O'er Many Lands, on Many Seas

by Gordon Stables

the lawn in front of Rowan Tree Villa. Thesky was overspread with masses of darkest cloud that were beingcontinually driven onward on the wings of a fierce north wind, seldompermitting even one solitary star to peep out. The storm roared throughthe leafless elm trees, and shrieked and moaned among the giant poplars.It was indeed a wild and wintry night.

  Ah! but it didn't prevent my old and faithful Ben from making hisappearance, though what with his long white beard, his snow-clad coat,and his round, rosy, laughing face, when I went myself to open the halldoor to him, I really took him for King Christmas himself.

  But half an hour afterwards, when the crimson curtains were closelydrawn, when the table was laden with good cheer, the two greatNewfoundlands sleeping on the ample hearthrug, old Polly asleep on herperch, the cat singing on the footstool, and the kettle on the hob, withBen at one side of the fire, his pipe in full blast, and myself at theother, you would have admitted we looked just as snug and jolly as therewas any occasion to be.

  "Well, Nie, lad," said Ben, "this is what I call the quintessence ofcomfort. Heave round with a yarn."

  "Just the thing," said I; "but what shall it be?"

  "Well, we're cosy enough here, that's certain, Nie, and as contrasts arepleasant sometimes, why, let's hear of some doings of yours in the iceand snow."

  "So let it be, Ben; I will tell you of a Christmas I once spent in theArctic Ocean."

  "Not a very jolly one, I suppose," Ben replied.

  "Not so dull as you might imagine, I can tell you. Ours was a bravebrig, as strong as iron and oak could make us. It seemed to me thatthere were no icebergs big enough to hurt us. We had spent the summerwhaling in Baffin's Bay. The sport we had, so far as birds and bearsand seals and foxes were concerned, was as good as anyone could havewished; while the wild grandeur of the scenery, and the very desolationof some of it, are painted on the tablets of my memory, and will remainfor ever. But we had not the fortune to kill a single whale.

  "Then winter came on us all at once, and we found ourselves frozen in,in one of the dreariest packs of ice it has ever been my lot to lie in.The days got shorter and shorter, till the sun at last went down to riseno more for months. We had the glorious aurora, though, and moonlightand stars, but sometimes for weeks together snows fell and storms raged,and we were enveloped in total darkness and a silence deep and awful asthat of the very vaults of death. We managed, despite the weather, togive Christmas a welcome, and were gay enough for a time. Perhaps itwas our very gaiety at this season that caused us to be so gloomy anddisheartened afterwards.

  "Sickness came, the black death almost decimated our crew, and when, inthe cold bleak spring-time, the sun returned, and the ice opened andallowed us to stagger southwards, though the whales were plentiful,there were not men enough to man the boats, and hardly enough to set thesails.

  "I had been an invalid; indeed, I had barely escaped with life, and itwould be long ere I was fit again for the wild roving existence and wildsports in which my soul was so much bound up.

  "`Come with me, sir,' said our captain when we reached New York at last.`I'm going south for the good of my health, and I have cousins near SanFrancisco, and it is right welcome we both shall be.'

  "`Are they ladies?' I asked.

  "`Ay, and dear good sisterly girls at that,' he answered.

  "My savage nature rather rebelled against the society of ladies, Ben;bears and wolves were more in my line. But I could not offend my kindfriend, so consented to go.

  "`We'll take it easy,' he said, `and have a look at the land as we gosouth.'

  "We did take it easy. We visited all the lovely and enchanting sceneryof the Adirondacks, then went slowly south and west; we lingered forweeks in the Yellowstone Park. It was summer, all the woods and forestswere astir with life, the prairies gay with gorgeous flowers; there wasjoy all around us; we drank in health in every breath we breathed.

  "I felt myself no longer an invalid when we arrived at the home of mycaptain's cousins, an old-fashioned log mansion, with verandahs andporticoes around which gigantic creepers flower-laden trailed andtwined, and cooled the sun's rays that sifted through their leaves, erethey entered the beautifully-furnished rooms. There were wide, grassy,park-like lawns, terraces, and fountains, and everything that wealthcould bestow or luxury suggest adorned this lovely spot. The owner wasa retired planter. His servants were still slaves, but the master waskindness itself to even the meanest of them.

  "I would now fain have resumed my old life, and gone with rod or gun inhand to the forest, the mountain, and stream. But I was not to bepermitted to do so. I must still consider myself an invalid. Such werethe orders of my captain's cousins. So I became a willing captive, anddid all that the dear kind-hearted girls told me.

  "And, indeed, sitting under the shade of a cool and leafy orange-tree,the air perfumed with its delightful scent, with Letitia quietly sewingbeside me, and Miriam reading `The Lady of the Lake,' was as good a way,Ben, of passing a drowsy summer's afternoon as any I ever tried."

  "Didn't you fall in love?" asked Ben slyly.

  "Don't ask any questions," I replied. "Stir the fire, my boy; just hearhow the wind is roaring, and the hail rattling against the panes."

  "Ugh!" said Ben, with a little shudder as he applied the poker to theblazing coals. "Well, go on, Nie."

  "When I got still a little stronger, we, the captain's cousins and I,used to go for long rambles to the hills and woods, and sometimes southto a picnic or dance.

  "There are giants in the forests of California, Ben. Once, I remember,our ball-room was the stump of an old tree, the lofty pines its walls,and the blue sky its roof.

  "As I happened one day to let out rather inadvertently that I was,virtually speaking, a homeless man, a wanderer over the wide, wideworld, my good host said bluntly, but kindly:

  "`Then, my dear sir, you are a prisoner here for the next six months.Come, I won't take a word of denial.'

  "Well, I had to give in, if only for the simple reason that both thegirls added their influence to that of their father; I promised to stay,and didn't repent it.

  "Though I say it myself, Ben, I was soon a favourite with all the slavesabout the old estate. I daresay I had my favourites among them; it isonly natural. One of these was Shoe-Sally, another was Shoe-Sally'slittle brother Tom. They were both characters in their way, and bothoddities. Shoe-Sally was quite a personage about the old mansion. Sheseemed to do anything and everything, and to be here, there, andeverywhere all at the same time. Shoe-Sally also knew everything, orappeared to do so, and she was just as black and shiny as the shoes shepolished. Sally was bound up in a little brother of hers called Tom.

  "`Leetle tiny Tom,' she told me one day, `is so cleber, sah. He read degood Book all same's one parson, sah. Make parson hisself one o' demdays. Sure he will, sah.'

  "But Tom had a deadly enemy in the person of Joliffe the overseer, aperfect brute of a fellow, with slouching gait and murderous eye. Howhis master retained him so long I don't know, but he had been overseerfor more than ten years, I was told. Well, he might have been useful insome ways, but he was terribly cruel. He did not dare to let his mastersee him with a whip in his hand, but he had a short thick one in hispocket with which he flogged the poor slaves most unmercifully.

  "Once Shoe-Sally came running to me; I was playing with a little pet dogbelonging to Tom:

  "`Oh! for mussy sake, come quick, sah!' she shrieked; `Massa Joliffe hedone whip my pooh brudder most to death.'

  "I followed her quickly enough, and I never want to see again what I sawthen. Joliffe had stripped the poor black boy, tied him up in thestable, and was lashing him across the face and shoulders. He hadinjured one eye badly, and the blood was flowing everywhere about.

  "`You cowardly savage!' I roared.

  "Ben, I have a hard fist. That wretch's head was under my arm in amoment, and I simply punched it till I was tired, then I threw him intothe stall and let him have a bucket of water over him by way of a
reviver. Joliffe's face was a sight to see for some weeks. I told myhost what I had done, and the verdict was, `Serve Joliffe right!'

  "Poor Shoe-Sally came to thank me with the tears streaming over herhonest black cheeks.

  "`For what you hab done dis day,' sobbed Sally, `Hebbin will bress youebery hour in your life. And, oh, sah!' she added, `Sally will die foryou!'

  "I shudder even now, Ben, my friend, when I think of how true, howterribly true, the latter part of this little grateful speech turnedout.

  "Time passed, and I felt happier far in that old Californian home than Ibelieve I ever did anywhere before. I never once, however, met Joliffethe overseer, but he scowled a dreadful