Mary Anerley

“Yes, there can, papa, ever so many; and you may see one in mamma every day. Now you put one eye to this glass, and the half is better than the whole. With both, you see nothing; with one, you see better, fifty times better, than with both before. Don’t talk of arithmetic after that. It is algebra now, and quod demonstrandum.”

“To reason with the less worthy gender is degeneration of reason. What would they have said in the Senate-house, Janetta? However, I will obey your orders. What am I to look at?”

“A tall and very extraordinary man, striking his arms out, thus and thus. I never saw any one looking so excited; and he flourishes a long sword now and again, as if he would like to cut everybody’s head off. There he has been going from ship to ship, for an hour or more, with a long white boat, and a lot of men jumping after him. Every one seems to be scared of him, and he stumps along the deck just as if he were on springs, and one spring longer than the other. You see that heavy brig outside the rest, painted with ten port-holes; well, she began to make sail and run away, but he fired a gun—quite a real cannon—and she had to come back again and drop her colors. Oh, is it some very great admiral, papa? Perhaps Lord Nelson himself; I would go and be seasick for three days to see Lord Nelson. Papa, it must be Lord Nelson.”

“My dear, Lord Nelson is a little, short man, with a very brisk walk, and one arm gone. Now let me see who this can be. Whereabout is he now, Janetta?”

“Do you see that clumsy-looking schooner, papa, just behind a pilot-boat? He is just in front of her foremast—making such a fuss—”

“What eyes you have got, my child! You see better without the glass than I do with it.—Oh, now I have him! Why, I might have guessed. Of course it is that very active man and vigilant officer Lieutenant Carroway.”

“Captain Carroway from Bridlington, papa? Why, what can he be doing with such authority? I have often heard of him, but I thought he was only a coast-guard.”

“He is, as you say, showing great authority, and, I fear, using very bad language, for which he is quite celebrated. However, the telescope refuses to repeat it, for which it is much to be commended. But every allowance must be made for a man who has to deal with a wholly uncultivated race, and not of natural piety, like ours.”

“Well, papa, I doubt if ours have too much, though you always make the best of them. But let me look again, please; and do tell me what he can be doing there.”

“You know that the revenue officers must take the law into their own hands sometimes. There have lately been certain rumors of some contraband proceedings on the Yorkshire coast. Not in Flamborough parish, of course, and perhaps—probably, I may say—a long way off–”

“Papa dear, will you never confess that free trade prevails and flourishes greatly even under your own dear nose?”

“Facts do not warrant me in any such assertion. If the fact were so, it must have been brought officially before me. I decline to listen to uncharitable rumors. But however that matter may be, there are officers on the spot to deal with it. My commission as a justice of the peace gives me no cognizance of offenses—if such there are—upon the high seas. Ah! you see something particular; my dear, what is it?”