For Faith and Freedom

by Walter Besant

  CHAPTER XXXIV.

  THE GOOD SAMARITAN.

  This was indeed the truth: I had parted with my money on the wordof a villain; I put myself into his power by telling him the wholeof my sad story; and, on the promise of sending me by ship to mycousins in New England, he had entered my name as a rebel sold tohimself (afterwards I learned that he made it appear as if I was oneof the hundred given to Mr. Jerome Nipho, all of whom he afterwardsbought and sent to the Plantations), and he had then shipped me onboard a vessel on the point of sailing with as vile a company ofrogues, vagabonds, thieves, and drabs as were ever raked togetherout of the streets and the prisons.

  When I came to my senses the Captain gave me a glass of cordial, andmade me sit down on a gun-carriage while he asked me many questions.I answered him all truthfully, concealing only the reason of myflight and of my visit to Taunton, where, I told him truly, I hopedto see my unhappy friend Miss Susan Blake, of whose imprisonment anddeath I knew nothing.

  'Madam,' said the Captain, stroking his chin, 'your case is indeeda hard one. Yet your name is entered on my list, and I must deliveryour body at St. Michael's Port, Barbadoes, or account for itsabsence. This must I do: I have no other choice. As for your beingsold to Mr. George Penne by Mr. Jerome Nipho, this may very well bewithout your knowing even that you had been given to that gentlemanby the King. They say that the Maids of Taunton have all been givenaway, mostly to the Queen's Maids of Honour, and must either beredeemed at a great price or be sold as you have been. On the otherhand, there may be villainy, and in this case it might be dangerousfor you to move in the matter lest you be apprehended and sent tojail as a rebel, and so a worse fate happen unto you.'

  '_When I came to my senses the captain gave me aglass of cordial._']

  He then went on to tell me that this pretended merchant, thisMr. George Penne, was the most notorious kidnapper in the wholeof Bristol; that he was always raking the prisons of rogues andsending them abroad for sale on the Plantations; that at this timehe was looking to make a great profit, because there were so manyprisoners that all could not be hanged, but most must be eitherflogged and sent about their business, or else sold to him and hislike for servitude. 'As for any money paid for your passage,' hewent on, 'I assure you, Madam, upon my honour, that nothing at allhas been paid by him; nor has he provided you with any change ofclothes or provisions of any kind for the voyage; nor hath he askedor bargained for any better treatment of you on board than is givento the rogues below; and that, Madam,' he added, 'is food of thecoarsest, and planks, for sleep, of the hardest. The letter whichyou have shown me is a mere trick. I do not think there is any suchperson in Boston. It is true, however, that there is a family ofyour name in Boston, and that they are substantial merchants. I makeno doubt that as he hath treated you, so he will treat your friends;and that all the money which he has taken from you will remain inhis own pocket.'

  'Then,' I cried, 'what am I to do? Where look for help?'

  ''Tis the damnedest villain!' cried the Captain, swearing afterthe profane way of sailors. 'When next I put in at the Port ofBristol, if the Monmouth scare be over, I will take care that allthe world shall know what he hath done. But, indeed, he will notcare. The respectable merchants have nothing to say with him--he isnow an open Catholic, who was formerly concealed in that religion.Therefore, he thinks his fortune is at the flood. But what is to bedone, Madam?'

  'Indeed, Sir, I know not.'

  He considered a while. His face was rough and coloured like a ripeplum with the wind and the sun; but he looked honest, and he didnot, like Mr. Penne, pretend to shed tears over my misfortunes.

  'Those who join rebellions,' he said, but not unkindly, 'generallyfind themselves out in their reckoning in the end. What the deucehave gentlewomen to do with the pulling down of Kings! I warrant,now, you thought you were doing a grand thing, and so you must needsgo walking with those pretty fools, the Maids of Taunton! Well; 'tispast praying for. George Penne is such a villain that keelhauling istoo good for him. Flogged through the fleet at Spithead he shouldbe. Madam, I am not one who favours rebels; yet you cannot sleep andmess with the scum down yonder. 'Twould be worse than inhuman--theirtalk and their manners would kill you. There is a cabin aft whichyou can have. The furniture is mean, but it will be your own whileyou are aboard. You shall mess at my table if you will so honour me.You shall have the liberty of the quarter-deck. I will also find foryou, if I can, among the women aboard, one somewhat less villainousthan the rest, who shall be your grumeta, as the Spaniards say--yourservant, that is--to keep your cabin clean and do your bidding. Whenwe make Barbadoes there is no help for it, but you must go ashorewith the rest and take your chance.'

  This was truly generous of the Captain, and I thanked him with allmy heart. He proved as good as his word, for though he was a hardman, who duly maintained discipline, flogging his prisoners withrigour, he treated me during the whole voyage with kindness andpity, never forgetting daily to curse the name of George Penne anddrink to his confusion.

  The voyage lasted six weeks. At first we had rough weather withheavy seas and rolling waves. Happily, I was not made sick bythe motion of the ship, and could always stand upon the deck andlook at the waves (a spectacle, to my mind, the grandest in thewhole world). But, I fear, there was much suffering among thepoor wretches--my fellow-prisoners. They were huddled and crowdedtogether below the deck; they were all sea-sick; there was no doctorto relieve their sufferings, nor were there any medicines forthose who were ill. Fever presently broke out among them, so thatwe buried nine in the first fortnight of our voyage. After this,the weather growing warm and the sea moderating, the sick mendedrapidly, and soon all were well again.

  I used to stand upon the quarter-deck and look at them gatheredin the waist below. Never had I seen such a company. They came,I heard, principally from London, which is the rendezvous orheadquarters of all the rogues in the country. They were all inrags--had any one among them possessed a decent coat it would havebeen snatched from his back the very first day; they were dirtyfrom the beginning; many of them had cuts and wounds on their headsgotten in their fights and quarrels, and these were bound aboutwith old clouts; their faces were not fresh-coloured and rosy,like the faces of our honest country lads, but pale and sometimescovered with red blotches, caused by their evil lives and their harddrinking; on their foreheads was clearly set the seal of Satan.Never did I behold wickedness so manifestly stamped upon the humancountenance. They were like monkeys for their knavish and thievishtricks. They stole everything that they could lay hands upon: piecesof rope, the sailors' knives when they could get them, even themarlinspikes if they were left about. When they were caught andflogged they would make the ship terrible with their shrieks, beingcowards as prodigious as they were thieves. They lay about all dayragged and dirty on deck, in the place assigned to them, stupidlysleeping or else silent and dumpish, except for some of the youngfellows who gambled with cards--I know not for what stakes--andquarrelled over the game and fought. It was an amusement among thesailors to make these lads fight on the forecastle, promising apannikin of rum to the victor. For this miserable prize they wouldfight with the greatest fury and desperation, even biting oneanother in their rage, while the sailors clapped their hands andencouraged them. Pity it is that the common sort do still delightthemselves with sport so brutal. On shore these fellows would berejoicing in cock-fights and bull-baitings: on board they baited theprisoners.

  There were among the prisoners twenty or thirty women, the sweepingsof the Bristol streets. They, too, would fight as readily as themen, until the Captain forbade it under penalty of a flogging. Thesewomen were to the full as wicked as the men; nay, their languagewas worse, insomuch that the very sailors would stand aghast to hearthe blasphemies they uttered, and would even remonstrate with them,saying, 'Nan,' or 'Poll'--they were all Polls and Nans--''tis enoughto cause the ship to be struck with lightning! Give over, now! Wiltsink the ship's company with your foul tongue?' But the promise of aflogging kept them from
fighting. Men, I think, will brave anythingfor a moment's gratification; but not even the most hardened womanwill willingly risk the pain of the whip.

  The Captain told me that of these convicts, of whom every year wholeshiploads are taken to Virginia, to Jamaica, and to Barbadoes, notone in a hundred ever returns. 'For,' he said, 'the work exactedfrom them is so severe, with so much exposure to a burning sun, andthe fare is so hard, that they fall into fevers and calentures.And, besides the dangers from the heat and the bad food, there is adrink called rum, or arrack, which is distilled from the juice ofthe sugar-cane, and another drink called "mobbie," distilled frompotatoes, which inflames their blood, and causes many to die beforetheir time. Moreover, the laws are harsh, and there is too muchflogging and branding and hanging. So that some fall into despairand, in that condition of mind, die under the first illness whichseizes on them.'

  'Captain,' I said, 'you forget that I am also to become one of thesepoor wretches.'

  The Captain swore lustily that, on his return, he would seek outthe villain Penne and break his neck for him. Then he assured methat the difference between myself and the common herd would beimmediately recognised; that a rebel is not a thief, and must notbe so treated; and that I had nothing to fear--nay, that he himselfwould say what he could in my favour. But he entreated me with theutmost vehemence to send home an account of where I was, and whatI was enduring, to such of my friends as might have either moneyto relieve me from servitude or interest to procure a pardon.Alas! I had no friends. Mr. Boscorel, I knew full well, would moveheaven and earth to help me. But he could not do that without hisson finding out where I was; and this thought so moved me thatI implored the Captain to tell no one who I was, or what was myhistory; and, for greater persuasion, I revealed to him those partsof my history which I had hitherto concealed, namely, my marriageand the reason of that rash step and my flight.

  'Madam,' he said, 'I would that I had the power of revenging thesefoul wrongs. For them, I swear, I would kidnap both Mr. George Penneand Mr. Benjamin Boscorel; and, look you, I would make them messwith the scum and the sweepings whom we carry for'ard; and I wouldsell them to the most inhuman of the planters, by whom they wouldbe daily beaten and cuffed and flogged; or, better still, wouldcause them to be sold at Havana to the Spaniards, where they wouldbe employed, as are the English prisoners commonly by that cruelpeople, namely, in fetching water under negro overseers. I leave youto imagine how long they would live, and what terrible treatmentthey would receive.'

  So it was certain that I was going to a place where I must lookfor very little mercy, unless I could buy it; and where the whiteservant was regarded as worth so many years of work; not so muchas a negro, because he doth sooner sink under the hardships of hislot, while the negro continues frolick and lusty, and marries andhas children, even though he has to toil all day in the sun, and isflogged continually to make him work with the greater heart.

  Among the women on board was a young woman, not more than eighteenor thereabout, who was called Deb. She had no other name. Herbirthplace she knew not; but she had run about the country withsome tinkers, whose language she said is called 'Shelta' by thosepeople. This she could still talk. They sold her in Bristol; afterwhich her history is one which, I learn, is common in towns. Whenthe Captain bade her come to the cabin, and ordered her to obey mein whatsoever I commanded, she looked stupidly at him, shrinkingfrom him if he moved, as if she was accustomed (which was indeed thecase) to be beaten at every word. I made her first clean herselfand wash her clothes. This done, she slept in my cabin, and, asthe Captain promised, became my servant. At first she was not onlyafraid of ill-treatment, but she would wilfully lie; she purloinedthings and hid them; she told me so many tales of her past life, allof them different, that I could believe none. Yet when she presentlyfound out that I was not going to beat her, and that the Captain didnever offer to cuff or kick her (which the poor wretch expected),she left off telling falsehoods and became as handy, obliging, anduseful a creature as one could desire. She was a great, strappinggirl, black-eyed and with black hair, as strong as any man, and agood-looking creature as well, to those who like great women.

  This Deb, when, I say, she ceased to be afraid of me, began to tellme her true history, which was, I suppose, only remarkable becauseshe seemed not to know that it was shameful and wicked. She lived,as the people among whom she had been brought up lived, without theleast sense or knowledge of God; indeed, no heathen savage couldbe more without religion than the tinkers and gipsies on the road.They have no knowledge at all; they are born; they live; they die;they are buried in a hedgeside, and are forgotten. It was surprisingto me to find that any woman could grow up in a Christian countryso ignorant and so uncared for. In the end, as you shall hear, sheshowed every mark of penitence and fell into a godly and pious life.

  My Captain continued in the same kindness towards me throughout thevoyage--suffering me to mess at his table, where the provisions wereplain but wholesome, and encouraging me to talk to him, seeming totake pleasure in my simple conversation. In the mornings when, witha fair wind and full sail, the ship ploughed through the water,while the sun was hot overhead, he would make me a seat with apillow in the shade, and would then entreat me to tell him aboutthe rebellion and our flight to Black Down. Or he would encourageme in serious talk (though his own conversation with his sailorswas over-much garnished with profane oaths), listening with graveface. And sometimes he would ask me questions about the villageof Bradford Orcas, my mother and her wheel, Sir Christopher andthe Rector, showing a wonderful interest in everything that I toldhim. It was strange to see how this man, hard as he was with theprisoners (whom it was necessary to terrify, otherwise they mightmutiny), could be so gentle towards me, a stranger, and a costly onetoo, because he was at the expense of maintaining me for the wholevoyage, and the whole time being of good manners, never rude orrough, or offering the least freedom or familiarity--a thing which awoman in my defenceless position naturally fears. He could not haveshown more respect unto a Queen. The Lord will surely reward himtherefor.

  One evening at sunset, when we had been at sea six weeks, he cameto me as I was sitting on the quarter-deck and pointed to whatseemed a cloud in the west. 'Tis the island of Barbadoes,' he said.'To-morrow, if this wind keeps fair, we shall make the Port of St.Michael's, which some call the Bridge, and then, Madam, alas!'--hefetched a deep sigh--'I must put you ashore and part with thesweetest companion that ever sailed across the ocean.'

  He said no more, but left me as if he had other things to say butstifled them. Presently the sun went down and darkness fell upon thewaters; the wind also fell and the sea was smooth, so that there wasa great silence. 'To-morrow,' I thought, 'we shall reach the port,and I shall be landed with these wretches and sent, perhaps, to toilin the fields.' But yet my soul was upheld by the vision which hadbeen granted to me upon the Black Down Hills, and I feared nothing.This I can say without boasting, because I had such weighty reasonsfor the faith that was in me.

  The Captain presently came back to me.

  'Madam,' he said, 'suffer me to open my mind to you.'

  'Sir,' I told him, 'there is nothing which I could refuse you,saving my honour.'

  'I must confess,' he said, 'I have been torn in twain for love ofyou, Madam, ever since you did me the honour to mess at my table.Nay, hear me out. And I have been minded a thousand times to assureyou first that your marriage is no marriage, and that you have notindeed any husband at all; next, that since you can never go back toyour old sweetheart, 'tis better to find another who would protectand cherish you; and thirdly, that I am ready--ay! and longing--nowto become your husband and protector, and to love you with all myheart and soul.'

  'Sir,' I said, 'I thank you for telling me this, which indeed I didnot suspect. But I am (alas! as you know) already married--eventhough my marriage be no true one--and can never forget the lovewhich I still must bear to my old sweetheart. Wherefore, I may notlisten to any talk of love.'

  'If,' he replied, 'you
were a woman after the common pattern youwould right gladly cast aside the chains of this marriage ceremony.But, Madam, you are a saint. Therefore, I refrained.' He sighed.'I confess that I have been dragged as by chains to lay myself atyour feet. Well; that must not be.' He sighed again. 'Yet I wouldsave you, Madam, from the dangers of this place. The merchants andplanters do, for the most part, though gentlemen of good birth, leaddebauched and ungodly lives, and I fear that, though they may spareyou the hardships of the field, they may offer you other and worseindignities.'

  I answered in the words of David: 'The Lord hath delivered me out ofthe paw of the lion, and out of the paw of the bear: He will deliverme out of the hand of the Philistines.'

  'Nay; but there is a way; you need not land at all. It is but ascratch of the pen, and I will enter your name among those who diedupon the voyage. There will be no more inquiry, any more than afterthe other names, and then I can carry you back with me to the Portof London, whither I am bound after taking in my cargo.'

  For a space I was sorely tempted. Then I reflected. It would be, Iremembered, by consenting to the Captain's treachery towards hisemployers, nothing less, that I could escape this lot.

  'No, Sir,' I said, 'I thank you from my heart for all your kindnessand for your forbearance; but we may not consent together unto thissin. Again, I thank you, but I must suffer what is laid upon me.'

  He knelt at my feet and kissed my hands, saying nothing more,and presently I went to my cabin, and so ended my first voyageacross the great Atlantic Ocean. In the morning when I awoke, wewere beating off Carlisle Bay, and I felt like unto one of thoseChristian martyrs, of whom I have read, whom they were about to leadforth and cast unto the lions.