. Master Rockafellar's voyage . as Rockafellar; father andmother always called me Tommy, and by thatname was I known until I grew too old to becalled by anything more familiar than Tom. Ihave seen people look at one another, and smile,perhaps, when they have heard the nameRockafellar mentioned as that of a family; butI here beg leave to state that the Rockafellarsare an exceedingly ancient race, who, if they donot claim to have arrived in this country withWilliam the Conqueror, can excuse themselves fornot having landed with that chieftain by beingable to prove that they had been many yearsest
. Master Rockafellar's voyage . as Rockafellar; father andmother always called me Tommy, and by thatname was I known until I grew too old to becalled by anything more familiar than Tom. Ihave seen people look at one another, and smile,perhaps, when they have heard the nameRockafellar mentioned as that of a family; butI here beg leave to state that the Rockafellarsare an exceedingly ancient race, who, if they donot claim to have arrived in this country withWilliam the Conqueror, can excuse themselves fornot having landed with that chieftain by beingable to prove that they had been many yearsestablished when the keels of the Norman galleysgrounded on the Hastings shore. 2 2 MASTER ROCKAFELLARS VOYAGE. Amongst my ancestors were several sailors,who had served the king or queen of their timesin the navy of the state. A portrait of EbenezerRockafellar, who was a rear-admiral in the earlyyears of George the Seconds reign, hung in thedining-room at home, and represented a face likethat of the man in the moon when the planet. EBENEZER ROCKAFELLAR. rises very crimson out of the sea on a hotsummers evening. He had a tail on his backand a great copper speaking-trumpet under hisarm and his forefinger, on which was a huge ring,rested upon a globe of the world. The artisthad painted in a picture of a thunderstorm hap-pening through a window, with the glimpse of arough sea, and an old-fashioned ship like a castle HE BEGS TO GO TO SEA. 3 tumbling about in it resembling a toy Noahs arktossing on the strong ripples of a pond. It might have been my looking at this red-facedancestor ot mine, and admiring his speaking-trumpet, and the noble colour of weather whichstained his face that first put it into my head togo to sea. I cannot say. Who can tell wherelittle boys get their notions from ? I wouldstand before that picture, and in my small waydream about the ocean, about sharks, tropicislands full of cocoa-nut trees, and monkeys, andparrots gorgeous as shapes of burnished gold ;and I wou
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookpublisherlondo, bookyear1913
