"Flog us first, and roast us afterwards." I repeated mechanically the
words of William Bludger. "Why, you must be mad; they are more likely to
fall down and worship us,--_me_ at any rate."
"No, Capt'n," replied William; "that's your mistake. They say we're both
Catharmata; that's what they call us; and you're no better than me."
"And what are Catharmata?" I inquired, remembering that this word, or
something like it, had been constantly used by the natives in my hearing.
"Well, Capt'n, it means, first and foremost, just the off-scourings of
creation, the very dust and sweepings of the shop," answered Bludger, who
had somehow regained his confidence. To have a fellow-sufferer, and to
see the pallor which, doubtless, overspread my features, was a source of
comfort to this hardened man. At the same time I confess that, if
William Bludger alone had been destined to suffer, I could have
contemplated the decree with Christian resignation.
"I speak the beggars' patter pretty well now," Bludger went on; "and I
see Catharmata means more than just mere dirt. It means two unlucky
devils."
"William?" I exclaimed.
"It means, saving your presence, two poor coves, as has no luck, like you
and me, and that can be got rid of once a year, at an entertainment they
call the Thargeelyah, I dunno why, a kind o' friendly lead. They choose
fellows as either behaves ill, or has no friends to make a fuss about
them, and they gives them three dozen, or more, and takes them down to
the beach, and burns them alive over a slow fire. And then they toss the
ashes out to sea, and think all the bad luck goes away with the tide. Oh,
I never was in such a hole as this!"
Bludger's words made me shudder. I had never forgotten the hideous
sacrifice, doubtless the Thargeelyah, as they called it, that greeted me
when I was first cast ashore on the island. To think that I had only
been saved that I might figure as a victim of some of their heathen gods!
Oh, now the thought came back to me with a bitter repentance, that if I
had only converted all the islanders, they would never have dreamed of
sacrificing me in honour of a mere idol! Why had I been so lukewarm, why
had I backslidden, why had I endeavoured to make myself agreeable by
joining in promiscuous dances, when I should have been thundering against
Pagan idolatry, holy water, idols, sacrifices and the whole abominable
system of life on the island? True, I might have goaded them into
slaying me; I might have suffered as a martyr; but, at the least, I would
have deserved the martyr's crown. And now I was to perish at the stake,
without even the precious consolation of being a real martyr, and was to
be flogged into the bargain.
I gave a hollow groan as these reflections passed through my mind, and
this appeared to afford William Bludger some consolation.
"You don't seem to like it yourself, Capt'n; what's your advice? We're
both in the same boat; leastways I wish we _were_ in a boat; anyhow we're
both in the same hole."
There was no denying this, and it was high time to mature some plan of
escape. Already I must have been missed by my attendants, my gaolers
rather, who would have returned from their festival, and would be looking
for me everywhere.
I bitterly turned over in my mind the facts of our situation; "ours,"
for, as a just punishment of my remissness, I was in the same quandary as
a drunken, dissipated sailor before the mast.
If William had but possessed a sweet and tuneful voice (often a gift
found in the most depraved natures), and if I had been able to borrow a
harmonium on wheels, I would not, even now, have despaired of converting
the whole island in the course of the week. As remarkable feats have
been performed, with equal alacrity, by precious Messrs. Moody and
Sankey, and I am informed that expeditious conversions are by no means
infrequent among politicians. But it was vain to think of this resource,
as William had no voice, and knew no hymns, while I had no means of
access to a perambulating harmonium.
"I'll tell you what it is, sir," said Bludger; "I have a notion."
"Name it, William," I replied, my heart and manner softened by community
in suffering and terror.
"Well, if I were you, sir, I would not go home to-night at all; I'd stop
where you are. The beggars won't find you, let them hunt as they like;
they daren't come near this place, bless you, it's an 'Arnt;" by which he
meant that it was haunted.
"Well," said I, "but how should we be any better off to-morrow morning?"
"That's just it, sir," said Bludger. "We'll be up with the first stroke
of dawn, nip down to the harbour, get on board a boat, and be off before
any of them are stirring."
"But, even if we manage to secure a boat," I said, "what about
provisions, and where are we to sail for?"
"Oh, never mind that," said Bill; "we can't be worse off than we are, and
I'll slip out to-night, and lay in some prog in the town. Also some
grog, if I can lay my hands on it," he added, with an unholy smile.
"No, William," I murmured; "no grog; our lives depend on our sobriety."
"Always a-preaching, the old tub-thumper," I heard William say to
himself; but he made no further reference to the subject.
It was now quite dark, and we lay whispering, in the damp hollow under
the great stone. Our plan was to crawl away at the first blush of dawn,
when men generally sleep most soundly; that William should enter one of
the unguarded houses (for these people never stole, and did not know the
meaning of the word "thief"), that he should help himself to provisions,
and that meanwhile I should have a boat ready to start in the harbour.
This larcenous but inevitable programme we carried out, after waiting
through dreadful hours of cold and shivering anxiety. Every cry of a
night bird from the marsh or the wood sent my heart into my mouth. I
felt inconceivably mean and remorseful, my vanity having received a
dreadful shock from the discovery that, far from being a god, I was to be
a kind of burnt-offering.
At last the east grew faintly grey, and we started, not keeping together,
but Bludger marching cautiously in my rear, at a considerable distance.
We only met one person, a dissipated young man, who, I greatly fear, had
been paying his court to a shepherdess in the hills. When he shouted a
challenge, I replied, Erastes eimi, which means, I am sorry to say, "I am
a lover," and implied that I, also, had been engaged in low intrigue.
"Farewell, with good fortune," he replied, and went on his way, singing
some catch about Amaryllis, who, I presume, was the object of his
unhallowed attentions.
We slipped into the silent town, unwalled and unguarded as it was, for as
one of their own poets had said, "We dwell by the wash of the waves, far
off from toilsome men, and with us are no folk conversant." They were a
race that knew war only by a vague tradition, that they had dwelt, at
some former age, in an island, perhaps New Zealand, where they were
subject to constant annoyance from Giants,--a likely story. Thence they
had migrated to their present home, where only one white man had ever
been cast away--one Odysseus, so their traditions declared--before our
arrival. Him, however, they had treated hospitably, very unlike their
contemplated behaviour to Bludger and me.
I am obliged to make this historical digression that the reader may
understand how it happened, under Providence, that we were not detected
in passing through the town, and how Bludger successfully accomplished
what, I fear, was by no means his first burglary.
We parted at the chief's house, Bill to secure provisions, and I to
unmoor a boat, and bring her round to a lonely bay on the coast, where my
companion was to join me.
I accomplished my task without the slightest difficulty, selected a light
craft,--they did not use canoes, but rowed boats like coracles,--and was
lying at anchor, moored with a heavy stone, in the bay.
The dawn was now breaking in the most beautiful colours--gold, purple,
crimson, and green--across the sea. All nature was still, save for the
first pipe of awakening birds.
There was a delicate fragrance in the air, which was at once soft and
keen, and, as I watched the red sunlight on the high cliffs, and on the
smooth trunks of the palm trees, I felt, strange to say, a kind of
reluctance to leave the island.
The people, apart from their cruel and abominable religion, were the
gentlest and most peaceful I have ever known. They were beautiful to
look upon, so finely made and shapely that I have never seen their like.
Their language was exquisitely sweet and melodious, and though, except
hymns, I do not care for poetry, yet I must admit that some of their
compositions in verse were extremely pleasing, though they were ignorant
of the art of rhyme. All about them was beautifully made, and they were
ignorant of poverty. I never saw a beggar on the island; and Christians,
unhappily, do not share their goods with each other, and with the poor,
so freely as did these benighted heathens. Often have I laboured to make
them understand what our Pauper Question means, but they could not
comprehend me.
"How can a man lack home, and food, and fire?" they would say; "do people
not love each other in your country?"
I explained that we love each other _as Christians_, but this did not
seem to enlighten their benighted minds. On the other hand, it is true
that they settle their population question by strangling or exposing the
majority of their infant daughters.
Rocked on the smooth green swell of the sea, beneath the white rocks, I
was brooding over these and many other matters, when I heard sudden and
violent movements in the deep vegetation on the hillside. The laurel
groves were stirred, and Bill Bludger, with a basket in his hand, bounded
down the slope, and swam for dear life to the boat.
"They're after me," he cried; and at that moment an arrow quivered in the
side of the boat.
I helped William on board as well as I might, under a shower of arrows
from the hill-top, most of which, owing to the distance, were ill
directed and fell short, or went wide.
Into the boat, at last, I got him, and thrusting an oar in his direction,
I said, "Pull for your life," and began rowing. To my horror, the boat
made no way, but kept spinning round. A glance in the bow showed me what
was the matter: _William Bludger was hopelessly intoxicated_! He had got
at the jars of wine in the chief's cellar,--thalamos, they call it,--and
had not taken the precaution of mixing the liquor with water, as the
natives invariably do when they drink. The excitement of running had
sent the alcoholic fumes direct to his brain, and now he lay, a useless
and embarrassing cargo, in the bows. Meanwhile, the shouts of the
natives rang nearer and louder, and I knew that boats would soon be
launched for our capture. I thought of throwing Bludger overboard, and
sculling, but determined not to stain what might be my last moments with
an act of selfishness. I therefore pulled hard for the open sea, but to
no avail. On every side boats crowded round me, and I should probably
have been shot, or speared, but for the old priest, who, erect in the
bows of the largest vessel, kept yelling that we were to be taken alive.
Alas! I well knew the secret of his cruel mercies.
He meant to reserve us for the sacrifice.