Chapter Fifty.

Chapter Fifty.Ralph falleth into the usual delusion of supposing himself happy—Wisheth it may last all his life, making it a reality—As yet no symptoms of it dispelling; but the brightest sunset may have the darkest night.She bounded from me in a transport of joy, shouting, “He stays, he stays!” and I heard the words repeated among the groups of negresses, who loved her; it seemed to be the burthen of a general song, the glad realisation of some prophecy; for, ere the night was an hour old, the old witch, who had had the tuition of Josephine, had already made a mongrel sort of hymn of the affair, whilst a circle of black chins were wagging to a chords of:—“Goramity good, buchra body stays!”I saw no more of Josephine that night. The old gentleman, her father, joined me after I had been alone nearly two hours—two hours, I assure the reader, of misery.I contemplated a courtship of some decent duration, and a legal marriage at the altar. I tried to view my position on all sides, and thus to find out that which was the most favourable for my mind’s eye to rest upon.—It was but a disconsolate survey. Sometimes a dark suspicion, that I repelled from me as if it were a demon whispering murder in my ear, would hint to me the possibility that I was entrapped. However, the lights that came in with Monsieur Manuel dissipated them and darkness together. He behaved extremely well—gave me an exact account of all his possessions, and of his ready money, the latter of which was greatly beyond my expectations, and the former very considerable.He immediately gave me an undertaking, that he would, if I remained with him, adopt me as his son, allow me during life a competency fit to support me and his daughter genteelly, and to make me his sole heir at his death. This undertaking bound him also to see the proper documents duly and legally drawn up by a notary, so as to render the conditions of our agreement binding on both parties. We then spoke, as father and son, of our future views. We were determined to leave the island, immediately we could get anything like its value for the plantation and the large gang of negroes upon it. But where go to then? England—my desertion. France?—yes, it was there that we were to spend our lives. And thus we speculated on future events, that the future never owned.I have said before, that, during the whole time that I was in the navy, I never was intoxicated—and never once swallowed spirituous liquors. Both assertions are strictly true. This memorable evening, over our light supper, I drank, perhaps, two glasses of claret more than was my wont at Captain Reud’s table. I was excessively wearied both in mind and body. I became so unaccountably, and lethargically drowsy, that, in spite of every effort of mine to the contrary, I fell fast asleep in the midst of a most animated harangue of the good Manuel, upon the various perfections of his lovely daughter—a strange subject for a lover to sleep upon; but so it was. Had Josephine’s nurse and the Obeah woman anything to do with it? perhaps. They are skilful druggers. If my life, and the lives of all those dearer to me than life itself; had depended upon my getting up and walking across the room, I could not have done it. How I got to bed I know not; but I awoke in the morning in luxuriant health, with a blushing bride upon my bosom.And then ensued days of dreamy ecstasy; my happiness seemed too great, too full, too overflowing, to be real. Everything around me started into poetry. I seemed to be under the direction of fairy spirits: all my wants were cared for as if by invisible hands. It appeared to me that I had but to wish, and gratification followed before the wish was half formed. I was passive, and carried away in a trance of happiness. I was beset with illusion; and so intense were my feelings of rapture, mingled with doubt, and my blissful distraction so great, that it was late in the day before I noticed the dress I had on. The light and broad-brimmed planter’s hat, the snowy white jean jacket and trousers, and the infinitely fine linen shirt, with its elaborately laced front, had all been donned without my noticing the change from my usual apparel. It was a dress, from its purity and its elegance, worthy of a bridegroom. I learnt afterwards that Josephine’s old negress-nurse had, with many and powerful incantations—at least, as powerful as incantations always are—buried under six feet of earth every article of clothing in which I had first entered the mansion.Well, there we were, a very pretty version of Paul and Virginia—not perhaps quite so innocent, but infinitely more happy, roving hand in hand through orange bowers and aromatic shades. Love is sweet, and a first love very, very delightful; but, when we are not only loved, but almost worshipped, that, that is the incense that warms the heart and intoxicates the brain. Wherever I turned, I found greeting and smiles, and respectful observance hovered along my path. The household adored their young mistress and me through her.Old Manuel seemed serenely happy. He encouraged us to be alone with each other. I could write volumes upon the little incidents, and interesting ones too, of this singular honeymoon. I observed no more bursts of passion in Josephine; her soul had folded its wings upon my bosom, and there dreamed itself away in a tender and loving melancholy. How I now smile, and perhaps could weep, when I call to mind all her little artifices of love to prevent my ever casting my eyes upon the hated ship! As I have related before, our little squadron at anchor in this secluded bay departed one by one, leaving only theEos, with her sorely-wounded captain; yet, though I saw them not, I knew, by Josephine’s triumphant looks, when a vessel had sailed. All thejalousiesin front of the house were nailed up, so that, if by chance I wandered into one of the rooms in that quarter, I saw nothing.I had been domesticated in this paradise—a fool’s perhaps, but still a paradise—a month: and I was sitting alone in the shade, reading, behind the house, when Josephine flew along the avenue of lemon-trees, and flung herself into my arms, and, sobbing hysterically, exclaimed, “My dear, dear Ralph, now you are almost wholly mine! there is only one left.”“And that one, my Josephine?”“Speak not of it, think not of it, sweet; it is not yours. But, swear, swear to me again, you will never more look upon it; do, dearest, and I will learn a whole column extra of words in two syllables.”And I repeated the often-iterated oath; and she sat down tranquilly at my feet, like a good little girl, and began murmuring the task she was committing to memory.And how did the schooling get on? Oh! beautifully; we had such sweet and so many school-rooms, and interruptions still more sweet and numerous. Sometimes our hall of study was beneath the cool rock, down the sides of which, green with age, the sparkling rill so delightfully trickled; sometimes in the impervious quiet, and flower-enamelled bower, amidst all the spicy fragrance of tropical shrubs; and sometimes, in the solemn old wood, beneath the boughs of trees that had stood for uncounted ages. And the interruptions! Repeatedly the book and the slate would be cast away, and we would start up, as if actuated by a single spirit, and chase some singularly beautiful humming-bird; sometimes, the genius of frolic would seize us, and we would chase each other round and round the old mahogany-trees, with no other object than to rid ourselves of our exuberance of happiness; but the most frequent interruptions were when she would close her book, and, bathing me in the lustre of her melancholy eyes, bid me tell her some tale that would make her weep; or, with a pious awe, request me to unfold some of the mysteries of the universe around her, and commune with her of the attributes of their great and beneficent Creator.Was not this a state of the supremest happiness? Joy seemed to come down to me from heaven in floods of light; the earth to offer up her incense to me, as I trod upon her beautiful and flower-encumbered bosom; the richly-plumaged birds to hover about me, as if sent to do me homage; even the boughs of the majestic trees, as I passed them, seemed to wave me a welcome. Joy was in me and around me; there was no pause in my blissful feelings. I required no relaxation to enjoy them more perfectly, for pleasure seemed to succeed pleasure in infinite variety. It was too glorious to last. The end was approaching, and that end was very bitter.

She bounded from me in a transport of joy, shouting, “He stays, he stays!” and I heard the words repeated among the groups of negresses, who loved her; it seemed to be the burthen of a general song, the glad realisation of some prophecy; for, ere the night was an hour old, the old witch, who had had the tuition of Josephine, had already made a mongrel sort of hymn of the affair, whilst a circle of black chins were wagging to a chords of:—

“Goramity good, buchra body stays!”

“Goramity good, buchra body stays!”

I saw no more of Josephine that night. The old gentleman, her father, joined me after I had been alone nearly two hours—two hours, I assure the reader, of misery.

I contemplated a courtship of some decent duration, and a legal marriage at the altar. I tried to view my position on all sides, and thus to find out that which was the most favourable for my mind’s eye to rest upon.—It was but a disconsolate survey. Sometimes a dark suspicion, that I repelled from me as if it were a demon whispering murder in my ear, would hint to me the possibility that I was entrapped. However, the lights that came in with Monsieur Manuel dissipated them and darkness together. He behaved extremely well—gave me an exact account of all his possessions, and of his ready money, the latter of which was greatly beyond my expectations, and the former very considerable.

He immediately gave me an undertaking, that he would, if I remained with him, adopt me as his son, allow me during life a competency fit to support me and his daughter genteelly, and to make me his sole heir at his death. This undertaking bound him also to see the proper documents duly and legally drawn up by a notary, so as to render the conditions of our agreement binding on both parties. We then spoke, as father and son, of our future views. We were determined to leave the island, immediately we could get anything like its value for the plantation and the large gang of negroes upon it. But where go to then? England—my desertion. France?—yes, it was there that we were to spend our lives. And thus we speculated on future events, that the future never owned.

I have said before, that, during the whole time that I was in the navy, I never was intoxicated—and never once swallowed spirituous liquors. Both assertions are strictly true. This memorable evening, over our light supper, I drank, perhaps, two glasses of claret more than was my wont at Captain Reud’s table. I was excessively wearied both in mind and body. I became so unaccountably, and lethargically drowsy, that, in spite of every effort of mine to the contrary, I fell fast asleep in the midst of a most animated harangue of the good Manuel, upon the various perfections of his lovely daughter—a strange subject for a lover to sleep upon; but so it was. Had Josephine’s nurse and the Obeah woman anything to do with it? perhaps. They are skilful druggers. If my life, and the lives of all those dearer to me than life itself; had depended upon my getting up and walking across the room, I could not have done it. How I got to bed I know not; but I awoke in the morning in luxuriant health, with a blushing bride upon my bosom.

And then ensued days of dreamy ecstasy; my happiness seemed too great, too full, too overflowing, to be real. Everything around me started into poetry. I seemed to be under the direction of fairy spirits: all my wants were cared for as if by invisible hands. It appeared to me that I had but to wish, and gratification followed before the wish was half formed. I was passive, and carried away in a trance of happiness. I was beset with illusion; and so intense were my feelings of rapture, mingled with doubt, and my blissful distraction so great, that it was late in the day before I noticed the dress I had on. The light and broad-brimmed planter’s hat, the snowy white jean jacket and trousers, and the infinitely fine linen shirt, with its elaborately laced front, had all been donned without my noticing the change from my usual apparel. It was a dress, from its purity and its elegance, worthy of a bridegroom. I learnt afterwards that Josephine’s old negress-nurse had, with many and powerful incantations—at least, as powerful as incantations always are—buried under six feet of earth every article of clothing in which I had first entered the mansion.

Well, there we were, a very pretty version of Paul and Virginia—not perhaps quite so innocent, but infinitely more happy, roving hand in hand through orange bowers and aromatic shades. Love is sweet, and a first love very, very delightful; but, when we are not only loved, but almost worshipped, that, that is the incense that warms the heart and intoxicates the brain. Wherever I turned, I found greeting and smiles, and respectful observance hovered along my path. The household adored their young mistress and me through her.

Old Manuel seemed serenely happy. He encouraged us to be alone with each other. I could write volumes upon the little incidents, and interesting ones too, of this singular honeymoon. I observed no more bursts of passion in Josephine; her soul had folded its wings upon my bosom, and there dreamed itself away in a tender and loving melancholy. How I now smile, and perhaps could weep, when I call to mind all her little artifices of love to prevent my ever casting my eyes upon the hated ship! As I have related before, our little squadron at anchor in this secluded bay departed one by one, leaving only theEos, with her sorely-wounded captain; yet, though I saw them not, I knew, by Josephine’s triumphant looks, when a vessel had sailed. All thejalousiesin front of the house were nailed up, so that, if by chance I wandered into one of the rooms in that quarter, I saw nothing.

I had been domesticated in this paradise—a fool’s perhaps, but still a paradise—a month: and I was sitting alone in the shade, reading, behind the house, when Josephine flew along the avenue of lemon-trees, and flung herself into my arms, and, sobbing hysterically, exclaimed, “My dear, dear Ralph, now you are almost wholly mine! there is only one left.”

“And that one, my Josephine?”

“Speak not of it, think not of it, sweet; it is not yours. But, swear, swear to me again, you will never more look upon it; do, dearest, and I will learn a whole column extra of words in two syllables.”

And I repeated the often-iterated oath; and she sat down tranquilly at my feet, like a good little girl, and began murmuring the task she was committing to memory.

And how did the schooling get on? Oh! beautifully; we had such sweet and so many school-rooms, and interruptions still more sweet and numerous. Sometimes our hall of study was beneath the cool rock, down the sides of which, green with age, the sparkling rill so delightfully trickled; sometimes in the impervious quiet, and flower-enamelled bower, amidst all the spicy fragrance of tropical shrubs; and sometimes, in the solemn old wood, beneath the boughs of trees that had stood for uncounted ages. And the interruptions! Repeatedly the book and the slate would be cast away, and we would start up, as if actuated by a single spirit, and chase some singularly beautiful humming-bird; sometimes, the genius of frolic would seize us, and we would chase each other round and round the old mahogany-trees, with no other object than to rid ourselves of our exuberance of happiness; but the most frequent interruptions were when she would close her book, and, bathing me in the lustre of her melancholy eyes, bid me tell her some tale that would make her weep; or, with a pious awe, request me to unfold some of the mysteries of the universe around her, and commune with her of the attributes of their great and beneficent Creator.

Was not this a state of the supremest happiness? Joy seemed to come down to me from heaven in floods of light; the earth to offer up her incense to me, as I trod upon her beautiful and flower-encumbered bosom; the richly-plumaged birds to hover about me, as if sent to do me homage; even the boughs of the majestic trees, as I passed them, seemed to wave me a welcome. Joy was in me and around me; there was no pause in my blissful feelings. I required no relaxation to enjoy them more perfectly, for pleasure seemed to succeed pleasure in infinite variety. It was too glorious to last. The end was approaching, and that end was very bitter.

Chapter Fifty One.A short chapter and a miserable one—The less that is said of it the better.I had been living in the plantation nearly three months. My little wife, for such I held her to be, had made much progress in her education—more in my affection she could not. I had already put her into joining hand; and I began to be as proud of her dawning intellect as I was of her person and of her love. I had renounced my country, and, in good faith, I had intended to have held by her for ever; and, when I should find myself in a country where marriage with one born in slavery was looked upon as no opprobrium, I had determined that the indissoluble ceremony should be legally performed. To do all this I was in earnest; but, events, or destiny, or by whatever high-sounding term we may call those occurrences which force us on in a path we wish not to tread, ruled it fearfully otherwise.I religiously abstained from looking towards the ship, or even the sea; yet, I plainly saw, by the alternations of hope, and joy, and fear, on Josephine’s sweet countenance, that something of the most vital importance was about to take place. They could not conceal from me that parties of men had been searching for me, because, for a few days, I had been in actual hiding with Josephine, three or four miles up the woody mountain. I must hurry over all this: for the recollection of it, even at this great lapse of time, is agonising. The night before theEossailed she would not sleep—her incessant tears, the tremulous energy with which clasped me and held me for hours, all told the secret that I wished not to know. All that night she watched, as a mother watches a departing and first-born child—tearfully—anxiously—but, overcome with fatigue, and the fierce contention of emotions, as the morning dawned, her face drooped away from mine, her clasping arms gradually relaxed, and, murmuring my name with a blessing, she slept. Did she ever sleep again? May God pardon me, I know not!I hung over her, and watched her, almost worshipping, until two hours after sunrise. I blessed her as she lay there in all her tranquil beauty, fervently, and, instead of my prayers, I repeated over and over again my oath, that I would never desert her. But some devil, in order to spread the ashes of bitterness through the long path of my after-life, suggested to me that now, as the frigate had sailed for some time, there could be no danger in taking one last look at her; indeed, the thought of doing so took the shape of a duty.I stole out of bed, and crept softly round to the front of the house. The place where the gallant ship had rode at anchor for so many weeks was vacant—all was still and lonely. I walked on to a higher spot; and, far distant among the sinuosities of the romantic entrance to the harbour, my eye caught, for a moment, her receding pennant. I, therefore, concluded that everything was safe—that I was cut off and for ever, from my country.A little qualm of remorse passed through my bosom, and then I was exceeding glad. The morning was fresh, and the air invigorating, and I determined to walk down to the beautiful minutely-sanded beach, and enjoy the refreshment of the sea-breeze just sweeping gently over the bay. To do this, I had to pass over a shoulder of land to my left. I gained the beach, and stood upon it for some minutes with folded arms. This particular walk had been so long debarred to me, that I now enjoyed it the more. I was upon the point of turning round, and seeking the nest where I had left my dove sleeping in conscious security, when, to my horror, I beheld theEos’pinnace, full-manned and double-banked, the wave foaming up her cutwater, and roaring under her sixteen oars, rapidly round the rocky hummock that formed the eastern horn of the little bay. Her prow soon tore up the sand; and the third-lieutenant, a master’s mate, and the officer of marines, with four privates, leaped ashore immediately.For a few moments I was paralysed with terror, and then, suddenly springing forward, I ran at the top of my speed. I need not say that my pursuers gave chase heartily. I had no other choice but to run on straight before me; and that, unfortunately, was up a rocky, rugged side of a steep hill, that rose directly from the beach, covered with that abominable vegetable, or shrub, the prickly pear. I was in full view; and, being hailed and told that I should be fired upon if I did not bring to, in the space of a short three minutes, before I was out of breath, I was in the hands of my captors—a prisoner.I prayed—I knelt—I wept. It was useless. I have scarcely the courage to write what then took place, it was so fearful—it was so hideous. Bounding down the hill, in her night-dress, her long black hair streaming like a meteor behind her, and her naked feet, usually so exquisitely white, covered with blood, came Josephine, shrieking “Ralph, Ralph!” Her voice seemed to stab my bosom like an actual knife. Behind her came running her father, and a number of negro men and women. Before she could reach me, they had flung me into the stern-sheets of the boat.“Shove off! shove off!” shouted the lieutenant; and the boat was immediately in motion. Like a convicted felon, or a murderer taken in the fact, I buried my craven head in my knees, and shut my eyes. I would not have looked back for kingdoms. But I could not, or did not, think of preventing myself from hearing. The boat had not pulled ten yards from the beach, when I heard a splash behind us, and simultaneous cries of horror from the boat’s crew and those on shore; among which the agonised voice of the heartbroken father rose shrilly, as he exclaimed, “Josephine, my child!” I looked up for a moment, but dared not look round; and I saw every man in the boat dashing away the tears from his eyes with one hand, as he reluctantly pulled his oar with the other.“Give way! give way!” roared the lieutenant, stamping violently against the grating at his feet. “Give way! or, by God, she’ll overtake us!”The poor girl was swimming after me.“Rattlin,” said Selby, stooping down and whispering in my ear—“Rattlin, I can’t stand it; if it was not as much as my life was worth, I would put you on shore directly.” I could answer him only by a long convulsive shudder. The horrible torment of those moments!Then ascended the loud howling curses of the negroes behind us. The seamen rose up upon their oars, and, with a few violent jerks, the pinnace shot round the next point of land, and the poor struggler in the waters was seen no more. Tidings never after came to me of her. I left her struggling in the waters of the ocean. My first love, and my last—my only one.I was taken on board stupefied. I was led up the side like a sick man. No one reproached me; no one spoke to me. I became physically, as well as mentally, ill. I went to my hammock with a stern feeling of joy, hoping soon to be lashed up in it, and find my grave in the deep blue sea. At first, my only consolation was enacting over and over again all the happy scenes with Josephine; but, as they invariably terminated in one dreadful point, this occupation became hateful. I then endeavoured to blot the whole transaction from my memory—to persuade myself that the events had not been real—that I had dreamed them—or read them long ago in some old book. But the mind is not so easily cheated—remorse not so soon blinded.

I had been living in the plantation nearly three months. My little wife, for such I held her to be, had made much progress in her education—more in my affection she could not. I had already put her into joining hand; and I began to be as proud of her dawning intellect as I was of her person and of her love. I had renounced my country, and, in good faith, I had intended to have held by her for ever; and, when I should find myself in a country where marriage with one born in slavery was looked upon as no opprobrium, I had determined that the indissoluble ceremony should be legally performed. To do all this I was in earnest; but, events, or destiny, or by whatever high-sounding term we may call those occurrences which force us on in a path we wish not to tread, ruled it fearfully otherwise.

I religiously abstained from looking towards the ship, or even the sea; yet, I plainly saw, by the alternations of hope, and joy, and fear, on Josephine’s sweet countenance, that something of the most vital importance was about to take place. They could not conceal from me that parties of men had been searching for me, because, for a few days, I had been in actual hiding with Josephine, three or four miles up the woody mountain. I must hurry over all this: for the recollection of it, even at this great lapse of time, is agonising. The night before theEossailed she would not sleep—her incessant tears, the tremulous energy with which clasped me and held me for hours, all told the secret that I wished not to know. All that night she watched, as a mother watches a departing and first-born child—tearfully—anxiously—but, overcome with fatigue, and the fierce contention of emotions, as the morning dawned, her face drooped away from mine, her clasping arms gradually relaxed, and, murmuring my name with a blessing, she slept. Did she ever sleep again? May God pardon me, I know not!

I hung over her, and watched her, almost worshipping, until two hours after sunrise. I blessed her as she lay there in all her tranquil beauty, fervently, and, instead of my prayers, I repeated over and over again my oath, that I would never desert her. But some devil, in order to spread the ashes of bitterness through the long path of my after-life, suggested to me that now, as the frigate had sailed for some time, there could be no danger in taking one last look at her; indeed, the thought of doing so took the shape of a duty.

I stole out of bed, and crept softly round to the front of the house. The place where the gallant ship had rode at anchor for so many weeks was vacant—all was still and lonely. I walked on to a higher spot; and, far distant among the sinuosities of the romantic entrance to the harbour, my eye caught, for a moment, her receding pennant. I, therefore, concluded that everything was safe—that I was cut off and for ever, from my country.

A little qualm of remorse passed through my bosom, and then I was exceeding glad. The morning was fresh, and the air invigorating, and I determined to walk down to the beautiful minutely-sanded beach, and enjoy the refreshment of the sea-breeze just sweeping gently over the bay. To do this, I had to pass over a shoulder of land to my left. I gained the beach, and stood upon it for some minutes with folded arms. This particular walk had been so long debarred to me, that I now enjoyed it the more. I was upon the point of turning round, and seeking the nest where I had left my dove sleeping in conscious security, when, to my horror, I beheld theEos’pinnace, full-manned and double-banked, the wave foaming up her cutwater, and roaring under her sixteen oars, rapidly round the rocky hummock that formed the eastern horn of the little bay. Her prow soon tore up the sand; and the third-lieutenant, a master’s mate, and the officer of marines, with four privates, leaped ashore immediately.

For a few moments I was paralysed with terror, and then, suddenly springing forward, I ran at the top of my speed. I need not say that my pursuers gave chase heartily. I had no other choice but to run on straight before me; and that, unfortunately, was up a rocky, rugged side of a steep hill, that rose directly from the beach, covered with that abominable vegetable, or shrub, the prickly pear. I was in full view; and, being hailed and told that I should be fired upon if I did not bring to, in the space of a short three minutes, before I was out of breath, I was in the hands of my captors—a prisoner.

I prayed—I knelt—I wept. It was useless. I have scarcely the courage to write what then took place, it was so fearful—it was so hideous. Bounding down the hill, in her night-dress, her long black hair streaming like a meteor behind her, and her naked feet, usually so exquisitely white, covered with blood, came Josephine, shrieking “Ralph, Ralph!” Her voice seemed to stab my bosom like an actual knife. Behind her came running her father, and a number of negro men and women. Before she could reach me, they had flung me into the stern-sheets of the boat.

“Shove off! shove off!” shouted the lieutenant; and the boat was immediately in motion. Like a convicted felon, or a murderer taken in the fact, I buried my craven head in my knees, and shut my eyes. I would not have looked back for kingdoms. But I could not, or did not, think of preventing myself from hearing. The boat had not pulled ten yards from the beach, when I heard a splash behind us, and simultaneous cries of horror from the boat’s crew and those on shore; among which the agonised voice of the heartbroken father rose shrilly, as he exclaimed, “Josephine, my child!” I looked up for a moment, but dared not look round; and I saw every man in the boat dashing away the tears from his eyes with one hand, as he reluctantly pulled his oar with the other.

“Give way! give way!” roared the lieutenant, stamping violently against the grating at his feet. “Give way! or, by God, she’ll overtake us!”

The poor girl was swimming after me.

“Rattlin,” said Selby, stooping down and whispering in my ear—“Rattlin, I can’t stand it; if it was not as much as my life was worth, I would put you on shore directly.” I could answer him only by a long convulsive shudder. The horrible torment of those moments!

Then ascended the loud howling curses of the negroes behind us. The seamen rose up upon their oars, and, with a few violent jerks, the pinnace shot round the next point of land, and the poor struggler in the waters was seen no more. Tidings never after came to me of her. I left her struggling in the waters of the ocean. My first love, and my last—my only one.

I was taken on board stupefied. I was led up the side like a sick man. No one reproached me; no one spoke to me. I became physically, as well as mentally, ill. I went to my hammock with a stern feeling of joy, hoping soon to be lashed up in it, and find my grave in the deep blue sea. At first, my only consolation was enacting over and over again all the happy scenes with Josephine; but, as they invariably terminated in one dreadful point, this occupation became hateful. I then endeavoured to blot the whole transaction from my memory—to persuade myself that the events had not been real—that I had dreamed them—or read them long ago in some old book. But the mind is not so easily cheated—remorse not so soon blinded.

Chapter Fifty Two.The captain taketh to tantrums—And keepeth on board monkeys, bears, and discipline—It is feared, also, that the moon hath too much to do with his observations.Notwithstanding my misery, I became convalescent. I went to my duty doggedly. Everybody saw and respected my grief; and the affair was never mentioned to me by any, with one only exception, and that was six months after, by a heavy brutal master’s-mate, named Pigtop, who had been in the pinnace that brought me off.He came close to me, and, without preparation, he electrified me by drawling out, “I say, Rattlin, what a mess you made of it at Aniana? That girl of yours, to my thinking, burst a blood-vessel as she was giving you chase. I saw the blood bubble out of her mouth and nose.”“Liar!” I exclaimed, and, seizing a heavy block that one of the afterguard was fitting, I felled him to the deck.The base-hearted poltroon went and made his complaint to Captain Reud, who ordered him to leave the ship immediately he came into harbour.We must now retrograde a little in the narrative, in order to show what events led to the disastrous catastrophe I have just related. Captain Reud, having been lying for many, many weeks, apparently unconscious of objects around him, one morning said, in a faint, low voice, when Dr Thompson and Mr Farmer, the first-lieutenant, were standing near him, “Send Ralph Rattlin to read the Bible to me.”Now, since my absence, some supposed I had been privately stabbed by one of the few ferocious and angry marauders still left in the town; but, as no traces of my body could be found, still more of my shipmates believed that I had deserted. In plain sincerity, these latter friends of mine were, as our Transatlantic brethren say, pretty considerably, slap-dashically right. However, as the shock to the wounded captain would have been the greater to say that I had been assassinated, they chose the milder alternative, and told him that “they feared I had deserted.”Captain Reud merely said, “I don’t believe it,” turned his face to the bulkhead, and remained silent for three or four days more. Still, as he was proceeding towards convalescence, he began to be more active, or, rather, ordered more active measures to be taken to clear up the mystery of my disappearance. Parties were consequently sent to scour the country for miles round; but I was too well concealed to permit them to be of any utility. The only two seamen that had seen me near Manuel’s premises belonged to the frigate which had sailed before my captain had recovered his faculties.But I was not to be so easily given up; perhaps he remembered that what remained of life to him was preserved by me, and, notwithstanding his cruel usage, I well knew that he entertained for me a sincere affection. As theEosgot under weigh, after remaining so long at anchor in the port, that the men observed she would shortly ground upon the beef-bones that their active masticators had denuded, and which were thrown overboard, the wind was light, and the boats were all out towing, with the exception of the pinnace, which was ordered to sweep round the bay and look into all the inlets, in order to seek for some vestige of my important self. For good or for evil, the heart-rending results ensued.How short is the real romance of life! A shout of joy—a pulsation of ecstasy—and it is over! In the course of my eventful life, I have seen very fair faces and very many beautiful forms. The fascinations of exterior loveliness I have met combined with high intellect, unswerving principles, and virtuous emotions, awful from their very holiness. The fair possessors of many of these lofty attributes I have sometimes wooed and strove to love; but, though I often sighed and prayed for a return of that heart-whole and absorbing passion, there was no magic, no charm, to call the dead embers into life. That young and beautiful savage swept from my bosom all the tenderer stuff: she collected the fresh flowers of passion, and left—It is of no consequence—Josephine, farewell!Let us talk idly. It is a droll world: let us mock each other, and call it mirth. There is my poor half-deranged captain cutting such antics, that even authority with the two-edged sword in his hand cannot repress the outbursting of ignoble derision. First of all, he takes a mania for apes and monkeys; disrates all his midshipmen, taking care, however, that they still do their duty; and makes the ship’s tailor rig out their successors in uniform. The officers are aghast, for the maniac is so cunning, and the risk of putting a superior officer under an arrest so tremendous, that they know not what to do. Besides, their captain is only mad on one subject at one time. Indeed, insanity seems sometimes to find a vent in monomania, actually improving all the faculties on all other points. Well, the monkey midshipmen did not behave very correctly; so, Captain Reud had them one afternoon all tied up to one of his guns in the cabin, and one after the other, well flogged with the cat-o’-nine-tails. It was highly ludicrous to see the poor fellows waiting each for his turn, well knowing what was to come; they never, than when under the impression of their fears, looked more human. That night they stole into the cabin, by two or three, in the dead of the night, and nearly murdered their persecutor. This looked very like combination, and an exercise of faculties that may be nearly termed reasoning.They were all thrown overboard. The next phantasy was the getting up of the forecastle carronades into the tops, thereby straining the ship and nearly carrying away the mast. That folly wore out, and the guns came down to their proper places. Then a huge bear came on board—a very gentlemanly, dignified fellow; never in a hurry, and who always moved about with a gracious deliberation. Captain Reud amused himself by endeavouring to teach him to dance; and a worthless blackguard who could play on the pipe and tambour, and who probably had led a bear about the country, was taken into especial grace, and was loaded with benefits, in order to assist his captain in his singular avocations.“Come and see my bear dance, do come and see him dance,” was now the little Creole’s continual cry. But the bear did not take his tuition kindly, and grew daily more ferocious; till, at length, seizing his opportunity, he caught up the diminutive skipper and nearly hugged the breath out of his body, and almost rubbed his red nose off his yellow face in endeavouring to bite him through his muzzle. The star of Ursa Major was no longer in the ascendant, and he was bartered away, with the master of the first merchant vessel we met, for a couple of game-cocks; and the bear-leader was turned back into the waist, and flogged the next day for impertinence, whilst, two days before, the vagabond was too proud to say “sir” to a middy.But it would be ridiculous to enumerate the long succession of these insane whimsicalities, each latter one being morebizarrethan the preceding.Whether a man be mad or not, Christmas will come round again. Now, Jack, from time immemorial, thinks that he has a right undeniable to get drunk on that auspicious day. In harbour, that right is not discussed by his officers, but is usually exercisedsub silentiounder their eyes, with everything but silence on the part of the exercisers. Even at sea, without the ship be in sight of the enemy, or it blows hard enough to blow the ship’s coppers overboard, our friends think it hard, very hard, to have their cups scored next morning upon their back; and, indeed, to keep all a frigate’s crew from intoxication on a Christmas-day would be something like undertaking the labour of Sisyphus, for, as fast as one man could be frightened or flogged into sobriety, another would become glorious.It was for this very reason that Captain Reud, the Christmas-day after he had received his wound, undertook the task; and, as the weather was fine, he hoped to find it not quite so hard as rolling a stone up a steep hill, and invariably seeing it bound down again before it attains the coveted summit. Immediately after breakfast, he had the word passed, fore and aft, that no man should be drunk that day, and that six dozen (not of wine) would be the reward of any who should dare, in the least, to infringe that order. What is drunkenness? What it is we can readily pronounce, when we see a man under its revolting phases. What is not drunkenness is more hard to say. Is it not difficult to ascertain the nice line that separates excitement from incipient delirium? Not at all, to a man like Captain Reud. To understand a disease thoroughly, a physician will tell you that you will be much assisted by the having suffered from it yourself. Upon this self-evident principle, our Aesculapius with the epaulettes was the first man drunk in the ship. After dinner that day, he had heightened his testing powers with an unusual, even to him, share of claret.Well, at the usual time, we beat to quarters; that is always done just before the hammocks are piped down; and it is then that the sobriety of the crew, as they stand to their guns, is narrowly looked into by the respective officers; for then the grog has been served out for the day, and it is supposed to have been all consumed. The captain, of course, came on the quarter-deck to quarters, making tack and half tack, till he fairly threw out his starboard grappling-iron, and moored himself to one of the belaying pins round the mizzen-mast.“Mister Farmer,” said he to the first luff, “you see I know how to keep a ship in discipline—not (hiccup) a man drunk on board of her.”“I doubt it, sir,” was, the respectful answer. “I think, sir, I can see one now,” said he, taking his eyes off his superior, after a searching glance, and looking carelessly around.“Where is he?”“Oh, sir, we must not forget that it is Christmas-day: so if you please, sir, we will not scrutinise very particularly.”“But we will scru—scrutinise very particularly: remember me of scru—scrutinise, Mister Rattlin—a good word that scru—screws—trenails—tenpenny nails—hammers—iron—clamps, and dog-fastenings—what were we all talking about. Mr Farmer? Oh; sobriety! we will—assuredly (hiccup) find out the drunken man.”So, with a largecortègeof officers, the master-at-arms, and the ship’s corporals, Captain Reud leaning his right arm heavily upon my left shoulder—for he was cunning enough, just then, to find that the gout was getting into his foot—we proceeded round the ship on our voyage of discovery. Now, it is no joke for a man half drunk to be tried for drunkenness by one wholly so. It was a curious and a comic sight, that examination—for many of the examined were conscious of a cup too much. These invariably endeavoured to look the most sober. As we approached the various groups around each gun, the different artifices of the men to pass muster were most amusing. Some drew themselves stiffly up, and looked as rigid as iron-stanchions; others took the examination with an easy,debonairair, as if to say, “Who so innocent as I?” Some again, not exactly liking the judge, quietly dodged round, shifting places with their shipmates, so that when the captain peered into the eyes of the last for the symptoms of ebriety, the mercurial rascals had quietly placed themselves first.To the sharp, startling accusation, “You are drunk, sir,” the answers were beautifully various. The indignant “No, sir!”—the well-acted surprise, “I, sir?”—the conciliatory “God bless your honour, no, sir!”—the logical “Bill Bowling was cook to-day, sir,”—and the sarcastic “No more than your honour’s honour,” to witness, were, as we small wits say, better than a play.The search was almost unavailing. The only fish that came to the net was a poor idiotic young man, that, to my certain knowledge, had not tasted grog for months; for his messmates gave him a hiding whenever he asked for his allowance. To the sudden, “You’re drunk, sir,” of Captain Reud, the simple youth, taken by surprise, and perhaps thinking it against the articles of war to contradict the captain, said, “Yes, sir; but I haven’t tasted grog since—”“You got drunk, sir; take him aft, master-at-arms, and put him in irons.”The scrutiny over, our temperate captain went aft himself, glorifying that, in all the ship’s company, there was only one instance of intoxication on Christmas-day; and thus he delivered himself; hiccupping on the gratifying occasion:“I call that discipline, Mr Farmer. The only drunken man in his Majesty’s vessel, under my command, aft on the poop, in irons, and that fellow not worth his salt.”“I quite agree with you,” said the sneering purser, “that the only fellow who has dared to get disgracefully drunk to-day, is not worth his salt, but he is not in irons, aft on the poop.”“I am sure he is not,” said the first lieutenant.“That is as—astonishing,” said the mystified extirpator of intemperance, as he staggered into his cabin, to console himself for, and to close his labours with, the two other bottles.The reader will perceive, from these incidents, that it was time that Captain Reud retired to enjoy his laurels on hissolum nataleinotium cumas muchdignitateas would conduce to the happiness of one of his mischief-loving temperament. The admiral on the station thought so too, when Reud took the ship into Port Royal. He superseded the black pilot, and took upon himself to con the ship; the consequence was, that she hugged the point so closely, that she went right upon the church steeple of old Port Royal, which is very quietly lying beside the new one, submerged by an earthquake, and a hole was knocked in the ship’s forefoot, of that large and ruinous description which may be aptly compared to the hole in a patriot’s reputation, who has lately taken office with his quondam opponents. With all the efforts of all the fleet, that sent relays of hands on board of us to work the pumps, we could not keep her afloat; so we were obliged, first putting a thrummed sail under her bottom, to tow her alongside of the dockyard wharf, lighten her, and lash her to it.The same evening, by nine o’clock, she had an empty hull, and all the ship’s company and officers were located in the dockyard, and preparations were made, the next day, for heaving the frigate down. It was the opinion of everybody that, had not our skipper been the nephew of a very high official of the Admiralty, he would have been tried by a court-martial, for thus attempting to overturn submarine churches and cracking the bottom of his Majesty’s beautiful frigate. As it was, we were only ordered to be repaired with all haste, and to go home, very much, indeed, to the satisfaction of everybody but the captain himself.

Notwithstanding my misery, I became convalescent. I went to my duty doggedly. Everybody saw and respected my grief; and the affair was never mentioned to me by any, with one only exception, and that was six months after, by a heavy brutal master’s-mate, named Pigtop, who had been in the pinnace that brought me off.

He came close to me, and, without preparation, he electrified me by drawling out, “I say, Rattlin, what a mess you made of it at Aniana? That girl of yours, to my thinking, burst a blood-vessel as she was giving you chase. I saw the blood bubble out of her mouth and nose.”

“Liar!” I exclaimed, and, seizing a heavy block that one of the afterguard was fitting, I felled him to the deck.

The base-hearted poltroon went and made his complaint to Captain Reud, who ordered him to leave the ship immediately he came into harbour.

We must now retrograde a little in the narrative, in order to show what events led to the disastrous catastrophe I have just related. Captain Reud, having been lying for many, many weeks, apparently unconscious of objects around him, one morning said, in a faint, low voice, when Dr Thompson and Mr Farmer, the first-lieutenant, were standing near him, “Send Ralph Rattlin to read the Bible to me.”

Now, since my absence, some supposed I had been privately stabbed by one of the few ferocious and angry marauders still left in the town; but, as no traces of my body could be found, still more of my shipmates believed that I had deserted. In plain sincerity, these latter friends of mine were, as our Transatlantic brethren say, pretty considerably, slap-dashically right. However, as the shock to the wounded captain would have been the greater to say that I had been assassinated, they chose the milder alternative, and told him that “they feared I had deserted.”

Captain Reud merely said, “I don’t believe it,” turned his face to the bulkhead, and remained silent for three or four days more. Still, as he was proceeding towards convalescence, he began to be more active, or, rather, ordered more active measures to be taken to clear up the mystery of my disappearance. Parties were consequently sent to scour the country for miles round; but I was too well concealed to permit them to be of any utility. The only two seamen that had seen me near Manuel’s premises belonged to the frigate which had sailed before my captain had recovered his faculties.

But I was not to be so easily given up; perhaps he remembered that what remained of life to him was preserved by me, and, notwithstanding his cruel usage, I well knew that he entertained for me a sincere affection. As theEosgot under weigh, after remaining so long at anchor in the port, that the men observed she would shortly ground upon the beef-bones that their active masticators had denuded, and which were thrown overboard, the wind was light, and the boats were all out towing, with the exception of the pinnace, which was ordered to sweep round the bay and look into all the inlets, in order to seek for some vestige of my important self. For good or for evil, the heart-rending results ensued.

How short is the real romance of life! A shout of joy—a pulsation of ecstasy—and it is over! In the course of my eventful life, I have seen very fair faces and very many beautiful forms. The fascinations of exterior loveliness I have met combined with high intellect, unswerving principles, and virtuous emotions, awful from their very holiness. The fair possessors of many of these lofty attributes I have sometimes wooed and strove to love; but, though I often sighed and prayed for a return of that heart-whole and absorbing passion, there was no magic, no charm, to call the dead embers into life. That young and beautiful savage swept from my bosom all the tenderer stuff: she collected the fresh flowers of passion, and left—It is of no consequence—Josephine, farewell!

Let us talk idly. It is a droll world: let us mock each other, and call it mirth. There is my poor half-deranged captain cutting such antics, that even authority with the two-edged sword in his hand cannot repress the outbursting of ignoble derision. First of all, he takes a mania for apes and monkeys; disrates all his midshipmen, taking care, however, that they still do their duty; and makes the ship’s tailor rig out their successors in uniform. The officers are aghast, for the maniac is so cunning, and the risk of putting a superior officer under an arrest so tremendous, that they know not what to do. Besides, their captain is only mad on one subject at one time. Indeed, insanity seems sometimes to find a vent in monomania, actually improving all the faculties on all other points. Well, the monkey midshipmen did not behave very correctly; so, Captain Reud had them one afternoon all tied up to one of his guns in the cabin, and one after the other, well flogged with the cat-o’-nine-tails. It was highly ludicrous to see the poor fellows waiting each for his turn, well knowing what was to come; they never, than when under the impression of their fears, looked more human. That night they stole into the cabin, by two or three, in the dead of the night, and nearly murdered their persecutor. This looked very like combination, and an exercise of faculties that may be nearly termed reasoning.

They were all thrown overboard. The next phantasy was the getting up of the forecastle carronades into the tops, thereby straining the ship and nearly carrying away the mast. That folly wore out, and the guns came down to their proper places. Then a huge bear came on board—a very gentlemanly, dignified fellow; never in a hurry, and who always moved about with a gracious deliberation. Captain Reud amused himself by endeavouring to teach him to dance; and a worthless blackguard who could play on the pipe and tambour, and who probably had led a bear about the country, was taken into especial grace, and was loaded with benefits, in order to assist his captain in his singular avocations.

“Come and see my bear dance, do come and see him dance,” was now the little Creole’s continual cry. But the bear did not take his tuition kindly, and grew daily more ferocious; till, at length, seizing his opportunity, he caught up the diminutive skipper and nearly hugged the breath out of his body, and almost rubbed his red nose off his yellow face in endeavouring to bite him through his muzzle. The star of Ursa Major was no longer in the ascendant, and he was bartered away, with the master of the first merchant vessel we met, for a couple of game-cocks; and the bear-leader was turned back into the waist, and flogged the next day for impertinence, whilst, two days before, the vagabond was too proud to say “sir” to a middy.

But it would be ridiculous to enumerate the long succession of these insane whimsicalities, each latter one being morebizarrethan the preceding.

Whether a man be mad or not, Christmas will come round again. Now, Jack, from time immemorial, thinks that he has a right undeniable to get drunk on that auspicious day. In harbour, that right is not discussed by his officers, but is usually exercisedsub silentiounder their eyes, with everything but silence on the part of the exercisers. Even at sea, without the ship be in sight of the enemy, or it blows hard enough to blow the ship’s coppers overboard, our friends think it hard, very hard, to have their cups scored next morning upon their back; and, indeed, to keep all a frigate’s crew from intoxication on a Christmas-day would be something like undertaking the labour of Sisyphus, for, as fast as one man could be frightened or flogged into sobriety, another would become glorious.

It was for this very reason that Captain Reud, the Christmas-day after he had received his wound, undertook the task; and, as the weather was fine, he hoped to find it not quite so hard as rolling a stone up a steep hill, and invariably seeing it bound down again before it attains the coveted summit. Immediately after breakfast, he had the word passed, fore and aft, that no man should be drunk that day, and that six dozen (not of wine) would be the reward of any who should dare, in the least, to infringe that order. What is drunkenness? What it is we can readily pronounce, when we see a man under its revolting phases. What is not drunkenness is more hard to say. Is it not difficult to ascertain the nice line that separates excitement from incipient delirium? Not at all, to a man like Captain Reud. To understand a disease thoroughly, a physician will tell you that you will be much assisted by the having suffered from it yourself. Upon this self-evident principle, our Aesculapius with the epaulettes was the first man drunk in the ship. After dinner that day, he had heightened his testing powers with an unusual, even to him, share of claret.

Well, at the usual time, we beat to quarters; that is always done just before the hammocks are piped down; and it is then that the sobriety of the crew, as they stand to their guns, is narrowly looked into by the respective officers; for then the grog has been served out for the day, and it is supposed to have been all consumed. The captain, of course, came on the quarter-deck to quarters, making tack and half tack, till he fairly threw out his starboard grappling-iron, and moored himself to one of the belaying pins round the mizzen-mast.

“Mister Farmer,” said he to the first luff, “you see I know how to keep a ship in discipline—not (hiccup) a man drunk on board of her.”

“I doubt it, sir,” was, the respectful answer. “I think, sir, I can see one now,” said he, taking his eyes off his superior, after a searching glance, and looking carelessly around.

“Where is he?”

“Oh, sir, we must not forget that it is Christmas-day: so if you please, sir, we will not scrutinise very particularly.”

“But we will scru—scrutinise very particularly: remember me of scru—scrutinise, Mister Rattlin—a good word that scru—screws—trenails—tenpenny nails—hammers—iron—clamps, and dog-fastenings—what were we all talking about. Mr Farmer? Oh; sobriety! we will—assuredly (hiccup) find out the drunken man.”

So, with a largecortègeof officers, the master-at-arms, and the ship’s corporals, Captain Reud leaning his right arm heavily upon my left shoulder—for he was cunning enough, just then, to find that the gout was getting into his foot—we proceeded round the ship on our voyage of discovery. Now, it is no joke for a man half drunk to be tried for drunkenness by one wholly so. It was a curious and a comic sight, that examination—for many of the examined were conscious of a cup too much. These invariably endeavoured to look the most sober. As we approached the various groups around each gun, the different artifices of the men to pass muster were most amusing. Some drew themselves stiffly up, and looked as rigid as iron-stanchions; others took the examination with an easy,debonairair, as if to say, “Who so innocent as I?” Some again, not exactly liking the judge, quietly dodged round, shifting places with their shipmates, so that when the captain peered into the eyes of the last for the symptoms of ebriety, the mercurial rascals had quietly placed themselves first.

To the sharp, startling accusation, “You are drunk, sir,” the answers were beautifully various. The indignant “No, sir!”—the well-acted surprise, “I, sir?”—the conciliatory “God bless your honour, no, sir!”—the logical “Bill Bowling was cook to-day, sir,”—and the sarcastic “No more than your honour’s honour,” to witness, were, as we small wits say, better than a play.

The search was almost unavailing. The only fish that came to the net was a poor idiotic young man, that, to my certain knowledge, had not tasted grog for months; for his messmates gave him a hiding whenever he asked for his allowance. To the sudden, “You’re drunk, sir,” of Captain Reud, the simple youth, taken by surprise, and perhaps thinking it against the articles of war to contradict the captain, said, “Yes, sir; but I haven’t tasted grog since—”

“You got drunk, sir; take him aft, master-at-arms, and put him in irons.”

The scrutiny over, our temperate captain went aft himself, glorifying that, in all the ship’s company, there was only one instance of intoxication on Christmas-day; and thus he delivered himself; hiccupping on the gratifying occasion:

“I call that discipline, Mr Farmer. The only drunken man in his Majesty’s vessel, under my command, aft on the poop, in irons, and that fellow not worth his salt.”

“I quite agree with you,” said the sneering purser, “that the only fellow who has dared to get disgracefully drunk to-day, is not worth his salt, but he is not in irons, aft on the poop.”

“I am sure he is not,” said the first lieutenant.

“That is as—astonishing,” said the mystified extirpator of intemperance, as he staggered into his cabin, to console himself for, and to close his labours with, the two other bottles.

The reader will perceive, from these incidents, that it was time that Captain Reud retired to enjoy his laurels on hissolum nataleinotium cumas muchdignitateas would conduce to the happiness of one of his mischief-loving temperament. The admiral on the station thought so too, when Reud took the ship into Port Royal. He superseded the black pilot, and took upon himself to con the ship; the consequence was, that she hugged the point so closely, that she went right upon the church steeple of old Port Royal, which is very quietly lying beside the new one, submerged by an earthquake, and a hole was knocked in the ship’s forefoot, of that large and ruinous description which may be aptly compared to the hole in a patriot’s reputation, who has lately taken office with his quondam opponents. With all the efforts of all the fleet, that sent relays of hands on board of us to work the pumps, we could not keep her afloat; so we were obliged, first putting a thrummed sail under her bottom, to tow her alongside of the dockyard wharf, lighten her, and lash her to it.

The same evening, by nine o’clock, she had an empty hull, and all the ship’s company and officers were located in the dockyard, and preparations were made, the next day, for heaving the frigate down. It was the opinion of everybody that, had not our skipper been the nephew of a very high official of the Admiralty, he would have been tried by a court-martial, for thus attempting to overturn submarine churches and cracking the bottom of his Majesty’s beautiful frigate. As it was, we were only ordered to be repaired with all haste, and to go home, very much, indeed, to the satisfaction of everybody but the captain himself.

Chapter Fifty Three.A fever case, and a potion of love, if not altogether a love-potion—What are the doctors about when men die despite of their knowledge, and are cured without it?—Ralph knoweth not.However, I must retrograde. It may seem surprising that I have made so little mention of my messmates, for it would seem that, to a midshipman, the affairs and characters of midshipmen would be paramount. To me they were not so, for reasons that I have before stated. Besides, our berth was like an eastern caravanserai, or the receiving-room of a pest-house. They all died, were promoted, or went into other ships, excepting two and myself; who returned to England. It must not be supposed that we were without young gentlemen; sometimes we had our full complement, sometimes half. Fresh ones came, and they died, and so on. Before I had time to form friendships with them, or to study their characters, they took their long sleep beneath the palisades, or were thrown overboard in their hammocks. This was much the case with the wardroom officers. The first lieutenant, the doctor, and the purser, were the only original ones that returned to England with us. The mortality among the assistant-surgeons was dreadful; they messed with us. Indeed, I have no recollection of the names, or even the persons, of the majority of those with whom I ate, and drank, and acted, they being so prone to prove this a transitory world.We were tolerably healthy till the capture of Saint Domingo; when, being obliged to convey a regiment of French soldiers to the prisons at Port Royal, they brought the fever in its worst form on board; and, notwithstanding every remedial measure that the then state of science could suggest, we never could eradicate the germs of it. The men were sent on board of a hulk, the vessel thoroughly cleansed and fumigated, and finally, we were ordered as far north as New Providence; but all these means were ineffectual, for, at intervals, nearly regular, the fever would again appear, and men and officers die.Hitherto, I had escaped. The only attack to which I was subjected took place in the capstan-house, for so the place was called where we were bivouacked during the heaving down of the ship. I record it, not that my conduct under the disease may be imitated, but on account of the singularity of the access, and the rapidity of the cure.I had to tow, from Port Royal up to Kingston, a powder-boy, and, through some misconduct of the coxswain, the boat’s awning had been left behind. Six or seven hours under a sun, vertical at noon, through the hottest part of the day, and among the swamps and morasses, so luxuriant in vegetable productions, that separate Port Royal from Kingston, is a good ordeal by which to try a European constitution. For the first time, my stamina seemed inclined to succumb before it.When I returned to Port Royal, at about four in the afternoon, the first peculiar sensation with which I was attacked was a sort of slipping of the ground from under me as I trod, and a notion that I could skim along the surface of the earth if I chose, without using my legs. Then I was not, as is most natural to a fasting midshipman, excessively hungry, but excessively jocular. So, instead of seeking good things to put into my mouth, I went about dispensing them from out of it. I soon began to be sensible that I was talking much nonsense, and to like it. At length, the little sense that I had still left, was kind enough to suggest to me that I might be distinguished by my first interview with that king of terrors, Saffron-crowned Jack. “Shall I go to the doctor?” said I. “No—I have the greatest opinion of Doctor Thompson—but it is a great pity that he cannot cure the yellow-fever. No doubt he’ll be offended, and we are the greatest of friends. But, I have always observed, that all those who go to the doctor begin going indeed—for, from the doctor they invariably go to their hammocks—from their hammocks go to the hospital—and from the hospital go to the palisades.” So while there was yet time, I decided to go in quite an opposite direction. I went out of the dockyard gates, and to a nice, matronly, free mulatto, who was a mother to me—and something more. She was a woman of some property, and had a very strong gang of young Negroes, that she used to hire out to his Majesty, to work in his Majesty’s dockyard, and permit, for certain considerations, to caulk the sides and bottoms of his Majesty’s vessels of war.Notwithstanding this intimate connection between his Majesty and herself; she did not disdain to wash, or cause to be washed, the shirts and stockings of his Majesty’s officers of the navy; that is, if she liked those officers. Now, she was kind enough to like me exceedingly; and, though very pretty, and not yet very old, all in a very proper and platonic manner. She was also a great giver of dignity balls, and when she was full dressed, Miss Belinda Bellarosa was altogether a very seductive personage. A warrant officer was an abomination. She had refused the hands of many master’s mates, and I knew “for true,” to use her own bewitching idiom, that several lieutenants had made her most honourable overtures.Well, to Miss Belinda I made the best of my way. I am choice in my phrases. I could hardly make my way at all, for a strange sort of delirium was supervening. Immediately she saw me, she exclaimed, “Ah, Goramity! him catched for sure—it break my heart to see him. You know I lub Massa Rattlin, like my own piccaninny. S’elp me God, he very bad!”“My queen of countless Indians! dear duchess of doubloons! marry me to-night and then you’ll be a jolly widow tomorrow.”“Hear him! him! how talk of marry me?”“Oh! Bella, dear, if you will not kill me with kindness, what shall I do? I cannot bear this raging pain in my head. You’ve been a kind soul to me. Pardon my nonsense, I could not help it. Let one of your servants help me to walk to the doctor.”“Nebber, nebber, doctor!” and she spat on the floor with a sovereign contempt. “Ah, Massa Ralph, me lub you dearly—dat sleep here to-night—me lose my reputation—nebber mind you you. What for you no run, Dorcas, a get me, from Massa Jackson’s store, bottle good port? Tell him for me, Missy Bellarosa. You Phebe, oder woman of colour dere, why you no take Massa Ralph, and put him in best bed? Him bad, for certainly—make haste, or poor buckra boy die.”So, with the assistance of my two dingy handmaidens, I was popped into bed, and, according to the directions of my kind hostess, a suffocating number of blankets heaped upon me. Shortly afterwards, and when my reeling senses were barely sane enough to enable me to recognise objects, my dear doctress, with two more Negresses, to witness to her reputation, entered, and putting the bottle of port, with a white powder floating at the top of it, into a china bowl, compelled me to drink off the whole of it. Then, with a look of great and truly motherly affection, she took her leave of me, telling the two nurses to put another blanket on me, and to hold me down in the bed if I attempted to get out.Then began the raging agony of fever. I felt as one mass of sentient fire. I had a foretaste of that state which, I hope, we shall all escape, save one, of ever-burning and never-consuming; but, though moments of such suffering tell upon the wretch with the duration of ages, this did not last more than half an hour, when they became exchanged for a dream, the most singular, and that never will be forgotten whilst memory can offer me one single idea.Methought that I was suddenly whisked out of bed, and placed in the centre of an interminable plain of sand. It bounded the horizon like a level sea: nothing was to be seen but this white and glowing sand, the intense blue and cloudless sky, and, directly above me, the eternal sun, like the eye of an angry God, pouring down intolerable fires upon my unprotected head. At length, my skull opened, and, from the interior of my head, a splendid temple seemed to arise. Rows of columns supported rows of columns, order was piled upon order, and, as it arose, Babel-like, to the skies, it extended in width as it increased in height; and there, in this strange edifice, I saw the lofty, the winding, the interminable staircase, the wide and marble-paved courts; nor was there wanting the majestic and splashing fountain, whose cool waters were mocking my scorched-up lips; and there were also the long range of beautiful statues. The structure continued multiplying itself until all the heavens were full of it, extending nearly to the horizon all around.Under this superincumbent weight I had long struggled to stand. It kept bearing down more and more heavily upon the root of my brain: the anguish became insufferable, but I still nobly essayed to keep my footing, with a defiance and a pride that savoured of impious presumption. At length I felt completely overcome, and exclaimed, “God of mercy, relieve me! the burthen is more than I can bear.” Then commenced the havoc in this temple, that was my head, and was not; there were the toppling down of the vast columns, the crushing of the several architraves, the grinding together of the rich entablatures; the breaking up, with noise louder than ever thunder was heard by man, of the marble pavements; the ruins crushed together in one awful confusion above me;—nature could do no more, and my dream slept.The sun was at its meridian height when I awoke the next day in health, with every sensation renewed, and that, too, in the so sweet a feeling that makes the mere act of living delightful. I found nothing remarkable, but that I had been subjected to a profuse perspiration.Miss Bellarosa met me at breakfast all triumph, and I was all gratitude. I was very hungry, and as playful as a schoolboy who had just procured a holiday.“Eh! Massa Ralph, suppose no marry me to-day—what for you say no yes to dat?”“Because, dear Bella, you wouldn’t have me.”“Try—you ask me,” said she, looking at me with a fondness not quite so maternal as I could wish.“Bella, dearest, will you marry me?”“For true?”“For true.”“Tanky, Massa Rattlin, dear, tanky; you make me very happy; but, for true, no. Were you older more fifteen year, or me more fifteen year younger, perhaps—but tank ye much for de comblement. Now go, and tell buckra doctor.”So, as I could not reward my kind physician with my hand, which, by-the-by, I should not have offered had I not been certain of refusal, I was obliged to force upon her as splendid a trinket as I could purchase, for a keepsake, and gave my sable nurses a handful of bits each. Bits of what? say the uninitiated.I don’t know whether I have described this fever case very nosologically, but, very truly I know I have.

However, I must retrograde. It may seem surprising that I have made so little mention of my messmates, for it would seem that, to a midshipman, the affairs and characters of midshipmen would be paramount. To me they were not so, for reasons that I have before stated. Besides, our berth was like an eastern caravanserai, or the receiving-room of a pest-house. They all died, were promoted, or went into other ships, excepting two and myself; who returned to England. It must not be supposed that we were without young gentlemen; sometimes we had our full complement, sometimes half. Fresh ones came, and they died, and so on. Before I had time to form friendships with them, or to study their characters, they took their long sleep beneath the palisades, or were thrown overboard in their hammocks. This was much the case with the wardroom officers. The first lieutenant, the doctor, and the purser, were the only original ones that returned to England with us. The mortality among the assistant-surgeons was dreadful; they messed with us. Indeed, I have no recollection of the names, or even the persons, of the majority of those with whom I ate, and drank, and acted, they being so prone to prove this a transitory world.

We were tolerably healthy till the capture of Saint Domingo; when, being obliged to convey a regiment of French soldiers to the prisons at Port Royal, they brought the fever in its worst form on board; and, notwithstanding every remedial measure that the then state of science could suggest, we never could eradicate the germs of it. The men were sent on board of a hulk, the vessel thoroughly cleansed and fumigated, and finally, we were ordered as far north as New Providence; but all these means were ineffectual, for, at intervals, nearly regular, the fever would again appear, and men and officers die.

Hitherto, I had escaped. The only attack to which I was subjected took place in the capstan-house, for so the place was called where we were bivouacked during the heaving down of the ship. I record it, not that my conduct under the disease may be imitated, but on account of the singularity of the access, and the rapidity of the cure.

I had to tow, from Port Royal up to Kingston, a powder-boy, and, through some misconduct of the coxswain, the boat’s awning had been left behind. Six or seven hours under a sun, vertical at noon, through the hottest part of the day, and among the swamps and morasses, so luxuriant in vegetable productions, that separate Port Royal from Kingston, is a good ordeal by which to try a European constitution. For the first time, my stamina seemed inclined to succumb before it.

When I returned to Port Royal, at about four in the afternoon, the first peculiar sensation with which I was attacked was a sort of slipping of the ground from under me as I trod, and a notion that I could skim along the surface of the earth if I chose, without using my legs. Then I was not, as is most natural to a fasting midshipman, excessively hungry, but excessively jocular. So, instead of seeking good things to put into my mouth, I went about dispensing them from out of it. I soon began to be sensible that I was talking much nonsense, and to like it. At length, the little sense that I had still left, was kind enough to suggest to me that I might be distinguished by my first interview with that king of terrors, Saffron-crowned Jack. “Shall I go to the doctor?” said I. “No—I have the greatest opinion of Doctor Thompson—but it is a great pity that he cannot cure the yellow-fever. No doubt he’ll be offended, and we are the greatest of friends. But, I have always observed, that all those who go to the doctor begin going indeed—for, from the doctor they invariably go to their hammocks—from their hammocks go to the hospital—and from the hospital go to the palisades.” So while there was yet time, I decided to go in quite an opposite direction. I went out of the dockyard gates, and to a nice, matronly, free mulatto, who was a mother to me—and something more. She was a woman of some property, and had a very strong gang of young Negroes, that she used to hire out to his Majesty, to work in his Majesty’s dockyard, and permit, for certain considerations, to caulk the sides and bottoms of his Majesty’s vessels of war.

Notwithstanding this intimate connection between his Majesty and herself; she did not disdain to wash, or cause to be washed, the shirts and stockings of his Majesty’s officers of the navy; that is, if she liked those officers. Now, she was kind enough to like me exceedingly; and, though very pretty, and not yet very old, all in a very proper and platonic manner. She was also a great giver of dignity balls, and when she was full dressed, Miss Belinda Bellarosa was altogether a very seductive personage. A warrant officer was an abomination. She had refused the hands of many master’s mates, and I knew “for true,” to use her own bewitching idiom, that several lieutenants had made her most honourable overtures.

Well, to Miss Belinda I made the best of my way. I am choice in my phrases. I could hardly make my way at all, for a strange sort of delirium was supervening. Immediately she saw me, she exclaimed, “Ah, Goramity! him catched for sure—it break my heart to see him. You know I lub Massa Rattlin, like my own piccaninny. S’elp me God, he very bad!”

“My queen of countless Indians! dear duchess of doubloons! marry me to-night and then you’ll be a jolly widow tomorrow.”

“Hear him! him! how talk of marry me?”

“Oh! Bella, dear, if you will not kill me with kindness, what shall I do? I cannot bear this raging pain in my head. You’ve been a kind soul to me. Pardon my nonsense, I could not help it. Let one of your servants help me to walk to the doctor.”

“Nebber, nebber, doctor!” and she spat on the floor with a sovereign contempt. “Ah, Massa Ralph, me lub you dearly—dat sleep here to-night—me lose my reputation—nebber mind you you. What for you no run, Dorcas, a get me, from Massa Jackson’s store, bottle good port? Tell him for me, Missy Bellarosa. You Phebe, oder woman of colour dere, why you no take Massa Ralph, and put him in best bed? Him bad, for certainly—make haste, or poor buckra boy die.”

So, with the assistance of my two dingy handmaidens, I was popped into bed, and, according to the directions of my kind hostess, a suffocating number of blankets heaped upon me. Shortly afterwards, and when my reeling senses were barely sane enough to enable me to recognise objects, my dear doctress, with two more Negresses, to witness to her reputation, entered, and putting the bottle of port, with a white powder floating at the top of it, into a china bowl, compelled me to drink off the whole of it. Then, with a look of great and truly motherly affection, she took her leave of me, telling the two nurses to put another blanket on me, and to hold me down in the bed if I attempted to get out.

Then began the raging agony of fever. I felt as one mass of sentient fire. I had a foretaste of that state which, I hope, we shall all escape, save one, of ever-burning and never-consuming; but, though moments of such suffering tell upon the wretch with the duration of ages, this did not last more than half an hour, when they became exchanged for a dream, the most singular, and that never will be forgotten whilst memory can offer me one single idea.

Methought that I was suddenly whisked out of bed, and placed in the centre of an interminable plain of sand. It bounded the horizon like a level sea: nothing was to be seen but this white and glowing sand, the intense blue and cloudless sky, and, directly above me, the eternal sun, like the eye of an angry God, pouring down intolerable fires upon my unprotected head. At length, my skull opened, and, from the interior of my head, a splendid temple seemed to arise. Rows of columns supported rows of columns, order was piled upon order, and, as it arose, Babel-like, to the skies, it extended in width as it increased in height; and there, in this strange edifice, I saw the lofty, the winding, the interminable staircase, the wide and marble-paved courts; nor was there wanting the majestic and splashing fountain, whose cool waters were mocking my scorched-up lips; and there were also the long range of beautiful statues. The structure continued multiplying itself until all the heavens were full of it, extending nearly to the horizon all around.

Under this superincumbent weight I had long struggled to stand. It kept bearing down more and more heavily upon the root of my brain: the anguish became insufferable, but I still nobly essayed to keep my footing, with a defiance and a pride that savoured of impious presumption. At length I felt completely overcome, and exclaimed, “God of mercy, relieve me! the burthen is more than I can bear.” Then commenced the havoc in this temple, that was my head, and was not; there were the toppling down of the vast columns, the crushing of the several architraves, the grinding together of the rich entablatures; the breaking up, with noise louder than ever thunder was heard by man, of the marble pavements; the ruins crushed together in one awful confusion above me;—nature could do no more, and my dream slept.

The sun was at its meridian height when I awoke the next day in health, with every sensation renewed, and that, too, in the so sweet a feeling that makes the mere act of living delightful. I found nothing remarkable, but that I had been subjected to a profuse perspiration.

Miss Bellarosa met me at breakfast all triumph, and I was all gratitude. I was very hungry, and as playful as a schoolboy who had just procured a holiday.

“Eh! Massa Ralph, suppose no marry me to-day—what for you say no yes to dat?”

“Because, dear Bella, you wouldn’t have me.”

“Try—you ask me,” said she, looking at me with a fondness not quite so maternal as I could wish.

“Bella, dearest, will you marry me?”

“For true?”

“For true.”

“Tanky, Massa Rattlin, dear, tanky; you make me very happy; but, for true, no. Were you older more fifteen year, or me more fifteen year younger, perhaps—but tank ye much for de comblement. Now go, and tell buckra doctor.”

So, as I could not reward my kind physician with my hand, which, by-the-by, I should not have offered had I not been certain of refusal, I was obliged to force upon her as splendid a trinket as I could purchase, for a keepsake, and gave my sable nurses a handful of bits each. Bits of what? say the uninitiated.

I don’t know whether I have described this fever case very nosologically, but, very truly I know I have.

Chapter Fifty Four.A new character introduced, who claimeth old acquaintanceship—Not very honest by his own account, which giveth him more the appearance of honesty than he deserveth—He proveth to be a steward not inclined to hide his talent in a napkin.During all the time that these West Indian events had been occurring, that is, nearly three years, I had no other communication with England than regularly and repeatedly sending there various pieces of paper thus headed, “This, my first of exchange, my second and third not paid;” or for variety’s sake, “This, my second of exchange, my first and third,” etcetera; or, to be more various still, “This, my third, my first and second,”—all of which received more attention than their strange phraseology seemed to entitle them to.But I must now introduce a new character; one that attended me for years, like an evil shadow, nor left me until the “beginning of the end.”The ship had been hove down, the wound in her forefoot healed, that is to say, the huge rent stopped up; and we were beginning to get water and stores on board, and I was walking on the quay of the dockyard, when I was civilly accosted by a man having the appearance of a captain’s steward. He was pale and handsome, with small white hands; and, if not actually genteel in his deportment, had that metropolitan refinement of look that indicated contact with genteel society. Though dressed in the blue jacket and white duck trousers of the sailor’s Sunday best, at a glance you would pronounce him to be no seaman. Before he spoke to me, he had looked attentively at several other midshipmen, some belonging to my own ship, others, young gentlemen who were on shore on dockyard duty. At length, after a scrutiny sufficient to make me rather angry, he took off his hat very respectfully, and said:“Have I the honour of speaking to Mr Ralph Rattlin?”“You have: well, my man?”“Ah, sir, you forget me, and no wonder. My name, sir, is Daunton—Joshua Daunton.”“Never heard the name before in my life.”“Oh yes, you have, sir, begging your pardon, very often indeed. Why, you used to call me Jossey; little Jossey, come here you little vagabond, and let me ride you pick-aback.”“The devil I did!”“Why, Mr Rattlin, I was your fag at Mr Roots’ school.”Now I knew this to be a lie; for, under that very respectable pedagogue, and in that very respectable seminary, as the reader well knows, I was thefagged, and not the fagger.“Now, really, Joshua Daunton,” said I, “I am inclined to think that you may be Joshua, the little vagabond, still; for, upon my honour, I remember nothing about you. Seeing there were so many hundred boys under Mr Roots, my schoolfellow you might have been; but may I be vexed, if ever I fagged you or any one else! Now, my good man, prove to me that you have been my schoolfellow first, and then let me know what I can do for you afterwards, for I suppose that you have some favour to ask, or some motive in seeking me.”“I have, indeed,” he replied, with a peculiar intonation of voice, that might have been construed in many ways. He then proceeded to give me many details of the school at Islington, which convinced me, if there he had never been, he had conversed with some one who had. Still, he evaded all my attempts at cross-examination, with a skill which gave me a much higher opinion of his intellect than of his honesty. With the utmost efforts of my recollection, I could not call him to mind, and I bluntly told him so. I then bade him tell me who he was and what he wanted.“I am the only son of an honest pawnbroker of Shoreditch. He was tolerably rich, and determined to give me a good education. He sent me to Mr Roots’ school. It was there that I had the happiness of being honoured by your friendship. Now, sir, you perceive that, though I am not so tall as you by some inches, I am at least seven or eight years older. Shortly after, you left school to go to another at Stickenham. I also left, with my education, as my father fondly supposed, finished. Sir, I turned out bad. I confess it with shame—I was a rascal. My father turned me out of doors. I have had several ups and downs in the world since, and I am now steward on board of theLondon, the West Indiaman that arrived here the day before yesterday.”“Very well, Joshua; but how came you to know that I went to school at Stickenham?”“Because, in my tramping about the country, I saw you with the other young gentlemen in the playground on the common.”“Hum! but how, in the name of all that is curious, came you to know that I was here at Port Royal dockyard, and a young gentleman belonging to theEos?”“Oh! very naturally, sir. About two years ago, I passed again over the same common with my associates. I could not resist the wish to see if you were still in the playground. I did not see you among the rest, and I made bold to inquire of one of the elder boys where you were. He told me the name of the ship, and of your captain. The first thing on coming into the harbour that struck my eye was your very frigate alongside the dockyard. I got leave to come on shore, and I knew you directly that I saw you.”“But why examine so many before you spoke to me? However, I have no reason to be suspicious, for time makes great changes. Now, what shall I do for you?”“Give me your protection, and as much of your friendliness as is compatible with our different stations.”“But, Daunton, according to your own words, you have been a sad fellow. Before I extend to you what you require, I ought to know what you really have done. You spoke of tramping—have you been a tramper—a gipsy?”“I have.”“Have you ever committed theft?”“Only in a small way.”“Ah! and swindled—only in a small way, of course?”“The temptations were great.”“Where will this fellow stop?” thought I; “let us see, however, how far he will go;” and then, giving utterance to my thoughts, I continued, “The step between swindling and forgery is but very short,” and I paused—for even I had not the confidence to ask him, “Are you a forger?”“Very,” was the short, dry answer. I was astonished. Perhaps he will confess to the commission of murder.“Oh! as you were just saying to yourself, we are the mere passive tools of fate—we are drawn on, in spite of ourselves. If a man comes in our way, why, you know, in self-defence—hey?”“What do you mean, sir?”“A little prick under the ribs in a quiet way. The wanderings and jerkings of the angry hand will happen. You understand me?”“Too well, I am afraid, sir. I have never yet shed man’s blood—I never will. Perhaps, sir, you would not depend upon my virtue for this—you may upon my cowardice. I tremble—I sicken at the sight of blood. I have endeavoured to win your confidence by candour—I have not succeeded. May I be permitted to wish you a good day?”“Stop, Daunton; this is a singular encounter, and a still more singular conference. As an old schoolfellow, you ask me to give you my protection. The protection of a reefer is, in itself, something laughable; and then, as an inducement, you confess to me that you are a villain, only in guilt just short of murder. Perhaps, by this bravado sort of confession, you have endeavoured to give me a worse impression of your character than it really deserves, that you might give me the better opinion of your sincerity. Is it not so?”“In a great measure, it is.”“I thought so. Now let me tell you, Daunton, that that very circumstance makes me afraid of you. But, still, I will not cast aside the appeal of an old schoolfellow. What can I do for you?”“Give me the protection afforded me by a man-of-war, by taking me as your servant.”“Utterly impossible! I can press you directly, or give the hint to any of the many men-of-war here to do so. But the rules of the service do not permit a midshipman to have a separate servant. Do you wish to enter?”“Only on board of your ship, and with the privilege of waiting upon you, and being constantly near your person.”“Thank you; but what prevents my impressing you, even as you stand there?”“These very ample protections.” And he produced them.“Yes! I see that you are well provided. But why give up your good berth on board theLondon?”“Mr Rattlin, I have my reasons. Permit them, as yet, to remain secret. There is no guilt attached to them. May I sail with you in the capacity of your servant?”“I have told you before that you cannot be my servant solely; you must be the servant of the midshipmen’s berth.”“Yes, with all my heart, provided that you pledge me your honour that I shall never be put to any other duty.”I was astonished at this perseverance, and very honestly told him all the miseries of the situation for which he seemed so ambitious. They did not shake his resolution. I then left him, and spoke to Mr Farmer. “Let the fool enter,” was the laconic reply.“But he will not enter but on the conditions I have mentioned, and his protections are too good to be violated.”“Then I authorise you to make them. We are short of men.”But Joshua would not enter; he required to be pressed; so I went on board his own merchant-ship, according to previous arrangement, and pressed him. He made no resistance and produced no documents; he only called the master of the ship, and the first and second officer, to witness that he was a pressed man, and then, taking his kit with him, he even cheerfully tripped down the side into the boat; and thus, for nearly an eventful year, I was the instrument of placing my evil genius near me.

During all the time that these West Indian events had been occurring, that is, nearly three years, I had no other communication with England than regularly and repeatedly sending there various pieces of paper thus headed, “This, my first of exchange, my second and third not paid;” or for variety’s sake, “This, my second of exchange, my first and third,” etcetera; or, to be more various still, “This, my third, my first and second,”—all of which received more attention than their strange phraseology seemed to entitle them to.

But I must now introduce a new character; one that attended me for years, like an evil shadow, nor left me until the “beginning of the end.”

The ship had been hove down, the wound in her forefoot healed, that is to say, the huge rent stopped up; and we were beginning to get water and stores on board, and I was walking on the quay of the dockyard, when I was civilly accosted by a man having the appearance of a captain’s steward. He was pale and handsome, with small white hands; and, if not actually genteel in his deportment, had that metropolitan refinement of look that indicated contact with genteel society. Though dressed in the blue jacket and white duck trousers of the sailor’s Sunday best, at a glance you would pronounce him to be no seaman. Before he spoke to me, he had looked attentively at several other midshipmen, some belonging to my own ship, others, young gentlemen who were on shore on dockyard duty. At length, after a scrutiny sufficient to make me rather angry, he took off his hat very respectfully, and said:

“Have I the honour of speaking to Mr Ralph Rattlin?”

“You have: well, my man?”

“Ah, sir, you forget me, and no wonder. My name, sir, is Daunton—Joshua Daunton.”

“Never heard the name before in my life.”

“Oh yes, you have, sir, begging your pardon, very often indeed. Why, you used to call me Jossey; little Jossey, come here you little vagabond, and let me ride you pick-aback.”

“The devil I did!”

“Why, Mr Rattlin, I was your fag at Mr Roots’ school.”

Now I knew this to be a lie; for, under that very respectable pedagogue, and in that very respectable seminary, as the reader well knows, I was thefagged, and not the fagger.

“Now, really, Joshua Daunton,” said I, “I am inclined to think that you may be Joshua, the little vagabond, still; for, upon my honour, I remember nothing about you. Seeing there were so many hundred boys under Mr Roots, my schoolfellow you might have been; but may I be vexed, if ever I fagged you or any one else! Now, my good man, prove to me that you have been my schoolfellow first, and then let me know what I can do for you afterwards, for I suppose that you have some favour to ask, or some motive in seeking me.”

“I have, indeed,” he replied, with a peculiar intonation of voice, that might have been construed in many ways. He then proceeded to give me many details of the school at Islington, which convinced me, if there he had never been, he had conversed with some one who had. Still, he evaded all my attempts at cross-examination, with a skill which gave me a much higher opinion of his intellect than of his honesty. With the utmost efforts of my recollection, I could not call him to mind, and I bluntly told him so. I then bade him tell me who he was and what he wanted.

“I am the only son of an honest pawnbroker of Shoreditch. He was tolerably rich, and determined to give me a good education. He sent me to Mr Roots’ school. It was there that I had the happiness of being honoured by your friendship. Now, sir, you perceive that, though I am not so tall as you by some inches, I am at least seven or eight years older. Shortly after, you left school to go to another at Stickenham. I also left, with my education, as my father fondly supposed, finished. Sir, I turned out bad. I confess it with shame—I was a rascal. My father turned me out of doors. I have had several ups and downs in the world since, and I am now steward on board of theLondon, the West Indiaman that arrived here the day before yesterday.”

“Very well, Joshua; but how came you to know that I went to school at Stickenham?”

“Because, in my tramping about the country, I saw you with the other young gentlemen in the playground on the common.”

“Hum! but how, in the name of all that is curious, came you to know that I was here at Port Royal dockyard, and a young gentleman belonging to theEos?”

“Oh! very naturally, sir. About two years ago, I passed again over the same common with my associates. I could not resist the wish to see if you were still in the playground. I did not see you among the rest, and I made bold to inquire of one of the elder boys where you were. He told me the name of the ship, and of your captain. The first thing on coming into the harbour that struck my eye was your very frigate alongside the dockyard. I got leave to come on shore, and I knew you directly that I saw you.”

“But why examine so many before you spoke to me? However, I have no reason to be suspicious, for time makes great changes. Now, what shall I do for you?”

“Give me your protection, and as much of your friendliness as is compatible with our different stations.”

“But, Daunton, according to your own words, you have been a sad fellow. Before I extend to you what you require, I ought to know what you really have done. You spoke of tramping—have you been a tramper—a gipsy?”

“I have.”

“Have you ever committed theft?”

“Only in a small way.”

“Ah! and swindled—only in a small way, of course?”

“The temptations were great.”

“Where will this fellow stop?” thought I; “let us see, however, how far he will go;” and then, giving utterance to my thoughts, I continued, “The step between swindling and forgery is but very short,” and I paused—for even I had not the confidence to ask him, “Are you a forger?”

“Very,” was the short, dry answer. I was astonished. Perhaps he will confess to the commission of murder.

“Oh! as you were just saying to yourself, we are the mere passive tools of fate—we are drawn on, in spite of ourselves. If a man comes in our way, why, you know, in self-defence—hey?”

“What do you mean, sir?”

“A little prick under the ribs in a quiet way. The wanderings and jerkings of the angry hand will happen. You understand me?”

“Too well, I am afraid, sir. I have never yet shed man’s blood—I never will. Perhaps, sir, you would not depend upon my virtue for this—you may upon my cowardice. I tremble—I sicken at the sight of blood. I have endeavoured to win your confidence by candour—I have not succeeded. May I be permitted to wish you a good day?”

“Stop, Daunton; this is a singular encounter, and a still more singular conference. As an old schoolfellow, you ask me to give you my protection. The protection of a reefer is, in itself, something laughable; and then, as an inducement, you confess to me that you are a villain, only in guilt just short of murder. Perhaps, by this bravado sort of confession, you have endeavoured to give me a worse impression of your character than it really deserves, that you might give me the better opinion of your sincerity. Is it not so?”

“In a great measure, it is.”

“I thought so. Now let me tell you, Daunton, that that very circumstance makes me afraid of you. But, still, I will not cast aside the appeal of an old schoolfellow. What can I do for you?”

“Give me the protection afforded me by a man-of-war, by taking me as your servant.”

“Utterly impossible! I can press you directly, or give the hint to any of the many men-of-war here to do so. But the rules of the service do not permit a midshipman to have a separate servant. Do you wish to enter?”

“Only on board of your ship, and with the privilege of waiting upon you, and being constantly near your person.”

“Thank you; but what prevents my impressing you, even as you stand there?”

“These very ample protections.” And he produced them.

“Yes! I see that you are well provided. But why give up your good berth on board theLondon?”

“Mr Rattlin, I have my reasons. Permit them, as yet, to remain secret. There is no guilt attached to them. May I sail with you in the capacity of your servant?”

“I have told you before that you cannot be my servant solely; you must be the servant of the midshipmen’s berth.”

“Yes, with all my heart, provided that you pledge me your honour that I shall never be put to any other duty.”

I was astonished at this perseverance, and very honestly told him all the miseries of the situation for which he seemed so ambitious. They did not shake his resolution. I then left him, and spoke to Mr Farmer. “Let the fool enter,” was the laconic reply.

“But he will not enter but on the conditions I have mentioned, and his protections are too good to be violated.”

“Then I authorise you to make them. We are short of men.”

But Joshua would not enter; he required to be pressed; so I went on board his own merchant-ship, according to previous arrangement, and pressed him. He made no resistance and produced no documents; he only called the master of the ship, and the first and second officer, to witness that he was a pressed man, and then, taking his kit with him, he even cheerfully tripped down the side into the boat; and thus, for nearly an eventful year, I was the instrument of placing my evil genius near me.

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