“Give me a gun, Captain,” said I, “and I will shew you how to uncork that bottle.”
I took the musket, but its weight was beyond my strength of arm. I was afraid that I could not hold it out steadily, even for a moment, it was so very heavy—I threw it up with a desperate effort and fired. The neck of the bottle flew up in the air a full yard, and then disappeared. I was amazed myself at my success. Every body was surprised, but as every body attributed it to long practice, they were not so much astonished as I was, who knew it was wholly owing to chance. It was a lucky hit, and I made the most of it; success made me arrogant, and boy-like, I became a boaster.
“Ah,” said I coolly, “you must be born with a rifle in your hand, Captain, to shoot well. Every body shoots well in America. I do not call myself a good shot. I have not had the requisite experience; but there are those who can take out the eye of a squirrel at a hundred yards.”
“Can you see the eye of a squirrel at that distance?” said the Captain, with a knowing wink of his own little ferret eye.
That question, which raised a general laugh at my expense, was a puzzler. The absurdity of the story, which I had heard a thousand times, never struck me so forcibly. But I was not to be pat down so easily.
“See it!” said I, “why not? Try it and you will find your sight improve with your shooting. Now, I can’t boast of being a good marksman myself; my studies” (and here I looked big, for I doubted if he could even read, much less construe a chapter in the Greek Testament) “did not leave me much time. A squirrel is too small an object for all but an experienced man, but a “large” mark like a quart bottle can easily be hit at a hundred yards—that is nothing.”
“I will take you a bet,” said he, “of a doubloon, you do not do it again?”
“Thank you,” I replied with great indifference: “I never bet, and besides, that gun has so injured my shoulder, that I could not, if I would.”
By that accidental shot, I obtained a great name as a marksman, and by prudence I retained it all the voyage. This is precisely my case now, gentle reader. I made an accidental hit with the Clockmaker: when he ceases to speak, I shall cease to write. The little reputation I then acquired, I do not intend to jeopardize by trying too many experiments. I know that it was chance—many people think it was skill. If they choose to think so, they have a right to their opinion, and that opinion is fame. I value this reputation too highly not to take care of it.
As I do not intend then to write often, I shall not wire-draw my subjects, for the mere purpose of filling my pages. Still a book should be perfect within itself, and intelligible without reference to other books. Authors are vain people, and vanity as well as dignity is indigenous to a colony. Like a pastry-cook’s apprentice, I see so much of both their sweet things around me daily, that I have no appetite for either of them.