unobtrusiveness of demeanour may have proceeded from a certain unaffected
modesty of manhood sometimes accompanying a resolute nature, a modesty evinced
at all times not calling for pronounced action, and which shown in any rank of
life suggests a virtue aristocratic in kind.
    As with some others engaged in various departments of the world's more
heroic activities, Captain Vere, though practical enough upon occasion, would at
times betray a certain dreaminess of mood. Standing alone on the weather-side of
the greater deck, one hand holding by the rigging, he would absently gaze off at
the black sea. At the presentation to him then of some minor matter interrupting
the current of his thoughts, he would show more or less irascibility; but
instantly he would control it.
    In the Navy he was popularly known by the appellation - Starry Vere. How
such a designation happened to fall upon one who, whatever his sturdy qualities,
was without any brilliant ones, was in this wise: a favourite kinsman, Lord
Denton, a free-handed fellow, had been the first to meet and congratulate him
upon his return to England from the West Indian cruise; and but the day previous
turning over a copy of Andrew Marvell's poems had lighted, not for the first
time however, upon the lines entitled »Appelton House,« the name of one of the
seats of their common ancestor, a hero in the German wars of the seventeenth
century, in which poem occur the lines,
 
»This 'tis to have been from the first
In a domestic heaven nursed,
Under the discipline severe
Of Fairfax and the starry Vere.«
 
And so, upon embracing his cousin fresh from Rodney's victory, wherein he had
played so gallant a part, brimming over with just family pride in the sailor of
their house, he exuberantly exclaimed, »Give ye joy, Ed; give ye joy, my starry
Vere!« This got currency, and the novel prefix serving in familiar parlance
readily to distinguish the Indomitable's captain from another Vere, his senior,
a distant relative, an officer of like rank in the Navy, it remained permanently
attached to the surname.
 

                                       VI

In view of the part that the commander of the Indomitable plays in scenes
shortly to follow, it may be well to fill out that sketch of him outlined in the
previous chapter. Aside from his qualities as a sea-officer Captain Vere was an
exceptional character. Unlike no few of England's renowned sailors, long and
arduous service with signal devotion to it, had not resulted in absorbing and
salting the entire man. He had a marked