MORGIANNA.

It was early on the morning of June 13, 1796, just twenty years after the Declaration of Independence, that Captain Felix Lane, of the good ship Ocean Star, was on his voyage from Rio to Baltimore with a cargo of coffee. The morning was specially bright, and the captain, as brave a man as ever paced a quarter deck, was in the best of spirits, for he expected soon to be home. He had no wife and children to greet him on his return, for Lane was a bachelor. He had served on board a privateer during the War of the Revolution and had done as much damage as any man on salt water to English merchantmen. Like most brave men, Captain Lane had a generous soul, a kind heart, and there was not a man aboard his vessel who would not have died for him. He preserved perfect discipline and respect through love rather than fear, for he was never known to be harsh with any of his crew.

No one knew why the captain had never married. His first mate, who had sailed under him four years, had never dared broach him on the subject of matrimony. There was a story--a mere rumor--perhaps without the slightest foundation, of Felix Lane, when a poor sailor boy, loving the daughter of an English merchant at Portsmouth, England. The mate got the story from a gossipy old English sailor, who claimed to know all about it, but whose fondness for spinning yarns brought discredit on his veracity. According to the old sailor's account, the fair English maid's name was Mary. Her father was one of the wealthiest merchants in the city; and one day when Lane was only nineteen he met Mary. Her beauty captivated him and inspired him to a nobler life. Mary loved the young sailor; but it was the old story of the penniless lover and cruel parent. The sailor was forcibly expelled from the house and sailed to America, with a heart full of revenge and ambition.

He arrived just after the battle of Lexington, and soon shipped aboard a privateer. Again it was the old story of a rash lover laughing at death, seeking the grim monster who seemed to avoid him. His ship was so successful, that in a short time each of the crew was rich from prize money. Four years and a half of war found Felix Lane commander of the most daring privateer on the ocean. He was already wealthy and continued by fresh prizes to add to his immense fortune. The merchant marine of Great Britain dreaded his ship, the Sea Rover, more than the whole American navy. Lane was one of the most expert seamen on the ocean, and might have had a high office in the regular navy, had he not found this semi-piratical business more lucrative.

One day his vessel sighted a large merchantman, off the coast of Spain, and engaged it in a terrible conflict. The merchantman carried twice as many people and heavier guns than the Sea Rover; but by the skilful management of his ship Captain Lane continued to rake her fore and aft until she was forced to strike her colors. When the conqueror went aboard, he found the splintered deck a scene of horror. Cordage, shrouds, broken spars and dead and dying men strewed the deck. Near the gangway was a middle-aged man holding in his arms a girl mortally wounded in the conflict. He recognized her in a moment, and the scene which followed tried all the powers of the old yarn-spinner's descriptive faculties. He held her in his arms and wept and prayed until her life was extinct. It was said that she recognized him and that she died with a sweet smile on her face, pointing upward to a place of reunion. The father, who had survived the conflict, was released, and Captain Felix continued his career a sadder and better man.

Whether this story was true or not, no one can at this day tell, for Jack tars are proverbial yarn-spinners, and seek more after romance than truth. One thing is quite certain, though, Captain Lane was still a bachelor, and had resisted all the advances of beautiful women, until no one doubted that he would end his days a bachelor.

On this bright June morning a sail was descried S.S.E., and there immediately sprang up a little conversation between master and mate as to the probable character of the ship.

"Perchance, captain, it's a British cruiser," suggested the mate.

"If it should be, we have no fears."

"No, for the Ocean Star can show a pair of clean heels to anything afloat. These British have a habit of searching all vessels they can capture and impressing seamen."

"It's ugly business."

"It will breed another storm."

"I don't think America will long submit."

At this, the mate, whose temper was as fiery as his red hair, vowed:

"If they should board a ship of mine, I would give 'em lead and steel, until they would not care to search or impress any one."

"They have no such right," the captain answered, and his face grew very stern.

The vessel, whatever she was, did not cross their path, however, and in a few hours disappeared around some jutting headlands.

They had only left Rio the day before, and had very light winds. The land breeze lasted long enough to bring them by Santa Cruz, and their ship drifted along all day between Raza and the main. Toward night the sea-breeze came in fresh from the eastward, and they made four-hour tacks, intending to keep the northern shore quite close aboard, and to take their departure from Cape Frio. The night was very clear, and at eight bells they tacked ship to the northward, heading about N.N.E.; Raza lights could just be discerned, bearing about West. Captain Lane had come on deck, as was his custom, to "stay" the brig, and, finding everything looking right, was about to go below, when the man on the lookout cried:

"Sail ho!"

"Where away?" demanded the Captain.

"Two points off the lee bow."

The captain walked forward to the forecastle, from where he descried what appeared to be a large square-rigged vessel standing directly for them, with her port-tacks aboard. This seemed strange to the captain, as he knew of no vessel which had left Rio, except one several days previous, and she should have been far on her voyage by this time.

The stranger approached very rapidly, carrying a press of canvas, and "lying over" to it in fine style. In a short time the stranger was almost within speaking distance, and Captain Lane made her out to be a large heavily-sparred clipper brig. A collision seemed inevitable, if she held her course. The Ocean Star was a little to windward of the stranger with the starboard tacks aboard, and Captain Lane knew it was the stranger's duty to "bear up" and keep away. He jumped for his speaking trumpet and hailed:

"Brig ahoy!"

No answer; and the mysterious vessel came booming right on for them with fearful speed.

"Brig ahoy!" shouted the captain again. "Hard up your helm, or you will be into me!"

Still no answer; and, jumping to the wheel, the captain jammed it down, and they came up flying into the wind. Leaving the wheel to the frightened seaman, he sprang into the port rail, to see where the stranger would strike them. As he did so, that mysterious craft flew by, and the whole sea seemed lighted up by a strange illumination. It was like a terrible dream--so wild, so supernatural and unearthly. As Captain Lane stood by the port rail, he saw right under his quarter, a large, low, black brig, with her decks crowded with men, and guns protruding from her ports; while on the weather rail, clinging with one hand to the shrouds, stood a strange, demoniacal-looking figure, holding in his outstretched hand, above the water, a burning blue light. On the quarter-deck a little knot of men seemed standing, a short distance apart from them was a strikingly handsome man, who, from his air of superiority, Lane at once knew to be the commander. His perfectly poised and graceful attitude, and thorough composure, as he removed a cigar from his mouth and motioned an order to the helmsman, struck the beholder as wonderful.

In an instant the whole thing flashed upon the captain--he was a pirate! He had run under the stern of the brig and burned a blue light to read the name of the vessel, and see if the bird was worth plucking.

Captain Lane's decision was instantaneous. He knew that the white feather never helped one out with such fellows. It was all the work of an instant. The stranger ran a couple of lengths astern the Ocean Star, swung his main-yard aback and hailed; but while the bold buccaneer was doing this, Captain Lane had performed an equally sea-manlike manoeuvre. He caught his sails aback, and his vessel having stern way, he shifted his helm, backed her round, and, filling away on the other tack, stood directly for the pirate.

It was the stranger's time to hail now. The Ocean Star was a sharp, strong, fast-sailing vessel, and was under good headway and perfect control. Captain Lane then acted hurriedly, but with precision, giving his orders to his mate and helmsman, and, seizing the cabin lantern and his speaking trumpet, he jumped upon the topgallant forecastle, and, holding up his lamp, made the master mason's "hailing sign of distress." He then hailed through his trumpet, in quick, determined syllables:

"Brig ahoy! Unless you swear as a man or as a Mason that you will not molest me, as true as there is a God, we will sink together!"

Quick as thought, the answer came back through the trumpet, clear and distinct:

"I swear as a Mason! Hard up your helm!"

"Hard up your helm!" the captain shouted aft, and, paying off like a bird, the Ocean Star swept by the stranger's stern near enough to almost touch her. As they went sailing past her, it became Captain Lane's turn to bend forward with a lantern, and ascertain who his new acquaintance was. There, painted in blood-red letters on the black stern, was the name

MORGIANNA.

He had scarce read it, when the same clear tones, more subdued, hailed him, as he thought, with somewhat of kindness:

"Captain, do me the favor to back your main-yard; I will come aboard of you--alone!"

[Illustration: Morgianna.]

The captain gave the necessary orders, and "hove to" within three or four cables' length of the stranger; and in a very few minutes a four-oared boat, containing but a single figure besides the crew, was seen approaching the Ocean Star.

Captain Lane had a ladder put over the gangway and threw a rope to the boat as it came alongside; and the next moment the stranger sprang upon the deck of the Ocean Star.

With an easy grace he gave to the captain the quick, intelligible sign of the "great brotherhood" and, taking his arm familiarly, walked aft.

Captain Lane called the steward, sent for glasses and wine, and, as soon as they were placed upon the table, closed the cabin door, and found himself alone with his strange visitor.

The captain filled his glass and, sipping it in Spanish fashion, passed the decanter to the stranger. He followed his example, and after the usual interchange of courtesies addressed him:

"Captain, I have a favor to ask of you."

"Name it."

"You are probably not aware of the true motive which induced me to heave you to?"

"I am not."

"It is this: I wish you to take a passenger to the United States--a lady and her child. Now that I have seen you and feel acquainted with you, by our common ties, I feel a confidence in sending them by you, which I should never have felt, perhaps, with another. Will you take them? Any price shall be yours."

"Yes; I will take them."

"Thank you. I have a still further favor to ask. I wish to send to the States a sum of money to be invested in the lady's name, and for her account. Will it be too much to ask you to attend to this? You may charge your own commission."

"I will obey your wishes to the letter," Captain Lane answered.

The stranger grasped his hand across the table and, with some emotion, added:

"If you will do this, and will place the lady and child where they may find a home, with the surroundings of Christian society, you will confer a favor upon me which money can never repay."

Captain Lane looked at the man with astonishment, and for the first time gave him a glance that was thoroughly searching and critical.

He was apparently of about thirty-five years of age, a little above the medium height, with a broad forehead, over which fine, brown hair clustered in careless folds. He wore his beard and mustache long, the former extending to a point a few inches below the throat. His eyes were brown, large and full of expression, while in conversation, and a mild and melancholy smile occasionally stole over his features.

His manners and conversation betokened refinement; and, take him all in all, he was the last man one would have ever taken for a smuggler or a pirate.

Captain Lane became very much interested in him, and gradually their conversation took a wider range. In the midst of it and before they had fully completed their business arrangements in relation to the passengers, whom Captain Lane had engaged to convey to the United States, the mate knocked at the cabin door, and informed them that a heavy squall was rising to westward.

They hurried on deck, which no sooner had they reached, than the stranger, looking hastily in the quarter indicated, shook Captain Lane warmly by the hand saying:

"I must go aboard, captain; that will be a heavy squall. Keep me in sight if you can; but, if we part company, meet me off Cape Frio--this side of it--to-morrow; wait for me till night, if you do not see me before. Good-by!" and springing into his boat, he pulled away for his vessel.

Captain Lane never saw him again alive.

No sooner was he over the side, than the captain gave orders to shorten sail. He took in royals and topgallant sails, furled the courses, trysail and jib, and double-reefed the topsails. They braced the yards a little to starboard, hauled the foretopmast staysail sheet well aft, and the captain, thinking he had everything snug, stood looking over the weather rails, watching the approaching squall. The wind had almost died away, and the atmosphere seemed strangely oppressive. Captain Lane was an old sea-dog and had witnessed many strange phenomena on the ocean; but never had he seen a squall approach so singularly. It seemed to move very slowly--a great black cloud, which looked intensely luminous withal, and yet so dense and heavy, that an ordinary observer might have mistaken it for one of the ordinary rain squalls encountered in the tropics. Captain Lane consulted his barometer, and found it falling rapidly.

"Clew the topsails up!" shouted the captain to the mate. "All hands lay aloft and furl them!"

The order was quickly obeyed; and just as the sailors reached the deck, the squall struck them. It did not come as it was expected; it had worked up from the westward, but struck the Ocean Star dead from the South. In an instant they were over, nearly on their beam ends, and a heavy sea rushed over the lee-rail, filling the deck.

"Hard up your helm!" shouted the captain, and, springing aft, he found the helmsman jammed under the tiller, and the second mate vainly endeavoring to heave it up. Taking hold with him, by their united efforts they at last succeeded; and, after a moment's suspense, the Ocean Star slowly wore off before the wind and, rising out of the water, shook herself like an affrighted spaniel and darted off with fearful speed before the hurricane.

Leaving orders to keep her "steady before it" the captain went forward to ascertain the extent of the damage they had sustained. It was now intensely dark, the rain falling in torrents, and lightning bolts striking the water all around them, accompanied by fearful and incessant peals of thunder. A human voice could not have been heard five paces away. The wind, which fairly roared through the shrouds, and the deluge of water upon the deck, were enough of themselves to drown any voice. By flashes of lightning, the captain soon ascertained that they were comparatively unharmed, and their spars were safe. Gathering his frightened crew and officers about him, he succeeded at length in freeing the decks of water by knocking out the ports on either side. They next sounded the pumps, and found three feet of water in the well. Immediately double pumps were rigged, and the steady clinking of brakes added to the noises and terror of the scene.

It was a fearful night, and Captain Lane prayed Heaven that he might never see such another.

About half an hour after the squall first struck them--the captain of the Ocean Star was standing with his two officers on the quarter-deck, "conning the vessel by the feel of the wind and rain," keeping her dead before the gale--when there came a flash and a peal which made them cower almost to the decks.

"My God!" was the simultaneous exclamation of all. A long chain of lightning and a heavy ball of fire seemed to shoot from the sky, lighting up the whole sea, revealing, and at the same time striking, in its descent, a full-rigged brig, which, like themselves, was scudding before the gale under bare poles, a few cables' length off their port beam. The next instant, a fearful explosion, heard loud above the roaring storm, shook the sea, a volume of flame and fire shot up in the air, and when they looked again for the vessel, in the flashes of lightning, it was nowhere to be seen.

As the morning broke, the gale abated, and settled into a light breeze from the eastward. They made all sail, and stood to the southward with the wind abeam, hoping to fall in with some survivors of the wreck.

Captain Lane changed his wet garments for something more comfortable, refreshed himself with a strong cup of coffee, and, taking his glass, sought the foretopsail yard. About seven bells, he thought he discovered some object in the water three or four points off the lee bow. Hailing the deck to keep off for it, he very soon made out fragments of a vessel--spars, water casks, pieces of deck and, as they came still nearer, a boat; but the captain, even from his lofty perch, could see no sign of any one in it.

Descending to the deck, he ordered a boat to be cleared away, and, running as near as he dared to the wreck, he backed his maintopsail and took a long and earnest survey with his glass.

All hands were watching with anxious eyes the expression on the captain's face. He handed his glass to the mate, who carefully examined every fragment which appeared above water. The captain looked at the mate inquiringly; but neither said a word. The mate handed back the glass and shook his head sorrowfully.

Again the captain looked long and earnestly; the mate looked again, and again returned the glass:

"Poor fellows--we may as well fill away, sir!" he said sadly.

There was still considerable sea on, and the mere launching of a boat was attended with more than ordinary danger, added to which was that to be encountered from the broken spars and fragments of wreck drifting about. Captain Lane thought of all these dangers, and was about to give the order to "fill away the main-yard," when something seemed to say to him:

"There is some one in that boat!"

This impression was so strong that he felt as if it would be murder to leave the spot without making a more minute search, and he ordered the boat to be lowered at once. Jumping into the stern sheets, four good oars well manned soon brought him within the little field of fragments, in the centre of which the boat was floating. No wonder none of the crew was left,--the water literally swarmed with sharks.

Standing in the bow with a boat hook, the captain warded off pieces of wreck and gradually made his way to the strange boat.

The sight there which met his eyes Captain Lane never forgot to his dying day. When bowed down with old age, and his feeble steps were tottering on the verge of the grave, that scene came to him as vividly as on that terrible day. Lying in the bottom of the boat was the burnt, blackened and bruised form of a man, which, with some difficulty, the captain recognized as the handsome stranger who had visited him on the previous evening. Clinging to him, with her arms clasped tightly around his mutilated form, a clasp which even death could not break, her fair face pressed close to his blackened features, was the lifeless body of the most beautiful woman Captain Lane had ever seen. The look of agony, of commiseration, of tenderness, of pity, of horror and despair, which was sealed upon, those lifeless features was beyond the powers of description; but the saddest spectacle of all was a child, a little girl about one year old, clinging frantically to the breast of her dead mother, and gazing silently at them in frightened wonder.

For years, Captain Lane's eyes had not been dimmed with tears, but now the fountains of grief were opened up, and his cheeks were wet. He carefully entered the boat, felt of each cold body, laid his hand upon each silent heart, and waited in vain for an answering signal to his touch upon the pulse.

"It is all over," he said, and sitting down in the stern sheets of the boat, he took the child in his arms and sent his men back for sheets and shot and palm and needle and prayer-book. "They shall have Christian burial," declared the kind-hearted captain.

They went away and left him alone with the dead and the baby. The infant seemed to cling to him from that moment, and the Great Father above alone knows how strangely and rapidly those cords of love were cemented between the bluff, old bachelor sea-captain and the infant. That heart, which he had thought dead to all love since the awful day on board the English merchantman, when he saw the only being he ever loved dying, was suddenly thrilled by the tenderest emotions. Those sweet blue eyes were upturned to his face with a glance of imploring trust, and the captain cried:

"Yes, blow my eyes, if I don't stand by you, little one, as long as there is a stitch of canvas left!"

The time was very short until his men returned. Wrapping the dead in one shroud and winding sheet, with heavy shot well secured at their feet, the captain put the little child's lips to its mother's, giving her an unconscious kiss, which caused the men to brush their rough sleeves across their weather-beaten eyes. Then, reading with a broken voice, the last service for the dead, the shroud was closed, and the opening waters received them and bore them away to their last resting place.

Jumping into his boat, with the little stranger nestling in his arms, Captain Lane was soon aboard the Ocean Star, and with a fair wind and sunny skies was once more homeward bound. The captain seemed loath to relinquish his little charge. There was a goat on the vessel which furnished milk, and the cook prepared some dainty food for the little stranger.

"What is her name, captain?" he asked, while feeding the hungry child. She was not old enough to know her name, and there was not found about her clothes or in the boat anything whatever by which her name could possibly be known, so she had to be rechristened. What name should he give her? He reflected a moment and then, remembering the name on the stern of that black, mysterious vessel, answered:

"Morgianna!"

"Morgianna?" said the cook.

"Yes, Morgianna Lane! she is my adopted daughter."

The cook smiled at the thought of bluff old Captain Lane the bachelor having an adopted daughter.

After the perils and excitements of such a night, it was not strange that Captain Lane slept long and soundly. He had good officers, and when he retired he gave them orders not to disturb him, unless absolutely necessary, until he should awake.

They obeyed the injunction to the letter, and on the following morning he was awakened by hearing one of the crew ask in an undertone of the steward.

"How is little Morgianna this morning?"

"Little Morgianna," he said to himself; and then it all came back, and with it a strangely tender dream which had all night long haunted his slumbers. The captain rose hurriedly, dressed himself and inquired for the child, who had been resigned to the care of the cook. She was brought to him, a bright, cheerful little thing, just beginning to lisp unintelligible words. For a few days she missed her mother and wore a look of expectation on her infantile face, occasionally crying out; but anon this passed away, and she became cheerful and happy. The captain spent as much of his time with her as he could spare from his duties, and as he held the little creature on his knee, heard her gentle voice in baby accents, and felt her warm baby fingers on his cheek, a new emotion took possession of his heart. He loved little Morgianna dearly as a father might.

Before that voyage was over, Captain Lane resolved to abandon the sea and retire to his fine estate at Mariana, a village on the seashore not a score of miles from Baltimore. He kept his intentions a secret until the vessel was in port; then the merchants with whom he had been engaged in business for years, were astounded to learn that Captain Lane had made his last voyage. A nurse was engaged for little Morgianna and the great mansion house on the hill within a fourth of a mile of Mariana was fitted up for habitation. Servants were sent to the place, and the villagers were lost in wonder.

The gossips had food for conjecture for weeks, and many were the strange stories afloat. Some of the old dames thought the captain was going to be married after all. Then the young widows and ancient maidens who had heard much about Captain Lane, sighed and looked disconsolate. Every kind of a story but the truth was afloat.

When on one bright autumnal day, a carriage from Baltimore was seen to dash into the village and roll up the great drive, between the rows of poplars, it was whispered he had come. One who watched averred that only the captain and a child not over a year and a half old alighted from the coach. (The nurse came in another vehicle.) The child started another rumor. She was a mysterious, unknown factor, and the gossips bandied the captain's name about in a reckless manner. Good old dames shook their heads knowingly and declared they had suspected the captain had a wife all the time in some far-off city.

"You kin never depend on these sea-captains!" Mrs. Hammond declared.

But despite all their conjectures, the captain lived in the old stone mansion house with his servants and Morgianna. A few weeks after his arrival, she was christened at the village church as Morgianna Lane, her parents not known.

Would wonders never cease? Bit by bit, the sensational story of Morgianna got out into the village, and she became the object of the greatest interest. Captain Lane adopted her, and when she became old enough to accompany him, he seldom went away without her. Morgianna loved the good old man, who, with all his rough seaman-like ways, was father and mother both to her.

Never had daughter a kinder or more indulgent father.

As years went on, Morgianna grew in beauty, intelligence, grace and goodness. Captain Lane was proud of her, and she was never so happy as when sitting on his knee listening to his yarns of the sea. Her own sad, dark story had never been told to her,--that was left for the future.