She
lived on board. The crew of runners had left, and there remained only
the officers, one boy, and the steward, a mulatto who answered to the
name of Abraham. Mrs. Beard was an old woman, with a face all wrinkled
and ruddy like a winter apple, and the figure of a young girl. She
caught sight of me once, sewing on a button, and insisted on having my
shirts to repair. This was something different from the captains' wives
I had known on board crack clippers. When I brought her the shirts, she
said: 'And the socks? They want mending, I am sure, and John's--Captain
Beard's--things are all in order now. I would be glad of something to
do.' Bless the old woman! She overhauled my outfit for me, and meantime
I read for the first time _Sartor Resartus_ and Burnaby's _Ride to
Khiva_. I didn't understand much of the first then; but I remember I
preferred the soldier to the philosopher at the time; a preference
which life has only confirmed. One was a man, and the other was either
more--or less. However, they are both dead, and Mrs. Beard is dead, and
youth, strength, genius, thoughts, achievements, simple hearts--all dies
. . . . No matter.
"They loaded us at last. We shipped a crew. Eight able seamen and two
boys. We hauled off one evening to the buoys at the dock-gates, ready to
go out, and with a fair prospect of beginning the voyage next day. Mrs.
Beard was to start for home by a late train. When the ship was fast
we went to tea.
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