THE CIRCASSIAN CAPTAIN.
On board the steamer our attention had been repeatedly attracted, and
our interest--mine, at least--excited by a fellow-passenger, whose
manner, costume, and bearing were too remarkable to escape notice.
His figure was tall and handsomely formed; his features, pale and
like marble, were cast in the most pure and severe model of classic
beauty; his nose was long and straight; his black eye-brows nearly
met over it in one unbroken line; a fierce mustache stuck out on each
side, giving great expression to a mouth, the lips of which were
generally compressed, and in expression stern.
Altogether, his face had in it more of pure intellect and pictorial
manly beauty than any I had ever seen. His costume was a scarlet
forage cap, the tassel of which drooped on his right shoulder, and a
loose tunic of dark green cloth, the cuffs, collar, and skirts of
which were trimmed with sables; but this peculiar garment, like his
long military boots, seemed well worn, or as Jack said, "decidedly
shabby."
He remained very much aloof from the passengers, and either sat or
walked apart, communing apparently with himself, and smoking a huge
pipe, the aspect of which was as foreign as his own.
A figure so melo-dramatic on board of a steamer--even a Spanish
one--was too remarkable in the present day to escape notice, and I
repeatedly drew Slingsby's attention to him; but honest Jack had not
quite recovered the effect of the start given him last night on the
hills of Trohniona, and replied briefly,--
"An interesting foreigner, eh! that will sound very well to the ears
of a novel-reading miss at home; but such personages excite a very
different feeling in me. A seedy sharper! I am sick, Ramble, of
your interesting foreigners; they are invariably swindlers, refugees,
and all that sort of thing, unless we except the poor monkeys in the
Zoological gardens," and so Jack assumed a sulky air of reserve,
while our voyager in the furs and long boots smoked his huge
meerschaum to leeward, and all unconscious that he was an object of
remark or interest to any one.
On visiting our horses in the stalls, we found that our
fellow-traveller had also a nag, and that this animal seemed the
object of all his cares; for he was by its side almost every half
hour, stroking its sleek coat and slender legs; tickling its square
nostrils and pointed ears, or wiping its fine liquid eyes with his
white handkerchief, and feeding it from the palm of his hands, which
were white and muscular, while he spoke caressingly in a barbarous
language, which the horse--a noble Arab-steed, with a magnificent
head, and limbs as slender as a girl's wrist--seemed to understand.
There was something so peculiar in all this, and especially in the
man's strong and tender regard for his horse, that Slingsby's John
Bullism began to relax, for the proverbial crustiness of his country
little became a frank fellow like him; so he ventured a few remarks
in English on horses in general, and this fine barb in particular.
The foreigner shook his head, and smiled pleasantly, as he
articulated with difficulty that he scarcely knew a word of English;
whereupon Jack turned his remarks into very choice Spanish.
Again the stranger smiled and bowed, showing under his close and
thick mustache that he had a set of teeth our brightest belles might
envy, as he said in the language of our allies,--
"I beg your pardon, sir, but I speak only French with my native
language; and it maybe a little--Russ."
"Russ--indeed!" said I, with fresh interest; "are you a Cossack?"
"No," said he, with a sudden air of haughty reserve, "do I look like
one?"
"I cannot say," said Jack, "as I never saw one."
He was about to withdraw, as if our notice was displeasing to him,
when it chanced that a puff of wind opened my cloak, and below it he
perceived the scarlet shell jacket, which was the undress of "Ours."
Then his bold dark eye lighted up with new animation, and raising his
forage cap, he said, smilingly, in French, which he spoke with great
fluency and a good accent,--
"Officers, I perceive, and, better than all, British officers! Would
that I had known this sooner, we might have had a pleasant evening
together; but now our voyage is nearly half over, as the captain has
just told me. I am so glad to meet you, gentlemen, for I, too, have
had the honour to wear a sword."
"May I ask in what service?" said Jack.
"The Russian, latterly."
"Indeed!"
"You are surprised," he said, with a sigh.
"Rather."
"It was the result of fate, or rather the fortune of war, that placed
me in their ranks. I was taken in battle, and had no alternative but
to serve in the imperial cavalry, or drag a chain over the snows of
Siberia; and thus I accepted the former, resolving to escape to my
own dear mountains on the first opportunity. I am a Circassian, and
fought under the heroic Schamyl, though latterly I held the rank of
captain in the Tenginski hussars; but tyranny and misfortune drove me
from the Russian ranks before a proper opportunity for escape had
come; and I have wandered over many lands with no companion save my
horse--my dear Zupi," he continued, caressing the Arab, which rubbed
its fine head upon his cheek, as if understanding the reference its
master had just made; "my beloved Zupi, who has shared with me many a
day of peril, and has thrice saved my life from Russian bullets and
from drowning; for there is no horse like thee, Zupi, between the
Kuban and the Caspian Sea."
"He is quite a Mazeppa, this," said Jack, in English.
"And you are now going to Gibraltar?" I asked.
"Yes, gentlemen; but I merely make a visit there, and at Malta, on my
way home through Turkey; as I have a letter of introduction to an
officer of your garrison."
"May I ask his name?"
"It is here: John Slingsby, Esq., Lieutenant, H.M. --th Foot--perhaps
you know him?"
"The deuce! It is for me; I am Slingsby of the --th," said Jack, in
astonishment, for he was puzzled to remember what friends he had
among the Tenginski hussars, or on the shores of the Caspian Sea;
"devilish odd, sir! I really don't know any one in Circassia, or any
one who ever was there, or likely to be so."
"I received this letter in London," said the stranger, with a soft
smile; "at a clubhouse of the Guards, for the officers of the
Household Brigade were more than kind; being, indeed, as fathers to
me, and treating me as if I had been their own son, instead of what I
am--a poor waif, floating on the current of events."
"I am the man," said Jack, tearing open the letter which the
Circassian produced from his breast-pocket, and delivered; but with
the slightest possible shade of anxiety on his fine but saddened
face. Poor fellow! he had doubtless been so often deceived and
misused, that he was learning to mistrust every one, and his eyes
were riveted on the face of Slingsby, who suddenly shook him by the
hand, saying,--
"This meeting is most remarkable; your letter of introduction to me
and to our mess is from my brother."
"Bismillah, is it possible!"
"From my brother, Sir Harry Slingsby, of the Grenadier Guards. I am
most happy to meet you, Captain Rioni, and with my friend, Captain
Ramble of "Ours," will do all in my power to assist you."
Jack handed his brother's letter to me. It ran thus:--
MY DEAR JACK,--
Allow me to introduce to you and to your brother officers of the old
--th Captain Osman Rioni (late of the--I am sorry to say it--Russian
service), who has been for some time in London teaching our Life
Guards the lance exercise, and who for the last three months has been
the lion of the club-houses. He arrived among us a staid and
respectable Mohammedan, very prone to sit cross-legged on the floor,
to dip his fingers in the gravy, and to grasp his knife if you gave
him a slice of ham with his fowl; but he leaves us much addicted to
balls, vingt un, champagne suppers, the polka, and the waltz. In
short, in one season, we have polished him up in good style, and
completed an education which had been somewhat neglected during his
rural life among the Caucasus. You, perhaps, know the history of
himself and his horse--for the morning papers get hold of everything.
Conyers of the Blues offered him £500 for the nag; but he won't sell
it for any known amount of the ready. Look at its legs and chest; I
never saw such an animal! The captain has been an honorary member of
our mess while in London--a hint this, for your fellows. He is now
on his way home to the Kuban (wherever the devil that may be), and so
you gentlemen of the Line in Gibraltar must look to the state of his
exchequer, and pass him on to the next station, as Conyers has given
him letters to some of the Rifles at Malta. I could easily have
procured him a troop in our new Turkish contingent; but home he must
and shall go, he says, and his own story will best let you know why.
To-morrow our battalion will change its quarters, and commence the
arduous march from St. John's Wood Barracks to those in
Portman-street, and from thence to Trafalgar-square, and I shall
follow in my cab; but you may see me ere long, for I am to sail with
the next draught of ours for the Crimea, where the shiny splendour
will be taken out of our Brahmins in the muddy trenches--ugh! Give
my remembrance to Dick Ramble--ask him what his next book is to be
about; and so, my dear Jack,
I remain, &c., &c.
The wishes of Sir Henry, and the efforts he and his brother officers
of the Grenadier Guards (most of whom will remember the affair I
allude to) made it imperative upon "Ours" not to be behind them in
kindness to this stranger.
Jack and I promised to leave nothing undone to serve him on our
arrival at Gibraltar, and assured him that we would see sufficient
funds raised to send him either to Malta, or by steamer straight to
Constantinople. His ignorance of English and Spanish had sadly
puzzled the brain of our poor Circassian, who had landed with his
horse and baggage at San Lucar, believing it to be Gibraltar, and had
thus lost several days, and, what was of more consequence, much of
his money; so that his mind was full of anxiety as to the future, and
how his horse--his Zupi--for they seemed one, like a centaur, were to
reach that mighty mountain range that lies between the Euxine and the
Cape of Alpcheron; and which, with all its black forests, wild rocks,
and snowy peaks was his beloved home; the altar of oriental
independence--the barrier of the Eastern world against the
encroaching Kuos.
We supped together in the cabin; and while the Spanish passengers
were all smoking or asleep on the benches and lockers, we prevailed
upon the Circassian, over a bottle of good wine, to inform us how he
came to serve in the Russian cavalry, and why he declined Sir Harry's
apparently advantageous offer of a Captain's commission in our
Turkish contingent--a service for which he seemed so admirably
fitted, and in which he might have won honour and distinction; at
least such distinction as John Bull awards to those who are not on
the staff, and have no ministerial interest.
He shook his head sadly, as I said something to this purpose, and
bowing, gave me a pleasant smile.
"When you have heard me, you will understand more fully that the only
place for me is my native land--that home which is now so far off,
that when I trace upon a map the extent of sea and shore that lie
between its hills and me, my heart grows faint and sick; but patience
yet awhile, and one day I shall stand again an the black rugged
mountains of Kushaa, and see at my feet far down below, the fertile
plains of Georgia and Mingrelia. Zupi will snuff the pure air of
these Alpine peaks, and toss his proud mane on the wind; strong
warriors, in their shirts of mail, will be riding by my side; the
Albanian musket and the Tartar bow will be there, as we survey the
long dark lines that mark upon the green summer fields, or it may be
the winter snow, the columns of the Russian Emperor--columns that
advance but to defeat and death; for in thousands, yea, hundreds of
thousands, have they come to war against us, and to perish on the
Circassian hills, until the very soil has been drenched in their
blood, and fattened by the bones of men and horses! But my emotions
carry me away, gentlemen, and I am forgetting my own story."
"Ah--yes, the story," said Jack, refilling the stranger's glass, and
pushing the decanters towards me, while our new friend began, as
nearly as I can remember, in the following words.