When I awoke next morning, the first thing I did was to reconnoitre how
our little and most unexpected visitor held out. There lay the fair
child, steeped in a balmy slumber, with his downy cheeks as peachlike
and blooming as ever; even his hair, with the crystallized salt
sparkling amongst it, once more curled thick and clustering round his
magnificent forehead.
"Art them a thing of mortal birth,
Whose happy home is on our earth?
Does human blood with life embue
Those wandering veins of heavenly blue,
That stray along thy forehead fair,
Lost 'mid a gleam of golden hair?
Oh, can that light and airy breath
Steal from a being doomed to death;
Those features to the grave be sent,
In sleep thus mutely eloquent?
Or art thou what thy form would seem,
The phantom of a blessed dream?"
As I stooped over him he awoke, and stretched out his arms in the
evident expectation of clasping some one that he had been accustomed to
lie beside; alas! they touched the cold hard ship's side. He grew
startled, and called on his mother and then on his father, on his
grandfather, and his dear aunt Emily, waiting between each exclamation
for the wonted caress or answer. His eye caught mine--he looked
surprised, and peered anxiously all about the cabin, until at last, as
if he really had comprehended the full extent of his desolation, he
began to cry bitterly, and to sob as if his little heart would have
burst. Lennox and I did every thing in our power to pacify him; but
who could come in stead to him of those whose hearts were now cold for
ever? I could not stand it, and went on deck, leaving him in the hands
of the steward.
The weather was now clear, and the sea had gone down; the frigate was
about a mile and a half on our lee-bow, carrying all sail, so that we
had to crack on to keep up with her. During that forenoon and the
following day we had no communication together; but about 11 A.M. on
the third day after the ship had foundered, we got so well placed on
her quarter as to be able to communicate without trumpets.
The commodore hailed first--"Sad accident that t'other day, Mr Lanyard."
"Very, sir."
"All hands lost, I presume?"
Before Dick could answer, he continued, evidently in great amazement,
"What child is that, Mr Brail?" I looked round, and was a good deal
surprised to see the figure the little stranger now cut. When picked
up he had nothing on but his little frock and shift, which had been
torn in the getting of him in; so Lennox and the sailmaker had rigged
him in a tiny check-frock, with white lappels, a pair of little duck
trowsers, with large horn buttons; very wide at the feet, and very
tight at the waist--cut in the very extreme of nautical dandyism;
little white canvass shoes, and a small tarpauling hat. They had even
hung by a piece of spunyarn a small horn-handled clasp-knife round his
neck, so that he was a complete topman in miniature.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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