The next evening our friend the captain found his fair audience by the
taffrail increased to a round dozen, while several of the gentlemen
passengers lounged near, and the chief officer divided his attention
between the gay group of ladies below and the "fanning" main-topsail
high up, with its corresponding studding-sail hung far out aloft to the
breeze; the narrative having by this time contracted a sort of
professional interest, even to his matter-of-fact taste, which enabled
him to enjoy greatly the occasional glances of sly humour directed to
him by his superior, for whom he evidently entertained a kind of
admiring respect, that seemed to be enhanced as he listened. As for the
commander himself, he related the adventures in question with a spirit
and vividness of manner that contributed to them no small charm;
amusingly contrasted with the cool, dry, indifferent sort of gravity of
countenance amidst which the keen grey seawardly eye, under the peak of
the naval cap, kept changing and twinkling as it seemed to run through
the experience of youth again--sometimes almost approaching to an
undeniable wink. The expression of it at this time, however, was more
serious, while it appeared to run along the dotted reef-band of the
mizzen-topsail above, as across the entry in a log-book, and as if there
were something interesting to come.
"_Well_, my dear captain," asked his matronly relative, "what comes
next? You and your friend had picked up a--a--what was it _now_!"
"Ah! I remember, ma'am," said the naval man, laughing; "the bottle--that
was where I was. Well, as you may conceive, this said scrap of
penmanship in the bottle _did_ take both of us rather on end; and for
two or three minutes Westwood and I sat staring at each other and the
uncouth-looking fist, in an inquiring sort of way, like two cocks over a
beetle. Westwood, for his part, was doubtful of its being the planter's
writing at all; but the whole thing, when I thought of it, made itself
as clear to me, so far, as two half-hitches, and so the angrier I was at
myself for being _done_--by a frog-eating bloody-politeful set of
Frenchmen like these. Could we only have clapped eyes on the villanous
thieving craft at the time, by Jove! if I wouldn't have manned a boat
from the Indiaman, leave or no leave, and boarded her in another
fashion. But where they were now, what they meant, and whether we should
ever see them again, Heaven only knew. For all we could say, indeed,
something strange might have turned up at home in Europe--a new war, old
Boney got loose once more, or what not; and I could scarce fall asleep
for guessing and bothering over the matter, as restless as the first
night we cruised down the Channel in the old _Pandora_.
"Early in the morning-watch a sudden stir of the men on deck woke me,
and I bundled up in five minutes' time. But it was only the second mate
setting them to wash decks, and out they came from all quarters,
yawning, stretching themselves, and tucking up their trousers, as they
passed the full buckets lazily along; while a couple of boys could be
seen hard at work to keep the head-pump going, up against the grey sky
over the bow. However, I was so anxious to have the first look-out
ahead, that I made a bold push through the thick of it for the bowsprit,
where I went out till I could see nothing astern of me but the
Indiaman's big black bows and figure-head, swinging as it were round the
spar I sat upon, with the spread of her canvas coming dim after me out
of the fog, and a lazy snatch of foam lifting to her cutwater as the
breeze died away.
"The sun was just beginning to rise; ten minutes before it had been
almost quite dark; there was a mist on the water, and the sails were
heavy with dew; when a circle began to open round us, where the surface
looked as smooth and dirty as in a dock, the haze seeming to shine
through, as the sunlight came sifting through it, like silver gauze. You
saw the big red top of the sun glare against the water-line, and a wet
gleam of crimson came sliding from one smooth blue swell to another;
while the back of the haze astern turned from blue to purple, and went
lifting away into vapoury streaks and patches. All of a sudden the ship
came clear out aloft and on the water, with her white streak as bright
as snow, her fore-royal and truck gilded, her broad foresail as red as
blood, and every face on deck shining as they looked ahead, where I felt
like a fellow held up on a toasting fork, against the fiery wheel the
sun made ere clearing the horizon. Two or three strips of cloud melted
in it like lumps of sugar in hot wine; and after overhauling the whole
seaboard round and round, I kept straining my eyes into the light, with
the notion there was something to be seen in that quarter, but to no
purpose; there wasn't the slightest sign of the brig or any other
blessed thing. What struck me a little, however, was the look of the
water just as the fog was clearing away; the swell was sinking down, the
wind fallen for the time to a dead calm; and when the smooth face of it
caught the light full from aloft, it seemed to come out all over
long-winding wrinkles and eddies, running in a broad path, as it were,
twisted and woven together, right into the wake of the sunrise.
"When I came in-board from the bowsprit, big Harry and another grumpy
old salt were standing by the bitts, taking a forecastle observation,
and gave me a squint, as much as to ask if I had come out of the east,
or had been trying to pocket the flying-jibboom. '_D'you_ notice
anything strange about the _water_ at all?' I asked in an offhand sort
of way, wishing to see if the men had remarked aught of what I
suspected. The old fellow gave me a queer look out of the tail of his
eye, and the ugly man seemed to be measuring me from head to foot. 'No,
sir,' said the first, carelessly; 'can't say as how I does'; while Harry
coolly commenced sharpening his sheath-knife on his shoe. 'Did you ever
hear of currents hereabouts?' said I to the other man. 'Hereaway!' said
he. 'Why, bless ye, sir, it's unpossible as I _could_ ha' heerd tell on
sich a thing, 'cause, ye see, sir, there ain't none so far out at sea,
sir--al'ays axin' _your_ parding, ye know, sir!' while he hitched up his
trousers and looked aloft, as if there were somewhat wrong about the
jib-halliards.
"The Indiaman by this time had quite lost steerage-way and came sheering
slowly round, broadside to the sun, while the water began to glitter
like a single sheet of quicksilver, trembling and swelling to the firm
edge of it far off; the pale blue sky filling deep aloft with light, and
a long white haze growing out of the horizon to eastward. I kept still
looking over from the fore-chains with my arms folded, and an eye to the
water on the starboard side, next the sun, where, just a fathom or two
from the bright copper of her sheathing along the water-line, you could
see into it. Every now and then little bells and bubbles, as I thought,
would come up in it, and break short of the surface; and sometimes I
fancied the line of a slight ripple, as fine as a rope-yarn, went
turning and glistening round one of the ship's quarters, across her
shadow. Just then the old sailor behind me shoved his face over the
bulwark, too, all warts and wrinkles, like a ripe walnut-shell, with a
round knob of a nose in the middle of it, and seemed to be watching to
see it below, when he suddenly squirted his tobacco-juice as far out as
possible alongside, and gave his mouth a wipe with the back of his tarry
yellow hand; catching my eye in a shame-faced sort of way, as I glanced
first at him and then at his floating property.
"I leant listlessly over the rail, watching the patch of oily yellow
froth as it floated quietly on the smooth face of the water; till all at
once I started to observe that beyond all question it had crept slowly
away past our starboard bow, clear of the ship, and at last melted into
the glittering blue brine. The two men noticed my attention, and stared
along with me; while the owner of the precious cargo himself kept
looking after it wistfully into the wake of the sunlight, as if he were
a little hurt; then aloft and round about, in a puzzled sort of way, to
see if the ship hadn't perhaps taken a sudden sheer to port. 'Why, my
man,' I said, meeting his oyster-like old sea-eye, 'what's the reason of
_that_?--perhaps there is some current or other here, after all, eh?'
Just as he meant to answer, however, I noticed his watch-mate give him a
hard shove in the ribs with his huge elbow, and a quick screw of his
weather top-light, while he kept the lee one doggedly fixed on myself. I
accordingly walked slowly aft as if to the quarter-deck, and came round
the long-boat again, right abreast of them.
"Harry was pacing fore and aft with his arms folded, when his companion
made some remark on the heat, peering all about him, and then right up
into the air aloft. 'Well then, shipmate,' said Harry, dabbing his
handkerchief back into his tarpaulin again, 'I've seen worse,
myself--ownly, 'twas in the Bight o' Benin, look ye--an' afore the end
o' it, d'ye see, we hove o'erboard nine o' a crew, let alone six dozen
odds of a cargo!' 'Cargo!' exclaimed his companion, in surprise. 'Ay,
black _passingers_ they was, ye know, old ship!' answered the ugly
rascal, coolly; 'an' I tell ye what it is, Jack, I never sails yet with
passengers aboard, but some'at bad turned up in the end--al'ays one or
another on 'em's got a foul turn in his conscience, ye see! I say,
mate,' continued he, looking round, 'didn't ye note that 'ere longshore
looking customer as walked aft just now, with them soft quest'ns o' his
about----' 'Why,' says Jack, 'it's him Jacobs and the larboard watch
calls the Green Hand, an' a blessed good joke they has about him, to all
appearance, but they keeps it pretty close.' 'Close, do they,' growled
Harry, 'I doesn't like the cut of his jib, I tell ye, shipmate! Jist you
take my word for it, that 'ere fellow's done some'at bad at home, or
he's bent on some'at bad afloat--it's all one! Don't ye mark how he
keeps boxhaulin' and skulking fore an' aft, not to say looking out to
wind'ard every now an' again, as much as he expected a sail to leave in
sight?' 'Well, I'm blowed, but you're right, Harry!' said the other,
taking off his hat to scratch his head, thoughtfully. 'Ay, and what's
more,' went on Harry, 'it's just comed ath'art me as how I've clapped
eyes on the chap somewheres or other afore this--if I don't think it was
amongst a gang o' Spanish pirates I saw tried for their lives, and let
off, in the Havanney!'
"'Thank you, my man,' thought I, as I leant against the booms on the
other side. 'Did you?--a wonder it wasn't in the Old Bailey, which would
have been more possible, though less romantic--seeing in the Havannah I
never was!' The curious thing was that I began to have a faint
recollection, myself, of having seen this same cross-grained beauty, or
heard his voice, before; though where and how it was I couldn't for the
life of me say at the moment.
"'Lor' bless us, Harry!' faltered out the old sailor, 'ye don't mean
it!--sich a young, soft-looked shaver, too!' 'Them smooth-skinned sort
o' coves is kimmonly the worst, mate,' replied Harry; 'for that matter
ye may be quite sure he's got his chums aboard--an' how does _we_ know
but the ship's _sold_, from stem to starn? There's that 'ere
blackavizzed parson, now, and one or two more aft--cuss me if that 'ere
feller smells brine for the first time! An' as for this here Bob Jacobs
o' yours, blow me if there ain't over many of his kind in the whole
larboard watch, Jack! A man-o'-war's-man's al'ays a blackguard out on a
man-o'-war, look-ye!' 'Why, bless me, shipmate,' said Jack, lowering his
voice, 'by that recknin', a man don't know his friends in this here
craft! The sooner we gives the mate a hint the better, to my thinking?'
'No, blow me, no, Jack,' said Harry, 'keep all fast, or ye'll kick up a
worse nitty, old boy! Just you hould on till ye see what's to turn
up--ownly stand by and look out for squalls, that's all! There's the
skipper laid up below in his berth, I hears--and to my notions, that
'ere mate of ours is no more but a blessed soldier, with his navigation
an' his head-work, an' be blowed to him: where's he runned the ship, I'd
like to know, messmate!' 'Well, strike me lucky if I'm fit to guess!'
answered Jack, gloomily. 'No, s'help me Bob, if he knows hisself!' said
Harry. 'But here's what _I_ says, anyhow--if so be we heaves in sight of
a pirate, or bumps ashore on a ileyand i' the dark, shiver my tawsels if
I doesn't have a clip with a handspike at that 'ere soft-sawderin' young
blade in the straw hat!' 'Well, my fine fellow,' thought I, 'many thanks
to you again, but I certainly shall look out for _you_!'
"All this time I couldn't exactly conceive whether the sulky rascal
really suspected anything of the kind, or whether he wasn't in fact
sounding his companion, and perhaps others of the crew, as to how far
they would go in case of an opportunity for mischief; especially when I
heard him begin to speculate if 'that 'ere proud ould beggar of a
naboob, aft yonder, musn't have a sight o' gould and jowels aboard with
him! Why, for the matter o' that, mate,' continued he, 'I doesn't
signify the twinklin' of a marling-spike, mind ye, what lubberly trick
they sarves this here craft, so be ownly ye can get anyhow ashore, when
all's done! It's nouther ship-law nor shore-law, look ye, mate, as
houlds good on a lonely dazart!' 'Ay, ay, true enough, bo',' said the
other, 'but what o' that? there ain't much signs of a dazart, I reckon,
in this here blue water!' 'Ho!' replied Harry, rather scornfully,
'that's 'cause you blue-water, long-v'yage chaps isn't up to them,
brother. There's you and that 'ere joker in the striped slops, Jack,
chaffing away over the side jist now about a current--confounded sharp
he thinks hisself, too--but d'ye think Harry Foster ain't got his
weather-eye open? For my part, I thinks more of the streak o' haze
yonder-away, right across the starboard bow, nor all the currents
in----' 'Ay, ay,' said Jack, stretching out again to look, 'the heat,
you means?' 'Heat!' exclaimed the ugly topman, 'heat be blowed! Hark ye,
mate, it _may_ be a strip o' cloud, no doubt, or the steam over a
sand-bank; but so be the calm lasts so long, and you sees that 'ere
streak again by sundown with a touch o' yallow in 't----'
"'What--_what_--shipmate?' asked Jack, breathless with anxiety. 'Then
it's the black coast iv Africay, and _no_ mistake,' said Harry. 'And
what's more,' continued the fellow, coolly, after taking a couple of
short turns, 'if there _be's_ a current, why look ye, it'll set dead in
to where the land lays--an' I'm blessed if there's one aboard, breeze or
no breeze, as is man enough for to take her out o' the suck of a
Africane current.' 'The Lord be with us!' exclaimed the other sailor, in
alarm, 'what's to be done, Harry, bo'; when do you mean for to let them
know aft?' 'Why, maybe I'm wrong, ye know, old ship,' said Harry, 'an' a
man mustn't go for to larn his betters, ye know; by this time half o'
the watch has a notion on it, at any rate. There's Dick White, Jack
Jones, Jim Sidey, an' a few more Wapping men, means to stick together in
case o' accidents; so Jack, man, ye needn't be in sich an a taking. What
the' (here he came out with a regular string of top-gallant oaths),
'when you finds a good chance shoved into your fist, none o' your doin',
ain't a feller to haul in the slack of it 'cause he's got a tarry paw
and ships before the mast? I tell ye what it is, old ship, 'tain't the
first time you an' me's been cast away, an' I doesn't care the drawin'
of a rope-yarn, in them 'ere latitudes, if I'm cast away again. Hark ye,
ould boy: grog to the mast-head, a grab at the passengers' wallibles,
when they ha'n't no more use for 'em, in course; and the pick of the
ladies, jist for the takin' o' them ashore!'
"'Lord love ye, Harry, belay there!' said Jack; 'what's the good o'
talkin' on what ain't like to be?' 'Less like things turn up,' said
Harry. 'More by token, if I hasn't pitched upon my fancy lass a'ready;
an' who knows, old ship, but you marries a naboob's darter yet, and
gets yourself shoved all square, like a riglar hare, into his heestate,
as they calls it? For my part, I've more notion of the _maid_! An' it'll
go hard with me if we doesn't manage to haul that 'ere mishynar parson
safe ashore on the strength of it.' 'God bless ye, Harry,' answered
Jack, somewhat mournfully, 'I'm twice spliced already!' 'Third time's
lucky, though,' replied Harry, with a chuckle, as he walked towards the
side again and looked over; the rest of the watch being gathered on the
other bow, talking and laughing; the passengers beginning to appear on
the poop, and the Scotch second mate standing up aft on the taffrail,
feeling for a breath of wind. The big topman came slowly back to his
companion, and leant himself on the spars again. 'Blowed if I don't
think you're right, mate,' said he, 'you and that 'ere lawyer. You'd
a'most say there's a ripple round her larboard bow just now, sure
enough--like she were broadside on to some drift or another. Hows'ever,
that's neither here nor there; for my part, I sets more count by the
look o' the sky to east'ard; an' be blowed, shipmate, if that same
yonder don't make me think of _woods_.' 'Well,' said Jack, '_I_ goes by
sunrise, messmate, an' I didn't like it overmuch myself, d' ye see! That
'ere talk o' yours, Harry, consarnin' dazarts and what not--why, bless
me, it's all my eye--this bout, at any rate--seein' as how, if we
doesn't have a stiff snuffler out o' that very quarter afore twenty-four
hours is over, you call me lubber!'
"'Ho, ho! old salt,' chuckled Harry, 'none o' them saws holds good
hereaway; if it's the coast of Africay, mate, _two_ watches 'll settle
our hash in them longitudes, without going the length o' _six_! Ha'n't I
knocked about the bloody coast of it six weeks at a time, myself, let
alone livin' as many months in the woods?--so I knows the breedin' of a
turn_a_dy a cussed sight too well, not to speak on the way the landblink
looms afore you sights it!'
"'_Lived_ in them there woods, did ye?' inquired Jack. 'Ay, bo', an' a
rum rig it was too, sure enough,' said Harry; 'the very same time I told
you on, i' the Bight o' Benin.' 'My eye,' exclaimed the other, 'a man
never knows what he may come to. Let's into the rights of it, Harry,
can't ye, afore eight bells strikes?'
"'Woods!' said Harry, 'I b'lieve ye, ould ship. I see'd enough o'
woods, that time, arter all--and 'twan't that long agone, either--I'll
not say _how_ long, but it wa'n't _last_ v'yage. A sharp, clinker-built
craft of a schooner she wor; I'm not goin' to give ye her right name,
but they called her the _Lubberhater_[21]--an' if there wa'n't all sorts
on us aboard, it's blaming ye--an' a big double-jinted man-eatin' chap
of a Yankee was our skipper, as sly as slush--more by token, he had a
wart alongside o' one eye as made him look two ways at ye--Job Price by
name--an' arter he'd made his fortin, I heard he's took up a teetotal
chapel afloat on the Missishippey. She'd got a strapping long nose, that
'ere schooner, so, my boy, we leaves everything astarn, chase or race, I
promise ye; an' as for a blessed ould ten-gun brig what kept a-cruising
thereaway, why, we jest got used to her, like, and al'ays lowers our
mainsail afore takin' the wind of her, by way o' good-bye, quite
perlite. Blowed if it warn't rum, though, for to see the brig's white
figger'ed over the swell, rollin' under a cloud o' canvas, stens'ls
crowded out alow an' aloft, as she jogged arter us. Then she'd haul her
wind an' fire a gun, an' go beating away up in chase of some other
craft, as caught the chance for runnin' out whenever they sees the
_Lubberhater_ well to sea--why, s' help me Bob, if the traders on the
coast didn't pay Job Price half-a-dozen blacks apiece every trip, jist
for to play that 'ere dodge. At last, one time, not long after I joined
the craft, what does he do but nigh-hand loses her an' her cargo, all
owin' to reckonin' over much on this here traverse. Out we comes one
night in the tail of a squall, an' as soon as it clears, there sure
enough we made out the brig, hard after us, as we thinks--so never a rag
more Job claps on, 'cause two of his friends, ye see, was jist outside
the bar in the Noon river. Well, very soon the cruiser begins to
overhaul us, as one gaff-taups'l wouldn't do, nor yet another, till the
flying-jib and bonnets made her walk away from them in right
'arnest--when slap comes a long-shot that that took the fore-topmast out
of us in a twinkling. So when the moonlight comed out, lo an' behold,
instead o' the brig's two masts stiff and straight against the haze,
there was _three_ spanking sticks all ataunto, my boy, in a fine new
sloop-o'-war as had fresh come on the station--the _Iris_, they called
her--and a fast ship she wor. But all said and done, the schooner had
the heels of her in aught short of a reef-taups'l breeze--though, as for
the other two, the sloop-o'-war picked off both on 'em in the end.'
[21] Query--Liberator?
"At this point of the fellow's account, I, Ned Collins, began to prick
up my ears, pretty sure it was the dear old _Iris_ he was talking of;
and, thought I, 'Oho, my mate, we shall have you directly--listening's
all fair with a chap of this breed.'
"'Well,' said he, ''twas the next trip after that, we finds the coast
clear, as commonly was--for, d' ye see, they couldn't touch us if so be
we hadn't a slave aboard--in fact, we heerd as how the cruiser was up by
Serry Lony, and left some young leftenant or other on the watch with a
sort o' lateen-rigged tender. A precious raw chap he was, by all
accounts--and, sure enough, there he kept plying off and on, in-shore,
'stead of out of sight to seaward till the craft would make a bolt; an'
as soon as ye dropped an anchor, he'd send a boat aboard with a reefer,
to ax if ye'd got slaves in the hold. In course, ye know, Job Price
sends back a message, "palm-ile an' iv'ry, an' gould if we can"--h'ists
the Portingee colours, brings up his Portingee papers, and makes the
Portingee stoo'rd skipper for the spell--but anyhow, bein' no less nor
three slavers in the mouth of the Bonny river at the time, why, he meant
to show fight if need be, and jest man-handle the young navy sprig to
his heart's content. Hows'ever, the second or third night, all on a
suddent we found he'd sheered off for a decency's sake, as it might be,
an hour or two afore we'd began to raft off the niggers. Well, mate,
right in the midst of it there comes sich a fury of a turnady off the
land, as we'd to slip cable and run fair out to sea after the other
craft what had got sooner full--one on 'em went ashore in sight, an' we
not ninety blacks aboard yet, with barely a day's water stowed in.
"'The next morning, out o' sight of land, we got the sea-breeze, and
stood in again under everything, till we made Fernandy Po ileyand, three
leagues off, or thereby, an' the two ebony-brigs beating out in company,
so the skipper stands over across their course for to give them a hail,
heaves to and pulls aboard the nearest, where he stays a good long spell
and drinks a stiff glass, as ye may fancy, afore partin'. Back comes
Job Price in high glee, and tould the mate as how that mornin' the brigs
had fell foul o' the man-o'-war tender, bottom up, an' a big
Newfoundling dog a-howlin' on the keel--no doubt she'd turned the turtle
in that 'ere squall--more by token, he brought the dog alongst with him
in a present. So away we filled again to go in for the Bonny river, when
the breeze fell, and shortly arter there we was all three dead becalmed,
a couple o' miles betwixt us, sticking on the water like flies on glass,
an' as hot, ye know, as blazes--the very moral o' this here. By sundown
we hadn't a drop of water, so the skipper sent to the nearest brig for
some; but strike me lucky if they'd part with a bucketful for love,
bein' out'ard bound. As the Spanish skipper said, 'twas either hard
dollars or a stout nigger, and t' other brig said the same. A slight
puff o' land-wind we had in the night, though next day 'twas as calm as
ever, and the brigs farther off--so by noon, my boy, for two blessed
casks, if Job Price hadn't to send six blacks in the boat. Shorter yarn,
Jack, but the calm held that night too, and blowed if the brigs would
sell another breaker--what we had we couldn't spare to the poor devils
under hatches, and the next day, why they died off like rotten sheep,
till we hove the last on 'em o'board; and frighterful enough it was,
mind ye, for to see about fifty sharks at work all round the schooner at
once, as long as it lasted.
"'Well, in the arternoon we'd just commenced squabbling aboard amongst
ourselves, round the dreg water, or whether to board one o' the brigs
and have a fair fight, when off come a bit of a breeze, betwixt the two
high peaks on Fernandy Po, both the brigs set stensails, and begins
slipping quietly off--our skipper gived orders to brace after them, and
clear away the long gun amidships; but all on a suddent we made out a
lump of a brig dropping down before it round the ileyand, which we
knowed her well enough for a Bristol craft as had lost half her hands up
the Callebar, in the gould an' iv'ry trade. Down she comed, wonderful
fast for the light breeze, if there hadn't been one o' yer currents
besides off the ileyand, till about half-a-mile away she braces up,
seemingly to sheer across it and steer clear of us. Out went our boat,
an' the skipper bids every man of her crew to shove a short cutlash
inside his trousers. Says he, "I guess we'll first speak 'em fair, but
if we don't ha' water enough, it'll be 'tarnall queer, that's all,"
says he--an' Job was a man never swore, but he _looked_ mighty _bad_
that time, I must say; so we outs oars and pulls right aboard the
trader, without answerin' ever a hail, when up the side we bundled on
deck, one arter the other, mad for a drink, and sees the master with
five or six of a crew, all as white as ghostesses, and two or three
Kroomen, besides a long-legged young feller a-sittin' and kicking his
feet over the kimpanion hatch, with a tumblerful o' grog in his fist, as
fresh to all seemin' as a fish, like a supper-cargo or some'at o' the
sort, as them craft commonly has.
"'"What schooner's that?" axes the master, all abroad like; an' says
Job--says he, out o' breath, "Never you mind; I guess you'll let 's have
some water, for we wants it mighty keen!" "Well," says the other,
shaking his head, "I'm afeared we're short ourselves--anyhow," says he,
"we'll give ye a dipper the piece"--and accordingly they fists us along
a dozen gulps, hand over hand. "'Twon't do, I guess, mister," says our
skipper; "we wants a cask!" Here the master o' the brig shakes his head
again, and guv a look to the young long-shore-like chap aft, which sings
out as we couldn't have no more for love nor money--an' I see Captin
Price commence for to look savitch again, and feel for the handle on his
cutlash. "Rather you'd ax iv'ry or gould-dust!" sings out the
supper-cargo; "hows'ever," says he, "as ye've tooken sich a fancy to it,
short o' water as we is, why a fair exchange ain't no robbery," says he:
"you wants water, an' we wants hands; haven't ye a couple o' niggers for
to spare us, sir, by way of a barter now?" he says. "Well, mate, I'll be
blowed if I ever see a man turn so wicked fur'ous as Job Price turns at
this here, an says he, through his teeth, "If ye'd said a nigger's
nail-parin', I couldn't done it, so it's no use talkin'." "Oh come,
captin," says the young fellow, wonderful angshis-like, "say _one_,
jist--it's all on the quiet, ye know. Bless me, captin," says he, "I'd
do a deal for a man in a strait, 'tickerly for yerself--an' I think we'd
manage with a single hand more. I'll give ye two casks and a bag o'
gould dust for _one_ black, and we'll send aboard for him just now,
ourselves!" "No!" roars Job Price, walkin' close up to him; "ye've riz
me, ye cussed Britisher ye, an' I tell ye we'll _take_ what we wants!"
"No jokes though, captin!" says the feller; "what's _one_ to a whole
raftful I heerd of ye shipping?" "Go an' ax the sharks, ye beggar!"
says the skipper; "here, my lads!" says he, an' makes a grab at the
other's throat, when slap comes a jug o' rum in his eye-lights, and the
young chap ups fist in quick-sticks, and drops him like a cock, big as
he was. By that time, though, in a twinklin' the master was flat on
deck, and the brig's crew showed no fight--when, lo an' behold, my boy,
up bundles a score o' strapping man-o'-war's-men out of the cabing. One
or two on us got a cut about the head, an' my gentleman supper-cargo
claps a pistol to my ear from aft, so we knocked under without more
to-do. In five minutes' time every man jack of us had a seizing about
his wrists and lower pins; and says Job Price, in a giving-up sort o'
v'ice, "You're too cust spry for playin' jokes on, I calc'late, squire,"
he says. "Jokes!" says the young feller, "why, it's no joke--in course
you knows me?" "Niver see'd ye atween the eyes afore," says Job, "but
don't bear no malice, mister, now." "That's it," says the t'other,
lookin' at the schooner again, "no more I does, so jist think a bit;
ha'n't you really a nigger or so aboard o' ye--if it was jist one?"
"Squash the one!" says Job, shakin' his head nellicholly like--an'
"Sorry for it," says the chap, "'cause ye see I'm the leftenant
belongin' to the _Irish_, an' I carn't titch yer schooner if so be ye
ha'n't a slave aboard." "Lawk a'mighty!--no!" sings out Job Price,
'cause, bein' half-blinded he couldn't ha' noted the lot o'
man-o'-war's-men sooner. "But I _can_," says the other, "for piratecy,
ye see; an' what's more," he says, "there's no help for it now, I'm
afeard, mister what-they-call-ye."
"'Well, mate, after that ye may fancy our skipper turns terrible down in
the mouth; so without a word more they parbuckles us all down below into
the cabin--an' what does this here leftenant do but he strips the whole
lot, rigs out as many of his men in our duds, hoists out a big cask o'
water on the brig's far side, and pulls round for the schooner--hisself
togged out like the skipper, and his odd hands laid down in the boat's
bottom.' You won't wonder at my being highly amused with the fellow's
yarn, since the fact was that it happened to be one of my own adventures
in the days of the _Iris_, two or three years before, when we saw a good
many scenes together, far more wild and stirring, of course, in the
thick of the slave trade; but really the ugly rascal described it
wonderfully well.
"'Well,' said Harry, 'I gets my chin shoved up in the starn-windy, where
I seed the whole thing, and tould the skipper accordently. The
schooner's crew looked out for the water like so many oysters in a tub;
the leftenant jumps up the side with his men after him, an' not so much
as the cross of two cutlashes did we hear afore the onion-jack flew out
a-peak over her mains'l. In five minutes more, the schooner fills away
before the breeze, and begins to slide off in fine style after the pair
o' brigs, as was nigh half-hull down to seaward by this time. There we
was, left neck and heel below in the trader, and he hauled up seemin'ly
for the land; an' arter a bit, says the skipper to me, "Foster, my lad,
I despise this way o' things," says he; "ain't there no way on gettin'
clear?" "Never say die, captin!" I says; an' says he, "I calc'late they
left considerable few hands aboard?" "None but them sleepy-like scum o'
iv'ry men," I says, but be blowed if I see'd what better we was, till
down comes a little nigger cabin-boy for some'at or other, with a knife
in his hand. Job fixes his eye on him--I've heerd he'd a way in his eye
with niggers as they couldn't stand--an' says he, soft-sawderin' like,
"Come here, will ye, my lad, an' give us a drink," so the black come
for'ard with a pannikin, one foot at a time, an' he houlds it out to the
skipper's lips--for, d'ye see, all on us had our flippers lashed behind
our backs. "Now," says he, "thankee, boy--look in atwixt my legs, and
ye'll find a dollar." With that, jest as the boy stoops, Job Price
ketches his neck fast betwixt his two knees, an' blowed if he didn't jam
them harder, grinning all the time, till down drops the little black
throttled on the deck. "That's for thankin' a nigger!" says he, lookin'
as savitch as a fiend, and got the knife in his teeth, when he turned to
and sawed through the seizing round my wrists--an' in course I sets
every man clear in quick-sticks. "_Now!_" says Job, looking round, "the
quicker the better--that cussed lubber-ratin' hound's got my schooner,
but maybe, my lads, this here iv'ry man'll pay expenses: if I'm made out
a pirate, I'll arn the name!"
"'Well, we squints up the hatchway, and see'd a young midshipman
a-standing with his back to us, watching the brig's crew at the braces,
an' a pistol in one hand--when all at once our skipper slips off his
shoes, runs up the stair as quiet as a cat, an' caught the end of a
capstan-bar as lay on the scuttle. With that down he comes crash on the
poor fellow's scull from aft, and brained him in a moment. Every man of
us got bloody-minded with the sight, so we scarce knowed what we did, ye
know, mate, afore all hands o' them was gone--how, I ain't goin' for to
say, nor the share as one had in it more nor another. The long an' the
short on it was, we run the brig by sundown in amongst the creeks up the
Camaroons river, thinkin' to lie stowed away close thereabouts till all
wor cold. Hows'ever, they kicked up the devil's delight about a
piratecy, and the sloop-o'-war comes back shortly, when night an' day
there was that young shark of a leftenant huntin' arter us, as sharp as
a marling-spike--we dursn't come down the river nohow, till what with a
bad conscience, fogs, and sleepin' every night within stink o' them
blasted muddy mangroves an' bulrushes together, why, mate, the whole ten
hands died off one arter the other in the fever--leaving ownly me an'
the skipper. Job Price was like a madman over the cargo, worth good
knows how many thousand dollars, as he couldn't take out; but for my
part, I gets the brig's punt one night and sculls myself ashore, and off
like a hare into the bush by moonlight. No use, ye know, for to say what
rum chances I meets with in the woods, livin' up trees and the like for
fear o' illiphants, sarpents, an' high-annies; but, blow me, if I didn't
think the farther ye went aloft, the more monkeys an' parrykeets you
roused out, jabberin' all night so as a feller couldn't close an
eye--an' as for the sky, be blowed if I ever once sighted it. So, d' ye
see, it puts all notions o' fruits an' flowers out o' my head, an' all
them jimmy-jessamy sort o' happy-go-lucky yarns about barbers' ileyands
and shipherdresses what they used for to spell out o' dicshinars at
school--all gammon, mate!'
"'Lor' love ye, no, surely,' said Jack; 'it's in the Bible!'
"'Ay, ay,' said Harry, 'that's arter ye've gone to Davy Jones, no doubt;
but I've been in the Southsy ileyands since, myself, an' be blowed if
it's much better there! Hows'ever, still anon, I took a new fancy, an'
away I makes for the river, in sarch of a nigger villache, as they calls
'em; and sure enough it warn't long ere right I plumps in the midst on a
lot o' cane huts amongst trees. But sich a shine and a nitty as I kicks
up, ye see, bein' half-naked, for all the world like a wild man o' the
woods, an' for a full hour I has the town to myself, so I hoists my
shirt on a stick over the hut I took, by way of a flag o' truce, an' at
last they all begins for to swarm in again. Well, ye see, I knowed the
ways o' the natifs thereabouts pretty well, an' what does I do but I'd
laid myself flat afore an ugly divvle of a wooden himmache, as stood on
the flour, an' I wriggles and twists myself, and groans like a chap in a
fit--what they calls _fittish_, thereaway--an' in course, with that they
logs me down at once for a rig'lar holy 'possel from Jerusalem. The long
an' the short on it was, the fittish-man takes me under charge, and sets
me to tell fortins or the like with an ould quadrant they got
somewheres--gives me a hut an' two black wives, begad! and there I lives
for two or three weeks on end, no doubt, as proud as Tommy; when, one
fine morning, what does I see off shore in the river but that confounded
man-o'-war tender, all ship-shape an' ataunto again. So, my boy, I gives
'em to understand as how, bein' over vallible at home with the king of
England, in course he'd sent for to puckalow me away--an' no sooner
said, but the whole town gets in a fluster--the fittish-man, which a
knowin' chap he was, takes and rubs me from heel to truck with ile out
on a sartin nut as turned me coal-black in half-an-hour, an' as soon as
I looks in the creek, mate, be blowed if I'd a knewn myself from a
nigger, somehow!'
"To tell the truth, as _I_ thought to myself, it was no wonder, as
Master Harry's nose and lips were by no means in the classic style, and
his skin, as it was, didn't appear of the whitest.
"'So there, ye know, I sits before a hut grindin' away at maize, with
nothink else but a waist-cloth round me, and my two legs stuck out, till
such a time as the leftenant an' two boats' crews had sarched the
villache, havin' heerd, no doubt, of a white man thereabouts--an' at
last off they went. Well, in course, at first this here affair gives the
fittish-man a lift in the niggers' eyes, by reason o' havin' turned a
white man black--'cause, ye see, them fittish-men has a rig'lar-bred
knowledge on plants and sich-like. But hows'ever, in a day or two I
begins for to get rayther oneasy, seein' it didn't wash off, an'
accordently I made beknown as much to the fittish-man, when, my boy, if
he doesn't shake his mop-head, and rubs noses, as much as to say, "We
ain't agoin' to part." 'Twas no use, and thinks I, "Ye man-eating scum,
be blowed if I don't put your neck out, then!" So I turns too with my
knife on a log o' wood, carves a himmache twice as big an' ugly as
his'n, and builds a hut over it, where I plays all the conjerin' tricks
I could mind on--till, be hanged if the niggers didn't begin to leave
the fittish-man pretty fast, and make a blessed sight more o' me. I
takes a couple more wives, gets drunk every day on palm-wine and toddy
juice--as for the hogs an' the yams they brought me, why I couldn't stow
'em away; an' in place o' wanting myself white again, I rubs myself over
and over with that 'ere nut, let alone palm-ile, till the ould
fittish-man looks brown alongside o' me. At last the king o' the niggers
thereaway--King Chimbey they called him, or some'at o' that sort--he
sends for to see me, an' away to his town they takes me, a mile or two
up the country, where I see'd him; but I'm blowed, Jack, if he'd got a
crown on at all, ownly a ould red marine's coat, an' a pair o'
top-boots, what was laid away when he warn't in state. Hows'ever, he
gives me two white beans an' a red un in sign o' high favour, and gives
me to know as I wor to stay there. But one thing I couldn't make out,
why the black king's hut an' the josst-house as they calls it, was all
stuck round with bones an' dead men's skulls!--'twan't long, though, ere
I finds it out, mate! That 'ere fittish-man, d 'ye see, wor a right-down
imp to look at, and wicked enough he eyed me; but still anon I sends
over for my wives, turns out a black feller out on his hut, an' slings a
hammock in it, when the next day or so I meets the first fittish-man in
the woods, an' the poor divvle looks wonderful friendly-like, makin' me
all kinds o' woful signs, and seemin'ly as much as to say for to keep a
bright look-out on the other one. All on a suddent what does he do, but
he runs a bit as far as a tree, picks up a sort of a red mushroom, an'
he rubs with it across the back o' my hand, gives a wink, and scuttles
off. What it meaned I couldn't make out, till I gets back to the town,
when I chanced to look at my flipper, and there I see a clean white
streak alongst it! Well, I thinks, liberty's sweet, an' I'm blessed if a
man's able to cruise much to windward o' right-down slavery, thinks I,
if he's black! Howsomever, thinks I, I'll jest hold on a _bit_ longer.
"'Well, next day, the black king had the blue-devils with drinking rum,
an' he couldn't sleep nohow, 'cause, as I made out, he'd killed his
uncle, they said--I doesn't know but he'd eaten him, too--anyhow, I
see'd him eat as much of a fat hog, raw, as ud sarve out half the
watch--so the fittish-man tells him there's nought for it but to please
the fittish. What that wor, blowed if I knew; but no sooner sundown nor
they hauls me out o' my hut, claps me in a stinking hole as dark as
pitch, and leaves me till mornin', as I thought. Jist about the end o'
the mid-watch, there kicks up a rumpus like close-reef taups'ls in a
hurricane--smash goes the sticks over me; I seed the stars, and a whole
lot o' strange blacks with long spears, a-fightin', yellin', tramplin',
an' twistin' in the midst of the huts--and off I'm hoisted in the gang,
on some feller's back or other, at five knots the hour, through the
woods--till down we all comes in a drove, plash amongst the very swamps
close by the river, where, lo an' behold! I makes out a schooner afloat
at her anchor. The next thing I feels a red-hot iron come hiss across my
shoulders, so I jumped up and sang out like blazes, in course. But, my
flippers bein' all fast, 'twas no use; I got one shove as sent me
head-foremost into a long canoe, with thirty or forty niggers stowed
away like cattle, and out the men pulls for the schooner. A big bright
fire there was ashore, astarn of us, I mind, where they heated the
irons, with a chap in a straw hat sarvin' out rum to the wild blacks
from a cask; and ye saw the pitch-black woods behind, with the branches
shoved out red in the light on it, and a bloody-like patch on the water
under a clump o' sooty mangroves. An', Jack, if I didn't feel the life
sick in me, that time--for, d' ye see, I hears nothin' spoke round me
but cussed French, Portingeese, an' nigger tongue--'specially when it
jist lighthens on me what sort on a case I were in; an' thinks I, "I'm
took for a _slave_, arter all!--an' be hanged, but I left that 'ere
'farnal mushroom a-lying under that there tree yonder!" I begins for to
think o' matters an' things, an' about Bristol quay, an' my old mother,
an' my sister as was at school--mind ye, mate, all atwixt shovin' off
the mangroves an' coming bump agen the schooner's side--an' blow me if I
doesn't turn to, an' nigh-hand commences for to blubber--when jist then
what does I catch sight on, by the lantern over the side, but that 'ere
villain of a fittish-man, an' what's more, King Chimbey hisself, both
hauled in the net. And with that I gives a chuckle, as ye may suppose,
an' no mistake; for thinks I, so far as consarns myself, this here can't
last long, blow me, for sooner or later I'll find some un to speak to,
even an I nivver gets rid o' this here outer darkness--be blowed if I
han't got a white mind, any ways, an' free I'll be, my boy! But I
laughs, in course, when I see'd the fittish-man grin at me--for thinks
I, "My cocks, you're logged down for a pretty long spell of it!"
"'Well, bo,' somehow I knows no more about it till such time as I sort
o' wakes up in pitch-dark, all choke and sweat, an' a feller's dirty big
toe in my mouth, with mine in some un else's eye; so out I spits it, an'
makes a scramble for my life. By the roll and the splash I knowed I wor
down in the schooner's hold; an' be hanged if there warn't twenty or
thirty holding on like bees to a open weather-port, where the fresh wind
and the spray come a-blowing through--but there, my boy, 'twere no go
for to get so much as the tip o' yer nose. Accordently, up I prizes
myself with my feet on another poor devil's wool--for d' ye see, by that
time I minds a man's face no more nor so much timber--an' I feels for
the hatch over me, where by good luck, as I thought, there I finds it
not battened down yet, so I shoved my head through on deck like a
blacksmith's hammer.
"'Well, mate, there was the schooner's deck wet, a swell of a sea on
round her, well off the land, no trifle of a morning gale, and the craft
heeling to it; a lot o' hands up on her yards, a-reefing at the boom
mains'l and fo'taups'l, an' if my heart doesn't jump into my mouth with
the sight, for I feels it for all the world like a good glass o' grog,
settin' all to rights. Two or three there was walkin' aft the
quarter-deck, so out I sings, "Hullo! hullo there, shipmates, give us a
hand out o' this!" Two on 'em comes for'ard, one lifts a handspike, but
both gives a grin, as much as to say it's some nigger tongue or other in
place o' good English--for, d' ye see, they'd half their faces
black-beard, and rings i' their ears--when up walks another chap like
the skipper, an' more the looks of a countryman. "I'm a free-born
Briton!" roars I again; with that he lends me a squint, looks to the
men, and gives some sort of a sign, when they jams-to the hatch and nips
me fast by the neck. "Devil of a deep beggar, this 'ere!" says he;
"jist give him the gag, my lads," says he; "the planters often thinks
more of a dumby, 'cause he works the more, and a stout piece o' goods
this _is_!" says he. Well, mate, what does they do but one pulls out a
knife, an' be blowed if they warn't a-goin' for to cut out my tongue;
but the men aloft sung out to hoist away the yards; so they left me
ready clinched till they'd belay the ropes. Next a hand for'ard, by good
luck, hailed "Sail ho!" and they'd some'at else to think o' besides me;
for there, my boy, little more nor three miles to wind'ard, I see'd the
_Irish_ as she come driving bodily out o' the mist, shakin' out her
three to'gallant-sails, an' a white spray flying with her off one surge
to another. Rather bad it was, mind ye, for my windpipe, for every time
the schooner pitched, away swings my feet clear o' the nigger's
heads--'cause, d' ye see, we chanced for to be stowed on the
'tween-decks, an' another tier there was, stuffed in her lower hold--an'
there I stuck, mate, so as I couldn't help watchin' the whole chase,
till at last the hatch slacks nip a bit, and down I plumps into the dark
again.
"'Well, bo', the breeze got lighter, an' to all seemin' the cursed
schooner held her own; but hows'ever, the sloop-o'-war kept it up all
day, and once or twice she tips us a long shot; till by sunset, as I
reckoned, we hears no more on her. The whole night long, again, there we
stews as thick as peas--I keeps harknin' to the sighs and groans, an'
the wash along the side, in a sort of a doze; an' s'help me Bob, I
fancies for a moment I'm swinging in my hammock in the foc'sle, an it's
no more but the bulkheads and timbers creakin'. Then I thinks it's some
un else I dreams on, as is oneasy, like to choke for heat and thirst;
and I'm a-chucklin' at him--when up I wakes with the cockroaches
swarming over my face. Another groan runs from that end to this, the
whole lot on us tries hard, and kicks their neighbours to turn, an' be
blowed if I knowed but I was buried in a churchyard, with the horrid
worms all a-crawl about me. All on a suddent, nigh-hand to daybreak it
was, I hears a gun to wind'ard, so with that I contrives for to scramble
up with my eye to the scuttle-port. 'Twas a stiffish breeze, an' I see'd
some'at lift on a sea like a albatross's wing, as one may say--though
what wor this but the _Irish's_ bit of a tender, standing right across
our bows--for the schooner, ye see, changed her course i' the
night-time, rig'lar slaver's dodge, thinkin' for to drop the
sloop-o'-war, sure enough. But as for the little f'lucca, why they
hadn't bargained for her at all, lying-to as she did, with a rag o' sail
up, in the troughs of the sea, till the schooner was close on her.
"'Well, no sooner does they go about, my boy, but the muskeety of a
cruiser lets drive at her off the top of a sea, as we hung broadside to
them in stays. Blessed if I ever see sich a mark!--the shot jist takes
our fore top fair slap--for the next minute I seed the fore-topmast come
over the lee-side, an' astarn we begins to go directly. What's more,
mate, I never see a small craft yet handled better in a sea, as that
'ere chap did--nor the same thing done, cleaner at any rate--for they
jist comes nigh-hand tip on our bowsprit-end, as the schooner
lifted--then up in the wind they went like clockwork, with a starnway on
as carried the f'lucca right alongside on us, like a coachman backing up
a lane, and _grind_ we both heaved on the swell, with the topmast hamper
an' its canvas for a fender atwixt us. Aboard jumps the
man-o'-war's-men, in course, cutlash in hand, an' for five minutes some
tough work there was on deck, by the tramp, the shots, an' the curses
over our heads--when off they shoved the hatches, and I seed a tall
young feller in a gold-banded cap look below. Be blowed if I wasn't
goin' to sing out again, for, d' ye see, I'm blessed if I took mind on
the chap at all, as much by reason o' the blood an' the smoke he'd got
on his face as aught else. Hows'ever, I holds a bit meantime, on account
o' Job Price an' that 'ere piratecy consarn--till what does I think, a
hour or two arter, when I finds as this here were the very leftenant as
chased us weeks on end in the Camaroons. So a close stopper, sure
enough, I keeps on my jaw; an' as for scentin' me out amongst a couple
o' hundred blacks in the hold, why, 'twere fit to 'ppal my own mother
herself.
"'Well, Jack, by this time bein' near Serry Loney, next day or so we got
in--where, what does they do but they _lubberrates_ us all, as they
calls it, into a barracoon ashore, till sich time as the slaver ud be
condemned--an' off goes the tender down coast again. Arter that, they
treats us well enough, but still I dursn't say a word; for one day, as
we goed to work makin' our huts, there I twigs a printed bill upon the
church-wall, holdin' out a reward, d' ye see, consarnin' the piratecy,
with my oun name and my very build logged down--ownly, be hanged if they
doesn't tack on to it all, by way of a topgallant ink-jury to a man,
these here words--"He's a very ugly feller--looks like a furriner."
Well, mate, I ain't a young maiden, sure enough, but, thinks I, afore I
fell foul o' that blasted fittish-man an' his nut, cuss me if I looks
jist so bad as that 'ere! So ye know this goes more to my heart nor
aught else, till there I spells out another confounded lie in the bill,
as how Captin Price's men had mutinied again him, and murdered the
brig's crew--when, in course, I sees the villain's whole traverse at
once. So sayin', I watched my chance one night an' went aboard a Yankee
brig as were to sail next day; an' I tells the skipper part o' the
story, offerin' for to work my passage across for nothing; which, says
he, "It's a hinterestin' narritif"--them was his words; and, says he,
"It's a land o' freedom is the States, an' no mistake--ain't there no
more on ye in the like case?" he says. "Not as I knows on, sir," I
answers; an' says he, "Plenty o' coloured gen'lmen there is yonder, all
in silks an' satins; an' I hear," says he, "there's one on 'em has a
chance o' bein' President next time--anyhow I'm your friend," says he,
quite hearty.
"'Well, the long an' short of it was, I stays aboard the brig, works my
spell in her, an' takes my trick at the hellum--but I'm blowed, Jack, if
the men 'ud let me sleep in the foc'sle, 'cause I was a black, so I
slung my hammock aft with the nigger stoord. D' ye see, I misgived
myself a bit when we sank the coast, for, thinks I, it's in Africay as
that 'ere blessed mushroom are to be found, to take the colour off
me--hows'ever, I thinks it carn't but wear out in time, now I've got out
o' that 'ere confounded mess, where, sure enough, things was against me.
So at last the v'yage were up, an' the brig got in to New Orleans. There
I walks aft to the skipper for to take leave, when says he, wonderfly
friendly like, "Now, my lad," says he, "I'm goin' up river a bit for to
see a friend as takes a interest in your kind--an' if ye likes, why I'll
pay yer passage that far?" In course I agrees, and up river we goes,
till we lands at a fine house, where I'm left in a far-handy, ye know,
while the skipper an' his friend has their dinner. All at once the
gen'lman shoves his head out of a doure, takes a look at me, an' in
again--arter that I hears the chink o' dollars--then the skipper walks
out, shuts the doure, and says he to me, "Now," he says, "that's a
'cute sort o' tale ye tould me, my lad, but it's a lie, I guess!" "Lie,
sir!" says I, "what d' ye mean?" for ye see that 'ere matter o' the
iv'ry brig made me sing small at first. "No slack, Pumpey," says he,
liftin' his forefinger like a schoolmaster; "ain't yer name Pumpey?"
says he. "Pumpey!" says I, "my name's Jack Brown," for that wor the name
I'd gived him afore. "Oh!" says he, "jest say it's Gin'ral Washington,
right off. Come," says he, "I guess I'd jest tell ye what tripe you
belongs to--you're a Mandigy nigger," says he. "It's all very well," he
says, "that 'ere yarn, but that's wot they'd all say when they comes,
they've been dyed black! Why," says he, "doesn't I see that 'ere brand
one night on yer back--there's yer arms all over pagan tattooin'----"
"Bless ye, captin," I says, a-holdin' up my arm, "it's crowns an'
anchors!" "Crowns!" says he, turnin' up his nose, "what does we know o'
crowns hereaway--_we_ ain't barbers yet, I guess"--of what he meant by
_barbers_ here, mate, I'm hanged if I knowed. "'Sides," says he, "you
speaks broken Aimerricane!" "'Merricain?" I says, "why, I speaks good
English! an' good reason, bein' a free-born Briton--as white's yerself,
if so be I could ownly clap hands for a minnet on some o' them mushrooms
I tould ye on!" "Where does they grow, then?" axes he, screwin' one eye
up. "In Africay yonder, sir," I says, "more's the pity I hadn't the
chance to lay hands on them again!" "Phoo!" says he, "glad they ain't
_here_! An' does you think we 're a-goin' for to send all the way over
to Africay for them mushrooms you talks on? Tell ye what, yer free
papers 'ud do ye a sight more good _here_!" says he; "it's no use with a
black skin for to claim white laws; an' what's more, ye're too tarnation
ugly-faced for it, let alone colour, Pumpey, my man," he says. "I tell
ye what it is, Captin Edwards," says I, "my frontispiece ain't neither
here nor there, but if you calls me Pumpey again, blowed an' I don't
pitch inty ye!"--so with that I handles my bones in a way as makes him
hop inside the doure--an' says the skipper houldin' it half-shut,
"Harkee, lad," he says, "it's no go your tryin' for to run, or they'll
make ye think angels o' bo'sun's-mates. But what's more," says he,
"nivver you whisper a word o' what ye tells me, about nuts an'
mushrooms, or sich like trash--no more will I; for d' ye see, my lad, in
that case they'd jest _hush ye up_ for good!" "Who d' ye mean?" I says,
all abroad, an' of a shiver like--mindin' on the slave-schooner again.
"Why, the planter's people," says he, "as I've sold ye to." An' with
that he pints into his mouth, and shuts the doure.
"'Well, mate, ye may fancy how I feels! Here I stands, givin' a look
round for a fair offing; but there was bulwarks two fadom high all round
the house, a big bloodhound lyin' chained, with his muzzle on his two
paws, an' nobody seem'd for to mind me. So, I see'd it were all up wonst
more; an' at the thou't of a knife in my tongue, I sits right down in
the far-handy, rig'lar flabbergasted, when out that 'ere blasted skipper
snoots his head again, an' says he, "Pumpey, my lad, good-day," says he;
"you knows some'at o' the water, an' as they've boat-work at times
hereaway, I don't know but, if you behaves yerself, they'll trust you
with an oar now an' then: for I tould yer master jist now," says he, "as
how you carn't speak no English!" Well, I gives him a hoath, 'cause by
that time I hadn't a word to throw at a dog; and shortly arter, up comes
the overseer with his black mate, walks me off to a shed, strips me, and
gives me a pair o' cotton drawers and a broad hat--so out I goes the
next mornin' for to hoe sugarcane with a gang o' niggers.
"'Well, mate, arter that I kept close enough--says no more, but mumbles
a lot o' no-man's jargon, as makes 'em all log me down for a sort o'
double-Guinea savitch--'cause why, I were hanged afeard for my tongue,
seein', if so be I lost it, I'd be a nigger for ever, sure enough. So
the blacks, for most part being country-bred, they talks nothin' but a
blessed jumble, for all the world like babbies at home; an' what does
they do but they fancies me a rig'lar African nigger, as proud as Tommy,
an' a'most ready for to washup me they wor--why, the poor divvles 'ud
bring me yams and fish; they kisses my flippers an' toes as I'd been the
Pope; an' as for the young girls, I'm blowed if I warn't all the go
amongst 'em--though I carn't say the same where both's white, ye know!
What with the sun an' the cocoa-nut ile, to my thinkin', I gets blacker
an' blacker--blessed if I didn't fancy a feller's very mind turned
nigger. I larns their confounded lingo, an' I answers to the name o'
Pumpey, blast it, till I right-down forgets that I'd ever another. As
for runnin', look ye, I knowed 'twas no use thereaway, as long as my
skin tould against me, an' as long as Africay wor where it wor. So, my
boy, I see'd pretty clear, ye know, as this here world 'ud turn a man
into a rig'lar built slave-nigger in the long run if he was an angel out
o' heaven!
"'Well, mate, one day I'm in the woods amongst a gang, chopping firewood
for the sugar-mill, when, what does I light on betwixt some big
ground-leaves and sich like, but a lot o' them very same red mushrooms
as the fittish-man shows me in Africay!--blowed if there warn't a whole
sight o' them round about, too! So I pulls enough for ten, ye may be
sure, stuffs 'em in my hat, an' that same night, as soon as all's dark,
off I goes into the woods, right by the stars, for the nearest town
'twixt there and New Orleans. As soon as I got nigh-hand it, there I
sits down below a tree amongst the bushes, hauls off my slops, an' I
turns to for to rub myself all over, from heel to truck, till daybreak.
So, in course, I watches for the light angshis enough, as ye may
suppose, to know what colour I were. Well, strike me lucky, Jack, if I
didn't jump near a fadom i' the air, when at last I sees I'm _white_
wonst more!--blessed if I didn't feel myself a new man from stem to
starn! I makes right for a creek near by, looks at my face in the water,
then up I comes again, an' every yarn o' them cussed slave-togs I pulls
to bits, when I shoves 'em under the leaves. Arter that I took fair to
the water for about a mile, jist to smooth out my wake, like; then I
shins aloft up a tree, where I stowed myself away till noon--'cause,
d'ye see, I knowed pretty well what to look for next. An' by this time,
mind ye, all them queer haps made a fellow wonderful sharp, so I'd
scheme out the whole chart aforehand how to weather on them cussed
Yankees.
"'Accordently, about noon, what does I hear but that 'ere savitch
bloodhound comin' along up creek, with a set o' slave-catchers astarn,
for to smell out my track. With that, down I went in the water again,
rounds a point into the big river, where I gets abreast of a landin'
place, near the town, with craft laying out-stream, boats plyin', an'
all alive. D' ye see, bo', I'd got no clothes at all, an' how for to rig
myself again, 'blowed if I knows--seein' as how by this time I'd turned
as white as the day I were born, an' a naked white man in a town arn't
no better than a black nigger. So in I swims like a porpus afore a
breeze, an' up an' down I ducks in the shallow, for all the world like a
chap a-takin' a bath; an' out I hollers to all an' sundry, with a Yankee
twang i' my nose, for to know if they had seen my clothes, till a whole
lot on 'em crowds on the quay. Hows'ever, I bethinks me on that 'ere
blasted brand atwixt my shoulders, an' I makes myself out as modest as a
lady, kicks out my legs, and splashes like a whale aground, an' sticks
out my starn to 'em for to let 'em see it's white. "Hullo!" I sings out,
"han't ye seen my clothes?" "No, stranger," says they, "someun's runned
off with 'em, we cal'clates!" With that I tells 'em I'm a Boston skipper
new comed up from New Orleans; an' not being used to the heat, why I'd
took a bath the first thing; an' I 'scribes the whole o' my togs as if
I'd made 'em--"split new," says I, "an' a beaver hat, more by token
there's my name inside it; an'," says I, "there's notes for a hundred
dollars in my trousers!"
"'By this time down comes the slave-catchers, an' says they, hearin' on
it, "That 'ere tarnation nigger's gone off with 'em, we'll know 'un by
them marks well enough," says they, an' off they goes across river.
"Hullo!" I sings out to the folks, "I'm a-gettin' cold here, so I guess
I'll come ashore again, slick off!" I twangs out. "Guess ye can't,
straunger!" they hails; "not till we gets ye some kiverin's!--we 're
considerable proper here, we are!" "Ain't this a free country, then?" I
says, givin' a divvle of a splash; an' with that they begs an' axes me
for to hould on, an' they'd fix me, as they calls it, in no time. "Well,
mate, what does they do but one an' another brings me somethin' as like
what I 'scribed as could be, hands 'em along on a pole, an' I puts 'em
on then an' there. Arter that, the ladies o' the place bein' blessed
modest, an' all of a fright leest I'd a comed out an' gone through the
town--why, out o' grannytude, as they says, they gets up a
supperscription on a hundred dollars to make up my loss--has a public
meetin' logged down for the evenin', when I'm for to indress the
citizens, as they says, all about freedom an' top-gallantry, an'
sich-like. Hows'ever, I jist sticks my tongue in my cheek, eats a
blessed good dinner in a hot-ell, watches my chance, an' off by a
track-boat at sundown to New Orleans, where I shipped aboard a English
barque, an' gets safe out to sea wonst more.
"'Lord love ye, Harry!' exclaimed Jack hereupon, 'the likes o' that now!
But I've heerd say, them fittish-men you talks on has wonderful
knowledge--why, mayhap it's them as keeps all the niggers black, now?'
'Well, bo',' said Harry, 'I don't doubt but if them 'Merricain slaves
jist knowed o' that 'ere red mushroom, why they'd show the Yankees more
stripes nor stars! D' ye see, if a Yankee knowed as his own father were
a-hoein' his sugar-canes, blowed if he wouldn't make him work up his
liberty in dollars! All the stripes, d' ye see, mate, is for the blacks,
an' all the stars is for the whites, in them Yankee colours as they
brags so much about! But what I says is, it's cussed hard to get through
this 'ere world, shipmate, if ye doesn't keep well to the wind'ard of
it!'
"I was the more amused with this account of the ugly rascal's adventures
that I remembered two or three of the occasions he mentioned, and he
told them pretty exactly so far as I had to do with them. As for the
fetish-man's curious nut, and that extraordinary mushroom of his, why
'ten to one,' thought I, 'but all the while the fellow never once
touched a piece of _soap_!' which, no doubt, had as much to do with it
as anything besides. Somehow or other, notwithstanding, I had taken
almost a fancy to the villain--such a rough sample of mankind he was,
with his uncouth grumpy voice, and his huge black beard; and he gave the
story in a cool, scornful sort of way that was laughable in itself. 'So,
my lad,' I thought, 'it seems you and I have met twice before; but if
you play any of your tricks this time, Master Harry, I hope you've found
your match'; and certainly, if I had fancied my gentleman was in the
slaver's hold that time off the African coast, I'd have 'lubberrated'
him with a vengeance.
"'I say, mates,' said he again, with a sulky kind of importance, to
those of the watch who had gathered round during the last half of his
yarn, 'there's three things I hates--an' good reason!' 'What be's they,
Harry?' asked the rest. 'One's a Yankee,' said he, 'an' be blowed to
him; the second's a slaver; and the third is--I carn't abide a nigger,
nohow. But d' ye see, there's one thing I _likes_----' Here eight bells
struck out, and up tumbled the watch below, with Jacobs' hearty face
amongst them: so I made my way aft, and, of course, missed hearing what
that said delightful thing might be, which this tarry Æsop approved of
so much.