Chapter Seven.
Mr Smellie makes a little Survey.
Giving the gig’s crew strict injunctions not to leave their boat for a moment upon any consideration, but to hold themselves in readiness to shove off on the instant of our rejoining them—should a precipitate retreat prove necessary—Captain Vernon and Mr Smellie stepped ashore with a request that I would accompany them.
The channel or canal in which the gig was now lying was about fifty feet wide, with a depth of water of about eight feet at the point to which we had reached. Its banks were composed of soft black foetid mud in a semi-liquid state, so that in order to land it was necessary for us to make our way as best we could for a distance of some two hundred feet over the roots of the mangrove trees which thickly bordered the stream, before we were enabled to place our feet on solid ground.
Beyond the belt of mangroves the soil was densely covered with that heterogeneous jumble of parasitic creepers of all descriptions spoken of in Africa by the generic denomination of “bush,” thickly interspersed with trees, many of which were of large size. Path there was none, not even the faintest traces of a footprint in the dry sandy soil to show that humanity had ever passed over the ground before us. It may be that ours were the first human footsteps which had ever pressed the soil in that particular spot; at all events it looked very much like it, and we had not travelled one hundred feet before we became fully impressed with the necessity for carefully marking our route if we had the slightest desire to find our way back again. This task was intrusted to me, and I accomplished it by cutting a twig half through, and then bending it downwards until a long light strip of the inner wood was exposed. This I did at distances of about a yard apart all along our route, whilst the skipper and Smellie went ahead and forced a passage for the party through the thick undergrowth.
The general direction of our route was about south-south-west, as nearly as the skipper could hit it off with the aid of a pocket-compass, and it took us more than two hours to accomplish a journey of as many miles through the thick tangled undergrowth. This brought us out close to the water’s edge again, and we saw before us a canal about a cable’s length across, which the skipper said he was certain was a continuation of the one we had entered in the gig. About a mile distant, on the opposite side of the canal, could be seen the tops of the hills which we had noticed on the occasion of our first exploration of the river.
Here, as at the point of our landing, the banks of the canal consisted of black slimy foetid mud, out of which grew a belt of mangroves, their curious twisted roots straggling in a thick complicated mass of net-work over the slime beneath.
The sun was shining brilliantly down through the richly variegated foliage on the opposite bank of the stream, and lighting up the surface of the thick turbid water as it rolled sluggishly past; but where we stood—just on the inner edge of the mangrove-swamp—everything was enshrouded in a sombre green twilight, and an absolute silence prevailed all round us, which was positively oppressive in its intensity.
Breathless, perspiring, and exhausted with our unwonted exertions, we flung ourselves upon the ground for a moment’s rest, during which the skipper and Smellie sought solace and refreshment in a cigar. As for me, not having at that time contracted the habit of smoking, I was contented to sit still and gaze with admiring eyes upon the weird beauty of my surroundings.
For perhaps a quarter of an hour my companions gave themselves up to the silent enjoyment of their cigars, but at the end of that time the skipper, turning to Smellie, said:
“I think this must be the creek to which we have been directed; but there are so many of these inlets, creeks, and canals on this side of the river—and on the other side also for that matter—that one cannot be at all certain about it. I would have explored the place thoroughly in the gig, and so have saved the labour of all this scrambling through the bush, but for the fact that if we are right, and any slave-craft happen to be lurking here—as our Yankee friend’s suspicious conduct leads me to believe may be the case—there would be a great risk of our stumbling upon them unawares, and so giving them the alarm. And even if we escaped that mischance I have no doubt but that they keep sentinels posted here and there on the look-out, and we could hardly hope that the boat would escape being sighted by one or other of them. If there are any craft hereabout, we may rest assured that they are fully aware of the presence of the Daphne in the river; but I am in hopes that our ruse of openly starting as upon a sporting expedition has thrown dust in their eyes for once, and that we may be able to steal near enough to get a sight of them without exciting their suspicions.”
“It would be worth all our trouble if we amid do so,” responded Smellie. “But I don’t half like this blind groping about in the bush; to say nothing of the tremendously hard work which it involves there is a very good chance, it seems to me, of our losing ourselves when we attempt to make our way back. And then, again, we are quite uncertain how much further we may have to go in order to complete our search satisfactorily. Do you not think it would be a good plan for one of us to shin up a tree and take a look round before we go any further? There are some fine tall trees here close at hand, from the higher branches of which one ought to be able to get a pretty extensive view.”
“A very capital idea!” assented the skipper. “We will act upon it at once. There, now,” pointing to a perfect forest giant only a few yards distant, “is a tree admirably suited to our purpose. Come, Mr Hawkesley, you are the youngest, and ought therefore to be the most active of the trio; give us a specimen of your tree-climbing powers. Just shin up aloft as high as you can go, take a good look round, and let us know if you can see anything worth looking at.”
“Ay ay, sir,” I responded; “but—” with a somewhat
blank look at the tall, straight, smooth stem to which he pointed, “where are the ratlines?”
“Ratlines, you impudent young monkey!” responded the skipper with a laugh; “why, an active young fellow like you ought to make nothing of going up a spar like that.”
But when we reached the tree it became evident that the task of climbing it was not likely to prove so easy as the skipper had imagined; for the bole was fully fifteen feet in circumference, with not a branch or protuberance of any description for the first sixty feet.
The second lieutenant, however, was equal to the occasion, and soon showed me how the thing might be done. Whipping out his knife, he quickly cut a long length of “monkey-rope” or creeper, and twisting the tough pliant stem into a grummet round the trunk of the tree, he bade me pass the bight over my shoulders, and then showed me how, with its aid, I might work myself gradually upward.
Accordingly, acting under his directions I placed myself within the bight, and tucking it well up under my arm-pits, slid the grummet up the trunk as high as it would go. Then bearing back upon it, so that it supported my whole weight, I worked my body upwards by pressing against the tree-trunk with my knees. By this means I rose about two feet from the ground. Then pressing against the tree firmly with my feet I gave the grummet a quick jerk upward and again worked myself up the trunk with my knees as before. In this way I got along very well, and after an awkward slip or two, in which my knees suffered somewhat and my breeches still more, soon acquired the knack of the thing, and speedily reached the lowermost branch, after which the rest of my ascent was of course easy.
On reaching the topmost branches I found that the tree I had climbed was indeed, as the skipper had aptly described it, a forest giant; it was by far the most lofty tree in the neighbourhood, and from my commanding position I had a fine uninterrupted prospect of many miles extent all round me, except to the southward, where the chain of hills before-mentioned shut in the view.
Away to the northward and eastward, in which direction I happened to be facing when I at length paused to look around me, I could catch glimpses of the river, over and between the intervening tree-tops, for a distance of quite twenty miles, and from what I saw I came to the conclusion that in that direction the river must widen out considerably and be thickly studded with islands, among which I thought it probable might be found many a snug lurking-place for slave-craft. On the extreme verge of the horizon I also distinctly made out a small group of hills, which I conjectured to be situate on the northern or right bank of the river. From these hills all the way round northerly, to about north-north-west, the country was flat and pretty well covered with bush; although at a distance of from two to four miles inland I could detect here and there large open patches of grass-land. Bearing about north-north-west from my point of observation was another chain of hills which stretched along the sea-coast outside the river’s mouth, and extended beyond the horizon. To the left of them again, or about north-west from me, lay Banana Creek, its entrance about eleven miles distant, and over the intervening tree-tops on Boolambemba Island I could, so clear was the atmosphere just then, distinctly make out the royal-mast-heads of the Daphne and the American barque; I could even occasionally detect the gleam of the sloop’s pennant as it waved idly in the sluggish breeze. Still further to the left there lay the river’s mouth, with the ripple which marked the junction between the fresh and the salt water clearly visible. Next came Shark Point, with the open sea stretching mile after mile away beyond it, until its gleaming surface became lost in the ruddy afternoon haze, and on the inner side of the point I could trace, without much difficulty, the course of the various creeks which we had explored in the boat on the occasion of our first visit. Looking below me, I allowed my eye to travel along the course of the stream or canal which flowed past almost under my feet, and following it along I saw that it forked at a point about three miles to the westward, and turned suddenly northward at a point about three miles further on, the branch and the stream itself eventually joining the river, and forming with it two islands of about five and three miles in length respectively, the larger of the two being that which we had so laboriously crossed that same afternoon.
The view which lay spread out below and around me was beautiful as a dream; it would have formed a fascinating study for a painter; but whatever art-instincts may have been awakened within me upon my first glance round were quickly put to flight by a scene which presented itself at a point only some three miles away. At that distance the channel or stream below me forked, as I have already said, and at the point of divergence of the two branches the water way broadened out until it became quite a mile wide, forming as snug a little harbour as one need wish to see. And in this harbour, perfectly concealed from all prying eyes which might happen to pass up or down the river, lay a brig, a brigantine, and a schooner, three as rakish-looking craft as could well be met with. Their appearance alone was almost sufficient to condemn them; but a huge barracoon standing in a cleared space close at hand, and a crowd of blacks huddled together on the adjacent bank, apparently in course of shipment on board one or other of the craft in sight, put their character quite beyond question.
A hail from below reminded me that there were others who would feel an interest in my discovery.
“Well, Mr Hawkesley, is there anything in sight, from your perch aloft there, worth looking at?” came floating up to me in the skipper’s voice.
“Yes, sir, indeed there is. There are three craft in the creek away yonder, in the very act of shipping negroes at this moment,” I replied.
“The deuce there are!” ejaculated the skipper. “Which do you think will be the easier plan of the two: to climb the tree, or to make our way through the bush to the spot?”
“You will find it much easier to climb the tree, I think, sir. You can be alongside me in five minutes, whilst it will take us nearly two hours, I should say, to make our way to them through the bush,” I replied.
“Very well; hold on where you are then. We will tackle the tree,” returned the skipper.
And, looking down, I saw him and the second lieutenant forthwith whip out their knives and begin hacking away at a creeper, wherewith to make grummets to assist them in their attempt at tree-climbing.
In a few minutes the twain were alongside me, and—in happy forgetfulness of the ruin wrought upon their unmentionables in the process of “shinning” aloft—eagerly noting through their telescopes the operations in progress on board the slavers.
“They seem very busy there,” observed the skipper with his eye still peering through the tube of his telescope. “You may depend on it, Mr Smellie, the rascals have got wind of our presence in the river, and intend trying to slip out past us to-night as soon as the fog settles down. I’ll be bound they know every inch of the river, and could find their way out blindfold?”
“No doubt of it, sir,” answered the second luff. “But it is not high-water until two o’clock to-morrow morning, so that I suspect they will not endeavour to make a move until about an hour after midnight. That will enable them to go out on the top of the flood, and with a strong land-breeze in their favour.”
“So much the better,” returned Captain Vernon, with sparkling eyes. “But we will take care to have the boats in the creek in good time. You never know where to have these fellows; they are as cunning as foxes. Please note their position as accurately as you can, Mr Smellie, for I intend you to lead the attack to-night.”
“Thank you, sir,” answered Smellie delightedly; and planting himself comfortably astride a branch, he drew out a pencil and paper and proceeded to make a very careful sketch-chart of the river-mouth, Banana Creek, and the creek in which the slavers were lying; noting the bearings carefully with the aid of a pocket-compass.
“There, sir,” said he, when he had finished, showing the sketch to the skipper; “that will enable me to find them, I think, let the night be as dark or as thick as it may. How do you think it looks for accuracy?”
“Capital!” answered Captain Vernon approvingly; “you really have a splendid eye for proportion and distance, Mr Smellie. That little chart might almost have been drawn to scale, so correct does it look. How in the world do you manage it?”
“It is all custom,” was the reply. “I make it an invariable rule to devote time and care enough to such sketches as this to ensure their being as nearly accurate as possible. I have devised a few rules upon which I always work; and the result is generally a very near approximation to absolute accuracy. But the sun is getting low; had we not better be moving, sir?”
“By all means, if you are sure you have all the information you need,” was the reply. “I would not miss my way in that confounded jungle to-night for anything. It would completely upset all our arrangements.”
“To say nothing of the possibility of our affording a meal to some of the hungry carnivora which probably lurk in the depths of the said jungle,” thought I. But I held my peace, and dutifully assisted my superior officers to effect their descent.
It was decidedly easier to go up than to go down; but we accomplished our descent without accident, and after a long and wearisome tramp back through the bush found ourselves once more on board the gig just as the last rays of the sun were gilding the tree-tops. The tide had now turned, and was therefore again in our favour; and in an hour from the time of our emerging upon the main stream we reached the sloop, just as the first faint mist-wreaths began to gather upon the bosom of the river.
I was exceedingly anxious to be allowed to take part in the forthcoming expedition and had been eagerly watching, all the way across the river, for an opportunity to ask the necessary permission; but Captain Vernon had been so earnestly engaged in discussing with Smellie the details and arrangements for the projected attack that I had been unable to do so. On reaching the ship, however, the opportunity came. As we went up over the side the skipper turned and said:
“By the way, Mr Smellie, I hope you—and you also, Mr Hawkesley—will give me the pleasure of your company to dinner this evening?”
Smellie duly bowed his acceptance of the invitation and I was about to follow suit when an idea struck me and I said:
“I shall be most happy, sir, if my acceptance of your kind invitation will not interfere with my taking part in to-night’s boat expedition. I have been watching for an opportunity to ask your permission, and I hope you will not refuse me.”
“Oh! that’s it, is it?” laughed the skipper. “I thought you seemed confoundedly fidgety in the boat. Well—I scarcely know what to say about it; it will be anything but child’s play, I can assure you. Still, you are tall and strong, and—there, I suppose I must say ‘yes.’ And now run away and shift your damaged rigging as quickly as possible; dinner will be on the table in ten minutes.”
I murmured my thanks and forthwith dived below to bend a fresh pair of pantaloons, those I had on being in so dilapidated a condition—what with the tree-climbing and our battle with the thorns and briars of the bush—as to be in fact scarcely decent.
The conversation at the dinner-table that night was of a very animated character, but as it referred entirely to the projected attack upon the slavers I will not inflict any portion of it upon the reader. Mr Austin, the first lieutenant, was at first very much disappointed when he found he was not to lead the boat expedition; but he brightened up a bit when the skipper pointed out to him that in all probability the slavers would slip their cables and endeavour to make their escape from the river on finding themselves attacked by the boats; in which case the cream of the fun would fall to the share of those left on board the sloop.
Mr Smellie—who was at all times an abstemious man—contented himself with a couple of glasses of wine after dinner, and, the moment that the conversation took a general turn, rose from the table, excusing himself upon the plea that he had several matters to attend to in connection with the expedition. As he rose he caught my eye and beckoned me to follow him, which I did after duly making my bow to the company.
When we reached the deck the fog was so thick that it was as much as we could do to see the length of the ship.
“Just as I expected,” remarked my companion. “How are we to find the creek in such weather as this, Mr Hawkesley?”
“I am sure I don’t know, sir,” I replied, looking round me in bewilderment. “I suppose the expedition will have to be postponed until it clears a bit.”
“Not if I can prevent it,” said he with energy. “Although,” he added, a little doubtfully, “it certainly is very thick, and with the slightest deviation from our course we should be irretrievably lost. Whereaway do you suppose the creek to be?”
“Oh, somewhere in that direction!” said I, pointing over the starboard quarter.
“You are wrong,” remarked my companion, looking into the binnacle. “The tide is slackening, whilst the land-breeze is freshening; so that the ship has swung with her head to the eastward, and the direction in which you pointed leads straight out to sea. Now, if you want to learn a good useful lesson—one which may prove of the utmost value to you in after-life—come below with me to the master, and between us we will show you how to find that creek in the fog.”
“Thank you,” said I, “I shall be very glad to learn. Why, you do not even know its compass-bearing.”
“No,” said Smellie, “but we will soon find it out.” With that we descended to the master’s cabin, where we found the owner in his shirt-sleeves and with a pipe in his mouth, poring over a chart of the coast on which was shown the mouth of the river only, its inland course being shown by two dotted lines, indicating that the portion thus marked had never been properly surveyed. He was busily engaged as we entered laying down in pencil upon this chart certain corrections and remarks with reference to the ebb and flow of the tidal current.
“Good evening, gentlemen!” said he as we entered. “Well, Mr Smellie, so you are going to lead the attack upon the slavers to-night, I hear.”
“Yes,” said Smellie, unconsciously straightening himself up, “yes, if this fog does not baffle us. And in order that it may not, I have come to invoke your assistance, Mr Mildmay.”
“All right, sir!” said old Mildmay. “I expected you; I was waiting for you, sir.”
“That’s all right,” said the second lieutenant. “Now, Mildmay,” bending over the chart, “whereabouts is the Daphne?”
“There she is,” replied the master, placing the point of his pencil carefully down on the chart and twisting it round so as to produce a black mark.
“Very good,” assented Smellie. “Now, look here, Mr Hawkesley, this is where your lesson begins.” And he produced the sketch-chart he had made that afternoon and spread it out on the table.
“You will see from this sketch,” he proceeded, “that the Daphne bore exactly north-north-west from the tree in which we were perched when I made it. Which is equivalent to saying that the tree bears south-south-east from the Daphne; is it not?”
I assented.
“Very well, then,” continued Smellie. “Be so good, Mr Mildmay, as to draw a line south-south-east from that pencil-mark which represents the Daphne on your chart.”
The master took his parallel ruler and did so.
“So far, so good,” resumed the second lieutenant. “Now my sketch shows that the outer extremity of Shark Point bore from the tree north-west ¼ west. In other words, the tree bears from Shark Point south-east ¼ east. Lay off that bearing, Mildmay, if you please.”
“Very good,” he continued, when this second line had been drawn. “Now it is evident that the point where these two lines intersect must be the position of the tree. But, as a check upon these two bearings I took a third to that sharp projecting point at the mouth of Banana Creek,” indicating with the pencil on the chart the point in question. “That point bears north-west by north; consequently the tree bears from it south-east by south. Mark that off also, Mildmay, if you please.”
The master did so, and the three lines were found to intersect each other at exactly the same point. “Capital!” exclaimed Smellie, in high good-humour. “That satisfactorily establishes the exact position of the tree. Now for the next step. The slave fleet bears north-west ¼ west from the tree; and the western entrance to the creek (that by which we shall advance to the attack to-night) bears exactly north-west from the same point. Let us lay down these two bearings on the chart—thus. Now it is evident that the slave fleet and the entrance to the creek are situate somewhere or other on these two lines; the question is—where? I will show you how I ascertained those two very important bits of information if you will step to my cabin and bring me the telescope which you will find hanging against the bulkhead.”
Intensely interested in this valuable practical lesson in surveying I hurried away to do his bidding, and speedily returned with the glass, a small but very powerful instrument, which I had often greatly admired.
Taking the telescope from my hand he drew it open and directed my attention to a long series of neat little numbered lines scratched on the polished brass tube.
“You see these scratches?” he said. “Very well; now I will explain to you what they are. When I was a midshipman it was my good fortune to be engaged for a time on certain surveying work, during which I acquired a tolerably clear insight of the science. And after the work was over and done with, it occurred to me that my knowledge might be of the greatest use in cases similar to the present. Now I may tell you, by way of explanation, that surveying consists, broadly, in the measurement of angles and lines. The angles are, as you have already seen, very easily taken by means of a pocket-compass; but the measurement of the lines bothered me very considerably for a long time. Of course you can measure a line with perfect accuracy by means of a surveyor’s chain, but I wanted something which, if not quite so accurate as that, would be sufficiently correct, while not occupying more than a few seconds in the operation of measurement. So I set to work and trained myself to judge distances by the eye alone; and by constant diligent practice I acquired quite a surprising amount of proficiency. And let me say here, I would very strongly recommend you and every young officer to practise the same thing; you will be surprised when you discover in how many unexpected ways it will be found useful. Well, I managed to do a great deal of serviceable work even in this rough-and-ready way; but after a time I grew dissatisfied with it—I wanted some means of measuring which should be just as rapid but a great deal more accurate. I thought the matter over for a long time, and at last hit upon the idea of turning the telescope to account. The way I did it was this. You have, of course, found that if you look through your telescope at an object, say, half a mile away, and then direct the instrument to another object, say, four miles off, you have to alter the focus of the glass before you can see the second object distinctly. It was this peculiarity which I pressed into my service as a means of measuring distances. My first step was to secure a small, handy, but first-rate telescope—the best I could procure for money; and, provided with this, I commenced operations by looking through it at objects, the exact distances of which from me I knew. I focused the glass upon them carefully, and then made a little scratch on the tube showing how far it had been necessary to draw it out in order to see the object distinctly; and then I marked the scratch with the distance of the object. You see,” pointing to the tube, “I have a regular scale of distances here, from one hundred yards up to ten miles; and these scratches, let me tell you, represent the expenditure of a vast amount of time and labour. But they are worth it all. For instance, I want to ascertain the distance of an object. I direct the telescope toward it, focus the instrument carefully, and find that I can see it most clearly when the tube is drawn out to, say, this distance,” suiting the action to the word. “I then look at the scale scratched on the tube, and find that it reads six thousand one hundred feet—which is a few feet over one nautical mile. And thus I measure all my distances, and am so enabled to make a really satisfactory little survey in a few minutes as in the case of this afternoon. You must not suppose, however, that I am able to measure in this way with absolute accuracy; I am not; but I manage to get a very near approximation to it, near enough for such purposes as the present. Thus, within the distance of a quarter of a mile I have found that I can always measure within two feet of the actual distance; beyond that and up to half a mile I can measure within four feet of the actual distance; and so on up to ten miles, which distance I can measure to within four hundred feet.
“And now to return to the business in hand. My telescope informed me that the slave fleet was anchored at a distance of eighteen thousand three hundred feet (or a shade over three nautical miles) from the tree, and that the western entrance to the creek is twenty-eight thousand nine hundred feet (or about four and three-quarter nautical miles) from the same spot. We have now only to mark off these two distances on the two compass-bearings which we last laid down on the chart: thus,”—measuring and marking off the distances as he spoke—“and here we have the position of the slavers and of the entrance to the creek; and by a moment’s use of Mildmay’s parallel ruler—thus—we get the compass-bearing of the entrance from the Daphne. There it is—south-east by east; and now we measure the distance from one to the other, and find it to be—eight miles, as nearly as it is possible to measure it. Thus, you see, my rough-and ready survey of this afternoon affords us the means of ascertaining our course and distance from the Daphne to a point for which we should otherwise have been obliged to search, and which we could not possibly have hoped to find in the impenetrable fog which now overspreads the river.”
“Thank you, Mr Smellie,” said I, highly delighted with the lesson I had received; “if it will not be troubling you too much I think I must ask you to give me a lesson or two in surveying when you can spare the time.”
“I shall be very pleased,” was the reply. “Never hesitate to come to me for any information or instruction which you think I may be able to afford you. I shall always be happy to help you on in your studies to the utmost extent of my ability. But we have not quite finished yet, and it is now, Mildmay, that I think you may perhaps be able to help us. You see we shall have to pull—or sail, as the case may be—across the current, and it will therefore be necessary to make some allowance for its set. Now do you happen to know anything about the speed of the current in the river?”
“Not half so much as I should like,” replied the master; “but a hint which the skipper dropped this morning caused me to take the dinghy and go away out in mid-stream to spend the day in fishing—ha—ha—ha! The Yankee had his glass turned full upon me, off and on, the whole morning—so I’m told—and if so I daresay he saw that I had some fairly good sport. But I wasn’t so busy with my hooks and lines but that I found time to ascertain that the ebb-stream runs at a rate of about four knots at half-tide; and just abreast of us it flows to seaward at the rate of about one knot at half-flood; the salt water flowing into the river along the bottom, and the fresh water continuing to flow outwards on the surface. Now, at what time do you propose to start?”
“About half-past nine to-night,” answered Smellie.
Old Mildmay referred to a book by his side, and then said:
“Ah, then you will have about two hours’ ebb to contend with—the last two hours of the ebb-tide. Now let me see,”—and he produced a sheet of paper on which were some calculations, evidently the result of his observations whilst “Sshing.” He ran over these carefully, and then said:
“How long do you expect it will take you to cross?”
“Two hours, if we have to pull across—as I expect we shall,” answered the second lieutenant.
“Two hours!” mused the master. “Two hours! Then you’ll have to make allowance, sir, for an average set to seaward of two miles an hour all the way across, or four miles in all.”
“Very well,” said Smellie. “Then to counteract that we must shape our course for a point four miles above that which marks the entrance to the creek—must we not, Mr Hawkesley?”
“Certainly,” I said; “that is quite clear.”
“Then be so good as to lay that course down on the chart.”
I measured off a distance of four miles with the dividers, and marked it off above the mouth of the creek; then applied the parallel ruler and found the course.
“It is exactly south-east,” said I; “and it will take us close past the southern extremity of this small island.”
“That is quite right,” remarked Smellie, who had been watching me; “and if we happen to sight the land in passing that point it will be an assurance that, so far, we have been steering our proper course. But—bless me,”—looking at his watch—“it is a quarter after nine. I had no idea it was so late. Run away, Mr Hawkesley, and make your preparations. Put on your worst suit of clothes, and throw your pea-jacket into the boat. You may be glad to have it when we get into the thick of that damp fog. Bring your pistols, but not your dirk; a ship’s cutlass, with which the armourer will supply you, will be much more serviceable for the work we have in hand to-night.”
I hastened away, and reached the deck again just in time to see the men going down the side into the boats after undergoing inspection.