The Water-Witch; Or, the Skimmer of the Seas Part 8

"This was indeed extraordinary! and what did you, to come at the character of the heavenly symbol?"

"We wore off sh.o.r.e, and left it a clear berth for bolder mariners. Glad enough was I to see, with the morning sun, the snowy hills of Corsica, again!"

"And the appearance of that object was never explained?"

"Nor ever will be. I have since spoke with the mariners of that sea concerning the sight, but never found any who could pretend to have seen it. There was indeed one bold enough to say, there is a church, far inland, of height and magnitude sufficient to be seen some leagues at sea, and that, favored by our position and the mists that hung above the low grounds, we had seen its upper works, looming above the fogs, and lighted for some brilliant ceremony; but we were all too old in seaman's experience to credit so wild a tale. I know not but a church may loom, as well as a hill or a ship; but he, who pretends to say, that the hands of man can thus pile stones among the clouds, should be certain of believers, ere he pushes the tale too far."

"Your narrative is extraordinary, and the marvel should have been looked into closer. It may truly have been a church, for there stands an edifice at Rome, which towers to treble the height of a cruiser's masts."

"Having rarely troubled churches, I know not why a church should trouble me," said the mariner of the sash, while he turned his back on the ocean, as if indisposed to regard the waste of water longer. "It is now twelve years since that sight was seen, and though a seaman of many voyages, my eyes have not looked upon the Roman coast, from that hour to this. Will your Honor lead the way from the bluff, as becomes your rank?"

"Your tale of the burning cross and looming church, Master Tiller, had almost caused me to forget to watch the movements of yon periagua,"

returned Ludlow, who still continued to face the bay. "That obstinate old Dutchman----I say, Sir, that Mr. Alderman Van Beverout has greater confidence in this description of craft than I feel myself. I like not the looks of yonder cloud, which is rising from out the mouth of Raritan; and here, seaward, we have a gloomy horizon.--By Heaven! there is a sail playing in the offing or my eye hath lost its use and judgment."

"Your Honor sees the wing of the sporting gull, again; it had been nigh to deceive my sight, which would be to cheat the look-out of a man that has the advantage of some ten or fifteen years' more practice in marine appearances. I remember once, when beating in among the islands of the China seas, with the trades here at south-east----"

"Enough of your marvels, friend; the church is as much as I can swallow, in one morning--It may have been a gull! for I confess the object small; yet it had the steadiness and size of a distant sail! There is some reason to expect one on our coast, for whom a bright and seaman's watch must be had."

"This may then leave me a choice of ships," rejoined Tiller. "I thank your Honor for having spoken, before I had given myself away to the Queen; who is a lady that is much more apt to receive gifts of this nature, than to return them."

"If your respect aboard shall bear any proportion to your hardihood on sh.o.r.e, you may be accounted a model of civility! But a mariner of your pretension should have some regard to the character of the vessel in which he takes service."

"That of which your Honor spoke, is then a buccaneer?"

"If not a buccaneer, one but little better. A lawless trader, under the most favorable view; and there are those who think that he, who has gone so far, has not stopt short of the end. But the reputation of the 'Skimmer of the Seas' must be known to one who has navigated the ocean, long as you."

"You will overlook the curiosity of a seafaring man, in a matter of his profession," returned the mariner of the sash, with strong and evident interest in his manner. "I am lately from a distant ocean, and though many tales of the buccaneers of the islands have been narrated, I do not remember to have heard of that rover, before his name came into the discourse between me and the schipper of the boat, that plies between this landing and the city. I am not, altogether, what I seem, Captain Ludlow; and when further acquaintance and hard service shall have brought me more before the eyes of my commander, he may not repent having induced a thorough seaman to enter his ship, by a little condescension and good-nature shown while the man was still his own master. Your Honor will take no offence at my boldness, when I tell you, I should be glad to know more of this unlawful trader."

Ludlow riveted his eyes on the unmoved and manly countenance of his companion. There was a vague and undefined suspicion in the look; but it vanished, as the practised organs drank in the a.s.surance, which so much physical promise afforded, of the aid of a bold and active mariner. Rather amused than offended by the freedom of the request, he turned upon his heel, and as they descended the bluff, on their way towards the place of landing, he continued the dialogue.

"You are truly from a distant ocean," said the young captain of the Coquette, smiling like a man who apologizes to himself for an act of what he thought undue condescension, "if the exploits of a brigantine known by the name of the 'Water-Witch,' and of him who commands her, under the fit appellation of the 'Skimmer of the Seas,' have not yet reached your ears.

It is now five summers, since orders have been in the colonies for the cruisers to be on the alert to hunt the picaroon; and it is even said, the daring smuggler has often braved the pennants of the narrow seas. 'Twould be a bigger ship, not knighthood, to the lucky officer who should catch the knave!"

"He must drive a money-gaining trade, to run these risks, and to brave the efforts of so many skilful gentlemen! May I add to a presumption that your Honor already finds too bold, if one may judge by a displeased eye, by asking if report speaks to the face and other particulars of the person of this--free trader, one must call him, though freebooter should be a better word."

"What matters the personal condition of a rogue?" said Captain Ludlow, who perhaps remembered that the freedom of their intercourse had been carried as far as comported with prudence.

"What matter, truly! I asked because the description answers a little to that of a man I once knew, in the seas of farther India, and who has long since disappeared, though no one can say whither he has gone. But this 'Skimmer of the Seas' is some Spaniard of the Main, or perhaps a Dutchman come from the country that is awash, in order to taste of terra-firma?"

"Spaniard of the southern coast never carried so bold a sail in these seas, nor was there ever known a Dutchman with so light a heel. The fellow is said to laugh at the swiftest cruiser out of England! As to his figure, I have heard little good of it. 'Tis said, he is some soured officer of better days, who has quitted the intercourse of honest men, because roguery is so plainly written on his face, that he vainly tries to hide it."

"Mine was a proper man, and one that need not have been ashamed to show his countenance among his fellows," said he of the sash. "This cannot be the same, if indeed there be any on the coast.--Is't known, your Honor, that the man is truly here?"

"So goes a rumor; though so many idle tales have led me before to seek the smuggler where he was not, that I give but little faith to the report.--The periagua has the wind more at west, and the cloud in the mouth of the Raritan is breaking into scud. The Alderman will have a lucky run of it!"

"And the gulls have gone more seaward--a certain sign of pleasant weather;" returned the other, glancing a quick but keen look over the horizon in the offing. "I believe our rover, with his light duck, has taken flight among them!"

"We will then go in pursuit. My ship is bound to sea; and it is time, Master Tiller, that I know in what berth you are willing to serve the Queen."

"G.o.d bless her Majesty! Anne is a royal lady and she had a Lord High Admiral for her husband. As for a berth, Sir, one always wishes to be captain even though he may be compelled to eat his ration in the lee-scuppers. I suppose the first-lieutenancy is filled, to your Honor's liking?"

"Sirrah, this is trifling; one of your years and experience need not be told, that commissions are obtained by service."

"Under favor;--I confess the error. Captain Ludlow, you are a man of honor, and will not deceive a sailor who puts trust in your word."

"Sailor, or landsman, he is safe who has the gage."

"Then, Sir, I ask it. Suffer me to enter your ship; to look into my future messmates, and to judge of their characters; to see if the vessel suits my humor; and then to quit her, if I find it convenient."

"Fellow," said Ludlow, "this impudence almost surpa.s.seth patience!"

"The request is reasonable, as can be shown;" gravely returned the unknown mariner. "Now, Captain Ludlow of the Coquette would gladly tie himself, for better for worse, to a fair lady who is lately gone on the water, and yet there are thousands who might be had with less difficulty."

"Still deeper and deeper in thy effrontery--and what if this be true?"

"Sir, a ship is a seaman's mistress--nay, when fairly under a pennant, with a war declared, he may be said to be wedded to her, lawfully or not.

He becomes 'bone of her bone, and flesh of her flesh, until death doth them part.' To such a long compact, there should be liberty of choice.

Has not your mariner a taste, as well as your lover? The harpings and counter of his ship are the waist and shoulders; the rigging, the ringlets; the cut and fit of the sails, the fashion of the millinery; the guns are always called the teeth, and her paint is the blush and bloom!

Here is matter of choice, Sir; and, without leave to make it, I must wish your Honor a happy cruise, and the Queen a better servitor."

"Why, Master Tiller," cried Ludlow, laughing, "you trust too much to these stunted oaks, if you believe it exceeds my power to hunt you out of their cover, at pleasure. But I take you at your word. The Coquette shall receive you on these conditions, and with the confidence that a first-rate city belle would enter a country ball-room."

"I follow in your Honor's wake, without more words," returned he of the sash, for the first time respectfully raising his canvas cap to the young commander. "Though not actually married, consider me a man betrothed."

It is not necessary to pursue the discourse between the two seamen any further. It was maintained, and with sufficient freedom on the part of the inferior, until they reached the sh.o.r.e, and came in full view of the pennant of the Queen; when, with the tact of an old man-of-war's man, he threw into his manner all the respect that was usually required by the difference of rank.

Half an hour later, the Coquette was rolling at a single anchor, as the puffs of wind came off the hills on her three top-sails; and shortly after, she was seen standing through the Narrows, with a fresh southwesterly breeze. In all these movements, there was nothing to attract attention. Notwithstanding the sarcastic allusions of Alderman Van Beverout, the cruiser was far from being idle; and her pa.s.sage outward was a circ.u.mstance of so common occurrence, that it excited no comment among the boatmen of the bay, and the coasters, who alone witnessed her departure.

Chapter VII.

"--I am no pilot; yet, wert thou as far As that vast sh.o.r.e wash'd with the furthest sea, I would adventure for such merchandise."

Romeo And Juliet.

A happy mixture of land and water, seen by a bright moon, and beneath the sky of the fortieth degree of lat.i.tude, cannot fail to make a pleasing picture. Such was the landscape which the reader must now endeavor to present to his mind.

The wide estuary of Raritan is shut in from the winds and billows of the open sea, by a long, low, and narrow cape, or point, which, by a medley of the Dutch and English languages, that is by no means rare in the names of places that lie within the former territories of the United Provinces of Holland, is known by the name of Sandy-Hook. This tongue of land appears to have been made by the unremitting and opposing actions of the waves, on one side, and of the currents of the different rivers, that empty their waters into the bay, on the other. It is commonly connected with the low coast of New-Jersey, to the south; but there are periods, of many years in succession, during which there exists an inlet from the sea, between what may be termed the inner end of the cape, and the main-land. During these periods, Sandy-Hook, of course, becomes an island. Such was the fact at the time of which it is our business to write.

The outer, or ocean side of this low and narrow bank of sand, is a smooth and regular beach, like that seen on most of the Jersey coast, while the inner is indented, in a manner to form several convenient anchoring-grounds, for ships that seek a shelter from easterly gales. One of the latter is a circular and pretty cove, in which vessels of a light draught are completely embayed, and where they may, in safety, ride secure from any winds that blow. The harbor, or, as it is always called, the Cove, lies at the point where the cape joins the main, and the inlet just named communicates directly with its waters, whenever the pa.s.sage is open.

The Shrewsbury, a river of the fourth or fifth cla.s.s, or in other words a stream of a few hundred feet in width, and of no great length, comes from the south, running nearly parallel with the coast, and becomes a tributary of the Bay, also, at a point near the Cove. Between the Shrewsbury and the sea, the land resembles that on the cape, being low and sandy, though not entirely without fertility. It is covered with a modest growth of pines and oaks, where it is not either subject to the labors of the husbandman, or in natural meadow. But the western bank of the river is an abrupt and high acclivity, which rises to the elevation of a mountain. It was near the base of the latter that Alderman Van Beverout, for reasons that may be more fully developed as we proceed in our tale, had seen fit to erect his villa, which, agreeably to a usage of Holland, he had called the l.u.s.t in Rust; an appellation that the merchant, who had read a few of the cla.s.sics in his boyhood, was wont to say meant nothing more nor less than 'Otium c.u.m dignitate.'

If a love of retirement and a pure air had its influence in determining the selection of the burgher of Manhattan, he could not have made a better choice. The adjoining lands had been occupied early in the previous century, by a respectable family of the name of Hartshorne, which continues seated at the place, to the present hour. The extent of their possessions served, at that day, to keep others at a distance. If to this fact be added the formation and quality of the ground, which was, at so early a period, of trifling value for agricultural purposes, it will be seen there was as little motive, as there was opportunity, for strangers to intrude. As to the air it was refreshed by the breezes of the ocean, which was scarcely a mile distant; while it had nothing to render it unhealthy, or impure. With this sketch of the general features of the scene where so many of our incidents occurred, we shall proceed to describe the habitation of the Alderman, a little more in detail.