IN a preceding chapter, we left the poor boy on the plantation1 of Colonel Whaley, affected2 by a pulmonary disease, the seeds of which were planted on the night he was confined in the guard-house, and the signs of gradual decay evinced their symptoms. After Captain Williams--for such was the name of the captain of the Three Sisters--left the plantation, no person appeared to care for him, and on the second day he was attacked with a fever, and sent to one of the negro cabins, where an old mulatto woman took care of him and nursed him as well as her scanty3 means would admit. The fever continued for seven days, when he became convalescent and able to walk out; but feeling that he was an incumbrance to those around him, he packed his clothes into a little bundle and started for Charleston on foot. He reached that city after four days' travelling over a heavy, sandy road, subsisting4 upon the charity of poor negroes, whom he found much more ready to supply his wants than the opulent planters. One night he, was compelled to make a pillow of his little bundle, and lay down in a corn-shed, where the planter, aroused by the noise of his dogs, which were confined in a kennel5, came with a lantern and two negroes and discovered him. At first he ordered him off, and threatened to set the dogs upon him if he did not instantly comply with the order; but his miserable6 appearance affected the planter, and before he had gone twenty rods one of the negroes overtook him, and said his master had sent him to bring him back. He returned, and the negro made him a coarse bed in his cabin, and gave him some homony and milk.
His hopes to see Manuel had buoyed7 him up through every fatigue8, but when he arrived, and was informed at the jail that Manuel had left three days before, his disappointment was extreme. A few days after he shipped as cabin-boy on board a ship ready for sea and bound to Liverpool. Scarcely half-way across, he was compelled to resign himself to the sick-list. The disease had struck deep into his system, and was rapidly wasting him away. The sailors, one by one in turns, watched over him with tenderness and care. As soon as the ship arrived, he was sent to the hospital, and there he breathed his last as Manuel entered the sick-chamber. We leave Manuel and a few of his shipmates following his remains9 to the last resting-place of man.
1 plantation | |
n.种植园,大农场 | |
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2 affected | |
adj.不自然的,假装的 | |
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3 scanty | |
adj.缺乏的,仅有的,节省的,狭小的,不够的 | |
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4 subsisting | |
v.(靠很少的钱或食物)维持生活,生存下去( subsist的现在分词 ) | |
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5 kennel | |
n.狗舍,狗窝 | |
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6 miserable | |
adj.悲惨的,痛苦的;可怜的,糟糕的 | |
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7 buoyed | |
v.使浮起( buoy的过去式和过去分词 );支持;为…设浮标;振奋…的精神 | |
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8 fatigue | |
n.疲劳,劳累 | |
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9 remains | |
n.剩余物,残留物;遗体,遗迹 | |
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