Three years elapsed before I saw the cape again. Indeed the remembrance
of that visit there, of a few days only, began to assume indistinctness
as a dream, and sometimes as I thought of it, recalling the events of
the journey there and back in the chaise, the wild scenery and the
strange sound of the surf, the old dark house and the devoted black
servants--sometimes, I say, as I thought of all these, as I loved to do
when I settled myself in bed for the night, or when in summer I lay on
my back in the grass looking up at the flying clouds, I would have to
stop and fix my attention sharp, to be sure whether it ever had been a
reality, or whether it might not be, after all, only a dream. I think
my father was afraid of the fascination of the cape for us boys--afraid
its charms, if we once partook of them freely, might distract our
attention from the order and duties of school life. To be sure, we
always went to the country with our parents for a month or six weeks,
and enjoyed it exceedingly, laying up a stock of trout, squirrel, and
badger stories to last us through the winter. But there was no other
country, we imagined, like the cape; and as our father and mother never
lived there, and rarely spent even a single night on the whole property,
they thought it best, I suppose, that we should not run wild there and
get a relish for what all boys seem to have, in some degree, by nature.
I mean the spirit of adventure, and love of the sea.
However, the good time came at last, or a reliable promise of it first,
just fifty years ago this very February. We older boys--Walter, sixteen
years of age, Drake, fourteen, and I, Robert, twelve--were attending
school at Bristol, and were, as usual too in the winter evenings, at
work over our lessons at the library table, when, on one
never-to-be-forgotten evening, our father, who was sitting in an easy
chair by the fire, suddenly asked, "Boys, how would you like to pass
next summer on the cape?" Ah! didn't we three give a terrific chorus of
assent? "Jolly! magnificent! splendid!" we cried, while Walter just
quietly vaulted over half a dozen chairs, two or three at a time,
backwards and forwards, till he had expended some of the animal vivacity
stored up in abundance within him. Drake, as usual when extremely
pleased, tried to accomplish the rubbing of his stomach and the patting
of his head both at the same time; and I climbed into the chair with my
father, and patted his cheeks and thanked him with a fierce shake of the
hands.
"Bob, boy, you are the only one of my youngsters who has been at the old
place, and you must have painted it as a wonderful corner of the earth,
that Walter and Drake should testify their pleasure in such eccentric
ways.--And look here, Walter: when you wish to turn acrobat again, let
it not be in this library or over those chairs; choose some piece of
green grass out of doors.--Well, boys, _perhaps_ you can pass the summer
at the cape. I do not promise it, but shall try to arrange it so if
your mother is willing; but under the unfailing condition that you make
good progress in your studies until that time."
"Shall we all be there together, father, and for the whole summer, and
without any school? How delightful!"
"Not too fast, Drake. Without school? What an idea! Why, in six
months you would be as wild and ignorant as the sheep there. No; you
shall have a strict tutor, who will keep you in harness, and help Walter
to prepare for going up next year to Cambridge. But only you three will
be there. I have some business in London, and I shall take your mother
and Aggie and Charley with me."
During those February evenings there were many more conversations on the
same subject, full of interest to us boys, and finally it was fully
decided by our father and mother that we should go in May, and stay
there until autumn; that a certain Mr Clare should be our tutor, and
that Clump and Juno should be our housekeepers and victuallers.
Never did a springtime appear longer and more wearisome. We counted
every day, and were disgusted with March for having thirty-one of them.
What greatly increased our impatience and the splendour of our
anticipation was that, some time in March, our father told us that a
brig had been cast away in a curious manner on the shore of the cape,
and that he had purchased the wreck as it lay, well preserved and firmly
held in the rocks above ordinary high-tide. He proposed, at some future
time, to make use of it as a sort of storehouse, or perhaps dwelling for
labourers. A shipwreck! a real wreck! and on our cape! stranded on the
very shore of our Robinson Crusoe-like paradise! Just imagine our
excitement.
The particulars of the wreck were as follows:--A brig of 300 tons
burden, on a voyage from South America to the Thames, having lost her
reckoning in consequence of several days' heavy gale and thick weather,
suddenly made the light on the Lizard, and as quickly lost it again in
the fog which surrounded her. The captain, mistaking the light he had
seen for some other well-known beacon, set his course accordingly. That
was near nine o'clock in the evening. The wind and tide helped him on
the course steered, and a little after midnight the misguided brig
struck on a rock three-quarters of a mile south-west of our point of
land. The wind had then increased to a gale, and was gathering new
strength with every moment. In less than an hour the thumping and
grating of the vessel's keel ceased, and then the captain knew that the
rising tide had set him off the rock; but, alas! his good brig was
leaking badly, and the fierce wind was driving her--whither the captain
knew not; and in five minutes more, by the force of the wind and suction
of the shore current, she was thrown high up on a rocky projection of
our cape. One sailor was washed overboard by the breakers as she passed
through them, and was dashed to death, probably in an instant, by the
fierce waves. The next day, when the storm had abated, the body was
found far above where the brig lay fastened immovably in the vice-like
fissure of enormous rocks. Twenty sovereigns, which perhaps the poor
fellow had saved to bring home to his old mother, were found in a belt
around his waist.
The damaged cargo was removed, and the wreck sold at auction, my father
being the purchaser.
There was an old church situated on the summit of a neighbouring point
of land, and to its now seldom used churchyard the body of the poor
sailor was conveyed. His grave was one of the first points of interest
to us when our visit to the cape commenced; and many a time that season
did I sit and watch the brown headstone topping the bleakest part of the
sea-bluff, and as the great voice of the sea, dashing and foaming on the
stony beach beneath, sang in its eternal melancholy grandeur, I fancied
long, long histories of what might have been that sailor's life; and I
wondered sadly if the poor mother knew where her son's grave was, and
whether she would ever come to look at it. On the stone was written:--
HARRY BREESE
LIES HERE, NEAR WHERE A CRUEL SHIPWRECK CAST HIM,
MARCH 23RD, 1814:
AGED 24 YEARS, 2 MONTHS, AND 17 DAYS.
REST IN PEACE, POOR BODY;
THY SHIPMATE, SOUL, HAS GONE ALOFT,
WHERE THY DEAR CAPTAIN, JESUS, IS.
By the 7th May everything was prepared for our departure. On the next
morning early we were to start in the stage-coach, and, what had lately
added to our brilliant anticipations, Harry and Alfred Higginson, two of
our most intimate friends, were to go with us--to be with us all the
summer, join our studies and our fun. But we were to separate from our
father and mother, and from our dear sister Aggie and the little
Charley--from all those dear ones from whom we had never been parted for
a day and night before. We were to leave for half a year. All this,
covered at first by the hopes and fancies we had built, and by the noise
and activity of preparation, appeared then, when everything was packed,
and we, the evening before the journey, drew our chairs about the
tea-table. The prospect of such a magnificent time as we expected to
have on the cape lost some of its brilliancy. Indeed, I positively
regretted that we were to go. We boys were as hushed as frightened
mice.
After tea, Drake and I got very close to our mother on the sofa, but
Walter lounged nervously about, trying to appear, I think, as if such an
affair--a parting for six months--were nothing to such a big fellow as
he. Aggie came and held my hand. When our father had taken his usual
seat, he and our mother commenced to give us careful instructions how we
were to regulate our time and conduct during our separation from them;
we were directed about our lessons, clothes, language, and play; to be
kind and patient with Clump and Juno; and very particular were our
orders about the new tutor, Mr Clare, to whom we had been formally
introduced a few days before, and we were required to promise solemnly
that we would obey him implicitly in every respect. Besides which our
father delighted us very much by the information that he had engaged an
old seaman, Mugford by name, once boatswain of an Indiaman, who had
taken up his abode at the fishing town across the bay from our cape, to
be with us often through the summer in our out-of-school hours; that he
would be, as it were, our skipper--perhaps reside with us--and that he
was to have full command in all our water amusements; he would teach us
to swim, to row, and to sail. That last subject cheered us up a bit,
and when I saw Walter, who was still walking up and down the room, going
through a pantomimic swim, striking out his arms in big circles, right
and left, I commenced to smile, and Drake to laugh outright. So our
conference ended in good spirits. And then we all kneeled in family
prayer, and that evening before the parting, as we kneeled and heard my
father's earnest words, I realised fully, perhaps for the first time,
how, more than parents or friends, God was our Father; how, though we
were going away from home and its securities, yet God was to be with us,
stronger and kinder than any on earth, to guard and care for us.
During the few days we had known Mr Clare, he had been with us
constantly, but we had not decided whether to like him or not. He
seemed pleasant, and was easy enough, both in his manners and
conversation, but yet he had a calm and decided way that was rather
provoking; as if to say, "I have read you through and through, boys, and
can govern you as easily as possible." Now we had no idea of resisting
him; we intended to behave well, and therefore his manner rather nettled
us. However, there was not much to object to. His appearance was
certainly all right--a large, bright, manly face and hearty smile, and a
strong, agile figure. We five boys had talked him over, and at the last
balloting our votes were a tie, for Walter declined to express an
opinion yet whether Mr Clare was a "screw" or a "good fellow." Harry
Higginson and Drake voted "screw," whilst Alfred and I said "good
fellow."
We must pass over the "goodbyes" of the next morning. Let us imagine
there were no wet eyes and sinking hearts. However it may have been,
the big rumbling old stage-coach containing Mr Clare and five boys, and
loaded well with trunks and boxes, rattled from our house in --- Street
at about six o'clock on that eighth morning in May, fifty years ago.
Our hearts cheered up with the growth of the sun. By ten o'clock we
were very talkative; by one, very hungry. The contents of a basket,
well-stored by our mother, and put in just as we were starting, settled
that complaint. The afternoon was tedious, and we were not sorry when
the coach dropped us at the quiet little country inn where we were to
sleep. I need not describe the journey of the next day. We were too
eager to get to its termination to care much for the beautiful scenery
through which we passed. As the evening drew on the weather became
chilly. Ah! we were approaching the sea. By nine at night innumerable
stars were twinkling over a dusky point of land which seemed to have
waded out as far as possible into the indefinable expanse mirroring
unsteadily a host of lights. A strong, damp, briny breath came up to
us, and a vast murmur as if thousands of unseen, mysterious, deep-voiced
spirits were chanting some wonderful religious service. "Whoa!" with a
heavy lurch the yellow post-chaise, in which we had performed the second
day's journey, came to a stand. We had arrived before the old stone ark
that was to be our home for half a year.