Eve rose from table, went to a side-board and returned, when she gracefully placed before the master of the Montauk a rich and beautifully chased punch-bowl, in silver. Almost at the same moment, Pierre offered a salver that contained a capital watch, a pair of small silver tongs to hold a coal, and a deck trumpet, in solid silver. "These are so many faint testimonials of our feelings," said Eve--"and you will do us the favour to retain them, as evidences of the esteem created by skill, kindness, and courage." "My dear young lady!" cried the old tar, touched to the soul by the feeling with which Eve acquitted herself of this little duty, "my dear young lady--well, God bless you--God bless you all--you too, Mr. John Effingham, for that matter--and Sir George--that I should ever have taken that runaway for a gentleman and a baronet--though I suppose there are some silly baronets, as well as silly lords--retain them?"--glancing furiously at Mr. Aristabulus Bragg, "may the Lord forget me, in the heaviest hurricane, if I ever forget whence these things came, and why they were given." Here the worthy captain was obliged to swallow some wine, by way of relieving his emotions, and Aristabulus, profiting by the opportunity, coolly took the bowl, which, to use a word of his own, he _hefted_ in his hand, with a view to form some tolerably accurate notion of its intrinsic value. Captain Truck's eye caught the action, and he reclaimed his property quite as unceremoniously as it had been taken away, nothing but the presence of the ladies preventing an outbreaking that would have amounted to a declaration of war. "With your permission, sir," said the captain, drily, after he had recovered the bowl, not only without the other's consent, but, in some degree, against his will; "this bowl is as precious in my eyes as if it were made of my father's bones." "You may indeed think so," returned the land-agent, "for its cost could not be less than a hundred dollars." "Cost, sir!--But, my dear young lady, let us talk of the real value. For what part of these things am I indebted to you?" "The bowl is my offering," Eve answered, smilingly, though a tear glistened in her eye, as she witnessed the strong unsophisticated feeling of the old tar. "I thought it might serve sometimes to bring me to your recollection, when it was well filled in honour of 'sweethearts and wives.'" "It shall--it shall, by the Lord; and Mr. Saunders needs look to it, if he do not keep this work as bright as a cruising frigate's bottom. To whom do I owe the coal-tongs?" "Those are from Mr. John Effingham, who insists that he will come nearer to your heart than any of us, though the gift be of so little cost."