Bessie on Her Travels

“Only one of them is a clock,” said the captain; “the others are to show how much steam we have on, and how it is working, and if all is right.”

Bessie did not understand, and said so; and the captain, taking her up in his arms, tried to explain the use and working of the dials to the little girls; but it was rather a difficult matter for them to take in, and I do not know that he made it very clear to them.

“But I want to know about that man,” said Maggie: “does he have to walk here and look at these things all the time?”

“All the time,” said Captain Brooks.

“Doesn’t he eat and sleep?” asked Belle.

“Oh! to be sure,” said the captain. “I said he was here all the time; but I should have said a man was here all the time; for there is another who takes his turn while this one rests.”

“But are you not tired sometimes?” Bessie asked of the man, who just then came to the end of the platform where she was.

He nodded assent as he turned, but made no answer in words, did not even smile, being a grum-looking man, and seeming altogether intent on his dials.

“He’s not very polite just to nod at you and not speak,” said Lily.

“It is against the rule of the ship for him to talk while he is on duty, and he always keeps the rule,” said the captain.

“Oh!” said Maggie, her pity more than ever roused for the object of her interest: “does he have to walk on this little bit of a place with nothing to amuse him, and can’t even talk? I think that is pretty hard: I never could do it.”

“But if he were talking and chatting with every one who came along, and thinking only of his own amusement, he would forget his work and have his attention taken off from those plates which it is his business to watch constantly,” said the captain.

“And then we’d be blown up or burnt up or drowned or something,” said Maggie.

“Not as bad as that, I hope,” said Captain Brooks, smiling; “but something might readily go wrong before he perceived it.”

“It seems like watching conscience all the time for fear we do something naughty,” said Bessie, who had been thoughtfully regarding the man since she last spoke. “If we forget conscience, or don’t pay attention where it points, we can be naughty before we know it.”

“Just so,” said the captain, looking at her half in amusement, half in surprise; “but tell me, little one, do you find some moral lesson in every thing?”

“I don’t know what ‘moral’ is, sir,” said Bessie, demurely; “but I think that man is a pretty good lesson to us.”

Here roguish Lily, for whom the prospect of being “blown up or burnt up or drowned or something,” did not seem to have any terrors, and who had been all this time trying to distract the watchman’s attention by shaking her head and finger at him, flirting her pocket-handkerchief, and giving little squeaks and “hems,” all without any avail, suddenly astonished him and accomplished her object, by firing a paper pellet which hit him directly between the eyes. The gruff old fellow only gave her a growl in return, however, and recommenced his pacing up and down; but Lily went capering about in an ecstasy of delight at her unlooked-for success, till the captain, who could not help laughing, called her to order with, —

“Here, here, you elf! have done with your monkey tricks, or I shall shut you up in a cage till we get to shore.”

“You’ve none large enough,” said laughing Lily.

“There are plenty of hencoops on board,” said the captain, pretending to look fierce, “and carpenters too, to make any sized cage I may order. You had better look out.”

“I don’t think it’s fair to tease the poor man,” said Bessie, “he has to be so stupid all the time, and he is so dutiful too. Let’s go away, Captain Brooks, and not let him be teased any more.”

So the captain took them away in search of other novelties; but Maggie and Bessie did not forget “the poor, stupid man,” as the latter called him, meaning only that she thought he passed his time in such a dull, uninteresting manner; and they set their young wits to work to see if they could not do him some kindness.

“I don’t see the good of it,” said Lily. “The captain said he was a surly old fellow, any way, and didn’t care to talk much when he could. I guess we’d better just let him alone.”

“We oughtn’t to judge by appearances,” said Maggie, gravely. “Bessie and I have learned that.”

“But not till we’d performed some pretty bad mistakes,” said Bessie: “so take a lesson of us.”

“Tell us about them,” said Belle; and accordingly Belle and Lily were much interested in hearing of Lem and the silver cup, and of Aunt Patty; Maggie also confessing how she had for a long time misjudged Mrs. Jones, of Quam Beach, because she had a disagreeable manner.

III

LUCY

Old ocean seemed to wish to make amends, during the last two days of the short voyage, for the tossing and rolling he had given our friends during the first. It was as smooth as a river almost, and broke itself up into little wavelets which seemed formed only to sparkle and catch the sunshine. The weather was warm and summer-like, growing more and more so the farther south they went; and the children spent the whole of their time on deck, even taking their meals there: for though Maggie declared herself “all right now,” she could not eat when taken below, and it was “such fun” to have breakfast, dinner, and tea, sent up to them and eaten on deck in such impromptu fashion, that the others were only too glad of the excuse of bearing her company. Mamma and Mrs. Norris preferred it too; so they had quite a sociable, cosey time of it.

As for Bessie, she wanted “no better contentment” than to sit watching the sea. The sky; the waves; the white sea-gulls, which now and then came sailing round on their snowy wings; the other vessels they saw in the far distance, or sometimes near at hand; the huge porpoises which threw themselves with a sudden leap and plunge out from the water and back again, – each and all had their charm for her; and, if undisturbed, she would sit for hours, her doll clasped in her arms, gazing her fill, and thinking her own thoughts. Happy, peaceful thoughts they were too, if one might judge by the expression of her sweet little face.

“How my Bessie loves the sea, does she not?” said her father, sitting down beside her one time when he found her thus absorbed.

“Yes, papa, dearly; but then I love the real sea better.”

“But this is the real sea, darling.”

“But I mean the real, real sea, papa; the true, very sea,” said the little girl.

“I do not know how you could have more real sea than this, dear,” said her father, rather at a loss to know what she could mean. “We are many, many miles from land. You can see none on any side. It is water, water, the real true ocean, all around us, as far and farther than our eyes can reach. You do not mean that you would have it rough and stormy?”

“Oh, no, papa!” Bessie answered, rather puzzled herself how to make her meaning plain to her father; “but I mean that kind of sea where the waves come slowly, slowly on the beach, all white and curly, and make that nice sound I like so much. It does not come in this kind of a sea.”

“Oh, ho!” said her father, “I understand. It is the seashore you are longing for, even more than the open sea itself. Well, perhaps one of these days, you may be there again.”

“Oh! do you think I might be, papa? Oh, that would be so delightful!” and she turned her little, eager, wistful face to her father with such a sparkle in her eye.

“I think it more than likely that such a thing will come to pass, Bessie,” said Mr. Bradford; but he did not tell her what a pleasant surprise awaited her in the course of her summer travels.

“Papa,” she said again presently, “do not these dear little waves we have to-day make you think of our Maggie? They seem just like her, as if they were dancing and laughing, and so glad and gay.”

“Yes,” said her father, pleased at the pretty conceit of the affectionate little sister, “and God’s sunshine, pouring down upon these merry waves and touching them with light and sparkle, is like the love and tenderness which make our Maggie’s heart so gay and happy.”

“And I am a little bit of Maggie’s sunshine: am I not, papa?” asked the sweet Bessie.

The reply came in a squeeze, half a dozen smothering kisses, and a squeal meant to express affection and delight, from Maggie herself, who, coming up behind them and hearing Bessie’s question, answered after her own peculiar fashion.

Yes: they were both true sunbeams, these two dear little girls: sunbeams as all children may be, because they were happy; happy because they were good and generous and loving; sunbeams to one another and to all around them, shedding light and brightness wherever they passed.

“Bessie,” said Maggie, when she had done hugging and kissing her sister, “I’ve made a very surprising discovery. Do you see that little girl sitting over there? I’ve seen her before.”

“Yes,” answered Bessie. “She’s a kind of errand girl and helps the stewardess. Yesterday morning when you were so sick she brought some ice for you; but I didn’t speak to her, ’cause I felt so bad about you.”

“But, do you know who her father is, Bessie?”

“No,” said Bessie. “Who?”

“That man downstairs, the steam-clock man. Isn’t that very curious?”