I then proceeded to write the recommendatory letter, which the reader will naturally imagine was of a somewhat different tenor from the one he had required; for if deception is in any case warrantable, it was certainly so in a situation like ours, where the only chance of regaining that freedom of which we had been so unjustly deprived, depended upon it; and I trust that few, even of the most rigid, will condemn me with severity for making use of it, on an occasion which afforded me the only hope of ever more beholding a Christian country, and preserving myself, if not from death, at least from a life of continued suffering.
The letter which I wrote was nearly in the following terms:—
TO CAPTAIN——
OF THE BRIG——
Nootka, July 19, 1805.
Sir,—The bearer of this letter is the Indian king by the name of Maquina. He was the instigator of the capture of the ship Boston, of Boston, in North America, John Salter, captain, and of the murder of twenty-five men of her crew, the two only survivors being now on shore—Wherefore I hope you will take care to confine him according to his merits, putting in your dead-lights, and keeping so good a watch over him, that he cannot escape from you. By so doing, we shall be able to obtain our release in the course of a few hours.
John R. Jewitt, Armourer of the "Boston"
for himself, and
John Thompson, Sail-maker of the said ship.
I have been asked how I dared to write in this manner: my answer is, that from my long residence among these people, I knew that I had little to apprehend from their anger on hearing of their king being confined, while they knew his life depended upon my release, and that they would sooner have given up five hundred white men, than have had him injured. This will serve to explain the little apprehension I felt at their menaces afterwards, for otherwise, sweet as liberty was to me, I should hardly have ventured on so hazardous an experiment.
On my giving the letter to Maquina, he asked me to explain it to him. This I did line by line, as he pointed them out with his finger, but in a sense very different from the real, giving him to understand that I had written to the captain that, as he had been kind to me since I had been taken by him, that it was my wish that the captain should treat him accordingly, and give him what molasses, biscuit, and rum he wanted.
When I had finished, placing his finger in a significant manner on my name at the bottom, and eyeing me with a look that seemed to read my inmost thoughts, he said to me, "John, you no lie?" Never did I undergo such a scrutiny, or ever experience greater apprehensions than I felt at that moment, when my destiny was suspended on the slightest thread, and the least mark of embarrassment on mine, or suspicion of treachery on his part, would probably have rendered my life the sacrifice.
Fortunately I was able to preserve my composure, and my being painted in the Indian manner, which Maquina had since my marriage required of me, prevented any change in my countenance from being noticed, and I replied with considerable promptitude, looking at him in my turn, with all the confidence I could muster,—