Young Langham had taken a guitar from one of the musicians and pressed it upon MacWilliams, with imperative directions to sing such and such songs, of which, in their isolation, they had grown to think most highly, and MacWilliams was protesting in much embarrassment.
MacWilliams had a tenor voice which he maltreated in the most villanous manner by singing directly through his nose.He had a taste for sentimental songs, in which ``kiss'' rhymed with ``bliss,'' and in which ``the people cry'' was always sure to be followed with ``as she goes by, that's pretty Katie Moody,'' or ``Rosie McIntyre.'' He had gathered his songs at the side of camp-fires, and in canteens at the first section-house of a new railroad, and his original collection of ballads had had but few additions in several years.MacWilliams at first was shy, which was quite a new development, until he made them promise to laugh if they wanted to laugh, explaining that he would not mind that so much as he would the idea that he thought he was serious.
The song of which he was especially fond was one called ``He never cares to wander from his own Fireside,'' which was especially appropriate in coming from a man who had visited almost every spot in the three Americas, except his home, in ten years.MacWilliams always ended the evening's entertainment with this chorus, no matter how many times it had been sung previously, and seemed to regard it with much the same veneration that the true Briton feels for his national anthem.
The words of the chorus were:
``He never cares to wander from his own fireside, He never cares to wander or to roam.
With his babies on his knee, He's as happy as can be, For there's no place like Home, Sweet Home.''
MacWilliams loved accidentals, and what he called ``barber-shop chords.'' He used a beautiful accidental at the word ``be,'' of which he was very fond, and he used to hang on that note for a long time, so that those in the extreme rear of the hall, as he was wont to explain, should get the full benefit of it.And it was his custom to emphasize ``for'' in the last line by speaking instead of singing it, and then coming to a full stop before dashing on again with the excellent truth that ``there is NO place like Home, Sweet Home.''
The men at the mines used to laugh at him and his song at first, but they saw that it was not to be so laughed away, and that he regarded it with some peculiar sentiment.So they suffered him to sing it in peace.
MacWilliams went through his repertoire to the unconcealed amusement of young Langham and Hope.When he had finished he asked Hope if she knew a comic song of which he had only heard by reputation.One of the men at the mines had gained a certain celebrity by claiming to have heard it in the States, but as he gave a completely new set of words to the tune of the ``Wearing of the Green'' as the true version, his veracity was doubted.
Hope said she knew it, of course, and they all went into the drawing-room, where the men grouped themselves about the piano.
It was a night they remembered long afterward.Hope sat at the piano protesting and laughing, but singing the songs of which the new-comers had become so weary, but which the three men heard open-eyed, and hailed with shouts of pleasure.The others enjoyed them and their delight, as though they were people in a play expressing themselves in this extravagant manner for their entertainment, until they understood how poverty-stricken their lives had been and that they were not only enjoying the music for itself, but because it was characteristic of all that they had left behind them.It was pathetic to hear them boast of having read of a certain song in such a paper, and of the fact that they knew the plot of a late comic opera and the names of those who had played in it, and that it had or had not been acceptable to the New York public.
``Dear me,'' Hope would cry, looking over her shoulder with a despairing glance at her sister and father, ``they don't even know `Tommy Atkins'!''
It was a very happy evening for them all, foreshadowing, as it did, a continuation of just such evenings.Young Langham was radiant with pleasure at the good account which Clay had given of him to his father, and Mr.Langham was gratified, and proud of the manner in which his son and heir had conducted himself; and MacWilliams, who had never before been taken so simply and sincerely by people of a class that he had always held in humorous awe, felt a sudden accession of dignity, and an unhappy fear that when they laughed at what he said, it was because its sense was so utterly different from their point of view, and not because they saw the humor of it.He did not know what the word ``snob'' signified, and in his roughened, easy-going nature there was no touch of false pride; but he could not help thinking how surprised his people would be if they could see him, whom they regarded as a wanderer and renegade on the face of the earth and the prodigal of the family, and for that reason the best loved, leaning over a grand piano, while one daughter of his much-revered president played comic songs for his delectation, and the other, who according to the newspapers refused princes daily, and who was the most wonderful creature he had ever seen, poured out his coffee and brought it to him with her own hands.
The evening came to an end at last, and the new arrivals accompanied their visitors to the veranda as they started to their cabin for the night.Clay was asking Mr.Langham when he wished to visit the mines, and the others were laughing over farewell speeches, when young Langham startled them all by hurrying down the length of the veranda and calling on them to follow.
``Look!'' he cried, pointing down the inlet.``Here comes a man-of-war, or a yacht.Isn't she smart-looking? What can she want here at this hour of the night? They won't let them land.Can you make her out, MacWilliams?''
A long, white ship was steaming slowly up the inlet, and passed within a few hundred feet of the cliff on which they were standing.
