Produced by Al Haines
[Illustration: Cover art]
[Frontispiece: "WHEN I LET FLY THE ARROW IT SPED VERY TRUE." (See page
335.)]
PALM TREE ISLAND
_BEING THE NARRATIVE OF_ HARRY BRENT _SHOWING HOW HE IN COMPANY WITH_
WILLIAM BOBBIN _OF_ LIMEHOUSE _WAS LEFT ON AN ISLAND IN THE SOUTHERN
HEMISPHERE, AND THE ACCIDENTS AND ADVENTURES THAT SPRANG THEREFROM, THE
WHOLE FAITHFULLY SET FORTH_
_BY_
HERBERT STRANG
_WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY_
_ARCHIBALD WEBB AND ALAN WRIGHT_
LONDON
HENRY FROWDE
HODDER AND STOUGHTON
1910
Copyright 1909, by the G. H. Doran Company, in the United States of
America.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER THE FIRST
OF MY UNCLE AND HIS HOBBY, AND WHAT CAME OF HIS CONVERSATIONS WITH TWO
MARINERS
CHAPTER THE SECOND
OF THE VOYAGE OF THE _LOVEY SUSAN_ AND OF MY CONCERN THEREIN, ALSO THE
DISTRESSFUL CASE OF WILLIAM BOBBIN
CHAPTER THE THIRD
OF THE NAVIGATION OF STRANGE SEAS; OF MUTTERINGS AND DISCONTENTS, OF
DESERTION, OF MUTINY AND OF SHIPWRECK
CHAPTER THE FOURTH
OF THE MEANS WHEREBY WE CHEATED NEPTUNE AND CAME WITHIN THE GRIP OF
VULCAN; AND OF THE INHUMANITY OF THE MARINERS
CHAPTER THE FIFTH
OF CLAMS AND COCOA-NUTS AND SUNDRY OUR DISCOVERIES; AND OF OUR
REFLECTIONS ON OUR FORLORN STATE
CHAPTER THE SIXTH
OF OUR SEARCH FOR SUSTENANCE AND SHELTER; WITH VARIOUS MATTERS OF MORE
CONSEQUENCE TO THE CASTAWAY THAN EXCITEMENT TO THE READER
CHAPTER THE SEVENTH
OF THE BUILDING OF OUR HUT, TO WHICH WE BRING MORE ENTHUSIASM THAN SKILL
CHAPTER THE EIGHTH
OF MY ENCOUNTER WITH A SEA MONSTER; AND OF THE MEANS WHEREBY WE
PROVIDED OURSELVES WITH ARMS
CHAPTER THE NINTH
OF PIGS AND POULTRY, AND OF THE DEPREDATIONS OF THE WILD DOGS, UPON
WHOM WE MAKE WAR
CHAPTER THE TENTH
OF THE NAMING OF OUR ISLAND--OF A FLEET OF CANOES, AND OF THE MEANS
WHEREBY WE PREPARE TO STAND A SIEGE
CHAPTER THE ELEVENTH
OF OUR SUBTERRANEOUS ADVENTURE, AND THE MANNER IN WHICH THE WILD DOGS
PROFITED BY OUR ABSENCE
CHAPTER THE TWELFTH
OF A DIFFERENCE OF OPINION BETWEEN BILLY AND THE NARRATOR--OF AN
ENCOUNTER WITH A SHARK, AND THE BUILDING OF A CANOE
CHAPTER THE THIRTEENTH
OF OUR ENTRENCHMENTS; OF THE LAUNCHING OF OUR CANOE, AND THE DEADLY
PERIL THAT ATTENDED OUR FIRST VOYAGE
CHAPTER THE FOURTEENTH
OF OUR VOYAGE TO A NEIGHBOURING ISLAND, AND OF OUR INHOSPITABLE
RECEPTION BY THE SAVAGES
CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH
OF THE SEVERAL SURPRISES THAT AWAITED BILLY AND THE NARRATOR AND THE
CREW OF THE _LOVEY SUSAN_; AND OF OUR ADVENTURES IN THE CAVE
CHAPTER THE SIXTEENTH
OF THE ASSAULT ON THE HUT, IN WHICH BOWS AND ARROWS PROVE SUPERIOR TO
MUSKETS
CHAPTER THE SEVENTEENTH
OF THE END OF THE SEA MONSTERS; AND OF THE EVENTS THAT LED US TO
RECEIVE THE CREW AS OUR GUESTS
CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH
OF THE DISCOMFITURE OF THE SAVAGES, AND THE UNMANNERLY BEHAVIOUR OF OUR
GUESTS
CHAPTER THE NINETEENTH
OF OUR RETREAT TO THE RED ROCK, AND OF OUR VARIOUS RAIDS UPON OUR
PROPERTY
CHAPTER THE TWENTIETH
OF ATTACKS BY LAND AND SEA; AND OF THE USES OF HUNGER IN THE MENDING OF
MANNERS
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-FIRST
OF THE MANNER IN WHICH THE CREW ARE PERSUADED TO AN INDUSTRIOUS AND
ORDERLY MODE OF LIFE
CHAPTER THE TWENTY-SECOND
OF OUR DEPARTURE FROM PALM TREE ISLAND; OF THOSE WHO WON THROUGH, AND
OF THOSE WHO FELL BY THE WAY
ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
BY ARCHIBALD WEBB
"WHEN I LET FLY THE ARROW IT SPED VERY TRUE . . . . . . _Frontispiece_
(see p. 335)
"ONE LIFTED THE PLANK AND AIMED A FURIOUS BLOW AT MY HEAD"
"THE BEAST WHEELED ABOUT, AND RUSHED UPON BILLY"
"I CRIED OUT TO HIM THAT A MONSTER WAS ATTACKING ME"
"ONE DAY I FOUND HIM TRYING TO SHAVE WITH A FLINT"
"THE BEAST HEAVED ITSELF CLEAN OUT OF THE WATER"
"BILLY REACHED OVER, AND BROUGHT HIS AXE DOWN ON THE MAN'S HEAD"
"I DEALT HIM SUCH A BLOW THAT HE FELL DOUBLED UP AT THE DOORWAY"
PEN-AND-INK SKETCHES
BY ALAN WRIGHT
BILLY'S AXE
OUR FLINT SCRAPER FOR SHARPENING AXES
BILLY'S PLATE AND MUG
SOME OF MY POTTERY
SPEARHEAD
BILLY'S BOW AND ARROW
BILLY'S SCRAPER FOR ROUNDING ARROW SHAFTS
CLAY SAUCEPANS, AND TONGS OF WOOD
OUR PIG-STY
KNIVES AND FORK
CLAY PAIL, THE HANDLE OF A TOUGH ROOT, BOUND ON WITH SHRUNK HIDE
BILLY'S PALM-LEAF HAT
OUR SMALL HUT TURNED INTO A FOWL-HOUSE
JUG WITH BENT-WOOD HANDLE, AND CUP
THE BRUSH BILLY MADE, SHOWING ALSO THE MANNER OF IT
COMB OF SPINES
SPADE CUT OUT OF A LOG
RAKE HEAD AND SCALLOP-SHELL HOE
OUR WHEELBARROW
OUR TABLE
MY CHAIR AND BILLY'S STOOL
OUR FISH-HOOKS
OUR GAFF AND LANDING-NET
OUR HARPOONS
OUR CANOE
OUR TRIPOD
BILLY'S TOASTING-FORK
OUR BASKETS
OUR LAMP
MAP OF PALM TREE ISLAND . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . _facing p._ 96
CHAPTER THE FIRST
OF MY UNCLE AND HIS OF HIS CONVERSATIONS WITH TWO MARINERS
I was rising four years old when my parents died, both within one week,
of the small-pox; and the day of their funeral is the furthermost of my
recollections. My nurse, having tied up the sleeves of my pinafore
with black, held me with her in the great room down-stairs as the
mourners assembled. Their solemn faces and whispered words, and the
dreadful black garments, drove me into a state of terror, and I was not
far from screaming among them when there entered a big man with a jolly
red face, at whom the company rose and bowed very respectfully. The
moment he was within the room his eye lit on me, and seeing at a glance
how matters stood, he thrust one hand into his great pocket, and drew
it forth full of sugar-plums, which he laid in my pinafore, and then
bade the nurse take me away.
'Twas my uncle Stephen, said Nurse, and a kind good man. Certainly I
liked him well enough, and when, two or three days thereafter, he set
me before him on his saddle, and rode away humming the rhyme of
"Banbury Cross," I laughed very joyously, never believing but that
after I had seen the lady with the tinkling toes, Uncle Stephen would
bring me home again, and that by that time my mother would have
returned from heaven, whither they told me she had gone.
I did not see my childhood's home again for near thirty years.
My uncle took me to live with him, in his own house not a great way
from Stafford. He was an elder brother of my father's, and till then
had been a bachelor; but having now a small nephew to nourish and breed
up, he did not delay to seek a wife, and wed a fine young woman of
Burslem. She was very kind to me, and even when there were two boys of
her own to engage her affections, her kindness did not alter. So I
grew up in great happiness, having had few troubles, the greatest of
them being, perhaps, those that beset my first steps to learning in
Dame Johnson's little school. As for my subsequent search after
knowledge on the benches of the Grammar School at Stafford, the less
said the better: the master once declared, in Latin, that I was "only
not a fool."
The light esteem in which the pedagogue held my intellects did not give
my uncle any concern. He was bad at the books himself, saving in one
kind I am to mention hereafter. He was a master potter, in a
substantial way of business, and held in some repute among men of his
trade. Indeed, it was the belief of many in our parts that he might
have become as famous in the world as Mr. Wedgwood himself, had he not
been afflicted with a hobby.
I will not follow the example of the ingenious Mr. Sterne, and write
here a chapter upon hobby-horses; though I do believe I could say
something on that subject, if not with his incomparable humour, yet
with a certain truth of observation. Why is a man's hobby often at
such variance with other parts of his character? Why did the late Mr.
Selwyn, to wit, take the greatest pleasure in life in seeing men
hanged, drawn, and quartered? Who that knew John Steer (I knew him
well) only as he stood with knife and cleaver in his butcher's shop,
would believe that 'twas his delight, after slaughtering his sheep and
oxen, to solace his evenings with warbling on the German flute? My
uncle's hobby was no less extraordinary. He was inland bred, and I do
believe, until the year of his great adventure, had never gone above
twenty miles from his native town; yet he had a wondrous passion for
the sea and all that pertained to it. I am sure that he never saw the
sea until he and I together looked upon it at Tilbury, and there, to be
sure, the salt water is much qualified with fresh; yet, after business
hours, he was for ever talking of it and reading about it and the
doings of sailor men. He would pore for long hours upon the pages of
the _Sailor's Waggoner_, and con by heart the rules and instructions of
the _Sailor's Vade Mecum_. He was deeply learned in the _Principal
Navigations_ of Mr. Hakluyt; he could tell you all that befell George
Cavendish in the _Desire_ and Sir Richard Hawkins in the _Dainty_, and
would hold me spell-bound as he recited with infinite gusto the stark
doings of the Buccaneers. And when Mr. Cadell, the bookseller in the
Strand in London, sent him the great volumes containing the discoveries
of Commodore Byron, and those gallant captains Carteret, Wallis, and
Cook in the southern hemisphere, the days were a weariness to him until
he could light his candle and put on his spectacles and feast on those
enthralling narratives. Many's the time, as I lay awake in my bed,
have I heard my aunt Susan call down the stairs through the open door
of her room, "Steve, Steve, when be a-coming to bed, man?" and his
jolly voice rolling up, "Yes, my dear, I am near the end of the
chapter"; and there he would sit, and finish the chapter, and begin
another, and read on and on, until I might be stirred from a doze by
the sound of him shuffling past in his stockings, and grumbling because
there was but an inch of guttering candle left.
My uncle was a sturdy patriot, and took a great delight in knowing that
the most of the navigators of those far-off seas were Englishmen. I
remember how he fumed and fretted when his bookseller in London sent
him the volume of Monsieur de Bougainville's voyage round the world.
What had these French apes, he cried, to do with voyages of discovery?
And when he read later, in Dr. Hawkesworth's book, of the trick which
Monsieur de Bougainville played on Captain Wallis--how, meeting the
captain on his homeward way, he sought with feigning to worm out of him
the secrets of his expedition--my uncle smote the table with his great
fist, and used such fiery language that my aunt turned pale and my
little cousins began to blubber.
At this time I was in my seventeenth year, and had been for some months
in my uncle's factory, learning the rudiments of his trade. 'Twas
taken for granted that I should become a partner with him when I was of
age, for the business was good enough to support both me and my elder
cousin Thomas; while as for the younger, James, my aunt had set her
heart on making a parson of him. But it was ordained that, in my case,
things should fall out quite contrary to the intention, as you shall
hear.
One fine Sunday we were walking home from church, my uncle and I,
across the fields, as our practice was, when we saw that the last stile
before we reached our road was occupied. A big fellow, clad in a dress
that was strange to our part of the country, sat athwart the rail of
the fence, with his feet on the upper step. Another man sprawled on
the grass beside the fence, lying stretched on his back with his hands
under his head, and a hat of black glazed straw tilted over his eyes.
As we drew nearer, I saw that the man on the stile had a big fat face,
his red cheeks so puffed out that his eyes were scarce visible, his
mouth loose and watery, with an underhung chin, a thick fringe of black
hair encircling it from ear to ear.
Seeing us approach, he began with uncouth and clumsy movements to
descend from his perch; but he gave my uncle a hard look as we came up
with him, and then, spitting upon the ground, he said,
"Bless my eyes--surely 'tis--ain't your name Stephen Brent, sir?"
My uncle looked at the man in the way of one who is puzzled, and for
some while stood thus, the man smiling at him. Then of a sudden his
face partly cleared, and he said--
"You are never Nick Wabberley?"
"The same, sir, Nick and Wabberley, as you knowed five and twenty year
ago."
"Why, man, I am glad to see you," says my uncle heartily, offering his
hand, which the man took, not however before he had rubbed his own hand
upon the back of his breeches.
"Same to you, sir, and very glad I am to see you so hearty. After five
and twenty year at sea----"
"You have been to sea!" cries my uncle, his jolly face beaming. "Then
you must come up to my house to supper and tell me all about it."
"Why, d'ye see, sir, there's my messmate," said the man, with a glance
at the prone figure, which had not moved; indeed, there came from
beneath the hat a succession of snores, as untuneful as ever I heard.
"We're in tow, d'ye see," added the big man.
"Bring him too," says my uncle. "We have plenty of bread and bacon,
thank God."
Whereupon the man went to his sleeping comrade, and neatly kicked his
hat into the air, bidding him wake, with a strange oath that startled
me. The sleeper did not at once open his eyes, but his mouth being
already open, he let forth a volley of curses, and demanded his hat,
avouching that if he suffered a sunstroke he would "this" and "that"
the other: his actual words I cannot write. My uncle's face showing
his reprobation of such language, especially on the Sabbath, the big
man excused his comrade, saying that 'twas only Joshua Chick's way, and
he was really a good soul, and very obliging. At this the prostrate
man opened his eyes, and, seeing my uncle, got upon his feet, and when
he was told of the invitation to supper, he touched his forelock and
said he was always ready to oblige. If the looks of Nick Wabberley did
not take my fancy, still less did those of Joshua Chick, who was a
small man, very lean and swarthy, and his eyes squinted so dreadfully
that he seemed to be looking at my uncle and myself at one and the same
time.
After a few more words we parted, the men promising to be at our house
prompt at eight o'clock. And as we continued our walk home, my uncle
satisfied my curiosity, telling me that the big man, Nick Wabberley,
who was, as I had already guessed, the brother of Tom Wabberley, that
owned Lowcote Farm some two miles from our door, had been a
school-fellow of his, and the idlest boy in the whole countryside. He
never got through a day without a flogging. The master birched him;
his father leathered him; but neither did him any good: he remained an
incorrigible dunce and truant, and no one was very sorry when one
morning it was found that he had slipped out of his bedroom window
during the night and run away. He had never since been heard of, but
now that after twenty-five years he had returned to his native place,
my uncle's heart warmed towards him because he had been to sea.
Sailors were not often seen in our inland parts, and the prospect of
discourse with a man who had actually beheld what he had only read
about filled my uncle with delight.
Prompt on the stroke of eight Nick Wabberley arrived, accompanied by
his messmate Joshua Chick. They proved to be excellent trenchermen:
indeed, they prolonged the meal longer than either my uncle or my aunt
liked, the former being impatient to hear stories of the sea, the
latter watching with concern the disappearance of her viands. But
supper was over at last, and then my uncle bade the visitors draw their
chairs to the fire, gave them each a long pipe and a sneaker of punch,
and settled himself in his arm-chair to drink in the tale of their
adventures. Being near seventeen I was allowed to make one of the
company, to the envy of my young cousins, who hung about the room for
some time, but being at last detected were bundled off to bed.
It needs not to tell how late we sat up, nor how many tumblers of
brandy-punch the two sailors tossed off between them before they
departed, steady enough on their legs, but a trifle thick in their
speech. My uncle was abstemious himself, and held a toper to be
something less than a man; at an ordinary time he would have avoided to
ply his visitors with liquor, but the truth is that on this occasion
his whole soul was rapt away into a kind of wonderland by Nick
Wabberley's tales, so that the men were able to replenish their glasses
at intervals, unperceived. I have heard many a mariner's yarn since,
and know them to be works of fancy and imagination as often as not; at
that time I was as credulous as a babe, and my uncle scarcely less, and
I doubt not we gulped down all the marvels we heard as greedily as the
trout gapes at a fly. Certainly Nick Wabberley was a masterly
story-teller, spinning yarns, as they say, as easily as a spider spins
her web, and never at a loss for a word. Joshua Chick took but a
modest part in the conversation, being very well occupied in
replenishing the glasses; but every now and again he would slip in a
word to correct some statement of his comrade, Nick accepting it with
great composure. I noticed that these occasional contributions of
Joshua's tended most often towards embellishment, and the level tones
in which he related the most astonishing marvels, at the same time
fixing one eye on my uncle and the other on me (keeping his hand on the
brandy-bottle), made a wonderful impression on us.
It appeared that the two sailors had been members of the company which
sailed with Captain Cook (he was then lieutenant) on his first voyage
into the southern hemisphere. My uncle knew by heart the story of this
voyage as it is given in Dr. Hawkesworth's book, and expressed great
surprise that so many of the incidents and particulars related by Nick
Wabberley were not mentioned in that worthy doctor's pages. He even
ventured at one point to controvert a statement of Nick's, adducing the
doctor as his authority, at which Nick waxed mightily indignant. "Why,
d'ye see, warn't I there?" he said. "Warn't I there, Josh?"
"You was," says Chick firmly.
"And warn't you there?" says Wabberley, his moist lips quivering with
indignation.
"I were," replies Chick, with vehemence.
"Then what the blazes has any landlubber of a doctor got to do with it,
what don't know one end of a ship from t'other!"
There was nothing to be said in answer to this, and my uncle afterwards
confided to me his opinion that Captain Cook's own journals contained a
good many things which Dr. Hawkesworth had not seen fit to print.
My uncle was so well pleased with the conversation of the seamen that
he invited them to come and see him again, and before long it became
their regular custom to drop in about supper-time, much to the
annoyance of Aunt Susan. She called Nick Wabberley a lazy lubber, and
as for Joshua Chick, she said his eyes made her feel creepy, and he ate
enough for four decent men. But my uncle was fairly mounted on his
hobby, and he asked her rather warmly whether she grudged a bite and a
sup to worthy mariners who had braved the perils of the deep (not to
speak of the appetites of cannibals) in the service of their country.
'Twas in vain she said that she knew Farmer Wabberley wished his
brother at Jericho--the great fat lubber lolloping about doing nothing
but eat and drink, when there were fields to hoe, and Joshua Chick
looking two ways at once, one eye on bacon and the other on beer; 'twas
a mercy he hadn't got two mouths as well, she said. My uncle would
hear nothing against them; always kindly and indulgent, he reminded her
that a gammon rasher and home-baked bread must be the most delectable
of dainties to men who for months at a time ate nothing but salt junk
and ship's biscuit.
He never tired--nor, I must own, did I--of listening to Nick Wabberley.
His face fairly glowed as he heard of those favoured islands of the
south where food grew without labour and wealth was to be had almost
without lifting a finger. Wabberley described the ease with which
pearls might be obtained in the Pacific: how he had seen the natives
dive into the water and bring up oysters, every tenth of them
containing a gem, so little valued by the finders that the present of a
four-penny nail or a glass bead would purchase a handful of them.
Wabberley heaved a great sigh as he deplored his desperate bad luck in
not being permitted to trade. "The Captain, d'ye see, warn't a
trader," he said; "he was always thinking of taking soundings and
marking charts and discovering that there southern continent, which I
don't believe there ain't no such thing, though they do say as how the
world 'ud topple over if there warn't summat over yonder to keep it
steady. And as often as not, when we come to a island, we was so
desperate pushed for provisions, and vegetables to cure us of the
scurvy, that he hadn't no thought except for stocking the ship. Oh!
'twas cruel, when we might all ha' been as rich as lords, and all
vittles found in the bargain."
In those days I remarked a certain restlessness in my uncle. He would
go to the door of an evening and look down the road for the two seamen,
and if they did not appear, which was seldom, he would walk up and
down, in and out of the house, with hands in pockets, melancholy
whistlings issuing from his lips. He read even more closely than usual
the pages of the _Vade Mecum_, and pored for hours on the maps that
embellish Dr. Hawkesworth's volumes. For the most part he was silent
and abstracted, but ever and anon he would startle me with some sudden
exclamation, some remark or question addressed, it seemed, to himself.
"Tugwell is a good man: I can trust him.... What will Susan say? ... A
matter of a year or two: what's that? ... I haven't a grey hair in my
head." I was somewhat concerned when I listened to these mutterings,
and wondered whether much brooding on oversea adventures had turned my
uncle's brain. And I was not at all prepared for the revelation that
came one night, when, looking up from his book, which lay open on his
knees, he waved his long pipe in the air and cried, "I'll do it, as
sure as my name is Stephen Brent."
And then he poured out upon my astonished ears the full tale of his
imaginings. He was bent on making a voyage round the world. The South
Seas had cast a spell upon him. He longed to see the lands of which
the sailor-men had spoken; he was athirst for discovery. Perhaps he
might light upon this Southern Continent which had eluded the search of
others, and if he could forestall the French, what a feather it would
be in his cap, and how glorious for old England! And in these dreams
he was not less a man of business. There was vast wealth to be had by
bold adventurers; why should not he obtain a share of it, and amass a
second fortune for his boys?
The greatness of this scheme as he unrolled it before me took my breath
away. When I asked how his business would fare in his absence he swept
the air with his pipe and declared that Tugwell, his manager, was sober
and trustworthy, and he had no fears on that score. I spoke of the
perils of shipwreck and pirates, of the Sallee rovers, of the
numberless accidents that might befall; but he brushed them all away as
things of no account. And then I myself took fire from his own
enthusiasm and begged that I might go with him. "No, no, Harry, my
boy," he said, kindly enough. "You must stay at home to look after
your aunt and the boys. Tugwell is a good man, but growing old; and if
anything happens to me you will be at hand to look to things; you are
seventeen, and pretty near a man."
That night at supper, with much hemming and hawing, he broached his
project to my aunt. You should have heard her laugh! 'twas plain she
did not believe him to be serious; she said it was all gammon, and she
wondered what next indeed. But when he assured her that he meant every
word of it, she was first alarmed and then angry. She talked about a
maggot in his head, and asked what she was to do, a widow and not a
widow, with two growing boys that would run wild without their father;
and she wondered how a respectable man nigh fifty years old should
think of such a thing, and there wasn't a woman in the country who
would put up with such a pack of nonsense. To which he replied that
Captain Cook was a respectable man with a wife and family, and if the
captain's lady could part with her husband for a year or two, for the
honour and profit of England, surely 'twas not becoming in Mrs. Stephen
Brent to make an outcry over such a trifling matter. This made my aunt
only the more angry, and, for the first time in all my knowledge of
them, the good people looked unkindly upon each other.
That my uncle's mind was firmly made up was plain to us next day.
Bidding me say nought of his intentions, which he wished to be kept
secret, lest they came to the ears of the French, he set off for
London, and was absent for a matter of ten days, much to the
displeasure of Nick Wabberley and Joshua Chick, who came to the house
evening after evening and went very disconsolate away, my aunt
detesting them both, and refusing to feed the men to whom she
attributed this mad whimsy of her husband. Her anger somewhat
moderated while he was away, and after a week or so she could smile at
his rubbish, declaring to me that she was sure he would think better of
it: he would be like a fish out of water in London Town, and the
sensible folks there would laugh him out of his foolishness, that they
would. She smiled and tossed her head even when he came back and told
us with great heartiness that he had bought a vessel--a north-country
collier of near four hundred tons, stout in her timbers and broad in
the beam, built for strength rather than speed--just such a vessel as
Captain Cook had sailed in. "Go along with you, Steve," she said.
"Don't tell me! You'll never go rampaging over the seas--a man of your
age: and 'tis a mercy, I'm sure, that you're a warm man and won't ruin
yourself, for you won't get half what you gave for it when you sell
your precious vessel again." She told me privately that she was sure,
when the time came, the foolish man would never venture himself on a
ship; what would _he_ do on a ship, she'd like to know, when he
couldn't ride a dozen miles in a coach, as he had told us, without
becoming squeamish and feeling as if his inside didn't belong to him!
The news that he had engaged a captain--a seasoned skipper, by name
Ezekiel Corke--only made her lift her hands and cry out, "Well, did you
ever see!" I am sure that her air of disbelief, and amusement mingled
with it, was a sore trial to my uncle.
As for him, good man, he was in earnest, if ever a man was. One day
after he returned he rode over with me to Lowcote Farm, where we found
those two mariners, Chick and Wabberley, gloomily sucking straws on a
five-barred gate, and idly looking on at a busy scene of
sheep-shearing. Their dull faces brightened at the sight of him, and
when he told them what he had been doing, and asked if they would join
his crew, they smote each other on the back and swore lustily for very
joy. They asked him many questions about the ship and the captain,
talked very knowingly of spars and armaments and the various articles
it behoved to carry for trading with the natives, and offered to go at
once to London--my uncle paying their coach fares--and seek out old
messmates who should form the finest crew that ever foregathered in a
foc'sle. My uncle showed great pleasure at their willingness, and
arranged that they should accompany him when he next went to London to
make his preparations for the voyage.
The news of my uncle's enterprise soon spread through our town, and it
became a nine days' wonder among our neighbours and the townsfolk. His
friends accosted him in the streets; some poked fun at him for entering
on a new branch of business at his time of life; others, with the best
intentions in the world, addressed to him the most solemn warnings,
taking him by the buttonhole and expatiating on the risks he was about
to run, doubting whether any money was to be made at sea, and advising
him very earnestly to stick to the clay. He bore their pleasantries
and their counsels with great good nature, declaring that he knew what
he was about, and they would see if they lived long enough. But I
could not help feeling sometimes that he was not quite so confident as
he liked to appear, and that the drawbacks and dangers he had shut his
eyes to in the first flush of his enthusiasm were now looming larger in
the prospect. Yet, whatever his qualms may have been, he pushed on his
preparations with vigour. He spent another fortnight in London,
collecting a crew with the aid of Wabberley and Chick, purchasing
stores, and laying in a cargo, and then he returned to take leave of
his family and friends.
All this time I was beset with a great longing. The making of pottery
in a quiet town seemed to me a very tame and spiritless occupation: I
felt an immense stirring towards a life of activity and adventure, and
wished with all my heart that my uncle would change his mind and take
me with him. Against this, however, he was resolute, and the utmost he
would concede was that I should accompany him when he departed finally
from Stafford, and see the vessel in which he was to sail forth.
Accordingly, one fine August day ('twas the year 1775), I took passage
with him in the London coach. All Stafford had gathered to speed him.
He parted from my aunt and his boys at the inn door: up to the very
last she had held to the belief that he would draw back; and even when
he left her side and mounted into the coach she whispered to me, "I
don't believe it. I won't believe it! He'll never go. He never
will!" But the coach rumbled off, the crowd cheered, some one flung an
old shoe after us for luck, and I had never a doubt that before the
month was out my uncle would be afloat on the wide ocean, fairly
committed to his wonderful adventure in the southern seas.
CHAPTER THE SECOND
OF THE VOYAGE OF THE _LOVEY SUSAN_ AND OF MY CONCERN THEREIN; ALSO THE
DISTRESSFUL CASE OF WILLIAM BOBBIN
The _Lovey Susan_--for so my uncle had named his vessel--lay at
Deptford, and as we walked from our inn, the _Cod and Lobster_ in Great
Tower Street, to see how her fitting out was proceeding, I was amazed
(this being the first time I had come to London) at the smells and the
noises of the narrow streets, and at the number of rough seamen whom we
met. How much greater was my amazement when we came to the docks, and
I saw the multitude of shipping--the forests of masts, the great black
hulls, the crowds of lighters that moved in and out among them. I
remember the fond air of pride with which my uncle pointed to his
vessel, and the smile upon his face when the captain spied him and
touched his hat. Captain Corke did not in the least resemble the idea
I had formed of a sea-captain. He was a little man, with lean cheeks,
and a brown wig a world too small for his head, so that I could see the
grey stubble of his own hair showing beneath it. My uncle presented me
to him and to the first mate, Mr. Lummis, whose hand, when I shook it,
left a strange pattern of tar on mine. Mr. Lummis was a rough-looking
man, with a square face and a tight mouth, who broke off his talk with
us very frequently to roar at one or other of the crew as they went to
and fro about their duties. The captain took us over the vessel, which
was all very strange to a landsman, and showed me his own quarters in
the round house, and when we came to my uncle's cabin, which was
certainly not so big as Aunt Susan's larder, nor half so sweet, I
thought of what she had said, and for the first time I felt some pity
for my uncle, and wondered how he would endure the being cooped up in
so narrow a compass. I was presented also to Mr. Bodger, the second
mate, who seemed a very shy and timid fellow, always looking away when
he spoke. I did not see either Wabberley or Chick, but learnt by and
by that they were on shore beating up for a few men to make up the
ship's full complement.
Things were in a very forward state, and the captain said that the
_Lovey Susan_ would be ready to set sail in a week's time. We spent
that week in going to and fro between the ship and our inn. I own I
should have liked to see the sights of London, but my uncle was so much
in love with his vessel that he could not bear to be away from her, and
he would not let me go sight-seeing alone, saying that London was a
terrible wicked place for a boy. The utmost he would consent to was to
ride out to Tilbury and ride in again, which was a very paltry
expedition. When the end of the week came, there were still some
berths vacant, a number of the men having been seized for the king's
ships, the press being then very active. This put my uncle in a
desperate state of annoyance. He declared it was monstrous that his
men should be stolen when he was embarking on an adventure which might
bring great honour to the country. Since it was plain that his
departure must be delayed, he said it was sinful for me to waste any
more time in London when I might be useful at the works, and so took
passage for me in the coach and dispatched me home. Knowing that the
business would not suffer a jot by my absence, I wondered whether my
uncle dreaded a scene of parting; and for my part I was so sore at not
being allowed to accompany him that I thought it would save me an extra
pang if I did not take my farewell of him at the ship's side.
I found my aunt wonderfully cheerful. She smiled when I told her of
the hindrances my uncle had met with, and declared that we should even
yet see him give up his whimsy and return to his proper business. This
opinion, however, I scouted, and when, after about a week, we received
a letter from him, I felt sure as I broke the seal that it was a last
message penned on the eve of sailing. It proved otherwise, being a
brief note to say that the crew was complete, through the good offices
of the obliging Chick, but that the departure was once more delayed, my
uncle being confined to his room at the _Cod and Lobster_ by a slight
attack of the gout. My aunt was for starting at once to attend upon
her husband, but this I dissuaded her from, saying that by the time she
arrived in London the attack might have passed and the ship sailed, and
she would have made the long journey for nothing, besides wasting
money. However, within three days comes another letter, in which my
uncle wrote that he was much worse, and desired me to come to him post
haste. This letter gave my aunt much concern, but on the whole pleased
her mightily, for she was sure I had been sent for to bring my uncle
home, and she went about with that triumphant look which a good lady
wears when she sees events answer to her predictions.
I set off by the coach next morning. When I opened the door of my
uncle's room he fairly screamed at me: "Take care! for mercy's sake
take care!" I stepped back and looked about me in alarm, seeking for
some great peril against which I must be on my guard. But I saw
nothing but my uncle sitting in a big chair, with one leg propped on a
stool, and his foot swathed in huge wrappings of flannel. "Take care!"
he cried again with a groan as I approached. "Mind my toe! Keep a
yard away; not an inch nearer, or I shall yell the house down." At
that time I was astonished beyond measure at my uncle's vehemence; but
having since then suffered from the gout myself--'tis in our family: my
grandfather was a martyr to it, I have been told--I know the terror
which a movement, even a gust of air, inspires in the sufferer.
My uncle told me, amid groans, that his heart was broken. The _Lovey
Susan_ was ready; he had as good a captain and crew as any man could
wish to have, but he himself would never make the voyage. Three
physicians, the best in London, were attending him, and their opinion
was that not only might he be some considerable time in recovering of
it, but that, being of a gouty habit of body, a new attack might seize
him at any moment and without warning. "Suppose it took me on the
voyage, Harry!" he said, groaning deeply. "Suppose I was like this on
board! You saw my cabin; no room to swing a kitten. What if a storm
blew up! What if I was tossed about!" Here he groaned again. "No
doctors! No comforts! I must go home to Susan, my boy--if I can ever
stand the journey---- Oh!" he shouted, as a twinge took him. "A
thousand plagues! Give me my draught, Harry; take care! Mind my toe!"
I was distressed at my uncle's pitiful plight. 'Twas plain that his
agony of mind was as great as that of his body, because of his
disappointment in the check to his cherished design. For some while he
did nothing but groan; presently, when he was a little easier, he
announced the resolution he had come to, which was a great surprise to
me, but a still greater joy. 'Twas nothing less than that I should
take his place. He could not abide that his plans should be brought to
nought. He had weighed the matter carefully as he lay awake o' nights;
I was seventeen and nearly a man, and though no doubt I had gout in my
blood, I need not fear that enemy for some years to come. Being
sober-minded (he was pleased to say), and well acquainted with his
purposes, I could very well represent him, and though this
responsibility was great for one of my years, yet it would teach me
self-reliance and strengthen my character. He spoke to me long and
earnestly of the manner in which I should bear myself, with respect to
the captain and kindliness to the seamen; and I must never lose sight
of the object of the expedition, which was to discover the southern
continent, if it were the will of Providence, and so forestall the
French.
I fear I paid less heed than I ought to my uncle's solemn admonitions,
so overjoyed was I at the wonderful prospect opening before me. Having
taken his resolution, my uncle was not the man to delay in executing
it. He sent for Captain Corke, and acquainted him with his design,
adjuring him to regard me in all things as his deputy, and to take me
fully into his counsels. He summoned before him Mr. Lummis and Mr.
Bodger, and Chick, who was made boatswain of the vessel, and addressed
them in my presence very solemnly, enlarging on the service they would
do their country if they assisted Captain Corke and me to bring the
expedition to a successful issue. And then, having dismissed them, he
bade me fall on my knees (at a yard's distance from his toe), and
besought the blessing of the Almighty on the voyage. A lump came into
my throat as I listened to his prayer, and when at its conclusion I
muttered my "Amen!" it expressed my earnest desire to do all that in me
lay to fulfil my uncle's behests, and, in God's good time, to give him
an account of my stewardship which should bring him comfort and
happiness.
Next day, it being Friday the 22nd of August and a fair day, we loosed
our moorings at four o'clock in the morning and fell down with the
tide. We were lucky in encountering a favouring breeze when we came
out into the broad estuary of the river, and rounding the Foreland, we
set our course down channel. The movements of the sailors in working
the ship gave me much entertainment, and the gentle motion of the
vessel, the sea being calm, caused not the least discomfort, though it
was the first time I had sailed upon the deep.
About eight o'clock in the evening, the time which mariners call
eight-bells, I was standing beside the captain on the main deck, and he
was pointing out a cluster of houses on the shore which he told me was
the fishing village of Margate, when we were aware of a commotion in
the fore-part of the vessel. I distinguished the rough voice of Mr.
Lummis, shouting abuse with many oaths that were new and shocking to my
ears. Presently the first mate comes up, hauling by the neck a boy of
some fifteen years, a short and sturdy fellow in dirty and ragged
garments, and with the grimiest face I ever did see. Up comes Mr.
Lummis, I say, lugging this boy along, cuffing him about the head, and
still rating him with the utmost vehemence. He hauls him in front of
the captain, and, shaking him as a terrier shakes a rat, says, "Here's
a young devil, sir, a ---- stowaway. Found him on the strakes in the
bilge, sir, the ---- little swipe."
The captain looked at the boy, who stood with his shoulders hunched to
defend his head from the mate's blows, and then bidding Mr. Lummis
loose him, he asked him in a mild voice what he did aboard the vessel.
The boy rubbed his hand across his eyes, thereby spreading a black
smudge, and then answered in a tearful mumble that he didn't know.
"What's your name?" says the captain.
"Bobbin, sir," says the boy.
"Bobbin what?" says the captain.
"William, sir," says the boy.
"Bobbin William?" says the captain.
"William Bobbin," says the boy.
The captain looked sternly on William Bobbin for the space of a minute
or two, but I do not remember that he said anything more to him at that
time. Mr. Lummis lugged him away and set him to some task, the captain
telling me that he would either put him ashore at some port in the
Channel or keep him if he gave promise of making himself useful. I may
as well say here that Billy Bobbin, as we called him, was not sent
ashore when contrary winds made us put in at Plymouth. It had come out
that his father was a blacksmith, of Limehouse, and the boy had run
away from the cruelties of his stepmother, and being strong of his
arms, and with some skill in smith's work, he proved a handy fellow. I
often wondered whether his stepmother used him any worse than he was
used aboard our vessel. The crew, as I was not long in finding out,
were a rough set of men, and seemed to look on Billy, being a stowaway,
as fair game. He was a good deal knocked about among them, and the
officers, so far as I could see, did nothing to defend him from their
ill-usage. When I spoke of it to the captain, he only said that was
the way at sea; and, indeed, Mr. Lummis himself was very free in
cuffing any of the seamen who displeased him, and once I saw him fell a
man to the deck with a marlin-spike, so that it was not to be wondered
at, when the men were thus treated, that they should deal in like
manner with the boy. I did speak of it once to Wabberley, thinking he
might perhaps put in a word for Billy, and he promised to speak to
Chick, who would do anything to oblige; but I never observed that
anything came of it.
We had fair weather for a week or more, with light breezes, and I was
not the least incommoded by the motion of the vessel, whereby I began
to think that I should escape the sea-sickness of which I had heard
some speak. But when we had passed the Lizard the wind freshened, and
the ship rolled so heavily that I turned very sick, and lay for several
days in my bunk a prey to the most horrible sufferings I ever endured,
so that I wished I was dead, and did nothing but groan. During this
time I was left much to myself, the captain coming now and then to see
me, and ordering Clums the cook to give me a little biscuit soaked in
rum. However, the sickness passed, and when I went on deck again the
captain told me that I had now found my sea-legs and should suffer no
more, a prediction which to my great thankfulness came true.
We proceeded without any remarkable incident until the 14th of
September, when we came to an anchor in Madeira road. The captain sent
a party of men on shore to replenish our water-casks, Mr. Lummis going
with them carrying three pistols stuck in his belt. I supposed that he
went thus armed for fear of some opposition from the natives of that
island, but the captain told me 'twas only to prevent the men from
deserting, it being not uncommon for such incidents to happen. We
sailed again on the 17th, and for two months never saw land, until the
6th of November, when we anchored off Cape Virgin Mary in the country
named Patagonia. There we perceived a great number of people on the
shore, who ran up and down both on foot and on horseback, hallooing to
us as if inviting us to land. This the captain was resolved not to do,
somewhat to my disappointment, for I should have liked to see the
Indians more nearly, especially as I had heard many things about them
from Wabberley when he related his voyages to my uncle. I had to
content myself with gazing at them through the captain's perspective
glass, and observed that all were tall and swarthy, and had a circle of
white painted round one eye, and a black ring about the other, the rest
of the face being streaked with divers colours, and their bodies almost
naked. One man, who seemed to be a chief, was of a gigantic stature,
and painted so as to make the most hideous appearance I ever beheld,
with the skin of some wild beast thrown over his shoulders.
The captain questioned whether we should proceed through the Straits of
Magellan or attempt to double Cape Horn. He decided for the latter
course, and having heard somewhat of the violent storms that were to be
encountered in that latitude, I was not a little apprehensive of our
safety. However, having taken in water at a retired part of the coast,
we doubled the Cape after a voyage of rather more than two months,
having sustained no damage, and the _Lovey Susan_ sailed into the South
Sea. Here the calm weather which had favoured us broke up, and for
several weeks we had strong gales and heavy seas, so that we were
frequently brought under our courses, and there was not a dry place in
the ship for weeks together. Our upper works being open, and our
clothes and beds continually wet, as well from the heavy mists and
rains as from the washing of the seas, many of the crew sickened with
fever, and the captain kept his bed for several days. On the first
fair day our clothes were spread on the rigging to dry, and the sick
were taken on deck and dosed with salop, which, with portable soup
boiled in their pease and oatmeal, and as much vinegar and mustard as
they could use, brought them in a fair way to recovery.
We proceeded on our voyage, the weather being variable, and I observed
that many strange birds came about the ship on squally days, which the
captain took for a sign that land was not far off. He was anxious now
to make land, for the men began to fall with the scurvy, and even those
who were not seized by that plague looked pale and sickly. We were
greatly rejoiced one day when the man at the masthead called out that
he saw land in the N.N.W., and within a little we sighted an island,
which approaching, we brought to, and the captain sent Mr. Lummis with
a boat fully manned and armed to the shore. After some hours the boat
returned, bearing a number of cocoa-nuts and a great quantity of
scurvy-grass, which proved an inestimable comfort to our sick. Mr.
Lummis reported that he had seen none of the inhabitants, who had all
fled away, it was plain, at the sight of our vessel. It being evening,
we stood off all night, and in the morning the captain sent two boats
to find a place where the ship might come to an anchor. But this was
found to be impossible, by reason of the reef surrounding the island.
The captain marked it down on his chart, and called it Brent Island
after my uncle; but I learnt many years afterward that it had already
been named Whitsun Island by Captain Wallis, having discovered it on
Whitsun Eve. We sailed away, hoping for better fortune. There was
none of us but longed to stretch our legs on the solid earth again, and
I think maybe it had been better for us if the captain had permitted
the men to stay for a while at Cape Virgin Mary or some other spot on
the coast of Patagonia, for the being cooped up for so many months
within the compass of a vessel of no great size must needs be trying to
the spirits even of men accustomed to it.
However, within a few days of our leaving Brent Island we made another,
that afforded a safe anchorage. Here we went ashore by turns, and the
native people being very friendly, we stayed for upwards of a fortnight
among them. It was an inestimable blessing, after living so long on
ship's fare--salt junk and pease and hard sea-biscuit (much of it
rotten and defiled by weevils)--to please our appetites with fresh meat
and fruits, and these the natives very willingly provided in exchange
for knives and beads and looking-glasses and other such trifles. It
was now I tasted for the first time many vegetable things of which I
had known nothing save from the reports of Wabberley and Chick and the
books I had heard my uncle read--yams (a great fibrous tuber that
savoured of potatoes sweetened), bananas (a fruit shaped like a sausage
and tasting like a pear, though not so sweet), and bread-fruit, a
marvellous fruit that grows on a tree about the size of a middling oak,
and is the nearest in flavour to good wheaten bread that ever I ate.
As for flesh meat and poultry, we had that in plenty, the island being
perfectly overrun with pigs (rather boars than our English swine) and
fowls no different from our own, except that they were more active on
the wing. In this place, I say, we stayed for a fortnight or more, and
were marvellously invigorated by the change of food, so that our men
recovered the ruddy look of health, and the scurvy wholly left us.