"When I get ready to go out of this place, I shall go. I needn"t stay here any longer than I please."
"Do you really mean to get up a mutiny?"
"Hush! Don"t call it by that name."
"What shall I call it?"
"Call it making a chain."
"I don"t understand you," answered Wilton, puzzled by the expression.
"I know what I"m about, and I have got more friends in the ship than Lowington has. And I know exactly how to manage the whole thing," added Shuffles, confidently.
"But the fellows are all perfectly satisfied with their condition. They wish to go to Europe, and are pleased with the prospect before them."
"Perhaps they are; and they shall all go to Europe, and travel about without being tied to Lowington"s coat-tails. I shall come out of this place to-morrow, and we will work the thing up."
"I"m in for a time with any good fellow; but I don"t think we can make this thing go," said Wilton. "Hush! Don"t say another word. There comes an officer."
One bell, indicating half past eight in the evening, struck on deck. It was the duty of the master and midshipman on deck, alternately, to pa.s.s through the steerage every half hour during the watch, to see that there was no disorder, and that the lights were all secure, so as to avoid any danger from fire. Henry Martyn, the second master, performed this office on the present occasion. He descended the main ladder, and Wilton, who expected the visit when he heard the stroke of the bell, retreated to his mess room, and threw himself into his berth. Harry walked around the steerage, and glanced into the gangways, from which the rooms opened.
"Harry," said Shuffles, in a low tone, as the master was about to return to the deck.
"Did you speak to me?" asked Harry, stepping up to the bars of the cage.
"I did. Will you oblige me by telling the chaplain that I would like to see him?" added the prisoner.
"I will;" and Harry knocked at the door of the professors" cabin.
CHAPTER X.
MAKING A CHAIN.
The chaplain was too glad of an opportunity to converse with the prisoner to refuse his request, and he hastened to the brig, hoping to find Shuffles in a better state of mind than when he had visited him before. Mr. Agneau entered the lock-up, and was securing the door behind him, when the prisoner spoke.
"You needn"t lock it, sir; I will not attempt to escape," said he. "I sent for you to apologize for my rudeness."
"Indeed! Then I am very glad to see you," replied the delighted chaplain. "I have been sorely grieved at your misconduct, and I would fain have brought you to see the error of your ways."
"I see it now, sir," replied Shuffles, with apparent penitence. "I"m afraid I am a great deal worse than you think I am, sir."
"It is of no consequence what I think, Shuffles, if you are conscious of the wrong you have done," added the worthy chaplain. "You behaved exceedingly well last year, and it almost broke my heart to see you relapsing into your former evil habits."
"I am grateful to you for the interest you have taken in me, and I a.s.sure you I have often been encouraged to do well by your kind words,"
continued the penitent, with due humility. "I have done wrong, and I don"t deserve to be forgiven."
""He that humbleth himself shall be exalted,"" said Mr. Agneau, gratified at the great change which had apparently been wrought in the prisoner. "If you are really sorry for your offence, Mr. Lowington, I doubt not, will pardon you, and restore you to favor again."
"I don"t deserve it, sir. Since you left me, I have been thinking of my past life. I dare not tell you how bad I have been."
"You need not tell me. It is not necessary that you should confess your errors to me. There is One who knows them, and if you are sincerely repentant He will pity and forgive you."
"I think I should feel better if I told some one of my misdeeds."
"Perhaps you would; that is for you to judge. I will speak to Mr.
Lowington about you to-night. What shall I say to him?"
"I hardly know. I deserve to be punished. I have done wrong, and am willing to suffer for it."
The tender-hearted chaplain thought that Shuffles was in a beautiful state of mind, and he desired to have him released at once, that he might converse with him on great themes under more favorable circ.u.mstances; but Shuffles still detained him.
"I"m afraid I have ruined myself on board this ship," continued Shuffles, persisting in his self-humiliation.
"If you manfully acknowledge your fault, you will be freely and generously forgiven."
"Mr. Lowington hates me now, after what I have done."
"O, far from it!" exclaimed the chaplain. "It will be a greater satisfaction to him than to you to forgive you. You are no longer of the opinion that you were unfairly used in the distribution of the offices, I suppose."
"Mr. Agneau, I was beside myself when I resisted the princ.i.p.al. I should not have done it if I had been in my right mind."
"You were very angry."
"I was--I was not myself."
"Anger often makes men crazy."
"You don"t understand me, Mr. Agneau."
"Indeed, I do. You mean that you deluded yourself into the belief that you had been wronged, and that you ought not to obey the orders of your officers, and of the princ.i.p.al. The force that was used made you so angry that you did not know what you were about," added the sympathizing chaplain.
"In one word, Mr. Agneau, I had been drinking," said Shuffles, with something like desperation in his manner, as he bent his head, and covered his face with his hands.
"Drinking!" gasped the chaplain, filled with horror at the confession.
"I told you I was worse than you thought I was," moaned Shuffles.
"Is it possible!"
"It is true, sir; I say it with shame."
"Are you in the habit of taking intoxicating drinks?" asked the chaplain, confounded beyond measure at this complication of the difficulty.
"I am not in the habit of it, because I can"t get liquor all the time.