And by and by he left her. It wrung his heart so to do, but the call of duty was stronger than her need. His ship was ready, or would be in a short time, and he had snatched a few days from his pressing work to fulfil this task. His presence was absolutely necessary on the vessel, and he must go. Saying nay to her piteous plea that he should stay, and most reluctantly refusing her proffers of hospitality, after leaving with her the letters and the pictures, he left the room. But in the doorway he looked back at her. The tears had come at last. Moved by a sudden impulse, he ran back and knelt down by her, and took her old face between his hands and kissed her. "Good-by, dear madam," he whispered; "would it had been I!" She laid her thin hands upon his head. "Good-by," she whispered; "God bless you. Oh, my boy--my boy!" She turned her face to the wall in bitterness, and so he fled. On the brow of the hill one could see, if he were keen-eyed, the Wilton place. There was the boat-house. There she had said she loved him. He struck spurs to his horse and galloped madly away. Was there nothing but grief and sorrow, then, under the sun? The lawyer and the doctor and the minister were with Madam Talbot all that day, but it was little they could do. She added a codicil to her will with the lawyer, submissively took the medicine the doctor left her, and listened quietly to the prayers of the priest. In the morning they found her whiter, stiller, calmer than ever. She had gone to meet her son in that new country where none rebel against the King! BOOK IV A DEATH GRAPPLE ON THE DEEP CHAPTER XXX _A Sailor's Opinion of the Land_ It was a delightful morning in February. The Continental ship Randolph, a tight little thirty-two-gun frigate, the first to get to sea of those ordered by Congress in 1775, was just leaving the beautiful harbor of Charleston, South Carolina, by way of the main ship channel, on her maiden cruise, under the command of Captain John Seymour Seymour, late first lieutenant of the Ranger. This was the second departure she had taken from that port. Forced by severe damages, incurred in an encounter with a heavy gale shortly after leaving Philadelphia, to put into that harbor for needed repairs to the new and unsettled vessel, she had put to sea again after a short interval, and in one week had taken six valuable prizes, one of them, an armed vessel of twenty guns, after a short action. After this brief and brilliant excursion she had put back to Charleston to dispose of her prizes, re-collect her prize crews, and land her prisoners.