Онлайн кітапты тегін оқу The Pirate of the Mediterranean / A Tale of the Sea
W.H.G. Kingston
The Pirate of the Mediterranean
Chapter One.
Malta, which I have selected as the opening scene of the following story, is, from its historical recollections, its fine climate, and brilliant skies, a very interesting spot; although, for such beauty as its scenery possesses, it must be acknowledged that it is indebted very much more to art than to nature. Notwithstanding, however, the noise it has made in the world, and will, I suspect, should we ever be driven into a war with our vivacious continental neighbour, again make, it is but a rock some twenty miles long, and twelve broad, in the middle of the Mediterranean, with a smaller rock, Gozo, to the north of it, and was, probably, at one time of this planet’s existence, merely a continuation of Sicily or Italy’s toe, or a lump, as it were, kicked off into the middle of the sea. If, also, report speaks true, the very soil which gives verdure to its valleys, and nourishes its sweet-scented orange-groves, was imported from richer lands; yet, notwithstanding this, a larger number of inhabitants of every religion, colour, and costume, continue to exist on its surface, than on any similar-sized portion of the globe. But in its capital, Valetta, with its magnificent fortifications, and superb harbour, are centred its chief attractions, and which have gained for it a name imperishable on the page of history as the bulwark of Christendom, against the pagan hosts of the Saracens.
But as my tale is with the present rather than with the past, I will not stop to describe how, when it was called Mileta, Saint Paul landed on the island, — how the Vandals and Goths took possession of it, and were driven out by Belisarius, — how in 1530, the Knights of Saint John of Jerusalem, driven away from Rhodes, here settled, — how they built a fortress which withstood the mighty army of the Turks, and how those gallant gentlemen hurled back the infidels defeated and disgraced, — how they at length degenerated, and its inhabitants, deceived by treachery from within and without their gates, yielded their liberty to the great enemy of Europe, Buonaparte, and were unmercifully ill-treated, and pillaged, — and how, in the year 1800, with the the aid of an English fleet and a small English army, they drove out their conquerors, and put themselves under the protection of Great Britain.
How Mr Cameron was first Civil Commissioner, and was succeeded by Sir Alexander Ball, a man justly endeared to the inhabitants as the sharer of their toils and victory, — how he was followed by Sir Hildebrand Oakes, after whom reigned, as their first Governor, for eleven years, commencing in 1813, Sir Thomas Maitland, called by irreverent lips, King Tom; a gallant soldier, and the terror of ill-doers, on whose decease the Marquis of Hastings and General Ponsonby successively became chiefs.
It was during the time that one of the three last-mentioned governors ruled the land, that the events I am about to narrate took place, and as it is in the capital, Valetta, and its magnificent harbour, that our scene more particularly lies, it is somewhat important that the reader should have them described to him.
Valetta is situated on that side of the island which faces the north-east, though towards the southern end of it. The harbour is of a very peculiar shape, and if the reader should not happen to possess a chart of it, he may form one by placing his left hand on the table, with the fingers separated as widely as possible from the middle finger: then let him bend up the third finger of his right hand, and place, widely apart, the tips of the others over the forefinger of his left hand. The middle finger of his left hand is Valetta, with Saint Elmo Castle on the nail, and its palaces and ramparts running along up to the knuckles. The space on the right is the Great Port, and on the left, Port Marsa Musceit, or the Quarantine Harbour. The tip of the little finger of the right hand is Port Ricasoli. On the bent-up third finger is the Bighi Palace, now a naval hospital, built by Napoleon as a residence for himself. The middle finger is the Burgh, with Port Saint Angelo at the end. The fore-finger is called Isola, with the Cotonera fortifications at the knuckle, and the thumb is denominated Carodino, where the Palatario is situated, while the spaces between each of the fingers are smaller harbours of great depth and security; and from Port Saint Angelo, numerous tiers of frowning batteries completely enfilade the entrance of the harbour — the approach to which is further defended by Forts Saint Elmo and Ricasoli. On the opposite side of Port Marsa Musceit, are two forts — Port Tigne at the entrance, and Fort Manuel; and there are several indentations, but of less depth and importance than those to the south. Besides the forts I have mentioned, the city is protected by the Floriana lines, and several other works. Indeed, it is said that there are sixty miles length of walls, which, in these economical times, are allowed slowly to crumble away. If our merchants value their trade with the East — if our rulers value our possession of India — if our philanthropists value the civilisation of the world, and the continuance of peace, let not Malta be neglected. To open the door is not the way to keep out a thief.
Valetta is a place of life, bustle, and animation. The Maltese are a busy people, given to gesticulation; and it is full of naval and military officers, and soldiers, and sailors, who are not addicted to quietude, especially the latter; and there are Greeks, and Moors, and Spaniards, and Italians, and Jews innumerable, congregated there, and priests and friars of all orders, who delight in the ringing of bells, so that silence is little known in this city of ramparts, steps, big guns, and churches. The streets are wide and handsome; those running along the middle finger, as I have described, are on a level, while those which lead up from the water are at right angles to them, and are occasionally steep, so that, in most instances, they consist of a broad flight of steps, the best known of which are the Nix Mangiare stairs, leading from the chief landing-place at the Great Port to the upper part of the town. The houses are balconied, lofty, and spacious, with terraces on the roofs, whence, in clear weather, Etna is visible; and where, in the cool of the evening, the inhabitants may enjoy the refreshing breeze from the sea, and behold it, in its intense blueness, dotted with white sails gliding in all directions over its surface. It is full of fine churches, the towers of which rise above the flat roofs of the palace-like houses, the whole surrounded by a broad walk, and a fringe of ramparts bristling with cannon.
It is to that part of the fortifications facing the mouth of the Great Port that I particularly wish to conduct the reader.
It was some four hours or so past noon when the boat of a British man-of-war ran in alongside the landing-place at the fort of Nix Mangiare stairs, and out of her stepped two persons, whose blue jackets, adorned with crown-and-anchor buttons, and the patches of white cloth on their cohars proclaimed them to belong to the exalted rank of midshipmen in the Royal Navy. But many might envy the free joyous laugh in which they indulged, seemingly on finding themselves on shore, and the light elastic tread with which they sprang up the long flight of steps before them, distancing, in a moment, several civilians and soldiers of various ranks, who, puffing and blowing, with handkerchiefs at their foreheads, were toiling upwards, while they arrived at the summit without even giving way to a gasp, and as cool, apparently, as when they landed. Their ears, as they went up, were saluted by —
“Yah hassare, carita — Nix mangiar these ten days, sar — Mi moder him die plague, sar! mi fader him die too,” and other pathetic cries and similar equally veracious assertions, from numerous cripples, deformed creatures, and children of all ages, in rags and tatters, who endeavoured to excite their compassion by exhibiting their wounds and scars. The two youths had time to put their hands in their pockets, and to distribute a few pence to the wretched-looking beings on their way; both pocket and heart, if that were possible, being made lighter thereby. On reaching the top of the flight of stairs, without stopping to contemplate the height they had ascended, they turned to the right, and took the way along the ramparts towards Fort Saint Elmo. There seemed not to have been the slightest necessity for their hurry, as they appeared to have come on shore simply to take a walk, for they now slackened their pace, and proceeded on side by side.
“Well, I’m so glad, Duff, that you have joined us,” exclaimed the one who appeared to be somewhat the eldest. “Who’d have thought it, when we parted four years ago at old Railton’s that we were next to meet out here. I didn’t think you would have got leave to enter the service.”
“Neither did I expect to get afloat, and still less to become your messmate, when you, lucky dog that I thought you, left school. I moped on there for nearly another year, and then wrote to my governor and told him that if he didn’t let me go to sea I should never be fit for anything. At last he believed that I was in earnest, and with a light heart I turned my back upon Brook-green, and shipped on board the old Rodney. But, I say, old fellow, what sort of a chap is our skipper? He looks like a taut hand.”
“There is not a better fellow afloat,” was the answer. “He’s none of your milk-and-water chaps who’ll let butter melt in their mouths, of that you may be assured; but he knows what ought to be done, and what man can do; and he makes them do it too. There’s no shirking work or being slack in stays when he carries on the duty, and there’s not a smarter ship in the service, nor a happier one either, though he won’t allow an idler on board. The fact is, my boy, both officers and men know that no one can shirk their work, so it comes easy to all, and we have more leave and less punishment than nearly any other vessel on the station.
“But, I say, Jack Raby, is it true, that he makes the midshipmen do the duty of topmen?” asked the youngest of the two.
“I believe you, my boy,” answered Jack Raby. “He makes all the youngsters lie out in the topsail-yards, and hand the canvas in fine style, ay, and black down the rigging at times too. By Jove, he’s the fellow to make your kid-glove-wearing gentlemen dip their hands in the tar-bucket, and keep them there, if he sees they are in any way squeamish about it.”
“By jingo, he seems to be somewhat of a Tartar,” exclaimed the midshipman called Duff, with a half-doubtful expression of countenance, as if his new shipmate was practising on his credulity.
“Not a bit of it,” was the rejoinder. “Let me tell you, that you’ll soon find that your slack captains are the worst to sail with. They let every one do as they like till all hands begin to take liberties, and the hard work falls on the most willing, and they then suddenly haul up, and there is six times more flogging and desertion than in a strict ship, and she soon becomes a regular hell afloat. I hate your honey-mouthed, easy-going skippers, who simper out, ‘Please, my good men, have the goodness to brace round the foreyard when the ship’s taken aback.’ No, no — give me a man who knows how to command men. Depend on it. Duff, you’ll like Captain Fleetwood before you’ve sailed with him a week, if you are worth your salt, mind you, though.”
By this time they had reached an angle of the ramparts, where, jumping up on the banquette, they could enjoy a good view up the harbour.
“There,” exclaimed Raby, pointing to a fine man-of-war brig, which lay at the mouth of the dockyard creek just off Fort Saint Angelo. “Isn’t the Ione a beauty now?”
“Yes, she is, indeed; and a fine craft, I dare say, in every respect,” answered Duff.
“Oh, there’s nothing can come up to her!” exclaimed Jack Raby, warming with his subject. “She’ll sail round almost any ship in the fleet; and I only wish, with Charlie Fleetwood to command her, and her present crew, we could fall in with an enemy twice her size. We should thrash him, I’d stake my existence on it, and bring him in as a prize before long.”
“Glorious!” exclaimed the other youth, catching the enthusiasm of his companion. “It’s a pity the war is over. I’m afraid there’s no chance of any fun of that sort.”
“Oh, you don’t know — something may come out of this row between the Greeks and the Turks; and we, at all events, shall have some amusement in looking after them, and cruising up the Archipelago — where I hear we are to be sent, as soon as we are ready for sea.”
Jack Raby was the speaker.
“How soon will that be?” asked his companion. “We might sail to-morrow, I should have thought.”
“Why, you see, there are more reasons than one for our not being ready,” observed Jack. “And I suspect the skipper himself is in no hurry to get away; for, don’t you go and talk about it now, but the fact is, he has been and fallen desperately in love with a sweetly pretty girl, who, from what I can observe, likes him not a little in return, so he’ll be very sorry to get out of sight of her smiles; at least, I know that I should be loath to be beyond hailing distance if I were in his place. Let me give you a piece of advice, Duff; don’t go and fall in love. It is a very inconvenient condition for a midshipman to be in, let me tell you.”
“Not if I can help it,” said Duff. “At least, till I am a lieutenant. However, I felt rather queer about the region of the brisket the other night, when I was dancing with that pretty little Maltese girl, with the black eyes, and cherry lips, though we neither of us could understand a word the other said, and I didn’t know what was to come of it. Fortunately, next morning, the sensation had gone off again, and I got out of the scrape. But the fact is, since I grew up (the rogue was scarcely fifteen), I have been so little on shore, that I have had no time to lose my heart.”
Jack Raby, who was a year older, and therefore considered himself a man at all events, burst into a loud fit of laughter, in which his companion joined him, at the absurdity of their conversation; of which, although they had spoken in earnest, they were both somewhat conscious. “But I say, old fellow, without any more humbug about love and such like bosh, just look at the dear old craft! how beautifully she sits on the water — what a graceful sheer she has — and how well her sixteen guns look run out, like dogs from their kennels, all ready to bite. You should see her under weigh though, and how beautiful she looks with her canvas spread! You’d know her for a man-of-war twenty miles off by the cut of her royals. See, what square yards she’s got! and how well her masts stand. How light she looks aloft — and yet everything that is required — not a block too large — and yet everything works as easy as possible. On deck, too, you’ll find there’s no jim-crack nonsense about her — everything is for service, and intended to last; and yet, where there is any brass or varnished wood, it’s kept as bright and clean as can be. There isn’t a ship on the station can come up to us in reefing or furling; and, let them say what they like in other ships, there isn’t a happier berth, or a better set of fellows to be found, on board any of them — take my word for it, Duff.”
“Well, from all you say, I haven’t a doubt but that I shall like the little Ione very much,” observed the other. “And, at all events, I wouldn’t mind a worse ship, for the sake of being with you. But, I say, who is the young lady your skipper — I may now, though, call him our skipper — has fallen in love with?”
“A Miss Garden. She is very young, and very fair, and very bright and lively. I’m not surprised at any one’s admiring her! it’s much more wonderful that everybody doesn’t fall in love with her over head and ears: for my part, though I’ve only seen her two or three times, I’m ready to fight and die for her, too, if it were necessary.”
“Oh, of course! that we should all be ready to do, as in duty bound, for our skipper’s wife, and much more for the lady of his love,” observed Duff; “but I want to know who she is?”
“I was going to tell you. She has no father nor mother; and her only living relation, that I know of, is an old colonel Gauntlett, on whose protection she is entirely thrown. He is rather a grumpy old chap, they say — but she has no help for it; and he takes her about wherever he goes. He has got some money — but he hates the navy, and swears she shall never marry a sailor, or if she does he’ll cut her off with a farthing. He came out here some months ago, and has never let any one with a blue jacket come inside his door; but, somehow or other, Captain Fleetwood got introduced to her, and as he was in mufti, the old chap didn’t know he was in the navy, and told him he should be happy to make his acquaintance. He did not find out his mistake for some time; and when he did — my eyes, what a rage he was in! He did not mind it so much, though, afterwards, as he is going away in a few days, and thought the captain and his niece were not likely to meet again; but the skipper, you see, is not the man to let the grass grow under his feet in making love, more than in anything else, and in the mean time he had managed to come it pretty strong with Miss Garden. How it will end I can’t say — I only know that our captain is the last man in the world to yield up a lady if he loves her, and believes she loves him — he’d as soon think of striking his flag to an enemy while he had got a shot in the locker; so, I suppose, he’ll either win over the old cove, or run off with her, and snap his fingers at him — he doesn’t care for his money; — and, to my idea, that would be the best way to settle it.”
“So I think,” observed the other youngster. “I’ve made up my mind, when I want to marry, if I cannot get the old one’s consent, to take French leave, and settle the matter in an offhand way. But where do you say the grumpy colonel and his pretty niece are going to; for the captain must look sharp after her, or he’ll be carrying her away somewhere inland, out of sight of salt water, where he can’t get at her.”
“No fear of that; the old dragon has too great an opinion of his own soldiership not to fancy that he can keep guard over his ward,” observed Raby. “But we’ll see if a sailor can’t weather on him. Nothing I should like so much as to help the skipper, and I only hope he may ask me. He hasn’t much time to lose, either; for we heard that the colonel and his niece were bound shortly for Cephalonia, or one of the Ionian Islands, where he has got an appointment. If we were ordered there also, we might find an opportunity; but, you see, the captain won’t have the chances of meeting her without being observed, which he has here, and a hundred to one the uncle claps half a dozen lobsters as sentries over her, if he sees the Ione come off the place.”
“Then I should be for carrying her off at once, if I were the captain, and letting the old lion growl away without her,” exclaimed Duff; and the two midshipmen walked on fully persuading themselves into the hope, that they should be called upon to assist their captain in running away with Miss Garden.
There were few people abroad to interrupt their conversation; for the heat of the sun kept most of the Maltese within doors. As the Italians, or Spaniards, I forget which, observe, none but dogs and Englishmen walk the streets when the sun shines in summer. There were, however, sentries on duty, and a few seamen belonging to men of war; or merchantmen of various nations would pass by; and here and there a cowled priest, a woman in the dark faldetta, a ragged beggar boy — or an old gentleman in three-cornered hat, a bag-wig, riding on a donkey, with a big red cotton umbrella over his head, would appear from one of the neighbouring streets, as necessity called him forth.
On the two happy youths went, careless of the heat, till they reached that part of the ramparts called the lower Barraca. It is a broad open space directly above the water, where stands a conspicuous object from the sea, in the form of a Grecian temple, a monument to the memory of that excellent man, and brave officer, Sir Alexander Ball, one of Lord Nelson’s most steemed captains. As they reached the spot, they encountered a person, who was apparently about to descend the way they had come; he was a man of about forty years old, with a countenance slightly weather-beaten, and hands which showed that they were no strangers to ropes and tar, and there was an undeniable roll in his gait, which betrayed the seaman, though his costume was that of a denizen of the shore; he wore a long, swallow-tailed, black coat, a round beaver hat, and a coloured waistcoat; but the wide duck trousers, and low shoes were those of a thorough salt. Jack Raby looked at him earnestly, and then held out his hand, which was shaken warmly by the other.
“What, Bowse, as I live,” he exclaimed; “what has brought you to Malta, old fellow? I thought you were snugly housed at home with Mrs Bowse, and had given up the sea altogether.”
“Well, sir, so did I think too, and for a time I was comfortable enough; but at last I began to wish to have a look at the blue water again; and I grew sick, and then sicker, till I felt that nothing but a sniff of the salt air would do me good. You know, sir, when I was bo’sun of the jolly little Dart, your first ship, I took to learning navigation, and was no bad hand at it. Ah! I loved that craft, and nothing but having that windfall of a fortune would have made me leave her. Well, as I was saying, when I wished to go to sea again, I turned in my mind that I could not do better with my money than take a share of a merchantman, and go master of her. No sooner said than done. Up I went to London, where I knew a respectable shipowner. He was glad enough to favour my wishes, for he knew he could trust me; and I soon became part owner and master of the Zodiac, a fine brig, of a hundred and sixty tons. I have made two voyages in her, and am now bound to the eastward to Cephalonia and Zante. I sail to-morrow or next day, according to circumstances. If you’ll step up here, sir, I think you’ll see her, for we’ve hauled out ready for a start, as soon as my passengers come on board.”
As the master of the merchantman spoke, he advanced to a part of the ramparts over which they could look down upon the great harbour, where, some way below the custom-house, was seen a merchant brig, laden and ready for sea.
“She’s as fine a sea boat as ever floated, I can assure you, sir. It’s a pleasure to be her master,” he continued, as he pointed with pride to her. Every good seaman is fond of his vessel, and overlooks her faults, whatever they may be, as a good husband does those of his wife.
“I am heartily glad of your success, Bowse, I can assure you,” said the midshipman warmly; “I owe you much; for you gave me my first lessons in seamanship, and I shall never forget them. You must come and dine with us to-morrow, and I shall introduce you as my friend, Captain Bowse.”
“No, sir — no, pray don’t do so,” answered the mariner; “I’ve served on board a man-of-war, and I know my place and rank better. Captains of king’s ships, if you please, sir, — but masters of merchantmen. I know the difference between a collier and a seventy-four, I think. But I’ll dine with your mess, sir, with much pleasure, if I don’t go to sea to-morrow.”
“We shall expect you, then, if we see the Zodiac still in the harbour,” said Raby. “I see you’ve got a spy-glass there, let me take a squint at her. You carry six guns, I observe; and I must say I like the look of your craft.”
“Very necessary, too, in the places to which we trade,” answered the master. “Those Greek chaps among the islands don’t scruple to plunder any vessels they may find unarmed, particularly in these times; but the truth is, two of those are quakers — their look is much worse than their bite. However, between this and Cephalonia there’s no danger.”
“Why, you know, if any pirates attacked you, and were caught, you’d have the satisfaction of having them strung up by King Tom, like those chaps yonder,” said Raby. “By the bye, Duff, did you ever observe King Tom’s Rubber of Whist?”
“No,” answered Duff. “What do you mean?”
“Take that glass, and look at the outer bastion of Port Ricasoli. What do you see there?”
“Four figures, which are hanging by their necks from gibbets,” answered Duff. “What are they?”
“Those are four Englishmen, — at least, one, by the way, was a Yankee, their master, — who turned pirates, and tried to scuttle another English brig, and to drown the people. It’s too long a story to tell you now. But old King Tom got hold of them, and treated them as you see.”
“That fellow, Delano, the Yankee master, was a terrible villain,” observed Captain Bowse, shuddering. “It was not the first black deed of the sort he had done, either. One doesn’t know what punishment is bad enough for such scoundrels. It’s a hundredfold worse when such-like acts are done by our countrymen, than when Greeks or Moors do them, because one does not expect anything better from their hands. But I see, sir, you are casting an eye at one of those strange-looking native crafts standing in for the land with the sea breeze.”
Raby had the telescope at his eye, and he was pointing it towards a sail which was rapidly approaching the shore. So broad and lofty was the canvass, that the hull looked like the small car of a balloon, in comparison to it, as if just gliding over the surface of the blue and unruffled sea.
The view both up and down the harbour, and in every direction, was very interesting. Directly facing them was Port Ricasoli, with its tiers of guns threatening any invader, and the black, wave-washed rocks at its base. A little to the right, in a sort of bay between it and Port Saint Angelo, appeared the white and elegant buildings of the Naval Hospital; and further on, towering upwards from the water, the last-mentioned fort, with its numerous rows of heavy guns, having behind it the Dockyard creek, or Galley harbour, where, in the days of yore, the far-famed galleys of the knights were drawn up, and secure from attack. On either side were white stone walls and buttresses, glittering in the sunshine; overhead a sky of intense blueness; and below, a mirror-like expanse of waters, reflecting the same cerulean hue, on which floated innumerable crafts, of all shapes, sizes, and rigs, from the proud line-of-battle ship which had triumphantly borne the flag of England through the battle and the breeze, to the little caique with its great big eyes in its bow and strange-shaped stem and high outlandish stern, filled with its swarthy, skirmish crew of vociferating natives. Among the merchantmen, the ensigns of all nations might be seen — the stars and stripes of Uncle Sam’s freedom-loving people alongside the black lowering eagle of Russia; the cross of the Christian Greek, and the crescent of the infidel Turk; there was the banner of the Pope, and of Sardinia, and of various other Italian States; but outnumbering them all, by far, was the red flag of Britain. Far out to the eastward, where the sky and sea formed the horizon, there was a slight, gauze-like, whitish haze, through which could be seen the lofty canvas of several vessels, rising, as it were, like spirits from the watery deep, and just catching the rays of the sun declining in the opposite direction, which gave an unusual brilliancy to their wide-spread sails. But the craft which most attracted the attention of our friends was the one Raby had been looking at.
He pointed her out to his brother midshipman, and handed him the telescope.
“What do you think of her?” he asked. “She is a rum one to look at, isn’t she?”
Duff burst into a fit of laughter.
“Why, if the fellows haven’t set their jib right between the long poking yards of their foresail and mainsail,” he exclaimed, “I never did see such an odd rig as that before. What in the world is she?”
“That’s what they call a speronara in these parts, sir,” answered Bowse; “but you’ll see rummer rigs than that before long, when you go up the Archipelago. You see that wide spread of canvass is made by crossing her two latine sails, and setting their jib as a topsail between them. They can lower that down, and haul their wind in an instant. These sails, to my mind, are very good where light airs and smooth seas prevail, though they would not answer in our northern latitudes; and they require a good many more people to handle them than we could spare for the work. They reef their canvas, not like fore-and-aft sails in general, by the foot, but by the leach along to the yard. There’s no doubt, however, though they have an outlandish look, that they sail well on a wind, and not badly before it, too, as we see by the craft below us there.”
Onward gracefully glided the speronara — such is the name given to the craft which ply between Malta and Sicily with goods and passengers, and from some port in the latter island she seemed to have come, from the direction in which she appeared. On she came very rapidly, considering the light breeze; she was evidently a very fast craft of her class. She came abreast of Fort Saint Elmo, and soon after took in her outlandish topsail, as Duff called, just before she passed close under the spot where our friends were posted, so that they could look directly down on her deck. She seemed to be full of men habited in the long blue caps and striped shirt of Mediterranean mariners, with light-blue trowsers, and a red sash round the waist. She was of considerable size, and, what is unusual with craft of her description, she was decked fore-and-aft, though her between-decks must have been inconveniently low. There was a place sunk aft where stood the helmsman holding his long tiller, and on either side were arranged, ready for use, several long sweeps; but the wind was at present sufficient to impel the vessel along without their aid. Thus much was seen as she ran up the harbour. She passed close to the Zodiac, the mate of which, by his gestures, seemed to be speaking to the crew, and scolding them for the risk they ran of getting foul of her, and they then appeared to be uncertain where to bring up. At last she crossed over to the Ione, and finally rounding to, took in her foresail, and dropped her anchor off the custom-house.
The midshipmen and their companion soon got tired of looking down upon the harbour. Captain Bowse was obliged to part from them, as he had business to transact; and they finally agreed, as they had still a couple of hours of daylight, to hire a couple of horses of old Salvatore, in the Palace-square, and to take a gallop into the country, as a preparation for a grand ball which was to take place that evening at the Auberge de Provence, and where Raby promised Jemmy Duff he would point him out Miss Garden. Away hurried the two happy youngsters, without casting another thought on the speronara. I, however, particularly wish my readers not to forget her, and also to remember the man-of-war brig, and the merchantman, as both are destined to play a conspicuous part in the following narrative.
Chapter Two.
The speronara would, on a near inspection by a nautical eye, appear somewhat different to the general run of vessels of her rig and build. There was evidently the greatest attention paid to her ropes, spars, and oars. They were of the best hemp and toughest wood; not a stranded or even worn sheet or halyard was to be seen; every spar was sound, and her canvas was new and strong. Her crew, or those who sent her out of port, seemed to consider that much might depend on her speed and capability of keeping the sea.
If, however, she was employed in carrying passengers between Sicily and Malta, it was very natural that her owners should make her appear as seaworthy as possible, to induce people to trust their lives and property in her. We will suppose her still outside the port, soon after Jack Raby and his companions first saw her. Evidently the most important person on board was a young man of very pleasing exterior. He was rather tall than otherwise, and though slight, possessed a breadth of chest which gave promise of great strength and activity. His complexion was sunburnt, if not dark by nature, and his lip, which betokened scorn and firmness, and gave an unattractive expression to his countenance, was shaded by a thick curling moustache. His features were decidedly regular and handsome; and had they been otherwise, his large, flashing, dark eye would have challenged observation. His age was probably about two or three-and-thirty — he might have been younger — and he was certainly a very remarkable person. Those who saw him even but for a moment, went away fancying that they had been long acquainted with his features. His costume at once betrayed his nation; for he wore the red fez, the embroidered jacket and full white kilt, and richly-worked leggings and slippers of the Greek, and the cast of his countenance made one also conclude that he belonged to that nation. The only other person on board dressed in the Greek costume, was evidently some years younger, and was neither so tall nor so strongly built as his companion. His countenance was decidedly handsome, and what would be called aristocratic. It was very grave, and, indeed, melancholy in the extreme; and an accurate observer of character might have divined, from the form of his mouth and expression of his eyes, that he was sadly in want of firmness and decision in his actions, which idea, probably, would not have been very far from the truth. His dress, though the materials were good, was as plain as the costume he wore would allow; but it could not be otherwise than elegant and handsome, and it sat well upon his graceful figure.
Those two persons were earnestly engaged in conversation with another, who appeared to be the master of the vessel, and they were standing leaning over the side, away from the rest of the people on board.
“Remember, now,” observed the principal Greek to the master, “you are to be ready to weigh and make sail at a moment’s notice; it may be to-night, even — it may be tomorrow or on the following day — I cannot say, but you must be prepared.”
“Signor, si,” answered the master in a tone of deep respect. “I will take care to obey your commands to the letter; but I am afraid there may be some difficulty with the authorities at the custom-house. They once suspected me of smuggling, though I was as innocent as the babe unborn, and they may detain me.”
“You know the consequences,” returned the Greek, with a fierce look; “I will listen to no excuse if anything miscarries, so look to it!”
“It is a dangerous expedition you go on, signore,” observed the Sicilian master.
“Dangerous!” exclaimed the Greek, in a tone of contempt. “Danger is the food we live on, the air we breathe; without it life would lose half its zest. I’ll tell you what, my friend, he is but a base-born slave who knows not how to live, and fears to die. Give me a life of activity and excitement, and when that ceases death will be welcome.”
“You, signore, are the best judge of your own taste,” answered the Sicilian; “for my part, I am content to make an honest livelihood by trading between my native city of Syracuse and yonder good port of Valetta, where, please the holy saints, we shall drop our anchor in the course of ten minutes.”
“And anything else by which you may turn a colonna,” muttered the Greek.
The speronara continued in her course, and as she came off Fort Ricasoli, the other person habited as a Greek, who had not hitherto spoken, observed the four figures suspended on the southern bastion.
“Holy Virgin, what are those?” he exclaimed in Italian.
“Those, signore,” answered the padrone, as the master of the speronara was called, with particular emphasis, “are pirates.”
“Pirates!” ejaculated the young man, while a shudder ran through his frame.
“Si, signore, pirates,” answered the padrone, with a significant look. “They had a short life of it after they had committed the acts for which they were condemned. They had reached Smyrna with their booty, when they were captured by the British and brought back here.”
“An awful lesson to others to be more careful how they manage affairs,” observed the principal Greek, laughing. “Now, I dare say, if the truth was known, those fellows blundered terribly. It’s always the case when people get into the clutches of the law.”
The other Greek shuddered and turned his head aside. “It is not a pleasant sight,” he observed.
“Oh! those English are terrible fellows for punishing those engaged in any little transaction of that sort,” said the padrone. “They are good people, though.”
“They are remarkably conceited,” said the Greek, twirling his moustache — “they believe that they can make the whole world obey them; but it is time that we should look about us. Ah! steer near that merchant-brig there, in the mouth of the harbour, I should like to have a look at her that I might know her again.”
The man at the helm put it so much to port, that the end of one of the long tapering yards of the speronara nearly got foul of the Zodiac’s fore-yard.
“What the deuce are you lubbers about, that you cannot keep yourself clear of your neighbours?” sung out Bowse’s mate, from the main rigging. “I’ll teach you better manners if I catch you at sea, that’s all.”
“The Englishman seems angry,” said the Greek, laughing. “That brig, though, looks as if she had a valuable cargo on board. I must learn more about her.”
Conversation was now put a stop to, in consequence of the caution necessary for steering into a thickly-crowded harbour, and the hurry of bringing up.
She dropped her anchor among a number of similarly-rigged craft, close inshore, where she lay exciting little or no observation, except that a few boatmen saw her, and were calculating their prospects of having to transport her passengers or merchandise to the landing-place.
As soon as her sails were stowed, which was speedily done, the health-boat came alongside, and as it appeared she had come from Sicily, pratique was immediately given her. She was next visited by the custom-house boat. The officer, for some reason or other, seemed to consider that there was something suspicious about her, for he examined her papers very minutely, and read them over more than once, but was at last obliged to pass them as correct. The vessel next underwent a strict search, but nothing contraband was found on board her, and at last he took his departure, even then casting back a look of doubt at her, as if he was not thoroughly convinced that all was right.
During these proceedings the Greek sat in the after part of the vessel, maintaining a perfect silence, while he played with the handle of a short poniard which he wore in his sash.
“You appear to be suspected, my friend,” he observed to the master, as soon as the officers had gone.
“So it seems, signore,” he answered. “The fact is, once upon a time, I had a few bales of goods on board, which I contrived to land without paying the duties, and I have ever since been watched as if I were a smuggler.”
“It was clumsy in you to be discovered,” observed the Greek. “In the present instance I might find it inconvenient.”
A man in a small boat, who had been paddling quietly at a little distance from the speronara, as soon as the government officials had left her, darted alongside.
“Ah! Signor Sandro, welcome back to Malta,” he exclaimed, addressing the master of the little vessel. “I have not seen you here for a long time.”
“Not the less welcome I hope, Manuel,” said the master.
“Few are who remember their friends and pay well,” said the boatman. “How can I best serve you, signore?”
“By landing my passengers, and giving them all the information they may require,” said the master. “Hark you, Manuel — put your head nearer — my boy’s life is answerable for their safety — so, as you love me, take care that they get into no trouble. They seek a passage to some part of their own country on board a merchantman, and have come here to look for one to suit them.”
“I understand clearly, signor,” said the boatman, significantly. “But who are they? What is their calling, or occupation?”
“Oh! mother of Heaven, don’t ask me!” answered the padrone, with a terrified look. “They may overhear you. It is not my business to put questions to them. It is enough that they pay well, and do not wish to be known. Besides, they would not scruple to cut my throat if they were offended — and most assuredly their friends would string up my poor boy, if anything went wrong with them. Even now, look at the captain — I mean the best dressed of the two. How he is playing with the hilt of his dagger there. He is meditating sticking it into my ribs because I am talking so long to you. I tell you, you must watch over their safety; and, in the name of the saints, aid them to get away as fast as possible — for, till they are out of the place, I shall not feel my head secure on my shoulders.”
“Oh! I understand. They are political offenders disguised as Greeks, who do not wish their movements to be known;” said the sharp-witted boatman, jumping at a conclusion. “I’ll undertake to serve you and them — not forgetting myself — and, I trust, that they will make it worth my while.”
“No fear of that,” the padrone was saying, when the Greek’s voice summoned him aft.
“What were you saying to the boatman?” he asked in an angry tone.
“I was making arrangements with him to take you on shore, signor, and do your bidding,” was the answer.
“Well, he may land me at once,” said the Greek. “Paolo, do you remain on board till I send for you, and let not a man quit the vessel on any excuse,” he whispered. “Such provisions as they require, the boatman can bring off for them, and I will manage to make him faithful.”
The Greek, without further remarks, swung himself over the side of the vessel and took his seat in Manuel’s boat.
“Hist, Manuel,” he said, in the lingua Franca, well understood by the Maltese boatmen; “you are debating in your mind whether you will inform the authorities that a suspicious character has landed on the island, and get a reward from them, or whether you will take the chance of pocketing what my generosity may induce me to bestow. Now, mark me, my honest friend. In the first place, I could get you hung for a little transaction, of which you know.”
The boatman started, and looked round with a suspicious glance.
“Que diavolo, who can this be?” he muttered.
“In the second, remember the English do not detain a man on bare suspicions, and but shabbily reward an informer. On the other hand, twenty colonati are yours, if you do my bidding. I do not want an answer — you are not a fool. Now row on shore as fast as you can.”
The Greek was a judge of character; and he seemed not to be altogether unacquainted with Manuel, the boatman. The boat ran into the public landing-place, and he stepped on shore with an independent and fearless air, where he mingled among the busy and motley throng who crowded the quay. The boatman, Manuel, sat in his boat a little distance from the shore, watching him, and ready, apparently, to obey his orders when he should be required.
The Greek proceeded onward through the lower parts of the town, eyeing those he passed with a quick keen glance, which seemed to read their very thoughts. People were too much accustomed to see the varied costumes of the East to regard him with unusual curiosity, or to incommode him in his progress by stopping to stare at him; at the same time that many remarked him as he slowly sauntered on and wondered whence he had come. He seemed to have nothing more to do than to amuse himself by viewing the city, though he had certainly not selected the most interesting or cleanest quarter. He apparently was a stranger to the place, by the way in which he hesitated at each crossing, which turning he should take, till he had carefully deciphered the name on the wall. Now he stopped to look into a shop, then to gaze up at the windows of a house as if he expected to see some one there, and then to throw a copper to some importunate beggar. He walked with an air of so much independence and nonchalance, indeed, at times, almost of haughtiness, that it was difficult to suppose he had the slightest apprehension of danger. Not a person, however, who, passed him, escaped his scrutiny; and even when he appeared to stop carelessly, or for the sake of considering the way he was to take, he cast a hurried glance behind him to satisfy himself that no one was acting the spy on his movements. He had evidently seen enough to convince him that the vessel, in which he had come, was in bad odour, and he naturally concluded that her passengers would be narrowly watched. Of the crowds who passed, not a human being seemed to know him, and if he was in reality particularly observed, it was done so cleverly and so cautiously, that with all his ingenuity, he failed to discover whether such was the case or not. He had already traversed a number of streets — ascending several flights of steps and descending others — when, at the corner of a narrow lane, his eye fell on a squalid-looking beggar who was lustily calling on the passers-by, in the name of all the saints, to preserve him from starvation. A broad-brimmed hat with a crown similar to those worn by Italian bandits, but sadly battered and brown with age and dirt, was worn slouchingly on his head, so as almost to hide his features, which were further concealed by a handkerchief tied under his chin, and a black patch over one of his eyes. A tattered cloak, the cast-off finery of a dandy of the palmy days of the old Knights of Malta, covered his shoulders, as did, in part, his legs, a pair of blue cloth trousers, through which his knees obtruded, and which were fringed with torn stripes at the feet. Such of his features as were visible were as ill-favoured as well could be. His voice, too, had a peculiarly disagreeable tone, as in the lingua Franca of the Maltese mendicants he begged for alms.
This interesting personage was supporting himself carelessly on a pair of crutches, while he rested on one foot, and stretched forth the palm of his right hand to grasp whatever might be put into it. The Greek stopped and put his hand into his pocket to draw out a piece of money, while he did so narrowly eyeing the beggar. The man’s voice changed instantly that he saw the stranger looking at him; from a half whining yet impudent tone, it began to sink and tremble with alarm, and finally he became perfectly mute and forgetful of his calling.
“I thought you would know me,” said the Greek. “And you must remember I never forget those I have once seen either as friends or foes.”
“No, signor, I perceive you do not,” replied the beggar, trembling with alarm. “Have mercy on me.”
“That depends upon yourself,” said the stranger. “At present, you deserve no mercy at my hands; but I will now give you an opportunity of serving me; and if you do so faithfully, I will overlook the past.”
“You are very generous, signor — you always were,” exclaimed the beggar, trying to fall down and embrace his knees, which the Greek prevented. “I will go to any part of the world. I will go through fire and water to serve you.”
“You have not to go far to perform my directions; but I want faithfulness in the discharge of the duty I shall impose on you,” said the Greek, sternly. “And, mark me, Giacomo — if you play me false, as you have done others, I will find you out, and finish your worthless life with as little compunction as I would that of a rabid dog.”
“Si, signor capitan, I very well know that you are not a man to be trifled with,” answered the beggar, bowing his head.
“Tell me what you want, and by the Holy Virgin and all the saints in heaven I will perform the work faithfully.”
“Your oath is superfluous, as you would break it for a copper-piece, so don’t insult me with it,” replied the Greek, scornfully. “But, listen: there is a certain Jew — Aaron Bannech by name — his office — his den — the place where he cheats, and robs, and lies, is beneath the Albergo — in the Strada. Do you hear?”
“Si, signor, si, — I know the place — I know the man,” said the beggar, hastily.
“You know him; it is well that you should — you are an admirable pair. He would sell his soul for a dollar, and would then try to cheat the devil out of it. You are a meaner knave. Half that sum would buy you. You both are useful to me, though. Hasten to him, and tell him that I am here. Say that he must clear out his den of visitors, clerks, or other prying knaves, and that I will be with him in half an hour. When you have done this, go down to the port, and learn what vessels are about to sail, shortly, for the eastward, with all particulars about them — their cargoes — armed force — and number of men — also what ships are expected to arrive shortly from the same quarter. Having gleaned this information, which you well know how to do, come up with it to the residence of the Jew. Listen, also, if anything is said about the Speronara Volante, from Syracuse, by which I arrived. Alessandro is her master — or, if any remarks are made respecting me. I am, probably, unnoticed; but it is as well to be cautious.”
“I will strictly obey your directions, signor,” said the beggar. “Have you further orders?”
“No — you may go. I have been talking to you too long already, and may have been observed.”
“Rest assured of my fidelity,” said the beggar, hobbling off up the street on his crutches, at a far more rapid rate than he was generally wont to move.
No sooner, however, had he got out of sight of the Greek, than he slackened his pace.
“Now, I wonder what I should get by denouncing him to the authorities,” he muttered to himself. “They are stingy in rewarding informers though, and he, probably, will pay better; besides, as he says, he may get me hung by a word; and if I get him into trouble, some of his friends are certain to avenge him. After all, too, he would probably make his story good, and I should not be believed. You can never catch those Greeks asleep; their wit is so keen, and they twist, and turn, and double in such a manner, that if they get into a scrape, they are certain of working their way out of it. No, it won’t do. I must keep to my word, and be honest with him. Curse him! Here am I a beggar on crutches, and a far greater rogue lords it over me as if he were a prince.”
So the beggar hobbled on towards the house of the Jew to fulfil his mission. I am afraid that there are too many people in the world like Giacomo, the Maltese beggar, who are honest as long only as it suits their purpose.
Chapter Three.
The Greek, little dreaming of the danger to which he was exposed, or, at all events, little fearing it, turned on his heel, and retraced his steps for some part of the distance he had come. His air was more buoyant and independent than before.
“So much for business,” he muttered. “And now for amusement. We’ll try what this brave city can afford. Let me see, I passed a tratoria or a caffè but just now; I’ll look in there, and learn what is going forward!”
He soon reached the place he spoke of; and throwing open the folding-doors at the entrance, entered with his usual careless air, and took his seat at a marble table, which chanced to be unoccupied. There was a billiard-table in the room beyond, and upstairs were more secret apartments, where games of chance were, at times, played.
The place was full of persons of all descriptions. English and Maltese, and others of various nations. Those belonging to the army and navy, were either of inferior rank, or were harum-scarum fellows, who cared not at all with whom they associated. There were, also, masters and mates of merchantmen, Frenchmen and Italians; and there was a representative, indeed, to be found of almost all the people dwelling on the shores of the Mediterranean, as also, of more distant nations. Some were smoking, and others drinking; but the greater number were idling about, laughing and talking, as if they had come there to kill time; and when, by chance, any pause occurred, the noise of the billiard balls was heard, and the cry of the marker from the next room. The Greek seemed to excite less observation even here than in the street, except from two or three of his countrymen, who were in the room, and who eyed him narrowly. He rose and sauntered into the billiard-room, perhaps to avoid their scrutiny, perhaps simply to amuse himself by looking on at the game. He soon, however, returned, and ordering some coffee, he took up a Maltese newspaper, which appeared to afford him considerable interest.
“Ah! here we have a complete list of all the vessels about to sail from this port,” he muttered to himself. “It will serve to compare with old Bannech’s and Giacomo’s account,” and taking out a pocket-book he quickly copied the list. “And let me see,” he continued. “What have we here? A ball to-night at the Auberge de Provence. By Saint Genario; it will be a good amusement to go there. I shall pick up not a little useful information of what is going forward in the great world, what way the wheel is next to turn, and how those English are going to act with regard to Greece, — whether we are to have a loan or an army to assist us. Heaven defend us from the latter, and afford us good pickings from the first. But, with regard to this ball. A stranger, I suppose, would not be admitted without an introduction. They are, I know, of old, very suspicious in this place. Well, I must make old Bannech settle that matter also for me. He must forge some good introductions, if he cannot procure them for me in any other way. He is well able to do so, for he keeps his hand in at the work, and knows everybody here and elsewhere.”
While he sat meditating and sipping his coffee, the three Greeks, at another table, continued eyeing him narrowly, and, at the same time, whispering among themselves. If he was conscious that their glances were fixed on him, he stood the scrutiny admirably, without the slightest change of colour, nor did his eye quail in the least. Looking suddenly up, however, he appeared first to discover that their eyes were turned towards him. Immediately rising, with a bland smile, he walked up to them.
“You seem to know me, gentlemen,” he observed, with a courteous tone, in pure Romaic. “Unfortunately, I do not enjoy the same happiness. Will you inform me where it was we met?”
“Pardon, sir, for our rudeness,” answered one of the three, rather abashed. “We mistook you for another person — we were trying to recollect where we had seen you.”
“It is not impossible that you may have met me before, if you have been in Italy, in which country I have resided for some years; or lately in Sicily,” answered the Greek. “In the fair city of Valetta you could not have seen me, as I only landed an hour ago from the last-mentioned island, and in our native Greece, I have not been since the days of my early boyhood, though I am on the very point of returning thither.”
“Then, clearly, we are mistaken,” replied another of the three. “We, ourselves, arrived here only yesterday from Greece, after encountering numerous hardships and dangers. Among others, when off the southern end of Cerigo, our vessel was boarded by a rascally pirate, manned, too, by our own countrymen, who robbed us of everything we possessed, which they could carry off, and we fully believe they would have sunk the ship, and murdered us, had not a British man-of-war hove in sight, and made them sheer off before they had completed their work.”
“I dare say they would,” replied the Greek, quietly. “Such gentry, I have heard, generally consider that the only safe plan of avoiding detection, and the troublesome affair of a trial, and perhaps a very disagreeable result, is to stop the mouths of those they plunder beneath the waves, lest they should afterwards tell inconvenient tales of them. If they thought you had escaped, they would take very good care another time not to commit such a blunder.”
“Why, it was certainly from no leniency on the part of the villains that we were not drowned, for they had bored holes in our ship’s bottom, and thought we should have sunk at once; but, fortunately, a fresh breeze brought up the man-of-war alongside of us before we went down, and her people stopped the leak, and saw us safely into port.”
“I regret to hear this account you give me,” said the stranger, in a sympathising tone; “though I congratulate you on your narrow escape, — I may call it miraculous. You are far more fortunate than the generality of people who fall into the hands of those gentry, I should think. I was in hopes that our countrymen, since the commencement of the glorious struggle to throw off the foul Turkish yoke, had abandoned all their malpractices, and had joined heart and hand in the great cause against the common enemy. I, too, am personally interested; as I am about to embark on board some merchant vessel for the East and may fare as badly as you have done, if not worse. Do you know any particulars of the pirate who attacked you? I should like to learn all about him, that we may, if possible, avoid the vessel if we see her at a distance.”
“It was dark when she boarded us, so that we had not an opportunity of scrutinising her near,” answered the person addressed, who was evidently, by his costume and appearance, a Greek merchant, and, as it afterwards appeared, the two younger men with him were his sons. “Our misfortune happened in this way. We sailed, you must know, on board a Neapolitan brigantine from Athens, bound to Syracuse. The first part of our voyage was performed in safety; but when some ten miles or so to the south of Cerigo, we lay becalmed the whole day. Our captain and the mariners set to work to pray to those accursed little images they call their saints, for a breeze; and, at last, it came; but to prove what sort of characters their saints are, at the same time appeared in the north east, a large polacca brig, of a very rakish look, stealing round the east end of the island. The stranger brought the wind up with her, and, as she neared us, the captain, who had been eyeing her earnestly, grew into a state of great trepidation, and began to pray harder than ever; but this time his saints would not listen to him. He wrung his hands, and beat his breast, and said that the stranger had a very suspicious look, and that he did not like it at all. After stamping on the deck, and weeping, and tearing his hair for some time, in which he was imitated by most of his crew, he bethought himself of getting more sail on his craft, and of trying to escape from the enemy, if enemy she were. A wild boar might as well try to outstrip the fleet hunter. The stranger came up with us hand over hand; our only hope of getting away from him was in the coming darkness. At last the seamen managed to set all the sail the vessel could carry, and, with the wind right aft, we began to glide through the water. On, however, came the stranger after us; if we wished to get away, he did not intend that we should do so, and all of a sudden he yawed to port, and let fly a bow chaser right at us; the shot did not hit us, but it frightened our captain excessively — for it flew directly over our heads. I verily believe, if we had not stopped him, he would have let fly everything, and waited patiently to be robbed and murdered. We caught hold of him, and urged him to be calm, and that we might yet have a chance of escaping. The breeze freshened, and we held on, and, though the stranger still continued to overhaul us, he did not come up so fast as at first. Every instant, too, it was growing dark; and as there was no moon shining, we hoped, by hauling our wind, to slip away from him, if we could contrive to run on without being hit till darkness had completely set in. He, however, seemed in a hurry, and again yawing, let fly another shot at us; though his gunnery was not particularly good — for he again missed us — it had the effect of setting the Neapolitan master and his crew dancing like madmen; they leaped and jumped, and twisted and turned, and tore their hair, and prayed and swore, all in the same breath. They prayed for themselves, and swore at their enemies, and at their own hard fate should they be taken; for they all had a venture on board, I believe. Though two shots had missed, it was not to be expected that all should have such ill-luck, and accordingly, when the brig yawed a third time and fired, down came our fore-topsail by the run. If the crew had been in a fright before, when they were not hit, it must be supposed that they were now in a complete paroxysm of terror; their first impulse was to let fly all the tacks and sheets, and to jam down the helm, so as to let the vessel fly up into the wind; their next was to rush below to put on their best clothes, and the very little money they had in their pockets, and then to fall to again at praying and beating their breasts. Cowardly fools that they were; had they held on like men, as matters turned out, we should have escaped being plundered at all. In ten minutes after the last shot had created such confusion on board, a boat pulled alongside, and a dozen fellows in Greek dresses jumped over the bulwarks down upon our decks. We three, my sons and I, sat aft as dignified as Turks, and as all the crew were below, there was not the slightest show of resistance. Our countrymen — for such I am sorry to say they were — seemed inclined to be civil to us, but vowed they would punish the Neapolitans for making them expend the three shots, and they forthwith began plundering the vessel; and hauling out the master from his berth, into which he had crept, they made him point out whatever was most valuable on board — brightening his wits up every now and then with a rope’s end. How the poor fellow did howl! but he deserved it; for he was an arrant coward. The leader of the pirates who boarded us was a very polite young man: he told us, that he should be sorry to be under the necessity of cutting our throats, or of otherwise sending us out of the world; but that he was afraid he should be compelled to do so, except we would consent to come on board his vessel, where he would make us take the vow of secrecy, and re-land us in Greece. He told us that he was in earnest, and would give us till the last moment to consider on the subject before he quitted the vessel. By this we concluded that he intended to murder all hands in cold blood, or to sink the brigantine. It is very extraordinary, and I hope that you will pardon me the remark, but he bore a very striking resemblance to you, except that he looked younger, and it was this circumstance that first attracted our attention to you.”
The Greek stranger who had been standing against the wall, with his arms folded and his legs crossed in an easy attitude during this narrative, at different parts indulging in a slight smile, now laughed outright. “An extraordinary coincidence as you say, my friend, though I confess that I would rather not bear so striking a resemblance to the cut-throat gentleman you describe. The consequences at times might be unpleasant; and I trust that no relative of mine — no younger brother nor cousin, has turned his hand to so disreputable an occupation. Men of the first families, it is true, have become pirates, especially in these disordered times; but they usually make war only against their natural enemies, the Turks or Moors. I cannot solve the mystery; however, I am very interested in your tale — pray go on with it.”
“Before I say another word, I must entreat your pardon for the remark I just made,” said the Greek merchant; “I was compelled to do so to account for our apparent rudeness.”
“Oh, certainly, my friend,” said the stranger, “I pardon you with all my heart. Nothing was more natural — only I must beg that you will not repeat the observation to any one else. The consequences you know might be unpleasant, as it might create disagreeable suspicions in men’s minds as to the rectitude of my character; but pray continue your tale.”
It must be remembered that although there were numbers of people within earshot, as this conversation was carried on in the Romaic, none of them understood it, which was, perhaps, fortunate for our stranger friend, as it would certainly have drawn their attention towards him; and if a man happens to be unknown in a place, the slightest shade of suspicion thrown on him, is sufficient to blacken his character to the darkest tint.
The Greek rubbed his red cap off and on his head two or three times to brighten his recollection, and then continued —
“While the pirates were ransacking below, their vessel ran alongside, and our decks were soon crowded with a cut-throat set of fellows, who speedily joined their comrades in the work of plunder, and in transporting everything they considered of value to their own ship. It is extraordinary with what rapidity bales and packages were handed out of one vessel into the other. The rascals must have been well accustomed to the work. Everything was done with the greatest regularity; their young leader directing all their movements. It did not take them a quarter of the time to unload that it had taken to load the vessel. Such discrimination, too, as the villains showed in selecting the most valuable merchandise.
“In the midst of the work, however, a cry was raised that a strange sail was in sight, right to windward, bearing down on us. With all their avidity for booty, the fellows had kept their eyes about them in the dark. Their leader sprang on board his own vessel to have a clearer view. He was convinced that the strange vessel was an enemy to him at all events, though a friend to us; and calm and collected as if he was enjoying a game of play, he issued his orders. The first was to tell his people to quit the brigantine, and to make sail on the brig. The second, part of which I heard, made my heart sink within me, and my blood run cold. He did not seem to think it had reached our ears, — indeed, I believe he had forgotten all about us; the words were, —
“‘Sink her — drown the people. No help for it — patience; we should otherwise be suspected.’
“Directly afterwards, several men with carpenters’ instruments for boring holes, went below, and quickly returning, knocked our boat to pieces, and jumped on board their own vessel. As soon as all the pirates had quitted us, the brig sheered off. Just as she did so, I heard some one exclaim —
“‘Our countrymen, our dear compatriots, where are they? We have forgotten them.’ However, I don’t think their regret for us could have been very great, for the next moment they fired a broadside slap into our hull, between wind and water, to try to make us sink the faster; and, making all sail, stood away from us as fast as a rattling breeze would carry them. Two of the crew had been knocked on the head by the pirates, and their broadside killed two more. The master and the survivors were utterly incapacitated from helping themselves; so we three Greeks, with the black cook, feeling some wish to preserve our lives, rigged the pumps which had escaped destruction, and set to work to keep the water from gaining enough on her to send us to the bottom. This we found we could easily do; and the cook, going below, was able to plug several of the holes, which had been very imperfectly bored. Some of the crew, also, at last recovered their senses and assisted us in our labours; so that we continued to keep the craft afloat till the vessel, which had frightened away the pirates, came up to us. She proved to be the British brig-of-war, the Cockroach, and a boat immediately came on board to learn what all the firing was about. Our condition proved the truth of our story; and we entreated the officer who boarded us not to desert us, as the sacrifice of our lives would have been the inevitable consequence; whereas, the improbabilities of his catching the pirate were very great. The British are a very humane people, I will say that for them; and the captain of the brig accordingly sent two boats’ crews on board us, with the carpenter and his crew, and they plugged the holes, and thrummed a sail, and got it under our bottom. Some manned the pumps, to which they quickly drove the Neapolitans with a rope’s end; and next morning we made sail for Zante, which we reached in safety, escorted by our preservers, who immediately afterwards started again in search of the pirate.”
“Did they fall in with him, do you know?” asked the Greek, carelessly.
“Can you catch a sunbeam?” said the first speaker. “She must be a fast craft to come up with him. They say nothing can catch him.”
“What, then, you learnt who your friend was?” said the stranger.
“Oh, yes! we heard a good deal about him in Zante. He is the very terror of all honest, quiet-going traders in those parts.”
“And who is this formidable, light-heeled gentleman, may I ask?” said the stranger.
“No other than that daring devil, Zappa,” said the merchant. “You have heard of him, doubtless?”
“I think I have somewhere heard his name mentioned,” said the stranger. “But has he already established so terrific a name for himself? You described him as very young.”
“Ay, but old in crime. A man who murders all his captives, and sinks every ship he plunders, soon gets his name up in the world. It is one of the various methods to gain notoriety. Each man to his taste.”
“You are right, my friend,” said the stranger, stretching out his arms and yawning; “there are many methods by which a man may gain an elevated position; and your friend, Signor Zappa, as you call him, seems to have chosen a very certain one, at least, if he falls into the hands of the governor of this island; who, judging from the specimens I saw hanging up at the entrance of the port, treats such gentry with no slight distinction, by placing them in the most conspicuous posts within his jurisdiction.”
“You joke merrily on the subject; but it is no laughing matter to those who have been robbed and nearly murdered,” said the Greek merchant. “I only wish I could get the villains in my power, I would hang them all without mercy, as high as Haman.”
“I dare say you do,” said the stranger, smiling. “Such is but a natural impulse. Yet, as I have not suffered, I cannot enter quite so warmly into your feelings. However, I am grateful to you for your account; and I shall take very good care to keep out of the way of your friend Zappa. May I ask, by the way, the appearance and name of the vessel commanded by this renowned cut-throat?”
“Certainly,” said the merchant, “though, as I said, it was nearly dark when he boarded us; but I should describe her as a rakish polacca brig, of about two hundred and fifty tons burden; and from what we learnt afterwards, we discovered that she must be the celebrated Sea Hawk. It is said that she is so fleet that nothing could ever catch her, and that she comes up with everything she chases; so that, my friend, you may not avoid her quite so easily as you may wish.”
“It is something to know what she is like; and, if we cannot run from her, we must fight her,” returned the stranger. “However, before we part, let me assure you that I shall be most happy to be of any service to you in my power. When do you again sail from hence?”
“In a few days our mission here will be concluded. We then return to our beloved Greece,” replied the merchant.
“What! and run the risk of being chased by the Sea Hawk, and of falling into the hands of that rogue, Zappa!” exclaimed the stranger. “However, as, by the law of chances, you could scarcely encounter him twice, I should much like to accompany you, for I should then consider myself safe from him. By what vessel do you go?”
“A Venetian merchant schooner, the Floriana. She sails hence in four days; and, as she has a rich cargo, she is well-armed and has plenty of men — so we need not fear Zappa or any other pirate.”
“Just as I should wish. I will look out for her, depend on it,” exclaimed the stranger, quickly. “But I must, for the present, wish you farewell, gentlemen. I have an appointment, and I have already overstayed my time.”
Saying this, the stranger bowed to his new acquaintance; and throwing down his reckoning with a haughty air, quitted the coffee-house.
“He seems an honestly fair spoken gentleman,” said one of the young Greeks to his father. “He will be a great addition to our society on board.”
“I am not quite so certain of that,” replied the more sagacious merchant. “Fair spoken he is without doubt; but for honesty, why you know the safe rule is to look upon all men as knaves till you find them otherwise. Therefore, my sons, never consider a stranger honest, or you may discover, when too late, that he is a rogue. Now, though it is doubtless fancy, I cannot help thinking that our friend there bears a very striking resemblance to the pirate Zappa.”
Chapter Four.
There is an old saying, that, “Give a dog a bad name, it is sure to stick by him.” On this account I suppose it is that Jews are always considered rogues. I am very far from saying that they really are so invariably, or even generally. On the contrary, I believe that there are a great number of very honest, generous, kind-hearted, hard-working people among them in all countries where they enjoy the privileges of free men.
That, in those times and countries where they have been treated as worse than slaves, despised, insulted, and robbed on every occasion, they should have become, what they are often described as being, is not only not surprising, but is according to the laws which govern mankind. Tyranny and wrong, invariably make the people, who submit to them, grow mean, treacherous, and false. Cut off from all honourable pursuits, they have recourse to such as are within their power; and thus the Jews, who were unable to hold even land in their possession, became the money-makers; and, consequently, moneylenders of the world — and, as they were frequently pillaged and deprived by extortion of their wealth, they naturally endeavoured to regain, by every means left to them, that of which they had been robbed.
Now, though there are many Jews whose upright conduct is sufficient to retrieve the characters of their whole people, such cannot be said for the old Maltese Jew, Aaron Bannech. He was a rogue ingrain. To lie, cheat, and rob, where he could do so without risk of detection, was his occupation and delight. Lying, cheating, and robbery, were in him a second nature. He considered them not only lawful, but praiseworthy employments. He could not help lying and cheating if he tried. By so doing, he had heaped up hoards of wealth — he had raised himself from abject penury, and how could he be expected to persuade his conscience, or what stood him in place of one, that he had not been acting rightly. True his gold was of no real use to him — he had no one to enjoy it with him — he had no relative to whom he could leave it. Some might say that it would serve to repurchase Judea for his people; but he cared no more for Judea than he did for Home. He would not have parted with a sixpence to rebuild Jerusalem, unless he could have got a very large interest for his money — indeed he would probably have required very sufficient security, before he would have consented to part with it. His appearance was far from peculiar or striking as he sat in a dingy underground den, which he appeared to have burrowed out for himself beneath the groaning walls of one of the old mansions of Valetta. He had sharp, ferrety eyes, a hooked nose, and a long, dirty, grey beard; indeed, no difference could be discerned between him and his countrymen employed in selling old clothes in London. He wore a brown cap on his head, anila, long serge overcoat, the colour of which it was impossible to determine; and a pair of slippers, which had once been yellow, but were now stained with many a varied tinge. The chamber in which he sat was fitted up with a desk, and a table covered with packages of papers and account-books, two high stools, and three or four rickety chairs. He was by himself, waiting in expectation of the arrival of the Greek. The time appointed had already passed, and he was beginning to think that some accident must have occurred to his acquaintance. Ten minutes more elapsed — his suspicions increased.
“Can the myrmidons of the law have got hold of him?” he muttered. “That rascal Giacomo — he may have informed, and will receive the reward which ought to be mine. If I dared, I would secure the prize at once — but then, I suspect, before long, the amount will be increased. Yes, it must be. The fruit is not yet ripe for plucking.”
He stopped, either to chuckle at his own wit, or to calculate the sum he might expect for betraying the man who trusted him. His virtuous meditations were interrupted by the entrance of the Greek. His manner was as free and joyous as ever. He addressed the Jew in Italian, with a remarkably pure accent.
“Ah! my dear correspondent — my noble friend — my prince of money-lenders, how fares it with you? Still at the old trade of coining gold, eh? Well, we must all live either by fraud or force; cunning or strength are the weapons put by nature into our hands. To some she gives one; to others the latter: nature is most impartial. To the lion she gives claws and teeth; to the horse his hoofs and fleetness. To a woman, beauty and softness; to a man, strength and courage. She intends all these attributes to be employed. So, friend Bannech, you live by fraud, and I by force. Is it not so?”
“I cannot dispute the correctness of your assertion: for, to say the truth, you have spoken so rapidly, that my poor comprehension could not follow you, noble signor,” said the Jew, bending low, and placing a chair for his visitor. “But may I inquire what thus unexpectedly brings you to Malta?”
“Pleasure, Bannech — pleasure, and, perhaps, the hopes of a little profit,” said the Greek, laughing. “Now, though I may not just yet tell you what brings me to Malta, I will tell you a little more of my history than you are at present acquainted with. Know, then, most worthy Jew, that I am, by name, Argiri Caramitzo, a patriot Greek chief, or prince, call me, of Graditza. That I have been educated in Italy — that years have passed since I set foot in my native land — and that I am now hastening thither to join in the noble struggle to emancipate Greece from the thraldom of the infidel Turk. I have travelled from that city of learning and piety, Pisa, to Naples, thence to Syracuse; and from that ancient city, I have crossed the sea hither. All this you must remember, Bannech, should you be questioned.”
“I will not forget it, most noble prince,” said the Jew, bending his head. “I like the story much. It has a probability about it which cannot fail to make it be believed — an essential point too frequently overlooked by bunglers in lying.”
“I am glad you like it,” observed the Greek, or prince — as we may now call him. He took no notice of the last, not very flattering, observation of the Jew. “But now, Bannech, I wish to know what vessels are sailing hence for Greece, as I desire, you must remember, to secure a passage by one of them.”
The Jew looked at him for a moment, doubting whether he was in earnest.
“Oh, I understand,” he said at length. “Why, there are several sailing in the course of a few days, but the one which will best suit your purpose quits the harbour to-morrow. She carries passengers — one of whom an English colonel is said to be rich, so he will doubtless have a store of gold on board. He has a daughter or niece with him, who is reported handsome. If she was, by chance, to fall into the hands of such gentry, as we wot of, she would gain them a large amount for her ransom. The vessel I speak of is the Zodiac, John Bowse, master.”
“I passed her as we entered the harbour,” remarked the Greek. “I will go on board this very evening. But I wish to know more about her passengers. Could not they be induced to carry a large amount of gold with them? It would be very convenient. Tell me, how can I become acquainted with them?”
The Jew shook his head.
“I do not know how it can be managed. These English people, with their proud manners, do not like making the acquaintance of foreigners of whose history they are ignorant.”
“Do not tell me that it cannot be done,” exclaimed the Greek impatiently. “I tell you, signor, that you must find means of doing it. Surely a Greek prince would not be refused admittance into the best society of an insignificant island dependency like this.”
“There are a great many arrant rogues bearing that title,” said the Jew, his eyes twinkling as he spoke. “And among the English here the rank alone does not bear much weight. You should have letters of introduction, and how they are to be procured, I cannot say.”
“How they are to be procured! Why, forge them to be sure, my friend,” exclaimed the Greek. “Nothing is so easy. Come, come, you are well accustomed to the work, I know.”
“Oh, father Abraham, suppose I was to be discovered!” ejaculated the Jew. “My credit would be gone, and I should be completely ruined and undone.”
“Oh, no fear of that, while your wits are as keen as at present,” said the Greek. “Come, has not the colonel some acquaintance or other in Italy, who would be likely to introduce a distinguished foreigner, his friend, visiting the island, or do you know of some other person to whom a letter of introduction might be addressed?”
The Jew meditated for some time, and if with any other sensation than that of grasping avarice, and all its accompanying hopes and fears, it was with that of admiration for the Greek’s daring and versatility of talent. He was thinking of the value of which they might be to himself.
“I have it,” he exclaimed. “There is a client of mine, a young spendthrift, who has lived much in Italy, and many of whose acquaintance I know. Stay, I have a letter by me from his friend the Count Montebello of Florence. He shall be your introducer. Do you know him?”
“I know nothing of him,” said the Greek, “make me a friend of his friend. It will be safer and will be sufficient.”
“Excellent, excellent,” exclaimed the Jew, chuckling at the thoughts of the fraud. “You should have been bred a lawyer instead of a sailor, prince. Now, remember, this client of mine is acquainted with Colonel Gauntlett, and is, indeed, a suitor of his niece’s, for the sake of the money he expects she will receive from her uncle. You will know how to talk to him.”
“Admirable! My plan must prosper. There is a ball, too, I understand to-night, at which I suppose all the principal people in the place will be present, and among them, the colonel, his niece, and my new friend. I must be prepared for the occasion; so, friend Bannech, send for the best tailor in the place forthwith; for it will never do to appear in this barbarian costume.”
The Greek having thus fully concocted his plan, overruled all the objections thrown out by the Jew, and, as he was a man of action, he insisted on a tailor being instantly sent for. In ten minutes afterwards the well-known artist Paolo Muhajiar made his appearance, and, though he was somewhat astounded at the shortness of the time allowed him to rig the Greek stranger in a suit of mufti, a show of some broad gold pieces overcame all difficulties, and he promised to set every hand at his establishment on to the work.
Little did the honest Paolo dream, as with a profound bow, he gathered up his measures and patterns, and took his departure, who was the distinguished foreigner for whom he was about to labour. The Greek desiring the Jew to detain the beggar Giacomo till his return, with a triumphant look soon after set out to inspect the good brig the Zodiac.
Argiri Caramitzo was a man who hated inactivity; he was never happy except he was in motion, and never contented unless he had a prospect of change before him. Born in England, he would have been a universal philanthropist or a radical reformer, or an inventor of patent machines, or, in late days, a railroad projector; he would have employed his time in haranguing popular assemblies on the rights of man, and the freedom of religion, and he would have been a loud advocate of the cause of the Poles, and Greeks, and Hungarians; but, as he happened to have been born in Greece, he cared not a jot for the Greeks, and employed his talents, sharpened by use, in making a fortune in the way most clearly open to him, and most suited to his taste.
He now hurried down to the quay, off which he saw Manuel at his post, waiting for his return. He beckoned him to approach, and, taking his seat, ordered him to pull alongside the English brig the Zodiac; he soon stood on her deck, to the no small astonishment of Captain Bowse, who had just before got on board. It may be supposed that they would have had no little difficulty in understanding each other; but there is a lingua Franca used in the Mediterranean, which all mariners, who traverse that sea, very quickly pick up; and, what with that and the aid of signs, they made themselves tolerably intelligible to each other; at all events the Greek learned all he wished to know; even before he had spoken, his quick glance had made him acquainted with the armament of the vessel, and her probable seaworthy qualities. His foot, too, as he walked aft, happened to strike one of the carronades, the look of which he considered suspicious, and he smiled as he found that it was of wood. He soon made known his object in visiting the ship; he was looking out for a passage to Greece by some vessel shortly to sail thither, and, as the appearance of the Zodiac pleased him, he should like to engage a cabin on board her.
“Cannot, though, receive you on board, sir; sorry for it: but all my accommodation is taken up by an English colonel and his family, and he would not allow anybody else on board, even if it was the Pope himself,” answered Captain Bowse.
“But I am not at all particular as to the sort of accommodation you can find for me,” urged the Greek. “I have been at sea before, and can rough it as well as any of you mariners.”
“No matter, Mr Prince; the colonel would not allow any stranger on board, so, with all the will in the world to serve you, I cannot do it.”
“But suppose the colonel should not object, would you then receive me?” asked the stranger.
“That would alter the case, sir, and we would rig you up the best berth we could manage,” answered Captain Bowse.
“So far, so good,” said the Greek. “About the passage-money we shall not disagree; but tell me of what does your cargo consist? I have the greatest horror of sleeping over gunpowder, or anything likely to explode.”
“Oh, we have no gunpowder except a few charges for our guns there; but we have some cases of muskets consigned to a merchant at Cephalonia, and which will, I suspect, soon find their way over to your friends on the main; and we have besides an assortment of hard goods, and of silks and clothes, and cottons, and such things, indeed, as would only be shipped in a sound ship — high up in Lloyd’s list, let me tell you, sir. There isn’t a finer craft out of London than the Zodiac, and none but a good ship would have weathered the gale we fell in with t’other day, though, as it was, we met with a little damage, which made us put in here to repair.”
“I have no doubt of the Zodiac’s good qualities, and I hope that I may yet have the satisfaction of proving them,” said the Greek, as he stepped over the side. “Adieu, captain; a prosperous voyage whether I sail with you or not.”
Chapter Five.
A grand ball was taking place at the Auberge de Provence, in the Strada Reale, at Valetta. All the rank and fashion of the city were assembled. They consisted of the naval, military, and civil officers of the crown stationed there, their wives and daughters; a few English visitors attracted to the island to recruit their health, or to indulge their curiosity; and some foreigners, illustrious and otherwise, who had come there chiefly on the latter account; though a small portion might have been travelling diplomatists or scientific savants. Few ball-rooms could display a larger number of glittering uniforms, both naval, military, and consular; and there was a very fair proportion of beauty among the younger ladies, and diamonds among the dowagers. The soldiers certainly took the lead. They consider that possession is nine parts of the law; and thus as they live in the island, while their naval brethren are merely visitors, they could not help feeling their superiority. Captains of line-of-battle ships and frigates are, of course, however, held in high consideration by the fair sex; but midshipmen were sadly at a discount; and even lieutenants, unless they happened to have handles to their names, or uncles in the ministry, were very little thought of. Such was the case at the time of which I write. I suspect very little alteration has, since then, taken place.
So our two young friends, Jack Raby and Jemmy Duff, seemed to feel as they sauntered into the ball-room, and cast their eyes round in a somewhat unusually bashful manner, in search of any young lady who would deign to bestow a bow on them, and accept them as partners. At last, Jemmy Duff exchanged a nod and a smile with the little Maltese girl who had before attracted him, and he was soon, according to his own fashion, engaged in making desperate love to her, evidently as much to her amusement as to his satisfaction. Poor Raby stood looking on, and could scarcely help feeling jealous at his friend’s good fortune; for not a single lady did he know in the room, when a hand was placed on his shoulder. He looked up, and a bright smile irradiated his countenance as he saw who it was.
“What, Raby, don’t you intend to show some of these fair ladies how well the Ione lads can kick their heels?”
The speaker was a young, intelligent-looking man, with a complexion which would have been fair, had it not been sunburnt, with thick, light, curling hair. He was strongly but gracefully made, of the ordinary height, and would have been by every one considered good looking; his forehead and mouth were decidedly handsome, the latter expressing great firmness, at the same time a great amiability of disposition. His dress was that of a commander in the navy.
“I can’t get a partner, sir,” answered the midshipman; “I don’t know a lady in the room.”
“Oh! we will soon find you one. I must not have my boys thought to be misanthropic.”
“Captain Fleetwood,” said a lady near, “can you introduce a partner to my niece?”
“Oh, certainly,” answered the officer, seizing Jack Raby by the arm, “allow me to introduce Mr Raby, of her Majesty’s brig Ione, who will be happy to dance the next quadrille with you.”
The young lady to whom he spoke, smiled, and said she should be very happy; but the aunt made a wry face, and observed that she intended to have asked him to introduce his friend, Major White of the — .
“I hope my young friend, Raby, will do as well. He is a nephew of Lord — ,” observed Captain Fleetwood, in a slightly satirical tone. “I will bring up White, in tow, to your ladyship, as soon as I can sight him.”
Captain Fleetwood was always more thoroughly nautical in his mode of expression at Malta than in any other place.
“Oh, certainly, I am most happy to know any of your officers, especially a nephew of Lord — , whose brother is a great friend of my husband’s cousin.”
Captain Fleetwood might have made a rejoinder; but at that moment his eye glanced towards the door, at which was entering a stout, oldish gentleman, in plain clothes, and hanging on his arm, a fair, young, and very pretty and interesting girl. He instantly hurried forward, and claimed her hand for the next dance, which, with one of the sweetest possible smiles, she promised to give him, while the old gentleman, though he nodded to him, evidently regarded him with far from amiable feelings.
The young officer, however, who appeared accustomed to the old man’s surly looks, and indifferent to them, remained by her side, and engaged her in an animated conversation. At last her companion lost all patience, and tugging at her arm, he exclaimed, —
“Come along, Ada, we must look for a seat somewhere till the dancing begins, for I cannot undertake to stand on my legs all night. Captain Fleetwood, you will find Miss Garden at the farther end of the room, probably, when you wish to claim her hand for the next quadrille; but as she is soon to commence a long sea voyage, I cannot allow her to fatigue herself by dancing much this evening.”
Colonel Gauntlett, for the speaker was the uncle of Ada Garden, said this in a grave, cold tone, sufficient to freeze the heart of any ordinary lover; and, pressing his niece’s arm as if to prevent her from escaping, he dragged her through the crowd towards a seat which he found vacant.
“Ada,” said the colonel, as he walked on, “I will not have you intimate with any of those sea officers. I cannot bear them, from the highest to the lowest. One of them had the impertinence to interfere between me and a lady to whom I was paying my addresses. By Jove, miss, he carried her off before my eyes. I have hated them ever since, with their easy-going, devil-me-care ways.”
“But surely, uncle, you would not make all suffer for the fault of one; and I suppose your rival loved the lady,” urged Ada.
“Love her, I suppose he did love her; but he had no business to do so, I tell you. I already looked upon her as my wife!” exclaimed the colonel, stamping down his stick vehemently on the floor, and speaking so loud that several people must have heard him.
“But did the lady confess her affection for you, uncle?” asked his niece.
“Confess her love! — why, ay, no — that is, I never asked her; or, rather, she took it into her head to refuse me altogether.”
Fleetwood was about to follow, but he suddenly stopped.
“It will only enrage the old man, and excite suspicions in his mind. Perhaps he will insult me to get rid of me altogether, — I had better not.”
Ada found herself seated next to Lady Marmion, with whose niece Jack Raby was dancing. Her attention was easily riveted by the praises which her ladyship lavished on Captain Fleetwood, and the secret of her affection, if secret it could be called, was easily penetrated by the astute dame.
“Now, my dear, you know I like him, though I do not like the navy in general. Their coats smell of tar and cockroaches, and their conversation is all about their ships and their adventures at sea and on shore; and then you know they are generally so poor, that it is dangerous to let a girl talk to them. Captain Fleetwood is not very rich, I believe; but then he has prospects, and they should be taken into consideration.”
“I really do not know,” said Ada. “It never occurred to me to calculate the fortunes of the gentlemen with whom I am acquainted.”
“Oh, you will grow more prudent, my dear, some day,” observed her ladyship. “But who can that particularly handsome man be walking this way, with Captain Dunnup? By the way, my dear, I should recommend you to keep that Captain Dunnup at a distance. I gave Jane the same advice, for you know he has entirely run through his property; and they say, besides, that he is completely in the hands of the Jews. Dear me, here he comes with the stranger.”
As she spoke, two gentlemen were advancing towards the spot where she and Ada Garden were sitting. The one she alluded to was a dissipated-looking young man, though with a well-bred air, and rather handsome. The other was decidedly so — indeed, he might well have been considered the handsomest man in the room. There was a noble and independent air, and a free-born grace about him — so all the ladies declared — which would have made him anywhere distinguished. His features were dark, and of the purest classical model; his eyes were large and sparkling, and a long silky black moustache shaded his lip. His costume was simple and correct, from his well-fitting black coat to his trousers, which showed off the shape of his handsome leg, and his silk stockings, and low, well-polished shoes. The most severe critic could not have found the slightest fault with him, except perhaps that his coat shone too much, as if it was just out of the tailor’s hands.
“Permit me to introduce to your ladyship, my friend, Prince Argiri Caramitzo,” said Captain Dunnup, advancing and presenting the stranger, who bowed gracefully.
“And may I, Miss Garden, be allowed to introduce him to you?” he continued. “Although a Greek, he speaks Italian like a native, in which language I know that you, also, are a proficient.”
Both ladies bowed their heads, and signified their pleasure in knowing the Prince Caramitzo. He, in his turn, in very pure Italian, expressed his still greater gratification at the honour he enjoyed.
While he was speaking, Dunnup caught Colonel Gauntlett’s eye fixed on him, and it occurred to him that he should introduce his friend. He accordingly took him up, and introduced him in form.
“The prince is going eastward, colonel, and as you will probably meet again in the classic land of Greece, if you do not rather journey together, I feel that you should become acquainted.”
As Colonel Gauntlett rather liked the look of the stranger, he condescended to be civil to him; but as he did not speak a word of Romaic, and as his Italian was very indifferent, and his French worse, Argiri Caramitzo could scarcely understand what he said. He, however, made a polite speech full of complimentary phrases in return, and then, bowing, went back to talk to the ladies.
The handsome stranger judged that he should more speedily gain all the information he required from the niece, and might afterwards, through her, if he found it requisite, persuade the colonel to do what he desired. He found on his return that Miss Garden had been led out to dance by Captain Fleetwood, so he sat himself down to play the agreeable to Lady Marmion, and to glean from her much which he wished to know about the politics of Valetta, and which she was too happy to impart.
We, however, must follow Captain Fleetwood and Miss Garden. There was no doubt of their being lovers, by the confiding way in which she rested on his arm, and glanced up into his face as he spoke; and the look of proud happiness with which he regarded her, and seemed to defy the world to venture on the experiment of tearing her from him. Everybody observed it but Colonel Gauntlett, and he remained obstinately blind to what had taken place.
“My beloved Ada, this is the last time that I may have an opportunity of speaking to you,” said Fleetwood, as, the dance being over, he led her to an open balcony which looked out on the moonlit harbour. “You know how ardently I love you, and that willingly would I sacrifice all the prospect of your uncle’s property, if he would give his consent to our union; but I would not urge you to act in opposition to his wishes — yet there is a time when obedience ceases to be a duty, and that time must come when he obstinately refuses to give you to me.”
“He will not, he cannot do so, when he knows how dearly, how deeply you love me.” She spoke according to the dictates of her own heart; nor was she, however, wrong.
“Then this very night, or to-morrow morning, before you sail, I will ask you from him, and as soon as I pay off the Ione, which I shall probably do in the course of two months, I will come back and claim you. Shall I do so, dearest?”
“Oh, yes! do, Charles. It is the only way, and, believe me, whatever is the result, I will be faithful to you. While you claim me, I will never marry another.”
“I cannot ask more, and yet I could not demand less without contemplating an event which would wring my heart with anguish,” exclaimed Fleetwood, pressing her hand to his lips. “I think, however, we may before that time again meet — I expect to be sent to Greece, and shall contrive to visit Cephalonia.”
For some time longer the lovers talked on without taking note of its flight, when they were disagreeably interrupted by the voice of the colonel inquiring for Ada.
“Come here, miss,” he exclaimed. “Here has been Prince Caramitzo waiting for the last quarter of an hour to lead you out to dance, and you were nowhere to be found — I will not have it.” And he looked a black thundercloud at Fleetwood. “Come, Signior Principe, there is your partner ready for you.”
The prince, comprehending his meaning more by his action than his words, stepped forward, and, with a profound bow, offered his arm, which Ada, giving a glance of regret at Fleetwood, was obliged to accept. The prince was not a man, it appeared, to allow a lady to feel annoyed in his society. He first paid her a slight and delicate compliment on her beauty, which he introduced in a description of his own countrywomen and the Italians. He told her how much he admired all he had heard of England, and seen of Malta; he drew out her opinion on several subjects, and a little account of her life, and then excited her curiosity about himself.
“But how is it that, being a Greek, you speak Italian so well?” she asked.
This was just what he expected; he wished to tell her his history, but could not volunteer to do so.
“Ah, signora, it is a long story, and would fatigue you; but thus much I may tell you: — You know the misery, the abject slavery to which my beautiful, my noble country was so long subjected beneath the iron despotism of the infidel Turks. Our fathers contrived to live under it, or the present race would not have been born to avenge them. We were rapidly becoming extinct as a nation; our religion languished — our education was totally neglected. My father, however, the late Prince of Graditza, also Argiri Caramitzo, was a man superior to those around him, and determining that I, his eldest son, should have the advantage of a good education, he sent me to the famous university of Pisa, in Tuscany. I there acquired the language of Italy in its purest form; but, unhappily, I almost learned to forget my own country — I formed friendships with those among whom I lived. I not only learned to talk, but to think as an Italian, and I was even ignorant of the gallant struggle which had commenced in Greece. This was owing to the affection of my parents, who, knowing that my disposition would have prompted me instantly to throw myself wherever danger was the greatest, did not inform me of what was taking place, and when they suspected that I must have heard something on the subject, assured me that my presence would be useless, and urged me to remain where I was. Alas! I listened to their well-meant deceit, till news was brought me that my noble father had been slain in combat with the enemies of our country, and that my mother had died of grief at his loss. Then, indeed, the truth was made known to me, and, rousing myself for action, I hastened to fly to the country, where I felt that the presence of even the meanest of her brave sons was required. Alas! I found that the means of quitting Italy were wanting — I was in debt, and no funds had been transmitted to me. I contrived to exist; for my friends were kind, but innumerable delays occurred before the money I sent for arrived, and I am only now on my way to Greece — my native land, the mother of the arts and sciences, the country of Socrates and Plato, of Alexander and Aristides, the battle-fields of Thermopylae and Marathon. Ah, signora, Greece once contained all that is noble and great, and brave — what she once was, such she will be again — when we, her brave sons, have regenerated her, when we have driven forth the accursed Turk, never more to set his foot upon our sacred shore, except as a slave, and a bondman. Ah, this is the patriot’s wish — his dream by night, his hope by day. This is the bond of union which now unites the hearts of our countrymen in one great feeling — a deadly hatred of the Turk — time is coming, and will shortly arrive when Greece, brightly and freshly burnished, will come forth a model of a perfect republic to all the nations of the earth. You are happy, signora, in going to the neighbourhood, that you may watch the progress of the glorious work.”
Ada listened, and her cheek glowed with animation, for she was an enthusiast in the cause of the Greeks. She looked at the prince, and thought him a noble patriot.
The Greek intended that she should do so. He was struck by her beauty, and every instant he felt his admiration for her increasing.
A second time she accepted the prince’s hand, in preference, however, only to that of Captain Dunnup, and she became the envy of the room, for numberless fair ladies were dying to dance with the handsome prince.
The Greek stranger was accompanied to the ball-room by a young man of very striking appearance, though of a slighter figure, and not as tall as himself. He spoke of him as his particular friend, the Count Montifalcone, who was on his way with him to join those struggling for Grecian independence. His manners were elegant: but he appeared to be very bashful, or diffident; and, at all events, appeared very much disinclined to enter into conversation. The Greek, however, introduced his Italian friend to Miss Garden; and though, at first, he was very much reserved, as he gazed at her animated and lovely countenance, he appeared to gain courage, and warmly entered into conversation on the beauty of his native Italy, and her superiority in works of arts over all other countries. It seemed curious to her that although he was going out to join the Greeks, he should show so little interest, as he appeared to do, on the subject of Greece, her wrongs and prospects. He danced, however, but once with Miss Garden nor did he, during the course of the evening, attempt to gain an introduction to any one else; but continued to watch her, at a distance, wherever she moved, and was evidently much struck with her beauty.
Many remarked the grave and silent young Italian as he stood, with his arms folded on his breast, endeavouring to conceal himself among the crowd, or leaned, apparently lost in reflection, against the door-post at the entrance to the room, in which she happened to be. His Greek friend seemed so much engaged, that he scarcely noticed him, and though Captain Dunnup exchanged a few words with him occasionally, he spoke to no one else, nor did he seem anxious to do so.
With a glowing cheek and sparkling eye she listened as he advocated, in ardent language, the cause of his native land, and her heart beat with enthusiasm.
“Oh! if I were a man, nothing should prevent me from hurrying to join the sacred ranks of your liberators!” she exclaimed.
“With such an advocate we must succeed,” returned the Greek, bowing. “Some of your noble countrymen, it is said, have already joined the patriot force; and, lady, when in the thick of the combat, fighting for Grecian liberty, I shall remember your words, and feel that your prayers are aiding us.”
Ada listened to the softly-flowing expressions of the voluble prince, and believed him to be a perfect patriot. Had she known a little more of the world, she might have thought otherwise, and yet, who can say, that while the prince was speaking to her, he did not feel all he expressed. New hopes, feelings, and aspirations rushed into his mind, elevating and purifying it — a glorious future might yet be in store for his country and himself — and while he remained by her side, the force of those sensations continued. It was with unwillingness, and even pain, that he was obliged to yield her up again to Captain Fleetwood, who was naturally on the watch to monopolise her whenever he could. How the prince hated the English Captain — for he soon saw that, though Miss Garden listened to his own honeyed words with pleasure, her heart was in the safe keeping of one whom he, all of a sudden, chose to consider as his rival.
“No matter,” he muttered. “I must teach her to forget him.”
He sauntered about the room for a short time by himself, paying little attention to the fair ladies who surrounded him, and it must be owned, was sadly indifferent to the charms of most of them. He then sought Colonel Gauntlett, whom he endeavoured to engage in conversation. It was certainly of a peculiar nature, and the meaning was not always clear to either party; but he gleaned much useful information, and suggested many things to the colonel in return. Among other pieces of advice, he recommended him to carry as much gold as he could with him, telling him that he would find it more convenient than bills. He strongly advised him also to keep it in his trunks, as they, in case of shipwreck, would more probably be saved than other things. It is extraordinary how very attentive and full of forethought he was.
The ball was at length over. Jack Raby and Jemmy Duff vowed that they had never enjoyed themselves more in their lives, thanks to their captain’s management; and they had made an agreement to introduce one another to each other’s partners, and, at the same time, to puff off each other’s wealth and connections, which plan they found answer very satisfactorily.
The Prince Caramitzo, as he threw a sea-cloak over his shoulder in front of the hotel, took the arm of Captain Dunnup, and warmly pressed his hand.
“I have much reason to thank you for your politeness, sir, and shall be glad to welcome you to Greece.”
The captain expressed his satisfaction at having been useful to him, and signified the very great probability there was of his shortly having to pay a visit to that country, at all events, of having to leave Malta. They then parted with mutual expressions of esteem.
The Greek then took the arm of his Italian friend, and together they sauntered down the street, every now and then stopping to ascertain whether any person from the ball was watching where they went.
Captain Fleetwood walked to his lodgings in an unusually melancholy humour. He had forebodings of disaster, which even his strong mind could not at once overcome, though he knew they arose from being fatigued and worried.
To-morrow he must take his farewell of his beloved Ada for an indefinite period; for, though he intended to hurry back from England as soon as possible, he knew that numberless events might occur to delay him. He had also ventured to speak to Colonel Gauntlett, for the first time, of his love for his niece; and the reception he had met with from the old gentleman was, as might be expected, most unsatisfactory.
The colonel and Ada were driving home together: she had not spoken, for she could not trust her voice.
“Niece,” said the colonel, stamping with his stick at the bottom of the carriage, as if to arouse her, “you were talking and dancing a great deal too much with that young naval man — that Captain Fleetwood — and after what I said to you at the commencement of the evening, I consider such conduct highly reprehensible.”
“I confess I spoke to him a great deal this evening,” answered the poor girl, in a tremulous voice. “I hoped that you would not blame me, as he said that he would speak to you and explain everything.”
“Well, young lady, he did speak to me, and a d — d impertinent thing he said, too. He had the folly — the outrageous, unconscionable folly — to ask me to allow you to marry him!” exclaimed the colonel in a husky voice, again almost driving his stick through the bottom of the carriage. “He had the folly; but I was not fool enough to accede to it — I refused him, young woman. And now, never let me hear his name mentioned again.”
With a sad heart Ada placed her head on her pillow, and, with a sadder still, she rose on the following morning to prepare for her voyage.
Chapter Six.
The crew of the Sicilian speronara were busily engaged the whole fore part of the day in discharging the small quantity of cargo, consisting chiefly of corn and other provisions, with which their vessel was laden.
When this was done she immediately cleared out at the custom-house, and without any of her crew having even visited the shore, she got up her anchor, and commenced making sail. The long tapering yard of her foresail was first hoisted, and its folds of white canvas let fall, and when her head paid round, her mainsail was next got on her, and sheeted home. Instead, however, of running out of the harbour, as it at first appeared she was about to do, after she had gone a little distance, just between Fort Saint Angelo and Fort Ricasoli, she hauled her foresail to windward, and hove to. The probable cause of this was soon explained, for a small boat was seen to dart out from beneath the fortifications of Valetta, and to take its way across the harbour towards her, carrying a person in the stern-sheets, wrapped up in a cloak, with a broad-brimmed hat shading his features. The hat may not have been worn for the purpose of disguise, for the rays of the sun, striking down full upon the water, were very ardent, and there was good reason for its being worn to protect him from their fury; but there was not quite so much for the use of the cloak, unless, following the Italian fashion, he carried that also over his shoulders for the same reason. The boat ran alongside the speronara, when the person, whoever he was, stepped out, and the foresail being let draw, the beautiful little craft stood out of the harbour. The boat on its return was found to belong to the boatman Manuel, who, being questioned as to the person he had conveyed on board the speronara, declared that he had not the slightest notion who he was — that he had never before seen his face, and that he could not tell whether he was an Englishman, an Italian, or a Frenchman, but that he thought the former. He said, all he knew was, that he had come down to the shore and engaged his boat, and as he had paid him well for the job, it was not his business to make further inquiries. The general opinion was, that he was some person making his escape from his creditors; but by the time the proper authorities were informed of the supposed fact, and the necessary measures taken to ascertain its truth, the delinquent was far beyond their reach.
The wind was about north-west — there was a nice fresh breeze, and supposing that the speronara was bound for Syracuse, she could, hauling as close to the wind as she was able to do, easily lay her course for that port. Either, however, she was carelessly steered, or she was bound to some port in Italy, for, after hauling round Saint Elmo, she fell off considerably from the wind, and finally, when she might have been supposed to have got beyond the range of observation of those on shore, who were not likely to take much notice of so insignificant a little craft, and of so ordinary a rig, she eased off both her sheets, and, with the wind on her larboard quarter, indeed, almost astern, ran out into the offing. By this course she crossed in a short time the mouth of the harbour; and though at a considerable distance, she was enabled to watch any vessel coming out.
Her movements, however, were not totally unobserved, for Captain Fleetwood, who had called at the house of Colonel Gauntlett, early in the morning, in the vain hope of seeing Ada, was returning in a disconsolate mood along the ramparts, and meditating in what way his duty should direct him to proceed, when his eye fell on the speronara, hove-to directly below him, Manuel’s boat just touching her side.
As he had, like most naval officers, a remarkably good glass in his pocket, he directed it towards the little vessel, and among the people on her deck he fancied that he distinguished the figure of the stranger who had paid so much attention to Ada on the previous evening. Now, as he understood that that gentleman was about to sail immediately for Greece, he was naturally surprised, indeed so unlikely did it appear, that he thought he must be mistaken. Although he was very far from being of a suspicious disposition, yet combining the manner in which the stranger had gone on board, and the doubtful character of the craft herself, he determined to watch her movements.
Another cause also combined to create very extraordinary suspicions in his mind respecting the character of the stranger, who had made his appearance so suddenly in Malta. On his way to Colonel Gauntlett’s residence, that morning, he had passed the office of the chief of the harbour police, and on looking in to speak a word with Captain S — , he found him engaged in examining three Greek merchants, who stated that the vessel in which they were making a passage from Athens to Sicily, had been plundered by a well-known pirate of the name of Zappa, and that he had appeared on board their vessel; that they had spoken to him, and that they felt almost confident that they had seen the same person, without any disguise, in a coffee-house in Valetta on the previous evening. They acknowledged, that though at first they had no doubt of his identity, yet that when he came up to them, and entered into conversation, they were staggered in their belief; but that after he had disappeared it again occurred to them with greater force than ever, that he must be the man they at first thought. When convinced of this they immediately set out in the hopes of falling in with him, and with the intention of handing him over to the police; but they were unsuccessful in their search, and when, after many inquiries, they learned before whom they should make their depositions, it was too late in the day to see any one. After sleeping on the subject, they were as strong in their opinion as on the previous night, and the first thing in the morning they had come, they said, to make their statement. Captain S — listened attentively. He told them that he thought they must be mistaken as to the identity of the person, as he could not believe that a pirate would have the audacity to venture into Valetta; particularly just after he had committed a daring act of piracy. The Greeks shrugged their shoulders, but asserted that from what they had heard of Zappa, they believed him capable of any act of hardihood.
“At all events,” observed Captain S — , “I will take your description of the gentleman. Figure tall, features regular, eyes large and animated, hair black, and slight curling moustache — not a bad-looking fellow for a cut-throat, at all events. I will order the police instantly to go in search of him, and if he can be found, of which I have no doubt, we will examine him, and confront him with you; and if he turns out to be Signor Zappa, he will, probably, before many days are over, be hanging up alongside Captain Delano and his shipmates.”
The Greeks were satisfied that they were right, and on their retiring, officers were instantly despatched in search of the supposed pirate. The result of their inquiries Captain Fleetwood had not yet learned; but the description given by the Greeks answered so exactly to that of the Prince Argiri Caramitzo, whom he had met at the ball the previous night, that he could not help being struck by it.
“I did not altogether like the style of the fellow,” he muttered to himself. “He is good-looking enough, certainly; but there was an impudent, sinister expression about his countenance which one does not observe in that of an honest man. I wonder, too, what right he has to the title of prince. There are some few chiefs in Greece, who call themselves princes, but they are very rare. Who they are can easily be ascertained, and I must learn if such a title exists. Let me see, he was introduced, too, by that fellow Dunnup. He is a mauvais sujet I suspect, and I should fight very shy of his friends at all events. What could have taken the gentleman on board that craft then! That puzzles me! I must see to it.”
Accordingly when the speronara let draw her foresail, and stood out of the harbour, he retraced his steps along the ramparts towards port Saint Elmo, to a position whence he could command a clear view to seaward.
“She is a pretty lively craft that,” he observed to himself, as he saw, with the pleased eye of a seaman, the rapid way in which the vessel glided over the crisp curling waves. “The fellows know how to handle her too; but what is she about now, I wonder? I thought, by the way she first steered, she was bound for Sicily, but there she goes running off to the south-east. I cannot be mistaken.” And he took a scrutinising glance at her with his telescope. “Yes, that is her, there can be no doubt about the matter.”
Now love makes most men sharp-witted in everything regarding the object of their affection, and Captain Fleetwood was certainly not a man to be less so than any other person.
The sudden change in the course of the speronara had given rise in his mind to sundry suspicions. They were not very serious, and probably, under other circumstances, he would not have entertained them; but he was out of spirits and fatigued, and he could not help connecting the movements of the speronara with the sailing of the Zodiac, on board which vessel Ada and her uncle were that evening to commence their voyage. He did not, however, suppose that a craft of her character would venture to attack an armed brig of the size of the Zodiac, unless she could take her by surprise, nor could she have any chance of success against so brave and good a seaman as Captain. Bowse, and so fine a crew as his; but at the same time he thought it would be more prudent to let him know what he had seen, and urge him to be on his guard against the speronara.
“I never heard of one of those fellows committing piracy — probably he is up to some smuggling trick — perhaps he expects to fall in with some vessel, and will take her goods out of her during the night, to run them on the Sicilian or Italian coast; perhaps to put that good-looking fellow of a Greek prince, if that is him, on board some craft or other bound eastward. However, I must speak to Bowse about it. I wish to heaven I might sail and convoy the brig; but the admiral would not give me leave if I was to ask him — he would only think it was an excuse to be near Miss Garden.”
These thoughts passed through his mind as he hurried down to the quay, where his boat was waiting for him, and jumping into her, he started for the Zodiac. He had made the acquaintance of the honest master, on finding that the colonel and his niece were going by his vessel, and he had been every day on board to assist in arranging Ada’s cabin, and to suggest many little alterations which might conduce to her comfort and convenience.
Captain Bowse was on board with every preparation made for sailing, and only awaited the arrival of his passengers. The master of the Zodiac heard the account given by the naval officer without any alarm, though at the same time he owned that there was some cause for suspicion; and he promised to keep a sharp look-out, and to take all the precaution in his power to prevent being surprised. When he heard that the Greek stranger had gone on board the speronara, he remembered the visit of a personage answering his description, on the previous evening, to his vessel, and he felt glad that he had not been induced to take him.
“The chances are, if the fellow be a rogue, that he saw that there would be no use trying to do anything with the Zodiac and he has gone to lay his plots against some other craft,” he observed. “That’s my view of the case, sir, and I don’t think that you need at all alarm yourself about the safety of your friends. But although we are safe ourselves, that is no reason that we should not think of others; and if I was you, sir, I would make inquiries about the strange gentleman, and give notice to the authorities of what you have observed. You can tell, sir, of his wanting to take a passage to Greece, on board here, and then shipping off suddenly in a Sicilian craft. There may be nothing in it; but there may be something; and to my mind it’s as well never to trust to a rope with a strand gone.”
Wishing a prosperous voyage to the master, and again cautioning him to be careful, Captain Fleetwood stepped into his gig, and had got some little distance, when he saw a large boat approaching, which he divined contained her he loved best on earth, with her uncle and his attendants. How could he resist the temptation of seeing and speaking to her once more? so, giving his boat a sweep, he pulled round to the other side of the Zodiac, from that on which the gangway ladder was shipped, and lay on his oars, trusting to the chance of seeing Ada on deck, while her uncle was below.
There were fewer packages than most families travel with, for the colonel was a martinet, and would allow none of his womankind, as he called them, to have more traps than was absolutely necessary; and thus no time was lost in getting the party and their goods on board. Besides the colonel and his niece, there was a little Maltese girl, as an attendant, and the colonel’s own man, Mitchell, who, like his master, was a character not unworthy of note. Bowse, who understood pretty well the state of affairs, soon contrived to get the colonel below, while he detained Ada on deck, and then pointing out Captain Fleetwood’s boat to her, beckoned him on board. He was much too judicious to show in any other way that he was aware of the feelings of the parties; but leaving them together, he rejoined the colonel in the cabin, determined to keep him there as long as he could, showing him the arrangements made for his convenience. Little did the old gentleman think, that when praising many of them, he was indebted for them to the man for whom he had conceived so hearty an aversion. What the lovers said need not be told. Those few moments were sweet but sad, and both felt that they would on no account have missed them. Ada again assured him that nothing should induce her to give him up, and he repeated his promise to hasten and claim her in spite of all opposition. The appearance of Bowse’s honest face up the companion-ladder was the signal for him to tear himself away from her, and he had just time to get over the side, when the colonel appeared on deck.
“What are you gazing at there, missie?” he asked, as he saw her, soon after, looking up the harbour. “Oh, ay, thinking of your partners at the ball, I suppose.” She did not answer; but as she turned her face with a reproachful look at her uncle, her eyes were full of tears.
As soon as Bowse came on deck, he gave the signal to weigh. The cable was already hove short, the topsails were loose. The men went about the work with alacrity, and in a style very different to that of merchant seamen in general. They were all prime hands, mostly old men-of-war’s men turned adrift, as ships were paid off, and had all before served with Bowse.
He carried on the duty, therefore, as far as circumstances would allow, in the fashion to which they had been accustomed, and to which they willingly submitted. The brig was consequently looked upon as as fine a vessel as any sailing out of the port of London. To the cheery sound of the pipe, they manned the capstan bars, and singing in chorus to a merry strain, away they ran swiftly round. A hand was sent to the helm, and the mate was on the forecastle.
“Heave and away,” he sung out, as the cable appearing up and down showed that the anchor was under the forefoot. As the wind blew out of the harbour, the jib and fore-topmast-staysail were now hoisted to cast her. With renewed exertions the crew hove round, and the shout they uttered gave the signal that they had dragged the anchor from the bottom. The bow of the vessel feeling the power of her head sails, now paid slowly off.
“Heave and in sight,” the mate next sung out, as the anchor appeared above water. Another turn ran it up to the bows. The foretopsail was next sheeted home and hoisted, and the head yards braced forward to help her round more quickly. In the meantime the anchor was catted and fished ready for sea, and as the wind came abaft the beam, the head yards were squared, and the fore-clew-garnets being let run, the ponderous folds of the foresail were allowed to fall towards the deck, just as the wind was brought right aft. Both sheets were then hauled aft, and the increasing breeze no longer finding escape beneath it, blew it out in a graceful swell which made it appear as if it were about to lift the vessel bodily out of the water to carry her gliding over the waves. The fore-topmast-staysail, no longer being of use, was hauled down, and her fore-topgallantsail and royal, with the after sail, were next set, followed by studden-sails on either side, till the brig presented the appearance of a tall tower of white canvas shining brightly in the rays of the sun, which was setting directly astern, and which threw on them, in confused lines of tracery-work, the shadows of the masts, their respective shrouds and running rigging.
Ada, who would not be persuaded by her uncle to go below, as he said, to get her out of harm’s way, looked on with deep interest at these proceedings, and with admiration at the method by which, in so short a time, so beautiful a fabric could be raised. Ada delighted in everything connected with the sea. She was a sailor’s daughter, and she loved a sailor; but even before she had known Captain Fleetwood she felt an affection for things nautical, and certainly he had done much to increase her regard. She enjoyed too the physical pleasures of the sea, the fresh free breeze, and the light dancing wave, which to her was a source of no inconvenience. While others suffered, she was on deck enjoying existence to the full. It is true that she had as yet only seen the ocean in its summer dress, and except from the experience of a short gale, which she looked upon rather as giving a zest to the pleasure of a voyage, she knew little of its wintry tempests, its dangers and horrors. Bowse observed the interest she took in all that was going forward, and, like a true sailor, felt as much gratified as if she was his own daughter, and under his especial protection. Jack, the cabin-boy, was coiling away a rope near him, and beckoning to him, he sent him down for a comfortable chair, which, on its appearance, he placed before her.
“There, miss,” he observed, “I think you will be able, more at your ease, to sit and look at the little island we are leaving behind us. It’s always a pleasure to take the last look at the place we are going from.”
Ada thanked him with a sweet smile for the chair which he had judiciously placed on the starboard side of the poop, and looking partly aft, so that she could command a full view of the harbour, where the Ione lay, and of the fortifications of Valetta. The Zodiac was now running out between forts Saint Elmo and Ricasoli; and as she cleared the former, she felt the wind drawing rather more to the northward. Her yards were, therefore, braced forward, and her mainsail hauled out; and now with the wind on her quarter, a point in which every sail a square-rigged vessel can carry draws best, with a fine rattling breeze she rapidly left the shores of Malta astern.
Chapter Seven.
Never did a vessel leave port under more propitious circumstances than did the Zodiac, with a fair, steady breeze, a smooth sea, and at a time of the year when there was every prospect of the continuance of fine weather.
As Bowse walked the deck with a spy-glass under his arm in man-of-war fashion, a smile of contentment lit up his honest countenance, and glistened in his eye; and as he felt the freshening breeze fanning his cheek, and lifting his vessel, as it were, he began to laugh at his momentary suspicions about the character of the speronara and her crew. Every now and then he would stop in his walk, and would look over the side to judge how fast the vessel was going through the water, or he would examine the compasses to assure himself that they were true, or he would cast his eye aloft to see how his sails drew, or his clear, full voice would be heard issuing some necessary order for the government of the ship.
Even Colonel Gauntlett could not help expressing his satisfaction at the propitious commencement of their voyage, as he stopped in his short and otherwise silent walk on the poop to address a few words to the master.
Ada sat silently in her chair, gazing on the fast-receding shore; and it is not surprising that her thoughts were fixed on him who was, she felt sure, even then watching, from its most extreme point, the bark which bore her away. Her little Maltese maid, Marianna, stood by her side with tears in her bright eyes, and gazing her last for an indefinite time on the land of her birth, and where all her affections were centred, except those which had lately arisen for her young mistress.
The colonel’s man, not knowing exactly where he ought to be, being too dignified, at first, to mix with the men forward, and astonished and confused at manoeuvres which he could not comprehend, as is generally the case with his class, always managed to get exactly where he was most in the way.
“Port a little, you may, my son,” said the master to the man at the helm; “steady, so, keep her. East-and-by-north is the course,” pronouncing the north with a strong emphasis on the O, and without the R — as if it were spelt Nothe. “Just get a gentle pull on our weather-braces, Mr Timmins,” to the mate. “The wind’s drawing a little more aft again. We’re making her walk along, sir,” to the colonel. “She’s not going less than six knots an hour, I’ll warrant, which, with this light wind, is not bad for a craft of her build — she’s no clipper, I own, sir. Heave the log here. I dare say you’ll like to be certain, miss,” turning to Ada, as he thought the operation would amuse her.
The second mate and two hands came aft with the log-line and reel. Bowse took a half-minute glass from the binnacle, and watching till all the sand had run into one end, held it up before him. The seamen, meantime, held the reel up before him, so as to allow it to turn easily in his hands, and the mate, taking the little triangular bit of wood, called the log-ship, adjusted the peg, and drew off, with a peculiar jerk of his left hand, several coils of the stray-line, which he held for a moment over the quarter of the vessel, till he saw that his chief was ready with the glass, and he then hove it over into the water. The first part of the line is called the stray-line, and its object is to allow the log-ship to settle properly in the water, as well as to take it clear of the eddy. As soon as this part had run out, a cloth mark ran through the mate’s fingers. “Turn,” he exclaimed. “Turn,” repeated the master, and turned the glass. The marks rapidly passed through the mate’s hand, as he jerked the line of the reel, always keeping it at a stretch.
“Stop,” sung out Bowse, as the sand had run out of the upper end of the glass.
“Done,” said the mate, and stopped the line.
He had not to count the knots run off, for his experienced eye was able to tell the number by the mark on the line. It must be understood that this line is divided into a certain number of equal parts, each of which bears the same proportion to a mile, which thirty seconds do to an hour, and therefore, as the log-ship remains stationary in the water, according to the number of these proportions dragged through, while the sand is running, so is shown how many miles or knots the vessel is going through the water.
“Six and a quarter,” exclaimed the mate. “That’s what I call good going for a ship with a full cargo, in a breeze like this.”
“That’s what we call heaving the log, Miss Garden,” said the master, who had been explaining the use of the log, though in not quite so succinct a way as I have attempted to do. “You’ll be able to turn the glass another time, I’m sure.”
The glass runs, in reality, only for twenty-eight seconds, as two are considered to be employed in turning it.
Ada, who enjoyed an advantage over the reader, by having the operation performed before her eyes, answered that she clearly understood it, and would always, in future, hold the glass.
“By this calculation, you see, miss, as it is just two hours since we passed Fort Saint Elmo, we have run exactly twelve knots and a half off the reel; though we didn’t go through the water so fast at first, as we are now doing. However, by the look of the land, I calculate we are not much less than that off it. You see we call miles — knots, miss, on account of the knots which are marked on the line. When we can just see the last of some conspicuous point, we shall take its bearing by compass and its distance, and then I shall commence pricking the ship’s course off on the chart, and that is what we call taking our departure. Now you see there’s many people on shore would fancy that when we left the port we took our departure; but the ties which bind a seaman to the shore, and to those we leave behind, are not so quickly parted as they may think, you see, miss.” And the honest master, chuckling at one of the first attempts at wit and gallantry of which he had ever been guilty, thought the next instant he blushed at his own audacity.
“It’s surprising, miss, what funny mistakes them who never leave the land make about seafaring concerns; but then, what can you expect of them? they know no better,” he added, in a tone showing the deep commiseration he felt for the ignorance of landsmen. “To say that they don’t know the stem from the stern, isn’t to say anything. They know nothing about a ship, how she’s built, how she sails, or what she’s like. The last voyage I made I had a passenger on board who was a cleverish sort of gentleman, too, and for talking politics he’d go on for an hour; yet he wanted to know why I couldn’t bring the ship to an anchor right out in the Bay of Biscay; and one night, when it was blowing a stiffish gale, with a heavy sea running, he roused me out of my sleep to ask me to send a better hand to the helm; one who knew how to keep the craft steady, or else to run into some harbour till the morning. He never could get it out of his head that he was not in the Thames. Now, miss, I see that you are not one of those sort of people, and that you will soon know all about a ship, though you may not just yet be able to act the captain. To-morrow I’ll show you how to shoot the sun, as we tell greenhorns we are doing, when we take an observation with the quadrant. It’s a very pretty instrument, and you will be pleased to know how to use it.”
“I shall like very much to learn all you can teach me, Captain Bowse,” answered Ada, making a great effort to rouse herself from the feeling of sadness which oppressed her. “I wonder how mariners managed to traverse, as they did, the most distant seas, before these instruments were invented.”
“They used to trust more to the sun and stars, and to their lead reckoning, than they do now, I suppose, miss,” answered the master. “Even now, there’s many a man in charge of a vessel who never takes more than a meridional observation, if even that; and having found his latitude, runs down the longitude by dead reckoning. Some even go about to many distant parts entirely by rule of guess, and it is extraordinary how often they hit their point. Now and then, to be sure, they find themselves two or three hundred miles out of their course, and sometimes they get the ship cast away. I have, too, met vessels out in the Atlantic which had entirely lost their reckoning, and had not the slightest notion where they were. Once, I remember, when I belonged to the Harkaway frigate, coming home from the Brazils, we sighted a Spanish man-of-war corvette. When we got up to her we hove to, and an officer came on board who could speak a little English; and you would scarcely believe it, but the first thing he did was to ask us for the latitude and longitude; and he confessed that the only instruments they had on board were out of repair, and, for what I know, the only man who knew how to use them was ill. Our captain then sent an officer on board the corvette, and a pretty condition she was in for a man-of-war. They had a governor of some place as a passenger, and his wife and family, and two or three other ladies and their families; and there they were all lying about the decks in a state of despair, thinking they were never to see land again. They had been a whole month tossing about in every direction, and not knowing how to find the way home. The decks were as dirty as if they had not been holystoned or swept all that time; not a sail was properly set, not a rope flemished down. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes, I could not have believed such a thing possible. Our appearance raised their spirits a little, and they began putting themselves to rights as soon as they had made sail on their course. They kept company with us till we got into the latitude of Cadiz, for their craft sailed very well, for all that they did not know how to handle her, and I believe that they managed to get into port in safety at last.”
“I am surprised at what you tell me,” observed Miss Garden, “I should have thought the Spaniards could not have so totally forgotten their ancient naval renown as to allow such dreadful ignorance to exist.”
“The men are active, intelligent fellows enough, and the officers in the merchant service are, from what I have seen, very good seamen; but since the war, their navy has been much neglected, and men were made officers who did not know the stem from the stern of the ship, just because they happened to be some poor dependent of one of their nobles, or the son of a valet out of place. Things are mending a little now with them, I hear.”
“I wonder any but such beggarly fellows as you speak of can be induced to go into the navy at all,” said the colonel, who had been listening to the master’s story, and was far from pleased at the interest Ada took in what he said. “For my part, I would as soon be a shoe-black; but you seem determined to give my niece a dose of the sea.”
“Oh, yes, sir!” answered Bowse, perfectly indifferent to the colonel’s ill-temper; “I hope we shall make the young lady a first-rate sailor before long.”
“I hope you will do no such thing, Mr Bowse; she thinks a great deal too much about it already,” returned the colonel, taking another turn aft.
“Indeed I do not, uncle,” replied Ada, as he came back, in a half-playful tone, calculated to disarm his anger. “You must acknowledge that the scene before us is very beautiful and enjoyable. Look at that blue and joyous sea, how the waves leap and curl as if in sport, their crests just fringed with sparkling bubbles of snow-white foam, which, in the freshness of their new-born existence, seem inclined to take wing into the air — then, what can be more bright and clear than the expanse of sky above us, or more pure than the breeze which wafts us along. Look, too, at the blue, misty hills of our dear Malta, just rising from the water. What mere mole-hills those wild rocks now seem. And then that glorious mass of glowing fire which spreads far and wide round the sun as he sinks into that clear outline of sea; and distant though it seems, sends its reflection across the waves even up to the very ship itself. Ah! if one could but secure that orange tinge, one might gaze at it unwearied all day long. See, also, the dark, fantastically-shaped spots on the ocean as the sails of the distant vessels appear between us and the sun, like evil spirits gliding about the ocean to cause shipwrecks and disaster; while again, on the opposite quarter, the canvas appears of snowy whiteness, just catching the last rays of the light-giving orb of day, and we would fain believe them benign beings hovering over the ocean, to protect us poor mortals from the malign influences of their antagonists; while our proud ship glides majestically along in solitary grandeur, casting indignantly aside the waves which it seems to rule, like some mighty monarch galloping over the broad domains which own him as their lord. Come, uncle, can you deny the correctness of my description? And I am sure Captain Bowse will agree with me.”
She laughed playfully at her attempts at a description of the scene surrounding them, and which she had purposely made as long as she could find words to go on with, well-knowing the effect which her own sweet voice exercised in calming the habitual irritation of her uncle.
“A pretty bit of jargon you have managed to string together,” said the colonel, looking more amiable than he had before done, “and that is what I suppose you call a poetical description, missie. Well, as it does not convey a bad idea of what we have before our eyes, it must pass for something of the sort, I suppose. What do you say, Mister Bowse?”
Now, although Bowse had not entirely comprehended all that Ada had said, he felt that he was called on to give an answer, and accordingly looked round the horizon, as if to satisfy himself that her description was correct. He had taken a survey of the whole expanse of the sea to the westward, and his eye had gradually swept round to the east, when, instead of turning round to answer, he kept it fixed on a distant spot just seen over the weather or larboard bow. Shifting his position a little, he placed his telescope to his eye, and took a steady gaze.
“That’s her, I can’t help thinking,” he muttered. “But what she wants out there, I can’t say.”
To the surprise of Ada, he walked forward, and called his mate to his side.
“Here, Mr Timmins, just tell me what you think of that chap out there, over the weather cat-head,” he said, giving his officer the glass.
The mate took the instrument, and looked as he was directed.
“She’s a lateen-rigged craft standing on a wind athwart our course, sir,” answered the mate instantly, as if there was no difficulty in ascertaining thus much.
“That one may see with half an eye, Mr Timmins; but do you see nothing unusual about her?”
“I can’t say that I see any difference between her and the craft, which one is always meeting with in these seas,” answered the mate. “Her canvas stands well, and looks very white as we see her beam almost on to us. She seems one of those vessels with a name I never could manage to speak, which trade along the coast of Sicily and Italy, and come over to Malta.”
“By the way she is standing, she will pass at no great distance to leeward of us, and if she was to haul up a little, she would just about reach us,” observed the master in a tone of interrogation.
“Just about it, sir,” replied the mate.
“Well, then, Mr Timmins, keep your eye on her, and when we get near her, if there is still light enough left to make her out, tell me if you have ever seen her before.”
The mate, somewhat surprised at the directions his chief had given him, prepared, however, to obey them, and while he superintended the people on deck, he constantly kept his telescope fixed on the stranger. A quarter of an hour or twenty minutes might have passed, when, after taking a longer scrutiny than before, he suddenly turned round, and walked to where his commander was standing.
“I know her, sir,” he exclaimed. “She is no other than the craft which nearly ran foul of us yesterday, and which went out of harbour this morning. She had two outlandish-looking chaps as passengers; and one of them came on board in the evening to talk about taking a passage to Greece. I remember him well, sir, though I did not say anything to you.”
“You are right, Mr Timmins, it’s her, there’s no doubt,” said Bowse. “We’ll give her a wide berth, for there seems to be something suspicious about her,” and he mentioned what Captain Fleetwood had said to him. “I don’t think the chap would dare to attack us; but, with females on board, it’s as well to be cautious. We’ll haul up a little by degrees, not to make it remarkable, so as to pass to windward of him, and have the guns loaded and run out, just as a matter of course, in the Mediterranean, tell the people. I don’t want to have any talking about it, you know; for it will all be moonshine, I suspect. Look you, too, have the small arms and cutlasses up on deck, just to overhaul them, as it were. The studden-sails must come in, at all events; it won’t do to be carrying on at night as if we had fifty hands in a watch instead of five. Now let the people knock off work.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the mate, and, without the slightest appearance of hurry, he set to work to obey his commander’s orders.
The crew, who had been employed beyond the usual hour in getting the ship to right, finished stowing away everything that was loose, and got the hatches on over the cargo. One after another the studden-sails, which had been extended beyond the yard-arms came flying down like huge white birds from their lofty perches, the moment the halyards and sheets were let go, and, as they bulged out, they looked as if they were about to sail off before the wind ahead of the vessel. As all hands were wanted for the work, Bowse clapped on himself, petting a rope into even Mitchell’s hands, and in a short time the Zodiac, stripped of her wings, was brought under more easy-working canvas. The lee-braces were then flattened in a little, and the helm being put a few strokes to starboard, she headed up towards the north. While the mate was following the other directions he had given, Bowse again brought his glass to bear on the speronara, and, while so doing, his eye was attracted to a sail which appeared in the horizon, and which he at once knew to be a square-rigged vessel. From its height, too, above the water, and its faint outline, he judged her to be a ship or a brig of some size. He had, indeed, remarked her some time before, and it now occurred to him that she had not altered her position since first seen. It would therefore appear that she was standing the same course as the Zodiac; but as they neared her rapidly, such could scarcely be the case, and he, now seeing that her head was turned towards them, could only come to the conclusion that she was hove to. He calculated, also, that the speronara, supposing that she had, for some time, steered the same course she was now on, must have passed close to her.
The idea came into the master’s head more as a matter of speculation than because any further suspicions occurred to him, for the probability of those he still entertained being correct, he thought so very slight, that he was almost vexed with himself for acting on them; and had it not been for his promise to Captain Fleetwood, he most likely would have done so. That the speronara, now to leeward of him, was the self-same craft he had seen in Malta harbour, he could, however, no longer entertain a doubt. He had noted her long, low hull, with overhanging stern and high bow, the great length of her tapering yards, and the way her immense lateen sails stood; there was also a peculiar dark mark on the cloth next to the outer leech of her foresail, near the head of the yard, which was unmistakable, and when he could clearly see that her identity would be proved. As he now brought his glass again to bear on the speronara, he saw that as the Zodiac was brought on a wind, she was immediately hauled close on it, so that, notwithstanding the change he had made in his course, she might still pass, if she liked, even to windward of him, unless she also chose to hug the wind as he had done. On seeing this, the spirit of the British sailor was roused within him.
“Oh, hang it,” he muttered. “I’m not going to be altering my course for fear of a rascally Italian piccaroon, if such that fellow should be. If he chooses to come near us, he must take the consequences. We’ll show him that we’ve got some bulldogs on board who can bark pretty well if they like. But I forgot the young lady, and the little Smaitch girl with her. It won’t do to let them run any risk of being hurt, should the villains begin by firing into us before they speak, as is the fashion of the cowards. I must manage to get them down below without frightening them.”
Having arrived at the conclusion of these cogitations, Bowse approached to where the colonel and his niece were sitting; the young lady employed in gazing on the sea, while he was looking with somewhat an inquiring eye at the preparations carrying on under the mate’s superintendence on deck.
“Don’t you think the young lady had better go below, out of the way of the damp, sir,” began Bowse, puzzled what excuse to make.
“Damp! surely there’s none to hurt me,” said Ada, looking up somewhat surprised. “It is so refreshing.”
“No, miss, the cold — the night air may do you harm,” rejoined Bowse.
“I have no fear of either,” answered Ada. “It’s quite warm, and I do not even require a cloak.”
The master was sadly perplexed, and the colonel would not come to his aid; at last he bethought him of a better reason, which must succeed.
“Yes, miss; but you see it’s coming on night, and it’s a rule that all ladies should go below at night,” he said, in a grave tone.
This made Ada fairly laugh outright.
“Oh! but I intend to break through the rule, I can assure you. The evening, when the moon is playing on the water, is the most delightful time of the twenty-four hours; and you will not persuade me to forego its pleasures.”
The colonel at length came to his rescue.
“What is it makes you so anxious for my niece to go below, Mr Bowse?” he asked. “If you have any particular reason, pray mention it, and I am sure she will be most ready to obey your wishes.”
“Why, sir,” said Bowse, drawing the colonel, who had risen, a little forward, and whispering so as not, he thought, to be heard by Ada; “you see, sir, I don’t quite like the look of that craft we are nearing — some murderous work has been done lately in these seas; and I was told, just before we sailed, to be cautious of her — that’s all.”
“It was for that reason you were loading your guns, and getting up your arms?” exclaimed the colonel, in a less cautious voice than that in which the kind master had spoken. “Very right and proper. I’m glad to see precautions taken. We’ll fight the rascals with pleasure.”
Ada overheard the words, and coming up, placed her arm on her uncle’s.
“What is the matter? — Is there any danger?” she exclaimed, in a pleading tone. “If there is — oh! let me share it with you. Do not send me down into the cabin.” She trembled, but it was more with excitement than fear.
“Oh! nonsense, girl — suppose there was any danger, what object could there be in your staying on deck?” answered the colonel. “You couldn’t save me from being hurt, missie, and I don’t think you would manage to hurt any of the enemy, if there should prove to be one in the case, after all, which is in no way certain yet.”
While the colonel was speaking, Bowse again looked at the speronara. He now, to a certainty, ascertained that she had the dark mark in her foresail, and that she was full of men. This at once decided him in urging Miss Garden to go below, and on her still resisting, the colonel gave indubitable signs of anger.
“Come, come, missie, no more nonsense. Go below you must, without further delay, and take your little nigger with you.”
Ada pleaded for a few minutes more to see what was likely to happen, but in vain, and was reluctantly compelled, in company with her maid, to go into her cabin, there to await the result of the meeting between the two vessels. Ada did as every right-minded girl, under the circumstances, would do — she knelt in prayer — not through abject fear for her own safety, did she pray, for of herself she thought not; but she prayed that her uncle, and the brave men with him on deck, might be shielded from danger — a danger which it was very natural that from what she had heard she should considerably exaggerate.
Chapter Eight.
If, as is asserted, the pleasures of life consist rather in the anticipation than in the fruition, or perhaps we may say, in the means taken to enjoy them, rather than in the objects when obtained; so, most assuredly, is the anticipation of evil worse than the evil itself; and misfortunes, which appear great and terrible when looked at timidly from a distance, diminish, if they do not altogether disappear, when grappled with manfully.
In fact, as somebody or other observed, once upon a time, that whenever he wrote a philosophical, a beautiful, or a noble sentiment, that fellow, Shakspeare, was sure to have been before him; I might more briefly express what I wanted to say, by quoting our great poet, —
“Cowards die many times before their death.”
Now, as neither Bowse, nor his officers or men, were characters of that description, but, on the contrary, as brave fellows as ever looked danger in the face without flinching, they, on their own accounts, cared very little whether the craft in sight was a pirate or an honest trader. But it was now very evident that the speronara had an object in steering, as she was clearly doing, for the brig, and as that object could scarcely be otherwise than hostile, there was a possibility of their being attacked; and with one of those unpremeditated cheers which British seamen cannot refrain from giving at the thoughts of a skirmish, every man hastened to buckle a cutlass to his side. Powder and shot were got up, and the small arms and boarding-pikes were placed by the sides of the guns, ready at hand, to be seized in a moment. The spirit of the veteran soldier was instantly aroused in the bosom of Colonel Gauntlett. As he sniffed the air of battle, the querulous, ill-tempered old gentleman was changed into the cool and gallant officer. As soon as Mitchell understood what was likely to happen, he was seen to dive into the cabin, from whence he soon returned, when going up to his master, he stood before him anticipating his orders.
“Mitchell, my sword and pistols, and bring me some ammunition, too, mark me.”
The servant’s hand rose to his cap, and turning round, he again descended to the cabin, reappearing in less than half a minute with the weapons. The colonel buckled on his sword with far greater satisfaction than a dandy tries on a new coat, and after carefully loading and priming his pistols, which were of exquisite workmanship, he placed them, with a look of satisfaction, in his belt. Not a word, however, did he say while thus employed. The first observation was to his servant.
“Mitchell,” he said, “if that rascally felucca attempts to board us, you are to act as my reserve, remember. We shall have to charge on to her deck, or her people will charge on to ours, and you are to keep close behind me, and support me if I require you.”
“Yes, your honour,” answered Mitchell, in imitation of his master fastening a cutlass round his waist. “Is it them chaps in the night-caps on board the little boat out there we’ve to fight?”
“It is, Mitchell, the people in that felucca now approaching us,” said the colonel.
“Och, then, by the powers, we’ll blow them to blazes with these little darlins alone;” and thereon he pulled forth from his coat-tail pockets a pair of huge horse-pistols, of antique date and prodigious bore, which would almost require a rest from which to fire them.
The sun had set, and the short twilight of that southern latitude was fast disappearing, yet sufficient remained to show the outline of the speronara as the two vessels drew near to each other, though more distant objects had long since been shrouded from sight. Her tapering lateen sails now, as seen in one, appeared like the summit of a lofty pyramid of dark hue, surrounded by the waves. Then, as they approached still nearer, and she was almost abeam, the crew were seen standing up, and watching them with eagerness. Instead, however, of attempting to pass ahead of the brig, as she came near, she kept away so as pass close under her quarter. Now came the anxious time. If she was about to board, she would be alongside in another instant. Bowse, however, felt that whatever might be his suspicions of her honesty, without some more presumptive evidence of evil intentions, it would not do for him to commence hostilities; he therefore, taking his speaking-trumpet in his hand, went aft, and leaned ever the quarter-rail.
The speronara came rapidly on, and was close to.
“I have one message for you,” exclaimed a voice from the deck of the stranger, in Italian accents — “send boat here.”
“I’ll see you d — d first,” exclaimed Bowse. “I’ve no boat to send — send yours,” he shouted through his speaking-trumpet.
“Heave to, there — I send boat,” was shouted in return from the speronara; and she was immediately seen to hug the wind, her helm was put down, and about she came on the other tack, the same on which the Zodiac was sailing, placing herself thus on their weather quarter.
“Keep her away,” shouted Bowse to the man at the helm, thinking that the speronara was about to board him; but immediately he saw he was mistaken, for instead of her fore-sheet being eased off, it was kept to windward, and as she lay hove to he observed preparations to launch a boat into the water. “I suppose, sir, we may let these fellows come on board?” he said, addressing the colonel, who was by his side; “they can do us no harm, and they may possibly have a message.”
“As you think fit, Captain Bowse,” returned the colonel, who was so pleased with the master’s coolness and bearing, that he no longer refused to give him the usual title, — “I’ve no objection. They can’t eat us; and if they meditate running alongside, they will see we are prepared for them.”
“Put the helm down, my lad, round in the weather after-braces, and lay the main-yard square — brace up the head yards — rouse in the main sheet — ease off the head sheets.”
These orders being executed, and the brig brought to the wind, she was hove to, with her head in the same direction as that of the speronara. That vessel could just be seen to windward, looking dark against the western sky, and far larger than she really was, slowly forging ahead, while a small boat could just be discerned traversing the intervening space.
“Well, as we are to have no fighting, I suppose, I will just go and relieve the anxiety of my little girl,” said the colonel, whose good humour was now in the ascendant.
No sooner did his niece see him than she flew into his arms, and kissed his cheek affectionately — an example Marianna, in the exuberance of her joy at finding there was to be no fighting, was nearly imitating.
“Oh, dear uncle, I am so glad that there is no danger to be encountered. You cannot tell how anxious I have been.”
“Well, missie, since you don’t like the cabin you shall come on deck and see what next takes place; we are going to have some visitors, it appears.” Saying this, he gallantly placed a shawl on her shoulders, and gave his hand to lead her on deck.
While the boat of the speronara was approaching, three or four of the Zodiac’s crew were collected by the foremost gun, watching her progress with no little interest. Two of them were regular salts of the old school, who still delighted in ear-rings and pigtails, though, in compliment to the degenerate taste of the times, they wore the latter ornaments much smaller than they had done in their younger days. They were prime seamen, and fellows who were ready to go down with their colours flying rather than strike to an enemy.
“You have heard tell on the Flying Dutchman, of course, Bill,” said Jem Marline, casting a look to windward at the speronara, and hitching up his trousers, while he squirted a stream of tobacco-juice through the port.
“On course,” answered Bill Rullock, “I haven’t been to sea near thirty years without, messmate.”
“Did you ever cast eyes on the chap, though?” asked Jem.
“Can’t say as how I have,” answered Bill. “But there’s many they say who has, and few who ever lived to tell of it. But what was you thinking on, Jem?”
“Why you see, Bill,” replied his chum, “I don’t altogether like the circumbendibus ways of that ere chap to windward. You see, first in Malta harbour, we falls in with him or one like him, for I don’t say, mind you, that that ere craft is the same which nearly ran foul on us yesterday; then out he goes right ahead of us, and then just as it’s got dark, down he comes again, and wants to send a boat aboard us. Now you see as how that’s the thing I don’t in no manner of ways approve on. If I was our skipper, I would send a round shot right into the boat, sooner than any of his people should step on this deck. That’s just the trick the cursed Dutchman’s up to.”
“No manner o’ doubt about it,” said Bill gravely; “but you know, Jem, they say the Dutchman’s cruising ground is off the Cape, in a full-rigged ship, and I never heard on his coming into these parts.”
“True as gospel, old shipmate, but how should we know that he hasn’t got tired of the Cape, and taken a trip up here?” argued Jem. “And as to the matter of the rig, he may shift his craft according to the sea he’s in. Besides, you know as how if there’s one Flying Dutchman, there may be two, and this fellow may have come to trouble us here, up the straits. Depend on’t, Bill, the less company one keeps with them sort of gentry the better.”
“Very true, Jem, but suppose a chap out of that boat then does come on board, what’s to happen think ye?” asked Bill, in a tone which showed that he in no way doubted his messmate’s account.
“Why I can’t say exactly, because as how I never seed what he does; but from what I’ve heard, I believe he tries to slip a letter like into the skipper’s or some ’un’s hand who’s green enough to take it; and then the chap, who’s no better nor Davy Jones himself, gives a loud laugh, and down goes the ship to the bottom, or else a hurricane is sure to get up and drive her ashore. But here comes that cursed felucca’s boat. I wish we might just let fly at her; it would save mischief, I’ll be sworn.”
“Bear a hand there with a rope for the boat coming alongside,” sung out the captain in a loud voice, which sounded as ominous of evil to the ears of the superstitious crew. “Bring a lantern here to the gangway,” he added. Bowse, with his first mate and Colonel Gauntlett, stood near the gangway, which was lighted up with a lantern to receive the strangers, as a small boat containing in all only four persons, came round under the brig’s stern. They pulled only two oars, and two people were seated in the stern sheet. “Keep an eye to windward there, Larkins, on that felucca,” said the first mate to the second, as he went to his captain’s summons. “I don’t altogether think her cut honest.”
“A mighty fuss about a very small affair, I suspect,” muttered the colonel, as a figure was seen to ascend from the boat up the side of the brig.
The stranger was dressed in the Phrygian cap, and simple garb of a Sicilian mariner. His appearance, as far as it could be judged of by the dim light of the lantern, was anything but prepossessing. A profusion of long, straggling, grizzly locks, once probably of raven hue, which evidently had not felt the barber’s scissors for many a year, concealed the greater part of his face which was still further hidden by a patch over one eye, and a handkerchief bound round his head, while his mouth was surrounded by an enormous pair of moustachios, and a beard of similar character, so that little more than the tip of a red nose, and a rolling fierce eye was visible. As he reached the deck, this handsome personage bowed to the group before him, without speaking, while he glanced his eye round at the crew, who still wore their cutlasses, and at the other weapons which were placed ready for use.
Behind the group I have described, stood several of the crew, among whom were Jem Marline, and his chum Bill Bullock, and if the stranger had been able to read the expression of their countenances, he would certainly have been a bold man, had he not felt some apprehension; for they spoke almost as plainly as words could do, that had they the power, they would, without ceremony, heave him into the sea. There were fear, suspicion, and dislike, strangely blended with the usual bold recklessness which had given a character to their features a sudden emotion could not obliterate. Fortunately, however, the light of the lantern fell in such a way as to throw them, where they stood, into shade.
“What is it you want with us, signor?” said Bowse, in his usual blunt tone, seeing that the other did not speak.
“To carry us all to Davy Jones, if we don’t look sharp,” muttered Jem Marline to his messmate. “The beggar will be handing a letter directly, and then stand by for squall.”
The stranger shook his head, as if not comprehending what was said.
“That’s it,” whispered Jem, in a tone of terror. “He don’t speak. He never does.”
Bowse repeated the question, in the lingua Franca of those seas.
The stranger shook his head.
“He does not understand our lingo,” observed Bowse. “Here, Timmins, you speak a little Italian — just ask this gentleman what he wants aboard here.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said the mate coming forward, and asking the question in execrable Italian.
Again the stranger shook his head, as if not comprehending the question, and finding that not much progress was likely to be made at this rate, he turned round, and leaning through the gangway, beckoned his companion to come on deck. As he drew back, another person appeared, dressed precisely in the same manner; but evidently very much younger. A long moustache shaded his mouth, and wild elf-locks concealed the greater portion of his face, and from a patch down one side of his cheek, he looked as if, like his elder companion, he had been engaged in some severe fighting. The light of the lantern, as he reached the deck, seemed particularly to annoy him, and he stood with his eyes cast on the deck, shading them with one of his hands, nor could he meet the glance of any of those surrounding him.
“What do you wish to explain?” said the second stranger in Italian, bowing with a not ungraceful bend, and a touch of his hand to his cap.
“Oh! you can speak, can you? Well, that’s all right,” said Timmins. “And now, if you please, tell us why it is the felucca there was so anxious to speak to us?”
“Si, signor,” answered the younger stranger, very slowly; and in an Italian which was mostly understood, he then explained that the speronara, of which his father was master, had, that afternoon, fallen in with an Austrian man-of-war brig, which had brought her to, and sent a boat on board her. The officers, he said, informed them that the noted Greek pirate Zappa, in his famous brig the Sea Hawk, had lately been heard of not far from the mouth of the Adriatic, and that he had plundered and destroyed several vessels. The Austrian, he said, had given him despatches for the governor of Malta, relative to the subject, as also to the Neapolitan Government, with a reward for carrying them, and had charged them to inform all vessels they should fall in with of what had occurred.
“Then he did not tell you to speak us in particular,” said Timmins.
“Si, signor, he expressly — oh! no — not you in particular — oh, no,” replied the young man.
“Have you nothing further to tell us?” said Timmins. “Because you see, though we are much obliged to you for your information, we are in a hurry to be on our course again, and if you should happen to fall in with the Signor Zappa and his brig the Sea Hawk, just tell him that the Zodiac will give him a warm reception if he attempts to play off any of his tricks upon her.”
“You don’t know the pirate,” exclaimed the young man vehemently, “he — ”
“Do you know him?” said Timmins, fixing his eye upon him. The man’s glance quailed before that of the stout sailor.
“Oh no, signor, I don’t know him — I have heard of him though.”
“Oh! is that it?” said the mate, interpreting what he heard to the captain.
“Well, just ask him and his father if they will come down below, and take a glass of something before they shove off,” said Bowse.
A few words were exchanged between the two strangers in a low tone, and there appeared to be some hesitation on the part of the elder; but, at last, they consented, and followed the master into an outer cabin, which he had retained as his own, and where he and his mate messed. A door from it opened into the cabins engaged by the colonel, who, when he saw the strangers, retired also with his niece into their cabin.
As the door between the two stood open, all that took place in one could be heard in the other.
“Let the Italians come in here, Mr Bowse,” said the colonel, from the inner cabin. “I will give them a glass of sherry which they will like better than rum and water, and it will do them more good than their own thin wash.”
When the strangers, who, directed by the signs made by the master, found themselves in the presence of a lady, they stood somewhat abashed, it seemed, and bowed respectfully as they quaffed off the wine offered to them. The bright light which was shed from a lamp hanging from the deck seemed also much to annoy their eyes, long accustomed to darkness, and they kept their faces shaded by their hands during the short time they were in the cabin, so that little or nothing of their feature? could be seen.
For an instant, however, the eyes of the youngest fell on Ada, and, at that moment, there gleamed in them a peculiar expression, which she could not help remarking; but what it meant to say, she was at a loss to comprehend. It was certainly a look of intelligence, as if he expected to be understood; but there was also blended with it an expression of admiration, pity, and regret, which further puzzled her. At all events, she was convinced that, by that look, he intended to convey some meaning, which he dared not otherwise explain.
The strangers remained scarcely a minute below, and respectfully wishing the occupants of the cabin a good evening, they took their leave. The elder went first, and as the second followed, he appeared to stumble at the door. As he did so, he let a folded paper fall from his hand, and, at the same instant, he gave a hurried glance at Ada over his shoulder. Before she had time to tell him of his loss, he had sprung up the companion-ladder. The strangers were quickly in their boat, which, with rapid strokes, pulled back towards the speronara.
“Up with the helm, my lad,” exclaimed the captain, in a hurried tone, to the man at the wheel, as soon as the boat left the side, “haul aft the head sheets — ease off the main sheet; Mr Timmins, we’ll keep her on her right course.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” answered the mate — shouting as the brig’s head fell off, “square away the head yards, my men; come, be sharp about it.”
“And what do you think, Timmins, of those fellows’ account of the Austrian brig and the pirate? It seems somewhat strange, doesn’t it?” said Bowse, as he walked the deck with his first officer as soon as they had put the ship on her former course. The speronara still lay hove to right astern, her outline every instant becoming more indistinct as the brig ran from her.
“Why, sir,” replied the mate, in return to his commander’s question. “I don’t think any good of it, and that’s a fact; but if you ask if I believe it, I don’t do that neither. These Italians are much given to lying at best, as far as my experience goes; and I believe we have just heard a pretty round lie, though I don’t say there was no truth altogether in it. To my mind, if there is such a chap as that Zap — what do they call him, the pirate — it is much more likely that he is on board that felucca, or perhaps he was one of the fellows who came on board us, than that an Austrian man-of-war brig should have sent her cruising about to give notice of him to English merchantmen.”
“Well, Timmins, that’s my view of the case,” replied Bowse; “I think the Austrian brig would have stood on to Malta herself, seeing she must have been almost in sight of it, instead of sending a craft of that sort with a message. Besides, what business had the speronara there at all?”
“There’s something very suspicious about it, at all events,” returned the mate. “Now, though I don’t often listen to what the men say, Captain Bowse, and they generally get hold of the wrong end of a thing, yet they have often an inkling of what’s right and wrong. Well, sir, they’ve already got all sorts of stories aboard here, about the Flying Dutchman and such-like stuff, and they don’t at all like the look of things. When you were below with the strangers, they talked of throwing them crop and heels overboard and letting them swim to their boats, and I believe if you hadn’t come up with them on deck yourself, they would not have let me prevent them.”
“I believe the people are right, Timmins, in thinking that the two fellows who stood on our deck lately are knaves, but it wouldn’t have done to heave them overboard,” said the master. “However, they are not likely to do us any harm if we keep a bright look-out, and should any rascally pirate attack us, I’m sure all on board here will stand to their guns like men.”
Chapter Nine.
One of the most valuable qualities which a person can possess, is presence of mind. Our safety and our life, and the safety and the lives of others, frequently depend on it. Some people are endued with it naturally — they never act without thought, and they in a moment perceive what is best to be said or done. Others act from impulse, without consideration, and though they may now and then do what is right by chance, they are more likely to do what is wrong; like the Irish seaman, who, when ordered to cut a rope to which he was hanging, cut above his head instead of below his feet, and came down by the run. I believe that it is very possible to attain a presence of mind which one does not naturally possess, by constant practice and attention, though I suspect the task would be found very difficult.
When Ada saw the paper drop from the hand of the young Italian mariner, her first impulse was to call out to him in order to restore it, but the look he gave as he left the cabin, convinced her that he had done so purposely, and feeling that if so, it was certainly of importance, as she did possess the quality of which I was speaking, she sprang forward to secure it. The paper she saw, as she returned to her seat, was the blank leaf of a book, torn hastily out, and folded up in the form of a note; but on opening it there appeared to be nothing written on it.
“Why, what is that you have got there, Ada?” said Colonel Gauntlett.
“Oh, I fancied that I had discovered an important document, and, lo and behold, it turns out to be merely a blank paper,” returned the young lady laughing. “One cannot help conjuring up some romantic incident in these lovely seas, and forgetting that in these matter-of-fact days nothing of the sort is likely to occur; but I believe after all there are some pencil marks on the paper.” She held it up closer to the light, and as she did so, her countenance grew graver. There were a few lines written in pencil, but so faint that it was not surprising she should, at first, not have remarked them. They were in Italian, and in the peculiar handwriting of the people of that nation.
“Trust not to appearances,” they said. “Avoid the polacca brig. The story told you is false.” At the bottom were the words, “An unwilling actor,” as if intended for a signature. There was nothing more to show by whom they were written, though there could be but little doubt that they were so by the young mariner, or by somebody who had employed him. Ada translated them to her uncle, who was at a loss to comprehend their meaning, further than that they contradicted the story they had just heard from the lips of the very man who dropped the paper. He thought over them for some time, and then summoned Mitchell, whom he directed to request the captain’s presence.
Ada was again called to translate them, when the captain appeared.
“And what do you think of them?” the colonel asked him.
“Why, sir, that they serve to confirm my suspicions, and those of my mate, that the felucca is not honest, and that there is a good deal of mystification going on somewhere or other.”
“Then you don’t believe the story of the Austrian brig having sent the felucca to us?” asked the colonel.
“Not a bit of it, sir; and my firm opinion is, that if the rascals had found us unprepared, she would have been alongside us before now. She had more people on board her than when she left Malta harbour this morning, though where they came from I can’t say; and I’m positive as to the craft, though the young man denied having been there for many a day. I can’t make it out.”
“But what does this paper mean about the polacca brig, think you?” asked the colonel.
Bowse thought for some time.
“I have it, sir!” he at length exclaimed, clapping his hand to his head. “That’s the brig those fellows wanted to make us suppose an Austrian man-of-war. If they had taken less trouble we might have been taken in.”
“And what do you intend to do, Captain Bowse? Remember I am under your orders, in the way of fighting on board here. If you ever come on shore when there’s anything doing, I will show you how we manage things there.”
The colonel spoke in a good-natured lively tone, as he always did the moment there appeared a prospect of fighting.
“Keep our guns loaded, and trust to Providence, sir,” replied the captain.
“Please, sir, Mr Timmins begs you will just step on deck for a moment,” said the steward, putting his head in at the door, and looking at the master.
Bowse jumped up and hurried on deck, for he knew the mate would not have sent for him except on a matter of importance.
“Here, Sims, what’s the matter now?” said the colonel, calling the steward from the pantry; “any more visitors?”
“O Lord, no, sir, I hope not,” answered Sims, coming forward and showing by the pallor of his countenance, and his trembling hand, that whatever the matter was it had alarmed him.
“What is the matter, then?” exclaimed the colonel. “Out with it.”
“Why, sir, they say on deck, that the Flying Dutchman is following us, and that we shall be sure to drive ashore or go to the bottom,” answered the steward, almost crying with alarm.
“Fiddle-de-dee, with the Flying Dutchman. What arrant fools the men must be to think of such nonsense,” exclaimed the colonel, in a contemptuous tone. “Come, Ada, let us go on deck before you return to your cabin, and we will have a look at the phantom.”
Bowse found his mate standing on the poop, looking intently over the weather quarter. He was so absorbed in what he saw, that he was not aware of his commander’s presence till the latter touched his arm.
“I thought it was better to send for you, Captain Bowse, for as I’m a living man there is that cursed felucca, instead of going to Malta, following at our heels, and coming up with us hand over hand.”
As the mate spoke, he pointed in the direction towards which he had been looking. Bowse, having just left the bright light of the cabin, could not at first discern anything; but gradually he perceived the dark shadowy outline of the speronara’s sails brought into one, and like a phantom gliding over the waves. There could be no manner of doubt that it was she, but the question in his mind was how to treat her. Though he might be almost certain that her intentions were evil, he could not fire into her, till there was no doubt of the matter, and she might be alongside, when the advantage he possessed in having heavy guns, would be much diminished, if not altogether lost. He might, possibly, by making more sail, get away from the speronara; but that he doubted, and the brig was already under as much canvas, as on ordinary occasions, it was considered prudent to carry at night. He remembered that he was not on board a man-of-war, when sail could be shortened, without calling the watch below. Yet sail must be made, as it would never do to have that little speronara buzzing about them all night without being allowed to punish her, or trying to get away from her.
“We must see if we can’t walk away from that fellow, Mr Timmins. Turn the hands up,” he at length exclaimed, after taking a turn on the poop. “Set the royals. Get the fore topmast, and lower studding-sails on her.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” replied the mate, going somewhat slowly to obey the order. “Little good I’m afraid it will do us, though.”
The crew, though expecting to be roused up, for the watch on deck had let those below know of the reappearance of the suspicious stranger, went about their duty without their usual alacrity.
“One might just as well try to run clear of a hurricane as to beat that chap out there either on wind or off it,” muttered Jem Marlin, as he went aloft to rig out the studding-sail booms. “All the canvas in store in Portsmouth Dockyard wouldn’t carry us away from him, if he wanted to catch us.”
The additional sail, however, was set, and as the wind had fallen light, it was only what was required to urge her at her previous speed through the water. While sail was being made the master was joined on the poop by his passengers.
“Well,” said the colonel, laughing. “I hear we have the honour of the company of the Flying Dutchman again.”
“Dutchman or not, sir,” replied the master, “that little speronara has taken it into her head to dodge us; and, shame on the brig, which ought to do better, she seems likely to come up with us.”
“Well let her — we are a match for her, I should think; and my little girl here seems rather anxious for a brush. She puts to shame that steward of yours, who came skulking into the cabin just now as white as a sheet, declaring we were going to be boarded by ghosts or hobgoblins of some sort.”
“You must humour seamen, or you can never manage them, sir,” replied the master. “They as firmly believe in the Flying Dutchman as they do in the Gospel; and you can’t persuade them that he is not to be met with. It would never do for me to go and tell them that they are cowards and credulous fools; and I well know that the same men would face three times their number with cutlasses in their hands.”
“And I am sure, uncle, any one might be excused for mistaking that dark object astern of us for a phantom wandering over the face of the deep,” said Ada. “Even now, as I look at it, I can scarcely persuade myself that it is the light, graceful speronara we saw during daylight; and am far more inclined to believe it a being from another world — the ghost of one of the old sea-kings one reads of — or, perhaps, a malign spirit stalking over the deep in search of prey.
“Well, miss, the same sort of idea occurs to the mind of the uneducated seaman as he keeps his silent watch at night on the mast-head or forecastle; and when he sees through the darkness tall ships slowly gliding noiselessly over the waters, and when no sign or signal is exchanged, there is nothing to show him to the contrary. I don’t mean to say that there are many seamen that would mistake a ship for a ghost, because they would not be worth their salt if they did; but a few may have done so, and have told stories about them which have found plenty of people to believe them, and tell them again.”
“That’s the way all the wonderful nonsense one hears spoken of has got circulated,” said the colonel. “But as I do not see much to interest us in looking at that vessel astern — and there is nothing else visible — I shall go to bed; and you, Miss Ada, must go to your cabin, so take Marianna off with you.”
Ada begged to remain a little longer; and, for a short time more, she was allowed to enjoy the fresh air on deck. The night was very fine. The sky was perfectly clear, and the stars shone brightly forth — but there was no moon; and, consequently, her range of vision was much circumscribed. The sea was covered with light waves, which, as they rose and fell, scarcely had any effect in giving motion to the vessel. The hue of the ocean was, in some places, almost of an inky blackness; in others it was lighted up with phosphorescent flashes, which, seen amid the surrounding darkness, seemed as brilliant as if composed of real fire — their reflection being caught by the light foam which curled on the summits of the dancing waves — while, on either side of the vessel, a mass of scintillating sparks flew off as if her stern were ploughing up a vast field with a sub-layer of gold-dust; and astern appeared a line of yet brighter lights composed of thousands of whirling eddies, which grew smaller and smaller, and less distinct, till lost in the distance. After watching the sea for some time, as Ada looked up at the rigging, and at the masts and wide-spread sails above her head, they no longer looked as in the day-time, like white wings extended to urge on the vessel in her course; but, increased to many times their former size, they seemed like a black pyramid to tower upwards to the sky till lost in the distance.
Ada was not long permitted to enjoy this, to her, unusual scene, before her uncle again summoned her below; and this time she was obliged to obey. He, however, had given strict orders to be called should anything occur.
The wind, as the night drew on, grew considerably lighter, and this gave a decided advantage to the speronara, which rapidly came up abeam. Neither Bowse nor his mates had turned in, and even the crew remained on deck, watching the stranger with jealous eyes. It appeared, as they watched her, that she was steering a course a point more to windward than they were, for, as she came up, her distance from them was far greater than they had expected, and it was soon evident that she had no intention of boarding them. Bowse breathed more freely, and looked at the studding-sails. He knew that all hands were weary as he was himself.
“Take in the studding-sails, Timmins, and furl top-gallant sails. The Zodiac can walk along fast enough without them, and we must not have the people roused out again, if we can help it.”
The order was obeyed with alacrity, and the brig was soon brought under the snug canvas she usually carried at night.
“I told ye, Bill, there was no manner nor use setting them studsails nor to’gallant sails neither,” said Jem Marlin, as, his watch on deck being over, he turned into his hammock at midnight. “Lord bless ye, nothing could have made us run away from her if we’d tried ever so much. But to my mind, it’s having that young lady aboard kept him off. Depend on’t there’s nothing like having a beautiful, virtuous young woman on your side, to keep Davy Jones and all his devils at long range. The fact is, they’re afraid of her, she’s so different to theirselves. While we, Bill, you knows, is sarcumstantially too much — ”
What Jem might have said further, I know not, for his head touched the end of his hammock, and he was fast asleep.
The grey light of the early dawn was just stealing across the sea, and a few faint streaks of reddish tinge showed the eastern part of the sky, when the master of the Zodiac came on deck. His ship was still proudly holding her course unharmed, amid the waste of waters, and with that fresh reviving hour when all the events of the new-born day are yet to occur, the indistinct causes of the alarm of the previous night appeared to have vanished, and even the superstitious seamen could venture to smile at their previous terrors. The wind had fallen considerably, and there was no longer sufficient to crest the tops of the sluggish leaden-like waves which had not yet lost the hue thrown over them by the mantle of night. Gradually, however, the eastern sky assumed a warmer, and yet a warmer tinge, increasing till an orange glow was cast across their surface, the sombre colour gave place to a brighter purple, and as the sun bursting from his ocean confines, took his rapid course upwards, they caught the intense blue of the sky above them, on their changeful bosoms.
The first thing which a sailor does on coming on deck, is to cast his eye aloft, to see what sails are set, and how they stand, and then to sweep it round the horizon; his next is to go aft to the binnacle, and to take a look at the compass.
Bowse quickly satisfied himself that the sails were properly trimmed, and that the ship was steering on her right course; but the survey he took of the horizon did not so well please him. There was in the first place, some odd-shaped clouds floating along to the south and south-east, just above the sea, which he did not like, and rather to the northward of east, just on the horizon, were two sails, the appearance of which he liked still less. He looked at them attentively, then he rubbed his eyes, and looked at them again; but neither operation satisfied him. He then went to the companion, and taking his spyglass, surveyed the two objects for some time. A landsman would not have remarked them; indeed, he would scarcely have perceived the faint, irregularly shaped dots they appeared, just suspended, as it were, above the horizon; but the well-practised eye of the old sailor could not only discover what were their peculiar rigs, but even which way they were steering. He soon determined, to the satisfaction of his own mind, that the northern-most of the two, and the nearest, was a lateen-rigged craft, standing, close hauled, to the northward, across his course, and that the other was a square-rigged vessel, probably a brig, under easy sail, standing in the same direction that he was. Now, although under ordinary circumstances, he would not have given the two vessels a second thought; yet coupling the events of the previous day, and the mysterious warning they had received, he could not help thinking that one was the speronara; the other the brig with which she was in communication, and which she wished to persuade them was an Austrian man-of-war. Bowse took two or three turns on deck, every now and then casting a glance eastward, expressive of no very amiable feelings.
“Oh! confound the rascals,” he muttered, stamping his foot on the deck. “If it wasn’t for that sweet young lady below, who should not have her eyes shocked with scenes of blood and fighting, I wish they would both of them come on at once, and have it out, if they want to rob us, instead of sneaking round, and bothering us in this way. If I do get alongside them, I will give it them; but we shall have something else to do before that, I suspect.”
He took another turn or so, and then stopped, looking to the northward. He had, at first, intended again setting all the sail the ship would carry before the wind; but on more critically examining the clouds in that quarter, he determined, for the present, to make no change. The clouds, he observed, were increasing in number, and banking up thickly together, and the first freshness of the morning had given way to an oppressive and heavy air, which seemed to weigh down their spirits. The wind, which had hitherto been so steady, though varying in strength, now dropped considerably, and began to veer about, so as to require the hands constantly at the braces. Bowse fully felt the responsibility of the command intrusted to him, and that the safety and lives of his crew and passengers would depend very much on his forethought, judgment, and coolness. He was glad to be alone, to think over what was best to be done under the circumstances; that a gale was brewing, he felt pretty sure, and that it would come from the southward and east; but whether it would be of long duration, or whether one of those sudden gusts, those short-lived tempests, which occur frequently during summer in the Mediterranean, he could not determine, though he was inclined to think it would be the latter; then, that some vessel, with no good motive, was looking out for the brig, he felt almost certain; though his pride would not allow him to suppose that any one, knowing the armament of the Zodiac, would attempt to attack her openly. At the same time this was an additional object of anxiety, and would require caution.
The watch, with bare feet, and trousers tucked up to their knees, with buckets in their hands, were employed in washing decks, and as they splashed the water along the planks, and up the inner sides of the bulwarks, they laughed and jested in very buoyancy of spirits; and played off on each other various little practical jokes, which the presence of the second mate, who superintended and aided in the operation, alone prevented from being of a more boisterous character.
The poop deck, where the captain was walking, had already been washed, and the people were now in the waist, and were giving a few more vehement splashes before moving further forward, when Colonel Gauntlett, in his forage cap, a richly flowered dressing-gown, and Turkish slippers, made his appearance at the companion hatch, very nearly receiving a copious shower-bath from the contents of a bucket dashed across the deck at that moment.
“Hillo, my men,” he exclaimed, in no very amiable tone. “I thought the ship was wrecked, with all that splashing and scrubbing. One would suppose that the vessel was as dirty as those Augean stables that fellow Hercules had to clean, by all the water you use.”
“It’s cheaper than pipe-clay, and cleaner, for it’s to be had for the taking, and don’t leave any dust,” muttered Jem Marlin, who was the offender.
“It may be cheap, but it makes a confounded noise, and we have enough of it outside, as it is,” answered the colonel, not hearing the reference to pipe-clay. “So I beg in future you won’t let quite so much of it play round my head in a morning.”
This was said, as he was standing with his body half-way down the companion ladder.
He then observed the master on the poop.
“Well, Mr Bowse, anything more of our friend, the Flying Dutchman?” he asked in a jocose tone.
“If you will step up here, I will tell you more about her, sir,” answered the master; and, thus summoned, the colonel picked his way over the wet deck to where he was standing. “I think it right, Colonel Gauntlett, to tell you, that you may be prepared, that we are going to have a blow of it, shortly; and I want you to look at that brig out there. What do you make of her?”
“Bless me, nothing — I can’t even see her,” said the colonel. “Do you mean to tell me that you can distinguish what that little black mark is out there?”
“Yes, Colonel Gauntlett, I am certain that yonder object is either a brig or a ship, under her tops’ils, standing to the eastward, and that the other, you see, to the north of her, is a felucca or speronara. Now, sir, if there is any credit to be placed in the letter we got last night, and in the account the two Sicilians who came on board gave us, and in the warnings we got at Malta, we are likely to fall in with a brig which is no better than she should be, and which is in connection, some way or other, with that same speronara. Now, there is a brig on the same course that we are; yet, for some reason or other, in no hurry to make a passage: perhaps, she is waiting for us to come up with her. Then there floats just such another craft as the speronara, supposing it is not she herself: so, if we are to fall in with a pirate, I cannot help thinking that brig ahead is the vessel. That is one thing I have to mention to you, sir; and please to look to the south’ard and east’ard. The black bank gathering there shows that we shall have a very different time of it to what we had yesterday.”
“Well, Mr Bowse, what would you have us do?” exclaimed the colonel, with rather a puzzled look. “Do you wish us to put back?”
“No, Colonel Gauntlett, I have been brought up in a school where it is not the custom to run from any danger men can meet with, when there is a chance of overcoming it,” replied the master, with not a little dignity in his tone. “But I thought it my duty to inform you, sir, of what, in my opinion, is likely to occur; and, please Providence, we’ll do our best to meet and overcome any dangers which may appear.”
“I like your spirit, Bowse, and cordially agree with you,” exclaimed the colonel, taking his hand. “Those black clouds may, after all, only indicate a squall; and, as for the pirate, if one falls foul of us I think we snail have no difficulty in handling him.”
“I won’t deceive you, sir; if you had been as much at sea as I have you would know that those clouds foretell a gale; but such a gale as I hope the Zodiac will weather without straining a timber; and, for the pirate, we must keep our weather eye open, that he does not take us unawares. Perhaps, Providence tends the storm to keep us clear of the pirate. My advice to you, sir, is to warn the young lady and her maid of what is going to happen, and to get everything stowed in your cabin. I’m just going to turn the hands up to shorten sail.”
“I wish I could be of as much use there as I hope to be alongside an enemy; but as I cannot, I will go where I can do some good.” Saying which, the colonel returned to the cabin.
“All hands on deck to shorten sail,” sang out the master; and ere a minute had passed, the senior mate and the watch below were on deck.
The fore-clue-garnets were manned, and the foresail was quickly clewed up, and the men flying aloft, it was securely furled. The topsails were next lowered on the caps, whence they bulged out like big balloons, about to fly away with the masts.
“Man the fore and main tops’il clew-lines and bunt-lines,” sung out Bowse, laying his hand on the main. “Away with it, my lads.”
The topsails were clewed up, the reef tackles hauled out, and the hands aloft lying in, in as short a time almost as it has taken to describe. Both sails were close reefed, and again sheeted home. The fore and aft mainsail was then close reefed, the jib hauled down, and fore-topmast staysail hoisted; the royal yards were also sent down, and the brig then, under her smallest working canvas, was prepared to meet the tempest, in whatever way, or from whatever quarter it might come.
Chapter Ten.
There is a strong similarity between the aspects of physical nature and those exhibited by man, as an individual, and in the aggregate.
Before any outbreak or great commotion, from the disorganised condition of the moral body, there are observed signs of discontent, murmurings, and complaints, fierce looks and threats — these, at length, disappear, and people seem to be seized with a sudden apathy and indifference, which is as quickly cast aside, and all is rage, havoc, and confusion. So, likewise, before the coming of a storm, clouds are seen gathering in the horizon, murmurs and growls are heard, then the wind dies away, and a perfect calm, for a short time, succeeds the fury of the tempest, and, in both instances, the more perfect the calm, the more is the subsequent outbreak to be feared.
The wind had gradually died away, till the sea became smooth as glass, and rose and fell in gentle undulations, which made the vessel roll from side to side, and caused every timber and bulkhead to groan and creak.
It appeared not to have been absolutely necessary to shorten sail so soon; but as there was a dead calm, this was of no consequence, and the most prudent seamanship; as it is, at times, difficult to judge the period a squall my take to travel up to a ship.
The brig still lay with her head a little to the northward of east, and her yards were now braced up on the starboard tack to meet the wind which gave signs of coming from the southward and east. Every preparation was made, and all hands were at their stations, ready to execute any of their commander’s orders which the emergency might require, when Ada, wearied of remaining in the hot cabin, came on deck, followed by her little maid; and before Bowse, who was looking to the southward, perceived them, they had gained the poop.
“This is no place for you, miss, I am sure,” he exclaimed, on seeing her. “You do not know what risk you run. Oh, go below again — go below.”
“Why, what is the matter, Captain Bowse?” she replied, laughing, and looking at the calm sea. “My uncle told me that we were to have a tremendous storm, and I do not feel a breath of wind.”
“And so we shall, miss,” he exclaimed. “You have no time to go below now without assistance. Hold on by these cleats, and tell your maid to do so too. Here it comes!”
As he spoke, the mass of clouds which had been collecting to the eastward, and gradually approaching, now came driving up bodily across the sky at a rapid rate — the dark waters below it, hitherto so smooth and calm, presented a sheet of snow-white foam, hissing and bubbling as if it were turned up and impelled onward by some gigantic besom. Ada, as she gazed with feelings of mingled terror and admiration, saw it in one long line near the brig — it reached her side — the white foam flew upwards, curling over them, and the wind, at the same instant, striking her canvas, her tall masts seemed to bend to its fury, and then pressed downwards, the hull heeled over till the lee bulwarks were nearly submerged.
Two strong hands were at the helm, ready to turn it a-weather, should it be necessary to scud; but, in an instant, the gallant ship rose again — and then, like a courser starting for the race, she shot forward through the boiling cauldron, heeling over till her guns were in the water, but still bravely carrying her canvas. Not a rope nor a lanyard had started — not a seam in her topsails had given, and away she flew on her proper course. The veteran master stood on the poop watching for any change or increase of wind. The safety of the ship depended on his promptitude. The sea was rapidly rising; and this was soon perceptible by her uneasy motion, as she rose and fell to each receding wave, the last always appearing of greater height than its predecessors. Any moment it might be necessary either to keep her away, and, furling everything, to let her drive before the gale under bare poles, or to put her helm down and heave her to, thus to let her lie forging slowly a-head, till the gale had abated. A few minutes only had passed since the brig first felt the force of the gale, and the whole sky was now a mass of dark clouds, and the sea a sheet of white driving foam — out of which lofty waves seemed to lift their angry heads, and to urge each other into increased violence. The wind howled and whistled through the rigging; the spars creaked and bent; and the whole hull groaned with the exertion as she tore onwards. Ada, who had, when the ship heeled over, held firmly on to the weather bulwarks, gazed at the scene, to her, so novel and grand, with intense pleasure, from which fear was soon banished; and little Marianna, having followed the example of her mistress in securing herself, imitated her also in her courage. Indeed, as yet, except that they were rather wetted by the foam which came on board, when the squall first struck the brig, there was no object of terror to alarm them. The moment Bowse could withdraw his attention from the care of the ship, he hurried to assist Ada and her attendant, and to place them on the seat which surrounded the cabin skylight, where she might enjoy the magnificent spectacle of the tumultuous ocean, without the fatigue of standing, and having to hold on by the bulwarks. A cloak was thrown round her feet, and as she reclined back in the seat, she declared she felt like an ocean queen in her barge of state, reviewing her watery realms. The colonel’s appearance on deck, supported by his man Mitchell, whose usual cadaverous countenance looked still more ghastly, drove away the romance in which she was beginning to indulge. He scolded her roundly for venturing on deck without his escort, and insisted on her promising never to do so again, on pain of being compelled instantly to go below.
The mate had returned to his post. The brig behaved beautifully; though she heeled over to the force of the wind, she rose buoyantly to each mountain wave, which reared its crest before her, and though the light spray which the short seas so quickly aroused would fly high above her bows, and come in showers down on her forecastle, little of it found its way aft, and not a sea which struck her came over her bulwarks. Bowse looked delighted and proud at the behaviour of his brig, as he pointed out her good qualities to his passengers.
“There’s many a craft, which is looked upon as a clipper, won’t behave as she does, that I’ll answer for,” he observed.
He was going on with his panegyrics when his voice became silent, and his eye riveted ahead. The atmosphere, which, when the gale first came on, had been somewhat thick, had now partially cleared, and revealed to him, at the distance of little more than a mile, a large polacca brig hove to on the starboard tack. He instantly summoned his first officer to his side, and pointed out the stranger to him.
“What think you of that fellow, Timmins?” he asked.
The mate took a look at the stranger through his glass.
“A fine polacca brig, sir, as one can see with half an eye,” he answered deliberately; “but more of her I cannot say, as she shows no colours. We must keep away a little though, sir, or we shall be right down upon her.”
“We should — starboard the helm a point my lads,” exclaimed the master. “Steady, that will take us clear, and we shall be near enough to have a look at him. Ah! there goes some buntin’ aloft. What colours are they, Timmins?”
“The Austrian ensign, sir,” replied the mate. “A black eagle on a white ground, and there flies a pennant at his mast head.”
“That’s extraordinary indeed,” exclaimed the master. “Hoist the ensign there,” he shouted. “Austrian or devil, we’ll show him that we are not ashamed of our flag, and will not strike it either in a hurry. Come here, Timmins, we mustn’t frighten the young lady by what we say. You know the paper dropped on board here last night; now it’s my opinion that that’s the very brig it speaks about, and the one the felucca’s two men tried to persuade us was an Austrian man-of-war. To my eye, she looks fifty times more like a Greek than an Austrian, for all that her colours say. Well, what’s your opinion that we ought to do?”
“With respect to her being a Greek, I think she is,” answered the mate. “And if she’s a pirate, we ought to do our best to stand clear of her, seeing that we were commissioned to carry merchandise, and not to look after such gentry; but if she comes after us, and we can’t get clear of her, that alters the case, sir, and we must stand to our guns and fight her.”
“I am glad to hear you say so, Timmins,” answered the master, laying his hand on the mate’s arm.
“Turn the hands up, my good fellow, and let them go to quarters.” (The people were at their breakfast.) “We will not fire the first shot; but if she attacks us, we will give it them as well as we can. One satisfaction is, that they cannot board us while the gale lasts.” While the mate flew forward to execute the orders, Bowse approached his passengers, and, pointing out the stranger to them, to which they were now rapidly drawing near, told them his suspicions as to her character, and advised them to go below.
“But do you think he will fire into us?” inquired the colonel.
“He would gain little by so doing, while the gale lasts,” replied Bowse, “and he might get injured in return, as he probably knows that we have guns on board.”
“There you see, Ada, there is little chance of any of us being hurt, but there is a possibility — so you must go below again.”
This the colonel said in a positive tone, and his niece was obliged to comply.
“Oh, how I wish Captain Fleetwood was here in the Ione,” she thought, as she quitted the deck. “No pirate would dare to molest us.”
The stranger was hove to, under her fore-topsail, and appeared to be making what seamen call very fine weather of it. The Zodiac came down scarcely a cable’s length from her quarter, but the stranger gave no sign of any intention of accompanying her. Very few seamen appeared on her deck, and two or three officers only, whose uniform, seen through the glass, was evidently that of Austria. One of them, who, from his wearing an epaulette on either shoulder, Bowse thought must be the captain, leaped up on the taffrail, and waved his hat to them, while another, in the lingua franca, sung out through a speaking trumpet —
“Heave to, and we will keep your company.”
“I’ll see you d — d first, my fine fellow,” answered the master, who had been attentively surveying them through his glass. “I wish I was as certain of heaven as I am that the fellow who waved to us is the same who came on board when in Malta harbour. I know his face, spite of his changed dress.”
“I don’t think he’s unlike, except that he didn’t look so tall quite as the Greek you mean,” observed the mate. “However, as they did not fire at us, and don’t seem inclined to keep company with us either, I suppose they are after other and surer game.”
The Zodiac had by this time left the stranger far astern, and numberless were the surmises of the crew as to what she was and what she was about. All agreed in pronouncing her a Greek-built craft. She was a large vessel, too, and well armed, if all the ports which showed on a side had guns to them; and she was, probably, as are most of the Greek vessels of that class, very fast. It is odd that they did not, however, regard her with half the suspicion that they did the little speronara, which could scarcely have harmed them, by mortal means, if she had tried.
The Zodiac had left the polacca brig about eight or ten miles astern, and her topsails could just be seen rising and falling above the boiling cauldron of waters which intervened, as she remounted the seas or sunk into the trough between them.
The ship had also by this time assumed her usual peaceful appearance; the shot and powder had been returned below, the guns were run in and secured, the small arms had been replaced in their racks, and the colonel had withdrawn the charges of his pistols, and sent Mitchell with them to his cabin.
“Well, I suppose as soon as this tornado blows over, we shall have a tranquil time of it, and hear no more of your Flying Dutchman and bloody pirates,” he observed to the master, as he held on the weather bulwarks. “I did not bargain for all this sort of work, I can tell you, when I refused a passage in a king’s ship in order that I might avoid the society of those young jackanapes of naval officers, and save my little girl from being exposed to their interested assiduities.”
“Can’t say what may happen to us,” returned Bowse, who was a great stickler for the honour of the navy, and did not at all relish the colonel’s observations. “I’ve done my best to please you, and I’m sure the officers of any of his Majesty’s ships would have done the same. I’ve belonged myself to the service, and have held the king’s warrant, and I have had as good opportunities of judging of the character of a very large number of officers as any in the same station, and I must say, sir, in justice to them, though with all respect to you, Colonel Gauntlett, that a less interested and less money-loving set of men than they are, are not to be found in any profession.”
“Well, well, Mr Bowse,” answered the colonel, seeing by the frown on the master’s good-natured countenance that he was in earnest, “I did not want to hear a defence of the navy, but I should like to have your opinion as to when there is a probability of our enjoying a little quiet again, and whether we are likely to be molested by these reputed pirates after all.”
“I do not think, by the looks of it, that the gale will last as long as I at first supposed,” said the master, at once appeased. “As for the matter of the pirates, no man can answer; I’m sure I can’t.”
“Well, but what do you think, Mr Timmins?” said the colonel, turning to the mate.
Now, although the officer would not have ventured to give an opinion in opposition to his superior, yet, as Bowse had not expressed one, he felt himself at liberty to pronounce his judgment.
“Why, sir — looking at the state of the case on both sides — the long and short of it is, in my opinion, that there has been a bit of free-trading going on with some of the Liverpool merchantmen, which isn’t at all unusual; and that those chaps who came about us mistook us for one of their friends; and then, when they found their mistake, wanted to bung up our eyes with a cock and a bull story about pirates. That’s what I think about it. You see that brig, whether Austrian or not, was looking out for some one else.”
“Was she, though?” exclaimed the master, with sudden animation. “I think not; for, by Heavens, here she comes.”
All those who heard the exclamation turned their eyes over the taffrail.
Just astern was the polacca brig — her head had paid off, and, with a reef shaken out of each of her topsails, she was seen heeling over to the gale, and tearing away through the foaming waves in chase of them.
The master, whose suspicions as to the honesty of her character had never been removed, now no longer hesitated to declare that he believed her to be the very pirate of whom he had been warned. He felt that he was now called on to decide what course it would be wisest to pursue. To avoid her by outsailing her, he knew to be hopeless — except that, by carrying on sail to the very last, he might induce her to do the same, till, perhaps, she might carry away her masts or spars, and the victory might remain with the stoutest and best-found ship. His next resource was the hope of crippling her with his guns, as she drew near, and thus preventing her from pursuing, while he escaped; and if both means failed, he trusted that Providence would give the victory to British courage and seamanship, should she attempt to engage him alongside. He explained his intentions to his officers and Colonel Gauntlett, who fully agreed with him, and, acting on the first plan he proposed trying, he immediately ordered a reef to be shaken out of the topsails. The men flew aloft obedient to the order — the reefs were quickly shaken out, and the yards again hoisted up.
Bowse watched with anxiety to see how the brig bore the additional canvas. A few minutes’ trial convinced him that she might even carry more without much risk. If any difference was perceptible, it was that the crests of the seas she met broke in thicker showers of spray over her bows; but she did not seem to heel over to it more than before.
The crew, called on deck to make sail, at once divined, by seeing the stranger in their wake, the reason of it, and flew with alacrity to their duty. They were all ready to fight, if necessary; they would rather have been chasing a vessel which they might hope to make their prize; but they were in no way indifferent to the excitement of endeavouring to outsail another craft, even though they might have been accused of being employed in the inglorious business of running away.
“Bless the little beauty, she goes along nicely through it, don’t she, old ship,” said Jem Marlin to his chum. “Them outlandish mounseers astern there will be clever if they comes up to us.”
All hands remained on the deck, for they had not been piped below again.
Bowse, every now and then, gave a scrutinising glance astern at the stranger; but it was impossible to determine whether there was any difference in their relative distance.
The two brigs were now under the same canvas, for the stranger had not shaken out a second reef in the topsails, when the Zodiac shook out the first.
The crew stood at their station ready to obey the next order.
“She’ll bear the fore-sail on her, Mr Timmins, if we close reef it,” said Bowse; “send some hands up and loose it, and hook on reef-burtons ready for reefing.”
As soon as the sail was let fall it flew out in thundering claps, as if it would fly away from the yard, and there was some danger of carrying it away or springing it, but steady hands were there, and the clew garnets being eased down, the reef-burtons hauled out, the ear-rings were soon secured, and the points tied; the lee clew garnet was then eased off, and the sheet steadied aft. The tack was roused down, another pull had of the sheet, and the bowline hauled taut, the weather-lift and brace being hauled taut, the sail stood like a board.
With this sail she carried too much lee helm, and it was difficult work for the helmsman to lift her, so as to let her rise over the seas, which now came one after the other in quick succession, rushing up her bows, and threatening to curl bodily over her bulwarks.
“Now, my lads, aft here, and shake a reef out of the fore-and-aft mainsail.”
Led by the mate, the men sprung aft, the points were soon cast off, and the reef-pendant eased off. The throat and peak halyards were manned, the main-sheet was slightly eased off, and the sail, thus enlarged, was hoisted to the mast. The instant effect was to make her carry a weather-helm, and great care was now required to prevent her flying up into the wind, and being taken aback; a most perilous position to be placed in under the present circumstances.
To prevent this, the fore-stay-sail was hoisted. As the master watched the effect of all the canvas he had packed on the brig, he saw clearly that she would not bear another stitch; indeed, she had already very much more set than under any but the most extraordinary circumstances he would have ventured to carry. He, however, felt that he could do more with her than could any stranger. He knew that every timber and plank in her was sound, every spar had been well proved, and the canvas was all new, and every inch of rigging about her he or his mate had seen fitted and turned in. He knew, indeed, that all was good, and it was this feeling, with a right confidence in his own knowledge and judgment, which gave him courage on this trying occasion.
Onward the brig tore through the foaming waves, her lee-scuppers completely under water. Now a dark sea would appear right a-head, seemingly about to overwhelm her, but buoyantly her bow would rise to it, the foam on its summit alone sweeping over her; then another would come of less height, and, as if disdaining to surmount it, she would cleave her way through it, while her decks were deluged as a punishment for her audacity. Nearly everything on deck had been properly secured, and such trifling articles as were not, were soon washed into the lee-scuppers or overboard. The crew, driven from forward, were huddled together close to the break of the poop, under shelter of the weather-bulwark, while Bowse and the first mate stood at their old post.
“It’s as much as she’ll carry,” said Timmins.
He thought it was a great deal too much, but did not like to say so.
Bowse looked at the stranger before answering.
“I only hope she will try to carry a great deal more,” he replied. “See, they are beginning to follow our example.”
The polacca brig had now not only set her foresail and mainsail, but had also shaken another reef out of her topsails. She thus already had more sail on her than the Zodiac.
“Now, then,” said Bowse, “if we do but hold our own, she will begin to think we shall escape her, and they will be shaking another of those reefs out.”
“If they do, they will just get the drop in the pitcher too much,” said the mate.
“That’s just what I wish they may do,” replied the master. “But, ah! hold on for your lives, my lads.”
A dark, circling wave appeared directly ahead of the vessel, as if it had risen suddenly out of the water. She rose at it like a bold hunter, without hesitation, attempting to take a high fence beyond his powers. Its force was too great for her, she stopped, and trembled in every timber, then again she tried, and dashing headlong into it, the watery hill came thundering down on her decks, tearing away her long boat and spare spars, hencoops, caboose, and water casks, and, making a breach through the lee-bulwarks, washed them overboard. Had not the hatches been well secured the Zodiac, with all in her, might never have risen again. Cries of terror were heard, and many a bold seaman turned pale; but none of the crew were injured, and the ship again flew buoyantly onward.
“That’s what we may call our drop too much,” said the mate. “Don’t you think we ought to take some of the canvas off her, sir?”
“Timmins, we’ve long known each other, and you know I’m no coward; but I tell you that my conviction is, that there will be no child’s play with that fellow astern if he comes alongside us. Heaven only knows who’ll come off the best if it comes to blows. He has twice as many guns as we have, if not more, and longer pieces, depend on it, and, probably, five times as many hands. These are fearful odds, and I don’t think any man can say it’s cowardly to shrink from them. I know, too, the sort of fellows those are on board yonder craft, and sooner than fall into their power, I would run the brig, and all in her, under water. Till she made sail in chase, I had my doubts about her; I now have none. You see I don’t risk the loss of our masts without good cause, and now see to getting life-lines along the lee-bulwarks, and secure them as you best can.”
The mate made no answer, except a hurried acquiescence in his chief’s reasons; and then calling three seamen to him, he worked his way forward to the forecastle, to search for the requisite cordage for passing fore and aft along the sides of the vessel.
Colonel Gauntlett had gone below to explain the state of affairs to poor Ada, and to endeavour to tranquillise her alarms. Nothing daunted the old veteran himself; a soldier of the great duke’s school, he was accustomed to hardships and vicissitudes of all sorts. Brave as his sword, and delighting in the excitement of danger, his spirits rose in proportion to its imminence, and all the sour testiness of his temper vanished; a temper which had grown on him since the return of peace caused him to sheath his sword, and tempted him to commit the folly, as an old bachelor, of leading an idle life. Married, and with a family, he would have had them to interest him; but, as it was, he had only to think of his own aches and ills, and, perhaps, past follies; and to brood over what he called the neglects he had experienced from his ungrateful country. No man on board, perhaps, was so anxious as he was to have a skirmish with the rover, but he was not aware of the dreadful odds which would be opposed to him, and of the too probable fate which would await all hands, should victory side with the enemy. His arguments had some effect in calming his niece’s fears; but not those of poor little Marianna, who, pale and weeping, sat at the feet of her mistress, imploring her to urge the captain and her uncle to return to Malta.
Ada, in her turn, had to act the part of comforter, and she promised her uncle that she would constantly remain below till they had escaped from the pirate, and the storm was over. Her uncle had not attempted to deceive her, nor did she shut her eyes to the greatness of the threatening danger — yet hope rose triumphant in her bosom. Though the storm had, at first, appeared very terrific, she got accustomed by degrees to the noise and commotion, and she could not persuade herself that a British vessel, manned by so many brave men, would not prove the victor against a pirate, of whatever nation she might be. By the faint light which found its way into her cabin, she was able to read; and that book was in her hand from which the truest source of comfort can be drawn, and which she, in her turn, imparted to her ignorant and trembling companion. Thus, between reading herself and explaining the subject to Marianna, and, at times, approaching the footstool of her Maker in prayer, Ada passed many hours, which would otherwise have become insupportable through anxiety and fear, and thus employed, we must leave her, to return on deck.
