"I shall get him."
"Why don't you get your government to demand him of the French government, if he's a citizen, and save the expense and trouble?"
"They have no government that amounts to anything. They don't like us because we won't go into a war with England on their account. Peterson might die of old age, and I likewise, before they could be got to move in the matter. Ben has got a vessel that sails like a witch; she has been repaired this winter past; we are going to put new rigging and a new suit of sails on her; and two of our boys have volunteered to take charge, and go after Peterson, and get him back by hook or by crook."
"What do you want me to do?"
"I want you to go home with me. You, myself, and Ben will cut and make the sails, rig and load her. You will live in my family, get all the salt junk and bad rum out of you, be amongst steady people, away from temptation, go out in the vessel with the boys, and, perhaps, a couple more of our young men; no rum, no landlords, no drunken shipmates. I'll give you better wages than you ever had in your life, because you shall have a share of the profits when the voyage is up. I'll build you a vessel; and, as you are no navigator, you shall coast along the shore in her, Captain Richard Cameron, marry some one of our good girls, and be a man. Is not there a chance to be decent? and do as I have done—let the liquor alone."
"God bless you, cap'n; will you do all that for old Dick?"
"I will, and there's my hand on it."
The seaman grasped the extended hand of his benefactor, exclaiming, "I'll do it, cap'n. Don't think the manhood is all so leached out of me by rum and bad company that I can't rally with such a motive as that."
"I don't want you to feel that the obligation is all on one side. It is not so. I know you, Richard Cameron, through and through; you are a cool, resolute, powerful, noble-hearted man. I never expected to meet you again; but I have always said, that, in a real trying time, you were worth any two men I ever had. I can't help thinking you have been sent to help me at this present time. You have had experience, and are seasoned to all climates and all kind of hardships, and you may have to throttle somebody."
"I don't profess to be much of a saint, cap'n; but, if there's any throttling to do, I am as good as the next one."