BOATSWAIN'S MATE. 

 

In the meantime Isabella had suffered her full share of persecution. Shortly after the family had retired from the coast to the vicinity of the city of Tepic, where Don Gaspar had an estate, he had urged her to accept Don Gregorio before their return to St. Blas. The tears and entreaties of the unhappy girl had, however, so far mollified him that he consented to put it off some time longer. A severe fit of the gout, during which Isabella attended him with the most assiduous and unremitting affection, had also operated as a powerful auxiliary to her wishes. Pressing her affectionately to his bosom one day, the old governor declared his unwillingness to part with her; and, "upon this hint she spake," and easily obtained from him a promise not to trouble her with any matrimonial schemes till she had completed her twenty-second year, and even then, if she felt disinclined to the holy state, she should be at liberty to retire to a convent. As she was not yet twenty-one, she regarded this reprieve as equivalent to a full release, and awaited anxiously the return of the dry season. It came at last, and the family returned to St. Blas.

 

Several American ships, whalemen and others, visited the port for supplies, and for the purpose of a little private speculation, with which the custom-house was not troubled. Dame Juanita's shop, being rather the largest in St. Blas, and possessing, moreover, the additional attraction of her own buxom countenance, and that of a pretty daughter behind the counter, was visited daily by the mates and crews of these ships; and of them she inquired, by direction of Isabella, concerning the officers of the Orion, without success for a long time, till at last the mate of a trader declared that he knew Mr. Morton very well; that when he saw him last he was engaged fitting out a ship bound round Cape Horn; and that she was, in all probability, on the coast at that moment, and would most probably soon visit San Blas.

 

This intelligence operated like a cordial upon Isabella's spirits; her eyes were constantly directed t............