“Well recited, skipper,” shouted Bang. “Given as the noble poet’s verses should be given. I did not know the extent of your accomplishments; grown poetical ever since you saw Francesca Cangrejo, eh?”
The darkness hid the gallant captain’s blushes, if blush he did.
“I say, Don Ricardo, who are those?”—half-a-dozen well-clad negroes had approached the house by this time—“Ask them, Mr Bang; take your friend Mr Cringle for an interpreter.”
“Well, I will. Tom, who are they? Ask them—do.”
I put the question, “Do you belong to the property?”
The foremost, a handsome Negro answered me, “No, we don’t, sir; at least, not till tomorrow.”
“Not till tomorrow?”
“No, sir; somos caballeros hoy” (we are gentlemen to-day.)
“Gentlemen today; and, pray, what shall you be tomorrow?”
“Esclavos otra ves,” (slaves again, sir,) rejoined the poor fellow, nowise daunted.
“And you, my darling,” said I to a nice well-dressed girl, who seemed to be the sister of the spokesman, “.what are you today, may I ask?”
She laughed—“Esclava, a slave to-day, but to-morrow I shall be free.”
“Very strange.”
“Not at all, senor; there are six of us in a family, and one of us is free each day, all to father there,” pointing to an old grey-headed negro, who stood by, leaning on his staff—“he is free two days in the week; and as I am going to have a child,”—a cool admission,—“I want to buy another day for myself too—but Don Ricardo will tell you all about it.”
The Don by this time chimed in, talking kindly to the poor creatures; but we had to retire, as dinner was now announced, to which we sat down.
Don Ricardo had been altogether Spanish in Santiago, because he lived there amongst Spaniards, and every thing was Spanish about him; so with the tact of his countrymen he had gradually been merged into the society in which he moved, and having married a very high caste Spanish lady, he at length became regularly amalgamated with the community. But here, in his mountain retreat, sole master, his slaves in attendance on him, he was once more an Englishman, in externals, as he always was at heart, and Richie Cloche, from the Lang Toon of Kirkaldy, shone forth in all his glory as the kind hearted landlord. His head household servant was an English, or rather a Jamaica negro; his equipment, so far as the dinner set out was concerned, was pure English; he would not even speak any thing but English himself.
The entertainment was exceedingly good,—the only thing that puzzled us uninitiated subjects, was a fricassee of Macaca worms, that is, the worm which breeds in the rotten trunk of the cotton-tree, a beautiful little insect, as big as a miller’s thumb, with a white trunk and a black head in one word, a gigantic caterpillar.
Bang fed thereon—he had been accustomed to it in Jamaica in some Creole families where he visited, he said—but it was beyond my compass. However, all this while we were having a great deal of fun, when Senora Campana addressed her husband—“My dear, you are now in your English mood, so I suppose we must go.” We had dined at six, and it might now be about eight. Don Ricardo, with all the complacency in the world, bowed, as much as to say, you are right, my dear, you may go, when his youngest niece addressed him.
“Tio—my uncle,” said she, in a low silver-toned voice, “Juana and I have brought our guitars”—
“Not another word to be said,” quoth Transom—“the guitars by all means.”
The girls in an instant, without any preparatory blushing, or other botheration, rose, slipped their heads and right arms through the black ribbons that supported their instruments, and stepped into the middle of the room.
“The Moorish Maid of Granada,” said Senora Campana. They nodded.
“You shall take Fernando, the sailor’s part,” said Senora Candalaria, the youngest sister, to Juana, “for your voice is deeper than mine, and I shall be Anna.”
“Agreed,” said Juana, with a lovely smile, and an arch twinkle of her eye towards me, and then launched forth in full tide, accompanying her sweet and mellow voice on that too much neglected instrument, the guitar. It was a wild, irregular sort of ditty, with one or two startling arabesque bursts in it. As near as may be, the following conveys the meaning, but not the poetry.
After the song, we all applauded, and the ladies having made their conges, retired. The Captain and I looked towards Aaron Bang and Don Ricardo; they were tooth and nail at something which we could not understand. So we wisely held our tongues.
“Very strange all this,” quoth Bang.
“Not at all,” said Ricardo. “As I tell you, every slave here can have himself or herself appraised, at any time they may choose, with liberty to purchase their freedom day by day.”
“But that would be compulsory manunmission,” quoth Bang.
“And if it be,” said Ricardo, “what then? The scheme works well here why should it not do so there—I mean with you, who have so many advantages over us?”
This is an unentertaining subject to most people, but having no bias myself, I have considered it but justice to insert in my log the following letter, which Bang, honest fellow, addressed to me, some years after the time I speak of.
MY DEAR CRINGLE,
“Since I last saw you in London, it is nearly, but not quite, three years ago. I considered at the time we parted, that if I lived at the rate of L3000 a-year, I was not spending one-half of my average income, and on the faith of this I did plead guilty to my house in Park Lane, and a carriage for my wife,——and, in short, I spent my L3000 a year. Where am I now? In the old shop at Mammee Gully—my two eldest daughters, little things, in the very middle of their education, hastily ordered out, shipped as it were, like two bales of goods to Jamaica—my eldest nephew, whom I had adopted, obliged to exchange from the—Light Dragoons, and to enter a foot regiment, receiving the difference, which but cleared him from his mess accounts. But the world says I was extravagant. Like Timon, however—No, d——n Timon. I spent money when I thought I had it, and therein I did no more than the Duke of Bedford, or Lord Grosvenor or many another worthy peer; and now when I no longer have it, why, I cut my coat by my cloth, have made up my mind to perpetual banishment here, and I owe no man a farthing.”
But all this is wandering from the subject. We are now asked in direct terms to free our slaves. I will not even glance at the injustice of this demand, the horrible infraction of rights that it would lead to; all this I will leave untouched; but, my dear fellow, were men in your service or the army to do us justice, each in his small sphere in England, how much good might you not do us? Officers of rank are, of all others, the most influential witnesses we could adduce, if they, like you, have had opportunities of judging for themselves. But I am rambling from my object. You may remember our escapade into Cuba, a thousand years ago, when you were a lieutenant of the Firebrand. Well, you may also remember Don Ricardo’s doctrine regarding the gradual emancipation of the negroes, and how we saw his plan in full operation at least I did, for you knew little of these matters. Well, last year I made a note of what then passed, and sent it to an eminent West India merchant in London, who had it published in the Courier, but it did not seem to please either one party or the other; a signal proof, one would have thought, that there was some good in it. At a later period, I requested the same gentleman to have it published in Blackwood, where it would at least have had a fair trial on its own merits, but it was refused insertion. My very worthy friend, who acted for old Kit at that time as secretary of state for colonial affairs, did not like it, I presume; it trenched a little, it would seem, on the integrity of his great question; it approached to something like compulsory manumission, about which he does rave. Why will he not think on this subject like a Christian man? The country—I say so—will never sanction the retaining in bondage of any slave, who is willing to pay his master his fair appraised value.
Our friend——injures us, and himself too, a leetle by his ultra notions. However, hear what I propose, and what, as I have told you formerly, was published in the Courier by no less a man than Lord——.
Scheme for the gradual Abolition of Slavery.
The following scheme of redemption for the slaves in our colonies is akin to a practice that prevails in some of the Spanish settlements.
We have now bishops, (a most excellent measure,) and we may presume that the inferior clergy will be much more efficient than heretofore. It is therefore proposed,—That every slave, on attaining the age of twenty one years, should be, by act of Parliament, competent to apply to his parish clergyman, and signify his desire to be appraised. The clergyman’s business would then be to select two respectable appraisers from amongst his parishioners, who should value the slave, calling in an umpire if they disagreed.
As men even of good principles will often be more or less swayed by the peculiar interests of the body to which they belong, the rector should be instructed, if he saw any flagrant swerving from an honest appraisement, to notify the same to his bishop, who, by application to the governor, if need were, could thereby rectify it. When the slave was thus valued, the valuation should be registered by the rector, in a book to be kept for that purpose, an attested copy of which should be annually lodged amongst the archives of the colony.
We shall assume a case, where a slave is valued for L120, Jamaica currency. He soon, by working by-hours, selling the produce of his provision grounds, etc. Acquires L20; and how easily and frequently this is done, every one knows, who is at all acquainted with West India affairs.
He then shall have a right to pay to his owner this L20 as the price of his Monday for ever, and his owner shall be bound to receive it. A similar sum would purchase him his freedom on Tuesday; and other four instalments, to use a West India phrase, would buy him free altogether. You will notice, I consider that he is already free on the Sunday. Now, where is the insurmountable difficulty here? The planter may be put to inconvenience, certainly, great inconvenience, but he has compensation, and the slave has his freedom—if he deserves it; and as his emancipation in nine cases out of ten would be a work of time, he would, as he approached absolute freedom, become more civilized, that is, more fit to be free; and as he became more civilized, new wants would spring up, so that when he was finally free, he would not be content to work a day or two in the week for subsistence merely. He would work the whole six to buy many little comforts, which, as a slave suddenly emancipated, he never would have thought of.
As the slave becomes free, I would have his owner’s allowance of provisions and clothing decrease gradually.
It may be objected—suppose slaves partly free, to be taken in execution, and sold for debt. I answer, let them be so. Why cannot three days of a man’s labour be sold by the deputy marshal as well as six?
Again—Suppose the gang is mortgaged, or liable to judgments against the owner of it. I still answer, let it be so—only, in this case let the slave pay his instalments into court, in place of paying them to his owners, and let him apply to his rector for information in such a case.
By the register I would have kept, every one could at once see what property an owner had in his gang—that is, how many were actually slaves, and how many were in progress of becoming free. Thus well disposed and industrious slaves would soon become freemen. But the idle and worthless would still continue slaves, and why the devil shouldn’t they?
(Signed) A. B——.
There does seem to be a rough, yet vigorous sound sense in all this. But I take leave of the subject, which I do not profess to understand; only I am willing to bear witness in favour of my old friends, so far as I can, conscientiously.
We returned next day to Santiago, and had then to undergo the bitterness of parting. With me it was a slight affair, but the skipper! However, I will not dwell on it. We reached the town towards evening. The women were ready to weep, I saw; but we all turned in, and next morning at breakfast we were moved, I will admit—some more, some less. Little Reefy, poor fellow, was crying like a child; indeed he was little more, being barely fifteen.
“Oh! Mr Cringle, I wish I had never seen Miss Candalaria de los Dolores; indeed I do.”
This was Don Ricardo’s youngest niece.
“Ah, Reefy, Reefy,” said I, “you must make haste, and be made post, and then....”
“What does he call her?” said Aaron.
“Senora Tomassa Candalaria de los Dolores Gonzales y Vallejo,” blubbered out little Reefy.
“What a complicated piece of machinery she must be!” gravely rejoined Bang.
The meal was protracted to a very unusual length, but time and tide wait for no man. We rose. Aaron Bang advanced to make his bow to our kind hostess; he held out his hand, but she, to Aaron’s great surprise apparently, pushed it on one side and regularly closing with our friend, hugged him in right earnest. I have before mentioned that she was a very small woman; so, as the devil would have it, the golden pin in her hair was thrust into Aaron’s eye, which made him jump back, wherein he lost his balance, and away he went, dragging Madama Campana down on the top of him. However, none of us could—laugh now; we parted, jumped into our boat, and proceeded straight to the anchorage, where three British merchantmen were by this time riding all ready for sea. We got on board. “Mr Yerk,” said the Captain, “fire a gun, and hoist blue Peter at the fore. Loose the foretopsail.” The masters came on board for their instructions; we passed but a melancholy evening of it, and next morning I took my last look of Santiago de Cuba.
At three o’clock next morning, about an hour and a half before daydawn, I was roused from my cot by the gruff voice of the boatswain on deck “All hands up anchor.”
The next moment the gunroom steward entered with a lantern, which he placed on the table—“Gentlemen, all hands up anchor, if you please.”
“Botheration!” grumbled one.
“Oh dear!” yawned another.
“How merrily we live that sailors be!” sung another in a most doleful strain, and in all the bitterness of heart consequent on being roused out of a warm nest so unceremoniously. But no help for it; so up we all got, and opening the door of my berth, I got out, and sat me down on the bench that ran along the starboard side of the table.
For the benefit of the uninitiated, let me describe a gunroom on board of a sloop of war. Everybody knows that the Captain’s cabin occupies the after part of the ship; next to it, on the same deck, is the gunroom. In a corvette, such as the Firebrand, it is a room, as, near as may be, twenty feet long by twelve wide, and lighted by a long scuttle, or skylight, in the deck above. On each side of this room runs a row of small chambers, seven feet long by six feet wide, boarded off from the main saloon, or, in nautical phrase, separated from it by bulkheads, each with a door and small window opening into the same, and, generally speaking, with a small scuttle in the side of the ship towards the sea. These are the officers’ sleeping apartments, in which they have each a chest of drawers and basin-stand; while overhead is suspended a cot, or hammock, kept asunder by a wooden frame, six feet long by about two broad, slung from cleats nailed to the beams above, by two lanyards fastened to rings, one at the head, and the other at the foot; from which radiate a number of smaller cords, which are fastened to the canvass of the cot; while a small strip of canvass runs from head to foot on each side, so as to prevent the sleeper from rolling out. The dimensions of the gunroom are, as will be seen, very much circumscribed by the side berths; and when you take into account, that the centre is occupied by a long table, running the whole length of the room, flanked by a wooden bench, with a high back to it, on each side, and a large clumsy chair at the head, and another at the foot, not forgetting the sideboard at the head of the table, (full of knives, forks, spoons, tumblers, glasses &c. &c. &c. stuck into mahogany sockets,) all of which are made fast to the deck by strong cleats and staples, and bands of spunyarn, so as to prevent them fetching way, or moving, when the vessel pitches or rolls, you will understand that there is no great scope to expatiate upon, free of the table, benches, and bulkheads of the cabins. While I sat monopolizing the full light of the lantern, and accoutring myself as decently as the hurry would admit of, I noticed the officers, in their nightgowns and night-caps, as they extricated themselves from their coops; and picturesque-looking subjects enough there were amongst them, in all conscience. At length, that is in about ten minutes from the time we were called, we were all at stations—a gun was fired, and we weighed, and then stood out to sea, running along about four knots, with the land—wind right aft. Having made an offing of three miles or so, we outran the terral, and got becalmed in the belt of smooth water between it and the sea-breeze. It was striking to see the three merchant-ships gradually draw out from the land, until we were all clustered together in a bunch, with a half a gale of wind curling the blue waves within musket-shot, while all was long swell and smooth water with us. At length the breeze reached us, and we made sail with our convoy to the southward and eastward, the lumbering merchantmen crowding every inch of canvass, while we could hardly keep astern, under close-reefed topsails, foresail, jib, and spanker.
“Pipe to breakfast,” said the Captain to Mr Yerk.
“A sail abeam of us to windward!”
“What is she?” sung out the skipper to the man at the masthead who had hailed.
“A small schooner, sir; she has fired a gun, and hoisted an ensign and pennant.”
“How is she steering?”
“She has edged away for us, sir.”
“Very well.—Mr Yerk, make the signal for the convoy to stand on.” Then to the boatswain—
“Mr Catwell, have the men gone to breakfast?”
“No, sir, but they are just going.”
“Then pipe belay with breakfast for a minute, will you? All hands make sail!”
“Crack on, Mr Yerk, and let us overhaul this small swaggerer.”
In a trice we had all sail set, and were staggering along on the larboard tack, close upon a wind. We hauled out from the merchant ships like smoke, and presently the schooner was seen from the deck.—“Go to breakfast now.” The crew disappeared, all to the officers, man at the helm, quartermaster at the conn, and signalman.
The first lieutenant had the book open on the drum of the capstan before him. “Make our number,” said the Captain. It was done. “What does she answer?”
The signalman answered from the fore-rigging, where he had perched himself with his glass—“She makes the signal to telegraph, sir—3, 9, 2, at the fore, sir”—and so on; which translated was simply this—“The Wave, with despatches from the admiral.”
“Oh, ho,” said Transom; “what is she sent for? Whenever the people have got their breakfast, tack, and stand towards her, Mr Yerk.”
The little vessel approached.—“Shorten sail, Mr Yerk, and heave the ship to,” said the Captain to the first lieutenant.
“Ay, ay, sir.”
“All hands, Mr Catwell.”
Presently the boatswain’s whistle rung sharp and clear, while his gruff voice, to which his mates bore any thing but mellow burdens, echoed through the ship—“All hands shorten sail-fore and mainsails haul up-haul down to jib—in topgallant sails—now back the main-topsail.”
By heaving-to, we brought the Wave on our weather bow. She was now within a cable’s length of the corvette; the captain was standing on the second foremost, gun, on the larboard side. “Mafame,” to his steward, “hand me up my trumpet.” He hailed the little vessel “Ho, the Wave, ahoy!”
Presently the responding “hillo” came down the wind to us from the officer in command of her, like an echo—“Run under our stern and heave to, to leeward.”
“Ay, ay, sir.”
As the Wave came to the wind, she lowered down her boat, and Mr Jigmaree, the boatswain of the dockyard in Jamaica, came on board, and, touching his hat, presented his despatches to the Captain. Presently he and the skipper retired into the cabin, and all hands were inspecting the Wave in her new character of one of his Britannic Majesty’s cruisers. When I had last seen her she was a most beautiful little craft, both in hull and rigging, as ever delighted the eye of a sailor; but the dockyard riggers and carpenters had fairly bedeviled her, at least so far as appearances went. First, they had replaced the light rail on her gunwale, by heavy solid bulwarks four feet high, surmounted by hammock nettings, at least another foot, so that the symmetrical little vessel, that formerly floated on the foam light as a seagull, now looked like a clumsy dish-shaped Dutch dogger. Her long slender wands of masts, which used to swig about, as if there were neither shrouds nor stays to support them, were now as taut and stiff as church steeples, with four heavy shrouds of a side, and stays and back-stays, and the Devil knows what all.
“Now,” quoth Tailtackle, “if them heave’em taughts at the yard have not taken the speed out of the little beauty, I am a Dutchman.” Timotheus, I may state in the bygoing, was not a Dutchman; he was fundamentally any thing but a Dutchman; but his opinion was sound, and soon verified to my cost. Jigmaree now approached.
“The Captain wants you in the cabin, sir,” said he. I descended, and found the skipper seated at a table with his clerk beside him, and several open letters lying before him. “Sit down, Mr Cringle.” I took a chair. “There—read that,” and he threw an open letter across the table to me, which ran as follows:
SIR,
“The Vice—Admiral, commanding on the Jamaica station, desires me to say, that the bearer, the boatswain of the dockyard, Mr Luke Jigmaree, has instructions to cruise for, and if possible to fall in with you, before you weather Cape Maize, and falling in with you, to deliver up charge of the vessel to you, as well as of the five negroes, and the pilot, Peter Mangrove, who are on board of her. The Wave having been armed and fitted with every thing considered necessary, you are to man her with thirty-five of your crew, including officers, and to place her under the command of Lieutenant Thomas Cringle, who is to be furnished with a copy of this letter authenticated by your signature, and to whom you will give written instructions, that he is first of all to cruise in the great Cuba channel, until the 14th proximo, for the prevention of piracy, and the suppression of the slave-trade carried on between the island of Cuba and the coast of Africa, and to detain and carry into Havanna, or Nassau, New Providence, all vessels having slaves on board, which he may have reason to believe have been shipped beyond the prescribed limits on the African coast as specified in the margin; and after the 14th he is to proceed direct to New Providence if unsuccessful, there to land Mr Jigmaree, and the dockyard negroes, and await your return from the northward, after having seen the merchantmen clear of the Caicos passage. When you have rejoined the Wave at Nassau, you are to proceed with her as your tender to Crooked Island, and there to await instructions from the Vice-Admiral, which shall be transmitted by the packet to sail on the 9th proximo, to the care of the postmaster. I have the honour to be, sir, your obedient servant.”
————, Sec.
To the Hon. Captain Transom, etc.
To say sooth, I was by no means amorous of this independent command, as an idea had, at the time I speak of, gone abroad in the navy, the lieutenants, commanding small vessels, seldom rose higher, unless through extraordinary interest, and I took the liberty of stating my repugnance to my captain.
He smiled, and threw over another letter to me; it was a private one from the Admiral’s Secretary, and was as follows:(Confidential.)
My DEAR TRANSOM,
“The Vice Admiral has got a hint from Sir——, to kick that wild splice, young Cringle, about a bit. It seems he is a nephew of Old Blueblazes, and as he has taken a fancy to the lad, he has promised his mother that he will do his utmost to give him opportunities of being knocked on the head, for all of which the old lady has professed herself wonderfully indebted. As the puppy has peculiar notions, hint, directly or indirectly, that he is not to be permanently bolted down to the little and that if half a dozen skippers (you, my darling, among the rest) were to evaporate during the approaching hot months, he may have some small chance of t’other swab. Write me, and mind the claret and curacoa. Put no address on either; and on coming to anchor, send notice to old Peterkin in the lodge at the Master Attendant’s, and he will relieve you and the pies de gallo, some calm evening, of all farther trouble regarding them. Don’t forget the turtle from Crooked Island, and the cigars.”
“Always, my dear Transom,”
“Yours sincerely,”
“Oh, I forgot. The Admiral begs you will spare him some steady old hands to act as gunner, boatswain, &c.—elderly men, if you please, who will shorten sail before the squall strikes him. If you float him away with a crew of boys, the little scamp will get bothered, or capsized, in a jiffy. All this for your worship’s government. How do you live with your passenger—prime follow, an’t he? My love to him. Lady——is dying to see him again.”
“WELL, MR CRINGLE, what say you?”
“Of course, I must obey, sir;—highly flattered by Mr Secretary’s good opinion, any how.”
The Captain laughed heartily.
“It is nearly calm, I see. We must set about manning this seventy four for you, without delay. So, come along, Captain Cringle.”
When we got on deck,—“Hail the Wave to close, Mr Yerk,” said Transom. “Lower away the boat, and pipe away the yaulers, boatswain’s mate.”
Presently the Captain and I were on the Wave’s deck, where I was much surprised to find no less personages than Pepperpot Wagtail, and Paul Gelid, Esquires. Mr Gelid, a conch, or native of the Bahamas, was the same yawning, drawling, long-legged Creole as ever. He had been ill with fever, and had asked a passage to Nassau, where his brother was established. At bottom, however, he was an excellent fellow, warm hearted, honourable, and upright. As for little Wagtail—oh, he was a delight!—a small round man, with all the Jamaica Creole irritability of temper, but also all the Jamaica warmth of heart about him straightforward, and scrupulously conscientious in his dealings, but devoted to good cheer in every shape. He had also been ailing, and had adventured on the cruise in order to recruit. I scarcely know how to describe his figure better than by comparing his corpus to an egg, with his little feet stuck through the bottom of the shell; but he was amazingly active withal.
Both the Captain and myself were rejoiced to see our old friends; and it was immediately fixed that they should go on board the corvette, and sling their cots alongside of Mr Bang, so long as the courses—of the two vessels lay together. This being carried into execution, we set about our arrangements. Our precious blockheads at the dockyard had fitted a thirty-two pound carronade on the pivot, and stuck two long sixes, one on each side of the little vessel. I hate carronades. I had, before now, seen thirty-two pound shot thrown by them jump off a ship’s side with a rebound like a football, when a shot from an eighteen— pounder long gun went crash, at the same range, through both sides of the ship, whipping off a leg and arm, or aiblins a head or two, in its transit.
“My dear sir,” said I, “don’t shove me adrift with that old pot there do lend me one of your long brass eighteen-pounders.”
“Why, Master Cringle, what is your antipathy to carronades?”
“I have no absolute antipathy to them, sir—they are all very well in their way. For instance, I wish you would fit me with two twelvepound carronades instead of those two popgun long sixes. These, with thirty muskets, and thirty-five men or so, would make me very complete.”
“A modest request,” said Captain Transom.
“Now, Tom Cringle, you have overshot your mark, my fine fellow,” thought I; but it was all right, and that forenoon the cutter was hoisted out with the guns in her, and the others dismounted and sent back in exchange; and in fine, after three days’ hard work, I took the command of H.B.M. schooner, Wave, with Timothy Tailtackle as gunner, the senior midshipman as master, one of the carpenter’s crew as carpenter, and a boatswain’s-mate as boatswain, a surgeon’s mate as surgeon, the captain’s clerk as purser, and thirty foremast-men, besides the blackies, as the crew. But the sailing of the little beauty had been regularly spoiled. We could still in light winds weather on’ the corvette, it is true, but then she was a slow top, unless it blew half a gale of wind; and as for going any thing free, why a sand barge would have beaten us.—We kept company with the Firebrand until we weathered Cape Maize. It was near five o’clock in the afternoon, the corvette was about half a mile on our lee-bow, when, while walking the deck, after an early dinner, Tailtackle came up to me.
“The Commodore has hove-to, sir.”
“Very like,” said I; “to allow the merchant-ships to close, I presume.”
“A gun,” said little Reefpoint. “Ah—what signal now?”—It was the signal to close.
“Put the helm up and run down to him,” said I. It was done—and presently the comfortable feeling of bowling along before the breeze, succeeded the sharp yerking digging motion of the little vessel, tearing and pitching through a head sea, close upon a wind. The water was buzzing under our bows, and we were once more close under the stern of the corvette. There was a boat alongside ready manned. The Captain hailed, “I sent your orders on board, Mr Cringle, to bear up on your separate cruise.” At the same moment, the Firebrand’s ensign and pennant were hoisted—we did the same—a gun from the Commodore—ditto from the tidy little Wave—and lo! Thomas Cringle, esquire, launched for the first time on his own bottom.
By this time the boat was alongside, with Messieurs Aaron Bang, Pepperpot Wagtail, and Paul Gelid—the former with his cot, and half a dozen cases of wine, and some pigs, and some poultry, all under the charge of his black servant.
“Hillo,” said I—“Mr Wagtail is at home here, you know, Mr Bang, and so is Mr Gelid; but to what lucky chance am I indebted for your society, my dear sir?”
“Thank your stars, Tom—Captain Cringle, I beg pardon—and be grateful; I am sick of rumbling tumbling in company with these heavy tools of merchantmen, so I entreated Transom to let me go and take a turn with you, promising to join the Firebrand again at Nassau.”
“Why, I am delighted,”—and so I really was. “But, my dear sir—I may lead you a dance, and, peradventure into trouble—a small vessel may catch a Tartar, you know.
“D—n the expense,” rejoined my jovial ally; “why, the hot little epicurean Wagtail, and Gelid, cold and frozen as he is, have both taken a fancy to me—and no wonder, knowing my pleasant qualities as they do ahem; so, for their sakes, I volunteer on this piece of knight-errantry as much as’—
“Poo—you be starved, Aaron dear,” rapped out little Wagtail; “you came here, because you thought you should have more fun, and escape the formality of the big ship, and eke the Captain’s sour claret.”
“Ah,” said Gelid, “my fine fellow,” with his usual Creole drawl, “you did not wait for my opinion. Ah—oh—why, Captain Cringle, a thousand pardons. Friend Bang, there, swears that he can’t do without you; and all he says about me is neither more nor less than humbug—ah.”
“My lovely yellowsnake,” quoth Aaron, “and my amiable dumpling, gentlemen both, now, do hold your tongues.—Why, Tom, here we are, never you mind how, after half a quarrel with the skipper—will you take us, or will you send us back, like rejected addresses?”
“Send you back, my boys! No, no, too happy to get you.” Another gun from the corvette. “Firebrands, you must shove off. My compliments, Wiggins, to the Captain, and there’s a trifle for you to drink my health, when you get into port.” The boat shoved off—the corvette filled her maintopsail. “Put the helm down—ease off the mainsheet stand by to run up the squaresail. How is her head, Mr Tailtackle?”
Timothy gave a most extraordinary grin at my bestowing the Mister on him for the first time.
“North-west, sir.”
“Keep her so”—and having bore up, we rapidly widened our distance from the Commodore and the fleet.
All men know, or should know, that on board of a man-of-war, there is never any “yo heave oh’ing.” That is confined to merchant vessels. But when the crew are having a strong pull of any rope, it is allowable for the man next the belaying pin, to sing out, in order t@6 give unity to the drag, “one-two-three,” the strain of the other men increasing with the figure. The tack of the mainsail had got jammed somehow, and on my desiring it to be hauled up, the men, whose province it was, were unable to start it.
“Something foul aloft,” said I.
Tailtackle came up. “What are you fiddling at, men? Give me here-one two-three.”
Crack went the strands of the rope under the paws of the Titan, whereby the head of the outermost sailor pitched right into Gelid’s stomach, knocked him over and capsized him head foremost into the wind sail which was let down through the skylight into the little well cabin of the schooner. It so happened that there was a bucket full of Spanish brown paint standing on the table in the cabin, right below the hoop of the canvass funnel, and into it plopped the august pate of Paul Gelid, esquire. Bang had, in the meantime, caught him by the heels, and with the assistance of Pearl, the handsome negro formerly noticed, who, from his steadiness, had been spared to me as a quartermaster, the conch was once more hoisted on deck, with a scalp of red paint, reaching down over his eyes.
“I say,” quoth Bang, “Gelid, my darling, not quite so smooth as the real Macassar, eh? Shall I try my hand—can shave beautifully—eh?”
“Ah,” drawled Gelid, “don’t require it—lucky my head was shaved in that last fever, Aaron dear. Ah—let me think—you tall man—you sailor— fellow—ah—do me the favour to scrape me with your knife—ah—and pray call my servant.”
Timothy, to whom he had addressed himself, set to, and scraped the red paint off his poll; and having called his servant, Chew Chew, handed him over to the negro, who, giving his arm to him, helped him below, and with the assistance of Cologne water, contrived to scrub him decently clean.
As the evening fell, the breeze freshened; and during the night it blew strong, so that from the time we bore up, and parted company with the Firebrand, until day-dawn next morning, we had run 130 miles or thereby to the northward and westward, and were then on the edge of the Great Bahama Bank. The breeze now failed us, and we lay roasting in the sun until mid-day, the current sweeping us to the northward, and still farther on to the bank, until the water shoaled to three fathoms. At this time the sun was blazing fiercely right overhead; and from the shallowness of the water, there was not the smallest swell, or undulation of the surface. The sea, as far as the eye could reach, was a sparkling light green, from the snow-white sand at the bottom, as if a level desert had been suddenly submerged under a few feet of crystal clear water, which formed a cheery spectacle, when compared with the customary leaden, or dark blue-colour of the rolling fathomless ocean. It was now dead calm.—“Fishing lines there—Idlers, fishing lines,” said I; and in a minute there were forty of them down over the side.
In Europe, fish in their shapes partake of the sedate character of the people who inhabit the coasts of the seas or rivers in which they swim at least I think so. The salmon, the trout, the cod, and all the other tribes of the finny people, are reputable in their shapes, and altogether respectable-looking creatures. But, within the tropics, Dame Nature plays strange vagaries; and here, on the great Bahama Bank, every new customer, as he floundered in on deck—no joke to him, poor fellow—elicited shouts of laughter from the crew. They were in no respect shaped like fish of our cold climates; some were all head others all tail-some, so far as shape went, had their heads where, with submission, I conceived their tails should have been; and then the colours, the intense brilliancy of the scales of these monstrous looking animals! We hooked up a lot of bonitos, 10 Lbs apiece, at the least. But Wagtail took small account of them.
“Here,” said Bang, at this moment, “by all that is wonderful, look here!” And he drew up a fish about a foot long, with a crop like a pigeon of the tumbler kind, which began to make a loud snorting noise.
“Ah,” drawled Gelid, “good fish, with claret sauce.”
“Daresay,” rejoined Aaron; “but do your Bahama fish speak, Paul, eh? Balaam’s ass was a joke to this fellow.”
I have already said that the water was not quite three fathoms deep, and it was so clear that I could see down to the very sand, and there were the fish cruising about in great numbers.
“Haul in, Wagtail—you have hooked him,” and up came a beautiful black grouper, about four pounds weight.
“Ah, there is the regular jiggery-jiggery,” sung out little Reefpoint, at the same moment, as he in turn began to pull up his line. “Stand by to land him,” and a red snapper, for all the world like a gigantic gold fish, was hauled on board; and so we carried on, black snappers, red snappers, and rock fish, and a vast variety, for all of which, however, Wagtail had names pat, until at length I caught a most lovely dolphin—a beauty to look at—but dry, terribly dry to eat. I cast it on the deck, and the chameleon tints of the dying fish, about which so many lies have been said and sung, were just beginning to fade, and wax pale, and ashy, and deathlike, when I felt another strong jiggery jiggery at my line, which little Reefpoint had, in the meantime, baited afresh. “Zounds! I have caught a whale—a shark at the very least” and I pulled him in, hand over hand.
“A most noble Jew fish,” said I.
“A Jew fish!” responded Wagtail.
“A Jew fish!” said Aaron Bang.
“A Jew fish!” said Paul Gelid.
“My dear Cringle,” continued Wagtail, “when do you dine?”
“At three, as usual.”
“Then, Mr Reefpoint, will you have the great kindness to cast off your sink, and hook that splendid fellow by the tail—only through the gristle—don’t prick him in the flesh—and let him meander about till half-past two?”
Reefy was half inclined to be angry at the idea of his Majesty’s officer being converted into a cook’s mate.
“Why,” said I, “we shall put him in a tub of water, here on deck, Mr Wagtail, if you please.”
“God bless me, no!” quoth the gastronome. “Why, he is strong as an eagle, and will smash himself to mummy in half an hour in a tub. No—no see, he weighs twelve pounds at the very lightest. Lord! Mr Cringle, I am surprised at you.”
The fish was let overboard again, according to his desire, and hauled in at the very moment he indicated by his watch, when, having seen him cut up and cleaned, with his own eyes—I believe I may say with his own hands—he betook himself to his small crib to dress.
At dinner our Creole friend was very entertaining. Bang drew him out, and had him to talk on all his favourite topics in a most amusing manner. All at once Gelid lay back on his chair.
“My God,” said he, “I have broken my tooth with that confounded hard biscuit—terrible—really: ah!”—and he screwed up his face, as if he had been eating sourcrout, or had heard of the death of a dear friend.
“Poo,” quoth Aaron, “any comb maker will furnish you forth as good as new; those grinders you brag of are not your own, Gelid, you know that.”
“Indeed, Aaron, my dear, I know nothing of the kind; but this I know, that I have broken a most lovely white front tooth, ah!”
“Oh, you be hanged,” said Aaron; “why, you have been bechopped any time these ten years, I know.”
The time wore on, and it might have been half past seven when we went on deck.
It was a very dark night—Tailtackle had the watch. “Any thing in sight, Mr Tailtackle?”
“Why, no, sir; but I have just asked your steward for your night glass, as, once or twice—but it is so thick—Pray, sir, how far are we off the Hole in the Wall?”
“Why, sixty miles at the least.”
The Hole in the Wall is a very remarkable rock in the Crooked Island Passage, greatly resembling, as the name betokens, a wall breached by the sea, or by battering cannon, which rises abruptly out of the water, to a height of forty feet.
“Then,” quoth Tailtackle sharply, “there must be a sail close aboard of us, to windward there.”
“Where?” said I. “Quick, send for my night-glass.”
“I have it here in my hand, sir.”
“Let me see”—and I peered through it until my eyes ached again. I could see nothing, and resumed my walk on the quarterdeck. Tailtackle, in the meantime, continued to look through the telescope, and as I turned from aft to walk forward, a few minutes after this—“Why, sir,” said he, “it clears a bit, and I see the object that has puzzled me again.”
“Eh? give me the glass”—in a second I caught it. “By Jupiter, you say true, Tailtackle! beat to quarters—quick—clear away the long gun forward there!”
All was bustle for a minute. I kept my eye on the object, but I could not make out more, than that it was a strange sail; I could neither judge of her size nor her rig, from the distance, and the extreme darkness of the night. At length I handed the glass to Tailtackle again. We were at this time standing in towards the Cuba shore, with a fine breeze, and going along seven knots, as near as could be.
“Give the glass to Mr Jigmaree, Mr Tailtackle, and come forward here, and see all snug.”
The long gun was slewed round—both carronades were run out, all three being loaded, double shotted, and carefully primed—the whole crew, with our black supernumeraries, being at quarters.
“I see her quite distinct now, sir,” sung out Timotheus.
“Well, what looks she like?”
“A large brig, sir, by the wind on the same tack—you can see her now without the glass—there—with the naked eye.”
I looked, and certainly fancied I saw some towering object rising high and dark to windward, like some mighty spectre walking the deep, but I could discern nothing more.
“She is a large vessel, sure enough, sir,” said Timothy once more “now she is hauling up her courses, sir—she takes in topgallant sails why, she is bearing up across our bows, sir—mind she don’t rake us.”
“The deuce!” said I. I now saw the chase very distinctly bear up. “Put the helm up—keep her away a bit—steady at that will do—fire a shot across her bows, Mr Tailtackle—and, Mr Reefpoint, show the private signal.” The gun was fired, and the lights shown, but our spectral friend was all darkness and silence. “Mr Scarfemwell,” said I to the carpenter, “stand by the long gun. Tailtackle, I don’t like that chap open the magazine.” By this time the strange sail was on our quarter, we shortened sail, while he, finding that his manoeuvre of crossing our bows had been foiled by our bearing up also, got the foretack on board again, and set his topgallant sails, all very cleverly. He was not far out of pistol-shot. Tailtackle, in his shirt and trowsers, and felt shoes, now stuck his head up the main hatchway.
“I would recommend your getting the hatches on, sir—that fellow is not honest, sir, take my word for it.”
“Never mind, Mr Tailtackle, never mind. Forward, there; Mr Jigmaree, slap a round shot into him, since he won’t speak, or heave-to—right between his masts, do you hear—are you ready?”
“All ready, sir.”
“Fire.” The gun was fired, and simultaneously we heard a crash on board the strange sail, followed by a piercing yell, similar to what the negroes raise over a dead comrade, and then a long melancholy howl.
“A slaver, and the shot has told, sir,” said Mr Handlead, the master.
“Then we shall have some fun for it,” thought I. I had scarcely spoken, when the brig once more shortened sail; and the instant that the foresail rose, he let fly his bow gun at us—then another, another, and another.
“Nine guns of a side, as I am a sinner,” quoth jigmaree; and three of the shot struck us, mortally wounded one poor fellow, and damaged poor little Reefy by a splinter in the side.
“Stand by, men—take good aim—fire”—and we again let drive the long gun and carronade; but our friend was too quick for us, for by this time he had once more hauled his wind, and made sail as close to it as he could stagger. We crowded every thing in chase, but he had the heels of us, and in an hour he was once more nearly out of sight in the dark night, right to windward.
“Keep, at him, Mr Jigmaree;” and as I feared he was running us in under the land, I dived to consult the chart. There, in the cabin, I found Wagtail, Gelid, and Bang, sitting smoking on each side of the small table, with some brandy and water before them.
“Ah,” quoth Gelid, “ah! fighting a little? Not pleasant in the evening, certainly.”
“Confound you,” said Aaron, “why will you bother at this awkward moment?”
Meanwhile Wagtail was a good deal discomposed.
“My dear fellow, hand me over that deviled biscuit.”
Bang handed him over the dish, slipping into it some fragments of ship biscuit, as hard as flint. All this time I was busy poring over the chart. Wagtail took up a piece and popt it into his mouth.
“Zounds, Bang—my dear Aaron, what dentist are you in league with? Gelid first breaks his pet fang, and now you”—
“Poo, poo,” quoth his friend, “don’t bother now—hillo—what the deuce I say, Wagtail—Gelid, my lad, look there”—as one of the seamen, with another following him, brought down on his back the poor fellow who had been wounded, and laid his bloody load on the table.
To those who are unacquainted with these matters, it may be right to say, that the captain’s cabin, in a small vessel like the Wave, is often in an emergency used as a cockpit—and so it was in the present instance.
“Beg pardon, Captain and gentlemen,” said the surgeon, “but I must, I fear, perform an ugly operation on this poor fellow. I fancy you had better go on deck, gentlemen.”
Now I had an opportunity to see of what sterling metal my friends were at bottom made. Mr Bang in a twinkling had his coat off.
“Doctor, I can be of use, I know it—no skill, but steady nerves,” although he had reckoned a leetle without his host here,—“And I can swathe a bandage too, although no surgeon,” said Wagtail.
Gelid said nothing, but he was in the end the best surgeon’s mate amongst them. The poor fellow, Wiggins, one of the captain’s gigs, and a most excellent man, in quarterdeck parlance, was now laid on the table a fine handsome young fellow, faint and pale, very pale, but courageous as a lion, even in his extremity. It appeared that a round shot had shattered his leg above the knee. A tourniquet had been applied on his thigh, and there was not much bleeding.
“Captain,” said the poor fellow, while Bang supported him in his arms, “I shall do yet, sir; indeed I have no great pain.”
All this time the surgeon was cutting off his trowsers, and then, to be sure, a terrible spectacle presented itself. The foot and leg, blue and shrunk, were connected with the thigh by a band of muscle about two inches wide, and an inch thick; that fined away to a bunch of white tendons or sinews at the knee, which again swelled out as they melted into the muscles of the calf of the leg; but as for the knee bone, it was smashed to pieces, leaving white spikes protruding from the shattered limb above, as well as from the shank beneath. The doctor gave the poor fellow a large dose of laudanum in a glass of brandy, and then proceeded to amputate the limb, high up on the thigh. Bang stood the knife part of it very steadily, but the instant the saw rasped against the shattered bone he shuddered.
“I am going, Cringle—can’t stand that—sick as a dog”—and he was so faint that I had to relieve him in supporting the poor fellow. Wagtail had also to go on deck, but Paul Gelid remained firm as a rock. The limb was cut off, the arteries taken up very cleverly, and the surgeon was in the act of slacking the tourniquet a little, when the thread that fastened the largest, or femoral artery, suddenly gave way and a gush like the jet from a fire-engine took place. The poor fellow had just time to cry out, “Take that cold hand off my heart!” when his chest collapsed, his jaw fell, and in an instant his pulse stopped.
“Dead as Julius Caesar, Captain,” said Gelid, with his usual deliberation. Dead enough, thought I; and I was leaving the cabin to resume my post on deck, when I stumbled against something at the ladder foot.
“My, what is that?” grumbled I.
“It is me, sir,” said a small faint voice.
“You!—who are you?”
“Reefpoint, sir.”
“Bless me, boy, what are you doing here? Not hurt, I hope?”
“A little, sir—a graze from a splinter, sir—the same shot that struck poor Wiggins knocked it off, sir.”
“Why did you not go to the doctor, then, Mr Reefpoint?”
“I waited till he was done with Wiggins, sir; but now, since it is all over with him, I will go and be dressed.”
His voice grew fainter and fainter, until I could scarcely hear him. I got him in my arms, and helped him into the cabin, where, on stripping the poor little fellow, it was found that he was much hurt on the right side, just above the hip. Bang’s kind heart, for by this time a glass of water had cured him of his faintness, shone conspicuous on this occasion.
“Why, Reefy—little Reefy—you are not hurt, my man—Surely you are not wounded—such a little fellow,—I should have as soon thought of firing at a musquitto.”
“Indeed, sir, but I am; see here.”—Bang looked at the hurt, as he supported the wounded midshipman in his arms.
“God help me,” said the excellent fellow, “you seem to me fitter for your mother’s nursery, my poor dear boy, than to be knocked about in this coarse way here.”
Reefy, at this moment, fell over into his arms, in a dead faint.
“You must take my berth, with the Captain’s permission,” said Aaron, while he and Wagtail undressed him with the greatest care, and placed him in the narrow crib.
“Thank you, my dear sir,” moaned little Reefpoint; “were my mother here, sir she would thank you too.”
Stern duty now called me on deck, and I heard no more. The night was still very dark, and I could see nothing of the chase, but I made all the sail I could in the direction which I calculated she would steer, trusting that, before morning, we might get another glimpse of her. In a little while Bang came on deck.
“I say, Tom, now since little Reefy is asleep—what think you big craft that—nearly caught a Tartar—not very sorry he has escaped, eh?”
“Why, my dear sir, I trust he has not escaped; I hope, when the day breaks, now since we have less wind, that we may have a tussle with him yet.”
“No, you don’t wish it, do you, really and truly?”
“Indeed, I do, sir; and the only thing which bothers me is the peril that you and your friends must necessarily encounter.”
“Poo, poo, don’t mind us, Tom, don’t mind us; but an’t he too big for you, Tom?”
He said this in such a comical way, that, for the life of me, I could not help laughing.
“Why, we shall see; but attack him I must, and shall, if I can get at him. However, we shall wait till morning; so I recommend your turning in, now since they have cleared away the cockpit out of the cabin; so good-night, my dear sir—I must stay here, I fear.”
“Good-night, Tom; God bless you. I shall go and comfort Wagtail and Paul.”
I was at this time standing well aft on the larboard side of the deck, close abaft of the tiller-rope, so that, with no earthly disposition to be an eavesdropper, I could neither help seeing nor hearing what was going on in the cabin, as the small open skylight was close to my All vestiges of the cockpit had been cleared away, and the table was laid for supper. Wagtail and Gelid were sitting on the side I stood on, so that I could not see them, although I heard every word they said. Presently Bang entered, and sat down opposite his allies. He crossed his arms, and leant down over the table, looking at them steadily.
“My dear Aaron,” I could hear little Wagtail say, “speak, man, don’t frighten a body so.”
“Ah, Bang,” drawled out Paul, “jests are good, being well-timed; what can you mean by that face of yours now, since the fighting is all over?”
My curiosity fairly overcame my good manners, and I moved round more amidships, so as to command a view of both parties, as they sat opposite each other at the narrow table.
Bang still held his peace for another minute; at length, in a very solemn tone, he said, “Gentlemen, do you ever say your prayers?” I don’t know if I mentioned it before, but Aaron had a most musical deep mellow voice, and now it absolutely thrilled to my very soul.
Wagtail and Paul looked at him, and then at each other, with a most absurd expression—between fear and jest—between crying and laughing but gave him no answer.
“Are you, my lads, such blockheads as to be ashamed to acknowledge that you say your prayers?”
“Ah,” aid Gelid, “why, ah no—not—that is”
“Oh, you Catholics are all so bigoted,—I suppose we should cross ourselves, eh?” said Wagtail hastily.
“I am a Catholic, Master Wagtail,” rejoined Bang—“better that than nothing. Before sunrise, we may both have proved the truth of our creeds, if you have one; but if you mean it as a taunt, Wagtail, it does discredit to your judgment to select such a moment, to say nothing of your heart. However, you cannot make me angry with you, Pepperpot, you little Creole wasp, do as you will.” A slight smile here curled Aaron’s lip for an instant, although he immediately resumed the solemn tone in which he had previously spoken.—“But I had hoped that two such old friends, as you both have been to me, would not altogether have made up their minds in cold blood, if advertised of their danger, to run the chance of dying like dogs in a ditch, without one preparatory thought towards that tremendous Being, before whom we may all stand before morning.”
“Murder!” quoth Wagtail, fairly frightened; “are you really serious, Aaron? I did not—would not, for the world, hurt your feelings in earnest, my dear; why do you desire so earnestly to know whether or not I ever say my prayers?”
“Oh, don’t bother, man,” rejoined Bang, resuming his usual friendly tone; “you had better say boldly that you do not, without any roundaboutation.”
“But why, my dear Bang, why do you ask the question?” persisted Wagtail, in a deuced quandary.
“Simply,”—and here our friend’s voice once more fell to the low deep serious tone in which he had opened the conference,—“simply because, in my humble estimation, if you don’t say your prayers tonight, it is three to one you shall never pray again.”
“The deuce!” said Pepperpot, twisting himself in all directions, as if his inexpressibles had been nailed to his seat, and he was trying to escape from them. “What, in the devil’s name, mean you, man?”
“I mean neither more nor less than what I say. I speak English, don’t I? I say, that that pestilent young fellow Cringle told me half an hour ago, that he was determined, as he words it, to stick to this Guineaman, who is three times his size, has eighteen guns, while Master Tommy has only three; and whose crew, I will venture to say, triples our number; and the snipe, from what I know of him, is the very man to keep his word so what say you, my darling, eh?”
“Ah, very inconvenient, ah,—I shall stay below,” said Paul.
“So shall I,” quoth Pepperpot; “won’t stick my nose on deck, Aaron dear, no, not for the whole world.”
“Why,” said Bang, in the same steady low tone, “you shall do as you please, ah,”—and here he very successfully imitated our amigo Gelid’s drawl—“and as best suits you, ah; but I have consulted the gunner, an old ally of mine, who, to be plain with you—ah—says that the danger from splinter wounds below, is much greater than from their musketry on deck—ah—the risk from the round shot being pretty equal—ah—in either situation.” At this announcement you could have jumped down either Wagtail’s or Gelid’s throat,—Wagtail’s for choice—without touching their teeth. “Farther, the aforesaid Timothy, and be hanged to him, deponeth, that the only place in a small vessel where we could have had a moderate chance of safety was the Run,—so called, I presume, from people running to it for safety; but where the deuce this sanctuary is situated I know not, nor does it signify greatly, for it is now converted into a spare powder magazine, and of course sealed to us. So here we are, my lads, in as neat a taking as ever three unfortunate gentlemen were in, in this weary world. However, now since I have comforted you, let us go to bed-time enough to think on all this in the morning, and I am consumedly tired.”
I heard no more, and resumed my solitary walk on deck, peering every now and then through the night-glass, until my eyes ached again. The tedious night at length wore away, and the grey dawn found me sound asleep, leaning out at the gangway. They had scarcely begun to wash down the decks, when we discerned our friend of the preceding night, about four miles to windward, close hauled on the same tack, apparently running in for the Cuba shore, as fast as canvass could carry him. If this was his object, we had proved too quick for him, as by casting off stays, and slacking shrouds, and, in every way we could think of, loosening the rigid trim of the little vessel, we had in a great measure recovered her sailing; so when he found he was cut off from the land, he resolutely bore up, took in his top-gallant sails, hauled up his courses, fired a gun, and hoisted his large Spanish ensign, all in regular man-of-war fashion. By this time it was broad daylight, and Wagtail, Gelid, and Bang, were all three on deck, performing their morning ablutions. As for myself, I was well forward, near the long gun. Pegtop, Mr Bang’s black valet, came up to me.