Page:Westward Ho! (1855).djvu/426

418 "Humph!" said John Squire. "Very good and godly: but still I du like a merry catch now and then, I du. Wouldn't you let a body sing 'Rumbelow'—even when he's heaving of the anchor?"

"Well, I don't know," said Yeo; "but the Lord's people had better praise the Lord then too, and pray for a good voyage, instead of howling about—

"Is that fit talk for immortal souls? How does that child's-trade sound beside the Psalms, John Squire?"

Now it befell that Salvation Yeo, for the very purpose of holding up to ridicule that time-honored melody, had put into it the true nasal twang, and rung it out as merrily as he had done perhaps twelve years before, when he got up John Oxenham's anchor in Plymouth Sound. And it befell also that Ayacanora, as she stood by Amyas's side, watching the men, and trying to make out their chat, heard it, and started; and then, half to herself, took up the strain, and sang it over again, word for word, in the very same tune and tone.

Salvation Yeo started in his turn, and turned deadly pale.

"Who sung that?" he asked quickly.

"The little maid here. She's coming on nicely in her English," said Amyas.

"The little maid?" said Yeo, turning paler still. "Why do you go about to scare an old servant, by talking of little maids. Captain Amyas? Well," he said aloud to himself, "as I am a sinful saint, if 1 hadn't seen where the voice came from, I could have sworn it was her; just as we taught her to sing it by the river there, I and William Penberthy of Marazion, my good comrade. The Lord have Mercy on me!"

All were silent as the grave whenever Yeo made any allusion to that lost child. Ayacanora only, pleased with Amyas's commendation, went humming on to herself—

Yeo started up from the gun where he sat. "I can't abear it! As I live, I can't! You, Indian maiden, where did you learn to sing that there?"

Ayacanora looked up at him, half frightened by his vehemence, then at Amyas, to see if she had been doing anything wrong; and then turned saucily away, looked over the side, and hummed on.

"Ask her, for mercy's sake—ask her, Captain Leigh!

"My child," said Amyas, speaking in Indian, "how is it you