By Frank H. Converse.
WHAT my own—my true own name may be or may have been, I do not know. I have a fancy like a dream, that perhaps it has been Adélê. And yet I cannot say why. My father, the captain, whose daughter I am by adoption, gave to me the name of Bessie, for his wife, and Luna, for the moon. Thus within the log-book it is written Bessie Luna Wray.
Girls that have upon the shore their home can tell to an exactness what age they have and when their birthdays shall be. But for myself who have only a home upon the sea, I may know but this—that I have nearly fifteen years of age, “or thereabouts,” as the captain says. I have never known of the birthday—only an anniversary. And when I have forgotten myself of the day of the month on which that happens, I obtain the “Petrel’s” log-book for the year of eighteen hundred and sixty-four, where I find this of record:
“Journal of hemaphrodite brig ‘Petrel,’ Wray, master, from San Francisco to Honolulu, Dec. 25, 1864.
“This day begins with clearing weather and light airs from S. E. Middle part of day wind light and baffling. At 3 P. M. passed a quantity of floating wreck stuff. Moon fulls at 11. P. M. At 11.30 P. M., Lat. by obs. 30° 15´, hove to, and picked up a boat of French build with ‘Toulon’ written in pencil on the seat, and a female child about one year old wrapped in a capote such as is worn by the pilots of Dieppe. Got under way at 12 M., course W. b. N. Call the child Bessie Luna Wray. So ends this twenty-four hours.”
Such is all I know of my beginning of life. Excepting that only for the uncommon brightness of the moon, the lookout had not seen the drifting boat. It is said in all the books I have read, of the babe who is discovered, that it smiles sweetly in the face of its benefactor. But the captain tells me often that I rent the air with crying till I was black in the face, until, arriving on the deck of the “Petrel,” old Candace, the negress, took me in her embrace. She it was who was stewardess, with her husband Jim (also of color) as cook.
The captain would at once have had me fed with Port wines, condensed milk, canned soups, and like nourishment. But Candace said “no,” and gave me of food in small quantities. “Dat ’ar little stummick mus’n be filled to depletion,” is that which the captain repeats as her words to him.
Remaining on board, she had a care of me for four years. I would not be on the shore for even an hour. I cried bitterly when out of sight of my captain. Again we had a stewardess who was English, with her husband to cook. She taught me my sewing, and a prayer to say to the good God. But as I became more old in years the captain gave to me my instruction in books. He learned me of many things useful, and it is said of me that I have a marvellous power to attain in study. At my present age I am thin—svelte, as old M. Jacques, the former mate, says—with a complexion of brunette, and eyes and hair which are black. This it is, with the readiness which I had in learning the French language of M. Jacques, which gives me to think that my mother at least was French. The accent and words seemed to always be known to me as of a dream.
But the captain will have it to say that I am a gift of Christmas from his wife who is with the good God. Be that as it may, I am to him as his very, very own, and he to me as father and mother in one, “the child of his old age,” he insists; for though straight and erect as the mast of the “Petrel,” he is in age sixty years.