I hope, sir, you do not think our case so desperate, as to intend
yielding as prisoners."
"Prisoners!" exclaimed the lieutenant; "no, no, lad, it has not got to
that, yet! England has been able to wreck my craft, I must concede; but
she has, as yet, obtained no other advantage over us. She was a precious
model, Merry! the cleanest run, and the neatest entrance, that art ever
united on the stem and stern of the same vessel! Do you remember the
time, younker, when I gave the frigate my top-sails, in beating out of
the Chesapeake? I could always do it, in smooth water, with a whole-sail
breeze. But she was a frail thing! a frail thing, boy, and could bear
but little."
"A mortar-ketch would have thumped to pieces where she lay," returned
the midshipman.
"Ay, it was asking too much of her, to expect she could hold together on
a bed of rocks. Merry, I loved her; dearly did I love her; she was my
first command, and I knew and loved every timber and bolt in her
beautiful frame!"
"I believe it is as natural, sir, for a seaman to love the wood and iron
in which he has floated over the depths of the ocean for so many days
and nights," rejoined the boy, "as it is for a father to love the
members of his own family."
"Quite, quite, ay, more so," said Barnstable, speaking as if he were
choked by emotion. Merry felt the heavy grasp of the lieutenant on his
slight arm, while his commander continued, in a voice that gradually
increased in power, as his feelings predominated; "and yet, boy, a human
being cannot love the creature of his own formation as he does the works
of God.
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