THE FETISH--CROSSING THE BAR, AND DESTRUCTION OF THE SLAVER.
The first man we encountered was Clinker, the master-at-arms.
"Who has seen the frigate?" said Lanyard.
"Why, there she is, sir," replied the man. "There, you see her
topgallant sails over the green bushes there, sir. Now you see the
heads of her fore and maintopsails."
"I see, I see. What signal is that flying at the fore, Mr Marline?" to
the midshipman who was looking out.
"The signal to close, sir."
"Close," croaked old Sprawl--"close--easier said than done, Sir Oliver."
"Like the Starling, 'we can't get out,'" quoth I.
Here the frigate in the offing slowly and majestically shoved her long
jib-boom past the mangroves on the westernmost bank, and gradually the
whole beautiful machine hove in sight, rising and falling on the long
swell.
As she came round the point, she took in topgallant sails, and hauled
down the foretopmast staysail; and whenever she had fairly opened the
river, and come nearly abreast of us, she laid her maintopsail to the
mast, with her fore and mainsails hanging in graceful festoons in the
brails, and hove-to under her three topsails, jib, and spanker. She
slid silently and majestically along; the bright green wave curling
outwards from her beautifully moulded bows, like the shell-shaped
canopy of Daddy Neptune's car, as the cut-water slid gently through the
calm heaving of the blue swell, and gradually subsiding, as the
glorious old hooker lost her way, and became stationary, when she
floated, like a swan asleep on the dark waters, the bright sun shining
cheerily on her white sails and hammocks and clear white streak, and
sparkling on her glittering sides, as they rose and fell fresh and wet
from the embraces of old Ocean; and as the land-breeze laid her over,
her gold-bright copper blazed like one vast polished mirror, wherein
the burning sun was reflected in dazzling glances. Bright blinding
rays flashed out, starlike, from the window in the quarter gallery, and
the glass in the scuttles of the officer's cabins, and from every
burnished piece of metal throughout the whole length of the gallant
craft, converting her black hull into a brilliant constellation; while
her heavy lower masts, with their strong shrouds and stays, and the
swelling sails, and the tall and taper spars aloft, were seen clear and
distinct against the deep blue of the seaward horizon.
As we looked, the frigate hauled down the jib, and brailed up the
spanker. A string of small round bundles, apparently each about the
size of a man's head, now twisted and struggled, and stopped, and
finally slid up to the main royal-mast-head. The instant the uppermost
reached the truck, as if it had touched a spring--bang--a gun was
fired, and at the same moment the round balls blew out steadily in so
many flags.
"What signal now, Mr Marline?"
"The signal to weigh and stand out, sir."
"Why, we can't; it is impossible: although the wind is fair, the swell
on the bar puts it out of our power."
"Very true," said old Pumpbolt; "and you had better say so, Lanyard.
I, for one, won't undertake to carry you over until there is less
broken water at the river's mouth, I know."
The lieutenant commanding the felucca telegraphed to this effect; the
frigate acknowledged it, and answered, that she would remain in the
offing all night in expectation of our getting over at high water, when
possibly there would be less sea on the bar.
Having made this signal, she run her jib up, set topgallant-sails, and
let fall the foresail: the ponderous mainyard slowly swung round, and
as the noble frigate fetched way again, she gradually fell off before
the wind; her long low hull fore-shortened into a mere tub of a vessel
to look at, and finally presenting her stern to us, she lay over,
inclining herself gracefully to the breeze, as if she was bidding us
farewell, and glided cheerily away; indicating by the increasing
whiteness of her wake, the accelerated speed with which she clove the
heaving billows.
"There goes the dear old beauty," said Davie; "there's a retiring
curtsy for you that beats the stateliest of my lady patronesses at
Almacks."
Having gained an offing of about three miles, she again shortened sail,
and hove to in her station to await our joining, when the bar became
passable in the night.
"Weary work, master Benjie,--weary work," said Davie Doublepipe; "so
here we must lie, roasting another whole day, while there is plenty of
water on the bar, if that confounded swell would only fall."
By this it was drawing near the men's dinner-time; and while the
lieutenant and I were pacing the deck, rather disconsolately, trying to
steer clear of the smoke of the galley, that streamed aft as we rode
head to wind, we noticed that our sable visitor, Serjeant Quacco, had,
with the true spirit of resignation, declined into cook's mate (indeed,
if there be a Negro on board when this birth becomes vacant, he
invariably slides into it, as naturally as a snail into his shell), and
was busy in assisting the maimed seaman who was watching the coppers.
The fire seemed to burn very indifferently from the greenness of the
wood, which gave out more smoke than flame.
"Drainings, my man," said Lanyard to cookey, "don't choke us, if you
please. Do get some dry chips from Shavings, will you?"
"Ay, ay, sir," said the man.
"Here, Quacco, mind the fire," continued Drainings, "till I get some
splinters from forward there.--Stay--Lennox, my dear boy, do get me a
handful of dry chips from old Shavings, will ye?"
The Scotch corporal civilly complied; and after a little, we saw him
split up a block of wood where the carpenter had been at work in the
bows of the felucca, and presently he returned with a bundle of them,
which Serjeant Quacco busily employed himself in poking into the fire,
blowing lustily with his blubber lips all the while. When Lennox
turned away, I could not help noticing, that he stuck his tongue in his
cheek, and winked to one of the crew as he went below.
Presently Lanyard desired the boatswain to pipe to dinner. In place of
bundling down below, according to the etiquette of the service in
larger vessels, he winked, I saw, at the poor fellows breaking away
forward into messes, which they contrived to screen from the view of
the quarterdeck, by slewing the long yard nearly athwart ships, and
loosing the sail as if to dry.
Notwithstanding all this, we could easily see what was going on
forward. Close to, sat the old cook himself, with Shavings the
carpenter, and Wadding the gunner, warrant officers in a small way,
with a little snipe of a boy waiting on them.
About a fathom from them, there was another group squatted on the deck,
consisting of Corporal Lennox, old Clinker the master at arms, Dogvane
the quartermaster, and no smaller a personage than Serjeant Quacco.
The food was peas-soup, and salt junk and biscuit. The hands, as we
turned and returned, seemed exceedingly comfortable and happy; when all
at once, the old cook pressed his hands on the pit of his stomach, and
began to make a variety of rather odd grimaces. Dogvane looked in his
face, and instantly seemed to catch the infection; so he next began to
screw himself up into a variety of indescribable contortions. Serjeant
Quacco looked first at one, and then at another, as they groaned in any
thing but a melodious concert, until he too, through sympathy, or in
reality from pain, began also to twist himself about, and to make such
hideous faces, that to have trusted him near a respectable pig in the
family way, would have been as much as the nine farrow were worth.
At length the contagion became general apparently, and Corporal Lennox
began to groan and wince, as he ejaculated, "Oh dear, what can this be!
what an awful pain in my stomach! Why, Mr Drainings, what _have_ you
clapt into that peas-soup? _Something bye common_ you must have put
into it, for we are all dying here with"----
"My eye!" said old Drainings, speaking slowly and deliberately, as if
the paroxysm had subsided, and some strange light had suddenly flashed
on him, "you are quite right, Lennox. That same peas-soup is none of
the right sort--that is clear now. I have just been telling Mr Wadding
that a wery-most-remarkable circumstance took place in the boiling
on't."
Here the old fellow, who had just finished his peas-soup, very solemnly
looked upwards, and wiped his muzzle with what hovered between a
pocket-handkerchief and a dishclout, of any colour but that of unsunned
snow.
"Why," continued the cook, "just when it began to simmer about the
edges of the boiler----Ah--ah--oh--there it is again--there it is
again," and once more he began to tumble about on the deck, giving
friend Quacco several miscellaneous kicks and punches during his
make-believe involuntary convulsions. This fit seemed also to pass
over.
"Why," said he, "just when the soup began to simmer about the edges of
the copper, and thin streaks of white froth began to shoot inwards
towards the middle, where the hot soup was whirling round in a bubbling
eddy, and poppling up for all the world like the sea on the bar there,
I saw--I saw"----Here he looked unutterable things with his one eye,
turning it up like a duck in thunder.
"What did you see?" said old Clinker, staring in his face with sham
earnestness.
"I saw--so sure as I see Mr Weevil the purser's d--d ugly mug aft on
the quarterdeck there--a small devil rise out of the boiling peas-soup
in the very middle of the copper, and fly up and away over the truck
like a shot--whipping the vane at the mast-head off its spindle with
the bight of his tail.
"No! did you though?" said several voices.
"To be sure I did," rejoined Drainings, "as distinctly as I now see my
thumb--none of the cleanest, by the way."
"The devil?" said Lennox, starting up; "what was it like, Mr Drainings?"
"Why, as like the little heathen god brought on board by Quacco there,
as you can fancy any thing."
"Oh--oh--oh," again resounded from all hands.
"But it could not be he," at length struck in the black serjeant. "It
could not be he, seeing he is safe stow below de heel of de bowsprit
dere."
"Heaven grant it may be so," whined Dogvane.
"If it really be as Quacco says," said Wadding, in a sympathizing tone,
"why, _then_, I will believe it is all fancy--all a barn."
Here the black serjeant, in great tribulation, rose to go forward,
evidently with a desire to reconnoitre whether the graven image was
really there in the body or no. After a long search, he came back and
sat down, blank and stupified, on the spot where he had risen from.
"And pray, Mr Drainings, when did you see this curious appearance?"
persisted Lennox.
"At the wery instant of time," drawled Cookey, with his arms crossed,
and his hands stuck into the open bosom of his greasy shirt, that had
once been red flannel, and with a short black stump of a pipe in his
mouth, from which he puffed out a cloud between every word, "at the
wery instant of time, by the glass, that Serjeant Quacco there mended
the fire."
"Oh--oh--oh!"--Here all hands of the rogues who were in the secret,
began again to roll about and grimace, as if a travelling _menagerie_
of baboons had suddenly burst, and capsized its inmates all about.
Quacco all this while was twisting and turning himself, and, although
evidently in a deuced quandary, trying to laugh the affair off as a
joke.
"Well," at length said he, "I don't believe in fetish--now dat I is
among whiteman Christian. So I will tank you, Massa Draining, to hand
me over my chocolate."
But I noticed that the devil a drop would he take into his mouth,
although he made believe to drink it. The jest went on--at length
there was a calm, when who should again break ground but Serjeant
Quacco--who made a last attempt to laugh off the whole affair.
"But where de debil _can_ he be?" said he, almost involuntarily--"gone,
sure enough."
"Oh--oh--oh--" sung out all hands once more, with their fists stuck
into their midriffs.
"Oh, that vile fetish," screamed Lennox; "we must all be
bewitched--Quacco, we are all bewitched.'"
"Bewitch!" responded the black Serjeant, jumping off the deck, and now
at his wit's end; "and I believe it is so. I hab pain in my tomak
too--just dis moment--oh, wery sharp!"
"Confound your fetish," groaned the old cook; "it was just as you stuck
those chips of cedarwood into the fire--precisely at the wery moment I
snuffed the delicious smell of them, that I saw the devil himself first
put his ugly fiz up in the middle of the peas-soup, and gibber, and
twinkle his eyes, and say"----
"Say!" shouted Lennox--"why did he really and truly speak, Mr
Drainings?"
"Speak!" responded he of the slush bucket--"speak! ay, as plain as I do
now."
"And what said he?" quoth Dogvane.
"Why, just as he shook off the spray from the barb at the end of his
tail, says he,--'Damme, I'm off,' says he."
"Oh, oh, oh! I am pinned through my ground tier with a harpoon,"
groaned Drainings.
"Where, in the devil's name, since we have seen him, got you those
cedar chips, Quacco?" yelled old Clinker.
A light seemed to break in on the poor Serjeant's bewildered mind.
"Chip, chip!--where I get dem chip?" Here the poor fellow gave an
idiotic laugh, as if he had been all abroad. "I get dem from Corporal
Lennox, to be sure,"--and he turned his eyes with the most intense
earnestness towards the marine, who was rolling about the deck over and
over.
"Where got I the chips, did you ask, Quacco? Oh, oh, oh!--Why, Heaven
forgive me--but I am punished for it now--they are the very splinters
of your fetish, that you brought on board!"
Up started the black resetter as if bit by a rattlesnake, dancing and
jumping, "Oh, my tomack, oh, my tomack!--de fetish have get into my
tomack--de leetle debil in a my tomack. Oh, doctor, doctor!--one evil
spirit in me--oh, doctor, someting to make him fly--someting to get him
out! Doctor, de debil in a my belly--physic--physic, doctor; de
strongerer de more betterer. Oh Lord!" And away he tumbled down the
fore-hatchway, roaring for Esculapius like a perfect bull of Bashan.
While we were laughing at this to our heart's content, Mr Marline came
aft to us. "There are a good many dark specks passing and repassing
above us in the furthermost reach of the river, yonder, sir--as far as
you can see there, sir. Will you please to look at them, Mr Sprawl?"
Sprawl took a long squint first, and then handed the glass to me. I
peered, and peered. The glorious stream was rolling down like a
shining flow of quicksilver; but although all continued quiet in our
vicinity, yet, where it narrowed nearly to a bright point in the
distance above, I could perceive a tiny dark object slowly descend the
river, and send up a thick cloud of smoke, after which it remained
stationary, while a number of small black spots were seen cruising
hither and thither all around it.
Sprawl had also noticed this. "Why, Brail, those gentry seem mustering
in some strength. There cannot be many fewer than a hundred canoes
paddling about there. What say you?"
It was now near three, P.M., and we were bethinking ourselves of going
to dinner, when a perfect cloud of the dark specks, fifty at the least,
began to drop down with the ebb in a solid phalanx, looking in the
distance like a compact black raft of wood. Presently they sheered off
right and left; and although the craft from which we had seen the smoke
arise, still remained at anchor in the stream, the attendant canoes
vanished, one and all, amongst the mangroves, on either bank.
"Poo--nonsense!" said Dick Lanyard. "Come along, Sprawl--come along.
Why, man, we shall get as thin as whipping-posts, if we allow these
barbarian demonstrations to interfere with our comforts."
"You may be right, my boy--you may be right," said old Davie; but he
appeared to have some strange misgivings.
However, we went to dinner; the reefers were all with us, little Joe
Peake among the rest, who was now quite recovered from the thump he had
got on shore, and old Pumpbolt; and we were in the very middle of it,
when down came Wadding, the gunner.--"Beg pardon, sir," said the old
seaman, sidling in, and trying to appear at his ease, although he was
very far from that same. "Beg pardon--but them chaps are coming more
nearer, sir, than seems quite convenient,--they are fast dropping down
with the afternoon's ebb, sir."
"Indeed!" said old Sprawl, "We must keep a bright look-out here, Brail,
at any rate."
We went on deck, and the report was literally true; but although the
mass above us continued to increase until the whole surface of the
river in the distance seemed swarming, as one has seen a pool with
those blue water-insects which, I believe, as boys, we used to call
sailors, still there was no warlike demonstration made, beyond the
occasional descent of a fast-pulling canoe now and then, a mile or so
below the main body. But they were always very easily satisfied in
their reconnoitring, so far as we could judge, for the whole of them
kept a wary distance.
We returned to the cabin for half an hour, and having finished off with
a caulker of good cogniac, all hands of us once more came on deck.
It was now half-past four, and low water as near as could be. The bar
astern of us--by this time the breeze having taken off, we were riding
to the ebb--was one roaring ledge of white breakers; but it was smooth
water where we lay, the fall of the tide having completely broken the
heave of the heavy swell that rolled in from the offing on the bar.
The clouds had risen over the land, some large drops of rain fell, and
altogether we had strong prognostications of a wet, if not a
tempestuous evening.
The declining sun, however, was yet shining brightly; and although,
calculating on the average at this season hereabouts, one might have
made himself almost sure of a fine evening, yet the present was an
exception, and we had every appearance of a thunderstorm.
All nature seemed hushed; the thick clouds that arose in the east,
sailed along on the usual current of the trade-wind with their edges as
well defined as if it had been a dark screen gradually shoving up and
across the arch of the blue empyrean; this gloomy canopy crept on and
on, and as it overlapped us and stole down the western horizon, every
thing assumed a deep dusky purple hue.
In the sudden darkness, the fires glanced bright and red on board of
three war-canoes, that had now been suddenly advanced down the river in
the shape of a triangle, the headmost being within a mile of us.
Presently, the sable curtain descended within a very few degrees of the
western horizon, until there was only a small streak of bright golden
sky between it and the line of the land; in the centre of which the
glorious sun, now near his setting, shot his level beams of blood-red
light over the river and its banks, and the trees that grew on them,
gilding the dark sides of the canoes; and as he sank, his last rays
flashed up into the black arch overhead, until the dark masses of cloud
glowed like crimson.
This soon faded--the clouds gradually sinking in the west, until, as if
their scope had been expended, they _lifted_ from the eastern horizon
majestically slow--like a magnificent curtain drawn up in order to
disclose the glorious moon, which now, preceded by her gemlike
forerunner the evening star, that sparkled bright and clear on the
fringe of the ascending cloud, rose above the low swampy banks, like a
diamond on the skirt of a sable velvet mantle.
Her disk, when she first appeared, was red and dim, until she attained
a considerable altitude, when, having struggled through the
pestilential effluvia that hovered over the river, she began to sail
through her liquid track in all her splendour--pale, but oh, how
crystal clear!--driving, like a queen, the dark vapours before her.
As the night wore on, the congregation of canoes became thicker, and
presently something like a raft floated down to within three quarters
of a mile of us, accompanied by five large boats, full of people.
It was clearly distinguishable, from a bright halo of luminous smoke
that hovered over it, proceeding from a fire that every now and then
blazed up on board. By the time the raft was anchored, the evening
breeze came strong down the river, wafting towards us the sounds of
African drums, blended with dismal yells, as of captives, and loud
fierce shouts.
I directed my glass towards the name, that was flashing fitfully, as if
tar or rosin, or some other equally inflammable substance, had been
suddenly cast into it.
"What can that be?" said I, to young De Walden, who was also spying
away at the same object, close to where I stood.
"Really," said the very handsome boy, "I cannot well tell, but I will
call Serjeant Quacco, sir. He knows all the practices of the savages
hereabouts."
"No, no," rejoined I; "never mind--never mind; but what _can_ they be
doing there on the raft? I see two uprights about five feet asunder,
and judging from the dusky figures that are cruising about them, and
the fire that is kindled beneath, as it were between them, they should
be about eight feet high above the raft on which they are rigged. What
_are_ they after now? Two fellows sitting on men's shoulders, are
fixing a cross piece, or transom, on the top of the uprights--now they
are lashing it to them tightly with some sort of rope--ah, they
descend, and the fire seems to have gone out, for every thing is dark
again."
All in the neighbourhood of the raft was now undistinguishable, but
small red fires began to burn steadily in the three advanced canoes.
"What next?" said Sprawl.
"Oh, I suppose, having set their piquets for the night, we are safe."
And I took the glass from my eye, and banged the joints of it one into
another, when De Walden spoke.
"Please look again, sir--please look again." I did so. The gibbet
sort of erection that I had been inspecting, was now lit up by a sudden
glare of bright crimson flame. The dark figures, and the bows and
sides of the attendant canoes, and the beams of the gallows-looking
machine itself, were all tinged with a blood-red light, and presently
the sound of the Eboe drums and flutes was borne down on the night-wind
with startling distinctness, and louder than before, drowning the
snoring of the toads, and _chir-chir-chirring_, and _wheetle-wheetling_
of the numberless noisy insects that floated off from the bank on
either side of us.
"What is that--do you see that, Master de Walden?" said I, as a dark
struggling figure seemed to be transferred by force from one of the
canoes that showed a light into a smaller one. De Walden could not
tell--and the small skiff into which, whatever it was, it had been
transhipped, gradually slid away, apparently in the direction of the
raft, into the impervious darkness that brooded over the river, above
the three advanced canoes with the watch-fires.
I was about resigning the glass once more, when I noticed the raft
again suddenly illuminated, and a great bustle among the people on
board. Presently a naked human being was dragged under the gallows,
and one arm immediately hoisted up, and fastened by cords to one of the
angles--a black figure, who had perched himself astride on the cross
beam, evincing great activity on the occasion.
For some purpose that I could not divine, the fire was now carried by a
group of savages from the foremost part of the raft, that is, from the
end of it next us, to the opposite extremity beyond the gibbet, the
immediate effect of which was to throw off the latter, and the figure
suspended on it, as well as the persons of the people who crowded
round, in high relief against the illuminated night damps lit up by the
fire, that hung as a bright curtain or background beyond it. In a few
seconds, the other arm was drawn up to the opposite corner: and--my
blood curdles as I write it--we could now make out that a
fellow-creature was suspended by the wrists from the corners of the
gibbet, directly under the centre of the beam, as if the sufferer had
been stretched on the cross.
The fire increased in intenseness--the noise of the long drums, and the
yells of the negroes, came down stronger and stronger; and although I
could notice two assistants holding the legs of the suspended figure,
yet its struggles seemed to be superhuman, and once or twice I said to
young De Walden, "Heaven help me--did you hear nothing?"
"Nothing particular, sir, beyond the infernal howling and drum-beating
of these monsters."
A pause--then another terrible convulsion of the suspended victim, as
it struggled to and fro with the dark figures that clung to its lower
limbs like demons.
"There--heard you nothing now?"
"Yes, sir--oh, yes," gasped my young ally--"such a yell!"
"Oh, may my ears never tingle to such another!" groaned I; and as I
spoke, the assistants let go their hold on the suspended victim,
when--Heaven have mercy on us! horror on horror--one of the lower limbs
had been extracted, or cut out from the socket at the hip joint. The
struggles of the mutilated carcass continued. Quacco, hearing his name
mentioned by the young midshipman, was now alongside of me. I handed
him the glass, which it was some time before he could manage. At
length, having got the focus, he took a long, long look--he held his
breath.
"What is it?" said I, "what dreadful scene is this? For Heaven's sake,
serjeant, tell me what is going on yonder?"
He puffed out his breath like a porpoise, and then answered me as
coolly as possible, as if it had been no strange sight to him.
"Fetish, massa--grand fetish dem make--such fetish as dem make before
dem go fight wid one enemy."
"But what was the figure we saw hoisted up on the gibbet-looking
apparatus just now?" said I.
"Can't tell," rejoined Quacco, "can't really tell, massa; at first I
taught it was man--but dat cry--so wery bitter and sharp like one
knife--no, I tink it must have been woman."
"Almighty powers! Do you mean to say that the figure hung up between
us and the fire is really and truly a human being?"
"I do," said Serjeant Quacco, with the same _sang froid_; "I do, massa.
What you tink it was?"
I could not tell--I thought at one moment it was a fellow-creature, and
at another that it must be impossible, notwithstanding all the hideous
tales I had heard of the doings on this coast; but the truth, the
horrible truth could no longer be concealed.
"It is only one man or woman prisoner dat dem are cutting in pieces,
and trowing into de river." Here I saw with my glass that the other
leg of the victim had been severed from the trunk. "But I sall tell
you, dat dem intend to attack you dis wery night."
I heard him, but was riveted to my telescope. All struggles had ceased
in the dark and maimed carcass, and presently one of the arms was cut
away at the shoulder, when the bloody limb fell against the post on one
side, and the mangled trunk banged against the upright on the other,
and swung round and round it, making the whole engine reel; while, as
the drums and shouts grew louder and louder, the other arm was also cut
off at the elbow, and down came the mutilated trunk of the sacrifice
into the middle of the fire, which for a moment blazed up, and shot
forth showers of sparks and bright smoke, then rapidly declined, and in
half a minute it was entirely extinguished.
The fires in the advanced boats were now all put out, and nothing
evinced the neighbourhood of our dangerous enemy; while the lovely moon
once more looked forth on us, her silver orb reflected on the arrowy
streams of the dark river, in a long trembling wake of sparkling
ripples, and all was as quiet as if she had been smiling on a scene of
peace and gentleness.
To what peculiarity in my moral composition it was to be attributed I
do not know, but the change from the infernal scene we had just
witnessed to the heavenly quietude of a lovely night had an
instantaneous, almost an electrical effect on me; and, wounded and ill
at heart as I was, I could not help looking up, out and away from my
grovelling condition, until in fancy I forgot my miserable whereabouts,
and only saw the deep blue heaven, and its countless stars, and the
chaste moon.
"Hillo, Benjie Brail," shouted friend Davie--"where away, my lad? Come
back to mother earth"--("_alma mater tellus_," said a voice near
me--Corporal Lennox for a thousand, thought I)--"my dear boy, the
bright sky overhead, that _I_ make no doubt you are apostrophising so
poetically, will soon be shrouded by that brooding mist there--never
doubt me."
He augured rightly; for, in a little, a thick haze did in very deed
begin to mantle over the water, and continued to increase until the
glorious planet and bright stars were again obscured, and you could
scarcely see the length of the felucca.
Quacco's hint, however, was by no means thrown away on us; we
immediately saw all clear to give our savage neighbours a warm
reception, should they venture down under cover of the fog.
We had been some time at quarters, the boats astern having been hauled
up alongside, lest, in the fog, some of the canoes might venture near
enough to cut the painters. But every thing continued so quiet and
still, that we were beginning to consider our warlike preparations
might not altogether have teen called for.
"I say, Sprawl," said I--"Poo, these poor creatures will not venture
down on us; especially after the lesson they had yesterday?"
"Don't trust to that, Brail, my good boy," said Davie.
"No, massa, don't you trust to dat, as Massa Prawl say," quoth
Quacco--"I know someting--ah, you shall see." Here the poor fellow
crept close up to Dick Lanyard, "Captain--if you love sleep in one skin
hab no hole in him--if, massa, you walue de life of dem sailor intrust
to you--ill-bred fellow as dem may be,--let no one--no--not so mosh as
de leetle dirty cook-boy--shut him eyelid until to-morrow sun melt de
fog, and"----
Something dropped at my foot, with a splintering sort of sound, as if
you had cast a long dry reed on the deck. "What is that?" said I.
"Will you be convince now?" said Quacco, slowly and solemnly. "Will
Massa Brail,"--turning to me, and handing a slender wand, about ten
feet long,--"will good Massa Brail be convin"----
Spin--another arrow-like affair quivered in the mast close beside us.
It had passed sheer between the first lieutenant and me.
"Ah, ah, ah!" exclaimed Quacco in a mighty great quandary--"dere is
anoder--anoder spear--mind, gentlemen--mind, gentlemen, mind, or a
whole feet of war-canoe will be aboard of you before you can look
round."
"Men!" shouted Lanyard, "keep a bright lookout; there are native canoes
cruising all about us, and close to, in the thick mist there. Peer
about, will ye? Small-arm men, stand to your tackling--clear away both
guns. Hush--what is that?"
"Nothing," said Sprawl--"I hear nothing but the rushing of the river,
and the groaning and rubbing of the boats alongside against the
gunwale."
"But I do," said Pumpbolt.
"And so do I," said Mr Marline. "There is the splash of paddles as
plain as can be--there"----
"Where?" said De Walden.
"There," said Binnacle--"there;" and, at the very instant, I saw the
dark prow of one canoe emerge from the fog, the after-part being hid
under the thick, but moon-illumined haze. Presently another appeared
close to her, but less distinctly; both assuming a wavering and
impalpable appearance, like two large fish seen, one near, and the
other farther off, in muddy water.
"Mr Marline, fire at that fellow nearest us."
The moment the musket was discharged, the canoe backed into the fog
again, but we could plainly hear the splash and whiz of a number of
paddles rapidly plied, as if in great alarm. But even these sounds
soon ceased, and, once more, all was still. For half an hour after
this, all hands remained on the _qui vive_, but the silence continued
unbroken; so, after seeing the lookouts all right, Sprawl, Pumpbolt,
and myself (as for Lanyard he would not leave the deck) went below to
have a snack of supper, preparatory to making a start of it, if it were
possible, whenever the swell on the bar was quieter.
"Tol lol de rol," sung _ould_ Davie Doublepipe. "Oh Benjie Brail,
Benjie Brail, are we never to get out of this Styx--out of this
infernal river? What say you, Pumpbolt, my man?"
"I'll tell you more about it," said Pumpbolt, "when we have got some
grub. But _what_ Sir Oliver has done, or how he has managed without
_me_, for these two days past, _is_ a puzzler."
"Ah, bad for you master," said I. "He will find he can do without
you--should not have given him the opportunity, man."
"No more I should--no more I should," responded the master.
So we set to our meal, and were making ourselves as comfortable as
circumstances admitted, when Binnacle trundled down the ladder in
red-hot haste.
"The canoes are abroad again, sir,--we hear them close to, but the fog
is thicker than ever."
"The devil!" said I; and we all hurried on deck.
Imminent peril is a beautiful antisoporitic, and we found all hands at
quarters of their own accord--the devil a drum need to have been beaten.
"Where do you hear them--where is the noise you speak of?" said Sprawl.
"Here, sir," said one man--"Here, sir," said another--and "Here,"
exclaimed a third, all indicating different points of the compass.
It was clear our enemies were clustering round us in force, although
the fog was absolutely impervious at a distance of ten paces.
"I say, master," said Sprawl, "the bar should almost be passable now
for a light craft like this?"
"Certainly," said Pumpbolt, "I make no doubt but it is; and if this
cursed mist would only clear away, I would undertake to take the Midge,
were she twenty tons bigger, slap across it, and pledge my credit she
should clear it as sound as a bell; for we have a noble moon, and Brail
there is quite confident about the river; besides, I took the bearings
of the westernmost channel with the eastern point this very morning.
No fear, if it would _but_ clear. See if the moonshine has not made
the fog quite gauzelike, as if it were bright and luminous of
itself--Oh that it would rise!"
The four little reefers were at this moment clustered forward, close to
me; we were riding with our head up the river, and I saw one or two old
hands alongside of them, all looking out, and stretching their necks
and straining their eyes in a vain attempt to pierce the fog.
"What is that?"--It was a greasy cheep, and then a rattle, as if a
loose purchase or fall had suddenly been shaken, so as to make the
blocks clatter, and then hauled taught, as if people were having a pull
at the boom-sheet of a schooner, or other fore-and-aft rigged vessel.
"What is that, indeed?" said Sprawl. "Why, look there--look there,
Lanyard--see you nothing there?"
"No, I see nothing--eh--faith, but I do--why, what is that?--Stand by,
small-arm, men--go to quarters the rest of ye--quick--Poo, it is simply
a thicker wreath of mist, after all."
Pumpbolt was standing by, but the object that we thought we had seen
descending the river was no longer visible, and I began to think it was
fancy. Suddenly the mist thinned.
"There is the spectre-like object once more," I shouted. "By all that
is portentous, it is a large schooner, one of these slaving villains,
who thinks he can steal past us under cover of the mist--There--there
he is on our quarter--there are his royal and gaff topsail over the
thickest of the fog--now his jib is stealing out of it."
"Clear away both guns there," sung out the fourth lieutenant. "We
shall give him a rally as he passes, if he won't speak."
The strange sail continued to slide noiselessly down the river.
"What vessel is that?"--No answer--"Speak, or I will fire into
you."--All silent--"Take good aim, men--fire!"
Both cannon were discharged, and, as if by magic, the watery veil that
had hid every thing from our view rose from the bosom of the midnight
river, and hung above our mast-head in a luminous fleecy cloud, which
the moonbeams impregnated, but did not pierce, being diffused by it
over the whole scene below in a mild radiance, like that cast by the
ground glass globe of a sinumbra lamp,--and disclosing suddenly the
dark stream above and on each side of us, covered with canoes within
pistol-shot; while the large schooner that we had fired into, instead
of making demonstrations to escape over the bar, now shortened sail,
and bore up resolutely across our bows, firing two guns and a volley of
small arms into us in passing.
"We are beset, Lanyard--that chap is the commander-in-chief. His
object is not to escape, but to capture us, my lad--take my word for
it," cried Sprawl. "Forward, master, and look out for the
channel--Lanyard, I recommend you to let Brail take the helm--I will
mind the sails."
"True enough, by Jupiter," sung out old Dick. "Knock off from the
guns, men--Shavings, stand by to cut the cable--hoist away the sail
there--cant her with her head to the eastward--steady, men, and no
rushing now. All ready there forward?"
"All ready, sir."
"Cut away, then."
The clear axe glanced bright and blue in the moonlight, and fell twice
in heavy gashing thumps, and the third time in a sharp trenchant
_chip_. The next moment the rushing of the rapid stream past our sides
ceased, as the little vessel slowly floated away, attaining gradually
the velocity of the river in which she swam. Presently round she came.
"Hoist away, foresail and mainsail--hoist--haul aft the sheets."
The breeze freshened at the moment. We were still about a mile from
the bar, on which the swell was breaking in thunder; but we had run
clear of the skirts of the mist, and the placid moon was again shining
crystal bright overhead. The yells from the canoes increased. A
volley of spears were lanced at us, several of which fell on board, but
none of them did any injury; and several muskets were also fired from
the tiny men-of-war, which were equally innocuous. The strange sail
was right in our path.
"What shall we do?" sung out old Pumpbolt from forward.
Trusting to the great strength of the Midge, Lanyard shouted,--"Plump
us right aboard of him, if you can't do better; but creep under his
stern, if you can. So starboard, Brail--starboard--steady--that will
do."
"Steady," I replied; but he would not give us the opportunity, for as
he saw us booming along, apparently aiming at him right amidships, as
if we had thought we could have sawn him in two, the youth bore up, and
stood right for the bar.
"So, so," quoth Davie Doublepipe--"we are away on a party of pleasure
together, I perceive, señor?"
We carried on, but the Don, from superior sailing, kept well on our
bow; and we were now, as we could judge from the increasing roar of the
breakers, rapidly approaching the river's mouth.
At this time we had a distinct view, not only of our formidable
antagonist, a large topsail schooner, and apparently full of men, but
of the bar which we were about to pass, in such uncomfortable
fellowship.
The canal of deep water that our steady and most excellent master aimed
at, was about fifty yards wide. In it there was depth enough to allow
the swell from without to roll in, clear and unbroken, had it not been
met by the downward current of the river, aided, as in the present
case, by the land-breeze, which made it break in short foam-crested
waves.
We carried on. All firing for the moment was out of our craniums on
either side.
"Do you see your marks now, Mr Brail--there in the clear?" cried the
master.
"Yes; I have the two trees on with the hummock--we are running straight
as an arrow for the channel."
"Steady then," sung out the old master.
"Steady," I returned once more.
On the right hand and on the left the swell was by this time breaking
in thunder, flashing up in snowflakes, and sending up a misty drizzle
into the cold moonlight sky; but the channel right a-head was still
comparatively quiet.
The schooner made an attempt to luff across our bows.
"Aim at him again," sung out old Bloody Politeful. "Aim at him again,
Lanyard; to heave-to here is impossible."
"Boarders, stand by," cried Lanyard; but he once more, as we approached
him, kept away.
We were now actually on the bar. The noise was astounding--deafening.
The sea foamed and raged, and flew up in mist, and boiled in over our
decks on either hand, as if we had been borne away in some phantom
ship, that floated on white foam instead of water; while, in the very
channel we were running through, the heave of the sea from without was
met by the rush of the stream downwards, and flashed up in numberless
jets of sparkling water, which danced about in the moonlight, and
curled, and hissed, and vanished, as if they had been white-shrouded,
unreal midnight spectres. We ran on, the strange sail on our lee-beam.
"Now is your chance," shouted old Pumpbolt; "jam him down against the
long reef there--up with your helm, Mr Brail."
"Ease off the sheets," chimed in the first lieutenant. "Handsomely,
men--handsomely."
In an instant our broadsides were rasping.
"Starboard--shove him down, Mr Brail!" again shrieked the master;
"hard-a-weather--keep her away, and ram him on the reef there, or let
us board him--time enough to luff when he strikes."
I was fully alive to all this. The whole scene was now brightly lit up
by the glorious moon, and we could perfectly see what we were about.
We sheered close aboard of the schooner.
"Fire, small-arm men--boarders, be ready."
He still eschewed the combat, however, and kept off the wind also. A
bright rainbow was at this moment formed by the moonbeams in the salt
spray--the blessed emblem of peace and forgiveness--_here!_ thought I,
even in that overwhelming moment. Yes; the bow of the Immutable, of
Him who hath said, "My ways are not like your ways!" spanned the
elemental turmoil, the scene of the yet more fearful conflict of man's
evil passions, in a resplendent arch, through which the stars sparkled,
their bright rays partaking of the hues through which they shone. Oh,
it was like the hope of mercy breaking through, the gloom, and
sanctifying, if it could not still, the troubled heavings of a sinner's
deathbed!
"A good omen--a glorious omen!" shouted young de Walden in the
excitement of the moment.
"Jam her on the reef!" again yelled the master.
I did so. Crash--the schooner struck. Her foremast bent forward like
a willow wand, the cordage and blocks rattling, and then went over the
bows like a shot. The next sea broke over her in smoke, and hove her
broadside on upon the reef--another shock, and the mainmast was
lumbering and rasping over the sides. She now fell off with her
broadside to the sea, which was making a fair breach over her; and
while the cries of the unfortunates aboard of her rent the air, and it
was clear she must instantly go to pieces, we all at once slid out of
the infernal turmoil of dashing waves--"the hell of waters"--and rose
buoyantly on the long smooth swell, that was rolling in from the
offing. For a minute before not a word had been spoken by officers or
men, all hands being riveted to the deck, looking out, and expecting
every instant to see the vessel under foot driven into staves; but now,
as each man drew a long breath, old Davie, with most unlooked-for
agility, gave a _spang_ into the air; and while he _skiffed_ his old
hat over the mast-head, as an offering to Neptune, the gallant little
Midge bent to the freshening blast, like a racehorse laying himself to
his work, and once more bounded exultingly "o'er the glad waters of the
dark blue sea," as if the sweet little craft had been instinct with
life, and conscious that she had once more regained her own proper
element--the cloven water roaring at her bows, as the stem tore through
it, like a trenchant ploughshare; and dashing it right and left into
smoke, until it rushed past us in a white sheet of buzzing water, that
spun away in a long straight wake astern; in the small yeasty _swirls_
of which the moon and stars sparkled diamond-like, but of many hues, as
if the surface of the ever-restless ocean had been covered with
floating prisms.--"Hurrah--hurrah--we are once more in blue water!"[1]
[1]Some weeks after the preceding chapters appeared in Blackwood, the
following accounts of poor Lander's untimely fate reached
England--melancholy vouchers for the truth of the descriptions
contained in them:--
MURDER OF RICHARD LANDER.
(_Official Despatch._)
"SIR,--Admiral Warren having mentioned to me your wish, that any
intelligence respecting the expedition on this coast might be addressed
to you privately, I take the advantage of this communication to state,
that on my arrival here this day from the Cape and Sierra Leone, I
found Mr Lander had died on the 2d instant of a wound in the thigh.
"Mr Lander left here some time since for Cape Coast Castle, to procure
boats, &c.; and having got one boat and two canoes, manned by four
Englishmen, seventeen black men, and two boys, had proceeded up the
Niger nearly to the town of Hiammock (about 100 miles). Confident of
the friendship of the natives, he was tracking the boat along there
near the turn of the river, and abreast of the island, which much
narrowed the passage, when, at 2 P.M., on the 20th ultimo, the boat
grounding, a heavy fire was opened from the bush on both sides, and
from the island, which killed two men, and wounded himself with three
others. A number of large armed canoes coming round the point at the
same time, they were obliged to abandon the boat, take to the canoes,
and make a running fight for four hours, in which they lost another
Englishman, killed, and four blacks wounded--making a total of three
killed, and eight wounded.
"He got to the Craven cutter, waiting at the mouth of the river, late
in the afternoon of the 21st, arrived here on the 25th, and died on the
2d of this month.
"Mr Lander estimated the parties that attacked him at from eight to ten
thousand, all armed with swords or muskets--a number, no doubt, much
exaggerated--and felt convinced, from the judicious position they
occupied, that some Europeans were assisting, which, from the slavers
being much opposed to the English, and any trade on the coast, is very
probable.
"A Mrs Brown (wife of an English merchant up the river), with her
child, passengers, and a wounded black boy, were unavoidably left in
the boat when she was abandoned; but Mr Lander communicated with King
Boy, who immediately sent about them, and had great hopes they would be
returned uninjured. The loss to the company in arms, goods, &c. on the
occasion is stated to be about L.450.
"I trust I have not troubled you with unnecessary details, and beg to
remain, sir, your most obedient and humble servant,
"RICHARD MEREDITH,
"Commander of his Majesty's sloop Pelorus.
"_Fernando Po, February_ 5, 1834.
"P.S.--Two vessels sail for England to-morrow morning. I send accounts
by each. "R.M."
ANOTHER ACCOUNT.
The following is an extract of a letter from the agent to Lloyd's at
Fernando Po, dated February 6, 1834:--
"You will be sorry to be informed of the death of Richard Lander, who
left this place some weeks since in the Craven cutter, belonging to the
company, taking with him a long-boat I let him have for the purpose.
On his arrival at the Nunn, he left the cutter, and proceeded up the
river in the boat with L.400 worth of goods, to join the iron
steam-boat, which he had sent up a few weeks before. She was to
proceed about 300 miles to a small island, which he had purchased from
the king, and where he had a factory. They had proceeded about 100
miles up, the current being strong against them. They were in good
spirits, tracking the boat along shore, when they were fired on from
the bush. Three men were killed, and four wounded: Mr Lander was of
the latter. They had a canoe of their own, and at the time they were
fired on, the boat was aground; and to save themselves, they were
forced to leap into the canoe, and make the best of their way. They
were immediately followed by five or six war-canoes full of men,
keeping up a continued fire for five hours, until it got dark, when
they lost sight of them. They arrived here on the 27th ultimo. Mr
Lander expired this morning. He wrote me a letter two days ago,
requesting that I would take charge of the vessels and property of the
African Inland Commercial Company, with which I accordingly complied.
The ball entered near his hip, and worked down to the thick of the
thigh. It was a most malicious and treacherous attack. Mr Lander told
me that there were Bonny, Brass, and Benin canoes; so that, from these
circumstances, I am of opinion that some of the slavers, or other
Europeans, have been the promoters of this murderous affair. Colonel
Nicolls has forwarded a statement of the transaction to Government, and
if proper steps are taken, the whole must be brought to light. Mr
Lander's clothes and papers are all lost. I have had a great deal of
trouble with the expedition, and now it will be increased; but the
value of Fernando Po, in all cases of difficulty, is incalculable, and
I shall now communicate a little information relating to this island,
and also to the slave trade. On New Year's day, at daylight, there
were four vessels in sight, two brigs, and two small vessels, schooner
rigged, in company with one of the brigs. One of them anchored, named
the Renown of Liverpool, M'Nab, master, belonging to Sir John Tobin,
three months' passage. Two hours afterwards the other brig and two
small schooners anchored. They turned out to be his Majesty's brig
Trinculo and two slavers, captured off the Gaboons, belonging to
Prince's island, fifty-four slaves and a crew of fifteen men on board
each. The slavers were surveyed by the officers of his Majesty's
vessels the Curlew, Griffin, and Trinculo, and condemned as unfit to
proceed to Sierra Leone. Captain Warren, son of Admiral Warren, wrote
to Colonel Nicolls, on service, requesting him to allow the slaves to
be landed here, which request was immediately complied with. The
spectacle was horrible. There were several children that must have
been torn from the breast, for when landed, it was found necessary to
give them in charge to the women, to take care of. So much for
Prince's island, that nest for piratical slavers. If Colonel Nicolls
had three Government steamers under his control, he would put down the
slave traffic on the coast in six months, by destroying their nests in
the rivers. At present the Government vessels only cruise about, and
pick up a slaver occasionally."