Rollo on the Atlantic. Abbott Jacob
George took out his ticket and gave it to the porter, whereupon the porter opened the gate and let him in.
Mr. George found himself under an enormous roof, which spread itself like a vast canopy over his head, and extended from side to side across the pier. Under this vast shed laborers were wheeling boxes and bales of merchandise to and fro, while small steam engines of curious forms and incessant activity were at work hoisting coal on board the ships from lighters alongside, and in other similar operations. There were two monstrous steamships lying at this pier, one on each side. Mr. George turned toward the one on the left. There was a long flight of steps leading up from the pier to the decks of this ship. It was formed by a staging, which extended from the pier to the bulwarks of the ship, like a stair-case, with a railing on each side. Mr. George ascended these steps to the bulwarks, and thence descended by a short flight of steps to the deck itself, and then went along the deck till he came to the door leading to the cabins.
He found within quite a number of cabins, arranged on different floors, like the different stories of a house. These cabins were very resplendent with gilding and carving, and were adorned with curtains and mirrors on every side. They presented to Mr. George, as he walked through them, a very imposing spectacle. Along the sides of them were a great many little bed rooms, called state rooms. These state rooms were all very beautifully finished, and were furnished with every convenience which passengers could require. Mr. George selected two of these state rooms. They were two that were adjoining to each other, and they were connected by a door. There were two beds, or rather bed places, in each state room, one above the other. Mr. George chose the lower berth in one state room for Rollo, and the lower one in the next state room for Jane. When he had chosen the berths in this manner, he wrote the name of each of the children on a card, and then pinned the cards up upon the curtains of the respective berths.
"There!" said he. "That is all right. Now perhaps some lady will take the other berth in Jane's room, and some gentleman that in Rollo's. Then they will both have company in their rooms. Otherwise I must find somebody to take care of them both."
Mr. George then left the ship and went back to the office in Wall Street, to engage the berths and pay the passage money. The office was spacious and handsomely furnished, and there were several clerks in it writing at desks. There were two rooms, and in the back room was a table, with large plans of the ship upon it, on which all the cabins and state rooms of the several decks were represented in their proper positions. The names of the various passengers that had engaged passage in the ship were written in the several state rooms which they had chosen. The clerk wrote the names, Master Holiday and Miss Holiday, in the state rooms which Mr. George pointed out to him, and, when he had done so, Mr. George looked over all the other names that had been written in before, to see if there were any persons whom he knew among them. To his great gratification he found that there were several such.
"Yes," said he, as he rose up from the examination of the plan, "there are several gentlemen there who will be very ready, under the circumstances of the case, to do Mr. Holiday the favor of looking after his children during the voyage."
Being thus, in a measure, relieved of all solicitude, Mr. George walked about the room a few minutes, examining the pictures of the several steamers of the line which were hanging on the walls, and then went away.
Chapter II.
The Embarkation
The time fixed for the sailing of the steamer was on Tuesday morning; and Mr. George, in order to have time to communicate with some of the gentlemen to whose care he intended to intrust the two children, planned his journey to New York so as to arrive there in good season on Monday. He supposed that he should be able, without any difficulty, to find one or the other of them in the afternoon or evening of that day.
"And if worst comes to the worst," added he to himself, in his reflections on the subject, "I can certainly find them at the ship, by going on board an hour or two before she sails, and watching the plank as the passengers come up from the pier."
Worst did come to the worst, it seems; for when Mr. George came home at nine o'clock in the evening, on Monday, and Rollo came up to him very eagerly in the parlor of the boarding house, to ask him whom he had found to take charge of them, he was forced to confess that he had not found any one.
"I am glad of it!" exclaimed Rollo, joyfully. "I am glad of it! I like it a great deal better to take care of ourselves."
He then began dancing about the room, and finally ran off in great glee, to inform Jane of the prospect before them. Rollo was very ambitious of being considered a man.
He found Jane sitting on the stairs with another child of her own age, that she had become acquainted with at the boarding house; for it was at a boarding house, and not at a hotel, that Mr. George had taken lodgings for his party. This child's name was Lottie; that is, she was commonly called Lottie, though her real name was Charlotte. She was a beautiful child, with beaming black eyes, a radiant face, and dark glossy curls of hair hanging down upon her neck. Jane and Lottie were playing together in a sort of recess at a landing of the stairs, where there was a sofa and a window. They had tiger and the cage with them. The door was open and tiger was playing about the cage, going in and out at her pleasure.
"Jane," said Rollo, "uncle George cannot find any body to take care of you, and so I am going to take care of you."
Jane did not answer.
"Are you going to England?" asked Lottie.
"Yes," replied Jane, mournfully; "and there is nobody to go with us, to take care of us."
"I went to England once," said Lottie.
"Did you?" asked Jane; "and did you go across the Atlantic Ocean?"
"Yes," said Lottie.
"Of course she did," said Rollo; "there is no other way."
"And how did you get along?" said Jane.
"O, very well," said Lottie; "we had a very good time playing about the decks and cabins."
Jane felt somewhat reassured by these declarations of Lottie, and she even began to think that if there was nothing to be done in crossing the Atlantic but to play about the decks and cabins all the way, there was a possibility that Rollo might be able to take care of her.
"My uncle is going on a voyage, too, to-morrow," added Lottie.
"What uncle?" asked Jane.
"My uncle Thomas," said Lottie. "He lives in this house. He is packing up his trunk now. He is going to Charleston. I wish I were going with him."
"Do you like to go to sea?" asked Jane.
"Yes," said Lottie, "pretty well. I like to see the sailors climb up the masts and rigging; and I like the cabins, because there are so many sofas in them, and so many places to hide."
Little Jane felt much less uneasiness at the idea of going to sea after hearing Lottie give such favorable accounts of her own experience. Still she was not entirely satisfied. As for Rollo, his eagerness to go independent of all supervision did not arise wholly from vanity and presumption. He was now twelve years of age, and that is an age which fairly qualifies a boy to bear some considerable burdens of responsibility and duty. At any rate, it is an age at which it ought to be expected that the powers and characteristics of manhood should, at least, begin to be developed. It is right, therefore, that a boy at that age should begin to feel something like a man, and to desire that opportunities should arise for exercising the powers which he finds thus developing themselves and growing stronger every day within him.
The fact that Lottie's uncle Thomas was going to embark for Charleston on the same day that had been fixed for Rollo's embarkation for Europe might seem at first view a very unimportant circumstance. It happened, however, that it led, in fact, to very serious consequences. The case was this. It is necessary, however, first to explain, for the benefit of those readers of this book who may never have had opportunities to become acquainted with the usages of great cities, that there are two separate systems in use in such cities for the transportation respectively of baggage, and of persons, from place to place. For baggage and parcels, there are what are called expresses. The owners of these expresses have offices in various