“I remember. You told me that once before. Do you know your brother Peter would not look at her?” “That was strange,” said Mrs. Bloommaert. “What was the matter with Peter?” “Peter always looks on a ship as a woman, and he cannot bear to see her in distress.” “It is a strange feeling, that, between ships and ship men,” said Dr. Smith. “Sailors all give them consciousness and sympathy, and it is a common thing to hear them say of any craft, ‘she behaves well.’ Captain Tim Barnard of the privateer _General Armstrong_, when chasing an enemy, talks to his ship, as an Arabian to his horse; urges her, entreats her to put forth all her speed, makes her promises of additional guns, or a new flag, and, what is more, he firmly believes she understands and obeys him.” “Well,” answered the judge, “every one I know connected with shipping speaks as commonly and as naturally of the average life of a ship as they do of the average life of a sailor.” “Once,” said Achille, “when I was in England I watched from the cliff a ship in danger. She flashed out signals of distress, and her minute guns sounded like the cries of some living creature, and as I looked and listened I saw men running to some boats that were lying half-alive on their stocks, and in a moment they were in the raving, raging sea. Boats and men seemed alike eager and pitiful. And the gallant ship! She was like a mother in extremity--if she must go, she entreated that her sons might be saved.” “Were they?” “Yes, all of them; but the next morning her figure-head, looking seaward wistfully, was lying on the beach; and her broken rudder beside it. They were sadder than spoken words. No one saw the ship die. She went down to her grave alone--but I think she was glad of that.” “Come, come then,” said Peter, who had entered during this conversation, “we need not go so far afield for splendid facts. Let us remember the nineteenth of last August, when Captain Isaac Hull wounded to death the fine British man-of-war _Guerrière_. It was seen at once that her case was hopeless, and the _Constitution_ watched by her all night, and removed not only all her men, but also all their private possessions. On the morning of the twentieth she was ready for her grave. A slow match was applied to her magazine, and the _Constitution_ bore away. At a safe distance she hove to, and the officers and men of both ships stood watching. The guns which had been left shotted soon began to go off. They were the death knells of the dying man-of-war. Presently the flames reached the magazine, a mass of wreckage flew skyward. The _Guerrière_ was no more. But William Storey, who was present, told me every man stood bare-headed as she sank, and that her officers wept, while some of her men blubbered like children.” “Thank you, Peter,” said the judge. “It is a good thing to hear that Hull was so noble to his prisoners.”