“Oh, Dearie,”—Prudence had “Dearies” to spare for others beside the Princess,—“you were asleep, and you couldn’t be expected to understand it all; you’re such a little girl—under seven.”
“I’m going to tell it most particularly to you, Kitten. Now, see if you don’t,” said the Princess.
She leaned a little forward on the stately seat, her elbow on her knee, and the silken folds fallen down on the broad stone. She looked for a long moment, her eyes shining straight out. And then she began:—
“Once upon a time, so long ago that nobody can remember when, a beautiful ship was sailing along under a spanking breeze with all sails set. The name of the ship was the Jane Ellen, and she was named for the Captain’s wife. At her prow was the figure of a mermaid, with long waving hair; and the head of the mermaid was like the head of the Captain’s wife. But that was when she was young. Now she sat at home and knit; but to the Captain she looked just like the lovely mermaid, and he kept the Jane Ellen spick and span from truck to keel,—the finest ship afloat, as she was the best of wives.”
(No one could tell stories as the Princess told them. The things she told she knew so well, it was as if she were seeing them, and words were waiting for her and came orderly, just as she needed them to make it plain.)
“Now, as the ship was sailing along on this fine starlight night, and everything favorable, the Captain in his cabin felt a great jolt, then a s-scrape, and the ship leaned away over, and everything that could slid down to one side. The next minute it tilted the other way, and most of them slid back again, and then the ship went on as before.
“The Captain jumped up and put his head out of the cabin window and looked fore and aft along the deck. He saw a man coming toward him, and called, very sharply, ‘Mr. Morganwg!’[[1]]
[1]. He called it “Morgan-ough,” but he was particular about the spelling.
“It was the Mate of the Jane Ellen. He was young and big, and he had gray eyes and black hair and heavy black eyebrows that almost met over his eyes, and he could look very stern, but his eyes laughed; and he could sing, and if he had had time, he could have played on a harp, because he was a Welshman, and his name was Taffy. But he didn’t have time, because if you are mate of a ship like the Jane Ellen, you have a great deal to do, and have to be everywhere at once, to see that things are done as the Captain wants them.
“‘What was that?’ asked the Captain.