“He jump up as smart a’most as if he’d bin in the open air, an’ they obsarved, when he turned round, that a huge lobster of some unbeknown species was holdin’ on to his trousers with all its claws like a limpet! The fish — or ripslang, as one of the men called it, who said he knowed it well — turned out to be a pugnaceous creetur, for no sooner did it see Skinclip’s great eyes lookin’ at it in horror, than it set up its frill of spikes, threw for’ard the long horns, an’ went slap at the bull’s-eye fit to drive it in. Skinclip he putt down his head, an’ the ripslang made five or six charges at the helmet without much effect. Then it changed its tactics, turned on its side, wriggled under the helmet, an’ looked in at Skinclip with one of its glarin’ eyes close to the glass. At the same time the lobster gave him a tree-mendious tug behind. This was more than Skinclip could stand. They see’d him jump round, seize the life-line, an’ give it four deadly pulls, but his comrades paid no attention to it. The lobster gave him another tug, an’ the ripslang prepared for another charge. It seemed to have got some extra spikes set up in its wrath, for its whole body was bristlin’ more or less by this time.

  “Again Skinclip tugged like a maniac at the line. The ripslang charged; the lobster tugged; the poor feller stepped back hastily, got his heels entangled in sea-weed, and went down head first into the grove!

  “The men got alarmed by this time, so they pulled him up as fast as they could, an’ got him inboard in a few minutes; but they do say,” added Maxwell, with emphasis, “that that ripslang leaped right out o’ the water arter him, an’ the lobster held on so that they had to chop its claws off with a hatchet to make it let go. They supped off it the game night, and long Tom Skinclip, who owned an over strong appetite, had a bad fit of indisgestion in consikence.”

  Chapter Twenty Three.

  More about the Sea.

  Once more we beg our reader to accompany us to sea — out into the thick darkness, over the wild waves, far from the abodes of man.

  There, one night in December, a powerful steamer did battle with a tempest. The wind was against her, and, as a matter of course, also the sea. The first howled among her rigging with what might have been styled vicious violence. The seas hit her bows with a fury that caused her to stagger, and, bursting right over her bulwarks at times, swept the decks from stem to stern, but nothing could altogether stop her onward progress. The sleepless monster in the hold, with a heart of fervent heat, and scalding breath of intense energy, and muscles of iron mould, and an indomitable — yet to man submissive — will, wrought on night and day unweariedly, driving the floating palace straight and steadily on her course — homeward-bound.

  Down in the cabin, in one of the side berths lay a female form. Opposite to it, in a similar berth, lay another female form. Both forms were very limp. The faces attached to the forms were pale yellow, edged here and there with green.

  “My dear,” sighed one of the forms, “this is dreadful!”

  After a long silence, as though much time were required for the inhalation of sufficient air for the purpose, the other form replied: —

  “Yes, Laura, dear, it is dreadful.”

  “‘Ave a cup of tea, ladies?” said the stewardess, opening the door just then, and appearing at an acute angle with the doorway, holding a cup in each hand.

  Miss Pritty shuddered and covered her head with the bed-clothes. Aileen made the form of “no, thanks,” with her lips, and shut her eyes.

  “Do ‘ave a cup,” said the stewardess, persuasively.

  The cups appeared at that moment inclined to “‘ave” a little game of hide-and-seek, which the stewardess nimbly prevented by suddenly forming an obtuse angle with the floor, and following that action up with a plunge to starboard, and a heel to port, that was suggestive — at least to a landsman — of an intention to baptise Miss Pritty with hot tea, and thereafter take a “header” through the cabin window into the boiling sea! She did neither, however, but, muttered something about “‘ow she do roll, to be sure,” and, seeing that her mission was hopeless, left the cabin with a balked stagger and a sudden rush, which was appropriately followed up by the door shutting itself with a terrific bang, as though it should say, “You might have known as much, goose! Why did you open me?”

  “Laura, dear,” said Aileen, “did you hear what the captain said to some one just now in the cabin, when the door was open?”

  “N–no,” replied Miss Pritty, faintly.

  “I distinctly heard some one ask how fast we were going, but I could not make out his reply.”

  “Oh!” exclaimed the other, brightening for a brief moment; “yes, I did hear him. He said we were going six knots. Now I do not understand what that means.”

  “Did you mean that?” asked Aileen, turning her eyes languidly on her friend, while a faint smile flickered on her mouth.

  “Mean what?” said Miss Pritty, in evident surprise.

  “No, I see you didn’t. Well, a knot means, I believe, a nautical mile.”

  “A notticle mile, Aileen; what is that?”

  “A nautical mile; dear me, how stupid you are, Laura!”

  “Oh! I understand. But, really, the noise of that screw makes it difficult to hear distinctly. And, after all, it is no wonder if I am stupid, for what between eating nothing but pickles for six weeks, and this dreadful — there! Oh! It comes ag—”

  Poor Miss Pritty stopped abruptly, and made a desperate effort to think of home. Aileen, albeit full of sympathy, turned her face to the wall, and lay with closed eyes.

  After a time the latter looked slowly round.

  “Are you asleep, Laura?”

  Miss Pritty gave a sharp semi-hysterical laugh at the bare idea of such an impossible condition.

  “Well, I was going to say,” resumed Aileen, “that we cannot be very far from land now, and when we do get there—”

  “Happy day!” murmured Miss Pritty.

  “We intend,” continued Aileen, “to go straight home — I — I mean to our old home, sell everything at once, and go to live in a cottage — quite a tiny cottage — by the sea somewhere. Now, I want you to come and visit us the very day we get into our cottage. I know you would like it — would like being with me, wouldn’t you?”

  “Like it? I should delight in it of all things.”

  “I knew you would. Well, I was going to say that it would be such a kindness to dear papa too, for you know he will naturally be very low-spirited when we make the change — for it is a great change, Laura, greater perhaps than you, who have never been very rich, can imagine, and I doubt my capacity to be a good comforter to him though I have all the will.”

  Two little spots of red appeared for the first time for many weeks on Miss Pritty’s cheeks, as she said in a tone of enthusiasm: —

  “What! You not a good comforter? I’ve a good mind to refuse your invitation, since you dare to insinuate that I could in any degree supplement you in such a matter.”

  “Well, then, we won’t make any more insinuations,” returned Aileen, with a sad smile; “but you’ll come — that’s settled. You know, dear, that we had lost everything, but ever since our jewel-case was found by — by—”

  “By Edgar,” said Miss Pritty; “why don’t you go on?”

  “Yes, by Mr Berrington,” continued Aileen, “ever since that, papa has been very hopeful. I don’t know exactly what his mind runs on, but I can see that he is making heaps of plans in regard to the future, and oh! You can’t think how glad and how thankful I am for the change. The state of dull, heartbreaking, weary depression that he fell into just after getting the news of our failure was beginning to undermine his health. I could see that plainly, and felt quite wretched about him. But now he is comparatively cheerful, and so gentle too. Do you know, I have been thinking a good deal lately of the psalmist’s saying, ‘it is good for me that I have been afflicted;’ and, in the midst of it all, our Heavenly Father remembered mercy, for it was He who sent our jewel-box, as if to prevent the burden from being too heavy for papa.”

  Miss Pritty’s kind face beamed agreement with these sentiments.

  “Now,” continued Aileen, “these jewels are, it seems, worth a great deal of money — much more than I had any idea of — for there are among them a number of very fine diamond rings and brooches. In fact, papa told me that he believed the whole were worth between eight and nine thousand pounds. This, you know, is a sum which will at least raise us above want, (poor Miss Pritty, well did she know that!) — though of course it will not enable us to live very luxuriously. How fortunate it was that these pirates—”

  “Oh!” screamed Miss Pritty, suddenly, as she drew the clothes over her head.

  “What’s the matter?” exclaimed Aileen; “are you going to be—”

  “Oh! No, no, no,” said Miss Pritty, peeping out again; “how could you bring these dreadful creatures to my remembrance so abruptly? I had quite forgotten them for the time. Why, oh why did you banish from my mind that sweet idea of a charming cottage by the sea, and all its little unluxurious elegancies, and call up in its place the h–h–horrors of that village-nest — pig-sty — of the dreadful buccaneers? But it can’t be helped now,” added Miss Pritty, with a resigned shudder, “and we have the greatest reason to be thankful that their hope of a good ransom made them treat us as well as they did; — but go on, dear, you were saying that it was fortunate that these p–pirates—”

  “That they did not sell the jewels or take any of them out of the box, or send them into the other prow which was sunk in deep water, where the divers could not have gone down to recover them.”

  “Very true,” assented Miss Pritty.

  At this point the cabin door again burst open, and the amiable stewardess appeared, bearing two cups of fresh tea, which she watched with the eyes of a tigress and the smile of an angel, while her body kept assuming sudden, and one would have thought impossible, attitudes.

  “Now, ladies, do try some tea. Really you must. I insist on it. Why, you’ll both die if you don’t.”

  Impressed with the force of this reasoning, both ladies made an effort, and got up on their respective elbows. They smiled incredulously at each other, and then, becoming suddenly grave, fell flat down on their backs, and remained so for some time without speaking.

  “Now, try again; do try, it will do you so much good — really.”

  Thus adjured they tried again and succeeded. Aileen took one sip of tea, spilt much of the rest in thrusting it hurriedly into the ready hands of the all but ubiquitous stewardess, and fell over with her face to the wall. Miss Pritty looked at her tea for a few seconds, earnestly. The stewardess, not being quite ubiquitous, failed to catch the cup as it was wildly held towards her. Miss Pritty therefore capsized the whole affair over her bed-clothes, and fell back with a deadly groan.

  The stewardess did not lose temper. She was used to such things. If Miss Pritty had capsized her intellect over the bed-clothes, the stewardess would only have smiled, and wiped it up with a napkin.

  “You’ll be better soon, Miss,” said the amiable woman, as she retired with the débris.

  The self-acting door shut her out with a bang of contemptuous mockery, and the poor ladies were once more left alone in their misery.

  Chapter Twenty Four.

  Taking the Tide at the Ebb.

  When things in this world reach their lowest ebb, it is generally understood or expected that the tide will turn, somehow, and rise. Not unfrequently the understanding and the expectation are disappointed. Still, there are sufficiently numerous instances of the fulfilment of both, to warrant the hope which is usually entertained by men and women whose tide has reached its lowest.

  Mr Hazlit was naturally of a sanguine temperament. He entertained, we had almost said, majestic views on many points. Esteeming himself “a beggar” on three hundred a year — the remains of the wreck of his vast fortune — he resolved to commence business again. Being a man of strict probity and punctuality in all business matters, and being much respected and sympathised with by his numerous business friends, he experienced little difficulty in doing so. Success attended his efforts; the tide began to rise.

  Seated in a miniature parlour, before a snug fire, in his cottage by the sea, with one of the prettiest girls in all England by his side, knitting him a pair of inimitable socks, the “beggar” opened his mouth slowly and spake.

  “Aileen,” said he, “I’ve been a fool!”

  Had Mr Hazlit said so to some of his cynical male friends they might have tacitly admitted the fact, and softened the admission with a smile. As it was, his auditor replied: —

  “No, papa, you have not.”

  “Yes, my love, I have. But I do not intend to prove the point or dispute it. There is a tide in the affairs of men which, taken at the ebb, leads on to fortune.”

  Aileen suspended her knitting and looked at her sire with some surprise, for, being a very matter-of-fact unpoetical man, this misquotation almost alarmed her.

  “‘Taken at the flood,’ is it not, papa?”

  “It may be so in Shakespeare’s experience. I say the ebb. When first I was reduced to beggary—”

  “You never were that, papa. We have never yet had to beg.”

  “Of course, of course,” said Mr Hazlit, with a motion of his hand to forbid further interruption. “When I say ‘beggary,’ you know what I mean. I certainly do not mean that I carry a wallet and a staff, and wear ragged garments, and knock at backdoors. Well, when I was reduced to beggary, I had reached the lowest ebb. At that time I was led — mark me, I was led — to ‘take the tide.’ I took it, and have been rising with the flood to fortune ever since. And yet, strange to say, though I am now rich in a way I never before dreamed of, I have still an insane thirst for earthly gold. What was the passage, dear, that you quoted to me as being your text for the day?”

  “‘Owe no man anything,’” replied Aileen.

  “Yes, it is curious. I have never mentioned the subject to you, my child, but some months ago — when, as I have said, the tide was very low — I was led to consider that passage, and under the influence of it I went to my creditors and delivered up to them your box of jewels. You are aware, no doubt, that having passed through the insolvency court, and given up all that I possessed, I became legally free. This box was recovered from the deep, and restored to me after my effects had been given up to my creditors, so that I might have retained it. But I felt that this would have been unjust. I respect the law which, after a man has given up all he possesses, sets him free to begin life again with some degree of hope, but I cannot avoid coming to the conclusion that moral duties cannot be abrogated by human laws. I take advantage of the law to prevent inhuman creditors from grinding me to death, but I refuse to take advantage of the law so as to escape from the clear duty that I ought to pay these creditors — gradually and according to my ability — to the uttermost farthing. Having been led to act on this opinion, I gave up the box of jewels. To my surprise, my creditors refused to take them. They returned them to me as a gift. I accepted the gift as a trust. On the proceeds, as you see, we manage to live comfortably, and I am now conducting a fairly successful business in the old line — on a small scale.”

  Mr Hazlit smiled sadly as he uttered the last words.

  “And the debts, papa, which you told me once were so heavy, do you mean to pay them all?” asked Aileen, anxiously.

  “I do,” replied her father, earnestly; “by slow degrees it may be, but to the last farthing if I live. I shall try to owe no man anything.”

  A glad smile lit up Aileen’s face as she was on the point of throwing her arms round her father’s neck, when the door opened, and a small domestic — their only one besides the cook — put a letter into the hands of her young mistress.

  Aileen’s countenance assumed a troubled look a she handed it to her father.

  “It is for you, papa.”

  Mr Hazlit’s visage also assumed an expression of anxiety as he opened and read the letter. It ran thus: —

  “Deer Sur, — i thinks it unkomon ‘ard that a man shood ‘ave is beed sold under im wen anuther man oas im munny, speshally wen is wifes ill — praps a-dyin — the Law has washt yoo sur, but it do seam ‘ard on me, if yoo cood spair ony a pownd or two id taik it kind. — Yoors to komand, John Timms.”

  “This is very much to the point,” said Mr Hazlit, with a faint smile, handing the letter to Aileen. “It is, as you see, from our old green-grocer, who must indeed be in great trouble when he, who used to be so particularly civil, could write in that strain to me. Now, Aileen, I want your opinion on a certain point. In consequence of your economical ways, my love, I find myself in a position to give fifty pounds this half-year towards the liquidation of my debts.”

  The merchant paused, smiled, and absolutely looked a little confused. The idea of commencing to liquidate many thousands of pounds by means of fifty was so inexpressibly ridiculous, that he half expected to hear his own respectful child laugh at him. But Aileen did not laugh. With her large earnest eyes she looked at him, and the unuttered language of her pursed, grave, little mouth was “Well, go on.”

  “The liquidation of my debts,” repeated Mr Hazlit, firmly. “The sum is indeed a small one — a paltry one — compared with the amount of these debts, but the passage which we have been considering appears to me to leave no option, save to begin at once, even on the smallest possible scale. Now, my love, duty requires that I should at once begin to liquidate. Observe, the law of the land requires nothing. It has set me free, but the law of God requires that I should pay, at once, as I am able. Conscience echoes the law, and says, ‘pay.’ What, therefore, am I to do?”