Dennis, in her little cottage,
undressed herself by a fragment of hearth-fire that now and then flashed
upon the picture of her husband, as he had left her sixteen years
before, when Levin was a baby--a rich blonde, youthful man, dressed in
naval uniform, like Decatur, whose birthplace was so near his own.
His golden hair curled upon his forehead, his blue eyes were full of
handsome daring, and his red, pouting mouth was like a woman's; upon his
arm a corded chapeau was held, epaulettes tasselled his shoulders, his
rich blue coat was slashed with gold along the wide lappels, and stood
stiffly around his neck and fleecy stock and fan-shaped shirt-ruffles.
He seemed to be a mere boy, but of the mettle which made American
officers and privateersmen of his days the only guerdons of the
republicanism of the seas against the else universal dominion of
England.
This portrait, the last of her family possessions, was the young
sailor's parting gift to her when he sailed in the _Ida_, leaving her a
mere girl, with his son upon her breast. The picture hung above the
lowly door, the bolt whereof was never fastened in that serene society,
and seldom is to this day.
Mrs. Dennis knelt upon the bare floor, and raised her branching arms,
white as her spirit, to the lover of her youth:
"Oh, thou I have adored since God gave me to feel the beauty and
strength of man in my childhood, if I have ever looked on man but thee
with love or wavering, rebuke me now for the offence I am to do, if such
it be, in choosing another father for thy boy!"
A low wail seemed to be breathed upon the midnight from somewhere near,
and a sick man's cough seemed to break the perfect silence.
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