‘We have brought some live-stock with us, mother,’ said Michael, smiling and looking significantly at his wife’s mother.
‘Live stock,’ repeated the dame, ‘why, what have you got?’
Margaret here took off the bearskin covering and displayed her little charge to view.
‘What, a baby!’ cried the old woman in a tone of amazement.
Wet and weary as the travellers were, it was not a time to keep up a jest, otherwise Michael would have let the old people guess for a while, before he told them in what way the little foundling had been thrown upon their protection, as it was, he explained all in a sentence, and then begged that they would let him have something to eat.
Margaret felt more disposed for taking rest than for sharing in the meal, so she and her mother retired together into one of the sleeping-rooms, taking the infant with them.
The storm subsided in the course of the night, but no effort could be made to rescue the shipwrecked people, even should any of them have drifted to the shore, for the river had by this time so far overflowed its banks, that the path the fisherman and his wife had so recently trodden, was not now to be seen. As there appeared but little probability that the child would ever be claimed, Michael and his wife resolved on adopting him, and treating him in every respect as if he were their own. The little fellow seemed very well satisfied with his new friends. He smiled and cooed at Margaret, in return for her caresses, and tried to imitate Michael’s loud ringing laugh. With Margaret’s mother too, he was an especial favourite, and even the old man was much pleased with this addition to their family.
The matter to be decided on next was, what name the little stranger should bear. Margaret was reminded by his wicker-cradle and the perils of his infancy of Moses in his ark of bulrushes, on the banks of the Egyptian river. She could not help thinking, she said, that a mother’s tender hand had fastened him so securely in his little bed, and that a mother’s prayers had saved him from a watery grave, and she proposed that he should be called by the name of Moses. However, when the swaddling-clothes in which he had been found were closely examined, an almost indistinct mark was found on one of them, which after some little difficulty, was discovered to be Gerald. It was therefore determined to call him by that name.
CHAPTER III.
A GLANCE AT RUSSIAN HISTORY.
Ten years glided away and very little change took place in the fisherman’s family, excepting that the infant foundling grew up, by degrees, into a fine intelligent boy. In the long nights of the Russian winter, unless there is some kind of mental employment, time passes very wearily. Michael had so far profited by his father’s instructions, as to be able to impart the elements of useful knowledge to Gerald, who was both an apt and eager scholar. His natural intelligence had thus been quickened, and his thirst for knowledge increased by the humble but useful instructions of his kind foster father. While they used to sit round the large warm stove, when they had read from the Bible or some other of the one or two books, which Michael inherited from his father, Michael would then relate incidents in the history of Sweden, or talk about the great protestant reformers—or the learned men his father had known or heard of at Upsal, his native city. Gerald was never tired of hearing about these things, and the thoughts that came into his mind when Michael talked about the famous university of Upsal, where so many people passed their time in acquiring or imparting knowledge were quite exciting, and he could not help hoping that something or other might occur that would place him in the way of acquiring more knowledge than he was likely to obtain in the hut of a poor fisherman, dearly as he loved his kind benefactors. Gerald was a good and grateful child, and desirous of doing all he could to assist those generous friends who had acted the part of parents to him. Even when quite a little boy, he tried to help his father, as he called him, in his craft. He was very fond too, of his good mother, as he called Margaret, and you may be sure they loved him very dearly.