-hand tone, as though he were a gruff sort of friend, impatient atbeing suspected for a foe. 

In a few moments the officer of the boat stepped into the Ranger'sgangway. Cocking his bonnet gallantly, Paul advanced towards him, makinga very polite bow, saying: "Good morning, sir, good morning; delightedto see you. That's a pretty sword you have; pray, let me look at it. "

"I see, " said the officer, glancing at the ship's armament, and turningpale, "I am your prisoner. "

"No--my guest, " responded Paul, winningly. "Pray, let me relieve you ofyour--your--cane. "

Thus humorously he received the officer's delivered sword. 

"Now tell me, sir, if you please, " he continued, "what brings out hisMajesty's ship Drake this fine morning? Going a little airing?"

"She comes out in search of you, but when I left her side half an hoursince she did not know that the ship off the harbor was the one shesought. "

"You had news from Whitehaven, I suppose, last night, eh?"

"Aye: express; saying that certain incendiaries had landed there earlythat morning. "

"What?--what sort of men were they, did you say?" said Paul, shaking hisbonnet fiercely to one side of his head, and coming close to theofficer. "Pardon me, " he added derisively, "I had forgot you are my_guest_. Israel, see the unfortunate gentleman below, and his menforward. "

The Drake was now seen slowly coming out under a light air, attended byfive small pleasure-vessels, decorated with flags and streamers, andfull of gaily-dressed people, whom motives similar to those which drewvisitors to the circus, had induced to embark on their adventurous trip. But they little dreamed how nigh the desperate enemy was. 

"Drop the captured boat astern, " said Paul; "see what effect that willhave on those merry voyagers. "

No sooner was the empty boat descried by the pleasure-vessels thanforthwith, surmising the truth, they with all diligence turned about andre-entered the harbor. Shortly after, alarm-smokes were seen extendingalong both sides of the channel. 

"They smoke us at last, Captain Paul, " said Israel. 

"There will be more smoke yet before the day is done, " replied Paul, gravely. 

The wind was right under the land, the tide unfavorable. The Drakeworked out very slowly. 

Meantime, like some fiery-heated duellist calling on urgent business atfrosty daybreak, and long kept waiting at the door by the dilatorinessof his antagonist, shrinking at the idea of getting up to be cut topieces in the cold--the Ranger, with a better breeze, impatiently tackedto and fro in the channel. At last, when the English vessel had fairlyweathered the point, Paul, ranging ahead, courteously led her forth, asa beau might a belle in a ballroom, to mid-channel, and then sufferedher to come within hail. 

"She is hoisting her colors now, sir, " said Israel. 

"Give her the stars and stripes, then, my lad. "

Joyfully running to the locker, Israel attached the flag to thehalyards. The wind freshened. He stood elevated. The bright flag blewaround him, a glorified shroud, enveloping him in its red ribbons andspangles, like up-springing tongues, and sparkles of flame. 

As the colors rose to their final perch, and streamed in the air, Pauleyed them exultingly. 

"I first hoisted that flag on an American ship, and was the first amongmen to get it saluted. If I perish this night, the name of Paul Jonesshall live. Hark! they hail us. "

"What ship are you?"

"Your enemy. Come on! What wants the fellow of more prefaces andintroductions?"

The sun was now calmly setting over the green land of Ireland. The skywas serene, the sea smooth, the wind just sufficient to waft the twovessels steadily and gently. After the first firing and a littlemanoeuvring, the two ships glided on freely, side by side; in that mildair Exchanging their deadly broadsides, like two friendly horsemenwalking their steeds along a plain, chatting as they go. After an hourof this running fight, the conversation ended. The Drake struck. Howchanged from the big craft of sixty short minutes before! She seemednow, above deck, like a piece of wild western woodland into whichchoppers had been. Her masts and yards prostrate, and hanging injack-straws; several of her sails ballooning out, as they dragged in thesea, like great lopped tops of foliage. The black hull and shatteredstumps of masts, galled and riddled, looked as if gigantic woodpeckershad been tapping them. 

The Drake was the larger ship; more cannon; more men. Her loss in killedand wounded was far the greater. Her brave captain and lieutenant weremortally wounded. 

The former died as the prize was boarded, the latter two days after. 

It was twilight, the weather still severe. No cannonade, naught that madman can do, molests the stoical imperturbability of Nature, when Naturechooses to be still. This weather, holding on through the following day, greatly facilitated the refitting of the ships. That done, the twovessels, sailing round the north of Ireland, steered towards Brest. Theywere repeatedly chased by English cruisers, but safely reached theiranchorage in the French waters. 

"A pretty fair four weeks' yachting, gentlemen, " said Paul Jones, as theRanger swung to her cable, while some French officers boarded her. "Ibring two travellers with me, gentlemen, " he continued. "Allow me tointroduce you to my particular friend Israel Potter, late of NorthAmerica, and also to his Britannic Majesty's ship Drake, late ofCarrickfergus, Ireland. "

This cruise made loud fame for Paul, especially at the court of France, whose king sent Paul, a sword and a medal. But poor Israel, who also hadconquered a craft, and all unaided too--what had he?

CHAPTER XVIII. 

THE EXPEDITION THAT SAILED FROM GROIX. 

Three months after anchoring at Brest, through Dr. Franklin'snegotiations with the French king, backed by the bestirring ardor ofPaul, a squadron of nine vessels, of various force, were ready in theroad of Groix for another descent on the British coasts. These craftwere miscellaneously picked up, their crews a mongrel pack, the officersmostly French, unacquainted with each other, and secretly jealous ofPaul. The expedition was full of the elements of insubordination andfailure. Much bitterness and agony resulted to a spirit like Paul's. Buthe bore up, and though in many particulars the sequel more thanwarranted his misgivings, his soul still refused to surrender. 

The career of this stubborn adventurer signally illustrates the ideathat since all human affairs are subject to organic disorder, since theyare created in and sustained by a sort of half-disciplined chaos, hencehe who in great things seeks success must never wait for smooth water, which never was and never will be, but, with what straggling method hecan, dash with all his derangements at his object, leaving the rest toFortune. 

Though nominally commander of the squadron, Paul was not so in effect. Most of his captains conceitedly claimed independent commands. One ofthem in the end proved a traitor outright; few of the rest werereliable. 

As for the ships, that commanded by Paul in person will be a goodexample of the fleet. She was an old Indiaman, clumsy and crank, smelling strongly of the savor of tea, cloves, and arrack, the cargoesof former voyages. Even at that day she was, from her venerablegrotesqueness, what a cocked hat is, at the present age, among ordinarybeavers. Her elephantine bulk was houdahed with a castellated poop likethe leaning tower of Pisa. Poor Israel, standing on the top of thispoop, spy-glass at his eye, looked more an astronomer than a mariner, having to do, not with the mountains of the billows, but the mountainsin the moon. Galileo on Fiesole. She was originally a single-deckedship, that is, carried her armament on one gun-deck; but cutting portsbelow, in her after part, Paul rammed out there six oldeighteen-pounders, whose rusty muzzles peered just above the water-line, like a parcel of dirty mulattoes from a cellar-way. Her name was theDuras, but, ere sailing, it was changed to that other appellation, whereby this sad old hulk became afterwards immortal. Though it is notunknown, that a compliment to Doctor Franklin was involved in thischange of titles, yet the secret history of the affair will now for thefirst time be disclosed. 

It was evening in the road of Groix. After a fagging day's work, tryingto conciliate the hostile jealousy of his officers, and provide, in theface of endless obstacles (for he had to dance attendance on scores ofintriguing factors and brokers ashore), the requisite stores for thefleet, Paul sat in his cabin in a half-despondent reverie, while Israel, cross-legged at his commander's feet, was patching up some old signals. 

"Captain Paul, I don't like our ship's name. --Duras? What's thatmean?--Duras? Being cribbed up in a ship named Duras! a sort of makesone feel as if he were in durance vile. "

"Gad, I never thought of that before, my lion. Duras--Durance vile. Isuppose it's superstition, but I'll change Come, Yellow-mane, what shallwe call her?"

"Well, Captain Paul, don't you like Doctor Franklin? Hasn't he been theprime man to get this fleet together? Let's call her the DoctorFranklin. "

"Oh, no, that will too publicly declare him just at present; and PoorRichard wants to be a little shady in this business. "

"Poor Richard!--call her Poor Richard, then, " cried Israel, suddenlystruck by the idea. 

"'Gad, you have it, " answered Paul, springing to his feet, as all traceof his former despondency left him;--"Poor Richard shall be the name, inhonor to the saying, that 'God helps them that help themselves, ' as PoorRichard says. "

Now this was the way the craft came to be called the _Bon HommeRichard_; for it being deemed advisable to have a French rendering ofthe new title, it assumed the above form. 

A few days after, the force sailed. Ere long, they captured severalvessels; but the captains of the squadron proving refractory, eventstook so deplorable a turn, that Paul, for the present, was obliged toreturn to Groix. Luckily, however, at this junction a cartel arrivedfrom England with upwards of a hundred exchanged American seamen, whoalmost to a man enlisted under the flag of Paul. 

Upon the resailing of the force, the old troubles broke out afresh. Mostof her consorts insubordinately separated from the Bon Homme Richard. Atlength Paul found himself in violent storms beating off the ruggedsoutheastern coast of Scotland, with only two accompanying ships. Butneither the mutiny of his fleet, nor the chaos of the elements, made himfalter in his purpose. Nay, at this crisis, he projected the most daringof all his descents. 

The Cheviot Hills were in sight. Sundry vessels had been described boundin for the Firth of Forth, on whose south shore, well up the Firth, stands Leith, the port of Edinburgh, distant but a mile or two from thatcapital. He resolved to dash at Leith, and lay it under contribution orin ashes. He called the captains of his two remaining consorts on boardhis own ship to arrange details. Those worthies had much of fastidiousremark to make against the plan. After losing much time in trying tobring to a conclusion their sage deliberations, Paul, by addressingtheir cupidity, achieved that which all appeals to their gallantrycould not accomplish. He proclaimed the grand prize of the Leith lotteryat no less a figure than £200, 000, that being named as the ransom. Enough: the three ships enter the Firth, boldly and freely, as ifcarrying Quakers to a Peace-Congress. 

Along both startled shores the panic of their approach spread like thecholera. The three suspicious crafts had so long lain off and on, thatnone doubted they were led by the audacious viking, Paul Jones. At fiveo'clock, on the following morning, they were distinctly seen from thecapital of Scotland, quietly sailing up the bay. Batteries were hastilythrown up at Leith, arms were obtained from the castle at Edinburgh, alarm fires were kindled in all directions. Yet with such tranquillityof effrontery did Paul conduct his ships, concealing as much as possibletheir warlike character, that more than once his vessels were mistakenfor merchantmen, and hailed by passing ships as such. 

In the afternoon, Israel, at his station on the tower of Pisa, reporteda boat with five men coming off to the Richard from the coast of Fife. 

"They have hot oat-cakes for us, " said Paul; "let 'em come. To encouragethem, show them the English ensign, Israel, my lad. "

Soon the boat was alongside. 

"Well, my good fellows, what can I do for you this afternoon?" saidPaul, leaning over the side with a patronizing air. 

"Why, captain, we come from the Laird of Crokarky, who wants some powderand ball for his money. "

"What would you with powder and ball, pray?"

"Oh! haven't you heard that that bloody pirate, Paul Jones, is somewherehanging round the coasts?"

"Aye, indeed, but he won't hurt you. He's only going round among thenations, with his old hat, taking up contributions. So, away with ye; yedon't want any powder and ball to give him. He wants contributions ofsilver, not lead. Prepare yourselves with silver, I say. "

"Nay, captain, the Laird ordered us not to return without powder andball. See, here is the price. It may be the taking of the bloody pirate, if you let us have what we want. "

"Well, pass 'em over a keg, " said Paul, laughing, but modifying hisorder by a sly whisper to Israel: "Oh, put up your price, it's a gift toye. "

"But ball, captain; what's the use of powder without ball?" roared oneof the fellows from the boat's bow, as the keg was lowered in. "We wantball. "

"Bless my soul, you bawl loud enough as it is. Away with ye, with whatyou have. Look to your keg, and hark ye, if ye catch that villain, PaulJones, give him no quarter. "

"But, captain, here, " shouted one of the boatmen, "there's a mistake. This is a keg of pickles, not powder. Look, " and poking into thebung-hole, he dragged out a green cucumber dripping with brine. "Takethis back, and give us the powder. "

"Pooh, " said Paul, "the powder is at the bottom, pickled powder, bestway to keep it. Away with ye, now, and after that bloody embezzler, PaulJones. "

This was Sunday. The ships held on. During the afternoon, a long tackof the Richard brought her close towards the shores of Fife, near thethriving little port of Kirkaldy. 

"There's a great crowd on the beach. Captain Paul, " said Israel, lookingthrough his glass. "There seems to be an old woman standing on afish-barrel there, a sort of selling things at auction to the people, but I can't be certain yet. "

"Let me see, " said Paul, taking the glass as they came nigher. "Sureenough, it's an old lady--an old quack-doctress, seems to me, in a blackgown, too. I must hail her. "

Ordering the ship to be kept on towards the port, he shortened sailwithin easy distance, so as to glide slowly by, and seizing the trumpet, thus spoke:

"Old lady, ahoy! What are you talking about? What's your text?"

"The righteous shall rejoice when he seeth the vengeance. He shall washhis feet in the blood of the wicked. "

"Ah, what a lack of charity. Now hear mine:--God helpeth them that helpthemselves, as Poor Richard says. "

"Reprobate pirate, a gale shall yet come to drive thee in wrecks fromour waters. "

"The strong wind of your hate fills my sails well. Adieu, " waving hisbonnet--"tell us the rest at Leith. "

Next morning the ships were almost within cannon-shot of the town. Themen to be landed were in the boats. Israel had the tiller of theforemost one, waiting for his commander to enter, when just as Paul'sfoot was on the gangway, a sudden squall struck all three ships, dashingthe boats against them, and causing indescribable confusion. The squallended in a violent gale. Getting his men on board with all dispatch, Paul essayed his best to withstand the fury of the wind, but it blewadversely, and with redoubled power. A ship at a distance went downbeneath it. The disappointed invader was obliged to turn before thegale, and renounce his project. 

To this hour, on the shores of the Firth of Forth, it is the popularpersuasion, that the Rev. Mr. Shirrer's (of Kirkaldy) powerfulintercession was the direct cause of the elemental repulse experiencedoff the endangered harbor of Leith. 

Through the ill qualities of Paul's associate captains: their timidity, incapable of keeping pace with his daring; their jealousy, blind to hissuperiority to rivalship; together with the general reduction of hisforce, now reduced by desertion, from nine to three ships; and last ofall, the enmity of seas and winds; the invader, driven, not by a fleet, but a gale, out of the Scottish water's, had the mortification inprospect of terminating a cruise, so formidable in appearance at theonset, without one added deed to sustain the reputation gained by formerexploits. Nevertheless, he was not disheartened. He sought to conciliatefortune, not by despondency, but by resolution. And, as if won by hisconfident bearing, that fickle power suddenly went over to him from theranks of the enemy--suddenly as plumed Marshal Ney to the stubbornstandard of Napoleon from Elba, marching regenerated on Paris. In aword, luck--that's the word--shortly threw in Paul's way the greataction of his life: the most extraordinary of all naval engagements; theunparalleled death-lock with the Serapis. 

CHAPTER XIX. 

THEY FIGHT THE SERAPIS. 

The battle between the Bon Homme Richard and the Serapis stands inhistory as the first signal collision on the sea between the Englishmanand the American. For obstinacy, mutual hatred, and courage, it iswithout precedent or subsequent in the story of ocean. The strife longhung undetermined, but the English flag struck in the end. 

There would seem to be something singularly indicatory I in thisengagement. It may involve at once a type, a parallel, and a prophecy. Sharing the same blood with England, and yet her proved foe in twowars--not wholly inclined at bottom to forget an old grudge--intrepid, unprincipled, reckless, predatory, with boundless ambition, civilized inexternals but a savage at heart, America is, or may yet be, the PaulJones of nations. 

Regarded in this indicatory light, the battle between the Bon HommeRichard and the Serapis--in itself so curious--may well enlist ourinterest. 

Never was there a fight so snarled. The intricacy of those incidentswhich defy the narrator's extrication, is not illy figured in thatbewildering intertanglement of all the yards and anchors of the twoships, which confounded them for the time in one chaos of devastation. 

Elsewhere than here the reader must go who seeks an elaborate version ofthe fight, or, indeed, much of any regular account of it whatever. Thewriter is but brought to mention the battle because he must needsfollow, in all events, the fortunes of the humble adventurer whose lifelie records. Yet this necessarily involves some general view of eachconspicuous incident in which he shares. 

Several circumstances of the place and time served to invest the fightwith a certain scenic atmosphere casting a light almost poetic over thewild gloom of its tragic results. The battle was fought between thehours of seven and ten at night; the height of it was under a fullharvest moon, in view of thousands of distant spectators crowning thehigh cliffs of Yorkshire. 

From the Tees to the Humber, the eastern coast of Britain, for the mostpart, wears a savage, melancholy, and Calabrian aspect. It is in courseof incessant decay. Every year the isle which repulses nearly all otherfoes, succumbs to the Attila assaults of the deep. Here and there thebase of the cliffs is strewn with masses of rock, undermined by thewaves, and tumbled headlong below, where, sometimes, the watercompletely surrounds them, showing in shattered confusion detachedrocks, pyramids, and obelisks, rising half-revealed from the surf--theTadmores of the wasteful desert of the sea. Nowhere is this desolationmore marked than for those fifty miles of coast between Flamborough Headand the Spurm. 

Weathering out the gale which had driven them from Leith, Paul's shipsfor a few days were employed in giving chase to various merchantmen andcolliers; capturing some, sinking others, and putting the rest toflight. Off the mouth of the Humber they ineffectually manoeuvred with aview of drawing out a king's frigate, reported to be lying at anchorwithin. At another time a large fleet was encountered, under convoy ofsome ships of force. But their panic caused the fleet to hug the edge ofperilous shoals very nigh the land, where, by reason of his having nocompetent pilot, Paul durst not approach to molest them. The same nighthe saw two strangers further out at sea, and chased them until three inthe morning, when, getting pretty nigh, ho surmised that they must needsbe vessels of his own squadron, which, previous to his entering theFirth of Forth, had separated from his command. Daylight proved thissupposition correct. Five vessels of the original squadron were now oncemore in company. About noon a fleet of forty merchantmen appeared cominground Flamborough Head, protected by two English man-of-war, the Serapisand Countess of Scarborough. Descrying the five cruisers sailing down, the forty sail, like forty chickens, fluttered in a panic under the wingof the shore. Their armed protectors bravely steered from the land, making the disposition for battle. Promptly accepting the challenge, Paul, giving the signal to his consorts, earnestly pressed forward. But, earnest as he was, it was seven in the evening ere the encounter began. Meantime his comrades, heedless of his signals, sailed independentlyalong. Dismissing them from present consideration, we confine ourselves, for a while, to the Richard and the Serapis, the grand duellists of thefight. 

The Richard carried a motley, crew, to keep whom in order one hundredand thirty-five soldiers--themselves a hybrid band--had been put onboard, commanded by French officers of inferior rank. Her armament wassimilarly heterogeneous; guns of all sorts and calibres; but about equalon the whole to those of a thirty-two-gun frigate. The spirit of banefulintermixture pervaded this craft throughout. 

The Serapis was a frigate of fifty guns, more than half of whichindividually exceeded in calibre any one gun of the Richard. She had acrew of some three hundred and twenty trained man-of-war's men. 

There is something in a naval engagement which radically distinguishesit from one on the land. The ocean, at times, has what is called its_sea_ and its _trough of the sea_; but it has neither rivers, woods, banks, towns, nor mountains. In mild weather it is one hammered plain. Stratagems, like those of disciplined armies--ambuscades, like those ofIndians, are impossible. All is clear, open, fluent. The very elementwhich sustains the combatants, yields at the stroke of a feather. Onewind and one tide at one time operate upon all who here engage. Thissimplicity renders a battle between two men-of-war, with their hugewhite wings, more akin to the Miltonic contests of archangels than to_the comparatively squalid_ tussles of earth. 

As the ships neared, a hazy darkness overspread the water. The moon wasnot yet risen. Objects were perceived with difficulty. Borne by a softmoist breeze over gentle waves, they came within pistol-shot. Owing tothe obscurity, and the known neighborhood of other vessels, the Serapiswas uncertain who the Richard was. Through the dim mist each ship loomedforth to the other vast, but indistinct, as the ghost of Morven. Soundsof the trampling of resolute men echoed from either hull, whose tightdecks dully resounded like drum-heads in a funeral march. 

The Serapis hailed. She was answered by a broadside. For half an hourthe combatants deliberately manoeuvred, continually changing theirposition, but always within shot fire. The. Serapis--the better sailerof the two--kept critically circling the Richard, making loungingadvances now and then, and as suddenly steering off; hate causing her toact not unlike a wheeling cock about a hen, when stirred by the contrarypassion. Meantime, though within easy speaking distance, no furthersyllable was exchanged; but an incessant cannonade was kept up. 

At this point, a third party, the Scarborough, drew near, seeminglydesirous of giving assistance to her consort. But thick smoke was nowadded to the night's natural obscurity. The Scarborough imperfectlydiscerned two ships, and plainly saw the common fire they made; butwhich was which, she could not tell. Eager to befriend the Serapis, shedurst not fire a gun, lest she might unwittingly act the part of a foe. As when a hawk and a crow are clawing and beaking high in the air, asecond crow flying near, will seek to join the battle, but finding nofair chance to engage, at last flies away to the woods; just so did theScarborough now. Prudence dictated the step; because several chanceshot--from which of the combatants could not be known--had alreadystruck the Scarborough. So, unwilling uselessly to expose herself, offwent for the present this baffled and ineffectual friend. 

Not long after, an invisible hand came and set down a great yellow lampin the east. The hand reached up unseen from below the horizon, and setthe lamp down right on the rim of the horizon, as on a threshold; asmuch as to say, Gentlemen warriors, permit me a little to light up thisrather gloomy looking subject. The lamp was the round harvest moon; theone solitary foot-light of the scene. But scarcely did the rays from thelamp pierce that languid haze. Objects before perceived with difficulty, now glimmered ambiguously. Bedded in strange vapors, the greatfoot-light cast a dubious, half demoniac glare across the waters, likethe phantasmagoric stream sent athwart a London flagging in a night-rainfrom an apothecary's blue and green window. Through this sardonicalmist, the face of the Man-in-the-Moon--looking right towards thecombatants, as if he were standing in a trap-door of the sea, leaningforward leisurely with his arms complacently folded over upon the edgeof the horizon--this queer face wore a serious, apishly self-satisfiedleer, as if the Man-in-the-Moon had somehow secretly put up the shipsto their contest, and in the depths of his malignant old soul was notunpleased to see how well his charms worked. There stood the grinningMan-in-the-Moon, his head just dodging into view over the rim of thesea:--Mephistopheles prompter of the stage. 

Aided now a little by the planet, one of the consorts of the Richard, the Pallas, hovering far outside the fight, dimly discerned thesuspicious form of a lonely vessel unknown to her. She resolved toengage it, if it proved a foe. But ere they joined, the unknownship--which proved to be the Scarborough--received a broadside at longgun's distance from another consort of the Richard the Alliance. Theshot whizzed across the broad interval like shuttlecocks across a greathall. Presently the battledores of both batteries were at work, andrapid compliments of shuttlecocks were very promptly exchanged. Theadverse consorts of the two main belligerents fought with all the rageof those fiery seconds who in some desperate duels make theirprincipal's quarrel their own. Diverted from the Richard and the Serapisby this little by-play, the Man-in-the-Moon, all eager to see what itwas, somewhat raised himself from his trap-door with an added grin onhis face. By this time, off sneaked the Alliance, and down swept thePallas, at close quarters engaging the Scarborough; an encounterdestined in less than an hour to end in the latter ship's striking herflag. 

Compared to the Serapis and the Richard, the Pallas and the Scarboroughwere as two pages to two knights. In their immature way they showed thesame traits as their fully developed superiors. 

The Man-in-the-Moon now raised himself still higher to obtain a betterview of affairs. 

But the Man-in-the-Moon was not the only spectator. From the high cliffsof the shore, and especially from the great promontory of FlamboroughHead, the scene was witnessed by crowds of the islanders. Any rusticmight be pardoned his curiosity in view of the spectacle, presented. Farin the indistinct distance fleets of frightened merchantmen filled thelower air with their sails, as flakes of snow in a snow-storm by night. Hovering undeterminedly, in another direction, were several of thescattered consorts of Paul, taking no part in the fray. Nearer, was anisolated mist, investing the Pallas and Scarborough--a mist slowlyadrift on the sea, like a floating isle, and at intervals irradiatedwith sparkles of fire and resonant with the boom of cannon. Furtheraway, in the deeper water, was a lurid cloud, incessantly torn in shredsof lightning, then fusing together again, once more to be rent. As yetthis lurid cloud was neither stationary nor slowly adrift, like thefirst-mentioned one; but, instinct with chaotic vitality, shifted hitherand thither, foaming with fire, like a valiant water-spout careering offthe coast of Malabar. 

To get some idea of the events enacting in that cloud, it will benecessary to enter it; to go and possess it, as a ghost may rush into abody, or the devils into the swine, which running down the steep placeperished in the sea; just as the Richard is yet to do. 

Thus far the Serapis and the Richard had been manoeuvring and chasingto each other like partners in a cotillion, all the time indulging inrapid repartee. 

But finding at last that the superior managableness of the enemy's shipenabled him to get the better of the clumsy old Indiaman, the Richard, in taking position, Paul, with his wonted resolution, at once sought toneutralize this, by hugging him close. But the attempt to lay theRichard right across the head of the Serapis ended quite otherwise, insending the enemy's jib-boom just over the Richard's great tower ofPisa, where Israel was stationed; who, catching it eagerly, stood for aninstant holding to the slack of the sail, like one grasping a horse bythe mane prior to vaulting into the saddle. 

"Aye, hold hard, lad, " cried Paul, springing to his side with a coil ofrigging. With a few rapid turns he knitted himself to his foe. The windnow acting on the sails of the Serapis forced her, heel and point, herentire length, cheek by jowl, alongside the Richard. The projectingcannon scraped; the yards interlocked; but the hulls did not touch. Along lane of darkling water lay wedged between, like that narrow canalin Venice which dozes between two shadowy piles, and high in air issecretly crossed by the Bridge of Sighs. But where the six yard-armsreciprocally arched overhead, three bridges of sighs were both seen andheard, as the moon and wind kept rising. 

Into that Lethean canal--pond-like in its smoothness as compared withthe sea without--fell many a poor soul that night; fell, foreverforgotten. 

As some heaving rent coinciding with a disputed frontier on a volcanicplain, that boundary abyss was the jaws of death to both sides. Socontracted was it, that in many cases the gun-rammers had to be thrustinto the opposite ports, in order to enter to muzzles of their owncannon. It seemed more an intestine feud, than a fight betweenstrangers. Or, rather, it was as if the Siamese Twins, oblivious oftheir fraternal bond, should rage in unnatural fight. 

Ere long, a horrible explosion was heard, drowning for the instant thecannonade. Two of the old eighteen-pounders--before spoken of, as havingbeen hurriedly set up below the main deck of the Richard--burst all topieces, killing the sailors who worked them, and shattering all thatpart of the hull, as if two exploded steam-boilers had shot out of itsopposite sides. The effect was like the fall of the walls of a house. Little now upheld the great tower of Pisa but a few naked crowstanchions. Thenceforth, not a few balls from the Serapis must havepassed straight through the Richard without grazing her. It was likefiring buck-shot through the ribs of a skeleton. 

But, further forward, so deadly was the broadside from the heavybatteries of the Serapis--levelled point-blank, and right down thethroat and bowels, as it were, of the Richard--that it clearedeverything before it. The men on the Richard's covered gun-deck ranabove, like miners from the fire-damp. Collecting on the forecastle, they continued to fight with grenades and muskets. The soldiers alsowere in the lofty tops, whence they kept up incessant volleys, cascadingtheir fire down as pouring lava from cliffs. 

The position of the men in the two ships was now exactly reversed. Forwhile the Serapis was tearing the Richard all to pieces below deck, andhad swept that covered part almost of the last man, the Richard's crowdof musketry had complete control of the upper deck of the Serapis, whereit was almost impossible for man to remain unless as a corpse. Though inthe beginning, the tops of the Serapis had not been unsupplied withmarksmen, yet they had long since been cleared by the overmasteringmusketry of the Richard. Several, with leg or arm broken by a ball, hadbeen seen going dimly downward from their giddy perch, like fallingpigeons shot on the wing. 

As busy swallows about barn-eaves and ridge-poles, some of the Richard'smarksmen, quitting their tops, now went far out on their yard-arms, where they overhung the Serapis. From thence they dropped hand-grenadesupon her decks, like apples, which growing in one field fall over thefence into another. Others of their band flung the same sour fruit intothe open ports of the Serapis. A hail-storm of aerial combustiondescended and slanted on the Serapis, while horizontal thunderboltsrolled crosswise through the subterranean vaults of the Richard. Thebelligerents were no longer, in the ordinary sense of things, an Englishship and an American ship. It was a co-partnership and joint-stockcombustion-company of both ships; yet divided, even in participation. The two vessels were as two houses, through whose party-wall doors havebeen cut; one family (the Guelphs) occupying the whole lower story;another family (the Ghibelines) the whole upper story. 

Meanwhile, determined Paul flew hither and thither like the meteoriccorposant-ball, which shiftingly dances on the tips and verges of ships'rigging in storms. Wherever he went, he seemed to cast a pale light onall faces. Blacked and burnt, his Scotch bonnet was compressed to agun-wad on his head. His Parisian coat, with its gold-laced sleeve laidaside, disclosed to the full the blue tattooing on his arm, whichsometimes in fierce gestures streamed in the haze of the cannonade, cabalistically terrific as the charmed standard of Satan. Yet hisfrenzied manner was less a testimony of his internal commotion thanintended to inspirit and madden his men, some of whom seeing him, intransports of intrepidity stripped themselves to their trowsers, exposing their naked bodies to the as naked shot The same was done onthe Serapis, where several guns were seen surrounded by their buff crewsas by fauns and satyrs. 

At the beginning of the fray, before the ships interlocked, in theintervals of smoke which swept over the ships as mist overmountain-tops, affording open rents here and there--the gun-deck of theSerapis, at certain points, showed, congealed for the instant in allattitudes of dauntlessness, a gallery of marble statues--fightinggladiators. 

Stooping low and intent, with one braced leg thrust behind, and one armthrust forward, curling round towards the muzzle of the gun, there wasseen the _loader_, performing his allotted part; on the other side ofthe carriage, in the same stooping posture, but with both hands holdinghis long black pole, pike-wise, ready for instant use--stood the eager_rammer and sponger_; while at the breech, crouched the wary _captain ofthe gun_, his keen eye, like the watching leopard's, burning along therange; and behind all, tall and erect, the Egyptian symbol of death, stood the _matchman_, immovable for the moment, his long-handled matchreversed. Up to their two long death-dealing batteries, the trained menof the Serapis stood and toiled in mechanical magic of discipline. Theytended those rows of guns, as Lowell girls the rows of looms in a cottonfactory. The Parcae were not more methodical; Atropos not more fatal;the automaton chess-player not more irresponsible. 

"Look, lad; I want a grenade, now, thrown down their main hatchway. Isaw long piles of cartridges there. The powder monkeys have brought themup faster than they can be used. Take a bucket of combustibles, andlet's hear from you presently. "

These words were spoken by Paul to Israel. Israel did as ordered. In afew minutes, bucket in hand, begrimed with powder, sixty feet in air, hehung like Apollyon from the extreme tip of the yard over the fated abyssof the hatchway. As he looked down between the eddies of smoke into thatslaughterous pit, it was like looking from the verge of a cataract downinto the yeasty pool at its base. Watching, his chance, he dropped onegrenade with such faultless precision, that, striking its mark, anexplosion rent the Serapis like a volcano. The long row of heapedcartridges was ignited. The fire ran horizontally, like an express on arailway. More than twenty men were instantly killed: nearly fortywounded. This blow restored the chances of battle, before in favor ofthe Serapis. 

But the drooping spirits of the English were suddenly revived, by anevent which crowned the scene by an act on the part of one of theconsorts of the Richard, the incredible atrocity of which has inducedall humane minds to impute it rather to some incomprehensible mistakethan to the malignant madness of the perpetrator. 

The cautious approach and retreat of a consort of the Serapis, theScarborough, before the moon rose, has already been mentioned. It is nowto be related how that, when the moon was more than an hour high, aconsort of the Richard, the Alliance, likewise approached and retreated. This ship, commanded by a Frenchman, infamous in his own navy, andobnoxious in the service to which he at present belonged; this ship, foremost in insurgency to Paul hitherto, and which, for the most part, had crept like a poltroon from the fray; the Alliance now was at hand. Seeing her, Paul deemed the battle at an end. But to his horror, theAlliance threw a broadside full into the stern of the Richard, withouttouching the Serapis. Paul called to her, for God's sake to forbeardestroying the Richard. The reply was, a second, a third, a fourthbroadside, striking the Richard ahead, astern, and amidships. One of thevolleys killed several men and one officer. Meantime, like carpenters'augers, and the sea-worm called Remora, the guns of the Serapis weredrilling away at the same doomed hull. After performing her namelessexploit, the Alliance sailed away, and did no more. She was like thegreat fire of London, breaking out on the heel of the great Plague. Bythis time, the Richard had so many shot-holes low down in her hull, thatlike a sieve she began to settle. 

"Do you strike?" cried the English captain. 

"I have not yet begun to fight, " howled sinking Paul. 

This summons and response were whirled on eddies of smoke and flame. Both vessels were now on fire. The men of either knew hardly which todo; strive to destroy the enemy, or save themselves. In the midst ofthis, one hundred human beings, hitherto invisible strangers, weresuddenly added to the rest. Five score English prisoners, till nowconfined in the Richard's hold, liberated in his consternation by themaster at arms, burst up the hatchways. One of them, the captain of aletter of marque, captured by Paul, off the Scottish coast, crawledthrough a port, as a burglar through a window, from the one ship to theother, and reported affairs to the English captain. 

While Paul and his lieutenants were confronting these prisoners, thegunner, running up from below, and not perceiving his officialsuperiors, and deeming them dead, believing himself now left solesurviving officer, ran to the tower of Pisa to haul down the colors. Butthey were already shot down and trailing in the water astern, like asailor's towing shirt. Seeing the gunner there, groping about in thesmoke, Israel asked what he wanted. 

At this moment the gunner, rushing to the rail, shouted "Quarter!quarter!" to the Serapis. 

"I'll quarter ye, " yelled Israel, smiting the gunner with the flat ofhis cutlass. 

"Do you strike?" now came from the Serapis. 

"Aye, aye, aye!" involuntarily cried Israel, fetching the gunner ashower of blows. 

"Do you strike?" again was repeated from the Serapis; whose captain, judging from the augmented confusion on board the Richard, owing to theescape of the prisoners, and also influenced by the report made to himby his late guest of the port-hole, doubted not that the enemy mustneeds be about surrendering. 

"Do you strike?"

"Aye!--I strike _back_" roared Paul, for the first time now hearing thesummons. 

But judging this frantic response to come, like the others, from someunauthorized source, the English captain directed his boarders to becalled, some of whom presently leaped on the Richard's rail, but, throwing out his tattooed arm at them, with a sabre at the end of it, Paul showed them how boarders repelled boarders. The English retreated, but not before they had been thinned out again, like spring radishes, bythe unfaltering fire from the Richard's tops. 

An officer of the Richard, seeing the mass of prisoners delirious withsudden liberty and fright, pricked them with his sword to the pumps, thus keeping the ship afloat by the very blunder which had promised tohave been fatal. The vessels now blazed so in the rigging that bothparties desisted from hostilities to subdue the common foe. 

When some faint order was again restored upon the Richard her chances ofvictory increased, while those of the English, driven under cover, proportionably waned. Early in the contest, Paul, with his own hand, hadbrought one of his largest guns to bear against the enemy's mainmast. That shot had hit. The mast now plainly tottered. Nevertheless, itseemed as if, in this fight, neither party could be victor. Mutualobliteration from the face of the waters seemed the only natural sequelto hostilities like these. It is, therefore, honor to him as a man, andnot reproach to him as an officer, that, to stay such carnage, CaptainPearson, of the Serapis, with his own hands hauled down his colors. Butjust as an officer from the Richard swung himself on board the Serapis, and accosted the English captain, the first lieutenant of the Serapiscame up from below inquiring whether the Richard had struck, since herfire had ceased. 

So equal was the conflict that, even after the surrender, it could be, and was, a question to one of the warriors engaged (who had not happenedto see the English flag hauled down) whether the Serapis had struck tothe Richard, or the Richard to the Serapis. Nay, while the Richard'sofficer was still amicably conversing with the English captain, amidshipman of the Richard, in act of following his superior on board thesurrendered vessel, was run through the thigh by a pike in the hand ofan ignorant boarder of the Serapis. While, equally ignorant, thecannons below deck were still thundering away at the nominal conquerorfrom the batteries of the nominally conquered ship. 

But though the Serapis had submitted, there were two misanthropical foeson board the Richard which would not so easily succumb--fire and water. All night the victors were engaged in suppressing the flames. Not untildaylight were the flames got under; but though the pumps were keptcontinually going, the water in the hold still gained. A few hours aftersunrise the Richard was deserted for the Serapis and the other vesselsof the squadron of Paul. About ten o'clock the Richard, gorged withslaughter, wallowed heavily, gave a long roll, and blasted by tornadoesof sulphur, slowly sunk, like Gomorrah, out of sight. 

The loss of life in the two ships was about equal; one-half of the totalnumber of those engaged being either killed or wounded. 

In view of this battle one may ask--What separates the enlightened manfrom the savage? Is civilization a thing distinct, or is it an advancedstage of barbarism?

CHAPTER XX. 

THE SHUTTLE. 

For a time back, across the otherwise blue-jean career of Israel, PaulJones flits and re-flits like a crimson thread. One more briefintermingling of it, and to the plain old homespun we return. 

The battle won, the squadron started for the Texel, where they arrivedin safety. Omitting all mention of intervening harassments, suffice it, that after some months of inaction as to anything of a warlike nature, Paul and Israel (both, from different motives, eager to return toAmerica) sailed for that country in the armed ship Ariel, Paul ascommander, Israel as quartermaster. 

Two weeks out, they encountered by night a frigate-like craft, supposedto be an enemy. The vessels came within hail, both showing Englishcolors, with purposes of mutual deception, affecting to belong to theEnglish Navy. For an hour, through their speaking trumpets, the captainsequivocally conversed. A very reserved, adroit, hoodwinking, statesman-like conversation, indeed. At last, professing some littleincredulity as to the truthfulness of the stranger's statement, Paulintimated a desire that he should put out a boat and come on board toshow his commission, to which the stranger very affably replied, thatunfortunately his boat was exceedingly leaky. With equal politeness, Paul begged him to consider the danger attending a refusal, whichrejoinder nettled the other, who suddenly retorted that he would answerfor twenty guns, and that both himself and men were knock-downEnglishmen. Upon this, Paul said that he would allow him exactly fiveminutes for a sober, second thought. That brief period passed, Paul, hoisting the American colors, ran close under the other ship's stern, and engaged her. It was about eight o'clock at night that this strangequarrel was picked in the middle of the ocean. Why cannot men bepeaceable on that great common? Or does nature in those fiercenight-brawlers, the billows, set mankind but a sorry example?

After ten minutes' cannonading, the stranger struck, shouting out thathalf his men were killed. The Ariel's crew hurrahed. Boarders werecalled to take possession. At this juncture, the prize shifting herposition so that she headed away, and to leeward of the Ariel, thrusther long spanker-boom diagonally over the latter's quarter; when Israel, who was standing close by, instinctively caught hold of it--just as hehad grasped the jib-boom of the Serapis--and, at the same moment, hearing the call to take possession, in the valiant excitement of theoccasion, he leaped upon the spar, and made a rush for the stranger'sdeck, thinking, of course, that he would be immediately followed by theregular boarders. But the sails of the strange ship suddenly filled;she began to glide through the sea; her spanker-boom, not having at allentangled itself, offering no hindrance. Israel, clinging midway alongthe boom, soon found himself divided from the Ariel by a spaceimpossible to be leaped. Meantime, suspecting foul play, Paul set everysail; but the stranger, having already the advantage, contrived to makegood her escape, though perseveringly chased by the cheated conqueror. 

In the confusion, no eye had observed our hero's spring. But, as thevessels separated more, an officer of the strange ship spying a man onthe boom, and taking him for one of his own men, demanded what he didthere. 

"Clearing the signal halyards, sir, " replied Israel, fumbling with thecord which happened to be dangling near by. 

"Well, bear a hand and come in, or you will have a bow-chaser at yousoon, " referring to the bow guns of the Ariel. 

"Aye, aye, sir, " said Israel, and in a moment he sprang to the deck, andsoon found himself mixed in among some two hundred English sailors of alarge letter of marque. At once he perceived that the story of half thecrew being killed was a mere hoax, played off for the sake of making anescape. Orders were continually being given to pull on this and thatrope, as the ship crowded all sail in flight. To these orders Israel, with the rest, promptly responded, pulling at the rigging stoutly as thebest of them; though Heaven knows his heart sunk deeper and deeper atevery pull which thus helped once again to widen the gulf between himand home. 

In intervals he considered with himself what to do. Favored by theobscurity of the night and the number of the crew, and wearing much thesame dress as theirs, it was very easy to pass himself off for one ofthem till morning. But daylight would be sure to expose him, unless somecunning, plan could be hit upon. If discovered for what he was, nothingshort of a prison awaited him upon the ship's arrival in port. 

It was a desperate case, only as desperate a remedy could serve. Onething was sure, he could not hide. Some audacious parade of himselfpromised the only hope. Marking that the sailors, not being of theregular navy, wore no uniform, and perceiving that his jacket was theonly garment on him which bore any distinguishing badge, our adventurertook it off, and privily dropped it overboard, remaining now in his darkblue woollen shirt and blue cloth waistcoat. 

What the more inspirited Israel to the added step now contemplated, wasthe circumstance that the ship was not a Frenchman's or other foreigner, but her crew, though enemies, spoke the same language that he did. 

So very quietly, at last, he goes aloft into the maintop, and sittingdown on an old sail there, beside some eight or ten topmen, in anoff-handed way asks one for tobacco. 

"Give us a quid, lad, " as he settled himself in his seat. 

"Halloo, " said the strange sailor, "who be you? Get out of the top! Thefore and mizzentop men won't let us go into their tops, and blame me ifwe'll let any of their gangs come here. So, away ye go. "

"You're blind, or crazy, old boy, " rejoined Israel. "I'm a topmate;ain't I, lads?" appealing to the rest. 

"There's only ten maintopmen belonging to our watch; if you are one, then there'll be eleven, " said a second sailor. "Get out of the top!"

"This is too bad, maties, " cried Israel, "to serve an old topmate thisway. Come, come, you are foolish. Give us a quid. " And, once more, withthe utmost sociability, he addressed the sailor next to him. 

"Look ye, " returned the other, "if you don't make away with yourself, you skulking spy from the mizzen, we'll drop you to deck like ajewel-block. "

Seeing the party thus resolute, Israel, with some affected banter, descended. 

The reason why he had tried the scheme--and, spite of the foregoingfailure, meant to repeat it--was this: As customary in armed ships, themen were in companies allotted to particular places and functions. Therefore, to escape final detection, Israel must some way get himselfrecognized as belonging to some one of those bands; otherwise, as anisolated nondescript, discovery ere long would be certain, especiallyupon the next general muster. To be sure, the hope in question was aforlorn sort of hope, but it was his sole one, and must therefore betried. 

Mixing in again for a while with the general watch, he at last goes onthe forecastle among the sheet-anchor-men there, at present engaged incritically discussing the merits of the late valiant encounter, andexpressing their opinion that by daybreak the enemy in chase would behull-down out of sight. 

"To be sure she will, " cried Israel, joining in with the group, "oldballyhoo that she is, to be sure. But didn't we pepper her, lads? Giveus a chew of tobacco, one of ye. How many have we wounded, do ye know?None killed that I've heard of. Wasn't that a fine hoax we played on'em? Ha! ha! But give us a chew. "

In the prodigal fraternal patriotism of the moment, one of the oldworthies freely handed his plug to our adventurer, who, helping himself, returned it, repeating the question as to the killed and wounded. 

"Why, " said he of the plug, "Jack Jewboy told me, just now, that there'sonly seven men been carried down to the surgeon, but not a soul killed. "

"Good, boys, good!" cried Israel, moving up to one of the gun-carriages, where three or four men were sitting--"slip along, chaps, slip along, and give a watchmate a seat with ye. "

"All full here, lad; try the next gun. "

"Boys, clear a place here, ", said Israel, advancing, like one of thefamily, to that gun. 

"Who the devil are _you_, making this row here?" demanded astern-looking old fellow, captain of the forecastle, "seems to me youmake considerable noise. Are you a forecastleman?"

"If the bowsprit belongs here, so do I, " rejoined Israel, composedly. 

"Let's look at ye, then!" and seizing a battle-lantern, before thrustunder a gun, the old veteran came close to Israel before he had time toelude the scrutiny. 

"Take that!" said his examiner, and fetching Israel a terrible thump, pushed him ignominiously off the forecastle as some unknown interloperfrom distant parts of the ship. 

With similar perseverance of effrontery, Israel tried other quarters ofthe vessel. But with equal ill success. Jealous with the spirit ofclass, no social circle would receive him. As a last resort, he diveddown among the _holders_. 

A group of them sat round a lantern, in the dark bowels of the ship, like a knot of charcoal burners in a pine forest at midnight. 

"Well, boys, what's the good word?" said Israel, advancing verycordially, but keeping as much as possible in the shadow. 

"The good word is, " rejoined a censorious old _holder_, "that you hadbest go where you belong--on deck--and not be a skulking down here whereyou _don't_ belong. I suppose this is the way you skulked during thefight. "

"Oh, you're growly to-night, shipmate, " said Israel, pleasantly--"suppersits hard on your conscience. "

"Get out of the hold with ye, " roared the other. "On deck, or I'll callthe master-at-arms. "

Once more Israel decamped. 

Sorely against his grain, as a final effort to blend himself openly withthe crew, he now went among the _waisters_: the vilest caste of an armedship's company, mere dregs and settlings--sea-Pariahs, comprising allthe lazy, all the inefficient, all the unfortunate and fated, all themelancholy, all the infirm, all the rheumatical scamps, scapegraces, ruined prodigal sons, sooty faces, and swineherds of the crew, notexcluding those with dismal wardrobes. 

An unhappy, tattered, moping row of them sat along dolefully on thegun-deck, like a parcel of crest-fallen buzzards, exiled from civilizedsociety. 

"Cheer up, lads, " said Israel, in a jovial tone, "homeward-bound, youknow. Give us a seat among ye, friends. "

"Oh, sit on your head!" answered a sullen fellow in the corner. 

"Come, come, no growling; we're homeward-bound. Whoop, my hearties!"

"Workhouse bound, you mean, " grumbled another sorry chap, in a darnedshirt. 

"Oh, boys, don't be down-hearted. Let's keep up our spirits. Sing us asong, one of ye, and I'll give the chorus. "

"Sing if ye like, but I'll plug my ears, for one, " said still anothersulky varlet, with the toes out of his sea-boots, while all the restwith one roar of misanthropy joined him. 

But Israel, riot to be daunted, began:

"'Cease, rude Boreas, cease your growling!'"

"And you cease your squeaking, will ye?" cried a fellow in a bangedtarpaulin. "Did ye get a ball in the windpipe, that ye cough that way, worse nor a broken-nosed old bellows? Have done with your groaning, it'sworse nor the death-rattle. "

"Boys, is this the way you treat a watchmate" demanded Israelreproachfully, "trying to cheer up his friends? Shame on ye, boys. Come, let's be sociable. Spin us a yarn, one of ye. Meantime, rub my back forme, another, " and very confidently he leaned against his neighbor. 

"Lean off me, will ye?" roared his friend, shoving him away. 

"But who _is_ this ere singing, leaning, yarn-spinning chap? Who are ye?Be you a waister, or be you not?"

So saying, one of this peevish, sottish band staggered close up toIsrael. But there was a deck above and a deck below, and the lanternswung in the distance. It was too dim to see with critical exactness. 

"No such singing chap belongs to our gang, that's flat, " he dogmaticallyexclaimed at last, after an ineffectual scrutiny. "Sail out of this!"

And with a shove once more, poor Israel was ejected. 

Blackballed out of every club, he went disheartened on deck. So long, while light screened him at least, as he contented himself withpromiscuously circulating, all was safe; it was the endeavor tofraternize with any one set which was sure to endanger him. At last, wearied out, he happened to find himself on the berth deck, where thewatch below were slumbering. Some hundred and fifty hammocks were onthat deck. Seeing one empty, he leaped in, thinking luck might yet someway befriend him. Here, at last, the sultry confinement put him fastasleep. He was wakened by a savage whiskerando of the other watch, who, seizing him by his waistband, dragged him most indecorously out, furiously denouncing him for a skulker. 

Springing to his feet, Israel perceived from the crowd and tumult of theberth deck, now all alive with men leaping into their hammocks, insteadof being full of sleepers quietly dosing therein, that the watches werechanged. Going above, he renewed in various quarters his offers ofintimacy with the fresh men there assembled; but was successivelyrepulsed as before. At length, just as day was breaking, an irasciblefellow whose stubborn opposition our adventurer had long in vain soughtto conciliate--this man suddenly perceiving, by the gray morning light, that Israel had somehow an alien sort of general look, very savagelypressed him for explicit information as to who he might be. The answersincreased his suspicion. Others began to surround the two. Presently, quite a circle was formed. Sailors from distant parts of the ship drewnear. One, and then another, and another, declared that they, in theirquarters, too, had been molested by a vagabond claiming fraternity, andseeking to palm himself off upon decent society. In vain Israelprotested. The truth, like the day, dawned clearer and clearer. More andmore closely he was scanned. At length the hour for having all hands ondeck arrived; when the other watch which Israel had first tried, reascending to the deck, and hearing the matter in discussion, theyendorsed the charge of molestation and attempted imposture through thenight, on the part of some person unknown, but who, likely enough, wasthe strange man now before them. In the end, the master-at-arms appearedwith his bamboo, who, summarily collaring poor Israel, led him as amysterious culprit to the officer of the deck, which gentleman havingheard the charge, examined him in great perplexity, and, saying that hedid not at all recognize that countenance, requested the junior officersto contribute their scrutiny. But those officers were equally at fault. 

"Who the deuce _are_ you?" at last said the officer-of-the-deck, inadded bewilderment. "Where did you come from? What's your business?Where are you stationed? What's your name? Who are you, any way? How didyou get here? and where are you going?"

"Sir, " replied Israel very humbly, "I am going to my regular duty, ifyou will but let me. I belong to the maintop, and ought to be nowengaged in preparing the topgallant stu'n'-sail for hoisting. "

"Belong to the maintop? Why, these men here say you have been trying tobelong to the foretop, and the mizzentop, and the forecastle, and thehold, and the waist, and every other part of the ship. This isextraordinary, " he added, turning upon the junior officers. 

"He must be out of his mind, " replied one of them, the sailing-master. 

"Out of his mind?" rejoined the officer-of-the-deck. "He's out of allreason; out of all men's knowledge and memories! Why, no one knows him;no one has ever seen him before; no imagination, in the wildest flightof a morbid nightmare, has ever so much as dreamed of him. Who _are_you?" he again added, fierce with amazement. "What's your name? Are youdown in the ship's books, or at all in the records of nature?"

"My name, sir, is Peter Perkins, " said Israel, thinking it most prudentto conceal his real appellation. 

"Certainly, I never heard that name before. Pray, see if Peter Perkinsis down on the quarter-bills, " he added to a midshipman. "Quick, bringthe book here. "

Having received it, he ran his fingers along the columns, and dashingdown the book, declared that no such name was there. 

"You are not down, sir. There is no Peter Perkins here. Tell me at oncewho are you?"

"It might be, sir, " said Israel, gravely, "that seeing I shipped underthe effects of liquor, I might, out of absent-mindedness like, havegiven in some other person's name instead of my own. "

"Well, what name have you gone by among your shipmates since you'vebeen aboard?"

"Peter Perkins, sir. "

Upon this the officer turned to the men around, inquiring whether thename of Peter Perkins was familiar to them as that of a shipmate. Oneand all answered no. 

"This won't do, sir, " now said the officer. "You see it won't do. Whoare you?"

"A poor persecuted fellow at your service, sir. "

"_Who_ persecutes you?"

"Every one, sir. All hands seem to be against me; none of them willingto remember me. "

"Tell me, " demanded the officer earnestly, "how long do you rememberyourself? Do you remember yesterday morning? You must have come intoexistence by some sort of spontaneous combustion in the hold. Or wereyou fired aboard from the enemy, last night, in a cartridge? Do youremember yesterday?"

"Oh, yes, sir. "

"What was you doing yesterday?"

"Well, sir, for one thing, I believe I had the honor of a little talkwith yourself. "

"With _me_?"

"Yes, sir; about nine o'clock in the morning--the sea being smooth andthe ship running, as I should think, about seven knots--you came up intothe maintop, where I belong, and was pleased to ask my opinion about thebest way to set a topgallant stu'n'-sail. "

"He's mad! He's mad!" said the officer, with delirious conclusiveness. "Take him away, take him away, take him away--put him somewhere, master-at-arms. Stay, one test more. What mess do you belong to?"

"Number 12, sir. "

"Mr. Tidds, " to a midshipman, "send mess No. 12 to the mast. "

Ten sailors replied to the summons, and arranged themselves beforeIsrael. 

"Men, does this man belong to your mess?"

"No, sir; never saw him before this morning. "

"What are those men's names?" he demanded of Israel. 

"Well, sir, I am so intimate with all of them, " looking upon them witha kindly glance, "I never call them by their real names, but bynicknames. So, never using their real names, I have forgotten them. Thenicknames that I know, them by, are Towser, Bowser, Rowser, Snowser. "

"Enough. Mad as a March hare. Take him away. Hold, " again added theofficer, whom some strange fascination still bound to the bootlessinvestigation. "What's _my_ name, sir?"

"Why, sir, one of my messmates here called you Lieutenant Williamson, just now, and I never heard you called by any other name. "

"There's method in his madness, " thought the officer to himself. "What'sthe captain's name?"

"Why, sir, when we spoke the enemy, last night, I heard him say, throughhis trumpet, that he was Captain Parker; and very likely he knows hisown name. "

"I have you now. That ain't the captain's real name. "

"He's the best judge himself, sir, of what his name is, I should think. "

"Were it not, " said the officer, now turning gravely upon his juniors, "were it not that such a supposition were on other grounds absurd, Ishould certainly conclude that this man, in some unknown way, got onboard here from the enemy last night. "

"How could he, sir?" asked the sailing-master. 

"Heaven knows. But our spanker-boom geared the other ship, you know, inmanoeuvring to get headway. "

"But supposing he _could_ have got here that fashion, which is quiteimpossible under all the circumstances, what motive could have inducedhim voluntarily to jump among enemies?"

"Let him answer for himself, " said the officer, turning suddenly uponIsrael, with the view of taking him off his guard, by the matter ofcourse assumption of the very point at issue. 

"Answer, sir. Why did you jump on board here, last night, from theenemy?"

"Jump on board, sir, from the enemy? Why, sir, my station at generalquarters is at gun No. 3, of the lower deck, here. "

"He's cracked--or else I am turned--or all the world is;--take himaway!"

"But where am I to take him, sir?" said the master-at-arms. "He don'tseem to belong anywhere, sir. Where--where am I to take him?"

"Take him-out of sight, " said the officer, now incensed with his ownperplexity. "Take him out of sight, I say. "

"Come along, then, my ghost, " said the master-at-arms. And, collaringthe phantom, he led it hither and thither, not knowing exactly what todo with it. 

Some fifteen minutes passed, when the captain coming from his cabin, andobserving the master-at-arms leading Israel about in this indefinitestyle, demanded the reason of that procedure, adding that it was againsthis express orders for any new and degrading punishments to be inventedfor his men. 

"Come here, master-at-arms. To what end do you lead that man about?"

"To no end in the world, sir. I keep leading him about because he hasno final destination. "

"Mr. Officer-of-the-deck, what does this mean? Who is this strange man?I don't know that I remember him. Who is he? And what is signified byhis being led about?"

Hereupon the officer-of-the-deck, throwing himself into a tragicalposture, set forth the entire mystery; much to the captain'sastonishment, who at once indignantly turned upon the phantom. 

"You rascal--don't try to deceive me. Who are you? and where did youcome from last?"

"Sir, my name is Peter Perkins, and I last came from the forecastle, where the master-at-arms last led me, before coming here. "

"No joking, sir, no joking. "

"Sir, I'm sure it's too serious a business to joke about. "

"Do you have the assurance to say, that you, as a regularly shipped man, have been on board this vessel ever since she sailed from Falmouth, tenmonths ago?"

"Sir, anxious to secure a berth under so good a commander, I was amongthe first to enlist. "

"What ports have we touched at, sir?" said the captain, now in a littlesofter tone. 

"Ports, sir, ports?"

"Yes, sir, _ports_"

Israel began to scratch his yellow hair. 

"What _ports_, sir?"

"Well, sir:--Boston, for one. "

"Right there, " whispered a midshipman. 

"What was the next port, sir?"

"Why, sir, I was saying Boston was the _first_ port, I believe; wasn'tit?--and"--

"The _second_ port, sir, is what I want. "

"Well--New York. "

"Right again, " whispered the midshipman. 

"And what port are we bound to, now?"

"Let me see--homeward-bound--Falmouth, sir. "

"What sort of a place is Boston?"

"Pretty considerable of a place, sir. "

"Very straight streets, ain't they?"

"Yes, sir; cow-paths, cut by sheep-walks, and intersected withhen-tracks. "

"When did we fire the first gun?"

"Well, sir, just as we were leaving Falmouth, ten monthsago--signal-gun, sir. "

"Where did we fire the first _shotted_ gun, sir?--and what was the nameof the privateer we took upon that occasion?"

"'Pears to me, sir, at that time I was on the sick list. Yes, sir, thatmust have been the time; I had the brain fever, and lost my mind for awhile. "

"Master-at-arms, take this man away. "

"Where shall I take him, sir?" touching his cap. 

"Go, and air him on the forecastle. "

So they resumed their devious wanderings. At last, they descended to theberth-deck. It being now breakfast-time, the master-at-arms, agood-humored man, very kindly' introduced our hero to his mess, andpresented him with breakfast, during which he in vain endeavored, byall sorts of subtle blandishments, to worm out his secret. 

At length Israel was set at liberty; and whenever there was anyimportant duty to be done, volunteered to it with such cheerfulalacrity, and approved himself so docile and excellent a seaman, that heconciliated the approbation of all the officers, as well as the captain;while his general sociability served, in the end, to turn in his favorthe suspicious hearts of the mariners. Perceiving his good qualities, both as a sailor and man, the captain of the maintop applied for hisadmission into that section of the ship; where, still improving upon hisformer reputation, our hero did duty for the residue of the voyage. 

One pleasant afternoon, the last of the passage, when the ship wasnearing the Lizard, within a few hours' sail of her port, theofficer-of-the-deck, happening to glance upwards towards the maintop, descried Israel there, leaning very leisurely over the rail, lookingmildly down where the officer stood. 

"Well, Peter Perkins, you seem to belong to the maintop, after all. "

"I always told you so, sir, " smiled Israel benevolently down upon him, "though, at first, you remember, sir, you would not believe it. "

CHAPTER XXI. 

SAMSON AMONG THE PHILISTINES. 

At length, as the ship, gliding on past three or four vessels at anchorin the roadstead--one, a man-of-war just furling her sails--came nighFalmouth town, Israel, from his perch, saw crowds in violent commotionon the shore, while the adjacent roofs were covered with sightseers. Alarge man-of-war cutter was just landing its occupants, among whom werea corporal's guard and three officers, besides the naval lieutenant andboat's crew. Some of this company having landed, and formed a sort oflane among the mob, two trim soldiers, armed to the teeth, rose in thestern-sheets; and between them, a martial man of Patagonian stature, their ragged and handcuffed captive, whose defiant head overshadowedtheirs, as St. Paul's dome its inferior steeples. Immediately the mobraised a shout, pressing in curiosity towards the colossal stranger; sothat, drawing their swords, four of the soldiers had to force a passagefor their comrades, who followed on, conducting the giant. 

As the letter of marque drew still nigher, Israel heard the officer incommand of the party ashore shouting, "To the castle! to the castle!"and so, surrounded by shouting throngs, the company moved on, precededby the three drawn swords, ever and anon flourished at the rioters, towards a large grim pile on a cliff about a mile from the landing. Longas they were in sight, the bulky form of the captive was seen at timesswayingly towering over the flashing bayonets and cutlasses, like agreat whale breaching amid a hostile retinue of sword-fish. Now andthen, too, with barbaric scorn, he taunted them with cramped gestures ofhis manacled hands. 

When at last the vessel had gained her anchorage, opposite a distantdetached warehouse, all was still; and the work of breaking out in thehold immediately commencing, and continuing till nightfall, absorbed allfurther attention for the present. 

Next day was Sunday; and about noon Israel, with others, was allowed togo ashore for a stroll. The town was quiet. Seeing nothing veryinteresting there, he passed out, alone, into the fields alongshore, andpresently found himself climbing the cliff whereon stood the grim pilebefore spoken of. 

"What place is yon?" he asked of a rustic passing. 

"Pendennis Castle. "

As he stepped upon the short crisp sward under its walls, he started ata violent sound from within, as of the roar of some tormented lion. Soonthe sound became articulate, and he heard the following words bayed outwith an amazing vigor:

"Brag no more, Old England; consider you are but an island! Order backyour broken battalions! home, and repent in ashes! Long enough have yourhired tories across the sea forgotten the Lord their God, and bowed downto Howe and Kniphausen--the Hessian!--Hands off, red-skinned jackal!Wearing the king's plate, [A] as I do, I have treasures of wrath againstyou British. "

[Footnote A: Meaning, probably, certain manacles. ]

Then came a clanking, as of a chain; many vengeful sounds, allconfusedly together; with strugglings. Then again the voice:

"Ye brought me out here, from my dungeon to this green--affronting yonSabbath sun--to see how a rebel looks. But I show ye how a truegentleman and Christian can conduct in adversity. Back, dogs! Respect agentleman and a Christian, though he _be_ in rags and smell ofbilge-water. "

Filled with astonishment at these words, which came from over a massivewall, enclosing what seemed an open parade-space, Israel pressedforward, and soon came to a black archway, leading far within, underneath, to a grassy tract, through a tower. Like two boar's tusks, two sentries stood on guard at either side of the open jaws of the arch. Scrutinizing our adventurer a moment, they signed him permission toenter. 

Arrived at the end of the arched-way, where the sun shone, Israel stoodtransfixed, at the scene. 

Like some baited bull in the ring, crouched the Patagonian-lookingcaptive, handcuffed as before; the grass of the green trampled, andgored up all about him, both by his own movements and those of thepeople around. Except some soldiers and sailors, these seemed mostlytownspeople, collected here out of curiosity. The stranger wasoutlandishly arrayed in the sorry remains of a half-Indian, half-Canadian sort of a dress, consisting of a fawn-skin jacket--the furoutside and hanging in ragged tufts--a half-rotten, bark-like belt ofwampum; aged breeches of sagathy; bedarned worsted stockings to theknee; old moccasins riddled with holes, their metal tags yellow withsalt-water rust; a faded red woollen bonnet, not unlike a Russiannight-cap, or a portentous, ensanguined full-moon, all soiled, and stuckabout with bits of half-rotted straw. He seemed just broken from thedead leases in David's outlawed Cave of Adullam. Unshaven, beard andhair matted, and profuse as a corn-field beaten down by hailstorms, hiswhole marred aspect was that of some wild beast; but of a royal sort, and unsubdued by the cage. 

"Aye, stare, stare! Though but last night dragged out of a ship's hold, like a smutty tierce; and this morning out of your littered barrackshere, like a murderer; for all that, you may well stare at EthanTiconderoga Allen, the unconquered soldier, by ----! You Turks never sawa Christian before. Stare on! I am he, who, when your Lord Howe wantedto bribe a patriot to fall down and worship him by an offer of amajor-generalship and five thousand acres of choice land in oldVermont--(Ha! three-times-three for glorious old Vermont, and myGreen-Mountain boys! Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!) I am he, I say, whoanswered your Lord Howe, 'You, _you_ offer _our_ land? You are like thedevil in Scripture, offering all the kingdoms in the world, when thed----d soul had not a corner-lot on earth! Stare on!'"

"Look you, rebel, you had best heed how you talk against General LordHowe, " here said a thin, wasp-waisted, epauletted officer of the castle, coming near and flourishing his sword like a schoolmaster's ferule. 

"General Lord Howe? Heed how I talk of that toad-hearted king'slick-spittle of a scarlet poltroon; the vilest wriggler in God'sworm-hole below? I tell you, that herds of red-haired devils areimpatiently snorting to ladle Lord Howe with all his gang (you included)into the seethingest syrups of tophet's flames!"

At this blast, the wasp-waisted officer was blown backwards as frombefore the suddenly burst head of a steam-boiler. 

Staggering away, with a snapped spine, he muttered something about itsbeing beneath his dignity to bandy further words with a low-lived rebel. 

"Come, come, Colonel Allen, " here said a mild-looking man in a sort ofclerical undress, "respect the day better than to talk thus of what liesbeyond. Were you to die this hour, or what is more probable, be hungnext week at Tower-wharf, you know not what might become, in eternity, of yourself. "

"Reverend Sir, " with a mocking bow, "when not better employed braidingmy beard, I have a little dabbled in your theologies. And let me tellyou, Reverend Sir, " lowering and intensifying his voice, "that as to theworld of spirits, of which you hint, though I know nothing of the modeor manner of that world, no more than do you, yet I expect when I shallarrive there to be treated as well as any other gentleman of my merit. That is to say, far better than you British know how to treat anAmerican officer and meek-hearted Christian captured in honorable war, by ----! Every one tells me, as you yourself just breathed, and as, crossing the sea, every billow dinned into my ear, that I, Ethan Allen, am to be hung like a thief. If I am, the great Jehovah and theContinental Congress shall avenge me; while I, for my part, shall showyou, even on the tree, how a Christian gentleman can die. Meantime, sir, if you are the clergyman you look, act out your consolatory function, bygetting an unfortunate Christian gentleman about to die, a bowl ofpunch. "

The good-natured stranger, not to have his religious courtesy appealedto in vain, immediately dispatched his servant, who stood by, to procurethe beverage. 

At this juncture, a faint rustling sound, as of the advance of an armywith banners, was heard. Silks, scarfs, and ribbons fluttered in thebackground. Presently, a bright squadron of fair ladies drew nigh, escorted by certain outriding gallants of Falmouth. 

"Ah, " sighed a soft voice, "what a strange sash, and furred vest, andwhat leopard-like teeth, and what flaxen hair, but all mildewed;--isthat he?"

"Yea, is it, lovely charmer, " said Allen, like an Ottoman, bowing overhis broad, bovine forehead, and breathing the words out like a lute; "itis he--Ethan Allen, the soldier; now, since ladies' eyes visit him, madetrebly a captive. "

"Why, he talks like a beau in a parlor, this wild, mossed American fromthe woods, " sighed another fair lady to her mate; "but can this be he wecame to see? I must have a lock of his hair. "

"It is he, adorable Delilah; and fear not, even though incited by thefoe, by clipping my locks, to dwindle my strength. Give me your sword, man, " turning to an officer:--"Ah! I'm fettered. Clip it yourself, lady. "

"No, no--I am--"

"Afraid, would you say? Afraid of the vowed friend and champion of allladies all round the world? Nay, nay, come hither. "

The lady advanced; and soon, overcoming her timidity, her white handshone like whipped foam amid the matted waves of flaxen hair. 

"Ah, this is like clipping tangled tags of gold-lace, " cried she; "butsee, it is half straw. "

"But the wearer is no man-of-straw, lady; were I free, and you had tenthousand foes--horse, foot, and dragoons--how like a friend I couldfight for you! Come, you have robbed me of my hair; let me rob yourdainty hand of its price. What, afraid again?"

"No, not that; but--"

"I see, lady; I may do it, by your leave, but not by your word; thewonted way of ladies. There, it is done. Sweeter that kiss, than thebitter heart of a cherry. "

When at length this lady left, no small talk was had by her with hercompanions about someway relieving the hard lot of so knightly anunfortunate. Whereupon a worthy, judicious gentleman, of middle-age, inattendance, suggested a bottle of good wine every day, and clean linenonce every week. And these the gentle Englishwoman--too polite and toogood to be fastidious--did indeed actually send to Ethan Allen, so longas he tarried a captive in her land. 

The withdrawal of this company was followed by a different scene. 

A perspiring man in top-boots, a riding-whip in his hand, and having theair of a prosperous farmer, brushed in, like a stray bullock, among therest, for a peep at the giant; having just entered through the arch, asthe ladies passed out. 

"Hearing that the man who took Ticonderoga was here in Pendennis Castle, I've ridden twenty-five miles to see him; and to-morrow my brother willride forty for the same purpose. So let me have first look. Sir, " hecontinued, addressing the captive, "will you let me ask you a few plainquestions, and be free with you?"

"Be free with me? With all my heart. I love freedom of all things. I'mready to die for freedom; I expect to. So be free as you please. What isit?"

"Then, sir, permit me to ask what is your occupation in life--in time ofpeace, I mean?"

"You talk like a tax-gatherer, " rejoined Allen, squinting diabolicallyat him; "what is my occupation in life? Why, in my younger days Istudied divinity, but at present I am a conjurer by profession. "

Hereupon everybody laughed, equally at the manner as the words, and thenettled farmer retorted:

"Conjurer, eh? well, you conjured wrong that time you were taken. "

"Not so wrong, though, as you British did, that time I took Ticonderoga, my friend. "

At this juncture the servant came with the punch, when his master badehim present it to the captive. 

"No!--give it me, sir, with your own hands, and pledge me as gentlemanto gentleman. "

"I cannot pledge a state-prisoner, Colonel Allen; but I will hand youthe punch with my own hands, since you insist upon it. "

"Spoken and done like a true gentleman, sir; I am bound to you. "

Then receiving the bowl into his gyved hands, the iron ringing againstthe china, he put it to his lips, and saying, "I hereby give the Britishnation credit for half a minute's good usage, " at one draught emptied itto the bottom. 

"The rebel gulps it down like a swilling hog at a trough, " here scoffeda lusty private of the guard, off duty. 

"Shame to you!" cried the giver of the bowl. 

"Nay, sir; his red coat is a standing blush to him, as it is to thewhole scarlet-blushing British army. " Then turning derisively upon theprivate: "You object to my way of taking things, do ye? I fear I shallnever please ye. You objected to the way, too, in which I tookTiconderoga, and the way in which I meant to take Montreal. Selah! Butpray, now that I look at you, are not you the hero I caught dodginground, in his shirt, in the cattle-pen, inside the fort? It was thebreak of day, you remember. "

"Come, Yankee, " here swore the incensed private; "cease this, or I'lldarn your old fawn-skins for ye with the flat of this sword;" for aspecimen, laying it lashwise, but not heavily, across the captive'sback. 

Turning like a tiger, the giant, catching the steel between his teeth, wrenched it from the private's grasp, and striking it with his manacles, sent it spinning like a juggler's dagger into the air, saying, "Lay yourdirty coward's iron on a tied gentleman again, and these, " lifting hishandcuffed fists, "shall be the beetle of mortality to you!"

The now furious soldier would have struck him with all his force, butseveral men of the town interposed, reminding him that it wereoutrageous to attack a chained captive. 

"Ah, " said Allen, "I am accustomed to that, and therefore I ambeforehand with them; and the extremity of what I say against Britain, is not meant for you, kind friends, but for my insulters, present and tocome. " Then recognizing among the interposers the giver of the bowl, heturned with a courteous bow, saying, "Thank you again and again, my goodsir; you may not be the worse for this; ours is an unstable world; sothat one gentleman never knows when it may be his turn to be helped ofanother. "

But the soldier still making a riot, and the commotion growing general, a superior officer stepped up, who terminated the scene by remanding theprisoner to his cell, dismissing the townspeople, with all strangers, Israel among the rest, and closing the castle gates after them. 

CHAPTER XXII. 

SOMETHING FURTHER OF ETHAN ALLEN; WITH ISRAEL'S FLIGHT TOWARDS THEWILDERNESS. 

Among the episodes of the Revolutionary War, none is stranger than thatof Ethan Allen in England; the event and the man being equally uncommon. 

Allen seems to have been a curious combination of a Hercules, a JoeMiller, a Bayard, and a Tom Hyer; had a person like the Belgian giants;mountain music in him like a Swiss; a heart plump as Coeur de Lion's. Though born in New England, he exhibited no trace of her character. Hewas frank, bluff, companionable as a Pagan, convivial, a Roman, heartyas a harvest. His spirit was essentially Western; and herein is hispeculiar Americanism; for the Western spirit is, or will yet be (for noother is, or can be), the true American one. 

For the most part, Allen's manner while in England was scornful andferocious in the last degree; however, qualified by that wild, heroicsort of levity, which in the hour of oppression or peril seemsinseparable from a nature like his; the mode whereby such a temper bestevinces its barbaric disdain of adversity, and how cheaply andwaggishly it holds the malice, even though triumphant, of its foes!Aside from that inevitable egotism relatively pertaining to pine trees, spires, and giants, there were, perhaps, two special incidental reasonsfor the Titanic Vermonter's singular demeanor abroad. Taken captivewhile heading a forlorn hope before Montreal, he was treated withinexcusable cruelty and indignity; something as if he had fallen intothe hands of the Dyaks. Immediately upon his capture he would have beendeliberately suffered to have been butchered by the Indian allies incold blood on the spot, had he not, with desperate intrepidity, availedhimself of his enormous physical strength, by twitching a Britishofficer to him, and using him for a living target, whirling him roundand round against the murderous tomahawks of the savages. Shortlyafterwards, led into the town, fenced about by bayonets of the guard, the commander of the enemy, one Colonel McCloud, flourished his caneover the captive's head, with brutal insults promising him a rebel'shalter at Tyburn. During his passage to England in the same ship whereinwent passenger Colonel Guy Johnson, the implacable tory, he was keptheavily ironed in the hold, and in all ways treated as a commonmutineer; or, it may be, rather as a lion of Asia; which, though caged, was still too dreadful to behold without fear and trembling, andconsequent cruelty. And no wonder, at least for the fear; for on oneoccasion, when chained hand and foot, he was insulted on shipboard by anofficer; with his teeth he twisted off the nail that went through themortise of his handcuffs, and so, having his arms at liberty, challengedhis insulter to combat. Often, as at Pendennis Castle, when no otheravengement was at hand, he would hurl on his foes such howling tempestsof anathema as fairly to shock them into retreat. Prompted by somewhatsimilar motives, both on shipboard and in England, he would often makethe most vociferous allusions to Ticonderoga, and the part he played inits capture, well knowing, that of all American names, Ticonderoga was, at that period, by far the most famous and galling to Englishmen. 

Parlor-men, dancing-masters, the graduates of the Albe Bellgarde, mayshrug their laced shoulders at the boisterousness of Allen in England. True, he stood upon no punctilios with his jailers; for where modestgentlemanhood is all on one side, it is a losing affair; as if my LordChesterfield should take off his hat, and smile, and bow, to a mad bull, in hopes of a reciprocation of politeness. When among wild beasts, ifthey menace you, be a wild beast. Neither is it unlikely that this wasthe view taken by Allen. For, besides the exasperating tendency toself-assertion which such treatment as his must have bred on a man likehim, his experience must have taught him, that by assuming the part of ajocular, reckless, and even braggart barbarian, he would better sustainhimself against bullying turnkeys than by submissive quietude. Norshould it be forgotten, that besides the petty details of personalmalice, the enemy violated every international usage of right anddecency, in treating a distinguished prisoner of war as if he had been aBotany-Bay convict. If, at the present day, in any similar case betweenthe same States, the repetition of such outrages would be more thanunlikely, it is only because it is among nations as among individuals:imputed indigence provokes oppression and scorn; but that same indigencebeing risen to opulence, receives a politic consideration even from itsformer insulters. 

As the event proved, in the course Allen pursued, he was right. Because, though at first nothing was talked of by his captors, and nothinganticipated by himself, but his ignominious execution, or at the least, prolonged and squalid incarceration, nevertheless, these threats andprospects evaporated, and by his facetious scorn for scorn, under theextremest sufferings, he finally wrung repentant usage from his foes;and in the end, being liberated from his irons, and walking thequarter-deck where before he had been thrust into the hold, was carriedback to America, and in due time, at New York, honorably included in aregular exchange of prisoners. 

It was not without strange interest that Israel had been an eye-witnessof the scenes on the Castle Green. Neither was this interest abated bythe painful necessity of concealing, for the present, from his bravecountryman and fellow-mountaineer, the fact of a friend being nigh. Whenat last the throng was dismissed, walking towards the town with therest, he heard that there were some forty or more Americans, privates, confined on the cliff. Upon this, inventing a pretence, he turned back, loitering around the walls for any chance glimpse of the captives. Presently, while looking up at a grated embrasure in the tower, hestarted at a voice from it familiarly hailing him:

"Potter, is that you? In God's name how came you here?"

At these words, a sentry below had his eye on our astonishedadventurer. Bringing his piece to bear, he bade him stand. Next momentIsrael was under arrest. Being brought into the presence of the fortyprisoners, where they lay in litters of mouldy straw, strewn with gnawedbones, as in a kennel, he recognized among them one Singles, nowSergeant Singles, the man who, upon our hero's return home from his lastCape Horn voyage, he had found wedded to his mountain Jenny. Instantly arush of emotions filled him. Not as when Damon found Pythias. But farstranger, because very different. For not only had this Singles been analien to Israel (so far as actual intercourse went), but impelled to itby instinct, Israel had all but detested him, as a successful, andperhaps insidious rival. Nor was it altogether unlikely that Singles hadreciprocated the feeling. But now, as if the Atlantic rolled, notbetween two continents, but two worlds--this, and the next--these aliensouls, oblivious to hate, melted down into one. 

At such a juncture, it was hard to maintain a disguise, especially whenit involved the seeming rejection of advances like the Sergeant's. Still, converting his real amazement into affected surprise, Israel, inpresence of the sentries, declared to Singles that he (Singles) mustlabor under some unaccountable delusion; for he (Potter) was no Yankeerebel, thank Heaven, but a true man to his king; in short, an honestEnglishman, born in Kent, and now serving his country, and doing whatdamage he might to her foes, by being first captain of a carronade onboard a letter of marque, that moment in the harbor. 

For a moment the captive stood astounded, but observing Israel morenarrowly, detecting his latent look, and bethinking him of the uselessperil he had thoughtlessly caused to a countryman, no doubt unfortunateas himself, Singles took his cue, and pretending sullenly to apologizefor his error, put on a disappointed and crest-fallen air. Nevertheless, it was not without much difficulty, and after many supplementalscrutinies and inquisitions from a board of officers before whom he wassubsequently brought, that our wanderer was finally permitted to quitthe cliff. 

This luckless adventure not only nipped in the bud a little scheme hehad been revolving, for materially befriending Ethan Allen and hiscomrades, but resulted in making his further stay at Falmouth perilousin the extreme. And as if this were not enough, next day, while hangingover the side, painting the hull, in trepidation of a visit from thecastle soldiers, rumor came to the ship that the man-of-war in the havenpurposed impressing one-third of the letter of marque's crew; though, indeed, the latter vessel was preparing for a second cruise. Being onboard a private armed ship, Israel had little dreamed of its liabilityto the same governmental hardships with the meanest merchantman. But thesystem of impressment is no respecter either of pity or person. 

His mind was soon determined. Unlike his shipmates, braving immediateand lonely hazard, rather than wait for a collective and ultimate one, he cunningly dropped himself overboard the same night, and after thenarrowest risk from the muskets of the man-of-war's sentries (whosegangways he had to pass), succeeded in swimming to shore, where he fellexhausted, but recovering, fled inland, doubly hunted by the thought, that whether as an Englishman, or whether as an American, he would, ifcaught, be now equally subject to enslavement. 

Shortly after the break of day, having gained many miles, he succeededin ridding himself of his seaman's clothing, having found some mouldyold rags on the banks of a stagnant pond, nigh a rickety building, whichlooked like a poorhouse--clothing not improbably, as he surmised, leftthere on the bank by some pauper suicide. Marvel not that he should withavidity seize these rags; what the suicides abandon, the living hug. 

Once more in beggar's garb, the fugitive sped towards London, promptedby the same instinct which impels the hunted fox to the wilderness; forsolitudes befriend the endangered wild beast, but crowds are thesecurity, because the true desert, of persecuted man. Among the thingsof the capital, Israel for more than forty years was yet to disappear, as one entering at dusk into a thick wood. Nor did ever the Germanforest, nor Tasso's enchanted one, contain in its depths more things ofhorror than eventually were revealed in the secret clefts, gulfs, cavesand dens of London. 

But here we anticipate a page. 

CHAPTER XXIII. 

ISRAEL IN EGYPT. 

It was a gray, lowering afternoon that, worn out, half starved, andhaggard, Israel arrived within some ten or fifteen miles of London, andsaw scores and scores of forlorn men engaged in a great brickyard. 

For the most part, brickmaking is all mud and mire. Where, abroad, thebusiness is carried on largely, as to supply the London market, hordesof the poorest wretches are employed, their grimy tatters naturallyadapting them to an employ where cleanliness is as much out of thequestion as with a drowned man at the bottom of the lake in the DismalSwamp. 

Desperate with want, Israel resolved to turn brickmaker, nor did he fearto present himself as a stranger, nothing doubting that to such avocation his rags would be accounted the best letters of introduction. 

To be brief, he accosted one of the many surly overseers, or taskmastersof the yard, who, with no few pompous airs, finally engaged him at sixshillings a week, almost equivalent to a dollar and a half. He wasappointed to one of the mills for grinding up the ingredients. Thismill stood in the open air. It was of a rude, primitive, Eastern aspect, consisting of a sort of hopper, emptying into a barrel-shapedreceptacle. In the barrel was a clumsy machine turned round at its axisby a great bent beam, like a well-sweep, only it was horizontal; to thisbeam, at its outer end, a spavined old horse was attached. The muddymixture was shovelled into the hopper by spavined-looking old men, while, trudging wearily round and round, the spavined old horse groundit all up till it slowly squashed out at the bottom of the barrel, in adoughy compound, all ready for the moulds. Where the dough squeezed outof the barrel a pit was sunken, so as to bring the moulder herestationed down to a level with the trough, into which the dough fell. Israel was assigned to this pit. Men came to him continually, reachingdown rude wooden trays, divided into compartments, each of the size andshape of a brick. With a flat sort of big ladle, Israel slapped thedough into the trays from the trough; then, with a bit of smooth board, scraped the top even, and handed it up. Half buried there in the pit, all the time handing those desolate trays, poor Israel seemed somegravedigger, or churchyard man, tucking away dead little innocents intheir coffins on one side, and cunningly disinterring them again toresurrectionists stationed on the other. 

Twenty of these melancholy old mills were in operation. Twentyheartbroken old horses, rigged out deplorably in cast-off old cartharness, incessantly tugged at twenty great shaggy beams; while fromtwenty half-burst old barrels, twenty wads of mud, with a lava-likecourse, gouged out into twenty old troughs, to be slapped by twentytattered men into the twenty-times-twenty battered old trays. 

Ere entering his pit for the first, Israel had been struck by thedismally devil-may-care gestures of the moulders. But hardly had hehimself been a moulder three days, when his previous sedateness ofconcern at his unfortunate lot, began to conform to the reckless sort ofhalf jolly despair expressed by the others. The truth indeed was, thatthis continual, violent, helter-skelter slapping of the dough into themoulds, begat a corresponding disposition in the moulder, who, byheedlessly slapping that sad dough, as stuff of little worth, wasthereby taught, in his meditations, to slap, with similar heedlessness, his own sadder fortunes, as of still less vital consideration. To thesemuddy philosophers, men and bricks were equally of clay. "What signifieswho we be--dukes or ditchers?" thought the moulders; "all is vanity andclay. "

So slap, slap, slap, care-free and negligent, with bitter unconcern, these dismal desperadoes flapped down the dough. If this recklessnesswere vicious of them, be it so; but their vice was like that weed whichbut grows on barren ground; enrich the soil, and it disappears. 

For thirteen weary weeks, lorded over by the taskmaster, Israel toiledin his pit. Though this condemned him to a sort of earthy dungeon, orgravedigger's hole, while he worked, yet even when liberated to hismeals, naught of a cheery nature greeted him. The yard was encamped, with all its endless rows of tented sheds, and kilns, and mills, upon awild waste moor, belted round by bogs and fens. The blank horizon, likea rope, coiled round the whole. 

Sometimes the air was harsh and bleak; the ridged and mottled sky lookedscourged, or cramping fogs set in from sea, for leagues around, ferreting out each rheumatic human bone, and racking it; the sciaticlimpers shivered; their aguish rags sponged up the mists. No shelter, though it hailed. The sheds were for the bricks. Unless, indeed, according to the phrase, each man was a "brick, " which, in soberscripture, was the case; brick is no bad name for any son of Adam; Edenwas but a brickyard; what is a mortal but a few luckless shovelfuls ofclay, moulded in a mould, laid out on a sheet to dry, and ere longquickened into his queer caprices by the sun? Are not men built intocommunities just like bricks into a wall? Consider the great wall ofChina: ponder the great populace of Pekin. As man serves bricks, so Godhim, building him up by billions into edifices of his purposes. Manattains not to the nobility of a brick, unless taken in the aggregate. Yet is there a difference in brick, whether quick or dead; which, forthe last, we now shall see. 

CHAPTER XXIV. 

CONTINUED. 

All night long, men sat before the mouth of the kilns, feeding them withfuel. A dull smoke--a smoke of their torments--went up from their tops. It was curious to see the kilns under the action of the fire, graduallychanging color, like boiling lobsters. When, at last, the fires would beextinguished, the bricks being duly baked, Israel often took a peep intothe low vaulted ways at the base, where the flaming fagots had crackled. The bricks immediately lining the vaults would be all burnt to uselessscrolls, black as charcoal, and twisted into shapes the most grotesque;the next tier would be a little less withered, but hardly fit forservice; and gradually, as you went higher and higher along thesuccessive layers of the kiln, you came to the midmost ones, sound, square, and perfect bricks, bringing the highest prices; from these thecontents of the kiln gradually deteriorated in the opposite direction, upward. But the topmost layers, though inferior to the best, by no meanspresented the distorted look of the furnace-bricks. The furnace-brickswere haggard, with the immediate blistering of the fire--the midmostones were ruddy with a genial and tempered glow--the summit ones werepale with the languor of too exclusive an exemption from the burden ofthe blaze. 

These kilns were a sort of temporary temples constructed in the yard, each brick being set against its neighbor almost with the care taken bythe mason. But as soon as the fire was extinguished, down came the kilnin a tumbled ruin, carted off to London, once more to be set up inambitious edifices, to a true brickyard philosopher, little lesstransient than the kilns. 

Sometimes, lading out his dough, Israel could not but bethink him ofwhat seemed enigmatic in his fate. He whom love of country made a haterof her foes--the foreigners among whom he now was thrown--he who, assoldier and sailor, had joined to kill, burn and destroy both them andtheirs--here he was at last, serving that very people as a slave, bettersucceeding in making their bricks than firing their ships. To think thathe should be thus helping, with all his strength, to extend the walls ofthe Thebes of the oppressor, made him half mad. Poor Israel!well-named--bondsman in the English Egypt. But he drowned the thought bystill more recklessly spattering with his ladle: "What signifies who webe, or where we are, or what we do?" Slap-dash! "Kings as clowns arecodgers--who ain't a nobody?" Splash! "All is vanity and clay. "

CHAPTER XXV. 

IN THE CITY OF DIS. 

At the end of his brickmaking, our adventurer found himself with atolerable suit of clothes--somewhat darned--on his back, severalblood-blisters in his palms, and some verdigris coppers in his pocket. Forthwith, to seek his fortune, he proceeded on foot to the capital, entering, like the king, from Windsor, from the Surrey side. 

It was late on a Monday morning, in November--a Blue Monday--a Fifth ofNovember--Guy Fawkes' Day!--very blue, foggy, doleful and gunpowdery, indeed, as shortly will be seen, that Israel found himself wedged inamong the greatest everyday crowd which grimy London presents to thecurious stranger: that hereditary crowd--gulf-stream of humanity--which, for continuous centuries, has never ceased pouring, like an endlessshoal of herring, over London Bridge. 

At the period here written of, the bridge, specifically known by thatname, was a singular and sombre pile, built by a cowled monk--Peter ofColechurch--some five hundred years before. Its arches had long beencrowded at the sides with strange old rookeries of disproportioned andtoppling height, converting the bridge at once into the most denselyoccupied ward and most jammed thoroughfare of the town, while, as theskulls of bullocks are hung out for signs to the gateways of shambles, so the withered heads and smoked quarters of traitors, stuck on pikes, long crowned the Southwark entrance. 

Though these rookeries, with their grisly heraldry, had been pulled downsome twenty years prior to the present visit, still enough of grotesqueand antiquity clung to the structure at large to render it the moststriking of objects, especially to one like our hero, born in a virginclime, where the only antiquities are the forever youthful heavens andthe earth. 

On his route from Brentford to Paris, Israel had passed through thecapital, but only as a courier; so that now, for the first time, he hadtime to linger, and loiter, and lounge--slowly absorb what hesaw--meditate himself into boundless amazement. For forty years he neverrecovered from that surprise--never, till dead, had done with hiswondering. 

Hung in long, sepulchral arches of stone, the black, besmoked bridgeseemed a huge scarf of crape, festooning the river across. Similarfuneral festoons spanned it to the west, while eastward, towards thesea, tiers and tiers of jetty colliers lay moored, side by side, fleetsof black swans. 

The Thames, which far away, among the green fields of Berks, ran clearas a brook, here, polluted by continual vicinity to man, curdled onbetween rotten wharves, one murky sheet of sewerage. Fretted by theill-built piers, awhile it crested and hissed, then shot balefullythrough the Erebus arches, desperate as the lost souls of the harlots, who, every night, took the same plunge. Meantime, here and there, likeawaiting hearses, the coal-scows drifted along, poled broadside, pell-mell to the current. 

And as that tide in the water swept all craft on, so a like tide seemedhurrying all men, all horses, all vehicles on the land. As ant-hills, the bridge arches crawled with processions of carts, coaches, drays, every sort of wheeled, rumbling thing, the noses of the horses behindtouching the backs of the vehicles in advance, all bespattered with ebonmud--ebon mud that stuck like Jews' pitch. At times the mass, receivingsome mysterious impulse far in the rear, away among the coiledthoroughfares out of sight, would, start forward with a spasmodic surge. It seemed as if some squadron of centaurs, on the thither side ofPhlegethon, with charge on charge, was driving tormented humanity, withall its chattels, across. 

Whichever way the eye turned, no tree, no speck of any green thing wasseen--no more than in smithies. All laborers, of whatsoever sort, werehued like the men in foundries. The black vistas of streets were as thegalleries in coal mines; the flagging, as flat tomb-stones, minus theconsecration of moss, and worn heavily down, by sorrowful tramping, asthe vitreous rocks in the cursed Gallipagos, over which the convicttortoises crawl. 

As in eclipses, the sun was hidden; the air darkened; the whole dull, dismayed aspect of things, as if some neighboring volcano, belching itspremonitory smoke, were about to whelm the great town, as Herculaneumand Pompeii, or the Cities of the Plain. And as they had been upturnedin terror towards the mountain, all faces were more or less snowed orspotted with soot. Nor marble, nor flesh, nor the sad spirit of man, mayin this cindery City of Dis abide white. 

As retired at length, midway, in a recess of the bridge, Israel surveyedthem, various individual aspects all but frighted him. Knowing not whothey were; never destined, it may be, to behold them again; one afterthe other, they drifted by, uninvoked ghosts in Hades. Some of thewayfarers wore a less serious look; some seemed hysterically merry; butthe mournful faces had an earnestness not seen in the others: becauseman, "poor player, " succeeds better in life's tragedy than comedy. 

Arrived, in the end, on the Middlesex side, Israel's heart wasprophetically heavy; foreknowing, that being of this race, felicitycould never be his lot. 

For five days he wandered and wandered. Without leaving statelier hauntsunvisited, he did not overlook those broader areas--hereditary parks andmanors of vice and misery. Not by constitution disposed to gloom, therewas a mysteriousness in those impulses which led him at this time torovings like these. But hereby stoic influences were at work, to fit himat a soon-coming day for enacting a part in the last extremities hereseen; when by sickness, destitution, each busy ill of exile, he wasdestined to experience a fate, uncommon even to luckless humanity--afate whose crowning qualities were its remoteness from relief and itsdepth of obscurity--London, adversity, and the sea, three Armageddons, which, at one and the same time, slay and secrete their victims. 

CHAPTER XXVI. 

FORTY-FIVE YEARS. 

For the most part, what befell Israel during his forty years wanderingsin the London deserts, surpassed the forty years in the naturalwilderness of the outcast Hebrews under Moses. 

In that London fog, went before him the ever-present cloud by day, butno pillar of fire by the night, except the cold column of the monument, two hundred feet beneath the mocking gilt flames on whose top, at thestone base, the shiverer, of midnight, often laid down. 

But these experiences, both from their intensity and his solitude, werenecessarily squalid. Best not enlarge upon them. For just as extremesuffering, without hope, is intolerable to the victim, so, to others, isits depiction without some corresponding delusive mitigation. Thegloomiest and truthfulest dramatist seldom chooses for his theme thecalamities, however extraordinary, of inferior and private persons;least of all, the pauper's; admonished by the fact, that to the crapedpalace of the king lying in state, thousands of starers shall throng;but few feel enticed to the shanty, where, like a pealed knuckle-bone, grins the unupholstered corpse of the beggar. 

Why at one given stone in the flagging does man after man cross yonderstreet? What plebeian Lear or Oedipus, what Israel Potter, cowers thereby the corner they shun? From this turning point, then, we too crossover and skim events to the end; omitting the particulars of thestarveling's wrangling with rats for prizes in the sewers; or hiscrawling into an abandoned doorless house in St. Giles', where his hostswere three dead men, one pendant; into another of an alley nighHoundsditch, where the crazy hovel, in phosphoric rottenness, fellsparkling on him one pitchy midnight, and he received that injury, which, excluding activity for no small part of the future, was an addedcause of his prolongation of exile, besides not leaving his facultiesunaffected by the concussion of one of the rafters on his brain. 

But these were some of the incidents not belonging to the beginning ofhis career. On the contrary, a sort of humble prosperity attended himfor a time; insomuch that once he was not without hopes of being able tobuy his homeward passage so soon as the war should end. But, as stubbornfate would have it, being run over one day at Holborn Bars, and takeninto a neighboring bakery, he was there treated with such kindliness bya Kentish lass, the shop-girl, that in the end he thought his debt ofgratitude could only be repaid by love. In a word, the money saved upfor his ocean voyage was lavished upon a rash embarkation in wedlock. 

Originally he had fled to the capital to avoid the dilemma ofimpressment or imprisonment. In the absence of other motives, the dreadof those hardships would have fixed him there till the peace. But now, when hostilities were no more, so was his money. Some period elapsed erethe affairs of the two governments were put on such a footing as tosupport an American consul at London. Yet, when this came to pass, hecould only embrace the facilities for a return here furnished, bydeserting a wife and child, wedded and born in the enemy's land. 

The peace immediately filled England, and more especially London, withhordes of disbanded soldiers; thousands of whom, rather than starve, orturn highwaymen (which no few of their comrades did, stopping coaches attimes in the most public streets), would work for such a pittance as tobring down the wages of all the laboring classes. Neither was ouradventurer the least among the sufferers. Driven out of his previousemploy--a sort of porter in a river-side warehouse--by this suddeninflux of rivals, destitute, honest men like himself, with the ingenuityof his race, he turned his hand to the village art of chair-bottoming. An itinerant, he paraded the streets with the cry of "Old chairs tomend!" furnishing a curious illustration of the contradictions of humanlife; that he who did little but trudge, should be giving cosy seats toall the rest of the world. Meantime, according to another well-knownMalthusian enigma in human affairs, his family increased. In all, elevenchildren were born to him in certain sixpenny garrets in Moorfields. Oneafter the other, ten were buried. 

When chair-bottoming would fail, resort was had to match-making. Thatbusiness being overdone in turn, next came the cutting of old rags, bitsof paper, nails, and broken glass. Nor was this the last step. From thegutter he slid to the sewer. The slope was smooth. In poverty--"Facilisdescensus Averni. "

But many a poor soldier had sloped down there into the boggy canal ofAvernus before him. Nay, he had three corporals and a sergeant forcompany. 

But his lot was relieved by two strange things, presently to appear. In1793 war again broke out, the great French war. This lighted London ofsome of its superfluous hordes, and lost Israel the subterranean societyof his friends, the corporals and sergeant, with whom wandering forlornthrough the black kingdoms of mud, he used to spin yarns about seaprisoners in hulks, and listen to stories of the Black Hole of Calcutta;and often would meet other pairs of poor soldiers, perfect strangers, atthe more public corners and intersections of sewers--the Charing-Crossesbelow; one soldier having the other by his remainder button, earnestlydiscussing the sad prospects of a rise in bread, or the tide; whilethrough the grating of the gutters overhead, the rusty skylights of therealm, came the hoarse rumblings of bakers' carts, with splashes of theflood whereby these unsuspected gnomes of the city lived. 

Encouraged by the exodus of the lost tribes of soldiers, Israel returnedto chair-bottoming. And it was in frequenting Covent-Garden market, atearly morning, for the purchase of his flags, that he experienced oneof the strange alleviations hinted of above. That chatting with theruddy, aproned, hucksterwomen, on whose moist cheeks yet trickled thedew of the dawn on the meadows; that being surrounded by bales of hay, as the raker by cocks and ricks in the field; those glimpses of gardenproduce, the blood-beets, with the damp earth still tufting the roots;that mere handling of his flags, and bethinking him of whence they musthave come, the green hedges through which the wagon that brought themhad passed; that trudging home with them as a gleaner with his sheaf ofwheat;--all this was inexpressibly grateful. In want and bitterness, pent in, perforce, between dingy walls, he had rural returns of hisboyhood's sweeter days among them; and the hardest stones of hissolitary heart (made hard by bare endurance alone) would feel the stirof tender but quenchless memories, like the grass of deserted flagging, upsprouting through its closest seams. Sometimes, when incited by somelittle incident, however trivial in itself, thoughts of homewould--either by gradually working and working upon him, or else by animpetuous rush of recollection--overpower him for a time to a sort ofhallucination. 

Thus was it:--One fair half-day in the July of 1800, by good luck, hewas employed, partly out of charity, by one of the keepers, to trim thesward in an oval enclosure within St. James' Park, a little green but athree-minutes' walk along the gravelled way from the brick-besmoked andgrimy Old Brewery of the palace which gives its ancient name to thepublic resort on whose borders it stands. It was a little oval, fencedin with iron pailings, between whose bars the imprisoned verdure peeredforth, as some wild captive creature of the woods from its cage. Andalien Israel there--at times staring dreamily about him--seemed likesome amazed runaway steer, or trespassing Pequod Indian, impounded onthe shores of Narraganset Bay, long ago; and back to New England ourexile was called in his soul. For still working, and thinking of home;and thinking of home, and working amid the verdant quietude of thislittle oasis, one rapt thought begat another, till at last his mindsettled intensely, and yet half humorously, upon the image of OldHuckleberry, his mother's favorite old pillion horse; and, ere long, hearing a sudden scraping noise (some hob-shoe without, against the ironpailing), he insanely took it to be Old Huckleberry in his stall, hailing him (Israel) with his shod fore-foot clattering against theplanks--his customary trick when hungry--and so, down goes Israel'shook, and with a tuft of white clover, impulsively snatched, he hurriesaway a few paces in obedience to the imaginary summons. But soonstopping midway, and forlornly gazing round at the enclosure, hebethought him that a far different oval, the great oval of the ocean, must be crossed ere his crazy errand could be done; and even then, OldHuckleberry would be found long surfeited with clover, since, doubtless, being dead many a summer, he must be buried beneath it. And many yearsafter, in a far different part of the town, and in far less winsomeweather too, passing with his bundle of flags through Red-Cross street, towards Barbican, in a fog so dense that the dimmed and massed blocksof houses, exaggerated by the loom, seemed shadowy ranges on ranges ofmidnight hills, he heard a confused pastoral sort of sounds--tramplings, lowings, halloos--and was suddenly called to by a voice to head offcertain cattle, bound to Smithfield, bewildered and unruly in the fog. Next instant he saw the white face--white as an orange-blossom--of ablack-bodied steer, in advance of the drove, gleaming ghost-like throughthe vapors; and presently, forgetting his limp, with rapid shout andgesture, he was more eager, even than the troubled farmers, theirowners, in driving the riotous cattle back into Barbican. Monomaniacreminiscences were in him--"To the right, to the right!" he shouted, as, arrived at the street corner, the farmers beat the drove to the left, towards Smithfield: "To the right! you are driving them back to thepastures--to the right! that way lies the barn-yard!" "Barn-yard?" crieda voice; "you are dreaming, old man. " And so, Israel, now an old man, was bewitched by the mirage of vapors; he had dreamed himself home intothe mists of the Housatonic mountains; ruddy boy on the upland pasturesagain. But how different the flat, apathetic, dead, London fog nowseemed from those agile mists which, goat-like, climbed the purplepeaks, or in routed armies of phantoms, broke down, pell-mell, dispersedin flight upon the plain, leaving the cattle-boy loftily alone, clear-cut as a balloon against the sky. 

In 1817 he once more endured extremity; this second peace again driftingits discharged soldiers on London, so that all kinds of labor wereoverstocked. Beggars, too, lighted on the walks like locusts. Timber-toed cripples stilted along, numerous as French peasants in_sabots_. And, as thirty years before, on all sides, the exile had heardthe supplicatory cry, not addressed to him, "An honorable scar, yourhonor, received at Bunker Hill, or Saratoga, or Trenton, fighting forhis most gracious Majesty, King George!" so now, in presence of thestill surviving Israel, our Wandering Jew, the amended cry was anewtaken up, by a succeeding generation of unfortunates, "An honorablescar, your honor, received at Corunna, or at Waterloo, or at Trafalgar!"Yet not a few of these petitioners had never been outside of the Londonsmoke; a sort of crafty aristocracy in their way, who, without havingendangered their own persons much if anything, reaped no insignificantshare both of the glory and profit of the bloody battles they claimed;while some of the genuine working heroes, too brave to beg, too cut-upto work, and too poor to live, laid down quietly in corners and died. And here it may be noted, as a fact nationally characteristic, thathowever desperately reduced at times, even to the sewers, Israel, theAmerican, never sunk below the mud, to actual beggary. 

Though henceforth elbowed out of many a chance threepenny job by theadded thousands who contended with him against starvation, nevertheless, somehow he continued to subsist, as those tough old oaks of the cliffs, which, though hacked at by hail-stones of tempests, and even wantonlymaimed by the passing woodman, still, however cramped by rival trees andfettered by rocks, succeed, against all odds, in keeping the vitalnerve of the tap-root alive. And even towards the end, in his dismallestDecember, our veteran could still at intervals feel a momentary warmthin his topmost boughs. In his Moorfields' garret, over a handful ofreignited cinders (which the night before might have warmed some lord), cinders raked up from the streets, he would drive away dolor, by talkingwith his one only surviving, and now motherless child--the sparedBenjamin of his old age--of the far Canaan beyond the sea; rehearsing tothe lad those well-remembered adventures among New England hills, andpainting scenes of rustling happiness and plenty, in which the lowliestshared. And here, shadowy as it was, was the second alleviation hintedof above. 

To these tales of the Fortunate Isles of the Free, recounted by one whohad been there, the poor enslaved boy of Moorfields listened, nightafter night, as to the stories of Sinbad the Sailor. When would hisfather take him there? "Some day to come, my boy, " would be the hopefulresponse of an unhoping heart. And "Would God it were to-morrow!" wouldbe the impassioned reply. 

In these talks Israel unconsciously sowed the seeds of his eventualreturn. For with added years, the boy felt added longing to escape hisentailed misery, by compassing for his father and himself a voyage tothe Promised Land. By his persevering efforts he succeeded at last, against every obstacle, in gaining credit in the right quarter to hisextraordinary statements. In short, charitably stretching a technicalpoint, the American Consul finally saw father and son embarked in theThames for Boston. 

It was the year 1826; half a century since Israel, in early manhood, hadsailed a prisoner in the Tartar frigate from the same port to which henow was bound. An octogenarian as he recrossed the brine, he showedlocks besnowed as its foam. White-haired old Ocean seemed as a brother. 

CHAPTER XXVII. 

REQUIESCAT IN PACE. 

It happened that the ship, gaining her port, was moored to the dock on aFourth of July; and half an hour after landing, hustled by the riotouscrowd near Faneuil Hall, the old man narrowly escaped being run over bya patriotic triumphal car in the procession, flying a broidered banner, inscribed with gilt letters:

"BUNKER-HILL

1775. 

GLORY TO THE HEROES THAT FOUGHT!"

It was on Copps' Hill, within the city bounds, one of the enemy'spositions during the fight, that our wanderer found his best repose thatday. Sitting down here on a mound in the graveyard, he looked off acrossCharles River towards the battle-ground, whose incipient monument, atthat period, was hard to see, as a struggling sprig of corn in a chillyspring. Upon those heights, fifty years before, his now feeble hands hadwielded both ends of the musket. There too he had received that slitupon the chest, which afterwards, in the affair with the Serapis, beingtraversed by a cutlass wound, made him now the bescarred bearer of across. 

For a long time he sat mute, gazing blankly about him. The sultry Julyday was waning. His son sought to cheer him a little ere rising toreturn to the lodging for the present assigned them by the ship-captain. "Nay, " replied the old man, "I shall get no fitter rest than here by themounds. "

But from this true "Potter's Field, " the boy at length drew him away;and encouraged next morning by a voluntary purse made up among thereassembled passengers, father and son started by stage for the countryof the Housatonie. But the exile's presence in these old mountaintownships proved less a return than a resurrection. At first, none knewhim, nor could recall having heard of him. Ere long it was found, thatmore than thirty years previous, the last known survivor of his familyin that region, a bachelor, following the example of three-fourths ofhis neighbors, had sold out and removed to a distant country in thewest; where exactly, none could say. 

He sought to get a glimpse of his father's homestead. But it had beenburnt down long ago. Accompanied by his son, dim-eyed and dim-hearted, he next went to find the site. But the roads had years before beenchanged. The old road was now browsed over by sheep; the new one ranstraight through what had formerly been orchards. But new orchards, planted from other suckers, and in time grafted, throve on sunny slopesnear by, where blackberries had once been picked by the bushel. Atlength he came to a field waving with buckwheat. It seemed one of thosefields which himself had often reaped. But it turned out, upon inquiry, that but three summers since a walnut grove had stood there. Then hevaguely remembered that his father had sometimes talked of planting sucha grove, to defend the neighboring fields against the cold north wind;yet where precisely that grove was to have been, his shattered mindcould not recall. But it seemed not unlikely that during his long exile, the walnut grove had been planted and harvested, as well as the annualcrops preceding and succeeding it, on the very same soil. 

Ere long, on the mountain side, he passed into an ancient natural wood, which seemed some way familiar, and midway in it, paused to contemplatea strange, mouldy pile, resting at one end against a sturdy beech. Though wherever touched by his staff, however lightly, this pile wouldcrumble, yet here and there, even in powder, it preserved the exactlook, each irregularly defined line, of what it had originallybeen--namely, a half-cord of stout hemlock (one of the woods leastaffected by exposure to the air), in a foregoing generation chopped andstacked up on the spot, against sledging-time, but, as sometimes happensin such cases, by subsequent oversight, abandoned to obliviousdecay--type now, as it stood there, of forever arrested intentions, anda long life still rotting in early mishap. 

"Do I dream?" mused the bewildered old man, "or what is this visionthat comes to me of a cold, cloudy morning, long, long ago, and Iheaving yon elbowed log against the beech, then a sapling? Nay, nay, Icannot be so old. "

"Come away, father, from this dismal, damp wood, " said his son, and ledhim forth. 

Blindly ranging to and fro, they next saw a man ploughing. Advancingslowly, the wanderer met him by a little heap of ruinous burnt masonry, like a tumbled chimney, what seemed the jams of the fire-place, nowaridly stuck over here and there, with thin, clinging, round, prohibitory mosses, like executors' wafers. Just as the oxen were bidstand, the stranger's plough was hitched over sideways, by suddencontact with some sunken stone at the ruin's base. 

"There, this is the twentieth year my plough has struck this oldhearthstone. Ah, old man, --sultry day, this. "

"Whose house stood here, friend?" said the wanderer, touching thehalf-buried hearth with his staff, where a fresh furrow overlapped it. 

"Don't know; forget the name; gone West, though, I believe. You know'em?"

But the wanderer made no response; his eye was now fixed on a curiousnatural bend or wave in one of the bemossed stone jambs. 

"What are you looking at so, father?"

"'_Father_!' Here, " raking with his staff, "_my_ father would sit, andhere, my mother, and here I, little infant, would totter between, evenas now, once again, on the very same spot, but in the unroofed air, Ido. The ends meet. Plough away, friend. "

Best followed now is this life, by hurrying, like itself, to a close. 

Few things remain. 

He was repulsed in efforts after a pension by certain caprices of law. His scars proved his only medals. He dictated a little book, the recordof his fortunes. But long ago it faded out of print--himself out ofbeing--his name out of memory. He died the same day that the oldest oakon his native hills was blown down. 

THE END.