Belmont chronicle. [volume] (St. Clairsville, Ohio) 1855-1973, 1864-01-28
.OrLdU1 zEEIT OF
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Nv % ttfS5t " II 10
ted to talk with the men, unless an oflioer
was by. With officers be had unrestraiHed
intercourse, as far as, they and he chose.
But hegrew shy, though he had favorites:
u was one, Then the captain always asked
him dinner, on Monday. Eyeryt mess ip
succession took up the invitation in its turn.
Accordingto to the size Of the ship yunhad
him. atsyour mess more or less often at DIR
ner. His breakfast he ate in his own state |
room, -rhe always had q state-room, which
watch, could sec the door. And whatever
| Sometimes. when the marines Or sailors had
any special jollifcation, theywere permitted
to invite '"Pain-Buttons,"' as they balled
him. Then Nolan was sent with some
officer, and the men we're forbidden to speak
of home while he was there. l believe the
theory was, that the sight of his punishment
did them good They called him ''Plain-
Button 3" because, while he always chose to
wear regulation army-uniform he was not
permitted to wear the army-button, for the
reason that it bore either, the initials or the
insignia Of the country he had dsowned.,
| remember, soon after joined the naty,
| was on shore with some of the older
officers from our ship and from the Brandy
wine, which we had met atJAlexanaria.
We had leave to make a party and 60 up 10
Cairo and the Pyramids As we logged
along, (you went on donkcys them some OF
the gentlemen(w we boys called them YDons,
but the phrase was long since changed) fell
to talking about Nolan, and some one told
the system which was adopted from the first
about his books and .other reading. As he
, was almost never permitted to 90 on shore,
even though the vessel lay in port for
months, his time, at the best, hung heavt;
aud everybody was permitted to lend him
: books, II they were not published in Amer-
: lea and made no allusioh to it. These were
common enough in the old days, when pee-
| pie in the other hemisphere talked of the
t United States as little'as we do of Paraguay.
4 He had almost all the foreign papIis that
came into the ship, sooner or later; only
somebody must go over them first, and cut
] out any advertisement or stray paragraph
g that alluded to America. This was little
cruel sometimes, when the back of what
was cut out might be as innocent as Hesiod.
z Right in the midst of one of Napoleon's
/. battles or one of Canning's speeches, poor
Nolan would find great hole, because on
the back of the page of that paper there
= had been an advertisement of packet for
o New York, or scrap from the President
G heard of this plan, which afterwards had
enough, and more than enough, to do with.
, | remember it, because poor Phillips, who
s was of the party as soon as the auson to
+. reading was made, tolda story of something
), which happened at the Cape of Good Hope
l on Nolans first voyage; and it is the only
II thing ever knew of that voyage. They
o had touched at the Capo, and had done the
y civil thing with the English Admiral anC
d the fleet, and then, leaving FOR a long cruist
up the Indian Ocean, Phillips had borrow
r ed lot of English books from an officer
g which, in those days, as indeed in these
d was quite windfall. Among them, as thu
It Devil would order, was tho "Lay of tht
1t Last Minstrel" which they had all Of thon
y heard Of but which most of them had never
L seen. think it could not have been pub
G lished long. Well, nobody thought there
n could be any risk Of anything national il
!, that, though Phillips. sYore Sld, Shaw hgac
y fore he let Nolan have it, because he sale
d "the Bermudas ought to be ours, and b!
~ Jovo, should be one day." So Nolan wa
IN permitted to join the circle ono afternoon
~ when lot of them sat on deck smoking
st and reading aloud People do not do sucl
OF things SO often now; but when was younl
IN We got rid of great deal of time so. We'll
lg1 soft happened that in his turn Nolan tool
y the book and read to the others; and n
in read very well, as know, Nobody in tn
y circle knew line of the poem, only it Wa
y all magic and Border chivalry, and was tel
st thousand years ago. Poor Nolan read stead
& lily through the fifth canto, stopped q min
is ute and drank something, and then began
to without thought Of what was coming
Is .Breuihes there the man, with soul SO dead
,el Who never 10 himself hath said, "
h 1t seems impossible to us that anybody eve
e. heard this for the first time. but all thes
is fellows did then, and poor Nolan hinisel
0, went on, still unconsciously or mechan
ically,- a .aa. . .. .r...-
3 ''rhis is my own, my naive lnnd!n 'rr .i.'
g Then they all saw something was to pay
D but he expected to get through, | suppose
- turned little pale, but plunged on, -
Ia "Whoss heart hath meier within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned
N II sacS S sS Slsa aim Sss}l0a
= BY this time thu men were all beside them
!. selves, wishing there was any way to max
him turn over two pages; but he had no
!, quite presence Of mind for that he gagged
"a little, colored crimson, and staggered on, =
IS 70 fEer hip n9 2, pIltstrel I =, rqp,nre, swelli
- Boundie,s his wealth ns wish can elni,n, =
isIh LtInF spite ihs 20 tos powell PadipslNEytH . .
% Inc wretch, eoneenired aiiif seH AA AZ % ,
% and here the poor fellow. chJkbd, could no
Is go on, but started up, swung the book int
: the sea, vanished into his state room, 'ant
If by Joye,S" 7 said Phillips, I'VE did not se
him Tor two months lakainyH And1 had t
make up some bsggarly story to. that Eng
r lish surgeon why did not return his Waite
o. Scott TO hum S9dg huc zegqop ,GtT .
"a That story shows about the time whoi
y Nolon's braggadocio mustI have broker
- down. At first, they said, he, took a YER
" high tone, considered his Imprisonment
:, mere farce, ,,affected to enjoy the voyage
10 and all that; but Philips said that after h
=. came out of his state-room he never was tn
a a same man again, He never read alou
again, unlessit was the Bible or Shakespeare
:. or something else he was sure of. But
ef was not that merely. He never entered j
:, with the other young men exactly as com
y panion again. He was always shy after
"a "a wards, when ! knew him, very seldor
q y spoke, unless he was spoken to, except to
IN very few friends, He lighted up occasion
% ally, 81 remember late in his life hearin