The Tour of the World.--The Way to manufacture Negroes--California.
--The Eldorado.--Revolt of Selkirk.--The Log-Book.--Degradation.
--A Free Shore.
The Swordfish, well provisioned, even with guns and ammunition, left
Dunbar one morning with a fresh breeze, sailed down the North Sea,
passed Ireland, France and Spain, the Azores, Canaries, and Cape Verd
Islands on the coast of Africa, and, after having stopped for a short
time in the harbors of Guinea and Congo, doubled the Cape of Good
Hope, amid the traditional tempest.
Entering the Indian Ocean, and passing through the Straits of Sunda,
she touched at Borneo, and at Java, reached the Southern Sea by the
Gulf of Siam, passed the Philippine Isles, then, through the vast
regions of the Pacific Ocean, pursued the route which had been marked
out by the exploring ship of William Dampier in 1686. Like that, the
Swordfish remained a few days at the Island of St. Pierre, before
launching into that immensity where, during nearly two months, wave
only succeeded to wave; at last she reached the coasts of South
America, and cast anchor in the Gulf of California.
This gigantic voyage, which seemed as if it must have been attempted
under the inspiration of science and with the hope of the most
important discoveries, had been undertaken by Stradling with no object
but of traffic and even of rapine. These had been the great ends of
most of the bold enterprises which had preceded. The Spanish and
Portuguese, in their discoveries of new continents, had thought less
of glory than of riches; they had conquered the New World only to
pillage it; the vanquished who escaped extermination, were forced to
dig their native soil, not to render it more fruitful, but to procure
from it, for the profit of the vanquisher, the gold it might contain.
Among the European nations, those who had had no part in the conquest
now sought to share the spoils. For this the least pretext of war or
commerce sufficed.
Stradling availed himself of both these pretences; when he touched at
the coasts of Guinea and Congo, it was to obtain negroes whom he
expected to sell in America. At Borneo, the opportunity presented
itself for an advantageous disposal of the greater part of his black
merchandize; as he was a man of resources and not at all scrupulous,
he soon found means to replace them.
In the Straits of Sunda, several barques, manned by negroes and
Malays, had become entangled in the masses of seaweed which are every
where floating on the surface of the wave; Stradling encountered them,
made the rowers enter his ship, and obligingly took the barques in
tow, to extricate them from their difficulty. But those who ascended
the side of the Swordfish, descended only to be sold in their turn.
Although he had received an education superior to that of his
companions, Selkirk shared in the prejudices of his times; he had
therefore found nothing objectionable in seeing his captain exchange
at Congo little mirrors, a few glass beads, half a dozen useless guns,
and some gallons of brandy, for men still young and vigorous, torn
from their country and their families. Their skin was of another
color, their heads woolly; this was a profitable traffic, recognized
by governments; but when he saw Stradling seize the property of others
to refill his empty hold, he could not control his indignation and
boldly expressed it:
'It is for their salvation,' replied the captain, without emotion; 'we
will make Christians of them.'
On approaching the Vermilion Sea, a deep gulf which separates
California from the American continent, and makes it almost an island,
the Malays were rubbed with a mixture of tar and dragon's blood,
dissolved in a caustic oil, to give to their olive skins a deeper
shade, and their flat noses and silky hair making them pass for Yolof
negroes, they were exchanged at Cape St. Lucas, along with the rest,
for pearls and native productions.
The young mate thought this proceeding not less mean and dishonorable
than the first; he made new observations.
'Nothing now remains to be done, captain,' said he, 'but to shave and
besmear with tar the monkey you have just bought, and to include it
among your new race of negroes.'
This time, the captain looked at him askance, and shrugged his
shoulders without replying.
The storm was beginning to growl in the distance.
It was not without a secret object that, in his course through the
Southern Sea, Stradling had first of all aimed at California.
He devoted an entire month to cruising along both shores of this
almost island, and penetrating all the bays of the Vermilion Sea; he
hoped to find there a passage to an unknown land, then predicted and
coveted by all navigators. What was this land? The _Eldorado_!
Although I would hasten over these details of the voyage to arrive at
the more important events of this history; now that the recent
discovery of the immense mines of gold buried beneath the hills of
California has aroused the entire world, that the name alone of
_Sacramento_ seems to fill with gold the mouth which pronounces it,
there is a curious fact, perhaps entirely unknown, which I cannot pass
over in silence.
After the middle of the sixteenth century, and long before the
seventeenth, a vague rumor, a confused tradition, had located, in the
neighborhood of the Vermilion Sea, a famed land, whose rivers rolled
over gold, and whose mountains rested on golden foundations; the
treasures of Mexico and Peru were nothing in comparison with those
which were to be gathered there. An ingot of native gold was talked
of, of a _pepite_ or eighty pounds weight.
It was a grape from the promised land.
This marvellous country had been named, in advance, _Eldorado_.
Among the bold Argonauts of these two centuries, there was a contest
as to who should first raise his flag over this new Colchis, defended,
it was said, by the Apaches, a terrible, sanguinary and cannibal race,
whom Cortez himself could not subdue. This land of gold some had
located in New Biscay or New Mexico; others, in the pretended kingdoms
of Sonora and Quivira; then, after several ineffectual attempts, the
possibility of reaching it was denied; learned men, from the various
academies of Europe, proved that the _Eldorado_ was not a country, but
a dream; on this subject the Old World laughed at the New; the
Argonauts became discouraged, and during a century the subject was
named only to be ridiculed.
And yet, in spite of sceptics and scoffers, the _Eldorado_ existed. It
existed where tradition had placed it, on the shores of this Vermilion
Sea, now the Gulf of California. For once, popular opinion had the
advantage over scientific dissertations and philosophic denials;
there, where, according to the Dictionary of Alcedo, nothing had been
discovered but mines of pewter! where Jacques Baegert had indeed
acknowledged the presence of gold, but _in meagre veins_; where Raynal
had named as curiosities only fishes and pearls, declaring, in
California, _the sea richer than the land_; where in our own times M.
Humboldt discovered nothing but cylindrical cacti, on a sandy soil,
remained buried, as a deposit for future ages, this treasure of the
world, which seemed to be waiting in order to leave its native soil,
the moment of falling into the hands of a commercial and industrious
people, that of the United States.
This _Eldorado_, Stradling sought in vain; he therefore decided to
pursue his route along the coast of Mexico, now under the French flag,
when he found an opportunity for traffic with the natives, colonists
or savages; now under the English flag, when he wished to exercise his
trade of corsair, an easy profession, for since the disaster of Vigo,
the Spanish had abandoned their transatlantic possessions to
themselves.
The Spanish soldiery of America then found themselves, in the presence
of European adventurers, in that state of pusillanimous inferiority in
which had been, at the period of the conquest, the subjects of the
Incas and Montezuma before the soldiers of Cortez and Pizarro. The
time was not already far passed, when a few bands of freebooters, from
France, England and Holland, had well nigh wrested from his Majesty,
the King of Spain and the Indies, the most extensive and wealthy of
his twenty-two hereditary kingdoms.
Stradling was following in the footsteps of these freebooters.
Recently, two little cities on the coast had been put under
contribution for the supplies of the Swordfish; there had been
resistance, a threatened attack, a parley, and capitulation; in this
affair, the young mate had nobly distinguished himself both as a
combatant and a negotiator, and yet the captain had not deigned to
give him a share in his distribution of compliments.
Selkirk felt an irritation the more lively that this shore life began
to be irksome. Not that his conscience disturbed him any more than in
the treatment of the blacks; he thought it as honorable to war with
the Spaniards in the New World, as to be beaten by them in the Old;
but he compared his present chief, Captain Stradling, with his former
commander, the noble and brave Admiral Rooke; the parallel extended in
his mind to his old companions in the royal navy, all so frank, so
gay, so loyal,--among whom he had yet never found a friend,--and his
new companions of to-day, recruited for the most part in the marshy
lowlands of the merchant marine of Scotland; his thoughts became
overshadowed, and his desires for independence, which dated from his
college life, returned in full force.
As much as his duties permitted, he loved to isolate himself from all;
when he could remain some time alone in his cabin, or gaze upon the
sea from a retired corner of the deck and watch the ploughing of the
vessel, then only he was happy.
As if to increase his uneasiness, Stradling became daily more severe
and more exacting towards his chief officer; he imposed upon him rude
labors foreign to his station. It seemed as if he were determined to
drive him to desperation.
He succeeded.
Selkirk protested against such treatment, and recapitulated his
subjects of complaint. The other paid no more attention than he would
have done to the buzzing of a fly.
Irritated by this outrageous impassibility, the young man declared
that there should no longer be any thing in common between them, and
that, whatever fate might await him, he demanded to be set on shore.
Stradling touched his forehead:
'That is a good idea,' said he, and he turned away.
The next day, they reached the Isthmus of Panama; the persevering
Selkirk returned to the charge: 'The moment is favorable for ridding
yourself of me, and me of you,' said he to the captain; 'let the boat
convey me to the shore; I will cross the Isthmus, reach the Gulf of
Darien, the North Sea, and return to Scotland, even before the
Swordfish!'
This time the honest corsair listened attentively, then shaking his
head and winking his eye, with the smile of a hungry vampire, replied:
'You are then in great haste to be married, comrade.'
It was the first word he had addressed to him relative to Catherine
during this long voyage, and this word Selkirk had not even
understood.
They were about passing Panama: the vessel continuing her voyage,
Selkirk interposed his authority, ordered the men to put about, take
in sail and approach the shore.
This Stradling prohibited, uttered a formidable oath, and commanded
the young man to bring the log-book. When it was brought, he made the
following entry:
'To-day, Sept. 24th, 1704, Alexander Selkirk, mate of this vessel,
having mutinied and attempted to desert to the enemy, we have deprived
him of his title and his office; in case of obstinacy we shall hang
him to the yard-arm.'
And he read the sentence to the offender.
From this day, the rebel saw himself compelled to serve in the
Swordfish as a simple sailor, and his subordinates of yesterday,
to-day his equals, indemnified themselves for the authority he had
exercised over them, which did not cure him of that native contempt he
had always felt for mankind.
A month passed away thus, during which the Swordfish several times
touched the shores of Peru, now to renew her supplies of provisions
and water, now to exchange with the Indians, nails, hatchets, knives,
and necklaces of beads, for gold dust, furs, and garments trimmed with
colored feathers.
During one of these pauses, Selkirk, left on the ship, accosted the
captain once more. He knew that the remains of some bands of
freebooters were colonized there, leading a peaceful and agricultural
life; this fact was known to all. At Coquimbo in Chili, some English
and Dutch pirates had formed a settlement of this kind, now in the
full tide of prosperity. Selkirk, who, during an entire month, had not
spoken to the captain, now demanded, in a voice which he attempted to
render calm and almost supplicating, to be landed at Coquimbo, from
which they were only a few days sail.
'You will not this time accuse me of wishing to desert to the enemy;
they are the English, Scotch, Dutch, our countrymen and allies whom I
wish to join! Do you still suspect me? Well, do not content yourself
with setting me on shore; place me in the hands of the chief men of
the settlement. Will that suit you?'
Stradling winked significantly; but this was all.
'Ah!' resumed the young man with increasing emotion, 'do not think to
detain me longer on board, to crush me beneath this humiliation! I
consented to serve under your orders as mate, and you have made me the
lowest of your sailors; this you had no right to do.'
Stradling took his glass and directed it towards the shore, where his
people were engaged in trafficking their beads and hardware.
Raising his head and folding his arms:
'Captain,' pursued Selkirk with vehemence, 'some day or other we shall
return to England, where the laws protect all; there, I shall have the
right of complaint, and Queen Anne loves to render justice; beware!'
Stradling, still spying, began to whistle _God save the Queen_; then
he called his monkey and made it gambol before him.
'I will depart, I will free myself from your presence, and that of
your worthy companions; I will do so at all events, do you
understand!' exclaimed Selkirk exasperated, 'I will not endure your
infamous treatment another week! If you refuse to consent to my
demand, I will leave without your permission; were the vessel twenty
miles from the land, and were I to perish twenty times on the way, I
will attempt to swim ashore. Will you land me at Coquimbo, yes or no?
Reply!'
By way of reply, Stradling ordered him to be confined in the hold.
Poor Selkirk! Ah! if pretty Kitty, if the beautiful landlady of the
Royal Salmon could know all thou hast endured for her sake, how many
tears would her fine eyes shed over thy fate! But who knows whether
she will ever hear of thee? Who can tell whether any human being will
learn the sufferings in reserve for thee?
Poor Selkirk! you who painted to yourself so smiling a picture of this
grand voyage to America; who hoped to leave, like Dampier, your name
to some strait, some newly discovered island; you who dreamed of
scientific walks in vast prairies and under the arches of virgin
forests, you have shared only in the career of a trafficker and a
pirate; of this New World, full of marvellous sights, you have seen
only the shore, the fringe of the mantle, the margin of this last work
of God!
Poor Selkirk, must you then return to your cold and foggy Scotland,
without having contemplated at your ease, beneath the brilliant sun of
the tropics, one of those Edens overshadowed by the luxuriant verdure
of palm-trees, bananas, mimosas and gigantic ferns? In your country,
the bark of the trees is clad with lichens and mosses, and the
parasite mistletoe suspends itself to the branches, more as a burden
than as an ornament; here, numerous families of the orchis, with their
singular forms, showy and variegated blossoms, climb along the knotty
stems of the tall monarchs of the forests; from their feet spring up,
as if to enlace them with a magic network, the brilliant passiflora,
the vanilla with its intoxicating perfume, the banisteria whose roots
seem to have dived into mines of gold and borrowed from thence the
color of its petals! Hither the birds of Paradise and Brazilian
parrots come to build their nests; here the bluebird and the
purple-necked wood-pigeon coo and sing; here, like swarms of bees,
thousands of humming-birds of mingled emerald and sapphire, warble and
glitter as they suck the nectar from the flowers. This was what you
hoped to contemplate, poor Selkirk! and this joy, like many others, is
henceforth forbidden.
In his floating prison, in his submarine cell, his only employment is
to listen to the dashing of the waves against the ship, or now and
then to catch a glimpse of the blue sky through the hatchways.
What cares he? He does not complain; he has learned to abhor mankind,
and he loves to be alone, in company with himself and his own
thoughts.
Several days passed in this manner.
One morning he felt the brig slacken its speed; the dashing of the
wave against the prow diminished, and the Swordfish, suddenly furling
its sails, after having slightly rocked hither and thither, stopped.
They had just cast anchor. Where? he knows not.
Soon he hears the rattling of the rope-ladder which serves as a
stairway to those above who would communicate with his prison. They
come, on the part of the captain, to seek him.
He finds the latter seated on the deck, surrounded by his principal
men.
'Young man,' said Stradling, 'I have been obliged to be severe for the
sake of an example; but you have been sufficiently punished by the
time you have passed below there,'--and he pointed to the ship's hold.
'Now, your wish shall be granted. You shall be allowed to land.'
And the rare smile which sometimes hovered on his lips, stole over his
rigid face.
'So much the better,' replied Selkirk, laconically.
The boat was let down; he entered it, and ten minutes afterwards
disembarked on a green shore, where the waves, as they broke upon it,
seemed to murmur softly in his ear the word, _liberty_!
The boat immediately rejoined the ship, which set sail, coasted along
Chili and Patagonia, and re-entered the Northern Sea by the Straits of
Magellan.