'bout ship, and make a fool of himself, by hauling up for the gulf of
matrimony."
"Gulf? Fie, captain!" exclaimed Rose; "you should call it a bay, or
happy haven."
"Do you know, captain, how they treated old bachelors in Sparta?"
asked the doctor.
"Stopped their grog, mayhap, or keel-hauled 'em, I shouldn't wonder."
"They were stripped of their clothes, and in the coldest days of
winter were forced to run through the principal streets, chanting
songs, full of sharp sarcasms upon their own condition."
"Deuced hard lines, doctor; was there any other nice little thing
they made us do?"
"Yes," resumed the doctor, furbishing up his Scotch latinity to
punish the captain for making Rosa blush, "Athenæus, the grammarian
of Naucratis----"
"My eyes! there's a name to turn in of a night with!"
"Well, he tells us that there was, every year, a laughable festival
celebrated in a great temple, at which all the bachelors of a certain
age were compelled to attend, that the ladies might taunt, mock them,
and slap their faces as much as they pleased."
Honest Phillips rubbed his curly head, the brown hair of which was
becoming thickly seamed with gray, slapped his sturdy thigh, and
burst into a hearty fit of laughter.
"Overhaul the charts, Quail, and see where this same Sparta lies.
Its latitude and longitude won't do for me, Sam. Another glass of
wine, ladies, and then I must be off to relieve the deck, and let Mr.
Manfredi down."
The night that followed this day was peculiarly lovely--lovely even
beyond what night is in the tropics at times.
Mr. Basset, the captain, Mr. Quail, and the second mate were having a
quiet rubber in the cabin; Hawkshaw had fallen asleep on one of the
lockers, or pretended to do so; Rose and Dr. Heriot were promenading
the deck aft the mainmast, in very close conversation, and Ethel was
seated alone near the taffrail, at the stern of the _Hermione_, which
was gliding through the water with an almost imperceptible motion,
for the wind was light and steady.
She was alone, for no one was near her, save the man at the wheel,
Zuares Barradas, who seemed oblivious of all save his duty. The
light of the binnacle lamps fell steadily on his dark olive face, his
bare neck, arms, and breast, on which the figure of a Madonna had
been graven with gunpowder, on the rings in his ears, and on his
black, glittering eyes.
The ship had her three courses, top and topgallant sails, royals, and
lower studding-sails set; and this vast cloud of canvas shone white
as snow in the moonlight, the bellying curve of every sail being
beautifully and softly rounded into shadow by the chastened radiance,
and with every heave she gave upon the long glassy rollers, the
reef-points pattered like a shower upon the taut and swollen bosom of
the sail.
Star after star twinkled out and was lost, and then seen again under
the arched leach of each square of canvas, as the ship rose and fell
with each successive heave. Forward she was sunk in silence; the
watch were clustered in a group near the chocks of the long-boat or
main-hatch; the rest of the crew were all seated together about the
windlass and forecastle-bitts.
Nothing broke the silence, save Mr. Basset's voice, or Captain
Phillips's laugh, in the lighted cabin, the occasional rattle of the
rudder in its case, the wash of the passing sea under the counter, or
the gurgle of the long wake astern, that seemed like a path of green
fire amid the eddying bosom of the deep, the unfathomable deep, that
held, as Ethel believed, the remains of him she loved and mourned, as
a widow, in her heart of hearts.
Full of thoughts of home, of sadness, and of the past, Ethel reclined
against the taffrail, with a heart inspired by deep and indescribable
emotions; and her dark, swimming eyes wandered with admiration over
the phantom-like outline of the vast white ship, gliding in awful
silence unerringly over the solitude of the broad ocean, beneath the
mighty dome of the star-studded sky.
Her thoughts were finding vent in tears, when she found that some one
was near her. Passing a handkerchief across her eyes, she drew her
cloak closely round her as this person came forward, and politely
touched his cap. It was Manfredi, the handsome and pleasing young
Italian mate.
"Pardon me, Miss Basset," said he, in his distinct yet somewhat
broken English; "I have been observing you for some time, and am very
sorry to see you so _triste_--so sad."
"I was not sad, Mr. Manfredi."
"Oh yes you were," said he, with smiling earnestness.
"The great beauty of the night impressed me. To you, perhaps, it may
be little worth noticing after the skies of your native Italy."
"The skies are clearer here than in Italy; the air is purer and
freer," he replied, with a sad smile.
"When so far away, do you never wish for home?"
"I did so once."
"And now?"
"I have no home, save on the sea."
This was said with such a melancholy and pathetic brevity, that Ethel
gazed at the young man inquiringly, but in silence.
"I had a home in Italy once, madam--a home, though humble, as happy,
perchance, as yours in England; but the Austrians came and brought
death and sorrow upon it, so I turned my back on the place where the
olives and acacias grew before my father's house, and returned there
no more."
"The Austrians," repeated Dr. Heriot, who, with Rose leaning on his
arm, had now joined them; "we, in England, occasionally heard of
great outrages committed by them."
The black eyes of Manfredi sparkled, and a sigh escaped him.
"Mr. Manfredi is sighing," said the heedless Rose; "depend upon it
that love has something to do with his memories of Italy."
"You mistake, madam," said the third mate, with a smile at the lively
girl, whose fair English face and fine merry eyes looked so beautiful
in the moonlight, that the younger Barradas at the wheel regarded her
more than his compass, so that frequently the sails shivered aloft,
and he was somewhat wild in his steering; "my memories of Italy are,
many of them, pure and charming, as if love formed a portion of them;
and yet I wish all these memories to die together."
"What kind of paradox is this, my dear Manfredi?" asked Dr. Heriot.
"It is no paradox."
"We have a Scottish writer who says that 'No thought, no delightful
memory, ever dies; it may remain silent for a season, but it will
come from those inexpressibly deep regions of memory; it will come at
some time to brighten the present, and to brighten the recollection
of the past."
The face of the young Scotchman flushed as he spoke, with Rose's
pretty hand trembling on his arm; but the Italian only smiled sadly,
and said:
"You mistake me, doctor. The pure and tender memories of my home are
so inseparably blended with the sad and bitter, that I have no desire
but to forget them altogether, for the former add but poignancy to
the latter. Surely you must have heard the story of my brother,
little Attilio Manfredi, whose assassination was termed the great
crime of the House of Hapsburg? As such it went the circuit of the
English newspapers, which received the story from the _Monitore
Toscana_, whose sheets were under the revision of the assassin, the
Austrian commandant."
After a silence of a minute, for the Italian seemed labouring under
deep emotion, Dr. Heriot said:
"No; I do not remember of this, Manfredi."
"Pray tell us about it," said Rose.
"Pray do," added Ethel.
"Wait, ladies, please, until the wheel is relieved, and I shall tell
you a sad but simple tale of barbarous cruelty."
A tall, rawboned Yankee sailor, with a hooked nose and villainous
square jaw, now relieved Zuares Barradas, who civilly touched his hat
and went forward, just as the whist-players came on deck, and
proceeded to exchange tobacco-pouches and light their pipes.
Immediately on discovering that the helmsman was changed, Hawkshaw
appeared on deck and joined the group, to whom Manfredi proceeded to
explain what he meant by relating one of the darkest stories that
ever disgraced the pretty voluminous annals of continental military
tyranny.
CHAPTER XXI.
THE STORY OF A BRAVE BOY.
"In 1850," began Adrian Manfredi, "I was, with my elder brother
Attilio, a schoolboy at home, in our father's house at Pistoja, and
had no more idea then of becoming a seaman or a wanderer on the sea,
than I have now of filling the chair of St. Peter.
"Our father was a sculptor; his studio was always filled with choice
efforts in Tuscan and Carrara marble, in alabaster and chalcedony.
He was a leading member of the Academia delle Belle Arti: but in that
land of artists his means were small; hence our living was frugal and
our house somewhat humble, because it was very old, being the same in
which Pope Clement IX. was born.
"My brother Attilio was said to be as beautiful as an angel by all
the mothers of Pistoja. Indeed, he was a very handsome little boy,
and frequently served my father as a model; thus Attilio's figure
appears in more than one of the groups which he contributed to the
Great Exhibition at London in 1851.
"Versions of my brother's story have already, as I have stated,
appeared in the English newspapers. I now propose to tell you mine.
"Pistoja, our native place, is a Tuscan town, situated amid a fertile
country, at the base of the beautiful Apennines. In fancy I can see
it still, with its carved cathedral of snowy Carrara marble; its
convents and hospitals; its quaint streets of the middle ages; its
old and crumbling walls, that were built by Didier, last king of the
Lombards, and the clear blue waters of the Ombrone, bordered by
chestnut groves, and lands that teem with corn, wine, and oil, all
reddened in the setting sun, as I saw them last; and that feature,
the blot and blight on all the rest, the accursed Austrian eagle,
that floats above its ancient fortress.
"Yes, Pistoja, like too many other Italian towns, had or has an
Austrian garrison, and, at the time I refer to--the first months of
1850--all Europe was filled with ardour, interest, and sympathy by
the gallant stand made by the Hungarians, under Kossuth, and other
chiefs, against their imperial oppressors; and nowhere did their
victories and their downfall find a more ready echo than in the
hearts of Italians.
"The boys of the Academia de Pistoja, which my brother Attilio and I
attended--he was then twelve, and I but ten years of age--held a
jubilee with others, on an evil day, when fresh tidings of some new
battle came. We received a holiday. I went to fish in the Ombrone,
and my brother returned home.
"When, chancing to pass near the palace of the Bishop of Pistoja,
where the Austrian commandant, Colonel Count Rudolf de Veinrich, had
quartered himself (after expelling our venerable prelate), Attilio
saw a number of soldiers in what he considered the Hungarian
uniform--brown tunics, embroidered and faced with red.
"When passing the first sentinel, Attilio lifted his little hat and
cried:
"'Viva Kossuth! Viva Hongria!'
"'Viva!' replied the sentinel, whose comrades joined in the cry,
adding:
"'Eviva--bravo Hongrie!'
"Thus emboldened, the rash boy continued to wave his hat and shout
the name of Kossuth.
"'Come hither, boy,' cried the soldiers, in strange Italian; 'we wish
to speak with you.'
"Attilio, believing that he beheld the countrymen of the Hungarian
dictator, approached, but was instantly surrounded and seized, and
then, to his astonishment, he found himself in the hands of a party
of Croats, whose uniform, in his ignorance of such matters, the boy
supposed to be Hungarian.
"They were proceeding to drag him into the guard-house, when Attilio,
active and nimble, glided like an eel through their hands, sprang
from an open window and escaped, but was closely pursued.
"Fearing to take shelter in our house, which would implicate our
innocent parents, and insure their ruthless pillage, he left the town
behind him, and fled, bareheaded, towards the woods. As it chanced,
he came close to where I was fishing in the Ombrone.
"'Change jackets with me, Adrian!' he exclaimed, 'the Austrians are
after me--change, but ask no questions.'
"We exchanged in a moment; my jacket was black, and his a bright
green; thus, when he disappeared, the Croats came upon me. I uttered
an involuntary cry of real terror as they seized me, and handled me
very roughly before they discovered their mistake.
"Then I laughed at them, on which they spitefully broke my rod, and
seized my fish basket, with its contents. A closer search was
instituted for poor Attilio, and at night he was dragged from our
dear mother's arms, and reconducted to the guardhouse, where he was
brought before Count Rudolf de Veinrich, colonel of the Regiment de
Radetzki.
"Knowing well the kind of hands he had fallen into, Attilio gave
himself up for lost; yet he was brave as a lion; his courage never
deserted him, and, in contempt of his captors, he spat upon the
Austrian flag that hung over the guard-house door. Yet he wept, when
in the dark, for the mother from whom he had been torn--the poor
little boy of twelve happy years!
"I may mention that though, like the Italians, the Croats generally
profess the Catholic religion, in the military portion of that
semi-barbarous race there is a strong element of the Greek schism,
and of this last was the Regiment de Radetzki composed. Its soldiers
had all the worst qualities of the Croat; they were revengeful,
deceitful, intemperate, prone to robbery, and officered by Germans,
who, when in Tuscany, cared little to restrain their licentiousness.
"Their colonel, notwithstanding his title of count, was a man without
family or friends, save such as position gave him, without kindly
sympathy or common human feeling. His mother had been found
speechless and dying near the new Scottish gate of Vienna, and she
expired soon after in the Allgemeine Krankenhaus, or great infirmary
of the city, leaving her child to the foundling hospital, by the name
of Rudolf.
"Ten years after a person of rank, a prince of the Russian Empire, on
searching the books of the said hospital, discovered in this
foundling his own son, the mother being a hapless Polish woman, whom,
he had deluded and abandoned; so the little Rudolf, on the payment of
so many thousand ducats, became a count, and in time rose to the rank
of colonel of Croats; and, as such, exercised the stern military laws
of Austria with unexampled severity.
"On bringing my brother before him, the Croats charged Attilio with
attempting to induce them to desert in the name of Kossuth; and then
with defiling the flag of the Empire by spitting thereon.
"'Did he attempt to seduce you by money?' asked the colonel, with a
frown on his face.
"'Yes, Herr Colonel,' replied a corporal named Schwartz, and he
produced eighteen _quattrini_, which he had found in the pocket of my
jacket, and which were in value about twopence British.
"On this the colonel, undeterred by the manly aspect of the beautiful
little boy--for my brother Attilio was beautiful--struck him with his
gloved hand, and with his sheathed sword, repeatedly.
"He then ordered him to be put into one of the dark, damp, and horrid
dungeons of the old castle of Pistoja, where, among the rats, the
toads, the gloom, and the cobwebs, the poor boy wept for his parents,
and for me; wept in cold and forlorn misery, on some wet straw, near
which a clay pitcher of water was placed.
"He had a stone whereon to rest his head if weary, and his right
wrist was fettered by a chain to his left ankle.
"'Sono desolato! Sono perduto!' ('I am ruined! I am lost!') he kept
repeating from time to time.
"Our father was crushed with grief, our mother was filled with wild
despair, and I was stupefied!"
"And they dared to seize him thus?" exclaimed Mr. Basset, flushing
with indignation like an honest John Bull, while vigorously polishing
his forehead with his silk handkerchief; "a frightful outrage on the
rights of the subject! Where were the police? Where was that great
bulwark of liberty, the writ of _habeas corpus_?"
Manfredi smiled sadly, and replied:
"You forget that I am talking of Tuscany?"
"True, my dear sir, true; but go on."
"The poor boy!" said Ethel, mournfully.
"Those odious, hateful Austrians!" commented Rose.
"D----n them!" was the addendum of Captain Jack Phillips, while
Manfredi resumed:
"In this horrible condition, crushed for a time in body and in soul,
and drowned in tears, he remained, while all access was denied to
him, even to our parents; but ultimately he was found by the good
Padre Marraccini, who had come to visit the sick prisoners, and who,
by chance or mistake, was shown by Corporal Schwartz into the
atrocious dungeon where our poor little Attilio lay.
"Undeterred by the grim Croat, who carried a smoky lamp, the light of
which scared the rats and toads, who were seen hurrying away to their
dark and slimy recesses, the child leaped up with a cry of joy, and
hastened towards the padre, who was our father's friend, but in
hastening fell, for his chain was short, and cramped the action of
his limbs.
"'Water, Padre Marraccini!' he exclaimed hoarsely, 'water; for I am
dying of thirst, and they have _salted_ what is in that pitcher.'
"With great difficulty the commiserating padre procured him some
water in the hollow of a broken bottle; the corporal would give
nothing else, and it cut the poor boy's mouth, so that he drank his
own blood, his tears, and the water together.
"'My mother, my father--are they well?' he asked.
"'Yes.'
"'It seems so long since I saw them--the day before yesterday when I
went to school,' continued Attilio, weeping, with his head on the
padre's shoulder. 'And Adrian, my brother--did they hurt him, for he
changed jackets with me?'
"'Hush!' said the padre, glancing at the stolid Croat who stood by
them, with a lamp flaring in one hand, and his drawn bayonet
glittering in the other.
"'Get me out of this, Padre Marraccini; pray get me out of this
place, and home to my mother. Oh, my mother! my mother!'
"'I will, dear Attilio, I will--that is if I can.'
"'I shall take courage. I shall be a man!'
"'Do, until I return from the commandant.'
"With dire forebodings in his heart, the poor old padre hastened to
the count, whom he found seated at his wine, after dinner, with
several Austrian officers, in the saloon of the bishop's palace.
"After enduring considerable annoyance--even insult--from the
Croatian sentinels and German lackeys--insults which he endured with
contempt, perhaps, rather than with meekness, and feeling himself the
servant of a higher master than even the Emperor of Austria--he was
admitted to an audience, and he begged--he dared not, in such a
presence, demand--'the release of the child Attilio Manfredi, who had
been seized by the soldiers of the garrison.'
"'Seized, Fra Marraccini, for attempting to seduce them by money to
desert their colours, in the name of the rebel Magyar, Kossuth,'
replied the count, sternly.
"'Term it as you please, Signor Excellenza. I implore you to allow
me to restore him to his parents--his heart-broken mother especially.'
"'It cannot be; his case is not in my hands.'
"'In whose then?'
"'It has been remitted to the general-commanding at Prato.'
"'And the answer will come----'
"'About midnight,' interrupted the count, with a dark glance there
was no misinterpreting. 'Enough, priest. You may go.'
"The poor priest felt his soul sink within him. Instead of seeking
our parents, to whom, knowing the Austrians as he did, he could give
no hope, he returned to the castle, and sought to prepare the unhappy
child, my brother, for the fate, the great change, that was to follow.
"All day had elapsed without food passing the boy's mouth, and he was
in such a state as to be incapable of swallowing the coarse cake
which the priest had procured with difficulty from the Croatian guard.
"Attended by the corporal, named Schwartz, who remained persistently
in the dungeon, holding a lamp, the priest sat on the damp stone,
with Attilio on his knee; and resting his head caressingly on his
shoulder, besought him to make his confession, in the fashion of our
church--to speak in whispers, lest the Croat might overhear and mock
them.
"But the confession of a boy--a mere child, so pure, so good, and
sinless, could interest the soldier but little, and the youthful
prisoner made it with charming artlessness; though his large dark
eyes began to dilate with mournful anxiety, fear, and wonder, and
then to sparkle with courage and sublime resignation, as Fra
Marraccini spoke to him in earnest whispers of his spiritual state,
beseeching him to think of hopes beyond the grave, of the Father he
had in heaven as well as his father on earth, and of the Blessed
Madonna, who was the mother of all good children.
"Then the little boy began to see clearly the terrible meaning of the
priest, and though his heart yearned, and his tears fell fast when he
thought of his poor mother who was on earth, and whom he never more
should see, at length he became pacified, or worn out by emotion, and
fell asleep in the arms of dear old Father Marraccini.
"So the hours stole on, Corporal Schwartz trimmed the lamp, growled
and swore, tugged his obstinate moustache, and smoked his huge
meerschaum, while the old priest, heedless of his impatience, read
the prayers for the dying with the child asleep upon his knee.
"The galloping of a horse was heard, and the clank of a sabre, as an
Austrian dragoon passed the grated window of the prison.
"'Poor Attilio!' groaned the priest.
"'Rouse the prisoner!' croaked the corporal, harshly, 'here comes the
final order about him!'
"At that time the clock of the fortress struck midnight.
"Prato is only six miles from Pistoja, so the general there had not
hurried himself.
"'They are not really going to kill me, Fra Marraccini, are they?
Oh! my sweet mother! Oh! my dear father! and my little brother
Adrian, too, shall I never see you any more?' exclaimed Attilio, as
he was dragged out by the guard.
"'Remember what I have said and taught you," whispered the priest;
'take courage, and be a Christian.'
"'Yes, padre, and a Tuscan, too!' replied Attilio, as they were
conducted from the dark passages and vaults of the ancient castle
into one of the dry ditches, where the moon was shining in all her
brilliance--yes, gloriously, as now she shines upon this tropical sea.
"There, between the high walls of the dry ditch, were several
Austrian officers in their white uniforms, with long boots and black
varnished helmets, surmounted by plumes or spikes, and double-headed
eagles, and all apparently flushed with wine.
"Beyond them were twelve Croats under arms, drawn in a single rank
across the ditch.
"'Corporal Schwartz,' said the count, as he opened a letter, 'unlock
the prisoner's chains.'
"As they were taken off and flung rattling aside, the courage of
Father Marraccini rose.
"Bareheaded before this imposing group, whose breasts were covered
with imperial orders and medals, stood Attilio, with his dark eyes
cast down, his crossed hands on his breast, humble, but courageous.
"'He looked so fair and handsome!' says the kind padre, in an account
he wrote of this affair. 'The moonlight silvered him from head to
foot, and made him look like an angel. The boy was very sad, but at
the same time calm. No entreaty passed his lips to be allowed to
look once more upon his parents' faces. All he said was, "Don't
leave me any more--oh! see to what a pass they have brought me!"'
"'Priest, bring the boy forward,' said Count Rudolf, imperiously.
"Marracini did so, and so clear and bright was the moonlight, which
poured aslant over the grand masses of the ancient castle of Pistoja,
on the glittering arms of the ferocious-looking Croats, on the white
uniforms and glittering accoutrements of the Austrian officers, and
on the boy's pale face, that the count could read distinctly, as if
at noon-day, the brief but pompous despatch of the general commanding
at Prato.
"'Attilio Manfredi,' said he, 'listen! Your sentence has come hither
in German, but I shall read it to you in Italian.'
"The boy bowed, played nervously with his hands, and said:
"'Dio il voglia, Signor Colonello--se piace a Dio!' ('God willing--if
it please God!')
"'Attilio Manfredi,' resumed the tall Austrian, raising his voice
with a hiccup at times, 'scholar of the Academy of Pistoja, son of
Adrian Manfredi, sculptor, and member of the Academia delle Belle
Arti, you have been accused and fully convicted of attempting, by
bribery, to induce Corporal Carl Schwartz and Private Demetrius
Spitzbübbel, with other soldiers of Veltmarshal Radetzki's Croatian
Regiment, to desert the fatherly and benign service of his Imperial
Majesty Ferdinand I., Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, Bohemia,
Lombardy, and Venice, Dalmatia, Crotia, Sclavonia, Galicia,
Lodomeria, and Illyria----'"
"Dash my wig!" exclaimed Captain Phillips; "why did he omit the
Cannibal Islands, and the Viceroy Whanky-fum?"
"Count Rudolf paused to draw breath, as well he might after such a
mouthful of words; and again the fine large eyes of the boy dilated
with wonder, at a list of names that sounded so strange and barbarous
to his Tuscan ear.
"'Have you the courage to hear your sentence?'
"'Si, signore; the blessed Madonna, who is alike the mother of my
mother and me, support me!'
"'She does, my son!' cried Marraccini, with enthusiasm.
"'Silence!' exclaimed the count. 'Prisoner--you are to be shot to
death by a platoon of twelve men.'
"He deliberately folded the despatch and drew back.
"'The mother of God receive me!' murmured the poor boy; then he
added, in a feeble voice, 'Father Marraccini, when it is all
over--when I am dead--cut off three locks of my hair: one for my dear
father, one for dear, dear mother, and one for my little brother
Adrian.'
"Here Manfredi drew a locket from his breast and kissed it.
"'You will keep my crucifix for yourself, in memory of your little
penitent, and say masses for his soul.'
"It was now the old priest's turn to weep, and he wept aloud, while
the brave little Attilio had not a tear in his eye.
"Hoarse, and harsh, and rapid were the German words of command, and
in less than three minutes, a volley of twelve rifles that rang like
thunder on the still midnight, waking all the echoes of the fortress
and of the silent streets of Pistoja, announced that all was
over--that the great crime had been committed!
"In five minutes more Attilio was flung into a hasty grave dug in the
ditch beneath the castle wall, quicklime was cast over him, and
there, uncoffined and unconsecrated, the Croats covered him up.
"My poor little brother!
"My father and mother could not survive the shock of this atrocity.
They both died soon after; I was left alone in the world, and,
turning my back upon Pistoja, became a sailor and a wanderer.
"A wooden cross nailed on the castle wall, by tine kind hand of Fra
Marraccina, marked the uncouth grave of my brother till 1860, when
the ecclesiastical and civic authorities of Pistoja took heart, and,
with many grand and empty ceremonies, exhumed his sad remains, and
reinterred them in a coffin within the church of the Confraternita
dei Dolori, where they now lie, and may they rest in peace![*]
[*] For the truth of this story, see the _Athenæum_ of 1860.
"Fra Marraccini, now Bishop of Pistoja, performed the funeral mass,
and wrote me all about it when I was far away, a merchant seaman, in
the Southern Pacific.. The good man sent me his blessing, and it
reached me even there."
As he concluded, the Italian crossed himself, and stepped aside, as
if to light a cigar; but Ethel Basset and others knew, by the tremor
of his voice, that he had turned to hide his emotion.
"And this cruel colonel--this Austrian," she asked, "what became of
him?"
"The curse that fell on Cain followed him. He died, not on a
gallows, as he deserved, but fell beneath the Danish rifles, at the
foot of the Dannewerke," replied Manfredi, with flashing eyes; "and
now I am Christian enough to say: may he, too, rest in peace, even as
my brother rests at Pistoja."
CHAPTER XXII.
ZUARES AND THE SHARK.
The voyage of the _Hermione_ had now lasted several weeks.
During that time Hawkshaw had never ventured to resume the subject
which Ethel had so summarily dismissed on that evening in Acton
Chase--the evening which had an end so fatal--the subject, of his
passion for her, and certainly, as such things grow and mature by
propinquity, it was more deeply rooted now than it was then.
He was wisely and sedulously attentive during their daily and hourly
intercourse in the circumscribed space on shipboard--attentive, but
nothing more.
Yet Ethel knew well what those delicate attentions inferred, and
shrank from them systematically and intuitively, and in such a
manner, though quiet and gentle, as to give the persevering
ex-captain of Texan troopers not the shadow of a hope for the future.
Moreover, he was rather galled to perceive that ever since that
evening when Morley Ashton disappeared, Ethel had adopted a nun-like
soberness of attire and colour that reminded one of mourning. Save
Morley's engagement-ring, she wore no ornament, and Hawkshaw knew
that to the black ribbon around her neck was attached a locket, with
a braid of Ashton's hair entwined with her own, on one side, and on
the other, a miniature of herself, for it was the same locket which
he had worn when in Africa, and which she had found lying on his
toilet-table on the morning after his mysterious disappearance and
supposed death.
She knew that he had always borne it next his heart, and now she
resolved it should ever be worn next her own; for with such things do
lovers solace themselves.
Hawkshaw knew, we say, quite well, that the black ribbon around that
white and slender neck sustained that which she deemed an
affectionate memento; so he never dared to ask her what it was, lest
its production should serve as a curb and rebuke to himself; and
while it was worn thus, he deemed it almost hopeless to resume the
task of entreating her to love him, or permit his loving her. So day
followed day, and still the great ship that bore them all flew on,
but not always successfully, for she encountered such a succession of
headwinds, as served almost to prove the truth of what our old friend
Bill Morrison, of the _Princess_, stated to Morley, about a ship that
had a "shedder" of blood on board; and now, even jolly Captain
Phillips lost his temper with his mates, his crew, himself, and
everybody but Rose Basset, who, he was wont to say, "could wind him
round her little finger like a bit o' spunyarn."
Though the _Hermione_ made long tacks westward and eastward, on the
latter sometimes "sighting" the coast of Africa, and though the winds
were ahead, and fearfully protracting the voyage, the weather was
very fine, almost to monotony, and thus for days after the moonlit
evening on which Manfredi told his tale, nothing occurred to disturb
the even tenor of the voyage, save the usual sights to be seen at sea.
A drove of porpoises dashing in the wind's eye; a shower of silvery
flying-fish crossing the vessel's course, and falling in hundreds,
like a glittering torrent, into the sea, from, which they had sprung;
the stormy petrels tripping gracefully with brown wings outspread,
above the snowy spray, or the black fin of a shark prowling for offal
in the vessel's wake astern; and once a sucking-fish was seen fixed
to the rudder, where it remained for weeks, wriggling and twisting,
for no amount of motion in the water, not even the waves of the
wildest storm that furrows up the sea, can shake it off when once it
adheres to a ship's bottom, to a whale, or a shark, as it is
sometimes wont to do.
Captain Phillips was not superstitious enough to believe that this
small parasite retarded the progress of a ship, though such has been
for ages the idea of those who live, and have lived, by salt water,
as we may find in many
"----a book,
From Captain Noah down to Captain Cook,"
but more especially in the works of many who have written of nautical
phenomena between the days of Pliny, Plutarch, and Captain Dampier.
Yet to watch from the taffrail its obstinate adherence and wriggling,
amid the foam down below, was for some time an amusement which duly
found a record in the journal or diary which Rose kept for the
special perusal of her friend Lucy Page when they met again.
On another day a ship was passed, "bound for Europe"--they had ceased
to speak of Britain now--and all crowded to the side to hear her
hailed. On she came, and each vessel backed her maintopsail and
showed her colours, plunging stern down and head, their cutwaters
dripping with foam, their bright copper, that rose to the bends,
flashing in the sun, the sails of the stranger shivering, as the
_Hermione_ kept the weather-gauge of her.
"Ahoy!" came faintly from a trumpet over the sea; "what ship is that?"
"The _Hermione_, of London--two months out--bound for Singapore.
What ship are you?"
"The _Robert Bruce_, of Glasgow, bound for Europe."
"Where from?"
"Batavia."
"Report all well."
"Aye, aye; good-bye."
Then the latitude and longitude, chalked on a black board, would be
shown over the quarter of each ship; the colours were dipped at the
gaff-peak, the yard-heads filled, a parting cheer exchanged, and each
left the other to plough through the waste of waters, and each, ere
the sun set, would be "hull down" to the other, at the horizon.
Then Rose hurried to her desk to record this trivial, but, to her,
important episode; but, alas! events were soon to occur which would
make her diary, if kept amid them, the most startling work of the
kind ever penned by a human hand--especially a hand so small and so
pretty as hers.
That the young Scotch surgeon, Dr. Leslie Heriot, was very much
captivated by Rose was evident to all in the cabin; but Rose was so
accustomed to have plenty of admirers to talk to, laugh, and flirt
with, when on shore, that to have an acknowledged dangler on board
ship seemed nothing unusual, and she accepted his attentions
accordingly.
She conceived it to be a penchant that had begun with the voyage, and
would end with it; but, being less volatile than she was, to our
young M.D. and F.R.C.S. of Edinburgh, it was a passion deeper than
she thought, and of that she was to have ample proof ere long.
Whether it was that the irritation always consequent to headwinds
extended from the occupants of the after cabin to those of the
forecastle bunks, we know not; but about this time a very perceptible
difference began to manifest itself in the tone and conduct of the
crew towards the passengers--towards each other generally, and the
officers of the ship in particular; in short, a general insolence of
bearing, to which the latter had been quite unaccustomed.
We have stated that they were a mixed crew; that the coloured, the
foreign, and the Yankee elements largely predominated among them;
hence, they were not the kind of men to stand upon trifles.
Thus, when two had their grog stopped for insolence to Mr. Quail when
ordering them to work the spun-yarn winch, they drew their knives,
and swore they "would have blood, if not their Jarnaiky rum;" and so
menacing generally was the conduct of the rest, that Mr. Quail was
polite enough to content himself by entering in the ship's log a
threat he affected not to overhear, and gave the mutineers their grog
two days after, when both got three tremendous sousings, when ordered
to "lay out forward and furl the gib."
The watch on deck at night went sometimes to sleep, committing the
care of the vessel to the winds and the man at the helm; and, as he
occasionally chose to nod also at his post, the _Hermione_ was thrice
thrown in the wind, hove flat aback with all her studding-sails set,
and fortunate it was that, on each of these occasions, the wind was
light, or some of her masts would have gone by the board.
Sailors are never idle when at sea, as a ship perpetually finds work
for every hand at all times, were it only to "polish the
chain-cable;" but the crew of the _Hermione_ were resolutely slothful.
By day, the men who lounged about the forecastle bitts, or stood in a
row with their backs against the bow to leeward, exchanged strange
cries, whoops, signals, and scraps of low ribald songs with those who
were engaged aloft, or elsewhere; and more than once the man at the
wheel ventured to do so likewise; and when told by Captain Phillips
never again to come aft the mainmast, or appear on the quarter-deck,
he very deliberately spat thereon, and told him that he and his
quarter-deck might both be--not blessed at least.
These unusual indications were quite enough to cause alarm, and a day
seldom passed that Captain Phillips, Mr. Quail, and his three mates,
did not confer about them, or exchange glances, the anxiety and
import of which Mr. Basset and his two daughters knew nothing.
The captain dreaded that this secret spirit of disorder might develop
itself in scenes of outrage when the old, and now almost disused,
ceremony of receiving Neptune and crossing the Line took place. To
ignore the occasion might cause discontent, and to celebrate it might
provoke what he feared; but, fortunately, for twenty-four hours,
about the time of crossing the equator, the wind blew almost a
hurricane, so Neptune and his visit were alike forgotten.
There was one occasion on which Hawkshaw hoped to get rid, at least,
of one of his chief sources of dread--the Barradas.
There fell a dead calm one day about noon; the air was almost
suffocating, the sea like glass or oil, and there was not a breath of
wind to stir the canvas, or even to wave the scarlet fringes of the
quarter-deck awning, under the shade of which Ethel and Rose reclined
languidly, with light summer dresses, and fan in hand.
It was strange that with this listlessness below there seemed to be
aloft a current of air, which did not descend even to the
skysail-yards, but played with the vane and its scarlet streamer on
the mainmast-head.
On this day the _Hermione_ was about a hundred miles to the northward
of St. Helena. The air was thin and ambient; the sunlight, broad and
blazing, exhaling from the sea a thin white haze, which, at the dim
horizon, made the sea and sky so blend together, that none could tell
where cloud began and water ended.
Through the glassy surface of the still, calm sea the black crooked
fin of a great shark was seen, as he glided stealthily alongside,
preceded, as usual, by the long, wriggling pilot-fish.
It was evidently a white shark, by the mode in which he swallowed;
for when the cook cast some offal to him, he turned on his back, and
opening his dreadful mouth, exhibited his six-fold row of teeth,
triangular, and sharp as razors. This terrible apparatus for
mastication is quite flat in the mouth when the shark is in a state
of quietude; but when biting or swallowing food, it has the power of
erecting it with vast power, by the enormous muscles of the jaw.
The whole body being of a light ash colour, his grim form, with the
motion of his pectoral fins, could be distinctly seen, as he floated
alongside, or glided to and fro.
Now Zuares Barradas, a daring and athletic young fellow, stripped of
everything but his canvas trousers, appeared suddenly in the
starboard forechains with a coil of rope in his hand, and a murmur
almost rang along the deck, as he made one end of his coil fast to a
belaying-pin, preparatory to plunging into the sea.
"Oh, Mr. Quail!" exclaimed Ethel, "is he about to fish for that
dreadful thing?"
"No, miss," replied Quail, quietly; "he is going to attack it."
"Attack it?"
"Yes, in the water. Shouldn't care if a few more tried the same
game," growled the mate.
"Is it not rashness--madness? So handsome a young man, too,"
continued Ethel, greatly excited.
"It is rashness and madness too, as you say, Miss Basset."
"You will prevent it, surely?"
"By no means. The weather is warm; if he wants a dip, let him have
it," replied the mate, who had not forgotten that Zuares was one of
the men who had drawn his knife when his grog was stopped.
Before he could be either warned or prevented, the younger Barradas
sprang into the jolly-boat, which had been alongside for the
carpenter, who had taken advantage of the calm to perform some piece
of work upon the outer sheathing.
Shoving off to the full extent of the painter, Zuares stood for a
moment in an attitude which showed his handsome, athletic, and tawny
form to great advantage, and when the horrible shark came within six
yards of the boat, rising at the same time so near to the surface
that his gray body shone through the pea-green sea, as if scaled with
gold and silver, a cry of terror burst from Ethel Basset, as Zuares
plunged headlong into the water, within three feet of his jaws.
Turning instantly, the shark shot towards his expected prey, who rose
near his tail, and, on the shark turning again, dived once more
beneath him, with a skill and courage he could only have acquired on
the half-savage shores of his native country.
All on deck beheld this strange and perilous game with breathless
interest, and even the ruffianly crew were hushed into silence by a
scene so unexpected.
Thrice the ill-matched antagonists appeared on the surface, Zuares
swimming with the hand he had at liberty, and keeping the other, with
the coiled rope, behind him on his loins, the shark following, but
warily, as if in doubt. Each time Zuares got breath he dived
headlong down, and on the third time, the monster dived after him, so
closely and so simultaneously, that not a doubt remained in the minds
of those who lined the ship's gunwale that they had encountered
below, and that the bubbles, now rising fast to the surface, would
soon be tinged with blood.
Even the swarthy visage and beetling brow of Pedro Barradas grew
pale; and his present emotion found vent in a heavy curse.
Ethel and Rose covered their faces, and sank down on the quarter-deck
seat. Nance Folgate gazed steadily at the place where the shark and
seaman had disappeared, and continued to utter a series of noisy
outcries, and "Lor' a mussy me's!"
Five, ten, fifteen, twenty seconds elapsed--they seemed an age; then
suddenly the slack of the rope at the starboard fore-rigging was seen
to tighten and pay out.
"Tail on--tally on--yeo-heavo!" was now the cry, and a dozen pairs of
strong hands were pulling at it, and meeting, apparently, with a
resistance that threatened to snap the rope.
At that moment, Zuares Barradas, panting, breathless and weary, rose
to the surface at some distance, and swam leisurely towards the boat,
while the shark--round the tail of which, and the small back fin that
is close thereto, he had, in some fashion known best to himself,
contrived to loop the rope tightly--was drawn, ignominiously and in
great wrath, tail-foremost from his proper element.
A hurrah, rather varying in its cadence, as it did not come from
British throats, greeted the monster's appearance as he floundered
alongside, with his head downwards, and his awful jaws rasping and
scraping in impotent fury against the ship's outer sheathing.
Up, up he was hoisted tailwise; then the carpenter, armed with his
hatchet, descended into the fore-chains, and put an end to his power,
by severing the spinal column, after which Jack Shark was cut adrift
to perish, and amid great exultation the intrepid Zuares was hauled
on board.
His right arm was severely lacerated and bleeding; but this, he
stated, was done by one of the monster's fins, and not its jaws.
Handsome though the young fellow was, Ethel and Rose beheld him more
with fear than admiration, for his feat savoured of a courage that
was reckless or diabolical.
"True," said Dr. Heriot, aside to Mr. Quail; "a fellow who sets so
little store upon his own life will set still less upon ours."
Although Captain Phillips would, perhaps, have felt small regret had
Zuares shared the fate of the Prophet Jonah, he ordered the steward
to give him a good tot of grog, and ere long, as the breeze sprang up
and sail was made on the ship, nothing remained of an adventure so
exciting, but an entry made very briefly by Mr. Quail in the ship's
log:--
"4 P.M., _calm. Zuares Sarradas caught and killed a shark_.
"6 P.M., _steady breeze; people employed in shifting the foretopsail
and slushing the mainmast. Pumps attended to as usual._"
The pumps and the foretopsail were evidently of more importance to
Mr. Quail than the shark and its story.
CHAPTER XXIII.
HAWKSHAW'S OLD FRIENDS.
One day, Ethel, inspired perhaps by Hawkshaw's evil genius, expressed
a wish to go forward and see what she termed "the front part of the
ship."
Her papa and Dr. Heriot were near; but as Hawkshaw had a jealous
dislike of Heriot's attention to the sisters, and Mr. Basset had no
desire to take more trouble than was absolutely necessary, the
ex-captain drew closer to her, on which she said:
"Please take me to see it."
Hawkshaw, though he would almost as soon have walked into a furnace,
gave his hand reluctantly to Ethel, pulled his newly-donned
wide-awake down over his eyes, and led her forward from the sanctum
of the quarter-deck.
Though in no way enchanted with her cavalier, Ethel, with a
minuteness that, to him, was alike distressing and provoking,
insisted on examining everything in this new region of the ship. The
capstan, with its drumhead, pals, and bars; the hatches, with their
tarpaulins and iron bands; the long-boat upon its chocks, lashed
amidships, full of hens, pigs, and all the debris of the deck; the
cook's galley, with its hot, steaming coppers and tin pans; the
skuttle-butt, from which the sailors drunk their water, by a long tin
measure lowered through the bung-hole; the bowsprit, riding gallantly
above the foam, with its perpendicular martingale for guying down the
headstays, dipping in the sea from time to time; the catheads with
their double sheaves; the windlass, the best bower anchor, and the
sheet anchor; and last of all, she peeped into the forecastle bunks,
a dreary-looking little den, in the berths of which a number of the
ruffian-like crew were lounging, sleeping, and some, in defiance of
all orders, smoking pipes and cigaritos.
So full of interest had the beautiful and intelligent girl been while
exploring this new world, passing from object to object, stepping
lightly and gracefully with her gathered skirts above her pretty
tapered ankles, that some time elapsed before she perceived, that
which the more wary Hawkshaw had from the first observed, the cool
and deliberate insolence with which the seamen--so unlike British
seamen--were observing her. They loitered or stood directly in her
way, and, when she begged pardon or turned aside, they leered at her,
thrust their tongues in their cheeks, applied their forefingers to
the side of their noses, whistled, and betrayed other and
unmistakable signs of coarse wit or insolent admiration.
Ignorant of all this, poor Ethel continued to loiter among them,
thinking them all very brave and fine fellows, though very dirty, and
quite unlike William in "Black-eyed Susan," with his spotless
trousers, tight at the waist and loose at the feet, his low-crowned,
varnished hat, with its black ribbon, his dandy jacket, broad collar,
and black silk neckerchief, with its peculiar tie.
The Barradas, Bill Badger, and Co., were the very antipodes of all
this; but now the cook's galley interested her again.
"Oh, Captain Hawkshaw--the cat--look at the poor cat!" she exclaimed,
as this useful domestic animal peeped at her from amid the cook's
kettles.
"Well, Ethel, what of the cat?"
"See, what a horror it is!" continued Ethel, pointing to pussy, who
had neither ears nor tail, and whose usually silky coat was coarse as
that of a Spitzbergen bear, by almost daily immersions in the salt
water of the lee-scuppers. "Captain Hawkshaw, tell me----"
"You must not speak so loudly, Miss Basset!" said that personage,
with uncontrollable asperity and alarm. "I am close beside you; and
others will hear as well as myself," he added.
"Others, sir?" repeated Ethel, with astonishment.
"You were about to ask something," said he, with visible uneasiness
and confusion.
"I was about to ask who had mutilated the poor animal so cruelly."
"How can I say? Some ruffian, no doubt. Come aft, and ask the
captain about it."
"Lord love you, marm," said the cook--a greasy black fellow, who
seemed to be in a perpetual state of steam, grime, and perspiration;
and no wonder, when he had his blazing coppers around him, and
overhead a tropical sun that melted pitch out of the decks--"there
ain't no cruelty in this whatsomdever."
"What! no cruelty in mutilating the poor animal thus?"
"It's natur's wicious, marm," replied the cook, with great
earnestness. "'Tain't lucky to have a cat aboard o' ship, or a
parson neither, for the matter o' that. We can't dock the parson;
but we docks the cat, as you see."
"Poor little pussy!"
"Poor! be darned, marm! I shears off the ears for'ard, and docks the
tail aft, leavin' on'y the starn post; and so a cook's knife alters
their appearance and their wicious nature entirely."
"What strange stuff is that you are cooking?"
"Scouse, for the fork'stle, marm; have a taste?" replied the cook,
offering a huge dirty ladle, filled with a queer mess, to Ethel's
lovely lip.
But she shrank back; so he poured down his capacious throat the
scalding contents, which, in reality, was a savoury mess, composed of
salt junk, chopped into small pieces, bruised biscuits, potatoes,
suet and pepper, all stewed up together, and ready to be served up in
the wooden kid for the ship's crew.
"Shall we go aft, now?" said Hawkshaw, with irrepressible annoyance.
"Yes, please," replied Ethel, hastening away, on finding herself the
centre of what she deemed a curious, but which was in reality an
impertinently admiring group.
And, grasping the belaying pins to steady her steps, she hastened
towards the quarter alone, for Hawkshaw remained behind, paralysed,
and almost cursing her in his heart, on finding himself confronted by
the bulky form and lowering front of Pedro Barradas.
He saw that Ethel, alone and unattended, had reached a seat near the
taffrail, and was now beside her father, Rose, Dr. Heriot, and some
of the ship's officers; so he turned hastily away, seeking to get aft
by passing between the foremast and the forehatch; but there he was
encountered by Bill Badger, the raw-boned, red-skinned, and
ruffianly-looking Yankee, who said, while touching his hat in
insolent mockery:
"Avast! I beg yer pardon, Capting 'Awkshaw, but haul yer wind. I
calculate there's a yellow cove as wants to speak with yer uncommon
pertic'lar--one o' the not-to-be-done squadron."
Turning, with rage and desperation in his heart, Hawkshaw affected a
calm exterior, and said, suavely, to Barradas:
"I believe you wish to speak with me, my good fellow?"
"Ha! ha! ha! _morte de Dios_; how well he does it!" exclaimed the
black-whiskered Pedro, slapping his huge thigh with a great brown,
hairy hand, and showing a row of strong white teeth that a shark
might envy. "But it won't do, capitano--_caramba!_ it won't do!"
"I do not comprehend you, fellow!" said Hawkshaw, with an assumption
of dignity.
"Oho! hallo, mates, he doesn't comprehend. Shall I make him?"
"Aye, aye; pitch into the cork-sucker!" growled several of the crew,
bent upon mischief.
"Step with me this way," said Hawkshaw, with growing perturbation,
drawing Pedro Barradas towards the bow of the long-boat. "I assure
you that I am quite at a loss to know what you mean."
"Mean!" thundered the other, with a scowl on his dark visage, so
terrible that Hawkshaw expected next moment to see a sharp knife
glittering at his throat; "do you pretend to say that you have
forgotten our old South American life, _camarado_, and how well you
handled your lasso in the Barranca Secca, between Orizaba and the
Puebla de Perote?"
"You are labouring under some strange mistake."
"If I were, would you take it so quietly, unless you were a coward?
Mistaken! _Por vida del demonio_, I am not!"
"You are, fellow!"
"Oh, no, we are not mistaken," sneered the seaman.
"We?"
"Yes, we--Zuares and I. We knew you at once, and have known you ever
since we cleared the Thames; so you may as well let your beard grow,
and leave off skulking below when we take our trick at the wheel, or
our spell at church on Sunday. You may as well leave off your
blasted quarter-deck airs, too, for they won't go down with either of
us."
"Scoundrel!" began Hawkshaw.
"Hah! is it to be _guerra al cuchillo_ between us?" said the half
Spaniard, touching his knife with a grim smile; "if so, _cuidar con
el lobo!_"--(beware of the wolf.)
"Let me pass," said Hawkshaw, choking with rage.
"Not yet. I see you have still on your finger the ring we cut off
the hand of the old padre, whom we lured into the Barranca, by
sending, in the name of our Lady of Guadaloupe, a message that he
must hasten to a dying man."
"Liar!" hissed Hawkshaw, while the crew drew nearer.
"He bent down to hear the confession of the expiring sinner--you,
capitano--YOU, who sprang up and cut his throat. Ho! ho! Demonio, I
knew from the first that we were _companeros de viage_."
"Villain and fiend!" muttered Hawkshaw, while drops of shame and rage
rolled over his damp, pale visage, and his hands longed to clutch the
muscular throat of the brawnier, mocking, and malevolent Barradas;
"villain and fiend! so you are here?"
"Yes, and Zuares, too, Senor Capitano, as you have known well by the
skulking aft; so civility is best. Oh, neither of us have forgotten
that pleasant afternoon which we spent together in the Barranca
Secca."
"Was I to blame for your mistake, or your brother's crime?"
"Now, what have you to say that I do not denounce you to your fine
friends in the cabin, eh?--particularly to that girl with the dark
eyes. Santos! what shoulders she has, such a bust and ankles! and
then, there is that pretty little mina-bird, her sister, with the red
cheeks and plump arms. It makes a fellow's mouth water to see them
here upon the open ocean, so far from land--and help, eh, mates?--one
would admire a coal-black negress here. And so you love the oldest
one, capitano, eh?"
Hawkshaw drew back with indignant disgust at the idea of Ethel being
referred to by such lips.
"Hah, did I sting you there?" resumed Barradas; "well, beware that
you do not feel all the bitterness of losing her."
"Losing her?"
"Yes--before our ground-tackle is rove and ready. Take care,"
continued the mocking ruffian, "that you do not experience the
bitterness of seeing a happiness that shall never be yours, _ours_.
Harkee, _hombre_, can your fair ones swim?"
"Why?" asked Hawkshaw, mechanically.
"We meant to have had some fun with them when we crossed the Line,
and shall have it yet. In their dainty white English skins--nothing
else, remember--they will look uncommonly pretty floundering
alongside, in the belly of a top-gallant studding-sail, won't
they--eh?"
"You cannot mean--you dare not!" gasped Hawkshaw.
"Oh, don't be shocked, _companero_, before that comes to pass, you
and some others shall have walked the plank, or been shot endlong,
foot foremost, off a grating to leeward. Do you remember the Gulf of
Florida, and what we did there to the mate of the _Polacca_?"
"Will you keep silent?" groaned Hawkshaw.
"Yes--if I am paid for it," grinned the other.
"Of course."
"But how am I to answer for Zuares, unless he is paid, too?"
"Of course," replied Hawkshaw, utterly bewildered.
The storm so long dreaded had burst upon him at last; and this was
all he reaped by the cruel manner in which he had supplanted Morley
Ashton.
"Well, the _duros_?" resumed Pedro, with a scowl, placing his hooked
nose instantly within an inch of Hawkshaw's.
"I have no money."
"_Maldita!_" replied the South American, with a frown, "have you
nothing?"
"Absolutely nothing--but this watch."
"Let us see it--presto!" said the impatient Pedro, with an oath that
made even Hawkshaw shudder.
Turning his back to the quarter-deck, the latter drew from his vest
pocket, with a sullen, humiliated, and hang-dog aspect, a handsome
gold watch.
"_Muchos gratias_," said the mocking Barradas, with a grin, as he
snatched it away with such force as to snap the guard; and then he
thrust it into one of the pockets of his tarry trowsers, adding, "Now
be off to your quarter-deck, and take care how you come forward
again, _until you are wanted--vaya usted al demonio!_ and the devil
go with you!"
Barradas spat at Hawkshaw, with a scowl in his face, and turning
away, walked to the forecastle, laughing.
A red blindness came over Hawkshaw, as if a crimson cloud enveloped
him; he trembled in every limb, and his breath came in short painful
gaspings. So black was his fury, that at first he thought of getting
a revolver from his baggage, and shooting both the Barradas before
the passengers and crew; but the fear of being instantly immolated by
the latter restrained him, for he was a coward at heart, and one,
moreover, who felt that he dared not die!
He was staggering, oppressed by hate, by rage, and shame, with the
voice and mocking laugh of Barradas and his companions ringing in his
ears, filling his tortured heart with bitterness and confusion, when
suddenly several men on the weather-side exclaimed:
"A man in the water!"
"A dead body alongside!"
"Lay the ship in the wind!"
"Where away?" cried Mr. Quail.
"It's to leeward now. Bear a hand, boys; lower away the
quarter-boat--stand by the falls."
This clamour, perhaps, arrested some immediate catastrophe, and gave
a new current to the fierce emotions of Hawkshaw.
Though everything was set aloft that would draw or catch a breath of
air, the breeze was very light, and all upon the starboard beam; thus
the ship went very slowly through the water, with a steady but gentle
heel to port.
Far away to leeward the western sun cast her giant shadow upon the
sunny bosom of the deep, and it was in the midst of that shadow,
about twenty yards from the ship, that the sad object was seen
floating.
Soon it was abeam; then on the lee quarter, and soon astern, among
the gold-tipped summits of the waves, as they rippled up in rapid
succession beneath the passing breath of the light breeze.
Captain Phillips gave orders to lie to; so the mainyard was backed,
and two of the crew, who owned the aristocratic names of Cribbit and
Bolter, accompanied by Dr. Heriot, Manfredi, and Hawkshaw (who, after
his late excitement, was anxious to do something, he knew not what),
shoved off in the larboard quarter-boat, with four six-pound shots in
a canvas bag, to sink the body after examining it.
A few strokes of the oar brought them alongside, scaring away a flock
of Mother Gary's chickens that were hovering and tripping about it.
The body appeared to be that of a young seaman.
It was floating on its face, as all male corpses do when in the
water, while those of females float on their back. How is it
so?--let naturalists determine.
With his death-clutch his hands still grasped the lanyard of a
life-buoy, from which the action of the weather had effaced the
ship's name, and, as the poor fellow was minus a jacket, there were
no pockets to search for anything that could lead to his identity.
His dark hair rose and fell, floating on the water with every ripple
that ran past him.
"He must have fallen overboard in the night, or belonged to some
craft which has foundered in a storm that has not come our way," said
Manfredi.
"Aye, aye," added Dr. Heriot; "some morning, perhaps the poor fellow
little thought his soul would be required of him ere night; and
little thinks some poor wife or sweetheart, mother or sister, that
one they love is floating thus, so far from land."
"How long has he been in the water?" asked Hawkshaw, in a low tone.
"About four days, I think," replied Dr. Heriot, who, as he spoke,
smartly lashed the bag containing the four six-pound shots to the
feet of the corpse, at the same time desiring Hawkshaw with a
clasp-knife to cut away the lanyard of the life-buoy, which was
grasped by the hands of the deceased.
Hawkshaw reluctantly and shudderingly obeyed.
Then, as the poor corpse began to sink feet foremost, slowly,
solemnly, and gradually into the pale green and transparent sea, the
head rose, nodding, but almost erect, from the water.
The face became visible in the glare of the setting sun, now almost
level with the sea, and an exclamation of horror burst from Hawkshaw,
as he fell backward over the middle thwarts of the boat, for in the
ghastly lineaments of the sinking dead man, as the sea closed slowly
over them, he seemed to recognise--oh, was it conscience, fancy, or
reality?--the dreaded features of MORLEY ASHTON!
CHAPTER XXIV.
UP ANCHOR.
In all the fleet of merchantmen which crowded the busy harbour of Rio
de Janeiro, Morley could not discover a single vessel bound for the
Isle of France. There were hundreds freighted for Holland, the
Mediterranean, the Baltic, the United States, Britain, and elsewhere,
but not one for the island of his pilgrimage. So kind Tom Bartelot's
generosity was proffered in vain, and for a time poor Morley was in
despair!
To return to England merely to find that Ethel and her family had
sailed at the appointed time, months ago, for the Isle of France, was
a line of action to which he, by nature restless, impetuous, and
impatient, could by no means reconcile himself to adopt.
He wrote to her a passionate and loving letter by the British mail,
addressed to Laurel Lodge, to be forwarded after her, if she had
left. In this letter he detailed the story of his disappearance,
revealed the true character of Hawkshaw, and concluded by declaring
that, whatever happened, death alone would prevent him from finding
his way to her before the year was out.
And this letter, which he knew might be months in reaching her, he
dropped into the post-office in the Rua Dirieta, with a sigh of hope,
and turned away sadly, again to seek the docks where the _Princess_
lay, feeling oppressively in his heart that his youth was almost
gone--his once bright, hopeful youth gone--and without avail. A
bitter, bitter conviction!
His letter, penned at such a distance from her, in a humble little
posada, frequented by seamen, in the Campo de Santa Anna, though duly
forwarded by the mail from Rio to Liverpool (for reasons which the
reader will learn ere long) never reached the hand of Ethel Basset.
This, happily for himself, Morley could scarcely anticipate. The
return steamer from Liverpool would not leave Rio, he learned, until
its usual day of sailing (the 29th of every month); thus he knew that
the letter on which his very life seemed to depend would be lying
uselessly in the mail-bag for nearly three weeks. Tom Bartelot urged
that Morley should remain with him, and he, poor fellow, at present
had no other resource, and no immediate views.
"One chance remains," said Tom: "the _Princess_ may get a freight for
India or China, and, if so, it will go hard with me if I don't
contrive somehow to get a sight of the Isle of France."
But this hope was speedily dissipated by the ship being chartered for
Tasmania, or "Wan Demon's Land," as old Noah Gawthrop persisted in
calling it.
Bartelot and Morrison were busy daily about the ship. Cast thus upon
himself, Morley rambled listlessly about the streets of Rio, feeling
downcast, forlorn, strange, and miserable.
The glorious climate, the endless summer, the wonderful fruits and
flowers of the province, with the beauty of its capital city, alike
failed to soothe, to charm, or to interest him, for Ethel was not
there.
In vain he visited the gay and beautiful Rua do Ouvidor, the Regent
Street of Rio, with its magnificent shops, some of which have their
enormous windows piled with massive gold and silver plate, the
produce of Brazilian mines, while others sparkle with jewels. He saw
nothing to interest him in the quaint old palace of the Portuguese
viceroy, and equally little in the noble residence of San Chris to
val.
In vain he ascended the lofty hill which is crowned by the Church of
Our Lady of Glory, and saw, spread at his feet, the vast Bay of Rio,
with all its eighty isles and fleet of shipping, under steam, canvas,
and bare poles; its verdant eminences, every one of which is crowned
by a church or a convent, the surrounding mountains studded with
villages and villas, and all this visible by the warm and golden
light of a gorgeous Brazilian sunset in July.
There, on the western shore, rises the City of Palaces, where the
early voyagers, 300 years ago, saw but a savage waste, a howling
wilderness. What a change in the New World since these times, when,
as quaint Richard Hakluyt informs us:
"Old Master William Hawkins, of Plymouth, a man esteemed for his
wisdom, valour, experience, and skill in sea causes, much esteemed
and beloved of Henry VIII., and being one of the principal
sea-captains in the west port of England in his time, not contented
with the short voyages commonly made then to the coasts of Europe,
armed out a tall and goodlie ship, of the burthen of 250 tons, called
the _Paul_, of Plymouth, wherewith he made three long and prosperous
voyages unto the coast of Brazil--a thing in those days very rare,
especially in our nation."
Great, indeed, is now the change, from those days when the _Paul_, of
Plymouth, let go her anchor in the Ganabara Janeiro, as the bay was
then named.
If a man wishes to kill time or bury care, few places afford better
means for doing so than Rio, where all classes of that mixed race
which inhabit it have an unlimited love for mirth and pleasure; but
in vain did Morley Ashton, to the utmost of his limited means, visit
the opera, where the loveliest women of Brazil may be seen in full
ball costume, seated in boxes that are without fronts, as in our
European theatres; and alike in vain he sought the public
masquerades, and those glorious gardens by the cool seashore, for he
had but one idea, one desire, to see Rio sink astern.
In this public garden, which is laid out with wonderful taste and
skill by a Scottish gardener, with enormous flower-pots, shrubberies,
and parterres, with winding walks between, bordered by tropical
trees, whose luxuriant foliage forms cool shades from the sun, are
beautifully-formed alcoves of trellis work, painted bright green and
gold, and over these are trained the gorgeous and odoriferous
flowering plants of that lovely clime; and in these great bowers are
nightly supper parties, lighted less by gas than by the moon or
stars, where music, mirth, laughter, love, flirtation, and frequently
dancing, make the night glide into morning unperceived; but of all
this, too, did our lost lover soon weary.
To lessen his gnawing anxiety, to spend the weary time, to make
himself useful, and in some measure, by doing so, to repay, if only
by mere manual labour, the friendliness of Tom Bartelot, Morley tried
to become available on board the _Princess_, which was being rapidly
got ready for sea, and he endeavoured to interest himself in all the
details thereof.
Every huge round cask of sugar or tobacco that was lowered into the
capacious hold seemed to hasten her departure, and every day that
passed was reckoned by our lover as one less of absence from Ethel.
Ah! if, after all he had undergone, he should only meet her to find
that she was lost to him for ever! But he thrust that idea aside,
and, in spite of all that Tom Bartelot would say, he "tallyed on" at
the rope, and "took his spell," like a veritable negro, at hoisting
in the cargo.
A numerous gang of slaves, natives of Angola (for to that province
the trade in "black passengers" is restricted in Brazil), sent by the
merchant who had chartered the ship, soon accomplished this, and ere
long the hatches were battened down, the tarpaulins spread over them,
and the iron bands locked round the coamings.
Many of those slaves who worked on board were captured fugitives; and
to Morley's European eye there was something strikingly repulsive in
the iron neck-collars with which they were accoutred, like mastiff
dogs, while others had masks of tin that concealed the lower part of
their faces, and were secured at the back by iron padlocks.
Yet these poor wretches were as merry as crickets withal, and tramped
away with their bare black feet on the sun-blistered deck, keeping
chorus and time to some uncouth ditty which they had learned in the
vast forests of their native Angola.
In their activity, especially under the long lash of their
broad-brim-hatted taskmasters, they formed a strange contrast to the
lazy Portuguese, or Spanish South Americans, who lounged, or, to use
a well-known western word, "loafed" about the piers and quays in the
sunshine, clad in their coarse but brilliantly-coloured _surreppas_
or blanket-cloaks, that hid their rags, or, it may be, nakedness
below; their poncho wrappers, or _abarcas_, or leather leggings,
wherein the dagger-knife was stuck, like the skene-dhu of the
Scottish Highlanders--solemn, stately, and polite ragamuffins, always
smoking, wherever or however got, a paper cigarito.
Slowly, slowly, to Morley Ashton, seemed to pass the hours of the
insipid anchor-watch, when he performed that duty, with his eyes
fixed on the countless lights of Rio, that shed long lines of
tremulous radiance across the bay, and his thoughts, as ever, with
Ethel Basset.
This is a small watch, composed of one, and, at times, of two men,
who look after the ship while at anchor or in port; and Morley was
frequently so abstracted or taciturn that his watchmate or companion,
when he had one, usually coiled himself up and dozed off to sleep
under the counter of the longboat, so our poor lover, when left in
charge of the deck, always forgot to strike the bell, which it was
his duty to do every half hour, as if the vessel were at sea.
On the 23rd July, after being thirteen days in Rio de Janeiro, the
_Princess_ was ready for sea, and blue peter flying at her
foremast-head. The hands were all busy preparing for their new and
long voyage; the royal-yards were crossed aloft; the chafing gear
(mats or other stuff to save the rigging from being frayed) was
shipped on the backstays, or wherever necessary; the last of the sea
stores were taken in, and the studding-sail gear rove.
The carpenter gave the ship a final touch of paint all round, the
standing and running rigging got their last overhauling, after the
fag-end of the cargo, which was principally composed of tobacco and
sugar, was hoisted in from a lighter alongside, and stowed away by
negroes between decks; the last boat laden with water had come off
and been hoisted to the davits, and about 4 P.M. Morley, with delight
in his heart, heard Bartelot's welcome order:
"All hands stand by the anchor--ahoy!"
It was soon heaved up, and hung dripping at the cathead; then came
the next orders to set the courses, cast loose the topsails, jib, and
staysails, to sheet home and hoist away.
Old Noah Gawthrop grasped the wheel, the sails filled, her head payed
off, and the tall cone of the giant Pao d'Asucar, which was before
astern, was now on the larboard bow, and the _Princess_ began to
leave the harbour of Rio.
In working out among the many isles which stud that magnificent bay,
bracing the yards sharp to port and then to starboard every few
minutes, a tug steamer nearly ran foul of her.
"Look out!" shouted the carpenter, who was probably thinking of his
new paint, while assisting to get the anchor a-cockbill; "are your
eyes no better than sojers' buttons, Noah?"
Old Noah, who handled the ship to perfection, disdained to reply as
he looked grimly at the puffing, pursy tug; but, nevertheless,
contrived to let the foreyardarm get foul of the foretopmast
rattlings of an ugly, squat, hermaphrodite brig[*] which shot
suddenly round the little isle of Paqueta, going at great speed, with
a vast fore-and-aft mainsail.
[*] A vessel with a schooner's mainmast and brig's foremast.
"Hallo, Noah," cried Morrison; "are you playing at sojers with that
wheel?"
"Are you going to sleep? Wipe your eyes with the flying jib," added
Bartelot angrily, while some men jumped aloft and got the hamper
clear.
"Dash my wig!" growled Noah, "after clearing a dirty smoke-jack, to
run foul o' that ere confounded butter-box! 'tain't like me, sir,
'tain't like me."
"I know it is not like your steering, you old Triton," said Tom
Bartelot; "but keep a bright look-out for the next craft that comes
near us, or your next glass of grog won't be measured by the rule of
thumb."
Poor old Noah, who had been a man-of-war's-man, and served with the
Black Sea fleet at Sebastopol, and who rather prided himself upon his
steering, almost wept with shame and vexation. Spasms twisted his
ancient visage, which was wrinkled like the kernel of a dry nut, and
his grey eyes, the pupils of which were like herring scales, glared
as he griped the wheel, with an air as much as to say:
"Thumb-grog or not, sir, pity the next craft as I runs foul
on--damme!"
And here, for the information of the uninitiated in such matters, we
may mention that the grog so specially mentioned, referred to that
made for the watch who came below in the dark; it was measured by
dipping the thumb into the can, to ascertain when it contained enough
of rum before adding water thereto; but, as the nights were often
cold as well as dark, the regular old salt had usually no sensation
in his thumb till the rum rose to the second joint thereof.
"'Twarn't my fault, sir!" resumed Noah, as Bartelot came aft; "that
hermaphrodite brig don't answer her helm a bit--see how her mainsheet
jibs."
"She is an old tub," said Bartelot, "and rolls at least twenty times
per minute in a sea-way, or, like a crab, goes sideways,
broadside-on, and any way but ahead."
"Shiver my topsails!" shouted Noah, with delight, "if she won't be
bump ashore upon that blowed island of Packwetty, and sarve her
right, too."
Contrary to his revengeful wish, however, the brig cleared it, and
now the _Princess_ soon passed the Castle of Santa Cruz, the giant
rock of the Pao d'Asucar, after which she felt the full force of the
sea breeze, and trimmed her sails on the starboard tack.
Morley was full of joy, and strangely excited.
The evening was a splendid one, and all the crew were in their summer
gear--straw hats, white duck trousers, and flannel shirts of any
colour they chose.
By 8 P.M. the coast of Brazil was many miles off, and all the outline
of the land wore a deep blue indigo tint, against a warm sky of the
most brilliant gold and burnt-sienna, that gradually turned to
crimson, as the sun set behind the mountains of the Corcovado, the
Sugar-loaf, and La Gaviá.
The pharos at the mouth of the Bay of Rio was twinkling like a star
that sunk at times amid the darkening waves, while, with night
closing around her, the _Princess_, with royals and studding-sails
set, bore swiftly on her course through the lonely waters of the
Southern Atlantic Ocean.
CHAPTER XXV.
THE SUSPICIOUS SAIL.
Though, to the impatient landsman, life on board ship becomes soon
monotonous, to be once again at sea was soothing to Morley Ashton.
He was not without imagination, and something of the poetic in his
temperament; thus, when contemplating the ocean, he felt how much
there is of the grand and sublime, the terrible and beautiful, the
free and fetterless in it; and hence, perhaps, the great popularity
of most tales, novels, and romances, which refer to that aqueous
element.
Morley seemed to become a new man. With all his disappointments, he
was too young not to feel the fresh impulses of youth strong within
him; and thus hope seemed to come with the keen breeze that blew over
the starlit sea, as he and Morrison trod the deck, keeping together
the middle watch, which extends from midnight till four in the
morning.
"There is," says one of the liveliest of our English writers, "a
great feeling of freedom in being the arbiter of one's actions, to go
where you will and when you will. The first burst of life is,
indeed, a glorious thing; youth, health, hope, and confidence, have
each a force and vigour they lose in after years. Life is then, a
splendid river, and we are swimming with the stream.--no adverse
waves to weary, no billows to buffet with us, as we hold on our way
rejoicing."
Morley had buffeted with many adverse waves, but it was the ardour
and confidence of this "first burst of life" and spring of youth that
enabled him to surmount them; and, inspired by it, he looked
hopefully and manfully forward to the vague and uncertain future.
Being an intelligent, well-educated, and well-read man, with a strong
sense of probity and trust in religion, Morrison, though several
years his senior, formed an admirable companion and occasional mentor
to Morley. He was a man who had undergone many vicissitudes in life;
but believing rigidly that all things were ordered for our ultimate
good, and nothing evil occurred which might not have been worse, he
passed through the world with a tolerable air of philosophy, and he
contrived somehow to infuse into Morley's more ardent nature the
quiet of content for the present time, with a spirit of perseverance
and hope for that to come.
So Morrison talked away about Ethel Basset, as if he had known her
all his life. He pointed out a variety of ways and means for
reaching the Isle of France. He calculated the distance to a nicety;
about 2,400 miles from Rio to the Cape; about 4,800 miles from thence
to Tasmania; and about 2,400 more from thence to the Isle of France.
In short, making allowance for variation, leeway, head-winds, and so
forth, poor Morley found that he must traverse at least 9,600 miles
before he saw the land that was Ethel's new home!
At this calculation he could not repress a sigh and an emotion of
repining, notwithstanding all the patience and philosophy with which
his Scottish friend sought to inspire him.
But the ship flew fast on her watery path. She was spanking along at
the rate of nine knots an hour over a smooth sea with a glorious sky
overhead--a sky wherein he saw, for the first time, the Hole, or, as
sailors term it, "the Coal-sack," a deep and dark blue starless space
in the southern quarter of the heavens, an appearance only to be
found in those latitudes where, in its far immensity of lightless
azure, that portion of the sky becomes black, as if it had been
pierced by a hole.
After they had been three days out from Rio, early in the morning,
Morley was roused from sleep, first by the rattling and hauling aft
of the starboard chain, which the watch on deck were unbending for
stowage in the cable-tier, and second by a conversation at the
companion hatch, where he heard the voices of Bartelot and Gawthrop,
who both summoned Morrison with something of excitement in their
tone, so he, too, hurried on deck.
The wind, which had been due west all night, enabling the _Princess_
to run her course with both sheets aft, had veered round to the
northward: so she was now trimmed with her starboard tacks on board,
and had all her fore-and-aft canvas set.
"What is the matter?" asked Morley.
"Look astern," replied Bartelot.
He did so, and saw a long, low brigantine, with a black hull, and a
vast spread of snow-white canvas, heading directly in their wake
about ten miles astern.
Every time she rose upon a wave her bright copper flashed in the
morning sun, and the foam that flew off from each side from her sharp
black prow was white as the cloth of the long tapering jib and fly
ing-jib that bellied out from the bowsprit and boom above.
The crew of the _Princess_ were all grouped aft about the quarter,
regarding her with some anxiety, conferring in whispers, and the
telescope was passed alternately from Bartelot and Morrison to Noah
Gawthrop, Ben Plank, the carpenter, and some of the older men of the
crew.
"Is there anything suspicious about her?" asked Morley of Gawthrop,
who was taking a long and steady look at her through a
tarpaulin-covered telescope.
Noah did not reply immediately; but vigorously expectorated his quid
to leeward, and again applied his stern grey visual organ to the
glass, puckering up the other fearfully as he closed it.
"When I came on deck this morning that craft was hull down at the
horizon, bearing northward close-hauled; but she soon altered her
course and headed directly after us. As I did not like the cut of
her jib, or her hull either, for the matter of that, I kept the ship
away six or eight points, upon which she still headed after us, and
spread more canvas, which I saw her crew had been wetting. I hoisted
our ensign, to which she made no reply by showing any colour, not
even a thread of bunting. She is full of men; I don't like her look
at all, and don't see why she should be dodging in this way."
This was the explanation of Bartelot, who added:
"And now, Noah, what do you say?"
"I say, sir, as she's a powerfully-built brigantine--coppered to the
bends, sharp as a needle, and harmed, too, sir--harmed. She has
stings in her, that wasp has! Blowed if I don't see 'em a-tricing up
her bow ports now! She's up to some mischief, that confounded
miskitty; so as we can't meet her in her own fashion, my advice,
captain, is to give her a jolly wide berth."
"Just what I mean to do, Noah. She has gained a knot on us in the
last twenty minutes; so, on a wind, we are no match for her; but
before the wind we'll give her the go-by hand over hand."
Bartelot now ordered the vessel's course to be altered due south; the
tacks to be brought aft, the fore-and-aft canvas to be reduced, the
studding-sails to be set, and each, before it was hoisted out, was
well drenched by buckets of water, to make the canvas draw better;
and from the tops and cross-trees the courses and topsails underwent
a similar process. The royals were set, and little triangular
skysails above them, too; thus, in a very few minutes, the _Princess_
was flying right before the wind under a mighty spread of canvas.
The morning breeze was fresh and increasing, and as she tore through
the glittering water at the rate of ten knots an hour, deeply laden
as she was, it literally smoked under her bows, and flew over her
dripping catheads, while her new wake was one of white froth, like a
mill-race, extending at an acute angle from the old one.
"Hah! look there--how well I knew she was bent on mischief!"
exclaimed Bartelot. A white puff, reduced by distance to the size of
a whiff of tobacco, escaped from, her lee-bow, and a long time after,
for she was nine miles or so astern, the report of a cannon came over
the water, but still no colours were displayed. "I knew it would
come to this; round goes her foretopsail-yard square before the wind."
With man-o'-war-like rapidity she, too, altered her course, set her
fore-royal, her fore-top and top-gallant studding-sails, easing off
the long spanker-boom and sheet of her enormous fore-and-aft
mainsail, above which, on a mast that tapered away aloft like a
fishing-rod, she hoisted a tall, shoulder-of-mutton gaff-topsail.
Fast flew the foam before her now, rising at times so high as to hide
nearly her black hull, the fulcrum above which this cloud of canvas
swayed as she rolled heavily from side to side; but, sharply though
she was built, and swiftly as she had hitherto run upon the wind, she
was no match _before_ it for a square-rigged vessel like the
_Princess_, with her greater spread of sail.
So now she was left astern as fast as previously she had been
overhauling the _Princess_, and as both were now trimmed dead before
the wind, each rolled heavily from side to side.
This too-evident pursuit caused considerable excitement, and no small
anxiety on board; for, with the exception of a revolver of Tom
Bartelot's, and a couple of fowling-pieces, the crew had no arms
whatever, save handspikes and their sheath knives, with which to
encounter the pirate, if such she proved to be.
That she was not a ship of war was evident, as she did not possess
steam power, and carried neither ensign nor pennant at this juncture;
so, whatever her object was, Tom Bartelot, in his present defenceless
condition, was resolved to avoid her acquaintance, and continued to
run due south during the whole day, for though she was left astern,
the brigantine still continued to pursue them, with four long sweeps
out, which her crew worked amidships; but, about the middle of the
first dog-watch, viz., four o'clock P.M., she was more than hull down
at the horizon.
Clouds were banking up to windward; the weather was becoming hazy;
but while daylight lasted, Bartelot did not alter his southern
course, though he took in some of his studdingsails, and sent down
his royals and skysails.
When darkness had fairly set, he reduced the last of his
studdingsails, set his fore and mainstay sail, brought the starboard
tacks on board, and kept the ship upon her former course, after being
forced by this little rencontre on the high seas to run about 100
miles out of it, for the ship had gone for more than ten hours at an
average of ten knots per hour by the log-line.
He gave Gawthrop the wheel, and ordered him to steer by the stars,
when he could see them, as he kept the binnacle dark, lest its lamps,
by their light, might reveal the ship's course to some keen-sighted
mastheadman of the suspicious brigantine. The cabin lamp was lit
below, but a tarpaulin was spread over the skylight.
Silence was ordered to be kept on deck, as water will convey every
sound to a vast distance; so, thus, in the dark, without moon, and
with very few stars visible through the gathering scud, to guide our
steersman, the ship sped upon her eastern course once more. The
chase of the day formed a fruitful theme in the cabin that night,
where they frequently congratulated themselves on their escape, and
many a strange story of the pirates, whom the progress of steam, and
its adoption in war vessels, had swept from those southern waters,
served to beguile the night.
Morrison, who had the history and memoirs of all the buccaneers of
America and the Indian Isles by heart, particularly excelled in the
yarns he spun; but the most quaint was one he told of a Scottish
skipper--a Hebridean from Stornaway--who possessed a bottle, the
stopper of which informed him how to steer for the avoidance of
storms as well as the sailor's horn-book could do.
"A bottle!" exclaimed Bartelot. "I have heard of many a man who has
lost his life, and his ship also, by application thereto; but never
of one who saved them through its means."
"But this bottle and its stopper were unlike any you ever saw.
"So 'twould seem."
"It was one of our old flat-bottomed, blue Scotch dram-bottles, and
had a quaint stopper of delf-ware, in the form of a man's head, with
a rubicund visage, a jovial-mouth, wicked-looking little eyes, and a
comical red hat. By day, or at any time when the skipper was not
present, the queer visage which surmounted the cork remained stolid
and immovable, and to all appearance mere delf, like any other
stopper where a human face was carved or cast. But at night, when
the skipper was seated at his grog, the steward, who peeped in from
the steerage the man at the helm, who also peeped down through the
skylight; the mate or anyone else who came suddenly below for orders,
would find the skipper talking away to the stopper in the bottle
neck--the little head was seen to nod waggishly, the eyes to wink and
leer, the mouth to laugh, and the little red tongue to speak merrily;
and it was further said, that the bottle had the admirable and
economical property of being always half full----"
"Like the widow's cruse of oil?"
"Yes; but with the best Campbelton--some said Islay whisky--the
quantity of which never diminished, yet it was never replenished by
the steward, for the skipper seemed to prize his bottle as if it were
the lamp of Aladdin, and always locked it carefully fast in the stern
locker."
"And where is this jolly old bottle now?"
"At his death, he bequeathed it to a crack-brained skipper of
Montrose, who, under its influence, astounded the public by the
discoveries he made."
"How?"
"He sent the spirit of the bottle, in the form of a woman--a
_clairvoyante_--to pry aboard a war ship in the West Indies; to
search for Sir John Franklin; to visit his family in heaven, and
bring back locks of their hair; to inquire after numerous enemies,
who had all gone to the other place--and all of which revelations he
duly recorded as they came to pass, in a Scotch newspaper, to the
great astonishment of the queen's lieges."
About twelve o'clock, Bartelot went on deck, and adjusted his
night-glass to sweep the horizon; but so dark and hazy was the
atmosphere, that a large ship might have been within three miles of
the _Princess_ and yet have been invisible from her deck; so, as the
middle watch was Morrison's, he and Morley turned in, and soon were
sound asleep.
At 4 P.M. the latter was awakened by the bell being struck, and the
morning watch called.
"Is that you, Morrison?" asked Bartelot, from his berth, as a step
was heard in the cabin.
"Yes, sir; I was just about to call you in haste."
"About that rascally brigantine?"
"No, sir."
"What is in sight, then??
"Land on the weather-bow, and we are raising it fast."
"Land!" exclaimed Bartelot, in astonishment.
"Bearing about twenty miles distant."
"Bah! Cape Flyaway. You have been at your Montrose skipper's
wonderful dram-bottle."
"Land as solid as the Bass Rock," continued the Scotchman
obstinately; "I have just had a squint at it from the
fore-crosstrees, and now mean to have a look at the chart."
"This must be some of your second sight--there is no island
hereabout, Morrison. Come Morley, turn out--tumble up, there, and
let us have a look at Morrison's enchanted island. How's the wind?"
"Veering ahead."
"And how does she lie?"
"East and by north," replied Morrison, glancing at the tell-tale
compass that swung in the skylight, and which is constructed so as to
hang with its face downward, for use in the cabin. Bartelot dressed
in haste, and was soon on deck, where Morley joined him.
Although our hero knew it not--for who can foresee what to-morrow may
bring forth?--this enforced and necessary divergence from the
vessel's proper course brought about a very strange episode, or
adventure, which cast some light upon the origin, and, it might be,
the crimes, of certain persons whom we have been, however
unwillingly, compelled by the force of circumstances and the tenor of
our story, to introduce to the reader.
CHAPTER XXVI.
THE STRANGE ISLAND.
When they came on deck, day was breaking. The stars were still
sparkling brightly in the blue zenith, and in the western quarter of
the sky; but they paled away and faded out, as dawn spread over the
east, and stole across the ocean in those long streaks of light that
are rendered so weird, strange, and indistinct, from having only the
tops of the lone waves to rest upon.
There is, indeed, something glorious and impressive in the dawn of a
new day, as it spreads over the unlimited space of the mighty deep;
and this effect increases in its splendour, as the sun, with tropical
rapidity, heaves up at the horizon, amid a burst of golden haze, and
then all becomes life and light. There is no eagle there to soar
towards him, with the dew on his pinions, and no lark to sing at
"heaven's gate;" but the petrels trip along the brine, the huge
porpoise soars through the foam rejoicingly, and the silvery flying
fish flits like a little spirit from the spray.
The wind was very light; the vessel was creeping along under a cloud
of canvas, and as Morley came on deck the watch were busy swabbing
it. No need was there to drench it first with water; there had been
a rough gale in the morning watch, during which Morrison had ordered
the foresail and foretopsail to be hoisted; since then, the wind had
come in angry puffs, and then died gradually away.
Now the ship was almost becalmed, and there, sure enough, upon her
weather bow, a few miles off, lay the land which Morrison had so
confidently reported, rising in dark and opaque outline, like a dusky
patch of indigo, against the yellow and gold of the sky beyond, and
the amber sea, that lay in middle distance.
For a time it looked like a dark cloud resting on the sunlit ocean,
from which it might arise and melt away, but, gradually, as the ship
crept on, the form of a headland, and some tuft-like palm-trees,
became defined against the sky.
Higher rose the sun, and ere long the beams began to gild this
headland, and to shine glitteringly on the face of a bluff, in which
it terminated.
"Land it is--but land here!" said Captain Bartelot.
"An island, and not a very small one either," added Morley.
"It is most extraordinary!"
"How so?"
"Bring up the chart, Morrison," said Bartelot, unheeding his friend's
query, "and the log-book, too, with yesterday's reckoning and
observation."
Morrison dived below, but speedily re-appeared, with a chart and the
ship's log.
"At twelve, sir, yesterday, when we were running away from that
rascally piccaroon, we were in latitude 28--25 south; longitude
35--20 west, Tristan d'Acunha bearing sixty-six miles to the
eastward."
"That is not Tristan, but an island about three miles long, and there
is no indication of it whatever in the chart. It is covered with
trees; but I can see no sign of a human habitation," observed
Bartelot, as he resumed his telescope.
Light though the wind, the ship gradually crept nearer the island;
and by breakfast time is was abeam of her, and about four miles
distant.
Save the rock before mentioned, no part of it was very high; it
seemed to be about the size stated by Bartelot, and yet, strange to
say, it was not recorded or borne in any map or chart on board.
Now there fell a dead and listless calm.
The sun was burning hot and the sea glistened like oil beneath its
rays, but the fertility and greenness of this nameless and unknown
isle were charming to look upon. Morley regretted the fresh delay
occasioned by this calm, especially after the lost hundred miles
yesterday (though a hundred were a trifle after Morrison's galling
calculation of the oceans he had yet to traverse), but he could not
resist the emotions of curiosity and novelty so peculiar to his age
and temperament; and thus he expressed a strong wish to visit this
_terra incognita_--this beautiful island of the southern sea. But
Bartelot hesitated.
"It may be the head-quarters, the rendezvous, of those who pursued us
yesterday," said he; "and some of their sort, shipmates and
companions, may be lurking among those thickets, the foliage of which
seems so inviting."
"Save the sea-birds, I cannot discover a living object about it,"
urged Morley.
"There may be savages--who can say?--and most likely wild animals.
There are some very ferocious boars on Tristan d'Acunha, and other
South Sea isles. Then we have no arms."
"The revolver and two fowling-pieces----"
"Are not enough, Morley."
"Come, let us be off."
"Lastly, a sudden breeze might spring up, and blow the ship off the
island to sea, so far that the boat, and what would be worse, its
crew, might be lost. Four sufficient reasons, Morley, for not
venturing ashore."
So Bartelot resisted all his friend's importunities, and the day
passed away in idleness, after an observation had been taken at noon,
and the exact bearings of the island recorded in the ship's log by
Morrison, for the information of the Admiralty, Lloyd's, and others
in London.
The calm continued; not a speck could be traced in the unclouded sky,
betokening a coming wind, or a casual current of air. The ship lay
like a log, with her courses clewed up, her spanker brailed and all
the rest of her canvas hanging loose and straight from the yardheads;
the wheel, left to itself, oscillated a spoke or two, alternately to
port and starboard. There seemed to be little or no current in the
water; she had probably not moved in any way more than half her own
length for three hours, as Morley perceived by a bunch of seaweed,
the top tuft of some mighty trailer (the root of which was, perhaps,
forty fathoms deep in the bed of the ocean), which rested on the oily
surface of the water, and remained in the same position, with regard
to the ship, about five feet from the port quarter-gallery.
In the first dog-watch, about four o'clock P.M., finding matters
still thus, and seeing all quiet on the isle, the whole outline of
which was reflected downward, as if in a mirror, and with wonderful
minuteness, the captain ordered the gig to be lowered. The
fowling-pieces and revolver were carefully loaded, capped, and placed
in her, and then he, Morley, old Gawthrop, and three more of the crew
shoved off for the shore, or, as they called it, in default of a
better name, "Bill Morrison's Island!"
The light gig shot swiftly over the smooth sea, which our friends
soon perceived to be full of gigantic trailers and floating leaves;
amid these, through the translucent waters, at a vast depth from its
surface, the finny tribes, especially the beautiful silver fish,
could be seen darting to and fro.
A little sandy creek or bight, bordered by mangrove trees and wild
palms, opened before the boat, and offered a secure landing place,
though overhung by rocks, that seemed to be literally alive with
albatrosses, sea-hens, and other aquatic birds.
In a short space, Morley, Bartelot, and Noah Gawthrop, with the three
fire-arms, leaped ashore, and desiring their three shipmates who were
in the gig to lie on their oars a few yards off, to prevent any
surprise, they started on their tour of discovery.
The island was covered with wood, the foliage of which was singularly
luxuriant, and of the most lovely green. Many of the trees and
plants were strongly aromatic, and filled the air with delicious
perfume. The myrtles, in particular, were of gigantic size, and
there were several groves of the graceful cocoa-palm, under which
were gourds, ground apples, and other tropical vegetables, growing in
wild luxuriance.
A bird suddenly whirred up from the covert at Morley's feet.
Bang went one of the barrels of his fowling-piece, and the bird fell
with flapping wings a few yards off, while hundreds of others, scared
apparently by a sound so unusual as the report of a gun, flew hither
and thither in confusion and dismay.
"A good shot, Morley," said Bartelot; "but reload instantly, and
don't fire again. We don't know whom we may meet in these woods, so
it is as well to be prepared."
The bird proved to be a species of black-cock, that is not uncommon
in the islands of the South Atlantic.
"Keep a bright look-out ahead, sir," said Noah Gawthrop in a low
voice; "this island ain't quite so desolate as it looks, arter all."
"How?"
"I'm blessed if here ain't a regular made road, and no mistake,
captain."
As Noah spoke, he pointed to a distinct foot track, or narrow beaten
way, that passed through the grass. In one direction it led to a
spring of deliciously cool and pure water, that fell plashing amid
the sylvan silence from the face of a rock, which was covered with
brilliant wild flowers; in the other it led away through a thicket of
myrtles, from amid which some wild goats fled, as our explorers
cautiously, and with cocked fire-arms, proceeded onward.
Morley was thinking of Ethel, and if with her what an Eden this
lonely isle would be; but it was not without emotions of considerable
anxiety and curiosity that he and his two companions continued to
pursue the narrow track, which ascended in regular zigzag windings to
the summit of that high rock, which they had first discerned at sea,
and on the face of which the morning sun had shone so brightly.
"It is merely a track made by the goats or wild boars," said
Bartelot; "the spring below seems to be the only one in the island,
and there, no doubt, they drink."
"Mayhap, sir, the wild boars, and the wild goatses made the road; but
'twasn't them as made this bit o' furnitur--out of a ship's
sheathing, too," exclaimed Noah, when, on the very summit of the
eminence, that overlooked a vast expanse of sea, they came upon a
rude seat, formed, apparently, by the number of holes pierced through
it at regular intervals, from a piece of ship's planking, pegged down
upon two uprights, which were securely driven into the turf.
The pathway ended here, and the soil about the seat seemed bare and
denuded of grass, as if worn away by the feet of frequent sitters.
"What can this mean on such a place?" observed Tom Bartelot,
perspiring with heat, and pushing his straw hat on one side of his
handsome curly head.
"It means, sir, as there is some reg'lar-built Robinson Crusoe a
livin' on this here island, and has made himself this seat to take a
good squint to seaward comfortable ov a mornin', to look out for a
ship, or, it may be, for the king of the Cannibal Islands, and them
cussed ribroasting salwages in their piratical canoos."
This idea of Noah Gawthrop's seemed extremely probable; but after
making a circuit of the entire island, they found themselves again on
the eminence without discovering other traces of the supposed recluse.
After hallooing repeatedly, scaring all kinds of wild birds from the
thickets above, and the gorse or jungle below, they descended towards
the spring; but before reaching it found a track that diverged from
thence into the very centre of the isle.
Proceeding onward, their curiosity becoming whetted at every step,
they perceived a piece of cleared ground, covered with fine grass, on
which some goats and little kids, that appeared quite tame, were
browsing.
Near this, enclosed by a fence of branches, torn from trees, stuck in
the earth, and twisted together, was a small garden, wherein were
some turnips, potatoes, radishes, ground apples, and other esculents
growing; and sheltered by a grove of giant myrtles, close by, was a
little hut, or wigwam, formed of driftwood, fragments of wreck, palm
leaves, and turf.
It measured only about twelve feet by ten; it was about nine feet in
height, and was covered by masses of beautiful scarlet-runners, and
other parasitical plants of the tropics.
The door, a panelled mahogany one, which had evidently been once a
portion of a large ship's cabin, was open; so the explorers advanced,
and, on entering, beheld a very remarkable, and, indeed, appalling
spectacle.
CHAPTER XXVII.
THE HERMIT.
The western sun streamed into the humble hut through the open door,
in a broad and yellow flake of light, that seemed to pierce like a
solid body the almost palpable obscurity within; and where that flake
of sunlight fell full in its glory, there lay, stretched on a bed of
moss and dry leaves, an old man, who was too evidently in the last
throes of death.
He was clad in a species of long brown weed, which was fashioned like
a friar's gown, but had a hood or tippet, formed of grass matting,
and both were worn, torn, patched, and mended thriftily.
A cord--a piece of common rope--girt his waist, and thereat hung a
little wooden cross, formed, apparently, by himself, of twigs of the
myrtle tied cruciform.
His feet were bare, and, like his hands, they were shrivelled and
attenuated, till every bone and muscle was painfully visible. His
head was bald by age; his features seemed to have been noble and
commanding, and a beard, bushy but dignified, and white as snow,
flowed over his breast, and reached to his girdle.
He was dying, whether of age, of illness, want of nourishment, or all
these three combined, those who looked on him knew not.
Livid hues were spreading over his face rapidly; his nose, which was
fine and aquiline, became pinched and white at the point.
As the visitors stooped over him, his eyes dilated, as if he were
still partially sensible to external objects; but it was evident that
sight had left him, and that the darkness of death was there.
The hardships incident to a life of seclusion and mortification, such
as his must have been on that lonely island, together with his
wretched attire and venerable white beard, all served to make him
seem a patriarch in years; but Bartelot supposed that he was not much
over sixty.
"He is sinking--dying' fast," said he, in a whisper, as he took off
his hat, while an irresistible emotion of reverence and awe stole
over him.
"Outward bound, heaven help him! Goin' forren, and no mistake," said
Noah Gawthrop, doffing his straw hat. "I've seen some poor cretturs
like this, when I was in the Naval Brigade at Sebastypool. One was
always a crossing ov hisself from stem to starn, and from port to
starboard. Another was wot they calls a darvish--he was always a
spinning of hisself like a peg-top, and shouting, 'Allar--Allar!'
Now, I reckons this here's been a darvish o' some kind."
"Had we come ashore this morning at the time I proposed, we might
have saved him, Tom," said Morley, in a low tone, to Bartelot. The
latter shook his head, and again the pupils of the glazing eyes
dilated, as if the sufferer's ear had caught a passing sound.
"Well," resumed Noah Gawthrop, hissing a kind of sigh through his
clenched teeth; "it is a darned hard thing for a poor old fellow like
this to slip his cable without knowing what port he may have to steer
for."
"He'll be brought up in heaven with a round turn, old boy; at least,
I hope so," said Bartelot, as he knelt down and applied to the
sufferer's lips a little water from a gourd or calabash that lay near.
Another vessel of the same primitive kind contained some _yerba_,
leaves of an evergreen common in Paraguay, and in the isles of the
south, which, when diluted with water, yields a species of tea. A
smaller calabash contained some goat's milk; such were the equipage
and last repast of this poor old recluse.
"See, Captain Bartelot, here is summut wrote on this bit o' plank,"
said Noah; "it's in some forren lingo, as I takes it."
On the board which formed the head of the truckle-bed, whereon the
hermit lay, appeared a cross, carved as if with a knife, and the
following inscription or request:
"Hermano[*] Pedro Zuares Miguel de Barradas,
"1863.
"Rueguen a Dios por el."
[*] Brother.
About five minutes after they entered, a heavy sigh, with a gurgling
sound, escaped the hermit, his head turned over a little on one side,
the lower jaw fell, quivered, became still, and all was over, and the
three strangers remained mute, hat in hand, and gazing with emotions
of solemnity and awe on this piteous spectacle.
What was his story? What were the crimes he had committed, the
wrongs he had endured at the hands of man, of woman, of the world,
that he had been driven to seek a life of such wild and savage
seclusion?
Was it the result of eccentric choice, or an inevitable necessity?
Who was he, and whence came he? How long had his dreary lot been
cast in that voiceless and solitary isle. Had he been the last, or
sole survivor, of some ill-fated crew, whose ship had never been
heard of since she left her port in old Spain, to be cast away amid
the lonely waters of the southern sea?
All these questions must remain unanswered now, and be committed to
oblivion with him in his solitary island grave.
That he was a Spaniard was evident from the name, if, as they had no
reason to doubt, that name was his which was carved upon the plank
that formed a portion of his humble couch, and also from the language
of the request, "Pray to God for him," which was written underneath.
Deeply impressed by what they had witnessed, Morley Ashton, Tom
Bartelot, and Noah quitted the hut, and under the bright sunshine
stepped towards the little garden, where the few herbs the hermit's
hand would never cull were ripening in the warm glow.
After a pause, Bartelot said:
"We must give the old man a Christian burial, for we can't shove off
to the ship, and leave him lying there like a dead gull."
He looked at his watch, and then at the sun, and added:
"We have two hours yet before sunset; the calm still holds--not a
breath of air on land or sea--and the ship is lying yonder like a
log. Run to the boat, Noah, shove off to her, and bid the men
stretch well on their oars, as we have no time to lose. Bring Ben
Plank, the carpenter, ashore, with some boards to make a coffin;
bring a shovel, and my prayer-book, for the English burial service.
He wouldn't have believed in it much, perhaps, poor man! but 'twill
serve his turn now, as well as another, I hope. Look sharp, old
fellow."
"Aye, aye, sir," said Tom, twitching his forelock, and hastening to
the creek where the boat lay, with its occupants smoking listlessly
in the sunshine, and wondering "what the deuce the skipper was up to
in that 'ere island," till Noah enlightened them by a yarn of his
own, about the "ould darvish or anchor-right they had found
a-drifting from his moorings, and dying all his self," information
that made them lay out on their oars, which flashed brightly as the
sharp gig shot over the sunlit sea.
Some time elapsed, however, before she came off again; for, though
the ship, influenced by a gentle undercurrent, had drifted nearer the
shore, she was still three miles distant.
When the gig's head was turned to the island, the _Princess_ had her
ensign half hoisted at the gaff peak by Morrison's order, in honour
of the funeral ceremony that was to be performed on shore, and the
crew were all clustered in the tops and on the cross-trees, with
their faces turned in that direction.
The gig soon steered into the wooded creek again, bringing the
carpenter, with two large packing boxes, his hammer, saw, and nails;
Noah brought a shovel, and while the former proceeded to make a rude
coffin, the latter, with Morley, working by turns with their jackets
off, dug a grave for the hermit, in a place chosen by Bartelot, under
a magnificent myrtle.
In an hour all the preparations were completed; he was coffined, and
lowered by some of the boat tackle into his last resting-place.
With that reverence of which seamen are seldom devoid, Tom Bartelot
stood bare-headed at the head of the humble grave, and read the
burial services of the Church of England, Morley making the responses.
On one side stood the ship's carpenter, a squat, sturdy sailor; on
the other, old, hard-visaged, weather-beaten Noah, hat in hand, his
grizzled hair glistening in the sunshine.
At the words--
"Ashes to ashes--dust to dust," Tom, with his straw hat under his
left arm, dropped a handful of earth on the coffin-lid; a little
rapid shovelling followed; a few sods were batted down, and the
funeral party prepared to leave the spot.
Ere doing so, Morley and Bartelot examined the hut very carefully;
but found only a few nuts and dried fruits, which formed the larder
of the deceased, an old and well-worn knife, like a seaman's, and two
or three drinking-cups, formed of cocoanut shells, on which were
carved crosses and other religious emblems. These were brought away
as relics of their visit.
Just as they were retiring, Noah chanced to cast a glance at the
couch of leaves, from which they had so recently removed the body,
and near the plank whereon the name and request were written, he
found a book, a Spanish missal, as the title-page bore, "_Madrid,_
1840, _Imprenta de Don Pedro Sanz, se hallara en su liberia calle de
Carretas,_" which he handed to the captain upside down, for any way
was all the same to poor Noah's eye.
It contained a piece of folded ribbon, with a cross of red enamelled
on gold, shaped like a sword, placed between the masses for the dead;
and these relics he and Morley examined as they shoved off for the
ship, giving a farewell glance at the lonely grave, at the head of
which--as a humble monument to mark that a Christian lay below--Ben
Plank had erected two barrel staves, nailed together in the form of a
cross.
There was a great deal of manuscript, written small and closely, in
Spanish, on the fly-leaves at each end of the missal, with implements
that had been apparently pens torn from sea-fowls' wings, and ink
furnished by leaves of the wild tobacco, dried in the sunshine, and
diluted with water. Thus, from its reddish-brown tint, the writing
had all the hue or appearance of that presented by a MS. of the
Middle Ages, rather than of a document which, by its date, seemed to
have been written only last year.
"Stretch out, lads, and let us get soon on board. Morrison knows
Spanish well, and he'll read all this for us," said Bartelot. "I am
curious to know what it is, though, perhaps, it may only be prayers
and pious meditations, after all."
The blood-red sun had now set behind the high rock of the Hermit's
Isle, and the rude seat, which he never more would occupy, could be
distinctly seen, defined in outline against the sky. With tropical
rapidity purple dusk was stealing over the red and golden sky. The
calm was passing away; the chill night wind, chill alike from sea and
land, was now blowing across the long rollers, that urged the swift
gig from this unknown shore towards the ship.
They were soon alongside.
"Stand by the fall tackles, watch on deck! Hoist in the boat!"
ordered Bartelot, as he sprang up the man-ropes and proceeded aft.
"Douse the ensign, Morrison. All is over; we've laid the old man in
his last home--and it has been a queer business this. Set the
courses; let fall and sheet home, for here comes the breeze; but
first look at these things."
"The enamelled sword--a knight's cross of the Spanish Order of
Santiago de Compostello," said Morrison.
"And this writing?"
"On the fly-leaves of the prayer-book or missal?"
"Yes," replied Bartelot, impatiently.
"It begins:--'_The confession of Don Pedro Zuares Miguel de Barradas,
Knight Commander of the Order of St. James of Spain, Captain and
Governor of the Castle of San Juan de Ulloa, for the Federal
Government of the Free States of Mexico._'"
"Barradas again? It seems to me most strange; but I seem to have
heard that name before," said Morley, searching in his memory, as
they descended to the cabin, while the yard-heads were filled, and
the ship, standing to her course before the freshening breeze, began
to leave astern the island where the old hermit lay.
END OF VOL. I.
CHARLES DICKENS AND EVANS, CRYSTAL PALACE PRESS.
End of Project Gutenberg's Morley Ashton, Volume 1 (of 3), by James Grant