"It is a launch into life for him," said Mr. Sewell, with suppressed feeling.
"Yes, and he has Mara on his arm," said Miss Emily; "that's as it should be. Who is that that Sally Kittridge is flirting with now? Oh, Tom Hiers. Well! he's good enough for her. Why don't she take him?" said Miss Emily, in her zeal jogging her brother's elbow.
"I'm sure, Emily, I don't know," said Mr. Sewell dryly; "perhaps he won't be taken."
"Don't you think Moses looks handsome?" said Miss Emily. "I declare there is something quite romantic and Spanish about him; don't you think so, Theophilus?"
"Yes, I think so," said her brother, quietly looking, externally, the meekest and most matter-of-fact of persons, but deep within him a voice sighed, "Poor Dolores, be comforted, your boy is beautiful and prosperous!"
"There, there!" said Miss Emily, "I believe she is starting."
All eyes of the crowd were now fixed on the ship; the sound of hammers stopped; the workmen were seen flying in every direction to gain good positions to see her go,--that sight so often seen on those shores, yet to which use cannot dull the most insensible.
First came a slight, almost imperceptible, movement, then a swift exultant rush, a dash into the hissing water, and the air was rent with hurrahs as the beautiful ship went floating far out on the blue seas, where her fairer life was henceforth to be.
Mara was leaning on Moses's arm at the instant the ship began to move, but in the moment of the last dizzy rush she felt his arm go tightly round her, holding her so close that she could hear the beating of his heart.
"Hurrah!" he said, letting go his hold the moment the ship floated free, and swinging his hat in answer to the hats, scarfs, and handkerchiefs, which fluttered from the crowd on the shore. His eyes sparkled with a proud light as he stretched himself upward, raising his head and throwing back his shoulders with a triumphant movement. He looked like a young sea-king just crowned; and the fact is the less wonderful, therefore, that Mara felt her heart throb as she looked at him, and that a treacherous throb of the same nature shook the breezy ribbons fluttering over the careless heart of Sally. A handsome young sea-captain, treading the deck of his own vessel, is, in his time and place, a prince.