The Red Rover & Other Sea Adventures – 3 Novels in One Volume. Джеймс Фенимор Купер
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his pious sponsors, humbly to express his future hopes, turned his head towards the heroic tailor, with an expression of drollery about the eye, that proved nature had not been niggardly in the gift of humour, however the quality was suppressed by the restraints of a very peculiar manner, and no less peculiar education.
“There’s an opening now, neighbour Homespun, for an ambitious man,” he said, “sin’ his Majesty has lost his stoutest general.”
“Yes, yes,” returned the individual who, either in his youth or in his age, had made so capital a blunder in the choice of a profession, “a fine and promising chance it is for one who counts but five-and-twenty; most of my day has gone by, and I must spend the rest of it here, where you see me, between buckram and osnaburghs—who put the dye into your cloth, Pardy? it is the best laid-in bark I’ve fingered this fall.”
“Let the old woman alone for giving the lasting colour to her web; I’ll engage, neighbour Homespun, provided you furnish the proper fit, there’ll not be a better dress’d lad on the island than my own mother’s son! But, sin’ you cannot be a general good-man, you’ll have the comfort of knowing there’ll be no more fighting without you. Every body agrees the French won’t hold out much longer, and then we must have a peace for want of enemies.”
“So best, so best, boy; for one, who has seen so much of the horrors of war as I, knows how to put a rational value on the blessings of tranquillity!”
“Then you ar’n’t altogether unacquainted, good-man, with the new trade you thought of setting up?”
“I! I have been through five long and bloody wars, and I’ve reason to thank God that I’ve gone through them all without a scratch so big as this needle would make. Five long and bloody, ay, and I may say glorious wars, have I liv’d through in safety!”
“A perilous time it must have been for you, neighbour. But I don’t remember to have heard of more than two quarrels with the Frenchmen in my day.” “You are but a boy, compared to one who has seen the end of his third score of years. Here is this war that is now so likely to be soon ended—Heaven, which rules all things in wisdom, be praised for the same! Then there was the business of ‘45, when the bold Warren sailed up and down our coasts; a scourge to his Majesty’s enemies, and a safeguard to all the loyal subjects. Then, there was a business in Garmany, concerning which we had awful accounts of battles fou’t, in which men were mowed down like grass falling before the scythe of a strong arm. That makes three. The fourth was the rebellion of ‘15, of which I pretend not to have seen much, being but a youth at the time; and the fifth was a dreadful rumour, that was spread through the provinces, of a general rising among the blacks and Indians, which was to sweep all us Christians into eternity at a minute’s warning!”
“Well, I had always reckoned you for a home-staying and a peaceable man, neighbour;” returned the admiring countryman; “nor did I ever dream that you had seen such serious movings.”
“I have not boasted, Pardon, or I might have added other heavy matters to the list. There was a great struggle in the East, no longer than the year ‘32, for the Persian throne. You have read of the laws of the Medes and the Persians: Well, for the very throne that gave forth those unalterable laws was there a frightful struggle, in which blood ran like water; but, as it was not in Christendom, I do not account it among my own experiences; though I might have spoken of the Porteous mob with great reason, as it took place in another portion of the very kingdom in which I lived.”
“You must have journeyed much, and been stirring late and early, good-man, to have seen all these things, and to have got no harm.”
“Yes, yes, I’ve been something of a traveller too, Pardy. Twice have I been over land to Boston, and once have I sailed through the Great Sound of Long Island, down to the town of York. It is an awful undertaking the latter, as it respects the distance, and more especially because it is needful to pass a place that is likened, by its name, to the entrance of Tophet.”
“I have often heard the spot call’d ‘Hell Gate’ spoken of, and I may say, too, that I know a man well who has been through it twice; once in going to York, and once in coming homeward.”
“He had enough of it, as I’ll engage! Did he tell you of the pot which tosses and roars as if the biggest of Beelzebub’s fires was burning beneath, and of the hog’s-back over which the water pitches, as it may tumble over the Great Falls of the West! Owing to reasonable skill in our seamen, and uncommon resolution in the passengers, we happily made a good time of it, through ourselves; though I care not who knows it, I will own it is a severe trial to the courage to enter that same dreadful Strait. We cast out our anchors at certain islands, which lie a few furlongs this side the place, and sent the pinnace, with the captain and two stout seamen, to reconnoitre the spot, in order to see if it were in a peaceful state or not. The report being favourable, the passengers were landed, and the vessel was got through, by the blessing of Heaven, in safety. We had all reason to rejoice that the prayers of the congregation were asked before we departed from the peace and security of our homes!”
“You journeyed round the ‘Gate’ on foot?”—demanded the attentive boor.
“Certain! It would have been a sinful and a blasphemous tempting of Providence to have done otherwise, seeing that our duty called us to no such sacrifice. But all that danger is gone by, and so I trust will that of this bloody war, in which we have both been actors; and then I humbly hope his sacred Majesty will have leisure to turn his royal mind to the pirates who infest the coast, and to order some of his stout naval captains to mete out to the rogues the treatment they are so fond of giving unto others. It would be a joyful sight to my old eyes to see the famous and long-hunted Red Rover brought into this very port, towing at the poop of a King’s cruiser.”
“And is it a desperate villain, he of whom you now make mention?”
“He! There are many he’s in that one, lawless ship, and bloody-minded and nefarious thieves are they, to the smallest boy. It is heart-searching and grievous, Pardy, to hear of their evil-doings on the high seas of the King!”
“I have often heard mention made of the Rover,” returned the countryman; “but never to enter into any of the intricate particulars of his knavery.”
“How should you, boy, who live up in the country, know so much of what is passing on the great deep, as we who dwell in a port that is so much resorted to by mariners! I am fearful you’ll be making it late home, Pardon,” he added, glancing his eye at certain lines drawn on his shop-board, by the aid of which he was enabled to note the progress of the setting sun. “It is drawing towards the hour of five, and you have twice that number of miles to go, before you can, by any manner of means, reach the nearest boundary of your father’s farm.”
“The road is plain, and the people honest,” returned the countryman, who cared not if it were midnight, provided he could be the bearer of tidings of some dreadful sea robbery to the ears of those whom he well knew would throng around him, at his return, to hear the tidings from the port. “And is he, in truth, so much feared and sought for, as people say?”
“Is he sought for! Is Tophet sought by a praying Christian? Few there are on the mighty deep, let them even be as stout for, battle as was Joshua the great Jewish captain, that would not rather behold the land than see the top-gallants of that wicked pirate! Men fight for glory, Pardon, as I may say I have seen, after living through so many wars, but none love to meet an enemy who hoists a bloody flag at the first blow, and who is ready to cast both parties into the air, when he finds the hand of Satan has no longer power to help him.”
“If the rogue is so desperate,” returned the youth straightening his powerful limbs, with a look of rising pride, “why do not the Island and the Plantations fit out a coaster in order to bring him in, that he might get a sight of a wholesome gibbet? Let the drum beat on such a message through our neighbourhood and I’ll engage that it don’t leave it without one volunteer at least.”
“So much for not having seen war! Of what use would flails and pitch-forks prove against men who have sold themselves to the devil? Often has the Rover been seen at night, or just as