Afloat and Ashore | Page 3

not wearing a proper clerical black coat with a stand-up collar of Oxford cut and the regulation white tie, and that of "commission" in smoking such a vulgar thing as a common clay pipe!
Presently, after his second turn as far as the lilac bush and back, father's face cleared, as if he had worked out the question that had been puzzling him; for, its anxious expression vanished and his eyes seemed to smile again.
"I suppose it's a family trait, and runs in the blood," he said. "Your grandfather,--my father, that is, Allan,--was a sailor; and I know I wanted to go to sea too, just like you, before I was sent to college. So, that accounts for your liking for it--eh?"
"I suppose so," I answered without thinking, just echoing his words like a parrot; although, now I come to consider the thing fully, I really can see no other reason than this hereditary instinct to account for the passionate longing that possessed me at that period to be a sailor, as, beyond reading Robinson Crusoe like other boys, I was absolutely ignorant of the life and all concerning it. Indeed, up to then, although it may seem hardly credible, I had only once actually seen the sea, and a ship in the distance--far-away out in the offing of what appeared to me an immeasurable expanse of space. This was when father took my sister Nellie and me for a day's visit to Brighton. It was a wonderful experience to us, from the contrast the busy town on the coast offered to the quiet country village where we lived and of which my father was the pastor, buried in the bosom of the shires away from the bustling world, and out of contact with seafaring folk and those that voyage the deep.
Yes, there's no doubt of it. That love for the sea, which made me wish to be a sailor as naturally as a cat loves cream, ran in my blood, and must have been bred in my bone, as father suggested.
Before, however, we could either of us pursue the psychological investigation of this theory any further, our argument was interrupted by my mother's coming to where we were standing under the elm-tree at the top of the garden.
Father at once put away his pipe on her approach, always respecting and honouring her beyond all women even as he loved her; and he greeted her with a smile of welcome.
"Well, dear?" said he sympathetically as she held out the letter she carried and then placed her hand on his arm confidingly, turning her anxious face up to his in the certainty of finding him ready to share her trouble whatever it might be. "Now tell me all about it."
"It has come, Robert!" she exclaimed, nestling nearer to him.
"Yes, I see, dear," he replied, glancing at the open sheet; for they had no secrets from each other, and she had opened the letter already, although it had been addressed to him. Then, looking at me, father added: "This is from Messrs. Splice and Mainbrace, the great ship- brokers of Leadenhall Street, to whom I wrote some time since, about taking you in one of their vessels, Allan, on your expressing such a desire to go to sea."
"Oh, father!" was all I could say.
"They inform me now," continued he, reading from the broker's communication, "that all the arrangements have been completed for your sailing in the Silver Queen on Saturday next, which will be to-morrow week, your premium as a first-class apprentice having been paid by my London agents, by whom also your outfit has been ordered; and your uniform, or `sea toggery' as sailors call it, will be down here next Monday or Tuesday for you to try on."
"Oh, father!" I cried again, in wondering delight at his having settled everything so promptly without my knowing even that he had acceded to my wishes. "Why, you seem to have decided the question long ago, while you were asking me only just now if I would not prefer any other profession to the sea!"
"Because, my son," he replied affectionately, "I know that boys, like girls, frequently change their minds, and I was anxious that you should make no mistake in such a vital matter as that of your life's calling; for, even at the last hour, if you had told me you preferred being a clergyman or a doctor or a lawyer to going to sea, I would cheerfully have sacrificed the money I have paid to the brokers and for your outfit. Aye, and I would willingly do it now, for your mother and I would be only too glad of your remaining with our other chicks at home."
"And why won't you, Allan?" pleaded mother, throwing her arms round me and hugging