Chapter Eight.

Chapter Eight.“A Friend in Need.”Jorrocks had no option but, first, to proceed to pinion us, and then tie us separately to the windlass, using us as kindly as he could in the operation and with a sympathising expression on his face—that said as plainly as looks could speak, “I am really very sorry for this; but I told you what you might expect, and I can’t help it!”He afterwards went aft to the skipper’s cabin, bringing forwards from thence a stout piece of cord, with the ends frayed into lashes like those of a whip, which had evidently seen a good deal of service. This “cat” he handed deferentially to the commander of the brig; who, seizing it firmly in his right fist, and holding the handspike still in his left, as if to be prepared for all emergencies, began to lay stroke upon stroke on our shoulders with a dexterity which Dr Hellyer would have envied, without being able to rival.It was the most terrible thrashing that either Tom or myself had ever experienced before; and, long ere the skipper’s practised arm had tired, our fortitude broke down so, that we had fairly to cry for mercy.“You’ll never stow yourself away on board my brig again, will you?” asked our flagellator of each of us alternately, with an alternate lash across our backs to give emphasis to his question, making us jump up from the deck and quiver all over, as we tried in vain to wriggle out of the lashings with which we were tied.“No, I won’t,” screamed out Tom, the tears running down his cheeks from the pain of the ordeal. “I’ll promise you never to put my foot within a mile of her, if you let me off!”“And so will I, too,” I bawled out quickly, following suit to Tom.I can really honestly aver that we both meant what we said, most sincerely!“All right then, you young beggars; that’ll do for your first lesson. The thrashing will pay your footing for coming aboard without leave. Jorrocks, you can cut these scamps down now, and find them something to do in the fo’c’s’le—make ’em polish the ring-bolts if there’s nothing else on hand!”So saying, the skipper, satisfied with taking our passage money out of our hides, walked away aft; while Jorrocks began to cast loose our lashings, with many whispered words of comfort, which he was afraid to utter aloud, mixed up with comments on the captain’s conduct.“He’s a rough customer to deal with—as tough as they make ’em,” said he, confidentially, removing the last bight round Tom’s body and setting him free; “but, he’s all there!”“So he is,” said Tom, with much decision, rubbing his sore shoulders. “I will vouch for the truth of that statement!”“And, when he says he’ll do a thing, he allys does it,” continued Jorrocks, in testimony to the skipper’s firmness of purpose.“He won’t flogmeagain,” said Tom, savagely, in answer to the boatswain’s last remark.“Nor me,” I put in.“Ah, you’d better keep quiet till you’re ashore ag’in,” advised our friend, meaningly. “You won’t find much more harm in him than you’ve done already; and bye-and-bye, when he’s got used to seeing you about, he’ll be as soft and easy as butter.”“Oh yes, I can well believe that!” said Tom, ironically; but then, acting on the advice of Jorrocks, although more to save him from getting into a scrape on our behalf, than from any fear of further molestation from the skipper, against whom our hearts were now hardened, we bustled about the fo’c’s’le, pretending to be awfully busy coiling down the slack of the jib halliards, and doing other odd jobs forward.Up to this time, neither of us had an opportunity of casting a glance over the vessel to see where she was, our attention from the moment we gained the deck having been entirely taken up by the proceedings of the little drama I have just narrated, which prevented us from making any observations of themise en scène, whether inboard or over the side.Now, however, having a chance of looking about me, my first glance was up aloft; and I noticed that the brig was under all plain sail, running before the wind, which was almost dead aft. Being “light,” that is having no cargo on board beyond such ballast as was required to ensure her stability when heeling over, she was rolling a good deal, lurching from side to side as her canvas filled out to the breeze, with every fresh puff of air.Away to the left, over our port beam, I could see land in the distance, which Jorrocks told me was the North Foreland—near Margate—a place that I knew by name of course, although this information did not give me any accurate idea of the brig’s whereabouts; but, later on in the day, when the vessel had run some fifteen or twenty miles further, steering to the north-east, with the wind to the southward of west, we passed through a lot of brackish mud-coloured water, close to a light-ship, that my friend the boatswain said was the Kentish Knock, midway between the mouth of the Thames and wash of the Humber, and it was only then that I realised the fact, that we were running up the eastern coast of England and were well on our way to Newcastle, for which port, as I’ve intimated before, we were bound.“Hurrah!” exclaimed Tom, when I mentioned this to him. “We’ll soon then be able to give that brute of a skipper the slip. I won’t stop on board this horrid brig a minute longer than I can help, Martin, you may be certain!”“Avast—belay that!” interposed Jorrocks, who was close behind, and heard this confession. “Don’t you count your chickens afore they’re hatched, young master! Take my word for it, the skipper won’t let you out of his sight ’fore you’ve paid him for your grub and passage.”“But how can he, when we’ve got no money?” asked Tom.“That makes no difference,” said Jorrocks, with an expressive wink that spoke volumes. “You’ll see if he don’t make you work ’em out, and that’ll be as good to him as if you paid him a shiner or two. You jest wait till we gets to Noocastle, my lad, and I specs you’ll larn what coal-screening is afore you’ve done with it.”“And what if we refuse?” inquired Tom, to whom this grimy prospect did not appear over-pleasant.“Why, there’ll be larruping,” replied the boatswain, significantly, with another expressive wink, and Tom was silenced; but, it was only for a moment, as he looked up again the instant afterwards with his usual bright expression.“Perhaps it will be wisest to make the best of a bad job, Martin, eh?” he said, cheerfully. “We have only to thank ourselves for getting into this scrape, and the most sensible thing we can do now is to grin and bear whatever we’ve got to put up with.”This exactly agreed with my own conclusions, and I signified my assent to the sound philosophy of Tom’s remark with my usual nod; but, as for Jorrocks, he was completely carried away with enthusiasm.“Right you are, my hearty!” he cried, wringing Tom’s hand in the grip of his brawny fist as if he would shake it off. “That’s the sort o’ lad for me! You’ve an old head on young shoulders, you have—you’ll get on with the skipper, no fear; and me and my mates will make you both as com’able aboard as we can; theer, I can say no better, can I?”“No,” replied Tom, in an equally hearty tone.TheSaucy Sallbeing only of small tonnage, she had a correspondingly small crew, seven men and a boy—including the skipper and Jorrocks, and excluding ourselves for the present—comprising “all hands.”Of this number, one was aft now, taking his turn at the wheel, with the skipper standing beside him, while a couple of others were lounging about, ready to slacken off or haul taut the sheets; and the remainder, whose watch below it was, were seeing to the preparations for dinner—a savoury smell coming out from the fo’c’s’le heads, that was most appetising to Tom and me, who were both longing to have once more a good hot meal.Presently, the skipper shouted out something about “making it eight bells,” whereupon Jorrocks took hold of a marlinspike, which he had seemingly ready for the purpose, striking eight sharp, quick blows on a little bell hanging right under the break of the little topgallant fo’c’s’le, with which the old-fashioned coaster was built.“That’s the pipe down to dinner,” he said to us in explanatory fashion. “Come along o’ me, and I’ll introduce you to yer messmates in proper shipshape way!”Thereupon, we both followed Jorrocks into the dark little den in the fore-part of the vessel, with which Tom had first made acquaintance the night we went on board, after escaping from Dr Hellyer’s, now four days since—a long while it seemed to us, although only so short an interval, from the experiences we had since gained, and our entirely new mode of life. The place was small and dark, with bunks ranged along either side, and a stove in the centre, at which one of the hands, selected as cook, was just giving a final stir to a steaming compound of meat, potatoes, and biscuit, all stewed up together, and dubbed by sailors “lobscouse.”Most of the crew I already knew, from my visits to the brig during vacation time; but, Tom being a comparative stranger—albeit all of them had witnessed the “striking proof” of the honour the skipper considered our coming on board had done him—Jorrocks thought best to introduce us in a set speech, saying how we were “a good sort, and no mistake”; and that, although we were the sons of gentlemen, who had “runned away from school,” we were going to shake in our lot with them “like one of theirselves.”This seemed to go down as well as the stew, of which we were cordially invited to partake, that disappeared rapidly down our famished throats; and, thenceforth, we were treated with that good fellowship which seems natural to those who follow the sea—none attempting to bully us, or take advantage of our youth, and all eager to complete our nautical education to the best of their ability. Perhaps this was principally on account of Jorrocks constituting himself our friend and patron, and keeping a keen eye on our interests in the food department, so as to see that we had a fair share of what was going; but, at any rate, thus it was, for, with the exception of the skipper, we had no reason to complain of the treatment of any one on board the brig, from the time we joined her in the surreptitious manner I have described, to the moment of our leaving her.Towards evening, the wind shifting more to the westwards and bearing on our quarter, the yards had to be braced round a bit and the jib sheet hauled in taut to leeward, giving Tom and me an opportunity of showing our willingness to bear a hand. Otherwise, however, until we arrived at Newcastle there was little to do in the way of trimming sails, as the wind was fair all the way, giving no occasion for reefing or furling canvas until we got into port. I don’t believe, either, we were out of sight of land once during the progress of the voyage; for, the skipper, like the commanders of most coasting craft, hugged the shore in navigating to and fro between the different places for which he was bound, never losing sight of one prominent landmark or headland till he could distinguish the next beyond, in the day-time, and steering by the lighthouses and floating beacons, by night.If times had been easy for us so far, when we arrived at Newcastle we had terrible work to balance our good fortune in this respect.Talk of galley slaves! no unfortunate criminals chained to the oar in the old days of that aquatic mode of punishment ever went through half what poor Tom and I did at this great coal centre of the north—none at least could have suffered so much in body and spirit from the effects of a form of toil, to which the ordinary labour of a negro slave on a Cuban plantation would be as nothing!The skipper never allowed us once to leave the vessel to go ashore, although all the other hands went backwards from brig to land as it seemed to please them, without any restraint being apparently put on their movements; but, whether our stern taskmaster was afraid of our “cutting and running” before he had his pound of flesh out of us, or whether he feared being called to account under the terms of the Merchant Shipping Act for having us on board without our names being on the brig’s books as duly licensed apprentices, when he might have been subjected to a penalty, I know not. The fact remains, that there he kept us day and night as long as we remained taking in a fresh cargo of coals. We never once set foot on land during our stay in port.And the work!We did not have to carry the bags of coal, as the rest of the crew did, from the wharf to the gangway of the vessel, as then we might have been seen; but we had to bear a hand over the hatches to shunt the bags down into the hold, into which we were afterwards sent with rakes and shovels to stow the rough lumps into odd holes and corners and make a smooth surface generally, until the brig was chock full to the deck-beams, when we couldn’t even creep in on our hands and knees to distribute the cargo further!This job being finished, the hatches were battened down, and the brig made sail again for the south.This time, our destination was further along the coast westwards, the collier brig proceeding to Plymouth instead of returning to our previous port of departure—a circumstance which rejoiced us both greatly, as we should not have liked to have been landed again at the place we had left: Dr Hellyer, perhaps, would have been more pleased to see us than we should have been to meet him!The wind, on our return trip, was still westerly, and consequently against us; so I had no reason to complain of any lack of instruction in seamanship on this part of the voyage. It was “tacks and sheets”—“mainsail haul”—and “bout-ship”—“down anchor” as the tide changed, and “up with it!” again, when the flood or ebb was in our favour—all the way from the Mouse Light to Beachy Head!In performing these various nautical manoeuvres, I had plenty of exercise aloft, so that my previous teaching, when I used to go down to the quay in the summer vacations on being left alone at school, stood me now in good stead; and in a little while I became really, for a lad of my years, an expert seaman, able to hand, reef, steer, and take a watch with any on board, long before we got to Plymouth!But, it was not so with Tom.The coal business, he thought, having no turn for colliery work, was bad enough; but, when it came to have to go aloft in a gale of wind and take in sail on a dark night, with the flapping canvas trying to jerk one off the yard, Tom acknowledged that he had no stomach to be a sailor—he preferred gymnastics ashore!Although, otherwise, I had found him bold and fearless to desperation, he now evinced a nervous timidity about mounting the rigging that I didn’t think he had in him. It seemed utterly unlike the dauntless Tom of old acquaintanceship on land.He said that he really “funked” going aloft, for it made his head swim when he looked down. I told him that if he got in the habit of looking down at the water below whenever he ascended the shrouds, instead of its only making his head swim, as he now complained, it would inevitably result in his entire self being forced to do so! However, he said he could not possibly help it, and really I don’t believe he could.Some people are so constituted.The upshot was that the skipper, noticing his inefficiency in the work of the ship, made him his cabin boy, in place of the lad who had hitherto occupied that enviable position, and whom he now sent forward amongst the other hands in the fo’c’s’le.But the change did not bring any amelioration to poor Tom’s lot. It was “like going from the frying-pan into the fire;” for, now, my unfortunate chum, being immediately under the control of the skipper, who was a surly, ill-tempered brute at bottom, he paid him out for his laziness in “shirking work,” as he termed the constitutional nervousness that he was powerless to fight against—Tom coming in for “more kicks than halfpence” by his promotion to the cabin, and having “purser’s allowance” of all the beatings going, when the skipper was in one of his tantrums.I got into a serious row with the brute for taking Tom’s part one day. In his passion, the skipper knocked me down with his favourite handspike, giving me a cut across my temple, the scar of which I’ll carry to my grave. My interference, however, saved Tom and myself any further ill-treatment, as I bled so much from the blow he gave me and was insensible so long, that the men thought the skipper had killed me. They accordingly remonstrated so forcibly with him on the subject that he promised to let us both alone for the future, at least so far as the handspike was concerned.Fortunately, however, we were not much longer at the mercy of the brute’s temper; for, the morning after this, we reached Beachy Head, anchoring there to await the ebb tide down Channel, and the wind chopping round to the north-eastwards, made it fair for us all the way, enabling us to fetch Plymouth within three days.Here, no sooner had the brig weathered Drake Island, anchoring inside the Cattwater, where all merchant vessels go to discharge their cargoes, than the skipper at once gave us notice to quit, almost without warning.“Be off now, you lazy lubbers,” he cried, motioning us down into theSaucy Sall’ssolitary boat, which had been got over the side, and which, with Jorrocks in charge of it, was waiting to take us ashore. “I’m glad to get rid of such idle hands; and you may thank your stars I’ve let you off so cheaply for your cheek in stowing yourselves away aboard my brig! You may think yourselves lucky I don’t give you in charge, and get you put in gaol for it!”“You daren’t,” shouted back Tom, defiantly, as soon as he was safely down in the stern-sheets of the dinghy. “If you wanted to give us in charge, you ought to have done so in Newcastle, instead of making us work there for you like niggers. I’ve a great mind to have you up before the magistrates for your ill-treatment!”This appeared to shut up the skipper very effectively, for he didn’t offer a word in reply; and, presently, Jorrocks landed us at the jetty stairs, close inside the Cattwater.Our old friend seemed quite sorry to part with us; and, knowing our destitute condition, he kindly presented us with the sum of five shillings, which he said was a joint subscription from all hands, who had “parted freely” when they learnt that we were about to be turned adrift from the brig, but which I believe mainly came out of his own pocket.“Good-bye, my lads,” were his last words. “Keep your pecker up, and if you’ll take the advice of an old sailor, I’d recommend you to write to your friends and go home.”“Much he knows of my Aunt Matilda!” I said to Tom, as we watched the good-hearted fellow pulling back to the old tub on board of which we had passed through so much. “If he were acquainted with all the circumstances of the case I don’t think he’d advise my going home at all events!”“I’m not quite sure of that, Martin,” replied Tom, who was now thoroughly tired of everything connected with the sea, vowing that, after the experience he had gained, he would not go afloat again, to be made “Lord High Admiral of England!”“Well, we’ll deliberate about it,” said I, as we turned away from the jetty and walked towards the town, where our immediate intention was to enter a coffee-shop and get a substantial breakfast out of the funds which Jorrocks had so thoughtfully provided us with.Here, Tom’s fate was soon decided; for, we had not long been seated in a small restaurant where we had ordered some coffee and bread-and-butter, which were the viands we specially longed for, than an advertisement on the front page of an old copy of theTimescaught my eye.It ran thus:—“If Tom L—, who ran away from school in company with another boy on the night of November the Fifth and is supposed to have gone to sea, will communicate with his distressed mother, all will be forgiven.”“Why, Tom,” said I, reading it aloud, with some further particulars describing him, which I have not quoted—“this must refer to you!”“So it does,” said he.“And what will you do?” I asked him.“Well, Martin, I don’t like to leave you, but then you know my mother must be so anxious, as I told you before, that I think I’d better write to her.”I suggested a better course, however, as soon as I saw he wished to go home; and that was, that, as his mother lived not very far from Exeter, he should take the balance of the money we had left after paying for our breakfast, and go off thither by train at once.This, after some demur, he agreed to; so, as soon as we had finished our meal and discharged the bill, which only took eightpence put of our store, we made our way to the railway station.A train was luckily just about starting, and Tom getting a ticket for half-price, he and I parted, not meeting again until many days had passed, and then in a very different place!When I realised the fact that Tom was gone, and that I was now left alone in that strange place, where I had never been in my life before, I felt so utterly cast down, that instinctively I made my way to the sea, there seeking that comfort and calm which the mere sight of it, somehow or other, always afforded me.I got down, I recollect, on the Hoe, and, walking along the esplanade, halted right in front of the Breakwater, whence I could command a view of the harbour, with the men-of-war in the Hamoaze on my right hand, and the Cattwater, where theSaucy Sallwas lying, on my left.I was very melancholy, and after a bit I sat down on an adjacent seat; when, burying my face in my hands, I gave way to tears.Presently, I was roused by the sound of a man’s voice close at hand, as if of some one speaking to me.I looked up hastily, ashamed of being caught crying. However, the good-natured, jolly, weather-beaten face I saw looking into mine reassured me.“Hullo, young cockbird,” said the owner of the face—a middle-aged, respectable, nautical-looking sort of man—speaking in a cheery voice, which went to my heart; “what’s the row with you, my hearty? Tell old Sam Pengelly all about it!”

Jorrocks had no option but, first, to proceed to pinion us, and then tie us separately to the windlass, using us as kindly as he could in the operation and with a sympathising expression on his face—that said as plainly as looks could speak, “I am really very sorry for this; but I told you what you might expect, and I can’t help it!”

He afterwards went aft to the skipper’s cabin, bringing forwards from thence a stout piece of cord, with the ends frayed into lashes like those of a whip, which had evidently seen a good deal of service. This “cat” he handed deferentially to the commander of the brig; who, seizing it firmly in his right fist, and holding the handspike still in his left, as if to be prepared for all emergencies, began to lay stroke upon stroke on our shoulders with a dexterity which Dr Hellyer would have envied, without being able to rival.

It was the most terrible thrashing that either Tom or myself had ever experienced before; and, long ere the skipper’s practised arm had tired, our fortitude broke down so, that we had fairly to cry for mercy.

“You’ll never stow yourself away on board my brig again, will you?” asked our flagellator of each of us alternately, with an alternate lash across our backs to give emphasis to his question, making us jump up from the deck and quiver all over, as we tried in vain to wriggle out of the lashings with which we were tied.

“No, I won’t,” screamed out Tom, the tears running down his cheeks from the pain of the ordeal. “I’ll promise you never to put my foot within a mile of her, if you let me off!”

“And so will I, too,” I bawled out quickly, following suit to Tom.

I can really honestly aver that we both meant what we said, most sincerely!

“All right then, you young beggars; that’ll do for your first lesson. The thrashing will pay your footing for coming aboard without leave. Jorrocks, you can cut these scamps down now, and find them something to do in the fo’c’s’le—make ’em polish the ring-bolts if there’s nothing else on hand!”

So saying, the skipper, satisfied with taking our passage money out of our hides, walked away aft; while Jorrocks began to cast loose our lashings, with many whispered words of comfort, which he was afraid to utter aloud, mixed up with comments on the captain’s conduct.

“He’s a rough customer to deal with—as tough as they make ’em,” said he, confidentially, removing the last bight round Tom’s body and setting him free; “but, he’s all there!”

“So he is,” said Tom, with much decision, rubbing his sore shoulders. “I will vouch for the truth of that statement!”

“And, when he says he’ll do a thing, he allys does it,” continued Jorrocks, in testimony to the skipper’s firmness of purpose.

“He won’t flogmeagain,” said Tom, savagely, in answer to the boatswain’s last remark.

“Nor me,” I put in.

“Ah, you’d better keep quiet till you’re ashore ag’in,” advised our friend, meaningly. “You won’t find much more harm in him than you’ve done already; and bye-and-bye, when he’s got used to seeing you about, he’ll be as soft and easy as butter.”

“Oh yes, I can well believe that!” said Tom, ironically; but then, acting on the advice of Jorrocks, although more to save him from getting into a scrape on our behalf, than from any fear of further molestation from the skipper, against whom our hearts were now hardened, we bustled about the fo’c’s’le, pretending to be awfully busy coiling down the slack of the jib halliards, and doing other odd jobs forward.

Up to this time, neither of us had an opportunity of casting a glance over the vessel to see where she was, our attention from the moment we gained the deck having been entirely taken up by the proceedings of the little drama I have just narrated, which prevented us from making any observations of themise en scène, whether inboard or over the side.

Now, however, having a chance of looking about me, my first glance was up aloft; and I noticed that the brig was under all plain sail, running before the wind, which was almost dead aft. Being “light,” that is having no cargo on board beyond such ballast as was required to ensure her stability when heeling over, she was rolling a good deal, lurching from side to side as her canvas filled out to the breeze, with every fresh puff of air.

Away to the left, over our port beam, I could see land in the distance, which Jorrocks told me was the North Foreland—near Margate—a place that I knew by name of course, although this information did not give me any accurate idea of the brig’s whereabouts; but, later on in the day, when the vessel had run some fifteen or twenty miles further, steering to the north-east, with the wind to the southward of west, we passed through a lot of brackish mud-coloured water, close to a light-ship, that my friend the boatswain said was the Kentish Knock, midway between the mouth of the Thames and wash of the Humber, and it was only then that I realised the fact, that we were running up the eastern coast of England and were well on our way to Newcastle, for which port, as I’ve intimated before, we were bound.

“Hurrah!” exclaimed Tom, when I mentioned this to him. “We’ll soon then be able to give that brute of a skipper the slip. I won’t stop on board this horrid brig a minute longer than I can help, Martin, you may be certain!”

“Avast—belay that!” interposed Jorrocks, who was close behind, and heard this confession. “Don’t you count your chickens afore they’re hatched, young master! Take my word for it, the skipper won’t let you out of his sight ’fore you’ve paid him for your grub and passage.”

“But how can he, when we’ve got no money?” asked Tom.

“That makes no difference,” said Jorrocks, with an expressive wink that spoke volumes. “You’ll see if he don’t make you work ’em out, and that’ll be as good to him as if you paid him a shiner or two. You jest wait till we gets to Noocastle, my lad, and I specs you’ll larn what coal-screening is afore you’ve done with it.”

“And what if we refuse?” inquired Tom, to whom this grimy prospect did not appear over-pleasant.

“Why, there’ll be larruping,” replied the boatswain, significantly, with another expressive wink, and Tom was silenced; but, it was only for a moment, as he looked up again the instant afterwards with his usual bright expression.

“Perhaps it will be wisest to make the best of a bad job, Martin, eh?” he said, cheerfully. “We have only to thank ourselves for getting into this scrape, and the most sensible thing we can do now is to grin and bear whatever we’ve got to put up with.”

This exactly agreed with my own conclusions, and I signified my assent to the sound philosophy of Tom’s remark with my usual nod; but, as for Jorrocks, he was completely carried away with enthusiasm.

“Right you are, my hearty!” he cried, wringing Tom’s hand in the grip of his brawny fist as if he would shake it off. “That’s the sort o’ lad for me! You’ve an old head on young shoulders, you have—you’ll get on with the skipper, no fear; and me and my mates will make you both as com’able aboard as we can; theer, I can say no better, can I?”

“No,” replied Tom, in an equally hearty tone.

TheSaucy Sallbeing only of small tonnage, she had a correspondingly small crew, seven men and a boy—including the skipper and Jorrocks, and excluding ourselves for the present—comprising “all hands.”

Of this number, one was aft now, taking his turn at the wheel, with the skipper standing beside him, while a couple of others were lounging about, ready to slacken off or haul taut the sheets; and the remainder, whose watch below it was, were seeing to the preparations for dinner—a savoury smell coming out from the fo’c’s’le heads, that was most appetising to Tom and me, who were both longing to have once more a good hot meal.

Presently, the skipper shouted out something about “making it eight bells,” whereupon Jorrocks took hold of a marlinspike, which he had seemingly ready for the purpose, striking eight sharp, quick blows on a little bell hanging right under the break of the little topgallant fo’c’s’le, with which the old-fashioned coaster was built.

“That’s the pipe down to dinner,” he said to us in explanatory fashion. “Come along o’ me, and I’ll introduce you to yer messmates in proper shipshape way!”

Thereupon, we both followed Jorrocks into the dark little den in the fore-part of the vessel, with which Tom had first made acquaintance the night we went on board, after escaping from Dr Hellyer’s, now four days since—a long while it seemed to us, although only so short an interval, from the experiences we had since gained, and our entirely new mode of life. The place was small and dark, with bunks ranged along either side, and a stove in the centre, at which one of the hands, selected as cook, was just giving a final stir to a steaming compound of meat, potatoes, and biscuit, all stewed up together, and dubbed by sailors “lobscouse.”

Most of the crew I already knew, from my visits to the brig during vacation time; but, Tom being a comparative stranger—albeit all of them had witnessed the “striking proof” of the honour the skipper considered our coming on board had done him—Jorrocks thought best to introduce us in a set speech, saying how we were “a good sort, and no mistake”; and that, although we were the sons of gentlemen, who had “runned away from school,” we were going to shake in our lot with them “like one of theirselves.”

This seemed to go down as well as the stew, of which we were cordially invited to partake, that disappeared rapidly down our famished throats; and, thenceforth, we were treated with that good fellowship which seems natural to those who follow the sea—none attempting to bully us, or take advantage of our youth, and all eager to complete our nautical education to the best of their ability. Perhaps this was principally on account of Jorrocks constituting himself our friend and patron, and keeping a keen eye on our interests in the food department, so as to see that we had a fair share of what was going; but, at any rate, thus it was, for, with the exception of the skipper, we had no reason to complain of the treatment of any one on board the brig, from the time we joined her in the surreptitious manner I have described, to the moment of our leaving her.

Towards evening, the wind shifting more to the westwards and bearing on our quarter, the yards had to be braced round a bit and the jib sheet hauled in taut to leeward, giving Tom and me an opportunity of showing our willingness to bear a hand. Otherwise, however, until we arrived at Newcastle there was little to do in the way of trimming sails, as the wind was fair all the way, giving no occasion for reefing or furling canvas until we got into port. I don’t believe, either, we were out of sight of land once during the progress of the voyage; for, the skipper, like the commanders of most coasting craft, hugged the shore in navigating to and fro between the different places for which he was bound, never losing sight of one prominent landmark or headland till he could distinguish the next beyond, in the day-time, and steering by the lighthouses and floating beacons, by night.

If times had been easy for us so far, when we arrived at Newcastle we had terrible work to balance our good fortune in this respect.

Talk of galley slaves! no unfortunate criminals chained to the oar in the old days of that aquatic mode of punishment ever went through half what poor Tom and I did at this great coal centre of the north—none at least could have suffered so much in body and spirit from the effects of a form of toil, to which the ordinary labour of a negro slave on a Cuban plantation would be as nothing!

The skipper never allowed us once to leave the vessel to go ashore, although all the other hands went backwards from brig to land as it seemed to please them, without any restraint being apparently put on their movements; but, whether our stern taskmaster was afraid of our “cutting and running” before he had his pound of flesh out of us, or whether he feared being called to account under the terms of the Merchant Shipping Act for having us on board without our names being on the brig’s books as duly licensed apprentices, when he might have been subjected to a penalty, I know not. The fact remains, that there he kept us day and night as long as we remained taking in a fresh cargo of coals. We never once set foot on land during our stay in port.

And the work!

We did not have to carry the bags of coal, as the rest of the crew did, from the wharf to the gangway of the vessel, as then we might have been seen; but we had to bear a hand over the hatches to shunt the bags down into the hold, into which we were afterwards sent with rakes and shovels to stow the rough lumps into odd holes and corners and make a smooth surface generally, until the brig was chock full to the deck-beams, when we couldn’t even creep in on our hands and knees to distribute the cargo further!

This job being finished, the hatches were battened down, and the brig made sail again for the south.

This time, our destination was further along the coast westwards, the collier brig proceeding to Plymouth instead of returning to our previous port of departure—a circumstance which rejoiced us both greatly, as we should not have liked to have been landed again at the place we had left: Dr Hellyer, perhaps, would have been more pleased to see us than we should have been to meet him!

The wind, on our return trip, was still westerly, and consequently against us; so I had no reason to complain of any lack of instruction in seamanship on this part of the voyage. It was “tacks and sheets”—“mainsail haul”—and “bout-ship”—“down anchor” as the tide changed, and “up with it!” again, when the flood or ebb was in our favour—all the way from the Mouse Light to Beachy Head!

In performing these various nautical manoeuvres, I had plenty of exercise aloft, so that my previous teaching, when I used to go down to the quay in the summer vacations on being left alone at school, stood me now in good stead; and in a little while I became really, for a lad of my years, an expert seaman, able to hand, reef, steer, and take a watch with any on board, long before we got to Plymouth!

But, it was not so with Tom.

The coal business, he thought, having no turn for colliery work, was bad enough; but, when it came to have to go aloft in a gale of wind and take in sail on a dark night, with the flapping canvas trying to jerk one off the yard, Tom acknowledged that he had no stomach to be a sailor—he preferred gymnastics ashore!

Although, otherwise, I had found him bold and fearless to desperation, he now evinced a nervous timidity about mounting the rigging that I didn’t think he had in him. It seemed utterly unlike the dauntless Tom of old acquaintanceship on land.

He said that he really “funked” going aloft, for it made his head swim when he looked down. I told him that if he got in the habit of looking down at the water below whenever he ascended the shrouds, instead of its only making his head swim, as he now complained, it would inevitably result in his entire self being forced to do so! However, he said he could not possibly help it, and really I don’t believe he could.

Some people are so constituted.

The upshot was that the skipper, noticing his inefficiency in the work of the ship, made him his cabin boy, in place of the lad who had hitherto occupied that enviable position, and whom he now sent forward amongst the other hands in the fo’c’s’le.

But the change did not bring any amelioration to poor Tom’s lot. It was “like going from the frying-pan into the fire;” for, now, my unfortunate chum, being immediately under the control of the skipper, who was a surly, ill-tempered brute at bottom, he paid him out for his laziness in “shirking work,” as he termed the constitutional nervousness that he was powerless to fight against—Tom coming in for “more kicks than halfpence” by his promotion to the cabin, and having “purser’s allowance” of all the beatings going, when the skipper was in one of his tantrums.

I got into a serious row with the brute for taking Tom’s part one day. In his passion, the skipper knocked me down with his favourite handspike, giving me a cut across my temple, the scar of which I’ll carry to my grave. My interference, however, saved Tom and myself any further ill-treatment, as I bled so much from the blow he gave me and was insensible so long, that the men thought the skipper had killed me. They accordingly remonstrated so forcibly with him on the subject that he promised to let us both alone for the future, at least so far as the handspike was concerned.

Fortunately, however, we were not much longer at the mercy of the brute’s temper; for, the morning after this, we reached Beachy Head, anchoring there to await the ebb tide down Channel, and the wind chopping round to the north-eastwards, made it fair for us all the way, enabling us to fetch Plymouth within three days.

Here, no sooner had the brig weathered Drake Island, anchoring inside the Cattwater, where all merchant vessels go to discharge their cargoes, than the skipper at once gave us notice to quit, almost without warning.

“Be off now, you lazy lubbers,” he cried, motioning us down into theSaucy Sall’ssolitary boat, which had been got over the side, and which, with Jorrocks in charge of it, was waiting to take us ashore. “I’m glad to get rid of such idle hands; and you may thank your stars I’ve let you off so cheaply for your cheek in stowing yourselves away aboard my brig! You may think yourselves lucky I don’t give you in charge, and get you put in gaol for it!”

“You daren’t,” shouted back Tom, defiantly, as soon as he was safely down in the stern-sheets of the dinghy. “If you wanted to give us in charge, you ought to have done so in Newcastle, instead of making us work there for you like niggers. I’ve a great mind to have you up before the magistrates for your ill-treatment!”

This appeared to shut up the skipper very effectively, for he didn’t offer a word in reply; and, presently, Jorrocks landed us at the jetty stairs, close inside the Cattwater.

Our old friend seemed quite sorry to part with us; and, knowing our destitute condition, he kindly presented us with the sum of five shillings, which he said was a joint subscription from all hands, who had “parted freely” when they learnt that we were about to be turned adrift from the brig, but which I believe mainly came out of his own pocket.

“Good-bye, my lads,” were his last words. “Keep your pecker up, and if you’ll take the advice of an old sailor, I’d recommend you to write to your friends and go home.”

“Much he knows of my Aunt Matilda!” I said to Tom, as we watched the good-hearted fellow pulling back to the old tub on board of which we had passed through so much. “If he were acquainted with all the circumstances of the case I don’t think he’d advise my going home at all events!”

“I’m not quite sure of that, Martin,” replied Tom, who was now thoroughly tired of everything connected with the sea, vowing that, after the experience he had gained, he would not go afloat again, to be made “Lord High Admiral of England!”

“Well, we’ll deliberate about it,” said I, as we turned away from the jetty and walked towards the town, where our immediate intention was to enter a coffee-shop and get a substantial breakfast out of the funds which Jorrocks had so thoughtfully provided us with.

Here, Tom’s fate was soon decided; for, we had not long been seated in a small restaurant where we had ordered some coffee and bread-and-butter, which were the viands we specially longed for, than an advertisement on the front page of an old copy of theTimescaught my eye.

It ran thus:—

“If Tom L—, who ran away from school in company with another boy on the night of November the Fifth and is supposed to have gone to sea, will communicate with his distressed mother, all will be forgiven.”

“Why, Tom,” said I, reading it aloud, with some further particulars describing him, which I have not quoted—“this must refer to you!”

“So it does,” said he.

“And what will you do?” I asked him.

“Well, Martin, I don’t like to leave you, but then you know my mother must be so anxious, as I told you before, that I think I’d better write to her.”

I suggested a better course, however, as soon as I saw he wished to go home; and that was, that, as his mother lived not very far from Exeter, he should take the balance of the money we had left after paying for our breakfast, and go off thither by train at once.

This, after some demur, he agreed to; so, as soon as we had finished our meal and discharged the bill, which only took eightpence put of our store, we made our way to the railway station.

A train was luckily just about starting, and Tom getting a ticket for half-price, he and I parted, not meeting again until many days had passed, and then in a very different place!

When I realised the fact that Tom was gone, and that I was now left alone in that strange place, where I had never been in my life before, I felt so utterly cast down, that instinctively I made my way to the sea, there seeking that comfort and calm which the mere sight of it, somehow or other, always afforded me.

I got down, I recollect, on the Hoe, and, walking along the esplanade, halted right in front of the Breakwater, whence I could command a view of the harbour, with the men-of-war in the Hamoaze on my right hand, and the Cattwater, where theSaucy Sallwas lying, on my left.

I was very melancholy, and after a bit I sat down on an adjacent seat; when, burying my face in my hands, I gave way to tears.

Presently, I was roused by the sound of a man’s voice close at hand, as if of some one speaking to me.

I looked up hastily, ashamed of being caught crying. However, the good-natured, jolly, weather-beaten face I saw looking into mine reassured me.

“Hullo, young cockbird,” said the owner of the face—a middle-aged, respectable, nautical-looking sort of man—speaking in a cheery voice, which went to my heart; “what’s the row with you, my hearty? Tell old Sam Pengelly all about it!”

Chapter Nine.Old Calabar Cottage.I don’t know why, excepting that the words had a kindly ring about them, in spite of the almost brusque quaintness of the address, that touched me keenly in the depressed state of mind in which I was; but, instead of answering the speaker’s pertinent question as to the reason of my grief, I now bent down my head again on my arm, sobbing away as if my heart would break.But this only made the good Samaritan prosecute his inquiry further.“Come, come, stow that, youngster,” said he, taking a seat beside me on the bench, where I was curled up in one corner, placing one of his hands gently on my shoulder in a caressing way. “Look up, and tell me what ails you, my lad, and if Sam Pengelly can help you, why, there’s his fist on it!”“You—you—are very k–kind,” I stammered out between my long-drawn sobs; “but—but—no—nobody can—help me, sir.”“Oh, nonsense, tell that to the marines, for a sailor won’t believe you,” he replied, briskly. “Why, laddie, anybody can help anybody, the same as the mouse nibbled the lion out of the hunter’s net; and, as for Mr Nobody, I don’t know the man! Look here, I can’t bear to see a ship in distress, or a comrade in the doldrums; so I tell you what, young cockbird, raise your crest and don’t look so peaky, for I’m going to help you if it’s in my power, as most likely it is—that is, saving as how it ain’t a loss by death, which takes us all, and which the good Lord above can only soothe, bringing comfort to you; and even then, why, a friendly word, and a grip o’ some un’s hand, sometimes softens down the roughest plank we’ve got to tread.“I tell you, my hearty,” he resumed again, after a brief pause, during which my sobs ceased, “I ain’t a going to let you adrift, now I’ve borne down alongside and boarded you, my hearty—that’s not Sam Pengelly’s way; so you’d better make a clean breast of your troubles and we’ll see what can be done for ’em. To begin with, for there’s no use argufying on an empty stomach, are you hungry, eh?”“No,” I said with a smile, his cheery address and quaint language banishing my melancholy feelings in a moment, just as a ray of sunshine or two, penetrating the surface mist, that hangs over the sea and land of a summer morning before the orb of day, causes it to melt away and disappear as if by magic, waking up the scene to life; “I had breakfast in the town about an hour ago.”“Are you hard up?” was his next query.“No,” I answered again, this time bursting into a laugh at the puzzled expression on his face; “I’ve got a shilling and a sixpence—there!” and I drew the coins from my pocket, showing them to him.“Well, I’m jiggered!” murmured the old fellow to himself, taking off the straight-peaked blue cloth cap he wore, and scratching his head reflectively—as if in a quandary, and cogitating how best to get out of it. “Neither hard up or hungry! I call this a stiff reckoning to work out. I’d better try the young shaver on another tack. Got any friends?” he added, in a louder key—addressing himself, now, personally to me, not supposing that I had heard his previous soliloquy, for he had merely uttered his thoughts aloud.This question touched me on the sore point, and I looked grave at once.“No,” I replied, “I’ve got none left now, since Tom’s gone.”“And who’s Tom?” he asked, confidentially, to draw me out.Thereupon, I told him of my being an orphan, brought up by relatives who didn’t care about me, and all about my being sent to school. I also detailed, with much gusto, the way in which Tom and I had made our exit from Dr Hellyer’s academy, and our subsequent adventures in the coal brig, down to the moment when I saw the last of my chum as he steamed out of the Plymouth railway station in the Exeter train, leaving me desolate behind.My new friend did not appear so very much amused by the account of our blowing up the Doctor as I thought he would be. Indeed, he looked quite serious about it, as if it were, no joking matter, as really it was not, but a very bad and mischievous piece of business. What seemed to interest him much more, was, what I told him of my longing for a sea-life, and the determination I had formed of being a sailor—which even the harsh treatment of theSaucy Sall’sskipper had in no degree banished from my mind.“What a pity you weren’t sent in the service,” he said, meditatively, “I fancy you’d ha’ made a good reefer from the cut of your jib. You’re just the very spit of one I served under when I was a man-o’-war’s-man afore I got pensioned off, now ten year ago!”“My father was an officer in the Navy,” I replied rather proudly. “He lost his life, gallantly, in the service of his country.”“You don’t say that now?” exclaimed my questioner, with much warmth, looking me earnestly in the face; “and what may your name be, if I may be so bold? you haven’t told it me yet.”“Martin Leigh,” I answered, promptly, a faint hope rising in my breast.“Leigh?—no, never, it can’t be!” said the old fellow, now greatly excited. “I once knew an officer of that very name—Gerald Leigh—and he was killed in action up the Niger River on the West Coast, while attacking a slave barracoon, ten years ago come next March—”“That was my father,” I here interposed, interrupting his reminiscences.“Your father? You don’t mean that!”“I do,” I said, eagerly, “I was four years old when Uncle George received the news of his death.”“My stunsails!” ejaculated the old fellow, dashing his cap to the ground in a fever of excitement; and, seizing both my hands in his, he shook them up and down so forcibly that he almost lifted me off the seat. “Think of that now; but, I could ha’ known it from the sort o’ feeling that drew me to you when I saw you curled up here, all lonesome, like a cock sparrow on a round of beef! And so, Lieutenant Leigh was your father—the bravest, kindest officer I ever sailed under! Why, youngster, do you know who I am?”He said this quite abruptly, and he looked as if he thought I would recognise him.“No,” I said, smiling, “but you’re a very kind-hearted man. I’m sure, to take such an interest in a friendless boy like me.”“Friendless boy, be jiggered!” he replied—“You’re not friendless from now, you can be sarten! Why, I was your father’s own coxswain in theSwallow, off the coast, and it was in my arms he died when he received that murdering nigger’s shot in his chest, right ’twixt wind and water. Yes! there’s a wonderful way in the workings o’ Providence—to think that you should come across me now when you needs a friend, one whom your father often befriended in old times, more like a brother than an officer! I thank the great Captain above,”—and the old fellow looked up reverently here to the blue heaven over us as he uttered these last words—“that I’m allowed this marciful chance o’ paying back, in a poor sort o’ way, all my old commander’s kindness to me in the years agone! Yes, young gentleman, my name’s Sam Pengelly, and I was your father’s coxswain. If he had ha’ lived he’d have talked to you, sure enough, about me.”“I’m very glad to hear this,” said I; and so I was, for my hopeful surmise had proved true.“Well, laddie—you’ll excuse my speaking to you familiar like, won’t you?”“Call me what you please,” I answered, “I’m only too proud to hear your kind voice, and see your friendly face. I have had all nonsense about dignity and position knocked out of me long since!”“Well, perhaps, that’s all for the best—though mind, Master Leigh, being your father’s son, you mustn’t ever forget you’ve been born a true gen’leman, and don’t you ever do an action that you’ll have cause to be ashamed on! That’s the only proper sort o’ dignity a gen’leman’s son need ever be partic’ler about, to make people recognise him for what he is; and, with this feeling and eddication, you’ll take your proper place in the world, never fear! Now, what do you think about doing, my lad? for the day is getting on, and it’s time to see after something.”“I’m sure I don’t know,” I replied. “I should like to go to sea, as I’ve told you. Not in a coasting vessel, like the coal brig, but really to pea, so as to be able to sail over the ocean to China or Australia; and, bye-and-bye, after awhile, as soon as I am old enough and have sufficient experience, I hope to command a ship of my own.”He had shown such sympathy towards me, that I couldn’t help telling him all the wild dreams about my future which had been filling my mind for the last two years, although I had not confided them even to Tom, for I thought he would make fun of my nautical ambition.Instead of laughing at me, however, my new friend looked highly delighted.“I’m blessed if you aren’t a reg’ler chip of the old block,” he said admiringly, gazing into my face with a broad smile on his weather-beaten countenance, that made it for the moment in my eyes positively handsome. “There spoke my old lieutenant, the same as I can fancy I hear him now, the morning we rowed up the Niger to assault the nigger stockade where he met his death. ‘Pengelly,’ sez he, in the same identical way as you first said them words o’ yourn, ‘I mean to take that prah,’ and, take it he did, though the poor fellow lost his life leading us on to the assault! I can see, very plain, you’ve got it all in you, the same as he; and, having been a seafaring man all my life, first in the sarvice, and then on my own hook in a small way in the coasting line, in course I honours your sentiments in wishing to be a sailor—though it’s a hard life at the best. Howsomedevers, ‘what’s bred in the bone,’ as the proverb says, ‘must come out in the flesh,’ and if you will go to sea, why, you must, and I’ll try to help you on to what you wish, as far as Sam Pengelly can; I can’t say more nor that, can I?”“No, certainly not, and I’m much obliged to you,” I answered; for he made a pause at this point, as if waiting for my reply.“Well, then, that’s all settled and entered in the log-book fair and square; but, as all this can’t be managed in a minute, and there’ll be a lot of arrangements to make, s’pose as how you come home along o’ me first? I’m an orphan, too, the same as yourself, with nobody left to care for or to mind me, save my old sister Jane, who keeps house for me; and she and I’ll make you as welcome as the flowers in May!”I demurred for a moment at accepting this kind proposal, for I was naturally of a very independent nature; and, besides, the lessons I had received in my uncle’s household made me shrink from incurring the obligation of any one’s hospitality, especially that of one with whom I had only such brief acquaintanceship, albeit he was “an orphan”—a rather oldish one, I thought—“like myself.”But my new friend would not be denied.“Come on, now,” he repeated, getting up from the seat, and holding out a big, strong hand to me, with such a beaming, good-natured expression on his face and so much genuine cordiality in his voice, that it was impossible for me to persist in refusing his invitation; the more particularly as, seeing me hesitate, he added the remark—“leastways, that is, unless you’re too high a gen’leman to consort with an humble sailor as was your own father’s coxswain!”This settled the point, making me jump up in a jiffey; when, without further delay, he and I went off from the Hoe, hand in hand, in the direction of Stoke, where he told me he lived.It was now nearly the middle of December, six weeks having passed by since the memorable Sunday on which I and Tom had made a Guy Fawkes of Dr Hellyer, and run away from school—the intervening time having slipped by quickly enough while on board the coal brig at Newcastle, and during our voyage down the coast again—but the weather, I recollect, was wonderfully mild for the time of year; and, as we walked past the terraces fronting the Hoe, the sun shone down on us, and over the blue sea beyond in Plymouth Sound below, as if it had been a summer day. Indeed, no matter what the weather might have been, I think it would have seemed fine and bright to me; for, I don’t believe I had ever felt so happy in my life as I did when trudging along by Sam Pengelly’s side that morning.“You’re a pretty strong-built chap for your age,” said Sam, as we went along. “I suppose you’re close on sixteen, eh?”“Dear me, no,” I laughed, light-heartedly. “Why, I’m only just fourteen! I told you I was four when my poor father was killed; and that, as you yourself said, happened ten years ago, so you can calculate yourself.”“Bless me, so you must be by all accounts; but, sure, you look fully two years older! Humph, you’re a little bit too young yet to get apprenticed to the sea regularly as I thought of; but there’s plenty o’ time for us to study the bearings of it arter we fetch home. Come along, step out. I feel kind o’ peckish with all this palavering, and thinks as how I could manage a bit of dinner pretty comfably, and it’ll be just about ready by the time we reach Stoke, as Jane’s mighty punctual to having it on the table by eight bells; step out, my hearty!”Presently, turning off from the main road into a sort of bye-lane, my conductor finally stopped before the entrance porch of a neat little cottage, standing in a large garden of its own, that stretched away for some distance on either side. There was an orchard also in the rear, the fruit-trees of which, such was the mildness of the season, appeared ready to break into bud.“Here’s my anchorage, laddie,” said he, with a wave of his hand—indicating the extent of his property.“What a jolly little place!” I exclaimed.“Yes,” he replied, with pardonable pride, “I set my heart on the little cabin years ago—afore I left the navy—and I used to save up my pay and prize money, so as to buy it in time. I meant it for mother, but she died before I could manage it; and then I bought it for myself, thinking that Jane and I would live here until we should be summoned for the watch on deck above, and that arter our time Teddy, my nephew, Jane’s only boy, would have it. But, not long arter we settled down comfably, poor Teddy caught a fever, which carried him off; and Jane and I have gone on alone, ever since, with only our two selves.”“You must miss your nephew Teddy,” I said, sympathisingly, seeing a grave look on his face.“Yes, laddie, I did miss him very much, but now, my cockbird,” and here his face brightened up with another beaming smile, as he laid a meaning emphasis on his words, “but now I fancy, somehow or other, I’ll not miss Teddy as much as I used to; d’ye know why?”“No,” I said, hesitatingly, and somewhat untruthfully, for I pretty well guessed what he meant.“Then I’ll tell you,” he continued, with much feeling and heartiness of expression, “I’ve christened this here anchorage o’ mine, ‘Old Calabar,’ in mem’ry o’ the West Coast, where I sarved under your father in theSwallow, as I told you just now; and, Master Leigh, as his son, I hope you’ll always consider the little shanty as your home, free to come and go or stay, just as you choose, and ever open to you with a welcome the same as now?”What could I say to this?Why, nothing.I declare that I couldn’t have uttered a word then to have saved my life.But he did not want any thanks.Pretending not to notice my emotion, he went on speaking, so as to allow me time to recover myself.“Rec’lect this, laddie,” said he, “that my sister Jane and I have neither chick nor child belonging to either of us, and that your presence will be like sunshine in the house. Come along in now, my boy. I’ll give Jane a hail to let her know we’re here in harbour, so that she can pipe down to dinner. Hi—hullo—on deck there!” and, raising his voice, in this concluding shout—just as if he were standing on the poop of a vessel in a heavy gale of wind and hailing a look-out man on the fore-crosstrees—he opened the door of the cottage, motioning me courteously to enter it first.

I don’t know why, excepting that the words had a kindly ring about them, in spite of the almost brusque quaintness of the address, that touched me keenly in the depressed state of mind in which I was; but, instead of answering the speaker’s pertinent question as to the reason of my grief, I now bent down my head again on my arm, sobbing away as if my heart would break.

But this only made the good Samaritan prosecute his inquiry further.

“Come, come, stow that, youngster,” said he, taking a seat beside me on the bench, where I was curled up in one corner, placing one of his hands gently on my shoulder in a caressing way. “Look up, and tell me what ails you, my lad, and if Sam Pengelly can help you, why, there’s his fist on it!”

“You—you—are very k–kind,” I stammered out between my long-drawn sobs; “but—but—no—nobody can—help me, sir.”

“Oh, nonsense, tell that to the marines, for a sailor won’t believe you,” he replied, briskly. “Why, laddie, anybody can help anybody, the same as the mouse nibbled the lion out of the hunter’s net; and, as for Mr Nobody, I don’t know the man! Look here, I can’t bear to see a ship in distress, or a comrade in the doldrums; so I tell you what, young cockbird, raise your crest and don’t look so peaky, for I’m going to help you if it’s in my power, as most likely it is—that is, saving as how it ain’t a loss by death, which takes us all, and which the good Lord above can only soothe, bringing comfort to you; and even then, why, a friendly word, and a grip o’ some un’s hand, sometimes softens down the roughest plank we’ve got to tread.

“I tell you, my hearty,” he resumed again, after a brief pause, during which my sobs ceased, “I ain’t a going to let you adrift, now I’ve borne down alongside and boarded you, my hearty—that’s not Sam Pengelly’s way; so you’d better make a clean breast of your troubles and we’ll see what can be done for ’em. To begin with, for there’s no use argufying on an empty stomach, are you hungry, eh?”

“No,” I said with a smile, his cheery address and quaint language banishing my melancholy feelings in a moment, just as a ray of sunshine or two, penetrating the surface mist, that hangs over the sea and land of a summer morning before the orb of day, causes it to melt away and disappear as if by magic, waking up the scene to life; “I had breakfast in the town about an hour ago.”

“Are you hard up?” was his next query.

“No,” I answered again, this time bursting into a laugh at the puzzled expression on his face; “I’ve got a shilling and a sixpence—there!” and I drew the coins from my pocket, showing them to him.

“Well, I’m jiggered!” murmured the old fellow to himself, taking off the straight-peaked blue cloth cap he wore, and scratching his head reflectively—as if in a quandary, and cogitating how best to get out of it. “Neither hard up or hungry! I call this a stiff reckoning to work out. I’d better try the young shaver on another tack. Got any friends?” he added, in a louder key—addressing himself, now, personally to me, not supposing that I had heard his previous soliloquy, for he had merely uttered his thoughts aloud.

This question touched me on the sore point, and I looked grave at once.

“No,” I replied, “I’ve got none left now, since Tom’s gone.”

“And who’s Tom?” he asked, confidentially, to draw me out.

Thereupon, I told him of my being an orphan, brought up by relatives who didn’t care about me, and all about my being sent to school. I also detailed, with much gusto, the way in which Tom and I had made our exit from Dr Hellyer’s academy, and our subsequent adventures in the coal brig, down to the moment when I saw the last of my chum as he steamed out of the Plymouth railway station in the Exeter train, leaving me desolate behind.

My new friend did not appear so very much amused by the account of our blowing up the Doctor as I thought he would be. Indeed, he looked quite serious about it, as if it were, no joking matter, as really it was not, but a very bad and mischievous piece of business. What seemed to interest him much more, was, what I told him of my longing for a sea-life, and the determination I had formed of being a sailor—which even the harsh treatment of theSaucy Sall’sskipper had in no degree banished from my mind.

“What a pity you weren’t sent in the service,” he said, meditatively, “I fancy you’d ha’ made a good reefer from the cut of your jib. You’re just the very spit of one I served under when I was a man-o’-war’s-man afore I got pensioned off, now ten year ago!”

“My father was an officer in the Navy,” I replied rather proudly. “He lost his life, gallantly, in the service of his country.”

“You don’t say that now?” exclaimed my questioner, with much warmth, looking me earnestly in the face; “and what may your name be, if I may be so bold? you haven’t told it me yet.”

“Martin Leigh,” I answered, promptly, a faint hope rising in my breast.

“Leigh?—no, never, it can’t be!” said the old fellow, now greatly excited. “I once knew an officer of that very name—Gerald Leigh—and he was killed in action up the Niger River on the West Coast, while attacking a slave barracoon, ten years ago come next March—”

“That was my father,” I here interposed, interrupting his reminiscences.

“Your father? You don’t mean that!”

“I do,” I said, eagerly, “I was four years old when Uncle George received the news of his death.”

“My stunsails!” ejaculated the old fellow, dashing his cap to the ground in a fever of excitement; and, seizing both my hands in his, he shook them up and down so forcibly that he almost lifted me off the seat. “Think of that now; but, I could ha’ known it from the sort o’ feeling that drew me to you when I saw you curled up here, all lonesome, like a cock sparrow on a round of beef! And so, Lieutenant Leigh was your father—the bravest, kindest officer I ever sailed under! Why, youngster, do you know who I am?”

He said this quite abruptly, and he looked as if he thought I would recognise him.

“No,” I said, smiling, “but you’re a very kind-hearted man. I’m sure, to take such an interest in a friendless boy like me.”

“Friendless boy, be jiggered!” he replied—“You’re not friendless from now, you can be sarten! Why, I was your father’s own coxswain in theSwallow, off the coast, and it was in my arms he died when he received that murdering nigger’s shot in his chest, right ’twixt wind and water. Yes! there’s a wonderful way in the workings o’ Providence—to think that you should come across me now when you needs a friend, one whom your father often befriended in old times, more like a brother than an officer! I thank the great Captain above,”—and the old fellow looked up reverently here to the blue heaven over us as he uttered these last words—“that I’m allowed this marciful chance o’ paying back, in a poor sort o’ way, all my old commander’s kindness to me in the years agone! Yes, young gentleman, my name’s Sam Pengelly, and I was your father’s coxswain. If he had ha’ lived he’d have talked to you, sure enough, about me.”

“I’m very glad to hear this,” said I; and so I was, for my hopeful surmise had proved true.

“Well, laddie—you’ll excuse my speaking to you familiar like, won’t you?”

“Call me what you please,” I answered, “I’m only too proud to hear your kind voice, and see your friendly face. I have had all nonsense about dignity and position knocked out of me long since!”

“Well, perhaps, that’s all for the best—though mind, Master Leigh, being your father’s son, you mustn’t ever forget you’ve been born a true gen’leman, and don’t you ever do an action that you’ll have cause to be ashamed on! That’s the only proper sort o’ dignity a gen’leman’s son need ever be partic’ler about, to make people recognise him for what he is; and, with this feeling and eddication, you’ll take your proper place in the world, never fear! Now, what do you think about doing, my lad? for the day is getting on, and it’s time to see after something.”

“I’m sure I don’t know,” I replied. “I should like to go to sea, as I’ve told you. Not in a coasting vessel, like the coal brig, but really to pea, so as to be able to sail over the ocean to China or Australia; and, bye-and-bye, after awhile, as soon as I am old enough and have sufficient experience, I hope to command a ship of my own.”

He had shown such sympathy towards me, that I couldn’t help telling him all the wild dreams about my future which had been filling my mind for the last two years, although I had not confided them even to Tom, for I thought he would make fun of my nautical ambition.

Instead of laughing at me, however, my new friend looked highly delighted.

“I’m blessed if you aren’t a reg’ler chip of the old block,” he said admiringly, gazing into my face with a broad smile on his weather-beaten countenance, that made it for the moment in my eyes positively handsome. “There spoke my old lieutenant, the same as I can fancy I hear him now, the morning we rowed up the Niger to assault the nigger stockade where he met his death. ‘Pengelly,’ sez he, in the same identical way as you first said them words o’ yourn, ‘I mean to take that prah,’ and, take it he did, though the poor fellow lost his life leading us on to the assault! I can see, very plain, you’ve got it all in you, the same as he; and, having been a seafaring man all my life, first in the sarvice, and then on my own hook in a small way in the coasting line, in course I honours your sentiments in wishing to be a sailor—though it’s a hard life at the best. Howsomedevers, ‘what’s bred in the bone,’ as the proverb says, ‘must come out in the flesh,’ and if you will go to sea, why, you must, and I’ll try to help you on to what you wish, as far as Sam Pengelly can; I can’t say more nor that, can I?”

“No, certainly not, and I’m much obliged to you,” I answered; for he made a pause at this point, as if waiting for my reply.

“Well, then, that’s all settled and entered in the log-book fair and square; but, as all this can’t be managed in a minute, and there’ll be a lot of arrangements to make, s’pose as how you come home along o’ me first? I’m an orphan, too, the same as yourself, with nobody left to care for or to mind me, save my old sister Jane, who keeps house for me; and she and I’ll make you as welcome as the flowers in May!”

I demurred for a moment at accepting this kind proposal, for I was naturally of a very independent nature; and, besides, the lessons I had received in my uncle’s household made me shrink from incurring the obligation of any one’s hospitality, especially that of one with whom I had only such brief acquaintanceship, albeit he was “an orphan”—a rather oldish one, I thought—“like myself.”

But my new friend would not be denied.

“Come on, now,” he repeated, getting up from the seat, and holding out a big, strong hand to me, with such a beaming, good-natured expression on his face and so much genuine cordiality in his voice, that it was impossible for me to persist in refusing his invitation; the more particularly as, seeing me hesitate, he added the remark—“leastways, that is, unless you’re too high a gen’leman to consort with an humble sailor as was your own father’s coxswain!”

This settled the point, making me jump up in a jiffey; when, without further delay, he and I went off from the Hoe, hand in hand, in the direction of Stoke, where he told me he lived.

It was now nearly the middle of December, six weeks having passed by since the memorable Sunday on which I and Tom had made a Guy Fawkes of Dr Hellyer, and run away from school—the intervening time having slipped by quickly enough while on board the coal brig at Newcastle, and during our voyage down the coast again—but the weather, I recollect, was wonderfully mild for the time of year; and, as we walked past the terraces fronting the Hoe, the sun shone down on us, and over the blue sea beyond in Plymouth Sound below, as if it had been a summer day. Indeed, no matter what the weather might have been, I think it would have seemed fine and bright to me; for, I don’t believe I had ever felt so happy in my life as I did when trudging along by Sam Pengelly’s side that morning.

“You’re a pretty strong-built chap for your age,” said Sam, as we went along. “I suppose you’re close on sixteen, eh?”

“Dear me, no,” I laughed, light-heartedly. “Why, I’m only just fourteen! I told you I was four when my poor father was killed; and that, as you yourself said, happened ten years ago, so you can calculate yourself.”

“Bless me, so you must be by all accounts; but, sure, you look fully two years older! Humph, you’re a little bit too young yet to get apprenticed to the sea regularly as I thought of; but there’s plenty o’ time for us to study the bearings of it arter we fetch home. Come along, step out. I feel kind o’ peckish with all this palavering, and thinks as how I could manage a bit of dinner pretty comfably, and it’ll be just about ready by the time we reach Stoke, as Jane’s mighty punctual to having it on the table by eight bells; step out, my hearty!”

Presently, turning off from the main road into a sort of bye-lane, my conductor finally stopped before the entrance porch of a neat little cottage, standing in a large garden of its own, that stretched away for some distance on either side. There was an orchard also in the rear, the fruit-trees of which, such was the mildness of the season, appeared ready to break into bud.

“Here’s my anchorage, laddie,” said he, with a wave of his hand—indicating the extent of his property.

“What a jolly little place!” I exclaimed.

“Yes,” he replied, with pardonable pride, “I set my heart on the little cabin years ago—afore I left the navy—and I used to save up my pay and prize money, so as to buy it in time. I meant it for mother, but she died before I could manage it; and then I bought it for myself, thinking that Jane and I would live here until we should be summoned for the watch on deck above, and that arter our time Teddy, my nephew, Jane’s only boy, would have it. But, not long arter we settled down comfably, poor Teddy caught a fever, which carried him off; and Jane and I have gone on alone, ever since, with only our two selves.”

“You must miss your nephew Teddy,” I said, sympathisingly, seeing a grave look on his face.

“Yes, laddie, I did miss him very much, but now, my cockbird,” and here his face brightened up with another beaming smile, as he laid a meaning emphasis on his words, “but now I fancy, somehow or other, I’ll not miss Teddy as much as I used to; d’ye know why?”

“No,” I said, hesitatingly, and somewhat untruthfully, for I pretty well guessed what he meant.

“Then I’ll tell you,” he continued, with much feeling and heartiness of expression, “I’ve christened this here anchorage o’ mine, ‘Old Calabar,’ in mem’ry o’ the West Coast, where I sarved under your father in theSwallow, as I told you just now; and, Master Leigh, as his son, I hope you’ll always consider the little shanty as your home, free to come and go or stay, just as you choose, and ever open to you with a welcome the same as now?”

What could I say to this?

Why, nothing.

I declare that I couldn’t have uttered a word then to have saved my life.

But he did not want any thanks.

Pretending not to notice my emotion, he went on speaking, so as to allow me time to recover myself.

“Rec’lect this, laddie,” said he, “that my sister Jane and I have neither chick nor child belonging to either of us, and that your presence will be like sunshine in the house. Come along in now, my boy. I’ll give Jane a hail to let her know we’re here in harbour, so that she can pipe down to dinner. Hi—hullo—on deck there!” and, raising his voice, in this concluding shout—just as if he were standing on the poop of a vessel in a heavy gale of wind and hailing a look-out man on the fore-crosstrees—he opened the door of the cottage, motioning me courteously to enter it first.

Chapter Ten.A Welcome Guest.The little hall, or passage way, opening out of the porch, in which I now found myself, was like the vestibule to a museum.It was crammed full, from floor to ceiling, with all sorts of curios, brought from foreign parts, evidently by the worthy owner of the dwelling, when returning home after his many cruisings in strange waters—conch shells from the Congo and cowries from Zanzibar; a swordfish’s broken spear from the Pacific, and a Fijian war-club; cases of stuffed humming-birds from Rio, and calabashes from the Caribbean Sea; a beautiful model, in the finest ivory work, of a Chinese junk on one side,vis-à-viswith a full-rigged English man-of-war on the other; and, above all, in the place of honour, the hideous body of a shark, displaying its systematic rows of triangularly arranged saw-like teeth, now harmless, but once ready to mangle the unwary!All these objects, of course, immediately attracted my attention, but I had not much time for glancing round the collection; for, almost as soon as we got inside the little hall, a bright-faced middle-aged woman, with jet-black hair and eyes, the very image of my new friend, only much more comely in feature, stepped forward from a room opening out of the other end of the passage.“Dear me, Sam, is that you?” she cried out in a voice closely resembling his in its cheery accents, although more musical by reason of its feminine ring; “I’m just dishing up, and dinner’ll be ready as soon as the pasty’s done.”Her brother did not apparently pay any attention to this highly important announcement for the moment.“Come here, Jane,” he said, “I’ve brought home a visitor.”With this she advanced, courtesying, her face changing as soon as she came nearer and saw who the stranger was.“My, Sam!” she exclaimed, “who is he? Why, he’s the very image of poor Ted!” and she raised the corner of her apron to her eyes as she spoke, as if to stop the ready-starting tears.“Whoever do you think he is?” said Sam Pengelly, triumphantly; “look at him carefully, now. No, Jane, my woman, I don’t believe you’d ever guess!”“Who?”“Why, the son of my good old commander, Lieutenant Leigh, of theSwallow, him as I’ve spun you so many yarns about! Why, Jane, my woman, I found the poor little laddie a desarted young orphan on the Hoe just now. He’s friendless, with never a home to go to; and so I asked him to come along o’ me, saying as how you’d welcome him to ‘Old Calabar’ the same as I.”“And so I will, too, Sam,” replied the other, coming up to me and speaking; “I’m main glad to see you here, young gentleman, for I’ve often heard Sam talk of your father, saying how good and kind he was to him. You’re heartily welcome to our little home. My gracious, Sam!” she added, turning aside and using her apron again; “he’s as like my Ted as two peas! I can’t help it!” and so saying, she threw her arms round my neck and kissed me.The action somewhat confused me; for, it was the first motherly caress I had ever experienced in my life. Aunt Matilda, you may be sure, never once thought of so greeting me!“Avast there, Jane,” laughed out Sam, much pleased at the way in which his sister had received me. “What d’ye mean by boarding my prize in that fashion? But I’m glad you think he’s like Teddy—it will make it more like old times and home-like for us to have the laddie with us.”“Aye, and he can have Ted’s room,” answered the other—all eagerness now to see to my being completely arranged for—“I think the poor boy’s clothes will fit him too.”“So they will, and just in time, too, for he wants a new rig,” said her brother, casting a critical eye over my wardrobe, which had not been improved by my stay on board the coal brig.We then proceeded to enter a nice roomy old-fashioned kitchen, with a cleanly-scoured floor like the deck of a man-of-war, and all resplendent with rows of plates and burnished pewter pots and dish-covers, where we had, what I considered both then and now to be, the best dinner I had ever eaten in my life, winding up with an apple tart that had Devonshire cream spread over it like powdered sugar—a most unparalleled prodigality of luxury to my unaccustomed eyes and palate!Afterwards, I was shown a little room at the back, looking out into the garden, which had been formerly occupied by Teddy. Of this I was now put in formal possession, along with a good stock of clothes which the bereaved mother had carefully preserved in the chest-of-drawers in one corner, just as if her boy had been still living, all ready for use. These, she now told me, with tears in her eyes, I was heartily welcome to, if I were not too proud to accept them, as, in wearing them, she said, I should make her think that she yet had poor Ted to comfort her, and I would take his vacant place in her heart. The good woman, however, with housewifely care, brought up to the room a large tub with a plentiful supply of hot water and soap, so that I might have “a thorough wash,” as she called it, before putting on the clean clothes. Thus, through the kind hospitality of brother and sister alike, before the day was out, I was as thoroughly at home in the household as if—having stepped into the lost Teddy’s shoes metaphorically as well as practically—I had lived there for years!It would take a volume for me to tell of all the kindness I received from these people, the brother and sister vying with each other in their endeavours to make me feel comfortable and at ease with them in my new home.Sam Pengelly, thinking it the right thing to do, wrote to Uncle George, informing him where I now was; and saying, that, if my relatives had no objection, he should like to be allowed to look after my future as if I were his own son.To this a reply soon came, to the effect that, as I had of my own will thrown away all the advantages that had been secured for me in putting me to a good school and holding out the offer of a situation afterwards in a merchant’s office, my uncle “washed his hands of me” on account of my ungrateful and abandoned behaviour; and that, henceforth, he did not care what became of me, nor would he be answerable for my support!“That’s a good ’un,” said Sam Pengelly, as he read this. “That cranky Aunt Matilda, you told me about, laddie, must ha’ had a hand in this, sartin; for, perhaps you don’t know that I’ve diskivered as your uncle drawed what they calls a ‘compassionate allowance’ from My Lords of th’ Admiralty for your keep all them years they starved you under their roof and pretended you was livin’ on their charity!”Sam Pengelly looked quite fierce and indignant as he made this, to me, new revelation.“Really?” I asked him, eagerly.“Yes, laddie, it’s true enough, for I’ve taken the pains to find it out for a fact from a friend o’ mine at head-quarters. Th’ Admiralty allers give an annual ’lowance for the support of the childer o’ them officers as is killed in action, that is when their folks are left badly off; and some one must ha’ put up your uncle to this, for he took precious good care to draw it every year you was along o’ him.”“Oh, I’m so glad!” I exclaimed, joyfully. “I only wish, though, I had known it before, so that I could have thrown it back in Aunt Matilda’s teeth when she used to tell me that I was robbing her children of their bread every meal I took in the house, taunting me with being only a pauper!”“Never mind that now,” said Sam Pengelly—quite his composed, calm, genial self again, after the little ebullition he had given way to on my behalf. “Better let byegones be byegones. It is a good sailin’ direction to go upon in this world; for your cross old aunt will be sartin to get paid out some time or other for her treatment o’ you, I’ll wager! Howsomedevers, I’m glad we’ve got that letter from your uncle, though. You see, laddie, it cuts them adrift altogether from any claim on you; and now, if you be so minded, you can chuck in your lot with old Sam and his sister—that is, unless you want to sheer off and part company, and desart us?”“Oh no, I’ll never do that if I can help it,” I replied, earnestly. “Why, I did not know what it was to be happy and cared for till I met you, and you brought me here to your home. I shall never willingly, now, leave you here—that is, except you want me to.”“Then, that’ll be never,” said he, with an emphasis and a kindly smile that showed his were no empty words.Nor did they prove to be as time rolled on.For many months after that casual meeting of ours on the Hoe, which I little thought was going to lead to such happy consequences, the little cottage at Stoke was my home in winter and summer alike; when Nature was gay in her spring dress, and when dreary autumn came; although, it was never dreary to me, no matter what the season might be.In the summer months I used generally to accompany Sam in the short trading trips he made in a little foretopsail schooner—of which he was the registered owner, and generally took the command—when we would fetch a compass for Falmouth or Torquay, and other small western ports; between which places and Plymouth the schooner went to and fro when wind and weather permitted.Sometimes, tempted by the inducement that early potatoes and green peas were plentiful and cheap at Saint Mary’s, Sam would venture out as far as the Scilly Isles; and once, a most memorable voyage, we made a round trip in the little craft to the Bristol Channel and back—facing all the perils of the “twenty-two fathom sandbank” off Cape Cornwall, with its heavy tumbling sea.This was not time wasted on my part; for I had not forgotten my ambition of being a sailor, and now, under Sam Pengelly’s able tuition I was thoroughly initiated into all the practical details of seamanship, albeit I had not yet essayed life on board ship in an ocean-going vessel.Sam Pengelly said, that, at fourteen, I was too young to be apprenticed regularly to the sea, and that it would be much better for me to wait until I should be able to be of use in a ship, and get on more quickly in navigation. Going to sea before would only be lost time, for I could gain quite as much experience of what it was necessary for me to know in the schooner along with him, until it was time for me to go afloat in real earnest.This was what my old friend advised; and, although he declared himself willing to forward my wishes should they go counter to his own views, I valued his opinion too highly to disagree with it, judging that his forty years’ experience of the sea must have taught him enough to know better than I about what was best in the matter.My life, therefore, for the two intervening years, after I had run away from school and before I went actually to sea, was a very even and pleasant one—cut off completely, as it was, from all the painful past, and the associations of Aunt Matilda and Dr Hellyer’s. I had heard once from Tom, my whilom chum, it is true, telling me that his mother had persuaded him to go back to the Doctor’s establishment, and that I should not have any further communication from him in consequence—which I didn’t; and there was the one letter from Uncle George to Sam Pengelly, “washing his hands of me,” which I have already alluded to. With these, however, all connection with my former existence ceased; and I can’t say I regretted it, cherished as I now was in the great loving Cornish hearts of Sam and Jane Pengelly.Sam would not let my education be neglected, however.“No, no, laddie, we must keep a clear look-out on that,” he often said to me. “If I had only had eddication when I was in the sarvice, I’d ha’ been a warrant officer with a long pension now, instead o’ having a short one, and bein’ ’bliged to trust to my own hands to lengthen it out. If you wants to be a good navigator, you must study now when you’re young; for arterwards it will be no use, and you may be as smart a sailor as ever handled a ship, and yet be unable to steer her across the ocean and take advantage of all the short cuts and currents, and so on, that only experienced seamen and those well up in book knowledge can know about.”Acting on this reasoning, he got the master of a neighbouring school to give me after-time lessons in mathematics and geography; and, in the course of a few months, I was able to be inducted into the mysteries of great circle sailing and the art of taking lunars, much to the admiration of Sam, whom I’m afraid I often took a delight in puzzling with trigonometrical phrases that sounded full of portentous difficulty, albeit harmlessly easy.As time went on, although I was happy enough at the cottage, I was continually asking Sam if he had found me a ship yet, he having promised to “keep his eye open” and let me know as soon as he saw a good opportunity of placing me with some captain with whom I was likely to learn my nautical calling well and have a chance of getting on up the ladder; but, as regularly as I asked him the question, the old salt would give me the same stereotyped answer—“No, laddie, our ship’s not got into port yet. We must still wait for an offing!”But at last, after many days, this anxiously awaited “offing” was, much to my satisfaction, apparently thought within reach by my old friend.One morning I did not accompany him as usual into Plymouth after breakfast, where the old fellow regularly proceeded every morning—never feeling happy for the day unless he saw the sea before dinner. I was busily engaged trimming up a large asparagus bed in the garden, wherein my adopted mother took considerable interest.I recollect the morning well.It was just at the beginning of summer, and the trees were all clothed in that delicately-tinged foliage of feathery green, which they lose later on in the season, while the ground below was covered with fruit blossoms like snowflakes, a stray blue flag or daffodil just springing up from the peaty soil, gleaming out amidst the vegetable wealth around, and the air perfumed with a delicious scent, of the wallflowers that were scattered about the garden in every stray nook and corner.Sam was late on his return.“Eight bells,” his regular hour, had struck without his well-known voice being heard hailing us from the porch; and it was quite half-past twelve before the customary shout in the porch of the cottage told of his arrival, for I was keeping strict watch over the time, having been rendered extra hungry by my exertions in the garden—our dinner being postponed till the missing mariner came.However, “better late than never,” says the old proverb; and here he was now—although as soon as I saw him I noticed from his face that something unusual and out-of-the-way had happened, his expression always disclosing if anything was on or in his mind, and being a sad tell-tale.He did not wait to let me ask, though.“Hullo!” he cried, as soon as he came into the kitchen-parlour, where the principal meal of the day was invariably partaken of, “I’ve got some news for you.”“A ship?” I said, questioningly.“Yes—an A1 too, my hearty.”“Hurrah!” I exclaimed—“Going a long voyage?”“To Callao and back again, on a round trip.”“Better and better still,” I said, in high glee, in which Sam Pengelly shared with a kindred feeling, while his sister put up her apron to her eyes, and began to cry at the idea of my going to sea. “Is she a large vessel?”“Aye, aye, my cockbird. A barque of a thousand tons, or more, and her name’s theEsmeralda.”

The little hall, or passage way, opening out of the porch, in which I now found myself, was like the vestibule to a museum.

It was crammed full, from floor to ceiling, with all sorts of curios, brought from foreign parts, evidently by the worthy owner of the dwelling, when returning home after his many cruisings in strange waters—conch shells from the Congo and cowries from Zanzibar; a swordfish’s broken spear from the Pacific, and a Fijian war-club; cases of stuffed humming-birds from Rio, and calabashes from the Caribbean Sea; a beautiful model, in the finest ivory work, of a Chinese junk on one side,vis-à-viswith a full-rigged English man-of-war on the other; and, above all, in the place of honour, the hideous body of a shark, displaying its systematic rows of triangularly arranged saw-like teeth, now harmless, but once ready to mangle the unwary!

All these objects, of course, immediately attracted my attention, but I had not much time for glancing round the collection; for, almost as soon as we got inside the little hall, a bright-faced middle-aged woman, with jet-black hair and eyes, the very image of my new friend, only much more comely in feature, stepped forward from a room opening out of the other end of the passage.

“Dear me, Sam, is that you?” she cried out in a voice closely resembling his in its cheery accents, although more musical by reason of its feminine ring; “I’m just dishing up, and dinner’ll be ready as soon as the pasty’s done.”

Her brother did not apparently pay any attention to this highly important announcement for the moment.

“Come here, Jane,” he said, “I’ve brought home a visitor.”

With this she advanced, courtesying, her face changing as soon as she came nearer and saw who the stranger was.

“My, Sam!” she exclaimed, “who is he? Why, he’s the very image of poor Ted!” and she raised the corner of her apron to her eyes as she spoke, as if to stop the ready-starting tears.

“Whoever do you think he is?” said Sam Pengelly, triumphantly; “look at him carefully, now. No, Jane, my woman, I don’t believe you’d ever guess!”

“Who?”

“Why, the son of my good old commander, Lieutenant Leigh, of theSwallow, him as I’ve spun you so many yarns about! Why, Jane, my woman, I found the poor little laddie a desarted young orphan on the Hoe just now. He’s friendless, with never a home to go to; and so I asked him to come along o’ me, saying as how you’d welcome him to ‘Old Calabar’ the same as I.”

“And so I will, too, Sam,” replied the other, coming up to me and speaking; “I’m main glad to see you here, young gentleman, for I’ve often heard Sam talk of your father, saying how good and kind he was to him. You’re heartily welcome to our little home. My gracious, Sam!” she added, turning aside and using her apron again; “he’s as like my Ted as two peas! I can’t help it!” and so saying, she threw her arms round my neck and kissed me.

The action somewhat confused me; for, it was the first motherly caress I had ever experienced in my life. Aunt Matilda, you may be sure, never once thought of so greeting me!

“Avast there, Jane,” laughed out Sam, much pleased at the way in which his sister had received me. “What d’ye mean by boarding my prize in that fashion? But I’m glad you think he’s like Teddy—it will make it more like old times and home-like for us to have the laddie with us.”

“Aye, and he can have Ted’s room,” answered the other—all eagerness now to see to my being completely arranged for—“I think the poor boy’s clothes will fit him too.”

“So they will, and just in time, too, for he wants a new rig,” said her brother, casting a critical eye over my wardrobe, which had not been improved by my stay on board the coal brig.

We then proceeded to enter a nice roomy old-fashioned kitchen, with a cleanly-scoured floor like the deck of a man-of-war, and all resplendent with rows of plates and burnished pewter pots and dish-covers, where we had, what I considered both then and now to be, the best dinner I had ever eaten in my life, winding up with an apple tart that had Devonshire cream spread over it like powdered sugar—a most unparalleled prodigality of luxury to my unaccustomed eyes and palate!

Afterwards, I was shown a little room at the back, looking out into the garden, which had been formerly occupied by Teddy. Of this I was now put in formal possession, along with a good stock of clothes which the bereaved mother had carefully preserved in the chest-of-drawers in one corner, just as if her boy had been still living, all ready for use. These, she now told me, with tears in her eyes, I was heartily welcome to, if I were not too proud to accept them, as, in wearing them, she said, I should make her think that she yet had poor Ted to comfort her, and I would take his vacant place in her heart. The good woman, however, with housewifely care, brought up to the room a large tub with a plentiful supply of hot water and soap, so that I might have “a thorough wash,” as she called it, before putting on the clean clothes. Thus, through the kind hospitality of brother and sister alike, before the day was out, I was as thoroughly at home in the household as if—having stepped into the lost Teddy’s shoes metaphorically as well as practically—I had lived there for years!

It would take a volume for me to tell of all the kindness I received from these people, the brother and sister vying with each other in their endeavours to make me feel comfortable and at ease with them in my new home.

Sam Pengelly, thinking it the right thing to do, wrote to Uncle George, informing him where I now was; and saying, that, if my relatives had no objection, he should like to be allowed to look after my future as if I were his own son.

To this a reply soon came, to the effect that, as I had of my own will thrown away all the advantages that had been secured for me in putting me to a good school and holding out the offer of a situation afterwards in a merchant’s office, my uncle “washed his hands of me” on account of my ungrateful and abandoned behaviour; and that, henceforth, he did not care what became of me, nor would he be answerable for my support!

“That’s a good ’un,” said Sam Pengelly, as he read this. “That cranky Aunt Matilda, you told me about, laddie, must ha’ had a hand in this, sartin; for, perhaps you don’t know that I’ve diskivered as your uncle drawed what they calls a ‘compassionate allowance’ from My Lords of th’ Admiralty for your keep all them years they starved you under their roof and pretended you was livin’ on their charity!”

Sam Pengelly looked quite fierce and indignant as he made this, to me, new revelation.

“Really?” I asked him, eagerly.

“Yes, laddie, it’s true enough, for I’ve taken the pains to find it out for a fact from a friend o’ mine at head-quarters. Th’ Admiralty allers give an annual ’lowance for the support of the childer o’ them officers as is killed in action, that is when their folks are left badly off; and some one must ha’ put up your uncle to this, for he took precious good care to draw it every year you was along o’ him.”

“Oh, I’m so glad!” I exclaimed, joyfully. “I only wish, though, I had known it before, so that I could have thrown it back in Aunt Matilda’s teeth when she used to tell me that I was robbing her children of their bread every meal I took in the house, taunting me with being only a pauper!”

“Never mind that now,” said Sam Pengelly—quite his composed, calm, genial self again, after the little ebullition he had given way to on my behalf. “Better let byegones be byegones. It is a good sailin’ direction to go upon in this world; for your cross old aunt will be sartin to get paid out some time or other for her treatment o’ you, I’ll wager! Howsomedevers, I’m glad we’ve got that letter from your uncle, though. You see, laddie, it cuts them adrift altogether from any claim on you; and now, if you be so minded, you can chuck in your lot with old Sam and his sister—that is, unless you want to sheer off and part company, and desart us?”

“Oh no, I’ll never do that if I can help it,” I replied, earnestly. “Why, I did not know what it was to be happy and cared for till I met you, and you brought me here to your home. I shall never willingly, now, leave you here—that is, except you want me to.”

“Then, that’ll be never,” said he, with an emphasis and a kindly smile that showed his were no empty words.

Nor did they prove to be as time rolled on.

For many months after that casual meeting of ours on the Hoe, which I little thought was going to lead to such happy consequences, the little cottage at Stoke was my home in winter and summer alike; when Nature was gay in her spring dress, and when dreary autumn came; although, it was never dreary to me, no matter what the season might be.

In the summer months I used generally to accompany Sam in the short trading trips he made in a little foretopsail schooner—of which he was the registered owner, and generally took the command—when we would fetch a compass for Falmouth or Torquay, and other small western ports; between which places and Plymouth the schooner went to and fro when wind and weather permitted.

Sometimes, tempted by the inducement that early potatoes and green peas were plentiful and cheap at Saint Mary’s, Sam would venture out as far as the Scilly Isles; and once, a most memorable voyage, we made a round trip in the little craft to the Bristol Channel and back—facing all the perils of the “twenty-two fathom sandbank” off Cape Cornwall, with its heavy tumbling sea.

This was not time wasted on my part; for I had not forgotten my ambition of being a sailor, and now, under Sam Pengelly’s able tuition I was thoroughly initiated into all the practical details of seamanship, albeit I had not yet essayed life on board ship in an ocean-going vessel.

Sam Pengelly said, that, at fourteen, I was too young to be apprenticed regularly to the sea, and that it would be much better for me to wait until I should be able to be of use in a ship, and get on more quickly in navigation. Going to sea before would only be lost time, for I could gain quite as much experience of what it was necessary for me to know in the schooner along with him, until it was time for me to go afloat in real earnest.

This was what my old friend advised; and, although he declared himself willing to forward my wishes should they go counter to his own views, I valued his opinion too highly to disagree with it, judging that his forty years’ experience of the sea must have taught him enough to know better than I about what was best in the matter.

My life, therefore, for the two intervening years, after I had run away from school and before I went actually to sea, was a very even and pleasant one—cut off completely, as it was, from all the painful past, and the associations of Aunt Matilda and Dr Hellyer’s. I had heard once from Tom, my whilom chum, it is true, telling me that his mother had persuaded him to go back to the Doctor’s establishment, and that I should not have any further communication from him in consequence—which I didn’t; and there was the one letter from Uncle George to Sam Pengelly, “washing his hands of me,” which I have already alluded to. With these, however, all connection with my former existence ceased; and I can’t say I regretted it, cherished as I now was in the great loving Cornish hearts of Sam and Jane Pengelly.

Sam would not let my education be neglected, however.

“No, no, laddie, we must keep a clear look-out on that,” he often said to me. “If I had only had eddication when I was in the sarvice, I’d ha’ been a warrant officer with a long pension now, instead o’ having a short one, and bein’ ’bliged to trust to my own hands to lengthen it out. If you wants to be a good navigator, you must study now when you’re young; for arterwards it will be no use, and you may be as smart a sailor as ever handled a ship, and yet be unable to steer her across the ocean and take advantage of all the short cuts and currents, and so on, that only experienced seamen and those well up in book knowledge can know about.”

Acting on this reasoning, he got the master of a neighbouring school to give me after-time lessons in mathematics and geography; and, in the course of a few months, I was able to be inducted into the mysteries of great circle sailing and the art of taking lunars, much to the admiration of Sam, whom I’m afraid I often took a delight in puzzling with trigonometrical phrases that sounded full of portentous difficulty, albeit harmlessly easy.

As time went on, although I was happy enough at the cottage, I was continually asking Sam if he had found me a ship yet, he having promised to “keep his eye open” and let me know as soon as he saw a good opportunity of placing me with some captain with whom I was likely to learn my nautical calling well and have a chance of getting on up the ladder; but, as regularly as I asked him the question, the old salt would give me the same stereotyped answer—“No, laddie, our ship’s not got into port yet. We must still wait for an offing!”

But at last, after many days, this anxiously awaited “offing” was, much to my satisfaction, apparently thought within reach by my old friend.

One morning I did not accompany him as usual into Plymouth after breakfast, where the old fellow regularly proceeded every morning—never feeling happy for the day unless he saw the sea before dinner. I was busily engaged trimming up a large asparagus bed in the garden, wherein my adopted mother took considerable interest.

I recollect the morning well.

It was just at the beginning of summer, and the trees were all clothed in that delicately-tinged foliage of feathery green, which they lose later on in the season, while the ground below was covered with fruit blossoms like snowflakes, a stray blue flag or daffodil just springing up from the peaty soil, gleaming out amidst the vegetable wealth around, and the air perfumed with a delicious scent, of the wallflowers that were scattered about the garden in every stray nook and corner.

Sam was late on his return.

“Eight bells,” his regular hour, had struck without his well-known voice being heard hailing us from the porch; and it was quite half-past twelve before the customary shout in the porch of the cottage told of his arrival, for I was keeping strict watch over the time, having been rendered extra hungry by my exertions in the garden—our dinner being postponed till the missing mariner came.

However, “better late than never,” says the old proverb; and here he was now—although as soon as I saw him I noticed from his face that something unusual and out-of-the-way had happened, his expression always disclosing if anything was on or in his mind, and being a sad tell-tale.

He did not wait to let me ask, though.

“Hullo!” he cried, as soon as he came into the kitchen-parlour, where the principal meal of the day was invariably partaken of, “I’ve got some news for you.”

“A ship?” I said, questioningly.

“Yes—an A1 too, my hearty.”

“Hurrah!” I exclaimed—“Going a long voyage?”

“To Callao and back again, on a round trip.”

“Better and better still,” I said, in high glee, in which Sam Pengelly shared with a kindred feeling, while his sister put up her apron to her eyes, and began to cry at the idea of my going to sea. “Is she a large vessel?”

“Aye, aye, my cockbird. A barque of a thousand tons, or more, and her name’s theEsmeralda.”

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