The 'Scots Brigade,' and other tales

by James Grant

THE VOYAGE OF THE 'BON ACCORD.'

My name is Bob Slingsby, and in the autumn of last year I was senior apprentice, or midshipman (for we wore a smart uniform), on board the good ship Bon Accord of Aberdeen, freighted from London to Hong Kong, and a few who may survive to read these lines will recall the story I am about to tell—the plain unvarnished one of a sailor boy (I was then only sixteen) in the Indian seas.

We had left Swatow on the 24th of September, after getting on board a pilot, who was the cause of all the mischief that followed.

The Bon Accord was a fine full-rigged clipper ship, of Aberdeen build, 900 tons, coppered to the bends, with masts that raked well aft; she was straight as an arrow in her planksheer, and was well armed, for there are some ugly customers to be met with in these seas beyond the ordinary track of our cruisers, as we found to our cost.

The ship's company consisted of Captain Archibald, a good and resolute seaman, who hailed from the port of Leith; three mates, the doctor, Joe Ruddersford, boatswain, two apprentices (myself and my chum, little Charlie Newcome, for we were three short according to our tonnage), and thirty men—thirty-eight all told, and a few lubberly Lascars who all bolted when the first sign of danger came.

We had been well warned on nearing Hong Kong to keep a bright look-out for Macao piratical boats, and particularly for one large lorcha manned by only such desperadoes as are to be found about these shores; and the captain of which, we were informed—Long Kiang by name—was as great a ruffian as ever figured of old, when Hong Kong was named by the Spaniards the Island of Ladrones, or thieves.

In a copy of the China Mail brought on board at Aden, we read a description of Long Kiang, which told us that he had been pierced and scarred by many wounds; that one of his eyes had been scorched out by gunpowder, and that his left arm, having been severely shattered by a shot from a swivel gun, had never been properly set, the fragments had worked themselves out, and this gave him the singular appearance of having an arm and elbow adhering to the shoulder by the flesh and tendons alone; yet this arm possessed double the strength of his right, and it was his boast that he had slain more men by it than with the other.

We made the name of Long Kiang a kind of joke—a bogie—on board during the voyage through the bay of Bengal and into the China seas, and had nearly forgotten all about him, when without other adventure than a foul wind or so we reached Swatow, some fifty miles distant from Hong Kong, and after anchoring for a little time, left it, as I have said, on the 24th of September, with a light fair wind, and by sunset had made an offing.

As evening deepened upon the crimson sea, the wind became lighter; then it fell calm, and the fore and main courses were hauled up, while the top-sails were left to flap idly against the masts; and now it was that a native boat came alongside with a pilot, who offered to take us to our destination for a certain sum in British money, and his services were accepted by Captain Archibald, to whom he showed, of course, good and well-attested certificates.

No trousers covered the long, lean, mahogany-coloured legs of this official; an ample abba was rolled round his body, and a tattered keffiah, of no particular hue, thrown loosely round his head, partly muffled his face, so that we could see but little of his features.

The wind freshened after a time; we let fall the courses and stretched them home, glad to make way on the ship; which had been drifting with a current.

Instead of standing by the binnacle and giving instructions to a steersman, the native pilot grasped the wheel unaided in his powerful hands, and from time to time it seemed to me that he cast his eyes oftener to the shore than aloft to keep the canvas full. As he stood there between us and the moonlight, his tall and muscular form and fantastic dress, when viewed in dark outline, had something weird and mysterious about them, and so thought Charlie Newcome, who was watching him narrowly, as we stood on the starboard side of the quarter-deck.

The mate of the watch was forward, looking after the 'ground tackle' and large anchor, and the captain was below, when suddenly Charlie, on whom the tall, stark figure of the stranger seemed to make an impression, twitched my sleeve and whispered:

'Look, Bob! look now! By Jove! isn't he like—like——'

'Like who?'

'Long Kiang, that we talked so much about—the fellow described in the China Mail.'

'You've got Long Kiang on the brain,' said I, laughing; but the laughter ceased when I did look.

The light breeze had partly deranged the Arab-like keffiah that enveloped his head, and by the rays of the binnacle lamp we saw that he was minus the left eye, that the whole of that side of his face was distorted as if scorched by powder, and for a moment or two the strange malformation of his left arm was distinctly visible, as he gasped one of the under-spokes of the wheel.

'It cannot be,' said I. 'How about his certificates, Charlie?'

'Another man's papers—stolen, no doubt.'

'If he should, after all, be Long Kiang,' I began, and then paused, for as I spoke the name seemed to catch his ear, and he turned on me his solitary eye, which in the moonlight glistened redly, like that of a rattlesnake. A knife of portentous length was in the same sheath with his chopsticks, a knife suggestive of cutting other things than yams or salt junk.

'Won't you youngsters turn in?' said the mate, coming aft. 'You are both in the middle watch.'

'Thank you, sir; not just yet,' said I, for, truth to tell, we were disposed to be wide awake as weasels.

Long Kiang had been such a standing joke during the latter part of our voyage—at least after leaving Aden—that neither of us, whatever we thought, ventured to tell our fears or suspicions to the mate, or to the men forward. While we were talking to the mate, the captain, who had come on deck, called him to the port side of the ship, which was going before the wind, but very slowly.

The captain was a tall, stout, and well-built man, with a florid complexion and a mass of iron-grey hair, luxuriant as when in youth, and likely to be so for years to come. There was an air of sturdy Scotch power and strength of mind and body about him that showed at once his resolute will and energetic brain.

He and the mate of the watch were in close conference at the port quarter, and looking at some object with an interest that soon became anxiety after they had resorted to the use of a night-glass, on seeing which the tall pilot grinned and showed all his white teeth like a row of dominoes.

'It is a lorcha—full of men, and evidently dodging us—a Macao lorcha, too,' said the captain, in a low voice. 'You see that craft?' he said suddenly to the pilot, who had evidently for some time affected not to do so.

'Si—si—yaas—senhor,' he replied in the broken lingo peculiar to Macao.

'And what do you think of her?'

'That piecey boat makey fightey if you meddle with her,' he replied quietly, in what is called 'pigeon English' in these regions.

'Oh, she will, will she?' exclaimed the captain; 'bring the starboard tacks aft. Keep the ship away a few points.'

But the breeze was so light that the lorcha was able to pass and repass us with ease, on each tack coming nearer us, and, indeed, it became but too evident that the steersman handled the ship in such a way that in a short time the stranger would be quite able to overhaul us. She was already within half-a-mile of us when Captain Archibald roughly accused the pilot of treachery, and ordered the third mate to take the wheel. Ere he could do so the native uttered a shout, quitted the spokes, letting them revolve at will, throwing the ship in the wind, and then he leaped overboard.

An exclamation burst from all, for had the breeze been fresher the top-mast would have snapped off at the caps and left us a helpless wreck; but the captain—quick, ready, and powerful—caught the wheel in a moment, brought the ship again upon a wind, and without looking whether the traitor who had left us sank or swam, ordered the ship to be close hauled, as she was clipper-built, and to be steered 'full and by.'

Some of the watch said the lorcha had picked up our pilot. Charlie and I now spoke, and not a doubt remained in the minds of all that we had been deceived by Long Kiang, who, using the papers of some man he had robbed, and very probably destroyed, had steered the ship to a part of the coast of Swatow, where his vessel and men had been concealed in some bay or creek.

By nine p.m. the lorcha, which we knew must be manned by the ferocious half-breeds who are the sons of Chinese and Tartar slaves, with a mixture of Caffre and Portuguese, the refuse of Macao, was so close, that in the moonlight we could see them distinctly, and reckoned that she must have at least seventy of these on board, and all armed to the teeth!

Charlie and I had read much about pirates and wild adventures, and had longed to meet some; and now the time had come with a vengeance!

The Scottish firm to whom the Bon Accord belonged had wisely armed her well.

'Now, my lads,' cried Captain Archibald, as all the small arms were brought on deck, and the crew mustered aft the mizenmast, 'obey me; act well and steadily; have faith in yourselves, for without it no man succeeds.'

A cheer responded, and under the care of the old boatswain, who had sailed with Archibald for more than twenty years, the guns were cast loose and loaded, and as some of our fellows belonged to the Royal Naval Reserve, they were at no loss how to go to work.

In common with several others, Charlie and I had revolvers; but somehow, as I loaded mine, my heart was beating wildly, and, like Charlie Newcome, I thought of my mother, far away in Kent, as I had never thought of her before!

If captured, we knew that every soul on board would perish by a miserable death. Of a peaceful escape we had no chance, as the wind was so light, and many a glance was cast aloft to see how the sails drew.

The lorcha was stealing steadily after us in our wake now, for doubtless Long Kiang had told his crew of our guns, and knew that while she was kept astern they would be useless. Already the pirates were so close that we could hear their voices, and see knives, bayonets, and tulwars glittering among them, and towering amid the throng the tall and muscular figure of the ferocious Long Kiang, so we could have no doubt of the intentions of his followers now.

'She will soon be under our counter, sir,' said the old boatswain, 'and, as we have little or no steerage way on the ship, our eight-pounders will soon be useless.'

'Then let fly the starboard gun, and bring her to on the wind.'

Bang went the gun, its white smoke curling over the moonlighted water. A yell rose from the lorcha, and a red, flashing, and spluttering fire of musketry responded. No one was hit as yet, but white splinters were knocked off the woodwork on deck.

'Fill the yard heads! Stand off; Re-load, and then bring to again!' This manœuvre was repeated more than once.

Bang! bang! went the six-pounders from the port quarter. The yells were redoubled, and as every man who was not at the guns was busy with his breach-loading rifle, the work soon became hot indeed. While lying close to the gunwale, Charlie and I fired at random with our revolvers under the open leeboard; yet the whole situation was so strangely sudden—so unexpected and improbable—that it seemed as if all this peril was happening not to me—Bob Slingsby—but to someone else.

Close by us was the captain, busy with his Winchester repeating rifle.

The yells of the infuriated pirates, maddened by the slaughter we made among them, became every moment closer and more appalling, and united with the sound of the firing, made such a din that we could not hear ourselves speak.

In the foretopmast of the lorcha they were now getting their horrible stink-balls ready, while, by the use of sweeps, they came close under our stern, and we could see their fierce, dark visages, their glowing eyes, and white glistening teeth. These stink-balls are an odious composition of mealed powder, saltpetre, pitch, and sulphur, rasped hoofs burned in the fire, assafœtida, and all manner of foul-smelling herbs, and they threw them, smoking and flaming, on the quarterdeck by dozens, compelling us to retire forward, if we would escape suffocation.

Several of our men had now fallen, killed or wounded, and the crew of the lorcha came swarming up the mizen chains, over the quarter, and rushed on madly with swords, knives, and fixed bayonets; and then it was the Lascars vanished by running below, or leaping overboard.

In vain our stoutest seamen strove to stem the tide by bayonet and rifle, and the scene became to me agonising and terrific. The whole deck became slippery with blood.

Captain Archibald, bleeding from a wound, was shot again in the forerigging.

'Oh, my wife and bairns!' he cried, and fell dead on the deck. The chief mate fell next: another and another fell, and I found myself seeking shelter from the bullets near the forecastle bitts.

Who had fallen or who escaped I knew not, but the crew of the lorcha were now in full possession of the Bon Accord. Two or three dark faces appeared above the topgallant forecastle. Shots were fired at me, and with a prayer on my lips I fell into the sea, and then thought all was over with me. Mechanically I swam, and the miscreants kept firing at me and some Lascars who were in the water.

An oar belonging to the lorcha was floating near me. I grasped it, and got close to the forechains. All voices on deck, save those of the captors, had ceased. The firing was at an end. A few dead bodies, thrown overboard, plunged heavily into the water near me, and raised great phosphorescent circles and bubbles of water in the gorgeous moonlight. The breeze had freshened a little; the reef points had ceased to patter upon the white sails which now curved gracefully out, and as the ship began to make a little way upon the water, I grasped the iron work under the forechains, and was carried with her.

Suddenly a rope's-end was lowered within my reach, and I heard a voice saying, in pigeon English:

'Comey up—me no killy you.'

I looked upward, and saw the terrible face of Long Kiang, with an indescribable gleam in his solitary eye, as it regarded me. Aware that it was either for life or death, and that I might as well trust him as perish by a bullet or of drowning by exhaustion, I allowed myself to be drawn on board, and one of the first sights I saw was the body of poor little Charlie Newcome, lying near one of the maindeck guns. Many dead and wounded pirates lay about.

On deck, I found myself the only living white!

Long Kiang grasped me by the arm with one hand, a long knife glittered in the other, and in a mixture of broken Portuguese and pigeon English, which would seem ridiculous to read, but was very terrible for me to hear, he questioned me about the ship; where she was from, what was her cargo, and where any money was stored. Finding that I was unable to give any account of the latter, Long Kiang, whose fierce eye when he was excited seemed to emit sparks as if struck from a flint—a peculiar phenomenon—gave me a terrible blow with the hand of his boneless arm, and, falling senseless, I remembered no more.

Meanwhile the Macao men completely sacked the ship. Rice, biscuit-bags, beef-barrels, the fowls in the coops, wines, spirits, bedding, clothes, all loose ropes, and everything portable were carried on board the lorcha, and setting fire to the cabin, intending to destroy all trace of the ship by burning her to the water's edge, they finally shoved off to the lorcha, and getting the spirit casks aboard, began, like savages as they were—to make merry and have a night of it—and a night they had of it, that they little anticipated!

About eleven p.m. I recovered, and found myself alone in the silent ship. The lorcha lay off about a quarter of a mile distant, floating on the calm and lonely moonlit sea, over which came the united noise of laughter, singing, and shouts, as the orgies were continued in her bunks below and on deck. The odour of burning wood drew me to the cabin, which I found full of smoke; but on lifting the skylight, as well as the wound I had received would permit me, I found where the fire was smouldering, and after extinguishing it by a bucket or two of water, began to look about me with a heart torn by anxiety and apprehension. Lamps, chronometers, compasses, everything, were gone; but had they remained, of what use would they have been to me?

On the blood-stained deck, where still some bodies, slashed and mutilated, were lying, their pallid visages looking doubly pale under the moon, I crawled forward, concealing myself under the bulwarks, to avoid being seen by the occupants of the lorcha, which was floating like a log upon the water.

In the forecastle bunks and elsewhere, to my intense joy, I found seven of our own men, all more or less wounded, coming forth now from their places of concealment—the old boatswain among them—but all doubtful what to do or how to act; for the slightest sound or movement in the ship might bring these wretches on board of her again; so we all cowered together in the forecastle, considering the future, and listening to the shouting and singing on board the lorcha. These seemed to grow fainter the nearer she was drawn towards the Bon Accord by the current; and some time after midnight they totally ceased, and the deepest silence reigned upon the sea, for the breeze had died completely away, and we heard only the slow flapping of the topsails, and the pattering of the reef-points above our heads.

Old Joe Rudderford, our boatswain, who was certain, he said, 'that every man Jack of them was drunk as a lord,' now resolved to take measures that would rid us of them effectually ere day dawned; and, acting under his orders, we put them in practice thus:

The port-quarter boat was softly lowered, on the side that was not next the lorcha, and he, with two men and myself, with oars muffled, pulled swiftly, yet noiselessly, off to her. All our revolvers were loaded, and Joe, the boatswain, had with him the largest and sharpest auger he could find in the carpenter's tool-chest, and a fierce, triumphant expression shone on his grave, grim Scotch face, which had a chin and eyebrows that expressed resolution and firmness of purpose.

Never shall I forget the keen and aching anxiety and excitement of that time, as we crept towards the hateful lorcha, and at every stroke of our oars, at every respiration, expected to see some of her merciless crew start up and fire on us; but all remained still—still as death—on board, as we got close under her starboard counter.

Our first mission was to cut away and scuttle her only boat, and while the boatswain, with strong hands and brawny arms wrenching round the cross-handle of the augur, bored a succession of large round holes between wind and water—with a few below the latter—two of our men with knives cut away all the starboard shrouds or stays; and as we left her, and pulled away to our own ship, the sea was pouring into her, and we knew that unless the artificial leaks were discovered and plugged she must surely go down.

'Thank heaven, the breeze is freshening!' exclaimed Joe, as we regained our unfortunate ship, and hoisted in the quarter boat; and, weak and faint as we all were from wounds, soon Joe himself made sail on her. During all the hours of that eventful morning we struggled to trim the ship, to coil up and clear away the loose ropes and running rigging; to throw overboard the dead men of the lorcha, which was now settling down fast by the stern in the light of the waning moon, and every moment her bow and bowsprit seemed to tilt up higher in the air.

At last, just as day began to break, a great commotion seemed suddenly to take place on board. Cries and shouts floated towards us on the freshening breeze, and we could see Macaomen, Chinamen, and Caffres rushing wildly to and fro, looking evidently for their vanished boat; and then their united yells rent the sky, as the lorcha gave a great lurch to port and anon went down with every man on board of her. Many swam about for a time, but all sank in succession, for the land was far distant, and we were standing off north and by east before a pleasant breeze.

Next morning we fell in with a native fishing-boat with a crew of three men, who agreed, for the sum of five British sovereigns, to pilot us into Hong Kong, where we duly arrived, and came safely to anchor in the famous 'Red Harbour,' after a voyage that none of us are likely to forget.

We had some strange adventures on the way home, and with these I shall close my story.

Of our crew, after the encounter with Long Kiang, only seven, with the boatswain, Joe Rudderford, and myself, remained with the ship. We got a new captain, and made up our number again to thirty-eight hands, all told, from the company of a bark that had been cast away in the East Lamma Channel, and after they were shipped an interesting event occurred.

Among them was a miserable-looking young fellow who had been wrecked years before on the coast of China, and been kept as a kind of slave in a village near Tonquin. Joe Rudderford, observing the assiduity with which this young seaman—in gratitude for finding himself once more under the Union Jack—did his work, asked him what was his native place.

'Stonehaven,' said he; 'I am a Scotsman.'

'Stonehaven! I am from there myself. What is your name?'

'William Rudderford.'

'Had you ever a brother?' asked the boatswain, with sudden agitation.

'Yes,' replied the other; 'but it is many a year since he last saw me, in our mother's cottage beside the Cowie water. Poor Joe! I wonder if he is alive now!'

'I am Joe—your brother Joe, Willie!' exclaimed the boatswain; and now for several minutes their feelings so overpowered them that they could neither of them speak till relief was given by tears; and each had to tell the other a long story, which lies apart from mine.

We left Hong Kong for New Zealand, with a mixed cargo, and dropped down the Lamma Channel into the China Sea, and after leaving the port for which we were destined, gladly trimmed our course for London, thinking by this time we had seen a good deal of the world of waters; but after leaving the harbour of Otago, and working to windward of a headland named the Nuggets, we stood away for the Southern Pacific.

From that time the people in Dunedin, which we had left, and in London, for which we were bound, heard of us no more.

No homeward-bound craft reported having seen or spoken with the good ship Bon Accord, of Aberdeen; no message concerning her came from the antipodes; and, to torture the minds of our friends at home, the newspapers circulated all kinds of rumours—that bits of wreck had been seen, that we had among our cargo thirty tons of gunpowder, together with 'no end' of petroleum and turpentine, commodities certainly calculated to produce the direst effects if ignited.

Month after month rolled on, and not even the most slender tidings came of the beautiful ship, and apprehension of a terrible fate deepened into certainty, in the loving hearts of all who had friends on board.

Meanwhile, where were we?

In about the 50th degree of southern latitude we had for weeks pleasant gales and prosperous weather, so that we scarcely required to lift tack or sheet, but bore on merrily. Joe Rudderford and his newly-recovered brother Willie were inseparable, and the memory of little Charlie Newcome often came back to me sadly, especially in the night-watches, which he and I had so often shared together, for the ship and her surroundings were all the same in many respects as when he sailed in her. But we had not been long at sea before we discovered that our new captain was a bad seaman and a bully.

Every order was given with an oath. Myself and the other apprentices he called 'young whelps,' and even respectable old Joe Rudderford was often greeted with taunts which he received in silence, remembering 'the least said, the soonest mended.'

'He is a coward,' said Joe to me one day.

'What makes you think so?' I asked.

'Because he is a tyrant, and tyrants are always cowards. We'll never have a captain again so good as brave old Archibald.'

In that latitude a curious incident occurred to us. On a fine morning, when running on a splendid breeze, with our port tacks on board and royals and top-gallants set, Willie Rudderford, who had the watch, reported a sail on the weather-bow—a large ship, full-rigged, with most of her canvas set, but all in confusion, and some of it thrown slack. Her top-hamper suggested perfect disorder, and not a soul was to be seen on board, or responded to our hailing, after we edged close down to her.

We hove to, threw the mainyard in the wind, and Joe Rudderford, the first mate, and two hands, of whom I was one, boarded her in the dingy.

I shall never forget the nervous, anxious, exciting and yet eerie emotions felt, as we clambered up the side of that silent ship.

She proved to be a new one of some 800 tons burden, laden with silk and indigo, to the value of £150,000, as her papers showed, bound from Calcutta to the Cape; but how she came to be in these southern waters surpassed our comprehension. The oddest thing of all was that there seemed to have been a panic on board, for the deck and cabins were strewed with the clothes of ladies and children; jewel-cases, jewels, and Indian shawls lay everywhere; but the chief part of the baggage had been taken away. Still more extraordinary was it to find that she had been scuttled in every compartment, evidently for the purpose of sinking her. Private letters, that we had no time to examine, lay strewed about, and cloaks and coats, bonnets and caps, yet hung on the hooks in the cabin. But what was her story, or the fate of those who had abandoned her, or why they had done so, we were fated never to know; for though our captain was in the highest glee at picking up so valuable a derelict, and proposed to put a few of the crew on board, and sail in company, a heavy gale came on after sunset, with thick clouds, and when day broke she was nowhere to be seen, and must have gone down in the night.

And now I come to the mystery of our disappearance.

Our voyage had been an exceedingly prosperous one till we reached the vicinity of the Crozet Islands, in the South Pacific.

This solitary group, 'placed far amid the melancholy main,' comprising the Marion Rocks and the Twelve Apostles, lies midway between Prince Edward's Island and the Island of Kerguelen, the abode only of seals and sea swallows, and twenty-two degrees west of the equally solitary St. Paul's, whereon H.M.S. Megara was cast away.

The Crozet Islands are all of volcanic origin—wild, rugged, and horrid in aspect, and nearly inaccessible. Their mountains rise in conical peaks to an elevation of from four to five thousand feet, and are covered by perpetual snow, while dense fogs frequently envelop their bases.

Before we came to this dangerous vicinity we had encountered a gale; but it had spent its fury, and was subsiding. The prospect, however, of the winter evening sea (for though the month was July, it was the season of midwinter there) was cheerless—a darkening sky, and nothing living in view but a seabird or two, swimming and skimming over the white tops of the grey waves.

It had become evident to all on board that the captain's work as navigator disagreed with that of the mate and Joe Rudderford. He was 'out of his reckoning,' but was wroth with anyone who dared to hint that he was so; and, to allay his chagrin, drank large quantities of spirits.

With night dense fogs came down upon the sea; the captain walked the deck excitedly, keeping a glass of spirits standing near him on the binnacle-head. He often looked aloft, and talked to himself. At one of these times, a little dog he had ran between his legs and nearly capsized him. With a fierce oath he took the poor animal up by the neck, and threw it into the sea.

On this, the sailors looked darkly in each other's faces, and felt sure that mischief was soon to follow.

The mate and Joe Rudderford now suggested respectfully, that, as the fog was deepening and the wind freshening, some of the canvas should be taken off the ship; but, in a gust of fury, the captain, instead of adopting their advice, had her trimmed before the wind, the yards squared, and the fore and main studding-sails hoisted to port and starboard. Willie Rudderford was at the wheel.

The seamen grew pale, and muttered under their breath as they obeyed the rash orders, and belayed the tackle.

'What do you think of all this, Joe?' I whispered.

Joe answered only by a grunt, whatever that might mean; but on board, it always seemed that a grunt from old Joe had more weight than a whole speech from any other man.

'I think we should take some of the canvas off her,' said he to me, after a pause, loud enough for the captain to hear.

On this, the skipper turned round furiously; but before he could say anything, there went up a cry through all the ship from stem to stern—I think I hear it still.

'May the Lord have mercy on us!' was the fervent prayer uttered by more than one brave fellow, as death seemed suddenly inevitable, when the ship went bump ashore with a frightful crash, and a horrible grinding sound followed.

'All is lost! Let every man shift for himself!' cried the helpless man who commanded us.

The three topmasts crashed off at the tops, with the fury of the shock, and with the yards and hamper fell heavily down over the yet inflated canvas, to port and starboard. Aloft we were a total wreck in a moment, and already going to pieces below.

Our new captain—a very different man from the gallant Archibald, who was killed in the fight off the coast of Swatow—was the first to perish, overwhelmed, apparently, amid the boiling surf in the dingy, in which he and the first mate tried to effect their escape.

Amid the gloom, I saw Joe and Willie Rudderford grasp each other's hard hands for a moment, as their minds, like mine, were doubtless filled with a thousand hurrying thoughts of home and distant friends—remembering, perhaps, former happiness, and contrasting it with the present danger and misery.

Horror had succeeded the first consternation and alarm into which the entire crew were thrown by this sudden and unexpected catastrophe. The afterpart of the hull was covered with water, but the bows were jammed hard and fast upon the rocks, where the boiling sea made clean breaches over them, washing away those who crouched there. By one of these seas I was swept overboard, and in a few moments I rose to the surface, feeling battered and bruised, with the salt water gurgling in my throat and whizzing in my ears.

I was washed towards some rocks, into the seaweed of which I dug my hands and clung to it, even with my teeth. For a moment the sea seemed to leave me, and I felt suspended above it. Then it rose again with tremendous force, and took me from my hold. I forgot all about the ship, and those who were perishing there; I thought only of myself, of self-preservation, and the dread of death. In that supreme moment of terror and agony I seemed to live a lifetime!

Again I rose to the surface on the summit of the wave, which washed me along the slippery face of the rocks, and ere it descended I caught some seaweed again, above the point where I had been before, and again the water left me, suspended in air, and gasping for life.

Sea after sea rose again, but none reached me now, and the waves only hissed and burst against the rocks below me, as if infuriated at having lost their prey.

Once more I began to respire more freely, and hope grew in my heart—the hope that I might yet live.

Then the dread that I might be sucked down by some wave more powerful than the rest caused me to make an effort, which then seemed to me super-human, to gain a footing; and slowly and laboriously I climbed upward to where even the highest spray fell far short of me; and in my heart I thanked God that I was safe, though where, or on what isle, I knew not.

In the mist and darkness I ascended some fifty feet to a species of dry plateau ere I ventured to stop and rest, and then I heard what, amid my own trouble and terror, had partly escaped my ear: the roar of the breakers below, with the shrill shrieks of our perishing crew.

'For pity's sake help me, whoever you are!' cried a voice a little below me; and, extending a hand to one of our people who had reached a shelf of rock, I assisted him upward, and he proved to be Willie Rudderford, sorely battered and bruised, having been dashed repeatedly against the cliffs; and now we began to ascend higher together.

I asked for Joe, the boatswain; but Willie only knew that they had been torn asunder by the waves that had swept him overboard, and he had not seen him again.

Panting and often breathless, drenched and sodden, clinging to the rocks, we continued to ascend, so far that even the booming of the sea began to sound faint; and then we lay down together, worn out, yet past all thoughts of sleep, to await the coming day and whatever might betide us.

The cold was beyond all description, and, but for the shelter an elevation of the rocks afforded us, we must have perished, as we lay there huddled close together for mutual warmth, while ever and anon Willie Rudderford lamented sorrowfully the too probable loss of his brother.

Slowly the grey dawn stole in, and the mist that enveloped the land melted away; and, to make my story brief, we found by degrees that seventeen of the ship's company, including Joe Rudderford and our two selves, had survived the catastrophe, and that we were shipwrecked on the Crozets—those horrible isles that lie in the Southern Pacific, out of the track of all vessels!

We could scarcely congratulate ourselves upon our escape, and some there were among us who bitterly regretted that they had not perished with the rest.

Out of the fore-part of the wreck we contrived to get some tins of preserved meat and a cask of gunpowder, after which she heeled over into deep water and disappeared; and a sigh escaped my lips as we saw the last of our floating home—the good old Bon Accord.

No island in the world could be more desolate than the one on which we found ourselves. Lashed by tempests, and surrounded by an ever-boiling sea, never visited save by some adventurous whaler, that solitary archipelago, the Crozets, does not possess one human being!

Under Joe Rudderford, to whom we all turned now, we began the dreary work of exploration, and found that we were on a long, gaunt, and naked isle a few miles in extent, without trees or verdure, and exposed to surf and the bitter blasts of the Southern Arctic winter.

Our boats had all been swamped or dashed to pieces, so that we had no chance or means of crossing to any of the larger islands which were visible, and on this miserable reef we must remain and exist as best we might.

Joe discovered a spring of pure water. 'Thus,' said he, 'we are sure of the one great necessity of life.'

Of food we had certainly one great source—the sea-birds frequenting the spot. An incredible number of albatrosses, frigate-birds, and gulls were resident on the isle; their eggs were found everywhere, and they and their young, being all unused to man, became an easy prey, as we could capture them by the hand or knock them over by a stick.

'Thank Heaven,' said Joe, 'we have food and drink provided, and it will go hard if our self-help and sagacity as British sailors don't do the rest for us.'

Everything that was cast in from the wreck was carefully brought on shore and stored up. By Joe's orders, we placed a spare topmast on an eminence, with a blanket, as a flag, attached thereto, and a regular watch was told off beside it, to signal any passing vessel. Rude shelters of stones were set up for weak or ailing men among us; Joe divided us into messes, and made arrangements for the distribution of the birds, the eggs, and all else that was in our general stock.

We required a moving and ruling spirit, and Joe took that place.

By his orders we utilised the preserved meat-tins as cooking vessels, and by partaking of certain coarse herbs and wild grasses, boiled therein, we averted all danger of scurvy.

For fuel we had at first the broken driftwood that came from the wreck; but this was soon, with all our care, expended, and the cold would perhaps have destroyed us, had not the indefatigable Joe discovered that we could make fires of the bones and skins of the seafowl; and Joe, who was a well-read Scotsman, told us all how Dr. Livingstone once fed the fires of his steam-boat on the Rovuma River with elephants' ribs.

The success of our plan, to feed fires with the legs of albatrosses, gulls, and kittiwakes, for the many months that we did, proves the vast number we must have caught; but weary indeed were we of this daily menu of eggs and oily sea-bird flesh, seasoned with salt obtained from the surf where it dried on the rocks.

I shall never forget the great horror that fell on us, when one of our little band died of a fatal gangrene, having injured his foot by a fall; and as we buried him in the sea came the dread question, if we were all fated to perish in succession, who among us would be the last and lonely man upon that rocky isle?

Save for the lucky accident that several among us had match-boxes in their pockets when quitting the wreck, we could never have lighted a fire! As the ship broke up, various things came ashore; among others, a passenger's chest, wherein we found some blankets, knives, and spoons.

So passed away August and September, and all this dreary time, a keen look-out was kept from the first break of dawn to the last glimpse of sunset for any passing sail, as life depended upon rescue. We often marvelled whether any vessel ever passed in the night, as we had no fiery beacon to attract attention.

Finding themselves preyed upon, the sea-birds became wilder, and food grew scarce. It is easy to imagine the agony in which, with haggard eyes and wildly beating hearts, we twice saw the sails of passing ships; but they were 'hull down,' at a vast distance, and could not see our despairing signals.

At length there came a day—oh, never, never shall I or any who were with me then forget it!

The morning broke warm, fine, and sunny, and a shout came from the watch at the beacon, that 'a ship was close in shore!'

We started up from the shelter where we were sleeping. We could scarcely believe our eyes, as with prayerful hearts we stretched out our hands simultaneously and in silence towards her.

Yes—yes! there she was, little more than a mile distant, a gallant brig of considerable burden, with her courses, topsails, and top-gallant-sails set, close hauled on the port tack, on a gentle breeze.

We were incapable of shouting or cheering, so great was our emotion, and many of us burst into tears when we saw the sheets let fly and the fore-yard thrown in the wind, while, as an additional token that we were seen and that succour was coming, the Stars and Stripes of America were run up to the gaff-peak, and a boat was instantly lowered and manned.

She proved to be the President, whaler, who, fishing in that lonely sea, had by chance come near the isle, where her morning watch had at dawn seen the fragment of our tattered blanket waving in the wind.

We were speedily taken off, after having spent—as a tally kept by Joe Rudderford showed—exactly one hundred and fifty-nine days (a little more than five months) on an isle of the Crozets; and, with one accord, we all stood bareheaded, and thanked God for all His goodness to us, when we found ourselves safe on the deck of the American.

Her captain made us all welcome and comfortable; but as we were what he called 'a tight fit' on board, with his own ample crew, he landed us at the Cape of Good Hope. There I parted company with Joe Rudderford and his brother, who shipped on board a Scotch clipper to return to their own home, while I, with the rest of the survivors, came back by a passenger steamer to London, and found that my people had long since given me up as dead.

A TALE

OF THE

RETREAT FROM CABUL