Camp Fire Yarns of the Lost Legion

by G. Hamilton-Browne

On the morning after my arrival I was strolling down Queen’s Street, wondering what I was to do with myself, when I was hailed from the other side of the road, and, looking in the direction from which the coo-ee came, I at once recognised the long red nose and brilliant scarlet hair of a man who had been our regimental surgeon during the past wars. His had been a hard case. Out and out the best medical man we had in our service, as far as professional knowledge and skill went, he was still a born fighting man, and was always more anxious, while under fire, to damage the enemy than to repair friends. This inclination was somewhat held in check and restrained by the Roman Catholic chaplain, a great pal of his who was always in the firing line doing the best he could for any wounded man, be he papist or heretic.

Well, one day while on a patrol along the east coast, we had a scrap with a few Maoris, and the doctor, who happened to be with us, to his huge delight, killed one. Now I do not for a moment want to assert that this was the first man the doctor had ever killed. He had, doubtless, during the practice of his profession, killed very many, but it was the first Hau Hau who had ever fallen to his carbine; for, although a brilliant medico, he was a vile shot, and the dear doctor was greatly elated, so much so that he determined to have a trophy in commemoration of the event. Now the Maori was a fine big fellow of some rank, and had the skin on his thighs magnificently tattooed, so the doctor, wanting a spolia opima, faute de mieux flayed off and preserved the tattooed portions of the bounder’s epidermis, which he cured and subsequently had made into a tobacco pouch. He was very proud of this pouch, and was fond of exhibiting it and making people to whom he showed it guess from what material it was manufactured.

He did so once too often; for one night after dining well, though not wisely, he exhibited it in the smoking-room of the club at Wellington. The same official was present whose son’s leg-bone was afterwards annexed and turned into a flute. He was at that time posing as a goody-goody minister; and, pretending to be shocked, brought such pressure to bear that he forced the medico to resign; and so we lost the services of our best doctor, and the company of a thundering good fellow. All this had happened some time before, and I had not seen him for over a year. We had been great friends, and I was under great obligations to him, as he had on several occasions mended me after I had been broken, and had even saved me my left leg when two other sawbones wanted to amputate it. So you can easily understand I was delighted to meet him, and we at once adjourned to Perkins’s saloon and proceeded to wet this auspicious meeting.

Well, no sooner had we lowered our first cocktail than the doctor demanded what I was doing in Auckland, and on my telling him I had lost my boat he expressed unfeeling delight and thanked Providence for sending and detaining me, as I was the very man he wanted, and I must take charge of a party he had raised to search the South Seas for a copper island.

Now I had not lost a copper island, and should not have known what to do with it if I found one, yet the very mention of the South Seas allured me like a honey-pot to a wasp.

Then as he went on to open out his plans, and tell me the names of the men who had joined him in his scheme, most of whom I knew well, I saw at once, copper island or no copper island, there was every chance of a rollicking good time. So when the men dropped in by twos and threes, Perkins’s saloon being their rendezvous, and all of them joining the doctor in persuading me, I quite gave way and consented to join with them and take command.

A case of champagne was quickly ordered and consumed, drinking luck to the venture, and I found myself chief of forty as reckless, devil-may-care filibusters as ever banded themselves together. Do not think, dear reader, we were going to hoist Jolly Roger, or anything of that sort. No, we were going to search through some of the least-frequented groups of islands to find one of pure copper, and we were all to return fabulously rich.

If we could not find the copper island, we might yet find something else of value, and even failing that we would trade with the islanders, gentle or otherwise, for bêche-de-mer, whales’ teeth, or anything else we thought could be disposed of to our advantage. Trade, I say, not take; we signed articles as Gentlemen Adventurers with every liberty but no licence.

We were, moreover, all of us highly respectable, very moral and well-brought-up young men. Every one of us had served and seen years of active service, so all knew the value of discipline. Most of us were public school boys, and although we might have found ourselves de trop at an Exeter Hall spring meeting tea-party, yet we were quite fit to take our places and shine in the beau-monde that at that period graced the South Seas.

Our party for the above purpose had chartered a very large and powerful American schooner, with a skipper, a Yankee who knew the South Seas well, and who turned out to be a rattling good fellow, two mates, a brace of cooks, a few China boys as flunkeys, and we worked her ourselves. Strict discipline was to be maintained. Every one of us had put a considerable sum of money into the venture; we all knew one another well, and two days after I had met the doctor we went to sea well armed, well found, and as good a crowd as ever set sail, without a single rotter amongst us.