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GOAWIN.COM Experience Online Casino: Where Betting and Entertainment Come Together! "We have come down to look over your ship, Walter," said the Admiral, sending from the wharf-side a sailor's knowing glance up at the masts and spars of the barque. "You'll not have had time yet, but I trust whilst you're in harbour you will set a good example to others by keeping your gear hauled taut and your yards square to a hair by lift and brace.",Some three miles east of the imaginary line which divided the Settlement from the outside world, on the Lake Shore road, stood a big frame house in a grove of tall walnut trees. It was the home of a man named Hinter—a man of mystery. Before it the lake flashed blue as a kingfisher's wing through the cedars; behind it swept a tangle of forest which gradually dwarfed into a stretch of swamp-willow and wild hazel-nut bushes, which in turn gave place to marshy bog-lands.,"Ha," cried a quavering voice, "and is ut the Prince av Darkness, himself, as spakes t' me? Thin it's no fit av the delirium tremens I've had at all, at all, but dead I am and in purgatory! Oh weary me, oh weary me! Such shnakes and evil eyed burruds have I never seen before. Och! could I be given wan taste av God's blissid air and sunshine ag'in, and never more would whiskey pass me lips.","Why, Ma," he cried, in amazement, "you don't mean to say he's gone?",Whilst they waited for Sir William the conversation turned upon his son.，The scene of the quay-side was gay and indeed festive. The few ships had hoisted colours in celebration of the Aurora's arrival, and the large flags of those days streaming from mast-head and gaff-end and ensign-staff and jack-staff combined with the brilliant blue of the sky, the light and lovely greenery of spring that clothed the ravine's slopes, the sober hue of the cliffs, the white shape of the squab lighthouse past which some gulls[Pg 90] were wheeling, the chocolate tint of the revolving windmill, the sober grey of the houses and the diamond sparkle of the river with its softened reflection of bridge and banks streaming into its heart in dreamlike shadow of what was mirrored: this combination, I say, coupled with the motions and colours of human life on the quay-side, albeit the beer hour had struck and the picture owed nothing of animation to the workmen, fascinated the eye with the calm, the freshness, and the glory of a little English sea-piece, Sabbath-like in repose, lighted by the sun of April beaming in a perfectly fair heaven.，"Well, what is it, then? Who sent you? Come now, out with it quick, or I'll take a tarred rope-end to you."，"Nothing more since the privateersman was run in," said Captain Acton.CHAPTER VIII LUCK RIDES THE STORM

The Captain's exclamation had been overheard, and the gaze of the Merchant seamen of the Minorca was fixed upon the figure of one of those fabrics which could never light up with their cloud of sail the confines of the sea or the nearer fields of water, without exciting a thrill of interest or causing the heart to leap up in momentary transport of patriotic pride. She was under fore and mizzen jury topmasts. With the main all was well, and the spars lifted their canvas to the moon-like royal without hint of wreck or suggestion of wound. Either she had been in action and had come away crippled, or had been in trouble on a lee-shore or amongst rocks. And still she painted a stately and a swelling picture upon the blue sky past her. The sun was westering; his yellow light flung upon the distant canvas the delicate sheen of fine silk. From the hand's breadth of black side under the lower white band, the stately roll to leeward flashed lightning-sparks from the wet, and, as she slightly pitched, the upheaval of her bows exhibited at the fore-foot the snow-like[Pg 294] crumbling of foam. She passed in grandeur and in tranquillity.,"But with the two of 'em," cried Billy eagerly, "we kin surely find the will, Harry.",Billy stared at the old man; then his face broke into a grin. "O Gee!" he sighed, and sinking on a log, closed his eyes. "O Gee!" he repeated—leaping to his feet and throwing his arms about the neck of the bay and yelling into that animal's twitching ear. "Hear that, you Thomas? They're married, Erie an' Teacher Stanhope's married!","But I'll get an awful hidin' if you don't. I don't mind an ordinary tannin' but a tannin' in these wet pants is goin' to hurt like fury. They're stickin close to my legs. I might as well be naked an' Ma she certainly does lay it on.",It was not very long before the eleven sail of the line with their attendant frigates were swelling large, bristling, and close to the Aurora, at whose signal halliards stood two sailors who dipped to such battle-ships as the schooner passed receiving the acknowledgment of small ensigns gaff-ended, and then hauled down to be hoisted no more. The picture was full of a grandeur that borrowed majesty from the sense of the power and the empire[Pg 397] the ships symbolised. They were lordly in slow motion; they bowed to the swell as though in lofty homage to their mistress the sea; they were terrible in triple rows of cannon and by virtue of the traditional magnificent spirit, silent and concealed behind their lofty and invincible defences. It was the breakfast hour, but the people aboard the Aurora were very willing to wait to break their fast. Not a man but was fascinated by the sight and presence of that tall, majestic ship out there, with the little flag at the fore. For Nelson—the Nelson of the North, of Aboukir Bay, of Teneriffe, of St Vincent, the Nelson of a hundred wounds, the first of all sea chieftains in the history of the world, Nelson, the truest sailor, the kindest shipmate, the man of the purest and loftiest spirit of chivalry and patriotism that ever stepped the planks of a ship's decks—this great, this sublime hero, to be even greater and sublimer in his victorious and immortal death a few months later—Nelson was in her!,Billy sighed. "That's awful good of you, Ma, an' I sure would like to have Jim over to supper, but he's so fond of his sister he won't go anywheres without her, you see.",Wilson laughed. "Not Cobin. He's quite satisfied with his little farm, I guess. No, Hinter didn't get much satisfaction from either of us.","Good!" cried the Admiral with a laugh and an applauding flourish of the hand, and[Pg 94] with this laugh, and smiles and bows from the ladies, Sir William and his companions pursued their way to the Minorca.,But Lucy Acton smiled and curtsied when he passed as usual. Old Miss Acton was nervously polite in her way in her little chirrupy salutations. Captain Acton was sometimes down at the ship, but had nothing to say about the finding of a letter good or bad.,"Oh look at the dear little thing," cried the girl. "What do you suppose he's saying?" as the squirrel broke into a shrill chatter.,Billy passed on slowly after his cows, up through the spicy pines to the pebbled beach of the lake, pondering for a solution to the biggest problem his young mind had ever had to wrestle with. He seated himself on the prow of the big fish-boat, his eyes on the thirsty cattle now belly-deep in the blue water, drinking their fill. Along the shore stood the big reels used for holding the seines and nets when not in use. The twine had been newly coal-tarred and the pungent odor of the tar mingled pleasingly with the breath of pine and the sweet freshness of the sun-warmed water.,Captain Acton waited until this [Pg 366]unconquerable fit of grief should have abated. He then went to his friend's side, and, passing his arm round his neck, said: "My dear old friend, keep up your heart! We will pursue the Minorca and regain her if possible, and depend upon it, your son shall be made to suffer as little as can be helped. Meanwhile, let us wait until we hear Lucy's story.".