It played
its part, however; and when Jean Jacques finished it, he plunged into
that other outburst of the habitant's gay spirits, 'Bal chez Boule':
"Bal chez Boule, bal chez Boule,
The vespers o'er, we'll away to that;
With our hearts so light, and our feet so gay,
We'll dance to the tune of 'The Cardinal's Hat'
The better the deed, the better the day
Bal chez Boule, bal chez Boule!"
And while Jean Jacques worked "like a little French pony," as they say in
Canada of every man with the courage to do hard things in him, he did not
stop to think that the scanty life-belts had all been taken, and that he
was a very poor swimmer indeed: for, as a child, he had been subject to
cramp, and so had made the Beau Cheval River less his friend than would
have been useful now.
He realized it, however, soon after daybreak, when, within a few hundred
yards of the shores of Gaspe, to which the good Basque captain had been
slowly driving the Antoine all night, there came the cry, "All hands on
deck!" and "Lower the boats!" for the Antoine's time had come, and within
a hand-reach of shore almost she found the end of her rickety life. Not
more than three-fourths of the passengers and crew were got into the
boats. Jean Jacques was not one of these; but he saw Carmen Dolores and
her father safely bestowed, though in different boats.
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