"Away with you all," cried the Buccaneer, addressing the servants. He was always ready to condemn peculation on such a scale as this. "Away with you," he cried, "for you are all robbers in disguise. Speak to them, Jack, and trounce them well with thy tongue."
"Aye, aye, yer honour. 'Bout ship, my lads and lasses, before shame and misfortune throw their grappling irons on board of you. You're heading for the jail and the work-house, and before you lie poverty and misery. 'Bout ship, I say, before you find that hunger is the best sauce for a proud stomach."
This batch went away more dissatisfied than ever, and they declared that the old coxswain's language was brutal in the extreme, and they swore they would have nothing to do with such a fellow as that. They determined to get some one of the ship's crew, who wanted some opportunity to bring himself before the public, to take their case up, and by putting a heavy tax upon foreign labour, give them greater opportunities to be independent, more idle, and insolent.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
The Buccaneer thought that for a contented and prosperous people he had his fair share of disaffection; but Liberty now ushered in a pale-faced and solemn looking batch, who declared that drink was sending the Buccaneer's people to the dogs and the devil. They carried in front of them a banner on which was depicted a drunkard beating his wife, and ill-using his starved children. On the reverse, there was the besotted mother and the sober but miserable husband. This cheerless-looking lot, upon whose features laughter-loving mirth never seemed to dwell, were the total abstainers, who declared that nothing would save the Buccaneer and his people, except they were all made sober by law.
"Why, Jack!" cried the Buccaneer, turning to his friend, "one lot wants to feed me on peacods, while another wants to drench me with water."
But now a portly lot of red-faced, pimply-nosed publicans, whose stomachs were as round as one of their own beer barrels, pushed their way to the front, and swore that water was being the ruin of them. They told the Buccaneer in plain and unmistakable language, that if his people continued to walk in the paths of sobriety at the same rate at which they were at present going, the source from which he derived no little of his revenue would be completely dried up, and he would lose millions of his yearly income, when his upper classes would have to bear the burden of increased taxation.
The Buccaneer always taxed his upper classes as much as ever he could. Perhaps this was right. Besides, what was called the people, that mighty, but barely defined force, did not like taxation, and therefore they were exempted; but they had no prejudice otherwise against the principle.
The Buccaneer was touched, and after a moment's consideration he said, "Why can't my subjects drink in moderation, and not make beasts of themselves?"