The word _captivity_, even when it refers to civilised lands and
peoples, conveys, we suspect, but a feeble and incorrect idea to the
minds of those who have never been in a state of personal bondage.
Still less do we fully appreciate its dread significance when it refers
to foreign lands and barbarous people.
It was not so much the indignities to which the captive Britons were
subjected that told upon them ultimately, as the hard, grinding,
restless toil, and the insufficient food and rest--sometimes accompanied
with absolute corporeal pain.
"A merciful man is merciful to his beast." There is not much of mercy
to his beast in an Arab. We have seen an Arab, in Algiers, who made use
of a sore on his donkey's back as a sort of convenient spur! It is
exhausting to belabour a thick-skinned and obstinate animal with a
stick. It is much easier, and much more effective, to tickle up a sore,
kept open for the purpose, with a little bit of stick, while comfortably
seated on the creature's back. The fellow we refer to did that. We do
not say or think that all Arabs are cruel; very far from it, but we hold
that, as a race, they are so. Their great prophet taught them cruelty
by example and precept, and the records of history, as well as of the
African slave-trade, bear witness to the fact that their "tender
mercies" are not and never have been conspicuous!
At first, as we have shown, indignities told pretty severely on the
unfortunate Englishmen. But, as time went on, and they were taken
further and further into the interior, and heavy burdens were daily
bound on their shoulders, and the lash was frequently applied to urge
them on, the keen sense of insult which had at first stirred them into
wild anger became blunted, and at last they reached that condition of
partial apathy which renders men almost indifferent to everything save
rest and food. Even the submissive Stevenson was growing callous. In
short, that process had begun which usually ends in making men either
brutes or martyrs.
As before, we must remark that Jack Molloy was to some extent an
exception. It did seem as if nothing but death itself could subdue that
remarkable man. His huge frame was so powerful that he seemed to be
capable of sustaining any weight his tyrants chose to put upon him. And
the influence of hope was so strong within him that it raised him almost
entirely above the region of despondency.
This was fortunate for his comrades in misfortune, for it served to keep
up their less vigorous spirits.
There was one thing about the seaman, however, which they could not
quite reconcile with his known character. This was a tendency to groan
heavily when he was being loaded. To be sure, there was not much reason
for wonder, seeing that the Arabs forced the Herculean man to carry
nearly double the weight borne by any of his companions, but then, as
Miles once confidentially remarked to Armstrong, "I thought that Jack
Molloy would rather have died than have groaned on account of the weight
of his burden; but, after all, it _is_ a tremendously heavy one--poor
fellow!"
One day the Arabs seemed to be filled with an unusual desire to torment
their victims. A man had passed the band that day on a fast dromedary,
and the prisoners conjectured that he might have brought news of some
defeat of their friends, which would account for their increased
cruelty. They were particularly hard on Molloy that day, as if they
regarded him as typical of British strength, and, therefore, an
appropriate object of revenge. After the midday rest, they not only put
on him his ordinary burden, but added to the enormous weight
considerably, so that the poor fellow staggered under it, and finally
fell down beneath it, with a very dismal groan indeed!
Of course the lash was at once applied, and under its influence the
sailor rose with great difficulty, and staggered forward a few paces,
but only to fall again. This time, however, he did not wait for the
lash, but made very determined efforts of his own accord to rise and
advance, without showing the smallest sign of resentment. Even his
captors seemed touched, for one of them removed a small portion of his
burden, so that, thereafter, the poor fellow proceeded with less
difficulty, though still with a little staggering and an occasional
groan.
That night they reached a village near the banks of a broad river, where
they put up for the night. After their usual not too heavy supper was
over, the prisoners were thrust into a sort of hut or cattle-shed, and
left to make themselves as comfortable as they could on the bare floor.
"I don't feel quite so much inclined for sleep to-night," said Miles to
Molloy.
"No more do I," remarked the sailor, stretching himself like a wearied
Goliath on the earthen floor, and placing his arms under his head for a
pillow.
"I feel pretty well used up too," said Simkin, throwing himself down
with a sigh that was more eloquent than his tongue. He was indeed
anything but Rattling Bill by that time.
Moses Pyne being, like his great namesake, a meek man, sympathised with
the others, but said nothing about himself, though his looks betrayed
him. Armstrong and Stevenson were silent. They seemed too much
exhausted to indulge in speech.
"Poor fellow!" said Moses to Molloy, "I don't wonder you are tired, for
you not only carried twice as much as any of us, but you took part of
_my_ load. Indeed he did, comrades," added Moses, turning to his
friends with an apologetic air. "I didn't want him to do it, but he
jerked part o' my load suddenly out o' my hand an' wouldn't give it up
again; an', you know, I didn't dare to make a row, for that would have
brought the lash down on both of us. But I didn't want him to carry so
much, an' him so tired."
"Tired!" exclaimed the sailor, with a loud laugh. "Why, I warn't tired
a bit. An', you know, you'd have dropped down, Moses, if I hadn't
helped ye at that time."
"Well, I confess I _was_ ready to drop," returned Moses, with a humbled
look; "but I would much rather have dropped than have added to your
burden. How can you say you wasn't tired when you had fallen down only
five minutes before, an' groaned heavily when you rose, and your legs
trembled so? I could _see_ it!"
To this the seaman's only reply was the expansion of his huge but
handsome mouth, the display of magnificent teeth, the disappearance of
both eyes, and a prolonged quiet chuckle.
"Why, what's the matter with you, Jack?" asked Stevenson.
"Nothin's the matter wi' me, old man--'cept--"
Here he indulged in another chuckle.
"Goin' mad, with over-fatigue," said Simkin, looking suspiciously at
him.
"Ay, that's it, messmate, clean mad wi' over-fatigue."
He wiped his eyes with the hairy back of his hand, for the chuckling,
being hearty, had produced a few tears.
"No, but really, Jack, what is it you're laughing at?" asked Armstrong.
"If there _is_ a joke you might as well let us have the benefit of
laughing along wi' you, for we stand much in need of something to cheer
us here."
"Well, Billy boy, I may as well make a clean breast of it," said Molloy,
raising himself on one elbow and becoming grave. "I do confess to
feelin' raither ashamed o' myself, but you mustn't be hard on me, lads,
for circumstances alters cases, you know, as Solomon said--leastwise if
it warn't him it was Job or somebody else. The fact is, I've bin
shammin', mates!"
"Shamming!"
"Ay, shammin' _weak_. Purtendin' that I was shaky on the legs, an' so
not quite up to the cargo they were puttin' aboard o' me."
"If what you've been doing means shamming _weak_, I'd like to see you
coming out _strong_," observed Miles, with a short laugh.
"Well, p'r'aps you'll see that too some day," returned the sailor, with
an amiable look.
"But do you really mean that all that groaning--which I confess to have
been surprised at--was mere pretence?"
"All sham. Downright sneakin'!" said Molloy. "The short an' the long
of it is, that I see'd from the first the on'y way to humbug them
yellow-faced baboons was to circumwent 'em. So I set to work at the
wery beginnin'."
"Ah, by takin' a header," said Simkin, "into one o' their
bread-baskets!"
"No, no!" returned the seaman, "that, I confess, was a mistake. But
you'll admit, I've made no more mistakes o' the same sort since then.
You see, I perceived that, as my strength is considerable above the
average, the baboons would be likely to overload me, so, arter profound
excogitation wi' myself, I made up my mind what to do, an' when they had
clapped on a little more than the rest o' you carried I began to groan,
then I began to shake a bit in my timbers, an' look as if I was agoin'
to founder. It didn't check 'em much, for they're awful cruel, so I
went fairly down by the head. I had a pretty fair guess that this would
bring the lash about my shoulders, an' I was right, but I got up wery
slowly an' broken-down-like, so that the baboons was fairly humbugged,
and stopped loadin' of me long afore I'd taken in a full cargo--so, you
see, boys, I've bin sailin' raither light than otherwise."
"But do you mean to tell me that the load you've bin carryin' is not too
heavy for you?" asked Moses.
"That's just what I does mean to tell you, lad. I could carry a good
deal more, an' dance with it. You see, they ain't used to men o' my
size, so I was able to humbug 'em into a miscalkilation. I on'y wish I
could have helped you all to do the same, but they're too 'cute, as the
Yankees say. Anyway, Moses, you don't need to trouble your head when I
gives you a helpin' hand again."
"Ah, that expression, `a helping hand,' sounds familiar in my ears,"
said Stevenson, in a sad tone.
"Yes, what do it recall, lad?" asked Molloy, extending himself again on
his broad back.
"It recalls places and friends in Portsmouth, Jack, that we may never
again set eyes on. You remember the Institoot? Well, they've got a new
branch o' the work there for the surrounding civilian poor, called the
_Helping Hand_. You see, Miss Robinson understands us soldiers out and
out. She knew that those among us who gave up drink and sin, and put on
the blue-ribbon, were not goin' to keep all the benefit to ourselves.
She knew that we understood the meaning of the word `enlist' That we'd
think very little o' the poor-spirited fellow who'd take the Queen's
shillin' and put on her uniform, and then shirk fightin' her battles and
honouring her flag. So when some of us put on the Lord's uniform--
which, like that of the Austrians, is white--and unfurled His flag, she
knew we'd soon be wantin' to fight His battles against sin--especially
against drink; so instead of lookin' after our welfare alone, she
encouraged us to hold out a _helpin' hand_ to the poorest and most
miserable people in Portsmouth, an' she found us ready to answer to the
call."
"Ah, they was grand times, these," continued the marine, with kindly
enthusiasm, as he observed that his comrades in sorrow were becoming
interested, and forgetting for the moment their own sorrows and
sufferings. "The Blue-Ribbon move was strong in Portsmouth at the time,
and many of the soldiers and sailors joined it. Some time after we had
held out a helping hand to the poor civilians, we took it into our heads
to invite some of 'em to a grand tea-fight in the big hall, so we asked
a lot o' the poorest who had faithfully kept the pledge through their
first teetotal Christmas; and it _was_ a scrimmage, I can tell you. We
got together more than forty of 'em, men and women, and there were about
three hundred soldiers and sailors, and their wives to wait on 'em an'
keep 'em company!"
"Capital!" exclaimed Miles, who had a sympathetic spirit--especially for
the poor.
"Good--good!" said Molloy, nodding his head. "That was the right thing
to do, an' I suppose they enjoyed theirselves?"
"Enjoyed themselves!" exclaimed the marine, with a laugh. "I should
just think they did. Trust Miss Robinson for knowin' how to make poor
folk enjoy themselves--and, for the matter of that, rich folk too! How
they did stuff, to be sure! Many of 'em, poor things, hadn't got such a
blow-out in all their lives before. You see, they was the very poorest
of the poor. You may believe what I say, for I went round myself with
one o' the Institoot ladies to invite 'em, and I do declare to you that
I never saw even pigs or dogs in such a state of destitootion--nothin'
whatever to lie on but the bare boards."
"You don't say so?" murmured Moses, with deep commiseration, and
seemingly oblivious of the fact that he was himself pretty much in
similar destitution at that moment.
"Indeed I do. Look here," continued the marine, becoming more earnest
as he went on; "thousands of people don't know--can't understand--what
misery and want and suffering is going on around 'em. City missionaries
and the like tell 'em about it, and write about it, but telling and
writin' _don't_ make people _know_ some things. They must _see_, ay,
sometimes they must _feel_, before they can rightly understand.
"One of the rooms we visited," continued Stevenson, in pathetic tones,
"belonged to a poor old couple who had been great drinkers, but had been
induced to put on the blue-ribbon. It was a pigeon-hole of a room,
narrow, up a dark stair. They had no means of support. The room was
empty. Everything had been pawned. The last thing given up was the
woman's shawl to pay the rent, and they were starving."
"Why didn't they go to the work'us?" asked Simkin.
"'Cause the workhouse separates man and wife, in defiance of the Divine
law--`Whom God hath joined together let no man put asunder.' They was
fond of each other, was that old man and woman, and had lived long
together, an' didn't want to part till death. So they had managed to
stick to the old home, ay, and they had stuck to their colours, for the
bit o' blue was still pinned to the tattered coat o' the man and the
thin gown o' the woman, (neither coat nor gown would fetch anything at
the pawn-shop!) and there was no smell o' drink in the room. Well, that
old couple went to the tea-fight. It was a bitter cold night, but they
came all the same, with nothing to cover the woman's thin old arms.
"The moment they appeared, away went one o' Miss Robinson's workers to
the room where they keep chests full of clothes sent by charitable folk
to the Institoot, an' you should have seen that old woman's wrinkled
face when the worker returned wi' the thickest worsted shawl she could
lay hold of, an' put it on her shoulders as tenderly as if the old woman
had been her own mother! At the same time they gave a big-coat to the
old man."
"But, I say," interrupted Simkin, "that Christmas feed an' shawl an'
coat wouldn't keep the couple for a twel'month, if they was sent home to
starve as before, would it?"
"Of course not," returned the marine, "but they wasn't sent off to
starve; they was looked after. Ay, an' the people o' the whole
neighbourhood are now looked after, for Miss Robinson has bought up a
grog-shop in Nobbs Lane--one o' the worst places in Portsmouth--an'
converted it into a temperance coffee-house, wi' lots of beds to send
people to when the Institoot overflows, an' a soup-kitchen for the
destitoot poor, an' a wash'us for them and the soldiers' wives, an', in
short, it has changed the whole place; but if I go on like this I'll
send Moses to sleep, for I've heard 'im smotherin' his yawns more than
once a'ready!"
"It's not for want of interest in what you're sayin' though, old man,"
returned Moses, with a tremendous unsmothered yawn, which of course set
all his comrades off, and confirmed them in the belief that it was time
to seek repose.
Scarcely a single comment was made on the narrative, as each laid his
weary head on his arm or on a folded garment, and stretched himself out
on the hard ground, in nearly as destitute a condition as the poor folk,
about whom they had been hearing; for while their bed was as hard as
theirs, and the covering as scant, the meal they had recently consumed
was by no means what hungry men would call satisfying.
There is reason to believe, however, that their consideration of the sad
lot of "the poor" at home did not render less profound or sweet that
night's repose in the great African wilderness.