ARTHUR BROWN,

THE YOUNG CAPTAIN.

BY

REV. ELIJAH KELLOGG,

AUTHOR OF THE ELM ISLAND STORIES—“LION BEN,” “CHARLIE BELL,” “THE BOY-FARMERS,” “THE ARK,” “THE YOUNG SHIP- BUILDERS,” “THE HARD-SCRABBLE.”

ILLUSTRATED.

BOSTON:

LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.

[4]

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870, by LEE AND SHEPARD, in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington.

Copyright, 1898, by Elijah Kellogg.

————

All Rights Reserved.

————

Arthur Brown.

Norwood Press: Berwick & Smith, Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

[5]

PREFACE.

Notwithstanding kindness is at times rewarded with ingratitude, and even positive injury, it is by no means so frequent an occurrence as persons naturally censorious, or whose minds have been soured by an unblest experience, would have us suppose.

Benefits conferred usually excite gratitude, and sometimes, when the donors have passed away are repaid, with interest, to their posterity.

The story of Arthur Brown presents a striking illustration of this principle. Lashed to a raft, perishing with cold and hunger in the edge of the surf, he is rescued by Captain Rhines, who, when a boy, poor and unable either to read or write, had been instructed and started in business[6] by Arthur’s father, who was afterwards lost at sea. The old captain, discovering, in the person he had perilled his life to save, the only son of his benefactor, receives him with open arms, with a nobility of soul that strengthens our faith in human nature, freely bestowing both time and property to aid the son and family of his benefactor, and repay the old debt. His efforts in this direction, together with those of the young man to help himself, at a most stirring period of our country’s history, the adventures growing out of those efforts, and the consequent development of character, will, we trust, prove interesting, and not without instruction.

Some references have necessarily been made to characters of the “Elm Island Series,” the reasons for which are given in the introductory chapter, and the references so explained as to render the connection plain to the reader.

[7]

CHAPTER I.

INTRODUCTORY.

IN the series of books denominated the “Elm Island Stories” (commencing at the period when the old “Continental Congress,” which had fought the war of the revolution, was superseded by the Federal Government, and running through successive years) were introduced certain characters in whom our juvenile readers became so much interested, that they have assured us they could not abruptly surrender their acquaintance, at least not without some slight knowledge of their future prospects, especially as we were compelled to conclude our tale when most of them were on the very threshold of manhood. Desiring[10] to gratify, and, at the same time, render them somewhat familiar with the history and progress of their native land in those snapping times included between the outbreak of the French revolution and the embargo, so prolific in gain and adventure to those possessing the enterprise, and daring to profit by them, and during which American commerce took such mighty strides, we must of necessity, at the commencement of this volume, make some slight reference to persons and places

previously described. For the benefit of those who have not read the former series, we introduce a brief sketch, referring those who may desire more accurate knowledge to those books.

Our old acquaintances can pursue, with this chapter, the course we used to adopt, when compelled to read one of Buckminster’s sermons aloud to the family, after having been twice to meeting, brought home the texts and heads of the sermon, and to Sabbath school—skip, skipped all we dared to, skipped all we could.

The scene of the “Elm Island Stories” is laid in eastern Maine, when it was little better than a forest, save a rim of clearings and incipient towns along the sea-shore.

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Captain Rhines, who lived on the shore at a place named from him and his ancestors Rhineville, but then a plantation unincorporated, was a noble specimen of a sea captain—shrewd, kindly, self-made, of a daring nature, controlled by clear, cool judgment.

His son Ben, possessing all the sterling qualities of his father, is a giant in strength, and in the very prime of life. Though in general of most even temper, and only by long provocations excited to wrath, yet, when thoroughly roused, he was terrible; hence his name, Lion Ben. Becoming enamoured of Sally Hadlock, who will only marry him on condition that he relinquishes the sea, he buys Elm Island, situated among the breakers, six miles from the main land, and inaccessible at some periods by reason of the surf; fertile as to soil, and covered with a heavy growth of timber. With nothing to depend upon but their hands, and obliged to mortgage the island at the outset, this resolute pair sit down among the woods to achieve independence. He is greatly assisted in all his plans and purposes by Uncle Isaac Murch, a man in middle life, who, in boyhood, was captured by the Penobscot Indians, and adopted into[12] their tribe—a most shrewd, resolute, genial being, with very strong attachment to youth, their unfailing friend and ally in every good purpose.

While Lion Ben is cutting off the spars and raising crops to pay for the island, some plunderers from the British Provinces, seeing but one house on the island, and supposing they had but little resistance to encounter, landed and insulted Ben’s wife. She flies to her husband, who is at work near by in the woods, who encounters and nearly kills the intruders. Among them is an English orphan boy, by the name of Charlie Bell, who had shipped with them as cook, being ignorant of their character. He remains, and is adopted by Lion Ben. He turns out to be a boy of most excellent principle, of remarkable mechanical genius, and learns the trade of a ship carpenter; makes the acquaintance of Captain Rhines’s youngest boy, John, and of Fred Williams, the miller’s son.

Fred is a boy naturally smart, and inclined to mischief. By associating with a miserable wretch by the name of Pete Clash, an importation from the Provinces, and another by the name of Godsoe, a home production, he is led into evil courses. These boys, while in the woods one day, plotting[13] mischief against Uncle Isaac, being surprised by John Rhines, and finding that he will expose them, attempt to flog him; but he is rescued by his dog Tige, who tears Pete and Fred, injuring Fred so severely that he is at the point of death, which brings him to reflection and reform.

Pete Clash, attempting to meddle with Uncle Isaac’s fish flakes, is caught by the old hunter in a wolf trap, and so threatened and frightened by him, that he leaves the place, together with Godsoe. John, Fred, and Charlie now became fast friends, and Uncle Isaac their mutual friend and adviser.

John Rhines becomes a blacksmith, Fred works with his father in the mill. Charlie and John accumulate money by labor and ventures sent to the West Indies, and set up Fred in trade. These three boys, with another by the name of Isaac Murch, a protégé of Captain Rhines, undertake to build a vessel, and do build her, and send her to the French West Indies, calling her the Hard-scrabble, in commemoration of the desperate nature of the undertaking. She arrives at Martinique at a lucky moment, and pays for herself, and more too. They afterwards build another[14] called the Casco, of larger dimensions, of which Isaac Murch becomes the master, surrendering the Hard-scrabble to another captain. Joe Griffin, to whom reference is made, is a friend of Lion Ben, a mighty man with an axe, a great wrestler, and kind-hearted, but a most inveterate practical joker.

Walter Griffin, a younger brother of Joe, inheriting all the grit of this rugged race, enters the store of Fred Williams as a clerk; but the Griffin blood rebels under the monotony and constraint, and he takes to the water. Peterson, the black pilot, was for many years addicted to intemperance. During that period some roguish boys got him into a store when intoxicated, poured molasses on his head, then applied flour, alternating the layers, till his head was as large as a half bushel; for many years after which he was known by the nickname of Flour, but, having become a sober and industrious man, has accumulated property, is respected by the whole community, and the nickname is forgotten.

The period at which this series commences is after the French revolution, when the star of Nelson was rising above the horizon, and Napoleon[15] Bonaparte, a colonel of the artillery, was planting batteries at Toulon, and giving the English blockading fleet a taste of his quality.

These young men are now in possession of capital. John Rhines is living at home with his father; Fred is engaged in trade, and just married to a daughter of Captain Rhines. Charlie Bell is living on a farm in a most beautiful spot, called “Pleasant Cove,” upon which he chanced to stumble one lovely night in summer while sailing, became enraptured with and bought it, married another daughter of the captain, and settled down on it in a log house, while it was a forest, has one child, now a babe, and having built the Casco on his own shore, hopes to be able to cultivate the soil (an occupation he dearly loves), and to carry out those ideas of taste and beauty which in childhood he had gathered from the vales and ancestral homes of his native land.

[16]

CHAPTER II.

THE WRECK AND THE RESCUE.

IT was the middle of October, about ten o’clock in the forenoon; there was no rain falling, but it was blowing—O, how it was blowing!—a tearing gale from the south-west, which roared through, the tree tops, and there was a tremendous sea in the bay. But under the lee of Pleasant Point, entirely sheltered from the wind by the high land and the woods, a shooting match had just been abruptly broken off by Sol Chase (a boy of sixteen, who put up the turkeys) declaring that it was no kind of use to set up, if such marksmen as Joe Griffin and Uncle Isaac were going to shoot.

“Well, Sol, we won’t fire any more,” said Joe; “you boys may do your own shooting.”

“Let us do something we can all do,” said Charlie. “Uncle Isaac, let us play knives. I’ll blaze this pine tree for a mark.”

[17]

“Blaze a pine tree! Half of you won’t be able to hit the tree. Take the barn door.”

“We haven’t got knives,” said Ricker.

“I’ve got my hunting knife,” said Uncle Isaac; “one knife will do for the whole of us.”

“I’ve got an Indian tomahawk in the house,” said Charlie; “one that you gave me, Uncle Isaac, long ago.”

A bull’s eye was marked out on the barn door; the knife was held by the point of the blade, and flung. Uncle Isaac, when, after the first two trials, he had ascertained his distance, hit the centre of the target every time; Joe Griffin nearly as often; Charlie, Fred, and John, who had at other times practised a good deal with Uncle Isaac and each other, twice out of three times.

“It takes Walter Griffin to throw a knife. He’d hit that mark every time.”

“I wish he was here,” said Fred. “I feel, since he went to sea, as though about half of me was gone.”

As to the rest, some hit within six inches; others didn’t hit the door; and others flung the knife so that it struck flatways, or on the end of the handle.

[18]

“Now let’s throw the tomahawk,” said Charlie.

In this game none of them could approach Uncle Isaac, who flung it with a force and precision that would soon have made a breach in Charlie’s barn door; but as the rest could not fling it with any accuracy, they soon tired of it.

“I’ll put up a mark for you, Uncle Isaac,” said Joe Bradish.

He had a soft hat, bran new; put it on for the first time that day.

“What will you give me for a shot at my hat, at six hundred yards?”

“Three shillings.”

“Done.”

Bradish rolled his hat carefully up, and thrust it into a mortise in the post of a rail fence.

“I thought I was to have the whole bigness of the hat to fire at; that’s a small mark for such a long distance.”

“That’s just like him,” said Charlie; “always doing some mean, underhand trick.”

“You was to fire at the hat. There’s the hat. Now measure off the six hundred yards,” said Bradish.

“Don’t measure it that way,” said Uncle Isaac[19] to the boys, who were about to measure in the direction that the hat was shoved into the hole.

“What difference does it make?” asked Bradish.

“’Cause it does. I’ve a right to fire in any direction I like, at six hundred yards.”

Uncle Isaac fired, and the ball, just grazing the edge of the post, went through every fold of the hat crossways, the rifle ball whirling as it went, cutting it all to pieces.

“You’ve spoilt my new hat,” said Bradish, with a rueful face, holding it up, all full of holes, like a colander.

“That’s what you get by trying to cheat: good enough for you,” was the cry.

Scarcely had the laugh subsided, when Will Griffin was seen coming on horseback at full speed, and as he drew near, he bawled out, “Uncle Isaac, Joe, Master Bell, Captain Rhines wants you to come just as quick as you can; there’s a vessel cast away—folks going to be drowned on the Brant rocks.”

When they reached the cove, they found Captain Rhines, in the Perseverance, her sails close reefed and set, hatches fastened down, and the vessel hauled in against a perpendicular ledge, while he was holding her by a rope fast to a tree.

[20]

“Jump aboard!” he cried. “There’s people on a raft, coming right in before the wind and sea, and they will go right into the breakers on the Brant rocks, except we can get them off. I happened to be looking with the glass, and saw them.”

“We’ll do what men can do,” said Uncle Isaac. “Hadn’t we better call at the island, and get Ben? It’s right on our road.”

“That’s a good thought. Wonder I didn’t think of it.”

Ben had not noticed the raft, but he saw the schooner coming, and knew that it must be a matter of life and death that would bring men to the island in such a gale. Both he and Sally met them at the shore.

“I want you, my little boy,” cried Captain Rhines, as the schooner luffed up beside the wharf, in the still water of Elm Island harbor. “There’s a raft coming before the wind and sea, with people on it, and a signal of distress flying. It’s breaking thirty feet high on the Brant rocks, and they will soon be in that surf, unless we take them off.”

No more was said. Ben jumped aboard, and the schooner, close hauled, stood boldly out into[21] that tremendous sea. The men all commenced to lash themselves. Charlie was forward. He had made the end of a rope fast to the foremast, and put it around his waist; but, before he could secure the other end, she shipped a sea over the bows, that filled her all full, and bore Charlie before it like a feather. In another instant it would have taken him overboard, when nothing could have saved him; but Joe caught him as he was going over the rail.

“A miss is as good as a mile,” said Captain Rhines. “She shakes off the water like a Newfoundland dog. Ben, take the axe, and knock off the waist boards, and then the sea can have a fair chance to get out as fast as it comes in.”

They were now nearing the raft, as it came rapidly down before the sea, while the crew of the schooner were endeavoring to cut athwart its path. Catching glimpses of it in moments when the raft and the schooner both chanced to be on the top of a sea at the same instant, they perceived that it was constructed of the yards and smaller spars of a vessel, with an elevation amid-ships, where an upright spar was secured by shrouds, on which an English flag was flying. On[22] this elevation were dark objects, that Captain Rhines (at home) had made out, with his glass, to be human beings.

“If they are people, father,” said Ben, who, confident to hold himself against the sea, had gone into the bows, “they are dead; for there’s nothing moves, only as the sea moves it.”

“Perhaps not, Ben. They are lashed, chilled, and most dead, but I’ve seen men brought to that apparently had but a few more breaths to draw.”

In a few moments Ben shouted, “There’s folks there, four or six, I can’t tell which. I see one move his arm a little.”

“What are we going to do?” asked Captain Rhines. “I thought there would be some one able to take a line and make it fast, and then we might tow them clear of the breakers and into some lee, where we could get them off; but if there’s nobody to take a line, we’ve got to carry one ourselves.”

“Let the raft go by us,” said Ben, “and follow it up astern with the schooner. I’ll take a line in the canoe.”

“I’ll go with you,” said Joe; but Charlie insisted[23] upon sharing the peril with his father. They took in all but the foresail, reefed to the smallest possible dimensions, leaving only a little of the peak, as it was difficult to make the schooner go slow enough to keep from running on to the raft and knocking her to pieces; but by luffing into the wind they managed to keep her clear till Ben and Charlie got into the canoe, and with a small line reached the raft, to which was made fast a larger one, which they hauled to them and secured.

There was no such thing as returning against that sea; they must take their chance with those they came to save. If the rope parted, or the little vessel failed to tow her charge clear of the surf, they were lost. During the interval occupied in fastening to the raft, it had made fearful progress towards the rocks, that could now be plainly seen ahead, the sea breaking on them in sheets of foam. Never was the clear judgment and resolute nature of Captain Rhines put to a severer test than now. He must carry sail enough to drive the Perseverance through the water with sufficient speed to clear the rocks. On the other hand, there was danger,[24] if he carried too much sail, of either parting the rope, in which case Ben and Charlie, with those they went to save, would perish, or of taking the masts out of the schooner; and also danger of the seas boarding her over the stern.

It was most fortunate for the crew of the schooner, that when they grappled to the raft they were a long distance off, and well over to the edge of the breakers, consequently had to work the raft but very little to windward. Every time the little vessel rose on one of those tremendous seas, when the raft was perhaps in the hollow of another, she quivered and trembled, and it seemed as if she must be crushed bodily down beneath the sea.

“Isaac,” said the captain, who had one hand on the rope, “I think this will bear more strain. Unless we go ahead a little faster, we shall hardly clear that ragged point making out to the leeward.”

“I’m afraid, Benjamin, it will take the mast out of her.”

“So am I, but we must risk it. There’s no other way. It’s sartain death to go into that surf.”

There was one other way. A stroke of the axe upon the “taut” rope, and the schooner, freed[25] from her encumbrance, would have gone off like a bird from the ragged reef and boiling surf, leaving their comrades to perish; but no such thought could find lodgment in the bosoms of the men on board the Perseverance.

“Give her the sail, Isaac,” said the captain; “it’s the only way.”

Beneath the increased canvas, the schooner plunged and quivered, as though every timber would part company.