The Story of Paul Jones: An Historical RomanceLewis, Alfred Henry
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The Story of Paul Jones: An Historical Romance
Lewis, Alfred Henry
Jones, John Paul, 1747-1792 -- Fiction
“The first craft, outward bound for England, shall do,” thinks first
mate Jack Paul. “As to William, I’ll defer my visit until I may go
ashore to him without bringing the yellow jack upon half Virginia.”
While waiting for that home-bound ship, first mate Jack Paul goes upon a
pilgrimage of respect to the tomb of Admiral Benbow. That sea-wolf lies
buried in the parish chapel-yard in King Street.
As first mate Jack Paul leaves the little burying-ground, he runs foul
of a polite adventure which, in its final expression, will have effect
upon his destiny. His aid is enlisted in favor of a lady in trouble.
The troubled lady, fat, florid and forty, is being conveyed along King
Street in her _ketureen_, a sort of sedan chair on two wheels, drawn by
a half-broken English horse. The horse, excited by a funeral procession
of dancing, singing, shouting blacks, capsizes the _ketureen_, and the
fat, florid one is decanted upon the curb at the feet of first mate
Jack Paul. Alive to what is Christian in the way of duty, he raises the
florid, fat decanted one, and congratulates her upon having suffered no
harm.
The _ketureen_ is restored to an even keel. The fat, florid one boards
it, though not before she invites first mate Jack Paul to dinner.
Being idle, lonesome, and hungry for English dishes, he accepts,
and accompanies the fat, florid one in the dual guise of guest and
bodyguard.
Sir Holman Hardy, husband to the fat, florid one, is as fatly florid as
his spouse. Incidentally he is in command of what British soldiers are
stationed at Kingston. The fat, florid one presents first mate Jack Paul
to her Hector, tells the tale of the rescue, and thereupon the three go
in to dinner. Later, first mate Jack Paul and his host smoke in the
deep veranda, where, during the cool of the evening, Sir Holman drinks
sangaree, and first mate Jack Paul drinks Madeira. Also Sir Holman
inveighs against the Horse Guards for consigning him to such a pit of
Tophet as is Kingston.
Between sangaree and maledictions levelled at the Horse Guards, Sir
Holman gives first mate Jack Paul word of a brig, the _King George’s
Packet_, out of China for Kingston with tea, which he looks for every
day. Discharging its tea, the _King George’s Packet_ will load with rum
for Whitehaven; and Sir Holman declares that first mate Jack Paul shall
sail therein, a passenger-guest, for home. Sir Holman is able to promise
this, since the fat, florid rescued one is the child of Shipowner Donald
of Donald, Currie & Beck, owners of the _King George’s Packet_.
“Which makes me,” expounds Sir Holman, his nose in the sangaree, “a kind
of son-in-law to the brig itself.”
He grumblingly intimates--he is far gone in sangaree at the time--that a
fleet of just such sea-trinkets as the _King George’s Packet_, so far
as he has experimented with the marital condition, constitutes the one
redeeming feature of wedlock.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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