“What say you, Schank? Suppose I help you in that matter. I am in duty bound to do so, and so you will excuse my making the offer,” said the Captain, his more generous feelings excited, as he thought of the forlorn condition of the little creature.
Lieutenant Schank thanked him, and promised if his mother would accept the charge not to decline his proposal. In the meantime the Little Lady was consigned to my mother’s charge. Next to me and my father, the kind woman soon learned to love her more than anything on earth; in fact, she felt for her as for a daughter. The little creature from the first clung to her, and from the way she looked into her eyes, I really believe thought she was her own mother. At first she would not let Susan King even touch her, and shrieked out with fear. Poor Susan’s tender heart was somewhat grieved at this. Her outward appearance and hoarse voice was indeed calculated to frighten a discerning child. However, in time, the Little Lady became reconciled to her, though she still always showed a strong preference to my mother.
Chapter Four.
I need scarcely say that I now, at all events, had a more powerful rival on board than had existed since Quacko was consigned to a watery grave. As may be supposed, the goat during a long sea voyage, where the food was scarce, gave but a small quantity of milk, only sufficient indeed for the Captain and any guest he might have at breakfast or tea. I do not believe that he would have sacrificed it for the sake of anyone else, but directly the child was brought on board he issued an order that the whole of the milk should be reserved for her use. There was something strange about this, for immediately the goat gave twice the quantity that had for some time appeared on the Captain’s table. It was, to be sure, whispered that some of the young gentlemen were fond of milk for their tea, and from that time forward not a drop was ever seen in their berth. Before that time, one or two of them used to boast that they had the art of manufacturing milk out of pipeclay, whereby they accounted for the rare fluid which occasionally appeared on the mess-table.
I remember clearly the funeral of the poor nurse. As the Captain and the First-Lieutenant had considered it important that her clothes should be preserved, in the hopes of assisting in discovering to whom the Little Lady belonged, Mrs King had dressed the body in one of her old petticoats. It was then sewn up in a piece of canvas, with a shot at the feet, and placed on a grating near an open port. The Captain, who had somewhat obfuscated theological views, could not decide whether he was bound to read the funeral service over the poor woman.
“Supposing she is a heathen—and I never heard of these black people being Christians—I shouldn’t think it was much in their way, eh, Schank? Would it not be something like sacrilege to bury her in a Christian fashion?” he asked of the First-Lieutenant.
“As to that,” observed Mr Schank, “I suspect we are apt to perform the ceremony over a good many who have no more claim to be considered true Christians than she possibly had.”
“Well, I suppose it can’t do much harm, eh, Schank?” observed the Captain, after a moment’s reflection, and the Little Lady’s nurse was buried, according to the notion of the crew, in a decent Christian manner; they piously believing that, however she might have lived, she would now at all events have a fair chance of getting a safe passage to heaven. We were during this time standing to the southward, and having rounded the south of Ceylon, we touched at Point de Galle, and afterwards at Colombo, proceeding on to Bombay. Greatly to the disappointment of the ship’s company, the “Boreas” was here found to be in such good condition, that, instead of going home, she was ordered back to the China Seas. Passing through the Straits of Malacca, we returned to Macao.