Chapter 3 - Page 2

bequests in my favour, and his precepts of respect and obedience; all
of which, it now seemed to me, I had openly dishonoured. Then came the
image of my mother, with her love and sufferings, her prayers, and her
mild but earnest exhortations to be good. I thought I could see both
these parents regarding me with sorrowful, though not with reproachful
countenances. They appeared to be soliciting my return, with a species
of silent, but not the less eloquent, warnings of the consequences.
Grace and Lucy, and their sobs, and admonitions, and entreaties to
abandon my scheme, and to write, and not to remain away long, and all
that tender interest had induced two warm-hearted girls to utter at
our parting, came fresh and vividly to my mind. The recollection
proved nearly too much for me. Nor did I forget Mr. Hardinge, and the
distress he would certainly feel, when he discovered that he had not
only lost his ward, but his only son. Then Clawbonny itself, the
house, the orchards, the meadows, the garden, the mill, and all that
belonged to the farm, began to have a double value in my eyes, and to
serve as so many cords attached to my heart-strings, and to remind me
that the rover

"Drags at each remove a lengthening chain.'"

I marvelled at Rupert's tranquility. I did not then understand his
character as thoroughly as I subsequently got to know it. All that he
most prized was with him in the boat, in fact, and this lessened his
grief at parting from less beloved objects. Where Rupert was, there
was his paradise. As for Neb, I do believe his head was over his
shoulder, for he affected to sit with his face down-stream, so long as
the hills that lay in the rear of Clawbonny could be at all
distinguished. This must have proceeded from tradition, or instinct,
or some latent negro quality; for I do not think the fellow fancied
_he_ was running away. He knew that his two young masters were;
but he was fully aware he was my property, and no doubt thought, as
long as he staid in my company, he was in the line of his legitimate
duty. Then it was _my_ plan that he should return with the boat,
and perhaps these backward glances were no more than the shadows of
coming events, cast, in his case, _behind_.

Rupert was indisposed to converse, for, to tell the truth, he had
eaten a hearty supper, and began to feel drowsy; and I was too much
wrapped up in my own busy thoughts to solicit any communications. I
found a sort of saddened pleasure in setting a watch for the night,
therefore, which had an air of seaman-like duty about it, that in a
slight degree revived my old taste for the profession. It was
midnight, and I took the first watch myself, bidding my two companions
to crawl under the half-deck,