"A moment, child," said the old man, forgetting for the moment, apparently, his environment. "I must look at the ship. Good-morning, Barry," he continued, as the sailor approached him; "is it well with the ship?" "A good piece of it went down last night, your honor, I'm sorry to say. It lies off on the port side, yonder, under the lee, but nothin' vital yet, sir." "I did not think to see it this morning. Bit by bit it wears away. Well, please God, there will be an end some day." CHAPTER IX THE SWORD OF THE CONSTITUTION Clothed in his own uniform, but hardly in his right mind, Mr. Richard Revere sat down late in the afternoon to consider the situation. He had passed a delightfully idle day in the society of the admiral and his granddaughter; principally, it must be confessed, and in so far as he could contrive it, with the latter. Her cunning fingers had mended the rents in his uniform, which had been dried and put into a passably wearable condition. The versatility of her education and the variety of her accomplishments were evidenced to him when he saw that she wielded the needle as deftly as she steered the boat. They had sat on the porch most of the time in the pleasant fall weather, and the dozing old admiral offered but little check to the freedom of their intercourse. In response to her insistent questioning, this young Telemachus, cast up by the sea at her feet, poured into the ear of this new Calypso stories of the naval battles in which he had participated and whose honorable scars he bore. Like Desdemona, she loved him for the dangers he had passed. She was familiar with the history of the old navy, of which the admiral had been one of the brightest stars. Many a tale had the old man told her of storm and tempest, battle and triumph, shipwreck and disaster, and his own adventures and distinguished career she knew by heart. Although the great wave of the Civil War had ebbed and flowed far to the south of them, she and her grandfather had prayerfully and anxiously followed its mighty course, especially on the sea; yet it so happened that this was the first time that either of them had been brought in personal contact with its naval side. A returning volunteer, a wounded soldier,--for the little town had done its patriotic part with the rest,--had sometimes brought fresher news of the battles than might be read in the papers, but no sailor had come to tell them how Farragut had damned the torpedoes and steamed through the pass until Revere told the thrilling story of the immortal fight. The admiral waked up while this was being recounted, and he pressed the young man with the keen questions of a veteran who knew well the sound of battle and had fronted the enemy undismayed. Even the story of the wound that disabled Revere must be told, in spite of his reluctance to mention it, and Emily dropped the needle and listened with bated breath to the simple and modest recital.