Dido—Calcutta

2 P.M.—Weighed in company with Cornwallis.

5.30.—Came to off Cavite Fort. Received on board Lord Saltoun, Hope Grant, and Captain Cunynghame, A.D.C. Parted company with Cornwallis.

Left Rear-Admiral’s bag of coffee behind, which he won’t think much of. Have plenty of turkeys, though.

Hong Kong; arrived 7 A.M. Glad to find Charlie Graham in command of Castor, 36, in from England.

Received following vexatious memo:—

Attended the counting, weighing, and packing of sycee silver to be sent by Dido.

$400,000 worth of sycee silver shipped this morning for Calcutta.

Farewell dinner given me by Compton, all the merchants accompanying me with lanterns afterwards to my boat. Three hearty cheers, and we parted. Have received much kindness and hospitality.

Report of a junk sunk with stones caused me to secure the best Chinese pilot. On his coming on board, he requested he might have a sailor’s hat, that he might hide his well-coiled tail, as “too muchee mandarin about.”

We weighed and made sail. I placed the pilot in the starboard hammock netting, he squatting at my feet. We had a fresh fair wind; tide with us.

At about 3 P.M. Dido’s bow suddenly rose (with $2,000,000 of sycee silver in her!). My two-foot Dollond came down like a hammer on the pilot’s head. He fell overboard, his life saved by the hat I had given him. I saw him swimming for the shore, like the toad that he was.

My Dido’s pace not checked. She rose to the obstacle—a sunken junk full of stones—and descended the other side like a hunter.

At sunset we came to at Hong Kong Roads. Not a drop of water could be found in the well, and my boys were too anxious to get away to breathe a word.

General Sir Hugh Gough was one of a parting dinner given by Admiral to Lord Saltoun.

Embarked Lord Saltoun at noon, Hope Grant and Cunynghame with him. Out of sight of flag before daylight.

Current favouring us. Saltoun and Grant performing on the guitar and violoncello of an evening.

Like my new Lieutenant, Turnour; he has nerve for carrying sail.

Anchored at Singapore. Found orders to proceed to Penang. Returned a salute of 17 guns fired for Lord Saltoun.

There is a pleasure in a fast-sailing ship. Until arrival of Dido opium clippers had it all their own way.

Anchored off Penang at 7 A.M. Glad to find Commander-in-Chief, living on the hill. Saltoun and staff came up after tiffin.

Diana arrived with accounts of Harlequin, and Wanderer’s boat action with pirates.

Wanderer arrived; too late to see my wounded friend Brooke or Henry Seymour.

Dinner with Admiral Sir William Parker. Good ball and supper given by kind residents.

Examined and passed Bobby Jenkins. If he has an opportunity he will distinguish himself. After tiffin with Admiral, re-embarked passengers. Left my China boy, Chopsticks, at school in Penang, and sailed.

Saltoun with gout. Nothing puts him out of temper though. Thermometer 84°. Grant training the small band into fairly good play.

During a calm D’Aeth and Turnour dived under ship’s bottom to see if any part of false keel had been disturbed; nothing perceptible.

The very small puppy Smut killed six large rats under gunroom skylight. Made the Sandheads light-vessel at 11 P.M.

Got a gentleman pilot on board at 2 A.M.—a Mr. Perie; he marked our lead-lines to inches.

Got up to-day as far as Hooghly Reach, forty miles from Calcutta. Cunynghame and Gemmell went up at midnight in cutter.

Started with tide at 2 A.M. in gig with Saltoun, arriving at Calcutta at six (thirty miles). Put up at Spence’s; dinner with the Governor-General, Lord Ellenborough.

Established a buggy and made calls. Dinner and dance at Government House.

Breakfast with my old friend Engledene, who had been with me in the Tweed. Landed the sycee silver. Lord Saltoun giving a parting dinner to the “Didos.”

Woodhead and Co. will be astonished. Sent by mail £500.

Grand ball given by Governor-General. Splendid sight.

Up at daylight to accompany Lord Saltoun to steamer. Larpent took me with him to the Tent Club. Sent horses and traps in the morning.

Up at daylight. Enjoy the noble sport of hog-hunting. Tiffined and slept in the middle of the day, and went at it again in the evening. It is indeed a noble sport.

Sunday.—Went out again, but not without some qualms of conscience as to the day, which, however, vanished as I blooded my first spear in a young boar, after a chase of a couple of miles; grand and exciting sport.

Returned with Larpent to Calcutta. Found mail letters on my table. Quiet dinner with Hope Grant prior to his departure up-country.

Drove Horton down Garden Reach. Called on Judges. Dinner with 10th Regiment. Ball at Mrs. Cameron’s. Fifteenth birthday of her handsome girl, Pattie.

Weather increasing in heat. Dined with Sir Lawrence, cousin to Sir Robert Peel—a princely fellow; large party; excellent dinner.

Up at daylight to inspect the arsenal and Phlegethon. Visited Deputy-Governor, Mr. Bird.

Overland mail arrived during the night, bringing news of Horton’s promotion. A more deserving step has never been bestowed.

Went over the Mint. Tête-à-tête dinner with a Mr. Grant, a scientific, good old boy with powerful telescope.

Up at daylight to have a further inspection of the dockyard and steamers. Went with Larpent in a boat; as good a dinner as ever I tasted at Mr. Maddock’s club afterwards.

Admiral arriving at 4 P.M. Dido manned yards and returned the fort’s salute. He established at Government House, Horton and I dined at Sir Henry Seton’s.

Admiral at Barrackpore. Dined at the Bengal Club; capital dinner. Barber and Welford pleasant companions.

At daylight with Tom Pitts to join hog-hunting-party; new ground. Sport not much; breakfast excellent. Dined with Mr. Brachan. Theatre in evening.

Rowed old Richards about in my gig. Tiffined with Lord Ellenborough. Dinner with Mr. Robison. Finished the evening, Horton and I, with Larpent.

Blue at the fore hoisted on board my Dido.

Visiting with Wilford. Dinner with Colonel Forbes.

Took Partridge on shore with me to breakfast, and passed a quiet day at Sir Lawrence Peel’s.

To tiffin with Wilson at the Cannon Foundry. Beautiful order. Went to a grand dinner given by the Artillery at Dum-Dum to the Admiral.

Sun broiling hot. Went on board in the middle of the day. Tiffin with Gillander and Gladstone. With young Larpent to the Tent Club. Got a fall on the hard road, horse rolling over; such a brute!

Up at daylight, hog-hunting; good sport. Well mounted this time by Tom Pitts. Slept, tiffined, and read in heat of the day. At 4 P.M. hunted again, and finished the evening with a jolly good dinner.

Two capital hunts after hog. Got a second spear with Mr. Brachan. Rode home in the evening, twenty-two miles, Tom Pitts having forgotten to send buggy. Large dinner at Government House.

Visited General Gilbert, a really good sporting family. Dinner at the Hay-Camerons’.

Sailing orders made out and pilot ordered. Tiffined with Lancelot Dent of China. To dinner with Platt’s pretty daughters. Don’t think much of his picture of “The Signing of the Treaty at Nanking.”

The Platt ladies visited my Dido, and stayed so late I had little time to dress for dinner. Hurried off in my buggy to Mr. Lawrence Peel’s at Garden Reach. Sir William Parker also dining.

The road inside the compound was flat and winding, lit on either side by cocoanut-oil lamps, mounted on poles just level with my eyes, which prevented my seeing obstacles in the way. The syce was seated on the step as usual. All at once I found myself on my head, with the buggy on top of me. Horse and shafts had disappeared. Being not far from the house, I joined the Admiral as he left his carriage. I was supposed to be part of his staff.

After dinner, when Sir William inquired how I had come out, I told him, and was kindly given a lift back.

Progress not much in tow of small steamer against fresh breeze, to say nothing of the dirt received from ditto. Ten lakhs on board though.

Sunday.—In pilot’s hands. When abreast of Diamond Harbour, Admiral came up in a steamer. Went on board to dine, and then took leave.

Pulo Penang in sight at daybreak. A squall took us the last eighteen miles in an hour and a half.

Niceish breeze. Passed the Sands and several sail. No time to go into Malacca. Plucky Smut unwilling to face a booby bird in single combat.

The poor dog got his tail under the truck of a gun-carriage, and made “plenty noise.”

Weighed early for Singapore Roads. Anchored. Found French corvette Sabine and an American frigate St. Louis.

Returned visits. Tête-à-tête dinner with George Hastings.

Party on board to dinner—some of them by the head!—Brooke, French Captain, Napier, Elliot, etc.

Sailed at daylight. Beat Harlequin, she taking Brooke to Sarawak.

Again running up the China Sea.

Made the Bombay reef at sunset: nasty-looking place on a dark night.

2.30 A.M.—Struck hard on a rock twice, all sail set. No one can tell, but those who try it, the painful, sickening sensation it causes. It was supposed to be a straggler from the Lincoln shoal. No apparent damage.

Symptoms of north-east monsoon having just given in. Came up with the Victoria barque, that had started ten days before us from Singapore.

Anchored at 7 A.M. in Hong Kong, happy to find flag absent. Dined with Caine.

Preparing my Dido for facing the south-west monsoon. Dinner with Charlie Graham. Punch, and porter cup; venison from Blenheim rotten. Jolly party though.

American corvette St. Louis arrived, we having beaten her four days. Dined with Caine to meet Sir Henry Pottinger.

Visited old Michael Quin, laid up.

Serpent off in a hurry, afraid of detention. Dined with the General (Sir Hugh Gough) to meet French Commodore and officers. Put up at Crawford Kerr’s.

A gallop with Synge. Dined with Caine, Sir Henry Pottinger and Rear-Admiral meeting them. Slow, with humbug.

Grand survey of Dido’s bottom by warrant officers expecting promotion. Report: “Much injured along the keel.”

Weighed at daylight. Did not lose sight of the blue at the mizzen until noon. Ran into the mud opposite Macao at 9 P.M. Went on shore to Drummond’s.

Made sail for Singapore.

Again in the free and open sea. A slashing breeze, such as my Dido delights in. Unable to do much, owing to rotten ropes and sails—unseamanlike and mistaken ideas of economy.

Brooke’s coast in sight, Tanjong Datu. Dido looking straight for Singapore.

Ran through the beautiful and picturesque Tambelan Islands, too numerous to count. Sent a boat on shore, and exchanged with the natives biscuit for green cocoanut.

Arrived late at Singapore.

Cambrian, 36, in the roads with broad pennant of Henry D. Chads. Dined with Belcher, at Captain’s House, he having been shot through both thighs in a scrimmage with pirates.

On board to see Chads off. A good fellow.

Dined with Napier. News from Brooke. Dido wanted.

Transacted business as Senior Naval Officer in the Straits. Jolly dinner-party with W. H. Read. George Hastings, of Harlequin, a capital fellow.

Hogg, of Fort William, and friends to dine. Amateur theatricals in the evening—“The Merchant of Venice.” Read performed. Supped with Portia!

We dined with Belcher. Noisy party on some good white port. Started Phlegethon for Borneo.

Weighed at daylight.

Off Brooke’s province in Borneo. Sent pinnace in by western entrance.

At sunset found steamer off the entrance of the river. Got on board; Dido to follow up to Kuching, where I found Brooke at three o’clock in the middle watch. Hearty welcome.

Kuching is to be called Sarawak; much improved. Some additional companions; the population considerably increased. Brooke in a new and better house; a much improved and prettier site.

Dido moving up. Native war-boats collecting to assist in the intended attack on Seriff Sahib. While at a midnight council with Rajah Muda Hassim, a report was brought me that Dido was high and dry. While warping up the Sarawak River the previous evening she came to an anchor at sunset, in a narrow passage short of the town. I had cautioned the Master that the flood came up with a rush, and recommended additional hawsers from the port quarter to be secured to the larger trees on shore. I had been up before, but the Master was older than I was, and as I had not given a positive order, I suppose he did not see the necessity. He was a good fellow, and fully saw where he was wrong. When I got there Dido was on her beam ends—royal yards across. Nothing could be done till the rise of the tide. I took this opportunity for ascertaining the truth of the warrant officers’ report to the Commander-in-Chief on 17th June last. Dido’s keel was uninjured, although some bits of copper had been torn off her bottom.

I took charge and went on the forecastle, where foothold was difficult. Outside on the starboard bow lay the gun that had been hoisted outside, but as it still clung to the ship, the standing part of the tackle was left in the rigging, with the fall on the forecastle. It was on the edge of this fall that I had got my footing. The tide had risen over the port hammock netting; and just as I was giving the order to cut away, the forecastle gun slipped overboard, taking the tackle with it, on the fall of which I was standing. It caused me to perform an unwilling somersault in the air.

Dido arrived at her old berth off Kuching, and saluted Rajah Muda Hassim.

Visited neat and pretty bungalows lately built by Williamson and Steward, the latter a Norfolk man.