them."
"There's a method in my obligingness, sir. Let's leave the rum indifferent jars about, and cut the 'baccy all in bits and scatter it overthe decks. Wolves, sir, fighting over a dead horse'll be nothing to thescramble they'll have for the 'baccy and rum."
The boats were now lowered and laden with the ship's valuables. Eachboat was well provisioned, and supplied with water and rum, and alsoarmed.
The men were twenty and two, all told, giving about five to each of twowhalers, and seven to the largest whaler or cutter, as she was sometimescalled. The captain himself took charge of this, his wife and Leila aspassengers; Peter took command of the second boat, and I of the third,in my boat Ritchie being rifleman. Jill, it is needless to say, camewith me, his elder brother. Ah! that five minutes of difference in ourages made me the man, you see, and Jill the child, and I would not havehad it otherwise for all the world.
The day wore on. Noon passed, yet never a sign of Indian was seen. Sowe did what all right-thinking Englishmen would have done under thecircumstances. We dined.
We made both ladies swallow a ration of rum. Poor Mrs Coates' eyeswatered, and Leila became a little hysterical and finally cried.
The wind went round and round, till at last it was fair.
Everything looked _so_ propitious. But why did not the savages appear?
"I have it, sir," said Ritchie. "They're waiting to attack us at night,and I now propose we start. They're hidden somewhere, depend upon it."
Ritchie was right, and no sooner had we got fairly into the offing, thanout their canoes swarmed after us.
"Keep well together in a line," cried the captain, "and stand by to givethem a volley."
Ritchie stood up in his boat, and shouted at the foremost boat in brokenSpanish. He tried to tell them that the tobacco was in the ship.
But on they came. Mrs Coates and Leila were made to lie down in theboat, and only just in time, for a shower of arrows flew over us nextminute.
"Fire!"
Half a dozen rifles rang out in the still air, dusky forms sprang up inthe canoes and fell to rise no more. Again and again our guns spreaddeath in their ranks, and the nearer they came the hotter they had it.
We had spears in the boats, boarding pikes and axes. Would we have touse them? For a moment it seemed likely. All sail was set, and almostevery hand was free for a tulzie that, if it came, would indeed be aterrible one.
One more telling volley. Would they now draw off? Yes, for over thewater from the wreck came a mingled shout and yell. The canoes at oncewere stopped. Greed did what our guns had failed to accomplish. Murderand revenge are sweet to a savage, but tobacco and rum are sweeterstill.
In ten minutes time we and our dusky foes were far apart indeed, thesavages having a grand canoe race back to the wreck, we dancing awayover the waves and heading straight for the east.
"Thank Heaven," said Ritchie, fervidly, "they're gone."
"Do you think we could have beaten them off, Ritchie?" I asked.
"One can never tell how things will go in a hand-to-hand fight. Not asever I've been in many, but, bless your innocent soul, lad, I've comethrough so much. I came to close quarters once on the African shorewith a crowd o' canoes just like that. I could have sworn we'd havebeaten them off easy. And so we might have done, if our boats hadcontinued on an even keel. But that wasn't their game. No, they threwthemselves like wild cats on one gunwale, and over we went. They had usin the water; and by the time a boat shoved off from the _Wasp_ and cameto our assistance, there was hardly a man among us left to tell tales."
"That was fearful!"
"Ye see--haul aft the main sheet a bit--you see, sir, mostly all savageshas their own ways o' fightin', their own tactics as you might say.Drat 'em all, I say."
"You don't believe in the noble savage?" said Jill.
"Not same's they make 'em nowadays, sir. 'Cause why, we white men havespiled them. And now we want to kill 'em all off the face o' the earth.It's just like an ignorant old party having a dog for a pet. He'severything at first, and the very cat takes liberties with him, till oneday he snaps. It's only natural, but what does the ignorant old partydo?--why puts him in a bag and drowns him. It's the same wi' thesavage: the white man has spoiled him, and now he thinks he'd better getrid of him entirely. Well, young gentlemen, by your leave I'll have asmoke. You've got the compass all right, Mr Jill? Thank ye. 'Causeif the weather changes for the worst, then--"
"Hush, hush. Why you _are_ a pessimist!"
"I don't know that ship. But never mind. You don't smoke?"
"N-no," said Jill, "not yet."
"Let me catch him at it," I said.
"What have ye got under the sail, sir?"
"Why, the dogs," said Jill, laughing. "You didn't think I was going toleave them, did you? Look here." He lifted the corner of the sail ashe spoke, and there, sure enough, were Ossian the noble Scottishdeerhound, and Bruce the collie.
"Mind," continued Jill, "both o' these would have done a little fightingif the worst had come to the worst."
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The wind held steadily from the west and by north, and blew stiff aftera time, but the boats sailed dry--neither were far distant from theother--and everything was as comfortable as could be expected under thesad circumstances.
"If there doesn't come any more north in it than this," said Ritchie,with a glance skyward, "it'll do. But, you see, we ought to be headingup Famine Reach now."
"What a name!" said Jill.
"Ay, and there is a sad and terrible story to it too, that some day Imay perhaps tell you."
The afternoon wore slowly away, neither Jill nor I saying much; Ritchie,with his old-world yarns, doing nearly all the talking, and indeed itwas a treat to listen to him. There was nothing of the nature of whatare called sailor's yarns about Ritchie's talk, but an air oftruthfulness in every sentence. Many a time by the galley fire in thedear lost _Salamander_, when asked by some of the men to "spin 'em ayarn," Ritchie would reply--
"If I thinks on anything as has really happened, I'll tell that. Mindye, men," he would add, "I'm going on for fifty. That ain't a springchicken, and I've knocked about so much and seen such a deal, that if Itells all the truth an' nobbut the truth, why I'll be seventy afore I'mfinished. By that time I reckon it'll be time to clear up decks toenter the eternal port."
Now, being senior officer, I really was in charge of the boat, still Idetermined to take advice in everything from Ritchie, as in duty bound,he being my superior by far and away both in age and experience, and Imay add in wisdom.
So, when near sundown, I asked him if the men should eat, he shook hishead and said--"Not yet awhile."
I did not feel easy in my mind at the answer, nor at his presentlyrelapsing into silence, pulling harder at his pipe than usual withoutseeming to enjoy it, and casting so many half-uneasy glances skywards.
I feared that we were not yet out of danger. Jill had gone to sleep inthe bottom of the boat, and somehow this also made me nervous anduneasy. I drew the sail over him with the exception of his face, andthere he lay snug enough to all appearance, his head pillowed on thecollie's shoulder. I could not help wondering to myself where he was inhis dreams. At home, I could have wagered two to one--two turnips to aleg of mutton, for instance.
Presently his features became pained, set and rigid, and his hands wereclutched in the sail, while he moaned or half screamed like one in anightmare.
Ritchie noticed it too.
"Call his name. Call his name, sir. That's allers the way to bring 'emout of it."
Well, desperate diseases need desperate remedies, so I did call hisname--in full too.
"_Rupert Domville Ffoljambe-Foley Jillard Jones_" I shouted, so loudthat the other boats must have thought I was hailing them.
Jill sat bolt upright, looking bewildered.
Ossian and Bruce jumped up and barked.
The men all
laughed, and no wonder.
"Well," said Ritchie, "blow me teetotally tight if ever in all my borndays I 'eard sich a name as that 'afore. Why 'twould wake old Riphimself. After that I think the men better have 'alf a biscuit and abite o' bacon. It'll do 'em good--after that."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN.
LOST IN THE SNOWSTORM--WHAT WE SAW IN THE FOREST.
We all felt "heartier," as Ritchie phrased it, after our dainty morselof supper. The pork, of course, was new, and, sailor fashion, we dippedour biscuits in the sea, to give them a relish, before we ate them.
The dogs shared just as if they had been part of the crew. So they werefor that matter.
The wind fell off as the sun sank behind the snowy mountains, fell offand off, till we were becalmed. Then I gave the orders--
"In sail," and "out oars."
After spanking along under sail for so long a time as we had done, to bereduced to rowing seems dreary work. However, there is nothing like thesea for teaching one patience, so we did not murmur.
The sunset was gorgeous enough, in all conscience, and played all sortsof fantastic tricks of colouring among the snowy cliffs, peaks, andglaciers, making a picture such as few artists could, if they would,produce on canvas, or would dare to if they could.
As we had nothing else to do, Jill and I sat silently staring at theever changing sky, with as much inward pleasure as ever child gazed uponthe flowers in a kaleidoscope.
Even after the sun had set entirely, the sky was wondrous in its beauty.It seemed to me as if the artist Nature, whom we all try to copy, weremixing her colours to commence some great new work, and that the sky washer palette.
But that palette itself was a picture, oh how grand and solemn! Firstwe had the sea, darkling now under the shadows of the giant hill, yetborrowing tints from the clouds. Then the wild wooded cliffs, andpointed rocks looking almost black against the background of snow andice rising up, and up, and up its sharpest lines, softened till it endedin the rugged serrated horizon.
High up in the heavens, where in the rifts the sky could be seen, it wasof a light cerulean blue, pure, ethereal, the grey clouds in bars andpiles, still the same shaped bars of cloud lower down; but here therifts of sky were of an ineffably lovely tint of pale sea green, and theclouds were purple, while all along the horizon the naked sky was of thedeepest orange, almost approaching to crimson, all aglow with light.
Even as we gazed, a change came over the spirit of the scene; for thegreen rifts changed to a milky white, with a hazy blush of crimsonfloating over it, borrowed from the splendour beneath and beyond.
Still another change: the rifts away to the north and the south had allturned to sea green, and right in the east, when we look round, we findthat the higher clouds that erst were grey and dull, are now a burningbronze and crimson.
Then the clouds kept borrowing each other's colours at second hand. Butat last crimson and yellow changed to lurid bronze and purple, then togrey and to darker grey, and soon, out from the only green rift left,shone a pale star.
It is night.
The air is chill and cold. Birds--strange, wild, low-flying creatureswhose names we know not--hurry past us, or over us, to their eeries insome distant rock, and the silence is unbroken save by the clunk-clank--clunk-clank--of the oars in the rowlocks.
Jill is leaning against me, and I feel him shiver slightly.
"Jill," I say, "you're not well, old man."
"Oh yes, brother, I'm well enough."
"But you're not downright, jolly well."
"I feel a trifle shivery, that's all, brother. I had an ugly dream; andbesides, I don't think I've quite recovered my sea-bath yet."
"Look 'ee here, sir," said Ritchie. "That young man isn't quite thething. Now I'm going to prescribe. He's going to bed down among thedogs, and what's more, he's going to sleep. He'll have a tot o' rum asmedicine. There are times, gentlemen, when such a thing may do good.Now's one o' them. And if he doesn't wake up early in the morning hisold self, then my name isn't Ted Ritchie."
I left my brother in Ritchie's hands, and soon he had him snug in bed.
There was more moonlight to-night, but still the moon had a struggle forit.
I happened to be looking behind me towards the bay where we had left thegood old _Salamander_, and Ritchie was looking too--both thinking thesame thoughts perhaps--when suddenly a huge pear-shaped column offire-rays shot up into the sky, then gradually died away. We spoke not,but listened, till over the water came a dull crashing rumble, the likeof which I had never heard before. The sound died away among the hillslike thunder.
"She's gone," said one of the men, and for a few moments all lay ontheir oars.
"_Ay_, right enough," said Ritchie, "and there's more'n a score o' themsea-fiends gone with her, I'll warrant.
"It's the gunpowder we were taking to Honolulu that's done it," hecontinued.
"A pity," I said, "we did not throw that overboard."
"I dunno so much about that. Those Indian savages would have had to diesometime. It's just as well now, as before they do more mischief."
I laughed.
"That is queer philosophy," I said; "we should never do evil, nor wishfor evil, that good may come. I wonder how they managed it."
"Why, sir, they're as inquisitive as monkeys--they be. They would findout a barrel and take it for rum. Off would come the lid, one fellowholding the light. A dozen hands would be plunged in, and they wouldtaste the black stuff. Well, they wouldn't like it, and one savagewould pitch a handful at the other. That would _begin_ the fun. We'vejust heard how it _ended_. Well, gentlemen, I feel a sort of satisfiednow, for blame me if I half liked the idea of leaving our old bonesthere for these savages to pick at."
A red gleam now illumined the sky where we had noticed the flash; it wasevident the old _Salamander_ was on fire, and burning fast andfuriously.
"Now, then," I said presently, "I'll take the first watch, Ritchie. Youturn in there. You go to the dogs with Jill."
"Ay, sir; and I'll sleep sound now I've seen the last of my dear oldship."
As the night wore on I was concerned to notice the moon become obscured.Although on the water there was not a puff of wind, still, high overhead, the clouds were hurrying over the sky from east to west.Something was coming, but I did not care to wake Ritchie yet. He neededall the rest he could get, having been awake so long and working sohard.
It grew very dark now, and I could not see the other boats, though theymust have been close at hand. We had kept well together on purpose, forwe cared not to show signal lights.
Presently there came a puff of wind. Then almost before words coulddescribe it, a snow-squall. It was the spring of the year, but indeedeven during summer, in this dreary region, snow-storms are not uncommon.
How soundly Ritchie slept! There was hail rattling on the canvas overhim, and there had been one or two sharp peals of thunder also, butstill he slumbered on. The men could make no headway against the storm;in fact we must have been losing way considerably, for the poor fellowswere tired, and, even before the squall, had been nodding at their oars.Still they would not give in, nor give up. By and by came the lull,but the wind still blew with a good deal of force, and the snow wasblinding.
"In oars," I said, "and get the sail up now; we'll tack a bit."
We did so, reaching well over on both sides, as far as we thought wassafe; the snow continuing thick and fast. Presently another squallcame. And so on and off for many long hours. I would not think ofwaking Ritchie, for I felt very fresh and fit for duty, and what couldhe do even if up. I allowed the men to sleep, two at a time, for anhour or so. Thus I managed to keep them fresh also.
The snow left off at last, and the sky cleared a little, but the windkept up and blew from the same quarter. Just at grey daylight in themorning Ritchie threw off his tarpaulin and sat up, looking dazed for amoment or two.
"My dear young sir, I'm ashamed of myself," he said, looking at hiswatch; "but whe
re in the world are we?"
"No where that I know of; it has been blowing and snowing all nightlong, and now we're close under some wooded cliffs, and the other boatsare not in sight."
"This is bad," said Ritchie.
I had taken off my jacket, and was wringing the sleeves when Jillappeared.
"I'm as fresh as a daisy," he said; "but what a time I must have slept!Are we nearly at Sandy Point?"
We laughed.
"Sandy Point, my dear sir; you won't see Sandy Point for a week if itkeeps on like this."
"Well, we'll have breakfast, I suppose. I could eat a hunter."
"Good sign. We'll all join you."
By and by Ritchie stood up and had a good look round.
"I know where we are. I've been here before in happier times. We'llrun in shore and rest. No good trying to beat up against this breeze.The other boats sail more closely to the wind, and I hope by this timethey are well on to Froward Reach, and round the corner."
The boat was now put about, and in a few minutes we found ourselves in abay, and sheltered cove off the bay.
At another time and under happier auspices we could have afforded toadmire the scenery around us. At first glance, had you been there, youmight have fancied yourself
Wild Life in the Land of the Giants: A Tale of Two Brothers Page 19