“Gallant sir!” said Halcro, “unquestionably it is because you have some poetry in your heart.”
“I have had enough of it in my mouth in my time,” answered Bunce; “but that day is by, old gentleman—however, I shall soon find out which of these girls is Minna.—Throw back your mufflings from your faces, and don’t be afraid, my Lindamiras; no one here shall meddle with you to do you wrong. On my soul, two pretty wenches!—I wish I were at sea in an egg-shell, and a rock under my lee-bow, if I would wish a better leaguer-lass than the worst of them!—Hark you, my girls; which of you would like to swing in a rover’s hammock?—you should have gold for the gathering!”
The terrified maidens clung close together, and grew pale at the bold and familiar language of the desperate libertine.
“Nay, don’t be frightened,” said he; “no one shall serve under the noble Altamont but by her own free choice—there is no pressing amongst gentlemen of fortune. And do not look so shy upon me neither, as if I spoke of what you never thought of before. One of you, at least, has heard of Captain Cleveland, the Rover.”
Brenda grew still paler, but the blood mounted at once in Minna’s cheeks, on hearing the name of her lover thus unexpectedly introduced; for the scene was in itself so confounding, that the idea of the vessel’s being the consort of which Cleveland had spoken at Burgh-Westra, had occurred to no one save the Udaller.
“I see how it is,” said Bunce, with a familiar nod, “and I will hold my course accordingly.—You need not be afraid of any injury, father,” he added, addressing Magnus familiarly; “and though I have made many a pretty girl pay tribute in my time, yet yours shall go ashore without either wrong or ransom.”
“If you will assure me of that,” said Magnus; “you are as welcome to the brig and cargo, as ever I made man welcome to a can of punch.”
“And it is no bad thing that same can of punch,” said Bunce, “if we had any one here that could mix it well.”
“I will do it,” said Claud Halcro, “with any man that ever squeezed lemon—Eric Scambester, the punch-maker of Burgh-Westra, being alone excepted.”
“And you are within a grapnel’s length of him, too,” said the Udaller.—“Go down below, my girls,” he added, “and send up the rare old man, and the punch-bowl.”