"The wine that is mellowed by woman's bright eye,
Outrivals the nectar of Jove."
And I had a dream, which was "all a dream." With Byron in his waking "Dream," "I saw two beings in the hue of youth," and like his lovers, they were "standing upon a hill," and "both were young, and one was beautiful." I do not know how in fitting words to tell my dream. But as it was similar to his, oh that I could with his language, without the imputation of plagiarism, set down what crossed my sleeping mind. Besides, I have a dread of offending some readers in these transcendental times, when lectures on mysterious subjects are given to married ladies only, whose faces would tingle at the mere mention of one of those English classics, from whose fount flowed "the well of English undefiled." But to my dream. It was the age of early manhood, boyhood still lingering on the face of a being who filled my mind until it formed a part of myself. The being described as beautiful, oh beautiful as an angel was she! was by his side. Love, full, passionate love, brimmed over in her dark black eye, darker, more dazzling than the gazelle's, which was reflected back from his dark orbs, which took their brightest brilliancy from hers. Over her cheek the rosy god had spread his crimson mantle, and in the dimples of her chin the mischievous boy had found a lurking-place. They walked and talked, and in what phrase? Truly they knew not themselves! and yet each word, each glance, each touch, had a meaning perfectly intelligible. Time passed, but what was time to them, they saw nothing of his beard, heard not the rustling of his ancient wings, his scythe was hidden. The heavens are overcast, thunder rolls above them, and the lightning's glare makes the black fringes of the heavy cloud more funereal. A shadow, heavy, dense, material, interposes, and the boy seeks for his fair companion—but she is gone: "Got to see the hammocks up! six bells, come turn out," "rouse and bitt," "show a leg in a purser's stocking." "Zounds, how he sleeps," "where, where, oh where is my hammock boy?" who appeared at my call, and whom I wished at the gangway, that I might have slept on. But turn out I must now—and so turned out my dream.
Other races were upon the tapis. The launchers, like brave old Taylor, would not stay beaten, and demanded another trial; they offered to oppose any thing, from the Captain's gig, down to the dingui—they even wanted to challenge the boats of the whole squadron, and old A., the coxswain, in the true spirit of Rhoderick Dhu, exclaimed, "Come one, come all," but the regatta was put a stop to, by orders to get out of the Typa, and the men commenced "mud-larking," as they termed it. The Typa is filling up so rapidly that we never could get out now without a scrape, and the senior officer perhaps thought it better we should move before we had formed a bar with our beef bones.
So out of the Typa again we got, poised our wings in the outer harbor, and took flight for Whampoa again, and settled down in our old resting place in the "Reach," on the 11th of October. From here I took another trip to Canton, made a few purchases, as I then supposed it would be our last opportunity. Heard there of an extensive fire which had raged near the factories, in which over five hundred houses had been destroyed. A fire in Canton is a serious affair, and from the ideas of fatalism which the Chinese entertain, is much dreaded by foreign residents.
Our stay at Whampoa was not marked by any incidents worth noticing, and it is only to keep up the chronological character of my journal, that the trip is introduced.
CHAPTER XXIII.
Anson's Bay—Hong-Kong again—P. & O. Company's hulk takes fire—Escape of Captain's wife—Toong-Koo Bay—Piracy—Fire at Macào—Wolf again at Whampoa—Amateur Theatricals at Canton—Melancholy musings.
From Whampoa, came down the river to Anson's Bay and anchored; here held communication with our consort, which went up to the "Reach" to take our place.