"A Middy of the Slave Squadron" (continued 5)

“You treacherous, murderous scoundrel!” I cried. “How shall I deal with you? You are as dangerous as a wild beast! If I were to beat your brains out with the butt of this pistol I should only be treating you as you deserve! And I will do it too as sure as you are lying there at my mercy, unless you will swear by all you hold sacred that you will never again attempt my life, and that you will set me ashore, free, at the first port at which we touch. Will you swear that, or will you die?”

“I swear it, monsieur,” he gasped. “Release my throat and let me rise, and I swear to you by the Blessed Virgin that I will declare a truce in your favour, and that you shall leave this ship as soon as a suitable opportunity offers.”

I relaxed my grasp upon his throat, and permitted him to regain his feet, whereupon he looked at me for some moments with an expression of surprise, not altogether unmingled, methought, with fear. Then, bowing profoundly, he said:

“Leave me, monsieur, I beg of you. I will send for you again, a little later.”

I passed out of the cabin, and made my way up on to the poop, where I found Monsieur Leroy, the chief mate, in charge of the watch. He nodded to me as I ascended the poop ladder, and when I joined him in his fore-and-aft promenade of the weather side of the deck, jerked his head knowingly toward the skylight and remarked:

“In his tantrums again? Ah! quite as I expected. It is rather unfortunate for you, monsieur, that you happen to be an Englishman, for the mere mention of the word to him has the same effect as exhibiting a red rag to a bull: it drives him perfectly frantic with rage.”

“So it appears,” remarked I dryly. “What is the cause of it? Have you any idea?”

“No,” answered the mate. “I doubt whether anybody knows; perhaps he does not even know himself. Of course I have heard him speak of the losses which he has sustained through the interference of the ships of the Slave Squadron; but we who elect to make our living by following a vocation which civilised nations have agreed to declare unlawful must be prepared to be interfered with. For my own part I have no particular fault to find with those who have undertaken to suppress the slave-trade. We go into the business with our eyes open; we know the penalties attaching to it; and if we are foolish or unskilful enough to permit ourselves to be caught we must not grumble if those penalties are exacted from us. I like the life; I enjoy it; it is full of excitement and adventure; and when we succeed in outwitting you gentlemen the profits are handsome enough to amply repay us for all our risk and trouble. It is like playing a game of skill for a heavy wager; and I contend that no man who is not sportsman enough to bear his losses philosophically should engage in the game. But that is not precisely what ails the skipper; he takes his ill-luck grievously to heart it is true, but he insists that he has other grievances against the English as well; and, whatever they may be, they seem to have partially turned his brain.”

“Partially!” I objected. “Why, the man is as mad as a March hare. He absolutely loses all control of himself when he allows his temper to master him, and becomes more like a savage beast than a man!”

“Ay, that is true, he does,” agreed Leroy. “But, hark ye, monsieur, let me give you a friendly hint—you have escaped unharmed thus far, therefore I believe you may consider yourself reasonably safe; but in case of any further outbreaks on the captain’s part, take especial care that you give him no reason to suppose that you are afraid of him; that is the surest road to safety with him.”

“Upon my word I believe you are right,” said I. “At all events that is the road which I took with him just now, for I pinned him down to the cabin deck, and threatened to beat his brains out. Yet here I am, alive, to speak of it.”

“Good!” ejaculated the mate. “If you did that you are all right; I believe that if there is one thing he admires more than another it is absolute fearlessness. Show him that you do not care the snap of a finger for him and he will forgive you anything, even the fact that you are an Englishman.”

I walked the poop with Monsieur Leroy for a full hour, chatting with him and learning many things very well worth knowing; and while I was chatting with him I kept my eyes about me, carefully noting all the particulars and peculiarities of the barque, with a view to future contingencies. Among other things I learned that she was named La Mouette; that she was of three hundred and sixty-four tons register; that she mounted fourteen twenty-eight pound carronades on her main-deck and four six-pounders on her poop; that she carried a complement of one hundred and seventy men; and that she was then bound into the river Kwara for a cargo of slaves to be conveyed to Martinique, or Cuba, as circumstances might decide.

At the end of about an hour I was once more summoned to the cabin, where I found Tourville sitting at the table. The man had now completely regained his self-control; he was perfectly calm, and waved me courteously to a seat on the cabin sofa, which I took.

“Monsieur Fortescue,” said he, “I shall not mock you or myself by pretending to excuse or apologise for my recent outbreak of violence, for it is due to a weakness which I am wholly unable to conquer, and which may, quite possibly, get the better of me again. If it should, I must ask you to kindly be patient and forbearing with me, and to keep out of my way until the fit has passed. What I particularly wish to say to you now is that you are from this moment perfectly safe so long as it may be necessary for you to honour my ship with your presence. But, since you will naturally desire to rejoin your own ship as speedily as possible, I propose to tranship you into the first vessel bearing the British flag which we may chance to fall in with—provided, of course, that she is not a ship of war. Should we happen to fall in with a British man-o’-war, my course of action will be guided by circumstances; I shall not feel myself justified in trusting to her captain’s magnanimity to let us go free after delivering you safe on board her; but should the weather be fine enough to allow of such a proceeding without risk to you, I will give you a boat in which you may make your own way on board her. Meanwhile, I beg that you will regard yourself as my guest, free to come and go in this cabin as you please, and to take your meals at my table; and I have also made arrangements for your greater comfort in the state-room which Leroy assigned to you when you came aboard last night. I trust that these plans of mine will be agreeable to you.”

I replied that they were not only perfectly agreeable to me, but that I regarded them as exceedingly generous—taking all the circumstances of the case into consideration; that I regretted his violent antipathy to Englishmen, as I feared that, in consequence of it, my presence could never be otherwise than exceedingly disagreeable to him, but that during my enforced sojourn aboard La Mouette I would strive to render my nationality as little obtrusive as possible, and that I trusted we might very soon be fortunate enough to fall in with a craft of some sort into which he could transfer me. To which he replied that he fervently hoped so too, for both our sakes; then directing my attention to a case of books attached to the after bulkhead, on the opposite side to that occupied by the piano, he rose, bowed, and retired to his own cabin. As for me, I went out on deck and resumed my conversation with Leroy, telling him what had passed, and begging him to keep a sharp look-out for vessels; for that since Captain Tourville made no attempt to disguise his uneasiness at my presence on board his ship I was quite determined to tranship into the first craft that we might happen to fall in with, provided, of course, that she did not happen to be of questionable character—for I had no inclination to jump out of the frying-pan into the fire by going aboard another slaver.

The mate fully agreed with me as to the wisdom of leaving the ship as soon as possible; indeed I soon discovered that, even after what had passed between Tourville and myself, he was still very far from satisfied that there might not be further trouble ahead. “If such should unfortunately come,” said he, “you must maintain a bold front, and show him that you are not to be so easily frightened. When his fits are upon him he very strongly reminds me of a wild beast which hesitates to attack so long as one faces it boldly, but springs the instant that one’s back is turned.”

I considered this very excellent advice, singularly applicable to the circumstances, and determined to act upon it. At eight bells I was summoned below to supper, and found the cabin brilliantly lit, and the table a picture of dainty elegance in the matter of equipage and of choice fare. Captain Tourville was evidently no ascetic in the matter of eating and drinking, and the meal to which we immediately sat down was quite as good as many that I have partaken of ashore in so-called first-class hotels.

Tourville seemed at first to be in imminent danger of relapsing into one of his black moods, for he was distrait and inclined to be silent; but I was determined not to permit this if I could help it. I therefore persisted in talking to him, trying him with subject after subject, until I discovered him to be an enthusiast upon the arts of painting and music—in both of which I also dabbled, in an amateurish way. As soon as I spoke of these his brow cleared, he threw off his gloom, and spoke fluently and with evident knowledge of his subject, with the result that the meal which had begun so inauspiciously ended quite pleasantly. Nay, more than that, as soon as the cloth was drawn this extraordinary man opened the piano and, sitting down to it, played piece after piece, sang several songs, and finally invited me to sing, the result being that, on the whole, the evening passed with far less constraint than I had anticipated.

The next morning, while Tourville was engaged in taking his sights for the longitude and working them out, he suddenly complained of feeling ill, sent for Leroy, gave him certain instructions, and then took to his bed. By noon it became evident that he was in for a smart attack of malarial fever, to which it appeared he was very subject; and when I turned in that night the mate volunteered the information that he feared the skipper was going to be very ill.

Tourville’s condition on the following morning amply justified Leroy’s foreboding; he grew steadily worse, became delirious, and at length grew so violent that about mid-day the mate considered it necessary to remain with him constantly, lest in his madness he should rise from his bed and fling himself through the stern windows into the sea. One result of this was that I offered to take Leroy’s watch, from eight o’clock to midnight, an offer which was gratefully accepted; but as we were running down before a fair wind there was nothing for me to do beyond maintaining a good look-out, and I thus found it unnecessary to give the crew any orders or to interfere with them in any way. For the next three days Tourville’s condition was such that the constant presence of some one in his cabin, night and day, to watch over him and guard against the possibility of his doing himself an injury, became an absolute necessity, and Leroy, the chief mate, and Thoreau, the boatswain, shared this duty between them. I volunteered to assume nursing duty in the place of Leroy, but my offer was declined, the chief mate rather drily remarking that the presence of an Englishman by the captain’s bedside was scarcely likely to accelerate the patient’s recovery, while some of his ravings were of such a character that it was better for all concerned that I should not hear them. But, he added, if I would be complaisant enough to keep his watch for him, he would esteem it a very great favour. Of course I could do no less than accede to this suggestion with a good grace.

Chapter Fourteen.

H.B.M.S. Gadfly.

I had been on duty as Leroy’s deputy for two whole days when it fell to my turn to keep the middle watch, that is to say, the watch which extends from midnight to four o’clock in the morning.

When, upon being called by Marcel, the second mate, I went on deck to relieve him, he informed me that the wind had been steadily dropping all through the first watch, and expressed a fear that we were about to lose it altogether. This did not in the least surprise me, for we were now at about our lowest parallel, and on the border at least of, if not actually within, the belt of practically perpetual calms that exists about the Line, which are the sources of so much delay, vexation, and hard work to the mariner. That the wind had dropped very considerably since I had turned in was evident to me even before I reached the deck, for, upon turning out of my bunk to dress after being called, I had immediately noticed that the ship was almost upon an even keel, while the inert “sloppy” sound of the water alongside that reached my ears through the open port of my cabin told me that we were sailing but slowly.

The night was intensely dark, for the moon was but one day old, and had only barely revealed herself as a thin line of faint pearl in the evening sky for about half an hour before she followed the sun beneath the horizon, there was not a star to be seen in the whole of the visible firmament, and there was a feeling of hot, muggy dampness in the air that made me shrewdly suspect the presence overhead of a pall of rain-charged vapour, which would account for the opacity of the darkness which hemmed us in and pressed down upon us from above.

As Marcel curtly bade me good-night and went below upon being relieved, after giving me the course to be steered, and expressing his forebodings concerning the weather, I walked aft, glanced into the binnacle, and inquired of the helmsman whether the ship still held steerage-way, to which he replied that she did, and that was about all, the man whom he had relieved at eight bells having informed him that the log, when last hove, had recorded a speed of barely two and a half knots. He also volunteered the opinion that we were booked for a heavy downpour of rain before long, significantly glancing at the same time at the oilskins and sou’wester which he had brought aft with him.

As the time dragged slowly along the heat seemed steadily to grow more oppressive, and the difficulty of obtaining a full breath greater; the perspiration was streaming from every pore of my body, and I felt almost too languid to drag one foot after the other as I moved about the deck. That the sick man also was affected unfavourably was evident, for his shouts came up through the after skylight with positively startling distinctness as his delirium grew more acute.

At length, just after two bells had struck—and how dreadfully clamourous the strokes sounded in that heavy, stagnant air—the helmsman reported that the ship was no longer under command; and presently she swung broadside-on to the swell, rolling heavily, with loud splashing and gurgling sounds in the scuppers, with a swirling and washing of water under the counter, frequent vicious kicks of the now useless rudder, accompanied by violent clankings of the wheel chains, loud creakings and groanings of the timbers, heavy flappings and rustlings of the invisible canvas aloft, with fierce jerks of the chain sheets, and, in short, a full chorus of those multitudinous sounds that emanate from a rolling ship in a stark calm. The helmsman, no longer needed, lashed the wheel and, gathering up his oilskins, slouched away forward, muttering that he was going to get a light for his pipe; and I let him go, although I knew perfectly well that he had no intention of returning uncalled; for, after all, where was the use of keeping the man standing there doing nothing? I therefore contented myself by calling upon the hands forward, from time to time, to keep a bright look-out, and flung myself into a basket-chair belonging to the skipper.

Sitting thus, I gradually fell into a somewhat sombre reverie, in the course of which I reviewed the events that had befallen me during the short period that had elapsed since the Dolphin and the Eros had parted company. I went over again, in memory, all the circumstances connected with the loss of the brigantine, the hours I had spent alone in the longboat, her destruction and my somewhat dramatic appearance among the crew of La Mouette, my reception by her mad captain, and then fell to conjecturing what the future might have in store for me, when I was suddenly aroused to a consciousness of my immediate surroundings by a sort of impression it was no more than that—that I had heard the sound of a ship’s bell struck four times—ting-ting, ting-ting—far away yonder in the heart of the thick darkness. So faint, such a mere ghost of a sound, did it seem to be that I felt almost convinced it was purely imaginary, an effect resulting from the train of thought in which I had been indulging; yet I rose to my feet and, walking over to the skylight, peered through it at the cabin clock to ascertain what the time might actually be. It was on the stroke of two o’clock! Therefore if, as I had assured myself, the sounds were imaginary, it was at least a singular coincidence that they should have reached me just at that precise moment. I walked to the fore end of the poop, upon the rail guarding which the ship’s bell was mounted, and sharply struck four bells, after which I again called to the crew forward to maintain a sharp look-out.

“Now,” thought I, “if those sounds originated outside my own imagination some of those fellows for’ard will certainly have heard them, and will mention it.” But my call elicited nothing more than the stereotyped “Ay, ay, sir!” and a faint momentary shuffling of feet—meant, no doubt, to convey to me the impression that the look-outs were on the alert and then deep silence, as before, so far as any report of suspicious sounds was concerned. I stood for quite two minutes listening intently for any further sounds out of the darkness, but none came to me, nor could I detect any light or other evidence of another craft in our neighbourhood. At length, fully confirmed in my conviction that my imagination had been playing a trick with me, I returned to the chair in which I had been sitting, and there finished out the watch, merely leaving my seat to strike six, and finally eight, bells. But I placed my chair in such a position that while still sitting in it I could keep my eye on the clock, and as the hands crept round its face, marking first three and then four o’clock, I strained my listening powers to their utmost in the hope that those elusive bell-strokes might again come stealing across the sea to me, but without result. When four o’clock came round, after striking eight bells with perhaps a little more vigour than usual, I called Marcel, resigned the deck to him, and went below.

Yet, although I had felt drowsy enough on deck, and although Tourville’s ravings had ceased and he seemed to have fallen asleep, when I flung off my clothes and stretched myself on top of the bedding in my bunk, expecting to instantly drop off to sleep, I found, to my annoyance, that I had never been less inclined to slumber than I was just then. The fact was that in spite of myself those ghostly tinklings were still worrying me. Were they, or were they not, imaginary? If they were—well, there was an end of it. But if they were not imaginary; if, as I now perversely began to think, they were actual sounds, then it followed, of necessity, that there must be a craft of some sort not very far from us.

If this were the case, what, I asked myself, was she likely to be? She could but be one of three things—either a trader, a slaver, or a craft belonging to the Slave Squadron; the chances, therefore, were about even that on the morrow I might be able to effect my escape from La Mouette—always provided, of course, that those strokes of the bell had been real. For if the craft on board which they had been struck happened to be a trader, the odds were in favour of her being British; and the same might be said presuming her to be a man-o’-war. On the other hand, she might of course be a slaver; in which case I was fully resolved to endure the ills I had, rather than fly to others which might conceivably be worse.

Thinking thus, and worrying myself as to the best course to be pursued in certain eventualities, I lay there restlessly tossing first to one side, then to the other, until at length, sitting up in my bunk and putting my face to the open port in quest of a breath of fresh air, the fancy took me that the darkness was no longer quite so opaque as it had been, nay, I was sure of it, for by putting my face right up against the circular opening I was enabled to catch an occasional transient gleam of faint, shifting light that I knew was the glancing of the coming dawn upon the back of the oily swell that came creeping up to the ship; while, by directing my glances higher, I found that I was able to make out indistinctly something of the outline of the great black cloud-masses that overhung us.

In those latitudes the dawn comes as quickly as the daylight vanishes, day comes and goes with a rush—thus within five minutes of the time when I first glanced out through the port there was enough light abroad to reveal a louring, overcast, thunder-threatening sky, an inky, oil-smooth, sluggishly undulating sea, and a long, low schooner with tremendously taunt masts raking over her stern, and not an inch of canvas set, lying broadside-on to us at a distance of some two miles to the eastward. When I caught my first glimpse of her she was very little more than a black blur standing out against the background of scarcely less black sky; but even as I sat looking at her the light grew, her outline sharpened and became clear and distinct, and my heart gave a great bound of delight as the conviction forced itself upon me that I knew her. Yes, that long low hull, with its abnormal length of counter, and its bold sheer forward, the high, dominating bow with its excessive rake of stem, and the peculiar steeve of the bowsprit were all familiar to me. I had seen and noted them before while in Sierra Leone harbour, and I was convinced that the craft was none other than the British man-o’-war schooner Gadfly, armed with eight 12-pound carronades and a long 32-pound pivot-gun on her forecastle, with a crew of eighty men under the command of Lieutenant Peters, than whom there was not a more dashing and enterprising officer on the Coast.

I had just arrived at the above conclusion when I heard one of the barque’s crew hailing the poop; I could not distinguish what was said, but I presumed that it had reference to the schooner, for immediately upon the hail I heard the creaking of the basket-chair on the poop, as though Marcel was just hoisting himself out of it, and presently his reply came floating down through the skylight, “Ay, ay; I see her.” Then I heard the soft shuffling of his footsteps overhead and guessed that he was getting hold of the telescope wherewith to examine the schooner.

Ten minutes later, perhaps, I heard the second mate leave the poop and enter the cabin, and I concluded that he had come down to report the schooner to Leroy; but, to my surprise, instead of doing that, he came straight to my cabin door and knocked softly. I at once guessed that he wished to question me about the stranger, but it was no part of my policy to let him know that I had already seen and made up my mind about her, I therefore feigned to be sound asleep, and did not reply. Then he knocked a second time more sharply, whereupon I started up and responded in a drowsy tone of voice, “Hillo! who is it? What’s the matter?”

“Monsieur Fortescue,” Marcel responded, murmuring through the slats in the upper panel of the door, “I want you on deck, quick!”

“Oh, indeed,” I replied, still affecting drowsiness; “what for? Is there anything wrong?”

“Please come up at once, monsieur,” he returned, with a note of impatience in his voice. “When you come on deck you will understand why I want you.”

“Very well,” I grumbled, “I will be up in a brace of shakes;” whereupon my disturber departed.

But his conversation with me, brief as it had been, and quietly as it had been conducted, had evidently aroused Leroy, for as I emerged from my cabin he stepped out of his and we proceeded to the poop together, the chief mate expressing his surprise that Marcel should have called me instead of him. Of course I had a very shrewd idea as to the reason, but it was my cue to feign ignorance, and I did so.

By the time that Leroy and I reached the poop the sun must have risen—although there was no sign of him to be seen through the dense canopy of cloud that completely obscured the heavens—for the light had strengthened so much and the atmosphere was so clear that every detail of the distant schooner was plainly distinguishable even to the unassisted eye. Marcel was again examining her through the glass; it was therefore only natural that Leroy’s and my own glances should turn toward her as soon as our heads rose above the level of the rail. Neither of us said anything, however, until Marcel took the glass from his eye, when, seeing Leroy, he said:

“What d’ye think of her, monsieur? I have taken it upon myself to turn out Monsieur Fortescue to see whether he can tell us anything about her?”

“I?” I ejaculated. “What the dickens should I know about her? That she is a slaver anybody can tell with half an eye,”—as a matter of fact the Gadfly had been a slaver in her time, but having been captured, had been purchased into the Service—“but her skipper is a sensible fellow, evidently; he doesn’t believe in threshing his canvas threadbare in a calm, so he has furled it.”

“Permit me,” said Leroy, taking the telescope from Marcel and placing it to his eye. He looked long and anxiously at the distant schooner, and at length, with an “Ah!” that spoke volumes, passed the glass over to me.

I understood at once from that expressive “Ah!” that Leroy knew and had recognised the vessel, and that my pretence of ignorance would no longer serve any good purpose. I therefore determined to abandon it and to make a virtue of necessity by frankly admitting my knowledge. For if Leroy recognised the schooner, as I was certain he had, he would be fully aware of the fact that I, as an officer of the Slave Squadron, must necessarily know her too. After regarding her attentively through the lenses, therefore, for more than a minute, I passed the glass back to the chief mate with the quiet remark:

“Yes, I believe I recognise her now that I come to see her distinctly. If I am not mistaken she is the British man-o’-war schooner Gadfly, and her presence yonder affords Captain Tourville an opportunity to fulfil his promise of transhipping me. He promised me that, should such a case as this occur, he would give me a boat in which to transfer myself; and that small dinghy of yours will be just the thing.”

“Y–es,” returned Leroy meditatively. “He promised you that, did he? I remember your telling me so. But, unfortunately for you, he never said a word upon the matter to me, and he is far too sick just now to be worried about that or anything else. I am very much afraid, therefore, Monsieur Fortescue, that you will be obliged to let this opportunity pass; for, you see, I could not possibly take it upon myself to release you and give you even the dinghy without first receiving definite instructions from the captain.”

“Oh, come, I say, Leroy, you surely don’t mean to insinuate that you doubt my word, do you?” I remonstrated. “I hope you don’t pretend—”

“I do not pretend or insinuate anything,” Leroy retorted, somewhat impatiently; “I merely state the fact that I have received from Captain Tourville no such instructions as those you mention, and without such instructions I dare not comply with your wishes.”

“Ha, ha!” jeered Marcel. “You will have to curb your impatience, Monsieur Englishman. It is evident that we are not yet to lose the pleasure of your society.”

To this I replied nothing, but turned remonstratingly to the chief mate, urging him to at least do me the favour to go down and see if the captain chanced to be awake, and if so, to put the matter to him. But he would not listen to my suggestion, insisting that, even if Captain Tourville happened to be awake, he was far too ill to be troubled over any such matter. Suddenly it came to me that, despite all his past apparent friendliness, he was, for some unknown reason, anxious that I should not be released. Seeing, therefore, the utter uselessness of further argument, I desisted, and turned away, bitterly disappointed.

Not, of course, that with Leroy’s refusal all hope of deliverance was to be abandoned. By no means. So long as the Gadfly remained in sight there was always a chance; for if I knew anything of Lieutenant Peters, he was not the man to let us go without giving us an overhaul, and then my chance would certainly come. It was the duty of the ships of the Slave Squadron to stop and examine the papers of every ship encountered in those waters, and I was certain that Peters would not be likely to make an exception in our favour; while, if Leroy resisted, as, of course, he would—well, it would simply mean that La Mouette would be captured.

Meanwhile Leroy and Marcel were eagerly consulting together, and presently the second mate left the poop, went forward, and quietly called all hands. Then, as soon as the crew were all on deck, they were ordered to clear for action, the guns were cast loose, the magazine opened, and powder and shot were passed up on deck; the arms’ chests were brought up, cutlasses and pistols were served out—a brace of the latter to each man; pistols and muskets were loaded, pikes cast adrift and distributed, and, in short, every preparation was made for a fight, except that the guns were not then loaded. The second mate had been the moving spirit in all these preparations, Leroy, meanwhile, remaining on the poop and intently watching the schooner through the telescope.

By the time that the preparations for battle were complete it was close upon seven bells, and the order was given for the crew to get breakfast, and for that meal to be also served in the cabin. A few minutes later the steward came along with a pot of cocoa in one hand and a covered dish in the other, and Leroy, coming aft to where I stood moodily pondering, thrust his hand under my arm and said, with all apparent good-nature:

“Now, don’t sulk, mon cher, but come down and have some breakfast. Unless I am greatly mistaken the Gadfly is about to send us her boats, and then you may perhaps be able to return in them. But do not build too much upon the chance, for as soon as they come within range I shall open fire upon them with round and grape; and if we cannot sink them before they get alongside, why, we shall deserve to be hanged, that’s all.”

“Thank you, monsieur,” I answered, “but I have no appetite for breakfast just now, and, with your permission, will remain on deck rather than go into that suffocating cabin, merely to watch you and Marcel eat.”

“Eh, bien! as you please,” he returned, with a shrug of the shoulders. “I will not ask you to keep a look-out for me, because I can do that quite well from the windows of the captain’s cabin; and,” looking round, “I do not think you can do any mischief up here. You are sure you will not come down? Very well, then, an revoir!”

Now, to be left on deck, practically alone, was a bit of luck that I had not dared to hope for; and the fact that I had been, coupled with what Leroy had said about the boats, gave me an idea upon which I immediately acted. We were still lying broadside-on to the Gadfly, and I had not the least doubt that on board her a constant watch was being kept upon the barque; glancing round hurriedly, therefore, and observing that all hands on the forecastle were busy with their breakfast, I slipped over the side into the mizzen chains, where I could stand without being seen from inboard, and, removing my jacket, so that my white shirt-sleeves might show up clearly against the barque’s black side, I forthwith began to semaphore with my arms, waving them up and down for about a minute to attract attention. Then, without knowing whether or not I had been successful, I proceeded to signal the following message:

“La Mouette, slaver, armed with fourteen 28-pound carronades and four 6-pounders. Carries one hundred and seventy men. Attack with your long thirty-two; boats too risky!”

Then, donning my jacket again, I returned inboard just in time to see Marcel’s head appear above the level of the poop.

“Hillo!” he exclaimed; “I was wondering what had become of you. What have you been doing over the side? Considering whether you should attempt to swim across to the Gadfly?”

“Yes,” answered I boldly, seizing at once upon the suggestion thus given. “But I have thought better of it,” I continued. “There are too many sharks about. Look there!” and I pointed to a dorsal fin that was sculling lazily along half-a-dozen fathoms away.

The man looked at me suspiciously for several seconds, then walked to the side and looked over into the chains, but of course there was nothing to be seen. Then, muttering to himself, he returned to the cabin, presumably to finish his breakfast.

He had scarcely disappeared, and I was looking round for the telescope, when a flash of flame and a cloud of white smoke suddenly burst from the schooner’s forecastle, and presently a 32-pound shot dashed into the water within half-a-dozen fathoms of our rudder. “Good shot, but not quite enough elevation!” muttered I, delighted at this indication that my message had been noted and was being acted upon; and then came the sullen boom of the gun across the water. I went to the skylight and quite unnecessarily reported, “The schooner has opened fire!”

“Sacré-e-e!” I heard Leroy exclaim between his teeth. “The one thing that I was afraid of! He has thought better of sending his boats, then!”

Marcel answered something, but what it was I could not catch, and then the pair of them came racing up on deck. They had scarcely arrived when another shot came from the schooner, crashing through the bulwarks just forward of the fore rigging, dismounting a gun, and playing havoc with the men who crowded that part of the deck. Five were killed outright and nine wounded by that one shot and the splinters that it created. Leroy at once called the crew to quarters and ordered them to return the schooner’s fire; but the latter was too far off for either the carronades or the 6-pounders to reach her; and my spirits began to rise, for if the schooner could only continue as she had begun she would soon compel La Mouette to strike. And there was every prospect of this happening, for the Gadfly had now got our range to a nicety, and shot after shot hulled us, playing the very mischief with us, dismounting another gun, strewing our decks with killed and wounded, and cutting up our rigging, but, most unfortunately, never touching our spars. Leroy stamped fore and aft the deck, cursing like a madman, shaking his fist at the schooner, glowering savagely at me, and whistling for a wind.

“Give me a breeze!” he shouted; “give me a breeze, and I will run down and blow that schooner out of the water!”

Presently his prayer was answered, but not quite as he desired; for, while we watched, the clouds broke away to the eastward, and presently we saw a dark line stealing along the water toward the schooner. Ten minutes later all hands aboard her were busily engaged in making sail, and by the time that the wind reached her she was all ready for it. Then, as it filled her sails, she put up her helm and squared away for us, running down before the wind and yawing from time to time to give us another shot. But it was a fatal mistake; she should have continued to play the game of long bowls, in which case she could have done as she pleased with us; by keeping away, however, and running down to us, she gave Leroy just the chance he wanted; he waited until she was well within range of his carronades, and then, double-shotting them and watching his opportunity, he gave her the whole of his starboard broadside, and down came her foremast and main-topmast. At the same moment another shot came from the schooner, badly wounding our main-topmast above the cap, and the breeze reaching us almost immediately afterward, the spar went over the side, dragging down the mizzen topmast and the fore-topgallant-mast with it. The result of all this was that while the schooner broached to and rode by the wreck of her foremast as to a sea anchor, La Mouette fell broad off and refused to come to the wind again; consequently the distance between the two vessels rapidly widened until both were out of range, and the firing ceased.

Thus ended the fight; and I presume that the two craft soon passed out of sight of each other and did not again meet, during that voyage at least, for there was no more firing from La Mouette while I remained aboard her. But what transpired during the rest of the voyage I was destined to know very little about, for scarcely had the firing ceased when Captain Tourville, thin, weak, and emaciated, crept up on the poop. He had a pistol in his hand, and no sooner did his gaze fall on me than he levelled the weapon at me and fired it point-blank.

Fortunately for me, the man’s hand was so unsteady that the ball flew wide; but the report brought the mates and half-a-dozen men to us with a rush to see what was the matter.

“Take that young scoundrel,” exclaimed Tourville, pointing at me with a finger that trembled with rage as much as with weakness, “put his hands and his feet in irons, heave him down on the ballast, and leave him there until I give you further instructions.”

Chapter Fifteen.

In the hands of savages.

The order was promptly obeyed; and in a few minutes I found myself, heavily ironed, in the pitchy darkness of the lower hold, squatted disconsolately upon the bed of shingle which constituted the ballast of the vessel.

And what a situation for a young fellow of less than twenty years of age to be in! The ship of which I had been placed in command lost—foundered in mid-ocean, and, only too probably, all hands lost with her. Our fate would never be known; it would be concluded that one of the mysterious disasters that so frequently befall the seaman had overtaken us; we should be given up as lost; and there would be an end of us all, so far as our fellow-men were concerned. For whatever hopes I might once have entertained of escaping from this accursed ship, I had none now.

That Tourville would not be satisfied with anything short of taking my life, I was convinced; and very soon I began to feel that I did not care how soon he sated his vengeance; for confined below in the heat and darkness of the stifling hold, with no resting-place but the hard shingle for my aching body, breathing an atmosphere poisonous with the odour of bilge-water, with only three flinty ship-biscuits, alive with weevils, and a half-pint of putrid water per day upon which to sustain life, and beset by ferocious rats who disputed with me the possession of my scanty fare, I soon became so miserably ill that death quickly lost all its terrors, and I felt that I could welcome it as a release from my sufferings.

How long I remained in this state of wretchedness I cannot tell, for I soon lost count of time and indeed at last sank into a state of semi-delirium; but I think from subsequent calculations it must have been about ten or twelve days after the date of my incarceration that I was aroused once more to a complete consciousness of my surroundings by observing that a change had occurred in the motion of the ship. She no longer pitched and rolled as does a vessel in the open sea, but slid along—as I could tell by the gurgling sound of the water along her bends—upon a perfectly even keel except for the slight list or inclination due to the pressure of the wind upon her sails. I conjectured that she must have arrived at the end of her voyage and entered the Kwara river, a conjecture that was shortly afterward confirmed by the sounds on deck of shouted orders and the bustle and confusion attendant upon the operation of shortening sail, soon followed by the splash of an anchor from the bows and the rumble of the stout hempen cable through the hawse-pipe. Then ensued a period of quiet of several hours’ duration, broken at length by the appearance of the carpenter and another seaman who, having removed my irons, gruffly ordered me to follow them up on deck.

I felt altogether too wretchedly ill, and too utterly indifferent respecting my fate, to ask these men any questions, but contrived, by almost superhuman exertion, to climb up the perpendicular ladder which led to the deck; and when I presently emerged from the foetid atmosphere of the hold into the free air and dazzling sunshine of what proved to be early morning, I was so overcome by the sudden transition that I swooned away.

I must have remained in a state of complete unconsciousness for several hours, for when at length I again opened my eyes and looked about me the sun was nearly overhead, and I was lying unbound in the bottom of a long craft that my slowly returning senses at length enabled me to recognise as a native dug-out canoe. She was about forty feet long by four feet beam and about two feet deep; and was manned by thirty as ferocious-looking savages as one need ever wish to see. They were stark naked, save for a kind of breech-clout round the loins, and squatted in pairs along the bottom of the canoe, plying short broad-bladed paddles with which they seemed to be urging their craft at a pretty good pace through the water. A big, brawny, and most repulsive-looking savage, who was probably the captain of the craft, sat perched up in the stern, steering with a somewhat longer and broader-bladed paddle, and urging his crew to maintain their exertions by continually giving utterance to the most hair-raising shrieks and yells.

It was the fresh air, I suppose, that revived me, even as, after my long sojourn in the noisome hold of the slaver, it had prostrated me by my sudden emergence into it, and I presently became conscious that I was feeling distinctly better than I had done for some time past. For a minute or two I lay passively where I was, in the bottom of the canoe, blinking up at the pallid zenith, near which the sun blazed with blinding brilliancy; and then, no one saying me nay, I slowly and painfully raised myself into a sitting posture and looked about me.

We were in a typical African river, about three-quarters of a mile wide, with low bush-clad banks bordered by the inevitable mangrove, while beyond towered the virgin tropical forest, dense, impenetrable, and full of mystery. The turbid current was against us, as could be seen at a glance; I therefore knew at once that we were paddling up-stream. But whither were we bound; of what tribe or nation were the negroes who manned the canoe; and how had I come to be among them? Had Tourville, with a greater refinement of cruelty than even I gave him credit for, handed me over to the tender mercies of these savages, to work their bloodthirsty will upon me, instead of himself murdering me out of hand? If so, what was to be my ultimate fate? I shuddered as I put this question to myself, for I had been on the Coast quite long enough to have heard many a gruesome, blood-curdling story of the horrors perpetrated by the African savages upon those unhappy white men who had been unfortunate enough to fall into their hands.

But I was not going to allow myself to be frightened or discouraged by dwelling upon stories of that kind; I was feeling so far better that the desire to live had returned to me. I even experienced some slight sensation of hunger, and there was no doubt at all as to the fact that I was parched with thirst. I therefore turned to the savage who was flourishing the steering paddle and, first pointing to my open mouth, went through the motions of raising a vessel to it and drinking. The man evidently understood me, for he shouted a few—to me quite unintelligible—words, whereupon one of the paddlers about the centre of the canoe laid in his paddle for a few moments, did something dexterous with a spear and a brownish-grey object the size of a man’s head, and a minute later my lips were glued to a luscious cocoa-nut, the extremity of which had been deftly struck off with the blade of the spear, disclosing the white-lined hollow of the cup within brimming with a full pint or more of the delicious “milk,” which I swallowed to the last drop. Then, breaking off a strip of the husk and using it as a spoon, I proceeded to scrape out and hungrily devour the soft creamy fruit that lined the shell, and thus made the most satisfying and enjoyable meal that had passed my lips for many a day. Shortly afterward, the strength of the ebb current increasing so greatly that we were able to make scarcely any headway against it, our steersman headed the canoe in toward the western bank of the river, and we presently entered a narrow creek up which we passed for a distance of about a quarter of a mile until we reached a practicable landing-place, when the canoe was secured to a stout mangrove root, and all hands stepped out of her, the steersman taking the precaution to draw my attention to the spears and bows and arrows with which his party were armed, as a hint, I suppose, of what I might expect should I be foolish enough to attempt to escape. We pushed our way through the thick bush for a distance of about a hundred yards, and then reached a small open space, where we bivouacked; a party of ten disappearing into the bush, while the rest remained to kindle a fire and, evidently, to look after me and make sure that I did not give them the slip. At length, after the lapse of about half an hour, the party who had vanished into the bush returned, singly or by two’s and three’s, some bringing in a monkey or two, others a few brace of parrots, one man a big lizard like an iguana, another a fine deer, until each of the ten had contributed something to the common larder, when the fire was made up, a plentiful supply of food cooked, and all hands set to with a will, each apparently animated by a determination to show all the others how much solid food he was capable of putting out of sight at a sitting. They very civilly offered me a choice of their dainties, and I accepted a tolerably substantial venison steak, broiled over the fire by being suspended close over the glowing embers upon the end of a stick. Off this I contrived to make a fairly hearty meal, after which, following the example of the others, I stretched myself out in the long grass under the shadow of a big bush, and quickly fell into a deep sleep.

I was aroused from my slumbers, some hours later, by my savage companions, who intimated to me, by signs, that the moment had arrived for us to take our departure, and we accordingly wended our way back to the canoe, taking our surplus stock of food with us, and, embarking, soon found ourselves once more afloat on the placid bosom of the broad river, the downward and opposing current of which had by this time greatly slackened under the influence of the flood tide which was evidently making fast.

Keeping well out toward the centre of the stream, and paddling steadily, we now made rapid progress in a northerly direction, the river gradually widening and shoaling as we went, until, by the time of sunset, we found ourselves progressing up a comparatively narrow deep-water channel with wide expanses of shallow water on either side of us, dotted here and there with dry patches of mud or sand upon which crocodiles lay basking, in some cases in groups of as many as six or eight together, while occasionally the great head of a hippopotamus appeared for a moment, only to vanish again with a little eddying swirl of the mud-charged water as the creature dived.

While the sun still hovered a degree or two above the tree-tops on the western bank of the stream, the moon, now nearly full, sailed gloriously into view above the clumps of vegetation that shrouded the eastern bank; and the gradual transition from the ruddy, golden light of the dying sun to the flooding silver of the brilliant moon, with the ever-changing effects that accompanied the transition, presented a spectacle of enchanting beauty such as I had never up to that time beheld, even at sea. But, beyond a low muttered word or two and a grunt, apparently expressive of deep satisfaction at the appearance of the unclouded moon, the savages took no notice of the magical loveliness of the scene; and while I sat entranced and practically oblivious of everything else, they merely paddled the harder, conversing in low tones among themselves. Of course I did not understand a single word of what was said, yet, so much did I gather from the glances that they flung about them, and the emphasis and accent of their speech, that I shrewdly suspected them of anticipating the possibility of attack from the shore.

This suspicion was strengthened, a little later on, by the fact that as we approached a certain bend in the river our timoneer edged the canoe in toward the eastern bank, until we were completely plunged in the deep shadow of the vegetation that grew right down to the water’s edge, as though he were desirous of escaping observation; at least there was no other reason that I could think of for such a manoeuvre, for by this time the current was running up quite strongly, and under ordinary circumstances it would have been to our advantage to have remained in mid-channel, where the full strength of it would be felt. But if this was his object he was only partially successful; for we presently arrived abreast of a bay, or it may have been the wide entrance of a creek, many of which branched off the main stream on either hand, where the forest receded so far that, for the distance of fully half a mile, we were compelled to traverse a space of water completely flooded by the brilliant rays of the moon, and before we had accomplished half the passage a quick ejaculation of mingled annoyance and dismay from the steersman caused me to glance toward the western bank, from an opening in which half-a-dozen canoes were darting out with the evident determination to intercept us if possible. Fortunately for us, however, we had already passed the spot from which the pursuing canoes were emerging, this spot now bearing well upon our port quarter; but, on the other hand, our pursuers would presently obtain an important advantage over us, since they would soon reach the deep channel, where the upward current was now running strongly. I feared that when they arrived in that channel they would turn the bows of their craft up-stream and avail themselves of the advantage afforded by the strong current to endeavour to pass ahead of us and cut off our retreat; but in the eagerness of their pursuit they seemed to lose sight of this advantage, for they continued to head straight for us, while we, impelled by the full strength of our thirty paddles, now plied with desperate energy by our freely perspiring crew, gradually drew out and threw our pursuers still further on our quarter. Yet they were steadily nearing us, and I did not see how we could scrape clear without something in the nature of a fight.

All this time we were heading straight for a low, heavily timbered point which marked another turn in the course of the stream, and I could see that our people were straining every nerve to get round this point before being overtaken. At length, with a mighty stirring up of the mud by our deep-plunging paddles in the shallow water, we shaved close round this point and almost immediately afterwards darted into a narrow creek so completely overgrown with vegetation that the boughs of the mangroves and other trees united over our heads, forming a sort of tunnel, the interior of which was so opaquely dark that it was scarcely possible to see one’s hand before one’s face. Yet our helmsman seemed to know the place perfectly, for he stood boldly on, urging the crew to continue their exertions. At length, after we had traversed a full hundred yards or more of the creek, we sighted a spot ahead where, doubtless in consequence of a wind-fall, or some similar phenomenon, the dense bush had been levelled, leaving room for a patch of clear moonlight, some ten yards in circumference, to fall full upon the channel of the creek, revealing every object, even the smallest, within its boundary with a clearness and distinctness that was positively startling. Arrived here, the canoe was sheered in alongside a spot where the mangroves grew thickly, and some twenty of our crew, laying in their paddles, hastily seized their bows and arrows and, springing ashore, swiftly vanished into the adjacent deep shadow, while the canoe, with the remainder of us on board, pushed across the patch of moonlight into the darkness beyond, where she was forced beneath an overhanging mass of foliage, in such a manner as to lie perfectly concealed.

Hardly had this been accomplished when we heard from the river the exclamations of our pursuers, startled at our sudden and, at first, inexplicable disappearance. But it did not long remain inexplicable; some sharp eye soon detected the entrance of the creek and suspected that we were concealed therein, for, after a few minutes spent in animated discussion by the occupants, the pursuing canoes were heard cautiously approaching. It was evident that their knowledge of the creek was not nearly so complete as that of our own steersman, for whereas we had contrived, despite the pitchy darkness, to navigate the crooked channel without running foul of anything, we could hear the continual swishing of foliage and the bumping of the canoes as they encountered the overhanging branches or collided with the mangrove roots on one side or the other. We were thus able to follow the progress of their approach with the utmost precision, and the moment that the leading canoe—a craft manned by some twenty most villainous-looking savages—emerged from the darkness into the patch of brilliant moonlight, she was greeted with a murderous discharge of arrows at short range which put the greater part of her crew hors de combat. She was closely followed by another canoe of about the same size, the occupants of which were treated to a similarly warm reception. A warning shout from one of the survivors of this second discharge was raised in time to save those behind from pushing forward to meet a similar fate, and now the quick twanging of bowstrings and loud shouts from those ashore and afloat told that a fierce battle was raging. But our people, from the advantage of their position, had very much the best of it, and at length the pursuers were beaten off and compelled to retreat precipitately, with the loss of nearly two-thirds of their number and two canoes, which, with their wounded occupants, were left in our hands, while our party escaped absolutely unscathed. The wounded of the enemy, numbering eleven, would have met with but short shrift at the hands of their captors, but for the interposition of the man whom I have termed our timoneer, who seemed to be a petty chief. This individual carefully examined his prisoners and found that three of them were so severely wounded as to afford little hope of their recovery; these three he therefore despatched with the most callous sang-froid by driving his broad-bladed spear into their throats, after which they were flung over the side; the remaining eight, who appeared to be only temporarily disabled, were trussed up, hand and foot, with thin, tough, pliant creeper, cut from the adjacent jungle, and bestowed, without much consideration for their comfort, in the bottom of our canoe. The captured canoes were then sunk by means of a few large stones placed in them to take them down, and then heeled until the water flowed in over their gunwales, when they quickly vanished beneath the turbid, foetid waters of the creek. This done, our people made preparations for the continuation of their journey.

But our leader, whose knowledge of the river seemed intimate enough to entitle him to a certificate as branch pilot, had no inclination to incur the risk of leaving the creek again at the point where we had entered it, and thus very possibly falling into a cleverly arranged ambuscade. On the contrary, he proceeded to push boldly on up the creek for a distance of several miles, much to my astonishment, for the waterway generally was so narrow as scarcely to afford room for two canoes to pass abreast, and I was momentarily expecting that this creek, like so many others of the African rivers, would abruptly end in a mud-bank overgrown with mangroves. Contrary to my anticipations, however, when a dozen times or more the banks closed in upon us in such a manner as to suggest that our further progress was about to be stayed, we would suddenly emerge into a comparatively wide channel, and push merrily on for a mile or more ere we encountered our next difficulty. In this manner we must have traversed a distance of nearly twenty miles when, to my amazement, and also that of most of the canoe’s crew, I think, we suddenly emerged from the tunnel-like channel that we had been navigating for something like five hours, and found ourselves once more in what was undoubtedly the main stream of the river, and so far away from the spot at which we had diverged from it that it was nowhere to be seen. The moon had by this time risen so high in the sky as to be almost directly overhead; there was therefore little or no shadow on either bank of the river to shroud us from observation, nevertheless we continued to cling closely to the eastern bank for several miles further—the tide having now turned and being against us—until at length, the current becoming too strong for us, our leader found a practicable landing-place, and all hands, except the unfortunate prisoners of war, scrambled ashore and, hastily lighting a fire, disposed ourselves to sleep around it.

Now, it will probably be thought by many that I was submitting to my uncertain fate with far greater philosophy than wisdom; but this was by no means the case. The fact was that I had no sooner awakened to the consciousness that I was a prisoner in the hands of African savages than I made up my mind that I could not too soon effect my escape from them; for although I have just spoken of my fate as uncertain I felt that, in reality, there was very little uncertainty about it. It was so rarely that a white man fell into the hands of the negro savages that when one had the misfortune to do so they generally made the utmost of him. And that “utmost” was usually something in which prolonged and agonising torture figured largely. But it would obviously be worse than useless to attempt to escape until an opportunity occurred of at least a fair prospect of success; for to attempt and fail meant the extinguishment at once of all further hope. And, up to the present, I had not had a ghost of an opportunity. My captors had taken good care of that, although they had been kind enough to leave me unbound. But now, when all hands must be feeling the effect of fatigue after several hours of strenuous labour at the paddles, and were likely to sleep soundly, it was possible that, by biding my time, I might be able to steal off to the canoe and cut the bonds of the captives who had been so callously left in it, when it would be strange indeed if, out of gratitude for my release of them, they were not willing to help me to make my way back to the mouth of the river, where I should of course have to take my chance of finding a ship the master of which would be willing to receive me on board. It was not, perhaps, a very brilliant prospect, but I felt that it was at least preferable to that to which I might look forward if I remained in the company of my present owners; and accordingly when my sable companions disposed themselves to sleep, I apparently did the same, but summoned all my energies to aid me in the task of resisting the tendency toward somnolence that I felt stealing over me.

But this was not nearly so easy as I had believed it would be. If I closed my eyes for a few seconds a delicious languor seized me, my thoughts began to wander, and it was only by an almost painful effort that I succeeded in, as it were, jerking myself back to full consciousness. My intention was to remain awake until all my companions had become wrapped in slumber, and then effect my escape from them; but to my chagrin I found that while it was almost impossible for me to remain awake, my captors or owners—I scarcely knew which to consider them seemed restless, watchful, and all more or less upon the alert. Finally, while waiting and watching for signs that they were succumbing to the influence of the drowsy god, I lost all control of myself and sank into a profound and delicious slumber.

Chapter Sixteen.

King Banda.

How long I remained steeped in that delightful and refreshing sleep I did not then know; but when at length I awoke with a violent start the embers of the fire were merely smouldering, while the snorts and snores that were emitted by the recumbent figures grouped around it seemed to indicate that the fateful moment had arrived when I might make a bid for liberty with some prospect of success. It was now very much darker than it had been when I sank into involuntary slumber, for the moon had swung so far over toward the west that at least two-thirds of the small clearing which we occupied were enveloped in deep shadow, but I observed with some dismay that my path to the canoe lay directly across the patch that was still bathed in the moon’s rays. That, however, could not be helped; I could not afford to delay until the moon had sunk low enough to throw the entire clearing into shadow, for with the setting of the moon would come dawn and sunrise. I therefore determined to start upon my attempt forthwith, and, as a first step, rolled myself over, away from the fire, as though stirring in my sleep.

I was now lying with my back to the fire, and could therefore not see my companions or observe what effect, if any, my movement had had upon them; but I resolved not to fail for want of caution, so I made no further attempt to withdraw myself for the next ten minutes, but confined myself simply to a few restless movements, as though—which was actually the case—I was being worried by the swarms of minute creeping and biting things with which the spot abounded. Then, at the end of about ten minutes from my first movement, I ventured again to roll over in the same direction as before, which once more brought me with my face toward the fire. I now opened my eyes cautiously and carefully surveyed my surroundings. Not one of the black figures about the fire appeared to have altered his position in the slightest degree, so far as I could perceive, while the snoring and snorting still proceeded as vigorously as ever. I lay quite still for two or three minutes, and then, as everything seemed perfectly safe, and I had not too much time to spare, I decided that I might venture upon a somewhat more rapid mode of progression. I accordingly raised myself upon my hands and knees, and proceeded to crawl very cautiously toward the canoe, looking back from time to time to see if I were observed.

It was while I was thus engaged in looking back, while still creeping forward, that, as I put forth my right hand, it fell upon something cold and clammy that stirred beneath my touch, and the next instant I felt a sharp pricking sensation in the fleshy base of my right thumb. Like lightning I snatched my hand away, threw myself backward and sprang to my feet with an involuntary cry; and as I did so I indistinctly caught sight of a small wriggling object in the long grass that seemed to vanish in a flash. It was a snake, and it had bitten me! Yes, there was no mistake about that, for as I lifted my hand to my eyes there was light enough for me to see two drops of blood, about a quarter of an inch apart upon my right hand. Upon the spur of the moment I clapped the wounded part to my mouth and sucked vigorously, spitting out such blood as I was able to draw from the wound, and this I continued to do industriously for the next hour or more. But my chance of escape was gone for that night at least; for my cry brought the whole of the savages to their feet as one man, with their weapons grasped and ready for instant use. Some half-a-dozen of them, seeing me upon my feet, sprang toward me and surrounded me with angry cries, but I did not of course make the slightest attempt to run; on the contrary, I showed them my wounded hand, and, with two fingers of my left hand extended, made a motion as of a snake striking his fangs into my flesh. The individual whom I took to be the chief of the little party thereupon led me back to the fire, and thrusting two or three dry twigs into the smouldering ashes, fanned the latter into a blaze with his breath, thus causing the twigs to ignite. Then, using these twigs as a torch, he carefully examined my wounded hand, shook his head as though to indicate that I had no chance, cast the blazing twigs to the ground, and saying a few words to his companions, lay down and again composed himself to sleep, an example at once followed by his companions. I, however, remained awake, diligently sucking my wounded hand, which soon began to swell and grow acutely painful, the throbbing pain extending all the way up my arm, right to the shoulder. The pain at length became so acute that I could sit still no longer, I therefore sprang to my feet and began to pace to and fro; but I had no sooner done so than half-a-dozen of the savages were beside me, not exactly interfering with me—for I think they understood pretty clearly what was the matter with me—but making it perfectly plain that they were watching me, and that only a certain amount of freedom would be permitted me. Whether they really understood that I was actually attempting to effect my escape when the snake bit me, I was never able to determine.

At length the dawn arrived, day broke, the sun rose, and a few of the savages, taking their bows and arrows, went off into the bush to forage, as I surmised; and a little later they returned, one after the other, each bringing some contribution to the common larder, while others busied themselves in collecting fresh wood and rebuilding the fire. While they were thus engaged, one of the party, who happened to pass near the spot where I had been bitten, suddenly uttered a most dreadful yell, grasped his left foot, looked at it a moment, and then began with furious haste to search about in the long grass, which he pushed apart with the blade of his spear. A few seconds later he fell to stabbing the ground, as it seemed, savagely, finally stooping down and picking up the still writhing halves of a snake that had been cut clean in two by a blow of his spear. It was not at all a formidable-looking creature, being not more than eighteen inches long and perhaps three inches girth about the thickest part of its body. But it was an ugly, repulsive-looking brute, its head being heart-shaped, and its body almost the same thickness for the greater part of its length, terminating in a short, blunt tail. Its ground colour was a dirty grey, upon which occurred large, irregular blotches or markings of dull black with a few splashes of brilliant red here and there. The fellow who had fallen upon it with such ferocity, and who had evidently been bitten by it, brought the two writhing fragments and flung them into the fire, in the midst of which they writhed still more horribly. Then seizing a good, stout, brightly-glowing brand from the fire, he coolly sat down and applied the almost white-hot end to the wound, which was in his left instep. I do not think I ever saw anything more heroic than this act of the savage, for though the flesh hissed and smoked and gave forth a most horrible odour of burnt flesh, the man never winced, but calmly and deliberately cauterised the bite with as much care and thoroughness as though he had been operating upon somebody else. But that he was not insensible to his self-inflicted torture was very evident from the fact that in a few seconds he was literally drenched with the perspiration that started from every pore of his body.

While this was happening, the leader of the party had hurriedly raked from the fire the scorched and blistered half of the snake to which the head was attached, and, seizing it by the neck, squeezed it until the jaws were forced open, revealing two long, slender, needle-like fangs projecting from the upper jaw. Holding this horrible object between the finger and thumb of his right hand, he approached me, and, before I had the least idea of what he intended to do, seized my wounded hand and approached the head of the still living reptile so closely to it that it was easily to be seen that the two tiny punctures in my flesh were exactly the same distance apart as the snake’s fangs, the inference being that this was the identical reptile that had bitten me. Having satisfied himself of this, the man flung the loathsome object back into the heart of the fire, where it was soon consumed.

I was by this time suffering the most dreadful agony, my hand and arm were so terribly swollen that they had almost lost all semblance to any portion of the human anatomy, while the two punctures made by the poison fangs were puffed up, almost to bursting, and encircled by two rings of livid grey colour. The throbbing of the limb, as the blood forced itself through the congested passages, can only be compared to the pulsing of a stream of fire, and I am certain that, had I been within reach of qualified surgical assistance at the moment, I should have insisted upon having the limb removed, as I was convinced that the pain of amputation would have been less acute than that from which I was suffering. Needless to say, I had no appetite for food when it was offered me a little while afterward; but I felt thirsty enough to drink the river dry, and quaffed several cocoa-nuts with an ecstasy of delight that almost caused me to forget my pain—for the moment.

Breakfast over, the word was given to re-embark, and we all wended our way back to the canoe. I do not know whether it was deliberate intention, or merely the result of accident, but I could not help noticing that during the short journey from our camping-place to the spot where the canoe had been left, there were always three or four savages quite close to me, who appeared to be keeping a very careful watch upon my movements, as though they more than half suspected me of a desire to give them the slip; but I was by this time suffering such excruciating agony that, for the time being at least, all thoughts of escape were completely banished from my mind. I had become quite convinced that the bite was going to prove fatal, and my only subject of speculation was how many more hours of torture I was doomed to endure before merciful death would come to my relief. But after we had been afloat for about half an hour, and were once more speeding up the river as fast as the sturdy arms of the paddlers could urge us, I suddenly became violently sick, the paroxysm lasting for nearly ten minutes; and when I had in some degree recovered from the exhaustion attendant upon this attack, I was equally surprised and delighted to find that the pain and throbbing in my arm were distinctly less acute; and from that moment, as much to the astonishment of the savages as of myself, my symptoms rapidly improved, until by evening I was so far free from pain as to be able to sleep for several hours, although the swelling did not entirely subside until nearly forty-eight hours later. But meanwhile my fellow-sufferer, the savage who had also been bitten, and who had resorted to the heroic method of cauterising his wound, had been all day steadily developing symptoms similar to my own before the curative attack of sickness, his foot and leg, right up to the hip, had swollen to an enormous size and become so stiff that when the moment arrived for us to disembark for the night he was unable to move, and begged most piteously—as I interpreted the tones of his voice and his actions—to be left in the canoe all night, to fight out the battle between life and death alone and undisturbed.

The next morning, when we went down to the canoe, the poor fellow was not only dead, but his whole body was swollen almost out of human semblance, presenting in that and other respects a most shocking and revolting spectacle. We took the corpse with us until we had reached the main channel of the river, and there flung it overboard. We had scarcely left it fifty fathoms astern when there arose a sudden violent commotion in the water about it, and a second or two later it disappeared from view, dragged down by the voracious crocodiles with which the river swarmed.

I was by this time quite free from pain, and apart from a feeling of extreme debility, which I had endured for some hours on the previous day, I was not much the worse for the alarming experience that I had undergone. The death of the savage who had been bitten after me, and undoubtedly by the same reptile, conclusively proved how very narrow had been my escape from a similar fate; and I naturally fell to wondering how it was that he had succumbed to his injury while I had recovered from mine. For it seemed to me at the moment that the remedial measure which he had adopted ought, from its very severe and drastic character, to have proved much more efficacious than my own; whereas the opposite was the case. But upon further reflection I came to the conclusion that while I had proceeded to suck the poison from the wound at once, or within a second or two of its infliction, the savage had wasted at least a minute in pursuing and slaying his enemy before cauterising his wound, and that this minute of delay, accompanied as it was by somewhat violent action on the part of the injured man, had sufficed for the poison to obtain a strong enough hold upon his system to produce fatal results. Whether or not this is the correct explanation I must leave to those who are better qualified than myself to judge.

Day after day we steadily pursued our course up the river, which, for the most part, retained the same dreary, monotonous aspect of low, bush-clad, mangrove-lined banks, and practically the same width, save where, at occasional intervals, it widened out and became dotted with islands, some of considerable size. At length we arrived at a point where the land on the western bank rose into a range of hills some eight or nine hundred feet high, densely clothed with vegetation to their summits. This range of hills extended northward for a distance of about thirty miles before it once more sank into the plain; but before it sank completely out of sight astern more high land was sighted ahead, and two days later we found ourselves navigating among some very picturesque scenery, with high land on both sides of us, some of the peaks being twelve to fourteen hundred feet high. Late in the evening of the second day after entering upon this picturesque stretch of the river we arrived at a point where the stream forked into two of apparently equal width and depth, one branch striking away to the eastward, while the other continued its northerly course. Here my savage companions proceeded with the utmost caution, frequently landing and sending one or two of the party away to reconnoitre, and otherwise behaving as though they feared attack; but after a slow and anxious progress of some twenty hours’ duration they seemed to consider the danger as past, and once more pressed boldly forward.

By this time I had completely recovered, not only from the effects of the snake-bite—at which my companions seemed greatly astonished—but also from the hardship and privation which I had experienced during the latter part of my voyage aboard La Mouette, and had begun to think very seriously of how I was to effect my escape from those who held me captive. Not that I was ill-treated by them, far from it; I enjoyed the same fare as themselves, and was never asked to share their labours, and that, I take it, was as much good treatment as I could reasonably expect under the circumstances. But I knew that they were not hampering themselves by taking me and their other prisoners this long journey up the river—much of the paddling being done against the stream—merely for the pleasure of enjoying our society. My intuition assured me that their action had a more sinister motive than this, and in any case I had no desire to penetrate the interior of equatorial Africa; therefore so soon as I felt that my health and strength were sufficiently restored to allow of my attempting the long and perilous journey back to the sea alone, I began to consider the question of escape. But the longer I thought of it the less became my hope of success; for I very soon discovered that under no circumstances whatever were my custodians disposed to allow me to stray a yard out of their sight. Without imposing any actual restraint upon me, they invariably so contrived that, if I made the slightest attempt to withdraw myself from them, three or four of the most active of the party, always well armed, had occasion to go in precisely the same direction as myself. That, however, was not my only difficulty; for, assuming for a moment the possibility of my being able to give the savages the slip, how was I, a white man, alone, unarmed, and with no means of obtaining food, to make my way down more than two hundred miles of river, flowing through a country every inhabitant of which would undoubtedly be an enemy, whose delight it would be to hunt me to death? I told myself that if I could obtain a small, light, handy canoe and weapons, even though they should but consist of a bow and arrows, the situation would not be altogether hopeless—for I possessed a very fair share of pluck and resource; but I felt that before I could effect my escape from my watchful custodians, and obtain these necessities, I might find myself in so dire a strait as to render them and all else valueless to me. Yet I would not suffer myself to feel discouraged, for I recognised that to abandon hope was to virtually surrender myself tamely to the worst that fate might have in store for me, and this was by no means my disposition; I therefore continued to keep my eyes wide open for an opportunity.

But, watch as I might, the opportunity never presented itself, nor, thanks to the watchfulness of my companions, could I make one; so the time dragged on until, after a river voyage of more than three weeks, we one evening, about two hours before sunset, entered a creek important enough to suggest the idea that it might possibly be a small tributary of the main river. After paddling up it for a distance of about two miles we suddenly hove in sight of a native town of considerable size built upon the north bank of the creek, upon an area of ground that had been completely cleared of all undergrowth, but was well shaded by the larger trees which had been allowed to stand. That the town was of some importance, as well as of considerable size, I surmised from the fact that, with a few exceptions, the habitations, instead of being of the usual circular, bee-hive shape common to most native African towns, were of comparatively spacious dimensions and substantial construction, being for the most part quadrangular in plan, with thick walls built of substantial wattles, interwoven about stout poles sunk well into the ground and solidly plastered with clay which, having dried and hardened in the sun, had become quite weather-tight, protected as they were from the tropical rains by a thick thatch of palm leaves, with which also their steep sloping roofs were covered. The average size of these huts was about twenty feet long by twelve feet wide and eight feet high to the eaves; but there were others—about fifty of them altogether—surrounded by and cut off from the rest by a high and stout palisade—the points of the palisades being sharpened, in order, as I took it, to render the fence unclimbable—which were not only considerably larger and more substantial in point of construction, but which, as I afterward had opportunity to observe, evidenced some rude attempt at decoration in the form of grotesquely carved finials affixed to the roofs. This part of the town, situated in its centre, and covering, perhaps, a space of forty acres, was, I afterwards learned, the habitation of King Banda, his Court, the principal officers of his army and household, and the priests, whose temple, or fetish-house, stood on the opposite side of the square to that occupied by the “palace” of the king.

Our appearance did not at first attract very much attention, or create any very great amount of excitement; but when we arrived within hail of the beach in front of the town—upon which were hauled up some three to four hundred canoes of various sizes—our skipper suddenly sprang to his feet and, placing his hands trumpet-wise to his mouth, began, in a curious, high-pitched voice, to shout a somewhat lengthy communication. Before it was half finished there was a very distinct commotion upon the beach; half the naked children, who had been playing in the water, were racing up to the town as fast as their legs would carry them, shouting as they went, while from every hut the inhabitants came pouring out, like ants from a disturbed nest, and began to hurry down to the beach. By the time that we arrived there must have been at least two thousand people assembled to meet us, and others were hurrying down in crowds.

I soon found that I was the cause of all the commotion, for no sooner did I step out of the canoe than, although my travelling companions formed themselves into a cordon round me, and the headman or chief who had me in charge strove by virtue of his authority to prevent such a happening, there occurred a wild rush on the part of the crowd to get at least a sight of me, while those who could get near enough to me insisted upon touching my skin, apparently with the object of satisfying themselves as to the genuineness of its colour; and from their eagerness and their exclamations of astonishment I came to the conclusion that although they might have heard of, they had never actually seen a white man before, a conclusion which I afterwards found to be correct.

Using the butts, and occasionally the points, of their spears freely in order to force a passage through the steadily growing crowd, my escort slowly made their way toward that part of the town which was enclosed by the palisade; and, as they did so, I studied the faces of those who thronged about me, with the object of forming some idea, if I could, of the fate that I might expect at their hands.

I must confess that the results of my inspection were by no means reassuring. The first fact to impress itself upon me was that these people among whom I now found myself were of an entirely different race from the negro, properly so-called—the woolly-pated, high cheek-boned, ebony-skinned individual with snub nose and thick lips usually met with aboard a slaver. To start with, their colour was much lighter, being a clear brown of varying degrees of depth, from that of the mulatto to a tint not many shades deeper than that of the average Spaniard. But this difference, marked though it was, was not so great as that between their cast of features and that of the negro; the features of these people were, for the most part, clean cut, shapely, and in many cases actually handsome, their noses especially being exceedingly well formed. Then their head covering was hair, not wool, that of the men being worn close-cropped, while the women allowed theirs to grow at will and wore it flowing freely over the back and shoulders, the locks in many cases reaching considerably below the waist. It was invariably curly, that of the men growing in close, tiny ringlets clustering thickly all over the head, while that of the women, because it was worn longer, I suppose, took the form of long graceful curls. In colour it was a rich glossy black. They were certainly an exceptionally fine race of people, the men being lithe, clean-limbed, muscular fellows, every one of them apparently in the pink of condition, while the faces and figures of the women, especially the younger ones, would have excited the envy of many an English belle. But there was a something, very difficult to define, in the expression of these people that I did not at all like, a hardness about the mouth, and a cruel glint in the eyes—especially of the men—which looked at me in a manner that suggested all sorts of unpleasant possibilities, and excited within me a distinct longing to be almost anywhere rather than where I was.

The party who had brought me to this remote spot were of an entirely different race from those among whom I now found myself, and the fact that we were making our way toward what was obviously the aristocratic part of the town, coupled with the expressive conversation carried on by the leader of my custodians with three or four individuals who had joined us, led me to surmise—although of course I did not understand a word of what was said—that I had been brought up the river as a peace-offering or something of that sort, which conclusion was again the reverse of reassuring.

As we drew near to the exceedingly narrow gate in the palisade, which had been thrown open to admit us—and which, I presently saw, was strongly guarded by a number of warriors armed with heavy, broad-bladed spears, murderous-looking swords, and small round shields, or targets, of wood covered with what looked like crocodile hide—I became sensible of a horrible charnel-house smell; but it was not until we had passed through the gate, and were inside the palisaded enclosure, that I discovered from whence it emanated. Then, observing the direction of the wind which wafted this dreadful odour to my nostrils, I looked that way and presently noticed a large dead tree standing in the middle of the square that formed the centre of this part of the town. It was the immense number of birds that wheeled and screamed about this tree that first caused me to regard it with particular attention, but even then I could not, for the moment, see anything to account for either the birds or the odour. But a minute or two later, as we drew nearer the tree, the stench meanwhile becoming almost overpoweringly strong, I detected fastened to the trunk of the tree, in a manner that was not at first apparent, nine human corpses, some of them so far advanced in decomposition that even the birds would not approach them! Then I understood that I saw before me that detestable thing of which I had often heard as the most prominent object in the typical African native town or village, the “crucifixion tree,” upon which the petty despot who rules over that particular community is wont summarily to put to a cruel and lingering death such of his subjects as may be unfortunate enough to offend him! In some cases, I believe, the monarch is content to cause his victims to be securely lashed to the crucifixion tree by stout lianas, there to perish slowly of hunger and thirst; but King Banda, the potentate whose will was law in this particular town, had carried his cruelty to its utmost limit by adopting the time-honoured method of nailing his victims to the tree with spike nails driven through the hands and feet into the tough timber.

The enormous crowd who had followed us up from the beach were not permitted to enter the palisaded enclosure, which was strictly taboo to the common herd; our party therefore now consisted solely of those who had brought me up the river, four individuals who had joined us outside the gate—and whom I took to be officials of some sort—and my unworthy self; and, for my own part, I would very willingly have waived the distinction of forming one of the party. Marching up to what I conjectured to be the king’s house—from the fact that it was not only by far the largest dwelling in the enclosure, but was also distinguished by an exclusive embellishment in the form of a row of a dozen poles, each surmounted by a human skull, planted upright in the ground before it—we halted at a distance of some twenty paces from the entrance, with our backs turned toward the crucifixion tree, the leafless branches of which overshadowed us, and waited.