“Heaven have mercy on us!” cried she, while she continued her efforts to restore her husband.
The messenger and his men departed, and left Eyrymount and his wife to the full anguish of their critical situation.
The news of this proceeding got wind, and reached the ears of Benjamin Rice, who thought it prudent to suspend his visits to Eyrymount. Græme had now the prospect of losing not only Outfieldhaugh, but his own patrimonial estate. What could he do but give Dione to Nashon? This he did. The couple were married; the two properties were afterwards conjoined; and the sportsman of Outfieldhaugh distanced all his competitors.
THE SEA FIGHT.
“Britannia needs no bulwarks,
No towers along the steep
Her march is o’er the mountain wave,
Her home is on the deep.”
Campbell.
It was on the close of a sultry day in August, about the end of the French war, that a carriage was slowly wending its way down one of the principal streets of the town of Berwick. The dust with which it was covered, and the jaded appearance of the horses, seemed to betoken that it came from a distance. The postilion, a pursy little man, whose rosy face bore the indubitable marks of a worshipper at the shrine of Bacchus, drew up at the first inn which presented itself to view. Out of the carriage stepped a young man who was plainly dressed in the garb of a sailor. He had nothing particular about his dress to distinguish him from the common run of seamen; but his upright figure, and that indescribable something which is peculiar to a “certain class,” and which serves to distinguish them from those in humbler situations in life, at first sight shewed that he belonged to the former. He appeared to be about twenty-six years of age, while his weather-beaten face, and a slight scar on his left cheek, shewed that he had borne both “the battle and the breeze.” He was accompanied by a squat muscular-looking fellow, who seemed to act in the capacity of servant; although his sea jargon and hard horny hands shewed him to be more accustomed to the duty of a sailor than that of a lacquey. After seeing that their baggage was properly taken care of, they retired together to a private room.
“Well, Bill,” said he who seemed the superior to his companion, “how do you feel after your ride? For my part, I would sooner sail round the world in a gale of wind, and the ship pitching bows under all the time, than be again jammed up and jostled in that infernal cage.”