zola at work.Like all Southerners, Zola helps out his voice with frequent gestures; but he has none of the exuberant eloquence of his race. In society he is still, to a certain degree, and must always remain the victim of bashfulness; and his one attempt at public speaking was a complete failure. He has in him nothing of the boulevardier, and he is happy only when at work. Enforced idleness would mean misery to him.People I Have Never Met.By Scott Rankin.RUDYARD KIPLING.“the light that failed.”An Ethiopian Cricket Match.By Eden Phillpotts.Illustrations by Geo. Hutchinson.After the “Rhine” had been anchored in the harbour of St. Thomas, West Indies, for the space of two days, our First Officer, more generally known in these records as the Model Man, received a rather remarkable communication. It was a letter from a black sportsman, who issued a challenge to our ship on behalf of a local club. This note reminded the Model Man of a most successful cricket match in the past, when an eleven from the “Rhine” was victorious; and it suggested that, during the present visit of our vessel, a return match might be played. We talked the matter over, and I said:“Of course you will accept.”But the Treasure answered:“You see there is always one great difficulty with black cricketers. They have a theory you cannot play the game properly in clothes, and they get themselves up for a match much the same as we should if we were going swimming.”“Why, last time we played,” continued the Model Man, “only one man had anything you could fairly call raiment. He came on to the pitch with what he regarded as a pair of cocoanut-fibre trousers, and his team made him captain upon the strength of them.”I said:“If they prefer to play undraped, I don’t see that it much matters to us.”“as if they weregoing in swimming.”“Not personally, but a mixed audience cannot be expected to stand it,” replied the Treasure. “We play cricket in St. Thomas upon a very public and central piece of ground, and, at one time, everybody used to turn out and watch the matches; but now, owing to the barbarous reasons I have given you, cricket has fallen into disrepute. Of course, to see an eleven taking the field in a state of nature makes dead against civilisation and human progress.”Finally, the Model Man wrote to say that it would give him great pleasure to bring a team to the ground upon the following morning if the local talent promised to wear clothes. “My eleven will absolutely refuse to play against anybody in the nude,” he wound up.An hour later a negro in a boat paddled out to us with an answer. He hailed us, and we asked him if his people would accept our terms.“Yes, massa, we all put fings on, but we much sooner play cricket widdout.”“Nonsense,” shouted back the Model Man. “Cricket is a civilised game, and must be followed in a civilised way, or not at all. We will be on the ground at ten o’clock.”The messenger rowed off, and a great discussion began as to the constitution of our team. Everybody wanted to go to the match, and sit in the shade and look on and criticise, but no one much cared about playing. The Captain of the “Rhine” absolutely refused, to begin with. He said:“I would do anything for my officers—anything in reason; but cricket is out of the question. I shall, however, be on the ground with some ladies. A good appreciative audience is everything in these cases. Moreover, I will umpire if the tide turns against us.”The Treasure only consented to play after much pressure. He said:“You know what the wicket is like; it’s simply mountainous,and black men have no control over their bowling. For you medium-sized chaps it may be comparatively safe, but bowling at me is like bowling at a haystack—you cannot miss. When I go in, the blacks never bother about the stumps, but just let fly at random on the chance of winging me. Last match here, I hit their crack fast bowler all over the island, and he got mad at last, and gave up attempting to bowl me, but just tried to kill me.”“You scored off him, though,” said our Fourth Officer, who remembered the incident.“nearly knocked a limb off him.”“I did,” admitted the Treasure. “I slapped one straight back, as hard as ever I could lay in to it, and he funked it, and tried to get out of the way and failed. I nearly knocked a limb off him, and then he abandoned the ball, and went and sulked and chattered to himself in the deep field.”The Doctor said it would give him great pleasure to play, but he added that he should feel very averse to bowling against anybody with nothing on. Then the Model Man answered:“You need not fear. The negroes are very particular about pads and such things. They don’t wear shoes, for nothing could hurt their feet, but they never dream of batting without leg-guards, because a nigger’s shins are his weak spot. These fellows are not much good at cricket after you have once hit them hard. Either they get cross and throw up the whole thing, and leave the ground and go home to their families, or else they become frightened and servile. I have known them almost beg for mercy before each ball.”“You’ll play, of course,” said the Fourth Officer to me.“Certainly, if you will,” I answered. Then he replied:“I shall undoubtedly play. I’m not a man who does much with the bat, but my bowling is rather out of the common. I have a natural leg-break which baffles fellows frightfully. Why, there was a question raised once about playing me for my county.”I did not ask him which county, because one should never goad a willing horse. The Fourth Officer had been in a thoroughly mendacious vein ever since we left St. Kitts; the fault grew upon him, and now he began to utter transparent inaccuracies at all hours, from sheer love of them.After much argument and conversation, our team was finally selected, the last man chosen being a black stoker of great size and strength.“I regard him as a speculation,” explained the Captain of our side; “either he will get out first ball or make a hundred. There are no half-measures with him.”As we approached the ground on the following morning, our Model Man confided to me a great source of anxiety. This was the fielding. He said:“You see, men don’t mind batting, but they get very unsportsmanlike when it comes to going out into the field. Some actually hide, or pretend they have engagements; others feign illness and retire; others, again, salve their miserable consciences by paying a negro a shilling to go and field for them. I only mention this. I know you’re not the man to do such things; but, between ourselves, I fear the Doctor is just a sort of chap to escape fielding. There are others also I must keep an eye upon. Being captain of a scratch cricket team in the Tropics is no light task, I can tell you.”A considerable crowd had gathered to see the conflict. The negroes sat and lolled round the ground, while, behind them, buggies and horsemen were drawn up. Conspicuous in that gay throng appeared the Captain of the “Rhine,” seated on a brown horse, amid female equestrians. Beyond the audience rose a belt of tamarind and flamboyant trees, the latter with gigantic green and brown seed-pods hanging from their branches; and above these woods, sloping upwards to the blue sky, extended the hills, with winding roads, visible here and there through the foliage that covered them, and with many a flagstaff and white cottage scattered upon their sides.“nibbled the bails.”The ground itself suggested golf rather than cricket. Here and there a little dried-up grass occurred, but it collected in lonely tufts, between which extended great ravines and hillocks and boulders andpatches of desolation. Upon a barren spot in the middle, the wickets had been pitched. When we arrived, they appeared to be an object of no little interest to sundry goats. These beasts evidently regarding the stumps as some strange new form of vegetation, sprang up in a single night from the arid soil, sauntered round them enquiringly, and a shabby he-goat, braver than his companions, nibbled the bails.Our opponents, adequately attired, had arrived. They constituted a motley, good-humoured gathering in all shades. One, John Smith, a genial hybrid, commanded them, and presently a great shout arose, when it transpired that he had secured choice of innings. The Doctor said, in a tone of reproof:“Hang it, John, you’ve only won the toss. You couldn’t make a bigger row if you’d won the match.”john smith.“Great fing to go in fus, sar,” explained John; “we go in fus now, when we’s fresh.”Then the Model Man led out his warriors.I sauntered across the pitch with the Treasure, and examined its peculiarities. We were discussing a curious geological formation, midway between the wickets, when our Fourth Officer approached in some glee at a great discovery. He had found a little hill, rather wide of the stumps,on one side, and he explained that whenever he dropped a ball on this elevation, he must bowl an Ethiop.“You see, my natural leg-break will take the ball dead into the wicket every time,” he said.We hoped it might be so; and he begged us to keep the thing a profound secret, because, as he said, if it got about that we were going to utilise this hill to such an extent, the enemy would probably send out and have it removed, or alter the pitch.“driven back a trifle.”After the goats cleared away, and the juvenile spectators driven back a trifle, our Model Man arranged his field. More correctly speaking, the field arranged itself. Indeed, our team hardly proved as amenable as might have been wished. The Doctor insisted on taking long-leg and long-oft.“Why?” asked his Captain, looking rather distrustfully at a buggy with some red parasols in it, which would be extremely close to the Doctor at long-leg.“It isn’t that, old chap,” replied our physician, cheerfully, following the Model Man’s eye. “In fact, I’m not sure if I even know those girls. I only suggested a place in the long field because I’m a safe catch. That’s important.”So he had his way.Meantime, the Treasure found some other parasols—white ones—and placed himself within easy chatting distance. Investigation proved that the white parasols were protecting the Enchantress and her mother. The Model Man said that he might just as well be on the ship as there. So he ordered his man upto take the wicket. The Treasure came reluctantly, and absolutely declined to keep wicket. He declared that it was simple murder to make a person of his size attempt such a thing on such a ground.He led me aside privately, and said:“Look here, you know that walking-stick of mine, manufactured from a shark’s backbone—the one you are always worrying me to give you? Well, I will, when we go back to the ship, if you’ll take the wicket. If you fall at your post, then your heirs shall have it.”I closed on this bargain promptly, and while I dressed up in all sorts of life-saving inventions used at cricket, the Treasure took an unobtrusive, circuitous route back to the white parasols.John Smith himself and another negro, who was said to be related to him by marriage, came in first. They were padded up to the eyes, and evidently felt the importance of their position. Then a black umpire said: “Play, gem’men,” and our Fourth Officer started with his world-famed, natural leg-break. He bowled three wides in succession as a preliminary. It is not easy to bowl wides underhand, but that Fourth Officer managed it; and I began to understand why, after all, his county had determined to struggle along without him.“What’s the matter, old man?” asked our Captain, who was fielding at short-slip.“It’s all right, old chap; you wait,” answered the Fourth Officer, full of confidence.“Yes, quite so, but they count one against us every time. I didn’t know whether you knew it,” explained the Model Man.Meantime the bowler made further futile attempts to drop the ball upon the mound he had discovered. At last he actually did do so, but instead of breaking in and taking a wicket, as we, who were in the secret, hoped, the batsman got hold of it, and hit it high and hard to long-leg. All eyes turned to see if the Doctor’s estimate of his own powers at a catch was justified. But he had disappeared entirely. He had not even left a substitute. Everybody shouted with dismay, and then the Doctor suddenly bounded on to the field. He distinctly came out of the buggy, from between the red parasols. If he had not actually known those girls, he must have introduced himself, or prevailed upon somebody else to do so. He tore into the scene of action, looking for the ball.“It’s in the air, you fool,” yelled a dozen voices. Then it fell within a yard of the Doctor. A child could have caught it. We were all quite unsettled. The Model Man said:“I’m not a bit surprised—it’s just what I expected.”And the Fourth Officer said:“I don’t really see what good it is my bowling for catches at long-leg if there’s no long-leg.”And the Doctor said:“Wouldn’t have done it for money. Hadn’t the faintest idea you’d started. I saw you bowling balls all over the place, miles away from the wicket, and I thought you were merely practising.” Which was rather an unpleasant thing for the Fourth Officer to hear.“a black umpire.”Then the game steadied down and proceeded. Our Captain took the ball, after the underhand expert had got a few within sight of the wicket, and so finished his over. The Model Man was much more successful, for he clean-bowled a negro with his third delivery. It pitched in a sort of mountain-pass, about ten feet from the wicket; then it branched off to the right and hit a stone, and came back again, and finally took the off stump. I don’t see how anybody alive could have played it. The batsman retired utterly bewildered, and the Model Man assured me he had never sent down a better ball.A slogger came in next, and made runs rather rapidly, but nothing much happened until the Fourth Officer’s third over. Then he fell foul of me, and took exception to my method of keeping the wicket. He was being hit about pretty generally, and had become very hot, so, at another time, I should not have retorted upon him; but, when he spoke, I was hot too, and being hit about also, so I answered without deliberation. He said:“Can’t you even try to stump them?”And I replied:“I might, if my arms were ten feet long.”Then he said:“You’ve had dozens of chances. I always want a wicket-keeper for my bowling.”Whereupon I answered:“You want twenty—in a row. One’s no good.”He said:“You don’t like standing up to my fast ones, that’s the truth.”And I responded:“Oh, bless you, I’d stand up to them all right, if I knewwhereto stand. A wicket-keeper’s supposed to keep the wicket, not run all over the ground after wides.”“refreshments were being sold.”During this unseemly argument, the Model Man, the Treasure, and the Doctor were all having an unpleasantness on their own account. The Doctor was imploring our Captain to take himself off and let somebody else bowl. He said: “Can’t you see they’ve collared you? They’ve scored twenty runs. Don’t think thatIwant to go on. Far from it. I’m only speaking for the good of the side.”But the Model Man refused to leave off bowling for anybody. He emphatically denied that they had collared him. Then he changed the subject, and turned upon the Treasure, and asked him where he supposed he was fielding.The Treasure answered:“This is mid-on. I’m all right.”“You may think it’s mid-on, but it isn’t,” shouted back the worried Model Man. “I’ve no doubt you’re all right,” he continued, bitterly, “but you’re no sportsman.”After twenty more runs had been scored, the Fourth Officer unexpectedly and frankly admitted that he was not in form. He relinquished the ball, and said he had the makings of a sunstroke about his head, and went off to field among a few friends in a patch of shade under a tree, where all kinds of refreshments werebeing sold. Then our Captain held a consultation, and determined to try a complete change in the attack. He called upon the Doctor and the Treasure, and told them just to bowl quietly and carefully, and as straight as possible.The Treasure started with yorkers; which was about the most effective thing he could have done, for, whenever he got one on the wicket, it bowled a black man. Two negroes, including the slogger, fell to him in his first over. Then the Doctor tried his hand, and began by being absurdly particular about the field. He put five men in the slips, and then started with terrifically fast full pitches to leg. A good player would have hit one and all of these right out of the island into the sea, but the people who were now at the wickets merely got out of the way, and let the Doctor’s deliveries proceed to the boundary for three byes each.Upon this he insulted me, as the Fourth Officer had done before him. He said:“Do stand up to them, old man.”I said:“Why should I? I’m out to enjoy myself. I’m a human being, not a target. Besides, long-stop will lose interest in the game if he has nothing to do.”“They don’t have long-stops in first-class cricket,” grumbled the Doctor. “You’ve got no proper pride.”Then I said:“Of course, if you are mistaking this display for first-class cricket, it’s no good arguing with you.”In his second over the Doctor bowled a shade straighter, and began knocking the batsmen about, and hurting them and frightening them. If they had only kept in front of the wicket, and put their bats between their legs out of the way, they might have been safe enough, but they dashed nervously about and tried to escape; and the ball would shoot and hit their toes, or rise and threaten their heads, or break back into their stomachs. Then the bowler got a man “retired hurt,” and a regular panic set in.“I’m keeping down the run-getting, anyhow,” said the elated Doctor.“Yes, and you’ll have to mend all these local celebrities for nothing after the match,” replied our Treasure.The latter had taken several more wickets, and now the score stood at sixty, with three further blacks to bat. About this time I made an appeal to the umpire upon a question of stumping aman, but he had his back turned and was buying a piece of sugarcane. He apologised profusely. He said:“I’se too sorry, Massa, jus’ too sorry, but I’se dam hungry, Sar.”Hungry! Whoever heard of an umpire being hungry? Thirsty they may be, and generally are, but hunger is a paltry plea to raise.Soon afterwards, our black stoker made two brilliant catches, one after the other, the Treasure quickly bowled their last man, and the innings closed for seventy-three runs.“black stoker made twobrilliant catches.”Then the rival teams scattered through St. Thomas for luncheon, the spectators dispersed, and the goats had the cricket ground all to themselves until the afternoon.Some lively betting took place during our meal. The Model Man was gloomy, and doubted the ability of his eleven to make the necessary score on such a wicket; but the Doctor appeared extremely sanguine, and the Fourth Officer actually guaranteed half the runs himself. He said:“Though not a finished bat, yet it often happens that I come off with the willow when I fail with the leather.”It struck me that if his success with one was proportionate to his failure with the other, there seemed just reason for hoping he would get into three figures that afternoon.Our Captain grew very anxious about the order of going in. Finally, he determined to start with the black stoker and me. He said:“You play steadily and cautiously and let him hit. If it chances to be his day, we may, after all, win with ten wickets in hand. Stranger things have happened at cricket.”“Not many,” I replied; “but we will do our best.”Our best, unfortunately, did not amount to much. The match was resumed at half-past three, before an increased gathering of onlookers; and three distinct rounds of applause greeted the gigantic stoker and me as we marched to the wickets. It proveda fortunate thing that we got the applause then, because we might have missed it later. My own innings, for instance, did not afford the smallest loophole for enthusiasm at any time.“somewhere in the small ribs.”The black certainly began well. He hit the first ball he received clean out of the ground for six runs, but the second ball retaliated and smote him direfully somewhere in the small ribs. Thereupon, he fell down and rolled twenty yards to allay the agony, after which he rose up and withdrew, declaring that he had met his death, and that no power on earth would induce him to bat again. These negroes never forget an injury of this kind. If our black stoker lives over to-morrow, he will probably collect his colleagues from the ship, and row ashore by night and seek out the local bowler, and make it very unrestful and exciting for him.The Model Man now came in, but he had the misfortune to lose my assistance almost immediately. I was caught at short leg after a patient innings of ten, slightly marred, however, by about the same number of chances. The Fourth Officer took my place. He began by nearly running out his Captain. If point had not stopped to dance and rub his leg, the wicket must have fallen. Then the new-comer settled down and played with great care, and irritated the bowlers extremely by giving them advice and criticising their efforts. Once they sent him so slow a ball that it never reached the wicket at all. Then our Fourth Officer rushed out and hit it after it had stopped, and so, rather ingeniously, scored two. It was a revolutionary sort of stroke, and the umpire said it must not be counted, but the batsman insisted upon having the runs put down. Of course, to argue with any umpire is madness. This black one simply waited for the next over, and then gave our Fourth Officer out “leg before.” There was a great argument, but the umpire’s ruling had to be upheld, and thebatsman retired, declaring that he would never play cricket with savages again as long as he lived. He said:“In the first place the ball was a wide, and in the second, after breaking a yard and a half, it hit my elbow. Then that black ass gives me out ‘leg before.’ It’s sickening. Emancipation is the biggest error of the century. I’m going back to the ship.” But he did not. He found something under a yellow parasol that comforted him.The Doctor came in next, and hit the first ball he received over the bowler’s head for three. Encouraged by this success, he ran half across the ground to the next one, missed it, and would have been stumped under ordinary circumstances, but the ball, instead of going to the wicket-keeper, shunted off at a sort of junction, and proceeded to short-slip. He, desiring the honour of defeating the Doctor, would not give the ball up, and tried to put the wicket down himself. This the outraged custodian of the stumps refused to permit, and while they were wrangling about it, and the rest of the team were screaming directions, our batsman galloped safely back amidst loud applause.“there was a great argument.”We made fifty-eight for four wickets, the Model Man being the next to succumb. He had performed well, in something approaching style, for thirty runs. After him came the Treasure. He played forward very tamely at everything, until a ball suddenly got up and skinned two of his knuckles. Then he grew excited, and began hitting very hard, and making runs at a tremendous pace.Meanwhile the Doctor, finding his wicket still intact, suddenly became enthusiastic and took extraordinary interest in his innings. Between each ball he marched about the pitch and grubbed uptufts of grass and threw away stones, and patted the different elevations and acclivities with his bat. But he might just as well have patted the Alps, or any other mountain range. He hit a fast ball straight up into the air, when only five or six runs were wanted to win the match. It was one of those awkward, lofty hits that half the field can get to, if they only look alive. In this case, four negroes were all waiting to secure him, so the Doctor escaped again. Then, evidently under the impression that he bore a charmed life, he began taking great liberties, and pulling straight balls and strolling about out of his ground, and so forth. Finally, amid some intricate manœuvres, he jumped on to his own wicket, and retired well pleased with his performance. The Treasure went on hitting and being hit for a few minutes longer; then he made the winning stroke, and the contest came to a happy conclusion.With one or two exceptions, everybody had much enjoyed the match; and that night, I recollect, we sat and smoked late on the deck of the “Rhine,” fought our battle once more, explained our theories of cricket to one another, and agreed that it was a great and grand amusement.“But,” said the Fourth Officer, “it is not a pastime in which your nigger will ever excel. He cannot learn the rules, let alone play the game.”“No,” I answered, “he does not excel at it, because, ‘unstable as water,’ the Ethiopian will never excel at anything; but he does quite as well as one might have expected, and, if he had a better ground, might play a better game.”Certainly that cricket ground requires attention. To level it, though doubtless an engineering feat, should not be impossible. If an earthquake could be arranged, it might leave a surface for steam rollers to begin working upon; but no mere patching or tinkering will answer the purpose. Something definite and drastic and colossal must be done to the cricket ground we played on at St. Thomas before it can become fairly worthy of the name.R M BallantyneMy First Book.By R. M. Ballantyne.Illustrations by Geo. Hutchinson.(Photographs by Messrs. Fradelle & Young.)Having been asked to give some account of the commencement of my literary career, I begin by remarking that my first book was not a tale or “story-book,” but a free-and-easy record of personal adventure and every-day life in those wild regions of North America which are known, variously, as Rupert’s Land—The Hudson’s Bay Territory—The Nor’ West, and “The Great Lone Land.”“where i wrote my first book.”(A Sketch by the Author.)The record was never meant to see the light in the form of a book. It was written solely for the eye of my mother, but, as it may be said that it was the means of leading me ultimately into the path of my life-work, and was penned under somewhat peculiar circumstances, it may not be out of place to refer to it particularly here.The circumstances were as follows:—After having spent about six years in the wild Nor’ West, as a servant of the Hudson’s Bay Fur Company, I found myself, one summer—at the advanced age of twenty-two—in charge of an outpost on the uninhabited northern shores of the gulf of St. Lawrence named Seven Islands. It was a dreary, desolate spot; at thattime far beyond the bounds of civilisation. The gulf, just opposite the establishment, was about fifty miles broad. The ships which passed up and down it were invisible, not only on account of distance, but because of seven islands at the mouth of the bay coming between them and the outpost. My next neighbour, in command of a similar post up the gulf, was about seventy miles distant. The nearest house down the gulf was about eighty miles off, and behind us lay the virgin forests, with swamps, lakes, prairies, and mountains, stretching away without break right across the continent to the Pacific Ocean.mr. ballantyne’s house at harrow.The outpost—which, in virtue of a ship’s carronade and a flagstaff, was occasionally styled a “fort”—consisted of four wooden buildings. One of these—the largest, with a verandah—was the Residency. There was an offshoot in rear which served as a kitchen. The other houses were a store for goods wherewith to carry on trade with the Indians, a stable, and a workshop. The whole population of the establishment—indeed of the surrounding district—consisted of myself and one man—also a horse! The horse occupied the stable, I dwelt in the Residency, the rest of the population lived in the kitchen.There were, indeed, other five men belonging to the establishment, but these did not affect its desolation, for they were away netting salmon at a river about twenty miles distant at the time I write of.My “Friday”—who was a French-Canadian—being cook, as well as man-of-all-works, found a little occupation in attending to the duties of his office, but the unfortunate Governor had nothing whatever to do except await the arrival of Indians, who were not due at that time. The horse was a bad one, without a saddle, and in possession of a pronounced backbone. My “Friday” was not sociable. I had no books, no newspapers, no magazines or literature of any kind, no game to shoot, no boat wherewith to prosecute fishing in the bay, and no prospect of seeing any one to speak to for weeks, if not months, to come. But I had pen and ink, and, by great good fortune, was in possession of a blank paper book fully an inch thick.These, then, were the circumstances in which I began my first book.When that book was finished, and, not long afterwards, submitted to the—I need hardly say favourable—criticism of my mother, I had not the most distant idea of taking to authorship as a profession. Even when a printer-cousin, seeing the MS., offered to print it, and the well-known Blackwood, of Edinburgh, seeing the book, offered to publish it—and did publish it—my ambition was still so absolutely asleep that I did not again put pen to paper inthatway for eight years thereafter, although I might have been encouraged thereto by the fact that this first book—named “Hudson’s Bay”—besides being a commercial success, received favourable notice from the press.It was not until the year 1854 that my literary path was opened up. At that time I was a partner in the late publishing firm of Constable & Co. of Edinburgh. Happening one day to meet with the late William Nelson, publisher, I was asked by him how I should like the idea of taking to literature as a profession. My answer I forget. It must have been vague, for I had never thought of the subject before.“Well,” said he, “what would you think of trying to write a story?”Somewhat amused, I replied that I did not know what to think, but I would try if he wished me to do so.“Do so,” said he, “and go to work at once”—or words to that effect.I went to work at once, and wrote my first story or work of fiction. It was published in 1855 under the name of “Snowflakes and Sunbeams; or, The Young Furtraders.” Afterwards the first part of the title was dropped, and the book is now known as “The Young Furtraders.” From that day to this I have lived by making story-books for young folk.the hall.From what I have said it will be seen that I have never aimed at the achieving of this position, and I hope that it is not presumptuous in me to think—and to derive much comfort from the thought—that God led me into the particular path along which I have walked for so many years.The scene of my first story was naturally laid in those backwoods with which I was familiar, and the story itself was foundedon the adventures and experiences of myself and my companions. When a second book was required of me, I stuck to the same regions, but changed the locality. When casting about in my mind for a suitable subject, I happened to meet with an old retired “Nor’wester” who had spent an adventurous life in Rupert’s Land. Among other duties he had been sent to establish an outpost of the Hudson Bay Company at Ungava Bay, one of the most dreary parts of a desolate region. On hearing what I wanted he sat down and wrote a long narrative of his proceedings there, which he placed at my disposal, and thus furnished me with the foundation of “Ungava.”But now I had reached the end of my tether, and when a third story was wanted I was compelled to seek new fields of adventure in the books of travellers. Regarding the Southern seas as the most romantic part of the world—after the backwoods!—I mentally and spiritually plunged into those warm waters, and the dive resulted in the “Coral Island.”It now began to be borne in upon me that there was something not quite satisfactory in describing, expatiating on, and energising in, regions which one has never seen. For one thing, it was needful to be always carefully on the watch to avoid falling into mistakes geographical, topographical, natural-historical, and otherwise.For instance, despite the utmost care of which I was capable while studying up for the “Coral Island,” I fell into a blunder through ignorance in regard to a familiar fruit. I was under the impression that cocoanuts grew on their trees in the same form as that in which they are usually presented to us in grocers’ windows—namely, about the size of a large fist with three spots at one end. Learning from trustworthy books that at a certain stage of development the nut contains a delicious beverage like lemonade, I sent one of my heroes up a tree for a nut, through the shell of which he bored a hole with a penknife. It was not till long after the story was published that my own brother—who had voyaged in Southern seas—wrote to draw my attention to the fact that the cocoanut is nearly as large as a man’s head, and its outer husk is over an inch thick, so that no ordinary penknife could bore to its interior! Of course I should have known this, and, perhaps, should be ashamed of my ignorance, but, somehow, I’m not!I admit that this was a slip, but such, and other slips, hardly justify the remark that some people have not hesitated to make, namely, that I have a tendency to draw the long bow. I feelalmost sensitive on this point, for I have always laboured to be true to nature and to fact even in my wildest flights of fancy.This reminds me of the remark made to myself once by a lady in reference to this same “Coral Island.” “There is one thing, Mr. Ballantyne,” she said, “which I really find it hard to believe. You make one of your three boys dive into a clear pool, go to the bottom, and then, turning on his back, look up and wink and laugh at the other two.”trophies from mr. ballantyne’s travels.“No, no, not ‘laugh,’” said I, remonstratively.“Well, then, you make him smile.”“Ah, that is true, but there is a vast difference between laughing and smiling under water. But is it not singular that you should doubt the only incident in the story which I personally verified? I happened to be in lodgings at the seaside while writing that story, and, after penning the passage you refer to, Iwent down to the shore, pulled off my clothes, dived to the bottom, turned on my back, and, looking up, I smiled and winked.”The lady laughed, but I have never been quite sure, from the tone of that laugh, whether it was a laugh of conviction or of unbelief. It is not improbable that my fair friend’s mental constitution may have been somewhat similar to that of the old woman who declined to believe her sailor-grandson when he told her he had seen flying-fish, but at once recognised his veracity when he said he had seen the remains of Pharaoh’s chariot wheels on the shores of the Red Sea.the dining room.Recognising, then, the difficulties of my position, I formed the resolution to visit—when possible—the scenes in which my stories were laid; converse with the people who, under modification, were to form thedramatis personæof the tales, and, generally, to obtain information in each case, as far as lay in my power, from the fountain head.Thus, when about to begin “The Lifeboat,” I went to Ramsgate, and, for some time, was hand and glove with Jarman, theheroic coxswain of the Ramsgate boat, a lion-like as well as lion-hearted man, who rescued hundreds of lives from the fatal Goodwin Sands during his career. In like manner, when getting up information for “The Lighthouse,” I obtained permission from the Commissioners of Northern Lights to visit the Bell Rock Lighthouse, where I hobnobbed with the three keepers of that celebrated pillar-in-the-sea for three weeks, and read Stevenson’s graphic account of the building of the structure in the library, or visitors’ room, just under the lantern. I was absolutely a prisoner there during those three weeks, for no boats ever came near us, and it need scarcely be said that ships kept well out of our way. By good fortune there came on a pretty stiff gale at the time, and Stevenson’s thrilling narrative was read to the tune of whistling winds and roaring seas, many of which latter sent the spray right up to the lantern and caused the building, more than once, to quiver to its foundation.the study.In order to do justice to “Fighting the Flames” I careered through the streets of London on fire-engines, clad in a pea-jacketand a black leather helmet of the Salvage Corps. This, to enable me to pass the cordon of police without question—though not without recognition, as was made apparent to me on one occasion at a fire by a fireman whispering confidentially, “I know whatyouare, sir, you’re a hamitoor!”
zola at work.
Like all Southerners, Zola helps out his voice with frequent gestures; but he has none of the exuberant eloquence of his race. In society he is still, to a certain degree, and must always remain the victim of bashfulness; and his one attempt at public speaking was a complete failure. He has in him nothing of the boulevardier, and he is happy only when at work. Enforced idleness would mean misery to him.
By Scott Rankin.
RUDYARD KIPLING.
“the light that failed.”
By Eden Phillpotts.
Illustrations by Geo. Hutchinson.
After the “Rhine” had been anchored in the harbour of St. Thomas, West Indies, for the space of two days, our First Officer, more generally known in these records as the Model Man, received a rather remarkable communication. It was a letter from a black sportsman, who issued a challenge to our ship on behalf of a local club. This note reminded the Model Man of a most successful cricket match in the past, when an eleven from the “Rhine” was victorious; and it suggested that, during the present visit of our vessel, a return match might be played. We talked the matter over, and I said:
“Of course you will accept.”
But the Treasure answered:
“You see there is always one great difficulty with black cricketers. They have a theory you cannot play the game properly in clothes, and they get themselves up for a match much the same as we should if we were going swimming.”
“Why, last time we played,” continued the Model Man, “only one man had anything you could fairly call raiment. He came on to the pitch with what he regarded as a pair of cocoanut-fibre trousers, and his team made him captain upon the strength of them.”
I said:
“If they prefer to play undraped, I don’t see that it much matters to us.”
“as if they weregoing in swimming.”
“Not personally, but a mixed audience cannot be expected to stand it,” replied the Treasure. “We play cricket in St. Thomas upon a very public and central piece of ground, and, at one time, everybody used to turn out and watch the matches; but now, owing to the barbarous reasons I have given you, cricket has fallen into disrepute. Of course, to see an eleven taking the field in a state of nature makes dead against civilisation and human progress.”
Finally, the Model Man wrote to say that it would give him great pleasure to bring a team to the ground upon the following morning if the local talent promised to wear clothes. “My eleven will absolutely refuse to play against anybody in the nude,” he wound up.
An hour later a negro in a boat paddled out to us with an answer. He hailed us, and we asked him if his people would accept our terms.
“Yes, massa, we all put fings on, but we much sooner play cricket widdout.”
“Nonsense,” shouted back the Model Man. “Cricket is a civilised game, and must be followed in a civilised way, or not at all. We will be on the ground at ten o’clock.”
The messenger rowed off, and a great discussion began as to the constitution of our team. Everybody wanted to go to the match, and sit in the shade and look on and criticise, but no one much cared about playing. The Captain of the “Rhine” absolutely refused, to begin with. He said:
“I would do anything for my officers—anything in reason; but cricket is out of the question. I shall, however, be on the ground with some ladies. A good appreciative audience is everything in these cases. Moreover, I will umpire if the tide turns against us.”
The Treasure only consented to play after much pressure. He said:
“You know what the wicket is like; it’s simply mountainous,and black men have no control over their bowling. For you medium-sized chaps it may be comparatively safe, but bowling at me is like bowling at a haystack—you cannot miss. When I go in, the blacks never bother about the stumps, but just let fly at random on the chance of winging me. Last match here, I hit their crack fast bowler all over the island, and he got mad at last, and gave up attempting to bowl me, but just tried to kill me.”
“You scored off him, though,” said our Fourth Officer, who remembered the incident.
“nearly knocked a limb off him.”
“I did,” admitted the Treasure. “I slapped one straight back, as hard as ever I could lay in to it, and he funked it, and tried to get out of the way and failed. I nearly knocked a limb off him, and then he abandoned the ball, and went and sulked and chattered to himself in the deep field.”
The Doctor said it would give him great pleasure to play, but he added that he should feel very averse to bowling against anybody with nothing on. Then the Model Man answered:
“You need not fear. The negroes are very particular about pads and such things. They don’t wear shoes, for nothing could hurt their feet, but they never dream of batting without leg-guards, because a nigger’s shins are his weak spot. These fellows are not much good at cricket after you have once hit them hard. Either they get cross and throw up the whole thing, and leave the ground and go home to their families, or else they become frightened and servile. I have known them almost beg for mercy before each ball.”
“You’ll play, of course,” said the Fourth Officer to me.
“Certainly, if you will,” I answered. Then he replied:
“I shall undoubtedly play. I’m not a man who does much with the bat, but my bowling is rather out of the common. I have a natural leg-break which baffles fellows frightfully. Why, there was a question raised once about playing me for my county.”
I did not ask him which county, because one should never goad a willing horse. The Fourth Officer had been in a thoroughly mendacious vein ever since we left St. Kitts; the fault grew upon him, and now he began to utter transparent inaccuracies at all hours, from sheer love of them.
After much argument and conversation, our team was finally selected, the last man chosen being a black stoker of great size and strength.
“I regard him as a speculation,” explained the Captain of our side; “either he will get out first ball or make a hundred. There are no half-measures with him.”
As we approached the ground on the following morning, our Model Man confided to me a great source of anxiety. This was the fielding. He said:
“You see, men don’t mind batting, but they get very unsportsmanlike when it comes to going out into the field. Some actually hide, or pretend they have engagements; others feign illness and retire; others, again, salve their miserable consciences by paying a negro a shilling to go and field for them. I only mention this. I know you’re not the man to do such things; but, between ourselves, I fear the Doctor is just a sort of chap to escape fielding. There are others also I must keep an eye upon. Being captain of a scratch cricket team in the Tropics is no light task, I can tell you.”
A considerable crowd had gathered to see the conflict. The negroes sat and lolled round the ground, while, behind them, buggies and horsemen were drawn up. Conspicuous in that gay throng appeared the Captain of the “Rhine,” seated on a brown horse, amid female equestrians. Beyond the audience rose a belt of tamarind and flamboyant trees, the latter with gigantic green and brown seed-pods hanging from their branches; and above these woods, sloping upwards to the blue sky, extended the hills, with winding roads, visible here and there through the foliage that covered them, and with many a flagstaff and white cottage scattered upon their sides.
“nibbled the bails.”
The ground itself suggested golf rather than cricket. Here and there a little dried-up grass occurred, but it collected in lonely tufts, between which extended great ravines and hillocks and boulders andpatches of desolation. Upon a barren spot in the middle, the wickets had been pitched. When we arrived, they appeared to be an object of no little interest to sundry goats. These beasts evidently regarding the stumps as some strange new form of vegetation, sprang up in a single night from the arid soil, sauntered round them enquiringly, and a shabby he-goat, braver than his companions, nibbled the bails.
Our opponents, adequately attired, had arrived. They constituted a motley, good-humoured gathering in all shades. One, John Smith, a genial hybrid, commanded them, and presently a great shout arose, when it transpired that he had secured choice of innings. The Doctor said, in a tone of reproof:
“Hang it, John, you’ve only won the toss. You couldn’t make a bigger row if you’d won the match.”
john smith.
“Great fing to go in fus, sar,” explained John; “we go in fus now, when we’s fresh.”
Then the Model Man led out his warriors.
I sauntered across the pitch with the Treasure, and examined its peculiarities. We were discussing a curious geological formation, midway between the wickets, when our Fourth Officer approached in some glee at a great discovery. He had found a little hill, rather wide of the stumps,on one side, and he explained that whenever he dropped a ball on this elevation, he must bowl an Ethiop.
“You see, my natural leg-break will take the ball dead into the wicket every time,” he said.
We hoped it might be so; and he begged us to keep the thing a profound secret, because, as he said, if it got about that we were going to utilise this hill to such an extent, the enemy would probably send out and have it removed, or alter the pitch.
“driven back a trifle.”
After the goats cleared away, and the juvenile spectators driven back a trifle, our Model Man arranged his field. More correctly speaking, the field arranged itself. Indeed, our team hardly proved as amenable as might have been wished. The Doctor insisted on taking long-leg and long-oft.
“Why?” asked his Captain, looking rather distrustfully at a buggy with some red parasols in it, which would be extremely close to the Doctor at long-leg.
“It isn’t that, old chap,” replied our physician, cheerfully, following the Model Man’s eye. “In fact, I’m not sure if I even know those girls. I only suggested a place in the long field because I’m a safe catch. That’s important.”
So he had his way.
Meantime, the Treasure found some other parasols—white ones—and placed himself within easy chatting distance. Investigation proved that the white parasols were protecting the Enchantress and her mother. The Model Man said that he might just as well be on the ship as there. So he ordered his man upto take the wicket. The Treasure came reluctantly, and absolutely declined to keep wicket. He declared that it was simple murder to make a person of his size attempt such a thing on such a ground.
He led me aside privately, and said:
“Look here, you know that walking-stick of mine, manufactured from a shark’s backbone—the one you are always worrying me to give you? Well, I will, when we go back to the ship, if you’ll take the wicket. If you fall at your post, then your heirs shall have it.”
I closed on this bargain promptly, and while I dressed up in all sorts of life-saving inventions used at cricket, the Treasure took an unobtrusive, circuitous route back to the white parasols.
John Smith himself and another negro, who was said to be related to him by marriage, came in first. They were padded up to the eyes, and evidently felt the importance of their position. Then a black umpire said: “Play, gem’men,” and our Fourth Officer started with his world-famed, natural leg-break. He bowled three wides in succession as a preliminary. It is not easy to bowl wides underhand, but that Fourth Officer managed it; and I began to understand why, after all, his county had determined to struggle along without him.
“What’s the matter, old man?” asked our Captain, who was fielding at short-slip.
“It’s all right, old chap; you wait,” answered the Fourth Officer, full of confidence.
“Yes, quite so, but they count one against us every time. I didn’t know whether you knew it,” explained the Model Man.
Meantime the bowler made further futile attempts to drop the ball upon the mound he had discovered. At last he actually did do so, but instead of breaking in and taking a wicket, as we, who were in the secret, hoped, the batsman got hold of it, and hit it high and hard to long-leg. All eyes turned to see if the Doctor’s estimate of his own powers at a catch was justified. But he had disappeared entirely. He had not even left a substitute. Everybody shouted with dismay, and then the Doctor suddenly bounded on to the field. He distinctly came out of the buggy, from between the red parasols. If he had not actually known those girls, he must have introduced himself, or prevailed upon somebody else to do so. He tore into the scene of action, looking for the ball.
“It’s in the air, you fool,” yelled a dozen voices. Then it fell within a yard of the Doctor. A child could have caught it. We were all quite unsettled. The Model Man said:
“I’m not a bit surprised—it’s just what I expected.”
And the Fourth Officer said:
“I don’t really see what good it is my bowling for catches at long-leg if there’s no long-leg.”
And the Doctor said:
“Wouldn’t have done it for money. Hadn’t the faintest idea you’d started. I saw you bowling balls all over the place, miles away from the wicket, and I thought you were merely practising.” Which was rather an unpleasant thing for the Fourth Officer to hear.
“a black umpire.”
Then the game steadied down and proceeded. Our Captain took the ball, after the underhand expert had got a few within sight of the wicket, and so finished his over. The Model Man was much more successful, for he clean-bowled a negro with his third delivery. It pitched in a sort of mountain-pass, about ten feet from the wicket; then it branched off to the right and hit a stone, and came back again, and finally took the off stump. I don’t see how anybody alive could have played it. The batsman retired utterly bewildered, and the Model Man assured me he had never sent down a better ball.
A slogger came in next, and made runs rather rapidly, but nothing much happened until the Fourth Officer’s third over. Then he fell foul of me, and took exception to my method of keeping the wicket. He was being hit about pretty generally, and had become very hot, so, at another time, I should not have retorted upon him; but, when he spoke, I was hot too, and being hit about also, so I answered without deliberation. He said:
“Can’t you even try to stump them?”
And I replied:
“I might, if my arms were ten feet long.”
Then he said:
“You’ve had dozens of chances. I always want a wicket-keeper for my bowling.”
Whereupon I answered:
“You want twenty—in a row. One’s no good.”
He said:
“You don’t like standing up to my fast ones, that’s the truth.”
And I responded:
“Oh, bless you, I’d stand up to them all right, if I knewwhereto stand. A wicket-keeper’s supposed to keep the wicket, not run all over the ground after wides.”
“refreshments were being sold.”
During this unseemly argument, the Model Man, the Treasure, and the Doctor were all having an unpleasantness on their own account. The Doctor was imploring our Captain to take himself off and let somebody else bowl. He said: “Can’t you see they’ve collared you? They’ve scored twenty runs. Don’t think thatIwant to go on. Far from it. I’m only speaking for the good of the side.”
But the Model Man refused to leave off bowling for anybody. He emphatically denied that they had collared him. Then he changed the subject, and turned upon the Treasure, and asked him where he supposed he was fielding.
The Treasure answered:
“This is mid-on. I’m all right.”
“You may think it’s mid-on, but it isn’t,” shouted back the worried Model Man. “I’ve no doubt you’re all right,” he continued, bitterly, “but you’re no sportsman.”
After twenty more runs had been scored, the Fourth Officer unexpectedly and frankly admitted that he was not in form. He relinquished the ball, and said he had the makings of a sunstroke about his head, and went off to field among a few friends in a patch of shade under a tree, where all kinds of refreshments werebeing sold. Then our Captain held a consultation, and determined to try a complete change in the attack. He called upon the Doctor and the Treasure, and told them just to bowl quietly and carefully, and as straight as possible.
The Treasure started with yorkers; which was about the most effective thing he could have done, for, whenever he got one on the wicket, it bowled a black man. Two negroes, including the slogger, fell to him in his first over. Then the Doctor tried his hand, and began by being absurdly particular about the field. He put five men in the slips, and then started with terrifically fast full pitches to leg. A good player would have hit one and all of these right out of the island into the sea, but the people who were now at the wickets merely got out of the way, and let the Doctor’s deliveries proceed to the boundary for three byes each.
Upon this he insulted me, as the Fourth Officer had done before him. He said:
“Do stand up to them, old man.”
I said:
“Why should I? I’m out to enjoy myself. I’m a human being, not a target. Besides, long-stop will lose interest in the game if he has nothing to do.”
“They don’t have long-stops in first-class cricket,” grumbled the Doctor. “You’ve got no proper pride.”
Then I said:
“Of course, if you are mistaking this display for first-class cricket, it’s no good arguing with you.”
In his second over the Doctor bowled a shade straighter, and began knocking the batsmen about, and hurting them and frightening them. If they had only kept in front of the wicket, and put their bats between their legs out of the way, they might have been safe enough, but they dashed nervously about and tried to escape; and the ball would shoot and hit their toes, or rise and threaten their heads, or break back into their stomachs. Then the bowler got a man “retired hurt,” and a regular panic set in.
“I’m keeping down the run-getting, anyhow,” said the elated Doctor.
“Yes, and you’ll have to mend all these local celebrities for nothing after the match,” replied our Treasure.
The latter had taken several more wickets, and now the score stood at sixty, with three further blacks to bat. About this time I made an appeal to the umpire upon a question of stumping aman, but he had his back turned and was buying a piece of sugarcane. He apologised profusely. He said:
“I’se too sorry, Massa, jus’ too sorry, but I’se dam hungry, Sar.”
Hungry! Whoever heard of an umpire being hungry? Thirsty they may be, and generally are, but hunger is a paltry plea to raise.
Soon afterwards, our black stoker made two brilliant catches, one after the other, the Treasure quickly bowled their last man, and the innings closed for seventy-three runs.
“black stoker made twobrilliant catches.”
Then the rival teams scattered through St. Thomas for luncheon, the spectators dispersed, and the goats had the cricket ground all to themselves until the afternoon.
Some lively betting took place during our meal. The Model Man was gloomy, and doubted the ability of his eleven to make the necessary score on such a wicket; but the Doctor appeared extremely sanguine, and the Fourth Officer actually guaranteed half the runs himself. He said:
“Though not a finished bat, yet it often happens that I come off with the willow when I fail with the leather.”
It struck me that if his success with one was proportionate to his failure with the other, there seemed just reason for hoping he would get into three figures that afternoon.
Our Captain grew very anxious about the order of going in. Finally, he determined to start with the black stoker and me. He said:
“You play steadily and cautiously and let him hit. If it chances to be his day, we may, after all, win with ten wickets in hand. Stranger things have happened at cricket.”
“Not many,” I replied; “but we will do our best.”
Our best, unfortunately, did not amount to much. The match was resumed at half-past three, before an increased gathering of onlookers; and three distinct rounds of applause greeted the gigantic stoker and me as we marched to the wickets. It proveda fortunate thing that we got the applause then, because we might have missed it later. My own innings, for instance, did not afford the smallest loophole for enthusiasm at any time.
“somewhere in the small ribs.”
The black certainly began well. He hit the first ball he received clean out of the ground for six runs, but the second ball retaliated and smote him direfully somewhere in the small ribs. Thereupon, he fell down and rolled twenty yards to allay the agony, after which he rose up and withdrew, declaring that he had met his death, and that no power on earth would induce him to bat again. These negroes never forget an injury of this kind. If our black stoker lives over to-morrow, he will probably collect his colleagues from the ship, and row ashore by night and seek out the local bowler, and make it very unrestful and exciting for him.
The Model Man now came in, but he had the misfortune to lose my assistance almost immediately. I was caught at short leg after a patient innings of ten, slightly marred, however, by about the same number of chances. The Fourth Officer took my place. He began by nearly running out his Captain. If point had not stopped to dance and rub his leg, the wicket must have fallen. Then the new-comer settled down and played with great care, and irritated the bowlers extremely by giving them advice and criticising their efforts. Once they sent him so slow a ball that it never reached the wicket at all. Then our Fourth Officer rushed out and hit it after it had stopped, and so, rather ingeniously, scored two. It was a revolutionary sort of stroke, and the umpire said it must not be counted, but the batsman insisted upon having the runs put down. Of course, to argue with any umpire is madness. This black one simply waited for the next over, and then gave our Fourth Officer out “leg before.” There was a great argument, but the umpire’s ruling had to be upheld, and thebatsman retired, declaring that he would never play cricket with savages again as long as he lived. He said:
“In the first place the ball was a wide, and in the second, after breaking a yard and a half, it hit my elbow. Then that black ass gives me out ‘leg before.’ It’s sickening. Emancipation is the biggest error of the century. I’m going back to the ship.” But he did not. He found something under a yellow parasol that comforted him.
The Doctor came in next, and hit the first ball he received over the bowler’s head for three. Encouraged by this success, he ran half across the ground to the next one, missed it, and would have been stumped under ordinary circumstances, but the ball, instead of going to the wicket-keeper, shunted off at a sort of junction, and proceeded to short-slip. He, desiring the honour of defeating the Doctor, would not give the ball up, and tried to put the wicket down himself. This the outraged custodian of the stumps refused to permit, and while they were wrangling about it, and the rest of the team were screaming directions, our batsman galloped safely back amidst loud applause.
“there was a great argument.”
We made fifty-eight for four wickets, the Model Man being the next to succumb. He had performed well, in something approaching style, for thirty runs. After him came the Treasure. He played forward very tamely at everything, until a ball suddenly got up and skinned two of his knuckles. Then he grew excited, and began hitting very hard, and making runs at a tremendous pace.
Meanwhile the Doctor, finding his wicket still intact, suddenly became enthusiastic and took extraordinary interest in his innings. Between each ball he marched about the pitch and grubbed uptufts of grass and threw away stones, and patted the different elevations and acclivities with his bat. But he might just as well have patted the Alps, or any other mountain range. He hit a fast ball straight up into the air, when only five or six runs were wanted to win the match. It was one of those awkward, lofty hits that half the field can get to, if they only look alive. In this case, four negroes were all waiting to secure him, so the Doctor escaped again. Then, evidently under the impression that he bore a charmed life, he began taking great liberties, and pulling straight balls and strolling about out of his ground, and so forth. Finally, amid some intricate manœuvres, he jumped on to his own wicket, and retired well pleased with his performance. The Treasure went on hitting and being hit for a few minutes longer; then he made the winning stroke, and the contest came to a happy conclusion.
With one or two exceptions, everybody had much enjoyed the match; and that night, I recollect, we sat and smoked late on the deck of the “Rhine,” fought our battle once more, explained our theories of cricket to one another, and agreed that it was a great and grand amusement.
“But,” said the Fourth Officer, “it is not a pastime in which your nigger will ever excel. He cannot learn the rules, let alone play the game.”
“No,” I answered, “he does not excel at it, because, ‘unstable as water,’ the Ethiopian will never excel at anything; but he does quite as well as one might have expected, and, if he had a better ground, might play a better game.”
Certainly that cricket ground requires attention. To level it, though doubtless an engineering feat, should not be impossible. If an earthquake could be arranged, it might leave a surface for steam rollers to begin working upon; but no mere patching or tinkering will answer the purpose. Something definite and drastic and colossal must be done to the cricket ground we played on at St. Thomas before it can become fairly worthy of the name.
R M Ballantyne
By R. M. Ballantyne.
Illustrations by Geo. Hutchinson.
(Photographs by Messrs. Fradelle & Young.)
Having been asked to give some account of the commencement of my literary career, I begin by remarking that my first book was not a tale or “story-book,” but a free-and-easy record of personal adventure and every-day life in those wild regions of North America which are known, variously, as Rupert’s Land—The Hudson’s Bay Territory—The Nor’ West, and “The Great Lone Land.”
“where i wrote my first book.”(A Sketch by the Author.)
The record was never meant to see the light in the form of a book. It was written solely for the eye of my mother, but, as it may be said that it was the means of leading me ultimately into the path of my life-work, and was penned under somewhat peculiar circumstances, it may not be out of place to refer to it particularly here.
The circumstances were as follows:—
After having spent about six years in the wild Nor’ West, as a servant of the Hudson’s Bay Fur Company, I found myself, one summer—at the advanced age of twenty-two—in charge of an outpost on the uninhabited northern shores of the gulf of St. Lawrence named Seven Islands. It was a dreary, desolate spot; at thattime far beyond the bounds of civilisation. The gulf, just opposite the establishment, was about fifty miles broad. The ships which passed up and down it were invisible, not only on account of distance, but because of seven islands at the mouth of the bay coming between them and the outpost. My next neighbour, in command of a similar post up the gulf, was about seventy miles distant. The nearest house down the gulf was about eighty miles off, and behind us lay the virgin forests, with swamps, lakes, prairies, and mountains, stretching away without break right across the continent to the Pacific Ocean.
mr. ballantyne’s house at harrow.
The outpost—which, in virtue of a ship’s carronade and a flagstaff, was occasionally styled a “fort”—consisted of four wooden buildings. One of these—the largest, with a verandah—was the Residency. There was an offshoot in rear which served as a kitchen. The other houses were a store for goods wherewith to carry on trade with the Indians, a stable, and a workshop. The whole population of the establishment—indeed of the surrounding district—consisted of myself and one man—also a horse! The horse occupied the stable, I dwelt in the Residency, the rest of the population lived in the kitchen.
There were, indeed, other five men belonging to the establishment, but these did not affect its desolation, for they were away netting salmon at a river about twenty miles distant at the time I write of.
My “Friday”—who was a French-Canadian—being cook, as well as man-of-all-works, found a little occupation in attending to the duties of his office, but the unfortunate Governor had nothing whatever to do except await the arrival of Indians, who were not due at that time. The horse was a bad one, without a saddle, and in possession of a pronounced backbone. My “Friday” was not sociable. I had no books, no newspapers, no magazines or literature of any kind, no game to shoot, no boat wherewith to prosecute fishing in the bay, and no prospect of seeing any one to speak to for weeks, if not months, to come. But I had pen and ink, and, by great good fortune, was in possession of a blank paper book fully an inch thick.
These, then, were the circumstances in which I began my first book.
When that book was finished, and, not long afterwards, submitted to the—I need hardly say favourable—criticism of my mother, I had not the most distant idea of taking to authorship as a profession. Even when a printer-cousin, seeing the MS., offered to print it, and the well-known Blackwood, of Edinburgh, seeing the book, offered to publish it—and did publish it—my ambition was still so absolutely asleep that I did not again put pen to paper inthatway for eight years thereafter, although I might have been encouraged thereto by the fact that this first book—named “Hudson’s Bay”—besides being a commercial success, received favourable notice from the press.
It was not until the year 1854 that my literary path was opened up. At that time I was a partner in the late publishing firm of Constable & Co. of Edinburgh. Happening one day to meet with the late William Nelson, publisher, I was asked by him how I should like the idea of taking to literature as a profession. My answer I forget. It must have been vague, for I had never thought of the subject before.
“Well,” said he, “what would you think of trying to write a story?”
Somewhat amused, I replied that I did not know what to think, but I would try if he wished me to do so.
“Do so,” said he, “and go to work at once”—or words to that effect.
I went to work at once, and wrote my first story or work of fiction. It was published in 1855 under the name of “Snowflakes and Sunbeams; or, The Young Furtraders.” Afterwards the first part of the title was dropped, and the book is now known as “The Young Furtraders.” From that day to this I have lived by making story-books for young folk.
the hall.
From what I have said it will be seen that I have never aimed at the achieving of this position, and I hope that it is not presumptuous in me to think—and to derive much comfort from the thought—that God led me into the particular path along which I have walked for so many years.
The scene of my first story was naturally laid in those backwoods with which I was familiar, and the story itself was foundedon the adventures and experiences of myself and my companions. When a second book was required of me, I stuck to the same regions, but changed the locality. When casting about in my mind for a suitable subject, I happened to meet with an old retired “Nor’wester” who had spent an adventurous life in Rupert’s Land. Among other duties he had been sent to establish an outpost of the Hudson Bay Company at Ungava Bay, one of the most dreary parts of a desolate region. On hearing what I wanted he sat down and wrote a long narrative of his proceedings there, which he placed at my disposal, and thus furnished me with the foundation of “Ungava.”
But now I had reached the end of my tether, and when a third story was wanted I was compelled to seek new fields of adventure in the books of travellers. Regarding the Southern seas as the most romantic part of the world—after the backwoods!—I mentally and spiritually plunged into those warm waters, and the dive resulted in the “Coral Island.”
It now began to be borne in upon me that there was something not quite satisfactory in describing, expatiating on, and energising in, regions which one has never seen. For one thing, it was needful to be always carefully on the watch to avoid falling into mistakes geographical, topographical, natural-historical, and otherwise.
For instance, despite the utmost care of which I was capable while studying up for the “Coral Island,” I fell into a blunder through ignorance in regard to a familiar fruit. I was under the impression that cocoanuts grew on their trees in the same form as that in which they are usually presented to us in grocers’ windows—namely, about the size of a large fist with three spots at one end. Learning from trustworthy books that at a certain stage of development the nut contains a delicious beverage like lemonade, I sent one of my heroes up a tree for a nut, through the shell of which he bored a hole with a penknife. It was not till long after the story was published that my own brother—who had voyaged in Southern seas—wrote to draw my attention to the fact that the cocoanut is nearly as large as a man’s head, and its outer husk is over an inch thick, so that no ordinary penknife could bore to its interior! Of course I should have known this, and, perhaps, should be ashamed of my ignorance, but, somehow, I’m not!
I admit that this was a slip, but such, and other slips, hardly justify the remark that some people have not hesitated to make, namely, that I have a tendency to draw the long bow. I feelalmost sensitive on this point, for I have always laboured to be true to nature and to fact even in my wildest flights of fancy.
This reminds me of the remark made to myself once by a lady in reference to this same “Coral Island.” “There is one thing, Mr. Ballantyne,” she said, “which I really find it hard to believe. You make one of your three boys dive into a clear pool, go to the bottom, and then, turning on his back, look up and wink and laugh at the other two.”
trophies from mr. ballantyne’s travels.
“No, no, not ‘laugh,’” said I, remonstratively.
“Well, then, you make him smile.”
“Ah, that is true, but there is a vast difference between laughing and smiling under water. But is it not singular that you should doubt the only incident in the story which I personally verified? I happened to be in lodgings at the seaside while writing that story, and, after penning the passage you refer to, Iwent down to the shore, pulled off my clothes, dived to the bottom, turned on my back, and, looking up, I smiled and winked.”
The lady laughed, but I have never been quite sure, from the tone of that laugh, whether it was a laugh of conviction or of unbelief. It is not improbable that my fair friend’s mental constitution may have been somewhat similar to that of the old woman who declined to believe her sailor-grandson when he told her he had seen flying-fish, but at once recognised his veracity when he said he had seen the remains of Pharaoh’s chariot wheels on the shores of the Red Sea.
the dining room.
Recognising, then, the difficulties of my position, I formed the resolution to visit—when possible—the scenes in which my stories were laid; converse with the people who, under modification, were to form thedramatis personæof the tales, and, generally, to obtain information in each case, as far as lay in my power, from the fountain head.
Thus, when about to begin “The Lifeboat,” I went to Ramsgate, and, for some time, was hand and glove with Jarman, theheroic coxswain of the Ramsgate boat, a lion-like as well as lion-hearted man, who rescued hundreds of lives from the fatal Goodwin Sands during his career. In like manner, when getting up information for “The Lighthouse,” I obtained permission from the Commissioners of Northern Lights to visit the Bell Rock Lighthouse, where I hobnobbed with the three keepers of that celebrated pillar-in-the-sea for three weeks, and read Stevenson’s graphic account of the building of the structure in the library, or visitors’ room, just under the lantern. I was absolutely a prisoner there during those three weeks, for no boats ever came near us, and it need scarcely be said that ships kept well out of our way. By good fortune there came on a pretty stiff gale at the time, and Stevenson’s thrilling narrative was read to the tune of whistling winds and roaring seas, many of which latter sent the spray right up to the lantern and caused the building, more than once, to quiver to its foundation.
the study.
In order to do justice to “Fighting the Flames” I careered through the streets of London on fire-engines, clad in a pea-jacketand a black leather helmet of the Salvage Corps. This, to enable me to pass the cordon of police without question—though not without recognition, as was made apparent to me on one occasion at a fire by a fireman whispering confidentially, “I know whatyouare, sir, you’re a hamitoor!”