Page:A child of the Orient (IA childoforient00vakarich).pdf/24

 "Word of this had come to us. We sat gloomily around a rude wooden table, saying not a word. Then Constantin Kanaris spoke, his voice hoarse, his face terrible to look at:

"'Take them away we cannot—unless God sends us ships from heaven at this minute. But if we cannot take them away, we can at least send them to God, pure as he has given them to us.'

"We listened breathless, while he unfolded to us his daring plan. He would go out in a small row-boat to the battle-ship alone. 'Never fear! I may not come back—but the battle-ship will be blown up.'

"He left us—so dumb with despair that for a long, long time none of us spoke. Hours passed since he had gone; then a far distant boom made the still air to tremble, and we, rushing to the shore, saw the sky bathed in burning colours.

"We lads were for shouting for joy, but at the sight of the older men, whose heads hung low on their breasts, we remembered that none yet knew whose were the daughters just sent to God. Each father there, maybe, had a child to mourn."

My uncle's friendship lasted as long as Kanaris lived, and at times he went to see him in Greece. Once he reproached me bitterly for having been born a few years too late to be taken to the home of Kanaris, to behold the great chieftain and to be blessed by him.