English passengers
Page 53
‘‘Captain Kewley!’’ This was Jonah Childs, showing all his teeth as if we were old friends. ‘‘I’m so glad you were able to come, and from so very far, too. But let me introduce you.’’
Before I knew it I was shaking hands with some major out of the English army—a huge fat sort of body, who Childs said had gone exploring deserts on a mule, though he looked like only an elephant would carry him—and also a pair of Potter’s doctor friends. These two and Childs had organized the exhibition.
‘‘But it’s Captain Kewley we should thank as much as anyone,’’ said Childs, giving me a wide smile. ‘‘If it had not been for him, after all, Dr. Potter’s book would never have been preserved for us. If anyone deserves our gratitude, it is you, Captain.’’
This was all news to me. ‘‘What book?’’
He just laughed. ‘‘But you must know? The Destiny of Nations. You were the one who brought it ashore.’’
I could only suppose it must have been that packet of gibberish in the leather case.
Childs was grinning at this fine joke he’d found. ‘‘Really, Captain, you should be proud of yourself You saved a work of greatness. People are talking of nothing else. The printer cannot keep up with new orders.’’
For a moment I wondered if this was some kind of trick. Had there been something in there, hidden among the gibberish, calling me criminal? Yet Jonah Childs and his doctor friends were all sweetest smiles. I had to ask, though it was tempting fate, sure as sure is, ‘‘So the salvaging went well, did it?’’
Childs gave a little piping laugh. ‘‘You joke, Captain. Why, I’ve never known such a trial. First there was the weather that could not have been worse, though this was supposed to be high summer. Then there was the fact that the vessel had sunk deeper than was supposed. Then there were the treacherous salvagers, who suddenly took it upon themselves to vanish away to Devon to another operation that offered greater payment. It was more than four months before it was done.’’
I was that far down the road now I had to finish. ‘‘Did you find any surprises?’’
D’you know, he gave me a troubled sort of look, as if he was the one who was being suspected. ‘‘I assure you, there was nothing there aside from Dr. Potter’s stores. If there had been anything else I would certainly have informed your insurers.’’
‘‘I’m sure you would, Mr. Childs.’’ Had the tide taken him away? I wondered. It was possible she’d broken up on the sea bottom, and he’d been dropped clean out. I could feel a smile brewing, and a mighty one it was, too. Then again there are few cheerier things to do of an evening than to find you’re not to be hanged after all.
‘‘But there are others here you should meet,’’ cooed Childs, all trying to please. ‘‘I never supposed the exhibition would attract so many eminent people. That tall man with grey hair is a member of Parliament, while that fellow just by the door is a writer of philosophy, whose works are greatly admired. The one beside him…’’
I didn’t much care who they were. All I wanted was a bit of quiet room to enjoy my own news. ‘‘If you don’t mind I’d like to take a look round the exhibition. I wouldn’t want to miss it.’’
‘‘Quite so, Captain, quite so.’’
So I started taking a little stroll round the room, though I hardly looked at the exhibits very carefully, being far too busy following my own sweet thoughts. I was free. Why, I’d never even needed to lock myself away in that basement all this while. The mad stupid foolishness of it.
I was barely halfway round when I found myself looking at another set of bones, all arranged on a handsome metal frame, and spliced together tidy as could be. I didn’t think anything of them at first. Then I noticed the skull had a big hole just above the right eye. It was probably just chance, but wasn’t that the sort of spot where China Clucas had gone tapping with his axe? On the frame was a little brass plate, all carved with neatest writing.
UNKNOWN MALE PRESUMED Tasmanian aborigine
POSSIBLE VICTIM OF HUMAN SACRIFICE
Just nearby was a little glass case, and in it was a little scran of what looked like skin.
ABORIGINAL WITCHCRAFT CHARM
There was no mistaking the hairs, which were were short, just right for someone’s beard, and a fine shade of red.
He’d not been washed away. He’d been picked clean. Of course. Four months would have been long enough for sea creatures to have themselves a fine little feed.
For a moment I quite expected Jonah Childs and the others to come up and haul me away to gaol, but none of them did. They all just carried on with their hellos and politeness and making little jokes, like before.
Nobody seemed very interested.
EPILOGUE
ALL FICTION—and nonfiction—changes and concentrates what it portrays. This is one of its first purposes. Having said this, I have tried to represent this era as truthfully and precisely as possible. All the major events of the Tasmanian strand of the novel follow real occurrences, from the stealing of aboriginal women by sealers to the massacre on the cliff, the bizarre cruelties of the convict system, the fiasco of the Black Line and the terrible farce of Flinders Island. Likewise some of the characters are closely based on people of the time, including Robson, the various governors and their wives and also Mother (Walyeric). She was inspired by a formidable woman named Walyer, who fought the whites and was greatly feared by them. She knew how to use firearms, was reputed to have cut a new path through the bush to facilitate her campaigns and would swear fluently in English as she launched her attacks. She was eventually captured by the British in late 1831, and at once began trying to organize fellow aboriginals in a rebellion. She died not long afterwards.
Another character based on a real figure of the time is Tayaleah, or George Vandiemen. The real George Vandiemen was a Tasmanian aboriginal child who was found wandering close to New Norfolk in 1821, having become separated from his family. His aboriginal name is not recorded. His discovery came to the attention of a recently arrived settler, William Kermode—oddly enough, a Manxman—who decided to have him sent to Lancashire to be educated. The boy did well in his studies, and was sent back to Tasmania in 1828, only to fall sick and die soon afterwards. His short history was soon forgotten.
Now I’d like to jump forward a little. During the 1850s a quiet revolution was occurring in England. Prior to this time Europeans had frequently treated other peoples with great cruelty—the worst example being, famously, slavery—yet there was little or no attempt in educated circles to justify such behaviour. The biblical notion that all men are roughly equal may have been ignored, yet it had remained largely unchallenged. This was all to change. In 1850 a disgraced surgeon named Robert Knox published The Races of Men, a fragment. This was in many ways a precursor of Hitler’s Mein Kampf, insisting that all history was nothing more than a process of racial conflicts (rather as Karl Marx, in his Communist Manifesto of three years earlier, had declared all history was merely a struggle between economic classes). Knox was among the first writers to claim that the various races of mankind were actually different species (a ludicrous notion in modern scientific terms), while it will come as little surprise that he proposed that the Saxon, of England, was among the most exalted. His book was an immediate best-seller. For the first time it became acceptable, even fashionable, to see the world in these terms. Though such ideas were strongly opposed in some quarters they continued to gain influence, forming a kind of ugly background music to the latter part of the century. Their impact since then is infamous, and we are living with it still today.
If only the Victorian British had troubled to look a little more carefully at the evidence before them. It was widely accepted throughout the later nineteenth century that the most inferior of all races had been the aborigines of Tasmania—how else could they have so foolishly permitted themselves to be exterminated?—who were often depicted as being a kind of halfway house between men and apes, wholly lacking in faculties of reason. Another presumption o
f the time was that the highest and rarest form of reason was mathematics.
I would now like to include a factual document from that time. This is George Vandiemen’s final school report, written by his teacher in Lancashire, John Bradley. I have reproduced it in full.
Mr. Kermode,
You will perceive, in George’s ciphering book, the easy manner that has been pursued in teaching him Arithmetic, a branch of education that he was supposed to be incompetent in, but this supposition, I am persuaded, could only have arisen from want of method and experience in those who attempted to teach him, and not from want of faculty in George. His abode with me has been but short, but I am convinced that his good memory, which you will perceive in his repetition of the Psalms and other things which he has got off, must certainly enable him to go through common Arithmetic with as much faculty as boys do in general.
I feel much gratified in having had this boy with me, tho’ but a little time, as it confirms me more in the opinion that I have long cherished: that Man is on all parts of the globe the same; being a free agent, he may mould himself to excellence or debase himself below the brute, & that education, government and established customs are the principal causes of the distinctions among nations. Let us place indiscriminately all the shades of colour in the human species in the same climate, allow them the same means for development of intellect, I apprehend the blacks will keep place with the whites, for colour neither impairs the muscles nor enervates the mind. We know that a black horse can match a white one in the race and that Hannibal and his black Africans contended gloriously with Rome for the Empire of the world. May the revolutions of mind establish the empire of reason and benevolence over the ruins of ignorance and prejudice. But I fear, sir, that I am running from the subject, which is by your desire to say the method that I would recommend to be pursued in the passage.
Arithmetic may be followed up by selecting the easy examples out of a printed one (?) which he has with him; but care should be taken that he do not disfigure his ciphering book, as it may be shown to the Governor, so that if he should write down any sums let it be on common paper, these may be at some future time transcribed, if it should be thought necessary.
The Psalms. Repeat one daily so as to keep in most those which he has already got off.
Read a lesson daily in the Juvenile Reader and commit a portion of it to memory.
Say the multiplication and pence tables frequently, also a portion of the Geography and write a lesson out of the Orthography & get the Rule connected with the lesson.
I refer to your judgment for the next. May the Giver of Intellect bless your endeavours and make you happy in the exercise of benevolence. I also pray that our Nation may be just as it is great and secure to George a portion of the land that gave him birth, that our Rulers may in this instance be governed by justice, let the Native have what the voice of reason and equity adjudge to him, and not let power supersede right. Accept my wishes for your own and George’s prosperity & a pleasant voyage to the other side of the globe.
Your humble servant,
John Bradley
THE ANGLO-MANX DIALECT
THE MANX SPOKE a Celtic language closely related to Irish and Scottish Gaelic. It gradually declined during the nineteenth century, and the last native Manx speaker died in the 1970s (though recently there has been a move to teach it in Manx schools). As the old language faded, there grew up what became known as the Anglo-Manx dialect. This was a form of English but was peppered with Celtic words and thoughts, and grammar was often a literal translation from Gaelic. Thus Manxmen would not say he has a new hat but there’s a new hat at him, and the definite article (the) could be used for emphasis, as in the phrase the hot I am.
Sad to say, the Anglo-Manx dialect has, like the old Gaelic language before it, largely vanished now, apart from the odd word or phrase, but fortunately a full record was made when it was still widely spoken, at the beginning of this century: Vocabulary of the Anglo-Manx Dialect by A. W. Moore, Edmund Goodwin and Sophia Morrison, which offers an intriguing picture of past Manx preoccupations. The sea, herring and superstition all figure strongly. So do various types of character, all of them viewed with disapproval. Smooth, slippery people are represented by no fewer than nine words (Creeper, Click, Clinker, Cluke, Crooil, Reezagh, Shliawn, Slebby and Sleetch). Showy, boastful people get ten (Branchy, Filosher, Feroash, Gizzard, Grinndher, High, Neck, Snurly, Stinky and Uplifted). Large, blundering people get fifteen (Bleih, Bleb, Dawd, Flid, Gaping, Glashan, Gogaw, Gorm, Hessian, Kinawn, Looban, Ommidhan, Slampy, Sthahl and Walloper), while peevish people—especially small, scolding women—get as many as eighteen (Borragh, Coughty, Crabby, Cretchy,
Corodank, Gob-mooar, Gonnag, Grangan, Grinnder, Grouw, Huffy, Mhinyag, Pootchagh, Scrissy, Scrowl, Smullagh, Spiddagh and Targe).
There is also a wealth of words concerned with beatings, inheritance and small amounts of money. Most of all, though, the dialect gives an impression of a people who delighted in playing games with language. I have used it sparingly, so it does not become too much of a distraction, and have tried to make the meaning of words apparent from their context. In case any have proved puzzling, though, I offer a glossary.
Anglo-Manx Glossary
Baarl Manx name for the English
language
Babban Baby
Bat Hit
Big Denoting anyone of importance
Black Pig Sulk: He had the black pig on his back
Bleb Fool
Boaster Someone from Ramsey town
Body Commonly used for person
Branchy Boastful, showy, spreading oneself
out
Brave Smart/intelligent
Canokers A beating
Clicky Crazy
Cob Short, stout person
To Cog To beat down a price
Cretchy/Cretch Querulous, infirm/querulous person
Crooil Crouching, deceitful
Crust A frail old person
Customs An officer of the customs
Dawd Dull, awkward person
Derb Wild, intractable person
Dirt No good person/bad weather
Fritlag Worthless person/rag
Gizzard (to have) To be conceited
Glashan Big hulking boy
Gorm A lout
Grouw Glum, sulky
Guilley Boy, fellow
Hard Case Someone with daring
High Proud, fine, loud
To be Hobbled To be in difficulties
Huffy Ill-tempered
Humpy Humped/hunchbacked
Jerrude A state of forgetfulness/dreaminess
Jink Money
Lonnag Sea name for a mouse
Lumper Anything of a good size
Mhinyag Short person
Mie Good
To Molevogue To punish
Morrey Morning
To Murder To ill-treat
Pay Wedding Wedding at which each guest pays
a share
To Pelt To thrash/skin
Pommit Sea name for a rabbit
Power A large number
A Raddling A beating
Rank Keen/eager
Refreshments (give) To beat
Rile To beat/to salt and shake herring
Sainty Saintly/Sanctified
Scanky Shrill
To Scelp To smack
Scotch Grey Louse
Scran A scrap/any caught fish not herring
Scranch A rending sound
Scrape(r) A miser
Scrapings Savings
Scrawley Parsimonious, mean
Screeb Scrape, scratch
Scriss/Scrissag A mean person/scolding woman
To Scutch To whip/lash
Shliawn Smooth, slippery, sly
Slampy Flabby
Sleetchy/Sleetch Slippery or deceitful/slippery person
Slewed Drunk
To Snurl To turn up your nose in disgust
Soo Juice, energy, sub
stance
Spiddagh Small sharp person
Stink Pride
Stob Short fencing post; stumpy figure
Swiney Sea name for a pig
Thrail Walk slowly
Throng A crowd/to crowd
Yernach Irish
Yernee Yeirk Irish beggar
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
I WOULD LIKE to thank the following people for their great help during the long time I have been trying to write this book.
In Tasmania: Jenny Scott, Phillipa Foster and Damien Morgan and, most of all, Cassandra Pybus. Thanks to the Archives Office of Tasmania for the use of George Vandiemen’s school report.
In mainland Australia: Gerard Bryant and Jacqui Boyle, Meredith and John Purcell, Maggie Hamilton, Judith Curr.
In the Isle of Man: Alan Kelly.
In Wales: John and Edna Fernihough and all in and around Gros-mont, Gwent.
In England: Deborah Rogers, David Miller, Maggie Black and Pamela Egan.
This book is dedicated to Victoria Egan.
Copyright © 2000 by Matthew Kneale
Anchor Books and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are
the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Kneale, Matthew, 1960–
English Passengers / Matthew Kneale.
p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-307-48431-4
1. Tasmania—History—1803-1900 Fiction. 2. Tasmanian aborigines Fiction.