The Pirate Slaver: A Story of the West African Coast

by Harry Collingwood

  Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England

  The Pirate Slaver, a Story of the West African Coast, by HarryCollingwood.

  ________________________________________________________________________This is a very well-written book, especially from the nautical point ofview. It is written as by a midshipman in a British warship patrollingthe west coast of Africa, especially the Congo area, to try to preventthe slave traders, especially the Portuguese, from succeeding in theirefforts to get the poor captured Africans over the Atlantic to Cuba inthe most miserable conditions.

  But it doesn't work out as simply as that! For the hero, Harry Dugdale,is captured in an action, and would have been killed but for theinterest taken in him by the slaver-captain's son. From this theresprang a deal with the slaver that Harry would assist with navigationand watch-keeping, but must go below decks when there is an action inprogress.

  We won't tell you much more than that but cannot refrain from commentingthat the book is at least as good as the best by Kingston, though inthis book the action is almost entirely at sea, or at least on board asea-going vessel.

  ________________________________________________________________________THE PIRATE SLAVER, A STORY OF THE WEST AFRICAN COAST, BY HARRYCOLLINGWOOD.

  CHAPTER ONE.

  THE CONGO RIVER.

  "Land ho! broad on the port bow!"

  The cry arose from the look-out on the forecastle of her BritannicMajesty's 18-gun brig _Barracouta_, on a certain morning near the middleof the month of November, 1840; the vessel then being situated in aboutlatitude 6 degrees 5 minutes south and about 120 east longitude. Shewas heading to the eastward, close-hauled on the port tack, under everyrag that her crew could spread to the light and almost imperceptibledraught of warm, damp air that came creeping out from the northward. Solight was the breeze that it scarcely wrinkled the glassy smoothness ofthe long undulations upon which the brig rocked and swayed heavily whileher lofty trucks described wide arcs across the paling sky overhead,from which the stars were vanishing one after another before the advanceof the pallid dawn. And at every lee roll her canvas flapped with arattle as of a volley of musketry to the masts, sending down a smartshower from the dew-saturated cloths upon the deck, to fill again withthe report of a nine-pounder and a great slatting of sheets and blocksas the ship recovered herself and rolled to windward.

  The brig was just two months out from England, from whence she had beendispatched to the West African coast to form a portion of theslave-squadron and to relieve the old _Garnet_, which, from herphenomenal lack of speed, had proved utterly unsuitable for the serviceof chasing and capturing the nimble slavers who, despite all ourprecautions, were still pursuing their cruel and nefarious vocation withunparalleled audacity and success. We had relieved the _Garnet_, andhad looked in at Sierra Leone for the latest news; the result of thisvisit being that we were now heading in for the mouth of the Congo,which river had been strongly commended to our especial attention by theGovernor of the little British colony. Our captain, Commander HenryStopford, was by no means a communicative man, it being a theory of histhat it is a mistake on the part of a chief to confide more to hisofficers than is absolutely necessary for the efficient and intelligentperformance of their duty; hence he had not seen fit to make public theexact particulars of the information thus received. But he had ofcourse made an exception in favour of Mr Young, our popular first luff;and as I--Henry Dugdale, senior mid of the _Barracouta_--happened to besomething of a favourite with the latter, I learned from him, in thecourse of conversation, some of the circumstances that were actuatingour movements. The intelligence, however, was of a very meagrecharacter, and simply amounted to this: That large numbers of Africanslaves were being continually landed on the Spanish West Indian islands;that two boats with their crews had mysteriously disappeared in theCongo while engaged upon a search of that river for slavers; and that asmall felucca named the _Wasp_--a tender to the British ship-sloop_Lapwing_--had also disappeared with all hands, some three monthspreviously, after having been seen in pursuit of a large brig that hadcome out of the river; these circumstances leading to the inference thatthe Congo was the haunt of a strong gang of daring slavers whose capturemust be effected at any cost.

  It was for this service that the _Barracouta_ had been selected, shebeing a brand-new ship especially built for work on the West Africancoast, and modelled to sail at a high speed upon a light draught ofwater. She was immensely beamy for her length, and very shallow,drawing only ten feet of water with all her stores and ammunition onboard, very heavily sparred--_too_ heavily, some of us thought--and, asfor canvas, her topsails had the hoist of those of a frigate of twiceher tonnage. She was certainly a beautiful model of a ship--far andaway the prettiest that I had ever seen when I first stepped on boardher--while her speed, especially in light winds and tolerably smoothwater, was such as to fill us all, fore and aft, with the mostextravagant hopes of success against the light-heeled slave clipperswhose business it was ours to suppress. She was a flush-decked vessel,with high, substantial bulwarks pierced for nine guns of a side, and shemounted fourteen 18-pounder carronades and four long nine-pounders, twoforward and two aft, which could be used as bow and stern-chasersrespectively, if need were, although we certainly did not anticipate thenecessity to employ any of our guns in the latter capacity. Our crew,all told, numbered one hundred and sixty-five.

  I was in the first lieutenant's watch, and happened to be on deck whenthe look-out reported land upon the morning upon which this story opens.I remember the circumstance as well as though it had occurred butyesterday, and I have only to close my eyes to bring the whole scene upbefore my mental vision as distinctly as a picture. The brig was, as Ihave already said, heading to the eastward, close-hauled, on the porttack, under everything that we could set, to her royals; but the windwas so scant that even the light upper sails flapped and rustledmonotonously to the sleepy heave and roll of the ship, and it was onlyby glancing through a port at the small, iridescent air-bubbles thatdrifted astern at the rate of about a knot and a half in the hour thatwe were able to detect the fact of our own forward movement at all. Wehad been on deck just an hour--for two bells had barely been struck--when the first faint suggestion of dawn appeared ahead in the shape of ascarcely-perceptible lightening of the sky along a narrow strip of theeastern horizon, in the midst of which the morning star beamedresplendently, while the air, although still warm, assumed a freshnessthat, compared with the close, muggy heat of the past night, seemedalmost cold, so that involuntarily I drew the lapels of my thin jackettogether and buttoned the garment from throat to waist. Quickly, yet byimperceptible gradations, the lightening of the eastern sky spread andstrengthened, the soft, velvety, star-lit, blue-black hue paling to anarch of cold, colourless pallor as the dawn asserted itself moreemphatically, while the stars dwindled and vanished one by one in therapidly-growing light. As the pallor of the sky extended itselfinsidiously north and south along the horizon, a low-lying bank of whatat first presented the appearance of dense vapour became visible on the_Barracouta's_ larboard bow; but presently, when the cold whiteness ofthe coming day became flushed with a delicate tint of purest, palestprimrose, the supposed fog-bank assumed a depth of rich purple hue and aclear-cut sharpness of outline that proclaimed it what it was--_land_,most unmistakably. The look-out was a smart young fellow, who hadalready established a reputation for trustworthiness, and he more thanhalf suspected the character of the cloud-like appearance when it firstcaught his attention; he therefore kept his eye upon it, and was nosooner assured of its nature than he raised the cry of--

  "Land ho! broad on th
e port bow!"

  The first luff, who had been for some time meditatively pacing theweather side of the deck from the binnacle to the gangway, with hishands clasped behind his back and his glance directed alternately to thedeck at his feet and to the swaying main-royal-mast-head, quickly awokefrom his abstraction at the cry from the forecastle, and, springinglightly upon a carronade slide, with one hand grasping the inner edge ofthe hammock-rail, looked long and steadily in the direction indicated.

  "Ay, ay, I see it," he answered, when after a long, steady look he hadsatisfied himself of the character of what he gazed upon. "Wheel,there, how's her head?"

  "East-south-east, sir!" answered the helmsman promptly.

  The lieutenant shut one eye and, raising his right arm, with the handheld flat and vertically, pointed toward the southern extremity of thedistant land, held it there for a moment, and murmured--

  "A point and a half--east-half-south, distant--what shall we say--twentymiles? Ay, about that, as nearly as may be. Mr Dugdale, just slipbelow and let the master know that the land is in sight on the port bow,bearing east-half-south, distant twenty miles."

  I touched my cap and trundled down to the master's cabin, the door ofwhich was hooked back wide open, permitting the cool, refreshing morningair that came in through the open scuttle free play throughout the fulllength of the rather circumscribed apartment in which Mr Robert Bateslay snoring anything but melodiously. Entering the cabin, I grasped theworthy man by the shoulder and shook him gently, calling him by name atthe same time in subdued tones in order that I might not awake theoccupants of the contiguous berths.

  "Ay, ay," was the answer, as the snoring abruptly terminated in aconvulsive snort: "Ay, ay. What's the matter now, youngster? Has theship tumbled overboard during the night, or has the skipper's cow gonealoft to roost in the main-top, that you come here disturbing me withyour `Mr Bates--Mr Bates'?"

  "Neither, sir," answered I, with a low laugh at this specimen of ourworthy master's quaint nautical humour; "but the first lieutenantdirected me to let you know that the land is in sight on the port bow,bearing east-half-south, distant twenty miles."

  "What, already?" exclaimed my companion, scrambling out of his cot,still more than half asleep, and landing against me with a force thatsent me spinning out through the open doorway to bring up prostrate witha crash in the cabin of the doctor opposite, half stunned by theconcussion of my skull against the bulkhead and by the avalanche ofponderous tomes that came crashing down upon me as the worthy medico'stier of hanging bookshelves yielded and came down by the run at my wildclutch as I stumbled over the ledge of the cabin-door.

  "Murther! foire! thieves! it's sunk, burnt, desthroyed, and kiltintoirely that I am!" roared poor Blake, rudely awakened out of a soundsleep by the crashing fall of his pet volumes upon the deck and by aterrific thwack across the face that I had inadvertently dealt him as Ifell. "Fwhat is it that's happenin' at all, thin? is it a collision? oris it a case of sthrandin'? or"--he looked over the edge of his cot andsaw me sitting upon the deck, ruefully rubbing the back of my head whileI vainly struggled to suppress my laughter at the ridiculous_contretemps_--"oh! so it's _you_, thin, is it, Misther Dugdale? Bedad,but you ought to be ashamed of yoursilf to be playin' these pranks--alad of your age, that's hitherto been the patthern of good behaviour!But wait a little, my man--sthop till I tell the first liftinint of yourouthrageous conduct--"

  By this time I thought that the matter had gone far enough; more over, Ihad in a measure recovered my scattered senses, so I scrambled to myfeet and, as I re-hung the book shelf and replaced the books, hurriedlyexplained to the good man the nature of the mishap, winding up with ahumble apology for having so rudely broken in upon what he was pleasedto call his "beauty shlape." Understanding at once that my involuntaryincursion into the privacy of his cabin had been the result of pureaccident, "Paddy," as we irreverently called him--his baptismal name wasWilliam--very good-naturedly accepted my explanation and apology, andcomposed himself to sleep again, whereupon I retreated in good order andre-entered the master's cabin. The old boy had by this time slipped onhis breeches and coat, and was bending over the table with the chart of"Africa--West Coast" spread out thereon, and a pencil and parallel rulerin his hands. He indulged in one or two of the grimly humorous remarksthat were characteristic of him in reference to my disturbance of thedoctor's slumbers; and then, pointing to a dot that he had just madeupon the chart, observed--

  "If the first lieutenant's bearing and distance are right, that's wherewe are, about twelve miles off Shark Point, and therefore in soundings.Did _you_ see the land, Mr Dugdale? What was it like?"

  "It made as a long stretch of undulating hills sloping gently down tothe horizon at its southernmost extremity, and extending beyond thehorizon to the northward," I replied.

  "Ay, ay, that's right; that's quite right," agreed the master. "It isthat range of hills stretching along parallel with the coast on thenorth side of the river, and reaching as far as Kabenda Point,"indicating the markings on the chart as he spoke. "Well, let us go ondeck and get a cast of the lead; it is time that we ascertained theexact position of the ship, for the deep-water channel is none too wide,and although there seems to be plenty of water for us over the banks oneither side, I have no fancy for trusting to the soundings laid downhere on the chart. These African rivers are never to be depended upon,the shoals are constantly shifting, and where you may find water enoughto float a line-of-battle ship to-day, you may ground in that sameship's launch a month hence."

  He rolled up the chart, tucked it under his arm, gathered up hisparallel ruler, pencil, and dividers, and together we left the cabin andmade our way up the hatchway to the deck, where we found the first luffstill perched upon the carronade slide, anxiously scanning the horizonon either bow under the sharp of his hand.

  As we reached the deck a spark of golden fire flashed out upon thehorizon on our lee bow, and the sun's disc soared slowly into view,warming the tints of a long, low-lying broken bank of grey cloud thatstretched athwart his course into crimson, and fringing its skirts withgold as his first beams shot athwart the heaving water to the ship in atremulous path of shimmering, dazzling radiance.

  The lieutenant caught a glimpse of us out of the corner of his eye as weemerged from the hatchway, and at once stepped down off the slide on tothe deck.

  "Good-morning, Bates," said he. "Well, here we are, with the landplainly in view, you see; and I am glad that you have come on deck totell us just _where_ we are, for all this part of the world is quite newground to me. We are closer in than I thought we were, for just beforethe sun rose the horizon ahead cleared, and I caught sight of whatlooked like the tops of trees, both on the port and on the starboardbow--you can't see them now for the dazzle, but you will presently, whenthe sun is a bit higher--and there seemed to be an opening orindentation of some sort between them, which I take to be the mouth ofthe river."

  "Ay, ay," answered Bates, "that will be it, no doubt." He sprang on tothe slide that Young had just vacated, took a long look at the land, andthen, turning to the helmsman, demanded, "How's her head?"

  "East-south-east, sir," answered the man for the second time.

  With this information the master in his turn took an approximate bearingof the southernmost extremity of the range of hills, after which hestepped down on to the deck again and, going to the capstan, spread outhis chart upon the head of it, calling me to help him keep the rollopen. The lieutenant followed him, and stood watching as the masteragain manipulated his parallel ruler and dividers.

  "Yes," remarked Bates, after a few moments' diligent study, "that's justabout where we are," pointing to the mark that he had made upon thechart while in his own cabin. "And see," he continued, glancing outthrough the nearest lee port, "we have reached the river water; look howbrown and thick it is, more like a cup of the captain's chocolate thangood, wholesome salt water. We will try a cast of the lead, Mr Young,if you please, just to make sure; though if we are fair in the c
hannel,as I think we are, we shall get no bottom as yet. Nor shall we make anyheadway until the wind freshens or the sea-breeze springs up, for we arealready within the influence of the outflowing current, and at thisseason of the year--which is the rainy season--it runs very strongly alittle further in."

  The lead was hove, but, as Bates had anticipated, no bottom was found;whereupon the master rolled up his chart again, gave orders that theship was to be kept going as she was, and returned to his cabin, whilethe watch mustered their buckets and scrubbing-brushes and proceeded towash decks and generally make the brig's toilet for the day.

  Our worthy master was right; we did not make a particle of headway untilabout nine o'clock, when the wind gradually hauled round aft andfreshened to a piping breeze before which we boomed along in fine styleuntil we came abreast of a low, narrow point on our port hand, protectedfrom the destructive action of the Atlantic breakers by a shoalextending some three-quarters of a mile to seaward. Abreast of thispoint we hauled up to the northward and entered a sort of bay abouthalf-a-mile wide, with the low point before-mentioned on our port hand,and a wide mud-bank to starboard, beyond which was an island ofconsiderable extent, fringed with mangroves and covered with thick bushand lofty trees. On the low point on our port hand were two"factories," or trading establishments, abreast of which were lying twobrigs and a barque, one of the brigs flying British and the otherSpanish colours, while the barque sported the Dutch ensign at hermizen-peak. We rounded-to just far enough outside these craft to givethem a clear berth, and let go our anchor in four fathoms of water.

  It was a queer spot that we now found ourselves in; queer to me atleast, who was now entering upon my first experience of West Africanservice. We were riding with our head to the north-west under thecombined influence of wind and tide together, with the low point--namedBanana Peninsula, so the master informed me, though _why_ it should beso named I never could understand, for there was not a singlebanana-tree upon the whole peninsula, as I subsequently ascertained.Let me see, where was I? I have gone adrift among those non-existentbanana-trees. Oh yes, I was going to attempt to make a word-sketch ofthe scene which surrounded us after we had let go our anchor and furledour canvas. The sea-breeze was piping strong from the westward, whilethe tide was ebbing down the creek from the northward, and under thesecombined influences the _Barracouta_ was riding with her head aboutnorth-west. Banana Peninsula lay ahead of us, trending away along ourlarboard beam and slightly away from us to the southward for abouthalf-a-mile, where it terminated in a sandy beach bordered by a broadpatch of smooth water, athwart which marched an endless line of mimicbreakers from the wall of flashing white surf that thundered upon theouter edge of the protecting shoal three-quarters of a mile to seaward.The point was pretty thickly covered with bush and trees, chieflycocoa-nut and other palms--except in the immediate vicinity and in frontof the two factories, where the soil had been cleared and a sort ofrough wharf constructed by driving piles formed of the trunks of treesinto the ground and wedging a few slabs of sawn timber in behind them.The point, for a distance of perhaps a mile from its southern extremity,was very narrow--not more than from one hundred and fifty to two hundredyards wide--but beyond that it widened out considerably until it mergedin the mainland. On the opposite side of the creek, on our starboardquarter and astern of us, was what I at first took to be a singleisland, but which I subsequently found to be a group of about a dozenislands, of which the smallest may have been half-a-mile long by about athird of a mile broad, while the largest was some nine or ten miles longby about three miles broad. These islands really constituted thenorthern bank of the river for a distance some twenty-four miles up thestream, being cut off from the mainland and from each other by narrowcanal-like creeks running generally in a direction more or less east andwest. The land all about here was low, and to a great extent swampy,the margin of the creeks being lined with mangroves that presented avery curious appearance as they stood up out of the dark, slimy-lookingwater, their trunks supported upon a network of naked, twisted rootsthat strongly suggested to me the idea of spiders' legs swollen andknotted with some hideous, deforming disease. The trees themselves,however, apart from their twisted, gnarled, and knotted roots, presenteda very pleasing appearance, for they had just come into full leaf, andtheir fresh green foliage was deeply grateful to the eye satiated with along and wearisome repetition of the panorama of unbroken sea and sky.Beyond the belt of mangroves the islands were overgrown with dense bush,interspersed with tall trees, some of which were rich with violetblossoms growing in great drooping clusters, like the flowers of thelaburnum; while others were heavily draped with long, trailing sprays ofmagnificent jasmine, of which there were two kinds, one bearing a pinkyflower, and the other a much larger star-like bloom of pure white. Theeuphorbia, acacia, and baobab or calabash-tree were all in bloom; andhere and there, through openings between the trunks of the mangroves,glimpses were caught of rich splashes of deep orange-colour, standingout like flame against the dark background of shadowed foliage, thatsubsequent investigation proved to be clumps of elegant orchids. Itappeared that we had entered the river at precisely the right time ofthe year to behold it at its brightest and best, for the spring rainshad only recently set in, and all Nature was rioting in the refreshmentof the welcome moisture and bursting forth into a joyous prodigality ofleaf and blossom, of colour and perfume, of life and glad activity. Theforest rang with the calls and cries of pairing birds; flocks ofparrots, parrakeets, and love-birds were constantly wheeling and dartinghither and thither; kingfishers flitted low across the placid water, orwatched motionless from some overhanging branch for the passage of theirunsuspecting prey; the wydah bird flaunted his gay plumage in thebrilliant sunshine, where it could be seen to the fullest advantage; andbutterflies, like living gems, flitted happily from flower to flower.Astern of us, some three miles away, lay Boolambemba Point, thesouthernmost extremity of the group of islands to which I have alreadyalluded, where the embouchure of the river may be said to begin, thestream here being about three and a half miles across, while immediatelybelow it abruptly widens to a breadth of about five and a half miles atthe indentation leading to Banana Creek, in the narrow approach to whichwe were lying at anchor. Of course it was not possible for us todistinguish, from where we were lying, much of the character of thecountry on the southern or left bank of the river, but it appeared to bepretty much the same as what we saw around us; that is to say, low landdensely covered with bush and trees along the river margin, with higherland beyond. About half-a-mile beyond us, broad on our starboard bow aswe were then lying, the anchorage narrowed down to a width of less thanhalf-a-mile, the western extremity of the group of islands alreadyreferred to there converging toward Banana Peninsula in a low,mangrove-wooded point. Beyond this, however, could be seen a stretch ofwater about a mile and a half wide, which I subsequently learned ran forseveral miles up at the back of the islands, between them and themainland, in the form of a narrow, shallow, canal-like creek that Bates,the master, seemed to think might well repay the trouble of carefulinspection, since the narrow maze of channels to which it gave accessoffered exceptional facilities for the embarkation of slaves, and achoice of routes for the light-draught slavers from their places ofconcealment into the main channel of the river.