Afloat and Ashore (17 page)

In this very narration of our voyage, Rupert had left false
impressions on the minds of his listeners, in fifty things. He had
made far more of both our little skirmishes, than the truth would
warrant, and he had neglected to do justice to Neb in his account of
each of the affairs. Then he commended Captain Robbins's conduct in
connection with the loss of the John, on points that could not be
sustained, and censured him for measures that deserved praise. I knew
Rupert was no seaman—was pretty well satisfied, by this time, he
never would make one—but I could not explain all his obliquities by
referring them to ignorance. The manner, moreover, in which he
represented himself as the principal actor, on all occasions, denoted
so much address, that, while I felt the falsity of the impressions he
left, I did not exactly see the means necessary to counteract them. So
ingenious, indeed, was his manner of stringing facts and inferences
together, or what
seemed
to be facts and inferences, that I
more than once caught myself actually believing that which, in sober
reality, I knew to be false. I was still too young, not quite
eighteen, to feel any apprehensions on the subject of Grace; and was
too much accustomed to both Rupert and his sister, to regard either
with any feelings very widely different from those which I entertained
for Grace herself.

As soon as the history of our adventures and exploits was concluded,
we all had leisure to observe and comment on the alterations that time
had made in our several persons. Rupert, being the oldest, was the
least changed in this particular. He had got his growth early, and
was only a little spread. He had cultivated a pair of whiskers at sea,
which rendered his face a little more manly—an improvement, by the
way—but, the effects of exposure and of the sun excepted, there was
no very material change in his exterior. Perhaps, on the whole, he
was improved in appearance. I think both the girls fancied this,
though Grace did not say it, and Lucy only half admitted it, and that
with many reservations. As for myself, I was also full-grown, standing
exactly six feet in my stockings, which was pretty well for eighteen.
But I had also spread; a fact that is not common for lads at that
age. Grace said I had lost all delicacy of appearance; and as for
Lucy, though she laughed and blushed she protested I began to look
like a great bear. To confess the truth, I was well satisfied with my
own appearance, did not envy Rupert a jot, and knew I could toss him
over my shoulder whenever I chose. I stood the strictures on my
appearance, therefore, very well; and, though no one was so much
derided and laughed at as myself, in that critical discussion, no one
cared less for it all. Just as I was permitted to escape, Lucy said,
in an under tone—

"You should have staid at home, Miles, and then the changes would have
come so gradually, no one would have noticed them, and you would have
escaped being told how much you are altered, and that you are a
bear
."

I looked eagerly round at the speaker, and eyed her intently. A look
of regret passed over the dear creature's face, her eyes looked as
penitent as they did soft, and the flush that suffused her countenance
rendered this last expression almost bewitching. At the same instant
she whispered—"I did not really mean
that
."

But it was Grace's turn, and my attention was drawn to my sister. A
year had made great improvements in Grace. Young as she was, she had
lost much of the girlish air, in the sedateness and propriety of the
young woman. Grace had always something more of these last than is
common; but they had now completely removed every appearance of
childish, I might almost say of girlish, frivolity. In person, her
improvement was great; though an air of exceeding delicacy rather left
an impression that such a being was more intended for another world,
than this. There was ever an air of fragility and of pure
intellectuality about my poor sister, that half disposed one to fancy
that she would one day be translated to a better sphere in the body,
precisely as she stood before human eyes. Lucy bore the examination
well. She was all woman, there being nothing about
her
to
create any miraculous expectations, or fanciful pictures; but she was
evidently fast getting to be a very lovely woman. Honest, sincere,
full of heart, overflowing with the feelings of her sex, gentle yet
spirited, buoyant though melting with the charities; her changeful,
but natural and yet constant feelings in her, kept me incessantly in
pursuit of her playful mind and varying humours. Still, a more
high-principled being, a firmer or more consistent friend, or a more
accurate thinker on all subjects that suited her years and became her
situation, than Lucy Hardinge, never existed. Even Grace was
influenced by her judgment, though I did not then know how much my
sister's mind was guided by her simple and less pretending friend's
capacity to foresee things, and to reason on their consequences.

We were more than an hour uninterruptedly together, before we thought
of repairing to the house. Lucy then reminded Rupert that he had not
yet seen his father, whom she had just before observed alighting from
his horse at the door of his own study. That he had been apprised of
the return of the runaways, if not prodigals, was evident, she
thought, by his manner; and it was disrespectful to delay seeking his
forgiveness and blessing. Mr. Hardinge received us both without
surprise, and totally without any show of resentment. It was about the
time he expected our return, and no surprise was felt at finding this
expectation realized, as a matter of course, while resentment was
almost a stranger to his nature. We all shed tears, the girls sobbing
aloud; and we were both solemnly blessed. Nor am I ashamed to say I
knelt to receive that blessing, in an age when the cant of a
pretending irreligion—there is as much cant in self-sufficiency as in
hypocrisy, and they very often go together—is disposed to turn into
ridicule the humbling of the person, while asking for the blessing of
the Almighty through the ministers of his altars; for kneel I did, and
weep I did, and, I trust, the one in humility and the other in
contrition.

When we had all become a little calm, and a substantial meal was
placed before us adventurers, Mr. Hardinge demanded an account of all
that had passed. He applied to me to give it, and I was compelled to
discharge the office of an historian, somewhat against my
inclination. There was no remedy, however, and I told the story in my
own simple manner, and certainly in a way to leave very different
impressions from many of those made by the narrative of Rupert. I
thought once or twice, as I proceeded, that Lucy looked sorrowful, and
Grace looked surprised. I do not think I coloured in the least, as
regarded myself, and I know I did Neb no more than justice. My tale
was soon told, for I felt the whole time as if I were contradicting
Rupert, who, by the way, appeared perfectly unconcerned—perfectly
unconscious, indeed—on the subject of the discrepancies in the two
accounts. I have since met with men who did not know the truth when it
was even placed very fairly before their eyes.

Mr. Hardinge expressed his heartfelt happiness at having us back
again, and, soon after, he ventured to ask if we were satisfied with
what we had seen of the world. This was a home question, but I thought
it best to meet it manfully. So far from being satisfied, I told him
it was my ardent desire to get on board one of the letters-of-marque,
of which so many were then fitting out in the country, and to make a
voyage to Europe. Rupert, however, confessed he had mistaken his
vocation, and that he thought he could do no better than to enter a
lawyer's office. I was thunderstruck at this quiet admission of my
friend, of his incapacity to make a sailor, for it was the first
intimation I heard of his intention. I had remarked a certain want of
energy, in various situations that required action, in Rupert, but no
want of courage; and I had ascribed some portion of his lassitude to
the change of condition, and, possibly, of food; for, after all, that
godlike creature, man, is nothing but an animal, and is just as much
influenced by his stomach and digestion as a sheep, or a horse.

Mr. Hardinge received his son's intimation of a preference of
intellectual labours to a more physical state of existence, with a
gratification my own wishes did not afford him. Still, he made no
particular remark to either at the time, permitting us both to enjoy
our return to Clawbonny, without any of the drawbacks of advice or
lectures. The evening passed delightfully, the girls beginning to
laugh heartily at our own ludicrous accounts of the mode of living on
board ship, and of our various scenes in China, the Isle of Bourbon,
and elsewhere. Rupert had a great deal of humour, and a very dry way
of exhibiting it; in short, he was almost a genius in the mere
superficialities of life; and even Grace rewarded his efforts to
entertain us, with laughter to tears. Neb was introduced after
supper, and the fellow was both censured and commended; censured for
having abandoned the household gods, and commended for not having
deserted their master. His droll descriptions of the Chinese, their
dress, pigtails, shoes and broken English, diverted even Mr.
Hardinge, who, I believe, felt as much like a boy on this occasion, as
any of the party. A happier evening than that which followed in the
little
tea
-parlour, as my dear mother used to call it, was
never passed in the century that the roof had covered the old walls of
Clawbonny.

Next day I had a private conversation with my guardian, who commenced
the discourse by rendering a sort of account of the proceeds of my
property during the past year. I listened respectfully, and with some
interest; for I saw the first gave Mr. Hardinge great satisfaction,
and I confess the last afforded some little pleasure to myself. I
found that things had gone on very prosperously. Ready money was
accumulating, and I saw that, by the time I came of age, sufficient
cash would be on hand to give me a ship of my own, should I choose to
purchase one. From that moment I was secretly determined to qualify
myself to command her in the intervening time. Little was said of the
future, beyond an expression of the hope, by my guardian, that I would
take time to reflect before I came to a final decision on the subject
of my profession. To this I said nothing beyond making a respectful
inclination of the head.

For the next month, Clawbonny was a scene of uninterrupted merriment
and delight. We had few families to visit in our immediate
neighbourhood, it is true; and Mr. Hardinge proposed an excursion to
the Springs—the country was then too new, and the roads too bad, to
think of Niagara—but to this I would not listen. I cared not for the
Springs—knew little of, and cared less for fashion—and loved
Clawbonny to its stocks and stones. We remained at home, then, living
principally for each other. Rupert read a good deal to the girls,
under the direction of his father; while I passed no small portion of
my time in athletic exercises. The Grace & Lucy made one or two
tolerably long cruises in the river, and at length I conceived the
idea of taking the party down to town in the Wallingford. Neither of
the girls had ever seen New York, or much of the Hudson; nor had
either ever seen a ship. The sloops that passed up and down the
Hudson, with an occasional schooner, were the extent of their
acquaintance with vessels; and I began to feel it to be matter of
reproach that those in whom I took so deep an interest, should be so
ignorant. As for the girls themselves, they both admitted, now I was a
sailor, that their desire to see a regular, three-masted, full-rigged
ship, was increased seven-fold.

Mr. Hardinge heard my proposition, at first, as a piece of pleasantry;
but Grace expressing a strong desire to see a large town, or what was
thought a large town in this country, in 1799, and Lucy looking
wistful, though she remained silent under an apprehension her father
could not afford the expense of such a journey, which her imagination
rendered a great deal more formidable than it actually proved to be,
the excellent divine finally acquiesced. The expense was disposed of
in a very simple manner. The journey, both ways, would be made in the
Wallingford; and Mr. Hardinge was not so unnecessarily scrupulous as
to refuse passages for himself and children in the sloop, which never
exacted passage-money from any who went to or from the farm. Food was
so cheap, too, as to be a matter of no consideration; and, being
entitled legally to receive that at Clawbonny, it made no great
difference whether it were taken on board the vessel, or in the
house. Then there was a Mrs. Bradfort in New York, a widow lady of
easy fortune, who was a cousin-german of Mr. Hardinge's—his father's
sister's daughter—and with her he always staid in his own annual
visits to attend the convention of the Church—I beg pardon, of the
Protestant Episcopal Church, as it is now
de rigueur
to say; I
wonder some ultra does not introduce the manifest improvement into the
Apostles' Creed of saying, "I believe in the Holy Protestant Episcopal
Catholic Church, &c."—but, the excellent divine, in his annual
attendance on the convention, was accustomed to stay with his
kinswoman, who often pressed him to bring both Lucy and Grace to see
her; her house in Wall street being abundantly large enough to
accommodate a much more numerous party. "Yes," said Mr. Hardinge,
"that shall be the arrangement. The girls and I will stay with
Mrs. Bradfort, and the young men can live at a tavern. I dare say this
new City Hotel, which seems to be large enough to contain a regiment,
will hold even
them
. I will write this very evening to my
cousin, so as not to take her by surprise."