It had been hurriedly pencilled by Frank Jocelyn, and ran thus:--

"MY DEAR NORCLIFF,--The lieutenant-colonel in command of the

consolidated depots here informs me that the route for ours is at

Maidstone, for which place the troop must march by daybreak to-morrow.

Sorry to disturb your dinner-party; but now the word is 'Eastward ho!'"

I handed it first to Louisa, and for a moment my voice failed me; but

rallying, I said--"I have to apologize for a hasty departure, and shall

thank you, my lord, to order my horse."

Much that followed was confusion. I can remember my good uncle shaking

me repeatedly by the hand, and patting me on the epaulettes (we were

like officers then, and had epaulettes on our shoulders). Cora wept a

great deal; Louisa was quite silent and very pale. Our parting scene

passed away like a dissolving view; but the bitterness was somewhat

taken from it by the whole party promising to "drive or ride over to

Maidstone and see us march out;" and so, with a kind adieu from all, I

sprang on my horse, quitted Chillingham Park, and soon reached the

barracks, where I found Jocelyn in my quarters awaiting me, and Willie

Pitblado, who had already relinquished his livery for his lancer

uniform, whistling vigorously as he packed and buckled up my traps.

Away from Louisa, I had no relief now for my mind but intense activity.

In the dull grey light of the next morning I quitted Canterbury with my

troop for Maidstone, into which we were played by our own band, which

came a mile or two on the Rochester Road to meet us.

There I learned from Colonel Beverley that, on the following day, we

should march to join the expedition destined for the defence of Turkey.

*CHAPTER XXIV.*

Now, brave boys, we're bound for marchin',

Both to Portingale and Spain;

Drums are batin', colours flyin',

And the divil a back we'll come again.

So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!

Eighty-eighth and Inniskillin',

Boys that's able, boys that's willin';

Faugh-a-ballagh and County Down,

Stand by the harp, and stand by the crown.

So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!

The colonel cries, "Boys, are yee's ready?"

"We're at your back, sir, firm and steady;

Our pouches filled with balls and poulther,

And a firelock sloped on every shoulther."

So, love, farewell, we're all for marchin'!

Such was the doggrel ditty--some camp song of the brave old Peninsular

days--with which I heard my Irish groom, Larity O'Regan, solacing

himself in the grey light of the early morning, as he rubbed down my

charger, and buckled his gay trappings, in the dawn of the, to me,

eventful 22nd of April. How I envied that man's lightness of heart!

Perhaps he had a mother in a thatched cabin in some brown Irish bog far

away; sisters, too; it might be a sweetheart--some grey-eyed and

black-haired Biddy, or Nora. If so, they occasioned him but little

regret then; and light-hearted Lanty's queer song and jovial bearing

went far to rouse my own spirit as I mounted the gallant dark horse that

was to bear me in the fields of the future.

The regiment, mustering about three hundred men of all ranks, came

rapidly from the stables, under the eye of Studhome, and that ubiquitous

and indefatigable non-commissioned officer, Sergeant-Major Drillem. The

sun had not yet risen, but the barrack windows were crowded by the men

of other corps to witness our departure. Their own turn would soon

arrive.

Wilford informed me that the route[*] had come suddenly, when the

regiment was in church, and it was first announced by the chaplain from

the pulpit. The sanctity of the place alone restrained the cheers of

the lancers, but not the sobs of the women; and he added, that by a

singular coincidence, the text the chaplain had chosen for his sermon

was from Proverbs xxvii. 1--"Boast not thyself of to-morrow, for thou

knowest not what a day may bring forth."

[*] Order for marching.

As the trumpets blew the assembly on this auspicious morning, their

sound seemed different--more warlike in fact than usual--a portion of

the great movement in which the fate of Europe, and certainly of many a

poor human being, was involved.

As yet Lionel Beverley, our lieutenant-colonel, who wore his Cross of

the Bath, was the only decorated man among us (save a few Indian

medals); but a rich crop of such tributes was to be reaped in the land

to which we were going.

Our plumes had been laid aside, glazed covers were on our square-crowned

caps, and officers and privates alike had canvas havresacks and wooden

canteens slung over the right shoulder; some of the former had

telescopes and courier-bags; but all betokened coming service and

preparation for it.

Our horses were nearly all of a deep dark bay colour, save those of the

band and trumpeters, many of which were white, or spotted grey. The

guidons were all uncased; each was of white silk (the colour of our

facings), embroidered with gold, measuring three feet long by twenty-one

inches on the lance, which was ten feet in length--the regulation for

light cavalry. On the flank of its troop each standard was now flying in

the morning wind.

On this occasion there were, as usual at such times, many of the fair

sex interested in our departure. There was much weeping among many

wives, and certainly among a great number of "very foolish virgins," as

Studhome designated them. Many of the soldiers' wives were mingling in

the ranks, and, fearless of the horses' hoofs, were holding up their

infants for the last kiss of many a poor father who was to find his

grave in the land to which we were departing; and there were many

painful separations among those who were destined never to meet again.

I remember a sergeant of Wilford's troop, whose wife had recently

presented him with a baby. The latter died suddenly on the night before

we were to march, and, by a singular coincidence, the little thing's

cradle and coffin were brought into barracks together next morning, but

poor Sergeant Dashwood had to mount and leave his weeping wife and

unburied little one behind him.

He was one of the first who fell at the passage of the Alma.

There was, on the other hand, much heedless jesting and idle levity.

"This time," said Wilford, to the group of officers who were gathered

round Beverley, "we shall do a portion of the Mediterranean, the entire

Levant, and Dardanelles, at her Majesty's expense, and without the aid

of Bradshaw or John Murray."

"So we are actually going at last," lisped Jocelyn, while playing with

his horse's mane.

"Ah! but we leave our representatives behind."

"How, Travers?"

"In a squad of light infantry in arms, no doubt," replied Travers, a

handsome fellow, with a clear blue eye and long fair moustache. He had

the reputation of being the most rakish fellow in the regiment, and

could not resist perpetrating the old dragoon joke.

"How clumsily we English show grief," I heard Berkeley say, as he

witnessed a very affecting parting between a mother and her son. "Hear

how that old--aw--woman is permitting herself to howl."

"Anything is better than having every natural emotion subdued and

snubbed from childhood, as among us in Scotland," thought I.

Soldiers muster and march at all times merrily. Care cumbers them but

little and briefly, for "with them the present is everything, the past a

point, the future a blank. The greeting of surviving friends is seldom

embittered by the recollection of those who are no more, and in a life

of danger and casualty this is natural."

Already the advanced guard had been detailed and thrown out, under young

Sir Henry Scarlett. The crowd in and about the barracks was great.

Many carriages full of fashionables from Canterbury, Tunbridge, and

elsewhere, were arriving, for the double purpose of getting up an

appetite for breakfast and seeing us depart; but I saw nothing of my

friends, for whom I was looking anxiously--so much so that Studhome

said, laughingly, as he rode past--

"Come, look alive, Norcliff, and get your troop into shape. There is no

such spoon in the service, or out of it, as an 'engaged man.'"

At another time I might have resented Jack's banter, but Beverley

wheeled the regiment from open column into line, and opened the ranks,

as the commandant of Maidstone cantered in, with his staff, their plumes

waving and epaulettes glittering. Then, from line, we were formed in

close column in rear of the leading troop, for the delivery of an

address, of which I did not hear one word, for just as the commandant

took off his cocked hat and began his oration Lord Chillingham's

carriage, preceded by two outriders, drove in, I perceived that it was

occupied by Cora, Lord Chillingham, and Lord Slubber. My uncle and Lady

Louisa, who were on horseback, came at once close up to me.

My pale love looked tenderly at me, and her dark eyes bore unmistakable

traces of recent tears, or was it the long ride in the morning wind

which had inflamed them? All emotion, however, was subdued now, which

was well, as her rare beauty, her bearing and seat in the saddle,

attracted the eyes of half the regiment, seriously damaging the interest

of the old commandant's address; and my uncle, after warmly shaking my

hand, proceeded to examine, with a critical eye, the mount of our men.

The party in the carriage alighted, so Louisa dismounted and gave her

bridle to her groom.

Our eyes seldom wandered from each other, but we had little to say

beyond a few commonplaces, yet at that bitter hour of parting our hearts

were very full, and she stroked and petted my horse, saying almost to it

the caressing things she dared not address to me.

At last the final moment of departure came, and her eyes filled with

irrepressible tears. Lord Slubber hurried forward to assist her to

remount; but his tremulous hands failed him, or Louisa proved too large

and ample; so I leaped from my horse, and took the office upon myself.

Louisa bit her lip, and smiled at Slubber, with mingled sorrow and

disdain in her expressive eye, as I put one arm caressingly around her,

and swung her up, arranging to her complete satisfaction the ample skirt

and padded stirrup for the prettiest foot and ankle that England ever

produced, and they are better there than in boasted Andalusia.

At that instant a hot tear from under her veil fell on my upturned face;

and then it was that I contrived, unseen, to give her the lock of hair.

It was in a tiny locket, the counterpart of that which I wore at my own

neck. She just touched it with her lips, and slipped it into her bosom.

Save Cora and myself, I think no one noticed the little action.

Another moment, and I found the whole regiment in motion, and, preceded

by the band of a dragoon guard corps, departing from the barrack square.

Many of our men now unslung their lances, and brandished them, while

chorusing, "Cheer, boys, cheer"--a song, the patriotism of which is

somewhat equivocal, though the air is fine and stirring.

Louisa accompanied me, riding by my side, to the gate. What we were

saying, I know not now; but my heart was beating painfully. The scene

around me seemed all confusion and phantasmagoria; the tramp of the

horses, the crash of the band, with cymbals and kettledrums, the cheers

of the soldiers and of the people, seemed faint and far away. I heard

Louisa's voice alone.

But now a loud and reiterated hurrah--the full, deep, hearty cheer of

warmth and welcome, of joy or triumph, which comes best from English

throats, and from English throats alone--rose from the multitudes

without, as the head of the column defiled slowly through the street;

and I must own that three hundred mounted lancers--all handsome young

men, well horsed, and in gay uniform, blue faced with white, and with

all their swallow-tailed red and white banneroles fluttering in the

wind--presented a magnificent spectacle.

Thousands of handkerchiefs were waved from the windows, and many laurel

branches and flowers were flung among us. Other troops, both horse and

foot, were on the march that morning, and the crash of other bands,

heard at a distance, came over the sprouting cornfields and hop-gardens

of beautiful Kent. I had pressed Louisa's hand for the last time, and

she had returned to her friends. We had separated at last, and with all

the love that welled up in our hearts, we had parted, as some one says,

"without the last seal upon the ceremony of good-bye, which it is

unlawful to administer in public to any but juvenile recipients."

I was alone now, and yet not quite alone, for my uncle, though his

military career had been confined to the ranks of the Kirkaldy troop of

Yeomanry, accompanied me for some miles, mounted on a stout cover-hack,

though sorely tempted to spur after some Highland regiment, whose

bagpipes we heard ringing on some parallel road, as we marched along the

highway to Tunbridge, _en route_ for Portsmouth, where our transports

lay.

Sir Nigel bade me farewell at Tunbridge, and turned to ride back to

Chillingham Park, whither my heart went with him. The fine old man's

voice faltered and his eyes grew very moist, as he pressed my hand for

the last time, and reined aside his horse, looking among the troop for

Willie Pitplado, whom he had known from infancy, and with whom he also

shook hands.

"Good-bye, Willie," said he. "Remember you are your father's son.

Dinna forget Calderwood Glen, and to stick to my nephew."

Willie's heart was full, and as he gnawed his chin-strap to hide his

emotion, I heard him send a farewell message to his father, the old

keeper.

And then, as the sturdy baronet rode slowly to the rear, adopting at

once the old hunting seat, several of our lancers cheered him, for he

was the last specimen of his class they would probably see for many a

day to come.

I now remembered, with keen reproach, that in the fulness of my emotion

at parting from Louisa--in fact, the selfishness of my love--I had

forgotten to bid adieu to Cora and to Lord Chillingham. About the

latter omission I cared little; but to leave Cora--kind, affectionate

Cora--whose sad and earnest face I seemed still to see, as she gazed so

wistfully from the carriage window, and to leave her, it might be for

ever, without a word of farewell, was a fault almost without remedy now.

However, I lost no time in writing my excuses from our first

halting-place, which was at Mayfield, though some of our troops remained

at Tunbridge Wells, and others had to ride to the market town of

Cranbrook for quarters and stabling. Proceeding through the great

hop-growing district of England, we frequently marched between gardens,

where the little plants were beginning to creep up those tall and

slender poles of ash or chestnut, which (before the hops gain their full

growth, in September) present so singular an appearance to a stranger's

eye. When those green hops were gathered, and when the hop-queen was

decorated in honour of the harvest home, we were moving towards the

passage of the Alma. Kent was wearing its loveliest aspect now, in the

full glory of hedgerows, copse, and meadows, in the last days of spring,

under a clear blue sunlit sky. The birds, in myriads, filled the hedges

with melody; the purple and white lilacs were already in full bloom, and

the grass was spotted with snow-white daisies and golden buttercups,

while primroses and violets grew wild by the side of the chalky and

flinty roads.

The quaint, tumble-down cottages, covered to their chimney tops with

ivy, woodbine, and wild hop-leaves; the fair, smiling faces that peeped

at us from their lozenged lattices; the sturdy fellows who lounged and

smoked at the turnpike; the red wheeled waggons on the road; the laden

wains, and the canvas-frocked yokels far a-field; the lowing cattle that

browsed on the upland slope; the square white tower of the little

village church on one side; the red-brick manor-house on the other, with

all its gables and oriels peeping above the woodlands; the whistle of

the distant railway train, and its white smoke curling up in the

sunshine, were all indicative of happy, peaceful, and prosperous

England, and of a soil long untrodden by a hostile foot. From every

port in the United Kingdom; between Portsmouth and Aberdeen, troops were

quickly departing now. Being cavalry, on our route through Kent,

Sussex, and a little part of Hampshire, we overtook and passed several

corps of infantry and artillery, which were marching by the same roads

for the same place of embarkation, and stirring were the cheers with

which we greeted each other.

We remarked that the bands of the Scottish and Irish regiments were

almost invariably playing the national quick marches peculiar to their

own countries, while those of English corps played German, and even

Yankee music.

The Black Watch, the Cameron Highlanders, the Scotch Fusiliers, &c.,

stirred each other's hearts by such airs as "Scots wha hae," "Lochaber

no more," and so forth; the Connaught Rangers and the 97th made the

welkin ring to "Garryowen," and similar airs, which are more inspiring

to the British soldier than those of Prussia or Austria can ever be;

and, as our colonel remarked it, it would have been better taste had the

English bands played the quicksteps of the sister countries than foreign

airs, with which an Englishman can have no sympathy whatever.[*]

[*] The same defect was observed on that great day when Her Majesty

distributed the Victoria Cross. The bands of the Guards played Scottish

airs for the Highlanders, and "Rule Britannia" for the Marines; but

otherwise "favoured the troops and the people with a great deal of

German music, to which no attention was paid. National airs would have

gratified both, and stirred up the patriotism of the people. The

Enniskilling Dragoons and Rifles were chiefly composed of Irishmen; but

the bands did not venture upon a single air peculiar to

Ireland."--_Nolan's History of the War_, p. 770.

I remembered a pleasant little incident during our march through Sussex.

As we passed a village parsonage--a quaint old gable-ended house,

secluded among moss-grown trees--the sound of our kettledrums and

trumpets, the tramp of the horses, and the clatter of the chain bridles

and steel scabbards, drew forth the inmates--an aged clergyman and his

two daughters--to a green wicket in the close-clipped holly-hedge, where

the group stood, as in a green frame of leaves, looking with deep

interest at the passing lancers, who were riding in what was then the

order--sections of three. White-haired and reverend, with his thin locks

shining in the sun, the curate took off his hat, and lifted up his hands

and eyes in a manner there could be no mistaking. The old man was

evidently praying for us. His face was expressive of the finest

emotion; he felt that he was looking on many a man he would never see

again. Perhaps he had a son a soldier, or was himself a soldier's son;

or he felt that he, though old and stricken with years, was destined to

survive many of the young, the hale and hearty in our ranks, who were

still "on life's morning march." Some of our officers lifted their caps

and bowed to the little group, and I am sure that Frank Jocelyn kissed

his hands to the girls, who were waving their handkerchiefs, while more

than one of ours cried, "God bless you, old boy!" and frequently, long

after, in the snows of Sebastopol and the terrors of the valley of

death, the face and form of that good old man, and the kindness of his

mute prayer, came to the memory of some of us. It formed one of our

last and most pleasing incidents connected with England.

In four days we reached Portsmouth, which presented a scene of

indescribable bustle and activity; and the fifth day saw my troop,

consisting of fifty men, with sixty horses, and with the colonel,

Studhome, M'Goldrick, one surgeon, the sergeant-major, and rest of the

staff, embarked from the dockyard jetty at eleven A.M., on board a

splendid clipper ship, the _Pride of the Ocean_, Captain Robert

Binnacle, bound for Turkey. The other five troops of the corps were

embarked on board the transports _Ganges_, _Bannockburn_, and other

vessels.

We had not been without hope of going in the _Himalaya_, which would

have taken the entire regiment in her capacious womb, and which,

moreover, is our only cavalry ship; but the authorities had declared

otherwise.

The morning of our embarkation was beautiful; the scene animated,

picturesque, and bustling, such as Portsmouth alone could exhibit at

such a time; but we were sorely troubled by our horses. Some were

conveyed on board in stall-boxes, others were lowered down the hatches

by bellybands and slings, in which, being spirited and young, they were

very restive, lashing out, to the imminent danger of the brains and

bones of those in their vicinity, until they found themselves in the

tow-padded stalls below the maindeck.

Adding to the bustle and interest of the scene, several ships of war

were taking in stores and preparing for sea; boats, manned by seamen and

marines in white jackets, were shooting to and fro between Portsmouth on

one side and Gosport on the other. A strong detachment of the 19th (1st

Yorkshire) Regiment was embarking on board the _Melita_, a Cunard

steamer; the _Euxine_, a Peninsular and Oriental liner, was receiving

many of the staff, a number of horses, and nearly twenty tons of ball

cartridges. A squadron of the 8th, or Royal Irish Hussars, under Major

de Salis, were stowing themselves on board of the _Mary Anne_ transport;

and a great body of Woolwich Pensioners, a numerous staff of veterinary

surgeons, members of the ambulance, ordnance, and transport corps, were

all embarking at the same time. Thus the hurly-burly was prodigious, and

the whole of the quays were encumbered by baggage, stores, field-pieces,

mortars, shot and shell, chests of arms, tents and camp equipage,

guarded by marines with fixed bayonets, or seamen with drawn cutlasses.

With all this apparent activity there was, of course, the counteracting

influence of that red-tapism which is the curse of the British service.

When war was declared the Royal Arsenal did not contain a sufficient

quantity of shells to furnish the first battering train that went to

Turkey, and the fuses then issued had been in store ever since the

battle of Waterloo! Even the mattocks and shovels issued to the troops

had been sent home from the Peninsula by the Duke of Wellington as

worthless!

Here at Portsmouth we saw many a bitter--also to too many it proved a

final--adieu. With all my soul I loved Louisa; and yet, when, standing

on the dockyard jetty there, I saw the partings of husbands from their

wives, and fathers from their children, I thanked Heaven in my heart

that in this, to them, most bitter hour, I had only my good black

charger to care for.

Midday was past ere all the passengers for the _Pride of the Ocean_,

with their baggage, &c., were on board. I had personally to see the

cattle stabled below; the men told off to their messes and watches; the

lances, swords, and other arms stowed away in racks; the valises and

hammocks slung to their cleats, and so forth. In the stables one stall

on each side was left vacant, with spare slings, in case of accidents at

sea.

Fortunately, I was spared the annoyance of Berkeley's society on the

voyage out, as there was not space for more than one troop on board the

clipper; so he was with Wilford's on board the _Ganges_. He was not

exactly "in Coventry," but somehow our mess disliked him, and could not

exactly comprehend, as they phrased it, "what was up" between him and

me.

Now that I was again in favour with Louisa Loftus; now that the untoward

affair at the Reculvers had been completely explained, and that the

victory was mine, and his the shame, defeat, and rejection--nearly all

emotion of hostility against him had died away, or been replaced by

settled contempt. Yet the hostile meeting was still looming in the

future, and would have to ensue on the first suitable opportunity.

I was not sorry when the bustle of embarkation was over, and the clipper

was towed out to the famous reach or roadstead at Spithead, where she

came to anchor for a time, under the shelter of the high lands of the

Isle of Wight.

The noblest army that ever left the shores of the British Isles was,

undoubtedly, that which departed under Lord Raglan's orders for the

East.

It was the carefully-developed army of forty years of peace, during

which the world had made a mighty stride in art, in science, and in

civilization--greater than it had done, perhaps, between the days of the

Twelfth Crusade and the last day of Waterloo.

"War," says Napier, in his "Peninsular History," "war tries the military

framework; but it is in peace that the framework itself must be

formed--otherwise barbarians would be the leading soldiers of the world.

A perfect army can only be made by civil institutions."

The same magnificent writer says elsewhere, with terrible truth, "In the

beginning of each war England has to seek in blood the knowledge

necessary to insure success; and like the fiend's progress towards Eden,

her conquering course is through chaos, followed by Death!" and that

such was her course in the Crimea, let the errors of general routine,

the trenches of Sebastopol, and the criminal red-tapism at home bear

witness.

Of the morale of that army there can be no higher evidence than the

voices that came from the poor fellows in our ranks--the letters with

which they filled the newspapers of the day, detailing with spirit,

simplicity, and pathos their humble experiences in the great events of

the war.

All our men loved Beverley, who was a model commanding officer, and my

troop deemed themselves (as I did) peculiarly lucky in being with him

and the head-quarters staff. He took great care of his regiment, and a

strict supervision of the horses.

He had left nothing undone while at home, by the establishment and

encouragement of a school, a library, and so forth, to raise the moral

tone of the lancers, their wives and families; hence some of the

contributions of our privates to the newspapers were fully equal to any

that emanated from Sir Colin's famous Highland Brigade. Beverley

regularly visited the sick in hospital, and cheered them by his kindly

manner; and all the little ones who played in the barrack square smiled

and welcomed the approach of the colonel, who was seldom without a few

small coins to scatter among them, and cause a scramble; yet, as I have

said, he was somewhat of a dandy, and not without a tinge of affectation

in his tone and manner.

Next evening saw us at sea.

The Nab Light had sunk far astern, and the pale cliffs of the Isle of

Wight had melted into the world of waters.

Old Jack Bloater, the pilot from Selsey, had drunk his last horn of grog

at the binnacle, and left us with every wish for "an 'appy journey--a

bong woyage, as the monseers called it, and that we would soon give them

Roosians a skewerin'."

And now I knew that many a day, and week, and month, it might be years,

filled up by the perils and stormy passages of a life of campaigning,

must inevitably pass ere I should again hear Louisa's voice, before I

had her hand in mine, and looked into her tender eyes again--if I was

kindly permitted by Heaven to return at all. But little knew our

departing army of the suffering and horrors that were before it--horrors

and sufferings to which the bayonets and bullets of the Russians were

but child's play.

I was now away from her finally, and without the least arrangement

having been made for that which alone can soothe the agony and anxiety

of such a separation--correspondence! I clung to the hope that she might

write to me; if not, I could only hear of her from Cora, or perhaps when

Miss Wilford wrote to her brother Fred; and, it might be, from some

stray paragraph in the _Court Journal_ or _Morning Post_, if either ever

found its way beyond the Dardanelles, which seemed doubtful.

I had her treasured lock of hair and the miniature, on which I was never

tired of gazing, especially when I could do so unseen in my swinging

cot, for a crowded transport is the last place in the world for

indulging in lover's dreams or reveries. It was a poor, feeble

daguerreotype, yet there were times when, by force of imagination, the

pictured face seemed to light up with Louisa's smile, and when the fine

feminine features became filled by a blaze of light and life, so like

the original that they became perfectly lovely.

Then I would think of Cora, too, and when I reflected over all her

bearing towards me, the light which broke upon me at first became

clearer.

Her tears when she first told Sir Nigel of her suspicion that I loved

Louisa; her sudden changes of colour, from pallor to ruddy suffusion of

the cheek; her hesitation in addressing me at times, her abruptness at

others, or her silence; her vehemence in defending me against the

accusations of Berkeley, and her joy at my victory; her occasional

coldness to Louisa and her silent sorrow at my departure; all that had

at any time puzzled me was explained now.

Cora loved me with a love beyond that of cousin, and I must often have

stabbed her good little heart by my impertinent confidences regarding my

passion for another.

Well, well, Cora's love and my regrets were alike vain now, for the

swift clipper ship was running on a taut bowline by the skirts of

Biscay's stormy bay, as she bore us on "to glory" and Gallipoli.

*CHAPTER XXV.*

A wet sheet and a flowing sea,

A wind that follows fast,

And fills the white and rustling sail,

And bends the gallant mast.

And bends the gallant mast, my boys.

While, like the eagle free,

Away the good ship flies, and leaves

Old England on the lee.

The cabin was spacious and comfortable. Binnacle, the skipper, was a

short, thick-set little stump of a fellow, with a round, good-humoured

face, which had become browned by exposure in every climate and on every

sea under the sun. He was very anecdotical, perpetually joking and

laughing, and had one peculiarity, that he never in conversation

inter-larded his remarks with nautical phraseology, like the

conventional or orthodox sailor of romance and the stage.

He had never sailed before with a horse on board, and now that he had

actually one hundred of those useful quadrupeds under his hatches, he

spent a great deal of his spare time among them, tickling their ears and

noses--more, perhaps, than some of them quite relished, if one might

judge of the manner in which they occasionally showed the whites of

their eyes, and lashed out at the rear end of their stall-boxes.

On board we smoked, of course, played chess, loo (_rouge-et-noir_, a

little), and daily watched with interest the steamers which passed us,

full of troops, British or French, all on their way to the East. Some

of us kept diaries and made memoranda for friends at home: but some grew

tired of doing so, or reflected that they might not live to record that,

on such a day, the white cliffs of old England were again in sight.

We had quite a bale of the "Railway Library" on board; but to reading we

preferred telling stories, to kill time, or watching, telescope in hand,

for bits of continental scenery, as we ran along the coast of Portugal,

spanned the Gulf of Cadiz, and hauled up for the Straits of Gibraltar,

after passing the rocky promontory of Cape St. Vincent, which we saw

rising from the sea north-north-east of us, about ten miles distant, on

the fifth day after we sailed from Spithead.

During the day we had not many leisure hours, as there is no situation

in which troops more urgently require the personal superintendence of

their officers than when on board ship.

All the lancers were supplied with white canvas frocks, to save their

uniforms, and were divided into three watches, each of which in turn was

on deck, with at least one officer. We had an officer of the day and

guard, who posted sentinels, armed with the sword, at the breaks of the

poop and forecastle, to maintain order, and, when the weather permitted,

we had an hour of carbine and sword exercise, to the great edification

of Captain Binnacle and his crew. Every morning the bedding was brought

on deck and triced in nettings alongside; no smoking was permitted in

the stables or between decks.

The cattle were of course our chief care, and Beverley was always

particular about his mounts. Experience and theory had long convinced

him that the sire dominated in the breed of chargers; thus he ever

eschewed the produce of half-bred stallions and stud horses. We gave

them mashes dashed with nitre, and mixed bran with their corn; daily we

had their hoofs and fetlocks washed in clean salt water, their eyes and

noses sponged, and when at times the windsails failed to act, and the

hold became close, we washed the mangers with vinegar and water, and

sponged the horses' nostrils with the same refreshing dilution.

Notwithstanding all our care, however, before we sighted Malta we lost

three--one of which was my uncle's present, the black cover-hack with

the white star on her counter. It became glandered.

Pitblado, who had seen the nag foaled, and had many a day taken it to

graze in Falkland Park, and on the green slopes of the Mid Lomond,

flatly refused to shoot it when I ordered him to do so, but gave his

loaded carbine to Lanty O'Regan, who had fewer scruples on the subject.

When this episode occurred, Cape Espartel was bearing south-east of us,

about twelve miles distant; and by our glasses we could distinctly see

the features of that remarkable headland of Morocco, the north-western

extremity of the mighty continent of Africa, with its range of basaltic

columns, which nearly rival in magnificence those of Fingal's Cave at

Staffa; and the noon of the following day, as we bore into the

Mediterranean, saw the great peak of Gibraltar rising from the horizon

like a couchant lion, with its tail turned to Spain.

When my poor nag, previous to its slaughter, was being slung up from the

hold, Beverley was much impressed by the real grief of honest Pitblado

for its loss; and told me an interesting Indian anecdote of a pet horse

that belonged to the 8th Royal Irish Hussars.

Beverley seldom spoke of India, for it was a land that was not without

sorrowful recollections to him; and we all knew that he wore at his neck

a large gold locket, containing a braid of the hair of his intended

bride--a lovely girl, who was shot in his arms, and when seated on his

saddle, as he was spurring with his troop through the horrors and the

carnage of the Khyber Pass--on that day when nearly our whole 44th

Regiment perished--and poor Beverley, with her dead body, fell into the

hands of the Afghans.

"When we last went out to India," said he, "that was when I was but a

cornet of sixteen, and several years before you joined us, we relieved

the 8th Royal Irish, who had been there long--I know not how many years,

but time enough to gain on their colours _Pristinae virtutis memores_,

with 'Leswaree,' and 'Hindostan'--honours which they shared with the old

25th Light Dragoons,[*] for five-and-twenty years was then the common

term of Indian expatriation.

[*] A corps disbanded in 1818; and formerly the 29th Light Dragoons,

were raised in 1795.

"The 8th had been at the storming of Kalunga, where their old and

beloved colonel--then General Sir Robert Rollo Gillespie--was killed at

their head, and fell with that splendid sword, inscribed 'The gift of

the Royal Irish,' clenched in his hand. His horse was a remarkably

noble animal, which had been foaled of an Irish mare at the Cape of Good

Hope; but he had the beautiful Arabian head, the finely-arched neck,

long oblique shoulders, ample quarters, well-bent legs, and long elastic

pastern of his sire--a splendid Godolphin barb. Black Bob was indeed a

beauty!

"After the affair at Kalunga he was put up for sale, with his saddle and

housings still spotted with the blood of the gallant Gillespie, who was

so greatly beloved by the brave Irish fellows of the 8th that they

resolved to keep his horse as a memorial of him; but, unfortunately, the

upset price was three hundred guineas.

"Two officers of the 25th Light Dragoons raised it speedily to a hundred

more. But not to be baffled, the poor fellows subscribed among

themselves, and actually raised five hundred guineas, for which the

beautiful black horse, with his housings, was sold to them.

"Black Bob thus became their property, and always preceded the regiment

on the march. He knew the trumpets of the 8th better than those of any

other regiment. The men were wont to affirm that he had a taste for the

Irish brogue, too, and that he pricked his ears always highest at

'Garryowen,' in regard that his mother was a mare from the Wicklow

Hills.

"Bob was fed, caressed, petted, and stroked as no horse ever had been

before; and always when in barracks, as the corps proceeded from station

to station where he had been with his old rider, he took the accustomed

position at the saluting base when the troops marched past, just as if

old Rollo Gillespie was still in the saddle, watching the squadrons or

companies defile in succession, and was not lying in his grave, far away

beneath the ramparts of Kalunga, among the Himalaya mountains in Nepaul.

"Well, as I have said, at last we came to relieve the 8th, who were

dismounted, and had their horses turned over to us. They were to go

home, as we had come out, by sea. The funds of the hussars were low

now; pay was spent and prize-money gone. They were in despair at the

prospect of losing their pet horse; but no such passengers ever went

round the Cape, so they had to part with Bob at last.

"A civilian at Cawnpore bought him, and the hussars gave him back more

than half the price, on receiving a solemn promise that Bob was to have

a good stable and snug paddock wherein he was to pass the remainder of

his days in comfort; and this pledge the new proprietor kept faithfully.

But Bob had only been three days in his new quarters, when he heard the

trumpets of the 8th waking the echoes of the compound, as they marched,

dismounted, before daybreak, to embark on the _Ganges_, for Calcutta.

"It was the old air of the regiment, 'Garryowen.' Then Bob became

frantic. He bit and tore his manger to pieces; he lashed out with his

hoofs and kicked the heel-posts and treviss boards to pieces. He

destroyed his whole stall, and sunk among the straw, bleeding, cut, and

half strangled in his stall collar.

"After a time, when day by day passed, and he saw no more the once

familiar uniforms, and heard no more the voices or the trumpets of his

old friends, he pined away, refused his corn, and even the most tempting

mashes, totally declining all food. So he was turned into the paddock;

but then he leaped the bamboo fence, and with all his remaining speed

rushed direct to the barracks at Cawnpore.

"There he made straight for the cantonment of the European cavalry, and

came whinneying up to the saluting post, where he had so often borne old

Gillespie and seen the squadrons of the 8th defiling past, and there, on

that very spot, the horse fell down and died!"[*]

[*] There was another pet of the 8th Hussars, which met with a different

fate. The jet-black horse, on whose back their colonel, T. P.

Vandeleur, was killed at the battle of Leswaree "long kept his place

with the regiment, and afterwards became the property of Cornet

Burrowes, who took great care of him until the corps left India, when he

was shot, that he might not fall into unworthy hands."--_Narrative of

Leswaree_. By Dr. Ore.

"I have often heard similar stories of dogs--but never such a yarn of a

horse," said Captain Binnacle, who was greatly impressed by this

anecdote, and smoked a long time thoughtfully and in silence after it.

"Fact though!" said Beverley, curtly, and rather haughtily, as he tipped

the ashes off his cigar.

"That horse had the heart of a man. But I could spin you a yarn,

colonel, of a man that had the heart of a beast--ay, of a wild wolf; and

it all occurred under my own eye--for I had to shed human blood in the

matter; though I doubt not God above will acquit me therefor, seeing as

how my own conscience acquits me."

The impressive manner so suddenly adopted by our worthy little skipper

attracted the attention of Beverley, Studhome, and M'Goldrick, and all

the listening group.

Even Jocelyn--a gay fellow, who had more _affaires de fantaisie_ than

_affaires de coeur_, and who never permitted the impulses of that useful

utensil, his heart, to go further than proved convenient or

comfortable--felt himself interested by the gloomy and stern expression

that came into the face of Captain Binnacle.

"Would you like to hear my yarn, gentlemen?" said the latter.

"With pleasure--certainly--by all means--if you please," said we,

alternately, and all together, for Binnacle was evidently anxious to

spin it.

He gave a glance aloft, and another at the sky. The evening was fine

and clear. The mate had charge of the deck, the ship was running under

her head-sails, courses, top-sails, and topgallant sails before a fine

strong breeze, which, as she rolled from side to side, made our horses

reel and oscillate in their padded stalls below. The watch of lancers

were all smoking or chatting on the port side; the sail-makers, squatted

under the break of the forecastle, were busy on a set of new

studding-sails; the carpenters were at work repairing the headrails

forward.

The result of Binnacle's glances was satisfactory; and, descending to

the cabin, whither we all followed, he ordered glasses and decanters,

with a case of four square bottles that held something stronger than

decanters usually do. We all betook us to brandy-and-water, except

Frank Jocelyn, who imbibed noyeau and lemonade, a decoction which

Binnacle viewed with sublime contempt; but Frank wore his hair, divided

in the middle, and invariably used _w_ for _r_, so we excused him, as

one might do a young lady.

After a few preliminary coughs and hems, Binnacle told us the following

story, which is so horrible that it fully requires--let us hope

deserves--an entire chapter to itself.

*CHAPTER XXVI.*

At length one whispered his companion, who

Whispered another, and thus it went round,

And then into a hoarser murmur grew,

An ominous, and wild, and desperate sound;

And when his comrade's thought each sufferer knew,

'Twas but his own, suppressed till now, he found,

And out they spoke of lots for flesh and blood,

And who should die to be his fellows' food.--BYRON.

"You must know, gentlemen, that five years ago, come December next, I

was first mate of the _Favourite_, a brig of London, registered at

Lloyd's as being two hundred tons burden, John Benson, master, with a

crew consisting only of nine men and a boy. We had run, late in the

year, to Newfoundland for a cargo of salted cod, and sailing later

still, lost a topmast, and had to run up Conception Bay to refit at the

town of Harbour Grace.

"Winter was close at hand now, so we lost no time in getting our gear

ready; but the field ice came down swiftly from the north, and for the

distance of two hundred miles from the mouth of the bay--that is, from

Baccalieu and Cape St. Francis--away towards the Great Bank of

Newfoundland, it covered all the sea, hard and fast, with hundreds of

icebergs wedged amid it; so there was nothing for us now but patience

and flannel, to strip the ship of her canvas and running rigging, to

stow away everything till the spring, to muffle ourselves to the nose,

and try to keep our blood from freezing by sitting close to wood-fires,

and drinking red Jamaica rum mixed with snow-water, or that of the

mineral springs on the hill of Lookout.

"A winter in Harbour Grace is not quite so lovely as one would be in

London, as it is a poor little wooden town, with a few thousand

miserable inhabitants, and a port that is difficult of entrance, though

safe enough when one is fairly in. Well, everything passes away in

time; so the winter passed, and the spring came; but, as usual in that

imaginary season there, the snow fell heavier, till it was fathoms deep

in the gulleys and flat places; the weather became more wintry than

ever, and though the fierce black frost relaxes a little, it will still

freeze half and half grog as hard as rock crystal.

"Some of our crew bemoaned this unlooked for detention bitterly,

especially the captain, Tom Dacres, and one or two married men, whose

wives, they feared, would deem them lost; but none were more impatient

than the boy I have named. We called him Scotch Willy, for his name was

William Ormiston, from the village of Gourock, on the Clyde. Well

educated, with a smattering of Latin and other things, a passion for

wild adventure, and chiefly for the sea--a passion fed by the perusal of

Robinson Crusoe and other romances--made him run from home and ship for

North America, where we picked him up; and often, in the watches of the

night, poor Willy confided to me his remorse and repentance, and wept

for his mother, whose heart he feared he had broken. Then he used to

show me an advertisement cut from a Glasgow paper, that fell into his

hands in New York:--

"Left his home, ten days ago, a boy fifteen years of age, named William

Ormiston; dressed in a blue jacket and trowsers, with a Glengarry

bonnet; has dark eyes and brown hair. Any information regarding him

will be most thankfully received by his widowed and afflicted mother, at

the Quayside, Gourock."

"'Such was the notice that caught my eye when I was more than two

thousand miles away from her--with my heart as full of remorse as my

pocket was empty,' Willy would say, in a voice broken by sobs; but he

hoped yet to get home and cast himself into her arms.

"In his tribulation Willy always thought his mother would be praying for

him, and that her prayers would be more efficacious than his own, and

this conviction always consoled and strengthened him. He was a handsome

boy, this Willy, with eyes so dark that he might have passed for a

grandson of 'Black-eyed Susan,' only that she was an English girl, and

our Willy was Scotch to the backbone--he was.

"In March we began to get ready for sea, as there is usually a partial

breaking up of the ice about the middle of that month, so we resolved to

get away if we could, and stand across for Cadiz, if once clear of that

dreary and snow-covered land and the field ice. In Spain we were to

exchange the salted cod for wine and fruit, and then return to London.

"A Russian whaler, which had been frozen in the same bight, but nearer

the sea, was working out ahead of us some three miles or so, through the

blue water and between the white floating floes, and we gave the greasy

beggar a cheer as he passed out of the bay, made a good offing, and bore

away, east by north, round Baccalieu Island.

"Conception Bay, I should tell you, gentlemen, is a large inlet of the

Newfoundland coast, about fifty-three miles long, by some twenty or so

broad; thus there is plenty of elbow-room for working out, even against

a head-wind. Its coast is very bold and precipitous, especially about

Point de Grates and Cape St. Francis. Harbour Grace and Carboniere on

its shore were settlements of the old French times.

"As we followed in the Russian's wake, Bob Jenner, a fine, handsome

young seaman, from Bristol, had the wheel, steering, with a steady hand,

between the floes of broken ice that were drifting dangerously about the

bay. We had the brig under easy sail; her fore and main courses,

topsails, jib, and forestay-sail.

"Amid the quiet that prevailed on board, and the satisfaction we felt in

having the blue water rippling alongside again, we were surprised by

hearing a voice hailing us, as it were, from the sea.

"'A man in the water, sir; just abeam of us, to port,' shouted Scotch

Willy, as he sprang into the main chains.

"And there, sure enough, in the sea, some twenty yards or so from us, we

saw a man's head bobbing up and down like a fisherman's float, just as

we neared the mouth of the inlet, where, beyond the headlands, that were

covered with snow, and shining in the sea, we could see the waters of

the Atlantic stretching far away.

"'Rope--a rope!--man overboard, Captain Benson; lay the maincourse to

the wind!' were now the shouts.

"'Bear a hand--quick--diable!' cried the man in the water. 'Are you

fellows fit for nothing, in heaven or hell, that you will let me drown

before your eyes, d--n them?'

"Ere this remarkable speech reached us, the sheet was let fly to

starboard, hauled into port, the brig lay to the wind, and the line was

hove to this ill-bred personage in the water. He caught the bight of it

with difficulty, for he was sorely benumbed, and actually sunk out of

sight as he tied it under his armpits. However, up he came again, and

we gently hauled him on board, where he fainted for a few minutes; but

recovered when we poured some warm brandy-and-water down his throat,

stripped off his wet clothes, and put him in a cosy spare hammock in the

forecastle.

"By the time all this was done, we had cleared Conception Bay, and, with

flocks of the Baccalieu birds screaming about us, were heading east by

north, to keep clear of the floes, which the current was throwing in

towards the land again, so rapidly, that many of them, like the links of

an icy chain, were already drifting between us and the Russian, who was

hoisting out his studding-sails on both sides, to make as good an offing

as possible, before the sun set upon that frozen shore and tideless sea.

"By midday she was well-nigh hull down; but standing to the southward,

having cleared the outer angle of the ice, while we were standing east

and by north, to turn the end of a long mass, which we hoped to do ere

night fell. In fact, the Russian had glided through some opening, which

had closed again, for we could see only a line of ice, now stretching to

the northern horizon, shutting us in towards the land.

"By midday our new hand was so far recovered as to be able to tell us

that he was by name Urbain Gautier, a French Canadian, and that he had

been a seaman on board the Russian whaler; that he had resented some

ill-usage, been flogged, and thrown overboard. In proof of this summary

procedure he showed us his back, which was covered with livid marks,

evidently produced by the hearty application of a cat or knotted rope's

end, but Scotch Willy lessened the general sympathy by informing me and

Tom Dacres, in a whisper, that when the Canadian's knife fell from its

sheath as we dragged him on board there was blood on its blade.

"Blood!

"This circumstance was whispered among the crew from ear to ear, and

gave rise to many suspicions in no way favourable to our new

acquisition, whom, however, they cared not to question, as he was a man

singularly repulsive and brutal in aspect, and having a something in his

expression of eye which made all on board shrink from him.

"Urbain Gautier was Herculean in stature and proportion, and most

saturnine and satanic in visage. His eyes were too near each other, and

too deeply set on each side of his long hooked nose, over which his two

eye-brows met in a straight and black unbroken line. His mouth, with

its thin lips and serrated fangs, suggested cruelty, and altogether

there was a general and terrible aspect of evil about him. He spoke

English, but when excited resorted to Canadian-French oaths and

interjections.

"If 'twas he brought us ill-luck we got our first instalment of it that

very night.

"The morning broke cold, grey, and cheerless, amid a storm of snow and

wind, through which, to reduce the ship's speed, for we could see but

little ahead, we drove under our fore-course and topsails all

close-reefed now, and bitterly did we all regret the impatience which

made us leave our snug moorings in Harbour Grace.

"Now and then the black scud would lift a little, but only to show the

ice-fields drawing nearer and nearer, so, lest we should be crushed or

enclosed amid them hopelessly, and then, it might be, starved to death

when the last of our beef, biscuits, and water were gone, we steered in

for the land, with the wild Arctic tempest--for such it was--increasing

every moment.

"We tried sounding to leeward, but the lead always slipped from my

benumbed hands, and in the end we lost the frozen line, as it parted in

the iron block which was seized to the rigging by a tail-rope. Ere long

we struck soundings with the hand lead, for the water was beginning to

shoal!

"The brig's tops and the bellies of the close-reefed topsails became

filled with snow, and now we began to look gloomily at each other,

fearing rather than doubting the end.

"For most of that weary day we held on thus, running alternately west

and north--sea-room was all we wanted till a safe harbourage opened; but

ere long we knew it would be hopeless to look for either if the gale

continued, and the briskest exercise could scarcely keep us from being

frozen.

"We had been driven nor'-west I know not how many miles--for, perhaps,

more than six-and-thirty--when a heavier sea than usual struck the brig

on her starboard side, throwing her over on her beam ends to port,

carrying away the bulwarks, tearing the long-boat from its chocks and

lashings amidships, and making a clean sweep of everything on deck,

buckets, loose spars, and handspikes; and with these went one of our

men, who was never seen again.

"The brig righted, for she was a brave little craft, but with the loss

of her topmasts and jib-boom, all of which, with yards and gearing, were

broken off at the caps, and with hatchets and knives we worked amid the

blinding and benumbing haze of drift and spray, snow, and the darkness

of the coming night, to clear the wreck away--and away it all went

astern with a crash, leaving the _Favourite_ now under only her

forecourse and staysail.

"I shall never forget that night, if I live for a thousand years.

"The pumps were frozen; the boxes a mass of ice; the brakes refused to

work; but I knew there was more water in the hold than was healthy for

us. We could get no tea, coffee, nor any warm food, for the cook's

galley had been swept overboard, and the tots of grog, which I served

out from time to time, conduced, I think, rather to stupefy than to

comfort the poor fellows, who were beginning to lose all heart, and to

huddle together for warmth in the forecastle.

"Lightning, green and ghastly, glared forth at times, revealing the

weird aspect of the crippled and snow-covered brig; yet it had the

effect of clearing the atmosphere and enabling us to see the stars; but

still the wind blew fierce and biting over the vast ice-fields, and

still the fated craft flew on--we scarcely knew whither--but as the

event proved, between the headland of Buenovista and the enclosing ice.

"We had the utmost difficulty in keeping a lamp in the binnacle, and by

its light, amid the storm, Urbain Gautier, the French-Canadian, who had

the wheel, was steering; no other man on board but he could have handled

it singly and kept the brig to her course, for he had the strength of

three of us, and seemed alike impervious to cold and to suffering.

"I think I can see him now as he stood then, with his feet firmly

planted on the quarterdeck grating, his hands on the spokes of the

wheel, and the livid lightning seeming to play about him, as the brig

flew on through the storm and the darkness, and with every varying flash

his features changed in hue. Now they were green, and anon red or blue;

now purple, and then ghastly white; ever and again, as the lightning

flashed forth, this infernal face came out of the gloom with a

diabolical grotesqueness, and a strange smile on it that appalled us

all; and now another day began to break.

"'Mate, that fellow is more like a devil than a human being,' whispered

Bob Jenner to me, echoing my own thoughts, as we clung together to the

belaying pins abaft the mainmast.

"He spoke in a low whisper; but in an instant the eyes of Urbain were on

him.

"'Ah!' said he, showing his serrated teeth, 'a _maladroit_ speech,

messmate.'

"'No messmate of yours,' growled Bob, unwisely.

"'Shipmate, then,' suggested the other, with a strange glance, between a

grin and a scowl, for his black, glittering eyes wore one expression,

and his cruel mouth another.

"'Well, mayhap, for so it must be,' said Bob, bluntly.

"'Ah,' said Urbain, with his horrible smile, as he held the wheel with

one hand, and--even at that terrible time--felt for his sheath-knife

with the other; 'ah! you think me a _mauvais sujet_, do you?"

"'I doesn't know what "mavy suggey" may be, and I doesn't care if I

never does,' replied Bob, sturdily; 'but once I catches you ashore,

mounseer, I'll teach you not to grip your knife when speaking to me.'

"'No quarrelling, lads,' said I, while my teeth chattered in the cold of

that awful morning atmosphere. 'I only wish we were ashore.'

"'Then have your wish. Land ho!' sung out Urbain; and at that moment

the grey wrack around us parted like a curtain; there was a dreadful

crash, which tumbled us all right and left; the breakers which he had

seen ahead were now boiling around us; and the brig lay bulged and

broken-backed upon a reef, close to a lofty line of rocky coast, a

helpless wreck, with the ice closing round her; and with a sound between

an oath and a laugh, Urbain quitted the now useless wheel, which

oscillated, as if in mockery, to and fro.

"Captain Benson, who, worn out by toil, had been snatching a few

minutes' repose under the hood of the companionway, now sprang on deck,

to find the brig totally lost, and that for us there was no resource, if

we would save our lives, but to abandon her and get on shore.

"Broken and bulged, she was too firmly wedged on the reef for us ever to

have the slightest hope of getting her off, save to sink her in deep

water. As yet she might hold together for some hours, if the fury of

the storm abated, and there were evident signs of such being the case.

"As each successive blast grew less in fury, and as the force and sound

of the sea went down, we heard the wild streaming of the Baccalieu

birds; and now, ere the water, which was rising fast in hold and cabin,

destroyed everything, we procured charts and telescopes, to discover on

what part of that barren, bleak, and most desolate of all the American

shores, our fate had cast us.

"On comparing the outline of the snow-clad coast with the diagrams on

the chart, we found we were stranded somewhere between the Bloody Bay

and the Bay of Fair and False, about one hundred and twenty miles to the

north-westward of the point from whence we had sailed.

"Few or no settlers, even of the most hardy and desperate description,

are to be found thereabout, as the inhabitants between that place and

the Bay of Notre Dame, about one hundred and fifty in number, are poor

wretches who fish for cod and salmon in what they call summer, and for

seals and the walrus in winter, and usually retire for the latter

purpose to St. John's, or bury themselves in the woods till the snow

disappears, about the month of June.

"We had but a sorry prospect before us; every instant the brig was going

more and more to pieces beneath our feet, and our glasses swept the far

extent of the snow-clad coast in vain, for not a vestige of a human

habitation, or any sign of a human being, could be seen. No living

thing was there save the Baccalieu birds, which screamed and wheeled in

flocks above the seething breakers.

"Captain Benson's resolutions were taken at once. He resolved to

abandon the wreck, and make his way by land at once for Trinity, a

little town on the western side of the great bay that divides Avalon

from the mainland of the island, or for Buenoventura, another settlement

twelve miles to the southward.

"By circumnavigating the numerous bights, bays, and other inlets that

lay between us and Buenoventura--especially the long, narrow, and

provoking reach of Clode Sound--provided we failed to cross it on the

ice, we should have at least a hundred miles to travel over a desolate

and snow-covered waste, without a pathway, and without other guide than

a pocket-compass.

"We set about our preparations at once. Every man put on his warmest

clothing, and Tom Dacres lent a cosy Petersham jacket to the Canadian,

Gautier. We greased our boots well, that they might exclude the wet,

and made us long leggings to wear over our trousers by tying pieces of

tarpaulin from the ankle to the knee, and lashing them well round with

spun-yarn.

"For many hours we had been without food, and now examination proved

that, save a few biscuits in the cabin locker, all the bread on board

had been destroyed by the salt water; yet Urbain Gautier was able to

make a meal of it. We were forced to content ourselves with a half

biscuit each, to be eaten at our first halting place on shore. Beef or

other provision we had none, and not a drop of rum or any other liquid

could be had, for the brig was going fast to pieces, as the breakers

surged up under her weather-counter, and all the hull abaft the mainmast

was settling rapidly down in the water.

"Luckily we got up six muskets and some dry ammunition through the

skylight. I say luckily, as we would have to hunt our way to

Buenoventura; and these, with two tin pannikins, wherewith to cook and

melt the snow for water, and a box of lucifer matches for lighting fires

when we squatted in the bush for the night, we made our way ashore in

the quarter-boat, and landed a chilled, wan, haggard, and miserable

little band, consisting of eleven persons in all, including the captain,

Bob Jenner, Tom Dacres, Willy Ormiston, the boy, myself, and five

others.

"We were not without some fears of the Red Indians, though few or none,

I believe, are now to be found on the island. Thus our first proceeding

was to load and cap our muskets carefully.[*]

[*] It was a tradition, when the author was there, that in 1810 an

exploring party, under Lieutenant Buchan, R.N., was sent to cultivate

friendship with the Red Indians, and left with them, as hostages, two

marines. Returning to the Bay of Exploits (about seventy miles westward

from Bloody Bay) next summer, he found the savages gone, and the

headless remains of his two marines lying in the bush.

"Captain Benson proceeded in front, with a fowling-piece on his

shoulder, steering the way, with the aid of his pocket compass and a

fragment of a chart; and he, too, was custodian of our box of lucifer

matches. Just as we reached the top of the cliffs, by a slippery and

dangerous ascent, we heard a sound, which made us all pause and look

back towards the wreck. The field ice had already closed in upon the

reef; but the last vestiges of the brig had disappeared where the

Baccalieu birds were whirling thickest and screaming loudest.

"From the cliff that overlooked the sea, which was covered to the

horizon with a myriad hummocks of field ice, diversified here and there

by a great iceberg, the view landward differed but little in aspect.

The whole dreary expanse was covered with snow--snow that made the

frozen lakes and bays so blend with the land, that save for the dark

groves of stunted firs and dwarf brushwood that grew in the arid soil,

it was difficult to know where one ended and the other began. The hills

were low, monotonous, and unpleasantly resembled icebergs, without

possessing the altitude, the sharp peaks, and abrupt outlines of the

latter.

"In all that wintry waste the most awful silence prevailed, and not a

sound was stirring in the clear blue air, for now the snow-storm had

ceased, the wind had died away, and the sky was all of the purest,

deepest, most intense, and unclouded blue. Amid it shone the dazzling

sun, causing a reflection from the snow that served partly to blind or

bewilder us; but now, after sharing our tobacco--all save Urbain--for a

friendly whiff, we set resolutely forth upon our journey, in a direction

at first due south-west from Bloody Bay, towards the upper angle of the

long and winding shores of Newman's Sound.

"Three days we travelled laboriously, each helping his shipmates on, for

our strength was failing fast, and sleeping in the scrubby bush at night

was perilous work, for the cold was beyond all description intense; but

we selected places where the snow was arched and massed over the low

fir-trees, and there we crept in for shelter, running only the risk of

being completely snowed up. Three days we travelled thus, without a

path, over the white waste, where, in some places, the snow was frozen

hard as flinty rock, and where, in others, we sank to our knees at every

step; and during those three days, save the half biscuit per man which

we had on quitting the wreck, no food passed our lips, and no other

fluid than melted snow; and when the damp destroyed our tiny store of

matches, we had no other means of allaying the agony of our thirst than

by sucking a piece of ice or a handful of snow, and these were sure to

produce bleeding lips and swollen tongues, as they burnt like fire.

"On the third morning, as we turned out, a seaman, whose name I forget,

did not stir; we shook and called him, but there was no response; the

poor fellow had passed away in his sleep, and so we left him there.

"Our fingers and noses were frequently frost-bitten; but when they were

well rubbed in snow, animation returned. Those who had whiskers, found

them more a nuisance than a source of warmth, as they generally became

clogged by heavy masses of ice. Dread of snow-blindness, after the

glare of the past winter, came on us, too; for each day the sun was

bright and cloudless--a shining globe overhead; but a globe that gave no

heat.

"We met no traces of Red, or of Micmac Indians, or of the wild cariboo

deer; the black bear, the red fox, the broad-tailed musquash, the white

hare, and other game of the country, were nowhere to be seen either, or

else we were not trappers enough to know their lairs or trail.

"Snow-birds, and all other fowl seemed equally scarce: in fact, the

severity of the weather had destroyed, or driven them elsewhere, and

with our hollow and blood-shot eyes we scanned the white wastes in vain

for a shot at anything.

"To add to our troubles, little Scotch Willy fairly broke down, unable

to proceed; and as the boy could not be left to perish, we carried him

by turns--all, save the great and muscular Urbain Gautier, who told us

plainly that he would see the boy and the crew in a very warm climate

indeed before he would add to his own sufferings by becoming a beast of

burden.

"'A beast you will ever be, whether of burden or not,' said Captain

Benson, as he took the first spell of carrying poor Willy, who like a

child as he was, wept sorely for his mother now.

"'_Tonnerre de Dieu!_' growled the savage, grinding his teeth and

cocking his musket; but as three of us did the same, he gave one of his

queer grins, and resumed his journey; but kept more aloof from us, for

which we were not sorry.

"By contrast to the icy horrors around us, memory tormented us with

ideas and pictures of blazing fires and festive hearths; of happy homes,

of warm dinners and jugs of hot punch; of steaming coffee and rich

cream; of mulled wines; of chestnuts sputtering amid the embers; of

carpeted rooms and close-drawn curtains, glowing redly in the warm blaze

of a sea-coal fire; of warm feather-beds and cosy English blankets; of

every distant comfort that we had not, and never more might see.

"On the fourth day there was no alleviation to our sufferings; no change

in the weather, save a sharp fall of snow, against which we were

sullenly and blindly staggering on, when a cry of despair escaped from

the blistered lips of Captain Benson.

"The fly and needle of the pocket-compass had given way, and we had no

longer a guide!

"Indeed, we knew not where, or in what direction, we might have been

proceeding with this faulty index since we left the ship. Long ere the

noon of the fourth day we should have turned the inner angle of Clode

Sound; but now we saw only masses of slaty rocks on every hand, rising

from the snow, with snow on their summits, save towards the west, where

the vast and flat expanse of a frozen and snow-covered sheet of water

spread in distance far away.

"We thought that it was the sea, but it proved eventually to be the

great Unexplored Lake, which is more than fifty miles long, by about

twenty miles broad.

"In this awful condition we found ourselves, while our little strength

was now failing so fast that we could scarcely carry our hitherto

useless muskets; and now another night was closing in.

"Urbain, who was near me, uttered a savage laugh.

"'What are you thinking of?' I asked with surprise.

"'Of what, eh?'

"'Yes.'

"'_Tres bien!_ very good; I was thinking over which is likely to be the

best part of a man.'

"'For what purpose?'

"'_Cordieu!_ for eating,' said he, with a fiendish grimace.

"After this the imprecations of Urbain, chiefly against the captain,

became loud, deep, and horrible; but luckily for us most of them were

uttered in French. Ere long the savage fellow's mood seemed to change;

he wept, and to our surprise offered to carry Willy, on one condition,

that one of us carried his musket; and then once more, guided now by the

direction in which the sun had set, we continued our pilgrimage towards

the south.

"Urbain's vast strength seemed to have departed now; he was incapable of

keeping up with us, and began to lag more and more behind, so that we

had frequently to wait for him, as we were too feeble to call, and

Willy, who feared him greatly, implored us not to leave them.

"On these occasions Urbain's old devilish temper became roused, and he

broke forth into oaths, and even threats; so, ultimately, we left him to

proceed at his own slow pace as we struggled towards a wood, dragging

with us a seaman named Tom Dacres, who had been no longer able to

abstain from swallowing snow, by which his mouth was almost immediately

swollen, while he became speechless and all but paralysed.

"Yet on and on we toiled, dragging him by turns, our weary limbs sinking

deep at every step. When I look back to those sufferings, I frequently

think that I must have been partially insane; but it would seem that,

like one in a dream, I went through all the formula of life like a sane

person.

"On reaching the thicket, it proved to be one of old and half-decayed

firs; then we proceeded to suck portions of the bark greedily. After

this we became aware, for the first time, of the absence of Urbain

Gautier and little Willy.

"They had disappeared in the twilight!"

Here Captain Binnacle interrupted his narrative by expressing a fear

that he wearied us; but we begged of him to proceed, as we were anxious

to know how those adventures ended by the shore of the Unexplored Lake.

*CHAPTER XXVII.*

A still small voice spoke unto me,

"Thou art so full of misery,

Were it not better not to be!"

Then to the still small voice I said,

"Let me not cast in endless shade

What is so wonderfully made." TENNYSON.

"Nestling close to a rock, from the side of which the snow formed an

arch, we found some moss, which we ate with avidity, and then some

sprigs of savine, which generally grows in the clefts of the rocks all

over the island and the Labrador coast, yielding the berry from which

the spruce beer is made. With tears of thankfulness we devoured them,

and were surmising what had become of Urbain, when about nine o'clock by

the captain's watch he appeared, but without Scotch Willy, who had, he

said, died about an hour ago, and been buried by him among the snow.

"'Where?' asked the captain, in a low voice, for Dacres, and two others

of our famine-stricken band, were in a dying condition.

"'Did you observe an old peeled trunk of a tree about a mile distant?'

"'Yes.'

"'_Tres bien_--I buried him there,' replied Urbain, whose voice sounded

strong and full compared with what it was some hours ago. Captain

Benson remarked this, and said--

"'You have hunted and found something to eat?'

"'_Tonnerre de ciel_! Beelzebub--no. I left my gun with you.'

"True; did poor little Willy die easily?" I asked.

"'I wish we may all die so easily,' replied Urbain, with an impatient

oath, as he crept close to me for warmth, causing me, I know not why, to

shudder.

"I scarcely slept that night, though our snow cell was not destitute of

heat; but vague suspicions and solid terrors kept me wakeful. Willy's

sudden death appalled me; and something in the bearing and aspect of

Urbain filled me with dreadful conjectures, which, in the morning, I

communicated only to Bob Jenner.

"At dawn we found Tom Dacres dead, and two others dying; to leave the

latter would have been inhuman; the poor fellows were quite collected,

shook hands with us all round, shared their tobacco among us equally,

and while we all smoked for warmth, the captain repeated the Lord's

Prayer. After which, Jenner and I took our guns and went forth to

explore. With tacit but silent consent, we went straight to the old

bare skeleton tree. The snow around it was frozen hard, and was pure,

spotless, and untrodden, as when it fell some days before; so Urbain had

told a falsehood, and little Willy was not buried there. For a little

sustenance we now sucked the rags with which we oiled our guns, and

looked about us, tracing back our trail of the preceding evening a

little way.

"Suddenly we came upon the footmarks of Urbain, which diverged at an

acute angle from our several tracks, and those we followed for about

three hundred yards, to where a great rock rose abruptly from the snow,

which was all disturbed and discoloured about its base--discoloured, and

by--blood.

"Bob Jenner and I looked blankly at each other, and cold as our own

blood was, it seemed to grow colder still. There, in that awful

solitude of vast and snowy prairies, dwarf forests, unexplored lakes,

and untrodden land, a terrible tragedy had too surely been acted. He

had killed the boy--but why? Removing the snow with the butts of our

guns, a white man's hand appeared, an arm, and then we drew forth the

dead body of little Willy Ormiston. It had a strange and unnaturally

emaciated aspect. A livid bruise was on the right temple, and there was

a wound, a singular perforation under the right ear. These were all we

could discover at first; but there was much blood upon the snow around,

and on the poor boy's tattered clothing. Then a groan escaped us both,

when we found that his left sleeve had been ripped up, and that a great

piece of the arm was wanting, from the elbow to the shoulder, having

been sliced off literally and close to the bone.

"'A strange mutilation!' said I, while my teeth chattered with dismay,

and I evaded putting my thoughts in words. 'If wolves----'

"'Wolves never did this,' replied Jenner in a husky voice; 'but a knife

has been used.'

"'You mean--you mean----'

"'Look ye, shipmate, at that round wound in the neck.'

"'Well?'

"'After stunning him by a blow, Urbain Gautier has punctured the boy's

throat, and sucked his blood, like a weazel or a vampire, or some such

thing, and ended actually by cutting a slice from his arm!'

"The whole details of this act of horror seemed but too complete, and

gradually we were compelled to accept the fact, the more so when I

recalled his strange remark of the preceding evening. We became sick

and giddy; the white landscape swam round and round us, and while

covering up the remains with snow we fell repeatedly with excess of

weakness, and then returned to the little thicket--returned slowly, to

find that our band was lessened by three, for in addition to Tom Dacres,

two other poor fellows had just breathed their last. Urbain's fierce

black eyes questioned us in stern silence as we approached.

"'Did you find the boy?' asked Captain Benson, who had been singeing the

hair off a fur cap of Dacres, and cutting it into strips for us to chew,

which we did thankfully.

"'Yes, he is dead. Let us think no more of it at present,' said I.

"Black fury gathered in Urbain's sombre visage as we came close to him,

and he growled out--'I buried him at the foot of the old tree, shipmate;

so, _diable!_ say what you like, or that which is safer, think what you

like.'

"I was too weak to resent this, or to confront him, and so turned away.

The captain divided some of the dead men's clothes among us, but these

Urbain declined to share, or in the strips of scorched fur, for his

strength seemed to have been completely renovated during the night; and

after covering our poor companions with snow, we again set forth wearily

towards the south-east, and, weak though, we were, we cast many a

backward glance to the thicket where our three dead shipmates lay side

by side. About noon a covey of white winter grouse were near us; we all

fired at once. Whether it was that we were bad shots, that our hands

were weak, that our eyes miscalculated the distance, or our aim wavered,

I know not, but every bird escaped, and with moans of despair we

reloaded. Then, to add to our troubles, it was found that only three of

us, to wit, the captain, Urbain, and myself, had dry powder left. On

and on yet to the south-east, through the blinding and trackless waste

of snow!

"In a place where a grey scalp of rock was almost bare of drifted snow

we found the skeleton of a cariboo deer. It was pure white, and coated

with crystal frost. Wolfishly we eyed it, as if we would have sucked

the dry bones that several winters, perhaps, had bleached, for not a

vestige even of skin remained on them. Those whose ammunition failed

them, now cast away their guns and powder-horns as useless incumbrances.

We were all reduced to shadows, and two had to support their bending

forms on walking-sticks. Even our jolly captain was becoming quite

feeble, and the despondency of settled despair was creeping over us all.

"Urbain alone seemed hale, and stepped steadily, when others fell ever

and anon in utter weakness. There were times when I surveyed his vast

bulk, which loomed greater to my diseased eyesight, and I thought we had

the foul fiend himself journeying with us in the form of a man.

"What if all should perish--all but he and me? On we toiled towards

another thicket, where we proposed to search for roots or moss, on which

to make a meal, and to light a fire, for evening was approaching; and

now it was that Urbain seated himself on a piece of rock, swearing that

he would proceed no farther then, but would rejoin us in the thicket.

Captain Benson was too weak, or cared too little about him, to

remonstrate, so we passed on in silence to our halting place, where,

most providentially, we found some juniper bushes, which the snow had

preserved, and some soft fir bark, which we devoured greedily.

Refreshed by this, we lighted a fire by means of some gunpowder and a

percussion cap, and heaped the branches on it. A bird or two twittered

past; I fired mechanically--almost without aim--and was lucky enough to

knock over a large-sized pigeon-eagle, which was speedily divided and

devoured, half broiled, ere we thought that the feathers only had been

left for Urbain, of whose guilt Bob and I had informed our shipmates,

that all might be on their guard, and our narrative added to their

sufferings, for now we all feared to sleep, and had to cast lots for a

watcher.

"About dawn he returned, and when we all set forth again, though we had

been renovated by the heat of our fire and by the savage meal we had

made, he seemed, as usual, the freshest among us, and on this day we

observed, in whispers to each other, that he wore round his neck a

red-spotted handkerchief which we had left tied over the face of Tom

Dacres!

"He must have gone back to the thicket where the three dead men lay, but

for what purpose?

"About noon on this day we found ourselves on the summit of a

mountainous ridge of bare rock; it was without snow, which, however, lay

drifted deep around. It commanded an extensive view so far as from the

borders of the great Unexplored Lake on our right, to the head of

Smith's Sound on our left.

"There was no sign of a human habitation to be seen, and our eyes swept

in vain the horizon, where the white snow and blue sky met, for a

smoke-wreath indicating where a squatter's cabin stood.

"'Malediction!' said Urbain, hoarsely, 'if this continues I shall have

something to eat, _bon gre malgre!_--if it should be the flesh of a man.

You seem shocked mate,' said he to me, as I shrank back.

"'I am shocked,' said, I, quietly.

"'Well--_diable!_ don't be so,' he replied, mockingly, 'because it is

wonderful truly what you may bring your mind to, if you put your courage

to the test, and place yourself _en visage_ with your fate like a man.'

"'Or a devil--eh, Urbain Gautier?' said Captain Benson; 'but no more of

this, or----'

"'Don't threaten me, _mon petit capitaine_--my nice little man,'

interrupted the giant, with a horrible grimace, 'or----' and pausing, he

laid his hand significantly on his knife.

"Urbain now became surly, insolent, and ferocious; but knowing his

singular strength, which failed less than ours, and knowing the secret,

the loathsome and terrible means by which he maintained it--aware also

that he had plenty of ammunition--we dissembled alike our fears, our

suspicions, and our abhorrence of him.

"After we had toiled on for two hours in silence, he suddenly stopped us

all by an oath.

"'_Nombril de Belzebub!_' he exclaimed to Captain Benson, 'what is the

use of looking for food or game in these infernal wastes, into which

your stupidity has led us? Let us cast lots, and find out who shall be

shot for the food of the rest!'

"'Silence, wretch,' said Captain Benson.

"'To that it will come at last,' said Urbain, grinning.

"'Perhaps it has come to it already,' said Bob Jenner, unwisely.

"'Ah, _sacre_! You think I murdered that boy, do you? And you think so,

too?' he added to me.

"'I have not said so,' I replied, evasively.

"'You had better not, or by ----, if you thought me capable of

committing such an act, or if you said it----' and so on he rambled

incoherently, threatening and bullying; but all the while most surely

confirming our just suspicions.

"'Let us cut him adrift; leave him behind; if we can do so, to-night,'

whispered Jenner to me.

"Low though the whisper was, it caught the huge ears of Urbain, even

while muffled by the lappets of a sealskin cap.

"'Leave me behind, will you? Well, you may do so; but, diable! I shall

not be left without food.'

"About an hour after this we met with a terrible but significant

catastrophe. While we were all proceeding in Indian file behind the

captain, Urbain stumbled on a piece of slippery ice; he fell, and in

doing so, his musket exploded, lodging its contents right in the back of

the head of my poor messmate, Bob Jenner, who fell back, and expired

without a groan.

"We were appalled by the suddenness of this calamity; all, save Urbain,

who rubbed his knees, muttered an oath, and reloaded with all the

rapidity of alarm; while each of us read in his neighbour's face the

conviction that there was more of design than accident in what had taken

place, though it had all the appearance of a casualty.

"Dissembling still, and having but little time for grief, we covered

poor Bob's remains with snow, and resumed our melancholy march.

"We were but six now, and five of those were famished scarecrows.

"A mile farther on, we found the ruins of a deserted log hut, which we

hailed with extravagant joy, as our first approach to civilization, and

the abode of human beings. There we resolved to pass the night, which

was approaching, and there we kindled a fire, and with blocks of snow

filled up the doorway, while the smoke escaped by an aperture in the

roof.

"Oh, how genial was the warmth we felt; and though we had only a few

fragments of moist bark to chew, we would have felt almost happy, but

for the recent catastrophe, and for our dread of Urbain Gautier, who as

soon as twilight fell said he would go in search of a shot, and taking

his gun went away.

"We breathed more freely when he left us; but we shuddered with intense

loathing when we knew that he was returning to the place where our dead

companion--too surely murdered by his hand--lay uncoffined in the snow.

"We felt that we were no longer safe with him, and all were conscious

that he should die, as a judicial retribution.

"Lots were cast for the dangerous office of executioner, and the fate

fell on me.

"Instead of alarm or compunction, I felt as one who had a terrible duty

to perform. I became conscious that justice to the dead and to the

living, if not my own personal safety, demanded the fulfilment of the

terrible task which had become mine, and with the most perfect coolness

and deliberation I overhauled my gun, examined the charge, carefully

capped it anew, and sleeplessly awaited him I was to destroy--this

wretch--this ghoul or vampire, on his return from his horrid repast amid

the snow--a repast which his own treachery and cruelty had provided; and

as I waited thus the face of poor Willy Ormiston, and the cheery voice

of poor Bob Jenner, as I had often heard it, when he sang at the wheel,

or when sharing the night-watch, came powerfully and distinctly to

memory.

"I threw more dry branches on the fire, and bidding my shipmates sleep,

addressed myself to the task of watching, and half dozing, with my

weapon beside me.

"I felt sure that Urbain hated me; that he knew I suspected him, and

would too probably be his next victim, especially if my shot missed him,

as he might then legally slay me, and would do so by a single blow.

"Already I felt my flesh creep at the idea of its furnishing a collop

for him, perhaps to-morrow night, when he stole back from the next

halting place.

"I shall never forget the weary moments of that exciting night. I have

somewhere read that 'it is one of the strange instincts of half slumber

to be often more alive to the influence of subdued and stealthy sounds

than of louder noises. The slightest whisperings, the low murmurings of

a human voice, the creaking of a chair, the cautious drawing back of a

curtain, will jar upon and rouse the faculties that have been insensible

to the rushing flow of a cataract, or the dull booming of the sea.'

"I must have been asleep, however, when a sound startled me, and I could

hear footsteps treading softly over the crisp and frozen snow. Rousing

myself, I started to the aperture which passed for a doorway, and which,

as I have stated, we had partially blocked up by snow; and through it,

about fifty paces distant, I saw the tall dark form of Urbain towering

between me and the ghastly white waste beyond. He loomed like a giant

in the bright but waning moon, that was sinking behind the hills that

are as yet unnamed, while a blood-red streak to the westward showed

where the morning was about to break.

"My heart beat fast, every pulse was quickened, and every fibre tingled,

as I raised the musket to my shoulder, took a deliberate aim, and, when

he was within twenty paces of me, fired, and shot him dead!

"The bullet entered his mouth, and passed out of the base of the skull

behind, injuring the brain in its passage, and destroying him instantly.

"So Captain Benson told me, for I never looked on his face again, though

I have often seen it since in my dreams.

"About two hours after this summary act of justice we were found and

relieved by a travelling party of Indians, Micmacs, who come from the

continent of America at times, and domicile themselves chiefly along the

western shore of the island, to hunt the beaver by the banks of the

Serpentine Lake.

"They conveyed us through the fur country of the Buenoventura people to

the miserable little settlement of that name, where we remained till the

ice broke up, when we were taken to St. John's in a seal-fisher.

"There our perils and suffering ended. We had shipped on board

different crafts for different countries, and the next year saw me

appointed captain of this clipper-ship, the _Pride of the Ocean_."[*]

[*] A character not unlike Urbain Gautier figures in the account of the

first or second expedition of Sir John Franklin.

*CHAPTER XXVIII.*

Pass we the long, unvarying course, the track

Oft trod, that never leaves a trace behind;

Pass we the calm, the gale, the change, the tack,

And each well-known caprice of wave and wind,

Cooped in their winged sea-girt citadel;

The foul, the fair, the contrary, the kind,

As breezes rise and fall, and billows swell,

Till on some jocund morn--lo, land! and all is well.

BYRON.

Pleasantly we traversed the almost tideless waters of the Mediterranean,

the great inland sea of Europe.

We generally had a fair wind; but in our tacks southward and northward

more than once we sighted the shores of Europe on one side, and those of

Africa on the other.

The routine of transport life varied but little, so every passing sail

became an object of speculation and interest. Day by day, and

frequently night after night, we walked with the same person on the same

side of the quarter-deck, turning short round at the taffrail aft, and

at the break forward, to resume the same pace, without making a remark,

for all our mutual ideas had been interchanged over and over again, and

no tie remained, save that of being comrades, weary and worn alike,

though each had his own thoughts, the mental orbit in which his soul

revolved, and these were, perhaps, three thousand leagues astern.

Every probable and possible phase of the war we had dissected and

discussed, and the future excitement that was to come we contrasted

impatiently with the quiet, inglorious monotony of the present, while

the swift clipper cleft the classic waters of the Mediterranean.

The monotony on board was once varied by a trivial practical joke played

by M'Goldrick, the paymaster, on the colonel and some of the English

officers, who had been deriding Scottish cookery. He produced at dinner

a valuable preserve, which he had previously had carefully soldered up

in a tin case, by the armourer's aid, and which he had compounded with

the joint assistance of the ship's cook and my man, Pitblado.

It was duly boiled, and produced at table in its tin case as a scarce

and rare Parisian decoction--_Farina d'avoine au fromage_, or some such

name; and after being partaken of by Beverley, Studhome, and the rest,

was pronounced excellent, though it proved, after all, to be only a very

ill-made Scotch haggis.

In the Mediterranean we were frequently impressed by the extreme

blueness of the water. It seemed to have a purer and deeper tint than

we had ever seen it wear even in higher latitudes, especially when the

weather was fine, and light scattered clouds were floating through the

sky.

About a fortnight after passing "old Gib," the outline of Malta and its

sister isle, the abode of Calypso, rose from the morning sea on our lee

bow; and during the whole of a lovely day our eyes were strained in that

direction, watching that rocky shore of so many great and glorious

memories--the last stronghold of Christian chivalry--the link between

Britain and her Indian empire--our "halfway house" to the

Bosphorus--with all its cannon bristling as the mistress of the

Mediterranean and Levant.

As we drew nearer, our field-glasses enabled us to trace the rocky

outline of the greater isle--the hilly range of which is only about a

hundred feet higher than the dome of St. Paul's--and the steep, rugged

coast to the north-east, beyond which lie the _casals_, or villages of

the lank, yellow-visaged, black-bearded, and malicious-looking Maltese,

concerning whom I do not mean to afflict my reader with either a

description or a dissertation.

The evening gun flashed redly from the Castle of St. Elmo, and the

harbour lights of Valetta were sparkling brightly amid the golden

evening haze, as we ran into the harbour, round which a thousand or more

pieces of cannon were bristling on battery and platform, and on coming

to anchor found that we were only a pistol-shot astern of the _Ganges_,

which had on board Wilford's troop of ours, and which had come in two

days before us.

We were only to wait the refilling of our tank with fresh water, of

which, being a horse transport, we required an unusual quantity; and now

our poor nags were neighing in concert in the hold, for, as Captain

Binnacle termed it, "they smelt the land."

No officer or soldier was permitted to go on shore, unless on duty, for

already Malta was crowded with troops, so much so that the 93rd

Highlanders were actually bivouacking in a burying-ground. But these

orders did not prevent us from visiting our comrades in the _Ganges_; so

Binnacle sent off his gig, with the colonel, Studhome, Sir Harry

Scarlett, and me.

We found that all were well on board, and had suffered no casualties,

save the loss of four horses by disease. Unlike us, however, they had

been favoured by that remarkable illumination known in those waters as

St. Elmo's light, which had shone on their main-topgallant mast for a

space of three feet below the truck in the night, when they were off the

volcanic isle of Pantalaria.

My old friend Fred Wilford received us with warmth and welcome. Thus

far our voyages had been equally unmarked by danger or adventure.

In the cabin we found Berkeley, reading one of the London morning

papers, which was only a week or so old. It had come by the steam

packet from Marseilles. He addressed a few remarks, in his usual

languid way, to the colonel and to Scarlett, made a pencil-mark on his

paper, as if half casually, and tossing it on the cabin table, retired,

with his strange smile and lounging gait, on deck.

Under other circumstances I should most probably have been awaiting him

at the hotel of M. Dessin, at Calais, for the purpose of giving him a

morning airing on the beach, with the chance of myself being carried

back on a shutter, perhaps, to that famous room, in which, as all the

travelling world know, Lawrence Sterne and Walter Scott have slept. But

fate or duty had arranged it otherwise; so here we were, quietly smoking

cheroots in the harbour of Valetta. But his voice and presence recalled

all the baseness of his conduct at the Reculvers, and the bitterness of

the time when he involved me in disgrace with Louisa Loftus--a double

piece of treachery for which I had yet to demand satisfaction.

Curious to see the paragraph which had such interest for him, I took up

his paper, and my eye fell at once upon the following paragraph:--

"THE NEW PEERAGE.--Our readers will be glad to perceive that, by last

night's _London Gazette_, a right honourable lord, long known in the

world of fashion, and latterly in political circles, has been raised to

a marquisate, by the title of Marquis of Slubber de Gullion and Viscount

Gabey of Slubberleigh. Rumour adds that, lest the newly-won honours

perish, the noble marquis is about to lead to the altar the only

daughter and heiress of one of the greatest of our English families--the

fair maid of Kent."

I knew well that the closing words could only refer to Louisa Loftus. I

had seen her but a few days before this piece of impertinent twaddle had

been penned, and the memory of our parting hour, and the expression of

her eyes, came vividly before me; but we were far separated now, and it

is difficult to describe how deeply the tenor of that paragraph stung

me.

The drums were beating in barrack and citadel, and the trumpets were

sounding tattoo in the transports, as we were rowed back to our vessel.

Studhome and the colonel were chatting gaily, and Scarlett was humming a

waltz, as he pulled the stroke-oar and thought of past days at Oxford.