is,' says the man that was leadin' of him, here's John Chidlaw, what there is left on him!' Then he give me a push toward him, and nodded to my mother like, a-drawin' his mouth into such queer shapes that I could n't tell whether he was a-laughin' or cryin', and I did n't know which I ought to do neither. "By this time the man that I partly took to be my father was a-backin' furder and furder from us, and at last he got clean agin the jamb o' the chimney, and then he looked up wild, as if he was a looking at the sky, and directly he spoke. This 'll be a stiff blow,' says he. We're struck aft, and we 'll be in the trough of the sea in a minute! God help us all!' And with that he began to climb up the shelves o' the cupboard, as though he was a climbin' into a ship's riggin'. "Next thing I seen, mother had got to him, somehow, and was a-holdin' round his neck, and talkin' to him in tones as sweet and coaxin' as though he had been a sick baby. Don't you know me, John?' she says, 'your own Katura, that you left so long ago!' He did n't answer her at all; he did n't seem to see her, but kep' right on,' a-talkin' about the ship not bein' able to lift herself, and about the rudder bein' tore away, and a leak som'er's, and settin' of a gang o' hands at the pumps, and gettin' of the cargo up, and the dear knows what all! I did n't understand a word on 't, and, besides that, I was afeard on him. "Tell 'em about the last whale we ketched, Jack, that big bull that so nigh upsot us all. Come, that 's a story worth while!' It was the man that had led him in who said this; and he laughed loud, and slapped him on the shoulder as he said it; and then he looked at my mother and winked, and drawed his mouth queer agin. "My father kind o' come to himself like now, and seatin' himself astride a chair, and with his face to the back on 't, he began: "We was a cruisin' about in the South Pacific, when, between three and four in the afternoon of an August day, we bein' in latitude forty at the time, the man on the look-out at the fore-topmast-head cried out that a whale had broke water in plain view of our ship, and on her weather bow. "Where away, sir? and what do you call her?' shouts the captain, hailin' the mast-head. "Sperm whale, sir, three pints on the weather-bow, and about two miles off!' "Keep a sharp eye, and sing out when the ship heads for her!' “Ay, ay, sir.' "The captain went aloft with his spyglass. Keep her away!' was his next order to the man at the helm. "Steady!' sung out the mast-head. "Steady it is!' answered the wheel. "Square in the after-yards, and call all hands!' 666 Ay, ay, sir.' "Forward there! Haul the mainsail up, and square the yards!' "Steady, steady!' sings out the mast-head. "Steady it is!' answers the wheel. "Call all hands!' shouts the captain, in a voice like a tempest. "The main hatches was off, and the men mostly in the blubber-room, engaged, some on 'em, in mincin' and pikin' pieces of blanket and horse from one tub to another, and some was atendin' fires, and some a-fillin' casks with hot ile from the cooler; but quick as lightnin' all the deck is thronged, like the street of a city when there is a cry of fire. "There she blows! O, she 's a beauty, a regular old sog!' sings the mast-head. "Slack down the fires! Quick, by G-!' shouts the captain in a voice like thunder. "She peaks her flukes, and goes down!' cries the mast-head. "A sharp eye, sir! Mind where she comes up!' “Ay, ay, sir!' "Get your boats ready, lads, and stand by to lower away!' "The men work as for life, - the boat-bottoms are tallered, the boat tackle-falls laid down, so as to run clear, the tub o' line and the harpoons got in, the gripes cast clear, and each boat's crew by the side o' their boat. "Hoist and swing! Lower away!' "In a moment we 're off, bendin' to our oars, every man on us, eager to see who will be up first. The whale was under half an hour; but at last we get sight o' the signal at the main, which tells us that she 's up agin. "Down to your oars, lads! Give way hard!' says the captain. "I got the palm o' my hand under the abaft oar, so as with each stroke to throw a part of my weight agin it, and our boat leapt for'a'd across the water, spring arter spring, like a tiger, her length and twice her length afore the others in a minute. "She's an eighty-barrel! right ahead! Give way, my boys!' cries the captain, encouragin' on us. And all our strength was put to the oar. "Spring harder, boys! Harder! If she blows agin, some on you 'll have an iron into her afore five minutes!' Then to the whale,-a-standin' with his legs wide, and bendin' for'a'd like, 'O, you're a beauty! Ahoy! ahoy! and let us fasten!' "We was nearly out of sight of our ship now, but we could see the smoke of her try-works still standin' black above her, though the fires had been slacked so long. "All at once the whale blowed agin; and we could see her plain now, lyin' like a log, not more 'n twenty rods ahead. A little more hard pullin', and 'Stand up!' says the Captain, and then, Give me the first chance at her!' I was a-steerin' and I steered him steady, closer, closer, alongside a'most, and give his iron the best chance possible; but it grazed off, and she settled quietly under, all but her head. "That wa' n't quite low enough,' says he. Another lance!' "This failed too, and she settled clean under. Every man was quiverin' with excitement; but I watched calmly, and, as soon as I spied her whitenin' under water, I sent my lance arter her without orders, and by good forten sunk it into her very life-full length. "She throwed out a great spout o' blood, and dashed furiously under. "God help us! She'll come up so as to upset our boat!' cries the captain. 'Every man here at her, when she comes in sight!' "He had hardly done speakin' when I felt a great knock, and at the same time seen somethin' a-flyin' through the air. She had just grazed us, shovin' our boat aside as a pig shoves his trough, and was breakin' water not a stone's throw ahead. "The captain had gone overboard; but we obeyed his last words before we looked arter him, and had a dozen irons into her afore you could 'a' said Jack Robinson! Down she went agin, pullin' the line arter her, coil on coil; but the pain would n't allow her to stay down long, and directly she was out agin, thrashin' the water with her flukes till it was all churned up like blubbers o' blood, for her side was bristlin' with harpoons, and the life pourin' out on her like rain out of a thunder-cloud. "Meantime the captain had been hauled aboard, and as he sunk down on an oar, for he could n't stand, — all his shirt and hair a-drippin' red, his cold, spiteful eye shot into me like a bullet, and says I to the mate, 'I 'm a doomed man.' "Then my father began ramblin' wildly about goin' overboard himself, and how he seen a stream o' fire afore his eyes as he sunk into the cold and dark; and how there came an awful pressure on his brain, and a roarin' in his ears; and how the strength went out of his thighs, and was as if the marrer was cut, how he heard a gurglin', and felt suffocation, and then clean lost himself!" At this point John Chidlaw ceased to be master of his voice, and all at once hid his face in his arms. When the woman who had been listening so attentively, getting one of his rough hands upon her knee, stroked it gently, without a word, and by and by he returned her a little pressure, and then, steadying himself up, he said: "It ain't no use to think on't, Rose, - it's all over now, and they've met beyond the seas o' time, my poor father and mother, for they both crossed long ago, met, and knowed each other, I hope, but the one never come to himself here, nor recognized the other. My mother took straight to her bed; and when she wore the white shawl agin, and had it drawed across her bosom, it was for that journey from which none on us come back." as he handed her ashore, "would you believe I was so stupid as not to see that the name o' your wessel was the same as my own? I read it the Rose Rolling, to be sure!" But John maintained that she was not stupid a single bit nor mite, but, on the contrary, smart altogether beyond the common. "To come so nigh the truth," says he, "and yet not get hold on 't, arter all, is a leetle the slickest thing yet!" And then he told, as they walked home together, he with three band-. boxes in one arm, and her on the other, "Dear John," says Rose, very soft--all about his weary years of hardship ly, all the coquette gone, only and poverty, and all about the beginthe woman left. And presently he ning of his good fortune, the running was strong enough to go on. away of the horse and of the little girl who drew him after her, because she reminded him so much of Rose herself as she used to be when he looked down upon her so fondly from the roof in Baker's Row, - told her of the child's father, and how he set him up in business, of his prosperity since, ending with her taking passage with him, which he said was the best fortune of all. It "It was a good many year," he said, "not till I was a'most a man, before I came to understand rightly what it was that sot my father crazy. The captain had been agin him all along on account of his too much sperit, and that capterin' o' the whale finished up the business, and pinted his fate. wa' n't long arter this till Captain Griscom found occasion to treat him very hardly, which bein' resented only by a look, he ordered him down below to be flogged! This, Rose, was what broke the spirit on him; he was never himself arterwards, never knowed nothin' at all clear, exceptin' about the takin' o' that whale; and that he told over and over a hundred times, arter that fust time, just as I've told it to you, but all before it and all behind it was shadders, till the great shadder of all came over him. "When I come to hear on 't, I said I hoped my father would meet that 'ere captain som'er's on the seas of eternity, and flog him within an inch of his life; and I ha'n't repented the sayin' on 't yet." The tide had come up while John Chidlaw was telling his story, and his little boat slid off the bar directly, when, taking up the oars, he soon brought her to land. "Bless your dear heart, John!" says Rose, pointing back to the boat's name, "That was luck," says he, "that no words can shadder forth!" And then he said, "I ought n't to call it luck, my dear; it was just an intervention of Divine Providence!" Then he corrected himself. "An interwention o' Diwine Providence," says he," that 's what it was!" And he hugged the very bandboxes till he fairly stove them in. About a month after this blessed luck, the milliner's shop was closed one day at an unusually early hour, and the white-muslin curtains at the parlor windows above might have been noticed to flutter and sway, as with some gay excitement indoors. And so indeed there was. John had taken his Rose for good and all, and the little parlor was full of glad hearts and merry feet. All the milliner's apprentices and sewing-girls of the neighborhood were there, bright as so many butterflies, laughing, and nodding, and whispering one another, and dropping their eyes before the young sailors, and teamsters, and other fine fellows, who were serving them with a generosity that was only equalled by their admiration. Coffee, cakes, cheese, chowder, bottled beer, fruits, and hot bannocks, the lasses had them all at once, and the lads would have been glad to give them even more. And John, grown ten years younger that day, kept all the while (being forced to turn his head away now and then to receive congratulations) one foot under the table, and against the soft slipper ARE THE CHILDREN AT HOME? By miro. &. Sheart Phelps. ACH day when the glow of sunset And the wee ones, tired of playing, Go tripping lightly by, I steal away from my husband, And watch from the open doorway Alone in the dear old homestead And oft, as the shadows come, "It is night! are the children home?" "Yes, love!" I answer him gently, Till the old man drops to slumber, With his head upon his hand, Home, where never a sorrow Shall dim their eyes with tears! |