For there was the commodore roused up from his sleep, with his gray hair and beard standing out all ways, like the picture of the sun in an almanac. And there was Mrs. Waugh, with the great-tooth comb in her hand. And Mary L'Osieau, with the pantry keys. And the maid, Maria, with the wooden tray of flour on her head. And Festus, with a bag of meal in his hands. And all with their eyes and ears and mouths agape with amazement and inquiry. "In the fiend's name, what's the matter? What the d----l's broke loose? Is the house on fire again?" vociferated the commodore, seeing that no one else spoke; "what's all this about, Nace Grimshaw?" "Ask your pretty niece, sir!" said the professor, sternly, turning away. "Oh, it's you, is it, you little termagant you? Oh, you're a honey-cooler. What have you been doing now, Imp?" cried the old man, turning fiercely to Jacquelina. "Answer me, you little vixen!--what does all this mean?" "Better ask 'the gentlemanly professor' why he seized and nearly shook the head off my shoulders and the breath out of my bosom!" said Jacquelina, half-crying, half-laughing. The commodore turned furiously toward Grim. Shaking a woman's head off her shoulders, and breath out of her body, in his house, did not suit his ideas of gallantry at all, rough as he was. "By heaven! are you mad, sir? What have you been doing? I never laid the weight of my hand on Jacquelina in all my life, wild as she has driven me at times. Explain your brutality, sir." "It was to force from her hand a paper which she has swallowed," said Dr. Grimshaw, with stern coldness regarding the group. "Swallowed! swallowed!" shrieked Mrs. Waugh, rushing toward Jacquelina, and seizing one of her arms, and gazing in her face, thinking only of poisons and of Jacko's frequent threats of suicide. "Swallowed! swallowed! Where did she get it? Who procured it for her? What was it? Oh, run for the doctor, somebody. What are you all standing like you were thunderstruck for? Dr. Grimshaw, start a boy on horseback immediately for a physician. Tell him to tell the doctor to bring a stomach pump with him. You had better go yourself. Oh, hasten; not a single moment is to be lost. Jacquelina, my dear, do you begin to feel sick? Do you feel a burning in your throat and stomach? Oh, my dear child! how came you to do such a rash act?" Jacko broke into a loud laugh. "Oh! crazy! crazy! it is something that affects her brain she has taken. Oh! Dr. Grimshaw, how can you have the heart to stand there and not go? Probably opium." Jacko laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks--never, since her marriage, had Jacko laughed so much. "Oh, Dr. Grimshaw! Don't you see she is getting worse and worse. How can you have the heart to stand there and not go for a physician?" said Mrs. Waugh, while Mary L'Oiseau looked on, mute with terror, and the commodore stood with his fat eyes protruding nearly to bursting. "Go, oh, go, Dr. Grimshaw!" insisted Mrs. Waugh.