Chapter 7 - Page 2

Leach, you have not been destroying your
prospects in life by looking too wistfully at a tobacco-field?"

"Not I, sir; and if you will give me leave to say it, Captain Truck, I do
not think a plug has been landed from the ship, which did not go ashore in
a _bona-fide_ tobacco-box, that might appear in any court in England. The
people will swear, to a man, that this is true."

"Ay, ay! and the Barons of the Exchequer would be the greatest fools in
England not to believe them. If there has been no defrauding the revenue,
why does a cruiser follow this ship, a regular packet, to sea?"

"This affair of the steerage passenger, Davis, sir, is probably the cause.
The man may be heavily in debt, or possibly a defaulter; for these rogues,
when they break down, often fall lower than the 'twixt decks of a ship
like this."

"This will do to put the quarter-deck and cabin in good humour at sailing,
and give them something to open an acquaintance with; but it is sawdust to
none but your new beginners. I have known that Seal this many a year, and
the rogue never yet had a case that touched the quarter-deck. It is as the
man and his wife say, and I'll not give them up, out here in blue water,
for as much foam as lies on Jersey beach after an easterly blow. It will
not be any of the family of Davis that will satisfy yonder wind-eater; but
he will lay his hand on the whole family of the Montauk, leaving them the
agreeable alternative of going back to Portsmouth in his pleasant society,
or getting out here in mid-channel, and wading ashore as best they can.
D--- me! If I believe, Leach, that Vattel will bear the fellow out in it,
even if there has been a whole hogshead of the leaves trundled into his
island without a permit!"

To this Mr. Leach had no encouraging answer to make, for, like most of his
class, he held practical force in much greater respect than the
abstractions of books. He deemed it prudent, therefore, to be silent,
though greatly doubting the efficacy of a quotation from any authority on
board, when fairly put in opposition to a written order from the admiral
at Portsmouth, or even to a signal sent down from Admiralty at London.

The day wore away, making a gradual change in the relative positions of
the two ships, though so slowly, as to give Captain Truck strong hopes of
being able to dodge his pursuer in the coming night, which promised to be
dark and squally. To return to Portsmouth was his full intention, but not
until he had first delivered his freight and passengers in New-York; for,
like all men bound up body and soul in the performance of an especial
duty, he looked on a frustration of his immediate object as a much greater
calamity than even a