was, indeed, nobly done, young sir, and I am glad that my child should have been of service to a grandson of Dick Revere, or to a friend of Dave Farragut. You were at Mobile, were you?"
"Yes, sir, and on the Hartford."
"I've seen many a battle in my day, young sir," said the old admiral, simply. "It was old-fashioned fighting then, yard-arm to yard-arm, but we went at it good and hard, and our hearts were in it, I doubt not, just as yours were."
"May I know your name, sir?"
"I am called Charles Stewart," responded the other.
"What?" cried the lieutenant. "Charles Stewart of the Constitution? The man who took the Cyane and the Levant?"
"The same, sir."
"Him they call 'Old Ironsides'?"
"I believe my countrymen do apply that name to me sometimes," replied the old man, smiling with pleasure at the hearty admiration of the younger.
"I am proud to know you, sir, and proud to see you. We of the new navy only hope that we may live up to the record you of the old made in the past, sir."
"You have more than done that," said the old man, heartily; "we had no better men than Farragut and young Porter. I sailed with old Porter, his father, many a time. I knew him well."
"But come, grandfather," said Emily, "breakfast is ready."
"A moment, child," said the old man, forgetting for the moment, apparently, his environment. "I must look at the ship. Good-morning, Barry," he continued, as the sailor approached him; "is it well with the ship?"
"A good piece of it went down last night, your honor, I'm sorry to say. It lies off on the port side, yonder, under the lee, but nothin' vital yet, sir."
"I did not think to see it this morning. Bit by bit it wears away. Well, please God, there will be an end some day."
CHAPTER IX
The Sword of the Constitution
Clothed in his own uniform, but hardly in his right mind, Mr. Richard Revere sat down late in the afternoon to consider the situation.
He had passed a delightfully idle day in the society of the admiral and his granddaughter; principally, it must be confessed, and in so far as he could contrive it, with the latter. Her cunning fingers had mended the rents in his uniform, which had been dried and put into a passably wearable condition. The versatility of her education and the variety of her accomplishments were evidenced to him when he saw that she wielded the needle as deftly as she steered the boat.
They had sat on the porch most of the time in the pleasant fall weather, and the dozing old admiral offered but little check to the freedom of their intercourse. In response to her insistent questioning, this young Telemachus, cast up by the sea at her feet, poured into the ear of this new Calypso stories of the naval battles in which he had participated and whose honorable scars he bore. Like Desdemona, she loved him for the dangers he had passed.
She was familiar with the history of the old navy, of which the admiral had been one of the brightest stars. Many a tale had the old man told her of storm and tempest, battle and triumph, shipwreck and disaster, and his own adventures and distinguished career she knew by heart. Although the great wave of the Civil War had ebbed and flowed far to the south of them, she and her grandfather had prayerfully and anxiously followed its mighty course, especially on the sea; yet it so happened that this was the first time that either of them had been brought in personal contact with its naval side. A returning volunteer, a wounded soldier, – for the little town had done its patriotic part with the rest, – had sometimes brought fresher news of the battles than might be read in the papers, but no sailor had come to tell them how Farragut had damned the torpedoes and steamed through the pass until Revere told the thrilling story of the immortal fight.
The admiral waked up while this was being recounted, and he pressed the young man with the keen questions of a veteran who knew well the sound of battle and had fronted the enemy undismayed. Even the story of the wound that disabled Revere must be told, in spite of his reluctance to mention it, and Emily dropped the needle and listened with bated breath to the simple and modest recital.
"Were you ever wounded, admiral?" questioned the young sailor, when he had finished his story.
"Never, by God's providence," said the old man; "though I came near to it once."
"And how was that, sir?"
"Well, sir, when the old Constitution took the Cyane and the Levant, a shot from the Cyane struck the hilt of my sword, carried it away, and slewed me about so that I thought for a moment that I had been hit in the side. It was a Spanish blade, and I prized it highly. I was lucky enough to give some succor to a Spanish brig in distress down in the West Indies on a certain occasion, years before, and His Most Catholic Majesty of Spain was pleased to present me with a sword for it, a beautiful Toledo blade, the finest sword I ever saw. It was richly hilted and scabbarded, as became such a weapon, and I always wore it in action. Of course, the hilt was ruined by the shot, and the armorer of the Constitution made a rude guard out of a piece of iron he took from the Levant after she struck, to replace the broken hilt, and I've never cared to change it since."
"I saw it this morning in Miss Emily's room," said Revere. "I took the liberty of examining it, and I was struck by the beauty of the blade and the roughness of the hilt. I quite agree with you, sir. I should not have it changed for anything."
"I call it the sword of the Constitution," said Emily.
"How comes it in your room, may I ask, Miss Emily?"
"Grandfather gave it to me. I am the only son of the house, you see," she continued with a melancholy sigh. "I would that I had been a man."
"That is a wish in which I cannot join you," said the young officer, quickly.
"I think it's a pity," responded the girl, "that so great and gallant a sailor as my grandfather should leave no one to bear his name."
"My dear young lady, his name is borne in our history and upon our hearts," answered Revere, quickly. "The world will never forget 'Old Ironsides' and her last great fighting captain. The new navy is the child of the old, and, in a certain sense, we all feel the obligations of such distinguished ancestry. As for me, that I have been permitted to meet you, sir," he said, turning to the admiral, "in this intimate and familiar way, is one of the proudest moments of my life."
"Is it so?" said the old man, simply; "we only did our duty then, just as you are doing it now. Dave Farragut, now, he was trained in our school – "
"And we are trained in his school; so you see here is a connection. Some day we may show what we have learned from him, as he showed what he had learned from you."
"I doubt it not, young sir, I doubt it not; and while I have no sons or grandsons to bear my name, yet Emily is a good child. No one could wish for a better daughter."
"Of that I am quite sure," interrupted the lieutenant, spontaneously.
"And, perhaps," continued the admiral, simply, "in the hands of her children the sword of the Constitution may again be drawn in the service of our beloved country. But where is Barry? The sun is just setting. He should – Ah, there he is. Evening colors, Mr. Revere," said the veteran, rising to his feet as the gun on the terrace boomed out in salute, and
