Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB

"If he knows it himself," growled the sick man. "He knows nothing about it; never was at sea in his life. He has an interest in the vessel, however, and is anxious. Look at the pilot, if

you want to know something."

This was the clue to all. I looked at the pilot. There stood the old fellow, just as I see him now, with both hands on one side of the wheel, while a sailor held the other; his tarpaulin cap drawn over the brown forehead, the flaps shading his face into the very physiognomy of a Laplander. And the deep-set eye was fixed, and the Russian leathercoloured face never varied; and when the breaker came rolling in, a grim smile came on the corner of the mouth, as he pressed the mysterious wheel to meet it; and when in some, to me, most unknown way, he lifted us up again from the deep, the grim smile was the least bit more grim. I think he knew that I was making him my index, and meant that smile for me. But he never looked at me, nor seemed to look at anything else; his eye never wandered, to sky, or chimney, or wheels, or rocks. And, after all, I said to myself that his face was like the words of an old diplomatist, one is no wiser for trying to find out.

There was a fine timber ship split on a rock as we drifted by; her masts were partly above water, and the rescued crew, taken off by a line, were on the adjoining rock. On some of these most singular island rocks are many houses, and even villages. I saw one church; and I could not help thinking, with regret, that had this been a Roman Catholic country there would have been several. How peaceful it looks there! even that one to the tempest-tost passengers-bringing thoughts of another life-another destiny!

The coast we came by, which surpasses in dreary desolateness any I ever saw, is one, I believe, rarely, if ever, visited by English tourists; it is known as Bohus Län, and is, if I do not mistake, the scene of a romance by the Swedish authoress, Emilie Carlen, which is to me a very unpleasing

one.

We stopped a little for shelter at one of these rocky islands, where there is a station; and here a council was held as to whether we ought to proceed or not; but all the worst was then over, and the passengers agreed to go on.

We seemed to make the rest of our way with greater rapidity, sometimes exposed to the horrible rolling in of the sea, sometimes sheltered

by the rocks. And so at last we got to the other fashionable watering place of Sweden, called Marlstrand; a place much resorted to by the rich merchants of Gottenburg, who congregate there, with Stockholmers and others, on a rocky island which allows them a little more than room to stand.

Some very smart-looking young ladies and handsome gentlemen adorned the pier; and looked at us in our miserable plight, and seemed trying hard to make use of the advantages of their position.

Then we were in calm water; and so we came to Gottenburg in the dead of night; and the bulky Captain rushed up to me, still wearing the white waistcoat, which true Swedes don on all state occasions, in the morning as well as evening; and the face was redder, and the great blue eye rolled still, as he caught my hand, and cried, "Here is my wife; you will lodge with me; she will take care of you."

So I was transferred from the pitching steamboat to a really handsome room in the Captain's house. His wife went to get supper, and when it was ready the Captain came in and said grace very devoutly, and instantly added, "Thank God it is finished!"-which words puzzled me until I

understood that he referred to his recent voyage. And then, in the remains of his anxiety and restlessness, he fell to work on the supper, and ate all the poached eggs with the mutton chops, to the infinite dismay of his loving spouse, who, at the moment they were devoured, came in with the soup, which the poached eggs were designed to have been put into.

Soup being, in Sweden, introduced in the middle of a meal, the Captain would have been obliged to have eaten it without poached eggs, but fortunately for him the two which, together with a vast amount of mutton chops, had been put on my plate, were still untouched; and I believe never was a captain or captain's wife much more surprised at foreign peculiarities than were these, when, affirming that I could not eat eggs and soup together, I expressed a wish to get rid of mine. With an expression of mingled pity for me and congratulation to himself, he delicately blended them up in his plate of soup, and made himself as happy as a captain need be after the trials and dangers of the sea.

218

CHAPTER XVII.

So after supper I went to bed and slept, first truly and gratefully repeating the Captain's expressive "Thank God it is over!" How often on bended knees do we utter the thanksgiving"for all the blessings of this life!"-how often do we murmur at the want of the least? how seldom do we attempt to enumerate their disproportion to our deserts; to watch their daily renewal, fresh to us every morning, new to us every moment! He redeemeth thy life from destruction; and asks but thy love for all He gives.

And the next day I found every one out of Gottenburg whom I wished to see, and every

« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »