[(3.)] “Now let me twist the rope a little.” This sentence must be similar in its meaning with the nautical phrase “spinning a yarn.”
[(4.)] “Thunder and lightnin’!” It will be seen that the oaths commonly used by the Columbians differ from those now in fashion; but this is very natural, for it is well known that the common phrases of one century are quite changed in another. We swear not as we did in the time of Queen Elizabeth, and the oaths then in vogue were altogether different from those which prevailed during the reign of William the Conqueror.
[CHAP. II.]
ZABRA.
Zabra had not been many days on board, before he became a source of wonder to the whole crew. A spirit flashed from his dark lustrous eyes, that kept off every thing approaching the shape of sociality among the persons by whom he was surrounded. He rarely spoke, except when attending upon Oriel Porphyry; and then the proud expression of his looks that made curiosity stand aloof, was changed into a glowing animation, and the tongue which had seemed to disdain all converse became eloquent with a resistless endeavour to delight. He had all the external appearance of a graceful youth of sixteen, with a form tall, elegant, and buoyant, whose heart had just received the invigorating warmth of the first dawn of manly sentiments; but when the voice sent its soft music to the ear, breathing the rich poetry of an ardent imagination, the splendour of the language, its power and meaning, and the energy with which it was supported, gave evidence of a mind much nearer approaching the maturity of a masculine intellect, than the age that has been mentioned could have possessed. He seemed as if he existed only for the purpose for which he had been sent—as if he knew that his occupation was watching over the safety of him to whom he had been committed; and he appeared to enter into the service with a heart and soul devoted to the object. His looks searched the inmost thoughts of those upon whom they fell, as if to discover whether any sinister intention against his lord and master was there harboured, and before their piercing sight it was scarcely possible to stand unmoved; and there was a mystery in his actions, when removed from the apparent source of his solicitude, that still more made the wonderers marvel. He sought a place where no one could intrude upon his privacy, and with a harp, with which on these occasions he never failed to be accompanied, so filled the air with unknown melodies, and unheard-of songs, that the superstitious seamen, as they listened, imagined he was in communication with beings of another world,—there was something so aërial, so soft, and so sweet in the music he created.
“Scrunch me if I can make it out at all!” exclaimed Climberkin to a group of sailors in the forecastle. “He ar’n’t got a word to throw away upon a dog; but if he looks at one, one doesn’t feel at all inclined to be ’quisitive. He was wand’rin’ about the main deck as it was getting duskish yesterday—and I, not keeping a good look out ahead, run foul o’ him afore I knowed who it was. As soon as I diskivered the craft, I was just beginning a bit of a ’pology, when he fixes on me a look as cut through me like a nor-wester, waves his arm in a most mysterus manner, and glides away as softly as if he trod upon butter.”
“As true as a fish swims, I’ve got the only prime notion of this here mystery,” said Boggle, with an air of considerable importance.
“No!” cried several voices incredulously.