Homeward Bound - James Fenimore Cooper (free e books to read .txt) 📗

together or not, for agreeable feelings give a fine appetite. Lovers make cheap passengers always."

"That is extr'or'nary, for I thought such as they was always hard to please, with every thing but one another."

"You never were more mistaken. I've seen a lover who couldn't tell a sweet potato from an onion, or a canvas-back from an old wife. But of all mortals in the way of passengers, the bagman or go-between is my greatest animosity. These fellows will sit up all night, if the captain consents, and lie abed next day, and do nothing but drink in their berths. Now, this time we have a compliable set, and on the whole, it is quite a condescension and pleasure to wait on them."

"Well, I think, Mr. Saunders, they isn't alike as much as they might be 'nother."

"Not more so than wenison and pig. Perfectly correct, sir; for this cabin is a lobskous as regards deportment and character. I set all the Effinghams down as tip-tops, or, A No. 1, as Mr. Leach calls the ship; and then Mr. Sharp and Mr. Blunt are quite the gentlemen. Nothing is easier, Mr. Toast, than to tell a gentleman; and as you have set up a new profession,--in which I hope, for the credit of the colour, you will be prosperous,--it is well worth your while to know how this is done, especially as you need never expect much from a passenger, that is not a true gentleman, but trouble. There is Mr. John Effingham, in particular; his man says he never anticipates change, and if a coat confines his arm, he repudiates it on the spot."

"Well, it must be a satisfaction to serve such a companion, I think Mr. Dodge, sir, quite a feller."

"Your taste, Toast, is getting to be observable, and by cultivating it, you will soon be remarkable for a knowledge of mankind. Mr. Dodge, as you werry justly insinuate, is not werry refined, or particularly well suited to figure in genteel society."

"And yet he seems attached to it Mr. Saunders, for he has purposed to establish five or six societies since we sailed."

"Werry true, sir; but then every society is not genteel. When we get back to New York, Toast, I must see and get you into a better set than the one you occupied when we sailed. You will not do yet for our circle, which is altogether conclusive; but you might be elevated. Mr. Dodge has been electioneering with me, to see if we cannot inwent a society among the steerage-passengers for the abstinence of liquors, and another for the perpetration of the morals and religious principles of our forefathers. As for the first, Toast, I told him it was sufficiently indurable to be confined in a hole like the steerage, without being percluded from the consolation of a little drink; and as for the last, it appeared to me that such a preposition inwolwed an attack on liberty of conscience."

"There you give'd him, sir, quite as good as he sent," returned the steward's mate, chuckling, or perhaps sniggering would be a word better suited to his habits of cachinnation, "and I should have been glad to witness his confusion. It seems to me, Mr. Saunders, that Mr. Dodge loves to get up his societies in support of liberty and religion, that he may predominate over both by his own inwentions."

Saunders laid his long yellow finger on the broad flat nose of his mate, with an air of approbation, as he replied,

"Toast, you have hit his character as pat as I touch your Roman. He is a man fit to make proselytes among the wulgar and Irish,"--the Hibernian peasant and the American negro are sworn enemies--"but quite unfit for anything respectable or decent. Were it not for Sir George, I would scarcely descend to clean his state-room."

"What is your sentiments, Mr. Saunders, respecting Sir George?"

"Why, Sir George is a titled gentleman, and of course is not to be strictured too freely. He has complimented me already with a sovereign, and apprised me of his intention to be more particular when we get in."

"I feel astonished such a gentleman should neglect to insure a state-room to his own convenience."

"Sir George has elucidated all that in a conversation we had in his room, soon after our acquaintance commenced. He is going to Canada on public business, and sailed at an hour's interval. He was too late for a single room, and his own man is to follow with most of his effects by the next ship. Oh! Sir George may be safely put down as respectable and liberalized, though thrown into disparagement perhaps by forty circumstances."

Mr. Saunders, who had run his vocabulary hard in this conversation, meant to say "fortuitous;" and Toast thought that so many circumstances might well reduce a better man to a dilemma. After a moment of thought, or what in his orbicular shining features he fancied passed for thought, he said,--

"I seem to diwine, Mr. Saunders, that the Effinghams do not much intimate Sir George."

Saunders looked out of the pantry-door to reconnoitre, and finding the sober quiet already described reigning, he opened a drawer, and drew forth a London newspaper.

"To treat you with the confidence of a gentleman in a situation as respectable and responsible as the one you occupy, Mr. Toast," he said, "a little ewent has transpired in my presence yesterday, that I thought sufficiently particular to be designated by retaining this paper. Mr. Sharp and Sir George happened to be in the cabin together, alone, and the last, as it suggested to me, Toast, was desirous of removing some of the haughter of the first, for you may have observed that there has been no conversation between any of the Effinghams, or Mr. Blunt, or Mr. Sharp, and the baronet; and so to break the ice of his haughter, as it might be, Sir George says, 'Really, Mr. Sharp, the papers have got to be so personally particular, that one cannot run into the country for a mouthful of fresh air that they don't record it. Now, I thought not a soul knew of my departure for America, and yet here you see they have mentioned it, with more particulars than are agreeable.' On concluding, Sir George gave Mr. Sharp this paper, and indicated this here paragraph. Mr. Sharp perused it, laid down the paper, and retorted coldly, 'It is indeed quite surprising, sir; but impudence is a general fault of the age.' And then he left the cabin solus. Sir George was so wexed, he went into his state-room and forgot the paper, which fell to the steward, you know, on a principle laid down in Wattel, Toast"

Here the two worthies indulged in a smothered merriment of their own at the expense of their commander; for though a dignified man in general, Mr. Saunders could laugh on occasion, and according to his own opinion of himself he danced particularly well.

"Would you like to read the paragraph, Mr. Toast?"

"Quite unnecessary, sir; your account will be perfectly legible and satisfactory."

By this touch of politeness, Mr. Toast, who knew as much of the art of reading as a monkey commonly knows of mathematics, got rid of the awkwardness of acknowledging the careless manner in which he had trifled with his early opportunities. Luckily, Mr. Saunders, who had been educated as a servant in a gentleman's family, was better off, and as he was vain of all his advantages, he was particularly pleased to have an opportunity of exhibiting them. Turning to the paragraph he read the following lines, in that sort of didactic tone and elaborate style with which gentlemen who commence the graces after thirty are a little apt to make bows:

"We understand Sir George Templemore, Bart., the member for Boodleigh, is about to visit our American colonies, with a view to make himself intimately acquainted with the merits of the unpleasant questions by which they are just now agitated, and with the intention of entering into the debates in the house on that interesting subject on his return. We believe that Sir George will sail in the packet of the first from Liverpool, and will return in time to be in his seat after the Easter holidays. His people and effects left town yesterday by the Liverpool coach. During the baronet's absence, his country will be hunted by Sir Gervaise de Brush, though the establishment at Templemore Hall will be kept up."

"How came Sir George here, then?" Mr. Toast very naturally inquired.

"Having been kept too late in London, he was obliged to come this way or to be left. It is sometimes as close work to get the passengers on board, Mr. Toast, as to get the people. I have often admired how gentlemen and ladies love procrastinating, when dishes that ought to be taken hot, are getting to be quite insipid and uneatable."

"Saunders!" cried the hearty voice of Captain Truck, who had taken possession of what he called his throne in the cabin. All the steward's elegant diction and finish of demeanour vanished at the well-known sound, and thrusting his head out of the pantry-door, he gave the prompt ship-answer to a call,

"Ay, ay, sir!"

"Come, none of your dictionary in the pantry there, but show your physiognomy in my presence. What the devil do you think Vattel would say to such a supper as this?"

"I think, sir, he would call it a werry good supper, for a ship in a hard gale of wind. That's my honest opinion, Captain Truck, and I never deceive any gentleman in a matter of food. I think, Mr. Wattel would approve of that there supper, sir."

"Perhaps he might, for he has made blunders as well as another man. Go, mix me a glass of just what I love when I've not had a drop all day. Gentlemen, will any of you honour me, by sharing in a cut? This beef is not indigestible, and here is a real Marylander, in the way of a ham. No want of oakum to fill up the chinks with, either."

Most of the gentlemen were too full of the gale to wish to eat; besides they had not fasted like Captain Truck since morning. But Mr. Monday, the bagman, as John Effingham had termed him, and who had been often enough at sea to know something of its varieties, consented to take a glass of brandy and water, as a corrective of the Madeira he had been swallowing. The appetite of Captain Truck was little affected by the state of the weather, however; for though too attentive to his duties to quit the deck until he had ascertained how matters were going on, now that he had fairly made up his mind to eat, he set about it with a heartiness and simplicity that proved his total disregard of appearances when his hunger was sharp. For some time he was too much occupied to talk, making regular attacks upon the different plats , as Mr. Saunders called them, without much regard to the cookery or the material. The only pauses were to drink, and this was always done with a steadiness that never left a drop in the glass. Still Mr. Truck was a temperate man; for he never consumed more than his physical wants appeared to require, or his physical energies knew how to dispose of. At length, however, he came to the steward's entremets , or he began to stuff what he, himself, had called "oakum," into the chinks of his dinner.

Mr. Sharp had watched the whole process from the ladies'