List, Ye Landsmen! A Romance of IncidentRussell, William Clark
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List, Ye Landsmen! A Romance of Incident
Russell, William Clark
English fiction -- 19th century; Sea stories
Galloon had followed me into the cabin, and bore me company. He sat upon
his chair and gazed at me affectionately when I talked to him. Often had
I talked out my mind to Galloon. Often in quiet, lonely watches, during
the outward passage, had I held his ears, while his fore paws rested
upon my knees, and given loose to the imaginations which the prospect of
the promise of realizing thirty thousand dollars raised up in me. And
then, again, I loved this dog as the savior of my life. Never could I
look into his affectionate, liquid, intelligent eye, but that I would
think to myself, and often say aloud to him, dog as he was, a poor
four-footed beast, soulless, as it is commonly supposed, of affections
to be best won by kicks and curses--that he had, by saving my life,
become in a sense the creator of a man, the renewer of a being deemed by
his own species immortal in spirit, so that whatever I did a dog would
be answerable for; the existence of all passions in me, my pleasures and
hopes and griefs; nay, my marriage, should ever I marry, and the
children I begot, would be all chargeable upon a poor dog, God wot! a
strange thing to reflect on by one who has been made to believe, all his
life, that he is only a little lower than the angels, and yet true as
the blessed sunlight itself; for if it had not been for Galloon, long
ago I should have been--what? the roe of a herring, perhaps, the liver
of a cod--instead of a man, capable of looking back, through a long
avenue of years, and of moralizing thus.
When I came on deck I found Antonio standing in front of Greaves, cap in
hand, translating for him and the lady. On my appearing, Miss Aurora
exclaimed quickly and eagerly to the Spaniard, who turning to me, said,
squinting as he spoke:
“The señorita has met you before.”
“Where?” said I.
“At Lima, señor.”
“Never was at Lima in my life.”
He translated; she made a little dignified gesture of impatience.
“The lady says that she has met you at the house of----” and here
Antonio named a Spanish merchant of Lima.
“No,” said I, looking at her and shaking my head.
“Yes,” she cried in English, and spoke rapidly to Antonio.
“She is not mistaken, _caballero_. Two thumbs are alike, but two faces
never.”
“You never were at Lima?” said Greaves.
“Never,” I exclaimed, laughing.
“Let her have her way,” said Greaves. “Contrive to have visited Lima,
and to have been a bosom friend of Don----,” and he named the Spanish
merchant. “What does it signify? May it not mean that she is in love
with you, and that her professing to have met you is a Spanish maiden’s
device to cover an advance, as a soldier would say.”
Antonio continued to squint. I viewed him narrowly, and was satisfied
that he had not understood the captain’s words.
“Beg the lady to continue her narrative,” said Greaves.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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