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from whose cruelty, devastations, and anarchy, the | his assailants, all of whom had been struck down Enfeebled as despotism of Louis the Fourteenth was a refuge. by his own sword on the same spot. Miss Pardoe justly observes, that it has been he was, he succeeded in disengaging himself from too much the fashion to look at the splendid qual- saddle of a led horse, which had been prepared in the his dead charger; and once more leaping into the ities of Francis the First, and to overlook the vices event of such an emergency, he turned one long both of the man and the monarch. We think, and regretful glance upon the chivalrous little however, his reputation has been built upon the group who had so lately formed his best bulwark, national type of those qualities already alluded to, but who were now scattered over the plain in a desand the lower theoretical standard of morality in perate attempt to evade the troops of Bourbon; and his own and succeeding ages compared with that striking his spurs into the flanks of the animal, he galloped off in the direction of the bridge across the of our day, as much as upon the enforced servility Ticino, ignorant that former fugitives had destroyed of writers. The facts were accessible to her pre- it after they had effected their own passage. At decessors; it is only the judgment that was in the moment in which he made this unfortunate disfault if Voltaire and other Frenchmen of the last covery, he was encountered by four Spanish riflecentury were terrified from passing a true opinion men, who at once sprang to his bridle, and preon French history, foreign writers were secure. vented all further attempts at escape. ProvidenIt is more extraordinary that the immediate punish-tially they had expended their ammunition; but one of the number, fearful that a prisoner whose ment of the monarch by means of his vices them-high rank was apparent from the richness of his selves has been overlooked. His yielding dispo- costume, should elude their grasp, struck the pantsition to favorites, especially to women, and his ing horse of the king over the head with the stock love of pleasure at any cost of time or money, of his rifle, and thus precipitated both the animal were his two great defects; and grievously did he and his rider into a ditch by the wayside. pay for them. Military glory was a great object This cowardly act was scarcely accomplished, of his life: but the defeat and surrender of Pavia, and Juan d'Urbiéta, arrived upon the spot; and, when two Spanish light-horsemen, Diégo d'Abila the reverses and disgraces that clouded the close being struck by the extreme richness of the king's of his career, overshadowed the glories of Marig- apparel, and the order of St. Michael with which nano, and severely punished the obstinacy and he was decorated, they at once agreed that the capneglect which caused them. The possession of tive was no common prize, and insisted upon their the Milanese was almost a passion with Francis: proportion of the ransom-money. The situation of he not only lost it, but lost it disgracefully, by the Francis was perilous in the extreme, for we have cruelties and corruption which his neglect permit chal de la Palice had been wantonly murdered under already stated that the gallant and veteran Maréted. The affronts he offered to Bourbon, and the precisely the same circumstances; but, as injustice he allowed his mother and his chancellor to exercise against that popular and successful soldier, were bitterly revenged by the defeat of Pavia, the captivity of Madrid, and the stain which his (politically necessary) violation of treaty and oaths left upon the honor of Francis. When it is remembered to what an extent he carried his notions of kingly prerogative and his idea of the personal supremacy of a king, we may judge how the iron entered his soul when he sank before the fortune and ability of his rebel subject.

This is Miss Pardoe's account of that striking scene; a little colored by the taste of the littérateur, but effective.

The battle had scarcely lasted throughout an hour, and already it was decided. A few feet of that field which he had confidently hoped would insure to him the undying glory of a conqueror, were all that remained to Francis; but even for these few feet he still contended gallantly. With nis own hand he had cut down the Marquis de St. Angelo, the last descendant of Scanderbeg, and unhorsed the Chevalier d'Andelot, besides dealing vigorous blows upon others of less note during the earlier period of the battle; and now, when he fought rather against hope than from any anticipation of success, his aim continued as true, and his hand as steady, as though an empire still hung on the result of his prowess.

He was already bleeding profusely from three wounds, one of which had traversed his forehead and caused him acute pain, when his horse was shot under him, and he fell to the ground beside six of!

There's a divinity doth hedge a king,

so did that special Providence preserve the defeated monarch in this fearful crisis of his fate. Horsemen were heard approaching rapidly; the rattling of armor and the clang of weapons announced a numerous party; and in the next instant, M. de Pompérant, the friend and confidant of Bourbon, and M. de la Motte des Moyers, a gentleman of his household, at the head of a troop of men-at-arms, checked their horses beside the group. One glance sufficed to assure them both that the wounded and exhausted man, from whose brow the blood was still streaming over his glittering surcoat, was the French monarch; and, putting aside the wrangling soldiers, M. de Pompérant sprang from his horse, and threw himself at the feet of the king, beseeching him not further to endanger his existence by a resistance which was alike hopeless and desperate.

Faint and subdued alike by fatigue, suffering, and bitter feeling, Francis leant for an instant upon his sword, as if in deliberation. "Rise, sir," he said at length; "it is mockery to kneel to a captive king. I am ready to share the fate of the brave men who have fallen with me. To whom can I resign my sword?"

66

The Duke de Bourbon is on the field, sire," murmured Pompérant, with averted eyes. "Not so, sir," replied the monarch, haughtily, as he once more stood proudly erect. This sword is that of France; it cannot be intrusted to a traitor. Rather would I die a thousand deaths than that my honor should be so sullied."

"The Viceroy of Naples, sire," was the next timid suggestion.

"So let it be," said the monarch, coldly; "he almost reproachfully, "Ah, sir, had you but folhas, at least, not disgraced his own. To M. de lowed my advice, you had never been here and Lannoy I may deliver it without shame." thus; nor so much of the best blood of France reeking upon the plains of Italy."

This concession made, La Motte galloped back to the field, to announce the surrender of the French king, and to summon the Neapolitan viceroy; not omitting at the same time to spread the welcome intelligence as he went, and to inquire for the Duke de Bourbon. Thus, only a brief time elapsed ere large bodies of men were on their way to the spot, where Francis, still attended by Pompérant and guarded by the six troopers, remained calmly awaiting their arrival. The first general who reached it was the Marquis del Guasto, who approached the monarch with an air of respectful deference; to which Francis replied with a courtesy as dignified as it was frank; immediately addressing him by name, and expressing a hope that he had escaped unhurt. The immediate care of the marquis was to disperse the crowd of soldiers who were rapidly collecting about the person of the king; after which he resumed his position, a little in the rear on his right hand; and after the hesitation of a moment, Francis, with a faint smile and a steady voice, again spoke.

"I have one favor to claim at your hands, M. del Guasto," he said. "Fortune has favored your master, and I must submit; but I would fain pray you not to conduct me to Pavia. I could ill brook to be made a spectacle to the citizens who have suffered so much at my hands. Allow me to become, for a time at least, your own guest."

For a moment Francis fixed his eyes sternly upon the prostrate figure before him, and then raising them to heaven, he said impatiently, "Patienceonly grant me patience, since fortune has deserted me

This trying interview was terminated by Pescara, who intimated to the king that he must within an hour hold himself in readiness to mount, as he should have the honor of escorting him to Pavia before nightfall. The lip of the monarch quivered for a second, and his cheek blenched, but he was too proud to reiterate a request which had been disregarded; and the Imperialist generals had no sooner withdrawn than he occupied himself in writing to his mother the celebrated letter which has been so often declared to have consisted only of the brief and emphatic sentence, "Madame, tout est perdu fors l'honneur;" but which Sismondi affirms, on the authority of a MS. chronicle of Nicaise Ladam, King-at-arms of Charles V., and the parliamentary registers of the 10th of November, to have been as wordy and diffuse as his ordinary epistles, and to have merely contained a version of the phrase of which modern historians have represented it entirely to consist.

Miss Pardoe's style varies a good deal with its subject. To the philosophy of politics or govern"I am at the orders of your majesty, and deeply ment she cannot rise; and her narrative of tactics sensible of the honor that is conferred upon me, and strategy is none of the clearest. She is more replied the favorite of Charles. A fresh horse was then led forward; the stirrup was held by Del Gu- at home in individual exploits, tales of gallantry, asto, bareheaded; and Francis once more mounted, or courtly scenes and processions; but she someand, escorted by the troop of the Spanish general, times injures these by the arts of the fictionist, and traversed the camp, in order to reach the quarters introduces dialogues that could not have been of his new host.

Medical aid was instantly procured; his wounds were dressed; and it was discovered that, in addition to the hurts which he had received, his cuirass was indented in several places by balls, one of which had been so well aimed, and had entered so deeply into the metal, that his life had only been preserved by a relic which he wore suspended from a gold chain about his neck, and against which the force of the ball had expended itself.

reported, as if she were writing an historical romance. That she does not always invent the speeches or conversations she uses, is nothing to the purpose, when they suggest the idea of obvious untruth, or flatten the force and dignity of the character. The knighting of Francis by Bayard, after the battle of Marignano, is an example. The points in the speech of the knight is all that were required.

Francis himself was so fully impressed with the same conviction, that before the night set in, he resolved, previously to creating knights with his own hand, to receive knighthood himself at that of Bayard: the romantic tastes in which he loved to indulge having caused him to overlook the fact that every a march of France was necessarily understood to be a knight even from the cradle.

The operations of the surgeons were scarcely completed ere the Marquis de Pescara entered the On the Friday evening, the same upon which tent; who saluted the King coldly but respectfully, this letter was written, the whole camp was loud and he was shortly followed by Lannoy, to whom with rejoicing, and the bearing of each separate Francis, with the mien rather of a conqueror than leader was warmly discussed; when it was genera captive, at once tendered his sword. The vice-ally admitted that Bayard was the hero of the two roy bent his knee as he received it; and having days, as he had ever been in the field of honor; and deferentially kissed the hand by which it was tendered, immediately presented the king with another weapon. The next general who appeared was Bourbon, still in complete armor, with his visor closed, and carrying his reeking sword unsheathed in his hand. As he approached, the king inquired his name; to which Pescara replied that it was Charles of Bourbon; upon which Francis stepped a pace backward, as if to avoid his contact, and Pescara advancing at the same moment, demanded the duke's sword. Bourbon at once delivered it up; and then raising his visor, cast himself upon his knees before Francis, and humbly craved permission to kiss the royal hand. The indignant monarch coldly and proudly refused to receive this act of homage; and his scorn so deeply wounded the ex-connétable, that he exclaimed, bitterly, and

Nevertheless, the ceremony must have been an imposing one, as the young king stood upon the battle-field where he had subdued his enemies, in the midst of the brave and devoted chivalry of a great nation: the dead, who had fallen in his cause, yet unearthed; the living, who had fought beside him, still at their post; the gallant men who survived the conflict marshalled about him, girding with their strength the proud group clustered about their

youthful and fearless and victorious sovereign; the monarch; a ceremony which took place with great banners of their beloved France streaming upon the pomp; and then, in order to divert the melancholy air, and the weapons which had so well and so re- that was rapidly gaining upon him, accompanied cently done their duty gleaming on all sides; feath-by a slow fever, which robbed him of all rest, ers streaming, proud war-horses champing the bit, Francis, who could no longer brook a moment of and the artillery-men leaning upon their guns, now inaction, removed to La Muette, a country-house dark and silent. which he had recently embellished, on the borders of the forest of St. Germain. There he sojourned for a whole week; but his mind was in so unsettled a state that he could not long remain upon one spot; and he accordingly repaired to Villepreux; where an increase of his fever induced him to travel the following day to Dampierre, near Chevreuse; and thence he pursued his way in order to pass the

Mistaken as the act may have been, and worse than supererogatory in a powerful monarch, the scene must nevertheless have been one to make high hearts leap, and bold brows flush, as Francis called Bayard to his side, and, with the noble and endearing courtesy familiar to him, declared his intention of being there and then knighted, by the hand of a warrior esteemed one of the most re-period of Lent at Limours. Throughout the whole nowned not only of his own nation but of all Christendom; and despite the disclaimers of his astonished subject, he persisted in his determination.

of this time he was accompanied by the court; but even his favorites now sought in vain to arouse him from the lethargy into which he was rapidly falling. Nowhere could he find peace; and after having spent three days at Limours, he once more removed to Rochefort, where he endeavored to amuse himself by hunting. To this violent exercise, however, his strength was no longer equal; and every evening his fever increased to a degree which alarmed those about him so greatly that they urged his return to St. Germain-en-Laye.

After some difficulty, the physicians succeeded

senting that he could travel slowly, and indulge in his favorite pursuit by the way; and he accordingly left Rochefort for Rambouillet, where he had decided to remain only one night; but the game proved so plentiful, and the sport so exciting, that he was induced to change his resolution. Two or three days were consequently spent in field sports, in which once more Catharine de Medici partici

"In good sooth, sire," then exclaimed Bayard, who would have held further objections to the command of his sovereign as discourteous and irreverent, "since it is your royal pleasure tha, this should be, I am ready to perform your will, not once, but many times, unworthy as I am of the high office to which you have appointed me;" and grasping his sword proudly and firmly, he continued, as the young king bent his knee, "May my poor agency be as efficacious as though the ceremony were per-in obtaining his consent to this measure, by repreformed by Oliver, Godfrey, or Baldwin; although, in good truth, you are the first prince whom I have ever dubbed a knight; and God grant that you may never turn your back upon an enemy." Then brandishing his good weapon, and glancing sportively at it, as the last rays of evening flashed upon his polished blade, he apostrophized it as though it were a thing of life, which could participate in his own hilarity of spirit, exclaiming, "Thou art for-pated; but the fever of the king, which had hithtunate indeed to-day, that thou hast been called upon to confer knighthood upon so great and powerful a monarch; and certes, my trusty sword, thou shalt henceforth be carefully guarded as a relic, honored above all others; and shalt never be unsheathed again, save it be against the Infidel!" Then, lowering the point with reverence, he thrust it back into its scabbard, amid the enthusiastic shouts of the excited army.

We end our quotations with the close of the career of Francis himself; in which, indeed, is also to be read the moral of his life; for he died at little more than fifty, the victim of his own

excesses.

erto been intermittent, became, by reason of this perpetual exertion, continuous; and his malady increased so rapidly that it was found impossible for him to proceed further.

Once apprized of his danger, Francis summoned the dauphin to his sick bed, and conversed with him at intervals for several hours; giving him the most wholesome advice concerning the future government of the kingdom over which he must so soon be called upon to rule; and consequently, like many other monarchs, he, in this supreme moment, gainsaid in almost every particular the system which he had himself pursued. He recommended him to diminish the public taxes under which the nation was then groaning; to be guided in all things by the Cardinal de Tournon and the Admiral d'AnneThe flame and the wheel were still in full oper- baut; and, above all, to exclude from his confidence ation in France, when, in January, 1547, news the Connétable de Montmorenci and the family of arrived at St. Germain-en-Laye, where the court the Duke de Guise. He then received the sacrawas then sojourning, of the death of Henry VIII.;ments of the church; and his persecutions of the an event which produced the most fatal effect alike upon the moral and physical temperament of the French king. He had long indulged a hope that Henry, whose rupture with the Emperor had rendered it necessary for him to strengthen his position, would be desirous of entering into a closer alliance with himself; while at the same time the similarity, not only of their ages, but also in many respects of their several characters, combined with a consciousness that the disease under which he was then suffering was daily becoming more virulent, filled him with alarm. He felt a conviction that his own end was approaching; and he became nervous and depressed. He commanded that a solema funeral service should be performed at the cathedral of Notre Dame in honor of the deceased

Protestants had apparently convinced him so thoroughly of his own salvation, that he expired peacefully, while the ashes of his victims were still floating between earth and heaven.

From the Spectator.

HERMAN MELVILLE'S REDBURN.* MR. MELVILLE's present work is even more remarkable than his stories "founded on fact"

*Redburn: his First Voyage. Being the Sailor-Boy Confessions and Reminiscences of the Son of a Gentle man in the Merchant Service. By Herman Melville, author of "Typee," "Omoo," and "Mardi." In two volumes. New York: Harper & Brothers. London: Published by Bentley.

ship, the captain taking him at low wages; he vainly tries to sell his gun, and has at last to pawn it; his wardrobe is none of the amplest, and by no means adapted to marine work; he is utterly ignorant of all that relates to the sea, the ship, or the service. The idea of throwing a simple and innocent-minded lad, just fresh from home, into the midst of the roughness, rudeness, and startling novelty of a ship, may be found in Peter Simple; but the circumstances of poor Redburn are so different from those of the well-connected midshipman, and the nautical incidents and characters

effect of originality. The quiet humor arising from the contrast between the frame of mind of the boy and his position and circumstances, as well as the sharp reflections his freshness and home education induce him to make, bear some resemblance in point of style to Marryat; but it may arise from the nature of the subject.

descriptive of native scenery and life in the islands of the Pacific. In Typee and Omoo there was novelty and interest of subject. Everything was fresh and vigorous in the manners of the people, the character of the country and its vegetation; there were rapidity, variety, and adventure in the story, with enough of nautical character to introduce the element of contrast. In Redburn, his First Voyage, there are none of these sources of attraction; yet, with the exception of some chapters descriptive of common-place things, the book is very readable and attractive. It has not the reality, or more properly the verac-have so little in common, that the story has the ity, of Dana's Two Years Before the Mast, nor the comprehensiveness and truthfulness of delinea tion which distinguish some of Cooper's novels that only aim at a simple exhibition of a sea life without strarge adventures or exciting dangers: Redburn, though merely the narrative of a voyage from New York to Liverpool and back, with a description of the characters of officers and crew, is, however, a book both of information and interWe get a good idea of life at sea, as it appears at first to the boy novice and afterwards to the more experienced seaman. The hardships and privations of the crew, the petty tyranny, the pettier greatness, with the tricks and frauds practised in a common merchant vessel on the raw hands, are well exhibited, without exaggeration. As Redburn sails in a vessel that carries passengers as well as cargo, the evils resulting from the indifferent regulations of emigration ships, and the practical disregard at sea of such regulations as exist, are exhibited in a scarcity among the poor emigrants, the effect of a slow passage, and in a fever produced by the scantiness and quality of the diet.

est.

Mr. Melville's character as an American is also a source of variety. The scenes on shore at New York, in the pawnbroker's and other places, indicate that the Atlantic cities of the Union are not much freer from vice and profligacy, if they are indeed from distress, than the seaports of Eu

rope.

At Liverpool many things are fresh to the American that are common to us, or which we ignore without intending it as the low haunts and lodging-houses of sailors.

There is nothing very striking in the incidents of Redburn-nothing, in fact, beyond the common probabilities of the merchant service in almost every vessel that sails between Great Britain and America; the characters, or something like them, may doubtless be met in almost every ship that leaves harbor. Nor does Mr. Melville aim at effect by melodramatic exaggeration, except once in an episodical trip to London on the contrary, he indicates several things, leaving the filling up to the reader's imagination, instead of painting scenes in detail, that a vulgar writer would certainly have done. The interest of Redburn arises from its quiet naturalness. It reads like a 66 true story"- -as if it had all taken place.

The best idea of the book, however, is obtained by extracts. The following are among the hero's earlier experiences.

By the time I got back to the ship, everything ordering about a good many men in the rigging; was in an uproar. The pea-jacket man was there, and people were bringing off chickens and pigs and beef and vegetables from the shore. Soon after, another man, in a striped calico shirt, a short blue jacket, and beaver hat, made his appearance, and went to ordering about the man in the big peajacket; and at last the captain came up the side, and began to order about both of them.

These two men turned out to be the first and second mates of the ship.

The plan of the book is well designed to bring out its matter effectively; though the position and reputed character of Redburn as "the son of a gentleman," contrived apparently for the sake of Thinking to make friends with the second mate, contrast and the display of a quiet humor, is not I took out an old tortoise-shell snuff-box of my fathalways consistently maintained. At the com-er's, in which I put a piece of Cavendish tobacco, mencement of the book, Redburn's father is dead, the family reduced, and the hero is cast upon the world to choose a means of living. His father's travels, some sea pieces, and a real glass ship in a glass case, (all rather tediously described,) combine with the enthusiasm and ignorance of youth to determine him to the sea; and he starts for New York, with enough money his thither, a letter to a friend, and a gun, the gift of his elder brother, who had nothing else to bestow upon him. The friend furnishes Redburn with a day's board and lodging, and gets him a

to pay

passage

6

to look sailor-like, and offered the box to him very
politely. He stared at me a moment, and then ex-
claimed, "Do you think we take snuff aboard here,
youngster? no, no, no time for snuff-taking at sea;
don't let the old man' see that snuff-box; take my
advice, and pitch it overboard as quick as you can."
I told him it was not snuff but tobacco; when he
said, he had plenty of tobacco of his own, and never
carried such nonsense about him as a tobacco-
any
box. With that he went off about his business,
and left me feeling foolish enough. But I had rea-
son to be glad that he had acted thus; for if he had
not, I think I should have offered my box to the
chief mate, who, in that case, from what I after-

ward learned of him, would have knocked me down, or done something else equally uncivil.

As I was standing looking around me, the chief mate approached in a great hurry about something; and seeing me in the way, cried out, "Ashore with you, you young loafer! There's no stealings here; sail away, I tell you, with that shootingjacket!"

Upon this I retreated, saying that I was going out in the ship as a sailor.

"A sailor!" he cried; "a barber's clerk, you mean you going out in the ship! what, in that jacket? Hang me, I hope the old man has n't been shipping any more greenhorns like you-he'll make a shipwreck of it, if he has. But this is the way nowadays; to save a few dollars in seamen's wages, they think nothing of shipping a parcel of farmers and clodhoppers and baby-boys. What's your name, Pillgarlic?"

66 Redburn," said I.

"A pretty handle to a man, that!-scorch you to take hold of it; hav' n't you got any other?" "Wellingborough," said I.

It happened on the second night out of port during the middle watch, when the sea was quite calm and the breeze was mild.

The order was given to loose the main-skysail, which is the fifth and highest sail from deck. It was a very small sail, and from the forecastle looked no bigger than a cambric pocket-handker

chief.

Now, when the order was passed to loose the skysail, an old Dutch sailor came up to me and said, "Buttons, my boy, it 's high time_you be doing something; and it's boy's business, Buttons, to loose de royals, and not old men's business, like me. Now, d' ye see dat little fellow way up dare? dare, just behind dem stars, dare? well, tumble up now, Buttons, I zay, and looze him; way you go, Buttons."

All the rest joining in, and seeming unanimous in the opinion that it was high time for me to be stirring myself and doing boy's business, as they called it, I made no more ado, but jumped into the rigging. Up I went, not daring to look down, but keeping my eyes glued, as it were, to the shrouds, as I ascended.

"Worse yet. Who had the baptizing of ye? Why did n't they call you Jack, or Jill, or some- It was a long road up those stairs, and I began thing short and handy? But I'll baptize you over to pant and breathe hard before I was half way; again. D'ye hear, sir, henceforth your name is but I kept at it till I got to the Jacob's ladder-and Buttons. And now do you go, Buttons, and clean they may well call it so, for it took me almost into out that pig-pen in the long-boat; it has not been the clouds; and at last, to my own amazement, I cleaned out since last voyage. And bear a hand found myself hanging on the skysail-yard, holding about it, d' ye hear; there's them pigs there wait-on might and main to the mast, and curling my feet ing to be put in: come, be off about it, now."

Was this, then, the beginning of my sea career? set to cleaning out a pig-pen the very first thing! But I thought it best to say nothing; I had bound myself to obey orders, and it was too late to retreat. So I only asked for a shovel, or spade, or something else to work with.

"We don't dig gardens here," was the reply; "dig it out with your teeth."

After looking around, I found a stick, and went to scraping out the pen ; which was awkward work enough.

The pig-pen being cleaned out, I was set to work picking up some shavings which lay about the deck, for there had been carpenters at work on board. The mate ordered me to throw these shavings into the long-boat at a particular place between two of the seats. But as I found it hard work to push the shavings through in that place, and as it looked wet there, I thought it would be better for the shavings as well as myself to thrust them where there was a larger opening and a dry spot. While I was thus employed, the mate, observing me, exclaimed, with an oath, "Didn't I tell you to put those shavings somewhere else? Do what I tell you, now, Buttons, or mind your eye!"

Stifling my indignation at his rudeness, which by this time I found was my only plan, I replied, that that was not so good a place for the shavings as that which I myself had selected; and asked him to tell me why he wanted me to put them in the place he designated. Upon this he flew into a terrible rage, and without explanation reiterated his order like a clap of thunder.

round the rigging as if they were another pair of hands.

For a few moments I stood awe-stricken and mute. I could not see far out upon the ocean, owing to the darkness of the night; and from my lofty perch the sea looked like a great black gulf, hemmed in all round by beetling black cliffs. I seemed all alone; treading the midnight clouds; and every second expected to find myself falling-falling— falling, as I have felt when the nightmare has been on me.

I could but just perceive the ship below me, like a long, narrow plank in the water; and it did not seem to belong at all to the yard over which I was hanging. A gull, or some sort of sea-fowl, was flying round the truck over my head, within a few yards of my face; and it almost frightened me to hear it, it seemed so much like a spirit, at such a lofty and solitary height.

Though there was a pretty smooth sea and little wind, yet at this extreme elevation the ship's motion was very great; so that when the ship rolled one way, I felt something as a fly must feel walking the ceiling; and when it rolled the other way, I felt as if I was hanging along a slanting pine

tree.

But presently I heard a distant hoarse noise from below; and though I could not make out anything intelligible, I knew it was the mate hurrying me. So in a nervous, trembling desperation, I went to casting off the gaskets or lines tying up the sail; and when all was ready, sung out as I had been told, to " hoist away." And hoist they did, and me too along with the yard and sail; for I had no time to get off, they were so unexpectedly quick about it. It seemed like magic: there I was, going up higher and higher; the yard rising under me as if it were alive, and no soul in sight. Without knowing it at the time, I was in a good deal of danger; but it was so dark that I could not see well enough to feel afraid-at least on that account, This account of a first adventure aloft is a piece though I felt frightened enough in a promiscuous of truthful and powerful description. .

This was my first lesson in the discipline of the sea, and I never forgot it. From that time I learned that sea-officers never give reasons for anything they order to be done. It is enough that they command it; so that the motto is, " Obey orders, though you break owners.'

way. I only held on hard, and made good the say

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