LETTER XLIV.
After eight or ten as disagreeable days as I remember to have spent in my life, weakened with incessant watching, harassed with bodily fatigue, and melted with the excessive heat of the sun, I arrived at the city of Bassora, where I was received with the utmost hospitality by Mr. Latouche, the Company’s Resident from Bombay, who did every thing possible for my accommodation, and procured me every instruction respecting my further progress.
This city, as well as Bagdad, is famous in marvellous story. The country about it is considered by the natives as the best spot in Asia, though the burning winds annoy and frequently destroy travellers, overwhelming them with mountains of hot sand, driven, like waves of the sea, before the tempest out of the neighbouring deserts. It carries on a great trade, and is inhabited by vast numbers of Christians and Jews. The English and Dutch have factories here, as well for the purpose of commerce, as the transit of dispatches, by way of Damascus and Aleppo, to Europe. The richest merchandise of India and Europe are brought here in caravans; and its opulence is greatly increased by the caravans of Pilgrims, who pass through it on their way to Mecca, and pay great duties, bartering for many rich commodities. The horses of this place are celebrated for their superior excellence: it is said that they will run thirty hours without meat or drink; I doubt the fact, and should be sorry to see so inhuman an experiment tried.
One comfortable circumstance attending Bassora is, that at night the streets may be walked with perfect safety at all hours. It is subject to an Arab Prince, who is tributary to the Turk, and whose revenue is very great, as well from the above-mentioned causes, as because he gives full liberty to all Nations to come and trade to his capital.
From Bassora I took my passage in a date-boat going to Muskat, expecting to get from thence a speedy passage to Bombay; but the boat sprung a leak at sea, and we were obliged to run into Busheer, where I was very hospitably received and entertained by Mr. Galley, the Company’s Resident.
There really seemed to be an unusual fatality attending me throughout the whole of my journey. You will recollect, in the first instance, I was prevented, by the war with France, from going by the direct route which I should otherwise have taken, and obliged to pass through the Low Countries and Germany——In the next place, at Venice I was disappointed in obtaining a passage to Latachæa; and, immediately on the heels of that, lost my servant at Trieste, by sending him for letters to Venice——Afterwards, when I had gone to Alexandria with expectation of travelling through Egypt, and viewing that interesting part of the world, I found myself prevented by the unhappy circumstances of the country——the plague raging in Alexandria, and all the roads being blocked up by an incursion of the Arabs. Thus mortified and disappointed, I turned about, in order to make my way in another direction; and arriving at Cyprus, found, to my infinite surprise and regret, that an epidemic disease, little short of the plague, prevailed there, and swept off the inhabitants in great numbers: when, after surmounting all those obstacles, I arrived at Aleppo, the first information I got was, that the caravan was gone, and that it would be a long time before another would be ready; and my departure from Aleppo was attended with circumstances no less inauspicious than my entrance——At Mosul I experienced another disappointment, by the river’s being dried up, and rendered impracticable by boats——My passage from Bassora to Muskat was impeded by the vessel springing a leak——And now, when at last I hoped to get from Busheer to Bombay, I was stopped by the intelligence that the Gulph was blocked up by French privateers, insomuch as no vessel could hope to escape. I was therefore obliged to remain at Busheer, till a Company’s frigate, commanded by Captain Hardy, and soon expected, should afford me an opportunity of proceeding to Bombay. Time, however, brought that period about; and I took my passage, and arrived safe at Bombay, where I soon after embarked on board a Portuguese vessel, being the only conveyance that offered for me to proceed to Madras: she was first bound to Goa, and we arrived safely at that island, where I was received with great politeness, and treated with the most friendly attention, by Mr. Henshaw, the English Resident.
Goa belongs to the Portuguese: the Viceroy of that Nation lives there in great pomp. It was once the scene of the most abominable cruelties, exercised by that flagitious people on the natives, under pretended zeal for Christianity——I had read the Abbé Raynal’s glowing description of it; and as I trod the ground, my frame trembled at the thoughts of the massacres perpetrated there.
I was impatient to get from Goa, and yet I looked forward to my departure with a secret uneasiness, for which I was entirely unable to account——I wished to proceed, and yet some secret foreboding whispered to my heart that I was on the verge of calamity: so powerful was it, and so obstinate, that I could neither reason away its admonitions, nor resist its impressions; and something incessantly told me, in as plain language as if a human being spoke, that I should suffer a dreadful misfortune. As I had all my life been an enemy to superstition, I felt my spirit insulted, and my understanding degraded, by the involuntary victory which I allowed to this impression——I combated it with reason, with ridicule, with self-contempt——all in vain: in spite of me, I became the very slave of gloomy presentiment; and in order to get the succedaneous aid of a friend’s reason, as well as to be prepared, I communicated the state of my feelings to Mr. Henshaw. In vain he endeavoured to cheer me: all he could do was to give me his counsel; in consequence of which I actually settled all my affairs up to that day, made my will, left it with Mr. Henshaw, and, full of dreadful forebodings of shipwreck, went on board a Portuguese snow bound to Madras.
It was now the eighteenth day of May when we sailed from Goa. The hemisphere had been for some days overcast with clouds: some light showers of rain had fallen; and you may conclude that it did not tend to raise my spirits, or free me from my ominous apprehensions, to hear that those circumstances indicated an approaching gale of wind. I observed, moreover, that the vessel was much too deep in the water, being greatly overloaded——that she was in many respects defective, and, as the seamen say, ill-found, and in short very unfit to encounter a gale of wind of any violence. I scorned, however, to yield to those united impressions, and determined to proceed.
On the nineteenth, the sky was obscured by immense fleeces of clouds, surcharged with inflammable matter; and in the evening, the rain fell in torrents, the firmament darkened apace, sudden night came on, and the horrors of extreme darkness were rendered still more horrible by the peals of thunder which rent the air, and the frequent flashes of lightning, which served only to shew us the horror of our situation, and leave us in increased darkness: mean-time the wind became more violent, blowing on the shore; and a heavy sea, raised by its force, united with it to make our state more formidable.
By day-light on the morning of the twentieth, the gale had increased to a furious tempest; and the sea, keeping pace with it, ran mountain-high; and as it kept invariably to the same point, the Captain and Officers became seriously alarmed, and almost persuaded that the South-west Monsoon had set in, which, if it were so, would render it absolutely impossible for us to weather the coast. All that day, however, we kept as close as the violence of the weather would allow us to the wind; but the sea canted her head so to leeward, that she made more lee than head-way; and the rigging was so strained with the work, that we had little hope of keeping off the shore, unless the wind changed, of which there was not now the smallest probability. During the night there was no intermission of the storm[storm]: many of the sails flew into ribbons; some of the rigging was carried away; and such exertions were made, that, before morning, every stick that could possibly be struck was down upon the deck.
About seven o’clock on the morning of the twenty-first, I was alarmed by an unusual noise upon the deck, and, running up, perceived that every remaining sail in the vessel, the fore-sail alone excepted, was totally carried away. The sight was horrible; and the whole vessel presented a spectacle as dreadful to the feelings as mortifying to human pride. Fear had produced, not only all the helplessness of despondency, but all the mischievous freaks of insanity. In one place stood the Captain, raving, stamping, and tearing his hair in handfuls from his head——here, some of the crew were cast upon their knees, clapping their hands, and praying, with all the extravagance of horror painted in their faces——there, others were flogging their images with all their might, calling upon them to allay the storm. One of our passengers, who was Purser of an English East-Indiaman, had got hold of a case-bottle of rum, and, with an air of distraction and deep despair imprinted in his face, was stalking about in his shirt. I perceived him to be on the point of serving it about, in large tumblers, to the few undismayed people; and well convinced, that, so far from alleviating, it would sharpen the horrors of their mind, I went forward, and with much difficulty prevented him.
Having accomplished this point, I applied myself to the Captain, and endeavoured to bring him back (if possible) to his recollection, and to a sense of what he owed to his duty as a commander, and to his dignity as a man: I exhorted him to encourage the sailors by his example; and strove to raise his spirits, by saying that the storm did not appear to me by any means so terrible as some I had before experienced.
While I was thus employed, we shipped a sea on the starboard side, which I really thought would have sent us down. The vessel seemed to sink beneath its weight, shivered, and remained motionless——it was a moment of critical suspense: fancy made me think I felt her gradually descending——I gave myself up as gone, and summoned all my fortitude to bear approaching death with becoming manhood.
Just at this crisis, the water, which rushed with incredible force through all parts[parts] of the vessel, brought out floating, and nearly suffocated, another English passenger, who was endeavouring to take a little repose in a small cabin boarded off from the deck: he was a very stout young man, and full of true spirit. Finding that the vessel was not, as I had thought, going immediately down, he joined me in exhorting the Captain to his duty: we persuaded him to throw the guns overboard, as well as a number of trunks and packages with which the vessel was much encumbered; and, with some little exertion, we got the pumps set agoing.
Here I will stop, knowing the warm sensibility of my Frederick’s mind; and, convinced that his sympathetic heart will go hand-in-hand with his Father’s sufferings, I will not overcharge it with grief by an immediate continuation of the business, but defer it to another Letter.