The String of Pearls; or, The Barber of Fleet Street — page 36: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

etna nee nt ltl A AR NES Yt) HE ERR RES ARATE SRE MRE ACM NIE OMY SRNR TENT TRETINOIN GS ORATION RS» TMM TES reece 28 THE STRING OF PEARLS. fig ee a , | Yes; it was an ill-fated ship, and it did sink; but I must not anticipated—let | sl? ‘| me proceedio my narrative with regularity. The ship was called the Star ; and if | ti? those who went with is looked upon it as the star of their destiny, they were © vist correct enough, and it might be considered an evil star for them, inasmuch as we nothing but disappointment and bitterness became their ultimate portion. And — ict | Mark Ingestrie, I am told, was the most hopeful man on board. Already in ' out imagination he could fancy himself homeward-bound with the vessel, ballasted and » em crammed with the rich produce of that shining river. Already he fancied what | nn he could do with his abundant wealth, and I have not a doubt but that, im conrmon ih with many who went on that adventure, he enjoyed to the full the spending of the — i ‘| wealth he should obtain in imagination—-perhaps, indeed, more than i he had | Fi ay ' obtained it in reality. Among the adventurers was one Thornhill, who had been — | outs a lieutenant in the Royal Navy, and between him and young Ingestrie there arose _ % ofthe a remarkable friendship—a friendship so strong and powerful, that there can be no — ar: { doubt that they communicated to each other all their hopes and fears; and ‘gill if anything could materially tend to beguile the tedium of such a weary voyage | Egg as those adventurers had undertaken, it certainly would be the free communica- | anes _ tion and confidential intercourse between two such kindred spirits as Thornhill | ae _ and Mark Ingestrie. You will bear in mind, Miss Oakley, that in making this © pte - communication to you, Iam putting together what I myself heard at different . ome times, so as to make it for you a distinct narrative, which you can have no — bree difficulty in comprehending, because, as I before stated, I never saw Mark Ingestric, _ ee bal _ and it was only once, for about five minutes, that I saw the vessel in which he . al th | went upon his perilous acventure—for perilous it turned out to be—to the Indian i ihe _ seas. It was from Thornhill I got my information during the many weary and | ‘util ' monotonous hours consumed in a home-bound voyage from India. It appears | | ny _ that without accident or cross of any description the Star reached the Indian | oe ocean, and the supposed immediate locality of the spot where the treasure was to * be found, and there she was spoken with by a vessel homeward-bound from India, | | et @alled the Neptune It was evening, and the sun had sunk in the horizon with | oe _ Some appearances that betokened a storm. I was on board that Indian vessel; St _ we did not expect anything serious, although we made every preparation for rough — | et | weather, and as it turned out, it was well mdeed we did, for never within the | ul ' memory of the oldest seamen, had sucha storm ravished the coast. A furious — te |, gale, which 1f was impossible to withstand, drove us southward; and but for the — al 0 _ utmost precautions, aided by courage and temerity on the part of the seamen, | mun _ such as I had never before witnessed in the merchant-service, we escaped with | | MMe ‘| triflmg damage, but we were driven at least 200 miles out of our course; led _ and instead of getting, as we ought to have done, to the Cape by a certain time, — | rei '| we were an immense distance eastward of it. It was just as the storm, which | | astn _ lasted three nights and two days, began to abate, that towards the horizon we saw _ | then ! a dull red light ; and as it was not in a quarter of the sky where any such ap- | + hoy || pearance might be imagined, nor were we in a latitude where electro-phenomena | a g ' might be expected, we steered toward it, surmising what turned out afterwards — day to be fully correct,’ ” : act ; “It was a ship on fire!” said Johanna. | y “It was.” “Alas! alas! I guessed it. A frightful suspicion from the first crossed my mind. | \. | It was a ship on fire, and that ship was——” te _ _ The Star was bound uy on its adventurous course, although driven far out of it ; la _ by adverse winds and waves. After about half an hour's sailing we came within ! | | sight distinctly of a blazing vessel. We could hear the roar of the flames, and | mast to mast, like fiery serpents, exulting in the destruction they were making. through our glasses we could see them curling up the cordage, and dancing from We made all sail, and strained every inch of canvas to reach the ill-fated vessel, || for distances at sea that look small are in reality very great, and an hour’s hard | saililg in a fair wind, with every stitch of canvas set, would not do more than | enable us to reach that ill-fated bark; but fancy in an hour what ravages the | } a ea a a eaten nascar TD TE sutras —~ ~ GEES SLA memaAne, - A ae is enters: See eee of, an ne a er a ee tt Et emt ake . ae \ oe Lr ~~ Ki ~ comicbooks.com a — a — ee