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- ramparts of Quebec, a lofty mark for the bitter blasts from Baffin’s
Bay and Labrador. There, as his eye sweeps down the St. Lawrence, whose
every billow is bound for the main that laves the shore of Old England;
as he thinks of his long term of enlistment, which sells him to the
army as Doctor Faust sold himself to the devil; how the poor fellow
must groan in his grief, and call to mind the church-yard stile, and
his Mary.
These army announcements are well fitted to draw recruits in Liverpool.
Among the vast number of emigrants, who daily arrive from all parts of
Britain to embark for the United States or the colonies, there are many
young men, who, upon arriving at Liverpool, find themselves next to
penniless; or, at least, with only enough money to carry them over the
sea, without providing for future contingencies. How easily and
naturally, then, may such youths be induced to enter upon the military
life, which promises them a free passage to the most distant and
flourishing colonies, and certain pay for doing nothing; besides
holding out hopes of vineyards and farms, to be verified in the
fullness of time. For in a moneyless youth, the decision to leave home
at all, and embark upon a long voyage to reside in a remote clime, is a
piece of adventurousness only one removed from the spirit that prompts
the army recruit to enlist.
I never passed these advertisements, surrounded by crowds of gaping
emigrants, without thinking of rattraps.
Besides the mysterious agents of the quacks, who privily thrust their
little notes into your hands, folded up like a powder; there are
another set of rascals prowling about the docks, chiefly at dusk; who
make strange motions to you, and beckon you to one side, as if they had
some state secret to disclose, intimately connected with the weal of
the commonwealth. They nudge you with an elbow full of indefinite hints
and intimations; they glitter upon you an eye like a Jew’s or a
pawnbroker’s; they dog you like Italian assassins. But if the blue coat
of a policeman chances to approach, how quickly they strive to look
completely indifferent, as to the surrounding universe; how they
saunter off, as if lazily wending their way to an affectionate wife and
family.
The first time one of these mysterious personages accosted me, I
fancied him crazy, and hurried forward to avoid him. But arm in arm
with my shadow, he followed after; till amazed at his conduct, I turned
round and paused.
He was a little, shabby, old man, with a forlorn looking coat and hat;
and his hand was fumbling in his vest pocket, as if to take out a card
with his address. Seeing me stand still he made a sign toward a dark
angle of the wall, near which we were; when taking him for a cunning
foot-pad, I again wheeled about, and swiftly passed on. But though I
did not look round, I _felt_ him following me still; so once more I
stopped. The fellow now assumed so mystic and admonitory an air, that I
began to fancy he came to me on some warning errand; that perhaps a
plot had been laid to blow up the Liverpool docks, and he was some
Monteagle bent upon accomplishing my flight. I was determined to see
what he was. With all my eyes about me, I followed him into the arch of
a warehouse; when he gazed round furtively, and silently showing me a
ring, whispered, “You may have it for a shilling; it’s pure gold—I
found it in the gutter—hush! don’t speak! give me the money, and it’s
yours.”
“My friend,” said I, “I don’t trade in these articles; I don’t want
your ring.”
“Don’t you? Then take that,” he whispered, in an intense hushed
passion; and I fell flat from a blow on the chest, while this infamous
jeweler made away with himself out of sight. This business transaction
was conducted with a counting-house promptitude that astonished me.
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