Perhaps she was dreaming of
me. I gazed for a long time; I did not make any noise, for I dared
not wake her. At length I imprinted a soft kiss upon the cheek of my
little child. While doing it a tear dropped from my eye and fell
upon her cheek. Her eyes opened as clearly as though she had not
been sleeping. I saw that she began to be frightened, and I said,
'Mary, it is your husband!' and she clasped me about my neck, and
fainted. But I will not describe that scene. She is now the happy
wife of a poor man. I am endeavoring to accumulate a little
property, and then I will leave the sea forever."
MR. WILTON. "A vote of thanks for Grandy. That little narrative has
agreeably refreshed our minds, while the wine and cake has had the
like effect on our bodies. Now, voyage the last!"
GEORGE. "Oh, papa! that sounds so strangely. I cannot bear the last
of anything; and now particularly, it reminds us how soon our happy
evening meetings will be at an end, and naught left but the bare
recollection of them."
MRS. WILTON. "Well, my dear, I will not distress you by repeating
the obnoxious word. We will start anew, and sail round the coast of
Africa. We are a goodly party, and I dare venture to say, shall not
lack for amusement during the voyage."
MR. STANLEY. "Then we are not to go so far south as Victoria Land,
and see all the wonderful things Sir James Ross saw?"
MR. WILTON. "No: we have been in the cold long enough, and I am
rejoiced that we have no more enormous icebergs to encounter--no
more still ice-fields stretching away in every direction, or
clashing and grinding under the influence of mighty storms--no more
mountains cased in eternal ice; but we have really bid adieu to the
wintry desolation of those frozen regions that
'Lie dark and wild, beat with perpetual storms.
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