But this double murder of Captain Brand and his companion happened, you are to understand, some twenty years before the time of this story, and while our hero was but one year old. So now to our present history.
It is a great pity that any one should have a grandfather who ended his days in such a sort as this; but it was no fault of Barnaby True's, nor could he have done anything to prevent it, seeing he was not even born into the world at the time that his grandfather turned pirate, and that he was only one year old when Captain Brand so met his death on the Cobra River. Nevertheless, the boys with whom he went to school never tired of calling him "Pirate," and would sometimes sing for his benefit that famous catchpenny ballad beginning thus:
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"Oh! my name was Captain Brand, A-sailing, And a-sailing; Oh! my name was Captain Brand, A-sailing free. Oh! my name was Captain Brand, And I sinned by sea and land, For I broke God's just command, A-sailing free." |
'Twas a vile thing to sing at the grandson of so unfortunate a man, and oftentimes Barnaby True would double up his little fists and would fight his tormentors at great odds, and would sometimes go back home with a bloody nose or a bruised eye to have his poor mother cry over him and grieve for him.
Not that his days were all of teasing and torment, either; for if his comrades did sometimes treat him so, why then there were other times when he and they were as great friends as could be, and used to go a-swimming together in the most amicable fashion where there was a bit of sandy strand below the little bluff along the East River above Fort George.
There was a clump of wide beech-trees at that place, with a fine shade and a place to lay their clothes while they swam about, splashing with their naked white bodies in the water. At these times Master Barnaby would bawl as lustily and laugh as loud as though his grandfather had been the most honest ship-chandler in the town, instead of a bloody-handed pirate who had been murdered in his sins.
Ah! It is a fine thing to look back to the days when one was a boy! Barnaby may remember how, often, when he and his companions were paddling so in the water, the soldiers off duty would come up from the fort and would maybe join them in the water, others, perhaps, standing in their red coats on the shore, looking on and smoking their pipes of tobacco.
Then there were other times when maybe the very next day after our hero had fought with great valor with his fellows he would go a-rambling with them up the Bouwerie Road with the utmost friendliness; perhaps to help them steal cherries from some old Dutch farmer, forgetting in such an adventure what a thief his own grandfather had been.