Run to Earth

es and trampling feet in many public-houses tell of festivity provided for Jack-along-shore. The emporiums of slop-sellers are illuminated for t

ana handkerchief's; and on every pane of glass in shop or tavern window is pai

day-time by a window commanding a pleasant prospect of coal-shed and dead wall. The paper on the walls was dark and greasy with age; and every bit of clumsy, bulging deal furniture i

and wizen, and misshapen. One had a dark, bronzed face, with a frank, fearless expression; the other was pale and freckled, and had small, light-gray eyes, that shifted and blinked perpetually, and shifted and blinked mo

xico. The second was his clerk, factotum, and confidant; half-sailor, half-landsman; able to take the helm in dangerous w

dy a personage, that Captain Jernam had declined to part with him at the end of the cruise: and from that time, the wizen little hunchback had been the stalwart seaman's friend and companion. For fifteen years, during which Valentine Jernam and his younger brother,

ocked on the head in some row, and was brought here. We've got him through a fever that was likely enough to have finished him; but there he lies, as weak as a starved rat. He has neither money nor friends. He wants to get back to England; but he has no more hope of ever seeing that country than I have of being Emperor of Mexico.' 'Hasn't he?' says I; 'we'll tell you a differ

ymen passed me by as I lay on that hospital-bed, and left me to rot there, for all they cared? I heard their loud voices

e, don't

r, you see, it doesn't improve a man's temper to find himself cut out according to a different pattern from that his fellow-creatures have been made by, and to find his fellow-creatures setting themselves against him because of that difference; and it doesn't soften a poor wretch's heart towards the world in general, to find the world in general

houldn

ies his fortune about him, as you do. I wish you

you. 'Why, of course you can,' reply they; and then you hand over your money, and then they hand you back a little bit of paper. 'That's your receipt,' say they. 'All right,' say you; and off you sheer. Perhaps you feel just a little bit queerish, when you get outside, to think that all your solid cash has been melted down into that

people down this way, any day in the

nker. I'm only a sleeping partner in the firm of Jernam Brothers. George takes the money, and George does what he likes with it - puts it here and there, and speculates in this and speculates in that. You've got a business head of your own, Joyce; you're one of George's own sort;

ernam Brothers are growing rich; Jernam Brothers are pros

by in the Pool. However, there's an old aunt of mine, down in a sleepy little village in Devonshire, who'd be glad to see me, and none the worse for a small slice of Jernam Brothers' good luck; so I'll take a p

e you to

his r

tum shook

people that have got it now are strangers to us. They've bought

n done up. But come, Joyce, some more rum-and-water. Let's enjoy ourselves to

music close at hand. A woman's voice, fresh and clear as the song of a sky-lark

s to pierce to the very core of my heart as I l

t's a sort of concert they give of a night; an excuse for drunkenness, and riot, and low company. If you're go

I'm as sober as a judge. Come, Joyce, le

and Harker followed, shrugg

of thirty years old," he muttered; "a bless

and a little platform at one end. The room was full of sailors and disreputable-looking

om for the captain and his companion at one of the table

l fellow like you," he said; "come, mat

t him and grinne

the landlord, and orde

sure you are not too liberal w

square-built man, with a flat, pale face, broad and square

e rickety, liquor-stained table, and t

There were only two performers in this primitive species of concert - the girl who sang, and an old blind man, who accompanied her on the piano; but such enter

med in bands of smooth black hair, and lighted by splendid black eyes; the face of a Roman empress rather than a singing-girl at a public-house in Shadwell. Never before had Valentine Jernam looked on so fair a woman. He had never been a student

uty and her singing, and thought very little about her. The girl was very quiet, very modest. She came and went under the ca

o sing agai

ed to her eagerly, as he played, and nodded fond approval every now and then, as the full, rich notes fell upon his ear. The poor blind

exclaimed the captain, in

ty girl," muttered

n in the world; and to think that such a woman should be here, in this place, in the mid

, you wouldn't take the trouble to pity her. I don't see why you should concern yourself about her, because she happens to have black eyes and r

l towards Joyce, and bade that gentleman dispense the mixture. His own glass remained before him untouched, while the foreign seamen and Joyce Ha

under the influence of a spell. There was only one exit from the room, so the singing-girl and her grandfather had to pass along the narrow space betwee

nd followed. He was just in time to see her leave the house with her grandfather, and w

r, as Jernam looked out into the street, watching the

't she?" said the landlor

or. "Who is she? - where does sh

and she lives with her fath

her who went out

at's Tom

ble. I don't think I ever set

rd, rather sulkily; "I've known Tom Milsom these

Rotherhithe. I worked with him in a shipbuilder's yard seven years ago: a surly brute he was then, and a surly brute he is now; and a lazy, skul

s you do your own, Joe Dermot," answered the

rust Black Milsom, and never will. There are men who would take your life's

erested in Black Milsom's character, but because he wanted to hear anything that co

orway, listening even more attentively than his employer; the small,

ed to resent any disrespectful allusion to that individual. The man called Joe Dermot paid his score, and went away.

unted by the vision of a beautiful face, the sound of a melodious v

five o'clock, and tapped at Joyce Marker's d

re you keep your eye upon the rep

; but to his surprise the door was opened,

ered Harker. "I don't like this place, and I want to see

; the place suit

ce. Don't you come back to this house till you come to meet Captain George. Captain George is a cool hand, and I'm not afraid of him; but you're too wild and too free-spoken for such folks as hang about the 'Jolly Tar'. You sported

ou've pluck enough for twenty in a storm a

smell danger when it threatens

g. The clerk's quick ear caught the sound of a stealthy footstep; and in the ne

" said Joyce Harker, recognizing

the matter of that,

ach, and I'm going to walk to the

hen, if he can stop to drink it,

y; "but you see, the captain hasn't time f

country for long, capt

pril, with a brother of mine, who's homeward-bound from Barbadoes. You see, my brother and me are p

sture with eager eyes. All through Valentine's speech, Joyce Harker had been trying to arrest his attent

a cheerful good day, and depar

yce Harker remonstrat

trusted, captain," he said; "and yet

I didn't say a w

man know you'd got the cash about you. But you won't go back

ourse

hange your m

ot

sharp work to get finished against you want to sail for Rio. So, you see, I shall be out

ifth. I'll come up from Plymouth by the night coach, and put up at the 'Golden Cross' like a gentle

. No honest man is ever

ey hailed a hackney-coach presently, and drove to the "Golden Cross," throu

y friendly words on both sides; but to th

e captain's dark face looking out of the coach-wi

k, as he trudged back towards the City. "But was there ever a baby so helpless o

ich lived the only relative he had in the world, except his brother George. Walking at a leisurely pace along the quiet road,

ildhood had been a very sad one. Motherless at eight years of age, and ill-used by

th, Valentine had been the infant's sole nurse and protector; standing between the helpless little one and

boy had braved and defied his fathe

re of brotherly love. Valentine had supplied the place of both parents to his brother George - the place of the mother, who

e vices which had caused his expulsion from the navy had increased with every year, until the family had sunk to the lowest depths of poverty and degradation, in spite of the wife's heroic efforts to accompl

r, and as soon as George was old enough to face the world with his brother, the t

er and all hardships. But the rough sailors were kinder than t

f character, their love for each other had known neither change nor diminution; and to-day, walking alone upon this quiet country road, t

ace on the fifth," he t

; but she had been very poor in the days of their childhood, and had been able to do but little for the neglected lads. She had giv

s sitting by the window when her nephew opened the little garden-gate: but she had opene

ed, "I have been look

es, and he was so willing to tell them. He sat before the fire smoking, while Susan Jernam's busy fingers p

tion. After dinner, he strolled out into the village, saw his old friends and acquaintanc

d seen all his old acquaintances. The face of the ballad-singer haunted him perpetually; and he spent the best

insman, "it's fortunate Providence made you a sailor, fo

s exhausted. The face which had made itself a part of his very mind lured him back to London. He was a man who ha

ind out it's only a common face after all, and get the better of this folly. But I must see her. Afte

told his aunt that he had business to transact in London. He left Allanbay at noon, wa

nce more in the familiar seafaring quarter; early as i

n of considerable surprise as the captai

"I thought we weren't t

siness to do in this neighbou

just come in time to take a snack of dinner with me and my missus,

t seemed proffered in such a hearty spirit. And beyond this,

ound himself asking all manner of questions about the si

was going to sing a

Friday. She only sings at my place o

o with herself for t

the course of the afternoon, and he can tell you. I say, though, captain, you

Jernam "perhaps I'm fool enough to be caught by a prett

ncy. There's the little private room at your service, captain, and I dare say you can make yourself comfortable there with your pipe

to the little den called a private room, where he speedily f

on, upon a hard wooden chair, with his arms folded on the

tence of a fire, made wit

t uncomfortable attitude, it was scarcely st

Pizarro', and that he woke suddenly and found himself in darkness. He

crew, utter loneliness, perfect silence. A stillness like the stilln

ed the universal gloom, and in that uncertain light a shadowy figure came gliding towards him across th

trange gliding motion. The shadow lifte

w

ered cold and white through

d on it the sleeper read this inscription

, saw the man they called Black Milsom sitting on the

ed in here just now, thinking to find Dennis Wayman, and I've been l

" answered Jernam,

m! What abo

daughter!"