A Chinese Command: A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas - Harry Collingwood

There is little more to add to the present history of Captain Murray Frobisher.

The captured destroyer was, of course, claimed by Japan, and Frobisher himself remained a prisoner for one day, until the treaty was signed. Then, being free, he sought Admiral Wong-lih, who had refused to follow his comrades’ example and destroy himself. The Englishman obtained from him the loan of an old gunboat, armed and manned her at his own expense, went up the Hoang-ho, and settled an outstanding account with certain pirates and an individual by the name of Ah-fu.

Then Drake and he revisited the ruined palace, and brought away Genghiz Khan’s hoard, which the two men shared and brought to England, where they arrived about Christmas time.

Frobisher was now an immensely wealthy man, and a famous one, too, for he found that the account of his services with the Chinese Navy had reached home, and that his name was in everybody’s mouth.

He was surprised, on the day following his arrival, to receive a visit from Dick Penryn, who, after the first warm greetings had passed, handed him a document intimating that the former sentence of the court martial had been reversed; that Frobisher had been reinstated in the British Navy, with the rank of captain; and that a ship was waiting for him as soon as he cared to take command.

He had, however, a little business of his own to transact first; and the nature of it became apparent, a little more than a year later, when Captain Murray Frobisher, of Her Majesty’s cruiser Dauntless, presented to a grateful and astonished country no less than four splendid battleships of the latest design, built in the mother country with part of the proceeds of his share of the hoard of the ancient “Conqueror of Asia”. He did not intend, he said to the deputation who waited upon him to thank him, that his country should ever be exposed to the danger of the fate that had overtaken China. If China had had more ships she might have come off victorious in her war with Japan, in spite of the manifold disadvantages to which she had been subjected. These were disadvantages of a kind to which Great Britain, he knew, would never be exposed; but he wanted his beloved country to possess a good “margin of safety.”

After this generous and unparalleled gift, will it surprise readers very much to learn that the lieutenant who was once cashiered from the Navy for losing his ship is now Captain Sir Murray Frobisher, Baronet, holding the rank of post-captain on board one of the battleships which he himself presented to his country?

The End.