have by your conduct set an example to the
other ladies, as I have no doubt your husband does to the gentlemen.
Now allow me to offer you my arm."

"Will you take mine also, my dear," said Mr Ferguson.

"No, Mr Ferguson," replied the lady, tartly; "I think it is enough for
you to take care of yourself. Recollect your Scripture proverb of `the
blind leading the blind.' I have no inclination to tumble into one of
those pits," added she, pointing to the hatchway.

Captain Drawlock very civilly dragged the lady to the weather-side of
the quarter-deck, where, after in vain attempting to walk, she sat down
upon one of the carronade slides.

"The fresh air will soon revive you, ma'am; you'll be much better
directly," observed the attentive captain. "I beg your pardon one
moment, but there is another lady coming out of the cuddy."

The cabins abaft the cuddy or dining-room were generally occupied by the
more distinguished and wealthy passengers (a proportionate sum being
charged extra for them). The good people of Glasgow, with a due regard
to economy, had not run themselves into such unnecessary expenses for
the passage of Mr and Mrs Ferguson. Mr Revel, aware of the effect
produced by an appearance of wealth, had taken one of them for his
daughters. The other had been secured by Miss Tavistock, much to the
gratification of the captain, who thus had his unmarried ladies and his
chronometers both immediately under his own eye.

The personage who had thus called away the attention of the captain was
Isabel Revel, whom, although she has already been mentioned, it will be
necessary to describe more particularly to the reader.

Isabel Revel was now eighteen years old, endowed with a mind so
superior, that had not her talents been checked by a natural reserve,
she might have stepped from the crowd, and have been hailed as a genius.
She had been brought up by a foolish mother, and had in her earlier
years been checked by her two insipid sisters, who assumed over her an
authority which their age alone could warrant. Seldom, if ever,
permitted to appear when there was company, that she might not "spoil
the market" of the eldest, she had in her solitude applied much to
reading, and thus had her mind been highly cultivated.

The conduct of her father entitled him to no respect; the heartlessness
of her mother to no esteem; the tyranny of her sisters, to no affection;
yet did she strive to render all. Until the age of sixt