Aladdin's Treasure

Aladdin's Treasure 100,000 players "To the point! Out with it and bear a hand!" exclaimed Mr Lawrence with a stern, contemptuous glance at the huddle of faces forward, and then slightly turning his head to see in the tail of his eye what Mr Pledge was doing.,"But he won't. If he does she'll tan him good fer goin' off an' leavin' you by yourself. You tell him he'll have to wait around here till you get back. He'll do it, all right. There he comes through the grove now. Better crawl back to where Ma left you.",They sat down on a mossy log. Her fingers brushed back his hair as her eyes sought vainly for marks or bruises.,"We are not willing to carry this ship to any other port than the port we agreed to, sir," said Old Jim, speaking with great firmness, the murmur that had risen behind him having stimulated his fortitude.,"He objects to service clubs. He said to[Pg 7] a friend of mine, 'Take my advice and have nothing to do with them; they are one of the signs of the times of which I highly disapprove; these assemblies of Army and Navy may in time become dangerous to the Government.' When he was Commander-in-Chief he strongly discouraged matrimony. He hated to have married officers in his fleet, for he said they were the first to run into port, and the last to come out of it. I do not wonder that they declined to drink his health at Bath."，"What did he say to you?" repeated the lawyer, and the wretched man on the rack answered hopelessly: "He told me that if I didn't give the will up to Stanhope he would have me arrested and sent to the pen."，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.，Anson nodded and set the dinner-pail down on the bridge.The Admiral's face wore an expression that was almost imbecile with bewilderment.

The frigate seemed unquestionably of foreign build; but the name Phœbe, written in large characters upon her stern over which from the peak of the mizzen-gaff streamed the flag of our country, was a warranty that whatever nationality her builders had boasted, she was now a British ship. She was somewhat old in years, as was manifested by her fore-mast that was stepped too far forward to please a critical eye, whilst her main-mast stood too far aft, its nearness to the mizzen-mast offending the gaze by an appearance of crowding. But she was very spick and span: as fresh as though just launched; her glossy, black sides trembled with the lustre of the sea; her canvas was spacious and superb in cut and set. The white line of hammock cloths delightfully contrasted with the gilt rope of beading which ran the length of her below the wash streak, and which terminated on the stern in a flourish of gilt scroll amid which the windows gleamed darkly like those of Old Harbour House duskily shining amidst the foliage of creepers.,"Give Perry my kind regards," said Captain Acton.,The twilight shadows were beginning to steal across the glade; the golden-rod of the uplands massed into indistinguishable clumps. The silence of eventide fell soft and sweet and songless—that breathless space between the forest day and darkness.,"Begobs, so I've heard before." Harry scratched his head reflectively.,Captain Acton slightly frowned upon the old dame, and exclaimed: "I think, Caroline, you should have withheld your conviction, for the present at all events, from Admiral Lawrence.","What on earth but some news of my daughter can bring Greyquill here at this hour?" said Captain Acton.,"Doo any day, Miss, unless she's been nabbed, but the vessel that's going to take the Aurora 'ull want more than wings.","But Bill," urged Jim, "the oil they've found there'll make you rich.",She cried: "A dirty fellow giving her a letter, and beguiling her and luring her into some dreadful place, perhaps to her destruction! Oh dear! oh dear! what is to be done? Can't she be discovered? Can't the bell-man raise the alarm? Who can the wretch be that wrote to her? And why should she rush away to his help? Oh dear! oh dear! what is to be done?",The ship in sight carried in those days a very unfamiliar rig. She was what is well known now as a barque. She was under all plain sail and showed many wings, and she lifted sails which Lord St Vincent when Captain Jervis was the first to introduce into the Navy, and Merchantmen, always quicker than Navy ships to adopt improvements or changes for the good, were using them when ships of the State, at least a good many of them, were still satisfied with the truck above the topgallant yard.,"Naw, why should there be? That's what you're supposed to do, if you get the chance—shoot 'em, an' get the reward.","I can't, ma'am, it's locked," and in proof of his assurance, Pledge turned the handle and shook the door..