And so it was; distinguished by the Protector at the very moment when to be so distinguished makes a man's fortune, the bold intrepid boy quickly ripened into the able and experienced seaman. His promotion was rapid, because his talents were appreciated—and, after the death of Cromwell, he had been too much occupied with England's enemies at sea, to suffer from the moral blight of Charles's court on shore.
"Now, Springall—I love to call you by that name," said the Buccaneer, "though you have taken your old one, and made it even more honoured than it was before,—the evening has closed in—the children a-bed—God bless them! We will draw nearer round our cheerful hearth, and talk of days long gone. Barbara, let's have some fresh logs on the fire; and now, for past and present times."
"I am a bad hand at a long yarn—you know I always was so, captain,"—said the naval officer, smiling, "and the news of poor Jack's death has damped my canvass. I always thought he'd make a queer end of it—so fond of plunder—so careless—so unprincipled—but brave, brave to the backbone."
"Do you remember what he dared, by way of adventure, not a hundred miles from this; when Major Wellmore and Walter De Guerre were masquing it here so gaily?" inquired Robin.
"Ay, ay! But he and Grimstone were both half-seas over, or they'd have hardly ventured it:—poor Grim paid the penalty."
"And deserved it too," added Robin. "He whom they assaulted was a wonder—a being that will serve future ages to talk about, when the rulers of the present day are either execrated or forgotten. Marry! but it makes one's head swim to think of the warm blood and true that has been spilled and wasted to raise up a throne for obscenity and folly! Chambering and wantonness walk together as twin-born, along the very halls where Cromwell, and Ireton, and Milton, and—my head's too hot to recollect their names; but they are graven on my heart, as men who made England a Queen among the nations."
"Then their Popery plots!" chimed in the Buccaneer; "the innocent blood that has flooded the scaffold, as if the earth was thirsty for it—and upon what grounds? the evidence, I hear, of one villain, supported by the evidence of another! I grieve for one thing, truly—that I was ever instrumental in forwarding the King's views. Robin said a true word in jest the other day, that men as well as puppies were born blind, only it takes a much longer period to open our eyes, than those of our four-footed friends."
"So it does," said Springall, laughing; "that was one of Robin's wise sayings. Barbara!—I beg your pardon,—Mistress Hays—do you think him as wise as ever?"
"I always thought him wise; but I know it now," she replied, smiling.