"O'er the glad waters of the dark-blue sea,
Our thoughts as boundless and ourselves as free."
Byron.
When cruising round Africa some years ago in a saucy wee gunboat, that
shall be nameless, I was not only junior assistant surgeon, but I was
likewise head surgeon, and chief of the whole medical department, and
the whole of that department consisted of--never a soul but myself. As
we had only ninety men all told, the Admiralty couldn't afford a medical
officer of higher standing than myself. I was ably assisted, however,
in my arduous duties, which, by the way, occupied me very nearly half an
hour every morning, after, not before, breakfast, by the loblolly boy
"Sugar o' Lead." I don't suppose he was baptised Sugar o' Lead. I
don't think it is likely ever he was baptised at all. This young
gentleman used to make my poultices, oatmeal they were made of, of
course--I'm a Scot. But Sugar o' Lead always put salt in them, ate one
half and singed the rest. He had also to keep the dispensary clean,
which he never did, but he used to rub the labels off the bottles, three
at a time, and stick them on again, but usually on the wrong bottles.
This kept me well up in my pharmacy; but when one day I gave a man a
dose of powder of jalap, instead of Gregory, Sugar o' Lead having
changed the labels, the man said "it were a kinder rough on him." Sugar
o' Lead thought he knew as much as I, perhaps; but Epsom salts and
sulphate of zinc, although alike in colour, are very different in their
effects when given internally. Sugar o' Lead had a different opinion.
Another of the duties which devolved upon Sugar o' Lead was to clean up
after the dogs. At this he was quite at home. At night he slept with
the monkeys. Although the old cockatoo couldn't stand him, Sugar o'
Lead and the monkeys were on very friendly terms; they lived together on
that great and broad principle which binds the whole of this mighty
world of ours together, the principle of "You favour me to-day and I'll
favour you to-morrow." Sugar o' Lead and the monkeys acted upon it in
quite the literal sense.
At Symon's Town, I was in the habit of constantly going on shore to
prospect, gun in hand, over the mountains. Grand old hills these are,
too, here and there covered with bush, with bold rocky bluffs abutting
from their summits, their breasts bedecked with the most gorgeous
geraniums, and those rare and beautiful heaths, which at home you can
only find in hot-houses.
My almost constant attendant was a midshipman, a gallant young
Scotchman, whom you may know by the name of Donald McPhee, though I knew
him by another.
The very first day of our many excursions "in the pursuit of game," we
were wading through some scrub, about three or four miles from the
shore, when suddenly my companion hailed me thus: "Look-out, doctor,
there's a panther yonder, and he's nearest you."
So he was; but then he wasn't a panther at all, but a very large
Pointer. I shouldn't like to say that he was good enough for the show
bench; he was, however, good enough for work. Poor Panther, doubtless
he now rests with his fathers, rests under the shadow of some of the
mighty mountains, the tartaned hills, over which he and I used to wander
in pursuit of game. On his grave green lizards bask, and wild
cinerarias bloom, while over it glides the shimmering snake; but the
poor, faithful fellow blooms fresh in my memory still. I think I became
his special favourite. Perhaps he was wise enough to admire the
Highland dress I often wore. Perhaps he thought, as I did, that of all
costumes, that was the best one for hill work. But the interest he took
in everything I did was remarkable. He seemed rejoiced to see me when I
landed, as betokened by the wagging tail, the lowered ears, slightly
elevated chin, and sparkling eye--a canine smile.
"Doctor," he seemed to say, "I was beginning to think you weren't
coming. But won't we have a day of it, just?"
And away we would go, through the busy town and along the sea beach,
where the lisping wavelets broke melodiously on sands of silvery sheen,
where many a monster medusa lay stranded, looking like huge umbrellas
made of jelly, and on, and on, until we came to a tiny stream, up whose
rocky banks we would scramble, skirting the bush, and arriving at last
at the great heath land. We followed no beaten track, we went here,
there, and everywhere. The scenery was enchantingly wild and beautiful,
and there was health and its concomitant happiness in every breeze.
Sometimes we would sit dreamily on a rock top, Panther and I, for an
hour at a time, vainly trying to drink in all the beauties of the scene.
How bright was the blue of the distant sea! How fleecy the cloudlets!
How romantic and lovely that far-off mountain range, its rugged outline
softened by the purple mists of distance! These everlasting mountains
we could people with people of our own imagination. I peopled them with
foreign fairies. Panther, I think, peopled them with rock rabbits.
Weary at last with gazing on the grandeur everywhere around us, we would
rivet our attention for a spell upon things less romantic--bloater paste
and sea biscuit. I shared my lunch with Panther.
Panther was most civil and obliging; he not only did duty as a pointer
and guide, but he would retrieve as well, rock rabbits and rats, and
such; and as he saw me bag them, he would look up in my face as much as
to say--
"Now aren't you pleased? Don't you feel all over joyful? Wouldn't you
wag a tail if you had one? I should think so."
Panther wouldn't retrieve black snakes.
"No," said Panther, "I draw the line at black snakes, doctor."
I would fain have taken him to sea with me, as he belonged to no one;
but Panther said, "No, I cannot go."
"Then good-bye, dear friend," I said.
"Farewell," said Panther.
And so we parted.
He looked wistfully after the boat as it receded from the shore. I
believe, poor fellow, he knew he would never see me again.
Conceive, if you can, of the lonesomeness, the dreariness of going to
sea without a dog. But as Panther wouldn't come with me, I had to sail
without him. As the purple mountains grew less and less distinct, and
shades of evening gathered around us, and twinkling lights from rocky
points glinted over the waters, I could only lean over the taffrail and
sing--
"Happy land! happy land!
Who would leave the glorious land?"
Who indeed? but sailor-men must. And now darkness covers the ocean, and
hides the distant land, and next we were out in the midst of just as
rough a sea as any one need care to be in. My only companion at this
doleful period of my chequered career was a beautiful white pigeon.
Here is how I came by him. Out at the Cape, in many a little rocky
nook, and by many a rippling stream, grow sweet flowerets that come
beautifully out in feather work. Feather-flower making then was one of
my chief delights and amusements; the art had been taught me by a young
friend of mine, whose father grew wine and kept hunters
(jackal-hunting), and had kindly given me "the run" of the house.
Before leaving, on the present cruise, I had secured some particularly
beautiful specimens of flowers, too delicate to be imitated by anything,
save the feathers of a pigeon; so I had bought a pure white one, which I
had ordered to be killed and sent off.
"Steward," I cried, as we were just under weigh, "did a boy bring a
white pigeon for me?"
"He did, sir; and I put it in your cabin in its basket, which I had to
give him sixpence extra for."
"But why," said I, "didn't you tell him to put his nasty old basket on
his back and take it off with him?"
"Because," said the steward, "the bird would have flown away."
"Flown away!" I cried. "Is the bird alive then?"
"To be sure, sir," said the steward.
"To be sure, you blockhead," said I; "how can I make feather-flowers
from a live pigeon?"
The man was looking at me pityingly, I thought.
"Can't you kill it, sir? Give him to me, sir; I'll Wring his neck in a
brace of shakes."
"You'd never wring another neck, steward," I said; "you'd lose the
number of your mess as sure as a gun."
When I opened the basket, knowing what rogues nigger-boys are, I fully
expected to find a bird with neither grace nor beauty, and about the
colour of an old white clucking hen. The boy had not deceived me,
however. The pigeon was a beauty, and as white as a Spitzbergen
snow-bird. Out he flew, and perched on a clothes-peg in my bulkhead,
and said--
"Troubled wi' you. Tr-rooubled with you."
"You'll need," said I, "to put up with the trouble for six months to
come, for we're messmates. Steward," I continued, "your fingers ain't
itching, are they, to kill that lovely creature?"
"Not they," said the fellow; "I wouldn't do it any harm for the world."
"There's my rum bottle," I said; "it always stands in that corner, and
it is always at your service while you tend upon the pigeon."
The cruise before, we had a black cat on board, that the sailors looked
upon as a bird of evil omen, for we got no luck, caught no slavers, ran
three times on shore, and were once on fire. This cruise, we had lots
of prize-money, and never a single mishap, and the men put it all down
to "the surgeon's pet," as they called my bird. He was a pet, too. I
made him a nest in a leathern hat-box, where he went when the weather
was rough. He was tame, loving, and winning in all his ways, and always
scrupulously white and clean.
The first place we ran into was Delagoa Bay. How sweetly pretty, how
English-like, is the scenery all around! The gently undulating hills,
clothed in clouds of green; the trees growing down almost to the water's
edge; the white houses nestling among the foliage, the fruit, the
flowers, the blue marbled sky, and the wavelets breaking musically on
the silvery sands--what a watering-place it would make, and what a pity
we can't import it body bulk! The houses are all built on the sand, so
that the beach is the only carpet. In the Portuguese governor's house,
where we spent such a jolly evening, it was just the same; the
chair-legs sank in the soft white sand, the table was off the plane, and
the piano all awry; and a dog belonging to one of the officers, a
monster boarhound, with eyes like needles, and tusks that would have
made umbrella handles, scraped a hole at one end of the room, and nearly
buried himself. That dog, his owner told me, would kill a jackal with
one blow of his paw; but he likewise caught mice like winking, and
killed a cockroach wherever he saw one. His owner wrote this down for
me, and I afterwards translated it.
Next morning, at eleven, the governor and his officers came off, arrayed
in scarlet, blue, and burnished gold, cocked-hats and swords, all so
gay, and we had tiffin in the captain's cabin; Carlo, the dog, came too,
of course, and seated himself thoughtfully at one end, abaft the mess
table. There we were, then, just six of us--the captain, a fiery
looking, wee, red man, but not half a bad fellow; the governor, bald in
pate, round-faced, jolly, but incapable of getting very close to the
table because of the rotundity of his body; his _aide-de-camp_, a little
thin man, as bright and as merry as moonshine; his lieutenant, a jolly
old fellow, with eyes like an Ulmer hound, and nose like a kidney
potato; myself, and Carlo.
Our conversation during tiffin was probably not very edifying, but it
was very spirited. You see, our captain couldn't speak a word of
Portuguese, and the poor Portuguese hadn't a word of English. I myself
possessed a smattering of Spanish, and a little French, and I soon
discovered that by mixing the two together, throwing in an occasional
English word and a sprinkling of Latin, I could manufacture very decent
Portuguese. At least, the foreigners themselves seemed to understand
me, or pretended to for politeness sake. To be sure they didn't always
give me the answer I expected, but that was all the funnier, and kept
the laugh up. I really believe each one of us knew exactly what he
himself meant, but I'm sure couldn't for the life of him have told what
his neighbour was driving at. And so we got a little mixed somehow, but
everybody knew the road to his mouth, and that was something. We got
into an argument upon a very interesting topic indeed, and kept it up
for nearly an hour, and were getting quite excited over it, when somehow
or other it came out, that the Portuguese had all the while been
argle-bargling about the rights of the Pope, while we Englishmen had
been deep in the mystery of the prices of yams and sucking pig, in the
different villages of the coast. Then we all laughed and shook hands,
and shrugged our shoulders, and turned up our palms, and laughed again.
Presently I observed the captain trying to draw my attention unobserved:
he was squinting down towards the cruet stand, and I soon perceived the
cause. An immense cockroach had got into a bottle of cayenne, and
feeling uncomfortably warm, was standing on his hind-legs and
frantically waving his long feelers as a signal of distress. I was just
wondering how I could get the bottle away without letting the governor
see me, when some one else spotted that unhappy cockroach, and that was
Carlo.
Now Carlo was a dog who acted on the spur of the moment, so as soon as
he saw the beast in the bottle he flew straight at it. That spring
would have taken him over a six-barred gate. And, woe is me for the
result! Down rolled the table, crockery and all; down rolled the
governor, with his bald pate and rotundity of body; down went the merry
little thin man; over rolled the fellow with the nose like a kidney
potato. The captain fell, and I fell, and there was an end to the whole
feast.
When we all got up, Carlo was intent upon his cockroach, and looking as
unconcerned as if nothing out of the common had occurred.