Years passed on, and Fernando, in his quiet home in the West, grew to be
a strong, healthy lad, with a constantly expanding mind.
CHAPTER II.
MORGIANNA.
It was early on the morning of June 13, 1796, just twenty years after
the Declaration of Independence, that Captain Felix Lane, of the good
ship _Ocean Star_, was on his voyage from Rio to Baltimore with a cargo
of coffee. The morning was specially bright, and the captain, as brave a
man as ever paced a quarter deck, was in the best of spirits, for he
expected soon to be home. He had no wife and children to greet him on
his return, for Lane was a bachelor. He had served on board a privateer
during the War of the Revolution and had done as much damage as any man
on salt water to English merchantmen. Like most brave men, Captain Lane
had a generous soul, a kind heart, and there was not a man aboard his
vessel who would not have died for him. He preserved perfect discipline
and respect through love rather than fear, for he was never known to be
harsh with any of his crew.
No one knew why the captain had never married. His first mate, who had
sailed under him four years, had never dared broach him on the subject
of matrimony. There was a story--a mere rumor--perhaps without the
slightest foundation, of Felix Lane, when a poor sailor boy, loving the
daughter of an English merchant at Portsmouth, England.
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