Of Rose we shall not stop to say much here.  Her deep-blue eye, which was equally spirited and gentle, if one can use such contradictory terms, seemed alive with interest and curiosity, running over the brig, the wharf, the arm of the sea, the two islands, and all near her, including the Alms-House, with such a devouring rapidity as might be expected in a town-bred girl, who was setting out on her travels for the first time.  Let us be understood; we say town-bred, because such was the fact; for Rose Budd had been both born and educated in Manhattan, though we are far from wishing to be understood that she was either very well-born, or highly educated.  Her station in life may be inferred from that of her aunt, and her education from her station.  Of the two, the last was, perhaps, a trifle the highest.

We have said that the fine blue eye of Rose passed swiftly over the various objects near her, as she alighted from the cab, and it naturally took in the form of Harry Mulford, as he stood in the gangway, offering his arm to aid her aunt and herself in passing the brig’s side.  A smile of recognition was exchanged between the young people, as their eyes met, and the colour, which formed so bright a charm in Rose’s sweet face, deepened, in a way to prove that that colour spoke with a tongue and eloquence of its own.  Nor was Mulford’s cheek mute on the occasion, though he helped the hesitating, half-doubting, half-bold girl along the plank with a steady hand and rigid muscles.  As for the aunt, as a captain’s widow, she had not felt it necessary to betray any extraordinary emotions in ascending the plank, unless, indeed, it might be those of delight on finding her foot once more on the deck of a vessel!

Something of the same feeling governed Biddy, too, for, as Mulford civilly extended his hand to her also, she exclaimed—­“No fear of me, Mr. Mate—­I came from Ireland by wather, and knows all about ships and brigs, I do.  If you could have seen the times we had, and the saas we crossed, you’d not think it nadeful to say much to the likes iv me.”

Spike had tact enough to understand he would be out of his element in assisting females along that plank, and he was busy in sending what he called “the old lady’s dunnage” on board, and in discharging the cabman.  As soon as this was done, he sprang into the main-channels, and thence vid the bulwarks, on deck, ordering the plank to be hauled aboard.  A solitary labourer was paid a quarter to throw off the fasts from the ring-bolts and posts, and everything was instantly in motion to cast the brig loose.  Work went on as if the vessel were in haste, and it consequently went on with activity.  Spike bestirred himself, giving his orders in a way to denote he had been long accustomed to exercise authority on the deck of a vessel, and knew his calling to its minutiae.  The only ostensible difference between his deportment to-day and on any ordinary occasion, perhaps, was in the circumstance that he now seemed anxious to get