"I see a barrack room, with a mess table, and a group of intoxicated
Celtic officers telling funny stories, and giving challenges to duel.
I see a young Irish gentleman capable of performing prodigies of valor.
I learn incidentally that the acme of all heroism is the cornetcy of a
dragoon regiment. I hear a good deal of French! No, thank you," said
the Haunted Man hurriedly, as he stayed the waving hand of the Goblin;
"I would rather NOT go to the Peninsula, and don't care to have a
private interview with Napoleon."
Again the Goblin flew away with the unfortunate man, and from a strange
roaring below them he judged they were above the ocean. A ship hove in
sight, and the Goblin stayed its flight. "Look," he said, squeezing
his companion's arm.
The Haunted Man yawned. "Don't you think, Charles, you're rather
running this thing into the ground? Of course it's very moral and
instructive, and all that. But ain't there a little too much pantomime
about it? Come now!"
"Look!" repeated the Goblin, pinching his arm malevolently. The
Haunted Man groaned.
"O, of course, I see her Majesty's ship Arethusa. Of course I am
familiar with her stern First Lieutenant, her eccentric Captain, her
one fascinating and several mischievous midshipmen. Of course I know
it's a splendid thing to see all this, and not to be seasick. O, there
the young gentlemen are going to play a trick on the purser. For God's
sake, let us go," and the unhappy man absolutely dragged the Goblin
away with him.
When they next halted, it was at the edge of a broad and boundless
prairie, in the middle of an oak opening.
"I see," said the Haunted Man, without waiting for his cue, but
mechanically, and as if he were repeating a lesson which the Goblin had
taught him,--"I see the Noble Savage. He is very fine to look at! But
I observe under his war-paint, feathers, and picturesque blanket, dirt,
disease, and an unsymmetrical contour. I observe beneath his inflated
rhetoric deceit and hypocrisy; beneath his physical hardihood, cruelty,
malice, and revenge. The Noble Savage is a humbug. I remarked the
same to Mr. Catlin."
"Come," said the phantom.
The Haunted Man sighed, and took out his watch. "Couldn't we do the
rest of this another time?"
"My hour is almost spent, irreverent being, but there is yet a chance
for your reformation. Come!"
Again they sped through the night, and again halted. The sound of
delicious but melancholy music fell upon their ears.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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