At Madeira seven of us were added to the first-class passengers of the
_Cambuscan_, homeward bound from Cape Town; and even so the company made
a poor muster in the saloon, which required a hundred and seventy feet
of hurricane-deck for covering. Those were days--long before the South
African War, before the Jameson Raid even--when every ship carried out a
load of miners for the Transvaal, and returned comparatively empty,
though as a rule with plenty of obviously rich men and be-diamonded
ladies.
But every tide has its backwash; and it so happened that the _Cambuscan_
held as many second and third-class passengers as she could stow.
They were--their general air proclaimed it--the failures of South
African immigration; men and women who had gone out too early and given
up the struggle just when the propitious moment arrived. Seediness
marked the second-class; the third-class came from all parts, from the
Cape to Pietermaritzburg, but they might have conspired to assemble on
the _Cambuscan_ as a protest against high hopes and dreams of a promised
land. The protest, let me add, was an entirely passive one. They stood
aloof, watching the flashy gaieties of the hurricane-deck from their own
sad penumbra--a dejected, wistful, whispering throng. "They simply
don't occur," one of the be-diamonded ladies remarked to me, and went on
to praise the U-- Line for arranging it so. With nightfall--or a trifle
later--they vanished; and at most, when the time came for my last pipe
before turning in, two or three figures would be left pacing there
forward, pacing and turning and pacing again. I wondered who these
figures were, and what their thoughts. They and the sleepers hived
beneath them belonged to another world--a world driven with ours through
wave and darkness, urged by the same propellers, controlled by the same
helmsman, separated only by thin partitions which the touch of a rock
would tear down like paper; yet, while the partitions stood, separated
as no city separates its rich and poor. Only on Sundays did these two
worlds consent to meet. They had, it appeared, a common God, and joined
for a few minutes once a week in worshipping Him.
The be-diamonded lady, however, was not quite accurate. Once, and once
only--it was the second day out from Madeira--the third-class passengers
did "occur," to the extent of organising athletic sports, and even (with
the captain's leave) of levying prize-money from the saloon-deck.
Some four or five of us, when their delegate approached, were lounging
beneath the great awning and listening, or pretending to listen, to the
discourse of our only millionaire, Mr. Olstein. As usual, he recited
his wrongs; and, as usual, the mere recital caused him to perspire.
The hairs on the back of his expostulatory hand bristled with
indignation, the diamonds on his fingers flashed with it. We had known
him but two days and were passing weary of him, but allowed him to talk.
He apostrophised the British Flag--his final Court of Appeal, he termed
it--while we stared out over the waters.
"We love it," he insisted. "We never see it without a lump in our
throats. But we ask ourselves, How long is this affection to count for
nothing? What are we to get in return?"
No one answered, perhaps because no one knew. My thoughts had flown
forward to a small riverside church in England, and a memorial window to
one whose body had been found after Isandlwhana with the same flag
wrapped around it beneath the tunic. This was _his_ reward.
"Hey? What's this?" Mr. Olstein took the subscription list, fitted his
gold-rimmed glasses and eyed the delegate over the paper.
"Athletic sports? Not much in your line, I should say."
"No, sir;" and while the delegate bent his eyes a bright spot showed on
either cheek. He was a weedy, hollow-chested man, about six feet in
height, with tell-tale pits at the back of the neck, and a ragged beard
evidently grown on the voyage. "I'm only a collector, with the
captain's permission."
"I see." Mr. Olstein pulled out a sovereign. "I don't put this on
_you_, mind; I can tell a consumptive with half an eye. See here"--he
appealed to us--"this is just what we suffer from. You fellows with
lung trouble flock to a tepid hole like Madeira, while the Cape would
cure you in half the time: why, the voyage itself only begins to be
decent after you get south! But you won't see it; and the people who
_do_ see it are just the sort who don't pay us when they come, and
damage us when they go back,--hard cases, sent out to pick up a living
as well as their health, who get stranded and hurry home half-cured."
A young Briton in the deck-chair next to mine rose and walked off
abruptly, while I fumbled for a coin, ashamed to meet the collector's
eye.
"Hullo!" Mr. Olstein grinned at me. "Our friend's in a hurry to dodge
the subscription list."
But the young Briton turned and intercepted the collector as he moved
towards the next group.
"It's _your_ sovereign," said I, "that seems to be overlooked."
Mr. Olstein saw it at his elbow and re-pocketed it. "Well, if he hasn't
the sense to pick it up, I've some more than to whistle him back.
But that'll show you the sort of fool we send out to compete with
Germans and suchlike. It's enough to make a man ashamed of his
country."
This happened on a Saturday morning, and in the afternoon we attended
the sports--a depressing ceremony. The performers went through their
contests, so to speak, with bated breath and a self-consciousness which,
try as we might, poisoned our applause and made it insufferably
patronising. Their backers would pluck up heart and encourage them
loudly with Whitechapel catch-words, and anon would hush their voices in
uneasy shame. Our collector, brave by fits in his dignity as steward,
would catch the eye of a saloon-deck passenger and shrink behind the
enormous rosette which some wag had pinned upon him.
Next day I made an opportunity to speak with him, after service.
It needed no pressing to extract his story, and he told it with entire
simplicity. He was a Cockney, and by trade had been a baker in
Bermondsey. "A wearing trade," he said. "The most of us die before
forty. You'd be surprised." But he had started with a sound
constitution, and somehow persuaded himself, in spite of warnings, that
he was immune. At thirty-two he had married. "A deal later than most,"
he explained--and had scarcely been married three months before lung
trouble declared itself. "I had a few pounds put by, having married so
late; and it seemed a duty to Emily to give myself every chance: so we
packed up almost at once and started for South Africa. It was a wrench
to her, but the voyage out did us both all the good in the world, she
being in a delicate state of health, and the room in Bermondsey not fit
for a woman in that condition." The baby was born in Cape Town, five
months after their landing. "But they've no employment for bakers out
there," he assured me. "We found trade very low altogether, and what I
picked up wasn't any healthier than in London. Emily disliked the
place, too; though she'd have stayed gladly if it had been doing me any
good. And so back we're going. There's one thing: I'm safe of work.
My old employer in Bermondsey has promised that all right. And the
child, you see, sir, won't suffer. There's no consumption, that I know
of, in either of our families; and Emily, you may be sure, will see he's
not brought up to be a baker."
He announced it in the most matter-of-fact way. He was going back to
England to die--to die speedily--and he knew it. "I should like you to
see our baby, sir," he added. "He weighs extraordinary, for his age.
My wife comes from the North of England--a very big-boned family; and
he's British, every ounce of him, though he _was_ born in South Africa."
But the wife took a chill on entering the Bay, and remained below with
the child; nor was it until the day we sighted England that I saw the
whole family together.
We were to pick up the Eddystone; and as this was calculated to happen
at sunset, or a little after, the usual sweepstake on the saloon-deck
aroused a little more than the usual excitement. For the first glimpse,
whether of lighthouse or light, would give the prize to the nearest
guesser. If we anticipated sunset, the clearness of the weather would
decide between two pretty close shots: if we ran it fine, the lamp
(which carries for seventeen miles and more) might upset those who
staked on daylight even at that distance from the mark. Our guesses had
been tabulated, and the paper pinned up in the smoking-room.
They allowed a margin of some twenty-five knots on the twenty-four
hours' run--ranging, as nearly as I can recollect, from three hundred
and thirty-five to three hundred and sixty; and the date being the last
week of March, and sunset falling close on half-past six, a whole nebula
of guesses surrounded that hour, one or two divided only by a few
seconds.
A strong head-wind met us in the Channel, and the backers of daylight
had almost given up hope; but it dropped in the late afternoon, and by
the log we were evidently in for a close finish. Mr. Olstein had set
his watch by the ship's chronometer, and consulted it from minute to
minute. He stood by me, binocular in hand, and grew paler with
excitement as sunset drew on and the minutes scored off the guesses one
by one from the list. His guess was among the last, but not actually
the last by half a dozen.
We had reached a point when five minutes disposed of no less than nine
guesses. The weather was dull: no one could tell precisely if the sun
had sunk or not. We were certainly within twenty miles of the rock, and
by the Nautical Almanack, unless our chronometer erred, the light ought
to flash out within sixty seconds. If within forty the man sang out
from the crow's-nest, Mr. Olstein would lose; after forty he had a whole
minute and a half for a clear win.
The forty seconds passed. Mr. Olstein drew a long breath of relief.
"But why the devil don't they light up?" he demanded after a moment.
"I call you to witness what the time is by our chronometer. I'll have
it tested as soon as I step ashore, and if it's wrong I'll complain to
the Company; if it's not, I'll send the Trinity House a letter'll lay
those lighthouse fellows by the heels! Punctuality, sir, in the case of
shipping--life or death--"
The cry of the man in the crow's-nest mingled with ours as a spark
touched the north-eastern horizon almost ahead of us--trembled and
died--shone out, as it seemed, more steadily--and again was quenched.
Mr. Olstein slapped his thigh. He had won something like ten pounds and
was a joyous millionaire. "That makes twice in four voyages," he
proclaimed.
I congratulated him and strode forward. A group of third-class
passengers had gathered by the starboard bow. They, too, had heard the
cry. To all appearance they might have been an ordinary Whitechapel
crowd, and even now they scarcely lifted their voices; but they
whispered and pointed.
"The Eddystone!"
I singled out my friend the baker. Before I could reach him he had
broken from the group. I hailed him. Without seeming to hear, he
disappeared down the fore-companion. But by and by he emerged again,
and with a baby in his arms. Evidently he had torn it from its cot.
His wife followed, weak and protesting.
The child, too, raised a wail of querulous protest; but he hugged it to
him, and running to the ship's side held it aloft.
"England, baby!"
It turned its head, seeking the pillow or its mother; and would not
look, but broke into fresh and louder wailing.
"England!"
He hugged it afresh. God knows of what feeling sprang the tears that
fell on its face and baptized it. But he hushed his voice, and, lifting
the child again, coaxed it to look--coaxed it with tears streaming now,
and with a thrill that would not be denied--
"England, baby--England!"