A Little Gipsy Lass by Gordon Stables

There are such things as happy ships still in the merchant service of this country, in which the crew are all, or nearly all, British men, and the captain and mate honest fellows and not tyrants. English or Scotch sailors work well for officers like these, and a bad word is never heard on the ship's decks.

The _Nor'lan' Star_ had scarcely changed a hand of her crew for several years. They were like a family in fact. Every one knew his duty and did it. When any dispeace occurred the matter was brought before the captain -- of course his word was law; and if there existed a malcontent on board he was very speedily got rid of, for a tainted sheep affects a flock.

But, somehow, when a captain takes his wife with him the whole tone of a ship is raised many degrees. But, over and above all this, Captain Paterson owned the ship, or most of her, for the mate and some others had shares, and this arrangement caused things to pull together better. This honest skipper was a good example of what industry and carefulness in business can accomplish, and love with honour, I may add; for he would have told you that the best thing ever he did was marrying Maggie, and taking her to sea with him.

Well, the _Nor'lan' Star_ reached Trondhjem at last; and as the men were not drunkards, but knew how to use without abusing God's gifts, every man settled to work, and with the help of dockmen the unloading and the loading-up again proceeded regularly and peacefully enough, and was all over in a week. Then the orders were to clean ship before the granting of a few days' leave off and on to the watches. In a very short time all signs of the loading-up were obliterated, and from stem to stern the _Nor'lan' Star_ looked as sweet and clean as a new half-crown.

Ben and the mate had been very busy up till now, but Mrs Skipper had taken Lotty on shore several times. The town, with its great cathedral, was in its winter garb; but they found the streets regular and wide, and even pretty, the older houses being of wood, plain in architecture, but very quaint. There were many fine shops too, and the people therein were kindly in the extreme. Everything here, especially about the suburbs, was very strange and foreign-like, but with none of the fussiness found in French ports, where it is mostly all palaver and insincerity. All her life at present was what, in the case of busy men who have been laid aside for a time by illness, doctors call 'an enforced holiday. ' But it was a very delightful and restful one. She was free for a time from the drudgery of show-work, of having to sing and act to crowds of gaping rustics and others; free from the bullying and ill-treatment of her father, Biffins Lee. She only wished that Wallace had been with her now. As for the others -- well, they would like her better when she came back from a watery grave, or, more plainly, when the sea gave up the one they all believed dead and gone.

But Wallace, what fun he would have had with little baby Norlans, and how he would have rolled him up and down the deck, but gone to sleep afterwards with the sealkin in his arms, like the good dog he was! A tub, both she and Mrs Skipper admitted, was an awkward and somewhat unsightly cot for the sealkin, so they had a look round the toy-shops, and at one they found an assortment of dolls as big as the baby-children of Anak must have been.

The shop-mistress curtsied and smiled, and felt certain the young lady would buy one. She raised a garishly dressed specimen as she spoke, which was half-doll, half-golliwog, and hideously ugly. But Lotty was not impressed. She was too old, she said, for dolls like that; but had the good woman bassinets for these?

'Oh yes,' she had, 'lovely little cradles, with rockers and all. Look!'

Lotty did look, and was delighted. These were just the thing for Norlans. How sweet he would show in one of these, with its tiny cushion, its muslin drapery, and its blanket of blue! And so one was bought and sent on board. That night Norlans was put to bed in it. Lotty sat down and rocked her baby; and as she rocked she sang a pretty cradle hymn:

'Baloo, baloo, my wee wee thing, / Oh, softly close thy blinkin' e'e; / Baloo, baloo, my dear wee thing, / Now thou art doubly dear to me. / Thy face is simple, sweet, and mild, / Like ony simmer evenin' fa'; / Thy sparklin' e'e is bonny black, / Thy neck is like the mountain snaw. / Baloo, baloo, baloo.'

And baby Norlans was willing to give himself up entirely to the luxury of the situation, and was soon sound enough asleep.

Then daddy Ben was called in -- he had to walk on tiptoe -- to take just one peep at him.

'Isn't he just lovelier than anything on earth, papa? ' said Lotty.

'Lovelier,' replied Ben, 'than biled cockles, and every bit as white and clean.'

A day or two after this Lotty ran on deck when Ben was hung up as usual on a belaying-pin, the ship having been put to sea again, and it being the lad's watch off.

'Oh papa,' she cried, pretending to be awfully excited, 'you are to run down below at once. Grandma says Norlans has cut a "toofams."

Of course a 'toofams' meant a tooth; and Ben, keeping up the game, went below at once and found it was the truth, and was wise enough to go into raptures over the pearly little appearance.