Page:Demon ship, or, The pirate of the Mediterranean.pdf/24

24 furiously over it, and then receding from their still ineffectual attempt to overwhelm the vessel, returned all dyed with crimson to the ocean; while the sun setting in a stormy and angry sky, threw his rays—for the last time—in lurid and fitful gleams on the ruined Demon.

As we hurriedly prepared to spring into the boat, I saw that Girod's pinioned members refused him the prompt aid necessary for effecting an escape at such a moment. I returned, seized a bloody cutlass that lay on deck, and, without leave of the officer, cut at once through the bonds which confined our first deliverer. 'This man,' I said, as we seated ourselves, 'has been the instrument of Heaven for our preservation. I will make myself answerable for his liberty and kind treatment.' Girod seized my hand, which received a passionate Gallic salute. Our sailors now rowed hard to avoid being drawn into the vortex of the sinking ship. Merciful God! we were then out of the Demon! I supported Margaret in my arms; and as I saw her bosom heave, a renewed glow of hope rushed to my heart.

We had not been on board the sloop many minutes, ere, slowly and awfully, the Demon sunk to the same eternal grave to which she had so often doomed her victims. We say the top of the main-mast, which had borne her fatal flag above the waters, tremble like a point on their very surface, and then vanish beneath them. A frightful chasm yawned for a moment—it was then closed by the meeting waters, which soon rolled, peacefully over the vessel they had engulfed; and the Demon, so long the terror of the seas and the scourge of mariners, disappeared for ever.

Should any reader have felt just sufficient interest in the narrative to wonder whether Margaret died, and whether Colonel Francillon attended her funeral as chief-mourner; or whether she recovered, and was married to the Colonel, I can only briefly say, that the sloop put into Naples, where the countess was soon placed under a skilful physician. He pronounced her case hopeless, and my relative had only the melaneholymelancholy [sic] satisfaction of reflecting that her dying hour would be peaceful, and her lovely remains honoured by Christian burial. She passed from the hands of her physician into thosothose [sic] of the British ambassador's chaplain; but I do not think it could have been for the purpose of religious interment—as I enjoyed, for nearly forty years after this period, the inestimable privilege of calling the colonel and the countess my revered father and mother!