Part 8 (1/2)
”Da up so”
”No, ht air may do you harm,” rejoined Bowse
”I have no fear of either,” answered Ada ”It's quite warm, and I do not even require a cloak”
The master was sadly perplexed, and the colonel would not coht him of a better reason, which ht, and it's a rule that all ladies should go below at night,” he said, in a grave tone
This ht
”Oh! but I intend to break through the rule, I can assure you The evening, when the htful time of the twenty-four hours; and you will not persuade th came to his rescue
”What is it o below, Mr Bowse?”
he asked ”If you have any particular reason, pray mention it, and I am sure she will be most ready to obey your wishes”
”Why, sir,” said Bowse, drawing the colonel, who had risen, a little forward, and whispering so as not, he thought, to be heard by Ada; ”you see, sir, I don't quite like the look of that craft we are nearing--some murderous work has been done lately in these seas; and I was told, just before we sailed, to be cautious of her--that's all”
”It was for that reason you were loading your guns, and getting up your arms?” exclaimed the colonel, in a less cautious voice than that in which the kind lad to see precautions taken We'll fight the rascals with pleasure”
Ada overheard the words, and co up, placed her arm on her uncle's
”What is thetone ”If there is--oh! let me share it with you Do not send me down into the cabin” She trembled, but it was irl--suppose there was any danger, what object could there be in your staying on deck?” answered the colonel ”You couldn't save e to hurt any of the enemy, if there should prove to be one in the case, after all, which is in no way certain yet”
While the colonel was speaking, Bowse again looked at the speronara He now, to a certainty, ascertained that she had the dark mark in her foresail, and that she was full of o below, and on her still resisting, the colonel gave indubitable signs of anger
”Come, come, missie, no more nonsense Go below you er with you”
Ada pleaded for a few minutes more to see as likely to happen, but in vain, and was reluctantly coo into her cabin, there to await the result of the ht-irl, under the circuh abject fear for her own safety, did she pray, for of herself she thought not; but she prayed that her uncle, and the brave er--a danger which it was very natural that froerate
CHAPTER EIGHT
If, as is asserted, the pleasures of life consist rather in the anticipation than in the fruition, or perhaps we may say, in the means taken to enjoy them, rather than in the objects when obtained; so, most assuredly, is the anticipation of evil worse than the evil itself; and reat and terrible when looked at tiether disappear, when grappled with manfully
In fact, as somebody or other observed, once upon a time, that whenever he wrote a philosophical, a beautiful, or a noble sentiment, that fellow, Shakspeare, was sure to have been before hiht reat poet--
”Cowards die many times before their death”
Now, as neither Bowse, nor his officers or men, were characters of that description, but, on the contrary, as brave fellows as ever looked danger in the face without flinching, they, on their own accounts, cared very little whether the craft in sight was a pirate or an honest trader
But it was now very evident that the speronara had an object in steering, as she was clearly doing, for the brig, and as that object could scarcely be otherwise than hostile, there was a possibility of their being attacked; and with one of those unpreiving at the thoughts of a skirmish, every man hastened to buckle a cutlass to his side Powder and shot were got up, and the suns, ready at hand, to be seized in a moment The spirit of the veteran soldier was instantly aroused in the bosom of Colonel Gauntlett As he sniffed the air of battle, the querulous, ill-teallant officer As soon as Mitchell understood as likely to happen, he was seen to dive into the cabin, fro up to hishis orders