Next day came news that Spetzas had openly joined the insurrection,
and two proselytizing brigs put into Hydra, to try to raise, if not
more ships, at any rate recruits. They both carried the new Greek
ensign, white and blue, and bearing the cross of Greece risen above the
crescent of Turkey. The tidings that the Capsina was going to join the
revolutionists with her ship had already spread through the town, and
when next morning she went down to the quay to speak with the captains
of the Spetziot vessels, she was like the queen bee to the swarm, and
the people followed her, cheering wildly. Their voices were music and
wine to her, and the thrill of exultation which belongs to acts of
leadership was hers.
Fierce and fine too was the news from Spetzas: the people had risen,
and after an immense meeting held on the quay had chosen a commander,
and broken open the treasury in which was kept the annual tribute
to the Ottoman government. The taxes had just been got in, and the
treasury was full. With this money eight brigs were being armed and
manned, and would set sail to Melos, at which island, as they knew,
were several Ottoman vessels making their annual cruise of conscription
for raising sailors. In such manner was the vintage of the sea to begin.
Round the Capsina and the Spetziot captains the crowd surged thickest.
One of these, Kostas Myrrides, had a certain loud and straight-hitting
gift of oratory, and the crowd gathered and swayed, and hung on his
words. There had been erected for him a sort of rude dais made of a
board placed upon two barrels, and from there he spoke to the people.
"The wine is drawn!" he cried; "to the feast then! Yet indeed there is
no choice. Greece is up in arms, and before long the armies and fleets
of the infidels will be on us. What will it profit you to stay still
and watch? Do you think that the Turks will sit in justice and examine
whether this man is an insurgent and the other is not? Is that their
way of dealing? The justice of the Turk! You have heard the proverb
and know what that means. The fire of war leaps from cape to cape and
mountain to mountain. Kindle it here. Already has one of you, and that
a woman whose name will not be forgotten, thrown in her lot with a
glorious cause--Greece, the freedom of Greece!"
The shout rose and broke in waves of sound, only to swell and tower
afresh when the speaker unfurled the new-blazoned flag, and waved it
above them. Truly, if the Turkish ship of conscription had come in
sight, there would have been short shrift for those on board.
The government of Hydra was in the hands of twelve primates, who
were responsible to the Ottoman government for the annual tribute in
specie (in itself but small), and also for the equipment and wages
of two hundred and fifty able-bodied seamen yearly to the Ottoman
fleet. To raise this more considerable sum a tax of five per cent. was
levied on the income of every man in the island. Now the ship-owners
were more than the bulk of the tax-payers, and it was clearer than
a summer noonday that if they joined the revolutionists, unless the
island revolution became general, or their ships met with immediate
success, the Ottoman fleet would descend on the Hydra, and the Shadow
of God would have a word for the primates, and a rope. Thus it came
about that while the uproar was still growing and fermenting on the
quay, the primates met together, and found grave faces. The Capsina,
they considered, was primarily responsible for this consternating
stroke, but to try to guide the Capsina back into the paths of peace,
they feared, was like attempting to lead the moon with a string,
and to quarrel with her was to quarrel with the clan, to whom she
was as a god, eccentric, perhaps, but certainly unquestionable. The
responsibility of debate, however, was not granted them, for before
they could devise any check on the Capsina, a new and tremendous burst
of cheering caused the president, Father Jakomaki Tombazes, to rise and
go to the window. Three vessels were leaving the port, two being the
Spetziot vessels, with the Greek flag blazoning its splendor to heaven,
and as for the other, there was no mistaking the build of the _Sophia_.
Tombazes gasped, then returned to the others.
"The Capsina has gone," he said. "And, by the Virgin," cried he, rising
to the heroical level of the event, and striking the table with his
fist, "she is a brave lass, and Hydra should be proud of her!"
This straightforward statement of the duty of Hydriots was not less
abhorrent to the assembled primates. The Capsina had gone, the clan
were shouting themselves hoarse on the beach, and, where an action of
the Capsina was concerned, it was not less idle to argue with the clan
than to employ rhetoric to a mad bull. The only courses open were to
fly for safety to the mainland, join the revolutionists, or employ
coercive measures with the rest, whereby they should not do so. Now the
tax-collectors were necessarily of their party, for the necks of all
the officials under the Turkish rule were, so to speak, in one noose,
and there were also a number of old, sedately minded or retired men who
would distinctly prefer to live out their lives in inglorious peace,
unless matters were already in the fire, than to burn squibs, for in
so small regard did the primates hold the revolution, under the very
nose of the Shadow of God. But, look at it as they might, they were
bound to confess that a sorrier party had never been got together.
Even Tombazes, by his remark about the duty of Hydra, showed he was of
no reliable stuff, and the primates seemed depressed. For the rest,
the island was capering in exultant frenzy on the beach, at what the
Capsina had done, and what they would do.
Tombazes, who as their president should have shown himself a pillar
of prudence, alone of them all sat with a glistening eye, and smiled,
showing his teeth in his black and scarcely gray-streaked beard. Then
throwing his head back, he burst out into a great crack of laughter.
"The Capsina is finer than we all," he said. "What a girl! She is the
only man among us, for all our long beards. Who knows she may not sail
straight for Constantinople, force her way into the Sultan's presence,
and set Michael at him. I can almost see her doing it, and indeed I
should dearly like to. 'Hi, Michael, at his throat, boy!' she would
cry. Yet I see her walking out again safe and leaving him lying dead
like a broken doll, for I cannot imagine three armies of Turks stopping
her. She would call them dogs and devils, and, the chidden dogs, they
would tuck their tails away and only snarl. Yes, my brothers, this is
not in order; I am but a fond dreamer. But let us come to the point.
The Capsina beats us. Oh, she beats us! We need not waste time in
making faces at that. But what next? Of course we must do our best to
stop this rising, but, though I would not have it said by others, my
heart is not wholly on our side, though my head shall be. Is not the
Capsina stupendous?"
He rose again from his place, and hurried to the open window for
another glance.
"They are all crowding on sail," he said, "but the Capsina's ship
is first--first by half a mile, I should say. She is always first.
Pre-eminently has she been first this morning. Yes, yes, I know, let us
come to the point. Perhaps Brother Nikolas will give us his views," and
the great burly man bent down his head to hide the inextinguishable joy
of his face.
Brother Nikolas's views were short, sour, eminently depressing, and as
follows:
The Turkish ships which were cruising for the conscription would be
at Hydra before the end of April--that is to say, in considerably
less than a month. Instead of two hundred and fifty able-bodied
recruits they would find twelve, or perhaps eleven, primates--here
his eyes looked lemon-juice at Tombazes--a quantity of unemployed
tax-collectors, some elderly gentlemen, some women, and some children.
This would probably be thought an unsatisfactory substitute. They
could fill in the probable course of subsequent events for themselves,
for one Turkish raid was very like another. He would suggest guarding
the treasury at the risk of their lives, to show that they, at any
rate, had no hand in the matter.
Others spoke in the same melancholy vein, and at the end Tombazes.
"The point, so I take it, is this," he said. "Unless we stop this
movement, or, if we are unable to stop it, unless we run away for
refuge to the insurgent armies in Greece or in other islands, we
are certainly dead men. Brother Nikolas has suggested that we have
a certain duty to the Turk; well, that is as it may be, but in any
case we are at present the vassals of the Sultan, and for the sake of
our own necks, this meeting, I am sure, would wish to repudiate the
movement. It will be no manner of good, but we must let that be known.
With your consent, I will send for the mayor, and make an official
inquiry as to what the tumult is about, and where and why the Capsina
has gone. Meantime, and with the utmost haste, I suggest that we stow
the island revenues in the church. It may be difficult, but I think it
will be possible if we do it quietly. The money will certainly be safer
there."
The primates dispersed: some to mingle with the crowd, and try to allay
this illicit enthusiasm, whereby certain men got infected with it;
some to make arrangements for the funds of the national treasury being
moved to the church; Tombazes alone, though burning to go down among
the people, waiting in the room where they had met for his conference
with the mayor, Christos Capsas. Indeed, he was in most unprelatical
vein, and the meeting of the two was very cordial; you would have said
they took the same side. Christos dwelt with extreme complacency on the
expedition of the Capsina--it was like the clan, he said, to take the
lead in adventure--and Tombazes, though officially he had bound himself
to deprecate it, gave a halting lip-service only to the cause of the
primates.
"And the men of the island, you say," says he, with a dancing eye, "are
resolved to follow this--this most imprudent and ill-advised example
set them by the Capsina? Man, do they realize what it means? Do they
not know that the Turks will descend on those they leave behind--their
women and their children?"
"Yet the women would have them go," said Christos.
"The more senseless they. Yet women are ever so. For what will happen
to them? Are the Turks so chivalrous? And will Turks make kind parents
to the children who will be fatherless?"
"Yet the children are sailing sticks and branches in the harbor, and
throwing stones at them. 'This,' they say to one another, 'we will do
to the Turks.'"
"By the Virgin, they are true Greeks, then!" shouted Tombazes, lustily,
forgetting himself for a moment but his voice ringing true. Then with
impatience: "What does it matter what the children do?" he asked. "It
is a new thing to take counsel of the children before we act."
"Yet you asked me of the children," said Christos, smiling, "and, as
you said, father, they are true Greeks."
Tombazes sat down, and motioned Christos to take a seat.
"You, then, are on the side of the women and the children," he said,
"or rather, if you look at it aright, against them; for sure is it
that you give them over to the Turks to treat--to treat as Turks treat
women and children. Your son Christos a servant in the harem--have you
thought of that?"
"I am on the side of the Capsina," said Christos.
Tombazes looked furtively round, as if to see that none other was
there, walked slowly to the window, and came back again with quicker
step. Twice he began to speak, twice stopped, but at the last he could
contain himself no longer.
"And so, by all the saints, am I!" he cried. "See, Christos, I trust
you, and this must not be known nor guessed. For sure I would, if
I followed my desire, sail after that splendid girl--yes, swim to
wherever she may go--with the Greek flag over me. Man, but my heart
burned when I saw that. The cross above the crescent, and soon no
crescent at all. Thus shall it be. But I and the others, and you, too,
are put over these people, and we must make them consider what will
follow. Nothing must be done wildly; because we are aflame with this
wonderful, prophetic flag, tinder to that spark, we must not act as
if the thing was done, as if the moment we take up arms, down go the
Turks like the walls of Jericho; and in this, Christos, I am speaking
with all the sincerity God gave me. No enthusiasm, no sudden rising
will do the work; the fight will be long and bitter, and if a new and
glorious thing is to spring up, it will be watered with tears and
with blood--with tears of the fatherless and widow, and blood of the
fathers. Tell me yourself, you are the father of a family, with a stake
in peace; what are you meaning to do?"
"The Capsina has lent me the _Hydra_, which was to have sailed to Syria
to-day with stuff for the Turkish governor. The stuff she has thrown
overboard, and I sail to-morrow for Nauplia, where I shall get orders."
"She threw the Turk's stuff overboard? I would it had been Turks! Great
is the Capsina!" and the primate capered barbarously up the room and
down again. "And now I will go down to the people," said he. "You and I
have a secret, Christos; but I wonder how long the devil will give me
strength to keep it."
Down on the quay matters had fared more briskly than among the
primates. A member and delegate of the Revolutionist Club, by name
Economos, had landed with the ships from Spetzas, and had been
preaching revolt and revenge to willing ears. Even before the departure
of the Capsina, whose sails were now a gull on the horizon, he had
begun enlisting volunteers, and before Tombazes reached the harbor,
he was already at the head of an armed band, including several
ship-captains, and was rapidly earning a cheap popularity by addressing
the mob as "citizens of Greece."
Tombazes, who, for his ruddy face and burly heartiness, was popular
with the people, made his way through to where the crowd was thickest,
and instantly interrupted the man's speeches.
"Now what is this all about?" he cried, good-humoredly, pushing his
way in. "What is all this disturbance? It is all most irregular. Ha,
Dimitri, you should be driving out the sheep instead of wasting time
on the quay, for all the world like a quacking goose that can't lay
an egg! You, too, Anastasi, now you are a less idiot than some, tell
me what this is about, and who is that holding a flag which I do not
remember to have seen before?"
He made his way through the people up to Economos.
"Now, my good fellow," he said, "just stop preaching for a moment.
We primates have a good deal of preaching to do, and so we have much
sympathy for those who listen. Who are you, where do you come from,
what's your business, and what's your name, and what are you talking
about? Oh, you silly folk!" he cried, aloud, as a discontented murmur
rose up. "You are all going to have fair play--that is why I am here.
But just let me learn what it is all about. Melesinas, don't brandish
your knife in that foolish way, or you will be cutting your own oaf's
hand off!"
Economos paused, and realizing that there was nothing to be gained by
insolence, seeing that this man was a friend evidently of the people,
stepped down from the table on which he was standing.
"My name is Antonios Economos," he said. "I am an emissary from the
Club of Patriots in Greece, and I am here to raise the revolt in Hydra
against the Turk."
"That is all very well," said Tombazes. "You want ships and support,
and for ships you want men, and for men money. Has the Club of Patriots
supplied you with that?"
"The treasury--the national treasury!" shouted several voices.
Tombazes looked up quickly, and, springing forward with an agility
which in a man of his bulk bordered on the miraculous, seized hold of
a big fellow whom he had seen shouting and shook him till his teeth
rattled in his head.
"Another word," he cried, "and I pop you into the harbor. You too,
George, I saw you shouting too. If I tell your wife it will be but
little supper you get. I am ready for you all, five under one arm
and six under the other. Oh, I will teach you to interrupt when I am
talking to another. Get back with you from the table, all of you, all
of you. And you there, Yanni, bring me wine and two glasses, this
gentleman and I have to talk together, and chairs--two chairs; and the
sooner the rest of you silly quacking folk clear away, the fewer there
will be for me to put into the sea, and that will save trouble for us
all: for me, in getting hot on so warm a day, for there are fat lubbers
among you; and for you, in having to change your clothes."
The crowd edged a little back, more good-humored than resentful, for
they were accustomed to be treated like children by Tombazes, and the
island knew him familiarly as "The Nurse." He was their doctor, a
practitioner of heroic simples, sun and sea being the staple of his
prescriptions, their spiritual consoler, herein also employing the
less morbid remedies. He could sail a boat against the best of their
seamen, and he had again and again, as they all knew, taken the side of
the people against the greedy and grabbing primates. The wine and the
chairs were brought, and he and Economos sat down, clinked glasses, and
settled down to talk.
"You will have found dry work in all that talking," said Tombazes,
"unless you are very fond of your own voice. Good wine is the gift of
God, and this is not bad. Now I heard what that man shouted, and so
did you. Now tell me straight, for this it will save trouble. Was it
you who suggested that they should get the money from the treasury, or
they?"
Economos, who had been playing the noisy demagogue all morning, and
was quite prepared to play it again, if advisable, determined for the
present to talk soberly.
"They suggested it," he said, dryly. "I'm willing also to tell you that
it struck me as an admirable notion."
"Did it so?" said Tombazes, musingly. "Then you are more easily pleased
than most men, for your idea of the admirable seems to me the silliest
thing I have ever heard tell of. And as I am older than you, and a
man of experience, it is likely I have run against many silly things
in this world. Now, man, sit down; this is my way of speaking; no man
in this island takes offence at what I say, for he knows that would
not help what he has his hand to--aye, and he would be like to get his
nose pulled, which is of the more immediate consequence. Now tell me
how many ships do you mean to victual and put into commission with your
admirable notions?"
"Four, to begin with," said Economos.
"Four, to begin with, says he!" exclaimed Tombazes, in a lamentable
treble voice. "And how many to end with, and with what will you be
paying the crews? Man, do you think you will find enough to keep them
in pipes and tobacco with what is in the treasury? Four, to begin
with!--save us all!"
"The crews will average sixty men each," continued Economos, "and that
will make two hundred and forty. Every year the treasury pays the wage
of two hundred and fifty men. I deal with facts, you see."
"Come, then, let's have facts," cried Tombazes, "and surely I will help
you. It's facts the man will be wanting. Why, you must have a fever or
an ague in your blood! You want bleeding, man, I see it in your eye. Do
you think we collect the taxes for a whole year together?"
"I suppose what there is in the treasury will last us a month."
"Well, say it lasts a month," said Tombazes. "What then? You will
return here for more money. Much will you find when you have taken from
the island just those men who pay the bulk of the taxes. I'm thinking
that your admirable notion is even sillier, if we look into it, than it
appeared on the surface. And even the look of it on the surface made me
think you had been better for blood-letting."
"See, father, listen to me," said Economos, with sudden earnestness.
"Have you heard what has happened? Surely you have not, or you would
not speak thus. Do you know that Kalamata has been taken by the Greeks,
that the beacons of liberty have flashed from one end of the country
to another? A free people have stood in the meadows round Kalamata and
sung the 'Te Deum' for that great and wonderful victory. Is that not a
thing to make the blood tingle? In the north, Germanos, archbishop and
primate, has raised the revolt. The monks of Megaspelaion are up in
arms; Petrobey and they of Maina have come forth like a herd of hungry
wolves."
Tombazes' eye flashed.
"It is fit that you should tell me all you have to say for their mad
scheme. Go on, man, go on. Tell me all you know. I--I can judge better
so."
Economos suspected the truth, that the primate was all tinder to the
flame, and, with a certain acumen, did not let him see this, nor did
he at present tax him with it. Instead, he spoke of the plans of the
revolutionists--how that the Turks were flocking into Tripolitza, from
which, when the time came, there would be no escape; how essential it
was to the success of the war that Greece should be cut off from the
headquarters of the Ottoman forces. This could not be done till the
coasts were in the hands of the insurgents, and their ships prevented
fresh arms and men being sent into the country. That was the part of
the Greek ports and islands. Spetzas had already joined; in Psara soon
would the standard of revolution be raised; was Hydra, the largest and
best-manned, she who should be both arms and sinews of naval Greece, to
stand neutral? Indeed, neutral she could not be. If she was not with
the insurgents the Turks would soon make her into an advanced point
from which they could the more easily reach the mainland. She would
be garrisoned; her harbor would be a cluster of Turkish ships--would
that be a pleasant thing for the Hydriots? Their only safety was in
fighting. Greece was in arms--what matter to the Turks if Hydra had
joined the insurgents or not? Would the mob of soldiers and sailors
spare them? Would they leave the Hydriots their houses while they
camped on the hillside? Would their women be spared because they were
loyal? And the danger to Greece was thus doubled. The Turks would be
holding an eyrie from which to swoop in the midst of the patriots.
"Indeed," concluded Economos, returning from his somewhat rhetorical
language to colloquialism, "we will have no wasps' nests in the seat of
our trousers, if you please."
This was too much for Tombazes, and motioning back the crowd, who had
begun to encroach again, he spoke low to the other.
"I shall surely burst unless I speak," he said. "Do you not see how
I am with you? Man, you are blinder than the worms if you do not see
that. But if you drop a word of that till I give you leave, I swear by
the lance of St. George and the coffee-pot which he made whole, that I
will kick you till my foot is sore and you are less like a man than a
jelly-fish! That treasury notion of yours is absurd. That I stick to,
and for the reasons I gave you. Give it up, I ask you, for the present.
Mark you, and listen to me. I am a traitor in my camp for a good cause,
and I can help you. If the primates and others are assured you are not
going to touch the national treasury--for its safety, they think, means
their safety from the Turk--half the opposition will be withdrawn. You
must raise money another way. Moreover, you want five times as much as
there is in the treasury. And what is the use of four ships? Eh, that
was what I meant when I said your notion seemed to me the silliest
thing I have ever heard. Did you not see that? Ah, well, God made the
blind men also! There are at least thirty in the harbor, which are all
capable of carrying guns and of outsailing those lubberly Turkish tubs.
You must have them all. And you must not leave the women and children
here defenceless. You must organize a body of men who will guard the
harbor and the town. Luckily there is no landing except this side the
island. Afterwards, of course, you will add the money in the treasury
to what must be collected by levying a tax. Milk the treasury dry, man.
The money will be stored in the Church of St. George, and I shall have
the key. Now mark the result of our conversation. I have persuaded
you, so I shall tell the primates, and you the people, not to touch
the treasury--that alone will quiet my party considerably. Propose to
the people to levy a tax on all the capital in the island, and submit
that to the primates as the only condition on which the treasury will
be untouched. The people will give willingly, the primates unwillingly,
but the money will be the same. Fill your glass; shake hands with me,
and I will go to my party. I drink to the freedom of Greece, and to
you. Viva!"
For the next two or three days negotiations went on between the
primates and the people, and often Tombazes had occasion to wear a
mighty grave face, whereby he should cloak the merriness of his heart.
The part he was playing, as he assured himself, was the only way of
fighting for the good cause, for had he openly joined the revolutionist
party, the confidence which the other primates felt in him would be
gone, and they would be the more eager to oppose tooth and nail to any
proposals. But what they regarded as his diplomatic victory with regard
to the national treasure, gave him a position of extraordinary security
among them, and Economos, perhaps partly for his own ends, and the
spurious credit which the people would give him of having successfully
fought down the opposition of the primates, was equally anxious to
conceal Tombazes' part in the affair.
At length a sum adequate to meet all immediate expenses was raised; the
crews were all paid one month's wages in advance, with the prospect of
prize-money won from the Turks, and the people seized on the national
treasury. Tombazes' ill-suppressed delight at this step, which was
conveyed to the primates in conclave, put him for the moment within an
ace of exposure.
Fresh intrigues began; the primates, to make the best of a bad job,
appealed to those sailors and captains who had formerly been in their
employment, offering fresh berths in their own service; for many of
them owned ships, and as the island was now pledged to the national
cause, they, too, proposed to have a finger in the prize-money.
Economos, on the other hand, failing to see how it was just that those
who had opposed the scheme should take a share in it now, organized
a revolutionary committee in whose hands should be the sole conduct
of the war, and naturally enough did not appoint any primate on it.
Eventually--for both sides were somewhat afraid of each other, and
wished to avoid open collision--a compromise was arrived at. Those
captains and men who had already definitely engaged themselves in the
service of the revolutionists during the opposition of the primates,
were forbidden to serve on the primates' ships. On the other hand, the
ships of the primates were to be admitted to the fleet, and should be
treated in the matter of prize-money with the others. Finally--and had
the primates known the cause of this, there would have been angry men
in Hydra--the command of the entire fleet was given to Tombazes.
On the morning of the 29th of April a solemn service was held in the
church, and Tombazes read out the declaration of the independence of
Hydra as part of the free state of Greece.
"It is determined by us," so ran the proclamation, "the primates and
governors of this island of Hydra, to serve no longer nor obey the
infidels who are the enemies of God and of His Christ, and of the
blessed mother of Christ, and from this day we declare that we will
make ourselves a free people of the realm of Greece. In the support of
this resolve it will be our duty to fight for our wives, our children,
our country, and we will fight till the death without counting the
cost, and giving whatever we possess--our goods, our obedience, and our
lives--to our country's cause. May He who is the Giver of Victory and
has already given us the will to fight, strengthen our arms and deliver
His foes and ours into our hands."
By the first week in May, such was the frenzy of expedition among the
men, the Hydriot contingent, numbering twenty sail, was ready to go to
sea. The eight brigs from Spetzas which had sailed to Melos to capture
the Turkish conscription ships had put in at Hydra, uniting themselves
with Tombazes' fleet, and reported complete success. The credit of the
capture however belonged, as they acknowledged, to a strange ship that
sailed as if by magic, and which no one knew. For as they were nearing
Melos, intending to get inside the harbor where they knew the Turks
were, and capture them before the Melian contingent got on board, and
while they were still a couple of miles out to sea, the wind, which
so far had been favorable, dropped, and the airs became so light and
variable that they lay for two days like painted ships, taken back
rather than making ground.
At this point, Tombazes, to whom the Spetziot captain was telling his
tale, got up from his chair and waved his arms wildly.
"It was she--I know it was she! Thank God it was she," he cried. "Go
on, man."
Captain Yassos looked at him a moment in surprised wonder.
"It certainly was a she," he said. "How did you know?"
"The spirit of prophecy was upon me!" cried Tombazes. "Finish your
tale."
"It was our desire to take the ships, you will understand," he said,
"before the Melian folk got aboard, while if we failed, they ran risk
of being murdered by the Turks, for fear of their helping us. But it
would seem God willed it otherwise, for He sent us no wind except as
it were the breath of a man cooling his broth. A little mist, too, was
rising seaward and spreading towards us, and when we who knew the sea
saw that, we thought it impossible we could get ten miles in time, for
the mist means a calm and windlessness."
"Oh, am I a boy who would be a sailor, that you tell me the alphabet of
things?" exclaimed Tombazes.
"You will see it all makes the thing more marvellous," said the other,
smiling, "so be patient with me. Well, we were cursing at the calm when
suddenly, on our starboard quarter--my ship being to starboard of all
the others--there came it seemed the shadow of a ship, white and huge,
with all sails spread and coming towards us. Dimitri, my son, who was
with me, said, 'Look, father, look!' and crossed himself, and I did the
same. Now I am no left-handed man at ship sailing, but when I saw that
ship moving slowly but steadily towards us while we lay like logs, I
thought it no canny thing. She passed half a cable's length from us,
and I saw her guns looking through the open ports, new so they seemed
to me; and on her topmast, and I blessed the Virgin when I saw that,
was the flag of Greece. One man stood at the tiller whose face seemed
familiar to me, and by him stood a woman, tall, and like the morning,
somehow, to look upon. In that still air I heard her say to him, 'A
point more to starboard,' so it seemed that she was the captain, and as
she passed us she waved her hand, and cried, 'Do you not wish a share
in this, or am I to go alone? Come, comrades, follow, follow. I bring
you the wind.'
"On her word the wind awoke, the slack ropes began to run through the
blocks, and in a few seconds the sail was full. Up went our helm, and
we followed. But it was like following a hare on the mountains to
follow that great white ship. She swam from us as a fish swims from
a man in the water, and before we had turned the cape behind which
lies the harbor we heard her guns. Twice before we came up she had
sailed round the largest of the three ships, pouring in broadside
after broadside, the other replying clumsily and hardly touching her,
and just as I, who was ahead of the rest, fired at one of the others,
the ship she was battering struck its colors, and anchoring, she
let down the boats, and with two boat-loads of her crew she put off
to board them. Then those treacherous devils of hell under the flag
of truce, you mind, again opened fire on her. But it seems she had
calculated on that, and on the instant her ship blazed again, firing
over their heads and raking the deck where the Turks were. This time,
as I could see, they fired red-hot ball, and one, I suppose, struck
the powder-magazine, for it was as if the end of the world came, and
a moment after the Turk sank. The boarding party was not far from the
ship, and the explosion showered boards and wreckage round them, but
thereat they turned and rowed back again, their work being done for
them. For me, I had my own affairs ready, and for ten minutes we blazed
and banged at each other, but before it was over I looked round once,
and saw already at the harbor's mouth the ship which had come out of
the mist beating out to sea again. Now, father, you seem to know who
that woman was; who was it?"
"Glory be to God!" said Tombazes. Then, "But, man, you are an ignorant
fool. Who could it be but the Capsina of Hydra? But where has she gone?
Why is she not with you?"
"I know not: she was gone before we had finished with the others."
With the combined squadron from Spetzas and Hydra had joined nine ships
from Psara. There was half a day's trouble with them, for they refused
at first to recognize the command of Tombazes, and said it was fitter
that the three islands should cast lots, and let the choice of the
admiral go with the winner. They had, they said, a most wary man of the
sea among them, who had worked with the Russians and knew the use of
the fire-ship. But the Spetziots had accepted Tombazes as commander of
the two islands, and the Psariots were told that they might do the same
or leave the squadron, and they chose the former, though ill-content.
They cruised northward, for knowing that news of the revolution had
reached Constantinople and that the Sultan Mahmud was preparing to send
a fleet to the refractory islands, they hoped to intercept this, and
thus prevent punishment reaching their homes or fresh supplies putting
into ports on the mainland. Several times they sighted Turkish ships,
and thus two or three small prizes were taken. For ten days they met
none but single ships, which, without exception, surrendered, often
without the exchange of a shot; the crews were taken and sent back to
Hydra or Spetzas, where they were prisoners; but these vessels being
for the most part trading brigs of the poorer class, there was little
booty to be divided among the captors.
The tenth day of the cruise saw the squadron off Cape Sunium, at the
extreme south end of Attica. The day before they had run before a
strong south wind, hoping to clear the promontory before night and get
through the dangerous straits to the north of it by daylight. Until
evening the heavens had been clear, but the night came on cloudy,
starless, and calm, and fearing to pass the straits in so uncertain
a light, for they were full of reefs, orders had been given to lie
to and wait for day. But the currents of that shifting sea rendered
it impossible to maintain position. The greater part of the squadron
was caught by the racing flow of water that runs up northwest towards
Peiraeus, and drifted safely but swiftly up the gulf. Of the remainder,
all but two weathered Sunium and lay for shelter under Zea, where they
remained till morning. But these two, finding themselves dangerously
near the rocky south headland of Sunium, beat out to sea again before
the breeze dropped, and by morning lay far out to the east of the
others.
Day broke windless and calm, with an oily sea, big, but not broken,
coming in from the south. The ships in the gulf had to wait for the
land breeze to spring up: those off Zea who had passed Sunium lay to
till the others joined them, but the two to the east, Hydriot ships,
out of shelter of the land, had a moderate breeze from the north.
For two hours after daybreak they waited, but the others, out of reach
of their wind, made no sign, and about nine o'clock they were aware of
a Turkish ship coming from the north, and sailing, as they supposed,
to the islands or to some Peloponnesian port. The two Greek ships
were lying close together, it may be a cable's distance apart, and
it was immediately clear to each that the Turk must be stopped, for
the purpose of their squadron was none other than this. The admiral's
ship, far away to the west, it was impossible to signal, and even if
possible, ineffectual, for nought but a miracle would have brought up a
land breeze at nine in the morning. So as in duty bound the two brigs,
like sea swallows, put about, and hoisting the Greek flag went in
pursuit of the Turk.
As they neared her it was evident that a day's work was before them,
and Sachturi, the captain of one of the brigs, signalled to Pinotzi:
"Ship of war," and Pinotzi signalled back: "So are we." Yanni Sachturi,
the captain's son, a lusty, laughing boy of about eighteen, danced
with delight as he read the signal to his father, and heard the order
to clear for action. The ports had been closed, for a heavy sea had
been running during the night, but in a few minutes the guns were run
out, the men at their posts, and the pokers heating in the galley fire.
Sachturi's vessel carried ten guns, four on each broadside and two in
the bows; Pinotzi's only six, but of these two were thirty-two-pounders
and heavier than any of Sachturi's.
The Turk was running due south, and Sachturi from the bridge, seeing
that if they went straight for her, she would pass them, ordered
that his ship should he laid two points nearer the wind, and Pinotzi
followed his lead. In ten minutes it was clear that they were rapidly
overhauling her, and in another half-hour they were but a short mile
off. For a moment the Turk seemed to hesitate, and then, putting about,
went off on an easterly tack. But here the Greek gained more speedily,
and she, perceiving this, went off straight down wind again. This
manoeuvre lost her more ground, and Sachturi and she were now broadside
to each other when the Turk opened fire. Her aim was too low, and the
halls struck the water some two hundred yards from the Greek ship. In
spite of her imposing appearance Sachturi noticed that only five guns
were fired, the balls from three of which ricochetted off the sea, and
flew, two of them, just beyond the Greek's bows, the other clearing
the deck without touching her. Sachturi's guns replied, but apparently
without effect, and changing his course he made an easterly tack to
pass behind her, for all her guns seemed to be forward. Pinotzi, who
had heavier ordnance, ran up broadside, and he and the Turk exchanged
a volley or two, but, owing to the heavy rolling of the ships and the
inexperience of the Greek gunners at least, without doing or receiving
damage.
Sachturi's guess had been correct, though why a ship-of-war had put to
sea only half-armed he did not pause to consider, and, coming up within
range, he let her have the starboard guns. But he had thus to lie
broadside on to the sea, which made accurate aim difficult; and again
putting her head to the sea, he ran on, meaning to use the two guns in
his bows at close quarters.
For an hour or more it was the battle of the hawk and the raven. The
two Greek ships skimmed and tacked about on the light breeze, sometimes
getting in a broadside as they closed in, sometimes passing behind her
stern, where she seemed to be unarmed. Twice Sachturi sailed round
her, giving broadside for broadside, and at last a lucky shot cut the
main-mast of the Turk in half, bringing down to the deck a pile of
wreckage and canvas. They could see the men hauling away to clear the
deck, when another shot from Pinotzi brought down the second mast,
leaving her rolling helplessly, with only the mizzen standing. Sachturi
had just rounded her stern, and had given another broadside, when
the Turk fired, and a ball crashing through the bulwarks killed two
sailors, and with them Yanni, who was just taking an order from his
father to close with her and throw on the grappling-irons.
Sachturi did not move; but he set his teeth for a moment, and looked at
Yanni. He was lying on his back, half his chest shot away, staring up
into the sky. His face was untouched, and his mouth seemed to smile. He
was his father's only son, and Sachturi loved him as his own soul.
In another ten minutes the grappling-irons were cast on to the Turk;
twice they were thrown off, but the third time two anchored themselves
in the ropes and blocks of the wrecked main-mast, and, though the Turks
sought furiously to free themselves, in another minute the Greeks from
Sachturi's ship were pouring over the side. Since Yanni had been killed
he had only said three words, twice when the grappling-irons were
thrown off, and he ordered them to be cast again, once as they boarded,
"Spare none!" he had cried.
The order was obeyed. The Turks had exhausted their ammunition, and
fought with knives only, charging down with undaunted bravery on the
muskets of the Greeks, and when the deck was cleared the boarders went
below. In a cabin they found an old man, dressed in the long white
robe of a Mussulman patriarch, with the green turban of the sons of
the Prophet on his head, playing draughts with a woman. And here, too,
Sachturi's order was obeyed.
The booty taken was immense, for on board were presents from the Sultan
to the Pasha of Egypt, and when the Turkish ship was no more than a
shambles they brought it all on board Sachturi's vessel for division.
They found him sitting on the deck, with Yanni's head on his knee. He
was quite silent and dry-eyed; he rested his weight on one hand, with
the other he was stroking the dead lad's hair.