“And there are, perhaps, few seafarers who have more inducements to stay at home than I, Charlie Halcott, have.
“I have a beautiful house of my own, and some day soon, I hope, you will both come and see it, and judge for yourselves.
“My house has a tower to it. Many a night, while walking the quarterdeck keeping my watch, with no companions save the silver-shining stars, I have said to myself—‘Charlie Halcott,’ I have said, ‘if ever you leave off ploughing the ocean wave, and settle down on shore, you must have a house with a tower to it.’
“And now I’ve got it.
“A large, square, old-fashioned tower it is, with a mullioned window on each side of it; and up the walls the dense green ivy climbs, with just enough Virginia creeper to cast a glamour of crimson over it in autumn, like the last red rays of the setting sun.
“One window looks up the valley of the Thames, where not far off is a little Niagara, a snow-white weir: I can hear the drowsy monotone of its foaming waters by night and by day, and its song is ever the same. Another window looks away down the valley, and the river here goes winding in and out among the meadows and the green and daisied leas, till, finally, it takes the appearance of a silver string, and loses itself, or is lost to me, amidst the distant trees. A third window, from which I dearly like to look early on a summer’s morning, while the blackbirds are yet in fullest, softest song, shows an English landscape that to me is the sweetest of the sweet. As far as eye can reach, till bounded by the grey horizon’s haze, are woods and wilds and meadows green, with the red gables or the roofs of many a stately farm peeping up through the rolling cloudland of foliage; and many a streamlet too, seen here and there in the sunbeams, as it goes speeding on towards the silent river.
“But though this house of mine has a tower to it, it is not a castle by any means, apart from the fact that every Englishman’s house is his castle. I have a tower, but no donjon keep. My castle is a villa—‘a handsome modern-built villa,’ the agent described it when I commenced correspondence with a view to its purchase. It is indeed a beautiful villa, and it is situated high up on the brow of a hill, all among the dreamy woods.
“Though I have been but a short spell on shore, my town friends already call me the ‘Sailor hermit,’ because I stick to my castle and its woods and gardens. Not for a single day can they prevail upon me to exchange it for the bustle and din of hideous London. But I retaliated on my city friends by bringing them down to my ‘castle’ in spring time, when the early flowers were opening their petals in the warm sunshine, and the very tulips seemed panting in the heat, and when there was such a gush of bird-melody coming from grove and copse and hedgerow that every leaf seemed to hide a feathered songster. And I rejoiced to see those friends of mine struck dumb by the wealth of beauty they beheld around them. For Philomel was making day melodious with a strange, unearthly music.
“All through the darkness the bird sang to his mate, and all through the day as well. No bolder birds than our nightingales live. They sing at our side, at our feet; they sing as they fly, sing as they alight, sing to us, ay and at us defiantly. No wonder we all love this sweet bird, this sweet spirit of the spring.
“So my quarterdeck dream has become a dear reality.