It was plain that the pursy seaman was beginning to be exhausted at last. He still danced away as imperturbably as ever; but there was a perceptible anxiety in his countenance; and at last, after fresh attempts, on the part of his comrades, to encourage him, had failed, he gave in, completely exhausted.
“You’re too much for me, shipmate,” he said, panting, good-humoredly addressing the victor. “I’ve seen the day, though,” he added, turning to the crowd, “when I could dance anybody down, but Portsmouth Peggy. But this chap, I own up, is my match. Give us your hand, my hearty, I bear no ill will.”
The countryman, on seeing his antagonist retire, had uttered a shrill cry of exultation, and cut a pigeon-wing, which latter he had just concluded, as the seaman tendered his hand. He clutched this between his horny palms, returning the good-fellowship with hearty accord.
“Let’s liquor,” he said, magnanimously, throwing his arms around his late adversary, and pulling him, nothing loath, towards the bar. “It’s my treat. Bring up your shipmates. I’m as dry as if my mouth was gunpowder. Hillo, Major,” he said, turning to the officer, “won’t yon drink? You’d rather not! No offence, I hope; for I meant none. Here’s to ‘Old Jarsey: small but spunky.’”
The toast was drank with all the honors, and then nothing would satisfy the exhilarated victor, but that the fiddler should also partake of a libation. Accordingly the sable performer was summoned to “stop that infernal caterwauling,” as his tuning up was elegantly termed by the speaker, and “walk up like a gentleman, to drink with the landlord and him.”
For a moment, after these words were spoken, and while the negro was grinning as the landlord handed out his glass, there was one of those moments of temporary silence which will happen even at the noisiest entertainments. Simultaneously there came a lull in the driving rain and howling wind without.
Suddenly, in this unexpected hush, there was heard what seemed a gun fired out at sea. The officer had just ceased writing, and was putting away his implements, when his attention was attracted by the sound. Few, if any others, heard it; and the merriment was beginning again, when he raised his hand and cried, in an authoritative voice, “Hark!”
His gesture, tone, and look, silenced every voice immediately. On the instant the sound was repeated. It was a low, sullen, stifled roar, apparently miles away.
“It’s a ship in distress,” said one of the group, whose dress bespoke him a waterman native to the region. “Hark: there it is again!”
“You must be mistaken, Mullen,” interposed the landlord, who saw that the words threw a damp over the company. “You couldn’t hear a gun so far off.”