The Capsina: An Historical Novel

by E. F. Benson

Suleima laid her hand on her knee.

"Ah, don't, don't!" she said. "Indeed you are talking nonsense."

The Capsina kissed the baby, and gave it back to its mother.

"You are right; I won't," she said, rising and giving herself a little shake. "And now I must go. I have many things to arrange in Nauplia to-night, for the Revenge must set off to-morrow. Tell little Mitsos we shall pass here and call for him by midday."

She held Suleima's two hands for a long moment in her own, gave her a quick, trembling little kiss, and went off down the garden-path and mounted her pony at the gate.

The Turkish fleet had gone back to Constantinople; not another ship was in Greek waters, and it was certain that until spring there would be no more work for the Revenge. Mitsos was too much disgusted with the conduct of the siege of Nauplia to take any part in operations by land. Indeed, the only commander he would have served under, Petrobey, had gone back with his Mainats home, vowing that he would never again co-operate with Kolocotrones. That chief was boasting far and wide of his exploits. Already he called himself the conqueror of Dramali; he had only to show himself at the walls of Nauplia, and the Turks surrendered; it was Joshua and Jericho, and not a penny of the treasure had he taken for himself. This last fact was true, and he ground his teeth at it. But Galaxidi, the port in the Corinthian gulf where the Capsina had begun to make a naval station, where also she had left the baby saved from Elatina, gave a scope to their energies, and she was going to start overland next day with Mitsos and most of the sailors from the two brigs to spend a month there fortifying and arming the place. Kanaris had gone home to Psara, and the brig Sophia was laid by for the winter, so, with the sailors from her and most of those on the Revenge, she would march four hundred men. Enough sailors were left on the Revenge for the working of the ship, but no more, for it was certain there were no Turkish vessels now in Greek waters. The Revenge meantime was to sail round, carrying on board some half-dozen guns to be mounted in a battery at Galaxidi, and join them there. The Turkish fort at Lepanto would be thinking that all the Greek fleet was still at Nauplia, and the risk of passing the guns of the fort could again be neutralized by co-operation with Germanos in Patras, to whom the Capsina sent her compliments. For themselves they were to march across the Isthmus of Corinth—a brush with the small Turkish garrison there was possible—north along the east end of the gulf, passing through Vilia, which they had defended from the raid of the Turkish ships the winter before, and so westward to Galaxidi. It was an informal, haphazard little excursion, after the heart of the Capsina, with a great goal of usefulness for its end. Nominally the march was to be on foot; any one who could do so might, however, provide a beast—the term was left vague—for himself. The keep of the beast would go to the charges of the expedition. Mitsos was in command of the men during the march, and in case of any attack; for the work of fortification at Galaxidi itself he might claim the right to be heard, and no more.

It still wanted an hour to noon when the "Capsina's Own," as Kanaris had christened them, appeared on the road from Nauplia, strangely irregular in appearance, but certainly fighting fit. A convoy of baggage-mules shambled along in front, carrying what baggage there was, and that was little, and most of the "Capsina's Own" were mule-drivers for the time being. Here a gay Turkish horse pranced along by the side of the road, the very sailor-like seat of its rider provoking howls of laughter and derision. Close beside it trotted a demure, mouse-colored donkey, the rider of which, being long in the leg, could paddle with his toes on each side of the animal. Other men, a minority, were on foot, and for these there were stirrup-leathers and tails to hold by. In the middle of the heterogeneous crowd came a great Bishareen camel, once the property of Selim, with a howdah on its back, on the curtains of which were embroidered the crescent and star; but, by way of correction, a short flagstaff, bearing the blue-and-white ensign of Greece, rose above the roof-beam and fluttered bravely in the wind. Out of the curtains of the howdah peered the face of the Capsina, rather anxious.

"Oh, lad!" she cried to Mitsos, as soon as they were within hearing, "this is like being at sea again in a heavy roll, and I feel as if I had sprung a leak somewhere. You will have to come up here and lend a hand with the tiller. The tiller is one rope, as you see, and it appears to me as if the brute's head were a long mile off. Here, furl the main-sail, one of you! I mean, take hold of its head and knock it down. I want to get off."

The camel sank down joint by joint, and the Capsina held on to the side with fixed and panic-stricken eyes.

"There are six joints in each leg!" she screamed; "and each joint is six miles long, and the joints are moved singly and in turn."