By Sheer Pluck: A Tale of the Ashanti War. Henty George Alfred
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it, and that all sorts of things have crept in which wasn’t there first. That may be so. When a man tells a story a great many times, naturally he can’t always tell it just the same, and he gets so mixed up atween what he told last and what he told first that he don’t rightly know which was which when he wants to tell it just as it really happened. So if sometimes it appears to you that I’m steering rather wild, just you put a stopper on and bring me up all standing with a question.”
There was a quiet humor about the boatman’s face, and the boys winked at each other as much as to say that after such an exordium they must expect something rather staggering. The boatman took two or three hard whiffs at his pipe and then began.
“It was towards the end of September in 1832, that’s just forty years ago now, that I went out with my father and three hands in the smack, the Flying Dolphin. I’d been at sea with father off and on ever since I was about nine years old, and a smarter boy wasn’t to be found on the beach. The Dolphin was a good sea boat, but she wasn’t, so to say, fast, and I dunno’ as she was much to look at, for the old man wasn’t the sort of chap to chuck away his money in paint or in new sails as long as the old ones could be pieced and patched so as to hold the wind. We sailed out pretty nigh over to the French coast, and good sport we had. We’d been out two days when we turned her head homewards. The wind was blowing pretty strong, and the old man remarked, he thought we was in for a gale. There was some talk of our running in to Calais and waiting till it had blown itself out, but the fish might have spoil before the Wind dropped, so we made up our minds to run straight into Dover and send the fish up from there. The night came on wild and squally, and as dark as pitch. It might be about eight bells, and I and one of the other hands had turned in, when father gave a sudden shout down the hatch, ‘All hands on deck.’ I was next to the steps and sprang up ‘em. Just as I got to the top something grazed my face. I caught at it, not knowing what it was, and the next moment there was a crash, and the Dolphin went away from under my feet. I clung for bare life, scarce awake yet nor knowing what had happened. The next moment I was under water. I still held on to the rope and was soon out again. By this time I was pretty well awake to what had happened. A ship running down channel had walked clean over the poor old Dolphin, and I had got hold of the bobstay. It took me some time to climb up on to the bowsprit, for every time she pitched I went under water. However, I got up at last and swarmed along the bowsprit and got on board. There was a chap sitting down fast asleep there. I walked aft to the helmsman. Two men were pacing up and down in front of him. ‘You’re a nice lot, you are,’ I said, ‘to go running down Channel at ten knots an hour without any watch, a-walking over ships and a-drowning of seamen. I’ll have the law of ye, see if I don’t.’
“‘Jeerusalem!’ said one, ‘who have we here?’
“‘My name is Jack Perkins,’ says I, ‘and I’m the sole survivor, as far as I knows, of the smack, the Flying Dolphin, as has been run down by this craft and lost with all hands.’
“‘Darn the Flying Dolphin, and you too,’ says the man, and he begins to walk up and down the deck a-puffn’ of a long cigar as if nothing had happened.
“‘Oh, come,’ says I, ‘this won’t do. Here you’ve been and run down a smack, drowned father and the other three hands, and your lookout fast asleep, and you does nothing.’
“‘I suppose,’ said the captain, sarcastic, ‘you want me to jump over to look for ‘em. You want me to heave the ship to in this gale and to invite yer father perlitely to come on board. P’raps you’d like a grapnel put out to see if I couldn’t hook the smack and bring her up again. Perhaps you’d like to be chucked overboard yourself. Nobody asked you to come on board, nobody wanted your company. I reckon the wisest thing you can do is to go for’ard and turn in.’ There didn’t seem much for me to do else, so I went forward to the forecastle. There most of the hands were asleep, but two or three were sitting up yarning. I told ‘em my story and what this captain had said.
“‘He’s a queer hand is the skipper,’ one of ‘em said, ‘and hasn’t got a soft place about him. Well, my lad, I’m sorry for what’s happened, but talking won’t do it any good. You’ve got a long voyage before you, and you’d best turn in and make yourself comfortable for it.’
“‘I ain’t going a long voyage,’ says I, beginning to wipe my eye, ‘I wants to be put ashore at the first port.’
“‘Well, my lad, I daresay the skipper will do that, but as we’re bound for the coast of Chili from Hamburg, and ain’t likely to be there for about five months, you’ve got, as I said, a long voyage before you. If the weather had been fine the skipper might have spoken some ship in the Channel, and put you on board, but before the gale’s blown out we shall be hundreds of miles at sea. Even if it had been fine I don’t suppose the skipper would have parted with you, especially if you told him the watch was asleep. He would not care next time he entered an English port to have a claim fixed on his ship for the vally of the smack.’
“I saw what the sailor said was like enough, and blamed myself for having let out about the watch. However, there was no help for it, and I turned into an empty bunk and cried myself to sleep. What a voyage that was, to be sure! The ship was a Yankee and so was the master and mates. The crew were of all sorts, Dutch, and Swedes, and English, a Yank or two, and a sprinklin’ of niggers. It was one of those ships they call a hell on earth, and cussing and kicking and driving went on all day. I hadn’t no regular place give me, but helped the black cook, and pulled at ropes, and swabbed the decks, and got kicked and cuffed all round. The skipper did not often speak to me, but when his eye lighted on me he gave an ugly sort of look, as seemed to say, ‘You’d better ha’ gone down with the others. You think you’re going to report the loss of the smack, and to get damages against the Potomac, do you? we shall see.’ The crew were a rough lot, but the spirit seemed taken out of ‘em by the treatment they met with. It was a word and a blow with the mates, and they would think no more of catching up a handspike and stretching a man senseless on the deck than I should of killing a fly. There was two or three among ‘em of a better sort than the others. The best of ‘em was the carpenter, an old Dutchman. ‘Leetle boy,’ he used to say to me, ‘you keep yourself out of the sight of de skipper. Bad man dat. Me much surprise if you get to de end of dis voyage all right. You best work vera hard and give him no excuse to hit you. If he do, by gosh, he kill you, and put down in de log, Boy killed by accident.’
“I felt that this was so myself, and I did my work as well as I could. One day, however, when we were near the line I happened to upset a bucket with some tar. The captain was standing close by.
“‘You young dog,’ he said, ‘you’ve done that a purpose,’ and before I could speak he caught up the bucket by the handle and brought it down on my head with all his might. The next thing I remember was, I was lying in a bunk in the forecastle. Everything looked strange to me, and I couldn’t raise my head. After a time I made shift to turn it round, and saw old Jans sitting on a chest mending a jacket. I called him, but my voice was so low I hardly seemed to hear it myself.
“‘Ah, my leetle boy!’ he said, ‘I am glad to hear you speak again. Two whole weeks you say nothing except talk nonsense.’
“‘Have I been ill?’ I asked.
“‘You haf been vera bad,’ he said. ‘De captain meant to kill you, I haf no doubt, and he pretty near do it. After he knock you down he said you dead. He sorry for accident, not mean to hit you so hard, but you dead and better be tossed overboard at once. De mates they come up and take your hands and feet. Den I insist dat I feel your wrist. Two or three of us dey stood by me. Captain he vera angry, say we mutinous dogs. I say not mutinous, but wasn’t going to see a boy who was only stunned thrown overboard. We say if he did dat we make complaint before consul when we get to port. De skipper he cuss and swear awful. Howebber we haf our way and carry you here. You haf fever and near die. Tree days after we bring you here de captain he swear you shamming and comed to look at you hisself, but he see that it true and tink you going to die. He go away wid smile on his face. Every day he ask if you alive, and give grunt when I say yes. Now you best keep vera quiet. You no talk ‘cept when no one else here but me. Other times lie wid your face to the side and your eyes shut. Best keep you here as long as we can, de longer de better.