of me. The instant I told him, Lord Frederick Bury gave me another
look, then a smile. "What?" said he, "Collins that was in the Orion?"
"Yes, Lord Frederick," said I, "the same; I was third in the Iris off
the West African coast, since then." "Why," said he, "I recollect
you quite well, Mr Collins, although you have grown a foot, I think,
sir--but your eye reminds me of sundry pranks you used to play on
board! What nickname was it your mess-mates called you, by the bye?"
"Something foolish enough, I suppose, my lord," replied I, biting my
lip; "but I remember clearly having the honour to steer the second
cutter in shore one dark night near Dunkirk, when your lordship
carried the Dutch brig and the two French chasse-marées--" "'Faith,"
broke in the captain of the Hebe, "you've a better memory than I
have--I do not recollect any chasse-marées at all, that time, Mr
Collins!" "Why," said I, "I got a knock on the head from a fellow in
a red shirt--that always kept me in mind." "Oh," remarked the Admiral
to Captain Wallis, laughing, "Lord Frederick Bury must have had so
many little parties of the kind, that his memory can't be expected
to be very nice! However, I shall go ashore at present, gentlemen,
leaving the Hebe and you to dispose of this runaway lieutenant in
someway or other. Only you'd better settle it before Admiral Plampin
arrives!" "Have you seen the--the--Longwood lately, Sir Dudley?"
asked the captain of the Podargus, carelessly. "Yes, not many days
ago I had an interview," said the Admiral gravely; "proud as ever,
and evidently resolved not to flinch from his condition. 'Tis
wonderful the command that man has over himself, Wallis--he speaks
of the whole world and its affairs like one that sees into them, and
had them still nearly under his foot! All saving those miserable
squabbles with Plantation House, which--but, next time, I shall
take my leave, and wash my hands of the whole concern, I am glad to
think!" Lord Frederick was talking to me meanwhile at the other end
of the cabin, but I was listening in spite of myself to Sir Dudley
Aldcombe, and noticed that Captain Wallis made no answer. "By the
way, Wallis," continued the Admiral, "'tis curious that he seemed
anxious more than once to know what you think of him--I believe he
would like to see you!" "To see _me_!" said the commander of the
Podargus, suddenly. "At last, does he! No, Sir Dudley, he and I never
_will_ meet; he ought to have thought of it twelve years sooner! God
knows," he went on, "the commander of a ten-gun brig is too small a
man to see the Emperor Napoleon a prisoner--but in ten years of war,
Sir Dudley, what mightn't one have been, instead of being remembered
after as only plain John Wallis, whom Buonaparte kept all that time
in prison, and who was sent, in course of time, to cruise off St
Helena!" Here the Admiral said something about a British sailor not
keeping malice, and Captain Wallis looked up at him gravely. "No,"
replied he; "no, Sir Dudley, I shouldn't have _chosen_ the thing;
but in the mean time I'm only doing my duty. There's a gloomy turn
in my mind by this time, no doubt; but you've no idea, Sir Dudley,
how the thought of other people comes into one's head when he's years
shut up--so _I_ may stand for many a one Buonaparte will never see
more than myself, that'll ring him round surer than those rocks
there, though they're dead and in their graves, Sir Dudley!" The
Admiral shook his head, observing that Napoleon was no common man,
and oughtn't to be judged as such. "Too many victories in that eye
of his, I suspect, Captain Wallis," said he, "for either Plantation
House or his own conscience to break his spirit!" "Ay, ay sir,"
answered the captain respectfully, "excuse me, Sir Dudley, but there
it is--so long as he's got his victories to fall back upon, he can't
see how, if he'd regarded common men more, with all belonging to
them, he wouldn't have been here! Why did Providence shut him up in a
dead volcano, with blue water round it, Sir Dudley, if it wasn't to
learn somehow or other he was a man after all?" Sir Dudley Aldcombe
shrugged his shoulders and looked to Lord Frederick, upon which he
rose, and the two captains followed him out of the cabin; in five
minutes I heard the side piped for the Admiral's leaving, and soon
after the captain of the Hebe came below again.
"This is a disagreeable affair of your old messmate's, Mr Collins,"
said he, seriously. "You are, perhaps, not aware that Captain
Duncombe was a relative of my own, and the fact of his property
having fallen by will to myself, rendered my position the more
peculiarly disagreeable, had I been obliged not only to recognise
Lieutenant Westwood here, but afterwards to urge proceedings against
him, even if he were let off by court-martial. I cannot tell you how
the sight of a stranger, as I thought, relieved me, sir!" "Indeed,
Lord Frederick!" replied I, too much confused in the circumstances to
say more. However, his lordship's manner soon set me at my ease, the
old good-humoured smile coming over his fine features again, while he
went on to offer me the place of his second lieutenant, who was going
home very ill by one of the homeward bound Indiamen; adding, that Sir
Dudley would confirm the appointment; indeed, he could scarce help
himself, he said, as there was nobody else he could get at present.
"You must be a thorough good sailor by this time, Collins," continued
he, "if you have gone on at the rate you used to do. I remember how
fond you were of having charge for a minute or two of the old Orion,
or when I let you put her about in my watch. Why they called you
'young Green,' I never could understand, unless it was '_ut lucus a
non lucendo_' as we used to say at Eton, you know. Well, what do you
say?" Now, as you may suppose, the idea of boxing about St Helena,
for heaven knew how long, didn't at all suit my liking--with the
thought of the Seringapatam steering away for Bombay the whole time,
and a hundred notions of Violet Hyde in India,--'twould have driven
me madder than the Temple did Captain Wallis: but it was only the
_first_ part of my mind I gave Lord Frederick. "What!" exclaimed
he, with a flush over his face, and drawing up his tall figure,
"you didn't suppose _I_ should remain here? Why, the Hebe is on her
way for Calcutta and Canton, and will sail as soon as the Conqueror
arrives at James Town with Admiral Plampin." "Your lordship is very
kind," said I looking down to cover my delight; "and if I am not
worthy of the post, it shan't be my fault, Lord Frederick." "Ah, very
good!" said he smiling; "'tis an opportunity you oughtn't to let
slip, Collins, let me tell you! For my own part, I should just as
soon cut out a pirate in the Straits of Malacca as a French brig in
the Channel; and there are plenty of them, I hear, there. As for a
chase, sir, I flatter myself you won't easily see a finer thing than
the Hebe spreading her cloth after one of those fast proas will be--I
think you are just the fellow to make her walk, too, Mr Collins--pah!
to compare a day on the Derby turf with _that_, would be a sin!
You have no idea, sir, how one longs for a fair horizon again, and
brisk breezes, when so ineffably tired out of all those ball-rooms,
and such things as you see about town just now--only I fear I shall
wish to be second lieutenant again, eh?" The noble captain of the
Hebe turned to look out through the stern window to seaward, his
face losing the weary sort of half-melancholy cast it had shown
for the last minute, while his eye glistened; and it struck me
how well-matched the Hebe and her commander were: you'd have said
both had good blood in them, both being models to look at of their
kind, and the frigate lifting under you at the moment, from the keel
upward, with a check aloft in her main-topsail, that lifted her stem
to the surge. A small telescope rolled off the sofa on to the cabin
deck, and as I picked it up, another gust could be heard coming down
St James' Valley from inside the island; through the gun-port one
saw the trees wave over the hot white houses in the bright coloured
little town, while the ship's canvass gave another flutter above
decks. Lord Frederick laughed, and said, "Then, I suppose, we need
say no more about it, Mr Collins, except referring once for all
to Sir Dudley?" I bowed, and the upshot was, that, an hour or two
after, I had my acting commission sent me from the Admiral, the same
boat having called at the Podargus for my things; upon which Lord
Frederick introduced me to the first lieutenant, and I found myself
once more doing duty in the service--the Hebe standing out to leeward
with the last light, just as the Podargus was tripping anchor to beat
round again the other way. As for our friends from the burnt vessel,
I must say I had forgot them already, for the time at least.
Every block, crag, and knot in the huge crust of the rock, shone
terribly bright for a minute or two, aloft from over the yard-ends,
as she stood suddenly out into the fiery gleam of the sun going down
many a mile away in the Atlantic. Then up leapt the light keener and
keener to the very topmost peak, till you'd have thought it went in
like a living thing behind a telegraph, that stood out against a
black cleft betwixt two cliffs. We saw the evening gun off Ladder
Hill flash upon the deep blue of the sky, seemingly throwing up the
peak and flag-staff a dozen feet higher; and the boom of the gun
sounding in among the wild hills and hollows within the island, as
if one heard it going up to Longwood door. Scarce was it lost, ere a
star or two were to be seen in the shadow on the other side, and you
listened almost, in the hush following upon the gunfire, for an echo
to it, or something stranger; in place of which the Hebe was already
forging ahead in the dark to get well clear of the land, every
wave bringing its own blackness with it up toward her forechains,
then sparkling back to her waist in the seeth of foam as she felt
the breeze; while St Helena lay towering along to larboard, with
its ragged top blotting against the deep dark-blue of the sky, all
filling as it was with the stars.
I had the middle watch that night; the ship being under short
canvass, and slowly edging down to make the most leewardly point of
the island, from which she was to beat up again at her leisure by
the morning. All we had to do was to keep a good look-out, on the
one hand, into the streak of starlight to seaward, and on the other
along the foot of the rocks, as well as holding her well in hand, in
case of some sudden squall through the valleys from inside. However,
I shan't easily forget the thoughts that ran in my mind, walking
the quarterdeck, with the frigate under charge, the first time I
noticed Orion and the Serpent begin to wheel glittering away from
over Diana's Peak--the others stealing quietly into sight after them,
past the leech of our main-topsail: scarce an English star to be seen
for the height of the island off our quarter; some of the men on one
side of the booms humming a song about Napoleon's dream, which you'll
hear to this day in ships' forecastles; another yarning solemnly, on
the other side, about some old sweetheart of his--but all of them
ready to jump at my own least word. In the morning, however, there
we were, stretching back by degrees to go round the lee side of the
island again; the haze melting off Diana's Peak as before, and the
sea rolling in swells as blue as indigo, to the huge red lumps of
bare crag; while the bright surges leapt out of them all along the
frigate's side, and the spray rose at times to her figure-head.
During the day we cruised farther out, and the Hebe had enough
to do in seeing off one Indiaman for home, and speaking another
outward-bound craft, that passed forty miles off or so, without
touching; the governor's telegraphs were eternally at work on the
heights, bothering her for the least trifle, and making out a sail
sixty miles off, it was said. For my part, I was pretty well tired
of it already, sincerely wishing for the Conqueror, with Admiral
Plampin, to heave in sight; but glad enough all aboard the Hebe were,
when, after an entire week of the thing, it came to her turn, with
the Newcastle and Podargus, to lie at anchor off James Town, where
half the ship's company at a time had their liberty ashore. For my
part, I had to see after the frigate's water-tanks, and a gang at
the rigging, till the afternoon, when Lord Frederick took the first
lieutenant and myself ashore with him in his gig; and no joke it was
landing even there, where the swell of the surf nighhand hove her
right up on the quay, while you had to look sharp, in case the next
wave washed you back again off your feet. The whole place was hot as
could be from the sun's rays off the rocks, slanting bare red to the
cloudless sky, on both sides of the neat little gaudy houses crowded
in the mouth of the valley, which narrowed away beyond the rise of
the street, till you didn't see how you'd get farther. But for the
air of the sea, indeed, with now and then a breath down out of the
hills, 'twas for all the world like a half-kindled oven; except under
the broad trees along the Government esplanade, where one couldn't
have stood for people. What with blacks, lascars, Chinamen, and
native 'Yamstocks,' together with liberty men from the men-of-war and
Indiamen, as well as reefers trotting about on ponies and donkeys,
the very soldiers could scarce get down the foot of the road up
Ladder Hill: as for the little town holding one half of them, it was
out of the question, but the noise and kick-up were beyond aught else
of the kind, saving a Calcutta bazaar. Accordingly, it was pleasant
enough at last to come within a shady walk of thick green fig-trees,
growing almost out of the rock near the main battery, above the small
sound of the water far below; the very sea looking bluer through the
leaves, while some birds no bigger than wrens hopped, chirruping,
about the branches. Here we met Sir Dudley Aldcombe coming down from
the batteries along with some Company's officers from India, and he
stopped to speak to Lord Frederick, giving the first lieutenant and
me a bow in return, as we lifted our hats and waited behind. The
Admiral proposed to get Lord Frederick a pass to visit Napoleon along
with himself next day, as the Conqueror would probably arrive very
soon. "You will oblige me greatly, Sir Dudley," said the captain
of the Hebe. "He seems as fond of seeing a true sailor," said the
Admiral, "as if we'd never done him harm! Things will be worse
after I go. By the way," added he suddenly, "'tis curious enough,
but there's one person on the island at present, has made wonderful
progress in Sir Hudson's good graces, for the short time--that
American botanist, or whatever he calls himself, that Captain Wallis
took off the burnt vessel on his way here. Your new lieutenant was
aboard at the time, you know, Lord Frederick." "You saw him, sir, of
course?" said the Admiral, looking to me. "Only for a minute that
night, Sir Dudley," answered I; "and afterwards both he and his
servant were under the surgeon's charge below." "Well," continued
Sir Dudley to the captain, "they seem quite recovered now; for I
saw them to-day up at Plantation House, where the philosopher was
in close discourse with the Governor about plants and such things;
while her ladyship was as much engaged with the assistant, who can
only speak Spanish. A remarkable-looking man the latter is, too; a
Mexican, I understand, with Indian blood in him, apparently--whereas
his principal has a strong Yankee twang; and queer enough it was to
hear him snuffling away as solemnly as possible about _buttany_ and
such things--besides his hinting at some great discovery likely to be
made in the island, which Sir Hudson seemed rather anxious to keep
quiet from _me_." What Sir Dudley said made me prick up my ears, as
you may fancy. I could scarce believe the thing; 'twas so thoroughly
rich, and so confoundedly cool at once, to risk striking at the very
heart of things this way with the Governor himself; but the whole
scheme, so far, flashed upon me in a moment, evidently carried on, as
it had been all along, by some one bold enough for anything earthly,
and with no small cunning besides. All that he needed, no doubt, was
_somebody else_ with the devil's own impudence and plenty of talk;
nor, if I'd thought for a day together, could one have pitched easily
upon a customer as plausible as our friend Daniel, who hadn't a spark
of fear in him, I knew, just owing to his want of respect for aught
in the entire creation. Still I couldn't, for the life of me, see
what the end of their plan was to be, unless the strange Frenchman
might have been some general or other under Buonaparte, and just
wanted to see his old commander once more; which, thought I, I'll be
hanged if I don't think fair enough, much pains as he had put himself
to for the thing.
"How!" asked Lord Frederick, "a discovery, did you say, Sir Dudley?"
"Oh, nothing of the kind we should care about, after all," said the
Admiral; "from what I could gather, 'twas only scientific, though the
American called it '_a_ pretty importaint fact.' This Mr Mathewson
Brown, I believe, was sent out by the States' Government as botanist
in an expedition to southward, and has leave from Sir Hudson to use
his opportunity before the next Indiaman sails, for examining part
of the island; and to-day he thought he found the same plants in
St Helena as he did in Gough's Island and Tristan d'Acunha, twelve
hundred miles off, near the Cape; showing, as he said, how once on
a time there must have been land between them, perhaps as far as
Ascension!" "Why," put in Lord Frederick, "that would have made a
pretty good empire, even for Napoleon!" "So it would, my lord,"
said Sir Dudley, "much better than Elba,--but the strangest part of
it is, this Mr Brown was just telling his Excellency, as I entered
the room, that some of the ancient philosophers wrote about this
said country existing in the Atlantic before the Flood--how rich
it was, with the kings it had, and the wars carried on there; till
on account of their doings, no doubt, what with an earthquake, a
volcano, and the ocean together, they all sunk to the bottom except
the tops of the mountains! Now I must say," continued the Admiral,
"all this learning seemed to one to come rather too much by rote out
of this gentleman's mouth, and the American style of his talk made it
somewhat ludicrous, though he evidently believed in what may be all
very true--particularly, in mentioning the treasures that must lie
under water for leagues round, or even in nooks about the St Helena
rocks, I thought his very teeth watered. As for Sir Hudson, he had
caught at the idea altogether, but rather in view of a historical
work on the island, from the earliest times till now--and I believe
he means to accompany the two botanists himself over toward Longwood
to-morrow, where we may very likely get sight of them."
"O--h?" thought I, and Lord Frederick Bury smiled. "Rather a novelty,
indeed!" said he; and the first lieutenant looked significantly
enough to me, as we leant over the battery wall, watching the hot
horizon through the spars of the ships before James Town. "What
amused me," Sir Dudley said again, "was the American botanist's utter
indifference, when I asked if he had seen anything of 'the General'
in the distance. The Governor started, glancing sharp at Mr Brown,
and I noticed his dark companion give a sudden side-look from the
midst of his talk with her ladyship, whereupon the botanist merely
pointed with his thumb to the floor, asking coolly 'what it was to
science?' At this," added Sir Dudley to the captain, "his Excellency
seemed much relieved; and after having got leave for myself and
your lordship to-morrow, I left them still in the spirit of it. It
certainly struck me that, in the United States themselves, educated
men in general couldn't have such a vulgar manner about them,--in
fact I thought the Mexican attendant more the gentleman of the
two--his face was turned half from me most of the time, but still
it struck me as remarkably intelligent." "Ah," said Lord Frederick
carelessly, "all the Spaniards have naturally a noble sort of air,
you know, Sir Dudley--they'll never make republicans!" "And I must
say," added the Admiral, as they strolled out of the shade, up the
battery steps, "little as I know of Latin, what this Mr Brown used
_did_ seem to me fearfully bad!"
"And no wonder!" thought I "from a Yankee schoolmaster," as I had
found my late shipmate was, before he thought of travelling; but
the valuable Daniel turning his hand to help out some communication
or other, no doubt, with Napoleon Buonaparte in St Helena, took me
at first as so queer an affair, that I didn't know whether to laugh
at him or admire his Yankee coolness, when he ran such risks. As
for the feasibleness of actually getting the prisoner clear out of
the island, our cruising on guard was enough to show me it would be
little short of a miracle; yet I couldn't help thinking they meant
to try it; and in case of a dark night, which the southeaster was
very likely to bring, if it shifted or freshened a little,--why, I
knew you needn't call anything impossible that a cool head and a
bold heart had to do with, provided only they could get their plans
laid inside and out so as to tally. The more eager I got for next
day, when it would be easy enough for any of us to go up inland
after Lord Frederick, as far as Hut's Gate, at least. Meantime the
first lieutenant and I walked up together to where the little town
broke into a sort of suburb of fancy cottages, with verandahs and
green venetians in bungalow style, scattered to both sides of the
rock amongst little grass plots and garden patches; every foot of
ground made use of. And a perfect gush of flowers and leaves it was,
clustering over the tiles of the low roofs; while you saw through a
thicket of poplars and plantains, right into the back of the gulley,
with a ridge of black rock closing it fair up; and Side Path, as they
call the road to windward, winding overhead along the crag behind the
houses, out of sight round a mass of cliffs. Every here and there,
a runlet of water came trickling down from above the trees to water
their roots; you saw the mice in hundreds, scampering in and out of
holes in the dry stone, with now and then a big ugly rat that turned
round to face you, being no doubt fine game to the St Helena people,
ill off as they all seemed for something to do--except the Chinese
with their huge hats, hoeing away under almost every tree one saw,
and the Yamstock fishermen to be seen bobbing for mullet outside the
ships, in a blaze of light sufficient to bake any heads but their
own. Every cottage had seven or eight parrots in it, apparently;
a cockatoo on a stand by the door, or a monkey up in a box--not
to speak of canaries in the window, and white goats feeding about
with bells round their necks: so you may suppose what a jabbering,
screaming, whistling, and tinkling there was up the whole hollow,
added to no end of children and young ladies making the most of the
shade as it got near nightfall--and all that were out of doors came
flocking down Side-Path.