To see one's native land receding through
The growing waters.—Byron.
The day brightened as the steamer bore out to sea, and the sun streamed along the fast-receding shore. Morton stood at the ship's stern, gazing back longingly towards his native rocks. Though far from inclining to echo those set terms of praise which the progeny of the Puritans are fond of lavishing on themselves, he felt himself bound with enduring cords to the woods and hills of New England, the scene of his boyish aspirations, of his pure ambition, and his devoted love; and while the crags of Gloucester faded from his sight, his eyes were dimmed as he turned them towards those rugged shores.
"Well, young man, seems to me you look a leetle kind o' streak-ed at the idee of quitting home," said a husky voice at his elbow.
Morton turned, and saw a small man, with a meagre, hatchet face, and a huge pair of black whiskers hedging round a countenance so dead and pallid that one could see at a glance that he was in a consumption. He had an eye hard as a flint, one that might have faced a Gorgon without risk. Morton regarded him with an expression which told him, as plainly as words, to go about his business; but he might as well have tried to look an image of brass out of countenance.
"Now I," pursued the small man, "have some reason to feel bad. It's an even bet if ever I see Boston lighthouse again—about six of one and half a dozen of the other. I consider myself a gone sucker. I've ben going, going, for about two years, and pretty soon I expect I shall be going, going, gone."
These words, uttered in a sort of bravado, were interrupted by a violent fit of coughing.
"Ever crossed the pond before?" asked the small man, as soon as he could gain breath.
"Yes."
"Business?"
"No."
"I thought not. You don't look like a business man. I know a business man, a mile off, by the cut of his jib. I'm a business man myself, and a hard used one at that."
Here a fresh fit of coughing began.
"Bad health; bad health, and damned hard luck, that's what has finished up this child. If it worn't for them, I should be worth my hundred thousand dollars this very minute."
Another fit of coughing.
"So you've ben across before. Well, so've I. That was three years ago, by the doctors' advice. It's great advice they give a man. It's good for their pockets, and there's deused little else it's good for. I spent that year over three thousand dollars; and if I'd staid to home, and stuck to my business, I should have ben jest about as well, and cleared,—well, yes, I should have cleared double the money, at the smallest figger."
More coughing.
"I expect you travel for pleasure."
Morton replied by an inarticulate sound, which the other might interpret as he pleased. He chose to interpret it in the affirmative.
"Well, that's all very well for a young man like you. You are young enough to like to look at the curiosities, and take an interest in what's going on; but I'm too old a bird for that. One night I was down to Palermo, there was an eruption of Mount Etna going on. We were on the piazzy at the back of Marston the consul's house, and there it was blazing away to kill, way off on the further side of the island. Well, the ladies was all O-ing and Ah-ing like fits. 'Nonsense!' says I; 'it ain't a circumstance to the fire that burnt down my splendid new freestone-front store on Broadway. Now that was something worth saying O at.'"
More coughing.
"There was a young man there from Boston, and we went round to look at the churches. He was all for staring at the pictures, and the marble images, and the Lord knows what all, while I went and paced off the length of the church from the door up to the altar, and then again crosswise. There wasn't a church in Palermo worth shaking a stick at that I didn't know the size of, and have it all set down on paper."
"And what good did that do you?"
"What good did that do me? Why, I had something to show for my pains, something that would keep. They wanted me to ride up on the back of a jackass to the top of a mountain to see a cavern where some she saint or other used to live,—St. Rosa Lee, or some such nigger-minstrel name."
"St. Rosalie, I suppose you mean."
"St. Rosaly or St. Rosa Lee, it comes to pretty much the same. She was fool enough to leave a comfortable home—inside of a palace, too, be gad—and go and live all alone by herself in that cavern. Well, they wanted me to ride up on the jackass and see it. 'No,' says I, 'you don't ketch me,' says I; 'if I did, I might as well change places with the jackass right away,' says I."
A fresh fit of coughing.
"Yes, sir, bad health and hard luck, that's ben the finishing of me, or else this minute I could show you my solid hundred thousand. The fire was what begun it all. A splendid freestone-front store, that hadn't its beat in all New York, chock full of goods, that worn't more than half covered by the insurance, burnt clean down to the sidewalk! Then come the great failure you've heard of—Bragg, Dash, and Bustup. I tell you, I was sucked in there to a handsome figger. Top of all that, my health caved in,—uh,—uh,—uh." Here the coughing grew violent. "Well, I'm a gone sucker, and it's no use crying over spilt milk. But if it worn't for bad health and damned hard luck, I should have been worth a hun—uh—uh—uh—a hundred thousand dol—uh—uh—dollars,—uh—uh—uh—uh—uh."
"This wind is too sharp for you," observed Morton.
"Fact," said the invalid; "I can't stand it no how."
He went down to the cabin, Morton's eye following him in pity and disgust.