of your daily profits" "Why, Sir," said he, "taking one day with another, I think I might go so far as to say four pence a day." He sometimes got less -sometimes nothing-but he sometimes got more-sixpence-a shilling-and this very precariousness of his returns gave an animation to his pursuit, that blinded him to its worthlessness, and was its own sufficient reward. "I wonder what it will be to-day"-he would say at starting; and this wonder at his age-was worth any thing. A tub of gin might be picked upthere was no telling-and here was a ground of hope that sent him day after day to the beach, with a heart as light as his basket. He had his comforts too of a more substantial character. Little as you might have thought of him, he had generally a piece of bread and cheese stowed away in some hole of his dress or other. This he called his dinner, and, incredible as it may appear to some people, he desired not a better. He never was hungry, and had outlived therefore all relish in eating. He used to talk of his stomach as if it and he were two persons; as if he had no living sympathies with it, and provided for its necessities as for those of his horse, or any foreign matter dependent on his care. "My stomach," he would say, "wants something-but I care little about it." He knew that he should become faint and weak by long inanition, and, to avoid this extremity, required himself to eat, having certain signs through the day out of himself, which regulated for him the seasons when this duty was to be performed. It was not "I feel hungry," but "it is low-water," or "the flood-tide is making," and out came the bread and cheese. Bob was still more abstemious, though his appetite probably, if he could have told his mind, was not quite so neutral on the subject of food as that of his master. He had a wonderful faculty of living both in and on the air, and tasted nothing else from early morning till he returned to his damaged hay at night. In the meanwhile, his monstrous belly grew larger and larger, as it grew emptier, though cer tain querulous expressions from within announced, from time to time, that this inflation had no refreshment in it. As the day advanced, Bob's visceral lamentations grew more urgent and audible, till they finally settled into an awful and continuous rumbling and rolling, like the muttering of distant thunder; and when it came to this pass, his master knew that it was time to be thinking of home. It may be imagined from the account that I have given of his habits and modes of passing his time, that his life, so destitute of all that is commonly esteemed pleasurable and comfortable, must, of necessity, have been a miserable one. But it was no such thing; had it been so, I should not have treated it so lightly and mirthfully. He was the most uninterruptedly cheerful creature that ever I conversed with; not alone placid and patient, but full of an active, bustling happiness, extracted from the very circumstances that might have been regarded as his most grievous hardships. His business was the delight of his heart. The difficulties and uncertainties of his pursuit invested it with a dignity and a complication of relations, that kept his mind in continual and healthful agitation, and preserved in it, what is so rarely felt at his age in any condition, an interest in the common revolutions of the seasons, and the daily necessity of being alive. He was awake in every sense when he was not asleep; and had found out the great secret of ease and contentment, in having always something before him that he considered worth doing or suffering. He did not affect to love cold and rain on their own account; but he had some little pretence for exposing himself to them and then is heroism nothing? Is glory nothing? Old gentlemen in their easy chairs and by their fire-sides, will scarcely believe that the consummation of all their brother Johnny's pleasures (and pleasures they were) was being wet to the skin; yet to my knowledge it was simply so. It is excitementemotion-that people want, and this Johnny never was without. He attached as much importance to his occupation, and combined his plots and cal culations, with as much earnestness and solemnity, as if he had been a secretary of state. What does the pampered and gouty old alderman care to know, that the wind will be westerly next Wednesday; and that the sun went down last night in a fog bank? He is not moved, not fre, though it be certain that spring tides are coming, which will lay bare the Cuckmore Sands, and the Fore Ness Rock. The world goes on without him, and he heeds it not; but languishes in a living death, in the midst of abundance, a finished fortune, and completed hopes. No such apathy ever fell upon Johnny; he looked out upon the heavens to the last, like one who had a personal concern-a voice in the great operations of nature; studied the lee and the weather sky, and the prognostications of the north-west (a mighty point with him) with as much anxiety as though he had had treasures due from all the quarters of the globe. A change of wind gave a new face to his destiny; and a shower of rain was a sign pregnant with infinite expectations. Even his grievances (for the best of us must have some care) had a vivacity and variety in them, that in the end did him service -stirred him up-and kept the elements of his mind and feelings sound, sweet, and wholesome. An east wind, for instance, was not received by him with the mere puny peevishness of age and rheumatism; he abused it heartily, and showed you on this topic that he had a tongue in his head, which would not bear an injury tamely. Was it not a smooth-water wind? Was it not a sheep's-head wind?-A perverse -starving-beggarly wind, that never brought good to man or brute, since the days of Adam? He never sunk into dulness-melancholy or despondence. If he was crossed, he was angry-and once in a way it is good to be angry. "Curse the east wind, and welcomebut cheer up withal; never despair, man: the south-west will come again, never fear, with its hurricanes and driving rains-its bottom-sweeping seasits beach-stirring surfs, and cuttle-fish bones." There is something in these natters, we must allow, and they are 28 ATHENEUM VOL. 14. surely better than utter indolence and satiety. Supplementary to his pleasing fatigues abroad, Johnny had the matchless comfort of an easy and quiet home, enlivened by the presence of one who had been his helpmate for fifty years, and in all the offices of affection and respect was still untired. His wife had a little more bodily activity than he had, and devoted all her surviving faculties to his service, and a sincere cooperation with him in his adventures by the sea-side. These were quite as important in her estimation as in his, and as far as her department in the concern allowed, she was quite as eager and persevering in promoting them. When he was with her there was always enough to do; and, in his absence, she had to set things in order for his return-and might help out the lingering time by visions of strange findings, and dreams of El Dorado. No man could be more decidedly "master in his own house" than Johnny: yet he was not harshly so-but rather, let me say, through the influence of his desertshis importance in the state--his basket of his knowledge and services; and, above all, of his wants and infirmities. There was something beautiful in his wife's perfect submission to him; she obeyed him, as it were involuntarily; his wants and wishes were to her as her will-the necessity that determined her motives, and directed all her actions. There is striking truth in Bacon's remark, that wives are young men's mistresses, and old men's nurses. A rheumatic lover-a worshiper with a white beard, is neither to be expected nor desired; and, oh! how much it speaks for the enduring kindness and constancy of women, that when we masters desist from our patronizing attentions, and lordlily demand their ministration in the day of our decline, they forget not their fealty, but look down upon, and serve us-pity, and obey us. The sight of this old woman, herself so feeble and wasted, hovering about her wreck of a husband, with fearful tenderness---tyrannized over by his dependence-enslaved by his helplessness-was really as much as a bachelor (poor barren unit) could bear. He beggarly gains he had a manifest distaste for the whole huckstering busiSuch were the duties and delights of ness, and never spoke of it in any of its Johnny's winter days. In the summer, circumstances without scorn. He purwhose gentle winds and moderate seas sued it as a duty, and because somebring no harvest to the beach, he for- thing like a daily task was necessary to sook his natural haunts, cast away his his existence: but he was clearly like lance and basket, and appeared in the a creature out of his element in his tame, dull character of an inland travel- cart. He languished under the tireler and trader. Shrimping and prawn- some sameness and stillness of sunny ing, according to the regular roamer's skies and dusty roads; and yearned calendar, should have succeeded to the for the animating violences, and all the business of the winter; but as these hurly-burly of the beach, with a piping tasks involved the necessity of standing gale from the south. Besides there and stooping, Johnny, who was nobo- was a meanness-a paltry narrowness dy on the ground, was obliged to resign-in all his inland transactions that them to more pliant frames, and in the humbled and dispirited him. flowery month of May, retired abso- who had so long been used to deal with lutely and most reluctantly from all the ocean, and bargain with the storm, his maritime connections. Amongst could ill condescend to higgle with a his worldly goods, he numbered a cart, child for a half-penny, and squabble which had descended to him from his with an old wife over a stale mackerel. father, though he had mended it till you With this indisposition to his commermight almost say he had made it. One cial concerns, he attended to them but of the wheels, I believe, was aboriginal, irregularly, and dozed away much of and he used to point it out as some- his time on the beach, stretched at his thing not to be matched by modern length in the sun, whose warmth kept wheelrights, and certainly not by its him alive, supplying the place in his companion. In this vehicle, such as it system of those kindling hopes and was, with Bob appended, and freighted stirring chances, which bore him so with a light cargo of nuts, gingerbread, bravely through the severity of his winwith such child's matters, together ter campaigns. Bob, in the meanwith a few fish occasionally, when he while, who did not examine things so could raise money or credit for the pur- curiously, we may suppose, yielded to chase, he visited the neighbouring vil- the leisure and quietness of these holilages and farms-the delight of little day-times with no apparent dissatisfacchildren--the play-thing of village tion. Tethered at the roadside, he had maids-and the butt of every clown free access to the pasture of a parched, that had a joke and a grin to spare. powdered hedge; and if he got not a By such excursions he beguiled a little full meal, he had his next best blessing the long light of the summer; but they in this world, a long stop. There yielded him a miserable profit, and no he stood, the nucleus of a cloud of flies cordial pleasure in any way. He would return sometimes bringing sad accounts of trade, and the condition of the country. "There never were such times-would you believe it?—a pint and a half of nuts-three hap'orth of gingerbread-with three whitingsand a dab-no more-and a day's work-it was enough to ruin any man. The fact is," said he, "there is no money," and he put on a definitive look that added-and you have my authority for saying so. I fear that Johnny was no unprejudiced reporter on this subject. Independent of his a picture of patience-vacantnoteless-or sometimes napping brokenly-with no care but how to keep his heavy drowsy head from the ground. As my own summer tastes led me rather to the solitudes of meadows and corn-fields, than to the haunts of my fellows, my communication with Johnny was not so constant at this season as in the winter; but we occasionally met in the roads, and I saw quite enough of him in his new character to complete my general portrait of him. If he had a satisfaction in his cart, it was derived certainly from his horse, and the pride of driving; he had no little conceit in himself as "a whip." The first time I ever met him on the road, he asked me how I thought Bob "looked in harness." My own interest (that perhaps of an idle and listless mind) in the small doings of this simple creature, may be betraying me, I fear, into a prolixity of trifling, that may be tiresome to my readers. I has ten-poor old soul! as he did-to his end. Towards the close of a wet and stormy day in February last, a man living at a tide-mill close upon the sea-shore, observed Johnny's horse at the distance of about half a mile from him, standing alone on the beach, his rider being nowhere to be seen. As such a circumstance was not quite unprecedented, he retired to his work, giving it little consideration; but when, in half an hour afterwards, he looked out again and saw things precisely in the same posture, he began to think, making all due allowances for their peculiar usages, there was something in this protracted stedfastness of the horse, and concealment of his master, that was strange and alarming. An hour elapsed-the night was drawing on, and still there was no change; when the man, a good-natured fellow, who knew Johnny well, and would not have had him come to barm for a trifle, felt his apprehension so much awakened, that he determined to walk down to the place where the horse stood, and ascertain what was the matter. When he had got better than half way, he began hallooing as he walked, and then stopped in the fearful hope of seeing Johnny's well-known hat peep up above the long level ridge of the shingles, and hearing himself hailed in his turn; but no such image appeared on the dreary waste, and no voice but his own mingled with the raving of the wind and the roar of the surf. He then advanced till he distinguished the body of the old man, lying on its face, stretched stiff out (as it always was, lying or standing), and close under his horse, whose nose was drooping down, till it rested apparently on the shoulders of his master. With a sickening foreboding of the truth that held back his feet, the man was still willing to hope that the travellers were both asleep, and he called out lustily upon Johnny; but received no notice in return, except from the horse, who raised his head, looked at him for a moment, and then resumed his former attitude, to wait for another signal of release, which was never to be seen again. The friendly miller now hastened at once to the body, "gave it a bit of a kick," crying, "Master Wolgar, Master Wolgar," stooped down, and turning over the face, which was bloody, and rooted down among the stones, found the old roamer stiff and cold-that indeed he had been for years, and alive-but he was now stiff and cold, and dead. His horse's bridle was still twisted as usual round his wrist, and, had he not been discovered before dark, the patient beast, confined by that slight bond as by a chain of iron, would have stood, probably, till he had dropped and perished by his master's side. It was "a fit," people said, that thus suddenly terminated poor Johnny's career; and the coroner with all his skill could make out little more than what will be reported of us all in our turn, that he was "found dead." This was following up his business with a gallantry that was worthy of him—facing the enemy to the last moment, and dying under arms. He had complained of no indisposition, no unusual sensations on last leaving his home; but started on his expedition with his accustomed alacrity-beat his way against wind and rain, to the ordinary boundary of his outward voyage—and there "brought up," to rest from his roaming for ever. How much I grieved for his losswhat gloom was cast over my solitary rambles on the shore, by this sudden removal of his friendly familiar face--my readers may guess; I will not oppress them with any parade of sentiment. To my imagination the beach. has been haunted ever since; in certain states of the weather I still see the grotesque figure of the mounted roamer poking and peering about on the border of the surf. In a few days a solemn bell announc ed to us poor Johnny's funeral-always an impressive scene in a small community, where all are known, and the meanest is missed. There was no lack of honest mourners to follow him; and if I breathed out my prayer with the rest for his peace, it was an act of obsequiousness (to say nothing of feeling) which I owed him, had it been only in return for the many, many times that he had bared his white head to the wind in courtesy to me. CHRISTIAN WARFARE AGAINST THE TURKS. (Mon. Mag. Sept.) Extraordinary Journal, called "the Bloody Journal," kept by William Davidson, on-board the St. Dinian Russian Privateer, in the Years 1788 and 9; with some Particulars of the said William Davidson. I PREFATORY MEMORANDUM. N the year 1791, a seaman, by name William Davidson, who belonged to one of the boats of the Niger frigate, being intoxicated, and insolent to the midshipman who was on duty in the boat, was put into confinement; and on the following day, his offence being of a nature which called for particular notice, was brought on deck and ordered to receive a dozen lashes. The punishment was not inflicted with more than ordinary severity, but the feelings of the man under it seemed very poignant: he made the strongest efforts to extricate himself from his situation, and was frequently thrown into convulsions. Such suffering being neyer witnessed by the byestanders, on the fourth or fifth lash the punishment was stopped; when, being almost in a state of insensibility, he was released, and returned to his duty. Some months afterwards, he was guilty of a similar offence, but in an aggravated degree: he struck the midshipman, and was, consequently, put again into irons. In consequence of the severity of his sufferings on the former occasion, it was determined to keep him a good while in confinement; and let that punishment, together with his contrition,-which it was expected he would of course manifest-plead an excuse against further corporal punishment. With this intention he was ordered on deck; but, conceiving the nature of his offence did not admit of excuse, he made an effort to cut his throat, and then attempted to rusk overboard; in both which he was prevented. It being thought equally impossible, under such circumstances, either to pardon or punish the man, he was re-ordered to his confinement; from which he was, after suitable exhortation, released. There was afterwards a confused story in the ship, which caused a good deal of conversation among the people, of some extraordinary situations in which this man had been; and it was said he had in his chest a book which recorded some wicked scenes. His conduct having marked a something particular in this man, his chest was ordered to be searched; which being done, the following journal was found. He was at that time upwards of thirty years of age; had received some education; was a north country man; of a dark complexion, gloomy, and saturnine. When he was questioned concerning the Journal, he always said it was a faithful record of the events he had witnessed. On being asked how he could be guilty of such multiplied cruelties, and yet himself shrink from a punishment trifling compared with those he had inflicted, he said the thought of punishment was dreadful beyond description to his mind, and that death in any shape was preferable to it. It being enquired of him if he felt any remorse for the barbarities. he had committed, he turned aside, and said he wished to God he had never seen that vessel: he protested that neither himself nor any of his countrymen had a thought of getting into the situation they found themselves in, until it was too late to be extricated; that at first they viewed with horror those scenes of blood, and |