The Floating Light of the Goodwin Sands, R. M. Ballantyne [polar express read aloud .txt] 📗

continuously. The interior of the hall itself glowed like a red-hot chamber of gold, and was tastefully decorated with flowers and flags and evergreens; while the floor of the room was covered with long tables, which groaned under the glittering accessories of an approaching feast. Fair ladies were among the assembling company, and busy gentlemen, who acted the part of stewards, hurried to and fro, giving directions and keeping order. A large portion of the company consisted of men whose hard hands, powerful frames, and bronzed faces, proclaimed them the sons of toil, and whose manly tones and holiday garments smacked of gales and salt water.

“What be goin’ on here, measter?” inquired a country fellow, nudging Mr Queeker with his elbow.

Queeker looked at his questioner in surprise, and told him that it was a supper which was about to be given to the lifeboat-men by the people of the town.

“An’ who be the lifeboat-men, measter?”

“‘Shades of the mighty dead;’ not to mention the glorious living!” exclaimed Queeker, aghast; “have you never heard of the noble fellows who man the lifeboats all round the coasts of this great country, and save hundreds of lives every year? Have you not read of their daring exploits in the newspapers? Have you never heard of the famous Ramsgate lifeboat?”

“Well, now ’ee mention it, I doos remember summat about loifboats,” replied the country fellow, after pondering a moment or two; “but, bless ’ee, I never read nothin’ about ’em, not bein’ able to read; an’ as I’ve lived all my loif fur inland, an’ on’y comed here to-day, it ain’t to be thow’t as I knows much about yer Ramsgate loifboats. Be there mony loifboat men in Ramsgate, measter?”

“My good fellow,” said Queeker, taking the man by the sleeve, and gazing at him with a look of earnest pity, “there are dozens of ’em. Splendid fellows, who have saved hundreds of men, women, and children from the raging deep; and they are all to be assembled in this hall to-night, to the number of nearly a hundred—for there are to be present not only the men who now constitute the crew of the Ramsgate boat, but all the men who have formed part of her crew in time past. Every man among them is a hero,” continued Queeker, warming as he went on, and shaking the country fellow’s arm in his earnestness, “and every man to-night will—”

He stopped short abruptly, for at that moment a carriage drove up to the door, and a gentleman jumping out assisted a lady to alight.

Without a word of explanation to the astonished country fellow, Queeker thrust him aside, dashed forward, presented himself before the lady, and, holding out his hand, exclaimed—

“How do you do, Miss Hennings? I’m so glad to have been fortunate enough to meet you.”

“Mr Quee— Queeker,” exclaimed Fanny, blushing scarlet; “I—I was not aware—so very unexpected—I thought—dear me!—but, pardon me—allow me to introduce my uncle, Mr Hemmings. Mr Queeker, uncle, whom you have often heard mamma speak about.”

Mr Hennings, a six-feet-two man, stooped to shake Queeker by the hand. An impatient cabman shouted, “Move on.” Fanny seized her uncle’s arm, and was led away. Queeker followed close, and all three were wedged together in the crowd, and swept towards the banquet-hall.

“Are you one of the stewards?” asked Fanny, during a momentary pause.

How exquisite she looks! thought Queeker, as she glanced over her shoulder at him. He felt inclined to call her an angel, or something of that sort, but restrained himself, and replied that he was not a steward, but a guest—an honoured guest—and that he would have no objection to be a dishonoured guest, if only, by being expelled from the festive board, he could manage to find an excuse to sit beside her in the ladies’ gallery.

“But that may not be,” he said, with a sigh. “I shall not be able to see you from my allotted position. Alas! we separate here—though—though—lost to sight, to memory dear!”

The latter part of this remark was said hurriedly and in desperation, in consequence of a sudden rush of the crowd, rendering abrupt separation unavoidable. But, although parted from his lady-love, and unable to gaze upon her, Queeker kept her steadily in his mind’s eye all that evening, made all his speeches to her, sang all his songs to her, and finally—but hold! we must not anticipate.

As we have said—or, rather, as we have recorded that Queeker said—all the lifeboat men of the town of Ramsgate sat down to that supper, to the number of nearly one hundred men. All sturdy men of tried courage. Some were old, with none of the fire that had nerved them to rescue lives in days gone by, save that which still gleamed in their eyes; some were young, with the glow of irrepressible enthusiasm on their smooth faces, and the intense wish to have a chance to dare and do swelling their bold hearts; others were middle-aged, iron-moulded; as able and as bold to the full as the younger men, with the coolness and self-restraint of the old ones; but all, old, middle-aged, and young, looking proud and pleased, and so gentle in their demeanour (owing, no doubt, to the presence of the fair sex), that it seemed as if a small breeze of wind would have made them all turn tail and run away,—especially if the breeze were raised by the women!

That the reception of these lion-like men (converted into lambs that night) was hearty, was evinced by the thunders of applause which greeted every reference to their brave deeds. That their reception was intensely earnest, was made plain by the scroll, emblazoned on a huge banner that spanned the upper end of the room, bearing the words. “God bless the Lifeboat Crews.”

We need not refer to the viands set forth on that great occasion. Of course they were of the best. We may just mention that they included “baccy and grog!” We merely record the fact. Whether buns and tea would have been equally effective is a question not now under consideration. We refrain from expressing an opinion on that point here.

Of course the first toast was the Queen, and as Jack always does everything heartily, it need scarcely be said that this toast was utterly divested of its usual formality of character. The chairman’s appropriate reference to her Majesty’s well-known sympathy with the distressed, especially with those who had suffered from shipwreck, intensified the enthusiasm of the loyal lifeboat-men.

A band of amateur Christy Minstrels (the “genuine original” amateur band, of course) enlivened the evening with appropriate songs, to the immense delight of all present, especially of Mr Robert Queeker, whose passionate love for music, ever since his attendance at the singing-class, long long ago, had strengthened with time to such an extent that language fails to convey any idea of it. It mattered not to Queeker whether the music were good or bad. Sufficient for him that it carried him back, with a gush, to that dear temple of music in Yarmouth where the learners were perpetually checked at critical points, and told by their callous teacher (tormentor, we had almost written) to “try it again!” and where he first beheld the perplexing and beautiful Fanny.

When the toast of the evening was given—“Success to the Ramsgate Lifeboat,”—it was, as a matter of course, received with deafening cheers and enthusiastic waving of handkerchiefs from the gallery in which the fair sex were accommodated, among which handkerchiefs Queeker, by turning his head very much round, tried to see, and believed that he saw, the precious bit of cambric wherewith Fanny Hennings was accustomed to salute her transcendental nose. The chairman spoke with enthusiasm of the noble deeds accomplished by the Ramsgate lifeboat in time past, and referred with pride, and with a touch of feeling, to the brave old coxswain, then present (loud cheers), who had been compelled, by increasing years, to resign a service which, they all knew better than he did, taxed the energies, courage, and endurance of the stoutest and youngest man among them to the uttermost. He expressed a firm belief in the courage and prowess of the coxswain who had succeeded him (renewed cheers), and felt assured that the success of the boat in time to come would at the least fully equal its successes in time past. He then referred to some of the more prominent achievements of the boat, especially to a night which all of them must remember, seven years ago, when the Ramsgate boat, with the aid of the steam-tug, was the means of saving so many lives—not to mention property—and among others the life of their brave townsman, James Welton (cheers), and a young doctor, the friend, and now the son-in-law, of one whose genial spirit and extensive charities were well known and highly appreciated—he referred to Mr George Durant (renewed cheers), whose niece at that moment graced the gallery with her presence.

At this there was a burst of loud and prolonged applause which terminated in a roar of laughter, owing to the fact that Mr Queeker, cheering and waving his hands in a state of wild enthusiasm, knocked the neck off a bottle of wine and flooded the table in his immediate vicinity! Covered with confusion, Queeker sat down amid continued laughter and rapturous applause.

The chairman then went on to say that the event to which he had referred—the rescue of the crew and passengers of the Wellington on the night of the great storm—had been eclipsed by some of the more recent doings of the same boat; and, after touching upon some of these, said that, although they had met there to do honour to the crews of their own lifeboat, they must not forget other and neighbouring lifeboats, which did their work nobly—the brave crews of which were represented by the coxswains of the Margate and Broadstairs lifeboats, who sat at that board that night as honoured guests (loud cheers, during which several of the men nearest to them shook hands with the coxswains referred to). He could not—the chairman went on to say—sit down without making special reference to the steam-tug, without which, and the courage as well as knowledge of her master, mate, and crew (renewed cheers), the lifeboat could not overtake a tenth part of the noble work which she annually accomplished. He concluded by praying that a kind Providence would continue to watch over and bless the Ramsgate lifeboat and her crew.

We need scarcely add that this toast was drunk with enthusiastic applause, and that it was followed up by the amateur minstrels with admirable effect.

Many songs were sung, and many toasts were proposed that night, and warm was the expression of feeling towards the men who were ever so ready to imperil their lives in the hope of saving those of their fellow-creatures, and who had already, oftentimes, given such ample proof that they were thoroughly able to do, as well as to dare, almost anything. Several singers with good, and one or two with splendid, voices, gave a variety of songs which greatly enhanced the brilliancy of the evening, and were highly appreciated in the gallery; and a few bad singers with miserable voices (who volunteered their songs) did really good service by impressing upon the audience very forcibly the immense differences between good and bad music, and thus kindly acted as shadows to the vocal lights of the evening—as useful touches of discord in the general harmony which by contrast rendered the latter all the sweeter.

But of all the solos sung that night none afforded such delight as a national melody sung by our friend Jerry MacGowl, in a voice that rang out like the voices of three first-class bo’s’ns rolled into one. That worthy son of the Emerald Isle, and Dick Moy, and Jack Shales, happened to be enjoying their month on shore when the supper to the lifeboat-men was planned, and they were all there in virtue of