by Charles
"Stand back, you others!" said Bligh. "Up with your weapon, you mutinous villain! I'll soon prove whether you are a man or not!"
He advanced resolutely toward the carpenter, who backed away at his approach.
"Fight, damn you!" Bligh roared. "Defend yourself or I'll cut you down as you stand!"
Purcell, although a larger man than Bligh, had little of the latter's inner fire and strength. Bligh was thoroughly roused; and had the carpenter tried to make good his boast, one or the other of them would, I am convinced, have been killed--and I have little doubt as to which would have been the victim. But Purcell made a complete about-face, and ran from his pursuer, who halted and gazed after him, breathing rapidly.
"Come back, Mr. Purcell!" he cried. "You have even less spirit than I gave you credit for! Come here, sir!...Now then; do you retract what you have said?"
"Yes, sir," Purcell replied.
"Very well," said Bligh. "Let me have no more of your insolence in the future. Get about your work."
It is to Bligh's credit that he never afterwards mentioned this incident. As for the carpenter, he was willing enough to have it forever put out of mind. He had, I believe, flattered himself that he was a match for his commander. From this time on, the relations of the two men were on a better footing.
The island upon which we had landed was of a considerable height. While the foraging parties were out, Mr. Bligh, Nelson, and myself walked inland to the, highest part of it for a better view of our surroundings; but we could see little more of the main than appeared from below. In our weakened condition the climb had been a fatiguing one, and we took shelter in the shade of a great rock to recover our breath. The lagoons were miracles of vivid colouring in the clear morning light. We could plainly see the tiny figures of the foraging parties as they made their way 'slowly along the shallows, searching for shellfish. Almost directly below us was the launch, looking smaller than a child's toy in the bight where she lay.
"There she lies," said Bligh, gazing fondly at the tiny craft. "I love every strake of planking, every nail in her. Mr. Nelson, could you have believed that she could have carried eighteen men such a voyage as we have come? Could you, Mr. Ledward?"
"I was thinking of just that," Nelson replied. "We have been under God's guidance. It must have been so."
"Aye," said Bligh, nodding gravely. "But God expected us to play our part. We should not have had His help, otherwise."
"What distance have we come, in all, sir?" I asked.
"I have this morning reckoned it up," said Bligh. "I think I am not far out in saying that we have sailed, from Tofoa to the passage within the reefs of New Holland, a distance of two thousand, three hundred and ninety miles."
"God be thanked that we have so much of the voyage behind us," said Nelson, fervently. "This leaves us with one thousand miles ahead, does it not?"
"More than that," Bligh replied. "As nearly as I can recollect, we have between one hundred and fifty and two hundred miles to coast New Holland before we reach Endeavour Straits; but once again in the open sea, we shall have no more than three hundred leagues between us and Timor."
Nelson turned to me. "Ledward, how long can a man go, in the ordinary course of nature, without passing stool?"
"Ten days is a long period under more normal circumstances," I replied, "but our situation is anything but a usual one. We have had so little food that our bodies seem to have absorbed the whole of it."
"So I think," said Bligh. "There could have been nothing in our bowels until within a day or two past. You look another man, Mr. Nelson, now that you have had rest and better food. We shall all have time to gain new strength before we push off for Timor."
"I mean to survive," Nelson replied, smiling faintly; "if only to defeat the purpose of the wretches who condemned us to this misery."
"Spoken like a man, sir," said Bligh. A cold glint came into his eyes and his lips were set in a thin line. "By God! I could sail the launch to England, if necessary, with nothing but water in my belly, for the sake of bringing them to justice!"
He rose to his feet and strode back and forth across the little flat-topped eminence where we rested; then he halted before us. Pale, hollow-eyed, his shreds of cloathing hanging loosely upon his bones, he yet had within him a fund of energy that amazed me. Mention of the mutineers had stirred him as the call of a trumpet stirs an old cavalry horse. He laughed in his harsh mirthless way. "They flatter themselves that they have seen the last of me," he said; "the Goddamned inhuman, black-hearted bastards! But Divine Providence sees them and will help me to track them down!"
Nelson threw a quick, quizzical glance in my direction. Bligh was quite unconscious of the mixture of blasphemy and reverence in his remark.
"Shall you endeavour to search for them yourself?" Nelson asked.
"Endeavour? By God, I shall more than endeavour! I shall sit on the doorstep at the Admiralty day and night until they give me command of the ship that is to search them out and bring them to justice. I have friends at home who will make my interest their own. I shall not draw a quiet breath until I am outward bound, on their trail."
"Your family may take a different view of the matter, sir," I said. "If we are fortunate enough to reach England, Mrs. Bligh will not wish to let you go so soon again."
"You know me little, Mr. Ledward, if you think I shall dawdle at home with those villains unhung. Not a day shall I spend there if I have my way. As for Mrs. Bligh, she is no ordinary woman. She will be the first to bid me Godspeed...Let us go down," he added, after a moment of silence. "I grudge every moment that we are not proceeding on our way."
Nelson and I rose to follow him. Bligh stood looking toward a small sandy cay that could be seen at a considerable distance to the northward, and several miles farther from the main than the island upon which we then were.
"We shall go there for the night," he said. "It will be a safer resting place. The savages yonder must have seen us land here. They seem harmless enough; and yet, without weapons to defend ourselves, I mean to take no risks."
We went down by another way, to the northern side of the island, stopping now and then to examine the shrubs and stunted trees that grew out of the sand and among clefts in the rocks. We found nothing in the way of food except wild beans, which we gathered in a handkerchief.
"You are sure these are edible, Mr. Nelson?" Bligh asked.
"Yes, there is not the slightest danger," Nelson replied. "They are dolichos. The flavour is not all that might be wished, but the bean is a nourishing food. It is of the genus of the kidney bean to which the Indian gram belongs."
"Good," said Bligh. "Let us hope that the others have collected some as well as ourselves."
Upon reaching the beach, we discovered an old canoe lying bottom up and half buried in the sand. We dug away around it, but our combined strength was not sufficient to budge it, to say nothing of turning it over. It was about thirty feet long, with a sharp, projecting bow, rudely carved in the resemblance of a fish's head. We estimated that it would hold about twenty men.
"Here is proof enough," said Bligh, "that the New Hollanders are not wholly landlubbers. In view of this find, I am all the more willing to proceed farther from the main. We must keep a sharp lookout for these fellows. In our weakened condition they would find us an easy prey."
We were now joined by Purcell and his party of foragers, carrying our copper pot on a pole between them. They had had splendid luck--the pot was more than half full of fine, fat clams and oysters. Bligh put the carpenter at ease by greeting him in his usual manner.
"It couldn't be better, Mr. Purcell," he said. "Every man shall have a bellyful to-day. A stew of these, mixed with dolicho beans--many a ship's company will fare worse than ourselves this day."
I was pleased to find a healthy hunger gnawing at my stomach; nothing could have looked more succulent than the sea food, and every man of us was eager to be at the camp with the pot set over a good fire. It was high noon when we joined the o
thers. Peckover's party had just come in with a supply of clams and oysters almost equal in amount to that in the pot. They had also found, on the south side of the island, an abundance of fresh water in hollows of the rocks--more than enough to fill our vessels. Every circumstance favoured us. The sun shone in a cloudless sky, so that Captain Bligh was able, with his magnifying glass, to kindle a fire at once. The oysters and clams were now dumped into the pot, together with a quart and a half of dolicho beans. The requisite amount of water was added, and to make our stew yet more tasty, each man's usual amount of bread was added to it. Smith and Hall, our cooks, had whittled out long wooden spoons with which they stirred the stew as it came to a boil, sending up a savoury steam that made the walls of our empty bellies quiver with anticipation. When the stew had cooked for a good twenty minutes,--the time had seemed hours to most of us,--the pot was set off the fire; and we gathered round with our half-coconut shells, while the cooks ladled into each man's shell all that it could hold of clams, oysters, beans, and delicious broth; and when all had been served, there was still enough in the pot for a half pint more, all round. The beans were not so tasty as we had hoped, but we made a small matter of that.
After our meal we rested for an hour in the shade of the rocks. I had just fallen into a refreshing sleep when Mr. Bligh aroused me. "Sorry to disturb you, Mr. Ledward," he said, "but we must push on. We are too close to the main here, and I have no desire for any night visits from the savages."
It was then about mid-afternoon. With a light breeze, we directed our course to a group of sandy cays which lay about five leagues off the continental shore. Darkness had fallen before we reached them and, as we could find no suitable landing place, we came to a grapnel and remained in the launch until dawn. All through the night we heard the cries of innumerable sea fowl, and daylight showed us that one of the cays was a place of resort for birds of the noddy kind. We found that we were on the westernmost of four small islands, surrounded by a reef of rocks, and connected with sand banks whose surface was barely above high tide. Within them lay a mirrorlike lagoon with a small passage, into which we brought the launch.
This place, so far from the main, seemed designed by nature as a refuge for men in our condition. Captain Bligh named it "Lagoon Island," and gladdened our hearts by informing us that he proposed to spend the day and the following night here. Unfortunately, the cays were little more than heaps of rock and sand, covered with coarse grass and a sparse growth of bush and stunted trees; but there were enough of these latter to protect us from the heat of the sun.
Our forces were divided so that some could rest while others searched for food. The lagoon abounded in fish; but try as we would, we could catch none. This was a great trial; after repeated unsuccessful efforts, we were forced to fall back upon oysters and clams and the one vegetable which these islands afforded--dolicho beans. Even the shellfish were not abundant here, and the party sent in search of them returned at about ten in the morning with a very small number, so that our dinner this day did little more than aggravate our hunger. During the long voyage from Tofoa we had been so cold and miserable the greater part of the time that the pangs of hunger were kept in check. Furthermore, the constant peril of the sea had prevented us from dwelling upon the thought of food. The case was altered now, and we thought of little else.
After our midday dinner, Elpinstone, with a party of four, was sent to the islet adjoining that at which we lay, to search for sea fowl and their eggs, for we had observed that the birds congregated at that place. The rest of us were glad enough to take our rest, crawling into the shade of bushes and overhanging rocks.
On this afternoon I enjoyed a long and undisturbed sleep which greatly refreshed me; indeed, I did not waken until near sundown, just as Mr. Elphinstone's party was returning. They came in all but empty-handed, having gotten no birds and only three eggs. This was, evidently, not the nesting season: they had found the islet practically deserted; the birds were away fishing for themselves, and the few they had seen were too wary to be caught.
"Nevertheless, we must try again," said Bligh. "They will soon be coming home with full gullets. We can be sure of catching them at night, and there will be a good light from the moon to hunt by...Mr. Cole, you shall try this time. Go warily, mind! Let the birds settle for the night before you go amongst them."
"Aye, sir, we'll see to that," said Cole. Samuel, Tinkler, Lamb, and myself were told off to make up his party; and, having provided ourselves with sticks, we set out for the bird island.
It was a beautiful evening, cool and fresh now that the sun had set. There was not a breath of air stirring, and the surface of the lagoons glowed with the colours of the western sky. Our way led over a causeway of hard-packed sand, laid over the coral reef. It was scarcely a dozen paces across, and curved in a wide arc across a shallow sea filled with mushroom coral that rose to within a few feet of the surface. The bar connecting the islands was about two miles long. Tinkler and Lamb were soon far ahead; the boatswain, Samuel, and I followed at a more leisurely pace, stopping to examine the rock pools along the reef for clams and oysters, though we found nothing save a few snails, scarcely larger than the end of one's thumb. Nevertheless, we gathered them into the bread bag we had brought to carry back the birds.
Whilst in Mr. Bligh's company we had been careful to make no reference to the mutiny. On one occasion, I remember, young Tinkler had ventured to speak in defense of two of the midshipmen who had been left behind on the Bounty ; but Bligh had silenced him in such a manner that no one else was tempted to bring up the subject in his presence. But now, the three of us, freed from restraint, fell naturally into talk of the seizure of the ship and of what had led up to it.
"What puzzles me," said Cole, "is that Mr. Christian could have made his plan without any of us getting wind of it."
"It was a sudden resolve on his part, I am fairly certain of that," I replied.
"That's my opinion," said Samuel. "No doubt the villain had plotted it long before, but he bided his time before opening his mind to the others."
Cole nodded. "Aye, it must have been so," he said. "What could have brought him to such a mad act, Mr. Ledward? Can you reason it out? He'd no better friend than Captain Bligh, and he must have known it in his heart." He shook his head, wonderingly. "I'd a liking for Mr. Christian," he added.
Samuel stopped short and gazed at the boatswain in a horrified manner.
"'Liking,' Mr. Cole?" he exclaimed.
"Aye," said Cole. "He was hot-tempered and anything but easy under Mr. Bligh's correction; but I never doubted him a gentleman and a loyal officer."
"His Majesty can well spare gentlemen of Christian's kidney from his service," I replied. "You're too lenient in your judgments, Mr. Cole. Whatever else may be said of him, Christian is an intelligent man. He must have known that he was condemning us to all but certain death."
"Begging your pardon, Mr. Ledward, I don't believe he did know it. He must have been out of his mind...This I will say: Mr. Christian will never again know peace. He'll have us on his conscience till the day of his death."
"He'll hang," said Samuel, confidently. "Hide where he may, Captain Bligh will find him and bring him to justice."
"Let that be as it will, Mr. Samuel," said Cole. "I'll warrant he's been punished enough as it is."
"Do you think God could forgive him, Mr. Cole?" I asked, out of curiosity more than for any other reason.
"He could, sir. There's no crime so black that God cannot forgive it if a man truly repents."
"Have you forgiven him?" I then asked.
He was silent for a moment as he pondered this question. Then, "No, sir," he replied, grimly. "He shall never have my forgiveness for the wrong he has done Captain Bligh."
We were now close to the bird island. Tinkler alone was awaiting us there.
"Where's Lamb, Mr. Tinkler?" Cole asked. "I told both of you to wait for us."
"He was here a moment ago. I ordered him to help me look for clams w
hile we waited. I'm damned if I know where he's got to."
"It's your place to know, Mr. Tinkler," said Samuel shortly. "Captain Bligh shall hear of this if anything goes wrong."
"Now don't be a telltale, Samuel, for God's sake," said Tinkler anxiously. "What did you expect me to do--throw him down and sit on his head? He can't have gone far."
"The man's a fool," said Samuel. "He's not to be trusted out of sight."
"Aye," said Cole, "if there's a wrong way of doing a thing, Lamb will find his way to it. We may as well wait here. There's time enough."
No Lamb appeared, for all our waiting. The afterglow faded from the sky, and the moon, nearing the full, shone with increasing splendour, paling all but the brightest of the stars. The birds must have sensed the presence of enemies, for they were long in settling. They circled in thousands over the island, filling the air with their grating cries, but at last the deafening clamour died away and we ventured to proceed on our expedition. The island was, roughly, a mile long and about half as wide, and the birds appeared to have congregated for the night on the farthest part of it. We separated to a distance of about fifty yards and had gone but a little way when the air was again filled with their cries and the moon all but darkened by their bodies. I could guess what had happened: the precious Lamb, without waiting for us, had blundered in amongst the birds, to the ruin of our plans. I saw Tinkler and the boatswain break into a run. My own legs were not equal to the added exertion; indeed, I had so little strength that I had drawn to the limit of it in reaching the bird island, and it was all I could now do to walk, to say nothing of running. By pure chance I managed to knock down two noddies that circled low over my head. One of them was only slightly hurt, and fluttered away from me, but I at length managed to capture it. Having done so, I myself fell down, completely exhausted. Shortly afterward I felt an attack of tenesmus coming on, but to my surprise and relief I discovered that I was evacuating, for the first time in thirty-three days. Perhaps I should pass over this matter in silence; it is not, under ordinary circumstances, one to be referred to; but members of my own profession will understand the interest I took both in the performance of a function so long delayed, and the result of it. The excrement was something curious to see--hard, round pellets not so large as sheep's turds, and looking perfectly black in the moonlight. The amount was woefully small, and yet I believe that it was all my bowels contained at that time. It confirmed me in the opinion I had ventured to Mr. Nelson--that our bodies had absorbed all but an infinitesimal amount of the little nourishment they had received.